Flop House Episode Nine - Next

[0:00] This is the next episode of the Flophouse.

[0:03] I mean, this Flophouse is the next Flophouse.

[0:07] I mean, this episode is next.

[0:09] I mean...

[0:30] Well, anyway, let's kick this thing off.

[0:39] Let's move on to what's next.

[0:42] Yes.

[0:43] That joke won't ever get old.

[0:45] Good night, good morning, good afternoon.

[0:48] Whenever you're listening, welcome to the Flophouse.

[0:51] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:53] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[0:55] I'm Frank Lesser.

[0:56] Yes, our guest host tonight, Frank Lesser.

[1:00] A very funny comedian, writer.

[1:04] Normally a writer for the Colbert Report.

[1:07] Right now, Striking.

[1:09] How's that going?

[1:10] Why'd you have to bring that up?

[1:11] Well...

[1:12] You're bringing me down.

[1:13] Well, I think that the...

[1:14] I was eager to talk.

[1:16] I think our listeners deserve an explanation

[1:19] for how we got a Colbert writer to come

[1:23] be on our unpaid, poorly listened to podcast.

[1:26] And I guess Strike is pretty much the only explanation

[1:29] they would accept.

[1:31] I've mostly just been watching movies.

[1:34] Nice.

[1:35] Non-stop.

[1:36] Well, we had...

[1:37] My friend Elliot was on last time,

[1:39] and he works at the Daily Show as a producer,

[1:42] and we were asking him what he did,

[1:43] and he's like,

[1:44] yeah, you know, watched Robocop today.

[1:46] So there you go.

[1:47] Yeah, I re-watched The Sixth Sense two nights ago.

[1:52] Did the twist still work?

[1:54] Yeah, well, I'm not trying to brag,

[1:56] but I think I'd like everyone to know

[1:58] that I called the surprise twist before the movie started.

[2:01] There are some extenuating circumstances

[2:03] that I don't want to take up this whole podcast.

[2:04] Wait, the first time you saw it?

[2:05] The first time I saw it in the theater.

[2:06] Sure.

[2:07] Not the second.

[2:08] The second time I would have been like,

[2:09] I've seen this before,

[2:10] but I'm pretty sure he's a ghost.

[2:12] It's like an urban legend, dude.

[2:14] I know this kid who didn't even see it,

[2:15] and he totally knew it was going to happen.

[2:18] But no, I wanted to see it

[2:19] because I had seen The Lady in the Water

[2:21] in a similar sort of,

[2:22] not The Lady in the Water, I'm sorry,

[2:24] it's Lady in the Water,

[2:25] in a similar sort of,

[2:26] let's watch a terrible, terrible movie,

[2:27] and it was so bad that I kind of was like,

[2:29] were we all just duped into thinking The Sixth Sense was good?

[2:32] But then I actually watched it,

[2:33] and it is actually really amazing.

[2:34] The cat is hitting some chords right now.

[2:38] Yeah, the cat's playing with the pipe.

[2:39] Yeah, but Lady in the Water, dude,

[2:41] so I might take that.

[2:42] Lady in the Water, like that's a shockingly bad movie.

[2:44] Yeah, yeah.

[2:45] Like it's so incredibly inept of a movie.

[2:47] I found it, I thought it was hilarious.

[2:49] I really, really enjoyed watching it,

[2:51] and I was laughing the whole time.

[2:53] But you have to go into it thinking that,

[2:54] and I honestly, it's, it's, it's,

[2:56] that was watching The Sixth Sense the second time,

[2:58] I was just trying to figure out,

[2:59] like how did he end up making Lady in the Water?

[3:01] And you can see bits of it.

[3:03] In certain scenes, like the scene with Mischa Barton,

[3:05] that part's the scariest part of the movie,

[3:07] but then when like Hayley Joel Osment goes to her family,

[3:10] like you know, goes to her funeral and is like,

[3:12] here, your daughter wanted you to watch this tape

[3:15] of the mom, like that is so cheesy and terrible.

[3:18] That's the one part of the movie that is like

[3:20] every other M. Night movie, but,

[3:21] we're not here to talk about M. Night, but we can.

[3:23] I don't know.

[3:24] M. Night.

[3:25] Your buddy, M. Night.

[3:26] You guys are in an amateur basketball league together.

[3:30] I have a friend who I was in a sketch group with in college

[3:33] whose family is friends with M. Nights in Philly.

[3:36] I don't want to say anything more

[3:37] because I don't want anyone to get in trouble for this,

[3:39] but he has to sort of pretend that he likes

[3:41] all the recent movies.

[3:43] So in that way, he's like anyone on the set of Lady of the Water.

[3:48] Well that's a bigger problem, that like with The Sixth Sense,

[3:50] he clearly had a lot to prove and I think a lot of,

[3:53] he probably listened to what people were telling him

[3:55] about the screen, or he worked on it for a really long time.

[3:58] I think it's still a great movie.

[4:00] You know, if he got like punched,

[4:03] like in the face in front of his family,

[4:06] I'd be pretty happy.

[4:08] That would take him down.

[4:10] I think he'd start writing good screenplays again.

[4:12] At the beginning of that sentence,

[4:14] I was wondering where you were going with that sentence.

[4:16] And it turned out you weren't going that far.

[4:18] It was pretty much an A to B sentence.

[4:20] I was waiting for the shock ending.

[4:22] I was waiting for the shock ending in that sentence.

[4:24] If he got punched by 10,000 scorpions.

[4:27] I was hoping that he would walk out from like your bedroom

[4:30] with his family back there,

[4:31] and then you would punch him in the face.

[4:33] And I'd be like, I wasn't expecting that.

[4:35] Oh my God.

[4:36] Well I would be shocked if, say you punched him,

[4:41] that would be a twist.

[4:43] But less so now that I've heard you say this.

[4:45] Yeah, exactly.

[4:46] Like if this came up on like celebrity gossip news.

[4:48] Yeah, well now the twist is that

[4:50] Stewart's going to dig up the corpse of Rod Serling

[4:52] and punch that.

[4:54] Anyway, let's not talk about twist endings

[4:58] because Simon's not here.

[5:00] Let's discuss...

[5:01] So earlier in this week,

[5:03] sorry to derail the conversation again,

[5:05] I was talking to my good friend Mary Kate Olsen.

[5:09] And she had just gotten done murdering Heath Ledger.

[5:12] Whoa!

[5:13] Whoa.

[5:14] Whoa.

[5:15] Okay, fine.

[5:16] His family could be listening to this.

[5:18] They probably are.

[5:19] Michelle Williams is a fan.

[5:21] Don't, not so...

[5:23] Seriously, as a side note,

[5:25] that was actually a slightly depressing news.

[5:27] I don't even think I've ever seen any of his movies,

[5:29] but I was like,

[5:30] well that kinda, that sucks.

[5:31] You didn't see Brokeback Mountain?

[5:33] I've never seen that.

[5:34] Okay.

[5:35] That was during a period where I was too busy.

[5:36] You didn't see A Knight's Tale?

[5:37] Well that was a thing.

[5:38] He's gay in that as well.

[5:40] He unfortunately passed away

[5:43] just when he was starting to get interesting.

[5:45] That was what was sad about it,

[5:46] like he was really sort of hitting his stride.

[5:49] Now what we have to remember him by

[5:50] is A Knight's Tale and The Patriot,

[5:52] whereas there could have been more

[5:54] Brokeback Mountains in the future.

[5:56] But also, I mean, The Joker,

[5:57] like I was like looking for,

[5:59] you know, I was like,

[6:00] oh I think he'll be,

[6:01] I thought he was a good choice.

[6:02] You know.

[6:03] I heard he got,

[6:04] he did most of his reshoots already, so.

[6:06] That was what I meant.

[6:08] Yeah, you were,

[6:09] Frank was basically just,

[6:10] you know, nervous.

[6:11] He was really upset about the new Batman movie.

[6:13] He was, he really wanted to know that

[6:15] the cat is just going nuts on his podcast,

[6:18] whereas I'm gonna have to.

[6:19] It's really hilarious,

[6:20] if only you guys could see it.

[6:23] Let's, uh,

[6:24] why don't you guys talk amongst yourselves

[6:25] while I chase her out of the room.

[6:27] Okay.

[6:28] Come here, buddy.

[6:29] What were we talking about?

[6:30] He was also in Monsters Ball.

[6:32] I never saw that either.

[6:33] He shoots himself in the chest.

[6:36] I've never seen that.

[6:39] We need to go back and tell people what's gonna.

[6:41] I haven't seen a lot of suicides

[6:43] that involve somebody shooting themselves in the chest.

[6:45] It was kind of weird.

[6:47] Oh, actually, yeah,

[6:48] that does, that seems like

[6:49] one of the worst ways to do it.

[6:51] Why'd you shoot your heart?

[6:52] Yeah, I mean,

[6:53] I think that's the point,

[6:54] but at the same time,

[6:55] I would imagine it still takes a while.

[6:57] It's not like,

[6:58] heart's gone,

[6:59] immediately dead.

[7:00] You know, it was my resolution

[7:01] that this episode would be edited

[7:03] less than any other episode that we've done,

[7:05] but I think it's gonna be edited more.

[7:07] Yeah, probably.

[7:08] It's all my beginning resolution.

[7:09] I think only the part

[7:10] talking about his character committing suicide

[7:11] before the autopsy results have come in.

[7:13] Right.

[7:14] You might want to edit that out.

[7:16] The cats.

[7:17] I think we were very respectful otherwise.

[7:19] No, I was sorry to hear about it.

[7:21] Jokes aside.

[7:23] Yeah.

[7:24] Do you deal with life with jokes?

[7:26] But this isn't the Heath Ledger Memorial podcast.

[7:29] I knew it was.

[7:30] Just imagine how many listens

[7:32] you would get.

[7:33] I don't know if it's called views.

[7:35] It's called,

[7:37] Downloads?

[7:38] I can't make a joke.

[7:40] Can't make a joke with all this grief.

[7:42] Yeah.

[7:43] So, next.

[7:44] We watched a film called Next Tonight, guys.

[7:46] Yeah, we did.

[7:48] I remember that.

[7:49] And starred,

[7:50] I can't,

[7:51] Nicolas Cage.

[7:52] Nicolas Cage,

[7:53] Jessica Biel.

[7:54] And Julianne Moore.

[7:55] This is Jessica Biel's second Flophouse feature,

[7:58] by the way.

[7:59] It's true.

[8:00] Has there been other repeats?

[8:03] I can't think of.

[8:04] I can't think of.

[8:05] What was the other?

[8:07] Stealth.

[8:08] Another one-word title.

[8:10] Okay.

[8:11] Yeah, the movie about the

[8:13] artificially intelligent airplane that goes crazy.

[8:16] Called Stealth.

[8:17] Wait, is that the one with Jamie Foxx?

[8:19] Yeah.

[8:20] I had no idea that was the plot of it.

[8:22] So it's like the Deep Blue Sea,

[8:24] but with planes.

[8:25] Or Short Circuit meets

[8:27] one of the war games or something.

[8:30] Yeah, okay.

[8:31] So I guess,

[8:32] I don't guess, I know.

[8:34] We just watched the movie.

[8:35] Yeah, of course.

[8:36] Next was about a guy.

[8:37] I have this gif where I can see into the past.

[8:40] Two hours.

[8:41] And I remember when we sat down to begin watching it,

[8:43] I was like,

[8:44] I bet this is going to be terrible.

[8:46] Right.

[8:47] And were we confirmed?

[8:49] I mean, it was an okay movie,

[8:51] I think.

[8:52] Nicolas Cage can see two minutes into the future.

[8:55] But only when it involves him.

[8:58] Yeah, he can't.

[8:59] Say you're Mahmoud Medinajad.

[9:03] I can't say it.

[9:04] He wouldn't be able to see what's going to go on

[9:07] two minutes into his future.

[9:08] Unless he's watching CNN,

[9:10] which is a spoiler alert,

[9:12] but at one point he's watching CNN

[9:14] to see if some big news event happens.

[9:17] He's being forced to watch.

[9:19] Yeah, but again,

[9:20] It's actually, I think, like a rip-off CNN.

[9:22] It's a news story that sort of involves him,

[9:24] because by that time,

[9:25] his girlfriend Jessica Biel is about to explode.

[9:28] She's been kidnapped and strapped with...

[9:31] You have a very strict definition of girlfriend.

[9:33] Yeah, exactly, dude.

[9:35] Well, let's talk about that.

[9:37] So, Nicolas Cage can see two minutes into the future,

[9:39] except for he's been having these reoccurring

[9:42] premonitions of this woman that's going to come into his life.

[9:45] And he's been having these premonitions, right?

[9:48] Who's he been sharing these premonitions with?

[9:50] He's been sharing his premonitions with Peter Falk.

[9:52] That's strange.

[9:53] His buddy Peter Falk,

[9:54] who he apparently, I guess, lives with

[9:56] in sort of a garage somewhere.

[10:00] because it's a little bit

[10:02] and uh... if you really want is literally in

[10:05] that one part of the like one scene interestingly developed character

[10:09] you see change dramatically

[10:12] from a old man to an old man who can't walk very well at the end of the scene

[10:17] you realize he has trouble walking

[10:19] yeah he also has trouble opening both of his eyes to the same amount

[10:23] we were introduced to peter falk uh...

[10:26] nicholas cage has

[10:28] been in a high-speed chase

[10:30] and it comes back to i guess it's a house for people because they're

[10:33] and people come to me

[10:35] you can't keep uh...

[10:37] you can't keep getting these chases

[10:39] which is a

[10:41] and you gotta wonder okay so i guess it's a regular parts of the life of a

[10:45] guy who seems to be a jersey's constantly high-speed chases

[10:48] so you know what's going to work i mean it is to be seen in the future

[10:52] i think you can keep getting a list and i don't know that's the whole point of

[10:56] the negative repercussions yeah

[10:59] what i think about the same i was just that it wasn't even like they didn't put

[11:02] it in there for any exposition for any reason of explaining what's going on the

[11:05] plot is really just like

[11:07] and then i don't know we got peter falk involved somehow so he's on the lot today

[11:12] he can't play a french terrorist

[11:14] he's not one of the bad guys maybe he can be his buddy

[11:17] his buddy that will be in one scene will play some pool with him

[11:20] that is weird no relationship explained

[11:23] i do want to say that i think that i really did like the scenes where he

[11:26] sees into the future

[11:28] so i think you surprise but it's only terrible happen and i would like to

[11:31] backwards and you realize

[11:33] all my god the whole time i've just been watching him watch

[11:35] the future what's gonna happen

[11:37] but i thought that was i actually thought that was like very well done

[11:40] but i think i was really surprised this wasn't as bad as i sort of was hoping it

[11:44] would be

[11:45] and inside i think there's a brilliant romantic comedy

[11:49] waiting to come out or be rewritten or have this turned into a well you were

[11:52] very enamored of the scene where it was a just to be able to get to know each

[11:57] other because like

[11:58] as i was saying he was he was he was having permissions over

[12:01] and like just a deal is with the

[12:04] the exception to his two-minute rule anything sure how do you just feel you

[12:08] can see further into the future because i guess they're

[12:11] there uh... their lives are inextricably linked in some way

[12:14] and so he does not matter i was just read my brain a moment ago to think of

[12:18] something

[12:20] based on just to be a little bit of rule but i i i i think it was a wrecking his

[12:25] mind

[12:27] my mind is

[12:29] mining her uh... that it's a part of it and i don't think so

[12:33] it's not really really let's talk about uh... my theory of jessica bills career

[12:38] because i do think she's very very attractive as it was a body

[12:41] but her face in a performance is not necessarily memorable but it's always

[12:44] adequate but i really do think that the world is just waiting for her to finally

[12:47] be completely naked in a movie because everyone policy to movies and i want to

[12:51] name the other embarrassed by it

[12:53] but i think it would be she said that she always was like

[12:56] skimpy clothes that's like

[12:57] all of you know i don't know what they did

[12:59] well she's not

[13:00] and i think this is a lot like sitting at home like we had a great day but i

[13:04] think that's what everyone in hollywood is yeah i don't think i don't think it's

[13:07] even like a dirty old man thing i think it's like that they're playing the

[13:10] numbers and i think we put her in a movie

[13:13] eventually

[13:14] so that's a little

[13:16] one of these movies will have a really good directors like really well

[13:19] respected you'll be like

[13:20] as one of the script when you saw it but i really think it's

[13:23] important to your character

[13:25] that she's naked here

[13:26] we have this little pillow fight

[13:29] the pillow fight is really sort of uh... revealing character shows that she's

[13:33] willing to have fun

[13:34] playful nature

[13:36] shows that she's got great

[13:37] naked boobs her nipples aren't gross

[13:40] except that's

[13:41] that's really key to her character

[13:43] what if that's a secret? what if she's constantly always like no i'm totally fine doing nudity

[13:47] and then she does and the directors are like

[13:49] her nipples are totally gross

[13:50] those shits are gross dude she's got fucking invisible nipples

[13:56] i don't know they're like a portal to some sort of horrible http lovecraft dimension

[14:01] can we repeat that quote those shits are horrible? i think that should be like the main theme of this entire episode

[14:09] right i think we should move away from jessica biel

[14:11] i was saying that the point was you were really

[14:14] like you liked the scene when they first

[14:17] meet each other like when he finally he's like okay she's gonna be in this

[14:21] diner

[14:22] i'm gonna meet her here

[14:23] and uh... he used his power sort of in a groundhog day sort of

[14:29] actually honestly kind of like a sleazy way though he's like alright i can

[14:33] pre-try out every approach to this girl and see what works and i actually

[14:38] thought like you know filmically

[14:40] to use a big fancy word but in the film medium i thought they did a

[14:44] good job of the first time he gets up he approaches her

[14:47] he tries some line or something and she's just like

[14:50] yeah

[14:51] you know get lost

[14:52] words to that effect i didn't write this screenplay i can't recapture the brilliance

[14:57] but um... and she's like get lost and then like the camera sort of racks focus

[15:01] and you see that he's actually still sitting where he was before and the whole

[15:04] thing was him seeing

[15:05] the future he portrayed that i thought that was the most fascinating i thought

[15:08] that was a really interesting thing i was like

[15:10] if this was just a romantic comedy about a guy

[15:13] played by nicholas cage who's kind of schlubby and has a terrible fake haircut

[15:17] i would be much more interested in it

[15:20] we should move on to his hair but i honestly would love to write that movie

[15:24] and then possibly at some point there's nudity justifying jessica biel's inclusion in the movie

[15:30] you know

[15:30] the thing that i'm confused by is like

[15:32] nicholas cage is

[15:34] pretty ancient at this point and

[15:36] i'm just wondering that i you know it's gotta be

[15:39] early forties i don't think he's well okay but the thing is he's too old for jessica biel

[15:45] in a world with julianne moore who

[15:47] while overrated as an actress

[15:50] is very attractive

[15:52] and could easily have done the role that jessica biel did

[15:56] right why couldn't she have been the love interest arguably better too i mean like

[16:00] you don't like it i mean i like julianne moore better than you guys

[16:04] maybe i should see more of her movies

[16:06] at least there's a little bit of like tenderness because it's like

[16:09] hey he's actually interested in a woman who's in kind of his age bracket

[16:14] when it comes to jessica biel it's like

[16:15] well yeah of course he's in love with her because he totally wants to bone her because he's hot

[16:20] why it just

[16:21] like it just doesn't make sense like i don't know

[16:23] well i mean the whole

[16:25] romance sort of went on fast forward there's never any

[16:29] they become as you put it boyfriend and girlfriend pretty quick

[16:32] they drive somewhere i wasn't paying complete attention to everything but

[16:36] somehow

[16:37] he hitches a ride with her

[16:39] and then they go to where she works which is the grand canyon

[16:43] yeah i'm taking a moment to talk about this because

[16:45] jessica biel's job

[16:47] is one of these crazy bullshit movie jobs

[16:50] which is

[16:51] she's a teacher who teaches native american children

[16:55] at the bottom of the grand canyon

[16:57] you know i've met girls that are into that kind of shit i'm going to tell you every time

[17:01] not that much fun to hang out with

[17:03] they think their life's really important and uh... they don't drink very much beer

[17:08] yeah but i bet that they would wear a lot more turquoise jewelry

[17:12] than jessica biel

[17:13] which is nice she didn't have any turquoise

[17:17] this was the southwest

[17:19] not the grand canyon on the east coast

[17:21] yes this was the original grand canyon

[17:25] but that's also an interesting issue i think the only reason she did that was

[17:28] there's a scene where nicholas cage is talking about the

[17:31] i don't think they were like the pueblo indians but the tribe that was

[17:34] there like how they could

[17:36] he's also a magician but he says you know they could see the

[17:39] something about that various other things and they could see the future

[17:42] talking about his own condition so they could talk about that but otherwise

[17:45] what she was doing had really no purpose to her character or it wasn't like

[17:49] she was like a stock market trader or

[17:52] there was no real reason that she was doing that for him to for him to be

[17:55] faded to meet her

[17:57] there's got to be a deleted scene

[17:59] whether it was shot or whether it was just in the original screenplay

[18:02] where nicholas cage does go to like meet a shaman and like talk to the shaman

[18:07] about his ability

[18:10] probably with like a masculine trip or something

[18:13] played by peter falk

[18:14] sort of in my native american face

[18:19] this is all faded

[18:21] native american face

[18:23] i don't know

[18:24] it's probably best that they cut that out

[18:26] i think like almost every action movie nowadays has something

[18:31] written into the script where

[18:33] the love interest just happens to like

[18:35] pick up the hero as a hitchhiker or just end up in a car with him and then like

[18:40] hey we're just going to travel around forever

[18:42] yeah that's how people meet

[18:46] that uh... that's probably why i'm so lonely. That's how romance works. That's how my wife and I met.

[18:51] Just beating your way through the U.S. consulate?

[18:54] well i've got this crazy superpower where uh... i can hear conversations

[18:58] but only if i'm like exactly across the world from them like they're exactly

[19:03] opposite me on the globe and i was hitchhiking through the southwest and i

[19:08] uh... was running out of water

[19:10] and uh... this woman

[19:12] you know her car broke down

[19:14] FBI was probably on your tail right?

[19:17] yeah i was being hunted from both ends

[19:19] the good guys and the bad guys

[19:21] sure the bad guys were french as well

[19:26] french terrorists in this film

[19:29] that's a common

[19:30] i don't know if you've been

[19:32] listening to the news lately but that's uh...

[19:34] didn't they kill that pakistani prime minister or something?

[19:39] that was the french

[19:41] i mean i wasn't really paying attention to the news i had the volume turned off

[19:46] i was pretty sad about that too because i think she was like right on the cusp of her greatest work

[19:50] very similar to heath ledger

[19:52] he was going to move on to so many

[19:56] i wonder what she would have done next

[19:58] uh... yes

[20:00] but it was good as well

[20:02] i think i thought it off of john travolta and swordfish or tom hanks and

[20:06] uh... the vinci code

[20:08] i think it might be like a weird like symbiote like a weird like parasitic organism

[20:12] it's got it's own credit

[20:14] it does yeah i mean i think they were like

[20:16] you know they wanted to put the hair in the movie but they really weren't quite sure if this was the

[20:20] appropriate feature board and in truth it probably wasn't cause

[20:23] it really kept me from seeing this movie in the theater i mean i honestly think that that's why

[20:27] like watching the commercials in the trailer aside from the fact that i think there was some line like

[20:31] but i can only see two minutes into the future

[20:34] i shouldn't have explained it that much but i think the main thing was like seeing

[20:38] you see like you see nicholas cage's

[20:41] you see nicholas cage and you're like i don't want to see that movie i don't want to watch a movie where somebody can actually see the future

[20:46] what a stupid uh... limitation

[20:48] but it was honestly i remember seeing the trailer or the commercial and i was just like

[20:51] oh god his hair looks terrible his hair looks so bad he should really just go for something natural

[20:56] stupid to be that petty but it's like

[20:58] so clearly fake

[21:00] something's wrong with it

[21:02] where's that weird like motorcycle jacket the whole time

[21:07] well maybe the uh... it's almost like he's like that's his costume and he's an

[21:10] action hero

[21:12] superhero called next

[21:14] maybe the um...

[21:15] maybe the hair's cause he's a magician and i'm jumping

[21:19] jumping forward and backward in time in the movie just like next

[21:23] the film does

[21:25] so i think that this podcast is thematically sort of linked

[21:28] but you mentioned before that he's a magician but i think we should examine this a little bit more

[21:33] it's logical it's like i was telling people off microphone that i had a very

[21:38] like similar idea for thriller once that i wanted to write

[21:42] and in my life with justin long starring in it

[21:45] yeah justin long would have been the uh... would have been the lead character and like the girl is naked the entire time

[21:51] but the thing was like you know i thought okay it'll be a psychic and he will

[21:56] be the psychic who can only

[21:59] who can only predict things for people he doesn't know that well

[22:01] well cause there's an issue in this movie where he says i don't want to give this is somewhat of a spoiler

[22:06] but he says it earlier

[22:07] but he says it earlier where like once you see the future it changes everything that happens

[22:11] essentially

[22:12] the alternate title is probably like schrodinger's next or something like that but like if you see what happens in the future it changes what's going to happen

[22:19] so it's a real science background so my idea is like okay well

[22:23] uh... what could a psychic with these limitations do

[22:26] he's like a fucking like phone psychic because he can be a psychic for people he doesn't know and that's the way he uses it

[22:31] and and it's kind of like

[22:32] it's not that clever but it's sort of like oh okay he's using his talent but in a really cheesy way and this film did the same thing where it's like

[22:39] oh well he's a magician

[22:41] he's a magician but the twist is he can actually do magic in a way like you can see the future

[22:47] but you see his magic act at the beginning of the movie

[22:50] and he's doing like sleight of hand like he's like like doves are coming out of his hands and he's

[22:55] and later on he like does things where you know like flames come out of his hands or he drops

[22:59] coins everywhere

[23:00] and you think to yourself

[23:02] why like if he has this power to see the future

[23:05] why is his magic act

[23:07] well maybe like he looked in the future and he saw that like flame was going to shoot out of his hand

[23:12] and it's actually real magic he has no control

[23:15] like I better make I better make the best of this

[23:18] I better make a hand motion or else I might

[23:20] I don't see it as as big of a plot hole because I think there is a part where he was

[23:24] he seemed to imply it's again I wasn't paying that much attention throughout the entire thing

[23:28] sure

[23:28] but there was a part where I think he's talking about he was studied before and he doesn't want to go back where they

[23:32] 36 hour marathon session of having to guess what card is going to come up next

[23:36] dude that was almost a direct quote

[23:37] I know I remembered that line it really stuck with me

[23:40] I related

[23:42] I don't want to give anything away but like I know things I know some things

[23:46] but I think like that would be like a diversion essentially which I believe is a magic term

[23:50] but I mean I think it would I think it makes it seem less like he can see the future if he's also like

[23:54] and now I turned a paper rose into a real rose girl I just met and will sleep with

[23:59] I like that idea

[24:00] 15 minutes

[24:01] I like that idea

[24:03] to bring Peter Falk back into the conversation

[24:06] he's like Columbo

[24:08] like he's sort of pretending to be kind of like a chintzy guy

[24:12] so he has to cover up his own his like real talent

[24:14] like he's a cheesy magician but I think a good question that I'd like to get to would be like

[24:18] well the other big thing is so the federal agents are after him because these terrorists have a

[24:22] nuclear bomb hitting somewhere in Los Angeles which is kind of a side plot

[24:27] that's not really that sort of comes into play but it's more about him and the girl

[24:31] but you know and he doesn't want to help him because he can only see what's going on in his own life

[24:35] but it does feel like a little

[24:37] silly and not selfish but like it you know I don't know I feel like if you had this gift you would

[24:41] not just be a magician in Las Vegas we sort of discussed this

[24:45] yeah it will not be such a dick about the like oh okay there's a nuclear bomb that's going to blow up in Los Angeles

[24:50] I'm sorry I really can't do it

[24:52] can't be bothered I gotta try and hit it again

[24:54] yeah no and it's only when he sees that the girl that he loves could be in danger that then like

[24:58] yeah ultimately he's like okay I'll help you guys

[25:00] it sort of makes him a bit of an unsympathetic protagonist

[25:03] except in Los Angeles' charm

[25:05] yeah

[25:07] carried him

[25:08] it's gotten him so much in this life

[25:11] well let's talk about

[25:12] one problem that I had and I feel like an idiot

[25:15] honestly like bringing up

[25:17] real logical objections to the movie

[25:20] however later in the film

[25:22] late in the movie

[25:24] he basically we basically see

[25:26] visually represented him

[25:28] his body splitting off into several possible different futures

[25:32] I also really like that scene

[25:33] it like you know it was a very MC Escher

[25:36] it was a cool idea

[25:37] before that scene from Labyrinth

[25:39] it was visually shocking

[25:42] it was because there were catwalks and platforms

[25:44] yeah he was like alright I gotta find Jessica Biel

[25:46] I'm gonna basically like

[25:48] imagine every possible future in which I

[25:50] explore the entire uh... base to see where she is

[25:53] and he's avoiding bombs

[25:55] and all kinds of shit

[25:56] but this I mean this brought up a question that I had earlier in the movie which is

[26:01] is he constantly aware of every possible thing that might happen to him in his life and if so

[26:06] isn't his brain overloaded by that

[26:09] like how can one

[26:11] like that's like the brain of God to know like every

[26:13] possibility that might happen

[26:15] it seemed like he was sort of making conscious decisions at that point to say like

[26:19] here I'm gonna go right and left

[26:22] and then this I mean yeah it seemed

[26:24] very focused but he was focused

[26:25] I was sort of able to believe that for some reason

[26:30] well also he seems very like physically like

[26:33] talented like if

[26:34] if say a giant log is coming at him which happened at least once during the film

[26:40] he is able to

[26:42] you know with lightning quick reflexes go exactly where he needs to go

[26:46] dodge bullets to dodge it and I don't know that just because you can see the future you have that ability

[26:51] oh yeah Dan tear this movie apart it just wasn't realistic enough

[26:55] yeah because look I can accept him seeing the future

[26:58] I totally have his same ability

[27:00] I know that in a minute a guy is going to walk into this room and shoot me

[27:04] that doesn't mean I know how to not get shot

[27:07] I'm like oh maybe if I move to the left nope if I move to the right he's still going to shoot me

[27:11] well there was this scene where a guy is firing bullets at him and he's splitting you're seeing like the

[27:15] various different versions of him that are getting shot but like he knows which one

[27:19] exactly where to sort of walk but then

[27:21] yeah there were certain little issues with it which is why I think it works better as a romantic comedy

[27:26] where you just focus on

[27:28] I would accept it if say in like Stewart's scenario that he's painted for us

[27:33] do you shoot anyone else after he shoots you or am I okay sitting here?

[27:39] I forgot to tell you I don't actually have this pile right here

[27:44] well you'll have to keep listening to the podcast you know it'll be down in a minute

[27:48] but say this guy comes in in a minute and shoots you

[27:51] I would believe it if you're like oh okay this guy is going to come in in a minute and shoot me

[27:56] I'm going to leave the house

[27:58] you know like that was your solution to it

[28:00] I'm going to dodge around like kick him in the head four times while he's trying to punch me

[28:07] you're going to do some matrix shit

[28:09] matrix shit I think is the technical term

[28:13] now I just want to bring this up because this is the part that this is something that I loved about the whole movie

[28:17] this is probably my favorite part about the whole movie

[28:20] and it's not as harrowing it's not like Jessica Biel's Bond or anything

[28:23] it's actually are you saying those are trait concerns?

[28:26] no those are I'm going to say those are secondary things I wouldn't say traits they are important

[28:30] surface yes exactly now

[28:32] it's the thing it's

[28:34] I just really like it when a movie accurately represents

[28:38] the United States government like the FBI and the police as being

[28:42] incredibly efficient at performing their job

[28:45] specifically in the collection of evidence and busting criminals

[28:49] because in this film just like in say like Lethal Weapon Part 2

[28:53] the good guys efficiently kill every single possible bad guy

[29:00] even when they're unarmed

[29:02] but I would say even when they could possibly give you information that would lead to

[29:08] I don't know say the nuclear bomb

[29:10] hidden somewhere in Los Angeles that you're looking for instead of

[29:13] capturing them

[29:14] they just like fly down in a helicopter

[29:16] and like shoot them twenty times so at the end of the movie when they have that like big crazy

[29:20] fake explosion in the necklace case like I made a mistake and they're like

[29:24] you made a mistake that's impossible he's like no I made a mistake

[29:28] like that moment

[29:29] that moment he says like that the thing is like

[29:33] shouldn't he be saying

[29:35] you made a mistake for shooting the lead fucking terrorist a second ago

[29:38] who had no weapons or even a fucking cell phone

[29:42] and just told it like hey dude I'm going to shoot you unless you tell me where the bomb is

[29:45] or maybe he saw in the future the possibility

[29:48] that if they did that

[29:50] he would like kill them I don't know

[29:51] you know they didn't actually explain how he made the mistake at all like what that

[29:55] really unless he was so distracted by the girl that that was the mistake oh that was the mistake

[29:59] I don't know

[30:00] Let's spoil the ending and say that we go through this big action movie ending and then

[30:07] everyone blows up.

[30:08] Because he made a mistake and the bomb was somewhere else.

[30:09] He got too distracted by Jessica Biel and then we zoom backwards in time and we realize

[30:17] that the last half an hour to forty minutes of the film has been a flash forward as Nicolas

[30:24] Cage lies in bed.

[30:25] Next to Jessica Biel because he can see farther into the future when it involves her.

[30:29] Now, can I just point out the weirdness of the fact that the movie that we watch immediately

[30:34] after I Know Who Killed Me features not only a scene that's weirdly reminiscent of an incident

[30:42] in Owl Creek Bridge, which you mentioned in the last podcast, but also has that weird

[30:47] bullshit type thing where it's like, just like in that movie, where you kind of feel

[30:51] like oh, so the whole thing was just a story you wrote.

[30:54] I haven't seen that.

[30:55] Oh, it's okay.

[30:56] This thing is like, yeah, the whole last forty-five minutes could have happened, who knows.

[31:03] And we don't see what actually did happen because the movie ends with Nicolas Cage and

[31:08] Julianne Moore setting out to, one assumes, do it right this time.

[31:13] And they repeat him saying, see the thing about the, I think it literally starts with

[31:17] like, see, the other thing I didn't tell you about the future is that when you look at

[31:21] it, he repeats it from earlier, that it changes.

[31:24] I fucking hate monologues at the very end of a movie.

[31:28] I didn't mind it.

[31:29] There were some parts earlier that I didn't mind, but yeah, at the end it was like, oh.

[31:32] I'm like, at the very end when they're like, so, here's the things you should take away

[31:35] from watching this movie, this movie is really good, and having the ability to be next is

[31:41] awesome, because you can dodge bullets at the end.

[31:44] Peace.

[31:45] There's one more thing about the end that I really want to bring up, and that's, literally

[31:48] the whole end of the movie is them going through like these warehouses, and Nicolas Cage is

[31:54] telling people where to shoot.

[31:56] Yeah.

[31:57] You know, like, oh, there's gonna be a sniper over here, and shoot over here, and oh, look

[32:00] out, you're gonna get shot, shoot over here, and it just weirdly, it's just a very strange

[32:05] way to end a movie, because it's like, well, there's no suspense about what's gonna happen,

[32:09] because Nicolas Cage knows how to fix everything.

[32:11] Well, except for the point where he was then like, okay, now at this scene, you guys go

[32:15] over there, and he'll go over here for no reason, because nothing happened, all of a

[32:21] sudden, and none of the agents were like, I think that's a bad idea.

[32:24] That's fucking retarded, dude, because you keep shooting me, and I don't want to die.

[32:28] I'm gonna stick with you.

[32:30] I'm gonna stick with next over here.

[32:33] I still felt like there was some stuff that could maybe go wrong.

[32:36] I thought that was the nice thing at the end, when he's confronting the lead terrorist,

[32:40] he's like, you have only one choice that's good.

[32:42] That wasn't it.

[32:44] And then, of course, he gets shot eight times by Julianne Moore.

[32:48] The thing is, and the problem with it is, any time there's suspense, the only possible

[32:52] way you can really have suspense is when the hero's in danger.

[32:55] So any time anything possibly bad would happen to Nicolas Cage, you're like, oh, that's just

[33:00] like the future he was watching.

[33:02] In a second, he's gonna stand there, and his head's gonna wobble, and then he's gonna walk

[33:05] back into the scene or something.

[33:07] Well, that was the other thing that, Dan, you mentioned, that as it got closer to the

[33:11] end, I think maybe the futures he envisioned were even more horrific, but he would viscerally

[33:16] feel like his head would shoot backwards when he would see the scene.

[33:20] It was like a ghost flies through his head in a Ghostbusters movie.

[33:24] All of a sudden, he's like, whoa!

[33:26] And his hair stands up on end.

[33:28] What the fuck?

[33:29] Well, we could talk about it all night, but we should wrap up this part of the thing with

[33:34] the final judgments.

[33:35] And Frank, I don't...

[33:37] I'm this film's biggest apologist.

[33:39] Yeah, I don't think you've actually heard this podcast before, so I will explain the

[33:45] rules to you and to the listening audience, anyone who might be new.

[33:48] I should probably hear them again, too.

[33:50] The three official Flophouse categories are, is this a movie that you did not like at all,

[33:56] a movie that you would maybe recommend to people as a good, bad film, something that

[34:01] might be fun to watch for some laughs, or a movie that you actually kind of liked.

[34:07] Since you're the guest, I'll go...

[34:09] I think I know where you're gonna go.

[34:10] Yeah, I know.

[34:11] I'm a little embarrassed to say it, and I haven't...

[34:14] I think I'd need to think about it a little bit more.

[34:16] And I don't think it was a great movie or even a particularly good movie, but I didn't

[34:20] dislike it, and I think there was a very good movie hidden within there, which, again, I

[34:24] would say is a romantic comedy along the lines of 51st Date or sort of like Groundhog Day.

[34:29] They might have ripped it off from that a little more than whatever Philip K. Dick-inspired

[34:33] novel or movie, as you were saying, the screenwriter watched before writing this.

[34:39] But I actually...

[34:40] I was...

[34:41] And maybe it was also the super low expectations that I went into it.

[34:44] It was no remake of The Wicker Man.

[34:47] It was no Island of Dr. Moreau.

[34:51] I was generally not necessarily pleased.

[34:54] I don't think I needed to see it.

[34:56] I don't know that I would tell anybody to go see it, but I didn't mind it.

[34:59] No jokes.

[35:00] Completely.

[35:01] That's my earnest thought.

[35:02] So where's it going?

[35:03] Which one was that?

[35:04] Was that one, two, or three?

[35:05] I think that was number three.

[35:06] Three, yes.

[35:07] Okay, wow.

[35:08] I'm going to go with...

[35:09] I'm going to say that I think this was a good, bad movie.

[35:11] Yeah?

[35:12] If anything, because I think it's totally worth watching to see all the weird shit

[35:17] where he's like, oh, I died.

[35:19] No, I didn't.

[35:20] Rewind.

[35:21] But see, I liked that.

[35:22] No, that's what I liked about it.

[35:24] I want people to see that.

[35:25] And the fact that the whole last half hour of the movie didn't actually happen and wasn't

[35:30] that suspenseful, totally worth watching.

[35:34] I'm going to go with Frank just because I wouldn't say it was a good, bad movie because

[35:38] it's not the sort of movie where I really laughed at what was wrong with it.

[35:42] It's more like I just sort of indulged what was wrong with it.

[35:46] I'll say the same thing that I basically said about Mr. Brooks, which is if you've had a

[35:52] rough day or you've had a drink or two or you're really tired, you don't really care

[35:58] what you're watching, but you want to watch something that's kind of fun and like Next

[36:01] comes on TV.

[36:02] Yep.

[36:03] Yeah, you sit there and watch Next, you know?

[36:05] I would say if you want to write a high-concept romantic comedy, you should watch Next and

[36:10] rip off the good parts of it.

[36:12] Frank is advocating that you use Next as like a junkyard for spare parts.

[36:18] So who are going to be the stars in your movie?

[36:21] I think Justin Long.

[36:22] I think we established that.

[36:23] Justin Long, sure, yeah.

[36:24] He's got some talent.

[36:25] Jessica Biel, but she would play the Julianne Moore character.

[36:28] Okay, so she's the FBI agent in this movie.

[36:31] But naked.

[36:32] The FBI in this movie is entirely nude.

[36:34] Sure.

[36:35] I think that would ruin the entire appeal, though.

[36:36] Part of the FBI beach patrol.

[36:38] But the appeal of her, again, I've only seen her in this and I'm embarrassed to say I now

[36:42] pronounce you Chuck and Larry, which I watched with some other people trying to watch a bad

[36:45] movie, and then we ended up not necessarily enjoying it.

[36:48] I don't want to get into this right now.

[36:49] But I think her whole thing is that she wears stuff that's on the verge of being completely

[36:53] naked.

[36:54] You're like, wow, she...

[36:55] I mean, the girl is watching it at the other thing.

[36:57] We're like, that's not fair that her body is that good.

[36:59] Right.

[37:00] Direct quote from a girl, from a real lady.

[37:02] Yeah, that sounds right.

[37:03] A real lady.

[37:04] So you say...

[37:05] She has like a handkerchief.

[37:06] But you haven't picked your lead.

[37:09] Who's your romantic lead to go opposite Justin Long?

[37:12] That powerhouse.

[37:13] I probably wouldn't actually pick Justin Long.

[37:15] I don't know who would be in it.

[37:17] I think it would be...

[37:18] Shia LaBeouf.

[37:19] Shia LaBeouf.

[37:20] Maybe Jack Black.

[37:22] He can bring a little bit of his little bullshit to it.

[37:25] I think that would be the same sort of issue with this, which is just at no point are you

[37:28] like, oh yeah, Nicolas Cage would be realistic as somebody who would approach Jessica Biel

[37:35] and this whole thing would happen.

[37:37] That was the bigger thing.

[37:38] I think it's more likely that someone can see the future two minutes ahead of time than

[37:42] that this sort of romance thing would have played out how it did.

[37:45] That wasn't believable for me.

[37:47] Yeah, that's true.

[37:49] Maybe that's being shallow.

[37:51] I guess in the world of probabilities, you're right.

[37:55] It is more probable that somebody can literally see into the future than Nicolas Cage's character

[38:02] would be able to reach that point in his relationship with Jessica Biel in two days.

[38:06] Unless the premise was also that he was like, by the way, I'm Nicolas Cage and you're not

[38:10] Jessica Biel.

[38:11] Well, I don't know if you guys know this, but teachers who teach Native American children

[38:15] in the Grand Canyon are total sluts.

[38:19] They're just aching for a snake.

[38:21] They're aching for Nicolas Cage to come along and show them what he's like.

[38:26] Maybe she was just a really big Nicolas Cage fan.

[38:29] Like, you look so much like Nicolas Cage.

[38:31] Maybe she grew up watching his movies.

[38:36] It's good to laugh.

[38:38] Yeah, it is good to laugh.

[38:40] Let's put next behind us and move on to the next segment.

[38:46] The next segment.

[38:48] Which is to talk about things that we saw recently that we actually enjoyed.

[38:54] Like, give a recommendation.

[38:57] Because we like to give.

[38:59] We don't like to just take.

[39:01] And so, I will explain again.

[39:04] Frank, this is where we usually recommend something maybe a little underrated or overlooked

[39:10] that we watched recently that we enjoyed and just say something about it.

[39:15] Stuart, is there anything that you want to bring up?

[39:18] It's not necessarily underrated, but if you get a chance, you should go see it.

[39:23] I just got to see Teeth, the movie about the girl with...

[39:28] Vagina Dentata.

[39:30] Yeah, Vagina Dentata.

[39:32] Yeah, there's a lot of bitten off penises in the movie.

[39:36] So, if you want to see a bunch of bitten off penises...

[39:39] See, if you combine that with my romantic comedy movie based on the idea of next,

[39:43] that the girl has a Vagina Dentata, I think I would see that movie.

[39:47] Fucking cinema gold right there, baby.

[39:49] Yeah, yeah.

[39:50] That goes beyond my concept.

[39:51] I heard good things about that, I think.

[39:53] But then bad things from someone else.

[39:55] But women entirely.

[39:57] Sure, well...

[39:58] Not that that matters.

[40:00] but the thing is that women

[40:02] they have a lot of mixed up ideas about the giant

[40:05] so

[40:06] i would not

[40:07] i would take what they say with a grain of salt

[40:10] they need a mirror to look at them

[40:14] i don't know what that means

[40:19] i don't know what that means

[40:22] it's a good one dude

[40:25] uh... so uh... that was me

[40:28] uh... something of uh... i don't know anything underrated i did recently uh...

[40:34] let me say something pretentious

[40:36] uh... at filmforum

[40:38] they were showing city lights which is the 1931 charlie chaplin movie

[40:42] that is really funny i'd only seen little bits of chaplin some of his shorts and i

[40:46] saw i think modern times and i wasn't that into it i think it was a long time ago but city lights

[40:50] i actually was

[40:51] it's fairly touching and it's also really very funny i was very surprised by that

[40:56] as far as companies and i did like no country for all men but that's not

[40:59] really underrated

[41:00] uh... enough

[41:03] well i didn't say that and there will be a lot of uh...

[41:06] uh... sixteen

[41:09] uh...

[41:10] uh...

[41:11] anything obscure recently that i thought i'd actually really sweet hot it's not

[41:15] obscure but it didn't do incredibly well

[41:18] there will be yeah

[41:20] well i uh...

[41:23] a classic

[41:24] but uh...

[41:26] not like a citizen kane style classic i saw i watched recently

[41:30] onibaba or onibaba

[41:33] japanese movie about uh...

[41:35] i can't even explain it

[41:37] i won't even try let's put that one away and say uh...

[41:40] spell it for people

[41:42] o n i

[41:44] b a b a

[41:46] and uh...

[41:48] if you want to see a movie that's sort of like a japanese horror movie from the

[41:51] late

[41:53] fifties early sixties with more like a weird psycho drama

[41:56] uh... that's a good movie to watch

[41:59] but uh...

[41:59] uh... move it's more accessible

[42:02] again

[42:03] i guess we're not really going to look the obscure

[42:07] stuff this week as we have more uh... mainstream but

[42:10] i'm surprised as the inside of the

[42:13] uh... my wife and i watched a story recently and

[42:16] i was really sort of struck by how

[42:20] pretty good that's who you do not recommend a couple of years ago remember

[42:24] you did idea that was pretty good it's a pretty solid

[42:27] right now i don't want anything to do with it

[42:31] but it did really well i actually he was a lot of us that's all i saw

[42:35] parts of that

[42:36] and i was actually very impressed there was a very funny scene

[42:39] later in the uh... later uh... place that's later in the uh... show

[42:43] between him and my uh... rudolph

[42:45] that was like this really weird like a really good ones that i think slipped in

[42:48] somehow or that there have been more you know they've been doing more of those

[42:52] that i highly recommend were like

[42:53] i'm not going to try to describe it it's not going to be as funny

[42:56] so look for it on youtube

[43:00] yeah i don't know it seems like the type that's too obscure

[43:04] it's like a lot of will forte sketches on snl that are really funny but for some reason

[43:08] they don't hit the demographic that posts

[43:11] snl clips to youtube

[43:13] but um... no i expect uh... great things from shia labeouf

[43:17] maybe i'll battle some more transformers soon

[43:20] i would uh... in my romantic comedy version of next

[43:23] shia labeouf

[43:24] sorry shia labeouf

[43:26] and we still haven't picked an actress dude

[43:28] uh... ranticomedy

[43:30] how about ellen cage from juno

[43:33] she's delightful i watched hard candy the other day

[43:36] how is that

[43:37] kinda boring

[43:38] she's really good in juno and the actors were generally good some of them weren't good

[43:42] i think it was great casting i despise jason reitman

[43:46] don't necessarily despise i didn't like thank you for smoking i didn't like thank you for smoking either

[43:50] i did not like juno at all it's a real movie for about thirty minutes near like the last

[43:54] about two-thirds of the way in it becomes a real movie until the thundercats line

[43:58] and then it's despicable i thought it was so sorry i'm going to like take over this podcast

[44:03] i'm going to start cursing while i try to wash my mouth i didn't really like the first twenty to thirty minutes

[44:07] but then i really liked it thereafter

[44:10] and i think

[44:11] i'll kill you but i think that i agree with you in so much as i think that it's mainly

[44:15] because it's got a great cast yeah they're all fantastic and ellen page

[44:21] is fantastic and hard candy

[44:23] is kind of a sleazy movie

[44:27] but she is she is great in it

[44:28] well this one too i think

[44:30] she's pretty great in it

[44:32] i think she's way better early on when you're like

[44:34] when she's playing like a young kid

[44:37] unless if she like

[44:39] plays like super smart and sassy i'm gonna

[44:42] torture this dude cause like

[44:44] i don't think it's necessarily good acting for a young person to pretend like they're an old person

[44:49] that's like the m. night shyamalan story

[44:52] this kid talks like people

[44:54] that's totally the script though

[44:55] well no i agree no that's not necessarily

[44:58] but at the same time like i'm not going to be like

[45:00] no side note i was just going to no this is completely unrelated but just moving back to m. night

[45:04] but i'm going to tie it into juno

[45:06] is that i think m. night actually

[45:07] sixth sense the acting is really good bruce willis is really good in it and it's semi

[45:11] realistic i think he eventually became the performances that he tries to get out of people

[45:16] become so mannered

[45:18] that it's like all of the same intonation it's basically when you watch him acting you realize

[45:22] that that's the performance he wants them all to act like him essentially

[45:25] because he's in all of the movies and it's

[45:27] very sort of earnest

[45:29] they're aliens but they're scared of water

[45:32] that's like the performance that's a terrible job i'm going to work on my m. night impression

[45:38] but he basically does the dramatic version of all of west anderson's comedic movies

[45:43] all of the performances are the same if you swapped out any of the characters

[45:48] who they are but like their intonation and the way that the performances that are drawn out of them

[45:52] would work perfectly i'm surprised he hasn't had bill murray in some terrible

[45:56] dramatic movie

[45:57] and then what i didn't like about juno was that it was just like a complete rip off of the whole west anderson

[46:01] style of like indie pretentious movies

[46:03] not pretentious that's the wrong word but you get the idea

[46:06] i don't know i thought it was heartfelt at the end

[46:11] oh when they were singing the song? no not that part

[46:16] i don't want to ruin it for the uh...

[46:18] i guess you're really pro-life dan mccoy

[46:21] yeah that's it

[46:23] are we going to title this podcast juno or next?

[46:26] i'm sorry i'm sorry

[46:31] can we all just agree that while x-men 3 was not very good ellen page was really good as kitty pride

[46:36] do you agree on that?

[46:37] uh... yes

[46:40] i don't remember her specifically from that movie

[46:44] i also didn't like that movie but i didn't think it was as bad as i was expecting it to be

[46:48] it was kind of shitty let's move on

[46:50] there's really shitty cgi in that movie

[46:53] it was like wait a minute

[46:54] uh... we need to release this movie tomorrow

[46:56] did you ever do the cgi?

[46:58] oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck

[47:01] it was like the joke you made before

[47:04] like when uh...

[47:05] jean gray you know like burns people up

[47:09] holy shit she just turned that person into a bunch of pixels

[47:13] yup like holy fuck he died in tron

[47:17] uh... man

[47:19] well there's a degree to which i think you can blame a movie for bad cgi which is that

[47:23] the fact that it's 2008 and we have technology that produces great cgi

[47:29] and when there's a movie like you haven't seen i am legend but when you watch i am legend

[47:32] which had a budget so big that i don't think the studio has released it to this date

[47:36] you know right now i don't think you can

[47:38] sure you can find it at this point but as of like the opening week they didn't want to tell anybody

[47:41] how much it cost

[47:42] when you see a movie that is that expensive even if they had to redo all the cgi

[47:46] because the director supposedly wasn't happy with the

[47:48] prosthetic humans

[47:50] it's embarrassing it's just like you're just like what

[47:53] how is this possible

[47:55] how can you make a movie that has such shitty

[47:57] cgi and such bad effects

[47:59] you're saying that they actually started out with prosthetic humans

[48:03] they apparently shot a lot of stuff with people and like the director was like i don't think

[48:07] because they're actors without shoes and he's like they just don't have the same sort of like

[48:10] you know not caring about

[48:12] not wearing shoes that these sort of plague infected zombies would have

[48:17] it would have been so much creepier if it was real people

[48:20] what makes me so much more angry is if you read the fucking book you're like

[48:22] oh shit under what circumstances were you even doing

[48:26] cock sucking fucking prosthetics at all

[48:28] they're so fucking weird

[48:30] they're well i mean

[48:31] i mean i guess in order to battle will smith you need to give him the prosthetics

[48:35] they're vampires in the book

[48:36] they're not like weird like bald uh...

[48:38] they're not fucking morlocks or something

[48:41] they're like the mummy that's what i hated that the main guy also you're like and one guy can unhinge his jaw

[48:47] i had issues with that again i realize this is not a good thing

[48:50] i guess this is like a screenwriter thing where they're like

[48:53] we need one bad guy that you can focus on we need one guy who's like

[48:57] a vp but it makes me so angry because it's just like

[49:00] the scary thing is that there's these hordes of people there's not like one

[49:04] leader

[49:05] of the uh... i am legend diseased people like oh he's he's like the

[49:10] spartacus of the i am legend you know

[49:13] so they called him an alpha male

[49:16] he's like striping gremlins

[49:19] i would have preferred if he had a mohawk that somehow they were still trimming the three years after the plague

[49:26] there's got to be some reason to believe why they're following him

[49:30] this guy's got a fucking awesome mohawk

[49:31] everyone else is like wait a minute

[49:34] the dude should have had long hair

[49:36] are they giving themselves haircuts? minor plot hole

[49:42] but like you'd be like wait they've been alive for three years and like the chick's totally bald

[49:47] made in front of the plague makes their hair fall out dude

[49:49] oh were they all bald?

[49:51] i never saw it

[49:53] i haven't seen it

[49:55] well i don't want to spoil anything for you uh... stewart but um...

[50:00] Will Smith is legend.

[50:02] So nice.

[50:04] So, I'm put off now.

[50:08] That joke actually angered Steve Jobs.

[50:12] Oh, actually, The Mist was a movie that,

[50:14] watching it, I kept being like,

[50:16] God, would I enjoy this more if I was watching this

[50:18] thinking it was a terrible movie?

[50:20] If I went into this expecting to dislike it?

[50:22] No, like, frankly, I thought it was,

[50:24] Frank, I thought it was, um,

[50:26] I thought it was actually okay.

[50:28] I didn't dislike it.

[50:30] I mean, I have so much affection for the story

[50:32] and it was actually, like, pretty close to it.

[50:34] However, the fucking CGI was like,

[50:36] are you kidding me, dude?

[50:38] I played video games that play with CGI.

[50:40] Well, the first time, the tentacle?

[50:42] I was like, okay, I don't think I need to see the rest of this movie.

[50:44] I'll tell you why.

[50:46] It was terrible. The one thing I liked was there was no music.

[50:48] It was like this weird moment of, like,

[50:50] what the fuck is going on?

[50:52] These dudes are just, like, wrestling around with the tentacle

[50:54] with no sound effects or music.

[50:56] It was almost too intentional.

[50:58] That seems to be a big thing now in movies,

[51:00] aside from movies being exceptionally violent and horrible.

[51:02] Is that a lot of...

[51:04] I didn't think it was done that well in The Mist.

[51:06] I Am Legend also has a lot of moments

[51:08] where you'd be like, wow, typically,

[51:10] I think it's directors who are like,

[51:12] have something in their head where they're like,

[51:14] oh, no, no, it would be the obvious thing to have a good score

[51:16] that would actually use music to help move...

[51:18] I can't think of words right now.

[51:20] I have to pee so badly.

[51:22] I'm just focusing on that.

[51:24] The music that would actually add to the emotion

[51:26] or the mood that we're trying to evoke in this scene.

[51:28] But they're like, no, no, we're not going to do that.

[51:30] That would be what other directors would do.

[51:32] It was done well in No Country for Old Men,

[51:34] which didn't have that much music.

[51:36] Another, just jumping back to Juno,

[51:38] the soundtrack was just so obviously put in.

[51:40] Like, well, what else should we put on this CD

[51:42] that we're going to sell

[51:44] when we sell this soundtrack?

[51:46] Let's have her drive and we'll put a song

[51:48] that has nothing to do with...

[51:50] Oh, my God, I don't want to talk about that.

[51:52] I just want to bring it back to the bench for a second.

[51:54] I'll tell you that I liked it

[51:56] for two big reasons.

[51:58] One, it wasn't based on

[52:00] a Japanese horror movie.

[52:02] And two, it wasn't like a PG-13

[52:04] When a Stranger Calls

[52:06] horror film.

[52:08] Like, it was a good old-fashioned

[52:10] monster film.

[52:12] I thought there was a little too much...

[52:14] What's her face?

[52:16] Crazy lady.

[52:18] Miller's Crossing. I can't remember.

[52:20] And I found the ending

[52:22] a little disturbingly nihilistic,

[52:24] but I liked it.

[52:26] I thought it was pretty good.

[52:28] I thought the little kid in that was also great.

[52:30] I thought he did a great job of crying

[52:32] a lot and having snot come out of his nose,

[52:34] which is difficult.

[52:36] Well, now we're just having a conversation.

[52:38] This is no longer, like,

[52:40] a radio program.

[52:44] Spoiler alert!

[52:46] There's probably not enough movies where kids get killed.

[52:48] People are like,

[52:50] I want to find out about Next, but I haven't seen The Mist.

[52:52] Holy shit, this dickhead spoiled it for me!

[52:54] I don't think it could really be spoiled.

[52:56] That's my argument for, like,

[52:58] it's really not a good movie.

[53:00] In my opinion.

[53:02] I don't know, maybe I was watching

[53:04] Frank Lesser's Loves Next.

[53:06] Didn't like Next.

[53:08] I'm fine going on record saying that.

[53:10] I'm fine saying that I was so angry

[53:12] at the end of Juno.

[53:14] I saw it with a friend, and I was like,

[53:16] I'm going to watch it before I wait until we get out of the theater.

[53:18] But the credits were still playing,

[53:20] and she was like,

[53:22] I really like the Moldy Peaches.

[53:24] And I was like, yeah, you know what I don't like?

[53:26] And I just launched into, like, 20 different things.

[53:28] And I was storing up for the entire last half of the movie.

[53:30] I have a soft spot because

[53:32] we had Kimya Dawson on

[53:34] Sarah Shaver's Obsessed With You once,

[53:36] and she was a really good guest.

[53:38] Yeah, I don't have anything with the music itself, necessarily.

[53:40] I just thought the way it was used

[53:42] in the movie was incredibly pandering.

[53:44] You're all dupes.

[53:46] You hear me out there?

[53:48] If you're listening to this...

[53:50] On that note, anyone who likes Juno,

[53:52] in the words of Frank Lesser,

[53:54] you're a dupe.

[53:56] That's not true. I don't think that, necessarily.

[53:58] I'm probably friends with you, in fact.

[54:00] There's a very good chance that this is...

[54:02] Ah, probably not.

[54:04] I mean, if they're listening to this podcast,

[54:06] I don't think...unless you tell them about it.

[54:08] This podcast has run the whole gamut.

[54:10] Sad, really happy about what happened in Next.

[54:12] Really mad about Juno.

[54:14] Was there more stuff about Next at all?

[54:16] No, no. Anything about Nicolas Cage?

[54:18] Because there was the interesting stuff.

[54:20] I'll let you wrap it up.

[54:22] I still think he makes sort of interesting career choices.

[54:24] They're not the most obvious, best things.

[54:26] They don't happen to usually be good movies.

[54:28] But I can understand why you'd do them.

[54:30] You brought up the Windtalkers.

[54:32] Yeah, sure.

[54:34] It's abysmal, dude.

[54:36] But John Woo!

[54:38] It probably sounded like a good movie.

[54:40] I don't understand.

[54:42] John Woo is one of these directors

[54:44] who gets, I guess, a free pass

[54:46] on the basis of a couple movies

[54:48] he made early in his career.

[54:50] But I hear John Woo at this point,

[54:52] and I'm like, yeah, alright, he made...

[54:54] Face Off.

[54:56] I like Face Off, but he also made...

[54:58] Well, that's why he gets a fucking free pass, too.

[55:00] But he also made Broken Arrow and Mission Impossible 2.

[55:02] And Windtalkers.

[55:04] Next was very much like Broken Arrow.

[55:06] And maybe just the way it was shot

[55:08] or some of the cinematography in it.

[55:10] Something about it reminds...

[55:12] I think they're also looking for a nuclear bomb.

[55:14] I was going to say, it reminded me

[55:16] a lot of fucking Paycheck.

[55:18] But not quite as anger-inducing.

[55:20] You know, because Ben Affleck's in it.

[55:22] Yeah.

[55:24] This was better than Paycheck.

[55:26] Again, I would say that you take this movie...

[55:28] Better than Paycheck.

[55:30] Take this movie, take out the nuclear plot device

[55:32] and make it a romantic comedy,

[55:34] you have a great movie,

[55:36] and you're at the nuclear bomb,

[55:38] and you have a great movie.

[55:40] I think those are the things that people don't realize.

[55:42] You take, like, I guess that's Jessica Alba,

[55:44] I didn't see the Dane Cook movie,

[55:46] but any romantic movie, 51st Dates,

[55:48] and she keeps forgetting where the nuclear bomb is.

[55:50] Sure.

[55:52] That's a good movie.

[55:54] I now pronounce you Chuck and Larry.

[55:56] Put a nuclear bomb.

[55:58] And the firefighters are called

[56:00] to, uh...

[56:02] To put out the fire from the nuclear bomb.

[56:04] Well, I think that if anything,

[56:06] if the audience for this podcast

[56:08] takes anything away from tonight,

[56:10] they should take away that if they go to the video store

[56:12] intending to rent Paycheck,

[56:14] which I think happens a lot,

[56:16] people are like, I really want to see Paycheck,

[56:18] you know, put that DVD box down,

[56:20] pick up the box for Next.

[56:22] I'd say the same thing about Broken Arrow.

[56:24] If you're in the mood for...

[56:26] If you've never seen Broken Arrow,

[56:28] watch Next instead.

[56:30] So 90% of the movies we've actually mentioned tonight,

[56:32] you should put those boxes down

[56:34] and pick up Next instead.

[56:36] That's a pretty fucking good selling point, dude.

[56:38] 90%?

[56:40] I think that it says more about the state of most films.

[56:42] Well, I think Frank needs to pee.

[56:44] Thank you.

[56:46] I heard something about that somewhere.

[56:48] So I think we should wrap it up.

[56:50] I don't know what we're going to watch next time.

[56:52] I can't see

[56:54] two episodes in the future.

[56:56] I see two minutes in the future

[56:58] and it's me peeing on your couch.

[57:00] Well, we may watch Good Luck Chuck.

[57:02] There was some discussion about that.

[57:04] So, until then,

[57:06] I'm Dan McCoy.

[57:08] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[57:10] I'm special guest Frank Lesser.

[57:12] Good night.

[57:14] Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo

[57:16] There it is. Stuart does the song.

[57:18] Yay, it's over.

[57:30] The best CGI, wait, is this on?

[57:32] Because I am just lying that I'm like...

[57:34] The best CGI in I Am Legend is the clip of Shrek

[57:36] that is shown

[57:38] at one point that is by far the finest CGI.

[57:40] Also, at one point he just watches Shrek

[57:42] and that's like a good minute of the movie.

[57:44] It's very disappointing.

Flop House Episode Nine - Next

Transcript

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