Speaker 1: Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey Everybody, and welcome to Movie Crush. Friday Interview Edition,
Speaker 1: Long Distance Love Affair Edition with Adam Pranica Hi, Adam Hi,
Speaker 1: Adam of Friendly Fire the War Movie Podcast and he
Speaker 1: does with Ben Harrison and John Roderick, The Maximum Network
Speaker 1: and uh Greatest Gin, Greatest Discovery? What else? Uh? Those are?
Speaker 1: Those are the three at the moment. But you know,
Speaker 1: now that we have all this time, choke like, I mean,
Speaker 1: why not add another show? Another two shows? Even Greatest Virus?
Speaker 1: What else are we going to do? Exactly? So Adam
Speaker 1: and I chatted for about fifteen or twenty minutes before
Speaker 1: we got going here because you, I don't know if
Speaker 1: I'm even allowed to say this stuff, but you've just
Speaker 1: moved from Seattle to Los Angeles. I did. Yeah. Look,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm an open book to you and all of
Speaker 1: your listeners. I feel like this is a very safe space. Well,
Speaker 1: you heard COVID nineteen was coming to Seattle, and so
Speaker 1: you're like, let's get the funk out of here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what a what a strange bit of business to leave
Speaker 1: at exactly the right time. Yeah, But also it's very
Speaker 1: me to have it follow me everywhere the way that
Speaker 1: it has. So you moved to the safe little hamlet
Speaker 1: of Los Angeles, that's right, Yeah, where I can be alone. Finally,
Speaker 1: ironically you are. That's so funny how that works, right,
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, I was just kidding everyone. He did not
Speaker 1: move for that reason. But you were in l A. Now,
Speaker 1: so you and Ben are in the same city, whereas
Speaker 1: you and John Roderick were in the same city before.
Speaker 1: So are you and been going to record together? I
Speaker 1: mean we're in the same city in the sense that
Speaker 1: like there are there are eight l A S and
Speaker 1: Ben lives in one and I live in another. And
Speaker 1: tell you what, before things really locked down, that drive
Speaker 1: to Ben's place was a delight. It was. It was
Speaker 1: twenty five minutes of of no traffic driving. I mean
Speaker 1: I never I never really got the full l A experience.
Speaker 1: Once I got here. It was disappointing where things already
Speaker 1: kind of slowing down. Yeah, yeah, the drawdown was in
Speaker 1: process when we were recording together, and we had to
Speaker 1: record together because when I got here, my entire studios
Speaker 1: in boxes and we had no way to make the
Speaker 1: show unless I went over. So that was when it
Speaker 1: ended up happening for a couple of weeks, and then
Speaker 1: your buddy I did yeah and that, and now I don't,
Speaker 1: which is probably for the best, right for the best,
Speaker 1: right now. But luckily we're in an industry and a
Speaker 1: medium that you don't need, a crew, you don't need.
Speaker 1: We've got the gear. We're finally I mean, I made
Speaker 1: a post on the movie crush page when I set
Speaker 1: this should be up down here. I was like, guys,
Speaker 1: twelve years in, I'm finally the old white guy recording
Speaker 1: a podcast in his basement. I know we're finally here.
Speaker 1: I mean, we're all those people who laughed at us
Speaker 1: for turning podcast into a career. Who's laughing Now we
Speaker 1: are laughing and coughing, laughing and coughing. Oh boy. It
Speaker 1: is a weird time. But that's kind of the cool
Speaker 1: thing though, at least with us. We do these remotely anyway.
Speaker 1: So I'm just gonna you know, you're gonna be on
Speaker 1: more than you probably want to be over the next
Speaker 1: couple of months, I hope. So I hope this ends
Speaker 1: up being my fourth show, like like you and I
Speaker 1: should spend something off check. I don't know what it is,
Speaker 1: but I'm game. I'm totally in. How about I don't
Speaker 1: know something we know nothing about? Huh and got you
Speaker 1: here in? I love it? Uh So do you want
Speaker 1: to plug any any like recent episodes of friendly Fire
Speaker 1: or anything. I'm kind of behind on you guys because
Speaker 1: I've been obsessed with the Ackerman r M podcast. But
Speaker 1: that's a great show. Yeah. But which which is cool
Speaker 1: because I've got like a ton of friendly Fires that
Speaker 1: I can binge on now. I mean, I feel like
Speaker 1: we had some really like we had Lawrence of Arabia drop.
Speaker 1: I don't know when when this episode a movie crush
Speaker 1: is going to come out, but tomorrow. Great, that's how
Speaker 1: close we're playing it to the best of you here. Wow,
Speaker 1: that you are a terrifying amount of on top of
Speaker 1: your schedule. It's great. Oh yeah, so Lawrence of Arabia
Speaker 1: has been out for a couple of weeks. What a
Speaker 1: fucking great movie. I did that on this show remotely, unfortunately.
Speaker 1: But I had had what's his name the director, geez
Speaker 1: this already, David Lean Yeah, I had David Lean on now,
Speaker 1: I had good guests, had Chris Whit's the director, Chris Whites.
Speaker 1: That was not the director of Lawrence of Arabia that
Speaker 1: No No, No, No Whites has picked Lawrence of Arabia.
Speaker 1: So I've still not met him in person, but we
Speaker 1: had a great hour long chat about it. I bet
Speaker 1: it's I mean, it's a meal of a movie, a
Speaker 1: lot like Magnolia is. And I am I am ashamed
Speaker 1: to say check that it was my first time watching
Speaker 1: it too. Yeah it's don't feel bad. It's one of
Speaker 1: those films that that film lovers hold in such high
Speaker 1: regard that I that at almost it was like it
Speaker 1: was like holding two magnets against each other that were
Speaker 1: that were pushing each other away. Like I like, I
Speaker 1: knew it's significant and I know I love film, but
Speaker 1: I was almost saving it for a I'm in my
Speaker 1: life that that I needed it. Two magnets. One is
Speaker 1: Lawrence of Arabia, one is Adam Franica. Yeah, they cannot
Speaker 1: get together. We're flipping those magnets around. They're they're repulsive. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: it was quite a movie, and I think maybe you
Speaker 1: and I should try and make a point to find
Speaker 1: out where it's playing on a big screen one day,
Speaker 1: because I'm taking nothing for granted now with seeing friends
Speaker 1: like I will fly to a city. Let's I will
Speaker 1: fly to Chicago to meet you there to see a
Speaker 1: goddamn movie. I would love nothing more than that. Once
Speaker 1: once they open up the movie theaters, I'm looking forward
Speaker 1: to sitting six seats away from you and uh and
Speaker 1: enjoying the hell out of that movie the way it
Speaker 1: was meant to be seen. Unbelievable. Yeah, well, I gotta
Speaker 1: listen to that one soon. Then. That sounds awesome. And
Speaker 1: I saw something else, someone on your because I'm a
Speaker 1: member of your Facebook group. They were you are and
Speaker 1: I'm not. That's great, None of you guys are. I
Speaker 1: don't interact. I just like John is John Roderick's remember
Speaker 1: of that Facebook group and he goes in there and
Speaker 1: I've seen him post only does his fight with people.
Speaker 1: I know that's his way, the Roderick way. When this
Speaker 1: whole thing broke out in Seattle, I texted he and
Speaker 1: Ken Jennings and was just making sure everyone was safe,
Speaker 1: and Ken was kind of talking back and forth, and
Speaker 1: then John jumped in late and just like totally burned
Speaker 1: Ken out of nowhere. And I was like, good to
Speaker 1: see Roderick's still bringing the Roderick. Yeah, I mean he
Speaker 1: can be no other way. Uh, I mean we we
Speaker 1: don't have a plan for losing Roderick, and I hope
Speaker 1: we never have to think about that. I mean, friendly
Speaker 1: fire would cease to exist. Oh come on, man, I
Speaker 1: mean there's no way we're doing that show with Jason Finn.
Speaker 1: I can tell you that right now. I feel like
Speaker 1: I could step in there. You know you're talking to
Speaker 1: me right I'm in the room. Yeah, I can. I'm
Speaker 1: looking right at you. I know I shaved my head.
Speaker 1: You like that. I Um, I was actually looking at
Speaker 1: it with some envy because I am uh, I'm about
Speaker 1: I've got a little bit of a page boy going.
Speaker 1: I think I think it's going to get pretty Michael
Speaker 1: Landon e here in another two weeks, and I need
Speaker 1: to I need to embrace the flitting, putting two fists
Speaker 1: in the back of my head and just sort of
Speaker 1: like pulling it out and like embracing, embracing the curl down. Dude.
Speaker 1: I think during this sequestration time, like there's a couple
Speaker 1: of ways to go. You can you can go Uni bomber,
Speaker 1: or you can you can just shave everything. And that's
Speaker 1: kind of where I'm at because I got the whole thing. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: up stairs and down yeah, I mean it gets Muggie
Speaker 1: in Atlanta. Oh good lord. So we're drinking tonight everyone,
Speaker 1: it's pm Atlanta time. That should explain a lot for
Speaker 1: the night before we're releasing this. I'm drinking uh red wine.
Speaker 1: I'm drinking uh delicious cabernet called sexual Chocolate is just
Speaker 1: oh man, it's so good. And the wine maker I
Speaker 1: can't remember his name. He's really got a good sense
Speaker 1: of humor. It's kind of a fun label. But what
Speaker 1: are you drinking? I'm drinking a glass of High West
Speaker 1: whiskey with a with a couple of ice cubes in it.
Speaker 1: I know that might be against whiskey code, but I
Speaker 1: like my drinks cold. Well, before we get going to Magnolia,
Speaker 1: I do have a couple of other things I want
Speaker 1: to talk about. Um. Everyone is like, there's like twenty
Speaker 1: people that still love me talking about Red Dead Redemption too.
Speaker 1: And the other movie crushers are probably sick of this.
Speaker 1: But I just learned that you played because someone on
Speaker 1: the movie crush page said you need to hook up
Speaker 1: with Pranica. Yeah, we really need to go out. We
Speaker 1: need to posse up now, how how do you do this?
Speaker 1: How do you posse up? Well, it hasn't worked very
Speaker 1: well for me in the past, but I can tell
Speaker 1: you that that you and I, if we chose to
Speaker 1: do it, we could go online and play Red Dead
Speaker 1: Open World and and like go on missions and stuff
Speaker 1: like like it's just you and me. Oh no, Unfortunately
Speaker 1: it would not be just you and me. I think
Speaker 1: a bunch of fucking gamer assholes. I think that's the problem.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you can while your your internet
Speaker 1: garden in that game in such a way that it
Speaker 1: could just be the people that you know and like
Speaker 1: it should be that way if it's not. But the
Speaker 1: last time I tried this was many months ago. The
Speaker 1: last time I played Red Dead was many months ago,
Speaker 1: and it was a fucking riot of friends getting shot
Speaker 1: at and horses dying and all the stuff you love
Speaker 1: about that game. My my one question for you, because
Speaker 1: I just finished it like two or three weeks ago, Um,
Speaker 1: what was the dumbest thing you ever did in that game?
Speaker 1: Like the biggest mistake, dumbest ship head move that you
Speaker 1: ever had happened. I still think about the death of
Speaker 1: my original horse, genuine was the best horse. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: I can't figure out, Like the mechanics of the game
Speaker 1: are still totally inscrutable to me. So, like, I know,
Speaker 1: temporary horses pop up and you can own them and
Speaker 1: then you can like stable them and stuff. I lost
Speaker 1: a couple though, that I liked, so I'm not quite
Speaker 1: sure about that either. I feel like I'm living with
Speaker 1: the ghosts of these horses because I see them on
Speaker 1: the map and then I go to them, and then
Speaker 1: and then it's not them at all. It's some different
Speaker 1: replacement horse, and it's heartbreaking every time to get my
Speaker 1: hopes up for for the ghost of horses past. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I had um this beautiful spotted Palomino that I loved,
Speaker 1: It's a nice yeah, and stabled it and like, I
Speaker 1: don't know that there may be something in how you
Speaker 1: die or when you die, but like she kind of
Speaker 1: just disappeared. But you know, I went and found that, um,
Speaker 1: the fucking white uh what's it called? The Arabian. I
Speaker 1: spent two days trying to find And that's a good time.
Speaker 1: That's time well spent. I haven't I haven't, I haven't
Speaker 1: thought to do that, but that's amazing. Was that a
Speaker 1: good riding horse? Yeah, there's like one area where it
Speaker 1: hangs out up in the West Elizabeth where it's all
Speaker 1: cold and mountaine. I'm not really good with the lasso.
Speaker 1: You gotta you gotta like call the horse and now
Speaker 1: you can just creep over very slowly and calm it
Speaker 1: down and pat it and pat it, and then eventually
Speaker 1: you hop on and it bucks you, and then you
Speaker 1: just do that a bunch until you've got it. I
Speaker 1: gotta admit I am I'm pretty I'm pretty obsessed with
Speaker 1: my uniform and like assembling neat like like I'm wearing
Speaker 1: a Civil War hat for some reason. I've got I've
Speaker 1: got like white lead her gloves. No one should wear
Speaker 1: leather gloves in the Emily. I'm sure Lane too like
Speaker 1: made fun of me a lot for how much care
Speaker 1: I put into my my hair, facial hair in my clothing. Yep. There,
Speaker 1: you cannot have enough fringe in red dead redemption, like
Speaker 1: fringe to the ground is what I think you need
Speaker 1: to have. Well, what happened to genuine? How did you
Speaker 1: kill that horse? Train? Cliff? I rode off a cliff, obviously,
Speaker 1: I feel like that's that's how all of my horses die,
Speaker 1: is a cliff accident, and it's so. The thing about
Speaker 1: riding a horse off of a cliff, as I'm sure
Speaker 1: you know, is that it takes a long time. You live,
Speaker 1: You live with the bouncing, the bouncing and the rolling,
Speaker 1: and then like finally the horse falls into the river
Speaker 1: that's obviously at the bottom of the cliff, and you're
Speaker 1: in the river and you both slowly die. It's It's bad.
Speaker 1: It's a really sad scene. And I'm not that type
Speaker 1: of I who will like save his game all the
Speaker 1: time in order to go back and like use a
Speaker 1: use a saved version of the game where Genuine is
Speaker 1: still alive. I like, I like to play it. I
Speaker 1: like to play it real, like we're death actually as stakes.
Speaker 1: So no, totally, except for the fact that you can't
Speaker 1: die as much as it hurts, Genuine is dead forever.
Speaker 1: Oh that sucks. The dumbest thing I ever did was
Speaker 1: I asked, well, I did a few things that Emily
Speaker 1: just every time she would watch me play like she
Speaker 1: was reading a magazine. Let me ask you, this is
Speaker 1: she watching you play all the time? Because he because
Speaker 1: my wife hates it. She will not watch She loved
Speaker 1: watching Skyrim, she hates watching Red did. Now. Emily kind
Speaker 1: of enjoyed it because it was pretty and it was
Speaker 1: you know, it's very beautiful game out in nature like that.
Speaker 1: But every time she watched I would funk up and
Speaker 1: do dumb things and she would just laugh at me,
Speaker 1: and it feels good. Oh god. Um. The dumbest I
Speaker 1: ever did that was not in front of her. I
Speaker 1: accidentally pulled a gun on a train and it was
Speaker 1: one of the things where I put it right back
Speaker 1: and I was like, why is it there a button
Speaker 1: where you can go my bad? Just kidding. Yeah, oh dude,
Speaker 1: it sucked everything up. I was toasted. I really wish
Speaker 1: the gambling metrics were more substantial in that game, because
Speaker 1: I feel like I could go into Red Dead and
Speaker 1: play poker for four hours if it were actually good.
Speaker 1: I bet that you played a lot of cards, didn't you,
Speaker 1: And and the stakes are too low and the games yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to play a high stakes game in Red Dead,
Speaker 1: and to my knowledge, one doesn't exist. I don't think so. Man,
Speaker 1: you get in there and everyone's got like seven dollars. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's not even worth the time. But I did play
Speaker 1: a little bit of cards. It's kind of fun. Yeah, yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a fun game. I got to get back into it.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you off air what I did after I
Speaker 1: finished the game, because it's a little disturbing, and I
Speaker 1: don't want people to think of me that way. All right,
Speaker 1: I will think of you that way. Thanks, I don't mind.
Speaker 1: Thanks for trusting me with that knowledge. You already know
Speaker 1: who I am. Um. And the other thing I wanted
Speaker 1: to talk about two was I'm sure you got the
Speaker 1: news today that Top Gun Maverick has been postponed to
Speaker 1: the end of the year. I understand it, which we're
Speaker 1: both sad about. It does make me very sad. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you and I were pretty pumped about that movie. You
Speaker 1: and I were talking about how how we're predicting that
Speaker 1: this thing will be cyclical in a way that that
Speaker 1: people might be going out and then oh we're we're
Speaker 1: told to go back in again. Yeah. I wonder if
Speaker 1: we ever get to the point where these movies are
Speaker 1: released for video on demand, because they have to be
Speaker 1: like how long on the on the shelf? Like if
Speaker 1: we're in, if we're in a bad cycle in December?
Speaker 1: I mean, do you think about making a video on
Speaker 1: demand and you pay your ten dollars and you just
Speaker 1: get it on iTunes. Is that a thing? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean they've already done that a little bit. They released
Speaker 1: that dumb Well, I say it's dumb. It might have
Speaker 1: been all right, that Invisible Man movie, uh, for twenty
Speaker 1: dollar for twenty dollar rental, with the thought that, like, hey,
Speaker 1: it's cheaper than taking a date to a movie, and
Speaker 1: we gotta make a little bit of money back on
Speaker 1: this thing. So I think there's gonna be a lot
Speaker 1: of adapting going on over the next year, man, with
Speaker 1: stuff like that, Like studios can't sit around forever. Man. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: with with money on the shelf. Really, it's what they've got.
Speaker 1: You know, you were talking about meeting up in a
Speaker 1: city to see a movie. It feels like top Gun
Speaker 1: would be a great candidate for that. Let's try to
Speaker 1: make that happen. Yeah, we'll meet up in in Miramar
Speaker 1: and uh perfect. I mean that's just a short drive
Speaker 1: for me. You're doing all the work. That's not fair.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's talk about Magnolia. This is our
Speaker 1: obviously the continuation of our our pt Anderson series that
Speaker 1: we're doing. Um. I know that you know a lot
Speaker 1: of this stuff, but for the benefit of the listener.
Speaker 1: That was I read a little bit of the trivia
Speaker 1: and after Boogie Nights. Uh. He had a lot of
Speaker 1: currency in Hollywood, such that Michael de Luca, executive, big
Speaker 1: big shot executive back then, came along and said, I
Speaker 1: don't need to read a word. You have final cut
Speaker 1: and carte blanche for whatever you want to do next.
Speaker 1: And this was what he made. It's insane to think
Speaker 1: about anyone getting that in the late nineties, but it
Speaker 1: makes sense in his twenties still, you know, he was
Speaker 1: like late twenties when he made this one. I really
Speaker 1: love that Paul Thomas Anderson had the wherewithal to not
Speaker 1: be like I feel I feel like a lot of
Speaker 1: people are like this. They're like, oh, really, that's really nice.
Speaker 1: You don't have to do like like, let's work collaboratively
Speaker 1: on this on this project. But that he had the
Speaker 1: wherewithal to go like, I know, this is rare. Are
Speaker 1: no one gets this deal. I'm going to make exactly
Speaker 1: the movie I want to make, and I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: no one give me notes. That's got to be the ultimate.
Speaker 1: Oh totally, and he said, I think he said soon
Speaker 1: after he made it as a as a twenty nine
Speaker 1: or thirty year old whenever it was released that he
Speaker 1: said it was, this is the best movie that I'll
Speaker 1: ever make, for better or for worse. And then a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago and an A M A. And
Speaker 1: then again on Mark Marin they're like, well, what do
Speaker 1: you think now or what would you say to yourself,
Speaker 1: the young you about Magnolian He said, I would tell
Speaker 1: myself to chill the funk out and cut twenty minutes.
Speaker 1: So that's his take looking back on it, that it
Speaker 1: is a movie that it's twenty nine year old would make,
Speaker 1: like Boogie Knights was a movie a twenty five year
Speaker 1: old would make. I think that's a great point. I
Speaker 1: this was. This feels like it was the first film
Speaker 1: I ever saw that made me feel smart as a filmgoer,
Speaker 1: Like what year was this? So yeah, I mean the
Speaker 1: late nineties were chock full of my favorite films ever,
Speaker 1: but this was this is when I had started going
Speaker 1: to college and taking film studies classes, and then this
Speaker 1: drops in a theater and I just felt uniquely ready
Speaker 1: to see something like this and feel like it was
Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, I didn't know movies like this could
Speaker 1: be made in a you know, by someone modern and
Speaker 1: I'm saying modern at the time that I saw it,
Speaker 1: you know, it was it was really significant like that.
Speaker 1: But I mean, maybe we can save this for the
Speaker 1: end of the show. But like, what twenty minutes would
Speaker 1: you cut? It feels like you either cut an hour
Speaker 1: of this film or you cut nothing. Well, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean you could make little trims throughout the whole thing
Speaker 1: to get it down ten to twenty minutes maybe, or
Speaker 1: you could cut an entire well, it's hard to cut
Speaker 1: a subplot because they're also intertwined. Yeah, Bloom was cut
Speaker 1: out entirely. Tell me about that he played worm. I
Speaker 1: did not know that. I knew that the I knew
Speaker 1: that the rap was written by Fiona Apple. Yeah the wrap. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I did not know that that was Orlando Bloom. That's interesting.
Speaker 1: Wait Orlando Bloom. Orlando Bloom, right? Who is he? Was
Speaker 1: he the Pirates of the Caribbean guy Lego Less? Oh no, no, no,
Speaker 1: not Orlando Bloom. I was going to say that would
Speaker 1: that would be interesting? Cat saying what a dumb It
Speaker 1: was at the twenty minute mark that the whisker Orlando
Speaker 1: Orlando Jones. Of course, Orlando Jones. Yeah, that is that
Speaker 1: is casting that makes more sense. Yeah. Yeah, so he
Speaker 1: got Orlando Jones got cut out whole cloth and various
Speaker 1: other things, like you know, they cut some of T. J. Mackie,
Speaker 1: like they had scenes of him out in the wild
Speaker 1: like wooing women and betting women. Uh, and some I
Speaker 1: think some other stuff was cut that. You know, it
Speaker 1: was probably like a four and a half hour movie
Speaker 1: until he got down to what like three ten I think. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean this is a big meal of a film.
Speaker 1: This is this is appetizer, main, salad and dessert. Like
Speaker 1: it's it's so much to take on and it's not
Speaker 1: a film that that I believe is diminished by taking
Speaker 1: it down and horses like that. Like I think you
Speaker 1: could pick it up and set it down, Like I
Speaker 1: don't think you need to do it all in one
Speaker 1: go to get what you need to get out of it.
Speaker 1: And I and I do get a lot out of
Speaker 1: this film every time I see it. Yeah, I haven't
Speaker 1: seen it in a really long time. And this is
Speaker 1: a movie that I loved back then. Like I bought
Speaker 1: the soundtrack. Obviously we'll talk about Amy Man. Obviously. Did
Speaker 1: you get the score? I did not get the score.
Speaker 1: I got the score. Did you really wow? John Brian? Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I got business the soundtrack, and I got the
Speaker 1: I bought the screenplay, like the book edition screenplay. I
Speaker 1: have it too that that hard bound book is on
Speaker 1: my bookshelf right now. Yeah, And it was because it
Speaker 1: was such a This is when I was writing a
Speaker 1: lot more and I was in l A. Or no,
Speaker 1: actually it wasn't. I was almost in l A, but
Speaker 1: I was about to move to l A to try
Speaker 1: and fucking rite movies. And like you said, it's just
Speaker 1: such a like it's a screenplay if you're a writer
Speaker 1: that you want to go out and buy and read
Speaker 1: these monologues, you know, and there's a there's a language
Speaker 1: in the script. I think, like I get. I get
Speaker 1: a lot of enjoyment about out of reading Tarantino scripts
Speaker 1: to like there's a communication happening between script reader and
Speaker 1: script writer that is more familiar than you typically get
Speaker 1: when you read anyone's script, just generally. And that's that's
Speaker 1: why Magnolia gets the hard bound book treatment, because if
Speaker 1: you were if you sit down and read it, it
Speaker 1: feels more conversational then scripts usually are. Yeah, which is
Speaker 1: funny too, because it's such a right e movie, you know,
Speaker 1: like uh, so many parts of it, like all the
Speaker 1: you know it is uh what is the line that
Speaker 1: they said in the bar about angels and children? Like
Speaker 1: these things? They have these random lines like that that
Speaker 1: people would bark out. That's not believable in how people
Speaker 1: talk at all. No, yeah, but but it works for
Speaker 1: the film, and like entirely I think I think so too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean those things, those things really stick out when
Speaker 1: you compare this film with a contemporary film like stuff
Speaker 1: that comes out twenty years later is not given the
Speaker 1: benefit of a line written for the sake of a
Speaker 1: well written line that this film gets to pull off
Speaker 1: because of its run time and because of its its
Speaker 1: final cut permission given to its writer director. Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean so I saw this a bunch of fucking times,
Speaker 1: I mean on the DVD back then too, and um
Speaker 1: did not see it for man, I haven't seen this
Speaker 1: movie in a long time, and I was a little
Speaker 1: worried that will it would have not have aged well
Speaker 1: in a way that and that a movie from might
Speaker 1: not quite that I thought was just so amazing. I
Speaker 1: was afraid I was gonna be a little disappointed, and
Speaker 1: I wasn't. I loved it all over again. I agree
Speaker 1: with you. I think I think the New Line Cinema
Speaker 1: logo is one of those ones that, like when you
Speaker 1: go and rewatch a Miramax or a New Line movie
Speaker 1: from the late nineties. I think it's a coin flip
Speaker 1: right now about about how a film ages. I think
Speaker 1: you're right, and so I I felt like, I feel
Speaker 1: like I watched this film every year for whatever reason.
Speaker 1: But there is definitely a little bit of a flinch
Speaker 1: when you see those logos pop up on screen, Like, fuck,
Speaker 1: is this going to be like a Kevin Smith situation
Speaker 1: or is this going to be something that that lasts
Speaker 1: the test of time. Yeah, it's just gonna be from
Speaker 1: dusk till dawn? Or is it right? That is some
Speaker 1: of those some of those movies I love back then
Speaker 1: don't age super well. Now you're totally right, um in
Speaker 1: those studios might be the common thread. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean at the time I ate them all up.
Speaker 1: I mean it feels like New Line in was the
Speaker 1: of today, like in terms of consumption, Like I like
Speaker 1: that was almost my seal equality. Yeah, and certainly Mirramax. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, despite the creep that ran that company. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Mirrimax was always was like, yeah, it's it's got to
Speaker 1: be like a pretty good movie. Yeah, not great. It's
Speaker 1: an interesting time to watch this movie because of its themes, right,
Speaker 1: like the the wire things happening ness of it, and
Speaker 1: how much that feeling pervades life right now for us
Speaker 1: and for everyone else. Yeah, this is a movie that
Speaker 1: I'd never um like, I was obsessed with it in
Speaker 1: a way, but I never really like sat around and
Speaker 1: got stoned and thought about what it meant for some reason.
Speaker 1: And and it's a movie that kind of begs you
Speaker 1: to do that in some ways, but I didn't. I
Speaker 1: don't know why. I just took it on its face value.
Speaker 1: Is this big not hanging out with a lot of
Speaker 1: stoners at the time, Yeah, yeah newts uh. I just
Speaker 1: took it on face value, like almost a little more
Speaker 1: of a kind of hippie dippy shortcuts or something like that. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like there's a way to watch this film, I think
Speaker 1: at the time where you just let it go through
Speaker 1: you and then you go on about your day, and
Speaker 1: then there's a type of personality that you just can't
Speaker 1: let it do that there's the type of personality that
Speaker 1: goes back into the theater and sees it again and again,
Speaker 1: because like it's so dense that certainly there's something that
Speaker 1: I'm missing in these subsequent watches and I and that
Speaker 1: I think was my attitude with it when it came out.
Speaker 1: I just had to rewatch it. Yeah, I did too,
Speaker 1: for sure. But did you kind of delve into the like, oh,
Speaker 1: what do the frogs mean? And like all these you know,
Speaker 1: all the symbolism and this different stuff where you just
Speaker 1: sort of along for the ride of this big epic
Speaker 1: sort of interwoven tale. No, I mean I got I
Speaker 1: was certainly curious about knowing whether or not there was
Speaker 1: a specific message that that p t A Was sending
Speaker 1: in it. But every time I I sought that out,
Speaker 1: it was a cast member. It was like it was
Speaker 1: like Philip smore Hoffman saying something like, well, it's obvious
Speaker 1: to me, and it should be obvious to everyone else
Speaker 1: that like the senselessness of life is equivalent to a
Speaker 1: rain of frogs, Like that's that's life. Like anything can
Speaker 1: happen anywhere, and we shouldn't be surprised when things like
Speaker 1: this do. And like reading enough interviews with big thinkers
Speaker 1: like that made me, you know, set that question aside
Speaker 1: a little more, like like, it's easy to make that
Speaker 1: the obsession of the thing, because it's the it's the
Speaker 1: centerpiece of the film. Uh, but it's almost so like
Speaker 1: if you can do that, if you can, if you
Speaker 1: can actually ignore the frogs somehow. Yeah, there's so much
Speaker 1: more here that's worth interrogation. Yeah, I think I'm able
Speaker 1: to and always have been. I certainly was last night,
Speaker 1: um and the and when the frogs come, Man, it's
Speaker 1: it's that first on the windshield of great sound design
Speaker 1: is scary and it's weird and the first and you can't.
Speaker 1: It's one of those movies where you want to remember
Speaker 1: what it was like the first time you were in
Speaker 1: the theater if you didn't know that was coming, and
Speaker 1: the what the funkness of it all? Um? But I
Speaker 1: never really explored too much what I thought it meant.
Speaker 1: I thought I thought just worked as a thing. You know,
Speaker 1: did you what were you feeling physically during those moments
Speaker 1: like like, this is such a visceral film. It's so
Speaker 1: much more visceral than most other films and most of
Speaker 1: their Paul Thomas Anderson Films, like for its three hour runtime,
Speaker 1: like I can't remember getting more chills or like holding
Speaker 1: back sobs or or all of the rest like that
Speaker 1: that frog thump is one of them. But like the
Speaker 1: chills of the like the ambulance going through the intersection
Speaker 1: and the and the rain of frogs, like moving from
Speaker 1: background to foreground is such an amazing Like there are
Speaker 1: ten parts of the frog scene that are amazing, but
Speaker 1: like that individually is incredible. The the tilting of the
Speaker 1: ambulance on its side is so cool. Although I will
Speaker 1: say last night, for the very first time and as
Speaker 1: many times as I've seen this, when I was watching
Speaker 1: that scene and the ambulances driving, I was like, fucking stop. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like hit the brakes, dude, and just stop. But also
Speaker 1: they're so close to the hospital, Like I understand the
Speaker 1: instinct to keep going. Yeah, I guess that was it.
Speaker 1: I mean, it is an ambulance and they do have
Speaker 1: a sick you know, and an overdose. Julian Moore in
Speaker 1: the back the the Cinerama and Seattle had a film festival,
Speaker 1: late nineties film festival, and I think I mentioned this
Speaker 1: when we were talking about Boogie Nights. But like this
Speaker 1: is a great theater in Seattle that programs mini festivals
Speaker 1: around dates like this, and I got to see Magnolia
Speaker 1: again in the theater. And I will say, because I
Speaker 1: need to say, I can't just praise the Cinerama in Seattle.
Speaker 1: They did a terrible thing in firing a bunch of
Speaker 1: their employees and closing the theater for remodeling in a
Speaker 1: way that before the pandemic was disgusting and off hole.
Speaker 1: And like all of the employees there are are great
Speaker 1: and and I missed the idea of them working in
Speaker 1: that great theater like full stop. That needs to be
Speaker 1: said that. But to see that movie in a in
Speaker 1: a theater like the Cinerama was such a treat. And
Speaker 1: the sound of those frogs was so special because that
Speaker 1: single thump was huge. But also like when uh, when
Speaker 1: Jimmy Gator is holding the gun to his head and
Speaker 1: you cut to the exterior of the single frog falling
Speaker 1: through the sky, you get that little rare through the air.
Speaker 1: It's it's falling through the skylight. There were so many
Speaker 1: little bitty touches with the frog stuff. Um when after
Speaker 1: after John c Riley helps Bill Macy return the money
Speaker 1: and there's at the very end of the film, when
Speaker 1: they're standing there, there's they both slip a couple of times,
Speaker 1: and when the car starts to back out at and
Speaker 1: it does that, it kind of like shimmy's a little
Speaker 1: bit because it's slipping on those fucking frogs. Those little
Speaker 1: details are so cool, my low key. One of my
Speaker 1: favorite characters in this whole movie is uh is Donnie's neighbor,
Speaker 1: the old lady who he borrows the car from. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all you all you get is her her Donnie, Oh Donny.
Speaker 1: And then you see the garage that's totally totally sparse.
Speaker 1: It's a ladder and that car and it is mint condition.
Speaker 1: I love her and I love that car. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: interesting if you if you cut any storyline, Bill Macy's
Speaker 1: would probably be on the chopping block for me more
Speaker 1: than any other. But I that's not saying I want
Speaker 1: to lose it. But do you feel the same way.
Speaker 1: You know it's got the least crossover, I guess, but
Speaker 1: I thought it was pretty brilliant having this grown up
Speaker 1: version of Stanley essentially and like as a sort of
Speaker 1: non to what Stanley might become. There's something so aggressive
Speaker 1: about how Henry Gibson's character treats him in that bar
Speaker 1: like there are so many scenes of of interpersonal drama
Speaker 1: and conflict, and all of them are like so concentrated
Speaker 1: and distilled, and like the Henry Gibson stuff is, there's
Speaker 1: not that many scenes with him and Bill Macy together,
Speaker 1: but but they are absolutely sword fighting at that bar.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah yeah over the yeah the braces uh brace
Speaker 1: tooth bartender. I can't put on the Breakfast in America
Speaker 1: album without thinking of this movie. Oh yeah, Goodbye Stranger Man.
Speaker 1: It's right, there's yeah, yeah, I love it. You know
Speaker 1: what actually, now that I think of it, dude, you
Speaker 1: and I. Next time I come to l A and
Speaker 1: I'm allowed to travel to l A and I can
Speaker 1: hug your sweet neck, we are going to go get
Speaker 1: drinks at the fox Fire, Yes village. Have you done
Speaker 1: that already? No, I've never been there, but that bar.
Speaker 1: Uh My My main hang in l A when I
Speaker 1: lived in Las Fielis was the drawing room. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you've been there before, but I have
Speaker 1: the drawing room. When Magnolia came out. I that doesn't
Speaker 1: surprise me, by the way. Uh, when the drawing or
Speaker 1: when the when Magnolia came out and that scene in
Speaker 1: the bar started, I was like, that's the fucking drawing room.
Speaker 1: And it's very much laid out the same way, but
Speaker 1: upon further like you know, that's Dan Harmon's like local,
Speaker 1: that's his that's his local drawing room. Yeah, he's in
Speaker 1: there all the time. Oh really yeah, Oh nice. Some
Speaker 1: friends and I went to drawing room like back when
Speaker 1: we were visiting l A. Yeah, like we new to
Speaker 1: seek it out, really, and we spend in entire day.
Speaker 1: They're just getting fucking hammered and and like taking over
Speaker 1: that juke. Yeah, dude, the drawing room is great. I was.
Speaker 1: I lived like a mile down the road and that
Speaker 1: that was my hang. We were there all the time.
Speaker 1: Um open to day am. I know on it says
Speaker 1: so on the sign uh and it's I got a
Speaker 1: little quick story about that too. I was doing a
Speaker 1: laundry two doors down and that little shopping center or whatever,
Speaker 1: that's where I did my laundry. And I did laundry
Speaker 1: one day at like ten am, maybe nine am, and
Speaker 1: I thought I'm gonna go over to the drawing room
Speaker 1: just to see there at nine am, and I went
Speaker 1: over there, and it's exactly what you think it was like.
Speaker 1: And we should say to the drawing room has no windows,
Speaker 1: so nine am feels like one in the morning as
Speaker 1: far as they're concerned, except when that door opens. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know that that jarring thing when a windowless bar
Speaker 1: during the day the door opens and everyone's like yeah,
Speaker 1: but there were they were like the four regular drunks.
Speaker 1: This's got named Henry. I think he's still around even
Speaker 1: was there, And then there was like three bros up
Speaker 1: from the night before, still going at it. Then that's
Speaker 1: who's there at nine in the morning. That's the clientele.
Speaker 1: That's the clientele. But you know, like a a lay
Speaker 1: person might be listening to these stories and thinking like
Speaker 1: this isn't the place for them. It may be like
Speaker 1: dangerous sounding, or like they might be unwelcome. But I
Speaker 1: think you you'd degree that there is no place more
Speaker 1: welcoming than the drawing room. Oh no, it's great. Like
Speaker 1: it's not like some scary bar, like don't be a
Speaker 1: fucking tourist, don't be a jerk in an idiot, but
Speaker 1: like you can go to the drawing room and have
Speaker 1: a great time and and enjoy it for its many pleasures.
Speaker 1: It's it's great. Yeah, I love those old frolic room
Speaker 1: obviously is another one these old l A bars with
Speaker 1: the big buttoned pleather booths and uh and the and
Speaker 1: the bars that have the pleather around the outside of it.
Speaker 1: I'm so sad, Chuck, because like, not to make this
Speaker 1: about me, but the but the pandemic has really stunted
Speaker 1: my l A experience. Like I I was excited. I
Speaker 1: was just excited to come down here and like basically
Speaker 1: live in vinyl booths for for months and months and
Speaker 1: I haven't gotten my booths. I'm so sorry. Man, You'll
Speaker 1: you'll get your booths. May be in those booths with you.
Speaker 1: I hope, so, I hope so l A l A
Speaker 1: is a big character in this movie. Right, Oh I
Speaker 1: mean yeah, I mean this is and I look forward to,
Speaker 1: uh to him getting back to that, like I've loved
Speaker 1: he did Boogie Nights, he did Hard eight, he did
Speaker 1: this what was right at oh punch drunk Love, right,
Speaker 1: which unfortunately we already did. So we're gonna have to
Speaker 1: skip that one. We are not skooping that, by the way,
Speaker 1: are we going to do it again? If you want
Speaker 1: me to keep doing this series where we've got to
Speaker 1: do all of them. I'm holding this serious hostage. All right,
Speaker 1: fair enough, we'll do it again. Uh, you and Tony
Speaker 1: Hale will have to go at it as to whose
Speaker 1: you know I was. I was at that Live Sketch
Speaker 1: Fest show with Tony Hale, Like I saw that show.
Speaker 1: I love Punch drunk Love. I'm not gonna step on
Speaker 1: any on any toes there. We'll go in a different direction,
Speaker 1: I promise. Oh no, I'm sure you can't go in
Speaker 1: the Tony Hale direction. You know what's interesting is that
Speaker 1: you can find the Boogie Night's house on the map,
Speaker 1: but you can't find Jason Robard's house from Magnolia, Like,
Speaker 1: I really looked for this house and I can't find it.
Speaker 1: Does it ever show the exterior a little bit? Like
Speaker 1: you see its doorstep and then I guess you see
Speaker 1: Julianne Moore dry her Mercedes in the garage? I guess
Speaker 1: you don't see too much of it it's exterior now
Speaker 1: that you mentioned it. But I just wondered if it
Speaker 1: was a stage. Wow, I wonder if it was. So
Speaker 1: I'm looking at his filmography now because I was. I
Speaker 1: couldn't remember what came after Punch Drunk Ah, there will
Speaker 1: be Blood. He took a five year break, so he did.
Speaker 1: He does. My point was he's he did these fully
Speaker 1: l A Valley movies and then went in a really
Speaker 1: different direction career wise with There Will Be Blood, and
Speaker 1: then the next one was The Master. Jesus, I can't
Speaker 1: wait till we do that when I haven't, I've only
Speaker 1: saw that once. You mean both, That's gonna be a
Speaker 1: four hour show for us. You know what movie? I
Speaker 1: have not even seen? Inherent Vice? That is the only
Speaker 1: Paul Thomas Anderson. Paul Thomas Anderson, Phil I'm see I've
Speaker 1: seen once. I never saw it, Dude, I got I
Speaker 1: heard bad things from enough people to where I made
Speaker 1: a conscious choice to not like Ruin one of my
Speaker 1: favorite filmmakers. But I've since heard from other people like, no, dude,
Speaker 1: see Inherent a Vice like you got to. I'm reluctant,
Speaker 1: Like I'm resistant to really going all in on p.
Speaker 1: T A's adaptations, like I want him to keep writing
Speaker 1: and producing his own movies, Like I want to see
Speaker 1: him and I want to see him do his voice.
Speaker 1: What else did he adapt? No, I'm talking about about
Speaker 1: that film about like one, like I don't. He's uh,
Speaker 1: he's so capable, and I understand, Yeah, I don't even
Speaker 1: do it. I understand if you're him, Like it's got
Speaker 1: to feel good to just take a breath and adapt
Speaker 1: something and and do it for the challenge. Like not
Speaker 1: holding that against him at all, but like, as a
Speaker 1: consumer of his work, I have my preferences, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure you do too. Yeah. Absolutely, Um, you know only
Speaker 1: saw Their Will Be Blood once now that I think
Speaker 1: about it as well, really, yes, just one time. Oh,
Speaker 1: he started making really challenging films. That's going to be
Speaker 1: a good one. You know what, You're not wrong at all,
Speaker 1: you know, I wonder, I wonder where that comes from,
Speaker 1: because you get Magnolia, and you get Carte Blanche, you
Speaker 1: get the whole thing. And then like we'll talk about
Speaker 1: this with Punch Drunk Love, but like that is not
Speaker 1: a permission that is granted forever. And yet you look
Speaker 1: at Punch Drunk Love and you think that that casting
Speaker 1: is a risk. The story is not mainstream. The people
Speaker 1: who love that movie love that a lot. I'm one
Speaker 1: of them. And then he somehow turns that into There
Speaker 1: Will Be Blood, not exactly a return to mainstream, you know,
Speaker 1: like it's almost like like he keeps adding middle fingers
Speaker 1: to people who bankroll his projects, Like if you if
Speaker 1: you think that was difficult, how about their will be blood?
Speaker 1: How about the master? How about inherent advice? Like he
Speaker 1: keeps doubling and tripling down on this Steph in a
Speaker 1: way that I really admire. Yeah, I do too. It's
Speaker 1: interesting though, because he started making films where there was
Speaker 1: nobody to root for it all. And and it's interesting
Speaker 1: because he made these he's family obsessed. Uh. We talked
Speaker 1: about that a lot in Boogie Nights. In this film,
Speaker 1: there is that the almost duplicate story of two TV
Speaker 1: hot shots, Jason Robards and uh and Jimmy Gator Partridge
Speaker 1: and Gator who have both have children they're estranged from
Speaker 1: and both abuse them. UH and our and I don't
Speaker 1: have a relationship with it all. So it's it's weird
Speaker 1: that he went with I mean, he's got a family
Speaker 1: thing and a dad thing for sure, but it's weird
Speaker 1: that he put he felt the need to put two
Speaker 1: of those in this movie. Yeah, I thought so too.
Speaker 1: I mean, and they both hit incredibly hard for their
Speaker 1: own reasons. There's like the Gators are so interesting to me, Like, uh,
Speaker 1: like you and I talked a lot about in Boogie Nights.
Speaker 1: There's so many lines that we use socially. Yeah, there
Speaker 1: are Magnolia lines that I use socially, Like I don't
Speaker 1: know if you have any of those, but like I'm
Speaker 1: fucking hammered Bert is one of them. Yeah, like are
Speaker 1: you drinking as fast as I can? And they all
Speaker 1: seem to belong to Jimmy Gator, which is the worst
Speaker 1: because he's one of the most lowsome characters in the movie.
Speaker 1: But he has such great lines and because it's Philip
Speaker 1: Baker Hall, like, they're imbued with like the most gravitas
Speaker 1: I know. And you know what, it's a character you
Speaker 1: want to like because he's this old, dying icon. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then the big gut punch is is the reveal
Speaker 1: of the and I was about to say possible molestation,
Speaker 1: but I think his he's saying, I don't know what
Speaker 1: happened is confirmation, you know. Uh, there are so many
Speaker 1: there's so many minor characters in this movie that you
Speaker 1: can't even call minor characters because Rose Gator gets a
Speaker 1: centerpiece scene in this movie. Man Melinda Dillon so great.
Speaker 1: She's so incredible when when she goes off on him,
Speaker 1: when when he can't say, but not being able to
Speaker 1: say is the indictment you deserve to die alone. That's
Speaker 1: what she says. It is such a and she's great.
Speaker 1: I'm just a door Melinda Dillan. She does so, she
Speaker 1: does so much, and he u he gave her such
Speaker 1: a plum even though it's smallest you can still have
Speaker 1: like a great role even though it's small, just massive.
Speaker 1: She's she's so good in this movie. And and so
Speaker 1: many of the smaller parts are they're fully realized. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: this may be a while because I'm now I'm starting
Speaker 1: to think of the cast. The great Ricky j is
Speaker 1: the narrator of that whole great beginning sequence comes back around,
Speaker 1: but man, those book ends he takes a full i
Speaker 1: mean between the book ends and the the kind of
Speaker 1: Boogie Nights esque montage setting everyone up. It's it's seventeen
Speaker 1: minutes into the film before narrative action gets going. It's
Speaker 1: so is I mean, the setup takes so long, but
Speaker 1: it's so satisfying too, because the stories are so good,
Speaker 1: like it's story within story. We get our three for
Speaker 1: the preamble, and then we're into putting our game pieces
Speaker 1: on the board, and that lasts for a good fifteen minutes,
Speaker 1: understanding where everyone is on the board and what their
Speaker 1: motivations are, and it's it's so beautifully done, and it's not.
Speaker 1: I feel like in a lesser person's hands, this would
Speaker 1: feel hack. Like you're you're being told, you're being signaled
Speaker 1: that this is a film about a thing. And and
Speaker 1: in saying that, I am saying that the preamble does
Speaker 1: that in magnolia, but it's not. It doesn't. It's so
Speaker 1: well told. It's almost as if the quality of the
Speaker 1: story was being told in the preamble. Forgive any element
Speaker 1: of it being hack at all. And by the time
Speaker 1: you're two hours into this, the preamble is so far
Speaker 1: in the past you're not really even processing that until
Speaker 1: until the epilogue, until it comes back for sure, and
Speaker 1: you're right, like he he does that thing that sort
Speaker 1: of amateurish filmmakers can do, which is here's the theme
Speaker 1: of the film. But it works. Webs Dictionary says, coincidence is,
Speaker 1: but that's what he does. At the very beginning, He's
Speaker 1: basically like, this is a movie about how chance and
Speaker 1: coincidence don't happen, um and and and you know he
Speaker 1: could have I guess if you're looking to cut things,
Speaker 1: he used three stories at the beginning, probably could have
Speaker 1: could have gone with two maybe. But but that pattern
Speaker 1: of threes is something that Paul Thomas Anderson does all
Speaker 1: the time. There's always a rule of threes for him. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true. Uh, And the and the and the opening
Speaker 1: narration too with Ricky J. That yeah, this cannot be
Speaker 1: one of those things. This please and not to be
Speaker 1: that these strange things happen all the time. And then
Speaker 1: that needle drop with Amy Man. So great man, what
Speaker 1: a great fucking opening. I love it so much. There's
Speaker 1: I mean, Ricky J. Should have should have had a
Speaker 1: more developed career as a voiceover artist. He should be
Speaker 1: he should have been the number one voiceover artist for
Speaker 1: the last forty years. Yeah, he's incredible in this, Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: And you know he gets just a kind of a
Speaker 1: small part is I guess what is he like the
Speaker 1: producer of Jimmy Gator Show. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the he's
Speaker 1: I mean, but but who is better than him at
Speaker 1: taking a little and making it a lot? Like there's
Speaker 1: so much weight into in his relationship between him and
Speaker 1: UH and Philip Baker Hall, Like you don't know their
Speaker 1: relationship at all, but when when Jimmy Gator steps to
Speaker 1: the curtain and they're together before he goes out, you
Speaker 1: know everything about their relationship at that point. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: And he does that. I mean, he takes such great
Speaker 1: care with his small roles, like there's never a throwaway.
Speaker 1: We already talked about Henry Gibson probably maybe a little
Speaker 1: bit of a non to Nashville Alfred Molinas. Solomon Solomon, Oh, man,
Speaker 1: that great little scene that he has. He's just so
Speaker 1: great at playing this sort of ambiguously ethnic dude. He's
Speaker 1: great in that scene. But I want to nominate the
Speaker 1: guy standing over his shoulder as the you don't need
Speaker 1: braces downy, like like the guy who just he's he's
Speaker 1: Jimmy two times with the repetition of everything, Solomon Soloman
Speaker 1: is saying, it's so great and you get the deeling
Speaker 1: you say, you know what, need braces not because like
Speaker 1: you shouldn't do that. He's saying it almost like with
Speaker 1: a tone of you look great. Yeah, yeah, he's he's
Speaker 1: encouraging April Grace as Guinevere. The interviewer of t. J.
Speaker 1: Mackie is so good in this movie. And she's just
Speaker 1: so like I think she she's so easily overlooked that role,
Speaker 1: you know, and think about the compositions with her, because
Speaker 1: that scene is all about getting closer and closer and closer.
Speaker 1: Like we start out wide with t J. Mackie and
Speaker 1: he's like doing his karate kicks in his underwear, like
Speaker 1: like we're getting two shots with them, and then that
Speaker 1: entire sequence is like about getting closer to Tom Cruise,
Speaker 1: closer to April Grace as Guenevere, and and she has
Speaker 1: to be Tom Cruise is equal. She has to go
Speaker 1: toe to toe with him in that scene and that
Speaker 1: is a huge challenge that she rises to and six
Speaker 1: eats that she's amazing in this movie. She does it, yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's not only Tom Cruise, which is intimidating enough
Speaker 1: as as a um you know, she was a young
Speaker 1: actor at the time, but it's Tom Cruise, like chewing
Speaker 1: fucking dialogue and scenery in the most overtop, over the
Speaker 1: top sort of Tom Cruise way that you could be
Speaker 1: as Frank t J. Mackie. And and I'm sure he
Speaker 1: that was part of the I'm sure that was part
Speaker 1: of the vibe in those scenes was the intimidation of
Speaker 1: Frank T. J. Mackie is the same intimidation that Tom
Speaker 1: Cruise brings in there in the room. It's so interesting that,
Speaker 1: like all of the verbal lessons that he teaches in
Speaker 1: that seminar are things that you can hear he and
Speaker 1: Doc and Captain Muffy use when they talk to anyone else.
Speaker 1: Like he's using this coded language with her. Yeah, throughout
Speaker 1: those scenes and those other and his two handlers are
Speaker 1: doing the same thing. Yeah. Yeah, it's just it's I've
Speaker 1: been It's sort of like, Ah, I worked on a
Speaker 1: TV commercial with Michael Bay once and shut the How
Speaker 1: have you not told me this story? Was it the
Speaker 1: commercial in the Elevator? No, it's like a Chevy Trucks thing.
Speaker 1: I've got some great stories from that job. It was
Speaker 1: like a two week thing all over California. Um, it
Speaker 1: was great. But it's the same way. There's like this
Speaker 1: culture that is set the same way that Frank Mackie's
Speaker 1: organization runs um on like a Michael Bay job, and
Speaker 1: it starts with that top asshole and and works its
Speaker 1: way down to everybody. Yeah, I'll tell you some stories
Speaker 1: at some point. Remind me that when we're at the
Speaker 1: fox Fire Room. I really I can't wait for that.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be awesome. But let's talk quickly about before
Speaker 1: we talk about Tom Cruise specifically, who you and I are.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's weird to say fans of because I'm
Speaker 1: so weird it out in anti scientology, but you and
Speaker 1: I are both fans of Tom Cruise's work. We feel
Speaker 1: the same way in that way. There are there are
Speaker 1: unfortunate aspects to being a Tom Cruise fan, but I
Speaker 1: am like you. Uh, I will go see every Tom
Speaker 1: Cruise film. Yeah, and I think he's a fucking hell
Speaker 1: of an actor. Uh. But the and it's so misogynistic
Speaker 1: that this seduce and destroy seminar. But I know you,
Speaker 1: and I know your sense of humor, and there are
Speaker 1: so many things that I know that Paul Thomas Anderson
Speaker 1: meant to be wrongly funny about about this seminar. Uh.
Speaker 1: And here's a couple of them. One of the slides,
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was a slider, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it was. One of the slides from his book
Speaker 1: was how to turn that friend into a sperm receptacle. Receptacle. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just the worst fucking thing you could imagine, like so disturbing.
Speaker 1: It's it's almost an exercise in if you were to
Speaker 1: pull that back into like make it half as disgusting,
Speaker 1: it would be worse. Like you almost need to press
Speaker 1: that all the way into ten out of ten in
Speaker 1: order to come around with the other side of that
Speaker 1: being laughable. Oh. Absolutely, Like he has to be and
Speaker 1: it's gross to watch, but he has to be the
Speaker 1: most like disgusting misogynist, and it has to be a
Speaker 1: room full of these uh woman hating Um, what's what's
Speaker 1: the word these guys these days, there's a word for it.
Speaker 1: These guys that don't have sex that want to you're
Speaker 1: talking about in cells. Yeah, and then they hate women
Speaker 1: because of that, these cells. That's what it was. It
Speaker 1: was kind of before that was popularized. But you fill
Speaker 1: a room full of these awful men that just seem
Speaker 1: like they hate women, but all they're trying to do
Speaker 1: is bed them in in a gross, like grudge fucky way.
Speaker 1: It's so like so gross to watch. There's a scene
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of when you were when you were saying
Speaker 1: that that's like it's almost therapeutic when that one person
Speaker 1: in the crowd tells their story and t J. Mackie
Speaker 1: comes up off of the stage and puts his hand
Speaker 1: on his shoulder and he's like, I don't think there's
Speaker 1: anyone in this from this and felt that way before. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because the guy says, she just didn't think of me
Speaker 1: that way or yeah, and like and what t J.
Speaker 1: Mackee is saying verbally on the page is true, Like
Speaker 1: that that is painful, that realization. But but in the
Speaker 1: context of that room and what's happening, it's so interesting
Speaker 1: to see that that sort of statement weaponized. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: and turned awful. Yeah. The other thing I thought was funny,
Speaker 1: it was and I know they had a good time
Speaker 1: with this was the it's this big seminar about seducing women.
Speaker 1: All this thing was the whole calendar bit, get a calendar. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, it's there's like ten lines dedicated to the calendar. Chuck.
Speaker 1: It's like, it's it's a night of night said thing
Speaker 1: you can get at the drug store. Like there's ten
Speaker 1: different versions of that line in the movie that I love.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and he and he's like, because you know,
Speaker 1: if you have the mandatory whatever day waiting period, Like,
Speaker 1: how are you going to know when that happened? Guys,
Speaker 1: unless you have that paper calendar hanging up. It's like
Speaker 1: pre iPhone, which is like this, And he makes himself
Speaker 1: magnanimous too, He's like, now I've included that for free,
Speaker 1: that's in your packet. Let's talk about Tom Cruise, man,
Speaker 1: I mean he you know. The story was he saw
Speaker 1: Boogie Nights and called Paul Thomas Anderson to England to
Speaker 1: visit him on Eyes Wide Shut to basically say, you're
Speaker 1: the real deal, man, and anytime you want to work
Speaker 1: with me, let's do it. And this character is so uh,
Speaker 1: it's so real. Man. I've known these guys that like,
Speaker 1: these are the guys that I never ever and that
Speaker 1: was never like really good friends with any of these
Speaker 1: dudes obviously, but these like guys like you and I,
Speaker 1: we want to go out into a bar and like
Speaker 1: when we were single, let's say if we had known
Speaker 1: each other, we go into a bar and hang out
Speaker 1: with each other, so we can fucking hang we went.
Speaker 1: They're looking over each other's shoulders, like who am I gonna?
Speaker 1: Who am I going to get tonight? Man? Who am
Speaker 1: I gonna take home. I went home alone every time,
Speaker 1: to man, because I was too busy hanging out with
Speaker 1: my friends, Like I was never like out there trying
Speaker 1: to get laid. Maybe that's a problem. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Maybe we did it wrong. Oh I'm sure. I'm sure
Speaker 1: we burned our best years on people like each other.
Speaker 1: Oh boy, that's the line, man, that's the line. Uh.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I knew some of these some do like
Speaker 1: this though, that like you couldn't even talk to him
Speaker 1: when you're out because all they're doing is scanning the
Speaker 1: room like a predator. It's fucking creepy, man, Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine what it must have been like to
Speaker 1: like get a phone call from Tom Cruise a and
Speaker 1: then be he's shooting a Kubrick film and he wants
Speaker 1: to talk to you about what might be next, and
Speaker 1: not only that, like to have your next thing be
Speaker 1: something that should repulse someone like him at that part
Speaker 1: of his career, right, Like if this was anyone else
Speaker 1: but Paul Thomas Anderson, I don't think Tom Cruise does
Speaker 1: this at all, and it's an easy decision for him
Speaker 1: to say no. But this is one of the ultimate
Speaker 1: examples of an actor really wanting to work with a director,
Speaker 1: regardless of party, and he takes and he runs with
Speaker 1: it in such a way like he he ran all
Speaker 1: the way to a Best Supporting Actor nomination. He's spectacular
Speaker 1: in this movie, in a and in an ensemble where
Speaker 1: there should where the entire Best Supporting Actor and actress
Speaker 1: category should be filled with every performance in this movie.
Speaker 1: Now you're you're totally right. Yet he manages to stand
Speaker 1: out somehow. He um like Emily hates Tom Cruz. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's well established on the show. But last night she
Speaker 1: was watching, not watching, kind of doing her own thing
Speaker 1: while it was on, and I was watching it, and
Speaker 1: when he comes on as as Frank McKie at the
Speaker 1: seminar and starts doing that thing, She's just she's so repulsed.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, that's it's supposed to be repulsive. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's how good he is. Is He's playing the worst
Speaker 1: fucking version of of a man that there is, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And and by the end, like when he goes into
Speaker 1: Jimmy's house, you're made to feel empathy for him. And
Speaker 1: that is one of the magic tricks of this film
Speaker 1: is that he shows up laid bear. He's gonna drop
Speaker 1: kick those fucking dogs if they come near him, and
Speaker 1: he's going to get his bedside moment. And that breakdown
Speaker 1: is one of the it's one of my favorite performances
Speaker 1: of any actor in any movie, the barely holding it
Speaker 1: to the barely holding it together. Tom Cruise is one
Speaker 1: of my favorite actors. That version of him totally dude,
Speaker 1: and it's like he's spent this whole movie looking at
Speaker 1: this guy and just thinking, like, what a fucking garbage
Speaker 1: man this is. He's the guy that makes good guys
Speaker 1: like us look bad. So guys like us having a special,
Speaker 1: like especially visceral reaction to someone like this. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then you learn the big reveal at the end is
Speaker 1: this awful thing that his dad did. He abused him
Speaker 1: and he uh he he left his wife, his dying wife,
Speaker 1: to his young son to deal with. And then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden at the end, he've got this like
Speaker 1: broken down man, not excusing behaviors, but it's it's like
Speaker 1: you said, it's that magic trick of like funck man,
Speaker 1: he got kicked in the nuts when he was a kid.
Speaker 1: That that line that I hang on every time is
Speaker 1: is like he brings it to a point when he's like,
Speaker 1: because I'm not going to take care of you, Like
Speaker 1: he's not going to take care of his father the
Speaker 1: way he was made to take care of his mother. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that hits just so hard, so hard. Man. H
Speaker 1: On a wider note, the other the other seminar, I'm
Speaker 1: looking at my notes now, the other seminar thing that
Speaker 1: I thought was so funny. All right, guys, we're gonna
Speaker 1: move on to this next bit. How to fake like
Speaker 1: you are nice? And I love it so much, Like
Speaker 1: there was a I mean, I'm still this guy, but
Speaker 1: there was a time when I would I would just
Speaker 1: be combing eBay for props from movies like this, because
Speaker 1: I really loved for a time trying to get the
Speaker 1: crew shirt of of a Magnolia, which I had for
Speaker 1: a time, and and like cruise shirts from other films
Speaker 1: from the late nineties. But like, how badly do you
Speaker 1: want the Blue Book from the T. J. Mackew seminar,
Speaker 1: Like I want that. It could be blank pages inside,
Speaker 1: that's fine, but I want them. I want the blue
Speaker 1: book with the cover of that stupid looking wolf with
Speaker 1: the leather vest. Yeah, I want have you ever bought
Speaker 1: some cool stuff. No, I mean my, I mean my,
Speaker 1: my interests are so specific that they couldn't possibly be
Speaker 1: found on eBay, Like I like, I'm too hyper specific
Speaker 1: about individual props that they're just like that belongs in
Speaker 1: someone's office. Yeah, I hear you. All right, so everyone
Speaker 1: should know that we both just took a little potty
Speaker 1: break and a drink refill. But I don't remember exactly
Speaker 1: where we were. I know we were talking about Tom
Speaker 1: Cruise and Frank Mackie. Do you remember, all right, well,
Speaker 1: I do want to say this. Then back to the
Speaker 1: scene with the interviewer. Um, he the way that scene
Speaker 1: is played between the two of them, he is he
Speaker 1: is in full uh search and destroy mode through the
Speaker 1: whole thing. And then the way that thing turns man
Speaker 1: as soon as she starts to challenge him, he gets
Speaker 1: agitated at first, and then he just fucking goes dead.
Speaker 1: And that that turn man is so fucking cool. I
Speaker 1: really love that as an interviewer, she's doing uch a
Speaker 1: capable job. But she is also never aggressive with him,
Speaker 1: Like if you'll notice, like her question is not who's
Speaker 1: your real who are your real parents? The question is
Speaker 1: why would you lie? Yes, which is a so much
Speaker 1: more interesting question to ask and so much less threatening
Speaker 1: of one to ask. Yeah, And and then she she
Speaker 1: she wears kid gloves the whole time, and she approaches
Speaker 1: that question even because she's like, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: my people said this, and if that's true, then why
Speaker 1: would you lie? And boy, he's just and you can
Speaker 1: see the anger man behind his eyes that this woman
Speaker 1: is besting him and it's just powerful. Yeah. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: that and the explosion at the end where he goes
Speaker 1: in on her and she pushes him away is a
Speaker 1: great and awful moment. Yeah, yeah, a thousand percent. Um.
Speaker 1: I feel like a good way that to go about this,
Speaker 1: And it seems like that's what we're doing, is to
Speaker 1: talk about these characters, and then the story just kind
Speaker 1: of comes around. So let's move on to let's move
Speaker 1: on to John c Riley and Laura Walters one of
Speaker 1: my and and it's kind of the heart of the
Speaker 1: film in a lot of ways, don't you think. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: I think Laura Walters is like you could argue the
Speaker 1: heart of Boogie Nights in her way, she's also the
Speaker 1: heart of this film. Um, she's so incredible in this
Speaker 1: and she gets the gavel to the film, which I
Speaker 1: think is like a lot of people, a lot of
Speaker 1: people like Lost in Translation for the same reason that
Speaker 1: I like Magnolia, which is like, you get that moment
Speaker 1: at the end of like a conversation building to this
Speaker 1: moment of realization that like, this is the love that
Speaker 1: that we want to see, that we've wanted to see
Speaker 1: for the entire film, and we might we might just
Speaker 1: get it. But when she looks directly at camera right
Speaker 1: at the moment that the song turns like it's it
Speaker 1: totally destroys me every time, every single time, every time
Speaker 1: it grabs me by the throw and and squeezes it's
Speaker 1: it's great. It's the best. And she is the reason why. Yeah, yeah, man,
Speaker 1: because she's so raw in this movie. And um, I've
Speaker 1: known people like this that had cocaine problems. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: many years ago. Obviously, when you're forty nine years old,
Speaker 1: if you know cocaine at its still, then you're traveling
Speaker 1: wrong circles. But when I was younger, I knew people
Speaker 1: get mixed up in that stuff, man, like good people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: uh and you and and you know, as as as
Speaker 1: Rick James said, it's a hell of a drug, and
Speaker 1: it's done some uh to see this played out on
Speaker 1: the screen, to this damaged woman who was molested by
Speaker 1: her father, and it's just seeking out these brief sexual
Speaker 1: liaisons uh and and doing cocaine, Like when she's doing
Speaker 1: cocaine on the date, even she's just seeking this goodness
Speaker 1: of this earnest cop man. It's just fucking heartbreaking. I think, like,
Speaker 1: if you're gonna look at this on paper and you're
Speaker 1: and you're sketching out her character as the coke addict,
Speaker 1: funk up, uh, the victim of abuse, you might think
Speaker 1: that if you're if you're a normal movie go or,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't have anything in common with this person. But
Speaker 1: when I first saw this movie and every subsequent time
Speaker 1: I've ever seen it, like she's the person who can't
Speaker 1: get out of her own way. She's the one who's
Speaker 1: doing the line before going out in a eight saying
Speaker 1: you're so stupid. Every part of her is is self
Speaker 1: sabotaging in a way that is universal. Everyone knows what
Speaker 1: that feels like. And it doesn't take being an addict
Speaker 1: to to know how that feels and to know how
Speaker 1: how awful it feels to see a way out or
Speaker 1: a good person in front of you, and to think
Speaker 1: like I'm just gonna sunk this up the way I
Speaker 1: funked up everything else, and and and whether or not,
Speaker 1: like I don't and I don't think in saying this
Speaker 1: that cocaine is a main character attribute of hers. It's
Speaker 1: just a way to get us to understand expediently how
Speaker 1: her mind works in a way that that that makes
Speaker 1: that happen, that like that makes it universal for all
Speaker 1: of us. Yeah, I mean her cocaine is someone's ice
Speaker 1: cream or inability to stand up to someone or whatever.
Speaker 1: It's that thing. Yea uh. And I think I'm now
Speaker 1: realizing like one character thing and movies that are really
Speaker 1: respond to in such a sad way. And this is
Speaker 1: not me because it's not a reflection on me, but
Speaker 1: as a character who feels there not worthy of love
Speaker 1: is really really tough for me to see, maybe because
Speaker 1: I try to see good in people, but like I
Speaker 1: see this character and like she's worthy of love but
Speaker 1: she doesn't think she is. It is heartbreaking to see
Speaker 1: every time I see it in a movie. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: her rage at her father is so raw that I
Speaker 1: can't remember seeing anything like it before this film. The
Speaker 1: way that she screams at her father, it feels like
Speaker 1: like it feels like you shouldn't be seeing it. It's
Speaker 1: so intimate, right, Yeah, And and this is and the
Speaker 1: way he plays this movie out is you don't know
Speaker 1: what had happened at that point, Like he reveals that
Speaker 1: it the end, which was really a master stroke, I think,
Speaker 1: because you don't, you're you're just sort of it's that
Speaker 1: tease of like, well, why does she fucking hate this
Speaker 1: guy's guts because he seems he's coming there with his
Speaker 1: hat in his hand. Yeah, fully, and uh, and she's
Speaker 1: just not having it. Yeah, you you place the blame
Speaker 1: on her before moving it through the course of the
Speaker 1: film to him, it's, uh, it's really strong stuff. And
Speaker 1: how about casting Philip Baker Hall as that guy too?
Speaker 1: Like what a great decision. Like, if there's anyone that
Speaker 1: I feel great love and admiration for, it's someone with
Speaker 1: that face, you'd like Sydney that that kind of man is, Like,
Speaker 1: that's the best, Like, how could he possibly do wrong?
Speaker 1: It's it's a surprise when you realize what's happened, and
Speaker 1: it's devastating because it's him. Yeah, he looks like he
Speaker 1: looks like a Bassett hound, you know. I love the
Speaker 1: detail of him coming home from work after after blowing
Speaker 1: the shoe, like everything that could go wrong goes wrong
Speaker 1: at the at the kid game show, but when he
Speaker 1: comes home, they change him out of his shirt and
Speaker 1: they put him into another collared shirt. Right, that's right.
Speaker 1: I love that detail so much, like like, of course
Speaker 1: there is no there's no casual where for him, right right.
Speaker 1: That guy's old Hollywood. It's it's it's button up shirts
Speaker 1: all the way down, all the way down. There's no
Speaker 1: T shirt going on. It's funny that jog my memory.
Speaker 1: Though I read that initially the Tom Cruise, the Frank T.
Speaker 1: J McKee character was supposed to be like Polo shirt
Speaker 1: and Khaki's guy. Yeah, and Tom Cruise took it in
Speaker 1: a whole different direction, and Pete Anderson was just like
Speaker 1: fully on board, which is cool. I like that note.
Speaker 1: I think I think it's grosser if it's polo shirt
Speaker 1: or two polo shirts, because it's so ever present, like
Speaker 1: it's everywhere, but you so rarely see leather vest guy
Speaker 1: that it's yeah, it seems almost safer like the lampoon
Speaker 1: that guy because fat fucking sausage and then he rhymes
Speaker 1: sausage with August. He did come August. I forgot about that.
Speaker 1: That's really funny. Oh man, Uh that's a disturbing amount
Speaker 1: of recall that I have. No, that's great, I love it.
Speaker 1: Uh all right, So back to Mlaura Walters. She this
Speaker 1: cop comes into her life that is just this uh
Speaker 1: like Ernest is the only way I can describe him.
Speaker 1: He's just um, you know, he doesn't like foul language.
Speaker 1: And he's and he he every he's he's the he's
Speaker 1: the cop that you want out there. You know. He
Speaker 1: goes into every situation wanting everything to be okay. He
Speaker 1: read his More to me before I knew what Mormon was. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like like super super quality guy, like and I mean
Speaker 1: that is a compliment, like quality fucking guy all the way,
Speaker 1: like those Mormons. Yeah, those fucking Mormons. Quality. Well, I
Speaker 1: mean I'm just getting the Mormons in my life for
Speaker 1: quality people. Mormons are great. I was just just working around,
Speaker 1: Like I'm sure you read this the way I did.
Speaker 1: But like, when you're a mid twenties Paul Thomas Anderson,
Speaker 1: you can go out and shoot your weird weekend movies
Speaker 1: with John c Riley on a whim and see what
Speaker 1: comes out of it. And the idea that this character
Speaker 1: came out of one of their weekenders. Like, like the
Speaker 1: thought that stuck in my head for a long time
Speaker 1: after seeing this movie was like, it's interesting how I
Speaker 1: think we all narrate our own lives to a certain degree,
Speaker 1: but to actually say the words out loud is such
Speaker 1: a fun and neat quality to a character. Man, And
Speaker 1: you never don't believe, like this is another magic rick, right,
Speaker 1: this should be so dumb, it should be well, there's
Speaker 1: another one coming. You should not work. No, it shouldn't work. Um,
Speaker 1: it's a guy dictating his diary and it totally works.
Speaker 1: But you know, because it's John c Riley, I think
Speaker 1: because he's the because he's everyman, he's the best. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the ultimate so good man. And he doesn't do
Speaker 1: it the whole movie. Does he just do it twice
Speaker 1: beginning and end? Or is there another one? I want
Speaker 1: to say, because it's p t A like there's three,
Speaker 1: but there might be one in the middle. But I do,
Speaker 1: really I love it. And it's never like it's it's
Speaker 1: never you know, sometimes it's a crutch, right when you
Speaker 1: when you throw the voice over, like like your telling
Speaker 1: me and not showing me, and that two weeks that's
Speaker 1: week sauce mostly, But when he's telling you and showing you,
Speaker 1: it's different. It's different because it's him. I totally agree. Man,
Speaker 1: he's just got a superpower in a way that few
Speaker 1: actors do. Yeah. Yeah, And and that's that first scene, man,
Speaker 1: when they first meet each other and that music is going,
Speaker 1: it's so uh like intense, intense and uh, she's so
Speaker 1: obviously fucking tweaked out. And he waits six minutes before
Speaker 1: he says, have you been using drugs? It's because he's
Speaker 1: so much in his own head and this is like
Speaker 1: a human nature thing, like he is self criticizing the
Speaker 1: entire time to like where do I put my nightstick?
Speaker 1: Where do I put my hands? I'm supposed to pretend
Speaker 1: that this coffee tastes good, Like he's running the script
Speaker 1: of how to look cool, while at the same time,
Speaker 1: she's running her own script how to look cool. And
Speaker 1: they're never they're never seeing each other, they're only seeing themselves. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And it's a relationship that you know in a million
Speaker 1: years will never work, but you want it to. And
Speaker 1: you you might even but buy it for a minute
Speaker 1: in the movie because they're so am I too much
Speaker 1: of the romantic by saying like I think that they
Speaker 1: make it. I think I think they make it. Look
Speaker 1: at you, what a sweetheart? Maybe so? Maybe so because
Speaker 1: that that others that, you know, sort of the final
Speaker 1: scene where they go on the date together, that is
Speaker 1: such good stuff, man, And it's so like melodramatic and overwritten,
Speaker 1: but it just fucking works with them bearing their souls
Speaker 1: like that, and and her just saying like being so
Speaker 1: raw and saying like, I'm you wouldn't want to know me, man,
Speaker 1: basically you don't want to know me, and he's saying, yes,
Speaker 1: I do. I do. I want to talk about this
Speaker 1: a lot unfriendly fire, but the idea of a special effect,
Speaker 1: like like an airplane sequence being done on wires and
Speaker 1: it looking really bad, but it looking really good. If
Speaker 1: all of your effects sequences are shot on wires, it's
Speaker 1: it's the comparison, right. If you can be consistent with
Speaker 1: the effect, then it doesn't stick out as much. And
Speaker 1: I think that that is at play here with the dialogue,
Speaker 1: because I think we both agree that it's overwritten in
Speaker 1: a lot of parts, but because in totality there is
Speaker 1: so much of that sprinkled around, like you never get
Speaker 1: it compared to something else in such a way that
Speaker 1: makes you see the wire. Yeah, absolutely, and you just want,
Speaker 1: like you really want these characters to be okay, these
Speaker 1: two uh, even if they're not together like individually, because
Speaker 1: he's so um what's the word when you're he's so vulnerable,
Speaker 1: you know when he loses that fucking gun man and
Speaker 1: what is he doing in that scene too, Like they're
Speaker 1: both still thinking about themselves, Like she's thinking about how
Speaker 1: fucked up she is, he's thinking about how he lost
Speaker 1: his gun. Like they're never quite seeing each other. And
Speaker 1: that's the thing that that that keeps their relationship going forward,
Speaker 1: because if they ever truly knew each other entirely, I
Speaker 1: think you're right, I think they would never work. But
Speaker 1: because they're both in their heads about their own ship, right,
Speaker 1: So there do you? So you think it's like a
Speaker 1: U two people who are both just sort of damaged,
Speaker 1: but they're damaged together, damaged in in compatible ways. Maybe. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that scene where he loses that gun is so raw
Speaker 1: because he's just he starts crying at one point and
Speaker 1: he's so scared, like you get that, yeah, like I'm
Speaker 1: not a religious there's when he starts when he starts
Speaker 1: praying about the gun like that. That's devastating to me.
Speaker 1: Now it is, It totally is. He was so good
Speaker 1: And I meant to point out to the second ago
Speaker 1: when you're talking about the weekend or ah for the listeners.
Speaker 1: Paul Thomas Anderson made a short film when with John
Speaker 1: c Riley and I think Jennifer Jason Lee and who else?
Speaker 1: It was like one more person. Jennifer Jason Lee was
Speaker 1: the one I thought of, and I can't think of
Speaker 1: the third. There was the third really famous person that
Speaker 1: just went out on a weekend and did this sort
Speaker 1: of cops spoof and he grew out the mustache. And
Speaker 1: that's sort of how this character developed out basically as
Speaker 1: officer Jim Jim Cullen. Was that it or Jim coming,
Speaker 1: It's Jim Curring. Yeah yeah, Jim Curring, which is such
Speaker 1: a cop name, has a mustache ever belonged more on
Speaker 1: a face than on John c Riley's face. It's really perfect,
Speaker 1: it did. It really worked out for him. It looked good.
Speaker 1: I love that kind of light ning in a bottle though, Like,
Speaker 1: let's just go experiment and see if this turns into
Speaker 1: a thing. And it full on turned into a b
Speaker 1: story here well and and the opposite of Reid Rothschild. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like the full I mean, we haven't even kind of
Speaker 1: really said it's it's obvious if you're a fan of his,
Speaker 1: But this is the p T Anderson, the early ensemble
Speaker 1: Yea and his his players basically, I mean Tom Cruise
Speaker 1: is nude, Julian Moore, Phil Hoffman, Bill Macy, Mlaura Walters,
Speaker 1: Philip Baker, Hall, John c Riley, Ricky j Molina, Louie
Speaker 1: Kusman funny in this movie. Yeah, you had such a
Speaker 1: small part, but I love that. Louis Guzman's only function
Speaker 1: in this movie was to talk ship to those kids.
Speaker 1: He knows all of the baseball trivia and dairy trivia,
Speaker 1: any questions about cheese or dairy products. Oh Man, Thomas
Speaker 1: Jane too. It's supposedly he played young Jimmy Gator. When
Speaker 1: was that scene? I don't even remember that. I think
Speaker 1: that was in the montage so we get like the
Speaker 1: Entertainment Tonight montage of we see him through the years. Dude,
Speaker 1: I did not notice that. Yeah, I love Thomas Jane. Also,
Speaker 1: I can't have too much Thomas Jane. But yeah, a
Speaker 1: couple of other little hit tiny parts was before I
Speaker 1: knew who he was. Patton Oswald at the beginning, Yeah,
Speaker 1: just baby face, baby face, he's so cute. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then the other one was I don't even know if
Speaker 1: you know this. You probably do because you know this movie.
Speaker 1: But the guy on the other end of the phone
Speaker 1: call with Phil Hoffman Chad, when he's trying to say,
Speaker 1: He's like, this is the scene in the movie which
Speaker 1: we need to talk about that that's p Is, It's
Speaker 1: p f D. It's Paula Tompkins. I never knew that
Speaker 1: until today. It's incredible trivia and like in the and
Speaker 1: I haven't been in the same room as him very often,
Speaker 1: but it's it's been the thing that I've wanted that
Speaker 1: I've wandered about a lot, Like I wonder how much
Speaker 1: he gets chatted up about that. Uh. Well, I love
Speaker 1: that I know this now, um, because next time my
Speaker 1: CM I will bring it up. But I knew he
Speaker 1: was in that sort of Pet Anderson John Brian crew
Speaker 1: from the Largo set. Back in those days. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of great voice work in this movie, like Marylynn
Speaker 1: Rashcoop as the as Janet. Did you recognize her voice?
Speaker 1: I totally didn't know that was her. I want I
Speaker 1: want you to give me the information, Janet. Wow, I
Speaker 1: want you to do your fucking job. I am doing
Speaker 1: my fucking job. Frank, Yeah, that's her. Yeah. Now that
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the cast to what the she's awesome.
Speaker 1: The I guess he just had a bit part in
Speaker 1: This Day and Marylynn Rashcoop came back for Punch Truk Love.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, she had a big part in that. Um
Speaker 1: as the most Aggro of the Agro sisters. She's great. Um.
Speaker 1: Alan Graf who played the guy in the donut shopping
Speaker 1: Boogie Nights who pulled out that fucking magnum. Apparently he
Speaker 1: plays a firefighter in this movie. No way, I didn't
Speaker 1: know that. Young Clark Greg is the a D. I
Speaker 1: love the Paul Thomas Anderson players. Like the repertory theater
Speaker 1: that he assembles for every film is a delight every time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's great on Tom Cruise's cousin What a Shock. Um.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the Philip Seymour Hoffman in uh and
Speaker 1: fucking robards Man like I was hoping we would. This
Speaker 1: is gonna go with the whole two hours and I've
Speaker 1: been glad to you. Are you okay? I absolutely do
Speaker 1: a right good. It's it's like eleven o'clock here in Atlanta.
Speaker 1: But I'm I'm I'm roaring. Yeah, yeah, man, Philip Symore
Speaker 1: Hoffman and I think I mentioned this and Boogie Nights.
Speaker 1: Uh p t Anderson had had always kind of written
Speaker 1: these asshole or freaky or weird roles for him, and
Speaker 1: he said he wanted to finally give him a role
Speaker 1: that was most like him, and apparently Phil in Magnolia
Speaker 1: as the nurse was the most true to who Philip
Speaker 1: Symore Hoffman was, which really fills me up and makes
Speaker 1: me super sad. Yeah, it's it's great, and it's devastating
Speaker 1: to hear that because, uh, he's so human. His character
Speaker 1: is so human in this film. Maybe the I mean
Speaker 1: Rose Gator is great, but we don't know her the
Speaker 1: way that we know Philip Parma. Phil Parma might be
Speaker 1: the real heart of the entire thing. I yeah, I
Speaker 1: know we said that was John c Roley Mlaura Walters,
Speaker 1: but yeah, Phil Parma is pure goodness in this movie,
Speaker 1: he really is. And uh, he's just he's just absorbing,
Speaker 1: right Like he never he never reacts and deflects, he's
Speaker 1: never on offense. He's always absorbing and letting things move
Speaker 1: through him, right, So like when when uh, when Julianne
Speaker 1: Moore's character is screaming at him, he's just like letting
Speaker 1: it go through. When when Jason Robards is telling him
Speaker 1: the story, he's just listening. When Tom Cruise is threatening
Speaker 1: to kick the fucking dogs, he's he's just there as
Speaker 1: as like he's like totemic in the center of this film.
Speaker 1: And he even gets like some of the low key
Speaker 1: best lines, like when he calls up the Pink Dot
Speaker 1: delivery so good and and like and the operator asked
Speaker 1: him if he still wants all the groceries along with
Speaker 1: the magazines. He's so innocently doesn't have any idea why
Speaker 1: anyone would question the entire grocery order. Yeah, there's so
Speaker 1: many great little moments like that with Philip Parma. That's
Speaker 1: one of them. And the other one that comes to
Speaker 1: mind is one that would have been so easy to
Speaker 1: cut out of this movie is when um towards the end,
Speaker 1: when when Partridge is literally dying. Ah, he knows this,
Speaker 1: and he gets the relief nursed at the door. You
Speaker 1: could have easily cut that scene, but he goes to
Speaker 1: the door and and opens it up just a little bit.
Speaker 1: And it was like, Nah, I'm just gonna I don't know,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna write it out or I can't remember what
Speaker 1: he said exactly, but that that's like such a quick
Speaker 1: little scene that says so much about who this guy is,
Speaker 1: Like he knows I'm going to be with this man
Speaker 1: when he dies tonight, and I want to be there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was a spectacular role, and that moment is so crucial.
Speaker 1: You're right, and he tells one that he's going to
Speaker 1: see it through. You never see his face. You're just
Speaker 1: you're locked onto Phil Parma. I think it was Paula Tompkins.
Speaker 1: It's the back, he's everywhere, all the all the fake
Speaker 1: cigarette stuff. That's such. That's such a great little detail.
Speaker 1: And in a hospice palliative care situation like that, Yeah, God,
Speaker 1: that it's so heavy. And I love how Jason Robarts
Speaker 1: is just lit on that Craftmatic adjustable bed like in
Speaker 1: the living room, Like you know, when you've reached a
Speaker 1: point in your declining health. When the bed is in
Speaker 1: the living room, that ship is fucking bad. And that's
Speaker 1: where Jason Robarts is in this movie. He's in the
Speaker 1: living room. Well, he was asked at some point, what
Speaker 1: room do you want to die in? Yeah, and that
Speaker 1: was it. It was the living room. Yeah. And and
Speaker 1: then you know, of course with this storyline, you bring
Speaker 1: in Julianne Moore, who's one of my favorite actors ever.
Speaker 1: And uh. And when I was watching Magnolia last night,
Speaker 1: I was like, God, has she ever been better? And
Speaker 1: then I remember Boogie Nights and everything else she's done,
Speaker 1: and it's like, well, I'll just pick a movie, and
Speaker 1: she's always great. She's so capable in the margins, both
Speaker 1: in Boogie Nights and in Magnolia, that like, I wonder,
Speaker 1: I wonder if p t A like as has the
Speaker 1: instinct to pull her back into the center, the way
Speaker 1: that he took John c Riley and like made him
Speaker 1: less weird and brought him back into the middle. Because
Speaker 1: she's so dynamic and explosive and scary and beautiful in
Speaker 1: what she does in this movie that like, you know,
Speaker 1: she can do it all. It's got to be hard
Speaker 1: when you've got her to not use her to her
Speaker 1: full potential this way. Yuh, She's she's a she's a
Speaker 1: fucking machine gun of emotions and you can't just you
Speaker 1: can't dial her back. I don't know how you can.
Speaker 1: And in this movie like that, that's the it's the
Speaker 1: purest example of that, Like the scene of her going
Speaker 1: to the pharmacy and taking that umbrage that she does
Speaker 1: with the pharmacist and all of her scenes with Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's such a specific, like great thing. Uh, I mean
Speaker 1: she has to really. I mean, she has a bunch
Speaker 1: of standout scenes that kind of all are but that
Speaker 1: one in the scene with with Michael Murphy as the
Speaker 1: attorney or just so fucking rock solid man, that attorney
Speaker 1: is one of those low key parts of this film
Speaker 1: that is great, like a real glue part. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: she makes it. She's one of these actors that always
Speaker 1: makes it look so easy. Like I don't know anything
Speaker 1: about her process, but julian Moore strikes me as someone
Speaker 1: who also on the set and can just fucking turn
Speaker 1: it on like that. I Mean, Meryl Streep gets the
Speaker 1: rep as best actor in the world, but like I
Speaker 1: feel like Julianne Moore's in the conversation and I and
Speaker 1: I fully believe that, like I think she can. There's
Speaker 1: no one. There are actors better, there are actors as
Speaker 1: good as her, but no actor that's better than her.
Speaker 1: I think one thousand percent agree. Man, She's she is
Speaker 1: amazing every single time. She's never done anything shitty. Have
Speaker 1: you ever seen Safe the film? Yeah? Yeah, that was
Speaker 1: that was like that may have been like the first
Speaker 1: thing I saw her in. Actually, now I think about
Speaker 1: I saw that in college. Yeah, when I worked at
Speaker 1: the cool video store and that was you know, that
Speaker 1: was during that great early nineties sort of indie period.
Speaker 1: I love that you had a cool video store phase
Speaker 1: because I had one of those two. Oh you worked
Speaker 1: on one. Yeah, I worked in a grocery store video department.
Speaker 1: Whoa wow, that was the best department man. Uh what
Speaker 1: grocery store Seattle, safe Way. Yeah. I used to sell
Speaker 1: I used to rent videos, and sell lottery tickets and
Speaker 1: rent out the rug doctor machines. That would all happen
Speaker 1: at that department. Yeah, flattery, carpet cleaner, and videos. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the whole thing. I think. I think I sold cigarettes
Speaker 1: there too. I think that was a part of it,
Speaker 1: but not a lot of cigarette business man. You had
Speaker 1: me going you throwing rug doctor. Yeah, rug doctor is
Speaker 1: a very specific reference. And that was a pain in
Speaker 1: the ask too, because like you had three of them
Speaker 1: in the store and you had to you had to
Speaker 1: break out the binder, and the binder had that that
Speaker 1: carbon paper like like chuck, if you're going to rent
Speaker 1: the rug doctor, man, we gotta fill out this thing.
Speaker 1: And so it's you and me flipping it back and forth,
Speaker 1: like you gotta fill out your name and address in
Speaker 1: your phone number. I gotta do I gotta do the
Speaker 1: slidey credit card thing over. It's a whole process. Oh
Speaker 1: my god. Yeah, how many credit cards did you mangle
Speaker 1: with those? I mangled a few of my day, all
Speaker 1: of them. I mean, the paper was illegible. It was bad.
Speaker 1: It was bad. But the best part of being a
Speaker 1: grocery store video department clerk was the videos. Man, Like
Speaker 1: I would, I'm not going to get in any trouble
Speaker 1: for saying this. I would take them home. I'm taking
Speaker 1: home new releases every night and I'm watching them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because you got to safe way going to come after you. No,
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't think so. I think. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: don't want any part of me. I'm driving business their way.
Speaker 1: So um, do they still rent VHSS? God? Uh? The
Speaker 1: co host Benjamin or Harrison, my co host on all
Speaker 1: my other shows, mentioned we were talking about how often
Speaker 1: we would go to Suncoast and by the VHS tapes
Speaker 1: and how I specifically would get the letterbox VHS versions
Speaker 1: of movies because that's the only place that you get them,
Speaker 1: the the mall video store, where you would spend twenty
Speaker 1: or thirty dollars on a VHS tape to get the
Speaker 1: letterbox version of like I forgot there that much of
Speaker 1: as Good as it Gets or something like I'm talking
Speaker 1: about something like of that era, as good as it gets.
Speaker 1: That's worth. That was a that was an era. So
Speaker 1: Robards like, we really haven't focused on him enough. He's uh,
Speaker 1: this was his last role obviously he uh. I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't know if he knew he was dying when
Speaker 1: he made this, but I think he knew it was
Speaker 1: close or something like that, because it sure feels like
Speaker 1: the part is in viewed with that energy. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And boy, he's good that last that last fucking monologue man,
Speaker 1: And you've got the book so you've read it. Like,
Speaker 1: I encourage you, if you're a screenwriter or just into
Speaker 1: exploring what a script might look like on a page
Speaker 1: you've never done it. Go read that monologue at the
Speaker 1: end of this film from the Partridge character. Unbelievable. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know a lot of the backstory is John c
Speaker 1: Riley and Paul Thomas Anderson fucking around on a weekend.
Speaker 1: But like I always wonder this in films like this,
Speaker 1: what's the scene you start with and then write in reverse,
Speaker 1: like like spiraling out from that centerpiece, And I can't
Speaker 1: help but think that this is that moment, This is
Speaker 1: where you begin your film, is this monologue and then
Speaker 1: you write outward because the the message of using your
Speaker 1: regret is something that's resonated with me my whole life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the goddamn regret. Yeah yeah, I mean the story he
Speaker 1: tells us awful and he understands what a terrible person
Speaker 1: he's been. But the instrumentality of making mistakes, the idea
Speaker 1: that like the truly bad people make mistakes and learn
Speaker 1: nothing from them, and keep making them and don't care.
Speaker 1: But there is like you can find redemption or or
Speaker 1: something in at least recognizing it. And using it for good.
Speaker 1: Yeah that is Uh. I wonder what like the brain
Speaker 1: space that you're in when you're writing something this heavy.
Speaker 1: I wrote a movie after this, and looking back, Magnolia
Speaker 1: was why it went in this direction, because I've only
Speaker 1: always written comedy scripts. Your Reign of Salamander's scene was
Speaker 1: pretty derivative, Chuck. I mean, I wasn't. I mean, I
Speaker 1: wasn't going to give you notes on the show. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it was a little too much on the You should
Speaker 1: know that I should have. Um, you should know better.
Speaker 1: I wrote a wrote a movie, a big fucking l
Speaker 1: A drama. It was totally Magnolia. That's why I wrote it.
Speaker 1: It was called hollywood Land before the movie hollywood Land
Speaker 1: came out, and it was about these interwoven stories on
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles on Christmas Eve, uh in Christmas Day
Speaker 1: when l A got its first freak snowstorm ever and
Speaker 1: the movie Crash did that afterward, and I remember both
Speaker 1: these things happened, and I was like, and you know
Speaker 1: what I did. This is a movie that I think
Speaker 1: I told the story in the show my uh my wife, Emily.
Speaker 1: I'm not telling you that I'm familiar. I know, uh.
Speaker 1: She was a producer in music videos, and she worked
Speaker 1: on a Black Crows videos. She have Michael Bays stories too. No,
Speaker 1: she didn't have Michael Bays stories, but she's got a
Speaker 1: bunch of music video stories, as do I because I
Speaker 1: was her PA. But she did a Black Crows video
Speaker 1: that shot way out in the fucking boonis of the mountains,
Speaker 1: like north of Los Angeles. And I was on that
Speaker 1: and Kate Hudson was there because that's when she was
Speaker 1: married to Chris Robinson. Fucking walked up and handed her
Speaker 1: my script and said, there's a part in there that
Speaker 1: I wrote for you, because she was who I had
Speaker 1: in mind for real, So I know, man and I
Speaker 1: and I and looking back, it's so funny that I
Speaker 1: had the balls to do that. But I watched her
Speaker 1: sit in her chair and open it up from a distance.
Speaker 1: I didn't like stand there. I like just did it
Speaker 1: and left, Yeah you gotta see, and and I like,
Speaker 1: you know, did the peek around the corner and she
Speaker 1: sat there and fucking read it for like ten minutes,
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, obviously that's as far as it
Speaker 1: ever went. But like, it's weird to think that I
Speaker 1: handed Kate Hudson his script and she read the first
Speaker 1: ten or fifteen pages. That's so amazing, Chuck, I would
Speaker 1: like to get at a copy of that. I don't
Speaker 1: even know if I have a copy of that anymore. Wow,
Speaker 1: I know, how dumb was I handing the script off?
Speaker 1: Not dumb? That's what you do. That's what you did
Speaker 1: at the time. Well, you know, and that's not something
Speaker 1: you do now. But no, you know what my motto, no,
Speaker 1: I kind of would. I'm kind of naive like that,
Speaker 1: or hopeful, but the my motto back then, and Emily
Speaker 1: always thought this was really kind of sweet and maybe
Speaker 1: right was not everyone has to love what you've written.
Speaker 1: Just the right person has to love what you've written.
Speaker 1: That's great, And like Kate Hudson could have loved it
Speaker 1: and championed it and send it to her agent. And
Speaker 1: that was always my thinking, was, like, man, if I
Speaker 1: get the right person to like it, that's all it takes,
Speaker 1: you know, Chuck. If you don't give her that script,
Speaker 1: what do you have? You have regret, the god damn regret,
Speaker 1: and and and that's that's like that's been a driving
Speaker 1: force for a lot of my life, Like the regret
Speaker 1: of of of not doing something as far worse than
Speaker 1: the regret of doing something that that you wish you hadn't.
Speaker 1: So like that, I hope you're glad to have done it.
Speaker 1: For as hilarious as that story is. Yeah, there's no
Speaker 1: like shame or like, oh, what a dumb dumb uh,
Speaker 1: even though I might have just called myself a dumb
Speaker 1: dumb like five minutes ago for doing it. But I
Speaker 1: like young sweet Chuck who would uh? Who would pass
Speaker 1: off the script as a p A? I like that kid. Plus,
Speaker 1: like if you're Kate Hudson, Like that's that's a story
Speaker 1: if you're an actor that I think is in the zeitgeist,
Speaker 1: like and I feel like Paul Thomas Anderson is an
Speaker 1: example of this. Like you get you get a young
Speaker 1: creative person who is fortunate enough to be in the
Speaker 1: right place at the right time, surrounded by the right people.
Speaker 1: Kate Hudson has a p A on her set who
Speaker 1: just handed her a script, Like what if? What if?
Speaker 1: This guy is great? She's got to read it. She's
Speaker 1: got to read it for ten minutes. You could be
Speaker 1: you could be something special. Well, and I caught her
Speaker 1: at the right time too, because she was just bored
Speaker 1: on this set. There was nothing going on. What was
Speaker 1: the song of the music video? It was Um, it
Speaker 1: was one of it was really late. It was one
Speaker 1: of their late Like I love those guys at first. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: me too. Um. And here's another little story. I bought
Speaker 1: my very first guitar from Rich Robert Rich Robinson. He
Speaker 1: he worked at Clark Music on Ponts in Atlanta. And
Speaker 1: this is before Black Crows is when he played with
Speaker 1: They were Mr. Crow's garden and he gave me a
Speaker 1: guitar pick and was like, hey, he should come out
Speaker 1: and see us. We do like R. E. M. Covers
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. I had that pick for many
Speaker 1: many years. Uh did it? Did it get broken? What
Speaker 1: happened at the pick? Oh? You know it's a guitar pick,
Speaker 1: you lose. Yeah. Wow. So uh, there's a few more
Speaker 1: things we've got to talk about. The looming rainstorm h
Speaker 1: and the rain and then eventually the clearing and then
Speaker 1: the frogs as a device is so effective in this movie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the way he plays with weather in l A especially,
Speaker 1: and you will learn as you live there, a big
Speaker 1: rainstorm is a big deal because it feels like a mood, right,
Speaker 1: big time. Like when you see the rain coming down
Speaker 1: in sheets on the windows behind our characters, you recognize
Speaker 1: visually through that language that they're going through a thing.
Speaker 1: You don't need to understand the dialogue to know that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that thing is just as weird as uh, or
Speaker 1: as actually as commonplaces. A rainstorm in l A, which
Speaker 1: just doesn't happen that much if you live in Atlanta
Speaker 1: or Seattle. Actually Seattle gets more like the misty stuff,
Speaker 1: but Atlanta gets as big storms. And when you live
Speaker 1: in l A, man, you'll see like you will go
Speaker 1: a long fucking time, dude, without seeing any rain. It's
Speaker 1: been happening a lot since I've moved here, and I
Speaker 1: don't like it. I don't like it at all. Chuck.
Speaker 1: It's raining there. It's gonna rain, I think this weekend.
Speaker 1: And it's rained for like five five days straight a
Speaker 1: week ago. So it's been a strange spring. Yeah. L
Speaker 1: A is not a town on that rain doesn't fit there.
Speaker 1: It just feels out of place and weird. Yeah, Randy
Speaker 1: Newman isn't writing songs about that. Uh. We should talk
Speaker 1: about the editing, uh for a second, because just the
Speaker 1: weaving of the story and the pace and the and
Speaker 1: the symphonic sort of orchestral pace of this movie is
Speaker 1: really impressive. I mean, if you're given final cut and
Speaker 1: you're told you can do anything, I mean, this is
Speaker 1: a film that uses a fire transition. Oh yeah, it
Speaker 1: uses multiple whip pan cuts, which which is very flourishy.
Speaker 1: Like that's a that's really mastributory in a fun way. Uh,
Speaker 1: the the rack focus into Jason Robards's lungs, and the
Speaker 1: professor like pointing at the schematic. I I love all
Speaker 1: this visual language. I love it so much. I think
Speaker 1: it's part of what makes the film great. But like,
Speaker 1: this is a guy who was given the blank check.
Speaker 1: But also like I hesitated to use the word restraint,
Speaker 1: but like I'm describing three scenes in a three hour film,
Speaker 1: Like he's not cartooning up, he's not ham and cheesing
Speaker 1: the entire run time with his visual flourishes. And I think,
Speaker 1: and I think that's emblematic of Paul Thomas Anderson. Like
Speaker 1: I think I think he knows better than to funk
Speaker 1: it up with a bunch of that stuff. Yeah, But
Speaker 1: I mean at the same time, he's he's like so
Speaker 1: showy as a filmmaker. Um, but I just I buy it,
Speaker 1: like it never felt like a he never felt like
Speaker 1: a phony to me. And it's very easy to come
Speaker 1: in there and especially back then and sort of fling
Speaker 1: the camera all over the place and come across as
Speaker 1: a phony that's just ripping people off. Like it just
Speaker 1: it always worked for me, for him. I wonder it's
Speaker 1: a if it's a matter of volume, because like we're
Speaker 1: talking about all this stuff in the same movie that
Speaker 1: a rain of frogs happens in, and a same movie
Speaker 1: that the entire cast sings along to an Amy Man song. Well,
Speaker 1: I was going to ask you about that. What do
Speaker 1: you think about that? I love it, I wholeheartedly love it.
Speaker 1: But I wonder if if this were a film where
Speaker 1: only one of those things happened, if that would be
Speaker 1: the clang. Yeah, And if it's only because of the
Speaker 1: volume of those things that makes the rest of it
Speaker 1: smoothed out, you know, Like, is that is that how
Speaker 1: you do it? Maybe? So do because if there's just
Speaker 1: the one thing, it's the jingling keys. But but in
Speaker 1: three hours, if you're doing if you're doing your bookends,
Speaker 1: if you're doing your your your whip pands and your
Speaker 1: transitions and your rain of frogs and your character singing
Speaker 1: and your character singing. It's it's just a bombardment of it.
Speaker 1: But it's not. It doesn't never feel like you're being bombarded.
Speaker 1: But if it's if it's a volume of these things
Speaker 1: and it's spaced out in such a way that that
Speaker 1: they all can coexist together, it works. I think you're right,
Speaker 1: because maybe that's the thing, because it's a filmmaker saying, listen,
Speaker 1: this is this kind of movie in every fucking way.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be existential and thematic and symbolic and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna really just fucking throw it all out there, and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna have character singing digetic music and uh, and
Speaker 1: it's it's going to be showy with the camera and
Speaker 1: I'm I'm going to have these kind of obvious bookends
Speaker 1: and tell you what the theme is, like that's what
Speaker 1: this movie is. Like like it or hate. And there
Speaker 1: are people that really don't like this movie too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I totally recognize that this, like this is a
Speaker 1: very divisive film to go see when you're in college.
Speaker 1: When it's uh, it's like, at times, I feel like
Speaker 1: it was more fraught than high school in that way,
Speaker 1: Like I'm I'm trying to make new friends and fit in,
Speaker 1: and I feel like, if you're a Magnolia person, you're
Speaker 1: my kind of person, and if you're not, then you
Speaker 1: can still be my kind of person. But I think
Speaker 1: I think it probably takes something else. Like what what
Speaker 1: other movies have you seen? Yeah? Yeah, like let's start
Speaker 1: the conversation. I feel like Boogie Nights was at Scorsese
Speaker 1: in a like here it is man like we're contemporaries. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like like this is this is answering that call. Do
Speaker 1: you feel like this film is at anyone specifically in
Speaker 1: the way that that one might have been. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean he's always uh, or not always, because I
Speaker 1: think he's kind of mixed it up more since then.
Speaker 1: But Boogie Nights and Magnolia, I think both or Scorsese
Speaker 1: esk you might want to go to Altman a little bit. Yeah. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's certainly reminiscent of shortcuts in Nashville and these big,
Speaker 1: sort of sprawling, interwoven stories. But I feel like it's
Speaker 1: Paul Thomas Anderson really putting his flag in the ground
Speaker 1: in a big way. You know. It's amazing how only
Speaker 1: a few films into his career, he he developed a
Speaker 1: style that is uniquely his, and very early on he
Speaker 1: was compared to Altman at Scorsese. But now I don't
Speaker 1: feel like he's in those sentences at all anymore. He's
Speaker 1: very much his own person and he has been for
Speaker 1: so long. It's really an achievement. You know what his
Speaker 1: next thing is? Right? No, I don't, Oh dude, he's
Speaker 1: making a nineteen seventies high school movie set in the
Speaker 1: San Fernando Valley. What yes, And it's I think the
Speaker 1: lead character is like a former child actor or something
Speaker 1: like that, or a current child doctor. I don't know.
Speaker 1: And I know it was supposed to be shooting starting
Speaker 1: in February, so it's probably been interrupted if it did
Speaker 1: start in February. But when I saw that, I was like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: he's like and I've and I've loved. I love his career,
Speaker 1: and I loved where he's gone and how challenging and
Speaker 1: how mature he's become as a filmmaker. But I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: get back to the valley. I want to see another
Speaker 1: one of those movies again. Hard degree. Yeah, wow, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just looking this at myself. That's that's going to
Speaker 1: be great. Yeah, it's gonna be there's amazing. There's been
Speaker 1: a couple of directors Guild uh podcast. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you listen to that podcast at all, but where
Speaker 1: Paul Thomas Anderson and Quentin Tarantino have done a bulicit
Speaker 1: downs with each other about film and to hear them
Speaker 1: chop it up is just the ultimate. It's great when
Speaker 1: it's great, tell p t about this what we're doing.
Speaker 1: I mean, someone's gotta gotta give him the what's up
Speaker 1: about movie? Crush? Right, yeah, someone should give him the
Speaker 1: what's up? All right, Well, let's finish up. Then the
Speaker 1: very end of the film, that great final John c
Speaker 1: Riley diary in the car and it says it goes
Speaker 1: a little something like this, Uh, that's the tough part.
Speaker 1: What can we forgive? That's the tough part of the job.
Speaker 1: Tough part about walking down the street and then that
Speaker 1: needle drop on that great final song and then you
Speaker 1: hear you, you don't hear about you. Here he enters
Speaker 1: that bedroom and you know they're talking, and you surmise
Speaker 1: that he's saying like I understand, I don't care, I
Speaker 1: want to love you. Yeah, and she gives that little
Speaker 1: smile and that look at camera man, and it's just
Speaker 1: fucking perfect. Actors have that special gift of like filling
Speaker 1: up their lower eyelid like all the way, like filling
Speaker 1: them up like they're fucking buckets before like dropping them
Speaker 1: like it's a fucking Disney ride. And and uh, Laura
Speaker 1: Walters is just the ultimate at this, like like she's
Speaker 1: perfectly timed and her turn to cameras so beautiful that
Speaker 1: and it's and it's time with the Amy man in
Speaker 1: such a way that it's it's it's got to be
Speaker 1: so stressful if you're a filmmaker to have written this
Speaker 1: thing and to see it come to its conclusion and
Speaker 1: to have an idea of a piece of music for it.
Speaker 1: And like, if I could ask Paul Thomas Anderson anything,
Speaker 1: I think it would be like if this film was
Speaker 1: shot in any kind of sequence, how nervous he might
Speaker 1: have been in stepping up to this scene knowing how
Speaker 1: much was hanging on it. Because if you don't get
Speaker 1: this right, I don't know if the entire film comes
Speaker 1: together in the way that it does totally, and then
Speaker 1: what is your plan? B I don't think there is one.
Speaker 1: This has to work and so the song's got to
Speaker 1: be right. He's got the song in the holster, like
Speaker 1: all the Amy Man songs were were chambered for the
Speaker 1: entire film. You've got the right actors. You've got to
Speaker 1: hope your dialogue is right. But what but if even
Speaker 1: if it's not, we're gonna we're gonna turn that down.
Speaker 1: We're just gonna make it about her face and the music,
Speaker 1: like like we can make that work. It's it's awesome,
Speaker 1: and I love I love the lack of vanity of
Speaker 1: it in that he wrote dialogue for this scene. But
Speaker 1: it's it's turned all the way down. We're just what
Speaker 1: We're hearing the music and we're watching the performance and
Speaker 1: it's uh and it's someone directing an actor and it's
Speaker 1: an actor performing as good as they can. And it's
Speaker 1: it's the it's the ultimate. It's what movies are all about.
Speaker 1: Is this moment? Absolutely, dude? Great movie. Yeah, thanks man,
Speaker 1: I think we did it. You're my kind of person, Chuck,
Speaker 1: if you like Magnolia, This is so much fun. I
Speaker 1: can't wait. Let's like, let's do it again in the
Speaker 1: next like within the month, because we're all around and
Speaker 1: this is a great hang studio set up now, so anytime, totally, man.
Speaker 1: I love you, brother, and and go listen to the
Speaker 1: Greatest Gin, Greatest Discovery Friendly Fire. Follow you on Twitter?
Speaker 1: Where can you be found? I'm at cuff for time
Speaker 1: on Twitter, spending more time than is healthy there these days.
Speaker 1: All right, well, don't do that. But this is perfect
Speaker 1: because I literally have fifteen seconds before my recorder cuts off.
Speaker 1: It says one hour, two hour limit. We're counting down.
Speaker 1: There's ten seconds left, all right, and we'll just take
Speaker 1: it all the way to the end. I'm gonna look it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna look into the camera about to pray. Well,
Speaker 1: know my computer is not dying. Goodbye. Movie Crush is produced, edited,
Speaker 1: and engineered by Ramsey unt here in our home studio
Speaker 1: at Pont City Market, Atlanta, Georgia. For I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I
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