The Postman with Emily St. James

[00:00:01] Blank Check with Griffin and David, Blank Check with Griffin and David Don't know what to say or to expect All you need to know is that the name of the show is Blank Check

[00:00:19] Wouldn't it be great if wars could just be fought by the podcasters who started them? Wait, what? Replacing the word assholes? Now, I think I got in my head. I said right before we started recording I think I'm going to struggle this entire mini-series

[00:00:40] On the difference between Costner and Biden Biden's just older He's got a youth it up Felt like I used to have a good Costner Sure From time spent in the trenches Costner's someone who you should be able to do an impression of

[00:00:55] Because he has a more distinctive voice Yeah But especially in the 90s he's got the very California vibe And now he's like Yeah, there's like, yeah He's one of those guys who secretly you're like Of course you're from like the wilds of Montana

[00:01:11] Right? He's like no, no he's not But anyway, carry on The first thing he ever said to me When they introduced me to him on the set of Draft Day On my first day of filming He went, uh, so where are you from? And I went New York

[00:01:25] And he went, New York A real actor, not one of these surfer guys Right You told me that before I think He said, not like one of these body boarders Wow Body boarders found dead in the water

[00:01:38] And I immediately was like, I don't know if I'm a real act I just live in New York What if you then turned around and you were holding a boogie board And you're just like, oh forget it Boogie board, sorry I said body boarder

[00:01:48] I will say I look at you And I can tell you've never been on a boogie board And he clocked that correctly But yes, no there is that weird There's that part of him that's like Half cowboy, half surfer dude Right Very laconic Biden's even when he's older

[00:02:06] He's got more I'm losing, they're mushing together in the middle Biden is hard to do Like Biden is not like There's a reason he's not been easy to like Do on SNL or whatever The fascinating thing of like no one had a Biden

[00:02:20] Even like when Sudeikis did Biden on SNL It was one of those things where it's like He's just made a character with a Biden That's coming completely up that's not resembled a man at all Right And then Dana Carvey did that one interview where he's like

[00:02:32] I think I figured out Biden And now everyone once again just does their impression of Dana Carvey's impression Yeah Who does it now because it's not Johnson Because they didn't want him to play both Of course it makes sense So now it's Mikey Day

[00:02:48] And it's like Mikey Day is doing an impression of James Austin Johnson's impression of Dana Carvey Which like Josh's fucking Biden is good And so like his Trump is better And everyone is just doing once again Like the George H.W. Bush

[00:03:00] Like oh we just all took the rhythms Of what Dana Carvey identified You gotta The economy Remember when Jim Carrey did fire Marshall Bill For a year as Biden Yes And everyone was just like this is bad Universally there was never any interest in it whatsoever

[00:03:18] And they were just like Carrey's coming back For six more And he was elected president And they were like so what we need to do is like Find someone who can actually be here every single week Woody Harrelson He was the best Biden

[00:03:32] And they did it three times He made a ton of sense as Biden They did it three times It's like what a surprise Woody Harrelson doesn't want to commit to a schedule He'd be good to miss This is almost like a full hour of conversation

[00:03:46] Here's my biggest take on this movie Right off the bat I'm not sure if the two of you agree with me On paper It seems like you can see the world In which Kevin Costner directing this movie Is a good choice

[00:04:00] And you can see the world in which Kevin Costner starring In this movie is a good choice And him doing both is disastrous Yes absolutely It's kind of like live by night The thing where Affleck finally let himself Fascinating live by night comparison point

[00:04:14] Affleck's the lead of Argo obviously But that's an ensemble movie He's doing the yeoman's work And then in live by night Affleck's like I'm going to finally star again I guess he's the star of the town Maybe I should take it back

[00:04:28] But even then that's a movie where he's letting everyone else have the color There's a kind of movie That the person directing Can also star in And it's not a movie where they're playing a messiah figure Ever ever ever Especially after you've already kind of done it once

[00:04:44] The whole time I just kept flipping back and forth In the mental exercise of Okay is it better if Costner directs And if so who stars Or is it better if he stars and if so who needs to be directing I think it's better if he directs

[00:04:56] I don't think he should be starring Clearly he's never directed a film that he didn't star in So clearly he just wants to star in the movie This is my take on this He should have played one of the mayors Or sheriffs in one of the towns

[00:05:08] And Billy Bob Thornton should have been the guy Thornton is hot right in 1997 That's acceptable to me Here's my galaxy brain take I had about half way through watching What if Costner played the Will Patton role Yeah And then you're right

[00:05:25] I think the guy you have to cast as the postman Is less of a conventional marquee idol guy To be clear This, if you're doing the same three hour movie Probably does not fix this stuff Unless you guys love this movie Do you guys love this movie? No

[00:05:41] I liked it more than I remembered liking it I was rooting for it so hard This is a movie where I'm like I just feel like we're exactly the same The first 45 minutes I thought the gas was off And I was like this thing isn't perfect

[00:05:55] But I'm building my defense For why it deserves a little more respect on its name It's not just that the oven stops working Like the oven turns into, I don't know A washing machine Like the gas is gone I'd say first hour you're like

[00:06:09] This isn't a perfectly functioning oven And the second hour You're like the gas has been turned off But it's still kind of a nice looking oven And I'm remembering the meals I had And then the third hour you were like The oven is caught on fire

[00:06:23] And it's burning down my entire apartment It's the first hour's oven Second hour's like easy bake oven And then the third hour's like Some guy just comes in and sits on the food And you're like well it's gonna be warm Someone's like shining a flashlight on a turkey

[00:06:37] You're holding a magnifying glass in the sun Trying to cook it By heat It is the fascinating example of a movie That just gets worse and worse as it goes on I watched it on a plane And like watching it on a plane was a great experience

[00:06:51] Because it was a long flight I was stuck with this movie You know the people next to me were watching Wish On their little in screen And I was like this movie seems like it doesn't work at all And the postman seemed good in comparison

[00:07:03] And you're gonna have to watch Wish two more times before you land Exactly And in that environment I was like this movie's kinda working for me And then the last hour I was like Oh no this is a disaster The whole time I'm watching it

[00:07:15] And I'm like I bet he nails the last hour I bet even with this movie Having some inherent issues The last hour is gonna work On some sort of base Like rah rah Sort of nationalistic whatever And then you're like completely falls apart

[00:07:31] But you also saw this movie in theaters I saw it in theaters, I read the book And weirdly the one person in America prepared to discuss the postman I was wondering if you'd read the book The book I'm gonna ask Sounds cool I am re-reading it right now

[00:07:45] I remember this book being great It is more overwritten than I remember In that manner of 80s sci-fi But it's pretty fucking good I'm sure this is in the dossier Emma has always been recommending his The Uplift Like his masterful hard sci-fi Trilogy Is this serialized in like

[00:08:05] Yes, so it is in four parts Although the fourth part is basically an epilogue The first two parts are novellas That were placed in magazines And then he was like I'm gonna write a third part Pull it all together This movie mostly adapts the first

[00:08:19] Section which is a smart choice And then they tack on some of the third Which is like a final battle I would say that's the bad choice It's one of the bad choices There's a few Well what's the podcast It's Blank Check with Griffin and David I'm Griffin

[00:08:39] I'm David I'm pinning this for a moment Post intro Something about Costner line delivery It's a podcast about filmographies Directors who have massive success early on In their careers Such as winning best picture the first time out Making one of the highest grossing films

[00:08:57] In history up until that point Way up there One of the higher grossing It was like number two in 1990 Only cause Home Alone You're not wrong I'm always bad at knowing What was on what list But it made a ton of money I kind of believe

[00:09:17] At the time of its release It was probably in the top 25 highest grossing films One day you know what It's gonna be a project of mine I'm gonna build my own list I'm gonna figure it out I know what the top 25 was In any given year

[00:09:33] If anyone wants to get on that for me I will give you a few thousand dollars That's a true promise This is gonna be your model railroad When your kid's like 13 And she's got stuff going on You're gonna be in your basement Making a spreadsheet

[00:09:49] It was an exact science But box office mojo used to have The drop down menu of any year We used to have hope Would the 2017 films Make in 1945 Like that's when I would start Zooming out in weird directions You're um Galifianakis At the poker table

[00:10:09] Or whatever it is This series is called Podcasts with Wolves That's right That's what we do We podcast with wolves And they've given us that title This is the second film In the directorial filmography Which is already a classic mistake Of like

[00:10:29] And it's very similar to the Affleck thing Of like Wow you know what You proved us all wrong You're a serious filmmaker And you did it well with yourself at the center And then he's like I'm gonna make a bunch of other shit Before I direct again

[00:10:47] Well we'll talk about the acting He made several great films In that period Weirdly his blank check extended To the people he worked with Cause like Wyatt Earp and Waterworld Do not exist It's why we're covering him The amount of blank checkness Around this man

[00:11:07] Obviously helped by the fact that he was a huge movie star On top of the fact that his directorial debut Was a Oscar winning best picture Blockbuster It's like 20 years of blank checks And now he's doing it again It's just he got because he's so big on television

[00:11:23] Everything about it's insane Everything about his career is interesting Insane but like For him to take 7 years Off from fully directing A movie again When he had a lot of projects in between Some worked some didn't Where he was a major authorial voice If not the dominant voice

[00:11:43] When he's like I'm back and I'm making the postman I do think it sets in place a bunch of Expectations of like Remember how good dances with wolves is There's so much of this that's smart He's gonna swing back

[00:11:57] The idea like this is a western but in a different mode Everything about it should work And it doesn't I'll crack open the dossier in a minute But we'll introduce our guest We're talking today the postman Yes I said that Our guest today returning to the show

[00:12:13] Emily St. James Yellow jackets This man wears a blue jacket You write yellow jackets The postman wears a blue jacket I should like work some Right now we're in 1997 In the past they are in the Canadian wilderness They have no knowledge of pop culture

[00:12:31] But they should just start talking about the postman It should just come to them fully formed Lorelei Gilmore review Did you see it? Postman Tom Petty playing Tom Petty That great big speech about once upon a time It'll make you laugh, it'll make you cry

[00:12:45] I'm saying this to Rory as Rory's running out the door Or whatever You must remember That was just lodged in my brain I have seen bits of this movie on cable over the years Or whatever I've probably seen a funny clip or two

[00:12:59] Like in a sort of famous flop Kind of like a sizzle reel But most of all I just think of Lorelei saying It'll make you want to mail something Because you're like well it can't really be about Mail right? It's not about mailing letters

[00:13:16] As some sort of movement That's literally what it's about Right Like what America needs is mail This movie in several ways Was different than what I had thought It was But I had always thought it was He has like the last Bag of mail

[00:13:36] And he's Johnny Appleseed going across This broken country delivering The final letters Not wrong It's part of the movie I didn't realize this movie is a liar And an actor Assumes this identity Then it becomes enough of a thing that he does have to do that

[00:13:54] But then it becomes that he basically Becomes this political Figure ideal Right, pretty quickly That starts a revolution but also makes people love mail again That it's new letters And I like mail! Mail's good! I was watching it and I was quietly

[00:14:12] The most successful aspect of this film I did truly go I should write more letters Like Lorelei Gilmore be damned It does kind of make me want to mail something The thing about this movie is that It has aged It's messaging has aged very well

[00:14:28] In a way that the movie itself has not And it's wild that the movie doesn't work Because you're like culture has fucking Caught up to this thing What you were trying to do in a lot of ways It's so fucking sloppy In the 90s people like

[00:14:42] Took the post office for granted Mallard Fillmore would make fun of it in the newspaper Like Mallard Fillmore was like That was his big grudge was against the post office And Mallard Fillmore won Turned him into And now the post office is like A shell of itself

[00:15:00] Remember when Mallard Fillmore Drew like a you know Chewy caricature of Jon Stewart Like with a giant nose And then like had to apologize I just want to point out The way you said that sentence Made it sound like Mallard Fillmore The character also draws his own script

[00:15:18] Bruce Tinsley Is the author of It was because Do you remember what I'm talking about Because the Jon Stewart book had like A fake Mallard Fillmore that ended with Mallard Fillmore just like It was like Mallard Fillmore talking about high taxation I forgot to make a joke

[00:15:36] Classic Mallard Fillmore Yeah but yeah he hated The fucking post office Bruce Tinsley Because when you're a newspaper comic strip you had to deal With the post office a lot because you had to mail your Strips you do also have to write a

[00:15:48] Whole ass comic strip every day And if yours is about a Republican Duck like you do have To hit some topics over and over I've talked about this with the Lockhorns as a child But that was another one when I was like

[00:16:00] Three or four and I would make my dad read The funniest to me where I'd be like This is inexplicable This thing and he'd be like you have to understand It's like this was like that character Shares a name with a Nixon speechwriter And I'd be like

[00:16:14] Why isn't the duck doing funny things No Mallard Fillmore of course Was the 13th president of the United States Who was famously a racist I wasn't saying I was saying like supporting characters Because even he'd try to set me and be like

[00:16:28] It's called Mallard Fillmore because Mallard's a name For a duck and Millard was the president And I'm like okay who's this guy And he's like oh god this guy is Like every joke Involves so much explaining And usually was not even funny if you knew the inside Sorry

[00:16:44] War on the mail And now we're in the 2020s where the post office Has been gutted by Louis DeJoy And you know You imagine him watching this movie And having like a Mr. Potter-esque reaction Of like fuck that guy And technology

[00:17:00] Like beyond it getting gutted by our government Right By like tyrants It also is like well we don't We're just texting all day We don't take the time to sit down and write long ant And the emotional intensity Like the moment

[00:17:16] The first moment in the movie where a letter is received By someone Is maybe the most emotionally effective part of the movie Where you're like this is an idea This idea has some fucking potency You read the book And the book is so good on that point

[00:17:30] It's so much like this guy finds this bag of mail And he finds just enough people Who like read these letters and have emotional reactions And he realizes like He's an actor in the book too And he's just like this is such a powerful thing

[00:17:42] And then the book immediately is like This is a movement and it's important to have this movement And it's important to have society But it can't be just one guy And this movie is like it's kind of just one guy I mean that's the Costner thing

[00:17:55] I grew up with this movie In that like there is this weird balancing act With movie stars Where people who become like A-list Beloved movie stars Which Costner for a decade was like If not the definitive guy Was at the absolute top tier Like just an insane run

[00:18:13] That basically starts With Untouchables And this is the hard end of it Yeah it is From this moment on it's like you're now kind of like This leading man You still get to be above the title You still get vehicles

[00:18:29] But the movies are not treated the same way With the same importance After this point This is the last time where he's still presented as like This man is one of the pillars of America To be fair obviously Waterworld had blown a giant hole In his career

[00:18:43] And this is the It's like you can have one of those not two Right exactly This should have been his comeback And then whatever Then the X-Wing crashed into the side of a hill If he came off of Waterworld Directing his first movie

[00:18:59] In seven years and it was good People would be like you know what you shut us up I think especially if he's in a supporting part Like we've talked about If he gives himself over to the movie And like lets someone else take the lead Whoever that is

[00:19:13] Even if the movie's not that good I think yeah The postman I do just like Dances with Wolves is 1990 It wins Best Picture And Best Director over Goodfellow And was made a lot of money In 1991 He was in Robin Hood and JFK

[00:19:33] Robin Hood is a fairly risible movie But it made a lot of money And had a hit song and was a big deal It was a big cultural JFK is also kind of a risible movie But it also rocks And made a ton of money

[00:19:47] Are you saying Riz-able It's got Riz It's got that unspoken Riz JFK is like It's a mountain of bullshit but it rocks And it's great and it's like so much fun And it was his Sort of low level version Of the Spielberg Schindler's List Jurassic Park year

[00:20:07] Where it wasn't breaking Everything in the same way He had the movie that was the presumed Oscar front runner for Best Picture Where he gives an excellent performance Working with one of the top directors in Hollywood At that moment And then he has one of the bigger blockbusters

[00:20:23] Yes he's doing a terrible accent Yes everyone just remembers Alan Rickman from that movie But still 1990 to 1991 This guy is magic You can mock him all you want But he's just like connecting When my baby was brand new My wife and I were like

[00:20:41] Let's watch a bunch of Costners America! A better time Relaxing Comforting We caught up on a lot we hadn't seen Including Draft Day Draft Day is a great movie to watch with your baby You can just dip in and out They're going to figure it out

[00:20:59] But we got to Robin Hood Prince of Thieves Which we watched all of and we were like We're kind of done with this guy He's really annoying in that movie The thing about him is His magic period when he's at the top of the world

[00:21:13] Is also when you start getting annoyed by him This is the point I was trying to make Kind of doing the same thing over and over This movie stardom thing There's this weird balancing act Of getting to that level of movie stardom Requires some sense of familiarity

[00:21:27] With the audience Where they know you They feel like they have some intimate relationship with you And a sense of trust Of I'm buying a ticket for this guy's movie Because I'm in on this guy I'll follow him anywhere I'll follow him from JFK to Robin Hood

[00:21:43] The other part of it is There does have to remain some kind of unknowability There has to be something That the audience can't quite crack about a movie star I think For them to stay Otherwise if it's like yeah I get it I know his thing

[00:21:59] They get bored and then they bail out And this is the movie where it feels like Everyone codified Have you noticed that Kevin Costner keeps positioning himself In a weird way in all of these movies And once it becomes a meme in that way

[00:22:11] Where there's a clean handle on it You're fucking done It's weird because he has this second lane In his star persona of I'm a horny freak Yes He sure does You're no way out You're bull Durham He's got tin cup

[00:22:29] And that's kind of the end of Kevin Costner's story Wait let me keep going That's where he needed to pivot a little bit I just want to say this one thing Because this jumped out to me I was on the Trivia page For this movie On IMDB

[00:22:48] And I think it mentioned That this is the third movie He had made at that point Where he has an animal Who's a best friend Who tragically gets murdered In a way that incentivizes the rest of the film And you're like that's when you're fucked

[00:23:04] Because the audience is like Do you notice he literally hits the same story beats Not just that he makes himself a messianic figure Or the stoic cowboy who solves everything But it's like And it's always that you know he's good

[00:23:16] Because he has the animal and the animal dies And that manipulates us and all that shit That's when you're just like It was the same thing with Will Smith and Seven Pounds Where it's like why does Will Smith keep dying For our sins

[00:23:28] What is this weird occupation he has And then Will Smith has to go away for four years After that 1991 In 1992 he makes The Bodyguard It is a gigantic smash hit We rewatched that for my podcast And it's It's campy It was like I didn't have a good time

[00:23:48] Watching it but then talking about it I was like this movie is fun as hell to talk about And the songs are great It's campy, it's pretty stupid It's a huge hit In 1993 he makes A Perfect World with Clint Eastwood It's not a smash hit It did fine

[00:24:04] But is a lovely movie And one of his best performances So even though it's a dip in sort of his box office power It's not as much a movie Being sold on Costner No because it's Costner and Eastwood Are the stars, Costner's playing kind of a bad boy

[00:24:18] And it feels like Costner is like You know what I want to work with one of my Inspirations It really reminds me of Bradley Cooper doing Nightmare Alley Where I think that's one of his best performances I love him in that movie

[00:24:30] I know that I have a very minority take on that It's one of my favorite del Toros And like I think Him doing that just to sort of see How del Toro works Costner working with Eastwood And Eastwood's Best Picture follow up Is such a smart career idea

[00:24:46] Even though the movie didn't do great But also a movie where it feels like he's letting go of his star persona And being like Clint I'm an actor, use me how you see fit And it's one of his better performances Because he's just like

[00:24:58] Succumbing to the material in a good way He's giving himself over Okay I'm actually forgetting, he has three flops Wyatt Earp is also a flop That's his 1994 film that runs into Tombstone Which is short and fun Wyatt Earp is long and not fun

[00:25:12] Wyatt Earp's supposed to be popcorn Or rather Tombstone's supposed to be popcorn Wyatt Earp's supposed to be the big epic And then Tombstone is like Seen as more fun and also A better movie Tombstone is a better movie despite Literally they fired the director

[00:25:28] Like they had crazy shit happen on set Like blah blah blah it's kind of trashy Wyatt Earp is like Larry Kasdan Passion Project, Costner Playing an American legend And no one remembers it On paper it should be the equivalent Of like Affleck doing Gone Girl

[00:25:44] Where it's like I know I should be making my Fucking Best Picture follow up But like come on this is on paper Good material, good director I'll obviously be very involved So he's in the plane and the plane Just got like hit by some flack He'll be okay

[00:26:00] He makes The War also in 1994 which I've never seen Is that the Elijah Wood? Yeah He's like a Vietnam vet who bonds with a kid It's okay It's the kind of movie It's the kind of movie where if Either Wyatt Earp or Waterworld had been a smash

[00:26:16] It would have been like yeah he did a little thing Went and did a small movie I think no one's holding it against him But also there may be questioning Three years ago would his name alone Have made that movie a hit

[00:26:28] If he wasn't coming off a little bit of a A cold Chill In 19, sounds like Mr. Freeze was involved Wait a second, Frozen Empire? Yeah it sounds like Ice Ghost from that movie Whose name I've already forgotten But I like to think of him as Ice Ghost Akara

[00:26:48] Okay, in 1995 he makes Waterworld, now we will be covering that film On our Patreon in a couple weeks We can get into it more then But that film was quite expensive Not enjoyed By critics or audiences And made little money And had six months of the press

[00:27:06] Being like get ready for this fucking disaster Where it landed basically As a pre-packaged fiasco I think that movie Has had like a bigger cultural footprint Then a lot of movies There's no question Waterworld is kind of liked now And has like the stunt

[00:27:25] There are things about Waterworld that still exist And it also was like It was certainly It performed under expectations Especially relative to it being the most expensive Movie ever made at that point in time It did not perform as badly As people remember it performed

[00:27:41] Or for a while For a while Peacock Was looking at making a TV series of it Because they like did the research Very hard to get in on that They did the research on it and were like People remember what this is And the thing about it is

[00:27:57] It is like Battlestar Galactica People remember what it is Do they remember if they like it? I have to go, I'm closing the door It is like Battlestar Galactica The world has caught up To it now because Climate Change is front of mind

[00:28:11] That movie is about climate change And like you could see You know, you could almost do like a fucking Waterworld prequel That is just set right now I think we are about to live in a water world And that is all you need

[00:28:23] And that movie was filmed at the last moment Maybe when they would have just truly Shot the entire thing on water Which obviously made the production a nightmare And so expensive and I think that is a lot of the movies

[00:28:33] Lasting values, you watch it and you are like Holy shit this looks crazy But today they would be like We can film this in a tank CGI makes it a lot easier to tell this type of story Probably true And then after

[00:28:47] That is a huge ding on him, they call it fish Now he is in trouble Mayday, mayday In 96 he makes Tin Cup Which does just fine But that is a really well remembered cable fun movie That is a movie He is reuniting with Ron Shelton

[00:29:03] That is a good kind of quiet Rebound for him To like just kind of steer The ship back up I think it is one of his best performances Yeah but now he is at the moment where like Tin Cup has stopped you from totally Hitting the ground

[00:29:19] Right, you are now in touch with air traffic control Yes You have stabilized an engine fire And then the postman is truly like You got hit with a nuclear weapon Right and not only that but it is like There is no escape

[00:29:33] He makes everyone think was dances with wolves like a fluke or a mistake Why are you going back to Post apocalyptic again After water world so soon It is a mistake probably I do think that The thing that happens to him is

[00:29:47] So many things that happen to this movie Are that Titanic comes out at the same time Is the biggest movie in the world But if Titanic had underperformed And had not become the biggest movie ever Like that movie had that water world stink on it

[00:29:59] Of course that could have been Another Kevin's game Instead everyone was like this is the biggest movie ever Titanic is a better film than the postman The postman has way hotter sex in it though Oh my god Anyway The postman is really bad sex

[00:30:15] Just FYI is my joke that I am making In 1980 Dick so good he starts snoring In 1980 David Brin Dick so good he starts snoring Ben, Ben is giving me a look Ben did a slow thumbs up That is the funniest moment In the movie is when you

[00:30:31] Like have Olivia Williams dripping with sweat As if she has had the most ecstatic sex Of her life And then the camera slowly tilts down And Costner is asleep And it's like this guy Gives orgasms by accident He's a tight type boy He's so virile

[00:30:49] We'll talk about his sperm later We'll talk about his sperm later In 1980 David Brin At the age of 30 writes Sun Diver His famous You know debut sci-fi novel In 1982 publishes The first part of The Postman In 1984 he Publishes The Cyclops which is the second part

[00:31:09] And then he in 1985 Publishes the complete novel with all The three parts He wrote it as an answer to post-apocalyptic Books and films that revel in the idea Of civilization's fall It's a story about how much we take for granted

[00:31:23] And how much we miss little gracious things that connect us Today It is an idealistic book It's not like a miserable book Honestly it's a beautiful book It is very much like This guy accidentally stumbles into Feeling human again And then he spreads that to other people

[00:31:41] It's tremendous Especially from like What I like about Brin is he's a hard sci-fi guy His other series is about Traveling through space and he's done all the math But it's also about like humans have made dolphins Our best friends It's a world It's a world uplifted

[00:32:00] Everyone who has ascended scientifically Was uplifted by another Civilization and humans are the first To have not done that We accidentally did that and if we had not Accidentally uplifted ourselves We would have been like adopted by a different alien species

[00:32:14] And so they all kind of hate us Because we uplifted dolphins and chimps and are working on dogs And it's kind of great But even decades later you're like We still don't really get many stories like this Few people attempt the optimistic Post apocalyptic

[00:32:28] The other one is station 11 And that adaptation has so much in common With this adaptation just because it's kind of like Well this is the one lane It's like let's remember what makes us human in the midst of all this darkness And that movie focuses on art

[00:32:40] And this movie focuses on you know Good government Mail, letters, stamps Dresses, uniforms Hats Floppy ass hats Uh gumption Gumption that's the thing What do you need to be a postman? Have gumption Counters with a bunch of shelves behind them Little boxes

[00:33:02] I'll be with you in a minute I'm sorting Long lines Scales that are proprietary Unclear divisions of how many different lines they are Weird rules about Sizes of envelopes And weights Does size matter or weight? No one knows Not even the mail people

[00:33:22] I think this movie would have been better If Costner was like we've solved all the problems With the post office you just need to use my promo code At checkout and we'll Click on the microphone Oh my god wait yeah we have to have stamps

[00:33:34] We have to get Stamps off the bench Hollywood We have to This episode You'll never guess Who it's brought to you by Tell me Curated streaming service dedicated To elevating great cinema around the globe And here's another thing they're dedicated to Semi regularly

[00:34:00] Bringing you episodes of our show Uh sure Yes they are They're a lovely and frequent sponsor of Blank check and I want to tell you some of the stuff You can catch on the great Streaming service Mubi

[00:34:14] This is why we like Mubi ad reads because we get to just Tell you movies we like that are on the service Streaming on Mubi in the US starting on July 1st Boyhood Richard Linklater's opus Shot over Nine years following a boy And his family

[00:34:30] If that were how they made that movie I would have heard about by now I think that movie was shot Straight through with extensive prosthetics to age him And stilts So if you're in a Linklater mood right now Because of Hitman and such

[00:34:42] Go check out Boyhood on Mubi Here's another one though Dami this is a short film by Yann Demange exploring what it means To be Arab, French or British Also tackling questions of vulnerability and family Relationships now Yann Demange Kind of a hot You know name in movies

[00:35:00] Right now was possibly going to be making A Marvel movie Famously not directing Blade Made 71 which is this very intense White boy Rick And then White boy Rick So much enthusiasm right there Dami has Riz Ahmed in it And Isabella Johnny Whoa Damn okay Sounds kind of cool

[00:35:24] I mean it's available to stream And apparently it's visually inventive and dreamlike So that's cool Anyway you can try Mubi free for 30 days at Mubi.com Slash blank check That's M-U-B-I dot com slash blank check For a month of great cinema for free movie

[00:35:40] This film comes out in 1985 Hollywood is immediately interested in adapting it So this is a Long cooking project Steve Tish and Wendy Finerman Who will eventually produce Forrest Gump Acquire the rights and put future Forrest Gump Writer Eric Roth on the script Steve Tish was on Shark Tank

[00:35:59] Once and always brags that he's The only man to have Both an Oscar And a Super Bowl ring And a Golden Raspberry What's the Super Bowl ring He owns some team Good for him Yeah looks like he The Giants So some people who were

[00:36:21] Attached to this project over the years Barry Levinson Richard Donner Ron Howard Yon DeBont Actors Tom Hanks Michael Keaton Robin Williams To be clear I'm not laughing at myself I'm laughing at the idea of Robin Of male jokes But you can see how whatever

[00:36:51] Energy that made him consider this project Gets distributed to Jacob the Ladder instead Like that sort of version Of Jacob the Ladder I'm sorry not Jacob the Ladder Jacob has a ladder He is not a ladder And the Good Morning Vietnam

[00:37:07] Thing of like who's the guy who gives hope In the worst of times Brin wrote a long interesting post About this on his website where he was like Until Costner came on board They kept trying to make it More Mad Max-y More traditional post apocalypse

[00:37:23] Where everybody kind of hates each other And wants to kill each other And the story is that he went to see Field of Dreams With his wife And turned to her and said That's the guy who should play the postman I will say Eric Roth says

[00:37:39] His version of this film was more satirical And ironic which Brin didn't really like He also says It was like a two hour western It was good guys vs bad guys The good guys win It was not overblown But it was just a sort of traditional

[00:37:55] Adventure action future film Every guy you just mentioned Star and director alike You can see the movie that they would make 100% especially like Tom Hanks Ron Howard is a very boring version Of the movie possibly but it's probably functional Like Levinson Keaton makes sense

[00:38:11] There are a bunch of pairings I guess Robin Williams and Levinson would probably Be the two or two You know what? Costner directing Keaton starring Keaton is at a point in his career where he kind of needs Something like that That's like a dead tornado Holy shit

[00:38:29] You're latching onto the right thing Which is like this guy needs to be more of a cat I would agree Warner Brothers eventually The script seems dead They turn to Kevin Costner And Costner says I like stories that raise the hairs on the back of your neck

[00:38:47] I'm not at all afraid of those feelings So He likes A non cynical film He's interested in a movie About We do want someone to take charge And we'd like to think at the end of the day We'd put on the uniform and we would fight for something

[00:39:05] He is a deeply earnest That is like the cornerstone of Costner Is what I enjoy about a lot of his work When it works It is his super power And when it doesn't work it makes him so mockable Cause he like stands up there And just treats everything

[00:39:21] This used to mean something You know like everything in a Costner movie Whether he's starring directing or both Has the energy of this used to mean something He'll admit that He likes that it's a very humble guy Who's nothing but a liar

[00:39:35] He's doing half of it just to stay alive Like he likes That there's that sort of foolish edge to it Scoundrel edge whatever He turns down Air Force One A film that could have possibly Completely resurrected his career post Westworld Like if he's in that movie

[00:39:51] The movie's the exact same And he's doing his bullshit It's still good Like Ford's perfect in that movie But like Costner be good That would be my note is that I think it's still not That Ford in that movie would always be the most

[00:40:05] Successful and most loved version of that film That is the perfect version of that film Costner would rebound if he were in that movie It's a Ford and Costner have I don't want to say Ford has the exact same energy But they have that similar blend of like

[00:40:17] I live in California but I also live on a ranch Which is like this weird Intersection I was carved out of a tree Yeah You can imagine exactly like this is a guy Who could take the controls of a plane

[00:40:32] Not that Ford never actually does that in Air Force One But nonetheless He does it in his life a lot Yes he does when he meets your baby stop So as you said Bryn has Said when he saw Field of Dreams he turned to his wife

[00:40:44] And was like that guy yeah That's the energy Brian Helgeland has just won an Academy Award Or no he's about to win LA Confidential He wins an Academy Award this year Highs and lows And Kevin Costner is basically Like This needs to be like

[00:41:04] A stirring tale of decency heroism And hope They took Some scenes from the novel but they also Thought up a whole lot of new ones on their own Kenneth Turan in his Review of this movie that ultimately comes out Describes it he says It's such an earnest hodgepodge

[00:41:22] That only by imagining Mad Max directed By Frank Capra can you even get an Inkling of what it's like You have to imagine that was Costner's pitch Can we put more Capra in this On paper it should work It's like the same thing with Darabont making the Majestic

[00:41:38] Or something where you're just like that can just Fall on it's face if you don't get it right Or if you don't capture the mood Right The production of this film was fine It's not one of those things

[00:41:50] Where you're like oh my god the writing was on the wall Like everyone had a good time Making it Costner is proud He thinks it should have Even more of a fairy tale vibe Like he's like I made a mistake not literally Starting with Once Upon a Time

[00:42:04] He does interviews now where he says that's the One thing that doomed that movie And I'm like I don't think it's the one No it is that's it It'd be so funny if he did a re-edit and that's the only Thing he's added

[00:42:16] Yeah because people still keep circling back To him being like You ready to admit that you should've cut an hour out of That thing and he's just like no I just needed one title card at the beginning Saying this is a fantasy Which I'm like if you think

[00:42:30] If your movie is not able to Get the audience on board with what Tone it is Putting one title card at the beginning Is not going to fix that I love that everyone's like cut an hour and he's like I think it's 30 seconds too short

[00:42:44] He needs more text But alright so You know Will Patton is cast as The villain they'd work together on No Way Out Will Patton is a very reliable actor Then and now I would say I love him He's good in the movie

[00:43:00] You do feel like you need someone doing like a fucking Rickman Sheriff and Nottingham in this movie against Costner He's understated Which is an interesting choice Which if you're casting someone who's a little bigger Like 90s Billy Bob or Michael Keaton To play the postman

[00:43:14] Then you can have the guy be stoic It's what makes you realize that Costner would play that part well Is that Patton is kind of in Costner mode Costner being the villain But playing it as Costner is such an Interesting idea cause it is like

[00:43:28] That's the kind of guy who Corrupts people into like Doing the worst shit And it would be seductive where you're like does this guy have a point Patton is in Horizon Coming up Nice to see them working together again Will Patton has just had a great recent career

[00:43:44] Where he's popping up in like Minari and Janet Planet And Halloween movies I love that dude He's the one who says what are you doing with a gun in space In Armageddon Great line At this point have been like over Seven years of entertainment Journalists dining out

[00:44:04] On writing about how difficult Kevin Costner Productions are Everyone was calling dances with wolves Kevin's gate They're calling water world fish tar Robin Hood had a lot of like Fucking tug of war power battle Whoever came up with fish tar should have Gotten a bonus whatever like

[00:44:22] Guy variety They won the Nobel prize for literature Fish tar But I'm saying The two biggest like shorthand Flops Kevin's gate fish tar Both of them to him And Robin Hood as well and you're like water world Was the only time they were wrong

[00:44:42] They have their knives out for him Because the story is always He's so stubborn he sticks to his gun Is he a narcissist is he an egomaniac The thing's so long and out of control And like budget increasing And most of the time he's winning

[00:44:56] This movie does not have that People are worried about it But none of the stories are like And he's holding up production to do this Like look I mean should he Maybe cast bigger in the villain role Sure Like fine Olivia Williams She's a British theater actress

[00:45:15] She's not bad in the movie She's very pretty She's incredibly pretty There's things about her character That don't make a lot of sense to me But like I'm not like oh god She's stinking up the joint But then the next two roles she does

[00:45:31] Are like the two iconic ones Rushmore and what's the other one Those are her first three films That is quite a jump out of the box She like lands in such a big flop The kind of thing that like tends to Doom someone If it's like an introducing

[00:45:47] Yeah yeah totally I love Olivia Williams She's one of my faves But I think what she plays best is Somebody who's very warm but has an agenda And you don't know what the agenda is In this movie she doesn't have any agenda She's just pretty

[00:46:03] It's also fascinating that her first three movies Are all about her relationship to her dead husband All three I feel like there's Maps to the Stars Normal movie She's great on television Because television rewards Someone who seems like Their gears are turning

[00:46:23] It also rewards an actress in her 40s Whereas films treat them like disgusting lepers But to your point Emily She's like an amazing close up actress And that's the thing that it feels like Costner's identifying Is like you can just cut to her Silently reacting to something

[00:46:37] And her face is still but you see her thinking And it's very effective storytelling Now another actor in this film And you might not have realized this But he's playing himself Is Tom Petty the musician Now Costner I love this quote

[00:46:51] Says this movie deals with the nature of fame You know what I mean it's a very subtle thing I think The Postman is actually kind of a funny movie When you watch it There's humor wrapped all the way through it

[00:47:01] And just dealing with a bit of the nature of fame And dealing with someone who's famous I know you're famous that's all I was trying to do I like the idea I think there's I think Costner could play the Petty part too That would be fun

[00:47:15] But as himself That might be too insane It's also just weird that two and a half hours into this movie Tom Petty appears and is like Hey man you're pretty cool And Costner's like He doesn't say his name but he's basically like Are you Tom Petty?

[00:47:31] Did you watch this Ben? I loved it It's so funny I agree Maybe it should have happened A little earlier It feels very different than the movie He's been making up until that point And over two hours in it's like One of the weird vestiges

[00:47:51] Of our old world It was nice to just Be reengaged a little bit Petty's kind of good What I love thinking about is We live in a nuclear apocalypse where The sky is scorched We seem to have just lived in a rural feudal society Yeah

[00:48:09] Our physical society has crumbled Without there being any health effects Everyone seems to have Well there is the bad mumps The explanation in Bryn's novel is There's a bunch of EMPs set off I heard of that And then there's a plague And then there's a limited nuclear exchange

[00:48:27] And then this guy Who's also referenced in the film The Holiness His explanation is none of these Would have been bad enough to wipe out humanity All of them together Knocked us back to feudalism But the idea that among all that Then Tom Petty's like

[00:48:45] Hey so I survived I'm going to have a town And I'll be in charge of it And I'd be like I want to live in Tom Petty's town Sign me up How did he end up in Oregon though? So was he on tour in Portland? He was touring

[00:49:03] Right Okay anyway Petty says I was kind of lost at the time I needed something to do with my time So I took off and went into Washington State In the middle of the woods somewhere And you know Kevin taught me a lot of things

[00:49:21] About how to get this or that across on the camera He's really grateful for being in the movie And then Kevin Costner presents a three hour film Called The Postman to Warner Brothers And it tests poorly With audiences And so Warner Brothers Is like could you cut it?

[00:49:37] And Kevin Costner says No And says in fact To me the length is perfect I don't know how I could have Made it shorter I know but Kevin does I have some ideas That's where I would start Take them out of the film I'd say

[00:50:00] Look at a big pair of scissors Grab the film print With two hands Hand the scissors to A different person And go make some choices You could get 15 minutes out of this easy Just by cutting down scenes Where there's lingering close ups on Kevin Costner

[00:50:18] Like that scene where He rides down and the little boy is holding up the letter And then he like senses the letter And turns around and comes back And grabs it and some of it's in slow mo You could get that down to 30 seconds And it's like 3 minutes

[00:50:32] I think you could cut 30 minutes out of this movie Shortening the length But lingering close ups On many characters Like there's 15 minutes of just him And 15 minutes of a character Who I was wildly unsurprised to find out Was played by his daughter The girl ponytail

[00:50:50] I keep cutting to her because I love this person Like we all Which is cute She's not bad but You know when you watch a movie and you're like The level of energy coming out of this performance Relative to how much the camera is doting on them

[00:51:04] This is someone's mother, wife or child This is a low energy film But the Dances with Wolves Is similar And why that movie works is you kind of like Being in the world with him And it's gorgeous I'm not saying this is fast moving

[00:51:20] This movie is about an apocalyptic society And a war And a man on horseback delivering mail It needs energy I need it to move Thought experiment Rather than just like oh get over there soon With the letters All the guys we're talking about

[00:51:38] Who maybe would make a better postman And even all the other guys that the studio Had thought about at some point in time All have more of a comedy background Which especially for this kind of character Who's like a liar and a faker

[00:51:50] Like any of these movies where you have the galaxy quest Type set up of like He's trying to bullshit his way Through a situation he's not quite equipped for Because there's a bit of a like Assumed identity thing I think Costner in this movie In his default

[00:52:08] Stoic state would be more interesting If the director behind the camera Had more comedy energy as well Where you're like there's a more Gonzo version of this movie Where you get like a Joe Dante A Sam Raimi, a George Miller Right? And they're just going a lot

[00:52:24] Pulpier with it And he's sort of the integrity at the center And then that's kind of a nice Counterbalance where he stops the movie From feeling ironic But the double down is like Deadly Can I say though I think we all agree

[00:52:42] We want as much of Billy the donkey As possible He's not in it enough They kill him early I was really sad to see him go Be quiet for a second while I speak I, David Sims, am now speaking To tell you About, I don't know

[00:53:03] I feel ripped off all the time When I'm online shopping I get sort of wooed in by something or other Some new gadget That looks very fancy Very low quality And getting ripped off sucks I feel like a Classic place that happens is The shaving industry

[00:53:24] Where there's these super fancy Doohickeys That you can end up buying That don't really perform very well Or aren't really well made And Harry's, the guys at Harry's Saw customers Getting taken advantage of by the shaving industry With overpriced Underperforming products and decided to do something Better

[00:53:46] They make beautifully designed razors for a fraction of the price Of other big brands So you know you're getting bang for your buck So Harry sent me A nice fancy razor With a nice ergonomic handle I got the Truman set Which I assume is an homage

[00:54:04] To the 1940's President Harry Truman, right? I don't know about that but It's got this no slip grip, it's got a weighted core And it's got three German engineered Blade cartridges with a flex hinge And a lubricating strip, it's a very fancy Razor that like really feels

[00:54:20] Weighty in your hands You get a foaming shave gel for rich lather With this kit You get a travel cover You get blades that are designed for your face So it's just Gorgeously designed, the packaging is really nice Everything is really simple and colourful

[00:54:36] And just clearly well made These are German engineered Blades and they're made in their own factory So they stay sharp longer You can get customisable delivery options You got scheduled refills that go as low as $2 That's half of what you're going to pay at the other big brands

[00:54:50] And you can get A 5 blade razor A weighted handle A foaming shave gel And a travel cover for just $3 at harrys.com Slash check Okay and look they've got some other stuff there They've got body wash They've got products for your hands like redwoods And wildlands and stone

[00:55:10] They have extra strength high quality smelling deodorant For just $5 They've got hair and grooming products that fit your unique look And needs Harry's has the highest customer satisfaction in the shaving industry It's a no risk trial If you don't like your shave it's fine

[00:55:24] It's on them and you can cancel anytime It's a really convenient subscription option So no one likes getting ripped off Get the best shave at the best price with harry's Get started with a $13 trial set for just $3 That's harrys.com slash check

[00:55:36] That's harrys.com slash check for a $3 trial set Let's discuss it's plot It's set in the year 2013 Now I understand why Kevin Costner probably realized that would be a bad year Because Barack Obama had just been reelected This is the joke I had saved from last night

[00:55:51] This of course is a period piece about the second Obama term I think the book is set in 2013 as well And he, Brin updated it in 2020 And is like now is like The depression is gone And there's no more depression And there's no more depression

[00:56:05] And is like now is like The depression of the late 2020s And the riots of the early 2030s And I'm like great thanks David Brin On target I'm like What else is happening in 2013 that we can make fun of I'm trying to think Birdman wins best picture

[00:56:23] That's later That's Argo year Argo wins in 2013 In the year 2013 In the year 2013 Argo wins True So that means also In the year 2013 Birdman comes out That's an apocalyptic event I think that's No Birdman came out in 2014 It wins in 15? Correct 2013 is 12 years a slave

[00:56:53] Wolf of Wall Street Gravity Inside Llewyn Davis Francis Ha What are the other funny things that could be happening around the same time As this film Just googling 2013 in news Edward Snowden Classified NSA Leaks Elon Musk is popular Oh god whoa Things are going bad

[00:57:21] Bitcoin rises wait a second This is the beginning That's a big moment I probably met you too I would have done Gethard Podcast ban or something I would have been around AV club You're recapping for the AV club I'm definitely just still doing that

[00:57:41] Like I'm not done with I do think that this movie should have made jokes about that About me recapping for the AV club Important story From 2013 Toronto Mayor Rob Ford Seen on video smoking crack It's a good memory I genuinely

[00:57:59] Everyone reacted to that in a really chill way Which is what I liked about it The fact that he died and then his brother Also went into politics Who looks almost exactly like him I had this like Mandela effect Thing where I was like

[00:58:13] I could have sworn the guy was dead and that his name was Rob I thought I was misremembering It's like no Doug's a new Ford It does kind of feel like an Andy Kaufman It's a legacy sequel It looks like I was recapping Black Mirrors

[00:58:25] Agents of First Season, Agents of Shield Was that the following? Which made you finally leave The following did not make me leave Getting a full time job with those benefits It was the following Remember how that's about an Edgar Allen Poe murderer People forget Okay so it's 2013

[00:58:43] The world has ended But looks pretty They're like small societies That all are kind of like Distant and closed off from each other Information silos They don't know anything about the world at large Or each other There's no internet but there is Shakespeare One man Shakespeare shows

[00:59:03] Being performed by an unnamed guy A man with no name There's a donkey And there's some crowd work Yeah So it's a guy doing Shakespeare But he's kind of doing Shakespeare in this way Like what happens next He knows a lot of it

[00:59:21] Like the moment where I realized Oh fuck this isn't going to work I didn't know this was an aspect Of the film That he's not really a postman I had always thought it was like He is this mythical Like man Who never gave up his job

[00:59:39] And the whole movie is that he keeps on soldiering on I didn't realize he like steals a uniform And creates a movement by accident I also kept thinking in this movie He read the constitution to someone Right Doesn't Battlefield Earth end with someone reading the constitution

[00:59:53] Dramatically and then someone else cries Or something Like the postman's oath to Lorenz Tate I know he does that and that's fine But in my head I was like He reads that to Will Patton And Will Patton cries Is that a thing

[01:00:09] I love that this movie lets you know if someone is good Or kind of shitty by if they deadname Ford Lincoln Mercury or not Very well said What's the movie where someone reads the constitution I thought it was Battlefield Earth I watched the trailer

[01:00:24] For this movie on the blu-ray disc Before I watched the movie I want to see how they sold this The trailer does not give up the actor aspect Of it It sets it up like he's just this mythical totemic figure Right There was a postman

[01:00:40] And there's the scene where he goes to the wall And it's whoever Daniel Van Bergen yelling at him Who are you The postman And he says it like that And I was like what the fuck is this line delivery In this movie that's like Costner playing

[01:00:54] The one man who can unify us Why is he being like so off the cuff Sort of lackadaisical about it And then I watch it and I'm like Oh the whole thing in this movie Is that he's a bullshit artist

[01:01:06] I think Costner kind of can't lie on screen I think there is something About Costner's like default energy Being this kind of earnestness That is very hard for him to play Guy who is lying Without it seeming like He is just not giving a performance energy Right

[01:01:24] Like it doesn't feel like the character Is being insincere It feels like he's not committing In the book Not to keep doing in the book The Brin sets it up as It's the very first chapter That the postman and that book named Gordon Finds this postal truck

[01:01:42] And he realizes it's from After a war had broken out And this post officer was trying To deliver mail to sort of hold What was left of America together And he was caught by bandits And like deliberately drove his car off the road

[01:01:56] Into a forest where it wouldn't be found Until it was found and then someone could like Deliver the mail for him So in the book the Costner character is Picking up someone else's mission And is like I'm going to continue doing this

[01:02:08] And in the film it's just like well I guess I got some letters here Right In the book it's set up more It's actually confusing that the letters are even for someone Right But you're saying in the book it's more of a green lantern situation

[01:02:20] In the book it's very much like Oh he has a letter For the mayor of Bend well the mayor of Bend's dead And then he discovers I have this personal correspondence Some of those people are still alive And that gets like passed around

[01:02:32] It makes a lot more sense but just this early Chunk of the movie where you're watching him Do the plays and like try to sneak off And everything you're like I should be having fun And he is not pulling off playing a rake

[01:02:44] Like this is the kind of set up That is usually Pretty fucking effective Of like you start out the movie With a guy who's like a bit of a piece of shit But you can't deny he's charismatic And slowly he like earns a soul And integrity

[01:03:00] And I'm like Costner's not having fun With this and Silverado Is him playing this kind of guy True Early in his career He's not the lead He doesn't have to carry the story weight But he always cites that as That was the thing that transformed my career

[01:03:18] That was the thing that broke me It made me electric But then from that moment on He basically jumps over to Untouchables And now he's the guy who's like I have a responsibility To shepherd the story to the audience Even his bull Durham energy And this it's like

[01:03:36] There's some part of him that won't Go full kind of like Unseemly Dishonest A thing that I think both Station Eleven and Mr. Burns In Electric Play which play in similar World Figured out is that like You need to have multiple people In this theater troupe

[01:03:56] Or if it's just like As much as it would be disastrous In a different way the Robin Williams version of this Is like the kids on stage just doing bits From like the era of television And like the children in the audience are like What's happening

[01:04:10] He's just reciting shit The other movie I kept thinking about watching this Was Edge of Tomorrow Which pulls off the exact character arc This movie is trying to do And does it with a similarly totemic movie star Of You start it out and the guy is faking

[01:04:26] The persona that we basically know That movie star for You re-dissect it, you take him as low as You possibly can And then it is watching the guy you're used to Be so steady Panic, really fucking fail And lose it for a long time

[01:04:42] Where watching him gradually get back To the point where he does the thing You know he's good at Feels like such an accomplishment And if Costner was out of his comfort zone For the first half of the movie And in the second half you're like

[01:04:56] Holy shit he's become Costner again It's the magic trick of taking something We all know is a given And removing it and making us excited To bring it back I think Shakespeare is also kind of a I don't want to say disastrous choice

[01:05:11] Because it could work in the right hands But it's the wrong choice for Costner I do think on screen stand up comedy energy Is kind of what you want from that guy You want Williams, you want him like Doing Mr. Burns I love the idea

[01:05:25] I mean imagine he just gets up there and does Shrek Right, like it's the Mr. Burns thing You can't believe what survives In our cultural memory I love the idea He does that with like Universal Soldier and shit That I wanted to get to

[01:05:39] I think Shrek 5 should be Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy Mike Myers somehow survive the apocalypse And they're wandering the wasteland performing Shrek But they don't really remember it Do you want to be donkey one more time But imagine that at the beginning of this movie

[01:05:53] The thing he's performing for the children Is like Rambo Like Rain of Fire Right I love the idea of Shakespeare I understand the romance of Shakespeare It's almost like religious text Where it's hundreds of years old The words are always remembered But then this movie's idea of Shakespeare

[01:06:13] Is basically just someone doing Two lines from Henry V That's all it's got And it's Shakespeare in the book Which makes sense because it's fun to read on the page You can do the plays from Shakespeare As long as the characters lives parallel them

[01:06:27] And their arcs can intersect with the plays That's another insane thing In this trilogy of Dances with Wolves The Mariner and the Postman All being very similar characters Where you're like They all have sort of assumed names Like titles that are bigger than their name

[01:06:43] Or in the case of Waterworld And Postman You never know their real name Of course, but he does eventually get the name The biggest problem That I have watching this movie Which I just set aside I just let it go But it's sort of the Star Wars problem

[01:07:03] Where you're like in The Force Awakens And you're like, ah, it was so long ago Years ago You know where you're like, it wasn't that long ago Everyone's forgotten the Jedi I'm like, they have? That was like in the 90s Yeah, ghosts were pretty big in the 80s

[01:07:19] There was a whole period in New York Do you think about it any more present day That we know the afterlife exists? This film's like, ah, the world has ended Tom Petty is alive And he looks like Tom Petty Does anyone recognize him?

[01:07:33] Only one man brave enough to recognize People remember It feels like Will Patton Tom Petty and Kevin Costner Remember the past And everyone else has forgotten it I think he does sort of do the smart thing Of like, there's a lot of kids here

[01:07:49] There's, you know, Ford Lincoln Mercury Obviously born after all this So he does have like these characters Who don't remember things, but then yeah He'll come to a town and it'll be like The sheriff character in Pineview is like I don't like your kind

[01:08:03] And I don't remember television at all And I'm just like, wait, Tom Petty's alive Did this happen 10 years ago? Not to jump ahead though But it does feel like Lorenz Tate's Character should be Younger as well Like I'm watching it being like This guy should be like 14

[01:08:21] The movie makes more sense when it's him Interacting with children He's like 23 when he makes this movie He's got a mustache I think Lorenz Tate was born with a mustache, but yes Just like in The Force Awakens Where Han Solo's like, it's true

[01:08:35] All of it, and I'm like, I'm sure everyone Knows that, but you just have to Let it go I do think about how there are people in college right now Who kind of remember the Obama era A little bit I think like 20 somethings

[01:08:49] Remember less time than we think they do Because the older you get, you remember more times You're like, well, everybody remembers Everything I remember Yeah, I mean my sister's 26 now And I'm sometimes astonished by the things That she just was like Well, I know I lived through that

[01:09:05] But I had no cognizance of what was happening This is like another thing that like Station 11 does Which is like the main character lives through the apocalypse As like an 8 year old girl And you are interrogating her memories And it's just like she kind of forgot everything

[01:09:19] Because it was so traumatic And she just lost her parents, she lost everything And now she lives among this theater troupe And that's her family That's the quality you get from that Where she kind of remembers cell phones And then all the kids she meets

[01:09:33] Are like, what's that? Okay, so he's an actor He tries to sneak away when Will Patton comes to town Who is basically this movie's sheriff of Nottingham Alright, this is my General Bethlehem This is my screenwriter Fix for this movie

[01:09:50] The book literally starts with him finding the postman's office Or the postman's truck And grabbing the mail And then going about and like realizing his acting job Isn't as stirring as like giving people mail Which we all agree is true We need postmen more than actors But

[01:10:06] I think you start this movie With him finding the postal truck You do like a bridged version Of the second hour up front Then he gets taken by The wholeness And he's there and they try to break his spirit They do the like a Ben-Hur Thing

[01:10:24] And he's suffering in captivity Meanwhile the postman like thing Is growing beyond it and then he escapes And yeah, I don't know The idea of the postman Is not even seeded in this film Until 45 minutes in Which I think is a mistake as much as I enjoy

[01:10:40] The first 45 minutes There's stuff in it Yeah, I think it's kind of the best directed stuff In the movie And it is like trying to set up this guy And who he is And the relationship he has with

[01:10:54] And in the book he doesn't have a relationship with the antagonist It just becomes a thing And I think in film you do need to have that relationship there But it's uh It is trickier when you start with that

[01:11:04] And then it's like now I'm going to introduce an entirely new premise And you're just going to have this in the back of your brain I think if they were intertwined It would work a little better Truly until the moment when he finds the letters

[01:11:14] I'm sitting there thinking Why isn't he talking about the fact That he used to be a postman Like I just through cultural osmosis And the poster and the title And even just re-watching the trailer right before And like but the point is

[01:11:28] That he was a postman in the old world, right And it's not until he finds it that I go like That's the set up of your movie That he's taking it over But it's just not a thing until That point and there's basically An entire act

[01:11:42] I can't get, it's like trying to grab water It's just like where they're like Ah no one remembers mail anymore There's a post truck right there with mail in it From people who are alive The post office is perfectly intact And they're like

[01:11:56] Ah nah but mail's fucked man Like there's no I guess the idea is just the apocalypse happens so quickly And so brutally that sure Of course then the US postage would be gone Like all other government But people would have still Written letters that didn't Get anywhere

[01:12:14] If they make, oh it doesn't matter I don't know why I'm even trying to figure it out If they make the future date of this movie ten years later It works ten percent better Right? If in 1997 it's set in 2023 Another terrible year to be clear Yeah

[01:12:30] It's a little more believable Maybe just having a year is a bad idea Even though we have fun with it Of like oh Blade Runner's set in 97 or whatever It's probably just a bad idea to do a year It's usually a mistake Except for 2001 A Space Odyssey

[01:12:46] Which they kind of trademarked that year Like good job by them Until Shrek came around That's true Somebody! Like they're like I can't do it Someone or Somebody And then it's the guy from Smash Mouth Oh wait he's dead now Well it's a different guy from Smash Mouth

[01:13:08] I brought the mood down I'm so sorry Alright so right pretty quickly He gets picked up by General Bethlehem And his figure eight scarred Army of Holonists And he's basically like Listen here In my world everything's shit And I'm mean And that's the rule of this society

[01:13:30] And if I don't like you I'll kill you I like being bad I like being in charge and right A bad guy This is kind of like bad guy zone Right I want everything to be bad and everyone to feel bad I get that he's just a warlord

[01:13:44] But he kind of lacks a Philosophy beyond might is right Except that he wants to do bad paintings He sold copy machines That's true He's like a An angry little middle American who for whatever reason Got to be in charge But you want the feeling of your Rickman

[01:14:04] Esque this guy is enjoying it Which Patton's a little too stoic I think he's honestly giving Too thoughtful a performance He probably just needs to be Mean and big and crazy I was reading a big LA Times Piece from when Prince of Thieves was coming out

[01:14:23] And everyone I was going to say had their knives out But really had their bows and arrows out At the movie Because Kevin Reynolds quit the movie like a month Before it came out and to the press Was just like I can't fucking deal with

[01:14:35] Costner anymore even though they would proceed To work together another two times And that they What Kevin Reynolds walked off Over Was that the studio was worried That Costner was disappearing in the movie And they wanted him to Recut it with more lingering close ups And remove Rickman's

[01:14:55] Material because Rickman was testing So much better than Costner And they interviewed Rickman about this And he in his sort of like Infinite wisdom and compassion Was like Costner is very good In this movie at doing what he needs to do

[01:15:09] If I were in his role I would Not be fun You know he was like he's got a very different Responsibility in this film He's gotta carry the story weight he's gotta be a romantic Lead he's gotta hold the center I get to just fucking camp it up

[01:15:23] That's my job Is to make this fun and silly And you're like that's the calculation That this movie isn't making I also just hate The Robocop thing Robocop obviously is like Directive three or whatever You know he has a secret directive Like okay

[01:15:43] In this right he's like rule one I suck Rule two I'm mean rule three fuck you Rule four blah blah blah And he's like rule seven anyone can challenge me at any time In a duel to the death Anyone wanna do it? And everyone's like no

[01:15:57] And he's like great I'm sure that won't come up again later Rule eight I'm the best It is a thing I will say in defense of this movie This is another like character actor city movie Yeah absolutely A lot of faces

[01:16:09] Right where you're like having Costner first build Olivia Williams first movie Tom Petty gets the and Daniel Bambara And all these people Although Giovanni Ribisi really went far from his usual Thing here You cannot give that man fake teeth That is like such an irresponsible

[01:16:27] It's the Ben Foster rule Don't let him put dirt on his face I just the second they reveal Ribisi I'm like who fucking signed off on this It was the moment Where you were letting Ribisi run wild Like the late 90s

[01:16:41] Even Ribisi is like pretty early in his career Sean Hattese Lorenz Tate was like You know one of the only people who really had some juice Coming into this movie In that sort of way What's his name I always get his name wrong

[01:16:53] But there's the guy who Costner Fights in the wholeness Troop who's got a three part name Brian Anthony Wilson Great actor does a lot of like cop shows And cool stuff this is like one of his first movies I was watching this thinking If this were made tomorrow

[01:17:09] Every character with more than five lines Would be played by someone with an Oscar nomination And like the analog project I was thinking of comparing this to Which I know you played in Cinematrix recently And it made me think about this Please tell me

[01:17:23] Olympus has fallen is a movie where you're like This is the most overqualified cast in the world And I'm not complaining about it But it's got like six Academy Award nominees In it And you're like isn't this putting character actors Out of work

[01:17:37] Angela Bassett Ashley Judd Melissa Lea Rada Mitchell Lawrence O'Donnell You have big people Who show up for like ten lines And you're like I guess if you can get Angela Bassett why not get her But also there was There used to be an entire functioning economy

[01:17:55] Of certain guys I mean Daniel Van Bargen who had a very tragic end To his life but was an incredible This is the moment Where he's everywhere Malcolm in the middle is right after this Let's shout out Van Bargen Yes sorry Seinfeld

[01:18:11] We've weirdly covered him like five or six times In different mini series Because he's in Silence of the Lambs True And in Philadelphia He's got a big Demi career Demi seems like They vibed But it was interesting to see the different directors Basic Instinct, Silence of the Lambs

[01:18:31] Philadelphia Amistad The Postman And then Shaft Singleton Shaft But he's also he's in the Majestic He's in No Brother Worth It You know what Shaft told him to do What? And you know what Shaft told him to do in the later movie

[01:18:51] Stop being such a whiny millennial ordering salad Or whatever he does in that movie Yeah I bet you shoot people through an app Or whatever the fuck That movie is so bad It's astonishing He was like one of the you know 90s TV

[01:19:08] Was so good for these guys Would come in and do one or two episodes And just be like he's in an amazing X-Files He's amazing in the X-Files it's not a great episode He's only in four episodes of Seinfeld And you ask people and they would assume

[01:19:20] He was on three seasons That's kind of like the Bryan Cranston thing too right Whereas if you played a guy who popped on Seinfeld Everyone was like you're that guy from Seinfeld He's only in 15 episodes And three seasons of Malcolm in the Middle

[01:19:32] I know it's just the first couple seasons Right when the guys It's so weird that that's a part of Malcolm in the Middle Like how is that Remember the oldest brother is in I was going to say remind me I watched the show but I cannot

[01:19:46] The premise of the show There's four brothers right You got the parents right And then it's like the oldest brother is in military school For being naughty And like there's always a B-plot With him in the military school being like wacky That never links up with the show

[01:20:02] You know the answer to this What is it? It's the other Masterson, Danny's brother It was because they were worried about having their main cast Have three underage actors Who couldn't work adult hours On a single camera That was going to have like difficult shoots

[01:20:16] On a stylized show I guess it's just weird that he's not with them But they were like it's better if that Could be it's own fucking unit Because even the parents are always going to have to relate back to the kids Yet one adult actor

[01:20:28] Who's off in his own space I know what you're saying practically Do you think that's the answer? I do I know that That sounds correct from what I've heard And I do think they continue doing that Even after he leaves military school

[01:20:44] He goes to the oil fields and gets married I remember the later versions of his story were boring The military academy was good And Daniel Von Vargin was good It was mostly because of Daniel Von Vargin He was only in military academy For the first three seasons

[01:20:58] Daniel Von Vargin is only in 15 of those episodes The first three seasons of Malcolm in the Middle Were 50 episodes Basically Malcolm in the Middle is one of those shows That in it's second season It was so hot That they had 25 episodes Which must have literally been illegal

[01:21:16] Like the way they treat those children on that show But his impression was so big Every episode has a plot line where he's yelling at Masterson That's like a great show right? It's a great show If I throw that on today I'd like it It's aged absurdly well

[01:21:30] It feels like one of the few shows that's interested in class That's what I liked about it at the time It was actually about a real family That had economic problems But not exaggerated ones It kind of runs out of steam

[01:21:42] But it ran seven seasons so of course it does And what I like about it is Frankie Moon is smart enough to escape this family But then he becomes a little asshole Because he's the one that can go off and join the upper classes

[01:21:52] He would do this a lot David's doing the face And he's nailing it George Weiner Who's the guy who plays Colonel Sanders In Spaceballs Who's like a very recognizable comedy character actor Was like a vet Like sitcom guest star in the 70s In this movie he's like bald

[01:22:12] And he's got like facial scruff And a big nose And you just look at him and you're like I've seen this guy in like a million sitcoms You know that guy And he's one of the guys in one of the towns Everyone in the towns

[01:22:26] I'm not going to say they're good But like they're doing their job Peggy Lipton Who's the guy with his tongue cut off He's like The sidekick to the general Is that Scott Baristow I think so Sean Hatzoy His life went in bad directions Oh dear

[01:22:50] I'm not enjoying this I think that is him I think that's Scott Baristow Luke the one who's Scott Baristow is the one who's going to shoot The postman at a certain point And Costner's like you're not going to do that See you later

[01:23:06] And then he comes over to the other side Would you shoot a letter I bet you wouldn't run a bullet through A stamp I mean even like I just love that it's about mail I do too It's the thing I like most about it

[01:23:24] And it's when the movie works for me It takes too long for the movie to get to the mail I was watching this and being like I bet David has like post office feelings Okay actually can I speak on this Yes please

[01:23:36] I think I may have said this before but in the first grade My first grade teacher Starett Pearson shout out Great teacher We did this thing where our class was a post office And we were in the school for a whole week We made stamps

[01:23:50] So it was like arts and crafts And we had envelopes And you could come to our classroom If you were any other kid in the school And write a letter And we would give you a stamp for one cent And an envelope for two cents

[01:24:04] It's such a good idea And then we had People all had roles You make the stamps And there were kids who were mail carriers And they could mail letters anywhere in the school And this was like allowed So I could go into any other room

[01:24:20] And be like I have a letter for this person And I was allowed to deliver it to them We voted on what to name our mail service Or what the mascot would be And I think we had just read Dr. Doolittle as a class

[01:24:30] It was the push me pull you mail Okay Which I will never forget It was just very bizarre It would take another pass but sure Imagine telling that to a bunch of six year olds And they were like push me pull you

[01:24:48] And I remember it so vividly and fondly And so yes It was like this It's fun to write letters and send mail But not in that boring way Where you go to the office And it's your taxes In the fun way My grandma would write me a letter

[01:25:06] Almost every other week Throughout my childhood From an era when you did that There's even now My dad collected all these letters Between her and my grandfather When he was in World War II That's just like amazing It's just incredible That that was how people corresponded

[01:25:26] With one another at one time My grandmother was a huge letter writer And I have too few of her letters to me I wish I kept more of them But like her kids are all trying to sort of keep this alive And it's like We all should

[01:25:41] Instead we're sending TikToks To China When they were doing those letters They were casual They were like what's up I did this today I ate roast beef today Anyway let me know how you're doing Like they weren't prolific You know Costner grabbing this letter in slow motion

[01:26:03] On his arm His grandma needs to know It was a life that very quickly became Very annoying But for like a period of time Felt like it gave me some Costner-esque Sense of like purpose And like focus and discipline But like very early in the pandemic

[01:26:21] My whole family moved out of New York Other than me Yes Very like suddenly Yeah they moved to And then started to scatter And everyone in the family's mail Didn't have permanent addresses Everyone made mail forwarding my apartment Because they were like well you're staying put right

[01:26:41] And I would have to like once a week Aggregate all the family mail And send it to everyone else In manila envelopes But I did kind of like the ritual Of going to the fucking post office once a week And partly it was because My life was hell

[01:26:57] But I would like I'd walk through With gloves and mask on And I'd feel like fucking the cause Did you inspire a movement? I did You did a great job You remember it was all over the news And then Louis DeJoy said We're shutting him down

[01:27:15] This kid Newman's giving people too much hope Mail and junk mail to his dad Okay so in the postman After he's with the wheel pound for a while It's sort of a weird story choice to start with this But I guess it makes sense

[01:27:27] It's Emily's point it's kind of a bad structural choice I do like the scene of them watching The crystal soldier and being like no And then he's like fine And they put on the sound of music And they're just like playing it on rocks

[01:27:39] Like they're just projecting it onto like You know it's so cool I like structural choice but it is interesting That it very much is out of And you name check this already Like the Spartacus playbook It's the gladiator playbook It's like these sort of slavery epics

[01:27:55] Or what they're kind of riffing on This is when I'm like this movie might be kind of good I do feel like if my two options were Sound of music and universal soldier I'd want to watch universal soldier like once every few days You know

[01:28:07] Sometimes but also like If you live in this world Right maybe it's a little too close to home Yeah I couldn't find any corroboration of this But rumors abound on the internet That people on set During the production of this movie

[01:28:21] Would jokingly refer to it as dirt world And Costner would fire anyone he heard Saying that What did he say? Did you say dirt? This is nothing like water world Like their joke was he's doing opposite water world Dirt world is a good name in and of itself

[01:28:37] Kind of is the moves you would make If you were handed two back to back 200 million dollar checks Where you'd be like first one's gonna be wet And the next one dry baby Let me just say this I would love to host a screening in a quarry

[01:28:49] I don't know how to make that happen You better get some comfortable seats This movie ain't short and I'm not sitting on rocks No not this movie Any other movie You've been advocating for underwater film exhibition You have It was just one of my ideas Emily

[01:29:05] Of how to advance cinema Keep people going You didn't have answers on how people would hear the movie Or survive watching it I did I said it would be broadcast Into their helmets Their tanks It would be great if you invented

[01:29:21] Like the bubble city that we've seen in sci-fi Under the ocean What's down there No it's an Alamo Draft House You want some chicken wings The pizza's okay It's frozen but you know Pretty decent frozen But Rock Theater must have excited you Oh yeah

[01:29:41] It didn't excite everyone here I was like this is kind of humorous And this is fun dystopian stuff I like this Then he escapes Sleeps in a postal truck And discovers a bag of mail Then moves on To another settlement Pineview And basically bullshits his way

[01:30:01] In by being like I'm a postman And I have letters for people He does it with the amount of commitment you just did it with The moment You've set this guy up to be an actor This kind of like attention whore Who just loves

[01:30:15] Everyone looking at him and him having fun And like fucking Being goofy or slick enough You're right And he's also not like selling it hard enough This should be a moment where the story clicks And you're like this actor who lives in a world

[01:30:30] Where theater basically no longer exists Has now landed upon The greatest role of his life Which is playing hero Like the Robin Williams Or Michael Keaton in that role Is like that scene is like it escalates And like the guy's gonna pull a gun on him

[01:30:46] And he's gonna shoot him And he's like I got one for Peggy I got one I just kept thinking about Tim Allen In Galaxy Quest who nails this so fucking hard Of like you're watching him Be sort of like a washed up idiot

[01:31:00] And then when he gets on the ship And they take him seriously He's like I'm back to being serious I'm like fucking savoring the fact That people look at me As some sort of like heroic figure Now Daniel Von Bargan is playing

[01:31:14] A guy who basically is right like He's gonna shoot like people on site If they try to come in But really if he says male I don't want to hope I don't want to hope

[01:31:26] But the one thing I kind of would love there to be is a postman But he also He's like are you really a postman Like don't fuck me around It's like a guy who's been on too many bad dates or something You're not lying to me right

[01:31:38] For five or ten minutes He's treating him like Woody treats Buzz Lightyear Where he's like guys he's not a real Space Ranger He keeps saying it to everyone where he's like He's not a male male And everyone else is like but we believe in him

[01:31:52] And then right at the moment Like ten minutes in he's like you know what I actually believe in you more than anyone else He turns so fast Back before the apocalypse He had the complete Topps card Set of all the mailmen in America

[01:32:06] He had all of them memorized He's like you're not one of them Rin Tin Tin But he's like fuck you fuck you No one fall for his bullshit I have a letter for you if you want it Please take it please Costner starts to ride out of town

[01:32:22] And he's like let me just ask you one last time are you a real mailman And Costner shrugs and he's like good enough for me God damn it Single tear rolls down his cheeks You're the best man I ever met Also in this town he meets a teenager

[01:32:34] Named Ford Lincoln Mercury Who's like I love your vibe Can I be a postman too And he's like I'll take that as a Start a giant system of postman cool But much like the rock theater You're like this kind of fun post apocalyptic stuff

[01:32:48] Like what do we make of the remnants Of our old society Now he also meets a couple who basically are like Saw you across the bar and liked your sperm vibe They basically like Hi how you doing here You're a mailman How's the sperm

[01:33:04] Couldn't help but notice your balls are Huge You think you could fire Six rounds into me right now Because my husband nice guy The mumps took his sperm And we need sperm now You'll just be the body father

[01:33:20] They set it up like her husband is just this sort of Like nice Sort of cuck He is played by Charles Esten Who is one of my favorite like TV bit Actors but I know him by a different name Chip

[01:33:34] When he was one of the main guys on Whose line is it anyway I was like why does this guy look so familiar He was the white guy Who would do the songs along with Wayne Brady Where Chip and Wayne were on The same episode you were like

[01:33:48] Fuck they're gonna do a lot of musical games This one The lane that he found on television Was he either is like Hey you wanna sleep with my wife Or he's like you're someone else's wife and I wanna sleep with you Those are the two guys he plays

[01:34:02] And you're just like oh this movie He's sort of like the well intentioned But sad sack like boyish guy Who can't impregnate his wife And he's gonna die tragically as a sacrifice And she's gonna like Have such a hard time Processing his death that it will take her

[01:34:18] The entire movie to fully fall in love with Kevin Costner instead to jump ahead The moment he dies she's like I just remembered that he's a piece of shit Suddenly I just remembered that he was an abusive monster Another screenwriting He's not giving you that energy on screen

[01:34:36] Another screenwriting thing I thought is Collapse the Lorenz Tate character And the Chip Aston character Into one guy and they're he's married Married to Abby and also like Helping start up the post office And then he's like a very and like

[01:34:50] I think this movie is better if Abby And the postman never become a thing They just kind of quietly long Not to spoil but he impregnates her With his you know mega seed They offer They go like would you mind

[01:35:05] He puts a bunch of stamps on that cum Would you mind being my body father And he's like This is too much for me He goes to sleep in his tent He's like man I can't believe I sold everyone this postman bullshit She shows up and she's like

[01:35:19] Circling back on my offer And he's like you know what let's fuck Right let's fuck I'll put 5% of my like effort into it He starts going like full Costner romance On her and she's Like don't compliment me Don't kiss me close my eyes And then he's like cool

[01:35:37] She rides on like a mechanical bull And then Walks away and is like I'm feeling really pregnant It's one of those movies This is where I am like Rewinding being like I must have missed something I'm sure this is when audiences are like Can the knob go lower

[01:35:57] I have lost interest in this film You read reviews from the time And a lot of people are like this movie is somehow 3 hours interminable And it feels like there are long sections missing It makes weird jumps Where you're like I'm sorry you spent

[01:36:11] 20 minutes on that but you're also Going to jump straight from this point to that point So it's like Costner's being like look I'm playing He's an ordinary guy he resurrects Earth through mail also People beg him for his cum Where you're just like Can you maybe take

[01:36:27] An ego pill buddy I swear to god I'm begging you To give my wife Some of your cum I kept thinking of that song Please Mr. Postman will you cuck my wife So okay General Bethlehem gets word That yes there's a rabble rousing Postman going around

[01:36:51] And is like Let's go to every town Do you like mail? Oh I think it's okay Decapitate this man But at this point he has He has sold this town On the idea of postmanning So hard That they're like

[01:37:09] We have letters for you can you go deliver them So now he's like wandering Like traveler man with no name Right I'm going off Smell you later I love how they keep asking him what he's gonna do next And he's like uhhh Go over there Go that way

[01:37:27] How bad this character is At lying It literally is like he's looking around And there's a sign that says west And he goes west This guy can't Fucking sell the thing Oh god but people are so bored In this shitty world

[01:37:45] Right anyway that they're just like I don't know I guess I'll put all my eggs in the mailman bag And also he'll put all his cum in my eggs That was good Thank you I knew this would be a good episode

[01:37:59] I just knew when I was watching this movie You texted that to us yesterday This is not k-19 the widow maker I'm not What were you gonna say Emily Symbolically speaking like the post office is a great choice for this movie It is of course It's so cool

[01:38:17] But like Well Go on Emily They should have cut like to a little Like shot of his sperm with like a little male carrier They should have done the spike leaf With carrier hats on Not rain nor sleep His face Superimposed she hate me style

[01:38:38] Wearing the little hat on each spermazoa Or looking like mr. Zip Or whatever the uh The post uh mascot was Yeah this movie should have more mr. Zip in it They should have done the look who's talking thing Where like her unborn child has Bruce Willis' voice

[01:38:52] Just occasionally offering I was thinking watching this that Bruce Would also do this better Yeah he'd do this better Again it kinda needs to be a different movie But yes Okay so Bethlehem basically goes on like a reign of terror He kills Olivia Williams' Cuck husband

[01:39:10] Sorry for calling him a cuck He literally participates in this Will Patton is like man I'd love to put my cum In that woman And he's like hey pal That's my wife Only men I give permission to Get to cum inside of her

[01:39:26] And Will Patton's like well in that case You're fucking dead You know how famously there's a lot of like couples On dating apps who are looking for a bisexual woman To cum and like sleep with both of them

[01:39:36] I think that my wife and I should get on a dating app And be like we're just looking for a body father We're looking for a body father Preferably US Postal At least pretend to be And please do an okay job pretending to be a postman Okay

[01:39:50] Don't just be like yeah stamps Envelopes mail goes in those I agree with you that the movie as it exists Ian Olivet Williams should never actually Fall in love But there is an interesting idea on paper To a set up like this Where basically at the beginning

[01:40:06] Of their relationship They sleep together And she gets pregnant And they're not actually falling in love until two hours later Like the reverse I understand that in this movie they fall in love Do they fall in love? No They barely seem to like each other

[01:40:22] The middle of the movie is after this Right after this like you know Bethlehem Scorched Earth campaign happens Like the postman By the way we never know his name He is the postman And Abby escaped to a cabin And kind of chill there for the winter

[01:40:38] We need this time jump so that when he returns The world postal services are just back up And better than ever She is somehow proficient in using an assault rifle Everything She is good at everything It's clearly Costner clearly is like this is the next Mary Mcdonald thing

[01:40:54] I need this kind of This lady who will seem outdoorsy And flinty and cool And she is fine at all that But you're kind of like what is this Once again he is replicating His beats God the fucking Costner movie Has basically become

[01:41:12] It's own set of story telling tropes What's weird about this is that The Bryn book ends with A scene where the way they overcome The warlord is they band together With the Umpqua An indigenous tribe that's native To that area but also like

[01:41:28] They're like well you are the white man who needs to lead us Into battle like we're so glad you're here Thank you so much And Costner like is just I don't know if you've read the book or whatever

[01:41:38] That would have been a disastrous choice to do that again But yeah it's in the book Which is weird And for how much he's replaying In other areas his same moves over and over again Yeah I think he's leaning on His moves a little too much even though

[01:41:52] Costner will be the one telling you No I feel like I made a funnier Kind of odder film And like yes you did Like this was much more serious Yes I have no question about that But like although Dead of the Swamp Wolves has a little humor

[01:42:08] But did not go far enough in either direction Right exactly but it's still just It has too much of your set dressing on it Right yeah Anyway so they hang out for a while They fall in love or they don't I don't even care

[01:42:20] But the point is when he gets back There's like a girl on a horse And he's like who are you and she's like The fucking US Postal Office Like everyone loves mail now Played by his daughter the character's name is Ponytail

[01:42:32] And he made up a government based in the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis One of those things again though Where he's just like the Vikings used to play there And I'm like okay so they both know The Minnesota Vikings So the NFL existed within the last 20 years

[01:42:46] Like what happened here buddy Right it feels like It needs to be less than 5 characters Who are over the age of 40 In this entire movie I do Is that his best improv though And then Will Patton's like I saw the White House burn

[01:43:03] Which also insane that he says that And he's like well Smartass it's in the Metrodome Now okay Like where it's just like he's clearly thinking Of like a place That's big That another one of his very convincing lies Is that the current president is Richard Starkey

[01:43:21] Of course the real name of Ringo Starr And then he says that his catchphrase is Things Peace and love peace and love He just quotes it right He rewords it It's like all you need is mail He says like it's getting better very often Like something like that

[01:43:39] They repeat it back to him Things are getting better everyday Right right it's everyday instead of all the time So yeah so now Postal service is happening everywhere Like Bethlehem's men Capture a postman from California This movie's set in Utah I don't think we said that And suddenly

[01:43:59] There's like a whole operation But then the postman realizes That these young postmen are being terrorized By Bethlehem's men So he's like I'll do it all myself Give me that mail I'll be back in a minute He's being heroic and self-sacrificing Yeah and it's your classic

[01:44:17] This idea is dangerous I need to snuff it out We cannot let people believe in something He's refusing the call I need to go home Kevin Maybe we shouldn't be postmen I'm pretty sure the cat's out of the bag Also you're watching this at home

[01:44:33] And you're like I don't know I need to go into a different room What's so fucking weird is When he does that I looked at the running time And was like there's only 40 minutes left Then the last 45 minutes of this movie Are just absurdly compressed

[01:44:47] This movie is horribly structured It doesn't make any sense How this has developed The division of Time across different story elements Is wrong in almost every area So what else happens Nothing Then there's a big battle They go to Tom Petty

[01:45:09] Oh Tom Petty that's the thing I'm forgetting Lorenz Tate has formalized The entire idea of what he is He has become a nationwide folk hero But it's also the idea Of like these tribes People are talking to each other now They're sort of just like

[01:45:25] People are no longer in the dark It means that someone like Will Patton is losing his power And then people are like I heard the postman's 50 feet tall And breathes fire or whatever You know whenever he goes to a new town Making Bill Braski jokes about the postman

[01:45:39] Right And you know whatever They go to see Tom Petty You're famous right I saw Tin Cup I thought it was pretty good The villain was called David Sims Spelled differently Two Ms I bet the film critic with that name gets that a lot

[01:45:59] Even from people who email him And his email says his name And it has one M in it I thought it was more of a TV critic Doesn't he do recaps No that was a long time ago It's 2013 Does he get the award for the most clueless reviewer

[01:46:15] From the commenters every year What kind of eyes do you put in Sims Making you do Seinfeld Was truly Life changing Then you did Gilmore Girls I may have talked about it before But I was fighting to do Gilmore Girls for years

[01:46:33] I also did The Simpsons for a while Which is like a rolling Classics that we had going I jumped on for a season or two Was there any other classics that I did I think It was just Simpsons, Seinfeld and Gilmore Then I'm like Please

[01:46:51] I truly had to sell them on Gilmore Girls I don't know if our audience cares enough About that Which is so crazy to think about now Now Gilmore Girls is this totemic rewatched show It was huge for us traffic wise

[01:47:03] And I feel like it was a lot of people Who were like why didn't you just say this is good And you were saying this is good I am rude about the second season finale Of Gilmore Girls I do think season two of Gilmore Girls Is overrated

[01:47:17] But Gilmore Girls is still one of the ten best TV shows of all time I'm a big three and four guy Weird blank check news And this will time stamp this episode very directly Park Chan Looked to remake Oldboy In English language for television As series

[01:47:33] I'm out on it I mean I just don't think it's necessary I also don't think it'll happen A lot of these things get announced Like that fucking Parasite show I'm like this is never going to happen This is a meeting It's just weird that he's doing it himself

[01:47:49] In theory I want to time stamp this even more I just got to ask David Bluey finale thoughts It's the season finale It's the season finale Although actually there is another episode Called Surprise Which we'll post next week How appropriate I believe they split up these three episodes

[01:48:11] And then the finale Which is called Ghost Basket Which my daughter is obsessed with Loves when Bingo goes in the ghost basket Ends with the reveal of the house For sale sign And I guess they didn't want to reveal that And this I assume deals with the aftermath

[01:48:27] Of them not selling the house Spoiler alert for Bluey They don't sell the house I thought it was beautiful Are you serious? What do you mean? To be clear I am too If Ben watched Bluey he would become The most intense about it

[01:48:45] You're going to eventually watch Bluey And you're going to dig it Everyone will eventually watch Bluey It's a show about a dog being a good dad Not to reduce it But that's something that is going to hit Ben In the feels Bluey is a show about imaginative play

[01:49:01] That is what Bluey is about 90% of Bluey is about A game that's being played with this family The kids play a game and the parents get involved And sometimes other people get involved Pretend I'm a postman I think they did that They definitely have a male Anyway

[01:49:19] The thing with Bluey To me is season 3 Is so ambitious In it's storytelling Not just the sign Which is this extra big long episode But just the way The episode where they roll the credits Because the teacher is like I guess you haven't learned a lesson

[01:49:40] And they start rolling the credits And the kids are like I don't know Things like that The episode that ends with Bluey being drawn Where it's about Bluey learning control They are really going for stuff If they want to never do Bluey again That's not going to happen

[01:49:58] Because it makes a billion bucks But they can walk off I'm like do more I genuinely think They should add some young kid characters And just keep Bluey and Bingo growing up The neighborhood should become more of a character But season 3 is trending in that direction

[01:50:14] I have heard you talk about Bluey with so many guests And they're like I don't watch that And I wanted to give you a chance The problem with Bluey is that I could talk too much I do keep telling people It's the best written show on TV

[01:50:26] I genuinely think that Griff you should check it out The thing with Bluey is that I've seen it so much It's like drugs There's nothing wrong with me watching this much Bluey But it's a little crazy How much I've seen Bluey I've seen certain episodes

[01:50:42] Dozens and dozens of times Emily Yoshida was staying with us When she was on this podcast And she stayed with me for a week And she watched a bunch of Bluey with us Because if you're going to be in my house These days

[01:50:56] You're going to watch some Bluey And we're watching Stickbird And there's this line delivery Where Bingo is mad at some kids And she's like Why'd they do that? They're mean And the dad's like they didn't mean to They took her Stickbird And she's like they're my rivals

[01:51:14] And I'm just like Line delivery is so funny It's such a funny word for a kid to say Rivals rather than enemies Or whatever she means to say And I was like Emily check it out And I'm laughing at the line delivery It's a show about

[01:51:30] Imaginative play but it's also quietly stealth A show about realizing your parents are people With disappointments And it's also a show about How parents make fun of their kids In the gentle fun ways And kids make fun of their parents It just understands shit man It's so good

[01:51:48] And the creator is super hot I discovered this He's a babe, Joe Brumms He looks like Ken Burns as a rhythm guitarist With a better haircut But similar Where you're like Ken Let someone at your hair We can do more with this Peace and love man

[01:52:08] Why did we get on Bluey? We were time stamping the episode I just wanted to know your thoughts I thought I'd do it on microphone I was so invested in this song I knew where it was going with the coin But I thought it was wonderful Beautiful television

[01:52:24] I do think that thing The moral of the sign Which is basically telling kids Whatever's going to happen is going to happen And that's okay Is profound In a not pretentious way It's sense of Rube Goldbergian storytelling Where everything affects everything else Is much better than the postman's

[01:52:44] Sense of that I brought it back I did it The postman It's like Civil War where there are basically two sides And one side is the postman And the other side is people The other side is random other guys Who have eights on them They're just standing there

[01:53:04] And it's like what's going to happen And Kevin Costner's like I invoke rule seven I challenge you And Will Benton's like you're not a holiness He's like yes I am here's my brand I was hoping you'd forget about that Somehow he's forgotten It was like half hours ago

[01:53:22] How does Will Benton not recognize Kevin Costner He shaved He shaved It's like Clark Kent putting on glasses He looks better with the beard Yeah I think so He looks good with the beard in this movie And it fits the aesthetic of the movie I think that

[01:53:42] It is kind of smart to have This end as one guy versus one guy I think that the fight choreography Is something to be desired Yeah them just wrestling in the dirt's a little underwhelming And then this kind of extended Like I'm not going to kill you

[01:53:56] Male is better than murder And then Lorenz Tate's going to do it And he doesn't do it And then Will Benton's like ah ha I will kill you And then the other guy shoots him And you're like okay And then Kevin Costner's like

[01:54:12] We're going to have new rules No murder And everyone's like oh Yay! And then just cut to 30 years later Life is completely normal again Cities look normal People are wearing Lanzen clothing It's just like we're back to normal We've re-established Patagonia A statue of the postman

[01:54:35] They have a statue It's his daughter Mary Stewart Masterson in an incredible performance I love to think about later Olivia Williams being like yeah your dad was a cool guy And I approached him at a party Was married at the time Right because most of their relationship

[01:54:51] For the second half of the movie is her being like I just want to make it clear this is not your baby And he's like I think it's my baby And I was like it's my husband's baby Might be dedicating a statue to me one day Statue Jesus

[01:55:07] I also like that they have the little boy Back in the statue from a moment that only The postman remembers and then the little boy is there And there's a grown man and he's like that was me And the other guy is like

[01:55:17] That was you what? Giving him a letter? Sure! Didn't lots of people give him letters? Wasn't he a postman? I don't know if it was in Waterworld Fallout or Robin Hood Fallout But Kevin Reynolds had this incredible Line because they would just

[01:55:31] Fall out and then get back together again And then fall out They were a warring couple And he had this incredible line where he's like I think Kevin should only Direct his own movies from here on out That way he always gets to work

[01:55:45] With his favorite movie star and his favorite director Which is a good A good Razz You read the reviews of this film and the moment that just Breaks them beyond repair is the statue Where they're like this thing fucking ends

[01:55:59] With him putting a giant gold version of himself On screen And basically having everyone pledge allegiance To them Obviously this movie just ending with him being like rule one No murder is not amazing But does it bring this movie down

[01:56:13] Like a full star to then have an epilogue Where they're like in case you didn't get it We think that guy was good And here's a statue of him I was thinking about Have you ever read the novel A Canticle for Leibowitz? I'm going to assume not

[01:56:27] It's one of my favorite post Post apocalyptic novel that and the movie that and the book Ridley Walker both of them are set long after A nuclear war A Canticle for Leibowitz does a similar thing where it's like What does religion look like after a nuclear war

[01:56:39] It's a bunch of monks They find this guy named Leibowitz's shopping list And they keep transcribing it and it gradually evolves Into a religion and it follows 1500 years of history And I'm like if this movie jumps 500 years later And now the male is a weird religion

[01:56:53] That's a better ending It's maybe a more nonsensical one but You know what this movie reminded me of A lot while watching it Original Planet of the Apes Sure A lot of talking And very methodically paced That movie is very slow

[01:57:11] The original but it's also like well under Two hours But it has the same sort of like disorienting Like what's going on here It takes about 40 minutes for like Heston to meet The apes It's so deliberate in setting everything up But it's going for the similar vibe

[01:57:27] Of like the before times were so long Ago that they've become abstracted They're trying to treat this The same way as if it's the ape civilization That's being like disrupted by Heston's New ideas And you're right that like the starting point

[01:57:41] Of this movie needs to be further in the future And the epilogue Needs to be even further out Or just that doesn't need to exist The epilogue probably doesn't need to exist Like I think it really hurts The movie to be like male Made the world normal Yeah

[01:57:59] Like can't I just imagine a better future is coming But then just like truly like we clicked our fingers And there's fucking running water And like you know whatever else I needed to see the designing of the statue I needed to see them cast it

[01:58:11] Well that's the spin off then I needed to see them decide where to place it And I want to talk about the stamp economy They barely get into it in this film I mean I'm certain that he would have been Featured on at least one stamp Absolutely

[01:58:25] That's what they should have ended on They should have ended on the stamp It should have been a statue And it just kind of doesn't look like him Yeah it would be great I do like I think that the book would work better As a mini series

[01:58:41] The second section of the book which is not touched on in this film at all But it's super good Like sets up the big bad as an AI That turns out to just be two guys Who are like Oracle of Delphi style

[01:58:51] Being like that seems like the answer And I think that if you blended that With some of the I think that's a more novel villain than Bethlehem But I think Costner is afraid of the sci-fi aspects of this tale The way Absolutely I mean it's

[01:59:08] The guy has only ever directed westerns And the furthest he's gone out of his comfort zone Is western combined with a different genre And he's leaning more on the western Than the sci-fi I think not to be the person who comes on

[01:59:20] And just talks about the politics of filmmakers But I think that Costner's politics Are often read as conservative Or more libertarian He endorsed Mayor Pete and Joe Biden Like he has this kind of like He was traditionally a deeply liberal Kind of borderline radical guy

[01:59:36] And he's a big environmentalist And over time he's gotten a little more I think he's got these crusty elements To him I think that him being on Yellowstone Has vastly influenced that Because Yellowstone is a show that has more progressive Politics than you'd expect

[01:59:52] But also is watched by red states This is a show about how Donald Trump is good And it's actually a show about how the social order Is horribly broken but it's the one we've got So we might as well live with it I feel like Taylor Sheridan

[02:00:04] His politics on Native Americans Are fine But there's a patronizing element to it The Wind River thing Of Jeremy Renner being like I'm one of you And being like okay It's very much a thing of like Taylor Sheridan will acknowledge That he was stolen unethically

[02:00:24] And horribly and immorally And a bunch of people died in that process But also what are you going to do? That happens And this guy's pretty cool isn't he? Yellowstone's like Dallas It's like a big shopping show Where insane shit happens There is an episode where a bear

[02:00:42] Chases two Chinese tourists off a cliff And they're hanging to the side of the cliff And then this guy The main guy comes and is like It's the kind of show where a bear chases people Off a cliff and it's wrongly understood

[02:00:54] As Kevin Costner being like now Donald Trump He's the man We gotta elect him again That's all in people's heads The episode you just described probably got Same day Live ratings Three times that of the finale of Succession Oh absolutely

[02:01:12] I actually know that was in season one when the show was barely watched But it is It was a slow building show But I think that Costner has been Written off as a very Radical in the past I grew up in South Dakota

[02:01:28] Which is where Dances with Wolves was filmed And there was this complicated relationship With that film there It's like when the movie comes to the small town And everyone's like oh my god The movie star's going to sleep with me for a whole state

[02:01:40] And we're still dining out On Dances with Wolves nostalgia Which is very weird because there's not a lot of it I think there's some though It was such a big movie I think that he is interested in The many ways in which the social order

[02:01:54] Is broken and oppresses the wrong people As long as people let Kevin Costner remain At the top of it I think you're dead on with that We need a society But it can't go as far as the book

[02:02:06] Which is like society means you have to kind of let Everybody live and be themselves But Kevin Costner still needs to be The leader I think Costner's big philosophy in this movie seems to be To be nice Let's be nice to each other

[02:02:20] Write each other letters and stuff Now it really sounds like Biden I'll see you later That was the thing that really hit me We're living in this era where people fucking hate each other And everybody wants their own individually catered experience And this movie is about

[02:02:34] Society is about connection And the first thing we would want After the end would be to connect with each other In some capacity But like it absolutely is You know that moment when two Tiny civilizations make contact And they can't be in touch with each other

[02:02:50] Is so profound and beautiful I don't know this movie should be better It's also wild that this movie was made in 1997 Before like internet culture Has really like found its footing And let alone like smartphones Where you're like The male being the thing

[02:03:06] Would make so much more sense today Where you're like Well this really is a form of communication That is almost alien to how we think About interacting with each other now You know And there's so many things Like the way you're describing the book Where you're like

[02:03:24] This does sound like something That someone could readapt very well right now But I do think more so than Waterworld Which as we were saying has sort of had its reputation Restored in some way This is like The postman is toxic That is inextricably tied

[02:03:41] To the notion of this guy losing the plot They should just call the TV series Gordon The name of the character And it's also an elf So it's like the postman meets elf Or post postman Ben do you know the Costner BP oil spill thing No

[02:04:01] Because I think this is just interesting to briefly touch on In relation to the politics stuff we're talking about I feel like we've talked about it years ago Ocean therapy solutions And everyone was like This unfortunately is a problem with no solution

[02:04:13] Things are just going to keep on getting worse The ocean's on fire and animals are dying Kevin Costner like showed up In the senate And was like I like off to the side Have invested tens of millions of dollars Of my own money into building a machine

[02:04:27] That can separate oil from water And I've been working on that for a decade It's like a giant centrifuge that like spins oily water To separate them out And I've always cared about this issue And I independently fund a bunch of scientific Experiments I believe they are used

[02:04:43] The government bought them after Deepwater Horizon But like Kevin Costner just kind of showed up And was like hey by the way I happen to have The solution for this exact problem In a way that is very much in line With the way that people want to position

[02:04:55] The idea of like Bezos or Musk Of like look at how responsibly they're using their money And he has like A couple of times kind of successfully Done that But it does speak to this sense of like

[02:05:09] We need to like connect and this needs to be a society But also there needs to be like an amazing Guy who shows up out of the shadows And stoically walks in and is like I used my movie star money to make the perfect machine

[02:05:19] Which is so much like I'm your savior It's so much of it is boomer liberalism That is like we need to come together as a society As long as I'm here leading the charge And like he did not do As much of a public victory lap

[02:05:33] Over that as you would expect To the extent that like You don't know that story I think a lot of our listeners will not He did like go and speak in front of like You know the fucking government And was televised and whatever

[02:05:47] But it still was a little like I'm just here to solve the problem There was also a thing where like Stephen Baldwin sued him And said he'd like cheated him out of money And then lost the lawsuit

[02:05:55] And Kevin Costner was like my name is more important than money Yes Stephen Baldwin of course a normal person Who doesn't do anything weird Stephen Baldwin and those things were like Nah Alec you ain't out weirding me I'm always going to be one step ahead

[02:06:09] Next movie for Costner After this is Message in a Bottle Yes which is two years later And is like you know obviously kind of just Not ignored but it's just kind of like a shrug A winter Nicholas Sparks movie At an inflated budget After that is

[02:06:25] You're into Dragonfly and 13 Days Don't excuse me Don't forget for the love of the game For love of the game The Sam Raimi film Which we talked about Of course you can go back to that episode But that is the movie where he like completely torpedoes

[02:06:41] Whatever he still has left Where he chooses to make that like his public battle Of fighting the studio And being like I do not endorse this movie That is coming out in theaters next week Because they wouldn't let me make it three hours long

[02:06:53] And like have say fuck eight times And like maybe show like three or four inches Of my dick And there's the quote which we read That Universal put out Where they were like first of all We do not respect Kevin Costner taking a

[02:07:07] 50 million dollar asset and holding it Hostage in the press Secondly he's trying to present us as being anti-creative We fully backed the vision Of the director of this film and his name is Sam Raimi not fucking Kevin Costner

[02:07:21] And that's the moment where they were like this should be an easy Layup for you this is a 50 million dollar Sports movie like go back to your safe Spot and he chose to burn it all Down on that I just want to say Ben and I yesterday

[02:07:33] Were digging into Our stats on iTunes For the podcast because we were curious about like How recent episodes had done And the way that Apple has Changed their algorithm It gives you like in real time Like what is sort of Your highest episode ever and how

[02:07:51] Does every episode perform relative to that And it threw out that our most Median episode ever is for the love Of the game so if you're looking At the performance of any episode How does this compare to For love of the game The episode where the bit is

[02:08:07] Ben saying I think I'm producing a perfect Podcast this is it This is the best one It just keeps saying in bold Most median I just want to say about Message in a bottle made money Critics ignored it but like whatever For love of the game

[02:08:26] Bit of an under performer In 2000 he does 13 days which is like A very watchable movie And is seen as his potential Comeback but he does just about The worst Boston accent you ever heard And he's a master of bad accents And it's kind of

[02:08:42] It like under performs like the Oscars Ignore it it doesn't make a ton of money I think they did one of those like one week And then it actually got released in February And it didn't get the noms And by that point new line kind of

[02:08:54] Gave up on it I put that on Like being like a deeply solid And I was like watching it It is a little like it's a little Spongy like it's a little slow It should be amazing and it's just Pretty good like Bruce Greenwood

[02:09:10] Incredible as Kennedy in it Costner just playing sort of The JFK character but not paranoid But where he's just like Hey Mr. President how do you like these apples You know have you seen these missiles over in Cuba You know like he's not

[02:09:24] 3000 miles to Graceland is arguably his all time low And then the next episode We'll talk about open range Comes after that where it's like Yeah after that and Dragonfly Which is Tom Shadyack so we'll cover that on the show one day But he's this level of guy

[02:09:38] Where his stardom was So great for like a decade That it's kind of He's always going to be a movie star To a degree But at that point in time it's like You are a deeply diminished movie star What do you think of 3000 miles to Graceland

[02:09:54] I've never seen it No one's ever seen it It was one of those like Golden raspberry movies where people didn't even bother They just saw the poster and they were like Oh you're telling me this one's bad I can't believe it

[02:10:08] The other thing is like most of the films that we just listed Were all like dump you weary releases And then he starts to become a king of dump you weary We should note of course the postman won five Worst actor worst director worst picture worst screenplay

[02:10:18] And then worst original song To the entire song selection I don't even remember the real songs The songs in this movie are There's a cover of Come and Get Your Love That's pretty fun Did you listen Wait through the credits for the song that Kevin Costner

[02:10:34] Performs with Amy Grant Cause it is truly bad I love to hear that he did that You can find it on Spotify everyone Even if you haven't seen this movie you should go listen to Kevin Costner I've maybe said this before Uh

[02:10:48] Draft Day was a fairly low budget movie And so unlike I think most films He works on Everyone was in one hair and makeup trailer With like many seats it wasn't his own trailer And uh The Cos got to control The uh sound system

[02:11:04] In that hell yeah hair and makeup trailer And you'll never guess What his favorite band to listen to Was in the makeup trailer every morning Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers Haysi and the Modern West Okay Kevin Costner's band of course Good For him

[02:11:24] And then the wrap party for the film was one of his concerts Oh good So I'm quite familiar with his musical I can get you a good rate on this I'm uh For you 10% off ticket Newman 10% off ticket price Do you still talk to Cost all the time

[02:11:40] Yeah You text every night You send him funny memes No I mean You write him letters You print out the memes And mail them to him I have comedy points I had such a A wonderful time with him Truly and I like have a very

[02:12:02] High impression of him And I think he was like very Kind to me and like Gave me a lot of like Guidance as an actor That I still think about to this day And I genuinely question if he Could like recognize me from a line up

[02:12:18] And I don't say that of any rudeness Cause it felt like he was like He would intimately lock into me But I'm also like Is he like the postman going from town to town Yeah and I wouldn't be offended

[02:12:30] Like I wouldn't be like how dare you not remember No but it would be nice if you like ran into him God knows how or when And he would be like Griffin Like you know that'd be cool I don't think he's come to New York in probably 20 years

[02:12:42] No Where the real actors are The last thing I think The most recent thing he has said to me And it's not even really To me Was at the premiere of Draft Day I went up to him and I was like

[02:12:58] Hey Kevin congrats the movie turned out great And he just As I finished the sentence Turned over to Ivan Reitman who was standing next to him And said like I told you the kid was gonna be good That's pretty cool It was cool but I was also like

[02:13:13] You're saying it as if I'm not next to you That's the kind of movie star shit I'd be pulling It was cool But it was even already a statement of like I'm taking credit for saying that he was gonna be good Which was nice

[02:13:25] It made me feel like my dad approved of me It would be better than like Lose the kid Get him out of here So I work on Yellow Jackets Which is on a Paramount network And so I'm co-workers with Kevin Conn

[02:13:39] Well not for much longer because he's left Not at all Your show is on Showtime plus Paramount plus Yes Whereas he is on Paramount plus plus Showtime Something like that He's not on Yellowstone anymore But you are both working on Yellowshows Yellowshows yeah

[02:13:57] I feel like you have to discuss Yellowstone and Yellowjackets at the same time Boosts me Thank you so much But they did like a sizzle reel Of like here's all of our shows Talking about important emotions And things like that And there's one clip from Yellowstone in it

[02:14:13] And it's basically Kevin Conn being like You know I have feelings sometimes And like I think The postman I think he's such a vulnerable screen presence Before the postman He doesn't know how to be vulnerable anymore He tries to be but it's all out of whack I think

[02:14:31] I'm so sad that people know him as the Yellowstone guy And assume that he loves Donald Trump And assume that he has no feelings Because he was so soulful That's always been his superpower As a movie star Is like he's this stoic Like oak tree

[02:14:47] And when that gives a little bit And it breaks and he gives you a little bit of emotion It's like so affecting I will see like a lot of I think Target Gen Z But I will see comments from people Who are like I don't understand

[02:15:03] How this guy became such a major movie star He feels really flat to me He's got this sort of affect In every performance Why was this one of the big actors of the 80s and 90s Right but it was like

[02:15:15] First off I think he is a little bit Undervalued at the craft of his acting And I think we've called out several Where he did not have the movie star Weight on him and he felt the freedom to just Act and I think very often

[02:15:27] As a movie star he is functioning as He's approaching it as a Storyteller first and foremost right Even in movies where he's not directing it He is I think always thinking About the big picture of the story How the audience is going to interpret it

[02:15:43] What are the story beats that make people Like that pull them in that push them away All that sort of stuff so there's something Very big picture in the way he approaches Steering the ship of A movie and he also just Understands the effectiveness of Such a

[02:15:59] Good understanding of how he plays On camera the affect Of his voice like all these things Which when you watch a movie like this It is so frustrating To see him misapply it He is very good on Yellowstone Like they give him no

[02:16:15] Good material but he's playing western Logan Roy and he's just like Locked into what that guy needs to be And they just don't give him the stuff The mother fucker just like never doesn't have presence And he just belongs on screen

[02:16:27] And I saw the horizon trailer in a theater Recently and like the first sort of Major close up they give him in that trailer Where I feel like he slowly turns in And it's the kind of like extended longing Look you talk about

[02:16:39] I saw that and I was just like Jesus Christ This guy belongs up here You know after like such a weird Like movies, tv, back to movies Back to tv whatever you're like Something about him wearing a cowboy hat And his head being a hundred feet tall

[02:16:53] And him just sort of squinting And looking off into the distance like He's just one of the great like Special effects we still have He looks good on a dang horse He looks great on a dang horse I should first tell you Can I just say

[02:17:11] Is this one we've done before Because I remember We've done this one as well before This is what you've done before I remember this vividly because I saw this film in theaters And had so many other options that I should have taken

[02:17:23] Is it the same weekend as Titanic No it's not but this is a time We have come to many times In the history of Blank Check Now of course the postman cost 80 million dollars To make it made 17 domestic But wait let's check the worldwide numbers Oh 20 okay

[02:17:39] 20 worldwide so it was a gigantic flop I saw it in a theater with one person It was a man in a cowboy hat And at the end of it he stood up and pointed at me And said someone needs to tell that man no Oh my god

[02:17:51] I can't believe you've been sitting on that all episode That is incredible He'd even lost cowboy hat guy But that speaks to the culture's relationship To him at that point It wasn't just fucking a Hollywood reporter Writing about him this way

[02:18:05] It was a follow on thing from Westworld Everyone was like this guy needs to fucking have a time out The film got bad reviews In the mix In the midst of Titanic becoming a phenomenon So what weekend is this for Titanic Two

[02:18:19] And I just also want to point out This is an interesting note from JJ This is the going postal era Where that's a big news story And kind of letterman gag That is wild The post office and postman are not Hugely high in credibility at this moment

[02:18:35] And so there's a lot of gags About a movie where the postman is a hero Like get the fuck out of here It's the one thing that's aged best Now you're like I wish the government functioned Number one at the box office though Griffin

[02:18:49] Also this movie has no jokes about dogs hating him Should have jokes about that There is one joke When he first arrives He says something about the dogs have to be leashed Would have been better with Robin Williams Hey Blank Check listeners This is Emily from the future

[02:19:07] I want to remind you that we recorded this postman episode In April And I am recording this now in July Shortly before the episode drops I have now finished reading the novel The Postman And I am amazed at how much of the weirdest shit

[02:19:21] In the film the postman Including the term body father Is from the novel the postman I did not make that clear enough In this episode as we recorded it I feel truly bad about that I don't want to blame Kevin Costner

[02:19:35] For coming up with some of the weirder stuff About Abby And about the postman sleeping with Abby Because a lot of that is from the book Although they don't run off together at the end of the book Spoilers for the book I guess Also I wish to apologize

[02:19:49] I doubted David when he said there would be a surprise Bluie episode There was indeed a surprise Bluie episode If that made it into the cut I apologize to all of you For being wrong about something for the first time in my life

[02:19:59] Alright thank you back to the past December 26th 1997 What's number one The postman is opening to number nine Okay it's Titanic again Titanic is number one At the box office growing 24% I'm trying to think what made us Cover this weekend before

[02:20:20] Is this the as good as it gets weekend Correct So number two though is What opened with Titanic We've covered it on this Patreon We've covered it on Patreon It's Tomorrow Never Dies Tomorrow Never Dies is number two Also doing well though not Titanic well

[02:20:38] And opening new number three Is as good as it gets 16 million dollars And it's going to have a very healthy run And make 150 Great movie Number four is a family film Family comedy 101 Dalmatians No Definitely a movie you like Probably liked it at the time

[02:21:02] Oh is it Mouse Hunt Oh Emily I know this weekend Or Verbinski's Mouse Hunt Which is also expanding and doing well It's Christmas time Weird ass movie When David Krumhut called out how well directed Mouse Hunt is He did Did we do that episode yet Yes

[02:21:24] Emily this is the first time It's largely because we're doing three short directors In a row Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday of this week Each day we're doing a different mini series Yeah we did Cohn, now Costner Tomorrow Brest Number five at the box office Opening this week

[02:21:42] In a somewhat baffling Christmas release Is a great film My favorite film of 1997 probably It's not L.A. Confidential No Great movie that's number 20 It's a book adaptation By a director who definitely gets talked about a lot It's a book adaptation By a director who definitely

[02:22:02] Gets talked about a lot I mean it's like a really really really important director It's his big follow up to a gigantic movie It's his big follow up to a gigantic movie And it's a book adaptation It's your favorite movie of 1997 It was a mild hit Made 40 mil

[02:22:18] Certainly You know come down from his last film Which in terms of hype Also have come down Was the previous film a blockbuster or was it just like a big awards film Big awards film that made a ton of money It was both Yeah it was

[02:22:34] One of the most consequential films ever made in American history Oh it's Jackie Brown I mean how do you describe Pulp Fiction The most seismic cultural event of the 90s In cinema basically It was his like big idea of like isn't it funny

[02:22:46] To release this movie on Christmas And everyone Like a big bag ad campaign Everyone felt like it backfired And then like 15 years later he does it again With Django and it fucking works Where they counter program Django On Christmas day and it explodes His highest grossing film

[02:23:04] Django is, Jackie Brown certainly is not Do you like Jackie Brown I think it's my favorite It always has been I didn't mean to give it a rewatch but I've seen it so many times It's so fucking good Number 6 at the box office is Scream 2

[02:23:18] Which came out just less than a year after Scream 1 Of course Number 7 opening new this week Is the incredibly ill advised remake Of an American Werewolf in London It's a sequel It's not a remake It's sort of a legacy sequel I guess Before that existed

[02:23:36] Directed by Anthony Waller The film is called yes American Werewolf in Paris Number 8 is Flubber This was an era where anytime anything Was even vaguely French I assumed my mother Would be thrilled about it and I remember walking past The poster in a theater and going

[02:23:52] The Werewolf's in Paris You're gonna wanna see that right Number 8 is Flubber In it's 5th weekend The postman couldn't knock off Flubber in his 5th weekend What if the postman had Flubber I don't know I think chaos would have Wait a second, Flubber was a big Flubber hit

[02:24:10] Flubber was a modest What did it get to 98 Pretty good For a movie as bad and stupid as Flubber Not bad, for a movie that's like the big Disney Thanksgiving family movie With Robin Williams maybe a little under

[02:24:24] I know this isn't the reality I know it was two different Eras of development On this project but it's funny to Imagine Create the fake idea of Robin Williams Standing above a desk and one script says the postman And one says Flubber What do I do? Number 9

[02:24:40] New this week is the postman and number 10 Hopefully the postman could beat out the first weekend Of Mr. Magoo The uh Leslie Nielsen film Where he plays the blind I mean cartoon character A deeply bizarre film I have not seen it A film directed by Stanley Tong

[02:25:01] Who directed a lot of Jackie Chan's best movies On paper Physical humor right Mr. Magoo He's gonna miss, he'll be walking Right and misses him And he goes up and down Hollywood's been struggling To figure out Hollywood's been struggling to figure out How to use Jackie Chan

[02:25:21] They're constantly going like what other franchises Can we plug Leslie Nielsen Our greatest 7 year old movie star Into They land on Mr. Magoo and then they're like Oh why wouldn't you hire The fucking Jackie Chan director To do the funny action in your family comedy

[02:25:37] And the movie is like A nerd It has an opening credit sequence I saw this in theaters It has an opening credit sequence that is animated With classic Magoo And when it transitions from animation to live action

[02:25:51] You're like I think we just left the best part of the movie I think the entire reason I came to the theater To see Mr. Magoo in the flesh Is starting and now everyone is Bored immediately Take us out Next week we have Open Range

[02:26:07] Which is not even a comeback For him but it's kind of like A reputation comeback for him Which is a great film I'm sorry you couldn't cover that film You wrote us a long email saying You wanted The Postman When Lynch won I was like fuck

[02:26:23] I love Lynch and then I was like But I've already committed to The Postman I was like gotta do it My final Postman story Is New Year's Eve 97 hanging out with some friends And they're like we gotta Get time to see Titanic

[02:26:39] And somewhere in the middle of it I'm like well let's not see The Postman Because I'd seen it and was like it's bad And then we're all out for dinner beforehand And this other group of people come in Having not been able to get Tickets to Titanic

[02:26:51] And the woman with them is so furious And she's mad and she's screaming And I'm like that angry girl is too much Reader I married her That was the first time I met my wife And I have Titanic to thank Somewhat Not really

[02:27:07] Kevin Costner is like The Postman is the hero of this story And they were like You're welcome Emma They were like What are you going to do instead And my wife was like we're just going to go watch videos

[02:27:19] So I did not get a chance to tell her not to see The Postman Which would have been like the first time we talked Kevin Costner hears this story Because he's of course a rabbit blankie And solemnly tips his cap Looks off into the distance and says

[02:27:31] My wedding invite must have gotten lost in the mail Emily take us out Yellow Jackets do we know when the new season is coming I don't know I'm guessing early 2025 But yeah go watch the first two seasons I don't have anything to do with them

[02:27:45] But it's one of my favorite shows I'm so lucky to get to work on it It's very exciting that you're writing an episode I am writing episode 6 of the new season So when that episode airs everyone needs to watch it

[02:27:55] Just to show that the blank check bump applies To premium cable shows I co-host a podcast Let's see This is coming out in July? August? Late July So we are very shortly switching over To being a podcast like it's the 2000s We're going to be covering

[02:28:13] The decade of the 2000s split up into mini series Our first one is the 10 highest grossing films Of the 2000s I have Like several books coming out My novel Woodworking comes out In April 2025 I am very proud of it It's a very good book

[02:28:29] But right now it's available for pre-order So just go to Amazon And hit refresh There will be a link in the description By April we'll probably be doing Shadiac So if you want to put your chips down on Dragonfly Right now And finally My most Just flying around

[02:28:49] My most Proximate thing is In September I have a book coming out about the TV show Lost That you can and should buy It's called Back to the Island I wrote it with my former AV club colleague Noel Murray You can find me on all social platforms

[02:29:05] I'm primarily on Blue Sky and Letterboxd But I do other things Why the other ones are good Yeah they're all great Thank you for being here Take us out so I can ask you a scheduling question What were you going to say? Sorry Emily

[02:29:19] I was just saying I love being on the show It's a great time From our friend Emily thank you for being here And thank you all for listening Please remember to rate, review and subscribe Thank you to Marie Barty for helping to produce the show

[02:29:34] AJ McKeon for our editing AJ McKeon is also our production coordinator Leigh Montgomery in the Great American Novel For our theme song Joe Bowen, Pat Reynolds for our artwork JJ Birch for our research You can go to BlankCheckPod.com For links to some real nerdy shit

[02:29:50] Including our Patreon And BlankCheck special features Which as we said we're doing Waterworld over there Ben is pointing at a screen This date Will be our final entry In our Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Commentary series Mutant Mayhem Which you may be surprised to hear Ben loved

[02:30:12] It blew my pants off It was a first time watch for him You get to hear him get very excited in real time I slam and scream a lot Also We haven't done this in a little while We do unlock We have the free tier on our Patreon

[02:30:28] Every 10 days we unlock an episode from 3 years ago For public consumption And so that is actually the final Entry in our Twilight Commentary series And that was quite a good series It was If I may say so myself with 3 years distance I think that was a fun one

[02:30:46] And certainly the New Moon episode with our friend Chris White If you're a fan of the director of that movie I highly recommend Now it's free we're giving it back to the people You can listen to that On Patreon as well as available on Spotify

[02:30:56] Yeah you can link those things up Just search on Spotify Playing check special features Tune in next week for Open Range And as always The real male Was the comely shadow on the left No That's a perfect ending That's Pulitzer Prize winning Yeah