#142. 'Ambulance' (Prime Video)
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The main event is a belated look at Michael Bay's Ambulance, newly arrived on Prime Video, and Sonny is downright euphoric about it, calling it one of his favorite movies of 2022 and awarding it something like "a hundred stars out of ten stars" while marveling at Bay's drone-heavy camerawork as a genuine, era-defining leap forward in action filmmaking. JVL is warmer than usual on a Bay movie too, praising it as the funniest entry in the director's filmography and singling out the dialogue humor and supporting cast (Garret Dillahunt, plus a Wedding Crashers alum who now resembles Peter Thiel), though he argues the film undercuts itself by writing Jake Gyllenhaal's character as both a bumbling screwup and a criminal mastermind at once. Vic runs his Quadrant scorecard and lands on plot A+, duration C (he and JVL agree it runs about thirty minutes too long), action/violence A+, and sex/nudity F, for an overall B, and shares that he watched the film with his retired-surgeon father, who stayed utterly unfazed by the gore. Along the way the trio also dissects the box-office carnage of David O. Russell's Amsterdam (projected to lose roughly $97 million) and the surprisingly strong theatrical legs of the horror hit Smile. The episode opens with its usual long banter stretch: JVL recounts his daughter's fight to dress as Harriet Tubman for Halloween and his frustration rewatching Andor with his son as the show abandons its own early setup, Sonny announces he's giving away his beloved Panasonic plasma TV, and Vic tells a horrified Sonny and JVL about a young couple who FaceTimed their toddler through an entire restaurant dinner while Vic's visiting father looked on unbothered. They close out with JVL raving about the tonal control of the Tom Holland Spider-Man trilogy and Vic previewing an upcoming medical procedure.
From the show notes
One thousand stars out of ten.
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00I'm sorry, brother. Sorry that I brought you into this. I just wanted things to be the way they used to be. That's my brother, Will. I could use some help. My wife needs this surgery. This is real life. How's that right? You put your life down the line for this country. You leave your family, your home. How much do you need? 231. How about one? 32 million. I need an extra man. I came to you for a loan.
Sonny00:00:32Look, have I ever gotten you anything that I couldn't get you out of?
Guest00:00:34It's time for you to do something for your family. What can I do you for, officer? We're just doing a transfer in the back. I'll let you in in 20 minutes. If I could just get it done real quick because I'm on the clock. Promise not to rob the place.
Vic00:00:58Hello? And welcome to another edition of the Sub-Beacon. I'm Victor Matus along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. Just a reminder, the Sub-Beacon is now available through Patreon. Go to subbeacon.com. You'll easily find us. Please subscribe and tell your friends. And don't forget about the Sub-Beacon merchandise store at tpublic.com Gentlemen, how are we? JVL, what's going on?
JVL00:01:22Got a little bit of a situation on the home front. A situation. The school, the school for the little kids says they they want them all to come into school dressed up for Halloween as a figure from history. Ooh. Historical figure. And little E came home with her heart set on going as Harriet Tubman.
Sonny00:01:51Nope. Nope, can't do that.
Vic00:01:55The heart is in the right place and there was a time
JVL00:01:57that this would be problematic at her Senate confirmation hearings further down the road. But, you know, on the other hand the kids today, these gen ZZers or whatever her generation will be, grew up in the age of Hamilton where all of these things are race independent. And you can go to Broadway and you know Cinderella can be black and the wolf can be somebody who doesn't actually identify as a furry.
Sonny00:02:25Only goes one way though.
Vic00:02:27It's 1776, 1776 on Broadway, it's a whole female trans cast.
JVL00:02:31What does it matter that she is a nine-year-old, 69, 59 pound blonde girl and that she wants to be Harriet Tubman?
Vic00:02:41She wants to be her because she admires her.
JVL00:02:44Oh, she thinks she's just the most badass figure in all of American history.
Sonny00:02:48As she was.
JVL00:02:49So, uh, she's great.
Sonny00:02:51I mean, can't ever dress up like her.
Vic00:02:52Well, is that true though?
JVL00:02:54Could you not just dress up? I mean, you can't do blackface.
Vic00:02:56Obviously you can't do, you can't do, uh, Justin Trudeau full on, but, uh, if you, that's
JVL00:03:04what I'm saying. If you, if you wear sort of period garb with a name tag, Harriet Tubman, no, no, I'm sorry
Sonny00:03:11that I, I, well, I mean, look in theory, yes, I agree with you that this is, would be a perfectly fine thing. We should all celebrate Harriet Tubman, one of the great heroes of American history. Uh, but at the same time, at the same time. No, no, I don't, I don't think that's a good idea.
Vic00:03:29I should look, uh, she has my support. Uh, I did something similar as a kid. Uh, I dressed up as a very, uh, famous figure from world war II. Winston Churchill. Oh, of course. What do you think I was talking about?
JVL00:03:42Oh, thank God. Rudolph Hess. Yes.
Vic00:03:45Rudolph Hess. Herman Goring. Very bushy eyebrows for Rudolph Hess. No, it was fine. It was just Rommel. At the time. No, I'm kidding.
Sonny00:03:52It was just Rommel. The desert, the desert fox. Oh. That one's a good one.
JVL00:03:56That one's a good one.
Sonny00:03:57Very honorable. Very honorable.
JVL00:03:59Very honorable. I, I will say this. So we, we have had a kid sickness in the house. And so I, uh, I have, I have gone and rewatched Andor with G money because G money really wanted to watch Andor and I had to lie and tell him that I had not watched it without him.
Sonny00:04:14And so he's like, great. We'll watch together. And I was like, yay together.
JVL00:04:18Um, what did he think? He likes it fine, but I'm here to tell you that, uh, it gets worse. I was paying a little, a little closer attention to the scenes in the forest with the tween and young teen children tribe in the beginning. I thought to myself, you know, in an alter universe, this, this piece does very high on the Vick quadrants.
Vic00:04:43Well, it is literally another universe.
JVL00:04:46I thought you were going to say there was some other, you know, it goes this close to blue lagoon, right? You could see where this could have been. This could have been star Wars blue.
Vic00:04:55Let me ask you this.
Sonny00:04:56Have you watched the whole thing? Have you watched the whole thing?
Vic00:04:59JBL? That was my question. Did you go one episode further than us at least? Yes. I've gone further than you guys. Has it become amazing?
Sonny00:05:05I've watched the whole thing now, or I've watched up till the episode that came out today. So I haven't watched the whole thing. We're taping on Wednesday for the record.
Vic00:05:12Does it get better Sonny?
Sonny00:05:13No, it doesn't. Uh, but it, it does like, it does a weird thing where it just like, it, it basically, I don't, I don't, I mean, I, who knows? Maybe they come back to it in this last, this next episode, which I think is the last, I think it's, it's only a six episode run, right? For this, for it doesn't matter. But the, they, they completely ignore like 80% of the stuff that we, we learned and talked about in the first three episodes of the show, like all the stuff with the, the little Peruvian kids on the, you know, the little line plan.
JVL00:05:48That's what I was, that's what I was talking about.
Sonny00:05:50Right, right. No, no, I, I understand.
JVL00:05:52And then all of the, like the, um, there are a couple of girls in that tribe that are right up Vic's alley.
Sonny00:05:58Oh, come on now.
Vic00:05:59That's not fair at all.
Sonny00:06:00All of this, all of his like friends and coworkers and stuff from the planet that they start on, you know, the girl that he is with, like all that is just jettisoned entirely from, I, we haven't come back to that at all. The, the security guy is not quite entirely jettisoned, but is like largely sidelined there.
JVL00:06:20I can't tell if there's friend of the show. Catherine Lowe, uh, was outraged at our verdict of this cause she is one of the Andor nerds. And what she said to me was, she said, it really picks up an episode four doesn't. And here's, here's my problem. If a show really picks up an episode four, then the first three episodes should have been 10 minutes of episode.
Vic00:06:44Right.
JVL00:06:45I mean, this is the, this is the problem with all the, I really do believe that there is a really good 90 minute movie. In Andor.
Vic00:06:53So does the, does the empire make an appearance then by episode four?
Sonny00:06:57Well, by, well, by episode four, now we get into like the empire and like the empire security services. And that's actually the most interesting.
Vic00:07:04Well, that sounds interesting.
Sonny00:07:06That's the most interesting part of the show is that there's like, there's like bureaucratic knife fighting in the Imperial. And there's some stuff, there's some stuff with Mon Mothma that's kind of interesting because it's like, you know, doing background resistance, but like, again, there, there, there, I, I, I keep getting frustrated with the show because I'm like, you set up all sorts of shit in the first 90 minutes and now you've just totally abandoned it.
Vic00:07:29Maybe they'll revisit it. But so this is all taking place between episodes three and four, right? Uh, between three and rogue one rogue between three and rogue one, three and rogue one,
JVL00:07:40I guess the, uh, I will say this, the entire episode three, it now occurs to me is just black Hawk down, but told from the point of view of the Somalis, right? We're supposed to be rooting for the Somalis instead of rooting for black Hawk down, right? Is almost literally everything about that is black Hawk down, or at least it's the part
Sonny00:08:01where they go and capture the warlord, except they never actually capture the warlord and
JVL00:08:04then trying to get out. Right. Yeah.
Sonny00:08:07Yeah. But I mean, the whole point of black Hawk down is they're trying to get their own guys out, which is no, I guess that's fair. All right.
Vic00:08:12That's all I've got. Was it also, when you look back on black Hawk down, was it really worth trying to get Ron elder?
Sonny00:08:17That's that, that guy. Yeah. Well, you know, I love that movie so much. It's a great movie. It's a great movie.
Vic00:08:25The sound in that movie is fantastic.
Sonny00:08:27It's a great looking four K disc as well. It's one of my, one of the best looking four K disc you can see Josh Hartnett or Josh Hartnett's great in that movie.
Vic00:08:34That was, that was, that was what made him a big star after that.
Sonny00:08:37That was the beginning. Eric.
JVL00:08:39That's my, that that's like America. That's the beginning of the Eric Banna moment, which really ends with Josh Hartnett, right?
Vic00:08:47I mean, which I don't understand because Eric Ben is great.
Sonny00:08:50He's great.
JVL00:08:51And, and then he just sort of, I don't understand as a movie star and I don't understand why that is.
Sonny00:08:55Yeah. Why, why is that? I don't know. He just would. He never, he never quite had it. He never, he, he was in that Hulk movie that didn't, that didn't work. He was in, he was in Munich, which I get critically acclaimed and best, best picture nominated. Don't you? I love, I, I think Munich, I don't, I wouldn't say I love Munich, but I think Munich is very good and very interesting and much better than it's dumber critics, give her much smarter than it's dumber critics. Give her, give her.
Vic00:09:17Say something. Now I'm not gonna say something. Okay.
Sonny00:09:20Yeah. What?
Vic00:09:22You didn't like Munich? You don't. No, I didn't see it. I didn't see it because I had read, I had read a review of it and said, there's a, there's
Sonny00:09:28a very specific argument about Munich that is, that I think is, is kind of justifiable by the text of the film, which is that essentially America brought nine 11 on itself by engaging in tit for tat terrorist rich. But I don't think that that's actually what the film is saying. The film is warning against. Yeah. Getting into tit for tat retribution with terrorists after nine 11, the closing shot of the movies is like on the twin towers at like, oh my gosh, you have to, I was going
Vic00:10:01to say, you have to remind me. And so Munich came out after nine 11.
Sonny00:10:04Yeah. Munich came out in 2005, I think it was 2005 or 2006. So anyway, but it's anyway, again, there was an argument, there was an argument about the, that people were making in the movie, either that America brought nine 11 on itself or that the Jews brought nine 11 on America. But, and that's not, that's not what the film is saying. Although like, I think it's not an unreasonable reading, but it's wrong.
JVL00:10:26It's like, that's not. Interesting to note that all the bankers called out sick for the day of nine 11. Isn't it sunny? It was very, it was a very busy day on the phones.
Sonny00:10:34I'm sure that's what Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner were going for in their, in their opus about. So you should do your own research.
Vic00:10:41They told everybody to stay home.
Sonny00:10:43They said stay home. It's typical. It's typical wishy washy, you know, more equivalent live equivalent, but like at the same time, it's great. Great filmmaking.
JVL00:10:52It is great.
Sonny00:10:53Closet neocon. Well, no, that's, this is anyway. Okay.
Vic00:10:56All right. That's all I've got. What do you, what are you boys up to Sonny? What's going on with you?
Sonny00:11:01We also had sick kids in the house. We had one of these, one of these runs where it was like one night, one of them wakes up at midnight and starts throwing up. And then literally 24 hours later, the other one start wakes up and starts throwing up at midnight. So, uh, I, I, I was in a stretch where I got like three hours of sleep over 48 hours. I finally, I finally have recovered from that. I'm finally back, uh, to full strength, which is great. Um, uh, I do have, I have some, I need, I have something I need to give away. I have one of my most prized possessions in the whole world. If there's anybody who's listening to this in Dallas, Texas and wants to come get it,
JVL00:11:36HG DVD player.
Sonny00:11:38I'll throw that into one of your, I have, I have no, it's a, it's my, it is my, my Panasonic Viera plasma TV, which I love. Love is my, is it was for a long time, my number one seed on the, but it is, it is, I just don't have any use for it anymore because I have another plasma TV. That's bigger in a different room. And I have the OLED. I can't, I don't, I don't, I just don't need it. So I'm, I'm gonna throw it away because I can't even, it's a, it's 40. It's either a 40 or 42 inch. So it's small.
Vic00:12:12When you say, when you say throw it away, Sonny, does that, because I thought about this, would you leave it at the curb?
Sonny00:12:18Well,
JVL00:12:19If you go to Facebook marketplace and post it and somebody will just come and take it
Sonny00:12:22in Dallas, they have bulk trash pickups and what, what they, what you do is you put out your bulk trash and then like half, if the stuff that you put out is halfway, either fixable or presentable, people will just come up and take it. They'll just like grab it and throw it in their truck. I'll drive off with it. We've gotten rid of several days, um, but the, uh, but the, um, the TV, the TV is kind of a, it's kind of a gray area on whether or not you're supposed to leave that sort of thing out. I don't, I'm not a hundred percent.
Vic00:12:49Sure. Yeah. There's sometimes there are like specific electronics. Yeah.
Sonny00:12:53But I'm going to, I'm just going to do it. I'm going to do it and see what happens. But the, uh, but the good home don't just put it out there for people to take. I don't want to put, I don't want to put it on the internet and have, you know, strangers showing up to my house. I want beloved fans of the show to, if any, so if anybody out there is listening, needs a good, like gaming monitor, it's a pretty good gaming monitor or you sign the back of it.
Vic00:13:15I was going to say, you could actually make money off of this, a sunny bunch. Yeah. Owned by Sonny Bunch.
Sonny00:13:20Look, I just wanted to, I just wanted to have a good home too.
JVL00:13:22How many times would you say that you watched sucker punch on this very monitor?
Sonny00:13:27At least 27.
JVL00:13:28So the, the, this is very special game used practically the, uh, the only, the only real
Sonny00:13:35issue with it. The only thing that does not work very well about it anymore is that one of the, it has three HDMI inputs and HDMI input. Number one is a little bit busted because at the last house where we had it, it was kind of up. It was jammed up against a wall. So you kind of really got to dig it in, but like everything else about it works fine. It's it's a, it's a good TV. So if anybody wants you, if you're listening to us and you're like, I need a 80 pound 40 inch plas, 10 ADP plasma TV with a remote, I'll even throw in new batteries. Uh, let me know.
JVL00:14:10You hold onto that for another 20 years. And that will be a vintage piece, like the way that Nintendo says. Original super Nintendo systems right now, I think sell for more than they did when they first came out in the eighties, right? Yeah.
Sonny00:14:26Because they're vintage. So really, I don't think it's quite that. This is an investment opportunity for people, but it, it, it's, it's a thing that I would key. If I had like a, if I had a storage unit somewhere, I would definitely, I would 100% put this in the storage unit and forget about it. And then when I died, people would come and be like, look at this, this, the, the hunters, you know, the, the, the storage unit wars guys would come over storage wars. They'd come over and they'd be like, oh yeah. This is, this is, this is a, this is a reference grade plasma TV. The filmmakers, they still use this sort of thing when they, we could get $500 for it. We better bid appropriately on it. So I, I'm, you know, I'm a little sad to have to let it go. Um, but I do want it to go to a good home. So anybody out there listening wants a good TV.
Vic00:15:09Yeah. Anybody out there listening, Sonny, why don't you tell us your home address right now?
Sonny00:15:12Well, if you're, if you're wanting to, you come, you let me know. And also we can set up a, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to rent out a stream at the Alamo and we're going to, we're going to all get together.
Vic00:15:22Look for Sonny's white van.
Sonny00:15:25It says free TV on the side. I've free TV scratched into it.
Vic00:15:28Yeah.
Sonny00:15:29The other side says free candy. Free TV kids. Anyway, that's what's going on. I'm giving away a TV. So Victorino, how are you buddy?
Vic00:15:37Uh, I'm doing okay. Uh, so, uh, you know, my dad is here for the week, which is great, which is why I'm upstairs right now, which is very nice.
Sonny00:15:44Did you guys watch Ambulance together?
Vic00:15:45Yes, we did. I'll get to that when we get there. We'll get to that when we get to, because how fitting it was very appropriate for him to be there. We'll get to that when we get to the show. Uh, we did go out to my, uh, I was going to say, this is my new favorite Japanese place. Well, it's my view, favorite Japanese restaurant. My new favorite Japanese place is called Tokyo therapy, but that's for a different show. Um, my new favorite Japanese restaurant on the other hand is called Yuraku on Fort Meyer, uh, drive. And it's fantastic. And the food is so good over there. So we go, the whole family's going there, like the five of us are there. We're sitting there. Um, and this is, I think it was a Sunday night, whatever it was. And uh, so behind us, it was not that many people and it's, you know, Sonny, it's the same restaurant that used to be a Mexican restaurant on Fort Meyer.
Sonny00:16:29Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know where that is.
Vic00:16:31Yeah. High ceilings, industrial like. So, uh, uh, there's a couple sitting behind us. There's not that many people. It's echoey and it's pretty quiet. Young couple sits behind us suddenly, uh, apparently they take out their phone, uh, their, uh, toddler son. And they turn it on and all of a sudden they start yelling, Hey buddy, what's going on? And then you hear the kid, hi daddy, I miss you. And then, and then they have the, so they have the volume on full blast. They're not on any headphones, not wearing any, you know, um, uh, you know, what do you call it? AirPods or anything like that. No, they're just talking with their baby in the restaurant. And I said, okay, well they miss him. Okay. You know, then it's okay. We'll see you later. No, they kept him there. Like he was like, as if they was propped up on the other chair. So that while they're eating, you can see it in the baby's like, what are you doing now? And look at my toy. And it's just, and it's louder than if the baby was there in the rest, like it's Sonny's face. It was, I never, I'd never seen anything like that is fucked up.
Sonny00:17:39That is a, that is a nightmare. Why would they do that?
JVL00:17:43I could not stop laughing because the whole point of going out without the kid.
Vic00:17:46It is to have dinner with the kid. Yeah. They're a young couple. They're a young couple and they just propped them up there. And I mean, I guess, you know, they had some babysitter watching, but instead the kid is there and they're just having this conversation, but it's like everything.
Sonny00:18:01And how long did that go on? What? How long did that happen for?
Vic00:18:05Oh, I don't know.
Sonny00:18:0615, 20 minutes. 15 or 20 minutes. It was insane.
Vic00:18:09It was so insane.
Sonny00:18:11Those people should be put in prison. I know. Those people should be arrested and put in prison.
Vic00:18:16Where do you stand on this? Have you ever witnessed anything like this? This is the first time I've ever seen this.
JVL00:18:21I have been in a restaurant and watched people do FaceTime calls throughout entire meals, but never with a kid. And what offends me here isn't what they've done to the other diners. It's what they've done to themselves, which again, the meter is running. They are paying for a sitter and they instead bring the child into their dining experience. Yeah.
Sonny00:18:46Whatever.
Vic00:18:47And you're like, "I miss you, mommy." And we're all hearing this, you know.
Sonny00:18:50I mean, whatever those sick freaks want to do with their time and their money is their thing. I don't care about that. They are impinging upon everybody else's ability to have a decent meal with their families and friends. And not cheap restaurant, right? No. I mean, it's not like this is like, you're not at McDonald's. It's not the Chopped even. It's like- Right, right.
Vic00:19:11It's a sit-down, full thing.
Sonny00:19:13It's great food. I am. I am. It's one thing if you bring a kid to a restaurant and they're loud and whatever, that's part of life. Yes. We have all dealt with that. It's not ideal, but at least it happens and I understand it. And teaching children how to behave in restaurants is part of the socialization project that parents are engaged in. But the idea that you would just prop up an iPad or whatever and talk to them throughout the meal is outrageous. If I ran that restaurant, I would have ejected them from the restaurant. I would have ejected them from the restaurant and I would have banned them from coming back. And then I would have called the newspaper and I would have said, "You know what just happened in my restaurant?" And I would have had Dave Barry come out and write a whole story about me, the mean person who kicked the parents out of their restaurant. I can't believe this.
JVL00:20:12This is the sign of a marriage that's in trouble. A husband and a wife have so little to talk about together that when they finally get an hour alone—
Vic00:20:21They're not talking to each other. They're not talking to each other. Like the mom's talking and the dad's just dating.
JVL00:20:24Let's just put the kid on the things that we could not have to engage with one another. That is an excellent observation. That's no good, man.
Sonny00:20:32It's one thing if you have to get the kid on there to get him to bed if you get an emergency call from the sitter.
JVL00:20:39Totally. Totally. This is what I'm drawing. This sounds more like a parent neediness than even a kid neediness. It's not like the kid was like freaking out and the sitter is like some 15-year-old girl who's having dinner. I don't know what to do, Mrs. Jones. What do I do? Right. No. This is like we're just going to bring him to a dinner like it's a Zoom meeting for work.
Vic00:20:58Yes. Yeah. It was like a Zoom meeting with your child at the restaurant.
Sonny00:21:03I am— I don't even know what else to say except that that is fucked up. I am. I'm actually like—I don't know that I can keep doing the show after that, after hearing that. So I'm so horrified.
Vic00:21:16Like the first few minutes, I hear the first few minutes like, "Oh, okay. You know, they missed the kid or whatever," and then it just went on. And then at some point, it dawns on you that this thing is just going to go on because at some point, the mom—the dad's like, "Okay, hold on, buddy. The waiter's here. Hold on. Okay. We're going to get—we're going to get the dragon roll, the spider roll. Hold on, buddy."
Sonny00:21:37You know. I would have leaned over like Tom Sizemore in Heat and just been like, "Right." Because I— Yeah. I don't—what did—you were there with your dad?
Vic00:21:47My dad and the kids and Kate?
Sonny00:21:49Yeah. What did—did any of them say anything or did they just go on?
Vic00:21:52Yeah. We started looking and then we just tried to ignore it but, you know, I couldn't. And in fact, I just started—the first thing I—I turned to Kate and I said, "This is going to be such great material for the podcast." That's content. You know what I did? And I turned, I looked.
Sonny00:22:06I turned and I looked. You can write that dinner off now on your taxes. I did. Believe me, I did. Save the receipt.
Vic00:22:11Save the receipt. I said, "Podcast material," on the back. I said, "Podcast material." And, no, but I didn't say anything. I just looked at them and smiled. Speaking of which, over the weekend. Oh! Nicely done. Thank you. Smile. I did. I did look at them and smile because I said, "You people are insane." Stayed atop—
Sonny00:22:26I would have smiled at them like Art the Clown from Terrifier, the horrible Rick Desgrin. Come over to your table and murder you people.
Vic00:22:34Thank you. Smile stayed atop the box office with $18.5 million followed by something I've never heard called Lyle Lyle Crockett. Crocodile with 11.4 million. Hmm.
JVL00:22:46Javier Bardem. Oh.
Vic00:22:4811.4 million. And in third place, Amsterdam with 6.4 million. That's awfully low for a Christian Bale movie. I'm sure you guys have thoughts on this. Box office thoughts.
JVL00:22:58I mean— I just have a question about Javier Bardem. Sure. Because, you know, like he had kind of been on my radar before Old Country for No Men. Old— No Country for Old Men. Is that the right thing? No Country for Old Men, right? Like I said, it's been a long week. Yeah. And then he came in. It was just this amazing performance. And he's been, you know, okay, but I would say on a steady downward trajectory as an actor. And then we get to Lila Crocodile, which is essentially he's playing the Hugh Jackman role from Greatest Showman via way of a kid's—of a children's picture book. And I'm just like, what's happened here? Like what has happened to this actor? So he plays a nice— He's a good guy. Yeah. The best guy, but whimsical. This role would have been played by Robin Williams 25 years ago.
Vic00:23:51Like following on the heels of Bicentennial Man.
JVL00:23:53This would have been like the Bicentennial Man, Patch Adams— Jack. Jack, Robin Williams part. And Javier Bardem is taking the—I hope he bought just like an enormous house somewhere because of this movie.
Sonny00:24:09Yeah.
JVL00:24:10I mean, he did some interesting—
Sonny00:24:11I knew nothing about this. He did some interesting stuff after No Country for Old Men, right? Yeah. He did Skyfall. He's good in Skyfall.
Vic00:24:16Oh, I liked him then.
Sonny00:24:17Very much. And he's good in The Counselor as the drug dealer who owns the cheetahs, right? And he's been in some other stuff that's either good or not good. He was in Dune. He had a very small part in Dune that's going to be a bigger part. He plays Stilgar.
Vic00:24:36What do you mean? What do you mean in Dune?
Sonny00:24:38The new Dune that we just saw? Yeah, the new Dune. The Dune. He plays Stilgar. He's one of the—he's the guy. He's the sand guy, the Fremen, who comes and spits in the hand of Oscar Isaac.
Vic00:24:47Oh, that's right. I forgot about that.
Sonny00:24:49Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right. That's him. He's barely in it. He's going to be in it more in part two. But the—but yeah, no, I agree. He kind of like—it's been a weird—I mean, he—I think he does stuff with like Pedro Moldavar and— Yeah. He does stuff we don't—he does stuff we don't do. We don't say. We don't have really any interest. We don't say. All right. And he was in Being the Ricardos. He may have gotten—did he get a Best Actor nomination?
Vic00:25:11When in doubt, Golden Globe or— Something. Probably.
Sonny00:25:15BAFTA. Something. So this is—I like— He did. He got—he got—he got a Best Actor nomination for Being the Ricardos.
JVL00:25:20So— Vic, can I ask Sonny something? Yes, Jason. Because I—I read your review of Amsterdam, and I got to say, everything about that trailer hit all of my pleasure centers, and I just thought, "I want to go see that." Wow. But here's the thing.
Vic00:25:36I hate David O. Russell. I was going to say this is David O. Russell.
JVL00:25:38I know you don't like him. I hated Three Kings. I hated I Heart Huckabees.
Vic00:25:41I loved—however, I did— I did—I loved Silver Linings Playbook, and I really liked—well, I guess he did The Fighter, which I thought was fanta—wasn't he The Fighter?
Sonny00:25:50Yeah, he did The Fighter.
Vic00:25:51Yeah, which I thought was great. He did The Fighter. And also— I haven't seen American Hustle.
JVL00:25:55American Hustle. So maybe—maybe American Hustle is good. So I like those three. Anyway, but you—you say this movie is—is dog shit. Yeah, what happened? And I would say, if it is, the trailer house who hooked that trailer up made it look like exactly the kind of thing that the three of us would love. Well, tell me— Yeah, I thought we were going to end up seeing—
Sonny00:26:12If you've watched the trailer—you've probably seen it a couple times if you've—if you've been to the theaters—how—what would you say the movie is about from the trailer?
JVL00:26:20It's a Guy Ritchie— Murder on the Orient Express. Yes.
Sonny00:26:23Guy Ritchie's Murder on the Orient Express. Okay. Well, that's—that's not what the movie is. Oh.
JVL00:26:27So— Right, doesn't it? I mean, it's— I mean, it looks quirky and with all these— It looks like a Coen Brothers movie.
Sonny00:26:32Yes.
Vic00:26:33It looks like—it looks like a Coen Brothers movie. Rogue's Gallery.
Sonny00:26:35Yes. Motley Crue. I—no, I—I saw the trailer and I was like, "Oh, I like this." And I like David O. Russell. I like—I like American Hustle a lot. I like—Silver Linings Playbook is a weird movie because it's essentially just Little Miss Sunshine but with older drug addicts instead of little kids. And, you know, I—I like the Firefighters movie.
JVL00:26:54Oh, I hate Little Miss Sunshine also.
Sonny00:26:56Well, no, Little Miss Sunshine is—I mean, that's a different director. I'm just saying it's like that.
Vic00:27:00I like—I like the Silver Linings better than Little Miss Sunshine.
Sonny00:27:03Go ahead. Yeah, but I—I like American Hustle. I think he—I like Joy even. I like the—the—the movie Joy— I haven't seen it. Jennifer Lawrence that he did. And this movie has a ton of actors that I like in it. I like Christian Bale a lot. You know, he's doing—he's doing some interesting stuff and I like Margot Robbie a lot. I like Anya Taylor-Joy and Rami Malek and I like, you know, I like Robert De Niro and I like John David Washington. And they—and there are things that I like about this—there are things about Amsterdam that I do like but it is a—it is just a narrative disaster. I mean, it is—it is—it is way too complicated. It's way—it's sprawling. It's all over the place. It's facile and it thinks it's smart. You know, it's—it's—it's a movie about, you know, the rise of incipient fascism and like I'm fine with making movies about the rise of incipient fascism. You want to make points about whatever, modernity, fine, do it. But like do it in a way that's not dog shit. Like for instance, Grand Budapest Hotel, much better movie. Does the same sort of—covers the same sort of ground. Interwar period, you know, lots of time in Europe, Bohemian lifestyles, you know, and ways in which the façade of humanity and civilization falls away in the face of brute power. Like I— Stefan Zweig. Like I can understand all of that.
Vic00:28:17Is this—is it a problem— But it's just— Is it a problem because people are too afraid to question David O. Russell's art?
Sonny00:28:24No, I mean the movie's getting hammered by critics. I mean the people who— 35% pressure on him.
Vic00:28:28No, I mean the people who are probably working with him because you know how he is.
JVL00:28:30Well, no, nobody—nobody—I mean— His reputation.
Sonny00:28:32I mean he is a—yeah, he—well, he does have a reputation for being a bit of a monster on set, which is one reason why he has not won. He has not worked very much. I mean his last big movie was Joy and that was 2015 or '16, I think. That was supposed to be a big Oscar season picture and totally bombed, totally flamed out. But he—you know, he's—I mean I would be shocked if he gets another check for $80 million to make a movie like this because this movie—a deadline ran the numbers. You know, it looks like this movie will probably lose $97 million or some astronomical sum of money. Wow.
Vic00:29:08That's nuts. Production or salary? Huge false salaries.
Sonny00:29:11Well, it's—I mean it's—a lot of it is salary, I'm sure. I mean you've got—you have four A-list—or at least three A-list names and a bunch of like A-minus list names. But it's also just—it's a period piece. It's overly long. It's, you know, a lot of location shooting, a lot of old cars and stuff to get. But also your right salary and—it's just not—it's just—the whole thing is ill conceived and not—not very good.
JVL00:29:40Are you excited for Smile 2?
Sonny00:29:42We could do an episode on it. I mean I wouldn't be opposed to that but it's not—it's not a good movie.
Vic00:29:48So Smile—yes. How about Smile? Let's just talk about that briefly. Your—
Sonny00:29:52Smile. So Smile—
JVL00:29:54Two weeks. The opposite. What does that mean? It was based on a short film. They made it for what? Seven million dollars or something?
Sonny00:30:00Smile I think cost a little—I think Smile cost about 17 million. It was actually like kind of—it was actually a little expensive for a movie of this variety compared to say Barbarian. Right. Which cost four million dollars or— The Annabelle series. The Black Phone cost I think 14 million something like that. So it was a little—it was a little more expensive than you might think. But it's—it's—it's actually an interesting story. So Smile was designed to be a streaming movie. It was made for Paramount Plus. Right. And somebody at Paramount Plus saw it and was like, "Oh, this is actually pretty good. Let's show it to some test screenings." Test screenings—numbers were through the roof for it. So they're like, "You know what? Let's spend—let's spend the money. Let's put it in theater." Let's get the effects up to par, whatever. Let's—let's get—let's—let's spend a little extra money on it. We'll—we'll spend 20 million dollars advertising it for a wide release, a 3,000-screen release. And, you know, the—the—I—I'm not—I'm not really shocked by this. Or I'm—I'll put it this way. I'm surprised by the hold. So Vic mentioned that it was 18.5 million or so in its second weekend. That's a decline of only 18.3 percent, which is an enormously good hold. Absolutely good hold.
JVL00:31:07Usually—
Sonny00:31:08It's like Get Out numbers, right? It is very—so it's very—the last time a horror movie did numbers like this, it was basically Get Out, which declined, I think, 14—14 percent in its second weekend. This is an 18 percent decline, so it's functionally the same. Now, it's starting from a lower number. I think—I think Get Out opened at 35 million or something like this. This started about 22, 23. So it's starting from a lower number. It won't do 170 million domestic, but I would be surprised if it doesn't get to 100 million. I think—I think that's a— I think that's a—that's a fair number, though it's going to have pretty stiff competition this weekend. I mean, look, I could nerd out about the box office numbers all—this whole show. You just did. But it's going to have—it's going to—it's going to have some stiff competition from Halloween ends this weekend. Halloween ends comes out on Friday. Does it really, though, Sonny? So that's—I think so.
JVL00:31:55I mean, people show up to these movies. No, I mean, does Halloween really end? Halloween kills. Is that what it's called?
Sonny00:31:59Halloween never ends. You can't kill the shape. Michael Myers will live forever.
JVL00:32:02We're finally going to get to see his face. That's why you have to go to the theaters.
Sonny00:32:07Gotta go see it.
JVL00:32:08I've been—all these years I've been thinking to myself, I can't stop wondering, what does his face look like?
Sonny00:32:15So anyway, I am—
JVL00:32:17Well, Paramount's got itself a franchise. They spent an extra couple million bucks and they've been rewarded with not only a hundred million dollar movie but a horror franchise. Yeah.
Sonny00:32:27Good for them. It's a bonus.
Vic00:32:29Those things don't grow on trees. On the other hand, this week we're talking about a movie that actually came out some time ago. You guys may remember when it came out and I had questions about that, but the movie just came out on Amazon Prime and that is Michael Bay's Ambulance. And so that's the movie that we watched and we're talking about on this episode. Sonny, how about—we didn't do it. You wondered if we did it. We did not discuss this movie at the time.
Sonny00:32:56Well, it was funny. It's funny. I could have sworn that I talked about this movie on at least one of my 17 podcasts that I do. But it turns out I have not. I have not actually talked about Ambulance. We talked a little bit about it on Across the Movie Isle, one of our bonus episodes. We did a Michael Bay bonus episode. I talked a little bit about it there, but I have not actually had a chance to effuse properly about Ambulance, one of my probably three or four favorite movies of 2022 so far.
Vic00:33:27I was going to say, I know you liked it. How about a big boy review?
Sonny00:33:31All right. So Ambulance is very basic setup. Very basic setup. Two brothers, one white, one black, because sure, are brought together to commit a robbery. The African-American brother is played by Yahya Abdul.
JVL00:33:47One last score. What's that? Right.
Sonny00:33:51To just take down one last. Well, it's so the the the the setup here is so hilariously stilted and stunted that I I admire Michael Bay for just saying we're not going to put any effort into like creating a setup here. We're just doing it. The opening minutes, the opening minutes are a black brother on the phone with insurance company. They won't pay the bills for his wife who's got the cancer. She needs money for the surgery. She says, you better not go see your brother about this. And he's like, don't worry, babe, I got I got an interview. I got a job interview. He goes right to his brothers played by Jake Gyllenhaal in this. And Jake Gyllenhaal owns like a used like a car repair depot or something like you. But he is he he takes down scores. That's what he does.
JVL00:34:36And he's guys like me. We take down scores.
Sonny00:34:38He calls. He calls his brother, who is a veteran. It should be noted. He says, you got to come on. We're rolling out. We're rolling out of the the compound right now. We're going to do that. We're going to do the job now and we can't do it without you.
JVL00:34:52We actually we were about to roll. I need you. But if you don't sign on, that's it. We can't do the job.
Sonny00:34:58You went around brother and brother's like, all right, I guess I got to do it. I need the money for my cancer surgery for my wife. So we're going to go do it. And then they just go and rob the bank. They go and rob the bank. And then, of course, the robbery, you know, gets interrupted midway and then they get in an ambulance that is driven by the delightful or is is the the I got the EMT on it is the delightful eyes. I yeah. Yeah. Is a.
JVL00:35:24Just call her Mexican Megan. Megan Fox. All right. Mexican.
Sonny00:35:28She is Mexican Megan Fox. That's all. I don't know that she's actually from Mexico, but whatever.
JVL00:35:31Whatever. Hispanic. Mexican actress.
Sonny00:35:34All right. And and they got they got to drive all over Los Angeles with a wounded cop in the back because they had to shoot one of the cops who was trying to stop the robbery. And so now it's it's it's both. It's both an extended two hour chase scene and it's a hospital drama. And there's a love triangle kind of. And there's a brotherly bond thing. And on top of that, on top, I don't know, I mean, the you know, with the teller between
JVL00:36:01the. Did I miss something?
Sonny00:36:03I guess the one there's there's the cop is trying to is trying to hit on the back. It doesn't matter. It doesn't. But the. And then on top of all that, you have the cartel, the cartel. And on top of all that, you've got the gay FBI agent for some reason. For what?
JVL00:36:21The whole thing by Peter Thiel.
Sonny00:36:23Everything about this movie is delightful to me. Everything about this movie is delightful to me. It's so over the top and ridiculous and and entertaining. I love it. I loved watching it on the big screen. I love watching it again at home. There are there there are a couple of different there are a couple of different formal things going on here that I think are very interesting. The first and most important of which is Michael Bay integrating the use of drones.
Vic00:36:47Yes, and clearly into his order to fulfill his dream.
Sonny00:36:53So so we have we I actually think we are on the cusp of a an actual innovation in cinematic storytelling. It's a switch that you see once every 20 or 30 years before. So before this, it was like the introduction of Steadicam shining right before that. Before that, it was, you know, the introduction of sound or color or whatever, right? Before that, it was montage and telling stories from different angles. But I think we are actually on the cusp of a new addition, a new and useful addition to the language of cinema. And Michael Bay has no idea what to do with it. He hasn't. He has absolutely no idea. What to do with it. There are some interesting. He has some a few interesting ideas like you can you can like have the drone follow people through little spaces and it's right there and it's at speed and that's cool. Or it can like zip in and out of cars as they're in there as they're doing cartridges. You can't do that sort of thing with a camera truck or a crane or anything like that. You can like have it go up in the air and then flip and do spins and turn and zoom around. And like again, it's like anything else that Michael Bay does in that he cuts everything about five seconds. Before it should be cut. It's like watching in a very real way. Michael Bay is the forebear of Tik Tok in the sense that like everything is cut. So everything is cut like half a second too fast, so you're never 100% sure where everything is supposed to be. But it all it all still basically works out. And again, like there are these shots in the movie where like the drone will come out of a tower and go shooting down and it's like it's going to be tracking a car. And then all of a sudden it cuts to like the opposite angle where the car is. Is coming the other way and you're like, ah, where am I supposed to be looking? But it's it's fine. It all works out again. I am. I'm fascinated by this real filmmakers going to come along and and like put it together properly and we're going to we're going to we're going to have. But for now, we have the experimental, the the actual experimental cinema of Michael Bay in Ambulance. I love this movie. It was shot during the pandemic. So the freeways were largely empty. If you notice. Like, it's hard to get freeways that empty in Los Angeles, but there's nobody going nobody going into the office. So they were able to, like, blow cars up, just blow my I wish I wish I'm sure somebody has done this somewhere somewhere, but I would love to see an actual map of the route these guys took, because I'm sure people who live in L.A. watching this are like throwing things at the TV.
JVL00:39:23You can't get to the 405 from the 10 here.
Sonny00:39:27That's a 17 mile drive.
Vic00:39:29The other one chasing no way out in the subway station in Georgia. Yeah, exactly.
Sonny00:39:34Exactly. I mean, look, there there are like 17 too many things going on in this movie. For instance, again, like there's there's a whole subplot with the cartels for some reason that I think only exists so they can bust out the like Gatling, the minigun remote minigun car.
JVL00:39:50There's a minigun mounted inside a classic car of I'm sorry, a robotically controlled minigun, a self-driving classic car that has a mannequin on it.
Sonny00:40:02And again. The stuff like you should have had one cop who served the purpose of both cops instead of having one cop. And then there's like the part of the FBI agent. And then we're trying they have their jurisdiction. You don't need any of that.
JVL00:40:16Yes, I asked. Chief.
Sonny00:40:18Yeah, you don't need any other.
JVL00:40:19Dilla Hunt.
Sonny00:40:20Garrett Dilla Hunt. Love. Garrett Dilla Hunt in this movie with his USC outfit.
Vic00:40:23I thought that was the other thing I will say is I'm so confused.
Sonny00:40:26No, no. It's similar. It's close. It's all the same. The the the other thing is a real actor. The other thing I will say this the other thing I will say about this just just as way of closing up is that the last hundred twenty seconds or so of this film are modeled almost directly on the end of the Dark Knight. I don't know if you you picked up on this JBL, but like it like from from like Isaac Gonzalez, like walking out of the hotel or the the the like you I could even I could almost do it beat for beat. I wish I'd actually sat down to do it.
Vic00:40:59But there's there's she sees the girl in the shot where she sees the patient.
Sonny00:41:03And she she she goes and sees the girl, the patient, then she walks. But there's the shot before that where the the one cop is like, is this which one of these two guys shot? Oh, he's like, this one saved my life. That is that's like Michael Caine's burning the letter at the end of the Dark Knight. Like there's they're just like it's it is structured almost identically like down to the kid being like, you know, the kid holding her hand and being like, don't let me go is like, why is why is he running? Why is he running away? The whole the whole thing.
JVL00:41:33Is because they have to chase him.
Sonny00:41:35It's it is Michael Bay God, Michael Bay learning from God, Christopher Nolan, how to put together a like emotional punch of an end. I loved it. I've never seen. Love that movie. Excited. A hundred stars. A hundred stars out of 10 stars.
Vic00:41:50Yeah. I've never seen you smile so much giving a movie, a movie review and look at JVL is about to pass out over here. Okay. So we know how Sonny felt JVL. You just saw this movie. It's fresh in your mind. How excited were you when this thing ended? How do you feel?
JVL00:42:08Uh, Vic, I have a feeling you and I are going to be the same place frenetic. I imagine if you watch it with 3d, you'd be not genetic, but there is, uh, so sometimes I don't understand Sonny and I mean that like in the, the deepest, most spiritual and philosophical sense. For instance, last week on this, this program, Sonny was talking. Talking about how he much, he didn't like avatar because avatar was nothing but spectacle. I remember another version of this show that we did when we talked about a movie called Aquaman, a film called Aquaman in which you and I Victorino said this movie is dog shit and we poked holes in it for an hour. And Sonny was like, I liked it. It had spectacle. Spectacle. This is literally, that was his word. I like Aquaman because it is spectacle and this is what we expect from movies. And I, you know, what's funny is Vic, there were a lot of things that I liked about, about ambulance. Yeah. And I mean, for instance, it is far and away the funniest Michael Bay.
Vic00:43:18Uh, yeah. I, I think.
JVL00:43:20Um, and normally the humor you get in Michael Bay movies is, I would say very lowbrow. Like for instance, giant, giant metal robots peeing on people. Uh, as you get in the transformers movie, right? There's a joke where they pee on John Turturro, I think. Yes. Uh, the Steve Buscemi and, but this has, there is a scene in this where, uh, a guy gets run over by a massive truck and his body, he's, he's one of the bank robbers. The truck is being driven by another bank robber and a third bank robber pulls this guy out from, and he is fucked up. His torso is flattened and his legs are like, and the, the guy pulls him out, yells up at the driver. You fucking crushed him. The driver replies, who cares? The guy who just pulled him out says he was at your wedding.
Vic00:44:22I'm sorry. It's very funny. The victim says something to the effect of, oh, look what he did to my leg. His leg. Not the fact that he's about to die.
Sonny00:44:29What did you do to my leg? What did you do to my leg? What did you do to my leg? What did you do to my leg? And then, and then, and then the line about the flip flops fucking flip the Birkenstocks
JVL00:44:37when we, when there was a very early, the first time you get the sense that it's gonna be funny is with the, our bank robbers, the, the guys who are breaching the bank, uh, load up into an elevator and they're pulling up their masks. And as the doors are closing, they stopped and you know, you're thinking, oh my God, how are they gonna get out of this? And when it opens, it's a little old Asian lady. Who's also wearing. A mask. Right.
Sonny00:45:04Exactly. Right. Because this is. It's pandemic humor.
Vic00:45:08It's like the only pandemic humor that has ever worked in a movie. You notice the mask otherwise throughout the movie. It's not noticeable, but it's one of these things when you saw it, you didn't think about it.
JVL00:45:14You were like, oh. Yeah. You know, at that time. So there, I mean, there, there are a lot of beats like those, most of which.
Sonny00:45:21The two cops riffing on Michael Bay movies in the Michael Bay movie.
JVL00:45:24That was a little.
Sonny00:45:25That was too much for you. That was too much for you.
JVL00:45:27But, but these things are, and almost all of the humor is dialogue humor. Is where the, the, the screenwriter has been allowed to do like really funny dialogue, which I think is a first in a Michael Bay movie. And the, it's, you know, like Michael Bay, the action is, it's very nice Victorino. Isn't it nice to see real things blowing up?
Vic00:45:48I was going to say the quadrant scores are really interesting here. It's a little bit all over the place, much like the movie itself. The plot is an A plus there's no sort of like what happens now we know what's going on. I mean, you're, there are questions. I have questions. Yeah. But not plot per se.
Sonny00:46:05Explain to me why, explain to me why the cartel is there.
Vic00:46:07Yeah. Well, also Danny is his name, Jake Gyllenhaal's plan at the end. What's his plan of escape because you know, is it like you get on a plane and go to Mexico? Everybody knows it's him. They know it's him.
JVL00:46:19This guy is the worst fucking criminal I've ever, the worst bank robber in the history. This guy is not even the, uh, captain Jack Sparrow of bank, uh, bank robbers. I mean, forget he's not the Neil McCauley. Right. And then when, when we are knocked over 37 banks, I mean, you have to look at this and say, how, how did he knock over 37 banks? Because he does every single thing wrong and he's psychotic, right? There's no, like, this is not a guy.
Vic00:46:51He's not a planer.
JVL00:46:52Like this. Right. I'm not gonna say they're all schemers.
Vic00:46:55I'm not a schemer, you know, do I look like a guy with a plan? The other 36 were actually eight bank ATMs that he knocked. So the plot was in a plus duration is a C that was a little long.
JVL00:47:07It's lower to 30 minutes too long. Would you, would you disagree with that 30, 30 minutes too long? I think.
Vic00:47:15Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Actually cause they're on the road forever. Action and violence was a plus plus tell me I, unless you're about to tell me the whole thing was a green screen and I'll be terribly disappointed. But I got, I had the feel of real cars and trucks being blown up and accidents in a typical classic Michael Bay style.
Sonny00:47:34I genuinely don't know how people died in some of those shots or how people did not die in some of those shots. Like the, the, the, the image that I actually sent out with the, the post announcing that this was gonna be the episode this week is like, it's like cars flipping over and guys running away. And like, I genuinely have no, that happened. They ha that happened in, I've like have seen the behind the scenes, you know, video footage of it that happened in real life. That was all done for real cars were just flying all over. I have no idea. How people did not die.
Vic00:48:03I think it's, it's, it's probably gonna be a lost art of the lost art of the stuntman because um, we've seen some movies in the last couple years where an entire chase turns out to be CGI and I don't know, I mean, there's, it's all speed race. Oh, there's one really bad movie that takes place in Florida. That's like half on the water, you know, and it's, it's like a, you know, that one, it was like a murder mystery thing. Noir. Yeah. I remember the effects. It was just awful. Yeah. I'm not looking at actually anything. Am I, you know, no, but there were several movies.
JVL00:48:36It's great. Here's the question, the one, the one thing that I wondered if it was CGI is there were a couple different times when they had helicopters flying under like, oh yes, I saw that too. And that I wondered, can you really impressive? Can you do that? The insurance on doing something like that, that has to be CGI, right? You can't. I don't know. You can't get clearance to fly a chopper.
Vic00:49:06Well, they did it in Mission Possible the first one, they had the helicopter in the tunnel. Yeah.
Sonny00:49:10In the tunnel. That was real. That they did that for real. No, there, there are a couple of, there are a couple of CGI shots in this movie and there, if you know where they are, they are, they jump out at you as bad. Like the, the, the, the shot where they go, uh, where they drive the wrong way down the exit or entry ramp.
Vic00:49:25Yeah. Like sort of Allah to live and die in LA.
Sonny00:49:27And there, there are like cars flying all over the place. That was, that was largely CGI.
Vic00:49:32So, um, uh, no. And also to see, you know, CGI fire is the worst, as you know, CJ blood is bad, but CJ far with that, that movie where Angelina Jolie is a firefighter in the forest, not a single tree, no commitment, not a single tree bird. Okay. Sex nudie is an F. So the overall score for this thing is a, uh, is a B. Uh, but I, I did find it very entertaining. Uh, and I do want to say, uh, um, it was also quite a tree. I saw this movie with my son and my wife. And my father, and for listeners who don't know my, my, my dad is, uh, he's a retired, uh, general surgeon who had actually, oh, did he like that? Uh, yeah, he was totally unfazed and, uh, he worked, uh, my father worked in, um, a New York city emergency room, uh, in the late 1960s and early seventies. So like from 68 to 72, and so gunshot wounds, uh, he says he wants, he wants to, he saved a guy's life who had an ice pick in his chest and they had to reach in and he had to actually with his fingers, stop the bleeding. So, you know, this thing's happening. I'm turning away and my dad's just watching, he's totally expressionless. And you know, the part where she says, oh, um, she's about to get the bullet, right? The EMT is about to get the bullet and you knew something was going to happen, right? Cause it's like, you know how these things are. This happened in black Hawk down, you know, where they could feel it, it slips away. So you're like, something's gonna happen. But I did not expect the explosion of blood. So this thing happens, you know, and my dad of course is like, oh, he's got to reach in the, you know, the splenic artery, blah, blah, blah. And the thing happens. And my dad's reaction was, he just goes, uh, oh, it ruptured. That was it. And I said, oh man, you know, and so it just, that was, that was his reaction. He was totally calm.
Sonny00:51:14Uh, what did he, did he say, did he give it a thumbs up or a thumbs down on the, on the
Vic00:51:19surgery? He says, you know, well, he said that, yeah, you got to clamp it. You got to do something. He says, you got to clamp it. And like, cause I guess they can bring them to the hospital and then, you know, they'll do it there. But in the, the only thing they can do right now is just stop the bleeding is they gotta, they gotta, they gotta clamp it. Um, the hair thing, whatever that worked, but you know, I mean, obviously it's not a sterile environment, uh, and it's insane that he, he loses this long, but, um, in general, he had no complaints. He's seen movies where he'll point out that that's, that's, there's too much blood or there's too many, you know, there's too many guts, you know, whatever. And, but this one, this one, he, he, he was, he was entertained. He liked it very much.
JVL00:51:56Vic, did the score bother you? No. The music? The pulsing and con that added to that mixed with the cutting. And this, this might be the most Michael Bay overcutting shaky cam ever. There is a scene when they are about to they're right before the surgery where they say to the nurse, uh, Mexican Megan Fox call a doctor and she calls a doctor. And what we get is a three. Cam shot of a microwave meal coming out of the, of microwave. And I was just like, well, I'm, I'm sorry. You couldn't lock the camera down for that establishing shot.
Sonny00:52:44He has two, he has two modes of filmmaking. Well, three now with the, the drones, he has two modes of filmmaking. He has shaky, shaky handheld, everything, you know, quick, or he has swooping heroic three 60. He's just actually coming at you. You can either get, but you can either get, you can either get a, a. The shaky coming out of the microwave, the lean cuisine all the way around the microwave.
Vic00:53:11I had forgotten this was a Michael Bay movie. So the movie starts and I'm like, you know, it has that feel, it has that sort of, uh,
Sonny00:53:17you know, um, like the shots with them as kids, like the, the, like, like a very steel
Vic00:53:23like, you know, Pearl Harbor, I was straight out of here, Pearl Harbor. I have Armageddon with the kids and the American flag. It's sepia toned, like it is this whole thing, uh, America, you know what those shots are?
Sonny00:53:36This, this movie is about America. Those shots are all of his movies are America.
Vic00:53:41It's true.
Sonny00:53:42That's his message. I get it. JBL. I, I forget.
JVL00:53:46Do you like pain and gain? I, I don't even remember. I'm not, I don't even know. I've seen it.
Sonny00:53:51I love paint. The Mark Wahlberg.
JVL00:53:53Yeah. Anthony Mackie.
Sonny00:53:56I love that movie. I, I w I could talk about that.
JVL00:53:59I don't even know if I've seen it. I, I gotta say. I, I liked all the character actors in this. Yeah. Um, like I was joking about, I, I love Garrett Hill hunt. I think it's great in every little, especially in bit parts. Um, the, the lady who played like the ops center.
Vic00:54:13Yeah, she was good.
JVL00:54:14Like, you know, in the command truck Zaza or Zaga was the character's name. I don't know. Yeah.
Sonny00:54:20I thought that was, I thought that was the girl from arrested development at first.
JVL00:54:22I thought that was, no, she's not, but she was, but it's not, it's not right there. And uh, you know, cure O'Donnell, the guy who plays the FBI from wedding crash again, just looks like Peter Thiel. Yeah. He's from wedding crashers. And as he's gotten older, he looks like Peter Thiel was great. And I love Jay chillen hall. I just don't like the decision to write the character as a psychopath screw up. Yeah. Right. And whose backstory is that he's a criminal mastermind, right? Like these things just don't mix to me. And so that's like on the most fundamental storytelling level. I think this kind of there's failure doesn't work because again, it's. And it succeeds in telling the story it wants to, but it prevents it from being like a really good move.
Vic00:55:06Well, two things. One is, uh, not knowing I, I got my phone out and went to IMDB while watching and say who directed. And then I said, oh, of course it's Michael Bay then got into it. Once you know, it's a Michael Bay movie, you, you, you sort of roll with the punches in terms of, you know, it's going to be that frenetic sort of, you know, cuts every five, six seconds. You got to keep on moving and knowing that he now has the power of drones to finally achieve what he's always wanted to, which is. Really insane as Sonny was just total chaos. Total chaos.
JVL00:55:36Total chaos. Bayhem.
Vic00:55:38Bayhem. Exactly. Uh, but, uh, in terms of Jake Gyllenhaal, there's a scene, for example, they want to be funny and he and his brother are listening to, um, sailing the Christopher cross song and I thought they tried too hard on that one. I thought, do you know what? It's, it's sort of a false known for me and I didn't buy it because at that point in the movie, you know, Jake Gyllenhaal is a bad person.
Sonny00:56:01That shot, that shot is, it gets at both the strengths and the weaknesses of this movie. The strength being that it's like kind of silly and self-aware and understands what it is. The weakness being that they, they, it goes on twice as long as it needs to you. The way that shot should work is they're singing and they're singing with each other. We're hearing it. And then you should cut to her hearing just them sing. And then that's it. That's the scene. Instead of like cuts back to them and then it cuts back to her and then it cuts back to them again. It just like goes on forever. So just like the movie. The movie is too long. I mean, the movie, the movie, the movie started. I agree that I, the movie is at least 15 minutes.
Vic00:56:35The movie is like, it's like heat from the moment Robert De Niro approaches Dennis Haysburg at the diner and starts from there. Yeah. Cause it goes to a big shootout. But all you can think of is heat in that shootout.
JVL00:56:49I believe they reference heat. Oh yeah, they do. They talk about a North Hollywood shootout, which I believe just refers to the fictionalized shootout.
Sonny00:56:59I thought that as well. Yeah.
JVL00:57:01Maybe, maybe I'm wrong. I believe there was like a North Hollywood shootout, but I.
Sonny00:57:04There was, there was a real shootout.
JVL00:57:05Yeah. Oh yeah. There was. That post-dated heat. And that was based on heat. The heat was the original. Right.
Vic00:57:12Okay. Uh, well there we go. Do we have any other, uh, thoughts on this movie?
Sonny00:57:18700 stars out of 20.
JVL00:57:20It was entertaining. It was entertaining. I do like Isa Gonzalez. She was great.
Sonny00:57:24I, I have always enjoyed her in all of the, she was in baby driver or yeah, I remember baby driver.
JVL00:57:32She was in that. See, I should see that. Has she had any work that, uh, that is worth looking up on daily motion? Nope.
Vic00:57:38She's in a remake of a man. Well, you didn't know that.
?00:57:40Okay.
JVL00:57:41No kidding. Of course that.
Vic00:57:45No. Yeah. So, uh, okay. Uh, moving on. Uh, I do have a shout out. Our friend listener, Ian Brody says JVL Honda for looking for a snowblower. Check out a Honda. You need to ask the Canadian.
JVL00:58:00I gotta say. Yeah. Like Ian, I got a lot of feedback. Yeah. So what are people saying? And all of it was contradictory. You know, some people saying, look, the truth is just buy an electric. Some people saying don't touch electric. Some people saying Honda, other people saying don't touch the Japanese stuff. Only buy American. I had another person say, whatever you do, don't buy anything.
Vic00:58:19American. I wouldn't listen to anybody that says don't touch Japanese stuff. That's what I'm gonna say.
JVL00:58:25Uh, yeah. I, can I give a shout out to, uh, to our boy Joe at T public. Oh. We need to get restocked on, uh, Sub-Beacon t-shirts. Headache shirts. And, uh, no, just normal, normal t- this guy, this guy, I'm sure it's fine shirts. Anyway, Joe, Joe hooked me up and sent them to me. Thank you, Joe. And these shirts really are great.
Sonny00:58:46They're so soft. They're very, very soft and very comfortable. I love those. They are.
JVL00:58:51I have a, I wear sensory things for shirts. These shirts are great. Yeah. Thank you, Joe. People should go to T public and buy our stuff.
Vic00:58:57Come on. I need it.
?00:58:59I need another salad.
Sonny00:59:00Uh, I have a clarification. I just want to, we, we had mentioned craftsman tools and, and a listener, uh, who, who knows a lot about American manufacturing wrote me, wrote me an email, uh, to say, uh, so the production of nearly all craftsman tools, uh, moved overseas in the nineties when Sears offshored and, and, uh, that turned out bad for Sears. They had to sell off, they sold off the line to Stanley Black and Decker, Stanley Black and Decker then said, uh, we're actually gonna reshore them and bring them back to the Americas. Uh, so, uh. Back to America. Yeah. Not the Americas, but back to America. Um, so anyway, they keep, they're continuing to do it. I don't think they have fully reshored all of craftsman tools, but they are bringing them back to America. It's very sad.
Vic00:59:43They also stopped displaying them front and center in, in, in, in the department stores. And so, I mean, you're, they're just not accessible and they, you know, they tried to instead focus on clothing and things, but people like those tools.
Sonny00:59:54People, you know, people liked craftsman. They liked the whole made in America, the steel. That's right. We're doing it here.
Vic00:59:59Okay. Yeah. Uh, that is all the time we're giving to this episode questions, comments, compliments, tweet us at Sonny Bunch at Victorino Mattis again, be sure to subscribe to us on Patrion. Just go to some beacon.com. We're there. Tell your friends until next time.
Sonny01:00:16All right, what do you got?
JVL01:00:24I got one just very short observation. Uh, so while G money was sick, he and I watched. All three of the Tom Holland Spider-Man movies together, the entire trilogy is all home themed,
Vic01:00:36right?
JVL01:00:37Yes. And, uh, and I think I have hit upon one of the secrets of these movies success, which is that it shifts tones as elegantly as any movie I've ever seen in my life. All three of them, which is all just a screen credit to the screenwriters, because it will move from really intense action to like really funny earned comedy beats. And it does it just so smoothly. You don't even notice it's happening and it does that over and over again.
Vic01:01:15And that is without being forced.
JVL01:01:17Yeah. Yeah. It's every, every one of those beats is earned in the transitions and it's very, it's very, uh, that's rewarding as a viewer, right? Making those, those shifts in tone as a viewer. Yeah. Makes it feel lively. And, uh, but anyway, that's wonderful. That's all I have. Uh, Sonny, do you disagree?
Sonny01:01:36No, those are good movies. I, I also appreciate the screenwriting on those.
Vic01:01:41And also a great movie of Filipino representation. I'm just gonna leave it at that. Yeah, that's right. What do you guys got? Uh, well, you know, D-Day is coming up for me. It's next week.
Sonny01:01:55Oh yeah. Wednesday Gabriel 2 coming out. Is this next week already?
Vic01:01:58Next Friday already.
JVL01:01:59So are you cleared? Are you okay to go? Are you like Jody Foster in contact?
Vic01:02:03Well, I gotta, I gotta go get my EKG in a two days, uh, and the, so are you gonna cheat that test? No. I was like, as long as they don't take in my blood again, because like, oh, while we're
JVL01:02:14here, let's just take a look at the, oh, take a little lorazepam before you sit down for
Vic01:02:18the EKG. Yeah. That's all we need. Uh, the only thing they tell us, there's no dietary obviously, or fasting or anything like that. But, uh, um, they just said, make sure you don't have any oils or lotions on you when they do it. And I said, oh, that's very important to know. Thank you. So don't go to the Japanese. Don't go to Japanese therapy. I'm sure it's fine.
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