What Are You Watching?
A podcast for people who LOVE movies. Filmmakers/best friends, Alex Withrow and Nick Dostal, do their part to keep film alive. Thanks for listening, and happy watching!
What Are You Watching?
188: The Odyssey (2026)
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Alex and Nick rave about Christopher Nolan’s latest film, “The Odyssey.” The guys break down the huge cast, IMAX 70mm screenings, Matt Damon’s best performances, the movie’s astounding set pieces, the score, the practical effects, Oscar chances, and so much more.
Later in the episode, the guys re-rank all of Christopher Nolan’s films.
Visit waywpodcast.com
Join WAYW Bonus Features on Patreon
Buy WAYW Merch
Hey everyone, welcome to What Are You Watching? Two men. One dot. A trick to break the walls of cinema and burn it screaming to the ground. I'm Alex Switzer and I'm joined by my best man, Nick Dosil. How you doing there, Odysseus? Yes!
SPEAKER_03Yes! Yes!
SPEAKER_02Oh, you got it today. What a red letter day. Oh, I got it today. I'll never ask for it ever again. You gave me Odysseus. Let's go. Hell yeah. Oh my god. I mean, how are you feeling to be here? I think. Dude, I think I can't even. This is gonna sound so silly because anyone who's your mad movie buffs that are with us right now, you've heard you've heard us get excited about movies. You've caught me at a particular moment on this, it's two o'clock PST at Pacific Standard Time. I am freaking the fuck out, man. This is so exciting. I don't think I've ever been more excited to be here at What Are You Watching than I am right now.
SPEAKER_01We, I mean, we're in the midst of like a this is a what what do you call it, like a turning point moment because I maybe for the first time in the history of the pod, we are like equally as excited and charged for a new movie. Like this is insane. I mean, he did it, he did it again.
SPEAKER_02I he fucking did it. Not only did he do it, I mean, this is this is the biggest thing that that that I I can't think of a bigger movie when you just look at everything, the scope, the whole entire uh process of how he made this, and that he made it so fucking good. This is I I'm I'm struggling to think of a feat that's higher than this, and I know that's a lot, that's a very, very big hard take for a movie that just came out two or three days ago. I can't I can't think of anything that's no one's done anything like this ever. And with the IMAX camera.
SPEAKER_01Right, right. I like that was my first feeling when I I s when I walked out. I've seen it twice now, so have you. And we are recording this on Monday, July, Monday, July 20th, 2026. So yeah, we're here, we're charged. Um, that was the first thing I thought too. Like, it I don't know the exact genre, what to call it, because obviously, like ancient Greece isn't quote unquote real history, but in terms of historical epics, this is the best I've ever seen. I I've never seen like a movie that takes place that long ago that's this well done, and is never I mean, and it has the scale of one of those grand epics from like old Hollywood, but never stale, never boring. And I mean, truly, I don't want to steal your word because what you texted me, why don't you just say what you texted me after you saw it? Because I loved it. It's a perfect way to describe it. You were like, that is the most blank movie he's made.
SPEAKER_02It's the most badass movie he's ever fucking made. Absolutely, absolutely I agree.
SPEAKER_01I mean, really, I was good. We were both like equally blown away. I was knocked on my ass really both times. It's way better the second time, too.
SPEAKER_02I agree, and the the thing that I'm kind of it's happening to me, it's in my blood right now. This happens for the same thing for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. When I saw Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, I remember walking out of that theater, and I was on the kick of that movie, but I had not fallen in love with it just yet. I was just I was dice, I was digesting it, I was thinking about it. I didn't, it was not exactly like instantaneous, like, oh, here is the love of your life, right here. It's a lot to take in on first viewing, so yeah. It would become that. Fortunately for me, I get to have that experience with a movie. But um I am finding that the way that Once Upon a Time to Hollywood grew on me was in the hours, the minutes, the days following where I can't I could not get the movie out of my head. And this is an entirely different type of movie. We're talking about a Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Quentin Tarantino, fun, joyful little little thing. This is a deep, poetic, action-filled, it has everything, honestly. All the drama in the world that you put into storytelling exists in there. But I cannot stop thinking about everything about this movie. I have had the score going on, it has been clocking my feet for every day now. I cannot get anything about this movie out of my head. Now I'm not saying that this is gonna become that. All I'm saying is I don't know, I don't think I have control of the brakes. Nice. And I will go see this movie in theaters as much as I need to to get my fix. Because right now I'm Jones in. I just saw it last night.
SPEAKER_01I'm thinking about seeing it again tonight. This is exact exactly what happened to me with Oppenheimer because no, the first time, even if people go listen to our first review of it, I'm like, yeah, it's good. And then it just would not go away. And I I went nuts. I mean, I seen that thing like 25 times in the theater, like it's it's crazy. I saw it like 15 on its opening run, and you know, no turning back, no, yeah, no breaks at all, all gas, no breaks, just straight cooking. And this feels like with with Oppenheimer, it wasn't necessarily like, oh, I think this is the most like amazing story ever. I was just going, okay, here's a scope. Like, no director does this with practical effects. So I want to keep going back. Like, all right, I'm gonna I'm gonna do film only, then I'm gonna do IMAX, and I'll do IMAX and film together. Yeah, so I we this has legs like that, and I'll just jump real quick to something I saw earlier this morning. This had the biggest opening of a Nolan film ever. It's it had the it was bigger than the Dark Knight, bigger than the Dark Knight Rises, bigger than Oppenheimer. This thing's gonna make an absolute killing, like it made its budget back. I know not like marketing and everything, but it seems to be garnering a lot of like really good reception, including from us. So I'm just I'm so ecstatic on all fronts, and I love that we have this movie that it can have some serious legs for both of us. Because I mean, I've seen it twice and I already have two more viewings booked. I've seen it on Wednesday and next Saturday. I'm I'm here, man. Yeah, man.
SPEAKER_02I'm I'm I'm I'm thinking about it. I'm like, how do I because because in LA, I've never seen anything like it. Uh you cannot get a ticket to these things. Like, well, forget about the IMAX, the 70 millimeter for sure.
SPEAKER_01Let me interrupt. So you have we've talked about on the pod, we saw Oppenheimer there a few Oscar weekends ago. AMC, you know, Universal, Universal City in LA has one of the biggest and best iMac screens in the country that can show IMAX 70 millimeter. You were like, Man, I can't get in there, like it's sold out. So I just for fun went on to look. People, they have 6 a.m. showings, they have midnight showings black, sold out from like now. I mean, I looked at I after like 20 show times, you go, all right, I guess I'm done here. So I just I because I was looking for you. I was gonna try to like see if I could find a ticket. So I don't think I've ever seen that either. But I've also never seen every single movie app freeze the day that tickets became available, which is what happened for this. Well, was that like a month and a half, two months ago?
SPEAKER_02And you can find regular iMac showings for it, which is probably the next one I'm gonna do. Well, even the regular IMAX is a digital version of this, right? It's only the 70 millimeter that's the actual film.
SPEAKER_01Correct. Unless you are watching a screening that says 70 MM, you are watching a digital version of it, digital version, even in IMAX, which is fine. I've seen it in we'll get to my first screening was IMAX 70mm. I drove three hours to see it. We had Igor and I made a whole road trip of it, and then Allie and I saw it in an AMC IMAX. And I mean, brilliant both times, but that film that oh my god, so yeah, that's two ways you could see it.
SPEAKER_02Yep. You've got the prime, which is AMC's sort of uh very good, like very great theaters. Uh uh the sound in the prime is probably gonna be rivaling to IMAX. That's one benefit of that.
SPEAKER_01We have a Dolby cinemat, so Dolby and Prime are like the same, and yeah, those like those the sound in those really don't fuck around. I'll see it in that version as well. Yeah, so that's another way.
SPEAKER_02And then you've got your 70 millimeter, which is not IMAX at all, but you're seeing that in a, for the most part, regular laser screening uh room.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it will it'll be like it'll look normal size movie screen, you know, won't be big on the top or anything, but you're getting that film quality, and that's gonna be a lot clearer than the digital copies, so they say. Yes.
SPEAKER_02And then you've got your standard uh with nothing, no 70 millimeter film, just the digital print. Yeah. Now my my one buddy was asking me, um, because he's trying like like hell to try to find a uh IMAX 70 millimeter version of this. But my friend was asking, should I wait? No. And I my honest answer is no, don't wait.
SPEAKER_01Just fucking go. Because I've had every version you just mentioned. I know at least one person now. My dad, I mean, Ali and I saw it together, but my dad didn't had no fancy version, he just went to his local theater and saw it on a normal screen, loved it. So just go see it. That that's what I do with Oppenheimer. Like, yeah, I had an IMAX screening and a film screening, but then I just watched it regular for a while because I couldn't get in for an IMAX or IMAX 70 millimeter, so I wrote it out. With this, I was crazy. Like, I stalked Fandango, I stalked RegalMovies.com, I was on there, I waited for 90 minutes to log into those sites, like with the little timer the day it was you know available. You know, it'll die down a little bit and it'll play for a while, not consistently, they're not gonna play it constantly, but they'll bring it back like for this weekend or that weekend. But if the demand is there, he will have it in theaters. He's good, it you you will be able anyone who wants to see the movie on IMAX 70 millimeter. If you are able to and you want to, you will be able to eventually, but in the meantime, just go, just go and check it out.
SPEAKER_02Just go. It's about as awesome as anything can possibly get.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and turn like big budget blockbuster American filmmaking does not get better than this. It just doesn't. Like, this is the gold standard for it, as far as I'm concerned. I don't want to be grandiose, like, I still have a lot of good, uh, amazing filmmakers who are still alive, Scorsese included. Scorsese, they're not doing it like at this level. The the age Nolan is at what he can command in terms of cast and just all of it, the practicality of the film. How I found out just before we went live that that damn Cyclops was like a giant puppet, and they like I've seen behind the scenes photos of the damn thing in the cave. It's huge, it's it was that size, and they use CGI to augment the puppetry. That I mean, there wasn't a single shot or scene of the movie where I'm like, Oh god, that looks fake. That looks when I knew I was gonna love the movie was the first time they set sail when they put up those fucking pulled up the oars and then put up the sails. I went, any other movie, any other director 2026, the water is CGI, the sky is CGI, anything, any other movie. And here I'm like, Nope, it's a camera and a bunch of dudes on a boat casting sail, like that's what it is, and it looked amazing in the fucking ocean, in the ocean, the actual ocean, not a tank, like the actual ocean on an actual ship. Fuck man.
SPEAKER_02The way that they did all this at is is as real as it gets. I've been watching every single thing I can find uh since seeing the movie on Friday that just shows the locations they went. I mean, you're talking about you're everywhere. They went to Greece, they went to Morocco, they went to Italy. I mean, you're you're scouring the globe to find the places that are going to give you the cinematic landscape that this director was looking for. These the cast and crew would be climbing, walking up 45 minutes up these mountains just to get to set. Yeah. And and the thing is, is like there's no other way there. Oh, you where where are we shooting today? Oh, you see on top of that mountain right there, up there. Oh, cool, cool. How are we gonna get there? One foot in front of the other, man. Yep. And and that went for everybody, and it was all worth it. Even the cast and crew talks about it. They're like, you know, this is the most intense filmmaking that that anyone's been a part of. But when you're there and you're doing it, it's it they're like, this is all worth it. Like, we're like I can't think of another movie that has done with the ambition. The the Troy thing, so they actually found a town, and they did use about I would say 30 to 20 percent of that town to use as the Troy battle sequences, and then they built the rest of it. So that's stuff that they all destroyed and all of that, right? But you've got the rest of that real town, and they just built around it, and that is one of the most colossal sets. Like, I was watching the the behind the scenes, and they showed how like they they made a bigger town than the town that actually existed in sets, and it's just like but that's how you get real fucking buildings falling down.
SPEAKER_01That is not CGI tenant. Does this too, but when you see that building like collapse behind him, I went, that's real, like that that's an actual structure falling down. It's oh my god, and they only have one shot at that, too.
SPEAKER_02They can't rebuild that, yeah, like nope, like nope, and you're talking about the most amount of extras with all of their costumes and all of this, and of course, like you know, you go back to like you know, like just thinking about movies like Ben Herr, um, the Ten Commandments, you know, these old historical epics, which were again for their time period, that was as big as you get. I this is what I'm saying is that like when you're when you're kind of thinking about all the movies that are made, and not in terms of CGI or cost, you know, because you've got James Cameron that's doing Avatar, right? Let's just throw that one out there. There's a level of what James Cameron's doing with those movies that's never been done before. Sure. And that's but that's so specific to technology and things like that. This is old school filmmaking peppered in with the visual effects that no one doesn't rely on but just uses to texture things, just like the Cyclops. And you're getting it done on a scale that the like Ben Heard Ten Commandments couldn't do. Right, right. You this is this is as big as filmmaking is, and and I that's why I don't think that there's a there's a there's nothing else you can say. There's no other movie that can you think of one that rivals this?
SPEAKER_01No, not that's why I said it's I think it's at least certainly my favorite historical epic. Those two movies you just cited, Ben Heard, Ten Commandments. Uh you can throw things like Cleopatra in there, which is absolutely stunning. I've seen all these movies. There's also Spartacus, too. There's a trade-off that comes with these movies, and that is that for long passages, I'm sorry to say, they're quite dull and they can get quite boring. Of not five to ten minutes, like 30, 40 minutes of complex dialogue and you know, political theater and all this stuff, and who screwed who over and who did this. And this movie has the appropriate amount of that, but I I struck like it was so funny. I didn't catch anyone going to the bathroom in the first viewing. That's like IMAX 70 millimeter, you know. It was 8 a.m. We were we're we're the heads, like we're in there. Yeah, but my second one, I did see a few people, and I'm like, you're like you think you have a down moment, and then they would go to the bathroom and they missed the whole Hades sequence, and they came back and I'm like, you just like it is paced so so well, and that is the Nolan thing. Like, there's I there's just no fat in it at all, it's shorter than Oppenheimer, two hours and 52 minutes, and the whole thing it moves, and that's that's like the modernness of it, yes. Also using CGI to augment certain stuff, but then also the modernization is the editing and it is the pace, and it's like, hey, I'm still building this perfect story over here on Ithaca, and I'll go back and you know, we'll talk for a little bit. But the next grand set piece that rivals just about anything you've seen before is just right around the corner. And what do we always say on this pod? Wow, I'm at the end. Oh my god, dude, about it, man. Jesus Christ. I'm like, how does does the does the music crescendo does it? No, it's just it's just I mean, oh my this crazy bastard's gonna win his fourth Oscar for score. I swear to God.
SPEAKER_02I swear to God, it's insane. It's I I was thinking that, you know, that okay, this is so funny. Okay, the like one of the things that I thought of going into this movie because I had Yeah, let's talk about our expectations. Okay, yeah. Yeah, let's talk about it. I can safely say that I was like, it's gonna be good. Me too. Like he's not gonna let us down. Like, like there, there's not gonna be a bad thing. Um, but other than that, I didn't really know what to expect. I didn't really have much of, and I didn't really want to have too much expectation. I just sort of kept my expectations at it's gonna be good. There was one notion that was going across my head. There, I don't care how good the score is, there's no way that this Ludwig fuck this guy. I say that I say that with all love and respect because he's an amazing artist. But I was like, there's no way this dude's gonna win another Oscar. Of all of the things that have stuck with me about this movie, it's the fucking score that I am like, I am walking, I'm brushing my teeth. I know I say that all the time, but I'm literally brushing my teeth to this score. From the second I wake up to my drives, to what I'm doing, to my workouts. Are you kidding me? Dude, it I I'm done. Like this score, it's one of my favorite scores I like I can remember hearing in a very long time. Now I don't know if it's gonna win necessarily, but then I saw the shit that they did to get some of these sounds.
SPEAKER_01Like the original instrumentation and stuff, and yeah, like not relying on an orchestra and all that. Yeah. Yep.
SPEAKER_02So there's two particular instruments, and I God help me, I don't know their names. There isn't an actual, like, they they are some of the oldest instruments in like um in like the hieroglyphics, where they're looking at these things and they're like, Well, there's actually no record of that type of instrument, but these go back to the 5th and 6th century. And the guy was saying, he goes, Well, whatever roots that there were for these, they don't exist anymore. So we've just had to kind of do our best with what from research and history, and we're going to make these instruments as close as we think that they were, and to how they might have been played based on hieroglyphics and where the locations of where these took place and what was around them, what they could have built to make instruments. And one of them is the an instrument that they use for the very very, very people will know the sirens, like the big siren sequence, that which actually does permeate a lot of the movie going forward after that particular sequence. Sort of, I would say, the theme, maybe of it. That's all done with one of those instruments from the fifth or sixth century that no one really knows how to use. Jesus.
SPEAKER_01I mean, dude, yeah, it it ripped out of control. Everything popped out, though, obviously the way it looked, but yeah, as soon as that score started, I'm like, man, this guy is. We can talk about Oscars later, potential Oscars. A lot of people have already asked me that. I can just tell you, I got no idea. And I mean, I don't, and the because he just won, not like last year, but his last movie, he won seven, including picture director, actor. I mean, and we're only halfway through the year. I don't I have no idea that this pod is not gonna this movie at the very least will be nominated for a lot. So we'll still be talking about Oscars like way down the line. But yeah, my expectations, I was keeping them in check. I'm like, cool. I don't think it's I'm not expecting it to be the best movie ever made, but honestly, when I look at the filmography, all 12 films, now 13. I have never seen a bad one. I like them all. Uh, we're we are re-ranking Nolan on here. My 13th movie, the one I have in 13th place, I give an A-minus to. So everything else gets an A- or higher. I love the man's work, but it just it it really did exceed my expectations in terms of the scope of it. Yeah. You and I both were avoiding the internet, not just social media, like the internet, like the plague for two weeks because these savages, you know, everyone who saw it early were just firebombing all these spoilers and all this shit that I didn't want to see. So I did not know much about it, and I did not know much about the Odyssey either. Not, I mean. Not really. I I knew kind of an embarrassing amount. The the majority of what I know from Homer's The Odyssey is from the Cohen brothers' Oh brother, where art thou? Like I and I could see parallels, even John Goodman with the patch. I'm like, oh, he's the Cyclops. Okay, I get it. And I knew that was an extremely loose adaptation, but um, I never read The Odyssey. I've read the Iliad. So when I knew when he announced The Odyssey is my next movie, I'm like, all right, I'm not gonna read it. But Allie studied this stuff in high school, you know, she was in those smart classes in high school and like studied the Odyssey and broke it down. So she was very familiar with I mean, she kind of expected, like she knew she knew the name Cersei and like stuff like that, and what was gonna lead to that. So it whether you are familiar with the story, like her or not, like me, I think you're gonna enjoy the movie equally. But if you like love the story, I mean this is how could you ask for a better adaptation than this? This is amazing.
SPEAKER_02I don't really think you can. Um, funny, I actually uh I knew I knew a bit about this because when I was a kid, I I wouldn't say I'm on Allie's level, I didn't study it, but when I was a kid, I went through a whole entire like Greek mythology phase. Like I saw Clash of the Titans when I was I don't my mom must have shown me that when I was about eight or nine. I love that movie, and I just I fell in love. I go, wait, there's like different gods, and they have like like powers, and like they like you know, I saw Medusa and the idea of this person where if you look at her eyes, she turns you into stone and she has snakes for hair. As a kid, I go, Well, this is as cool as cool gets. Like, like, like, like I can't even imagine. So I went on, I didn't read uh Homer's The Odyssey. However, uh back in the day, they used to do this, they had this for the Bible, too, um, where they would give you like kind of Cliff Notes comic book, graphic novel type things. Yeah. So I knew the Odyssey from that. I forgot what it was called. I couldn't tell you what publication it was, but it was essentially a kid's version, uh graphic novel style, Cliff Notes of Homer's The Odyssey. And so I pretty much knew the story from that. But and I mean, you're you're really getting most of it. There's not really much, you know. You're yeah. Um, and so I've always been familiar with it from that same thing with the Iliad. I knew the exact same graphic novel version of that as well. So um I've always been very interested. I think that it's some of the most interesting storytelling that's ever been. I mean, these the Greek mythology is just is it's it's just so fucking cool. It really is. Yeah, and I thought this movie did an excellent job of you not needing to know any of it going in. I would say if you wanted to give your, if you know absolutely nothing, want to give yourself a little bit of like an intro, just do a little bit of research on what led to the Trojan War. That would that that will help you out tremendously because the stuff that they cover very, very fast, and I think they do it in the only way I can imagine how, is the stuff with um uh Helen and Milanus and uh and uh I can never pronounce it, our Argamanon. Yeah. That piece of it, while you won't be confused by the movie, if you know a little bit more about the war go, like how the why the reason there was the Trojan horse and all that, then you'll be like, ah, all right, now I get it. And and then it'll make Ben Safty's big moment on Hades just ring true a little bit clearer.
SPEAKER_01Um, yeah, absolutely. It's and that's kind of what Troy is about, the Wolfgang Peterson movie with Brad Pitt from 2004. That's the Iliad. That yeah, you know. I didn't know if you do that was Betty Zafty as I left him because we're gonna do the cast deck, so I left him off, and they don't focus on his face at all. Man, I thought he was great. I could only tell it was him in the Hades sequence before, and then when I saw it a second time, I'm like, oh yeah, that's him. Yeah, I can see him behind behind that big mask. But he was, I mean, he yeah, he was great. What a good presence he has.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, his whole entire deal was basically, you know, if you kind of look at the two versions of the kings of Odysseus and and him, is that he led by my presence, it means I rule. People's lives don't matter, like the cost of sacrifices, whatever I need it to be to get what I want. That's how he ruled. The main one, Odysseus, Odysseus, there's more of an honor to his way of ruling. Oh, yeah. And and this movie, the movie's not even about that at all, but you can just sort of see it. Like the fact that Odysseus sits in a horse with his men for days covered in piss and shit, just to unlock the door, just so he can be there and be like, that's right, I'm taking this over. We're going. God damn right. Uh, what a sequence. But yes, that was all just to say Benny Safi's presence is absolutely felt.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. Let's get just by way of starting, where I'm gonna talk, uh, you know, we're gonna talk about most of the cast here and the different sort of like roles they play. Not gonna get too in-depth, just talk, you know, what we thought about them, all that stuff. I guess you know, 32 minutes here into the pod. Hey, we were talking about this right before we recorded. If like I myself, Alex, would never listen to a podcast episode about the Odyssey before seeing the film. So I think that is implicit by this point. People understand that. And then there are the other lovable freaks who just don't really care and will listen to us, and they don't care about spoilers. So we're not gonna like go out of our way to spoil shit. But yes, certain things are gonna get brought up, so that's that. And you know, we're again not gonna like dissect the ending, but just you've been warned. Here we go. This cast will start with the man, the fucking man, Matt Damon is Odysseus. We're gonna have a brief side quest because I wanted to hear your top five from him, top five Damon. It can be, you know, boom, quick, because I I really want to see if the Odyssey is on it, and then where.
SPEAKER_02Um, I will say I I I this is why it's gonna be a tough one. I don't have him on here yet for this. Okay. Because I need I need it to sit a little bit more. Um, but I mean, talk to me in like tomorrow, and it'll probably talk to you. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01All right, number five favorite Damon.
SPEAKER_02You're gonna fucking laugh so hard when you hear what I have to say. This my number five favorite Matt Damon performance is The Departed.
SPEAKER_01Oh, wow. I that's one of the movies you talk the most shit about, so that does surprise me. But even in your shit talking, like I think Leo's really good in it. I've always thought the acting was very good in the film. I mean, Jack is like on his own planet, but the story is the thing that is like silly in the movie. It's still a very entertaining movie, but I love that. I love that for you.
SPEAKER_02I well, I've always thought that because uh I even have some issues with Leo's acting in that movie as well. Matt Damon, since the very first day I saw it, I go, the actor to watch in this movie, it's not Leo, it's not Jack, it's Matt fucking Damon. Watch what he's doing throughout that entire movie. He is balancing so much, and you can tell that he's playing a guy that's not in the text. He is he's making choices about this guy's sexuality, about these little behavioral things that you're just getting like these little like impulse ideas about that he's fucking putting in there. So everyone else is just kind of running around doing some crazy shit. Matt Damon's performance in The Departed is actually really layered in I'd dare say the word, this word for that movie complex.
SPEAKER_01Nice. My number five, Oppenheimer, General Leslie Groves. The only supporting performance I have on my list, and I wanted to get a supporting. I've seen the movie a gazillion times. There's a huge pop when he enters it, and he is one of the funniest assholes characters just in film I've seen. He hates he's an asshole to everyone, but I love him in it. All right, number four.
SPEAKER_02Number four, uh, oldie but a goodie, the talented Mr. Ripley.
SPEAKER_01That's my number four. Cool. Hell yeah, perfect. Let's go. He really, I mean, we just well, we're going to talk about him in an upcoming episode because we pre-recorded a oh, that's a Patreon. Oh, you're gonna have to head over to Patreon here. Our list of our favorite movie sociopaths ever. And maybe he makes one of ours who did that for the upcoming vanishing episode. Yes, yes. So head over to Patreon for that. But yeah, I mean, he this is a he's fantastic in this, he's so good.
SPEAKER_02Fantastic. I mean, you talk about like every kind of like facet of like like uh sensitivity, vulnerability, uh, intelligence. I mean, this dude's he's talented.
SPEAKER_01He is a talented guy, he's a talented son of a bitch. How's the peeking Tommy?
SPEAKER_02How's the peeping, Tommy? Number three from you. All right. This is one that we did talk about in our Steven Soderbergh um uh I know you're gonna say, like, well, which one? He's in like 8,000 of them. I'm going with Behind the Candelabra.
SPEAKER_01Oh, very nice.
SPEAKER_02Good, good, good. Okay, I love that. This is uh, it's the most un Matt Damon performance that I think he's ever given. But I like Behind the Can't Behind the Candle Abra because I feel like that was a really big swing on his part.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I love that film. Love him in it. My number three, boy genius from Southie, Goodwill Hunting. Uh, that's my number two. Okay, good. Yeah. My number two, also a Soderbergh favorite. I am gonna call my shot early and maybe guess this is your number one. The informant, Mark Whitaker, another very good, he's a manic depressive, not necessarily a sociopath, but is that your one? That's my number one.
SPEAKER_02I love it. The informant.
SPEAKER_01What's my number one?
SPEAKER_02Don't fucking don't be an asshole. Don't fucking give it to this right here, right now. You've seen it twice. Odysseus, baby. It's the opposite.
SPEAKER_00Dude, you're crazy.
SPEAKER_02You're fucking, you're out of your fucking not out of your mind, but that's a wild statement.
SPEAKER_01No, it's not. Think on it a little bit. Think about all of his other work and what he's asked to do in this. Well, it's well, no, it's absolutely true. We don't even hear him. He is fucking muted listening to those sirens, and he is astounding. This wasn't, I mean, I love Will Hunting, I love Mark Whitaker. I'm a huge Damon fan. This could be, I mean, we could have done top 15 easily, like behind the candelabra. Love, love. I have always loved Damon. I love all the pretty horses, rounders, like always. He was the first celebrity I was ever called. Like when I was a kid, when he became famous, people started saying, You look like you'd be Matt Damon's brother or something. I still get it today. What a listen gift. Here, here's the deal. So I'm saying it's it no, it no, I'm I'm making my case for number one. It's Odysseus. There's no fucking question. He has led movies, he has never led movies by like this. He is fucking commanding it. And why don't you say your hot take that you've been saying for months? We could open that up right now about what's gonna happen in March.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I've been saying it since months before it. I was like, Matt Damon's gonna win best actor for uh for this movie. How do you feel? I mean, I mean, he's got crews to compete with that the the the the it's already in it's already broomed. We're gonna get a we're gonna get a battle to the fucking death right here between these two. It's gonna be awesome. It's gonna be awesome. You're not wrong at all. Yeah, it's the crowning achievement of his career. And you are going to make fun of me mercilessly when I come back to you in a couple days and say, you're right, he's this is my favorite Matthew performance he's ever given.
SPEAKER_01So I'm not even saying it's my favorite. I'm saying it's his best. I I truly think it like I love him in Ocean's 12, but I don't I really can't think of too many other people who could do this right now. I re the man is 55. Like that that that is you, you know, we we usually associate roles like this with 30-year-old actors or something. This it's astounding. The depth, the pathos, it's astounding.
SPEAKER_02And it does sort of kind of roll up everything, uh, in terms of what he's done in his entire career. You've got levels of Jason Bourne in here, absolutely got levels, and like, you know, the the biggest thing about Matt Damon is like he's always the one, he's like always the guy, it's like the chosen one. Like in every single type of thing, that's sort of his thing, and this is playing right into it. And one of my favorite aspects of his performance in here, in seeing where he's at in his like kind of psychology.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Because now that you know that the Battle of Troy fucks him up to the point where I'm well, I guess we're kind of getting into spoiler territory right here. He's had a huge entire shift in the way that he sees the world. He still has some war arrogance to him. When you go here, what we'll go here, and the food will be there.
SPEAKER_01We'll find it. We'll let us find it. Absolutely, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02And he uses Zeus's law as like reason to do things, even though he no longer believes in it, basically. He betrayed it, yeah.
SPEAKER_01That's what that's what he's saying with the Trojan horse.
SPEAKER_02Like, we betrayed Zeus's law. And and and then as he starts to lose more and more, and he realizes that he's he's failing, and and and the way that that takes a toll on him, his voice, his body, everything about him is so different. I mean, you're talking seven years of being uh lost, you know, not remembering anything, you know, who comes back for that. So you're right. You're right. You've convinced me. Just wait a little while, that's all.
SPEAKER_01You'll you'll it's it's maybe you'll come around, you know, by the time the Oscars are up, maybe not. But I just went to the case. I'm gonna come around to Martian. All right.
SPEAKER_02You've you you've convinced me basically already. You're just not letting me say it.
SPEAKER_01You're letting me say stand my horse, and now I'm turning around. Your horse. Stand my horse for his wild card I had, which we already kind of alluded to, all the one scene cameos, like if you go on his Wikipedia, oh my god, he even says like cameo, cameo, cameo. I don't even want to say like all of them because it kind of spoils it, but even Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, which is one shot and it's silent, to something like No Sudden Move, which is kind of a a glorified cameo because he has a few really good scenes, but yeah, what on the Soderbergh pod we talked about like how we just you know Chapar 2, unsane, like he's just here. You're like, Hey Damon, hey Damon, I love him. I love him. I mean, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, taking the piss out of himself, hysterical, so great, hysterical, so great. Rest of the cast, Tom Holland as oh, and forgive me for the damn. I mean, come on, these Greek names. I'm not I'm no fucking scholar. As Tomeculus, he's the son. Thank you. The son of Odysseus there, and then Anne Hathaway's Penelope. These are you know, that's the wife, and she's you know, left behind, and Tom Holland's with her, and Tom's like, yo, is my dad still alive? Like, what the hell's going on? We need a king up in here. Oh, it's great. I'm I uh there's no one in the cast I didn't like. I mean, I liked it.
SPEAKER_02No, honestly, they they all are absolutely doing their best work, I think. Yeah, I was floored, especially the second time with Anne Hathaway.
SPEAKER_01Oh my god, those scenes with him with Tom Holland, just the oh my god, it's so good narrative. I want yes, she's crazy.
SPEAKER_02I just I just I'm getting goose when I was thinking about her right now. Every scene that she is in, she is just so absolutely grounded in who she is and what's upsetting her. And I know that sounds very silly, but like she carries the weight of this world on her, really blown away by her. I thought she was amazing.
SPEAKER_01Another performer getting a lot of attention, rightfully so, is John Linguizamo as I don't know however you say that, and Emmanuel, and he is um Eumaeus. He's kind of like a blind servant who's around you know the quarters as well. He is fantastic, and then the mentor, the guy that goes with Tom Holland with Tobecus on his journey was Ryan Hearst. I didn't know if you could see, like if you recognized it was him. That's you know, Bertir from Remember the Titans and the ear guy from Save Private Ryan, somewhere over in Belmonsvale or some damn place. But yes, he clearly got a huge glow-up from Sons of Anarchy, which I have never seen. But man, he just looks totally different. So while those people are largely at home, and you know, Odysseus is out on his Odyssey. There's some home suitors, some like wannabe badasses who want to marry Penelope to become, you know, they're like, We need a king, what's going on? Kind of led by Robert Pattinson is and Antanius. I don't know how to say these damn names, who is like a really good weasel. He was he all he was good that he's a slimy little fucker right up until the end. I loved him.
SPEAKER_02I loved him. I've I've seen two movies from him this year, uh, and and so far, and he's got like fucking three more coming out. This uh, this and the drama are my two favorite performances I've ever seen from him.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Corey Hawkins is another suitor. I just I know him like who's introduced to me as Dr. Dre and straight out of Compton, so I usually see that, but he's great as well. Mia Goth is all also in there, kind of like you know, weasling around behind the scenes. Then we have some Warriors. I'm believe me, I know I'm doing like 50% of the cast, maybe that's stacked, but I'm just kind of going fast. Elliot Page is Sinean. I really liked his role a lot. And kind of, you know, Sinon, thank you. Yes, I added an extra eye, I think. Sinon, that's a name that becomes very important and love that arc, love the arc of that character, and just everything that was revealed through the structure of the film. Hamish Patel, as uh, you know, kind of his right hand man. I really like that. He's in Tenet, he's so dry and so funny in Tenet. I love him so great to see him. This dude of all the supporting characters that we're talking about is the one that I think steals it. He was, yeah, he he was kind of like the voice of reason for a while on the actual ship until you know that uh until not, and everyone, yeah. It the movie goes through all the motions, and again, it's all anchored at Damon. And like you said, the the evolution of him, like after the sirens, how he's so like down and out, or after the trip to Hades when he knows what's going to happen coming up. I miss that the first time. I missed it. He is literally told you are gonna encounter this and this. If you take that, you're you all die. That other way, eh, only six of you. I mean, I yeah, yeah, it's so the weight that he has to carry with all that. Oh uh yo Yovan Adepo, he's our guy from Babylon. He was on the boat there. Love that guy. Andrew Howard, I love this dude. The bald guy, you know, he's also in tenet. I love him. He was great. All the dudes on the boat were great. Oh, the leaders, here it is. Fucking John Bernthal, as you already said it earlier. Melanus. Menelaus. Menelaus, yes. I I either miss or add a syllable. Who has the story of Odysseus, huh? Some say he's rich, some say he's poor. God, what a scene. What a fucking moment, too. When like, have you heard the song of Troy? Yeah, how about from the inside? Boom, you just fucking cut. I was like, holy shit, here we go. I mean, he's great. That's he's the brother of Agamemnon Agamemnon. When you need John Bernthal for something, you're gonna get John Bernthal.
SPEAKER_02He'll fucking show up. And and and and like I fucking love this dude because he only knows one speed, and it's just full fucking on. Like fucking go.
SPEAKER_01That's why I loved him in the accountant too. He is like at 12 the entire time, he is out of his mind. But no, I mean, a little, yeah, I mean a little more restrained here, but still like fucking great. I mean, just oh, yeah, no.
SPEAKER_02What whatever restraint is for everyone else, John Bernthal is just sort of like, I'll show you what fucking restraint is. And then it's just like the chains are off, and you're just getting this very masculine energy attitude, and it's awesome. I'm I'm just saying I love it.
SPEAKER_01Helen of Troy is played by the great Lapita Niango in kind of a small part because yeah, this isn't her story, that's more of the Iliad. But she also is playing a dual role, I'll say, and wow, making really good use of both of her characters. Maybe brief, but uh shocked the shit out of me.
SPEAKER_02Well, and it's also great because it it also kind of spins so much on its head about um what everything has lost already. That's why her end moment, where she's like, I apologize to your mother for me about everything that's been done in my name. My name. Yep. Yep. I mean, that like when you when you kind of look at the totality, because you're right, this is not her story. But when you look at the totality of that sentence alone, the the reasoning for everything, is it, is it not? There's just there's there it opens up a great Christopher Nolan question for the whole entire scope of the movie.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah, absolutely. And then we said kind of rounding out the leaders, Benny Zafty as Agamemnon. Uh again, pretty just not focusing on him, never even showing us a clear view of his face. I love that. We have some journey people he meets along the way. Charlie's Therone is Calypso. I had no idea she was in it. I thought she was really good. We had Bill Bill Irwin adopting the movements of Cyclops, who we're gonna talk to, love Bill Irwin. That's the voice of Tars there from Interstellar. We have, oh, I think we are guaranteed three acting nominations. I think Damon's gonna get him there. I think they're gonna nominate John, old Linguizamo. I think he's earned it. I think so. I don't know if he's gonna get the push that Robert Downey Jr. did. And I don't know, Emily Blunt didn't really get much of a push from Oppenheimer, but I'm very confident that Samantha Morton playing Cersei will be in there. And oh yeah, if if anyone wants a preview of Christopher Nolan doing horror, wow, it is her scene. We'll get to like the set pieces coming up, but she is fantastic in the 10 to 15 minutes she has. Fuck. It's truly amazing, truly amazing stuff. Back to those practical effects, reminding me watching um an American werewolf in London from 1981, where you where you see a guy transform into a werewolf, like before with very or very little or no CGI. Oh, amazing! And then at down there in Hades, I just know the voice. All his face was covered up. That's old James Remar in the dirt. God, I love I was gonna say Remar. I love it. Yeah, I've taken Kyoto off the list. My wife and I honeybooned air, it's a beautiful country. He says as he decides which two Japanese cities to bomb, Jesus Christ, man. And then rounding out the cast, I had the lovely Zendaya. Um kind of as a thing, you know, a little bit. I yeah, yes, uh, the visualization of her, but I love, love, love how they brought back like her literal face and what her face represents to Odysseus and how that's you know followed him around since the fall of Troy. I like that a lot. Yeah, she's great. So I mean that's the bulk of our cast, but we just get to these set pieces. I don't even I just have the big ones kind of listed, and we we don't have to go through them kind of in depth because I, you know, here we are. But it starts with, yeah, we're at home. It's the intro, we get suitors, we get songs, which I you know was funnily mocking in the beginning. That's Travis Scott saying the first words, and Christopher Nolan's the Odyssey, and I thought loved it. Just starting us out, and I'm like, all right, here we go. Another these new the modern Nolan movies. I mean, Tenet Oppenheimer, this you cook in those first five, ten minutes, jumping here, here, here, and then they'll kind of like settle down a little bit. It's like speed, speed, speed, speed, speed. Then you settle down and breathe a little bit until our first action scene.
SPEAKER_02He's he's been doing this forever. I mean, outside of like you get the opening dark night, you know, with the Joker scene in the bank, but right after that, if that scene didn't happen, he just starts the movie, it's just exposition after exposition, and he does it so quick. And I feel like his whole entire kind of idea of doing this is let's just get it all done now. Let's go. Let's go. Like we'll make these scenes as interesting as we can, but let's get in, get out, because we don't want to live in exposition land, right? It's a very, very efficient, stumbly way to get through. But he's made it his style. He's like, that's the first thing I noticed. Like when we get this opening right here, outside of the first like Elliot Page sequence, but like once we're in there and we're listening to basically Tom Holland talk and all this, I go, it's doing that fucking Nolan thing where it's just like page turn, page turn, page turn, give us what we need to get, and then we'll kind of land in a particular scene where now we can actually get the weight of what we've heard up until this point. And then then now we can breathe. Yeah, and even Nolan still will still like breeze fucking through shit. But yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we meet, we're like, you know, meeting people and you know, years ago, stuff like that, uh, really early on. His great when Damon is revealed, it's just like a great, nice, subtle reveal of him. And then oh yeah, he incurs an injury there that is becomes very important later. I miss that the first time. I missed how toward the end I was like, How did she what did she just recognize that cut or something? But she's the one who tended to it all those years ago.
SPEAKER_02And the smile that he gives her so warm, just it was so warm and beautiful because he's shaking his head just to be like, Don't don't say anything, but like mentor the Ryan Hearst, they have it a little too in that church.
SPEAKER_01Like he's kind of the first one who notices, and then just his eyes is uh yeah, it's great. But so yeah, we're like at home, things are cool, and then yeah, Tom Holland sets off on his journey to find dad. His first stop is at John Bernthal's, and that's when we get really the first like proper set piece of the movie. I mean, yeah, we set sail, that was beautiful, but it's that fucking Trojan horse. Oh my god. And I saw an extended preview of this for before Avatar 3. They showed like a six-minute preview, and I went, you know what? I don't care, I'm just gonna watch it. See, and even though I had seen that, it still lived up to it. And just just the setup of have you heard about it from someone on the inside? And uh you just don't think about that. Like they men drowned in there because they had to wait on the fucking beach. Like, what if they never got picked up? I mean, honestly, one of my favorite details about this is when they escaped, they were all having trouble walking, like which you would because you've been trapped in a wooden horse for days, and you could feel them like getting their feet back and getting their legs. This is, I mean, you know you're in good hands pretty quickly, but this Trojan horse, I it just all of it was so well done. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_02I got a good story for you that Damon talks about. Uh it's a John, it's about John Bernthal, but it's about this sequence. And so they said, because they fucking shot that fucking shit with water in there, and they were told that it was gonna be warm water. It was not warm water, it was cold water. Matt Damon in this particular day was not in the water. John Bernthal was. Matt Damon's like, Have you ever fucking done a cold plunge? And everyone's very well aware, but you know what, you've got this actor that's basically freezing, you know, he's he's in the cold plunge and he's shaking, he's shaking, but he's not complaining. And Damon said that this was early on, that he was grateful for this because this set the tone. Whoever's a part of this movie, one day it's gonna be your day to eat shit, and you're gonna have to prove to be you have to lead us like how I have to lead too. I can't and no one ever complained, but he said he gave a lot of credit to Bernthal for that.
SPEAKER_01Good. Yeah, I mean, eat the shit and just know that you're down there in the cold, in the muck, in the dirt. Like I mean, you're hoping, yeah, give a good performance, but you're also making cinema history. People are gonna be watching and studying this, they're gonna watch this movie in school to study Greek mythology. Like, this is gonna be around forever in that scene. I mean, Bernthal's face, because he's like the only one with the shaved head and just the wide eyes. And man, when they stick that sword down there, you see the other guy grab the tip of the blade so it doesn't draw blood. Just perfect. But yeah, frankly, I never really thought about oh, yeah, they would have drowned in there. I mean, you're all in there on top of each other. You gotta pee, you gotta go to the bathroom. What's happening to that stuff? It's just there, like setting it up that only one man, like we're on that beach for 10 fucking years, and one man figured out how to get us all. Oh my god, it's it's a brilliant way to set up like an action pact. All right, dude. I just can't believe how fucking good this movie is. Uh and then the first thing kind of with Odysseus and his crew alone, because yeah, they leave Troy and they're like, all right, we gotta we gotta go home and we're gonna take this route, and Athena will lead the way, we'll stop at the different different islands and trade, or we'll get food. Because that's Zeus's law, basically. You welcome the strangers and you welcome them in like they're they're yours, and they stop at one island. I think I have everything in the right order. I don't know, but we my god. I mean, I didn't know this was part of the movie. I didn't know this movie was gonna feature like some giant fucking cyclops beast. So when it walked into the cave and they're following in the sheep and he just pushes them in, I I I was like all of them. I leaned back and went, holy shit. And then yeah, to find out that this Cyclops is again augmented with CGI, but it's practical. They had a giant puppet that they are stringing along. I mean, what an amazing sequence all of these are.
SPEAKER_02It just really is. And and there's something also that I loved about the Cyclops is that it would be so easy to just make that a vicious, gross, disgusting monster. But there was almost like this, like like the posture of him and the look on his face as you call it that. You felt bad for it. Like, this is just like this old man who's all alone, probably like on this island alone.
SPEAKER_01Maybe he's in exile. You do, you feel like his his pathos. He's just taking care of sheep, just wanted to go to bed, he just wanted a nap.
SPEAKER_02And and and and you know, yeah, like there's people in his in his way that he's aware of, but you know, he's like, Yeah, don't get in my way, I'll fucking eat you. But you know, like, you know, I I'm I'm not here for you. No, would you talk to ants? It's a great line. Like, would you talk to ants? Yeah, that it's a perfect thing. Would you talk to ants? And like there, and and you if you were to go to sleep and there were ants around you, you know, you're like sort of like just get out, buddy. Okay, you're here, fuck it, I'll eat you. And yeah, and and it doesn't mean any harm. Like it really doesn't, but it will kill you if because you're an ant, and humans step on ants, even if they don't even know you're fucking there.
SPEAKER_01Well, you're yeah, you're in his space, like that's his home. You you uh yeah, he has a right to whatever. But I I do I I felt that too, and I that's in the Bill Irwin, I think, body movements and yeah, what he puts on the face and everything. Yeah, but then it just seemed like he got it. It was like, no, I ate two of them. Now I just need to lay down because he's a big dude. You need to conk out for naps, apparently. But and yeah, getting his schedule. Like, I like that Odysseus was like, Let's go to sleep, let's take it. We can't do anything until he wakes up, so let's take care of this opportunity, and just that whole back and forth, and then yeah, showing how Odysseus is like big this is not a perfect hero. That's what I loved about him. Like, they are gone, they're out the door. I'm fairly certain that Cyclops is closing it up, putting that rock back up, or maybe not because he let the sheep out. But I mean, he boom, he's has to do the the second arrow to the eye to really piss it off. And he did not have to do that, but yeah, I I loved the Cyclops thing. I love that the violence, despite this being rated R, is not like you could go in for a close-up and it's blood, it's guts spilled out everywhere. Again, I think most any director would do that because when a guy is getting his head bitten off, where the guts, but instead, what we get from Cyclops is the a kind of a really amusing fuck you of just spitting out the armor and like spinning out the helmet to Odysseus. Like, yeah, that's what I think of your men. Uh, but a great scene. I'm not trying to breeze past any of these, but it's just one banger set piece after the next.
SPEAKER_02It it just is, and the and there's there's humor in there, there's uh the I mean it it's just it it really just does have kind of everything. And oh, the one thing I was gonna say, the wailing of the Cyclops, the sound of that.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah, the sound of him, and then I mean it was so loud too. And then, yeah, the moans of like, was he talking about Poseidon? Then you learned that was Poseidon's son. You're oh my god, yeah. Yeah, the wails were so good, and they that's when you kind of feel bad for it. That he's just like sitting off in the corner. Like, why these guys, why am I getting fucked with?
SPEAKER_02You just took he basically just took the equivalent of of taking a match to the eye, yeah, exactly. Exactly.
SPEAKER_01It's like, what the hell's going on here? Um, yeah, they go to the second island, and it was really the second my second viewing that I realized that is a kid, but when it turns around and stands, it is as tall as them. So I didn't understand when they were like, if that's a kid, where where is its mom and dad? But that means wait, so this is a child and it's like six feet tall, and then boom, here come the I don't even know what the hell you call these things. These just I I looked it up on Wikipedia that they are they're man eating like these savages, but they're in the movie portrayed as like these armored titans who are fucking beasts.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think I think uh because because in this story they're there are cannibals, yeah. And and I think because you've got like so much already going with the the cyclops eating people, right? The the pigs to a certain degree, like you've just kind of got too much of the same thing a little bit.
SPEAKER_01So but the stabbing was a I mean they trapped him in like that the trees and then were stabbing away. But really, when they got to those boats and were destroying those boats like a soft piece of like a rotted tree that's falling over, and you're just messing with the bark. Oh my god. I mean, that's where most of his crew died. Yeah, because they took out the other ship, yeah. They wiped them out there because there's three ships at that point, right? There's still three, and now now there is one because of these fucking savages. But again, that you're on their land. Yeah, exactly. We don't have anything to barter with. Uh, and then yeah, that's how it gets. Like they're going from place to place and kind of bouncing from island to island, and they can't even leave the the cannibal island because he's like, We we don't have any food, we have to stop at this new place. Look, there's a place up on the hill. They just go up, yeah, exactly. And again, another reason why I love this movie, they because they're you know, maybe there's like a light mutiny going on, but the guys are like, nah, man, you need to stay here. We we're more comfortable with you staying with the boats. So, as all the guys are walking up to this house on the hill, it's like, holy shit, there's a fucking lion. Like, that's a lion. And I looked at that and I went, That is a real lion. I can tell that is not a fake lion. Any other movie, we've seen this countless, so so many movies. You're that Black Panther, that lion, and that tiger are going to be CGI because of it's just easier, no animal wranglers, whatever. But that was there, and you felt the fear on the actors.
SPEAKER_02And this is where we get the Cersei scene, which this is also one of my favorite Matt Damon moments in the whole entire movie. He's that's what I mean.
SPEAKER_01Like, he's different in all of these different set pieces, because you're like, Oh dude, don't get fooled, don't get fooled.
SPEAKER_02Oh listen, you're right, okay, you're right. I take back everything else with my Matt Damon ranking. But the the moment that I because I've been thinking about it ever since you've said it, and and and I can't, I can't, I can't unhear everything that you're right about. Oof. Take that. When he's when when he when he walks up to those guys after he after they basically say, like, uh, you stay here. He has this expression in it about his voice where there's like a bit of an acceptance, because if they are, he will accept it. And a little bit of like, are you kidding me? All at the same time. He's like, is this mutiny? Mutiny? Yeah, it's a very specific line delivery, not racing. Very specific. No, no, and he then says, and this is how good of a leader he goes. I'm gonna stay, I'm gonna have dinner for you, regardless of what you go and find. Yep. So, and and that's that's how good he is.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, he's the best hunter of them for sure. And yeah, when he's off hunting, great scene, you know, shoots another wild uh deer, and like, oh great, we're gonna, you know, eat tonight. And then he sees that that deer is a man. So, what's going on with his man up in Cersei's house? Maybe we can I, you know, we can go to it as much as we want. I didn't know where it was gonna go, and it was just the practicality of it, and doing I know what he's doing. You have that one actor rigged up so like their jaw moves funny, then you have the other actor rigged up so their jaw can extend, and the other one so their nose moves funny, and you just edit all of that together, you put it all together so it's not one thing, and it is I mean, it's fantastic what she does to these to these men. I didn't even know. Again, not being familiar with the story, I just didn't know this was a thing, and yeah. And yes, the way that he plays it with her is so good to where you're like, is this is he already under some sort of spell or guys and that fucking meat, all those guys shoveling that meat into their it was a great scene.
SPEAKER_02The and the best part is is like, and I tracked this the second time I saw it because I remember I was so emotionally affected because it's before you start to even understand what what's happening at all. Yeah, yeah, there's one one actor is like really going for it.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I think that's I think that's my guy Andrew Howard, the bald guy. He's like, whoa, like as he's eating because they haven't eaten.
SPEAKER_02And and I was and I almost thought, I'm like, wow, what a weird take to kind of like keep in there, like because I was like that clearly that's not like because I also know from the story, like you know, her thing is a potion, it's not food. And so, because I didn't think they were actually gonna go pigs with it. I I thought there was gonna be something else, and so, but then I then of course, like right after that, you start to notice that all the men are eating quite strangely, and then it gets as primal as it gets, and you're like, something is very wrong, and then she starts doing what she's doing, and it is uh go back to your I love that, go back to your costumes, go back like what she's turned, yeah, your disguises, go back, but just the way he plays it, grabbing the bird.
SPEAKER_01I I love all of that, what it all represents. It was yeah, it's another just great sequence, and she does have you know a message for him, which is you know, you're going into now you gotta go into hell, buddy. Yeah, like holy shit, they they're gonna go to hell in this story. And again, practical, they shot in Iceland and like some midnight sun thing, and it looks amazing. And this, yeah, what a great sequence on Hades here. Some folks called it hell, I called it Hades. It's a sling blade reference right there. And yeah, we're just on hell meeting everyone, and this is where he learns along with us that uh Agamemnon didn't make it back before then, but he is dead because he's talking to you here on hell, and we find out how he died. Oh, and just the oh yeah, what he had to do because there's a lot of things of like sacrifice, uh, obviously, during the time that's a big thing. So, you know, you sacrifice, you make a huge sacrifice, Agamemnon did before his journey for favorable wins, but that even that's and then you go out and you fucking fight, and you're in prison and you're gone like 10 years, and then how does this great massive hero hat suffer his fate? I love it. This is I love the Greek mythology of this. It's like, oh yeah, you're all bathed. You right when you're most comfortable is when you get a yeah, oh god, I love it. His line, she made me soft. Yep. Oh, yeah, she did. Yes, she did, buddy. Uh great, yeah, great little moment from Lupita as well, just in the you know, in the bed there. I don't remember exactly what's next, if it's the world pulverse sea monster or the sirens. I couldn't remember which one could be.
SPEAKER_02Well, it's it's it's it's the sirens that comes first.
SPEAKER_01And I mean, yeah, that I mean the sirens is again. I I knew about that from Oh Brother, where art thou? It has a slightly different ending, but they hear them singing, and you know, they think that they turn John Totoro into a frog. So I had a concept of that, and the way the Hornitoad. Do not seek the treasure. That's a that's a hint, folks, as to who our next uh director episode is gonna be, director's episode, in fact. But yes, catch up on your code, brothers. But yeah, do not seek treasure. But no, the Hades thing is great. We got James Remar there, and we get Elliot Page back to which I I love that perspective as well. And he's like, No, we were right there, like we were all new because that's I mean, that's fucked up. Like that soldier is kind of a sacrificial lamb of standing next to the Trojan horse and then presenting it as a gift without knowing that all of his fellow men are right on the other side of that wood.
SPEAKER_02You know, when you talk about exposition, this is a brilliant scene because we're already like two hours basically into this movie. We now are actually hearing everything that has really happened and everything that Matt Damon needs to know. So we're kind of getting it all right here, and it couldn't have been done in a cooler way. We're learning a lot of information here in hell, and uh, and and this is what sets Matt Damon off on what like there, like for him, the again, you look at the arc of what he's doing scene by scene, and you're fucking right. I'm taking it all back. This is his best fucking performance.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_02And it's even in his face is the as the ship is setting sail behind, because like I love it when when when all the like the the the ruckus starts after he's told the information, and Damon he goes, What is that? He goes, All of your unburied men are coming back.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And and then you see that long, like sweeping shot of once they're on the ship, but backing away. It's just Damon's face lit up by that orange glow, and he looks at all the dead men. And so it's like the weight of what he's done and the Weight of what's coming all on him. Though this is a oh, this is my fucking favorite goddamn fucking thing. Again, you're right about Damon. Thank you. Yeah. So they're about they're about to go into the sirens. And so the the the lore of the sirens is that um is that once you hear their song, you're comp you you have no choice. You you you are so compelled uh to go there that the the idea is that you just crash your ship into you don't even see the the siren, you don't even get to the sirens, you die before then, they just lure you in.
SPEAKER_01But if you do get to them, they're gonna yeah, fuck you over eventually. But yeah, they're their song is so sweet, it's the sweetest thing you've ever heard that they're like you have to block your fucking ears with wax as you go by.
SPEAKER_02And so if you really pay attention to Damon as they're approaching, because they literally get there and they're like, the sirens are up ahead. And so Damon's sort of like, all right, everyone, get your wax. He's so excited, and and and everyone's like, he's like, un for me. And he's like, What do you mean? He goes, and and he goes, nah, you guys all wear it, I want to hear the song. And they're like, but no one is surviving. That's why you like you're that's right, you're gonna tie me to this thing, and I don't care how much I'm screaming or whatnot, you don't release me. He goes, because but he's like, no one's ever no one's ever lived, and he goes, I know I'm gonna be the first. Well, it'd be great that I'll be the first.
SPEAKER_01And he's so like amped up and excited. Yes, exactly. This is why he's not this like amazing, flawless hero. It's this ego of yeah, all the men get waxed there. One can't take it. I love that the one can't take it and bails out, but but we get that, you know, the uh Hamish, that actor, we are in like his sound, so when he puts the wax in, we the sound goes out. So we are watching Damon, Odysseus, hear this stuff and watching him transform from perhaps the most magical thing he's heard to the worst thing he's heard. And it, I mean, he just lets out this horrific cry, and he can't do anything because he's bound to this post with rope as he requested. Yeah, and it's brilliant, but again, we don't it's like uh McConaughey crying in Interstellar, like you don't necessarily have to hear it, and you just see this wailing, and then he is not the same after this, so yeah, he's getting like all the men you left behind that you know it's war, men die, but it's your job to bury them properly. If not, now they're in Hades and they're gonna fucking chase after you. So yeah, the weight that he has, you know, going away from that, like you said, and then now this like he changes after this. His voice is literally gone because he's cried himself out, and now he's like kind of forlorn and just sitting on the deck and like, oh fuck, now we got this whirlpool, like we gotta go around. And he's like, No, you can take it. Like, try, don't be afraid, it's fine, it's fine. When he knows, because he's also that is weighing on him because James Remar has really again. I missed that the first time, but he has laid out exactly what is about what is going to happen for like the next 10 minutes of the movie. Can't wait to watch this movie with subtitles. Fuck. Oh, yeah, actually, I agree. Really can't. I might find a specific theater because they do you know show times with him on screen, and I love that. But then, yeah, we get this next set piece of this thing where they're you know up against a huge whirlpool, which and now I understand that is actually a creature. Like, I think there's a creature under it that will kill them. So it's either dodge the whirlpool and go through that canal, or take on the whirlpool, and only one person knows what happens if you go through the canal because Odysseus has been told, but we don't know yet. And that shit scared the shit out of me. I had no idea what was coming. None. Oh my god. So this is another set piece, like the whirlpool or the sea monster. Oh Christ.
SPEAKER_02And and uh and yeah, and then I love the line where this is my favorite moment from Hamish when when he basically is he's like, You knew, and he goes, Yeah, that's right, I knew. And he and he and he's like, You had no right. He goes, I had every right and the responsibility, yeah. And it it and he yeah, he doesn't have his voice, and uh, and and he and he basically just tells him all the truth. He's sort of like, yup, and you want to know what happens next? I'm gonna tell you we can't go here, and you're all gonna fight me, and then I'm gonna tell you, all right, if you touch the Apollo's cattle, you're all gonna fucking die. I won't, you will. Yep. And and they don't listen. Nope, they can't take it. They can take it, and then I love it when he fucking catches them on that fucking like again, like the beautiful bluish night with that orange hue. He just sees them all and they guiltily look up at him, and and all Damon says, he's like, he goes, I didn't want this, I'm not the problem. I wanted you to live, yeah, and then he just walks away.
SPEAKER_01Did you think if you ate quietly and quietly enough, Zeus wouldn't hear you, or or the god, we thought you wouldn't hear us? I'm not the problem. And then he just says, I wanted you to live, and about face turns and walks out because he knows they're they're toast, like they broke the rule.
SPEAKER_02So he is still in his way trying to defy what this fate is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, he's like, then he says that in Haiti, like, then I'll defy the gods. If they think all my men are destined to die, then I'm gonna defy them. Look how that works out.
SPEAKER_02And then he and it well, and then because he realized there's only so like he can't fight. Like, his men are his men are making these decisions. Yep. And he's giving them all the reason not to, and and they still are. And so, yes, so then finally they get out of there because they uh they're face a huge giant storm. No better way, I thought, cinematically, to to explain how everyone dies than when the ship gets separated, he's just by himself, yeah. And the all the rest of his crew get to look at him and be like, fuck, he was right.
SPEAKER_01Again, practical. Yep. They split that fucking ship and it just, yep, and then drift apart. Uh, because Poseidon is pissed. So yeah, they are getting the the the wave and the winds of the gods, the rains of the gods.
SPEAKER_02And then we end up uh finally this has been going on for the whole entire movie, but we are on Calypso's Island, where we learn that basically for a very long time he has been there, lost in his memory, but well taken care of. Yeah, by a woman who loves him. And I love the way Charlize Theron played this because I don't think she was trying to trick him at all. I don't either.
SPEAKER_01James Remar says, You're not ready to go home. And and he says, the sirens told me that I'm not ready. And you know, perhaps he wasn't. Perhaps he was not ready and he needed to what so no, I don't think she's like manipulating him. I really think she when she realizes okay, he is now ready to remember, that's when the questions come. Remember, tell me, stop eating the lotus. She's helping remember exactly, exactly.
SPEAKER_02That that was my read as well. Real, like he comes to full realization of what's been going on, and he's like, I'm ready to go home now. And she looks at him and she goes, as I knew you always would be. And I and that's one thing, too, is that I love that there's this idea in him that he doesn't actually want to go home.
SPEAKER_01Right. Yeah, there are two kind of final set pieces here. One is in extended flashback where they've essentially broken up the fall of Troy because we saw it earlier with Burndhal explaining the Trojan horse, and now we go and get a proper showing of like that absolute fucking panicked chaos, which just seems horrible and does impact him. And I love the way that Zinde is, like I said, her face is used in this and what that means to him. And I love yeah, there's a final set piece that you just gotta, you really gotta go to the movie and witness to believe, because uh often in movies like this, there there's some sort of like kind of you know thrilling conclusion. I was I was not even ready for this. All the mechanics of it, the theatrical, the theatricality of it, like setting, you know, setting the stage, put the weapons in this room, put here, this person's here, the blocking, the setup, it is all perfect. And for a movie of huge, huge scope where we've gotten these massive set pieces in caves, in oceans. Now we are in a I don't know, we are in a room, a big room, but we are in a room pretty much for the duration, and it is going to it's gonna wow any person who sees it. How could it not? This is a fantastic. It's uh it's oh my god, it's I'm speech, I was speechless watching it both times.
SPEAKER_02The amount of cheers that were going on in my neck 70 millimeter multiple times.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yes, especially when one person, you know, the the first yes, would one person get in the neck and it was just going crazy because you're like, here it is. And this is you know, they've been kind of stretching out like okay, he's what what plan is it gonna be? You know, are you gonna bring down vengeance? Bring it all, and you're what all right, what are we building up to? Like, what are we building up to? It won't let you down. I'm gonna watch this so many times. God, this 4K, Jesus Christ, I'm gonna break it. I'm gonna watch it so much.
SPEAKER_02Oh, and you know, and it's and it's and it's interesting because I didn't clock it the first time, but at the fine second viewing, at no point before this do we see Odysseus as a great warrior. It's true. That whole entire Trojan thing, and then like he's he's doing some cool shit, you know. But but mostly that whole entire idea of that is that's when his recognition of right, what that like that monologue he has with that was one of my favorite moments that I tracked was like he's actually fighting horribly, and he almost dies to some random, and then that his friend, the Hamash guy, saves him. Yep. And and he's still sort of kind of just struck laying there. So we don't really know this great warrior until until we do. I mean, and what a cinematic way. I'm of course it sort of sets it up, but I'll I'll tell you what, man. In the theater that I had, that fucking arm bent that fucking bow and then he fucking plucked it. My theater erupted. They it was Christy like that again. This is that thing that only movies can do. You cannot get that type of like emotion in any other way. I'm getting chills thinking about it right now, and then and then yeah, and then it's just it's just the score from that moment on.
SPEAKER_00It's fucking insane.
SPEAKER_01It's written. It's just I was like, when does it peak? When is the crescendo here?
SPEAKER_02It doesn't so hard, it goes so hard. And I mean, we've already put a lot of spoilers in, so I'm not gonna say it, but we'll just give you that one of the most satisfying end kills with like again, you're right. Matt Matt Damon's final fucking like charge and then like thing that he says, it's fucking oh my god, man. Yeah, you're right. It is his best performance he's ever given. Fuck yeah, I love it. Yes, it is. I love it. It didn't even take till tomorrow. There it is, there it is. No, we've gone through it now and I and I've just piecemealed, then I've had it going in my head, but now just saying it out loud and just realizing every single scene that he's in, something has changed, and he's playing it to that exact place that it needs to be. Like it's so thorough and specific.
SPEAKER_01That that exactly, that's what I was saying, and kind of my reasoning for it, but yeah.
SPEAKER_02He is tasked with uh translating 20 years of a life lived, yeah, in basically what comes off as just minutes. He is as specific as you can get in each one of those time frames.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's a vulnerability there when it needs to be, there's an appropriate amount of aggression. Yeah, it's I I ego, yeah, ego, yeah. I think arrogance, I think it's a really tower. I think it's a towering achievement of his career. And I you're right, I am very hopeful of you know, Oscar chances and everything. But he's also just like the press loves him right now. He's doing a really good, really good job. I think he's gonna ride this out. We'll see. But I want to hit on, you know, we did talk about Ludwig Gordon, the the guy who did the music for it, the score. But we can't, you know, this is his Nolan's hit crew now. We got Hoyta van Hoytema doing cinematography. Amazing. I mean, he won it, he won an Oscar for Oppenheimer. We got Jennifer Lame doing the editing, she won an Oscar for Oppenheimer. Like we have Andrew Jackson doing the visual effects, not relying on computer imagery. He won an Oscar for Tenet. He's got his people, but then also we usually don't talk about uh a lot of times we don't make room for costumes, production design, hair, and makeup all insane and just off the wall good. Like, I don't we're too early, but I don't know how it what the hell else wins these things. What the hell else wins costumes? Look at the sheer amount of them, not CGI, like the amount of material you had to wield and sew and all that shit. It's astounding. Every aspect of the movie.
SPEAKER_02I I think we what I'm calling right now is we are gonna get 16 nominations. We're gonna beat sinners.
SPEAKER_01No, that would tie, my friend.
SPEAKER_02That would tie. It's gonna get it's gonna get 17. It's gonna get 17.
SPEAKER_01That would uh 17 would be you have to have multiple, multiple acting nominations for that. And you know, we'll see. I'm no, you you got that.
SPEAKER_02You got I I could see a world where John Leguizamo and Tom Holland get nominated.
SPEAKER_01They talked about this for Oppenheimer too, though. They were like Damon and Robert Downey Jr. will get nominated, Florence Bugh and Emily Blunt. But that, you know, it doesn't necessarily happen.
SPEAKER_02You're gonna get Samantha Morton up there, they're all gonna be there, and then you're gonna get every single category cinematography, editing, adapted screenplay, score, visual, costumes, production, uh ensemble, best casting. We'll get that. It's 17, baby.
SPEAKER_01We're talking nominations here. Yeah, I will be um, we'll talk way more about the Oscars as the year goes on. I need to do some research. How many directors, two movies in a row, have did they win picture and director? I I don't know off the top of my head. I really don't. It would be uh an astounding achievement, and I don't really see that for its future. I don't think the academy's gonna do that. I don't think they're gonna go hard and go, yep, two in a row, we're gonna give him director, two in a row. I don't know. Uh I mean, I I I do not know. I I have no idea. Maybe I'm completely wrong in there. It's like fuck it, he did it again. Thank you.
SPEAKER_02You listen, I am admitting that I was wrong, that this is Matt Damon's towering best performance he's ever given. I'm admitting that right now. And I'm just telling you right now, you're wrong. You think he's gonna it's gonna win picture and director? I think it's gonna, I think it's gonna sweep damn near almost everything. God damn.
SPEAKER_01Oh boy, it'll uh I'll put it this way it's gonna be a very uh tough year for because there's always a number two. There's always the number two movie, and whatever two. No, but I'm saying if that number two becomes number one, it's gonna be it's gonna be a tough road ahoe for that flick, whatever it may be. I'm just saying. From me.
SPEAKER_02This is a towering achievement in filmmaking. You cannot hold a candle to the way that this movie was made and the quality that it was made in. That's why, like, you could have the best fucking indie fucking movie that comes out here that's gonna do all the good shit that it's gonna do. But like even like one battle after another, as is as much praise as we give that.
SPEAKER_01This is filmmaking on a whole other fucking level. Absolutely, absolutely. This is the craft, this is the craft, like right here, right here.
SPEAKER_02And this is the height that it can get to when you are given you know, when you talk about IMAX and being shot in this way, no other movie has ever done this. You're talking about the scope and ambition and just the sheer movie making that it was with very little CGI. Like, like, you don't you don't beat this. You can't. This is I cannot think of another movie that's done. I'm not even going back to like Ben Heard, Ten Commandments, but like Jurassic Park, fucking, you know, like all of these movies, like nothing touches what how what Christopher Nolan fucking made here. Yeah, I agree. With him and all of his crew. So that's why this is gonna this has to. If you if if the Academy recognizes film in any sort of way, you can't look at the Odyssey looking at whatever else comes here from acting acting is the one thing where you could be like, yeah, it might not win certain things because you might have to give it up. But if we're talking directing, we're talking picture, it has to go to this. It has to, dog.
SPEAKER_01It's bark for me. Bark, yeah, bark for me, Academy Voters. We're gonna see. It's uh we got a ways to go. I mean, this is not this will not be decided until March. We got months and months and months before even nominations, but you know, we'll we'll of course we will be here. Damn right. Well, I'm excited. I'm excited again for the Academy Awards. My final thoughts on the Odyssey, go fucking see it. Go see it in the theater. Yeah, if you have access to name 'em, IMAX, IMAX 70 millimeters, 70 millimeter, prime, dolby, whatever the hell, cool. If not, go see it anyway. It like we have been saying, this is the first feature-length motion picture that you know, like cinema movie, not a documentary, filmed entirely with IMAX cameras. Entirely, it's the only time that has ever done that, so that will pay off if you see it in IMAX. I my first viewing was IMAX 70 millimeter. Woke up or drove up on Friday. Old King of Prussia, three hours away. That's the name of the town, King of Prussia. It's about a half hour outside of Philadelphia. They got a giant fucking mall out there and a movie theater that's just second to none. It's an old Regal, it looks exactly like Regals did when we were kids. Like they didn't do any of the silly, like the carpeting's the same. Like, I love it. So I mean, road trip Friday night, got a hotel right next to the fucking theater, and we left that hotel at 7 45 a.m. and we're seated, and we just loved it. I mean, it was amazing. And then yes, my Allie liked it, loved it, absolutely loved it. Everyone I've uh who's seen it that I know really likes it. They my uh stepbrother's 10 years younger, he loved it. My dad, yeah, dad loved it, wife loved it. Every it's just it's doing really well. I think I I it's a I don't know. I think it's just a really hard movie to be like that was a piece of shit. Like, the fuck are you talking? I how? Yeah, I mean how you have everything you want, like in a movie. I yeah, so just please go see it. Go go see it. I it will be worth your time and is not slow or dull at all. Support your local theater. That's right. Support your local theater, go see it in any format that you can, and yeah, just get out there and go do it. I already said, you know, we kind of talked about Oscars, but this is already and it was his biggest opener ever, so I think box office is gonna do well. I think they're gonna keep it in theaters for a long time. So please go check it out. It's a lock. There we go. He's fucking start already. Now, well, you too, you have been saying Damon is a lock forever. Now you're like, oh the acting, I don't know. It could go either way.
SPEAKER_02Now he's well, I I I well I've I'm I'm just I'm just scared now because I've been seeing I've been seeing uh I've been seeing more of Tom Cruise in the trailers for Digger.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and I'm not gonna be mad at that because I would love Tom Cruise to win an Oscar, but it'll it will likely be them head to head, depending on if yeah, depending.
SPEAKER_02And that's the thing, is it's sort of like we're talking two vastly different performances. Everything that you've been saying that's completely switched my entire way of thinking. The only reason I didn't want to put the the the the Odysseus in this category is because I thought it was too soon. I feel it. But then you started, but that was the only reason I did not put it in there, and it wouldn't even been number five, it would have been number one. But I was like, I can't do that. I've only seen this movie two times, and I cannot say that this is Matt Damon's best performance because I feel like that's a little too soon. But then you came in all fucking hot and bothered, and then he fucking started listing all the reasons why it is, and then we went through it scene by scene, and I realized it fucking is.
SPEAKER_01Just gotta listen to me. I your odyssey is to my brain. I I'd steer you in the right way. But no, this is gonna be a lot of fun. I didn't go back and check our work from we did this in 2023, it was episode 101. We ranked Christopher Nolan, and I have a loose memory of the way I rank things, but there are a few differences, and we're gonna go 13 to 1, with 13 being our again, least favorite is very uh I'm I'm using least as a very loose term because my number 13, I give that movie an A minus. I I can't remember what our ranking was. I I have them up and hidden, so I'll go through them at the end of the day. Okay, all right.
SPEAKER_02Well, I'll I'll go ahead and I'll start because there's just no way that I'm wrong about this one. Fucking 13, always be 13. I don't like this movie. That's right. I'm going to come out and flat out say, I do not, it's not even a matter of you saying this isn't an A minus movie. I don't like the Dark Knight Rises. We're just going there.
SPEAKER_01I I this is it's really one of the most baffling things because you always take this stance. This is my 13 as well, by the way. But you've always, since we've met, talked so much shit. We watched this movie together a few months ago and I was in LA. You did not have many bad things to say about it as we were watching. You pointed out the few dumb things that I also think are dumb, but I kept looking at you going, This set piece isn't impressive to you. And you're like, No, it is. It is. No, I respect it.
SPEAKER_02I no listen, okay. Let's put you back now.
SPEAKER_01But if you're yeah, if you're saying you don't think like you don't like it, I straight up dis I do not agree with that assessment because I've watched this movie with you. We watched the whole fucking thing, and yes, we made fun of it at parts where it deserves to be made fun of. It's my number 13. We did, but it's still like I don't think I I don't know. I've heard you talk mad shit about some movies, and this this ire is there, but when we watched it together, I wasn't seeing all like the fucking massive hatred that you spew.
SPEAKER_02No, because it's got it's got some good set pieces, and and there are some there, yeah. So okay. I and I respect it. I have never disrespected it, but I'm not a Well you just said you don't like it. Yeah, yeah, but that's not disrespect, but I can respect something not like it.
SPEAKER_01I feel like they have a better Nirvana. All right, but yeah, my number 13 as well, Dark Knight Rises. I'm actually gonna do my 13 and 12 in a row because I had a little speech before you stormed over it. So yeah, 13 is Dark Knight Rises. I do actually adore the spectacle of it. I love that first scene, the plane scene, so much. While noting that whatever the fuck Aiden Gillian, my main man from the wire, is doing like he's terrible. Like his live deliveries are terrible, and he's like, you do, and like he said, you're a big guy. I mean, it's funny. I I get it, I think there's a lot of silly shit in it. But what is happening is you know, the music, I don't know. I really don't know. Noting that that's good, noting that my number 12 is the movie, the Nolan movie, I have seen the least in my life. It is the one I go back to the least amount of times. It's not because it's a bad movie, but it is Batman Begins. I never go back to this one. I don't really have a reason to. I have seen The Dark Knight Rises so many more times than Batman Begins. I don't think, and the reason that I can't put Batman Begins at 13 because there's not too much dumb shit in it. There's some dumb shit, there's quite a bit of dumb shit in the dark knight as well. Don't hate me for that, but there's a there's some silly ass comic book shit in all of these movies that it are very little conveniences that happen, but yeah, that's so I thought that was interesting that Batman Begins without question is the nolen film I've seen the least. I feel like I like got it, and I really don't think that movie has a good strong villain. I always thought that. I don't think they're like that imposing, really. Not like the Joker.
SPEAKER_02Uh, I mean, I see what you're saying, and I I uh I I I think Well, I love all these all these movies. That's the thing.
SPEAKER_01It's like that that's the thing. It and but you're also not a comic book guy, not at all. I'm not a comic book guy at all. So that's why these like if I'm talking about comic book movies, these three to me are like the best that have ever been made because of the practicality, the practical effects, all that stuff.
SPEAKER_02So, yeah, and and so and that it's not like I'm staying here, sitting here being like, oh, I'm Mr. Comic Book. I've you've seen way more Marvel movies than I have, and um, but just growing up as a Batman fan and kind of having a little bit more of a knowledge of that, that this was, I think, like the best origin movie that you could ever have. Like this the yeah, this movie, this movie put respect back in Batman's name. But I understand what you're saying, and I have no fucking leg to stand on because my number 12 pick is the movie that everyone and their fucking like soon to be kids are going to adore and and and and and bow to like the sun. Interstellar.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, this is another one that has never been uh fully for you, and this is this is where I notice our disparity in terms of how we view movies. Probably better. I think Interstellar honestly crystallizes it because all the criticisms you have of Interstellar, I have those too. I don't need Topher Grace, I don't know what the fuck Casey Affleck is doing. I get it, but my brain does not care. I do not care. I am absolutely willing to forgive all that because I've never seen anything like the docking sequence. So that's what I mean. Like the set pieces in the Dark Knight rises are enough to like get me to forgive the dumb shit that and yeah, I do think interstellar, like I don't think it need necessarily needs to be that long. I think the editing does get out of control during that end and lighting the corn on fire, like it's stupid. I I agree it's stupid, but it doesn't, it really doesn't impact my viewing of the movie at all. So, but that's just how we're different. That's all.
SPEAKER_02No, and and and I've got those outliers too, where they're like, we have we can have the exact same conversation about I can't think of one right now, but I know that there's a ton of shit that I love that that you're like, but how can you justify this? And I go, I can't.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's true. We all yes, you we do. We do have those movies, and you're like, no, I like even weapons was one for you. You were like, I hear all your criticisms of it, but that it just worked for me. And I go, that's when I put up my hands and I go, hey, fair enough. Because if a movie works for you, fine.
SPEAKER_02And I'm also in the minority, hugely. I don't know anyone that doesn't like Interstellar.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you also have a very, in my opinion, with respect, very odd gatekeeping thing with movies that are in space where you're like, no one's done it right. And I'm like, well, what you you can't say that like there has to be a bar, like someone has to have like as Cooper here, like someone has to have done it correct.
SPEAKER_02No, all the space stuff about Interstellar is all great. I got no issue with any of the space stuff. I didn't know that. No, okay, it's all about it's all the home shit. The home shit, how he gets into this fucking thing, like, like, like, like, and then once he's fucking there at NASA, they just fucking accept him, and then they're like, and by the way, it's our last hope. You're the looking last hope. You're like, dude, you just fucking got here. Like, like, who the like all of that just it just it's so like it's so it bothers me so much. I can tell. Yeah, the Topher Grace, that's just dumb. But really, what gets to me more than anything else about Interstellar is the leap that Jessica Chastain's character makes into realizing that that he's behind the wall and he's a ghost. There is nothing, there is nothing that indicates that you can make that leap that she connects those dots believable. It's just not like like and I and and Morse code, but uh no. She she doesn't no, no, that that is preposterous. That's just that's just feeding off of what everyone wants to be true and then happens to be true, and then it gives a big what you're what you're not understanding here is that love, Nick, can connect us and that love can bring us together.
SPEAKER_01That's what you don't understand because when you have kids, you don't tell them that the world's ending. All right, you gotta get home to them and talk to them. So that's what love is all about. I hear everything you're saying. We're gonna keep it moving. My number 12 is Batman Begins with respect, with respect, your number 11.
SPEAKER_02Um, oh, this is so hard. Why do I have this here? But then again, I remember us now having this exact conversation now, because we're talking about Christopher Nolan movies, and I've just talked disdainly about the last two. I don't disdain either of these movies. Uh I don't disdain any Christopher Nolan movie, but sometimes I just get a little bit of attitude for no reason. Now I have to have the reverse because I uh I I don't know how, but Dunkirk is my number 11, and I fucking love that movie. Dunkirk's great. Yeah, I got I'm gonna talk a little bit. Uh but all of these have to have a fucking place, I guess, huh?
SPEAKER_01We all of this is gold. Like, how do you place this one gold bar above the other one? It's all personal taste and it's all pulling hairs, and we just do this because it's a movie podcast and we think it's fun. That's the only reason. So, yeah, Dunkirk, that's fine. That's fine. Well, and we're the best. Well, yeah, right. We're the best. Thank you, Odysseus. Uh, you did not like this three years ago and you're not gonna like it now, and I'm fine with it. That's fine. You don't bully me. My number 11 is following, a movie I love. Wow, following. Yeah, I love following. Wow, number 11. Yeah, he would I he would even say if Nolan was ranking his own movies, he would put that at 13 because it's the first one. It's like you know, you're testing out all the stuff, and there the certainly the spectacle of following, of which there is very little, is not greater than the dark knight rises or Batman Begins. But yeah, it's a really good start. It's a good, it's a very good, like seven million, seven million, Jesus, seven thousand dollar first feature that is incredibly innovative. Number ten.
SPEAKER_02All right, number ten. Ha. But yeah, I need to see it more because you're you I know how much you love it, and I want to get to your level with it, but I love it a lot. I got tenant at number ten.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, that's fair. This would have been if we did this, if we recorded this podcast in October 2020, tenant would have been my number 100 because I fucking hated it so much. I'm gonna talk about that a little bit later. But yeah, I mean, you I think you've only seen it once if I if memory serves, or maybe twice. Okay, I'll try. Yeah, I'm up to like 15 and I uh do it a few times a year because I am an absolute lunatic, so that is not my number 10. And I did, and I did like it a lot, even though upon first viewing, like you did. I was very I even warned you, I was like, dude, I don't know if you're gonna like this because you watched it before the Nolan pod, and you're like, no, I liked it. I I understood very little of it, but that's okay. And even with 15 viewings, I don't understand it fully either. How could you? I don't even know if Nolan does. How could you? My number 10 is your 11, and yeah, not throwing shade. It's just it we have a lot of good movies to talk about. Dunkirk.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01A lot of good movies. You're number nine.
SPEAKER_02Number nine right here. Okay, now I got you with uh I got you with Batman Begins. This is number nine.
SPEAKER_01Okay, okay. My number nine. Yeah, this we have some differences here, but again, measuring gold. So sorry, I'm putting Inception right here. It's a movie I love, just upgraded to 4K. Inception number nine. You're better than this. You're better than this.
SPEAKER_02Have you watched it recently? Uh I watch it all the time. I brush my teeth. Have you watched it all the way through recently? Yeah, I saw it like a year ago in theaters. Oh, okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I mean, it's a great movie. It is. It's not as good as his other work to me at all.
SPEAKER_02It means something to me, alright? It means something to me.
SPEAKER_01He refined his process a lot since then because that's I love the movie, but the first hour is talking. There's a lot of cool shit that happens in that talking, but it is all exposition. It's a lot of it. And then 90 minutes of beautiful payoff, but he has refined his process to where he is not just doing that. I'm gonna explain to you exactly what this is for an hour so that when we enter the dream, you get it. He's found other ways to do that, and I appreciate the different ways he's found it. That's all. I still love the movie. There's still shit. The hallway fight is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. I fucking love that. So good.
SPEAKER_02All right, and then we number eight right here, The Dark Knight. Wow, that does surprise me for you. I I I'm more of a like with me when it comes to these, um, and I know that's crazy because a lot of people like that movie a lot. I think I I think that is a better movie of performance rather than a full-on movie.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I agree too. It's actually my number eight as well. That's the only one we have linked, and I thought you were gonna be mad at me for that. But I I I'm starting to remember too that I think three years ago you had it around this placement. And I remember I put Oppenheimer three years ago, I put that at number eight. I don't remember where you had it. That's crazy. That's the only one I don't remember. Yeah, I think you had it at I think you put it at three, and I even remember I was hedging my bet and I put it at eight, and that is uh obviously it's that's changed. We haven't heard it so far. So yeah, that's changed drastically. My God. So that's the only one. So when I go through our old rankings, I don't I know I put Oppenheimer at eight. I don't remember where you had it. You might have had it like three or four, but anyway, number seven.
SPEAKER_02Number seven for me. Um, I'm gonna go with following right here. Okay, cool. Because I I really I remember really, really liking that movie and just thinking about like I because I sometimes I guess I'm a sucker for first-time filmmakers' movies because you like when you I am too. Because like now, here's the thing though, like if I had seen that when it came out, I might not have had such a opinion about it. But once you look at all of Nolan's work and then you go back and see what he first did, you just see where his mind was at the start, and it's very and it's very intoxicating to kind of feel like you're there. So, so um, yes, but I I don't I have no idea where the hell I put this on my first ranking.
SPEAKER_01My number seven, it it feels like it doesn't get talked about that much. I find it was the last one I upgraded to 4K. Every Nolan movie is available on 4K except for his first three, which is fucking baffling because his second one is like, why isn't that on 4K? Anyway, my last one to upgrade was The Prestige, and I love that you haven't said this yet because that means it's ranked kind of high for both of us. But I just I really like this movie. That I hadn't seen it in a while. I watched the 4K, and it the the big twist is literally the last shot. It's just awesome, it's awesome.
SPEAKER_02It's uh it's a movie that gets better and better every single time.
SPEAKER_01Every time like every time, and if you've if it's been a few years and you haven't seen it, you're not gonna remember every beat, every detail, and that's good. It's good, it's a fun movie. That's why it gets my number six. Okay, cool. So it is so we're pretty close with that one, too. All right, I like it. My number six is I just finished watching it, the Blu-ray, because it's not on 4K right before we hit record. That is Insomnia, a movie I love. Love that film.
SPEAKER_02We're fucking right on the gap. Well, we're we're we're one off with the I I that's my number five. Love it.
SPEAKER_01I mean, god Pacino. Dome. So fucking like just tired. He plays tired so well. Oh, we're getting up there. It's amazing. I know insomnia fucking oh yeah, we're in top five category. Yeah, this is it. Top five. So insomnia was your number five. Number my number five. I'm gonna make a change. Yeah, my number five is Interstellar. Wow, this is a big one.
SPEAKER_02I mean, well, I don't remember where this sat with you, but I just remember because I I I mean, well, I mean, now I actually don't know what your number one is because so much has changed over the last few years. But I remember you were you were pretty rock solid in that number one.
SPEAKER_01That was my number two.
SPEAKER_02That was your number one.
SPEAKER_01Interstellar was always my yep. Interstellar has always been my number two before Oppenheimer. Before Oppenheimer, Interstellar was my number two Nolan forever. My number one and two were always locked at that. So that is this is a big drive, yeah, going down to five a little bit because we've had some other movies since Oppenheimer. Rightfully so. Yeah, rightfully so. My ass, it's still number four. The movie fucking rips. Watch it all the time.
SPEAKER_02Number four. All right, number four is this is where I put ol' Oppie.
SPEAKER_01Oh, okay. Old Oppin' Hammer. Yeah, we got it. I will say that my number four is the movie we're talking about today. It's the Odyssey. That is a big deal for me, frankly, to put it this high. It's just that good, and people go see it. Yeah, I'm I can't wait to hear where it ranks, where it ranks for you. Number three from Nick. Oh my god, are you ready for this? I don't think you're ready for this.
SPEAKER_02Memento.
SPEAKER_01Okay, that's all right. I get it. I I know, I know you have uh such a like you fucking love Inception so so much. That's good, that's fine. But you, yeah, your your heels are dug in with it. My number three, the biggest about face of my life. When I first saw Tenet, I fucking hated it. I did not like it. I texted Nick, I texted my wife. I was like, the man has lost the thread. This is all because I mean COVID had something to do with it. I mean, it's it's the first movie in COVID, you know, masks sitting three seats away from everyone. So there's that going on, but really, this is because I did not understand it, I rejected it. I think this movie is so fucking cool, and honestly, simply put, it's Christopher Nolan's James Bond. It is that's just what it is. It's Christopher Nolan's James Bond, and there is no James Bond movie, none. I've seen them all multiple times. I cannot explain to you every single fucking thing that happens in them. It it doesn't all make sense. This movie is baffling, uh, in it's incoherent at times, and I'm okay with that now. Biggest about face of my life, Christopher Nolan's tenant. It is my number three. Your number two.
SPEAKER_02It's the Odyssey.
SPEAKER_01Fuck yeah, man. That is awesome.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, hell yeah, I love it. Number two. Like I like I started this whole entire podcast. I've not felt this way um about a movie since Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and that ended up being my second favorite movie of all time. Now, I'm not saying that the Odyssey is gonna crack that code, I'm just saying that there's a level of obsession that's coming over me and a pure desire to just want to watch this movie over and over. I can't not like want to live with it. Me too, man. Um, and and and then you know that that that you know as well as I do. That feeling does not come around all the time. No, because like I know how that's how it was for Oppenheimer for you. And Oppenheimer's not is not in your top 10 of all time, at least not yet, maybe. It's not so curious what my number one is, especially that process of elimination. But I'm more curious now, before you tell your answer, I would say your favorite Nolan movie, because I know what it's between right here, because I don't know what you've done here. Yep. I have no idea if you've gone for it and if you have made a switch. It's a big deal because I know what memento means to you.
SPEAKER_01It's been tough for me. It's been very, it's been a hard, it's been a hard time. Your number one was Inception, we'll say.
SPEAKER_02Yes, my number one's Inception, and okay, I'll finish my fucking yes. Uh Inception just means something to me and a certain level of when I saw it and how I saw it that does not go away from me, even though I am like healed from a heartbreak. There was something that was very healing for me about Inception that I needed at the time. And I related to that movie at that time in a way where no other movie could really kind of encapsulate a certain amount of regret and heartbreak that I was having. That old Cobb Leo DiCaprio was going through. That so every time I watched that movie, I'm sort of transported back there, but now in like a way where I loved I love to revisit. But at the time, I saw that movie over and over again because it was my like weird therapy. I get it now.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I I never knew that. I never knew you had that emotional component to it until now. Look at us learning.
SPEAKER_02I'll tell you what, man, when when he is holding Marianne Coatesyard at the end and he's telling her that we've had our time, but now I have to let you go. I couldn't let go at that time. And hearing his words over and over say that, and me knowing that this is what I need to do, but I can't, I just can't, I would be in tears every time that fucking movie goes on. God, I fucking love it. It's so good. All right, good. And yes, but you are right. You're right. It does, it it he has gotten better in his filmmaking, but I still love it. But, anyways, I am going to guess Memento is number two and Oppenheimer is number one.
SPEAKER_01All right, I got a little speech plan. So it just like I did for uh Spielberg, my top 10. So here's the thing Memento taught me about the art form of film. I was at the right age, I was 15. It was one of the foundational movies to prove to me that new movies can break barriers, and not every idea has been told in every way. There is some stark individuality in filmmakers out there. I already knew this, like pulp fiction, I had seen that. But Memento, I think, was one of the first times I discovered it in real time with everyone, not on TV, not on VHS, not because someone told me that it won a bunch of Oscars and I need to go see it. I discovered this groundbreaking thing with everyone else, and it just changed my cinema life. Now, Oppenheimer didn't necessarily teach me anything about the art form, but it does prove that, like the Odyssey, contemporary modern blockbusters can be masterpieces, and I didn't really know that was possible for me on this massive of a scale. I mean, Oppenheimer's a fucking biopic about a theoretical physicist. Like what? And it's astounding, like it's an astounding movie. The one I've seen the most is Oppenheimer. I mean, I've seen that, I've seen Memento a lot too, but it's for this reason that Oppenheimer is my number two and Memento is my number one. So I have gone back and forth a little bit. I will say, with uh a fully objective lens, and I don't ever mean this to be arrogant. Heimer and the Odyssey, I think, are the two best films he's made, like from a technical level. And I might even say the Odyssey is number one, like, just on the grand skill, grand scale of filmmaking. We've said it a lot in this episode. We've never seen anything like this, not contemporary with this little CGI. Absolutely not. It is a very 1A, 1B thing for me, obviously, because of this podcast and you know, me talking about how many times I saw Oppenheimer, became ups became obsessed with it. In the summer of 2001, I didn't have a podcast, but if I did, you would have heard me talking about Memento a lot. But like I got the DVD, I watched it in order before knowing that there was like a special feature where you could watch in a chronological order. I took Memento with me to college and showed it to everyone because it was like that weird little indie that not a lot of people had seen. So I can watch either anytime. I watch them back to back preparing for this. Like, oh, which one is it? It it's just the barely an edge to Memento. And yeah, that's it. But I I love both of these movies so so much. So yeah, Oppenheimer number two, Memento number one. Your top 10 is damn near a your your rather ranking is damn near exactly the same as it was three years ago. Oh boy, exactly, just with a few additions. I'm actually kind of shocked by that. So you had number 11, Dark Knight. This is from 2023. So you had you had I'll just go in descending order. You had Dark Knight Rises, Interstellar, Dunkirk, Tenet, Batman Begins, the Dark Knight, that's all aligned. Then you had the prestige and following. So you've switched those.
SPEAKER_02Oh, so I switched those. And then you had that makes sense.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and then you had Insomnia number three, Memento Two, Inception One. And now you have Insomnia number five, Oppenheimer Four, Memento Two, Odyssey, Memento Three, Odyssey Two, Inception One. And then mine, mine didn't change too much either, actually. Like I I've given in uh the prestige little bump up, but I initially had Dark Knight Rises, Batman Begins, Following, Prestige, Tenant, which I've given a big bump up to, Inception, Dunkirk, which I have taken down a little bit, the Dark Knight, which I took down a little bit, and then Insomnia, Interstellar, and Memento.
SPEAKER_02And well, well, yeah, well, differences in terms of ranking with Prestige and Interstellar.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, prestige I just changed one kind of like you. Well, you did too, actually. Like we both bumped it up one. I yeah, just oh you bumped it up one. Yeah, yeah, I bumped it up to because it used to be it was lower than some. And then yeah, Tenet. So the by way of saying, like, when you look at my top three, I have the one that made him really famous, Memento, and then I have his three most recent movies. I have Oppenheimer, Tenet, and the Odyssey. And you uh you know, Tenet's a little farther down from you, but Oppenheimer and the and the Odyssey are both in our top four Christopher Nolan movies. Like, that's crazy. Yeah, that's that's crazy. Yeah, these are good rankings, and this is all by way of saying that the Odyssey this movie fucking rules. This is a gift to the art form.
SPEAKER_02It really is. It's uh it's it truly is. Um I can't wait to see it again. I mean I'm like for trying to figure out when it's gonna be. If I can fucking get in a viewing tonight, god damn it.
SPEAKER_01I know, man. That's how I was with Oppenheimer, and that's how I'm feeling with this too. That I just get that itch and I already got a ticket for Wednesday. We're recording this on Monday, I got a ticket for Wednesday, and then yeah, for Saturday as well. I got already got some. I'm just gonna keep going. I'm gonna keep keep going. Uh, what are you watching?
SPEAKER_02The caption's a good idea.
SPEAKER_01I do think I'm gonna do that.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna find a specific one, yeah, with those burned in closed captions because all the names and all the places and all that stuff, it I think it could help a little bit, but I I think it'll help just with some of just like the the very, very specific history that that it gets kind of like just blown past a lot. Yeah, like it it'll help with that.
SPEAKER_01So as we go to what are you watching, I'm gonna I have kind of I two, but I I want to do a little teaser for what are you watching because obviously we were both recommending the Odyssey, but it's not what we're gonna recommend because you know we're gonna recommend something else. So at this King of Prussia theater, I didn't know this, no trailers, no bullshit. They're like, because they don't have fucking trailers in 70 millimeter. So they would have to like change over the lens and change over the projector. So they're like, this thing's just gonna start. That's what's gonna happen. Instead, what happened is we got a little title card that said, Thanks so much to Christopher Nolan for letting me show this early extended preview of Dune 3. Oh did you see this? Yeah, I did. I I mean I I haven't been looking forward to seeing this movie until this. And that was like saving Private Ryan, the Normandy invasion meets the opening attack of War of the Worlds, and I was I just went, Alright, I'm in. I'll see that damn movie. I really had no interest until I saw this like five-minute. I mean, that was nuts. Just you know, crown the beach, and that thing comes up, and I went, Alright, cool, you got me. Well, I'll go see it. So I I haven't really been looking forward to seeing that movie until now, and that really impressed me.
SPEAKER_02Uh yeah, um, I am I I I will see it. I'm not looking forward to it. Yeah, it's not gonna be the Odyssey, I'll put it that way. Is as impressive as that trailer was, um, it it it did not it did not have an effect on me and like even to the point where I would even talk about it. Oh man, it did.
SPEAKER_01It did for it did for us. We were in the theater. I was like, holy shit, what the fuck? I just didn't know I don't think anything else from the first two movies goes that hard. In my opinion, it doesn't, and that was like tough.
SPEAKER_02I thought it was cool. Well, I'll tell you, when when his name popped up, uh, because everyone knew what we were about to see, my theater went crazy. And I was just sort of like, man, fucking people love these movies.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they do. They're they're really not for me. Like, I've I've tried the second one in particular is we've talked about a little bit. You know, I'm not hating, but it it is that's not for me. It's not a movie for me, sorry. Anyway, I I that that little teaser made me it wasn't little, it was like five minutes long. It did make me excited for the third one. So I was like, alright, here we go. But I do have a few other what are you watching to talk about. Give me yours. What do you got?
SPEAKER_02Are you ready for the show? Are you ready for the one that I've that I've been hiding forever?
SPEAKER_01Oh, it's now you hate it to live and die in LA? Fuck, how did you know? Nailed it. Fucking no, I know everything. God damn it. I'm the fucking man. God damn it. Why would you hate like that movie fucking rules and you're gonna cover your- I like it a lot.
SPEAKER_02That's why I was bringing it in.
SPEAKER_01You told me you had a negative opinion on a Friedkin movie, and you're gonna talk about it on what are you watching? So I'm assuming you didn't like it because you said it was negative. I said I I said I said a negative opinion. You said you I said that maybe I'm way off. I thought you said, I watch it, and I didn't really like it as much as everyone else. I don't know. Did you okay?
SPEAKER_02Let's start off. Oh no, I okay, no, I've got a negative take. Um and what it wasn't about the movie necessarily. My question is it, and I don't mean this to come off disrespectfully, but like I I after seeing To Live and Die in LA, which I did like, but I wonder how the hell did William Peterson actually have a career. Oh, did you think he was bad? I will I've thought he's just been vanilla ice cream in every single thing. I mean, he goes kind of crazy in this sometimes, but I just look at him and everything I've ever seen him in. I go, how the hell did you get cast? Well, like who, like, like how how the hell did you like and not just in this, but in a lot of things.
SPEAKER_01Well, I was gonna say, name he had a big career, not a not a big film career, not not starring roles. He had a career because he got CSI. It's a manhunter. He is the lead of Manhunter, like, yes, he he is the lead of that. Man liked him in the 80s. He had that pop, but he got manhunter because of to live and die in LA. So that that was Friedkin being like, No, I know this Chicago theater actor, so I'm gonna give him this part. I agree, but he's like a lunatic in it. Like, they got in so much trouble when he jumped up on that turnstile in the airport and ran on it because that was the airport said that's the one thing you're not allowed to do, you can't run on it. And he told old William Peterson that he's like, Oh fuck that man, watch this. So he just did it anyway. But no, I I know what you mean. He's much more suited for like the lead of uh of CSI for you know 10, 12 years, something like that. Yeah, I hear you. I hear you.
SPEAKER_02But even still, then I'm still like, how the hell does this guy fucking make a goddamn career for himself?
SPEAKER_01Okay, I was wrong, or I misremembered what you said, but you did like it. You like the you like the picture. I I did like it.
SPEAKER_02Um, I mean, it's pretty bonkers.
SPEAKER_01It's to live and die in LA, directed by William Friedkin, is fucking nuts. They got in a lot of trouble because they accurately depicted how to create counterfeit money. They accurately depicted it so well that someone like accidentally kept some of the bills, the FBI got involved, like it it was crazy, and then they got in trouble for showing it that way because that's actually how you did it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, like I at first, like I didn't know what kind of movie it was. So it took a little bit to kind of realize oh, this movie is nuts. Like there's a lot of cool to it, but I thought the whole thing was like a cool vibe. Very cool. I thought for some reason that but well, I thought it was more like nuts than cool. Like I thought it was like Michael McCollateral, cool. Like, that's what I thought it was gonna be, where it was sort of like, oh, this is a sleek fucking like you know, like LA vibe. Because all the all the uh the um I remember coming up with those pictures on Twitter like way back when and seeing all these like cool colorful like greens and things. So I was like, oh, this is uh this is one of those types of movies, and then I just get a movie where I go, this movie is out of its fucking mind. It is keyed up, there's some cool stuff to it for sure.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but yeah, that's exactly what it is. It is it's absolutely keyed up to where you wonder if there was uh you know, whatever, something else going on, yeah. But yeah, it is it's mean, he's mean, but also the movie is mean, like how it resolves its characters is mean, and like, hey, it's crazy. I I will never forget seeing that and thinking, like, did was is there a mistake? Like in the well, huh? What just happened? It takes yeah, it it's a very audacious thing to do, and Willem Defoe's great in it, but yeah, even the end, like the very end is kind of a little bit silly, and I I don't know, but I'm glad you watch it. I am, I am.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I no, I I no, I definitely did not, I definitely did not dislike it. Um, it wasn't what I expected it to be, but I you know, that's not gonna be like uh I'm not gonna take that stance. A lot of people were like, it wasn't what I expected, so I didn't like it. It just wasn't what I expected. But then once I took it for what it was, I just go, okay, so we're just in a crazy movie.
SPEAKER_01That might have been what you said to me. Actually, you might have been like, it wasn't what I expected, but I guess I interpreted that as you didn't necessarily like it.
SPEAKER_02I might have said it in a I might have said it with a certain tone in my voice, because I realized that, you know, even if you were to listen to that ranking, you would think that I absolutely hate Christopher Knoll the way that I talk about Interstellar Dark Knight Rises. So I understand it. Sometimes my tone gets in the way of what I mean. Do not go gentlemen to that good night.
SPEAKER_01Um my my No seek the treasure. We are recording this episode on July 20th, 2026, which means this is the three-year anniversary of the release of Christopher Nolan's best picture-winning masterpiece, Oppenheimer. My Oppenheimer, I know it's been a what a journey. I'm so my very quick what are you watchings? I always thought it would be a fun editing exercise to put this movie in chronological order before realizing who the fuck has time to do that. I just don't. It's I love to do it with other movies, but this was gonna be way too much of a challenge. Instead, I found a very nice soul on Reddit who did it and he lets you watch it, you know, like from his Google Drive. Cool, like fun experiment, but does not is not as effective because the last 50 minutes is like you get 20 minutes of Oppie testimony before that board, and then you get 25 minutes of straight straws in his testimony. So, like that's it. So it's not as effective. Now, interestingly, I always thought the biggest challenge, it would be the biggest challenge to put in chronological order would be Dunkirk. And I wasn't even gonna attempt to brave that. But after I watched Oppenheimer Chronological Order, I'm like, hmm, I wonder if anyone else has done this. I found one, watched it. I, you know, I've never understood the movie better than watching this cut, especially everything that goes on on the mole, and like, oh, that is a different chip. Okay, and it's really when you watch it this way, those poor boys like cannot get off that beach, they keep getting back on it, but it really helped capture just all their stuff really, really well. And I'll say, uh, this was not a bad cut, like I you know, on and the only reason I do this because on following, they he has like a legit special feature as part of Criterion, watch the linear cut in the Memento DVD. I have there's an Easter egg where you can watch it in chronological order. So I've done that. I guess it's not you know fashionable to do that now, but the Dunkirk one, I'd honestly argue it that movie may have been better received and it still did great, but if it was in chronological order, because I like the way he did it, like this way, the action is always collapsing on top of each other, but it yeah, it's it was definitely easier to follow along in chronological order.
SPEAKER_02Well, and that that was always my biggest complaint with it the very first time I saw it was you just had to do a lot of sort of like wait, am I tracking everything correctly? And and then, yeah, because sometimes it is like you like you don't recognize that that's oh, that's that plane or that's that ship, or like you know, little things like that. You do kind of get a better, you get your bearings more the second time you see it. But yeah, I kind of wonder, I'd that I'd be curious to see what that would be like uh in that format. And it's cool that it worked. It did like you're saying the Oppenheimer one doesn't really what Dunkirk actually does.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, a lot of the Oppenheimer cut like is in order, like a lot of when they're on Trinity or you know, doing that, a lot of that is already in order, but yeah, you're just basically taking out all those cuts to Robert Downey Jr. And you're just saving all those, his whole performance comes in the end of the film, like the entire thing. But with Dunkirk, I mean, even the Killian Murphy reveal, the way it is now, it's we meet him first shell-shocked, and then we get that brief look of him as like the really upstanding, you know, no boys, take the next boat, it'll be fine. But in the chronological cut, that's what we get first-the kind of upstanding officer, and then the shell-shocked, and it still works. But I don't know if I remember from Dunkirk where all those boys get rescued, like the oil spill. I thought that was so that's from the boat they're all hiding in that's getting like target practice. I never like, oh, that got literally shipped back out to sea, and okay, okay, now I get it. So it was just cool, but again, the the music and the sound didn't work as well because the the editor didn't have control over all of that. So, like, where the music crescendos, I could tell he had to make some adjustments, but I don't know. I I like watching these cuts not because I think they're better, I just think they're really good experiments, but to watch them, but moreover, I love watching them and just thinking of Nolan going, nah, okay, that's what it is in order. Watch me fuck this all up and just move it all around. And the Odyssey is not told in chronological order, but not in a way that is alienating, like Dunkirk. It was very easy to follow.
SPEAKER_02Very, very easy.
SPEAKER_01Highest recommendation from what are you watching to go see Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey? He did it. It sounds like you got a bug for it, I got a bug for it. I can't wait. When we're doing our top 10 at the end of the year, like, how many times did you see the Odyssey? You know, it's gonna be hopefully we can see it together. You know, we'll try to time like a viewing and see it together, but I think we'll be able to. I'm just I'm so excited to go again. It was so much better the second time. I'm just gonna keep going and I mean he did it. Thank you, Chris for Nolan.
SPEAKER_02Jesus Christ. And and I'll tell you what, man, and I think a big part of the reason why I feel the way that I feel about it is it's honestly it lies in the score. Oh my god, it's emotionally primal in so many ways. Where the feeling you have walking out, I can't just shake the sound of that score everywhere I go.
SPEAKER_01I have not uh lit downloaded or listened to it, so I'm gonna do that. And I haven't worked out to it. You're gonna love it. Yeah, I am because even even you just you just enjoy though listening to scores, like even if they're not in that next time. Oh, yeah, I do. I I love to write to scores, so yeah, I definitely be listening to it.
SPEAKER_02Great film.
SPEAKER_01I am too boned up, great film, fantastic film. Loved it. All right, head to W A Y W podcast to let us know everything. Let us know what you're watching. You can write to us, you can donate. We're on Patreon, folks. We have a steady, loyal fan base that is growing, and we have a lot of fun over there. We are uncut, uncensored on Patreon. Patreon.com slash W A Y W. We're right there. It's easy to find. Very, very easy. What are you watching podcast bonus features on Patreon? But as always, thank you so much for listening and happy watching the end of the odds. Hey everyone, thanks again for listening. Go to our brand new website, waywpodcast.com, for everything. Episode categories. You can write to us, donate if you're feeling generous, buy our brand new merch, and you can find our new Patreon link. That's right, what are you watching bonus features? We are on Patreon now, so for just a few bucks a month, you can get so much more WAYW content. Go to wayw podcast.com for all of your what are you watching needs. Next time, we're bringing the WAYW new Hollywood film project back. Not 10 movies or anything, just one at a time. First up, Cool Hand Luke, starring Paul Newman, one of my favorite films of all time, one of Nick's favorite films of all time. Go watch it and go see the Odyssey. Stay tuned.