Fearless with Timothy Simons

[00:00:01] Blank Check Some podcasts are afraid of nothing.

[00:00:26] So the tagline for this movie is some people are afraid of nothing. I pulled that off of a low-res, barely-loading image on the Wikipedia page for Fearless because IMDB is down! IMDB is down, but Box Office Mojo is working. Really? We're recording this on the day of seemingly the apocalypse. It is stormy and dark as hell outside. It looks like the planet Camino. Wait, wait, it was barely, it was like drizzling. Griffin's, okay, okay. It's looking overcast.

[00:00:56] There have got to be, I mean like... Griffin, you can't live in New York and be like, it's gonna rain. I think the world, this is it. It's over. Rain, I go, okay, I can put up with this. IMDB is down? My apps are down? That's tough for you, IMDB being down too. Right, right. I did, yes. Amazon Web Services, a terrible company, a terrible service as part of a terrible company, has collapsed today. And like 60% of the internet has gone down with it.

[00:01:23] How did I not hear about this until now? Because you got your head in the clouds and your ivory tower. I am, I'm up in my ivory tower. Yeah. But usually they give me the broad strokes of what the pleads are doing. Who's they? They can't reach you because they're on the web service. Your team is on AWS. Well, I would have assumed that one of my handlers would have mentioned... You forget that your handlers are AI and they're also backed up on AWS. Oh, wow.

[00:01:51] Yeah, well, no, it's actually no, they're humans, but he won't let them look at him or see his face. So they have to communicate with him via the internet. Yeah. Even if they're in the same room. Yeah. Right, exactly. And if they look at your face, what do you do? Well, it starts with like just like a hard or stern like warning. Like just like a look of like, you know that you shouldn't have done this. And then it proceeds from there to be more physical.

[00:02:17] It's also, here's the thing, you're so tall that making eye contact with you requires a lot of effort. You can't do it by accident. Gotta crane that neck. You gotta crane a neck. There's no plausible deniability. Nope. Unless you're on top of a ladder. Or if I'm sitting down. Even then. Even then. Even then. Even then. You should have, you should have tried harder. How tall is... You sitting down might be me standing. What? What was your question? How tall is chicken shop date, girl? Have you done the date? You gotta do that. Cause I feel like that'd be a, she feels short. You could do like a fun height differential. Oh, okay.

[00:02:47] You know, chicken shop date. I've only ever seen her sitting down. Dim and ball. Amelia something. Dim and ball. I'm sorry. I don't want to mangle her name. She might be sneaky taller than you think. Well, it's a low, let me see if Amazon Web Services can answer my question. Uh, it says she's 5'3". So that's, you know. Oh, got it. Okay. Not that tall. Yeah, we would have a stark difference in our appearance standing there. Amelia de Moldenberg. One could even, one could argue that that could be used for comedic effect. Well, this is what she does. It, it, she's never, she, it's astounding.

[00:03:16] Oh my goodness, she went to Marlebone. It's astounding what she's done. She went where? I'm just, I'm doing the English thing that is, that is not acceptable that I shouldn't do or I judge someone based on where they went to secondary school. She went to a posh school. Oh, she did. In my experience, in my life, all dates have gone well. All of her chicken shop dates? No, all my dates. Oh, all your dates. Oh yeah. And then I watch her and I go, wait a second, what if a date was awkward? I, I, I'll actually say. I think she's very funny. I find her incredibly charming. I think she's very funny. She's good at what she does. I do too. I was just mocking the premise, but I think she's really good.

[00:03:45] I have never watched like a full episode. I see clips. Is it supposed to be intentionally awkward or is that? Yeah, it's got the sort of YouTube comedy kind of, you know, the, right, the, the pauses and the harsh cuts and stuff. It's like, it's really, it's good. Between two ferns with less of a character. Okay. Right. And less antagonistic. It's between two ferns, but you like the little moments right where they are, are really being humans. 100%. Right. Right. Chicken shop date. Yeah. Sometimes you're like, it's the same with hot ones. You're like the cream roast to the top here, baby.

[00:04:15] Like I know there's like a thousand pounds of crap on the internet and I'm hearing about this one cause she's pretty good at it. She's pretty good. Right. Yeah. You know what else is pretty good? You ever done hot ones? Okay. Here we go. I haven't done hot ones, but I would not be garbage. I, because I can, I feel like, and we'll see how this goes. I feel like I could succeed here in hot ones. Like I, I, you think, do you not have the constitution? I have, do not have the constitution. You don't like a spicy. I cannot handle it. Yeah.

[00:04:41] I, I, I, yeah, no, I, I, I, I truly don't know if I would be able to physically continue. And I know that like people have struggle there and that's part of it. But I worry about even like the very basic. So you're thinking, I got to correct you there. He's never taken an L. Oh, you think he's struggling, but he just doesn't play like that. No, he's, he's never taken an L. He's never tapped out about wing four or five. I think he's never taken an L. He's never eaten a P. Is there.

[00:05:12] And you don't mean them peas from a pod. No, he's eating those. Is there, is there any, uh, is there like a downside to not continuing? Uh, I mean, you're kind of. Kind of being a poopy pants, I guess. Like, right. You're not, I mean, I don't think. Brought to the town square. A little commander poopy pants. I feel like a little, oh, you're being a little bit of a commander poopy pants. I mean, I think that like the way through, if you're struggling, it's just like, take a little bite of each one or whatever. Right. Like people do. No one's leaning on you to finish your wings.

[00:05:42] Okay. Right. It's very few people really like actually leave bones. Have I shared my conspiracy theory? Go ahead. That, because like DJ Khaled really like fucking ate shit and looked like a fool. Right. And do you think they, they, they pulled it back a little bit because of that? So, I, I was talking to someone who was like, do you think they've nerfed the sauces? Do you think the sauces are watered down now? Because no one has. No one really has much trouble until the bomb, which everybody reacts to. Cause that, that exists to make people react. And the guests keep on getting better. Right. Yeah.

[00:06:12] And I equate it to, uh, I, I think our buddy Lin-Manuel, drop a name, told us this. Well, Lin-Manuel who? Miranda. Oh. That when big stars are doing like Chicago for like 10 days. He said this on mic, didn't he? I can't remember. Yeah. Uh, oh, this person doesn't have musical theater experience. How the fuck are they going to do this show? And the company has been doing the show for 25 years that they basically have a, B and C tracks.

[00:06:38] Where they bring them in for their first rehearsal and see what their natural ability as a singer and dancer is. And go like, okay, they're a C. Right. They won't do much. We're doing a simpler version of the show. We move around them more. And the A you're like, oh, they actually have the skills. I think they have like different intensities of the sauces. They try the first wing and they're like, you're a liar. I mean, you think they're lying. I think they don't know that they're getting an easier go of it. But I think the production is adjusting in real time.

[00:07:07] Oh, here's this season's sauces. And Ben did the hot ones challenge. For my birthday. It was tough. Yeah. It was really, really fucked up. Did you finish every wing? Like, did you try to like. Yeah. I made it to the end. Yeah. I more mean like, were you taking a bite of each wing or like finishing the wing? I let the show inform my approach where I wasn't taking that whole fucker down. Right. I would take like. I feel like it's. I would take like a reasonable bite. Right.

[00:07:34] Is the entire wing coated in that sauce or are they just putting a drop? No, no. It's totally coated. Of course, the 10th wing, you get the dab. Yes. The wing is already coated, but. An extra dab. An extra dab. The last dab. And if you're Jennifer Lawrence, you say, what do you mean? What do you mean? What do you mean? The thing I always think about though, and I like hot ones, having done it myself, the next day, the shit that I took was so radioactive. That it was bad. It ruins multiple days. Yes. Okay. For you. Like as far as your digestive tract.

[00:08:04] Okay. Right. Because you're not supposed to do that. I think about these celebrities having to then take a shit for the next few days. Yeah. It's brutal. Now in fearless, do you think he would do the hot wings challenge? No problem. While he's in fearless mode. The strawberries kind of is his hot. That's what I'm saying. Like, I mean, honestly, his life in fearless mode, which is what I'm referring to his like sort of cognitive dissonance or is like, you know, hot wing is like the bomb. Yeah.

[00:08:33] Beyond insanity. It almost becomes his last dab. If not for the power of love. Very good. That was good. Thank you. Did you see how he turned it around back to the. I really tried to do that like five minutes ago when it was ignored. This is blank check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin. I'm David. It's a podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce baby. Our guest is mouthing along.

[00:09:04] Oh, what a cutie pie. I really like the baby part. Our guest is such a cutie pie. I'll just say it. He's a cutie pie. This is a miniseries on the films of Peter Weir. It is called so a cutie pie. Podnick at hanging cast. Right. Although I want the opinion of our guest. Oh my God. What's what were the other options? Here he fucking goes. Podster and cast mander the pod side of the cast. Now I like. Every time he says it, he pivots out of the title because he knows it's bad. Being able to get pod and cast in there two times each.

[00:09:33] I mean, I think maybe in theory rather than practice. Today we're talking about. Oh, he pivots right away. Our guest today, of course, from the hit movie Goosebumps. Sure. Yes. Obviously known as Tim Simons today introduced exclusively as Hitmaker. Oh my God. Hitmaker. He's here. Hitmaker. Blonde edition. You are here in New York. Frosted. You're here in New York. Tim has blonde hair. Press gauntlet. You're doing all the morning shows.

[00:10:03] That's why we're talking about all these other fucking things. Cause you're doing like every morning show here in New York. Yes. To promote the new season of the Netflix show. Nobody wants this, which at the time this episode comes out will have premiered six months Right. Is reheated oatmeal at this point. If you want to watch that on Netflix now, it's still there. I assume. Maybe. Unless you got canceled. Everyone will have watched it 30 seconds at a time on TikTok by this point. Oh hell yeah, exactly. And start me at like part 62, right?

[00:10:31] You know, like TikTok likes to just dump you in the middle there. Now tip, the show's called Nobody Wants This, but judging by the viewer data, it's seems like a lot of people want this. I, uh, uh, have I, have I told you this story before? Has that just sucked? Interesting. You just got a job offer. I got a job offer. NBC. How many, how many of those do you have to deal with now? A fair amount. Yeah. A fair amount. But I, I don't know if I've ever told you this or if you saw this at the time, but there was a lot of conversation around what the show was going to be called.

[00:10:59] It had, it had a working title and then it had a few other, like a few other working titles. One of which I thought worked. I think at one point it was going to be called, uh, it was initially titled Shiksa. Sure. And then it was called for a little bit, it was called Heartburn. And you can't do that. Yeah. Well, no, that's the thing is that ultimately I think if it existed in a vacuum is a good name for the show. Sure. But it's, but it is sort of owned already.

[00:11:26] It should have been called like the Jewish guy and the white girl or that's just like the most obvious. I think that's good. Getting a text from Netflix that they want to hire you. You guys. Hire me for title brainstorming. You guys got to stop being so good at this to get, you're getting all these jobs. I just think that almost every time something is titled like that, it bombs and then the headlines write themselves and everyone's like, we should have seen this coming. Yes.

[00:11:51] It's a rare case where a title has that much of a self own in it and it fucking defies the haters. I don't know if you remember this, but when they announced the title and they gave the, you know, they gave us like, here's your first look pictures. If you want to post them, I posted on Instagram, Hey, here is the show. It comes out on whatever day. This was for the first season. And here's a picture of Adam and Kristen and they look amazing. And I said, I really hope that reviewers like this show.

[00:12:18] Otherwise they were going, they are going to dog fuck us into the ground with our title. Dog fuck us is, is a great hit maker. It's a hit maker for sure. Yeah. That's you. That's you through and through. I can't think of another case where it's worked out. Yeah. Like what's the worst that could happen? It's a big one. I remember the, the Dane DeVito, Martin Lawrence movie where that came out, buying a ticket to this piece of shit. Right.

[00:12:46] The reviews were just like a full page photo of the critic pointing at the poster. Zero stars. Like there was, uh, this is a little bit more like it's not as direct, but I remember like, how do you know? Ended up being like, how do you know? This is a shitty movie. I watched it or whatever. You just don't want like a vague question, any kind of negative statement, obviously. Yeah. Can I, I'm just, so you're in nobody wants this. So that's on Netflix.

[00:13:15] Well, anything else we should mention that you're, you're in Percy Jackson. I forget when that's coming out. Oh yeah. Wait, when, when does this come? So this is of course posting on May 10th, 2026. Wow. Jesus. Really? Yeah. So we hope Trump at this point has solved six to eight more wars. Yeah. And by the time you're listening in this, you're in month six of the AWS outage. Yeah. Right. If you're even the only thing that's still down though, everything else is fine.

[00:13:42] I think at this point I will have been in scream seven. Oh fuck. Yeah. There you go. Do you, wait, do you make it? Well, I can tell you that I am in the film scream seven. Okay, fine. Yeah. Phenasy was asking like, are you ghost face? You have to tell me now. And Tim was like, I can't say anything. And I was like, if the movie starts and ghost faces seven foot three. Yes. It is tough to, yeah. Just kind of hide you. They're not going to hide you. That's the, this is the problem.

[00:14:09] I'm not asking you to reveal any spoilers, but I think I'm going to know pretty quickly whether you are or are not. He's like hunched down. Yeah. Like he has to, he bumps his head on every door frame. It's actually you and chicken shop date. And it keeps like, it's very obvious. Right. She's the other one. Yeah. Uh, no, those are, those were, I'd say by and large, the things that are going on. Well, I'm seeing, is your commander bell on the handmaid's tail. Now I'm seeing here that June stabbed you in the eye. Who's June? June is, uh, uh, Lizzie Moss.

[00:14:38] And she, she fucking stabbed you. She stabs me in the eye. Dang. And there was a point. And were you like in charge of all that? All the bad stuff happening? Were you one of the good guys? Were you one of the good guys? I played one of the very, I think if Elizabeth Moss is stabbing you in the eye, you might not be one of the, not all men. I was like the leader of like the resistance. And she was just like, she thought I was like going at him too hard. And she was like, well, you know, we should be moderate. We need to be moderate about this. This is the problem. Um, no, I, I did. I played a bad person.

[00:15:06] I think I was kind of thrown in there as like, you know, the son of a, an unseen, very powerful voice. Oh, you're like a Nepo. I'm like a Nepo. Yeah. And there is like a, there is like a, a generational, a generational. Yeah. And, and I, I, I did take this. I don't, why we don't need to talk about this. Did you work with Max? No, probably not. I did. One thing that was very fun was that I kind of at some point crossed over with everybody in the show. You were in like five episodes. Yes.

[00:15:36] But I somehow managed to have at least a small scene. Whitford. Whitford. Whitford. Whitford fucking rules. Are you kind of doing a Whitford thing with the blonde haircut? He's got the white hair, but you know, just kind of the, the shock of hair, you know, I did. There's nothing intentional behind it, but if it, if there is any way that I can be compared to him, I will take it. He's someone you want to. It's a great career. Yeah. It is an incredible career. And there is just something about his cadence that makes me happy.

[00:16:05] It's so specific. And yes, it is in a, it is in a lot of characters that he plays, but it never feels like a crutch. And also. Yeah. He can, he can kind of, he can moderate, you know, modulate it. It doesn't feel like a gimmick. Yeah. And one thing that I find amazing about watching Bradley Whitford is that there is a real subtlety about like, he's not the most still like facial actor. No, he's not.

[00:16:33] But there is such a subtlety in his like facial movements that I think is so admirable. So I agree with that. In another Netflix show, The Diplomat, which is a hit show on Netflix. Oh yes. Kind of a hit. Episode on Fearless, the Peter Weir movie from 1993. Go on. Mm-hmm. Um, I'm watching season three, season three just dropped. Right. And so in season two of the day, you know, it's about what if Kerry Russell was a diplomat? Of course. And what if Rufus Sewell was her randy husband who just loves to almost have affairs?

[00:17:00] Like kind of a plot point in The Diplomat as Rufus Sewell keeps being like, can I fuck you? And the lady's like, yeah, you should fuck me. And he's like, actually I can only fuck my wife, but I'll fight with you. Like he like can't actually have affairs when he gets like, he loves to get close. Uh huh. And then he's just like, sorry, actually I'm so in love with Kerry Russell. Season two introduces who's the vice president, Allison Janney. Okay. Yes. We love Allison Janney. Another example. Yeah. And then not to spoil The Diplomat, but some things happen kind of Veep style and she becomes the president. Whoa.

[00:17:27] And then in season three, we meet her husband, Bradley Whitford. Okay. And it's like, that's the most gimmicky version of using Bradley Whitford. Right? We're like, West Wing reunion. We're marrying two West Wing actors who were, you know, not married. Right? And even still, I was like, I'm happy to see you. Of course. Bradley walking. He's got a big beard or something. Yeah. It's great. Yeah. I, I just, he fucking rules. He rules.

[00:17:54] I had to do a, there's a, a picture of us doing dance rehearsals on a Sunday. Now I hear you do a dance and nobody, but he told me he keeps getting this question at the end. I do do a dance. I do do dance. I do do a dance. And, but we had to do, we also had to do dance rehearsals for the Handmaid's Tale. And there is a picture of Bradley Whitford and I. For like ballroom dancing or something? We were doing the Foxtrot. There's a Macarena at the end of the season. I'm sorry. Who do you do the Foxtrot with it? I'll admit I never watched the Handmaid's Tale. Are you only on the last season?

[00:18:23] I'm only on the last season. There's a big wedding. You were the big bad. There's a big wedding. Okay. And so people are like doing a sort of fancy dance during the wedding. Yeah. We're doing a trot rehearsals and it's on a Sunday. And we are sitting at the studio that we're rehearsing in is called, the studio is called The Joy of Dance. Okay. And we are sitting underneath like a TV that has the logo that says The Joy of Dance. Uh huh. And I'm like so happy to be there.

[00:18:50] And Bradley Whitford is sitting next to me looking like the most miserable man. Right. Most cantankerous. Who has ever lived. And I have the biggest shit eating grin on my face underneath the sign that says The Joy of Dance. It is just two people in very different circumstances in their head. And I love that picture. That's nice. David, I have terrible news. What's up? Bradley Whitford is a graduate of Juilliard. Yeah! David! Guys. Do you not like Juilliard? No. This is a thing.

[00:19:17] I do not like people's lionization of Juilliard. Okay. I do not mind if people went to Juilliard. Griffin thinks I have a beef with Juilliard. Now, I have a beef with the way that elite schools in this country and other countries get their dick sucked all day and night. That's all. That's all. There's nothing wrong with a little bit of top. You don't like too much top. Oh, God. Let's work the tip a little. Don't go down to the shaft.

[00:19:44] The thing is, David loves to do this defense now, right? I love to do this defense now. We did the Superman movies on Patreon. Yes. Christopher Reeve, famous graduate of Juilliard. David Cornswit, current Superman, famous graduate of Juilliard. Can you believe a guy named Juilliard would be Superman? Is he a famous graduate of Juilliard? Which one? He's a Superman now. I guess he's currently very famous. He's currently becoming famous. He's holding the office of Superman.

[00:20:11] I don't know that you can say famously a graduate of Juilliard because I did not know that until just now. Well, this is why the podcast exists to educate people. Did Dean Cain get... Like, is he in the office for a minute there? Like, if it's like you're imagining like presidential terms, it's like Christopher Reeve until Superman 4 and then is it like succeeded by Dean Cain? I think he's almost more like the US ambassador. Or is it like in Wikipedia? Stationed in another country. Or is it like in Wikipedia, Superman, but it says like acting beneath... Like, it's sort of like, you know, there's a qualifier. Yes. Right, right.

[00:20:39] And then we actually have Brandon Routh or whatever. He's maybe speaker of the house or some shit. He graduated from the Juilliard of like going through those tubes pretending to be an ICE agent. Oh, dude. That was the Juilliard of fucking proud boy training centers. He's like, watch me own the libs. And I'm like, you're doing an assault. You are owning yourself, my friend. So David now frames it as, I just have a problem with the lionization of upper institutions. I do as well. I fucking hate higher education. Okay? Yeah. I don't hate higher education. Wait a second.

[00:21:09] When I... I'm saying what I do. Okay. When I bring it up in the episode, David goes from zero to 8,000 and goes, if you bring up Juilliard again, I'm going to fucking murder you. That is the direct quote. You deserve it. With no explanation of why he was spinning out of control. You deserve it. And then he goes, I don't understand why people think I hate Juilliard. You deserve it. You deserve it then and now. I'll murder you now. He only explains things eight to nine months ago. It's because we're doing a commentary and I'm watching it and you keep being like,

[00:21:37] and he went to Juilliard and I'm like, stop fucking bringing up Juilliard. Who gives a shit? I don't care where someone went to school. If he gets that angry about it that quickly, people are like, did Juilliard murder his parents in a back alley? What's going on? My dad was a working class guy who probably drilled this shit into me a little too hard, if anything. My dad didn't go to college. Did he drive a lorry? No. I mean, maybe in his younger days, did he drive a lorry? Just going for the lowest common denominator joke there.

[00:22:07] Hitmaker. I will say. Yeah. As despite your feelings about Juilliard, going back to Bradley Whitford for one moment, the man is an amazing storyteller. He has a lot of great stories about being- He's been on so many sets. So many sets. Worked with so many cool people. He once told me a 20 minute breakup story that included a doctor's visit where he found out that the challenger had exploded. Holy shit.

[00:22:35] And that was the smallest detail of the story. The man's an incredible storyteller. So this is pre-Caximeric? Yes. How do you say your last name? I always thought it was Caximeric. Yeah. Because he was married to her. Yes. But only in the 90s. Pre-Caximeric. So it would have been like, you know, I think college girlfriend. Okay. All right. Yeah. It would have been back then. All right. Co-ed Bradley. Yeah. Man about town Bradley. Wait, you were about to say something, Griffin. Hitmaker.

[00:23:04] Oh, yes. The previous two appearances you've made on this podcast are- And this is our guest is Timothy Simons. We've said that. Hitmaker. Hitmaker. The Shining and Joss. Wait, I, and also, only to digress- To digress, and I definitely want to, we have to talk about that. I am very, the nickname Hitmaker. Mm-hmm. Coined by Tracy Lutz. Coined by Tracy Lutz. Who has a Pulitzer Prize. Yeah. Who has a Pulitzer Prize. You got zero of those. I have zero of those. Okay.

[00:23:34] I found out from Tracy Lutz that apparently you find out that you were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize at the same moment that you either win or lose it. Yeah. That's why. You basically get notified like, right, you made the three. Yes. But they also give you a call, right? If they're like, hey, by the way, you didn't get it. Right. And like, you would just be enjoying your morning. It's an honor to be, you know, shortlisted. Yeah, to be shortlisted. Right, right. But you're just like walking around and somebody calls you, oh, hey, by the way, you didn't win one today. Yeah.

[00:24:03] I didn't even know it was an option. If you're Tracy Lutz, you're walking around probably a closet of discs somewhere. Yes. Yeah. You get the call. So he coins that. And it feels like a nickname that I just don't know, based on my own personal constitution, that I can lean into it too hard. The reason that I am even. He's making the joke because you were on a show that was a hit.

[00:24:26] But what I am known for nickname wise previous there, the little part of me that leans into it is that every other nickname I am publicly known by has something to do with jizz. And it's just kind of nice. Okay. Because I was assuming like your height might be, you know, like because of Veep, because of like the JNAD files, because of all those nicknames. Right. That show has a running gag of people coming up with the worst things to call you. Because you're an objectionable little. For reasons.

[00:24:56] I mean, not little, tall. Freak. Weasel. Weasel. And so it is nice, I think, just for there to be like one nickname out there that is like complimentary in a way. And I do like that, although I don't lean into it too hard. I would never refer to myself as such. It would be funny if you went on like CBS this morning and like handed a postcard and like, and you shall refer to me. And you shall refer. I'm picturing you Joker style leaning back in the chair. And one last thing. One last thing. When you bring me out. Call me, hit maker. So Jaws and The Shining are the two previous.

[00:25:26] Right, right, right. We have an active group text with friends. You will text us once or twice a year and go, guys, I got to come back on blank check. Oh, now we're going to roast him. I think this is good. I think this is good. Yeah. And then we're like. Get some foglers. Of course. We're making a roast. Tim, we'll have you on any time. Tim, we're doing this director. Well, first we'll say, we're booked up right now. The second we have new stuff on the schedule, we'll let you know. And then we go, Tim, here you go. It's the Glengarry leads, right? Yes. Here's the first six months of a schedule.

[00:25:55] Take your pick. You have first crack and you always go, none of these really get my dick hard. But it's like David Lynch and the Coen brothers where the two are like flipping through. Oh. Blue Velvet, is that a movie? Yeah. Oh. I'm sorry. Or we show you Spielberg and you go, I guess I would do E.T., Raiders or Jaws. I like Jaws. You either only pick the three things everyone want to do or you go, none of these get my dick hard. All right. Let him defend him. This guy's famous.

[00:26:24] He comes on our show. We're mean to him. He's a hit maker. Let me defend myself momentarily. When it came to Lynch and the Coen brothers, I was very vocal about the Coen brothers. And Grant, I know you like doing these things in person. I do. I love it is schedule wise. It is. I want to honor your commitment to doing it in person. I appreciate that. When it came to the Coen brothers, I believe I threw out a list of all of them. Mm-hmm.

[00:26:53] I still haven't seen, ever seen Lady Killers, which I am sort of embarrassed by, even though I know it's like not a favorite or whatever. You're fine. Thank you. I feel like maybe that was embellished a little bit when it came to the Coens because I am such a huge fan of the Coens. Sure, sure. But I also want to, in a way, part of that is I don't want to take away something from the Lynch filmography that somebody feels passionately about when I'm a little bit more, you know, oh, I'm going to take that away from the- I understand that. Totally, totally, totally. And then this director is right.

[00:27:23] People are going to be passionate. I get that. Sometimes shit just doesn't get my dick hard. You know what I mean? You do drop that phrase. I bring this up not to roast you as much as to say this episode came about- I'm not here to roast. I'm not here to roast. I'm not here to roast. This episode came about a different way. Mm-hmm. We throw you the schedule. Mm-hmm. You go, honestly, I'm up for anything. You guys tell me where I could best be used. Right. Yeah. And I say, have you ever seen Fearless? And you say no. And I go, I feel like that might be a hitmaker movie. Right.

[00:27:52] Why don't you watch it? Throw it on, tell me what you think. If you spark to in the way I think you will, it's yours. But you were a mensch about this. I was. And I think even on this list, there were things where I was like, I had just very recently seen Picnic at Hanging Rock for the first time, but there was a part of me that was like, I can't tackle it. That's kind of a big, yeah. That's a big one. Yeah. I think you're the one to speak to the sort of teenage girl experience in like turn of the century in Australia. Yeah. Women going missing.

[00:28:21] But I think it- He has a lot of experience weird. Yeah. To your credit, you recognize that yes, I may have been the perfect person for that episode. Yeah. But then we're like, you know, maybe we should, maybe we should give another voice a chance on that. So look, Heavy weighs the crown. And we loved having Hillary Clinton on that episode. I mean, we haven't booked that episode yet. Yeah. It's going to be Hillary. You know, you do a thing like Jaws or Shining. You're like, this has to be a three hour episode.

[00:28:49] We're going to have to talk about fucking every element of this movie and we'll wedge in some tangents. But like Fearless is the kind of movie I love covering on this podcast where I'm like, I think this is an excellent movie. Yes. But it is not in, does not require, right? Like an oil level drilling. No. Yes. No. Yes. And it offers many different tendrils of conversation. And I was excited to do something because I am passionate about The Shining and Jaws. And those are like totemic films in and of themselves.

[00:29:19] I am sort of excited to talk about one that I didn't have like much of an emotional, I had never seen it. So I didn't really have an emotional connection to it. You've seen it twice now. I didn't really look up. And I would say even broadly, I have seen a lot of Peter Weir's movies, but I wasn't, I'm not like familiar with his style throughout his entire career. Sure. And so, and I haven't looked up anything about this one. So I'm actually really excited to find out more about Fearless today, just as somebody

[00:29:49] who, uh, as a listener. We're here to learn. I mean, I think Peter Weir is an ultimate, his style matches the material. Kind of guy. Right? Yeah. Not that he's a chameleon. I think there are lines. Sure. I think of him a little similar to Sidney Lumet's. A little bit. I mean, but I see. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I'm interested as we do the, cause like the thing with Ang Lee, when we did him, we picked Ang Lee because he was a blank check candidate.

[00:30:16] Obviously made movies like Hulk that we were like perfect for the show. But we were also like, oh, he's kind of a chameleon, right? He's done a bunch of genres. Then you watch the movies and you're like, there are very obvious themes and through lines. Every single movie is about emotional repression and when it bubbles over. Families. Yes. Like, you know, made and found all this shit, you know, like, and you're like, right. And I'm excited to see this with Peter Weir too. I do feel like he was a little bit more of a, I want to do something different. Like, you know, consciously, like as he was approaching projects, as he's accruing fame.

[00:30:44] It's also an era in Hollywood when there were interesting scripts that you could pivot to. Yeah. You could tell your team, like, I want, find me something that's more dramatic. Find me something that's more going to cost this much money. Right? Like versus like, whatever, I'm Peter Weir, so I do this sort of move. Like that the story of this movie is he had made green card and he was like, well, I don't want to do something as light next time. Like it's a broad, you know, sort of direction for him to go in, but he's thinking of directions to go in.

[00:31:14] The book comes out the same year as the movie. So this is a thing that gets optioned as a manuscript. It's not adapting a hit book. Right? And it's not even like you read the galleys of this thing and you go like, holy shit, this is the Da Vinci code. People are going to lose their minds. I imagine you go, this is a good piece of writing, you know, and this is a good vehicle for a good actor. And Jeff Bridges is certainly a star at this period of time, but he's not Harrison Ford. He's not Mel Gibson. He's not Robin Williams. He's not the level. Well, indeed, talk about it. The studio was unhappy. A-list box office.

[00:31:44] Right. He's like one of the best actors working in the studio system in the 90s, the studio system in Hollywood in the 90s. But he's a guy who kind of has a little bit of a box office ceiling while having like ultimate credibility. And you look at the poster for this movie. This isn't a blank check movie. But the top thing of the poster is from the director of Witness and Dead Poets. Right. He's got these two big grown up Hollywood hits that he can now like, you know, advertise off of.

[00:32:12] Even if he's not a household name, this is an era where you could put that at the top of a poster and people would walk by it and go like, I liked the way those movies made me feel. And also it seems like and this is a broad statement, I guess, and I don't want it to be detrimental to audiences right now. This also very much seems like a movie that could be made in 1993 where you see those two movies above the title. And this is not like necessarily a fun, exciting night out at the movies.

[00:32:41] It's a movie I really, really enjoyed. Yes. But it also is not like, hey, let's go to the cinema play. An audience was willing to engage with a movie like this. To some extent. Yeah. It was a modest hit. I would say. Right. Like it made. Okay. Was the studio not happy with Jeff Bridges being cast? Well, you'll just I can go into the dossier, but like Weir's first call was to Mel Gibson, who had someone he'd worked with before, who's obviously a giant star.

[00:33:08] And Gibson was busy making his first film, The Man Without a Face, and probably doing all the normal stuff. And, you know, like he's your best friend. You can probably speak to it better than me. Yeah. I was in the car when he got pulled over that one time. Say more stuff. Say more stuff. You pitched him sugar tits. I did. I was like, it's going to be like a little harsh, but they'll find it funny. They're not recording this. You're not recording this. You passed them a list of alts. Dog fucker? I know that's not how you use it.

[00:33:38] No, no, no. When he, you know, Gibson passed, Peter Weir then went to the studio and was like, I'm thinking Jeff Bridges. And they were like, oh, we were thinking another Mel Gibson type famous person. We like Jeff Bridges just fine, but that's not that tier of fame. So they were disappointed when, you know, they learned he was like, no, no, no, Jeff Bridges. We're talking about this a lot in this series, but because Weir was so much a guy who worked with the top A-list stars and was a guy that these stars trusted either brought on to develop

[00:34:07] their projects or would sign up to the project because he was directing it. This is still a time where if you have one of the 10 guys above the title, you can basically sell the audience on whatever they're doing. Yeah. You can take something that seems a little challenging or a little uncommercial and a studio will give it tens of millions of dollars and full promotional support. And the audience will like go along for the ride. And you're like across the nineties, he works with and the eighties. Sure.

[00:34:35] He works with Gibson, Williams, Ford and Carey. Yeah. Right. And he works with two of those guys, two times. And let's not forget the other A-lister he worked with. Draw the bottle. Uh huh. The normal man. A normal man who definitely did not like pee in the aisle of a plane. I need to go. I need to go. It is time. The bathroom is occupied. The line is too long. I feel like that was also a very short flight. It's just the guy from Little Mermaid. Yeah.

[00:35:04] It was a very short flight. Are we- It was LA to San Francisco. It was LA to San Diego. And he's like, I gotta go. Just open the door. I'm gonna go outside. We just bored it. The fearless sequel. The fearless sequel is everyone taking off the plane like so shaken, except for one guy who's like, I feel fine. And everyone's like, Jared Depardieu just pissed all over our plane. That was- They opened the doors and they pissed for us. The one thing- They're all running away. The one thing that I read was that initially it wasn't a plane crash.

[00:35:32] It was just they all witnessed a man pee in the aisle. They just saw it. And then they were like, I saw death in that moment. Have we planted a flag that Witness is the blank check? What is the blank check? Witness is the blank check. I would say the guarantor is year of living dangerously, personally, but we'll get there. I think that's the guarantor that gets them into Hollywood. I think Witness is the guarantor for the next- For the rest. For the Hollywood career. Because like Witness is kind of a- That movie, obviously, Scott Harrison Ford. So, you know, he helps.

[00:36:00] But the wild success of that film certainly means it's like he is now the kind of director pretty much anyone would want to work with. It's a big hit. He gets a Best Picture nomination. Best Director, Best Actor. But also, it is that thing where like- And then Dead Poets and you know- He made Harrison Ford respected as an actor. Yeah. And the same with Dead Poets and Robin Williams, I guess. Yeah. But there was a certain degree, the last guy who kind of had this for better or worse and mostly for worse was David O. Russell. Yeah.

[00:36:28] Where it was just like, people know it's automatic if you're in his movie, you have a really good shot at getting an Oscar. You've got an awards campaign. Right. You won't get yelled at on set. Right. No. And I think a lot of these A-list guys really were just like, I trust this guy. Right. He's unlocking new corridors of movie stars, you know? I have two questions for, was Picnic at Hanging Rock a reclamation or was that something that really put him on the map at the time?

[00:36:57] Very much put him on the map. Okay. Really big deal. And then- Australian cultural phenomenon, in America and the States art house phenomenon. Okay. Beyond respected. And then where was Jeff Bridges in his career at this point? Okay, so we got to talk about it because- All right, look. Good. I want to talk about it. He's been building bridges for 20 years at this point. Amazing stuff. Like, you look at his career and you doff your cap. Is he one of your guys, Tim? I really-

[00:37:20] He has always historically been one of those guys and probably because of Lebowski, has been one of those guys that I have always loved. But as I have gone back and started filling holes, a huge one I had never seen in the last picture show. Right at the start. And then I was like- Right at the start. I was like, oh, that's why. Yeah. He's a fucking movie star. From the start. He isn't like this sort of schlubby, like he was a beautiful fucking movie star. It's very true.

[00:37:49] He was beautiful, but I do feel like for such a cutie pie, he took these roles. The early stuff like Fat City, Thunderbolt, and Lightfoot, he's like, I will play the face, I'll play the young guy, but it'll be in a dark movie that's like, you know, tragic and sort of playing against my handsomeness in a way, right? I mean, those are the two early ones post- But he's the kind of cocky hotshot. Right. He gets taken down a bit.

[00:38:17] Right, because he also does stuff we don't remember, like he made a NASCAR movie called The Last American Hero, which I think is probably just more direct, like what if he was a cocky hotshot guy? He entered the grid, of course, in the 80s. Well, we'll get there. But you know, in the 70s, just to do more of the 70s, you know, Stay Hungry, he's really good in, that's a good movie. The Bob Raffles movie. King Kong, he's Sea Gorilla. Yeah, he's Sea Gorilla. I don't- Crunchy, he's environmentalist. Winter Kills, a movie I know Ben enjoyed. Yeah, I just saw it recently for the first time. Which has had a bit of a revival of late. Winter Kills? Yeah, dude, you would dig Winter Kills.

[00:38:47] It's kind of like a weird, like satire of the JFK assassination. It's like a Parallax View spoof movie, kind of. Oh. It's a very strange film. That sounds like it fucking rules. It does kind of rule. And then Heaven's Gate- Right. Is not, I don't think really held against anybody. He's not even a big part of that movie. Mm-hmm. That movie's held against Chameet. Like it's not held against Chris Christofferson or whatever.

[00:39:39] I don't know. He's got a solid career and just really drilled into them. Like you can't take this for granted. Every job's a gift. You gotta show up and give it your best. And then he talks about Last Picture Show being the first moment where he's like, oh, I like see how I could build a life out of this. Yeah. Where it went from being a thing of like, I don't know, this has kind of gotten thrown to me. Um, and he gets this Oscar nomination for Last Picture Show. Yeah. It's a classic- Another for Thunderbolt and Life.

[00:40:05] Well, the Last Picture Show nomination is the kind that doesn't happen that often anymore where you're like, this is not some extreme dramatic part, but a guy just fucking nails it so hard. It's the sort of like Jude Law, talented Mr. Ripley, like welcome to the club- He's popping. Yeah. And then Thunderbolt is like, congratulations, you've graduated to two-hander with Clint Eastwood and you've held your own. Not just held- I think he- Eastwood I think was annoyed at it. He was like, this guy's fucking getting- having all the fun.

[00:40:35] Like this guy gets the fun part. Which is that nomination of like, you might actually be like a fucking movie star. But then- Are we in infrastructure week right now? Okay. Cause we're building bridges? Yeah, cause we're building bridges. We're building bridges. Build back better. We gotta build back better. I- Bridges should play Biden. One thing that I love- Right? Yeah. He actually looks good. He'd be really good. Moving pretty slow. Yeah.

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[00:43:35] He won for Crazy Heart. Yeah. Right? You're jumping ahead there. I am jumping ahead a little bit. He's jumping ahead. One thing that I love about Jeff Bridges is when I remember so clearly he gets up there and just says, what a groovy profession, man. And it's that thing. It was so lovely. It was so lovely. Yeah. And I think that that work-a-day ethic that you're talking about is even present when he's doing that. And all of these-

[00:44:03] You get the sense that he was just like, yeah, I'm going to take my career seriously, but also I'm going to go work and I'm going to be in a movie. This one might not win an Oscar, but- He's had like the same stand-in for like, I want to say maybe 50 years now who's like his best friend. And there are amazing sort of like photo montages you can see of them styled together across the decades of they just kind of like live in tandem. He's been like married to the same woman for decades. Like there's shit like this, but also I think it's like that Heaven's Gate moment

[00:44:33] doesn't knock him down. Well- Because this guy's reputation is just like, I think within the industry- Well, within the industry, right. Professional, great, does interesting things. But- Arguably until True Grit, he was never seen as a guy who could like really guarantee box office, but I think he's like consummate pro. Of course. Everyone likes working with him. He's never bad. Well, except if you tell him that Tony Stark, you know, you can't build like the Ark reactor and he knows that Tony Stark- Well, we have limited pieces here.

[00:45:01] Built it in a cave from a box of scraps. That- Who wouldn't get frustrated by that though? I mean, it's true, it's frustrating. It's frustrating. It's like a phone brought up Juilliard. You'd have to snap it. You have to be like, no, I'm gonna build the Ark reactor. Yeah. I just, when you look at his sort of post, what you're, you know, the first two noms, right? You look at the King Kong Winter Kills, Heaven's Gate Cuttersway, Tron. You are, I am like, right. He did a lot of interesting projects and none of them really like financially succeeded. I mean, King Kong made money, but under wealth, right? Things like that.

[00:45:32] So it's like, by the time he does Starman in 84, a film we've covered, a film that really, I was thinking about a lot while I was watching Fearless. There's similar performances in an interesting one. Right, because you're both about people who are a little outside of reality, right? Who are like one step removed from being normal humans. And so much of him observing. Yes. Like watching him look at stuff. And he's so tremendous in both movies. Yeah. But, but yeah, by the time he makes Starman, it's like, yeah, he's, you know, he's a little

[00:45:59] weird and he's like the guy Carpenter would use to play like kind of a weird guy. And to your point, like two nominations before he's 25 and then it takes another 10 years before they give him the best actor. Get to the third though. Then, God, he's, have you seen Tucker Man in his Dream, the FFC Coppola, Megalopolis guy? No. Great bridges. Is that the guy who made the car?

[00:46:29] Oh, yes, I have seen Tucker. I haven't. I watched that, I think when I was in high school. Have you ever seen Smucker's The Man in his Dream about the guy who did the jelly? No, no, that one I missed. Then he does peanut butter and then it just, the wheels fall off. You ever seen the peanut butter solution? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is a good, right. Severin Kids release. You got that? You got that below? Did they put it out? Oh, yeah. You ever seen the peanut butter falcon? I didn't see the peanut butter falcon, but the guy that wrote and directed it used to go to my gym. Really?

[00:46:56] Actually, still currently, I'm now just doing it. I thought you were going to say high school or something. No. You're lying. You go to gym in Los Angeles. I could never believe such a thing. We actually used to go to one gym and now that gym and then that gym closed. And now we go to a new gym and he's at this new gym. This is an honest podcast. Also, it's just like, this is the kind of incendiary stuff we can't put on. We need lawyers to check against this. We're an independent podcast. You're right.

[00:47:26] The liability you're exposing us to here. Look, my point is after this weird kind of up and down 80s. And this is something Peter Weir says when he in the dossier, what he says, like, I was drawn to bridges. It's like fabulous Baker boys, 89, Fisher King, 91. Like, it's kind of the like, this is an interesting actor, like who is a real movie star. He is a real movie star. Undeniably. I would say the fabulous Baker boys. You can put this title above it.

[00:47:55] The fabulous Baker boys is the first time in my life that I was aware of Jeff Bridges. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I never saw rocks in it. You should see it. I should see it. It was like one of those movies that like my parents were talking about. It's my mom's favorite movie of all time. He's always good. But there's something about when Bridges hits his 40s in the 90s. You're like, this makes sense. This makes perfect sense. This is good. This is like he's a grown up movie star with an interesting edge.

[00:48:23] I also think it's just to this point, right? Uh, this is an era where if there's a good script that a good director is interested in, if there's an interesting piece of material around town, the studio goes like, we want to make this. Let's offer it to Mel, both Tom's whoever. Right. And then they pass and they go like, okay, let's move down. Let's open it up. Right. They don't go, well, then we're not going to make it. Yeah. And Bridges kind of becomes this guy where a lot of those movies he did, you imagine that the

[00:48:52] 10 guys above him all turned it down. And then the studio goes like, I guess we can get Bridges for cheap. And the director's like, great. I get to cast Jeff Bridges. Like he's kind of the most interesting consolation movie star. Yeah. Uh, I think that's fair. He's always going to deliver. Well, let me open the dossier in fact to tell you what happened here. And I also want to throw in a question. Whatever that list above him is, and we don't need to get into like the specifics of the movie quite yet. Yeah.

[00:49:22] Is there any one of those actors that you think would have given as compelling a performance? No. I kind of, no, I kind of perfect for this. He's kind of perfect for it. Here's who I thought of. Yeah. Because of unbreakable Bruce Willis, because an unbreakable is a sort of like, you know, very, very different movie, but sort of a similar idea of a guy who's kind of like, can fucking nothing happened to me? Like, and who is recovering from an accident. Yeah. I'm not ready for this yet.

[00:49:50] No, he'd be like, you're doing wisecracks. Right. But like, he makes sense as if Peter Weir had said, what about Bruce Willis? And she would have been like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Great, great, great. Like we like that. You know, that'll, that'll sell. I feel like you texted last night, like all caps. What was it? Peak Bridges. Bridges. Bridges. Bridges. And I had, he is true from minute one. You're just like, I am in good hands. Unbelievable. Jeff Bridges. And also the best head of hair I've ever seen. Okay. A fucking lion's man. Ben, speak to this for a second. I want to throw something at you.

[00:50:19] The way he looks in this movie, especially the sort of first look, the jacket, the glasses, the hair. Yeah. This is how men should look. I kept thinking this. Like sort of early nineties, like the suits are a little bigger. The suiting is so fantastic. It's very much that trend of that time where it was the, the sports jacket was like kind of a little bit longer. Just like a little baggier. Because the eighties are over. Just the Armani influence.

[00:50:46] The hair and the sunglasses when he's leaning against the car. Those glasses, get me them right now. Chat GPT, like shit, how do I buy them? Like this is what AI should be for. Truly, I like left watching that for the first time and was like, all of the those looks like I need to start wearing sports jackets. Yeah. He looks so, and then even the slacks, they're a little bit loose. They're kind of like a little bit higher waist cut. Is this just like, do I just want to live in like 1992 and have like a Palm Pilot? Yeah. You want to be on it. Yes.

[00:51:15] You want to be him. Well, I want to be him too. It is Jeff Bridges. Right. He's also, he's one of those guys where if you rough him up 10%, he gets 50% more handsome. Right? Like him with like a little bit of dirt looking a little hungover. Yeah. He's a natural line. He's funky. You're like, holy shit. I, if I am not mistaken, cause I rewatched it recently. I believe that this was the main visual reference for creepy CGI Jeff Bridges and Tron Legacy. You know, it makes sense.

[00:51:45] That they identified this as, this is his physical peak. Yeah. If you're trying to visually create the uncanny valley of what's the Jeff Bridges frozen in time moment, it's this. That makes sense. Yeah. That's interesting. You could try to Fran Lebowitz those glasses. Uh, go speak on that. It's where, did you ever read this interview with Fran Lebowitz? Which you're going to have to be more. No, no, no. You know what, Griffin? Answer the question. Okay. Yes.

[00:52:10] Where they're talking about her style and, and she was basically like, my, did you ever read this interview with Bruce Willis? Uh huh. I was just like, well, what? Yep. Sorry. One of the most prolific interview givers that has ever been. Yeah. She had this interview about her style and she was basically like, I, the shirt that I wear, she wears like one shirt and she has her glasses. She's got a Doug funny closet. Yes. It's the same outfit. It's the same outfit every day. Yeah.

[00:52:38] And she was like, at some point, the, the shirt maker that made those shirts stop making them. So I had to start having them custom made. But then what also happened is the glasses maker that makes my glasses stopped making them. And I had to have those custom made. And Ben, you'll know about this. So I had to have those suits, suiting custom made shirts, not inexpensive, but, uh, but not insane. Sure. I think if you're friendly boys, they were like, well, how much does it cost to have glasses made?

[00:53:05] And it really, she would not give a number, but broadly was like, how much does a car cost? That was the number. If it's one of one, like if it's like one of one, and I'm sure if they were making them, she was like, make me two or three while you were there. But I think that basically meant buying two or three cars. But it's like the right. Yeah. When like they're making the bat suit in Batman begins, we bought 10,000 cause might as well. Like we're making them. Yeah.

[00:53:32] You're like these parts now basically need to be machined for her. Yeah. Yeah. That's, I think that is what she referenced in the article. I'll go look up that interview. If you just want to Google Fran Leibovitz interview, I'm sure it'll be the first one. Right. I'll just, I'll actually just yell it into my phone. Yeah. I only did one. I think though, that now with 3d printing, I bet that it's actually a little bit more inexpensive, but I'm sure, you know, this is like a very recent technology. Yes.

[00:54:02] Uh, you definitely would have to get a mold created that then they would have to fill with plastic or whatever the material base is. So yeah, it was not a cheap process. Probably less expensive. Now, can I just say, did you guys see the interview with Harrison Ford where he talked about Jay Leno? Don't answer the question. Yeah. We know. Jay Leno. No, I don't think so. Jay Leno 3d printed him a toilet seat. No.

[00:54:27] This is the, this is the most, the, the most charming. That's what he said when he handed it to him. Celebrity interview. I have ever seen. Wait, but who's interviewing him about this? Like who is, it's not Jay Leno. No, no, he is. He is in an interview. I can't even remember which one I think it was. It was like, what, what's the movie? Oh, it was probably for Red Hulk. That was the end of the movie. And he's being interviewed by, um, yeah, NPR. Uh, the, the nice lady from NPR, not Terry Gross.

[00:54:57] Another one. And Tim, can you quickly just please pay respects to our president. Salute. There he is. Of course. The president. Oh, there he is. Jay Leno calls him during the interview. He's like, hey, your, your, your, your toilet seat's ready. And she's like, why is Jay Leno calling you? And he was like, oh, he's making me a toilet seat. And then goes on to explain that he has a, a, a, a rare toilet seat.

[00:55:22] And, or a rare toilet that does not have any new seats, but he loves the toilet. And Jay Leno has a 3D printer. Has the technology because of all the car shit that he does. And Jay was like, I'll take care of that for you. I'm not doing it justice, but it's a very charming interview. Yeah. I'm just kind of reeling. Uh, you know, Harrison Ford, as we've, I think brought up on other episodes, he's, yeah, he's been given some charming interviews of late. We, we, we. It was a wild card with Rachel Martin. Okay. There you go.

[00:55:51] We did our, our witness episode with the great Amanda Dobbins very recently. Oh, that's. And talking about how that's a like peak physical form. The best, one of the best looking men in the history of movies has ever looked movies. And yeah, watching this just a week or two later, I'm like, this might actually be the number one look a guy has ever had on screen. Yeah. Yeah. This in a way, and I'm not saying any of us could attain it. This feels somewhat more attainable than peak Harrison Ford. Yes.

[00:56:18] There is a possibility that another human being could look like this. There's something weirdly a little more every man about him. Yeah. And his handsomeness comes from like, it is not an obvious chiseled perfection. Yeah. But I also think this era of him in the nineties, his work just feels so like simple and effortless while clearly being thoughtful. And like soulful. Like soulful.

[00:56:48] Like deeply soulful. In everything. This man is just like so comfortable on camera, understands the medium and has just like honed his fucking craft. And then Lebowski obviously like breaks something in him that leads to the next era of I'm a Billy goat gruff eating a tin can. I live under a bridge. Right. And like everything after that point becomes something else, which he's very good at. What were his nineties after this? Jeff Bridges, it's a good question.

[00:57:15] And I'm going to hear to answer it for you because I do think it's not like I get his look, he made the big Lebowski. So like he has a great nineties. Right. But he does make a lot more stuff that goes over. Okay. To bad. So the vanishing remake, he's actually good in that, you know, but I think ultimately pretty good movie, except for the fact that remake of a better movie or whatever blown away. He kind of rocks in it. Yeah. He does a lot of like yelling movies. So blown away white squall, Arlington road, all kind of solid movies where he yells a bunch. Right.

[00:57:44] None of them classics. Yeah. Wild Bill, where he plays Wild Bill Hickok for Walter Hill was a huge failure. Right. And that felt like the first, the biggest stretch he had done. Yeah. In terms of like a bit. Yeah, exactly. Mirror has two faces, a movie we've covered on this podcast. Very normal. The issue with it is how normal it is. It's too normal. Just regular and nothing weird happens. You forget you're watching a movie and not looking at a blank piece of paper. Right. Or just like, right. Watching your friends hang out.

[00:58:12] It is so reflective of the way normal people talk today. But then the thing with the right dialogue, the way they're right, the way they interact and dress and behave. That's a bit like with the Bosky. It's like, Lebowski shirt doesn't do very well at the time, but very quickly you see love of bridges. Right. Like, so the contender, he plays the fucking president. He's great in that movie. It's another Oscar nomination. Oh, that was with, um, why am I blanking on the internet? Joan Allen. Yes. Yeah.

[00:58:40] Maybe you don't support women or good actors or whatever. Yeah. No, no, no. No, you don't. Exactly. Yeah. Thank you for bringing it up. Cause I have my own dossier of things I wanted to make clear. Right. And one of them was I don't support women. Women shouldn't be the leads of movies. That was probably. Sean Fancy coined a new term to describe when Tim goes off, which is movie MAGA mode. And like, I want to make it clear that movie MAGA mode is basically like a little bit of a nitpick of a movie that most people agree is perfection.

[00:59:10] I feel like that's what my movie MAGA takes on. It's not actually right wing opinions expressed through movie culture. But it's like the tone or tenor, the like energy. Tim leans in and says, am I crazy? And then throws out a, I'm just asking questions, movie take. And am I proud of this? Yeah. No, but I do think every once in a while, I, I, I love, uh, uh, an unbridled positivity toward the movie going and movie watching experience.

[00:59:40] Yeah. And David, I'm going to direct this to you. Oh yeah. And I don't Griffin, I should be directing this to you, but every once in a while Griffin will refer to a film that is not a masterpiece as a masterpiece. Such as any, any in particular that you're thinking of? Yeah. Well, I don't think I've ever been wrong about this. So I'd love to hear you pull one example. I mean, I feel like, look, this isn't the example, but a thing that has come up recently

[01:00:07] when we're talking about physical media is like Griffin would just sort of casually be like, Oh, the movie sliver. That's a masterpiece. I don't think Griffin did that. No, but that's not exactly. Like let's cite that as an example of like a God bless it. It's not a bad movie. They announced, they announced small soldiers for K steelbook and I go, obviously inarguable masterpiece. Yes. And everyone in the group text agrees with me and we move along. That is, I think that would be an example. Um, right. And that makes you go movie mega mode.

[01:00:36] Uh, just to give you Bridges nineties, uh, you know, I'm sorry. Yeah. We gave you the nineties, but then like the two thousands, I just feel like he packs is it. He tries to nail Kate backs to the wall. Uh, that guy's like fucking Joey. Yes. Or no alien. He slips him a piece of paper. Uh, are you an alien? Check one. He's face. He's like, I'll never tell, uh, stuff like Seabiscuit, like door in the floor, which he's

[01:01:04] really good in Iron Man, obviously even like less seen stuff like Tide land. He's becoming a little bit of elder Statesman. Right. He's entering young grandpa. Even if he's first build, he's kind of supporting someone else. And we all support him and love him. But then post crazy heart, he has the genuine, like, I guess he's a 60 plus year old movie star, right? Like crazy heart. Yeah. True grit. Man, who's Derek goats the Tron legacy. You know, he's all over that movie. Good and bad.

[01:01:34] RIPD rounding up the rest in pieces. The thing. The giver. We obviously talked about it on, on the Cohen series, but true grit and Tron legacy come out a week apart from each other. They sure do. The two movies are just like burning up the box office together. And Hollywood goes like, I guess he's box office gold now. And then, and then he has this run of terrible big budget. Some of them are bad. Some of them are bad. RIPD giver all nightmares giver. But the giver is an example of it's like he had been trying to make that movie for so

[01:02:04] long. And it's only post like true grit. Right. Then he finally asked the club. He was like, I'll bring a giver, you know? And they're like, all right, all right, all right. We'll make it. The crazier thing about the giver. He read the book when it came out. Excellent book. It's the best book. Options it. Yeah. And goes, I want to make this as a movie starring my dad. Right. That was his big thing was he wanted Lloyd to play. Giver's got to be old. Yes. And then eventually he like Lloyd had died. He aged into it. He has an Oscar. He's seen his box office now. And then they fuck up every single.

[01:02:34] It sucks how bad that movie is. It's a real bummer. Yeah. And so, you know, he's doing great. I think he's even great. I mean, obviously, Hell or High Water was like six Oscar. Yeah. Yeah. And he rocks in that movie. But you're right. The crazy heart moment was bizarre because there was this feeling of like, oh, I guess we never realized that he's overdue for an Oscar. He didn't have that same kind of narrative to him as like, when are they going to give it to DiCaprio or Julianne Moore or some of these people?

[01:03:03] Because his nominations were spaced out and it was always a sort of like, oh, right. Yeah. And then that movie like premieres at Toronto and everyone's like, fuck, we could just get him the Oscar. This movie is whatever. We could go full court press and he could probably win. And Hell or High Water. I feel like there's like that last moment where I believe he shoots Ben Foster. Spoilers for the 2012.

[01:03:31] Ben Foster has never played a character in a movie that would require shooting. Yeah. I don't know what you're talking about. No, I would say broadly. Yeah. No, he's always playing a guy who's on the right side of the law. I'd like shake your hand. Let him cook. Let him cook. Ben Foster. Let's hear what he has to say. Yeah. Um, is death a coming? Um, that's a 30 days of night, uh, quote, but I feel like everybody is going to get, um, masterpiece. Exactly. I'm joking. I've never seen that movie. Okay. Um, you haven't seen it?

[01:04:01] No. Ben Foster is really good and scary in the opening scene. He's got like a, he's got like a real, he's like, you hear that noise. That's death a coming. And it's so good. Um, I don't know if the movie's great, but Ben Foster. I can picture coming out of his mouth and certainly not with like an accent. He didn't like to do those. The, the, the, uh, the Jeff Bridges performance in that last moment or in those later in, in like that, in that scene in hell or high water, I feel like is indicative of Jeff Bridges broadly,

[01:04:31] which is he gives you something that contains three emotions that you, that no one else could do. Yeah. He finds a way to have a reaction to these situations that feels completely singular and also emotionally true for the entire audience watching it. That's a great way of putting it. And, and, you know, post crazy heart, all these characters become a lot larger and more overstated. And he's obviously turned into like a bearded burping man.

[01:05:01] Mm hmm. But when you see him in interviews present day, the dude is much closer to his cruising altitude as a guy. Yeah. And then he loves playing these like ornery old coots or whatever. Right. Yeah. Um, but this nineties era where he's doing that in a movie like fearless, where I think this movie is excellent. Mm hmm. And I'm wondering if this is an episode to coin a term for this kind of thing, but a movie that is uniformly excellent.

[01:05:28] And yet there is a stretch of it that is like transcendent where I think the first 30 minutes of this movie. To me, the book ends to me, it's the first 30 kind of last 20 are really what I'm dialed into. The first 30 I like can't breathe. Yes. The first 30 are basically like, why is this film not talked about constantly? Yes. I understand like that Schindler's List came out in 1993, like, or whatever. But like, why am I not always hearing about fearless? Yeah.

[01:05:56] And then the middle is not bad at all. Right. It is good. It is makes sense for the movie it's trying to be or whatever, but it's a little less thrilling, I guess, whatever, you know. And no point does the movie lose me. No. But the first 30 minutes I'm, as you're saying, leaning and going like, wait, is this actually one of the best films ever made? Yeah. And it has a little bit of that picnic at hanging rock thing where you're like, what is this mood? It's so spooky. Right. What is this feeling with such kind of like invisible craft?

[01:06:26] Right. I cannot think of another movie that feels like this. Uh, and so much of it is him being able to do this, especially in the first chunk where he is inscrutable. Right. Where it's a while until we backfill kind of who this guy is. Which is really smart. And you're just like, what the fuck is motivating his decisions? I understand he just walked off of a plane crash, but why is he doing this?

[01:06:47] And you're so locked into everything he's doing because every little moment is like three hyper specific emotions that are legible without being like overly communicated to the audience. Right. He's not doing anything like showy. He's not indicating. And it's almost like the thing that he gets to the emotion that he gets to. Yeah. Is the one that in the script is supposed to be there or other maybe other actors could find their way to.

[01:07:16] It's just he somehow manages to choose the most interesting path to it. Yeah. Yeah. The film, just to give you the dossier a little bit. Um, like I said, Peter Weir had done Dead Poets Society and Green Card basically back to back because he was trying to get Green Card made. Makes Dead Poets Society while he's trying to get that made and then goes right to Green Card. And he said he needed a rest. He was apparently covered in French piss. Not sure what's going on there.

[01:07:44] Um, do your taxes for you. Here is the trick. You no file. We have not recorded our Green Card episode. Oh, I have some ideas. The time we're doing this. I just like, I can't even imagine. That is going to be on. How many piss jokes our listeners will have heard at this point. It is going to be on listener. A movie, a movie I, Green Card to be clear, a movie I really love and like, like really is a movie that makes me happy. But the, uh, the piss jokes. They write themselves.

[01:08:09] Um, so, uh, he's, uh, Peter Weir, kind of a wellness king. I'm going to say kind of a, a, a self healing. Okay. Um, because he's just like moving, going back to Sydney and I'm going to chill. I am going to apparently spend this break reading, swimming, learning French and tending to my garden. That's right. Taking it easy. And he thinks exactly. He, he never moved to LA.

[01:08:37] He thinks that like, it kind of helped his directorial eyes stay sharper. Yeah. Just to stay out of the scene a little bit. Uh, unhooked from Hollywood. You were Jim's with the directors. That is true. And he does say this here. Like it's too bad I never saw like a 6'5 guy at a gym who was on an HBO show. Mm-hmm. What are you, 6'6? 6'5". Yeah, 6'5". Okay. It's crazy that that's quote in there. I know. Shouts to JJ for D&D. He said in 1993 to Premier Magazine. Um, and he doesn't want to make another green card.

[01:09:07] He's like, green card had done, it was successful. It was a direction I didn't want to continue in. I was a little uneasy with the success. I wanted to do something a little more difficult. Well, Hollywood always wants you to do the thing you just did. Of course. They're going to throw those, those versions of the scripts they've got. And he wants to make a rom-com. People are like, you can't make a rom-com. Right. He makes a rom-com well. And they're like, congrats, you've proven it. Make 10 more rom-coms. Right, right. Um, so he dips his toe back into the, you know, blah, like situation. He's a big deal director. He's an Oscar nominee. And so he says- Two times now.

[01:09:37] Dos. Dos. And he says he got sent, I think three, because he got a green card nom too, for screenplay. Oh, you're right. And he got sent a bunch of scripts, he said, that were basically like, go pictures. Right? Yeah. You're a big shot. Like, what do you want to do? And he was like, these are all suck. Like, not interested. Nothing edgy. Nothing strange. Everything was clear and logical. Nothing was unconscious. And he said, all these films are out right now. They are films that were made. I'd love to know. Yeah. Like, you know.

[01:10:02] But basically, he's like, these are scripts that Hollywood had cleaned up already. You know what I mean? And I just was bored by like, whatever notes get put through, you know, the studio. Yeah. Yeah. Fearless, however, right, is based, like you said, it's a spec script based on a book that hasn't even come out yet. Yeah. Raphael Iglesias, father of normal man, Matt Iglesias, had written this book. It was like, I think his seventh book or something.

[01:10:31] And it's the first draft script and we're as like, thank you. This has not been fucked with. This is weird. He adapts his own unpublished book. Right. Get me this right away. Now, Raphael Iglesias is inspired by he was in a car accident a long time in the 70s or whatever and had like walked away, you know, no injuries, shaken up. He's still got that kind of like, it took him days to readjust to life.

[01:10:58] He starts getting obsessed with plane crashes, which normal people like me are also obsessed with. Oh, I feel like this really will lead to a, we have to have a sidebar. We're pinning this on board. It's not a sidebar. It's a main bar. Okay. Yeah. It's a satellite plane crash movie. Yeah. And then he in 89 reads about the notorious United flight two 32 crash. I don't know if you know about it, which is like a famous crash and it crashed in aviation history in that, like the thing that happened was a one in a million thing, like a crazy mechanical

[01:11:26] failure that fucked up the engines and the hydraulics. So the plane, you know, landed, but crash landed onto like, you know, they tried to get it on a runway, but not really in like South Dakota or Iowa, some, you know, somewhere. And a lot of people died, but a lot did not. Okay. And some people walked out on scale and other people died. It was like a hundred people died. A hundred and eighty survived something like it's a, and it is in like a plane crash history.

[01:11:55] Like they have simulated a million times and it's never this been that they've never gotten as good a result. They're like, we don't understand how like this actually went quote unquote so well. But also in an era of newly launched 24 hour news. Yes. I feel like plane crash culture explodes in the nineties. You know, if a plane crash goes wrong, it's like we're, we're staying on this beat for days and following it.

[01:12:22] It just felt like, I don't know, the coverage of these things became a lot louder than it had previously been. I'm sure. For sure. Is hero the same year as this movie? Uh, I think that film starred Jet Li and came out in 2002 Griffin. No, I think that was also by the way, title of a jet Li film. Yeah. Uh, that's right. Good. Not a bad movie. A hero is 92. So the year before, okay, a very different movie, but it's similarly kind of obsessed

[01:12:48] with what happens to the people who walk off, walk out of a crash alive. Yeah. Um, so we're likes the script, uh, has some notes, um, pretty much immediately, uh, which is kind of his move. Like that's what he did with dead poets society as well. Uh huh. Oh, sure.

[01:13:18] So the first 25 pages are about the plane crash, how you cope with the knowledge you're going to die all this. And then the next part is that. So he's like, no, we're going to intersperse the plane crash throughout. Right? Like we're going to do the structure of the movie, which is basically like start after the crash and then build the flashbacks out a little bit, little by little, which I think is why the movie works. Yeah. Because you'd be too overwhelmed if it started with the plane crash. Yeah. Like too conventional and it's conventional. What's so striking about the opening.

[01:13:48] It's about him reaching an emotional realization about what happened to him. Right? Like, so it helps to see, I mean, another great film about a plane crash. Sully does basically the same thing. Agreed. But also this movie is about like a rebirth, right? That he walks off. He walks out of this crash feeling like a different person in a way. And so dramatically, the most impactful thing you can do is start the movie with that guy and then slowly catch up to everyone around him being like, the fuck happened to you?

[01:14:15] Because the first 30 minutes, he does feel like Starman. Yes. A hundred percent. Is this a person who's outside of reality? Being in a place before? Yeah. What were you going to say, Hitmaker? Hitmaker. Well, it is like, no, I think you're- Say it to Baby Joey. Say it to Baby Joey. And who is that? It's the baby from Superman, your favorite movie of 2025. Oh yeah, that was my favorite movie of 2025. The- And he did go to Juilliard. And he- Well, you can see- I'm gonna fucking murder you!

[01:14:42] I think there is something interesting about, like, yes, about that structure. And as he gets sort of closer back to real life, him remembering more and more of it, or whatever, the audience learning more and more about it. You could also then say he's remembering more and more of it, if you want to take that examination of it. Yeah.

[01:15:04] But also, like, the first 25 minutes are a little bit odd to cope with because you realize that he didn't call his wife. Yes. Like, that is- Yeah, no, I mean- That is- If I'm his wife, I have some notes. I have some- Yeah. Some cues. Wait, you mean to tell me you just went to go visit your college girlfriend? Let's just, like, speed round, okay? Movie starts, he's walking through a cornfield. Uh-huh. It's like- With a baby. Quiet Warner Brothers logo.

[01:15:34] And then it's like, cornfield, here's Jeff Bridges with a baby. He's very calmly like, ooh, who's missing a baby? Yeah. Hands the baby back, says goodbye to the child. Mm-hmm. Goes to first responders, is like, I gotta get in a train. Gets on a train, meets up with his college girlfriend, orders a bowl of raspberries. Well, he goes to the hotel- Oh, he goes- Takes a shower. And then he, like, takes a shower, realizes that he's got a gash inside. Yeah. That should be, like, stitched. Yeah. Like, it's a deep gash.

[01:16:02] But everyone else is, like, crying and screaming, and he's just like- Well, yeah, they were in a plane crash. I need to get to a hotel. Yeah. I need to find my college ex-girlfriend, check out my chest, eat the strawberry. She's like, aren't you fucking allergic? While she's, like, spiraling about her life has gone awry. Deborah Monk, by the way, absolutely crushing that scene. Yes. She's so fucking good. Yes. Like, I just love someone like that, like a theater actor, who can just come in and be like, I'll give you a full picture of this person really fast. You're real calm in this movie? Yes, absolutely.

[01:16:31] Is out of control in two scenes? Yep. I did a short- I did, like, a short film that- We've heard of him. Huh? Short films? Shorty's watching shorties. My friend Dan Bulla wrote and directed. He is a- SNL. SNL writer. And there was, it's about a guy who thinks he wins the lottery and then just kind of goes off the rails. And at one point, there was a moment in this movie that I really liked that if anybody's

[01:16:58] ever seen the short film Winners by Dan Bulla, I wonder if it was when he's basically eats the strawberry and he, and she's like, I thought you were, I thought you were allergic. And he was like, I'm past all that. There was a moment in Winners where somebody says to me, you're not wearing shoes. And I just say, I'm done with shoes. Good. And this is a very deep cut reference, but I really liked that moment just because he was like, it almost feels, you know what it feels like? What?

[01:17:28] And I think you should leave Sketch. A Tim Robinson character where he's like, I'm past all that. I'm past all that! People can change. People can change. People can change. Mrs. Doubtfire. This guy used to slop up his steaks. Mrs. Doubtfire is also 93. Okay. So there's two movies about strawberry allergies in 1993, right? Right, right. Isn't it Mrs. Doubtfire's strawberries? Yeah. Oh yeah. It's 15- I just know the famous quote. Which is of course, hello!

[01:17:58] It's 15 minutes before he returns home, but it feels like 30 because the movie is just operating like out of space and time almost. Yeah, very dreamy. But yeah, they find him outside the diner. Yeah. The representative from the airline is like, this is the last guy we haven't been able to track down and do damage control with. Right, and I mean, well there's the two- there's the guys where he's like, am I under arrest? And they're like, I mean, no, you haven't done anything. No. They're just like, you're just being weird. Do you recognize this man? Right.

[01:18:28] And it's his, like the license of his business partner? John DeLancey. And he's like, yeah. They're trying to- I do. They're trying to ID John DeLancey because John DeLancey's body was separated from his head. But also like, is this guy a liability? I mean, that's what's going on. Right, right. Yes, of course, they're freaked out about it. What are you gonna do? All the insurance companies and the lawyers and how does all of this get settled? And this guy is just like beyond all of that. Right. And then the- I love the airline lady being like, so we booked you on Amtrak, of course.

[01:18:56] And he's like, no, I'll take a plane right now, baby, first class. And she's like, okay, like cool. And she's gotta be thinking like, this is so great for us. Yeah. Like how can he sue us? Right, right, right, right. That's all of these conversations are everyone walking on pins and needles trying to make sure that they're- No one's gonna say the thing that cost them $100 million. Mm-hmm. Right? And they put him on the plane next to John Turturro playing a very calm, dry- This is great casting.

[01:19:26] Stale man. Him and Tom Wall-Sebaud. You mean physically dried. Yeah. Like, yeah. Right? I mean, this is like, it's a couple years after Jungle Fever. Like, I think he's mostly at this point still a Spike Lee guy, right? Like, and like, you know, those early Woody Allen movies that he's in and stuff. But he's done Miller's Crossing already or is it the same? Miller's Crossing is, yeah. What is that, 90? Yeah. So he's done Miller's Crossing as well. Yeah. So he's just a guy you like to see in a movie. Yeah. But this, I feel like they're coasting off a lot of look into your heart in this. Sure.

[01:19:54] Of like, right, is this guy a fucking rat? Uh, he's, you know, a therapist hired by the airlines to manage the psychological kind of trauma of the survivors who they kind of sneak onto the plane next to him. Bridges immediately calls him out. Mm-hmm. And then like minute 15, he walks through his front door to his wife and child who he has made no attempt to contact. Right. And everyone is bawling. There are like 10 family members there. Oh, sure.

[01:20:23] That Tom Hulse is a lawyer. I never thought, he's planted. I didn't even actually make the connection. I thought it was just random. But it makes more total sense that like, they rushed him like last minute to get into that seat on that plane. Right. But because they're like, this guy says he wants to go back on a plane, but like 90% chance the thing takes off and he starts screaming and ripping the chairs out. Sure. Totally. Everyone's in such a like intense holding pattern of, right, how do we mitigate this situation?

[01:20:54] He shows up back home. This is the beginning of him needing to butt up against the expectation of how he behaves. Everything up until that point in the movie is what's going on with this guy. Right. As an audience. But he's kind of like warping the world around him. The second he's back in his familial home, there's a sense of like the fuck is up with you down to like how calmly he slaps John Turturro.

[01:21:21] That yeah, there isn't some ramp up big explosive. I think you should leave type moment. He just in a very focused way is like, nope, not doing this. There was though a thing that maybe just stuck out a little bit to me. Like, I don't know. I've been kind of, I've only seen it twice and I have kind of gone back and forth and it'll come up in all the conversations we'll be doing about the emotional, like the, what's going on emotionally. But there is something a little bit about him slapping John Turturro that feels maybe

[01:21:51] out of place in that moment. And well, it's too much. And Turturro reacts by just being like, I can't help him right now. You know, I'm going to go rather than freak out. But yeah, I mean, but he, he was just in a plane crash where like half the people died or more. So like he can really do anything and no one's really going to call him out. That's the big thing. And that's not why he's behaving that way, but it's why everyone is walking around on tiptoes around. It's the post strawberry moment.

[01:22:18] It's that here's this guy who had this allergy that almost killed him as a child. And he just goes like, fuck it. I'm going to try eating a whole bowl and they taste delicious and he has no problems. And there is a part of him that thinks maybe I am dead. This is not real. But even if it is real, then no rules apply to me anymore. And there's a sense of like testing the boundaries of just I'm going to do like no impulse control whatsoever. Okay. If this guy's annoying me, I'm going to slap him in the face.

[01:22:48] And he needs to do something that extreme for everyone around him to go like, what the fuck is going on here? Because everyone up until that point, especially to Turu who's been sitting next to him is like, it's actually alarming how calm he seems to be. Look, I mean, if we're doing the end of the movie, like he basically looks into the other world or whatever. And then after that, he's calm. He's like, you know, and I ever he's shed of human feeling. I feel like that made that makes the way that you just described that makes a little bit more

[01:23:17] sense when I was rewatching it last night. There was a part of me that felt like that was the underneath of it bubbling up too early in the performance, like like the internal thing rather than a like an external testing of boundaries. It seemed to me more like it was revealing what was going on, like that there was this thing underneath him. He has this calm. Yes, but that it almost feels like that's a little bit too early to show a crack in it.

[01:23:47] That was the way I read it last night. I think it's more like we've watched for 15 minutes as this guy is in like accidental vacation mode, right? I'm going to rent a car. I'm going to stick my head out the window. I'm going to like park it on the side of the road and just sit with my sunglasses on. He's going to rent a car, drive 80 miles an hour with his eyes closed. Right. He's going for it. That's how I, right. That's how I am. And his college girlfriend, someone he has this like history with, but hasn't seen in decades, right? Like none of this is real.

[01:24:16] None of these are like real interactions that affect his daily life. And I think he's like having a really quick adverse reaction to entering a space where everyone is expecting him to be the guy he was before. And it's sort of like first idea, best idea. Yeah. You know, the way if someone's annoying you, you're like, God, I wish I could hit this guy in the fucking face. And you knock that thought down immediately. He's like, well, what I'm going to do is hit him in the face. And Turturro's response is, yeah, cool. Makes sense.

[01:24:46] You need to be doing something weird now because you just almost died. But I don't think it's just that he he's doing what we all wanted to do, which is give Turturro a slap and a kisser. I mean, I've thought about it. I can't deny it. It's that Turturro is picking at something he can't think about. And so he reacts, you know, he gets angriest. Don't you think? Like, you know, he's he has put it away.

[01:25:13] He can't think about what happened when the boy comes to stay with him because he's like, I just can't stop thinking about how good you were. Like, you know, how you helped me. He doesn't want to confront what he did. He doesn't want to talk about what he did. Right. He's like, I did nothing. Yeah. Again and again. He's just like, no, no, no, no, no. Whatever, whatever, whatever. You know? And when he meets Rosie Perez, it's like he's like, I feel like love for her. Mm hmm. Like I I'm connected with her in this element.

[01:25:41] He can't describe why, you know, like he can't talk about the plane crash. Well, it's ever. Yeah. She is the other person that he comes across who treats that as the first day of a new life. For her, she entered hell. It's hell. And he basically entered heaven. Right. I mean, this is a one of the most spiritual mainstream movies I have ever seen without being without being religious in any way. It is also like second rewatch. I will say I was like, obviously, there are going to be a lot of like a lot of religious

[01:26:10] imagery or talk about angels or whatever. But like the first thing, and this is just me not knowing a lot about. Yeah. The Bible, but like the first thing he does walking out of the cornfield with a with a tiny baby. And the first thing, the first characters that you see are three like field workers kneeling down and crossing themselves.

[01:26:34] I was like, oh, wait, was this movie like much more directly religious than I remember from the first time? I don't think I don't think so. Yeah. Like I don't. I think it's more that like the people around him keep trying to put that on him and on the situation. Right. And obviously, like Rosie Perez's character comes from a more religious background, but both of them have like experienced something that goes beyond that. Yeah.

[01:27:01] That transcends the codex of being able to use this book to process experiences. And that's what their connection is, is like we're going through different things, but we're the only two people who understand that something changed and we're not the person those people knew before, which is really profound. David.

[01:27:31] Yes. Got an intentional air about you today. Well, I'm more intentional about what I wear day to day. Oh, I like to lean into pieces that feel easy, comfortable and put together. I'm sure you could get those from anywhere, right? Oh, quince. Look, really. Oh, he's showing. I'm really wearing quince right now. He's showing tag on Maine. It's been my go to because very clean fits. Very nice fabrics. Yeah. They don't feel like cheap fabrics. I hate dirty fits. I hate cheap fabrics. I am it.

[01:27:59] We're in, you know, if the weather's getting warmer, I really rely on my quince polo shirts for the kind of like, exactly like a formal enough piece of clothing that I can go to the office, but it's comfy. Yes. Because we do have a dress code here at Blanket Productions. Uh huh. Um, so they've got those 100% Pima cotton tees with a softness. They got a feel. Oh, enjoy. And for the lizard home, David is touching the fabric. Pants hit that same balance, relaxed and comfortable.

[01:28:25] I got to tell you, uh, I recently had a birthday and my in-laws sent me a quince gift card because they know I like quince so much and I am itching to spend it. That's, that's a really strong endorsement. That's an endorsement. Yes. Um, everything at quince, it's priced 50 to 80% less than what you'd find a similar brands because they work with those ethical factories. They cut out the middlemen getting premium materials without the markup. Mm-hmm. Uh, I've got the cashmere zip. Okay. David is showing me. Oh, nice. Cashmere zip sweater. It's very nice. Yeah. I wear it all the time.

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[01:30:49] New customers only. Thanks, Huel, for partnering and supporting our show. Do you guys want to talk momentarily about plane crashes? Sure, anytime. And our generalized feelings about them? Main bar. Main bar. Main bar. We got a main bar here. Who starts? Who starts? I don't understand.

[01:31:18] Like, what do you want me to say about plane crashes? Well, you don't fly on planes? Pro, con? Or you? I haven't flown on a plane since COVID. Now, I've got the excuse that I have young children so like there's been no, and all my extended family lives in New York, right? So I'm not compelled to travel afar to see family, which is like any of my friends with kids when they're getting on a plane. Mm-hmm. And you're like, Jesus, you gotta take a flight. I mean, you've taken kids on planes. Oh, yes. It's a pain in the ass, I'm sure. Yeah. Like, they're like, yeah, but I gotta see my... And I'm like, right, you gotta fly to wherever.

[01:31:48] I don't have to do that. I haven't flown for work. I don't like flying. I have flown on many, many, many planes. Like, this is not a like... So you will get on a plane. Paralyzing thing, right? Okay. But I've been avoiding it. Uh-oh. It's gonna have to happen again sometime and that won't be fun for me. Because two things. In the years leading up to the pandemic, you started winding down your desire, I shouldn't say desire, your tolerance for covering anything that would require a flight. That is not true.

[01:32:16] I feel like in the early years of us being friends, you flew more for work. I flew twice in 2020. I flew to Utah for Sundance. I flew to Charleston to go on vacation. I used to get... I just don't like it. I take drugs to calm myself down and I deal with it. Like, but I don't like it. I... I'm gonna throw a Zanny down. I'm a Clonny guy. Okay. A little Clonny guy? A little Clonny boy? Okay, I got a little... I got a bunch of Clonys. Okay.

[01:32:45] And if anyone wants them, come to my house. Well, I don't think you can... Hold on, hold on. I don't think you can do that. Absolutely not. The address is... Main feed. Main feed. No, I... I like... I have a prescription, a medical prescription for anxiety on planes. Right, but I don't think that legally gives you the right to be able to just hand them out or sell them. Well, they're $100 per pill in my house if you come there. Okay. We're launching a new tier on Patreon. The Clonny boy tier? No ads, free Clonny.

[01:33:13] Technically, you're paying for the podcast. The Clonny is free. It's like the Dallas Buyers Club. Yes. The... Are you somebody that... But I know a lot about plane crashes because I'm an anxious flyer and I think a lot of anxious flyers do what I do, which is sort of like, well, okay, let me understand what went wrong with a plane to understand that it's very unlikely yada yada yada. You talk about that you watch successful plane landing sometimes to calm yourself down. I haven't done that in a while. There's... There's... There's... There's... There's... There's...

[01:33:39] There's a conversation we had like this off mic with a guest where they were interrogating you. Not interrogating. But asking you about the plane thing, right? And how high your level of anxiety was. And you did say out loud, I don't know if I ever go on a plane again. Fuck planes. Why would I go on one of those things? You did say... It also... I gotta say, anytime a friend of mine takes a plane, there's always some bullshit happening, it feels like. Air travel sucks. It doesn't help that air travel sucks. It's delayed. Yeah. There's...

[01:34:08] You know, like, it's hard to get places. Like, you know what I mean? Like, it just sucks in every way now. I love going to places. He loves to go to places. I find almost everything about flying annoying. You used to be a big flying fan, I feel like. You were like, I genuinely like flying. Um, well, my thing is, I have no problems with the being in the air and a giant mechanical bird part of it. Uh-huh. I find, like, the hell is other people part of it. Right. Hard, hard. They're making it harder.

[01:34:36] I think airports basically bring out the worst in people. Yeah. I think airlines keep on making everything worse and more expensive. I think post-pandemic, everyone's lost their fucking minds, and it just becomes like an ultimate... People are just weirder around other people. ...pressure cooker thing. Right. But I don't dislike the act of it once we're like in the air. Okay. I actually kind of find it relaxing. I have all my piccadillos of like, I need to be in the right seat. Jerking off. I gotta jerk off four or five times. Gotta dig out. Yeah, right.

[01:35:06] Uh, gotta drink seven bottles of white Zinfandel, gotta piss in the aisle. Uh-huh. Not do your French taxes. Yeah. Exactly. I need to not memorize my lines, have people feed them to me with an earpiece. And will you be filing your French taxes? And they say, no, no, no! Piss on the taxes. I owe them nothing! Yeah. Um, but, uh, Jerr Deppardy's also done worse things, just to be clear. Yes, he's been accused of various things. Yeah, it's a long round sheet. And we'll talk about it on the Green Card episode briefly just to address that we are

[01:35:35] conscious and we know that Jerr Deppardy has been accused of bad things. You are both very tall men. I know you bring up, David, that on top of your, like, flying anxiety that you're also like, I don't like being in a small space. I don't like this and that, right? Like, despite being a little guy, I can get claustrophobic really quickly and I need, like, exit paths more for bathroom than, like, what if this crashes shit gets to me. I'm with you on all that too, though, for sure.

[01:35:59] I'm, like, very specific about, like, where my seat is and times of flight and routines and all that sort of shit. But any time I'm on a plane and there's, like, extreme turbulence, for someone who, like, as a child was so all-consuming in his obsession with death, anxiety of death, every time that happens now, I'm like, if this plane goes down, that is what it is. Yeah. Tranquility. Like, I have this absolute, like, I guess maybe this is how I die kind of thing.

[01:36:27] I don't like turbulence, but turbulence bothers me the least because that's actually the least dangerous thing on a plane. Are you able to, like, are you able to engage with plane crashes in movies? Yeah, but I mean, this to me, I said this on Letterboxd, this is the final boss plane crash movie. I have seen the plane crash in this movie. Like, you know, you know what I mean? But, like, I do feel like until maybe Flight, Griff, do you have any other takes? This was the, like... Flight with Sully.

[01:36:54] Well, but Sully is about a successful air, uh, forced water landing. A successful forced water landing. It's not a crash. Nobody died in Sully. Like, yes, it's intense and scary, but like, you know, Sully's obvious, you know, but like... One time I took my kids... Flight obviously is also about, I guess, sort of mostly people walk away from that one, right? Well, he rolled it. It's also fictional. He did roll it. He was gonna roll it. One time I took my kids to like a Lego exhibition. Cool. And there was a Lego miracle on the Hudson.

[01:37:23] It was like they had made the little Hudson and they made the plane and all the people getting off on the wings. I just wanted to throw that in. Yeah, great place. But I feel like, I mean, I guess Castaway, but it's like that's a... It's the two Zemeckis. You know, but that's like a... I feel like when Castaway came out, people were like, this is the best plane crash ever committed to film. And then when Flight came out, they were like, Zemeckis has topped himself. Right. What's fascinating about this one... But to me, Fearless was always the kind of like, that's the most like sort of graphic,

[01:37:51] realistic or whatever, you know, like a visceral plane crash scene in a movie. Obviously, it's also an entire movie about a plane crash. It's people wrestling with what happened on the plane crash. It's just the awful thing of what happened to Rosie's... Rosie Perez's character. Like, you know, like, like it's... It's the plane crash movie. This is the fucking plane crash movie. Also, what is more... What is most interesting about Weir's approach to the plane crash to me? Besides... Aside from... I think spacing it out is brilliant. Yes, I agree.

[01:38:20] And you're getting only these little slivers. He's holding off for so long. And in those little slivers that are mostly about dramatizing the human reaction to this thing going wrong and getting worse, which he does really, really well. Those moments are very intense. But cinematically, he is just using like Star Trek original series tricks. Mostly. Until the final sequence. Until the final sequence. He's truly just like kind of shaking the camera and shaking the set. Yeah. And it's well done and it's well acted.

[01:38:48] And I'm rewatching it and I'm going like, man, David texted this as the ultimate plane crash movie. Right. He gets it right dramatically, but it's not that visceral. And I forgot how extreme the end sequence is. That's why the end is so transcendent. Yeah. Like he's finally looking at it again. And you said realistic. Realistic in the sense that it hits so many different beats of what would happen. It visualizes the different elements of what happens in a crash, but it also does feel stylized.

[01:39:14] It feels nightmarish while also feeling like transcendent and almost holy. And I was remarking to myself last night that again, to like the 1993 of like from the director of Witness and Dead Poets Society. The fact that they take the time to show not only the collection of sharp materials, but also high heels. The moment where she just opens the bathroom door and throws all the hot. And she's like crying.

[01:39:45] I didn't know this was part of the process until now. I still don't. But that feels like a really amazing dramatization of the fucking sort of absurdity of the terror of a moment like that. She's doing her training or whatever. Yeah. It's one of my favorite moments, favorite things that can happen. So what the what do what do I do with this baby? And they're like, I don't know.

[01:40:09] I mean, one of my favorite experiences I can have watching a fictional scripted film is to go. That must be how it really happens. Even if I'm watching some phone. They must have called somebody and checked. Yeah. You don't make that up. That was research. That was experienced. Yeah. And like the the flight attendant character is based on a real woman who had given false advice based on older protocols of what you should do. Jesus. Oh, it freaks me out.

[01:40:36] I won't get into the details of it, but basically gave the wrong advice. Right. The child died and basically spent the next like two decades of her life fighting to change the laws and the protocols to be like this is like the unfortunate sacrifice in the cautionary tale. We need to change this. But basically, the argument was the sample size is so small. We don't know. Right. This only happens every right very rarely. I mean, yes.

[01:41:04] And the variables are so extreme that you can't like simulate this and test the best way to handle. Right. But the point of this movie, obviously, the point of what he does with Rosie Perez, normal therapy stuff. Uh huh. Right. Everything they would do, I would say is. I think everything they do is completely normal. Medically recommended. We should also acknowledge Rosie Perez in a stellar performance. Great performance. Yeah.

[01:41:28] Very deserved Oscar nomination coming off like an incredible four or five year run for her that basically ends with this. It is. I mean, it's not like she's not a working actor, but you're right. It's a huge bummer that she did not like, you know, whatever. I went to the Wikipedia. To a higher level of stardom. And I was like, clearly it didn't sustain. But what were the post Oscar like bump nomination bump role she got? And you're like, no, it kind of all the best stuff is before this. Right. And I feel like every five or six years, someone will clearly be like, I'm going to bring Rosie Perez back.

[01:41:59] And she's always good. Always good. Always good. And it never totally hits. She should have won the Oscar this year as much as I love Anna Paquin, but she's like, she to me, and she was sort of like, she won the critics awards. Like she was sort of the, whatever, you know, the, the favorite. I think this movie is kind of, I'd say this positively, but like kind of woo woo. And like, yeah. Oh, for sure. Is, you know, wasn't hugely successful.

[01:42:22] It was critically like it got respectable reviews, like, but it didn't get, I don't think like the kind of flat out raves you need. And like, it was the Schindler's list, piano, fugitive. There's all these fucking great heavy hitters. I remembered so confidently that Bridges did get nominated for this. And I was like, in what fucking universe does he not get nominated? And then you're like, Oh, the five nominees are Liam Neeson for Schindler's list. Anthony Hopkins remains of the day. Keep going.

[01:42:52] Daniel Day-Lewis in the name of the father. Incredible performance. I know, um, the, the sort of surprise nominee in the batch was Laurence Fishburne for What's Love Got To Do With It, who hadn't gotten the precursors, but deservedly got the Oscar nom. And then fucking Tom Hanks for Philadelphia. Jesus. And you're like, yeah, you're right. That is the one year where Bridges wouldn't have made it in. And we said the same thing in Witness of like, how did fucking Ford not get nominated for Fugitive? And you're like, that five. The Globes even nominated Ford. Right.

[01:43:21] Uh, there is one thing that I will throw out there that this almost feels like a movie and a performance that is, yes, there's the woo-woo parts of it, but I could see people being like, I don't know that I really want to, like, obviously incredible important performance that she gives. But one that I could understand if people were like, I don't really want to engage with this. I don't want to engage with what this woman is having to deal with. Yes. Totally.

[01:43:50] I don't want to think about it. I don't want to think about a plane crash. I also really don't want to think about the death of my baby. Yes. I could see that being a factor working against it. Right. You know what I mean? Well, I kept thinking about Flay while watching this. Which I will say. Yeah. It's going back to main bar. Mm-hmm. I have broadly always been a pretty good flyer when our kids were born. You gotta, you know, you gotta travel for work all the time. You're a twin. I gotta travel for work all the time. I'm just like, I'm here, you're a hit maker of some sort. You know what? And you know what?

[01:44:19] Sometimes hits, they get produced in other states or other countries. Right. And you fly to your gym. Almost exclusively in Budapest these days. I fly to my gym. You fly to your gym. Of course. But that is like, that's just a little two-seater. Just like a little funny thing. It's a little funny thing. They're like, hit maker coming in. Parachute out. The, um, there was a period of time and I'm much better about this now, but right

[01:44:45] after my kids were born, it became a thing where I was like all of a sudden terrified to fly in ways I cannot describe. But was it just, okay, terrified to fly. So it wasn't just like, it is so difficult to fly with young children. It was also like, I'm existentially afraid for their- I am existent- I was honestly- Yeah. I guess I've heard a lot of parents talk about this where I'm kind of okay with flying if we're all together. Right.

[01:45:12] I was terrified when I was leaving them. Yeah, absolutely. And the sort of sharp focus that would get thrown into like- Like this could be the last time I'm getting by. This could be the last time and I don't like that. I was talking about this on draft day. Yeah. Why you were even hesitant to like take quick trips to go back and visit them if you had a couple days off where you were like limit the- They were like two or three. They were like less than a year. Am I wrong? That was, they would have been- They'd just been born and you said, I'm out of here, I think is what I'm seeing here.

[01:45:40] That was, that was, I mean like look, yeah that's like a paraphrase of what I said. Sure, right. But the doctor was like, do you want to hold your baby? And you were like, I'm- Draft day. Draft day. 2014. Do you not know who Kevin fucking Costner is? Kevin fucking Costner. You were yelling that from your helicopter. I was in the- Took off from the hospital. I was- There was like one of those like life flights that got delayed because I was screaming at the NICU doctor being like Kevin fucking Costner. It was like Batman and Darker, you get sucked up into the airplane.

[01:46:10] Sorry. The other part of it is, it's not like you were a late in life success, but you had done a lot of theater. You had like worked in casting. You're old. I'm very- I'm sorry, M&E. I mean again, a paraphrase of what he just said, but yes, it was to the point. Yeah, you were a little older, you'd had kids. Then you have children and then it's like, suddenly you like, you got it. Right? It was like, you got Veep and like things started rolling and you stayed blessed and blessed booked and busy since then.

[01:46:38] But I- Draft Day, I feel like was only after you had done the second season of Veep. It was after, so the kids are probably right around two at that point. Okay. But it was still very much in that thing of like, I had to take Xanax, but I had this experience of like, it was either I was terrified for the entire flight if I didn't take it. Yes. Or I would take it and then halfway through the flight would wake up in like the Xanax haze.

[01:47:03] And it was like, I woke up to know that we were flying through a city about to hit a building. Well, right. So you know what I mean? Am I going to create a single mother because I have to be in Goosebumps? Like that kind of shit. And the attendant would lean down and say, we'll be at Riyadh soon. And don't worry, your car will take you right to the comedy. Right. Of course. Meeting you at the gate. Headlining. And I would tell even the person on the plane, I have no qualms about what I'm doing. No.

[01:47:30] You'd be like, I'm scared of the flight, not of the great people I'll be entertaining. Right. These people deserve to hear comedy and I am a truth teller. I just remember you talking about all this anxiety a lot because it was also the like, you're leaving your wife at home with twins, right? Yes, there's that. And there's the part of like, you never know when it's going to stop. So if jobs are like lining up and especially if it's like starting for the first time, you're like, do I have to like ride this out? Yeah. As long as I'm like holding a hot hand.

[01:47:59] And then the other part of it was you're like, I have twins. I like this is going to cost me for the rest of my life. Yeah. I got to take all these small parts, but it means you're traveling all the time. Right. But you do feel like you've. I'm like kind of way past it now. Okay. My wife is a terrible flyer. Wow. And so I. My heart is with her. I. And so like we have talked about ways that we work through that and how I can be more supportive, which I do think she doesn't listen to this podcast. So she will not be here to rebut me. Smart.

[01:48:29] That I do feel. You don't listen to her. Yes. She doesn't listen to this podcast. Yes. I have tried to become better at how I can support her, but I do feel like I never think about taking Xanax anymore. And frankly, like I kind of enjoy it now. Mm hmm. And even when I have to like fly it, like recently I flew back from somewhere like in the 23rd row in the middle seat. I was like, you know what? I had a great time and I watched so horses and this is fun. Man of the people here. He's got a sag nom, but it don't matter. Right. Don't matter. He's flying in row 23.

[01:48:59] Row 23 middle seat. He put my little iPad in the holder with my big old legs. And, uh, but I will say I have never seen the movie plane because that came out in that period of time. The, um, plane is that the sorry? No flight. Yeah. Yeah. They crash. They just kind of land in like action or whatever. Right. Yeah. But I never saw. Yeah. Flight is scary. Right.

[01:49:27] Like came out in that period of time where I was like, Oh, I am totally not going to be engaging with this movie. My whole thing with other like plane crash classics, right? Like the lost pilot, but like, you know, movies like cast away fly. I'm trying to think of like a flight of the navigate, but I'm like things you're saying things that like show a plane crash. Like in like visceral detail of some sort, you know, like a fly final. Final destination. I suppose. Um, that, that one doesn't turn out so well. Uh, die hard too. Yeah. That stuff.

[01:49:58] It's so absurd, right? Like it's like, and it's like anything where it's like a terrorist blows up a plane. Air force one level stuff. You're like, well, I think I'm okay. Like, you know, yeah, it's the one, the freaky ones are the ones that are depicting somewhat realistically, like a real ish plane accident. United 93. I would say kind of a historically bad plane incident. Yeah. That's it. That is a, I'll, I will speak truth to power and say that movie is a little stressful. It's a little stressful. It's a little stressful.

[01:50:24] There was a movie that I was watching recently that had a, a recently, this was probably 10 years ago. I watched on a plane, had a very famous plane, uh, plane explosion in the, in the beginning of it. And I was watching it on a plane. They edited out the explosion. Oh yeah. Planes will. Oh yeah. Oh, movie on plane. We'll get rid of a plane. They will just do it or not have the movie air at all. You know, we're forgetting. And this is such a grounded, realistic take on the, the plane crash, a con air. Yeah.

[01:50:54] And that is, and I do, I don't fly much, but I will fly con air regular. Also. And I am a miles member of con air. I love a cage. Exactly. They should have a cage more often as an option. I have to correct you, Ben. That wasn't a crash. That was a forced Vegas strip land. That's right. I mean, and Cyrus the virus, I do think has been a pretty good secretary of state for Donald Trump. I don't know what you guys think. We, we, we. Good guy.

[01:51:21] We talked about flight several years ago. That is a movie where every time I watch it and I try to circle back to it. Another movie about reckoning with after. This is my thing is that flight for me. The first half is unbelievable. Yeah. And every time I watch it, I expect it to go down more smoothly, but I bump against how kind of pat it feels in the whole movie getting simplified to you got to get sober and find Christ again. It's not an incredibly well-written. Despite its screenplay. Right.

[01:51:49] Like this movie is spiritual because it's in conversation with the intangible. Mm-hmm. Yes. Whereas flight is like, you gotta just buy into these two pre-established systems. There's, there's one sort of supernatural thing that happens in this movie, which is he can eat the strawberries. Right. That's the one thing where you're like, okay, we're going a little beyond science here. Yeah. I guess maybe his body, his nervous system is in such a bizarre state. I was gonna say, my read especially. But I don't know how allergies work.

[01:52:17] I was just like, I, when I watch it, I'm like, it must be something with his adrenaline. We don't, we don't mind watching it. No. Right. Everything else in the movie. I mean, sure. He behaves badly. He walks into traffic. Sure. He drives too fast. Like things like that. But you're like, it's not unbreakable where it's like he genuinely cannot be harmed. He doesn't seem magical. No, exactly. But he, that's why Bridges is so good because right. He just seems a little out of step with real life. Yes.

[01:52:45] He just feels a little touched or a little angelic or a little whatever you want to call it. And I like that this movie is like, there aren't answers for this. There's nothing that can speak to what he's feeling or what she's feeling. You know, when I hear about people who have tragedies, like what befalls the Rosie Perez character here, I go like, I literally don't know how you wake up the next morning. Yeah, no, no, I just don't understand how you could possibly ever move on from. And to Turo has a line where he says, because Isabella Russell, who's great.

[01:53:15] We love Isabella. Yeah. Remind me to talk about her one minute. Okay. Before I finish this off. You know, she says, like, why are you doing this? Why are you putting them together to Turo and to Turo's like, if Rosie Perez is not reached, like she will, you know, basically need help for the rest of her life. He's like she'll be in institution. Yes. I mean, like she will. These are my two problem cases. She cannot be pulled out of it and he's acting like nothing happened. And the two most severe reactions.

[01:53:40] They're basically at opposite ends of like the PTSD spectrum, which is like almost kind of complete disassociation from reality and like an inability to pull yourself out. Oh, and one thing that I didn't really pick up on the first time, which I feel like stuck out the second once he mentioned something early on about people that are dealing with PTSD sometimes almost chase the feeling of indestructibility. Like he says about Vietnam vets. Yes.

[01:54:07] And there was a, they feel indestructible in some way because they didn't die. They didn't die. But then if they start to lose it, they start chasing it. Right. And there was a moment where he agrees to lie. He's like, so you want me to lie? Right. To the lawyers. You want me to say, you know, the more minutes we spent in this, do you want me to lie? And when he agrees to do it, he runs out and goes up to the roof. Right. And that one, I feel like I noticed more of that. The moments where he could feel himself slipping away from it. He then ran.

[01:54:36] When real world is starting, like Tom Hulse is talking to him and he's just like, all right, can't fucking deal with you. I can't fucking. That's what I'm saying. It's the slap moment. He's getting him back, you know, through the barrier. Don't pull me out of my dreams. Through the liminal barrier. Because the Hulse moment is Hulse starts saying like, and look, if you could focus on this in the narrative. And he just screams abruptly. Hulse is like, what's going on? And he's like, no more lying. Yeah. I'm not lying. I refuse to play by these rules. Do you want to talk about Isabella Rossellini? Oh, I do. So she comes on screen.

[01:55:06] I'm talking to my wife about her. She looks quite good in this film. Her and Jeff Bridges are. She's a beautiful vision. Quite a handsome couple. And I will say we're caster because he was like, I want his wife to be like from another country. I can tell you about that later. But I was like, Isabella Rossellini, kind of in the Sean Connery zone, always sounds like that it's never a problem. Correct. Do you know what I mean? I don't want to see Isabella Rossellini talking different. I want her talking Rossellini style. Right? Yeah.

[01:55:35] Because she's got the most beautiful diction. Like this wonderful accent. It's always like melodic and interesting to hear her read dialogue. It helps. She always is doing that. That she's a ballet teacher. And it would be one thing if she was a lunch lady. But I mean, hey man, I'd be like, wow, interesting lunch lady. Ben and I were watching a friend of the show, a past and future recent guest, Ben David Grabinski, showed us End of Days, which we had never seen before. Oh, good movie.

[01:56:00] And I couldn't stop making jokes about this movie that's like built on the premise of like, what if just a New York cop had to come face to face with Satan? And that New York cop is, of course, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. I walk my beat in Brooklyn. With a cup of coffee and a trench coat being like, oh, this is my block. I'm Lieutenant Cop. Right. And the movie just acts like, there's nothing. I remember these streets from when I grew up here. I mean, and this is. His partner is Kevin Pollack. And the movie keeps acting like both of them look like that. In a way.

[01:56:29] Late 90s Schwarzenegger, I feel like, is where this had gotten out of hand. Right. Like, yes. But yes, absolutely. And I was like, beyond the fact that he just looks like that, right? The bone structure and like the shape he was in and everything. It's not just that he's Austrian and I can't accept that someone could immigrate from one country to another and hold down an American job. I'm like, he just doesn't even sound like a human being. Other Austrian people don't sound like him, right? Nobody like him. Isabella Rossellini has this built-in thing where anytime she enters a movie, you're like, cool.

[01:56:57] This character's backstory is she has lived in five different countries. Yeah. And there's never a movie where it butts up against that, where you couldn't believe like, yeah, she had an interesting childhood. Like, 100%. I mean, she's horrible. But the thing, I start just going on it about like, look, Ingrid Bergman, Roberto Rossellini, they had a famous affair. She's like this product of this like notorious affair and it was so scandalous. She always plays a cultured woman who has experienced things. I was just talking about this last night with a friend that I bumped into. Yes. About the bone collector.

[01:57:27] Of course. When Angelina Jolie has to say, I moved to New York to be a model, but I found that unfulfilling. So now I am a police officer. Someone had to insert that line when she was cast. Yes. Right. They should have given that movie a special Oscar for putting in that one line. Because that's the one thing those movies never do when you cast the most beautiful people in the world, especially with actresses. Where you're like, has anyone ever like come up to you and said maybe gap catalog?

[01:57:56] The, Ken, I, one thing that was interesting about having never seen this movie before and, and then watching it a second time was the first time through, I kept struggling to figure out if I was supposed to be cheering for this new Jeff, Jeff Bridges. I think what he's doing is very seductive. Yes.

[01:58:21] Because you're like, you know, obviously a character like Tom Hulse's character, you're like, well, fuck this blood sucking lawyer guy. Right. And even what, you know, everyone like, you know, you're like, yeah, he's above it all. But then you are like, no, he, this is a man who's so traumatized. He's behaving in this way. And he needs to engage with what's happened. You see the way that he's trying to help Rosie Perez and you're like, what are we, what are we going for?

[01:58:45] Like, I feel, I feel conflict as he is clearly not doing a great job with his own family. Can I throw out a headier take? Yeah. And this is part of the power bridges in this movie is the top tier movie stars in most eras, but I think particularly in the 90s in Hollywood kind of represent the id. That even when they're playing kind of every man in some sense.

[01:59:14] You want, you're, they're doing what you could only dream of doing. Exactly. Yes. Right. Behaving in a way that's alluring. It's not just they look better than you and they're more charismatic than you, but part of it is like, you want to watch them get away with it. You want to watch them be awesome. You want to watch them take control and say the things you can't say. And even if they have to learn a lesson at the end, you know, that was part of the juice. And Jeff Bridges is a guy who never feels like he's representing a fantasy version of a person. Yeah.

[01:59:38] Even when he's in extreme circumstances and especially in this like 90s earthy era where if it was Mel Gibson, there would be 30 minutes of this movie that felt like yes, man. Right. There would be, even if Mel was good, you know, same with Bruce where there'd be a little bit of like, ain't I a stinker? Isn't this awesome? I can drive the car this fast and like kiss Rosie Perez and do whatever I want. You know, to that point.

[02:00:04] Bridges is too grounded where the whole time you're like, what's happening here feels extreme, but it doesn't feel like wish fulfillment. Yes. And it doesn't feel fun. I thought about that when he last night when he was walking across the street and he's like, you're trying to kill me, but you can't. And there is that part of me where it's like, it's not like he like walked through the traffic magically and it never slowed. And no time. That's what's crucial. One of the cars has to swerve and jam on its brakes.

[02:00:33] And it's like, no, God didn't let you survive. Somebody hit their brakes. Yes. Like you, it was not magic. The rest of the world helped out in this. What he is really representing is what if you choose not to buy into the rules of society, right? Not what if nothing could kill you? What if you casually mentioned to your wife, Isabella Rossellini, that you have never experienced a love like the one that you feel for this other woman?

[02:01:02] Which, I mean, again, Rossellini's got to give him a lot of rope. He was in a plane crash. Yes. Yeah. He's got plane crash hall pass right now. But you know. He's obsessed with holes. You know, like five, six years. It's like the Karanima's Bosch painting that they're, you know, Ascent of the Blast, you know, like this idea of like the light at the end of the tunnel. Yeah. Right. I'm just saying, this guy's printing out all the holes he can find in history. It's true. If OnlyFans had existed, he would have never pulled back up forever. Well, that's a bit of an off-color joke, I'll say.

[02:01:31] I get a little ribald on this podcast from time to time. That's a little shocking. I can work a little blue if I want to. I do think that if like six years went by, Isabella would be like, he's still fucking dying and out on this plane crash? Oh, should we have Fearless too where he's back to being normal and she's like, he brings it up a lot. God damn it. I have a life too. I fucking ballet school. I had, I had a bad day today. Right. You had a bad day six years ago.

[02:01:59] One of those girls is being mean to me and she said, whatever. It's such a good moment when the representative from the airline finds him, right? Right. And says like, we know that you were already kind of like touchy about flying before the thing happened. She doesn't even want to say crash. She's talked to Rossellini and his family before he has. And that's the first tell of like the guy before this was actually deeply neurotic.

[02:02:29] And you see it in Bridges in the flat, in the full flashback. Right. Yeah. Before he looks out the window and basically obviously just has this like, I, this is it. Yeah. This is. And now I have crossed the barrier. But like before then, yeah, he's an anxious. Yeah. And it's more that feeling of, I think the surrendering of control of being, I can't do any of this. I don't think he orders a bowl of strawberries because he thinks he's now invincible. I think he orders a bowl of strawberries because he's like, I almost just died.

[02:02:58] So what's the difference if I order a bowl of strawberries now and this kills me? Yeah. And if not this, it could be crossing the street. Right. He doesn't walk across the street because he thinks it's impossible for a car to hit him. It's that he keeps kind of like testing the limits of all of this is so random. In a synopsis of the novel, I found this term that's really interesting. It's described as the character is experiencing an extreme form of pink cloud syndrome. Go on.

[02:03:27] And a pink cloud syndrome is a thing that you find when describing people who are getting sober. Mm-hmm. Early on, they have this feeling of elation. Oh, yeah. Of like just extreme high. And that doesn't like last forever. And it doesn't last. But it's that initial period of like, it's not just like I'm doing this. It's like, it's this incredible, like just heightened experience of feeling such positivity.

[02:03:55] But of course, life sits in the reality after a period of time. I'm being an architect. Yeah. You gotta go back to fucking Rossellini. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. It's only a thing. Mmh. Jetzt nur du, dein Podcast und eine leckere Auszeit. Ab zu Aldi Nord. Für 2,99 Euro bringst du deine Mittagspause mit Sushi ins Rollen. Mmh, lecker.

[02:04:22] Und für 1,99 Euro gönnst du dir danach noch eine kleine Eiszeit. Bei Aldi Nord findest du immer das Passende. Klingt gut? Dann probiere die Snacktime Sushi Box. Ab 205 Gramm für nur 2,99 Euro. Oder Mookie Sandwich Eis. Je acht Stück für nur 1,99 Euro. Das ist Gutes für alle zum Aldi-Preis. Jetzt in deiner Filiale. Aldi. Gutes für alle. I'm not gonna go into like a crazy tangent about this,

[02:04:51] but you know, I have my extended health problems that turned out to be this gallbladder thing. But for like six months was a medical mystery that after the fact they were like, that would have killed you if it had gone on another three months and hadn't been identified. And that was starting the beginning of 2021. So it's after nearly a year of being like an extreme lockdown where it triggered all of my worst anxieties and I lost my fucking mind. And then it's like, vaccination's coming. Wait a second.

[02:05:20] There's some problem in your body that we can't identify. Something's up with you. And the can keeps getting kicked and I keep going back for tests and they're just like, we don't know. We don't know. And I'm stuck in a medical hamster wheel and I feel like I haven't been in person for like 18 months. Right? When this thing finally got resolved and it got the bad shit out of my body in like July 2021, I had this feeling where it was like, okay, like the couple of days after the surgery, my recovery, you know, there was wonkiness. I, of course, checked out of the hospital,

[02:05:49] immediately went to a screening of F9. It was captured on our Patreon. Yeah. And if you're wondering, when did he arrive for said screening? They like to complain about me being late to the screening. I was waiting to be checked out of the hospital. No, we're actually just complaining about how you're late all the time. It's just a very funny example of you being late. But I had to... It was my first like thing I did after my kid was born, I feel like as well. It was a very early. Right. Crazy early.

[02:06:18] Every society beginning to flower, whatever. But I had this thing where like, when the basic recovery had happened, let's say a week after the surgery, I was just like, oh my God, I'm taking nothing for granted ever again. I am so happy to be alive, able to walk out on the street. But then you saw that movie, Yes Man, and you're like, oh, this covers it. What if I start saying no to shit? No, but even beyond that, and I felt a little bit of this with my fucking dental problems I've had recently, where it's like,

[02:06:48] this thing is weighing down on you. Surgery happens. Sky's cleared up. I wake up one day. I'm like, holy shit. I slept properly. My executive function is in line. I'm like organized. I'm not feeling like stressed out by all this. There's just like a clarity to like, holy shit, I can just do stuff. Like the burden is gone. And every time I fall for the shit, the pink cloud syndrome of like, oh, this might truly be the first day of the rest of my life. What if like all the fucking bits

[02:07:17] about Griffin fucking shit up ended yesterday? And now I'm just like the best at being normal. And then like 10 days later, I'm like, oh, wait a second. It's crept back up on me. I heard you say organized. So I imagine maybe day three, all of a sudden your apartment appears to be like similar to the way your desk looks. A little bit. Yeah. Now we should share the listeners too, just before we start recording. Griffin immediately. Spilled coffee. Spilled coffee.

[02:07:47] Everything's going well. Griffin wanted to be back coffee. I have two more dentist appointments this week. I have a bone spur in my jaw. They need to remove. You spilled what looks like green, gray water. It was a matcha latte. You have a bone spur in your jaw. Yeah. Yet another thing me and our president have in common. These are on his feet. Two great New Yorkers with bone spurs. The fuck? They're going to take something else out of your mouth. Yeah. And then I'll have five days of feeling like Jeff Bridges in Fearless. Well, good for you.

[02:08:16] And then I'll go back to fucking dropping coffee like Rick the intern. It is, I do feel like a pretty, not in the trailer, by the way. I just don't want to, I can't let that go. It's on the trailer. It was not, it was in, oh sorry, in the trailer. It's not in the film. It's not in the film. It's false advertising. It wasn't on the Blu-ray in the deleted sand. And Kevin Costner heard that and got so mad that he started deep sea diving. Looking for treasure. Well, because Rick spilled the coffee all the way to the bottom of the ocean. I needed that coffee. Yeah.

[02:08:46] That is a very human response to these things of like, oh my God, I went through like the moments, like I remember getting like STD tests in college and that five days or whatever. Were you up to anything in college? Well, just like, you know, whatever, a normal. Just being responsible. Being a responsible person. I used to call him Hitmaker for a different reason. I'm sorry. It's good to get STD tested. Because he pointed across the room and got it. I'm not here to make fun of that. I'm sorry.

[02:09:12] But like, you know, I think, you know, I grew up in a time in which sex killed you. Right. There was always like this little extra weight to those coming back. Yeah. Right. And in that period of time, we were like, all right, I'm never making another mistake in my life. And then you get it. Of course. I'm fucking good. I told you, or you go see the doctor and the doctor's like, hey, you got to stop doing it. And you're like, you're right. I will. And then like a week later, you're like, doctor what? Yes. Doctor who? Well, I'm also. Doctor. Actually, his name is the doctor.

[02:09:41] Doctor who is just what they call the show because people ask doctor who is he? I'm such a manic person in general. What? That when I have these moments like post surgery, it is the only time in my life where I feel level. That's the thing. It's not like I'm like, holy shit, I'm unstoppable. It is a little similar to the Jeff Bridges thing where I'm like, oh, my God, I just feel like I can walk. You know, like my thoughts are like in order.

[02:10:08] Given that we've hit two hours, can I give you a couple more things from the dossier? I would love that. Yeah. Okay. I just think we need to talk more about Rosie Pratt. Yeah. She's great in the film. Just the Mel Gibson thing I said of he was the first choice and Mel was like, look, I'm about to direct The Man Without a Face. And then Mel has said apparently like, who's your second choice? Like, who else are you thinking of? And Weir says Jeff Bridges. And Mel was like, fuck. I wanted to cast him in The Man Without a Face. Oh. Wow. Which rocks. Which is kind of cool. Mel wasn't going to play the lead himself. No.

[02:10:37] He was like, no, I fucking want Jeff Bridges. Interesting. Now, I mean, like maybe Mel was like, actually, what if I had no face? Like, I don't know. But I've never seen that movie. Me neither. Yeah. I hear it's pretty good. What's it about? Well. It's a man with some facial starring. He's actually, he's got it right. Who like tutors a boy in English. Yeah. It's like a sort of heartwarming movie about a sort of reclusive man. He's like a Phantom of the Opera. Right. English teacher. Oh.

[02:11:07] We can take English too to where he's like, don't look at me. I'm hideous. And they're like, you're Mel Gibson. You just got some shit on one side of your face. He's got scarring. Serious scarring. But he's like pushed away from society, I think. Basically, he's become a hermit. I feel like both based in and shot in Maine. Sounds right. Which is where I'm from. Here he comes, the fucking Mr. Maine. The Maine event. The Maine event's a good nickname. That is a really good nickname. Film set and shot in Maine.

[02:11:33] So the casting bridge is just to say the film got sort of the budget got right sized, you know, a little bit. Cost about $20 million. Wow. Which is, you know, regular budget at the time. Back to this sort of notion of like how these things used to be greenlit. It's like, this is a go picture. It's 40. If you can get one of these 10 guys, it goes up to 60. Right. If you go for someone you like who's less of a name, it goes down to 20.

[02:12:00] Bridges called Gary Busey, one of his close friends, who had been in a serious motorcycle accident and survived. Came out normal. Give me a bowl of strawberries! Busey said that he described the feeling, the sort of pink cloud feeling that Ben is referring to is feeling like an angel in an earth suit. And, you know, the thing with Bridges was just like he wanted to do it. He was really into it. But he had just made The Vanishing. He made a lot of movies like back to back to back. And he was like, I'm worried I'm going to be like burnt out.

[02:12:30] And Weir was like, you know, take a break. Get yourself right. And we're going to make the movie. The book is set in New York. But Peter Weir had just done Green Card and was like, I don't want to do New York. I want to do somewhere else. So they moved into San Francisco. The Rosie Perez character is Italian in the book, like Italian-American. And Peter Weir was like, well, if we're going to San Francisco, she should be Latina. Yeah. And so that's how that happened. She was the first choice for the role, essentially. Well, do you know who the studio wanted?

[02:12:59] Oh, tell me. Winona Ryder. Yes, they did. They were told to Jeff Bridges character that they wanted her because she was big. This is the same year as Age of Innocence. Yeah, it is. It was obviously before they had made that cultural swap, right? And they wanted her to audition with him and do the kissing scene. And he was like, I'm not going to kiss her. He's like, I'm way too old for this. Right. In front of like the studio and everything.

[02:13:27] And she was just like, that's the only guy in Hollywood who would have done that. Right. Wow. Yeah. Also, good call, like not just from like a creepiness factor. Wrong for the movie. It's wrong for the movie. The moment isn't really like how it isn't about their chemistry. It's about something weirder past beyond that. The response is so good. It's not a really, right. Their relationship is not romantic per se. It's more just like they are. There's just like an embarrassing closeness or whatever.

[02:13:56] Like they're the only two people who can understand each other in a weird way. I also love that the narrative reveals itself to be that for this guy who's like, I'm not a hero. I don't like to be looked at this way. I'm uncomfortable with all this attention. Locks in on like, actually, I might be the only person who can help her. That it starts as just like, you're the only person I feel like I can actually be heard by. And then becomes like, wait a second. There's a thing I can do here that no one else can help you with.

[02:14:24] And also, it doesn't even seem like he really knows what that is. And he would have never been able to figure out what it was unless he had been sort of untethered from the regular human life. Because nobody's like John Turturro in group therapy isn't going to suggest. What if you drove your very safe Swedish car head on into a wall? Have you ever tried a car crash therapy? Have you ever tried that? It's coming up.

[02:14:54] Your doctor spins around and it's David Cronenberg with a hair. Have you ever fucked the scars of someone in a car accident? Scars can be fun to fuck. I think just to speak on Rosie Perez for a second, one thing that I did not notice the first time was how she kissed the toolbox. Holding it in her arms. She is incredible in this movie.

[02:15:18] And that scene, I think, went unnoticed the first time. But I don't think I really realized how fucking good she is in that scene and embodying that fucking toolbox turning into bubble. You know what I mean? So she's, of course, a fly girl choreographer on Unliving Color, right? Her first movie is Do the Right Thing. Yes. Then it's Night on Earth. White men can't jump. She's great in both.

[02:15:47] Untamed Heart, which I've never seen. Neither have I. And Fearless. Yeah. Fearless is her fifth movie ever. My God. Yeah. And she basically was this person where it was like, well, she's got a really interesting vibe, but is she really like a technical actress? Or is she just good at playing herself kind of thing? Right. And then this felt like a movie where people were like, we cannot deny. There is like a level of emotional access and technique here. It's not just, oh, she's got an interesting dialect. Yeah. Kind of thing.

[02:16:17] And then the run after this is like, it could happen to you. She's the third lead of that. Or whatever. She's like the best friend character. 100%. Right. Yep. Somebody to Love is the Alexandra Rockwell. We've never seen it. That's a nice Cabiria riff. Right. She's like a taxi dancer. I think that that movie is probably like, you know, somewhat interesting. Sure. But it was tiny. She does a lot of indie stuff. I mean, I think of her. Pagina Durango's like her one kind of like lead follow-up thing there. Yeah.

[02:16:42] Um, which, uh, it's like, obviously like Hollywood is racist. Yes. Yeah. Especially in the 90s. I feel like Hollywood had not calibrated how to tell like Latin stories on screen much at all. Right. There's some movies, but there's very few. And to her credit, a lot of these indie movies we're saying that she does in the wake of the nomination are very low budget, independent, Latin stories told by Latin people that did not get support and attention. Rosie Perez is also like, she's like five foot even. Yeah.

[02:17:11] Uh, she's got this amazing accent. Like, but she is Rosie Perez. She's a spark plug. Like, you know, and it's like, I feel like probably every casting person looked at her and was like, yeah, it's Rosie Perez. Right. You bring her in as a spark plug or whatever. It's insane that no one watched this movie. Not nobody. Yeah. She did movies after this. Yeah. That she's good in. But right. Nobody watched Fearless and was like, fuck, like, I gotta use her right now for myriad quilt of role.

[02:17:44] Like, you know, like, absolutely. And it does feel like she tried to use her clout to get smaller films made that didn't really hit. When she locked the gates, her episode of WTF is incredible.

[02:18:14] Not, not surprised to hear that. She, it's like very emotional and she talks about how traumatic her childhood was and she basically didn't process any of it. She had a crazy childhood. You should listen to the WTF to talk. Like, you know. Right. And that it was, Fearless was one of the things where everyone was just like, are you okay during the scenes? Like when they called cut and she was like, yeah, why? And they were like, that seemed like something really extreme was happening within you. And she was like, oh, really? I don't know.

[02:18:42] You know that she like started only kind of after this movie doing the work to be like, why are my emotions like this? Right. She was Jeff Bridges-ing throughout the entire production of Fearless. I mean, kind of. That's the way she sort of talks about it. She was just sort of like, I just accepted everything that happened to me my entire life as normal until other people made me realize it wasn't. Very complicated family situation. She's an incredible actor. She's still around.

[02:19:10] I feel like it's like she's also like just kind of a New York celebrity. I mean. I mean, she's in highest to lowest. As for herself. As for herself. Rosie Perez. Like, it's just like she's like a forever personality. Like she was on The View for a while. You know what I mean? Like where it's like she will always be Rosie Perez. But it does feel like a major missed opportunity that she did not have a crazy career. Or even like whatever. Just yeah, like more blockbusters.

[02:19:38] More kind of like mainstream shit. Maybe she turned some of it down. I don't know. Like I. Yeah. I'm sure she did. But it's also. Like. It's like it's not a fait accompli where you're just like. Why aren't the like the 10 hottest directors in Hollywood writing shit for her right now? She's one of those people. I feel like you talked about when you interviewed Rian Johnson for Glass Onion. Sure. And asked him about Dave Bautista. Right.

[02:20:06] And he said like one of these days like Paul Thomas Anderson or someone is going to write a part that gets him an Oscar and they're going to look like a genius. And I use that term a lot in my head now where I'm like actors who are kind of just right there and someone just needs to write like the Frank TJ Mackey for them. And it's not like, oh, my God, I didn't know they could do that. It's like you build the right frame for them and you look like a genius for having them do the thing they always were capable of. Yeah. Yeah. And she's one of those where you're like, she's right there.

[02:20:36] There's no one else like her. And I think she still got her fastball. Benicio de Toro, we have not even mentioned. Oh, my God. No, I mean, it's that early run of his. Young, mumbly, tired looking Benicio. Even this is pre-usual suspects. It's post, obviously, like License to Kill and stuff like. But yeah, I think he was still just like this young guy with a really interesting face. Yeah. That people kept being like, okay, like what do we do with this guy? Because he's so beautiful. Yes. He's always been tired.

[02:21:06] Always tired. He makes me tired his whole life. He makes you look like Kelly Ripa. He, he, he looks. I got a few pounds on Kelly Ripa. She's pretty tiny. I just meant terms of tiredness. I know what you're saying. I know what you're saying. It was a good line. Thank you. It was a good line. He is, his voice is interesting. Yes. He looks interesting. Yeah. And emotionally, he is compelling even just standing there. I think the thing with him all the way to traffic, like, you know, especially things

[02:21:35] like usual suspects is he is like a Philip Glass score in a movie where you're just like, he's almost too interesting. I kind of can't stop looking at this guy. Yeah. I'm not paying attention to this story now. You had to limit how much of him you could put in a movie. Right. In this he's pretty subdued, but like sometimes he would just be like this kind of like wild, interesting, you know, energy, like, and just like, fuck, it's Benicio. He has had pretty good year. It's been pretty incredible. Yeah. We're talking about the year 2025. I remind you. Oh my God.

[02:22:02] It's not like Benicio ever left our hearts. We've always been here for Benicio. But like a kind of transcendent 2025 for him. Um, he, I'm trying to remember who it is, but someone who went to drama school with him. At Julia? Who also became, of course, but of course, uh, who also became a successful actor tells the story of seeing him like do a scene on the first day and being like, Jesus fucking Christ. What am I supposed to do now? Yeah, truly. Just being like immediately, this guy's the most interesting performer I've ever seen.

[02:22:31] And not just that he had an intelligence and a skill and a facility and whatever, but you're just like, I, I cannot look away from this guy. Yeah. And it did feel like in the nineties, he was almost like a plutonium or something where they were like, you got to really like kind of quarantine him and put him in a specific box and knock him out of the plot at a certain point. And he also does a lot of like very big stylized performances. This is like an early kind of him playing a normal guy kind of thing.

[02:22:59] And especially when so much of his work is kind of so heavy and haunted, uh, it feels like in a lesser version of this film, one that probably isn't directed by Peter Weir, where this guy is a lot, this character is like a dirt bag. Is it dirt bag? It's like unsupportive. Looking for the paycheck. Right. A hundred percent. And there are just these little brushstrokes and how the character is written and how he plays it where it's like, he's got his eye on the payout because this is amount of money

[02:23:28] that would change their fucking lives. Yeah. And they're living through a horrible, horrible incident. Yeah. And they do deserve some sense of compensation for this. And he doesn't want to get screwed. They're the types of people who often don't have the proper representation in these types of situations. And he's trying to figure out how to support her emotionally, but he is so out of his depth on it. Uh, and I just think he plays that incredibly well. Absolutely. He's very good in the movie. Everyone is good in this movie. Everyone's good.

[02:23:57] John DeLancey, my beloved John DeLancey. Uh, the, the look on his face when Bridges leaves the seat, uh, really gets me every time. The scene where he goes. Weird that he didn't use his Q powers to save the plane, but whatever. The scene where he goes to Deirdre O'Connor. That's mostly kind of extended. Cue the Star Trek character, not the conspiracy theory Tim believes in. Yeah, of course. He's movie Q, Pilt, as well. The Q takes are completely different than the, my Q movie takes are completely different

[02:24:27] than the MAGA movie takes. Yeah. Right. That's a different mode to go in. That's a different mode. Yeah. What were you going to say, Griff? Sorry. The movie MAGA night was the same night, David, because we all, we got dinner in LA, right? Yeah, I wasn't there. But you were on the group text leading up to it. Sure. Where Tim was freaking out claiming. I'm late, guys. Save me a seat. Yeah. Excuse me. Oh, oh. We were all in the same car. And were you late in the car to get to the car? Hmm. Not too bad. Not too bad. Sure, sure, sure.

[02:24:54] Tim, that was the day of Tim's freak out of, is this a psyop? You guys can't tell me that Lily Collins has been famous for 15 years. Oh, yeah. You were really insistent on that. Not that Lily Collins was an industry plant, but that he was calling bullshit on us knowing who she was. Right. I was, it started with all capitals. Lily Phillips is. Got her name wrong. Wait, fuck. Lily. Intentionally doing. Lily Collins is her. Is this Phil Collins' daughter? Like, all capitals. All caps in Terrabang.

[02:25:22] And everybody was like, yes, she has been famous forever. And I said, this is a lie. Yeah, you were like, that is not true. And we were sending you movie posters from 2010 where she's above the title. And you were saying, these are fake movies in a fake movie. Yeah. I can actually, here we go. Yeah. Lily Collins is Phil Collins' daughter. I reply, yes. Any other cues? Not cute, Phil. Griffin replies, Jane Fonda is Henry Fonda's daughter. Pretty good joke from Griff. Yeah, that's pretty good. Griff dog coming in hot.

[02:25:50] And I kind of started hitting you with like, she does kind of look like Phil Collins. Her father. I mean, like, it's like they have the same face. This is also not a thing that's kept under lock and key. And we're like, she's been famous for 15 years. This has always been a talking point. But I mean, the thing that I found funny is that like, I actually like Lily Collins. I think she's got eyebrows for days. She's been in some movies I enjoy. But the thing she's most famous for is a hit Netflix show, my friend. She's in Paris.

[02:26:18] She was the previous hit maker under the big red egg. Exactly. Her ass is in Paris. We're also like, we're sidebarring and going like, why is he getting worked up about this now? Where'd this come from? What spurred this? Nothing was happening in the news to bring this on. She hadn't gone on like a killing spree. No. My wife was listening to a lot of Phil Collins at that moment. Uh-huh. And in one of the songs, we say, and my daughter will be in rules don't apply. We're throwing out Mank and Mirror, Mirror. Right, right.

[02:26:46] She was in fucking Warren Beatty's probably last movie ever. And you're like, none of this is real. You guys are lying. You guys are lying. It just feels like if she has been famous for this long, I would have come up. Yeah. It would have come up that she's famous? Yes. Okay. Like someone would have just approached you in your gym, maybe. We're ready to go to dinner. And I go to my girlfriend. I go, I just got to give you the heads up. Tim's coming in hot. Tim's full of beans about Lily Collins.

[02:27:14] I speak of you often, but she's never met you before. And she's like, oh no, did something happen? And I was like, no, I'm just saying. Well, in 1989, she was born to Phil Collins and Jill Tabelman. I'm just saying, Tim's going to be on one tonight. And then we get there and within five minutes, he's unleashing movie MAGA. Well, you know what? You know what also came up, David? What's up? Malibu's Most Wanted. Yeah, Malibu's Most Wanted. This is the fakest controversy. To my core. I still think about it.

[02:27:43] I don't like that movie. It's fine. And I don't have a vibe that I do. Do you like other bad movies that are on Comedy Central? No, Ben is roping out. That's really all it is, my friend. Ben's face is bright red. I also don't think that movie is that bad. I remember it being kind of a two-star general. Interesting. So baby, you're the Ben Hosley of the group. Isn't it cheating much? I've only, isn't it fine? I may not have even seen it. Every accusation is a confession. I didn't realize this was something I had to confess. Wait a second.

[02:28:13] David Sims went to the Juilliard School of Film Criticism? Fucking assholes. Give me a B+. Have you seen Malibu's Most Wanted, Griffin? No. No, I haven't either. Griffin, you cannot be scandalized. You do tend to see studio comedies that were released in theaters. I only see masterpieces. I could honestly see three weeks from now Griffin coming in and guys, him being like, you know what, Malibu's Most Wanted, kind of a masterpiece. Kind of a two and a half, three star. I don't know that I've seen it. Three discs.

[02:28:42] I've seen a Jamie Kennedy film. Did he have others? A Kickin' at Old School? That I might have seen. I've definitely seen one of them. What's going on in Kickin' at Old School? Kickin' at Old School, he's a B-boy who has a breakdancing incident in which he falls into a coma, I think trying to do a head spin. Okay. And then he wakes up 20 years later and still thinks it's the 80s. And comedy ensues. Hey, I mean, sure.

[02:29:11] I suppose it's similar to has a plane crash and is no longer allergic to strong. He's kind of the fearless of the 2000s. Yeah. He's not in the Benchwarmers? No. That's Swardson and other? Okay. But Swardson co-wrote Malibu's Most Wanted. Okay. Okay. I've definitely seen the Benchwarmers. Yeah. That Lovitz is in that. Benchwarmers is... It's like it's passable. It's Happy Madison B team. It's Schneider, Spade, Lovitz.

[02:29:38] And then they try to work John Heater in at the time where Hollywood couldn't figure out, is this a thing? And then they figured something out. No, he's not. Because he's in Blades of Glory. Yeah. Yeah. And I remember that was one of those things where everyone was like, you know what's great about this movie? Will Arnett and Amy Poehler and not John Heater. Like nobody cared about John Heater. The entire run of post-Napoleon Dynamite movies all flop. Yeah.

[02:30:08] Just Like Heaven, he's in that one. And Blades of Glory was the last one in the can and was a big ass hit. Yeah, because of Feral and... And even still, I was like, so are they going to have to back around and give him another shot? And they were like, no, no, no, no. We feel settled in this. He's never starring in a studio movie ever again. He took those tickets to the front desk or whatever. And they were like, these are no longer legal tender. Like, yeah. You're back down to zero. Right? Yes. I just remember the Just Like Heaven trailer.

[02:30:38] He's like the funny friend or whatever. It is Reese Weatherspoon, Mark Ruffalo, and Napoleon Dynamite's John Heater. And he has some line where he's like, feeling a little parched. I'm going to need a cola. Like he had some weird line like that. But that moment of... And it's just every time, crickets. That was, I think, the first one post-Napoleon Dynamite. And they were like, we have to... No one knows his name. And they're not going to recognize him.

[02:31:04] We have to, in the trailer, announce that he's Napoleon Dynamite. Right. Right, right, right. Because he won't be dressed like him. Right. He won't be voting for Pedro. Before we do the box office game, anything else we want to talk about in the Fearless? One thing that I want to say about... It'd be funny if we hadn't mentioned the plane crash yet or something. Yeah. One thing that I really loved about this movie was that when I was watching it, I couldn't really get my head around it. And some of the pieces don't feel like they fit.

[02:31:33] Again, this is like a Jeff Bridges, holy fucking shit moment when he is brought back to life. Right. To the end of the movie, of course, he eats the strawberries again. And says like, I think I need you to save me or something like that. And then he has the allergic reaction, Isabella Russell and resuscitates him, and you get the feeling that he is back to normal. And they roll credits right there. Yeah. But it's like he is engaged with his human body again in fear of losing it.

[02:31:59] That moment is so incredibly brilliant on a performance level, but also in this way that it was... And I just want to... This is, I think, like a Peter Weir thing. It was like there were just puzzle pieces spread out over the table. And in that moment, he just shoved them all together and they all locked into place. Like it was like I kind of didn't really get the movie.

[02:32:28] That moment happens and now everything has been perfectly clear. And I loved that part about it. How like it kept me guessing. And then all of a sudden he just fucking locked it in so hard and then was like, here are the fucking credits. It is a really brilliant, incredible ending. That's very well said. And for a movie that's not about like plot mechanics and doesn't have big story pushes, it is another experience I love while watching a film where you're like, how the fuck is

[02:32:57] this thing going to resolve itself? And to resolve itself quickly at a point where... Yeah. It feels like there could be 20 more minutes and then they're like, no, it's over. And be like, that's perfect. And in fact, it's the only way it could have ended. And I can't believe how exquisitely you built up to this moment without letting me see what you were doing. Yes. It's not a twist. It's not like it's some crazy overstated moment, but it's just like that is how it ends. Did you buy the blue? I did. So did I. Warner Archive. I have it on my desk. Me too. Got it in the pile.

[02:33:27] Alan Davio shot this film, who of course... The first American cinematographer that Weir had worked with. He mostly kept his like above the line Australian crew. Russell Boyd and John Seale and guys like that. But coming off the fucking E.T. What? He did E.T. Empire. He might have also done Last Crusade. He worked with Spielberg a lot in the 80s. Yeah. Slocum does all the indies, but there was another... Color Purple. Sure. Those are the three, and we'll disregard Twilight Zone, the movie.

[02:33:56] But this film looks incredible, and this is a movie that needs to just look good because it's so much about like absorbing textures of things and the space and the feeling in the air and... Yeah. There is one particular shot that I want to call out, which I feel like is... I don't want to say it's a lost art, but it feels like Peter Weir in this sort of like studio system gets this script. And, you know, I didn't know about the history of it, but I was like, I didn't know exactly

[02:34:26] its developmental process, but... or its development process. But when he first sees Rosie Perez, the entire frame is filled with the shadow of Jeff Bridges standing in the doorway, and it is slightly overtaking her. And I love that moment of like visual storytelling of her being consumed by shadow.

[02:34:51] Like it basically is like a black stain that takes up and almost engulfs her in the frame, and it's a really incredible shot. And I just love that level of artistry in what is essentially studio fair. Sure. You know what I mean? Right. And what is a... I mean, I guess this crazy... It has a crazy plane crash sequence, so it's not just like a domestic drama. Yeah. Like it is a heightened crazy... But like, you know, it's largely about people dealing with their feelings. Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to find this quote. Ben, what did you want to say about?

[02:35:21] Yeah, please. Before I forget. The plane wouldn't have crashed if you were on it. No. I'm not going to claim that. If this were you, you would have eaten raspberries. The car crash scene. Yeah. There's a U2 drop. Oh, thank you for bringing this up. There's a... Yes, a wonderful U2. There's also wonderful music hearing the plane crash at the end. I had to... I have to give it up. I think that... Oh! It was really effective. And what I liked about it is that it's totally unhinged.

[02:35:50] And I think using U2 in an unhinged context, it really opened that band up and that music for me in a new way. This is awesome. Are you anti-U2? Yeah. You know what, man? I'm going to throw a little MAGA music take. I'm with you. There we go. Hell yeah. This would be a MAGA movie take. This is the kind of thing we're talking about. I understand. Like, yeah, fucking U2, get out of here. It gives us shit, man. Just wear those big glasses. Great job. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I love U2 very much. I love their music. I love that song. It's Where the Streets Have No Name, I believe.

[02:36:20] It uses a non-vocal part. Most of the music in this film, there's a Maurice Juret score that's very good, but it's a lot of classical pieces. Yeah. The big classical piece is the Henrik Garecki Symphony of Sorrow's songs, which is playing over the plane crash montage. Which is fucking incredible. It's pretty good. I mean, maybe you could have thrown in like, you know, uno, dos, tres, catorce, like that. That would be good. And like, maybe just like an Apple ad during the plane crash. I'm not cringing when the song starts.

[02:36:50] Everyone gets an album. But the movie has been in such a specific register musically. And then Streets Have No Name, which is so recognizable. It is. And it's one of those songs that has been so omnipresent for 30 plus years now that obviously when this film is made, it's more of a recent song. Jesus Christ. You're just like, well, whatever the intended use of this song was in 1993, is it abstracted

[02:37:16] now to a point where you can't listen to it and not think of car commercials or football games or whatever the fuck? It's one of these songs that's everywhere. Right. And I kept watching it being like, is the use going to get cringy at any point? And it just it is it is a transcendent use of music. It is like it's really well done. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like a perfect kind of no, you couldn't actually write an original piece of score for

[02:37:41] this that would work as well as both the way the music syncs up and like the power you gain from the recognition of what's playing. And it clearly just feels like the kind of thing that only comes out of listening to the album and being like, oh, you know what? You could construct a good sequence to listening to that part of the song and visualizing something building. Um, this film came out October 15th, 1993. Can I ask a question about the box office game? You sure can.

[02:38:11] Do you prefer or not? And maybe this is to Griffin. Griffin, I'm going to direct this to you. Do you prefer or not when the guests try to also guess with you? I'm, I'm open either way. Okay. Uh, I don't think Griffin really minds a guest jumping in. I'm not competitive, especially when I'm struggling. I, I, I love to be relieved of my misery. Okay. Number one at the box office is a film I like a lot and I think you enjoy, but I think it's more of a Sims favorite. It's an action film, a sci-fi action film.

[02:38:40] Is this an era where you feel like you might be quick to guess some of these? Was this like peak movie going time for you to hit maker? Fall 93. I mean, you would have been, you're not, you're not that much older than me. You're like four or five years older than me. I feel maybe you're older than me. I would have been a freshman in high school probably. Okay. So you're a fair bit older than me. Well, you're like seven years older. This was like prime fucking movie going. So you're seeing, you may well have seen this film. It stars two action stars. Oh, was it Independence Day? No. 93. Nope.

[02:39:08] I suppose that would have come out on Independence Day. Yes. Sorry. It's a Sims favorite. I'm not going to jump in anymore. Which studio released it? It is a Warner Brothers picture. It's a Warner Brothers sci-fi two-hander. Who stars? Is it based on anything? No. It's original. Yeah. Based on some crazy idea somebody had. It's a good movie. It's sort of the, we're approaching the final years of one of the stars' original kind of A-list career.

[02:39:38] I would say. More common for him to link up with another star, maybe to help out. And the other guy's younger, up and coming, action star. Is in the middle of a hot run in the 90s. Has his own flame out later on. I love him. But, you know. He seems like a complicated guy. Momentarily, I was thinking like Rumble in the Bronx. No. Is it a big Two-Face poster? They're looking at each other. Oh, they're looking at each other. Broken Arrow. No. No. It's not enemy mine. No.

[02:40:08] That is a real. Oh, it's Demolition Man. There we go. There he is. It's one of the real Sims favorites. It's a real favorite of mine. I love that movie so much. It's a masterpiece. Thank you. I feel like those are the two different types of. I like it. But you just don't have the passion. But it's the two different types of Two-Faces. There's the sort of broken arrow, two half faces. Two half faces. And then there's the. And then there's the face to face. Yeah. It's on. Absolutely true. So that's number one for the second week in a row. Okay. Yeah. Number two is new this week.

[02:40:37] It is a comedy film based on a TV show. 1993. It's a very popular TV show. I think this movie did okay. It's not. Is it a continuation of that show? You know. Or is it kind of a reboot or reimagining? And I cannot speak. I cannot answer that because I don't know the show very well beyond very, very basic information. And I've never seen the film. But it's not a Saturday Night Live. No, it is not.

[02:41:05] It's based on like a hit sitcom that ran for like 10 years in the 60s and maybe early 70s. It's directed by a woman. Relax, Tim. Jesus. It's not a Betty Thomas, is it? Do I have to go back to the notes? Is it a Betty Thomas? It is not. It's not Brady Bunch movie. It's not Beverly Hillbillies. It's not Leave it to Beaver. It is Beverly Hillbillies. Oh, okay. Which is directed by Penelope Spheres. I always think that movie is later. 1993. Yeah. And of course, Diedrich Bader. Dabney Coleman.

[02:41:35] Jim Varney. Dabney Coleman, Jim Varney. Is it a continuation or not? I have no idea. It's just like the Addams Family. It's like, let's just do this as a movie. Yes. Have you ever seen it? No, I never have. Ben? Saving it for when we do Spheres. You like Beverly Hillbillies? I don't remember anything about it. Yeah. I mean. I feel like they find oil probably. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Number three. And you know what? There's fun. Yeah. There's definitely fun. For sure. Number three, The Box Office.

[02:42:02] It's a family-friendly, modern, you know, hit movie. Comedy. It's the movie that like the video store rental guy would recommend to every parent, I feel, when I was a kid. This is actually a good kids movie? Like that kind of tone of... It's a good movie. But like the video store guy is like, you want a good family movie? Is that the tone of the recommendation? I guess so. It's just a movie where it's like, it's pretty harmless. Everybody kind of likes it. Straight Down the Middle, 93. It's not The Sandlot. No. It's a sports movie, though. It is a sports movie.

[02:42:31] It's not Little Giants. It's not Little Big League. It's not Rookie of the Year. No, but I mean... Angels in the Outfields? These are all movies I saw in theaters. Yeah. It's not The Big Green. No. Mighty Ducks. No. Great movies. Not D2. No. Certainly not D3. Definitely not. If you tell us the sport, will it give it away? It will. It will. So it's a specific sport. Very specific. Air Bud? It's Cool Runnings. It's Cool Runnings! Thanks.

[02:43:03] Which is... Yeah, a fun movie. Totally fun, right? I haven't seen it in 25 years. I showed it to the kids, I think, when they were a little bit like this, probably would have been five years ago. And they fucking loved it. Yeah. It's fun. Yeah, it'd be funny if I'm like, no, it's a bobsled movie. There's plenty of those. I just watched the Colin Hanks, John Candy documentary. Yes, I'd like to watch that. Sure. Is it on Netflix or... It's Prime. I think Prime. You gotta Prime it up? Prime video. Well, not today. No, not today. Not today. And maybe never again. Yes.

[02:43:32] But they talk about how the final couple of years before his very untimely premature death, that it felt like the movies were starting to... Was the guy overexposed? Right. Were getting tired? They show a lot of interviews of critics being like, so you've been in more turkeys than a fucking Thanksgiving dinner. He was kind of similar to Belushi, where he felt kind of less healthy. Like you could see him sort of... Although he's less of a party guy. No, I know, but he just looked bigger. I mean, he wasn't doing hard jobs and shit. Yeah, he was just in poor health. Yes.

[02:44:02] And he was overworked, and he was doing like four or five movies a year, and they were like, is this too much of this guy? And that I was like, but wasn't like... Cool Runnings running the other. Cool Runnings running the other. Cool Runnings like a late hit, and it's one of the last movies. Had he died? I'm not sure. Let's see. I think it's maybe the last one released while he was still alive. Yeah, no, he was still alive. Yeah, because he died early in 94. And Canadian bacon wagons used to be the two after his death. Yeah, that's exactly right. Did he not get any credit for Cool Runnings being a hit? And then I looked it up, and he's not on the fucking poster.

[02:44:30] No, because the poster is that cool Jamaican kind of cartoon of the bobsled. But he's certainly the most proven movie star in that film, and it felt like Disney was like, maybe he's actually a deterrent at this point, that we need to hide him in the marketing. Oh, wow. And also, Cool Runnings is a lot to explain to its audience. It's a lot of practice. Jamaica's got a bobsled team. Well, I mean, I don't want to negate what you just said, but it feels like that's not a lot to explain. Yeah, you actually just explained it right there.

[02:44:58] You've got a bobsled team, and so you need to engage with that news. It's a fun movie. Judd Candy's really good. He is really good, and it's a good movie. I mean, like, it's a fun movie. One of the best. One of the best? He's so funny. I mean, I grew up with him. One of my faves of all time. Number four at the box office is, and this might shock you to hear this. This is a film where Alec Baldwin plays kind of an intense guy. In the 90s? Can you believe it? It's not The Edge. Nope. Is it Malice? There we go.

[02:45:28] I'm telling you, this is like prime fucking time. You know, it's a neo-noir Harold Becker thriller. Kidman is the love interest, and Bill Pullman's in there and stuff. But it's the one where he gives the I Am God speech that Eric Sorkin wrote. Have you ever seen Malice? No, I've never seen Malice. I've seen that clip. Yeah. I feel like I remember it being good. I haven't watched it recently. Solid, yeah. Solid 90s thriller.

[02:45:58] Baldwin kind of an interesting counterpoint to the Bridges discussion. Obviously, Bridges started so much younger, right? Had been a movie star for longer. True. But in the 90s, I think they were like, Bridges has found his place. This is where he is. This is where he lives. And Baldwin was another guy you went to if the top 10 turned it down. But the difference was Hollywood was like, is Baldwin one movie away from becoming one of the 10? Yeah, no.

[02:46:24] It kept being like, isn't he an A-lister or is he not? Isn't he like an inch away from it? Right. Yeah. And then it'll, you know, movies like Malice, it'll be like, yeah, rack up 50 mil for it. Like, it's not like a nothing burger. Yeah. But it's not quite. Number five. This is a thriller, an action thriller. Okay. I feel it is 100% best known for its soundtrack. It has an iconic. Is it Judgment Night?

[02:46:53] It is the film Judgment Night movie in which, of course. Emilio? Yes. Directed by Stephen Hopkins, in which, of course, Emilio Estevez, Cuba Gunning Jr., Jeremy Piven, and Stephen Dorfer are on the run from Dennis Leary. You could have just said The Boys and we would have known the cast. You didn't have to name them one by one. But it's just one of those things where, like, you look at the poster and it's like Emilio and Dorf and Cuba looking stressed out. Yeah. And then behind him in silhouette is fucking Dennis Leary smoking a cigarette. I'm like, the man was everywhere.

[02:47:23] Like, he was out there saying, like, whatever, coffee shouldn't have sugar in it or whatever. And everyone was like, ah! Right? YouTube weirdly... He's also in fucking Demolition Man. Yeah. YouTube algorithm stirred me up the Rich Eisen show, my favorite show, which I complimented Tim for being on. And Tim said, I was never on that show. And then I sent him back his own clip. But Rich Eisen, he seems like a good interviewer. I love it. He was actually. It's a good time. Yeah. I remember it now. I have fond memories from him being, him and Stuart Scott being my favorite guys when my

[02:47:53] brother James, he was watching SportsCenter. SportsCenter. Those two guys I found fun. Stuart Scott, absolute legend. Rest in power. The best. Do you remember when we were? Rest in power. We're going to bring him back to draft day. Remember that night where we were? He's in the movie. He's in the movie. Yeah. And there was this night where Griffin and I were, like, sitting looking at our phones. And he came in and was like, everybody's on their phone these days. Nobody talks anymore. And immediately Griffin and I, like, put our phones out. We're like, fuck Dennis. And then we're like, Dad, what's going on, man? And he was like, oh, I didn't really have anything to say. So we kind of like, well, fucking tell us a story, man.

[02:48:23] You're Dennis Leary, asshole. You're Dennis Leary. You've definitely told this story before. It's a great story. And this story apparently inspired the Fox sitcom where he's a military general. Yeah. Did that keep going? That one? It's still on the air. Is that the story that he told? The creator of that show listens to this podcast and was like, oh, someone should write a show where Dennis Leary has a reason to yell at people all the time. I mean, he is good at it. What if he's a drill sergeant or whatever? I guess he's a general. I don't know. I don't fucking know. Rude. Sorry. I'm sorry.

[02:48:52] No, I'm being rude. Yes. Thing I was going to say, Rich Eisen had Jeremy Piven on. Mm-hmm. And he asks him about the Larry Sanders show. Uh-huh. And that's a show he quit a season and a half in because he thought they weren't giving him enough material. Right. And he keeps asking him, like, what was it like, Larry Sanders? And he keeps going, like, answering anything but Larry Sanders and being like, and I'm on that show and I get cast on Seinfeld and I've never even watched Seinfeld because I don't even own a TV. And they're like, right, but Larry Sanders.

[02:49:22] And he won't answer it. And I think he's trying to talk around how much of a brat he was on Larry Sanders. And he goes, look, I was just so young. I was so green. I'm right out of college. And suddenly I'm on a TV show and it was crazy. And then I was like, do the years line up for that? I look it up. He's 27. He had been in seven movies. Jeremy Piven, I'll, yes, I'll just say. What is this story? I feel like he massages the truth once in a while. Unfortunately, not the only thing he massages without permission.

[02:49:51] I think that you are right. Like, for all the credit that the Hot Ones guy gets for, like, his questions, I feel like Rich Eisen is not a softball guy. He's a really good interviewer. He's a really good interviewer. And he loves movies and TV. He's a real nerd about it. I don't watch his show when he has a fucking athlete on. Why not? Anytime he has an actor on, I'm like, he's asking really good questions. He's good. He knows the catalog.

[02:50:18] When he has Ray Liotta on and he's got that signed Goodfellas poster and Ray Liotta's like, I never signed that. It's not my signature. Make him smash it open and sign it. It's good shit. Ben Hosley is fully checked out. Ben, have you, you know the Judgment Night soundtrack? If not, queued up on Spotify. You're going to love it. Great hip hop soundtrack from the early 90s. I'm serious. All right. I'll check it out. I'm serious. You will. You will. I'm not like. I like the Sims. I like it. I like it. Funky fresh.

[02:50:47] Hosley's got the Sims posture right now. He does. And Sims is leaning in. Sims is leaning in. Sims is wide awake. The side of Sims. What is happening? Number six at the box office. It's because of Amazon. Yeah. Is turned everything off. Jesus, we almost spent three hours on Fearless. On Fearless. Hell, yeah. An excellent film. David, what's number five at the box office? Number five is Judgment Night. Number six is The Good Son. I'm going to call it a Culkin thriller. Uh-huh. Number seven is- Overdub him swearing. Oh, yeah. Because they didn't want it to.

[02:51:13] If they wanted to be able to say he's still, like, he is not sullied by the swear words. It would have broken America. It would have broken America. So they overdubbed a hit that when he was like, don't fuck with me. Number six is, yeah, I said already. Good Son. Number seven is The Joy Luck Club. Great movie. Number eight is- Go away. Age of Innocence. Pop up. Number nine. Age of Innocence. Great movie as well. With Hunter and Ryder. Number nine, The Fugitive, which we love.

[02:51:42] Number ten, A Bronx Tale, which was a flop at the time and has become quite a beloved classic, obviously. And there's that scene where Chaz Palminteri fucks up the Hells Angels in the bar. The TikTok is like, you want to watch this scene? I'm like, I fucking watched it yesterday. And they're like, give it another ganda. Yeah. At dinner last night, having this conversation about how- It's dinner. I do all sorts of crazy shit. What dinner were you eating? Just like a dinner in the lobby of the hotel. I was in New York at a hotel. I was so lazy.

[02:52:12] He can't even leave his lobby. New York needs tourism. I love it. I just heard anything he says on him. Take those long legs out for a walk. Gotta move that butt around. NYC needs to see those gams. Exactly. A sidewalk isn't good enough for you? Right. I need a four-inch inseam on your shorts. We really gotta get all the gams out. How are people gonna know if you're walking here? Exactly. What else does one do in New York? That, like, they're now doing-

[02:52:39] They'll do it with, like, the shitty horror movies that were made in, like, 2011 that you've never seen. Where it's, like, the man wants to go into the bathroom, but he does not know that there is another man behind with a knife. You know what I mean? Like, where they have, like, the shitty AI. Right. But they're starting to do that with, like, Titanic. And, like, movies that everybody- Like, they've been doing it with Goodfellas. Like, they try to enter the bar, but instead of going through the front door, they go through the kitchen where they- Actually, I'm intrigued, and I will be clicking on your link.

[02:53:10] Sounds like they might have fixed Goodfellas. Giving it a clearer title. Yeah. Like, I don't know. What is it about pizza? I don't understand. Tim, you're the best. Guys, I love this so much. Hey, it's so nice that we got to do this because you're not in town that often. That often. And hopefully you'll be back in town soon, though. One of the- And we don't have to do a podcast, maybe. And I love New York City. Right? And, like, their dreams that I have of staying here for longer periods of time all include-

[02:53:37] And this is 100% true- All include my ability to be on this podcast more often. We'd love to have you on more often. But unfortunately, we're booked up, so- Yes. No, no, no. Yes. But also, I'd love to just get dinner with you. Yeah. We're gonna hear a tell of a dinner you guys all got in L.A. Ugh. Get on a plane and do it. It was a nice dinner. It was some pizza. It was fun. That was good? It was a fun time. And we shut it down. They were, like, changing the light bulbs in the restaurant. Somebody had a ladder out. Like, we had to apologize.

[02:54:06] Like, thank you so much for letting us- We were supposed to go see Mars Attacks of Vidiots, and we ran past that by, like, two hours. You arrived while the credits were rolling or whatever. Sounds good. Fantasy made fun of me. He's like, you're wearing linen pants and drinking orange wine? Who are you really? That sounds awesome to me, my friend. That was L.A. Benny. L.A. Benny. L.A. Benny. I mean, like, you know, let's do it. Love it. What used to be several different group texts we combined into sort of a mega, not mega,

[02:54:35] mega group texts that we call News and Deals that's ostensibly designed for us to share physical media announcements and discounts and becomes a bit of a garbage plate of every other opinion we have. Yeah. But my favorite thing is when- Because we'll all gang up on each other and say, yeah, everyone gets their turn in the barrel to be the butt of a joke, right? And everyone- Lowry seems to be broadly unscathed at this point. How can you make fun of David Lowry? You can't make fun of him. Jesus Christ. He's like a creature from another universe. He's got the eyes of an angel. Exactly.

[02:55:06] Beautiful. People will pile up on Sims, and then David will go like, I'm sorry, in my defense, I'm the only one in here who has to raise twins, and like three times he's dropped this, and you go like, excuse me. I have never done that. It has happened. I do have you beat, though. And you go- I have me beat. And I've met other twin parents. I meet more twin parents now. My kid's in school with two twins, right? Like, where the other kid's in another class, right? Because they split them up, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'll be like, I have twins, too. And they're like, oh, you do?

[02:55:35] Where's your sibling? And I'm like, no, I have twins in addition. And they'll go, oh, fuck. Like, literally, other parents have been like, Jesus. The reason I remember that this did, in fact, happen is you said this, right? And Tim was like, I have twins as well. And you were like- I was like, take a hike. Yours aren't babies. Yeah, take a hike. Well, it's true. Yeah, they're 13. Famously easy age. Famously easy age to parents. Well, before you got here, you were like, Tim and I- I was getting coffee, and Amazon was down.

[02:56:04] Griffin said the best, best excuse ever. Usually his excuse is the train is late or whatever. So they had to brew a new pot. They did! I said, three cups for me and my friends, please. And they said, we can only give you one. It'll take us so long here at the coffee shop. The POS is down, the coffee shop's on fire, I couldn't place a mobile order. Tim and I were talking about this, yes. His- I have immediate child problems, which are, feed me, change me, I can't sleep, whatever.

[02:56:34] My teeth hurt. You have complex emotional problems dealing with teenagers. I have, like, the Jeff Bridges in Fearless level of problems with mine. Like, I don't know if this is solvable, man. Maybe stop driving your car into a wall while your kids are in the car. That is not the best way to address every issue. But the lesson of Fearless is that's how you teach lessons. Yeah. It works. I've got an idea. Nothing else is working. Oh, boy. Just blast where the streets have no name. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

[02:57:03] Make your twins hold on to their toolboxes for dear life. Give them a little kiss and just pedal to the metal. What a pleasure. Yeah. Nobody wants this string now on Netflix. Thank God you did this today and not tomorrow when you were, like, sandwiched between Kelly Clarkson and whatever other, like, you know. We were truly going to have to do it in between two fucking talk show appearances. Yes. And I was stressed out about getting to this point of being like, we haven't even spoken about the movie and I now have to leave two and a half hours in. Which is a disaster.

[02:57:34] Yeah. Thank you all for listening. Is there anything else you want to plug? No. I think we did it all. Great. Nobody wants this came out six months ago. We have a TV show. I mean, sorry, a podcast. Oh, yeah. That is a good thing. I do a podcast with Matt Walsh where we now cover movies that have presidents or vice presidents in them. And it's called Second in Command. You can find us on Patreon. I did an episode on Dave. The penis question, the big central penis question of the Ivan Reitman film Dave was discussed in depth. In depth. I'm going to get into it.

[02:58:04] Yeah. Thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. Tune in next week for... Is next week Truman? Yeah. This is the thing about Peter Weir. You're like, damn, fearless. Like, this rocks. He's really hitting this amazing Hollywood stride. And it's like Truman Show Master and Commander way back. Yeah. Like, his career's almost over. Well, and we'll talk... And he's going to make great movies. We'll talk about it next week. But the whole thing with Truman is they're like, great news. Jim Carrey wants to do the movie. Bad news.

[02:58:32] He is actually booked for the next two years straight. Right. He will do it, but you're sixth in line. So he has like two years of prep on that movie. Right. Which is part of why that movie is... I was going to say, it's so good. It probably helped. Right. But, yeah. Who's your guest? J.D. Amato. I think J.D. is going to be on that one, barring... The great J.D. Amato returned to the show. Over on the Patreon, tomorrow we release an episode on Devil Wears Prada 2. Okay. That is true. We will definitely be doing that. That schedule, right, in general, who knows? Assuming no release date changes.

[02:59:03] Yep. No, that thing feels like it is going to eat at the start of summer. Right? That thing is going to crush. Right. And we're going to have a special guest. Yeah. My sister, Romley Newman, longtime sister, returned to the show for the first time in many years. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, and as always, movies are great again. MAGA.

[02:59:33] Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hosley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas. And our associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy. Research by J.J. Birch. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in the Great American Novel, with additional music by Alex Mitchell. Artwork by Joe Bowen, Holly Moss, and Pat Reynolds. Our production assistant is Minnick.

[03:00:03] Special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish, and Nate Patterson for their production help. Head over to blankcheckpod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit. Join our Patreon, Blank Check Special Features, for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us on social at blankcheckpod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook, on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions. Follow us on social networks. See you next time. E Jin Holding. Bye,