#164. 'Cocaine Bear'
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JVL is back from a mysterious week off (details teased for the bonus) to join Mike and Sonny on Cocaine Bear, Elizabeth Banks's fact-inspired horror-comedy in which a drug smuggler's dumped stash lands in a Georgia national park and a bear that eats it goes on a killing spree through hikers, park employees, truant kids, and a gang of youths oddly named after Marcel Duchamp. Sonny gives it a thumbs-up on pure truth-in-advertising grounds — it promises a coked-up bear murdering people and delivers, complete with surprisingly graphic gore — while conceding there's a funnier version of this movie buried under too many "wacky reaction shot" beats instead of real jokes; JVL agrees, singling out a gazebo Mexican standoff, Alden Ehrenreich's drug-dealer-trying-to-go-straight subplot, and the bear's eerily ninja-like movement as the bits with actual written comedy, and pins the shortfall on Banks's broad directorial instincts (an echo, he says, of her Pitch Perfect 2 problems) leaving an obvious thematic parallel between the mother bear and Keri Russell's harried single mom totally unmined. Mike, who has actually hiked and camped atop the real Blood Mountain where the story is set, praises the film's authentic Georgia mountain-town texture but wishes the tension and scares hadn't evaporated in the last third, and the trio agrees the whole thing falls short of the cult-classic status Snakes on a Plane managed. Before any of that, there's a long opening stretch of banter — Sonny's rant about strangers talking through a Silversun Pickups concert and the plague of phone-filming and selfie culture, a tangent into JVL's agonized non-photo with George Will and Tony La Russa and Roger Ebert's rule against asking film subjects for pictures, Mike teasing a new-car purchase, and JVL cagily saving his "body problems" medical update for the bonus. They close things out, as often, by pitching absurd animal-drug movie sequels: JVL's meth gator, Sonny's LSD beaver, and Mike's bath salts marmot.
From the show notes
The BEAR did COCAINE.
Full transcript
Mike00:00:00Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I'm your co-host, Mike Warren. Joininging me, of course, are my two co-hosts, who are always up to snuff, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. In this week's episode, we are going to do a few lines of Cocaine Bear, but first, let's hear how everyone is doing. JVL, you're back in the saddle this week, but why don't we come to you last here? Give the listeners a bit of a tease. Keep them wondering why you were gone last week. Sonny, let's start with you. How are you? What's going on?
Sonny00:00:42I'm good. I'm pretty okay. Things in my world are fine. This is weird, isn't it, Sonny? It is weird. I don't know how I feel about this.
JVL00:00:50That's okay. We're going to go with it. We're going to go with it, and we're just going to see what happens.
Sonny00:00:55It's like when you put on a... It's like when you put on a... You put on a new piece of clothing at the store, and you're like, I don't know.
JVL00:01:01I don't know if this is going to work.
Mike00:01:04You're grinding the whole show to a stop, guys.
Sonny00:01:07I don't know if this is... What's going on, Dino? It's a good fit. God, I had a whole thing planned for this, and I have totally blanked on it because of Mike's hosting. I had a rant. What are you going to rant about? No, so I'm curious. You guys... Mike... Mike, you're a concert guy, right? You like live music.
Mike00:01:31I love live music, but I haven't been to concerts regularly in a long time. Right. Well, because you have children. Seven years. That's right.
Sonny00:01:40Because you're an adult with children, so we don't really do those things anymore. However, for some reason, over the last six months, I've now been to four or five shows kind of in rapid succession, which has been fun. But this is... So I went to see... I went to go see... I went to go see the Silver Sun Pickups at the House of Blues in Dallas, the Dallas House of Blues.
JVL00:02:02That sounds amazing from one of my favorite movies of the last 10 years.
Sonny00:02:06Under the Silver Lake, the band who they were... In the movie, they're renamed Jesus and the Brides of Dracula, I believe, but the real band is called the Silver Sun Pickups. They're actually from LA. They're actually a Silver Lake man. Anyway, doesn't matter.
Mike00:02:23And they did the song in the trailer for this little movie called Sucker Punch.
?00:02:28Really?
Mike00:02:31Yes, that is true. Which trailer? One of the trailers, the one that I saw. Was it Panic Switch? Yeah, Panic Switch. That's right. It was Panic Switch.
Sonny00:02:42Yes, I saw that trailer. I actually didn't even know that. I didn't even know that. It all comes together. It's all coming together. So anyway, I went to go see the Silver Sun Pickups. And fun show. I had a good time. I enjoyed it. Except right at the beginning... So, you know, we're there. We get there. Early, we watch the opening act, which was... This is a total aside. I hadn't really planned on talking about this. Opening act. We're listening to it. Opening act's pretty good. It's like it's a female lead singer with a bunch of guys who are clearly like either studio musicians or professional touring musicians. You know, they're like doing drum solos. And the guitarist looks like fucking Dave Navarro with his facial hair. He's like dancing all around the stage. But this... The singer seemed a little tentative almost, I would say. And at the end of the set, she says, I'm Paris Jackson. And this has been Paris Jackson, Michael Jackson's daughter, who's like 25 now. Model slash singer is touring, doing... It was a good set. It was like a super... They sounded super 90s, which is a thing that appeals to me on a variety of levels. But that was just like a random aside. But anyway, so they go off stage and, you know, the crowd starts to fill up and Silversound pickups come out and they start playing. They played... The first two songs were off their new album. And as they're playing, as the headline band is here to play, they start playing their set. Behind me and my wife, in the row directly behind me, are two guys who are talking over the music the whole time. Just talking, just having a conversation with, like, shouting over the music so they can hear each other. After the first song, during the first song, I was like...
JVL00:04:39Are these assigned seats or just standing around in a club?
Sonny00:04:41Just in seats. We're all seated. It's like in a, it's in a balcony area. Everyone is, everyone's seated. And it's just talking, just having a, just having a full on conversation after the, during the first song, I was like, okay, maybe they'll, they'll stop and it goes through the second song too. And at the end of the second song, I, I like, I turned around, I'm like, are you guys going to do this the whole show? And they were very apologetic about, they were like, oh, sorry, sorry, we don't mean to, like, like they didn't even realize, like they didn't even comprehend that they could possibly be, uh, interrupting anyone. Again, they were super, they were like, anytime you're in a situation like this and you ask somebody to shut the fuck up, shut the fuck, there's always a chance that things escalate and it gets real nasty. It gets real nasty. But these guys were like, they were, they were like, oh, sorry, we don't mean to, we're not trying to, uh, you know, we're not trying to mess up your, your, your, your, your night. Um, and like, they, they shut up the rest of the show and that like, I made me happy, but I was just like, I was so, I was so confused by it. I couldn't, I like part of me wonders, you know, I, I feel like there has been a, I feel like there's been an erosion in social norms since the pandemic on a variety of different levels. But I can't tell if this is one of those things or if it's just like, people are always just kind of shitty all the time and always have been like rudeness is the natural state of man is, is my, my question here. My opening question is, is this, is this a, is this just a thing that I have never noticed before or is this a, is this, is this getting worse all the time? I feel like it's getting worse, but I can't tell.
Mike00:06:21It's, it's a weird, it's a weird thing because only in the last few years have I been going to concerts in the way that your concert seemed to have been, which was seated, you know, in a, in a balcony or in an auditorium or in an arena somewhere. So, you know, when you're younger and you're standing up and, you know, standing room only or, or, you know, if it's a festival or a bar or something, you're listening to live music at, you know, I mean, it's just, everybody's there. You're dancing if depending on the music or you're just jamming, you know, banging your head, whatever you're doing and like everybody is kind of oriented to paying attention, but I have noticed like what you're describing, it's a little, I mean, it's a little more like going to a movie. Of course, like you have shared your thoughts Sonny on what people, you know, people talk in movies, but I do think people sort of think of it more like a pastime when you're sitting down then like a, a show or a performance that you must be like silent and attentive watching. And I don't know if that's new or not, or if that's just a sort of the way that we as human beings just kind of get lazy or get comfortable and, and just do our own thing because Hey, we're sitting down, uh, we paid our, our money and, uh, and we get to do whatever we want.
JVL00:07:46I'm surprised they were talking to each other and not just on their phones. That's right. The type, the type of person who would talk during concert seems to be also the type of person who would sit around texting and Instagram. Instagramming during a concert. And, uh, so I'm surprised that also it's like hard to talk during a concert because especially a rock concert, cause they're loud. Right. So you gotta be at each other.
Sonny00:08:07I mean, they are, they were like yelling at each other to be heard over the music and have their conversation. It was, it was bizarre. I will say another thing that I have noticed, and this is not, I don't think this is pandemic related. It just is, is it's more technology related. There were people who were filming the entire show from their seats. Just like cameras out filming every single second of the show. And like, I, it's one thing to film like, I, I still think this is bad, but it's one thing to film like your favorite song. If you hear, if they're going to play your favorite song, right. Or if there's like a, a, a, a drum solo that you want to capture and you want to put it on the internet. Okay. Fine. But this guy, the guy who was like directly in front of me, luckily he was like so in front of me that his. And his camera was like at chest level. So I couldn't actually see it at all, but literally filmed the entire concert. And I was just like, why even, why bother? Why bother being here? If this is what you're gonna, if, if this is what you're gonna do, this is a thing I have noticed a lot of I've at every show I go to now, it's just like a sea of people.
JVL00:09:17Was he filming it vertical or landscape?
Sonny00:09:20It was, it was landscape. It was, it was horizontal.
JVL00:09:23Okay.
Mike00:09:24Well, at least, at least there's that he's not a complete monster. Um, I, yeah, no, the, I mean the recording thing is, is nuts. I mean, it's very much like, you know, it's the way, and, and I will admit, I do this too. You go to like a sporting event and your eyes end up getting pulled to the Jumbotron, even though you're at the, at the event itself, watching, able to watch things happen on the field. And that's just this sort of, uh, I dunno, it's the allure of the, of the camera, I, but the recording, like, what are you going to do? Are you go, you're not gonna post it like the whole thing.
JVL00:09:54Sure. Yeah. They post it on YouTube. Yeah. A hundred percent. They do that.
Sonny00:10:00They post it, post everything. Yeah. Everything.
JVL00:10:03Everything. That's all the concerts. Well, I think that's the problem. Yeah. A concert is an oral experience and the recording you're getting on your iPhone that go listen to those things. The sound quality sucks. Terrible. Yeah. Right. It's, it's real. What is, what is the point of having a concert recorded on your iPhone? Cuz it's just gonna make your ears hurt. Right. Listening to something like that.
Sonny00:10:24Again, it's like monsters.
JVL00:10:25They don't care.
Sonny00:10:26Again. I, so like one of the shows I went to, uh, a couple weeks, I went, I saw Bruce Springsteen and the East street band and we had rear view seats, which I actually really like having rear view seats at, uh, at Springsteen shows because a, there's a big, they're, they have a huge band. Um, and they're, they're kind of like all running around, but there's so many different things going on and seeing, seeing the performances from behind is I think superior than seeing them from, from the ground and up or from, from the front. You can actually see people play instruments, which is interesting. To me as, uh, somebody who played drums a little bit in, in school and like, I, I enjoy doing that. And I, I, there was a, there was a long kind of instrumental breakdown. And one of the songs I forget what, maybe it was kitty's back or something, um, where I filmed part of it because I was like, oh, this is like, really, I like, I'm going, I like how they're going from people to person to person. I, I, I wanna like, I wanna capture part of this. It's it's interesting. Um, but again, I like, there were people who were just filming the whole show and it's like, what do you, what are you gonna do with three hours of 2023 Bruce Springsteen taped on your phone? Just like, what is the point?
JVL00:11:34Film it with your eyes. Film it with your eyes. Remember it. The other thing is here's, here's the thing that's absolutely true. When you watch people filming it, they're not actually watching the stage. They're watching their phones. Yes. So anytime you go to like a kid's graduation or like, you know, a, a elementary school concert, watch the people who are filming it because they're not watching the thing they're watching. And so to be at the concert, to be staring at your phone, to get like that
Sonny00:11:56mediated view of it is again, I saw, I saw, uh, there was a David Lynch. There was an image of, um, when Kareem Abdul, or I'm sorry, when, uh, when LeBron James broke Kareem Abdul Jabbar's, uh, scoring title, there was this great photo. Everybody in the crowd has their camera up. They're taking the picture of LeBron on the court and they're getting, they're capturing that moment on their phone, which they'll never be able to see any other way. There won't be any other record of it except for one guy, one guy hero, Phil Knight, who Phil Knight, the Nike, the Nike CEO chair, whatever his title is. Phil Knight was like, I am rich enough that I don't have to pretend like this is, uh, this is a thing that I have to capture on my phone for me to watch. I'm just gonna sit here and soak it in. You know what? He's right. He's right. He's right. But here's the thing.
Mike00:12:56These are all, this is all like, it's not about actually capturing the moment. It is about being able to say I was there. And the way, you know, I was there is because I had my, my picture of it, or I took my video of the concert. So it's a very, it is very much, uh, you know, the sort of self, uh, inward focus, self-centered, you know, element of our, of our time. That's my like quasi philosophical, uh, comment on that.
Sonny00:13:23Well, there, there is the, the, the phone. The increase of narcissism and narcissistic disorders and phone use is palpable. I mean, like this is, this is why, right. The, the autograph, the celebrity autograph, um, has gone, has gone kind of by the wayside. I mean, you still have your professional autograph hunters out there, but when you are in Los Angeles and you run into Keanu Reeves filling up, you know, his motorcycle with gas at the Exxon, you don't go up to him with your little signature book and say, oh, Mr. Mr. Reeves, I need, I need your autograph. You asked for a selfie, right? It's like here, it's a photo of me and Keanu Reeves and we're together and we're both pumping gas and it's great, but this is my proof of it. This is how I can show you that I, that I have met the person and like, I get it on a certain sense. Cause that is kind of like, I would never do this because I would die of shame if I ever showed it to anybody. Um, but like I get it on a, on a cert and on a certain level, um, as an, as an autograph replacement.
JVL00:14:25I guess. But I, you know, so I, you know, my one like amazing famous person thing of the last few years was when George will invited me to go take in a baseball game with him at the old ball field. And his other guest was hall of famer, Tony La Russa, and I got to sit and watch seven innings of, of baseball with George will Tony La Russa and, uh, and people were coming up to, to George will left and right asking for photos with him, not a single person even as who La Russa was, even though he's wearing two world series rings, these gigantic, gigantic
Sonny00:15:01rings. Did he wear both? Does he wear one on each hand?
JVL00:15:04Yeah. Yeah, that's right. That's funny. And, uh, and I, I wrestled the entire time with, should I ask if I could get a picture with the two of them? Because I was not just a random person. I was, I was a co guest and I couldn't make myself do it. I just thought if I do that, I will be ashamed of myself forever. And uh, but then I don't have like this little memento of that thing. And I often wonder if I made the right choice.
Sonny00:15:32No, I, you, you did, you did what you should have done was buy a ticket for somebody else to go sit somewhere near you, but not with you and then turn around and take a picture of the three of you together. A candid shot. That's what you should have done. Yeah. Yeah. Like they, you know, just the, you know, we're all, we're all hanging out. No, this is a, God, this is something Roger Ebert used to say. Roger Ebert used to say, if you are interviewing a film person. You do not ask to take a picture with them. That is, that is against the rules that you can't do that. It's gauche. You gotta act like you've been there before you, you can't, you can't do that to, you can't do that to them, but you also can't do it to yourself. However, if you get a shot of you talking to the person taken by somebody else that is done candidly, that is totally fine. That's a thing you can put up on your wall and be like, here's me talking to Robert DeNiro or whatever. Right? The only example I ever bring it full circle. The only example I actually have of this is a, uh, I, I interviewed LeBron James once for when I was at the Washington times, uh, he had a, he's a, he was a producer on a basketball documentary, um, about his, his, his time in, in high school sports, um, and his team, uh, and I interviewed him and I'm like, so it's, it's like me and him in a hotel room, uh, of, he's like sitting. Not on the couch, but his legs are like still as high as I am, you know, like standing up. I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's an amazing thing being around professional basketball players because they are enormous freaks of nature, just like huge, enormous freaks. Um, but, uh, but like, that is like the one of those sorts of things that I have some, I actually don't even know where it's in one of my computers. Somebody else took the picture, but somebody else took the picture. There was a Washington times photographer there who was like taking pictures and I was
Mike00:17:25taking a better angle that way. Right. I mean, you're like the, the, the awkwardness, the sort of, you know, depending on how you hold the phone and where, you know, you've, you know, you're giving yourself like a double chin or you're not, you know, you're sort of doing this weird thing. It, it, you know, having that, that, that sort of third party, you know, gives it a, gives it a nice, you know, professional angle to it.
Sonny00:17:45If they're that's a, that's a, that's a, I mean, that's a separate question altogether. The aesthetics of the selfie, right. I hate, I dislike, I dislike selfies. I hate selfies as a genre. I don't, I don't like them.
Mike00:17:57I hit the name selfie. I resisted it as long as I could. It's an ussy.
Sonny00:18:00It's an ussy.
Mike00:18:01It's an ussy. Right. It's an ussy. It's an ussy. Well, then there was, when Elizabeth Warren was running for president you know, there was like a whole thing. You could get a selfie with her or, you know, the selfie line with her, the selfie line, but they weren't selfies. They were, she would grab the phone and, and, and, or they would like take pictures of her, but like they weren't actually selfies. They were, it was, are they, oh, I know what it was. They had like a. They had an original photographer taking photos and it was like selfie with Elizabeth Warren, but nobody who was in the photo was actually holding the camera and it was, it like drove me nuts. It was like, okay, selfie doesn't mean anything anymore.
Sonny00:18:36Not a selfie.
Mike00:18:37Not a selfie.
Sonny00:18:38That's just a photo. That's just a photo. That's just a photograph.
Mike00:18:42So the only thing that, that this reminds me of Sonny is you mentioned having somebody take the photo for you. I was listening to a podcast. There's a, there's a youngish comedian named Mark Normand. Like comedy fans may know him. And he famously has like struck up this friendship with Jerry Seinfeld. And I was listening to him talk about that friendship. You know, he like opened for him a series of nights or one night and they went out to dinner afterward, Mark Normand and Jerry Seinfeld. This is like his idol, obviously. And he was talking about this on a podcast and saying you know, the whole time I'm thinking I can't ask for a photo, but what happened was like Seinfeld. Body guy, you know, Seinfeld guy who's there with him, you know, all the time professionally snapped a photo of him and he says he blew it up and he has it in his house and it's a great photo and it's a casual photo. They're both sort of looking at each other and it's it's like so much better than the cheesiness because then the celebrity you want to take the photo with isn't like thrilled to be, you know, taking a photo with you. All of the sort of dynamics of like the weirdness and awkwardness of the selfie so much better to have somebody. Who knows this is an important moment. I should take a photo of it for this guy. Anyway, it was interesting. All right.
Sonny00:20:03Well, Mike, how are you doing?
Mike00:20:05I am fine. You know, things were going on in my house. We could. I'll tease it a little bit. Maybe we'll talk about it in the bonus episode that that that will that will do. But we are in the market for a new car and that's that's really all it's been like consuming me for the past like 48 hours. And I think by the time this airs. We will actually have a new car, which is very exciting, but but we'll we'll we'll talk about that later. All right, Jonathan, we missed you last week. Tell us, where were you? We soldiered on. But but we needed you. What's what was what was going on?
JVL00:20:38Yeah, I am very grateful for you guys doing the show without me. I am very, very grateful for you holding cocaine bear for me because I was super excited to see it. You know what? We'll talk about it on the bonus because I. I realize this is going to be out there for everybody, and it's a little, you know, a little sensitive medical medical information problem. It's it's rough. It's rough. We'll we'll talk about my body problems in the bonus.
Mike00:21:09But you're OK.
JVL00:21:10OK, you're OK, right? Save it for the bonus. Save it for the show. I went for the follow up doc appointment like two hours before we're sitting down to record this. And the doc was like, well, you know, we'll say it's great. Thanks, buddy.
Mike00:21:35All right, then. Well, I guess we should just then roll into what we were hoping to talk about last week. And then in your absence, we delayed to this week. Cocaine Bear, the I don't know what you call this, Sonny, a comedy horror movie. Cocaine Bear.
Sonny00:21:49It's just there. It's it's a it's a I would say it's a horror comedy. Yeah, well, I mean, there's some debate over how to discuss this movie's like box office performance and it's it's it's cinema score because it got us it got a B minus from cinema score audiences, which if it's a horror movie, that's actually a pretty good score. That's that's the equivalent of getting like a B plus or an A minus because horror movies are always judged more harshly than any any other genre for some reason. So like the way cinema score works, I'm going to get real nerdy. Here for a second. The way cinema score works is they interview people who go to see a movie on opening weekend. And what cinema score then is actually measuring is does this movie meet your expectations? Person who was convinced by the advertising campaign to come see this, who likes this genre and this type of movie? Are you are you the target audience, a fan of this movie? And for some reason, horror movies are always judged more harshly by by the people who go to these movies in any other genre. It's the weirdest thing. Everything else, you know, this this is one reason why MCU the Marvel Cinematic Universe had such a long, unbroken streak of a a minus type movies is it's not just that they were well done. It's that they were meeting the expectations of the audiences that that they were they were going for. So, you know, if this is a horror movie, B minus is fine. If it's comedy, that's not as good, but it's holding OK at the box office again by horror expectations. So I think of this. I think of this as a horror.
Mike00:23:31With comedic elements, Sonny, why don't you why don't you just give us the the big boy review of this of this comedy with horror elements or horror with comedy elements?
Sonny00:23:42So Cocaine Bear directed by Elizabeth Banks, Elizabeth Banks getting back into the director's chair is about a bear. That does cocaine. That's it. That's the movie. Hold on. Back up.
Mike00:24:00Back up. Cocaine.
Sonny00:24:02Can you explain that in a way that maybe there's a bear bear in this movie? There's a bear. Right.
Mike00:24:08The animal. Right. I mean, the animal. Not not not the Chicago football player.
Sonny00:24:12OK, the animal bear. Does human cocaine, I think it's just can you believe how wacky that is? Yeah. And guess what? It makes the bear kind of crazy. Bear kills a bunch of people. Bear kills Ben. Then the bear passes out until it gets more cocaine and then it's excited again. It's just like a human.
JVL00:24:36It's it's like the bear dies, but the cocaine brings it back to life so it can save her children.
Sonny00:24:42Exactly. Cocaine is a real wonder drug in this movie.
JVL00:24:45Cocaine is a wonder drug.
Sonny00:24:47Cocaine is a real wonder drug. So all right. So the setup here is a drug dealer tosses his drugs out of an airplane. And it lands in a national park and the bear finds the cocaine and starts killing hikers and park employees and hunting children who are skipping school and gangs that run around the park and are named after Marcel Duchamp for some reason. And that's that's that's I mean, like literally that's the entire movie. It has been stripped down to the most basic element. Which, again, is a bear doing cocaine and killing people. That's that's all this movie is. That's all that's all you're looking for in Cocaine Bear. And on those very limited grounds, this movie is a huge success. This movie has a bear. The movie, the movie features a bear that does cocaine and it's it gets it on its promise. Wacky hijinks that involve people dying. That's all I like. It's hard for me to. So, like, I don't think this is a great film or anything. I don't think this is a, you know, this isn't going to win any Oscars or anything. But it is a it's a movie that promises you one very limited thing and it delivers on that promise. And as a result, I have to give it a thumbs up because it is truth in advertising. There's something to be said for truth and truth in advertising in this movie, has it? I don't know, man. I like I it's it's the sort of thing where I feel like there's a version of this movie that's one hundred percent funnier that doesn't rely just on. For for all of its comic beats to just be like people saying like the bear did cocaine in various like wacky faces like there. There's a movie that has actual jokes and has like setups and payoffs later. But this is also it's also I saw somebody described this movie as adjacent to Wet Hot American Summer, and that is actually like more of the tone of what it is going for than anything more serious, like a more serious horror film or even a more serious comedy.
Mike00:26:54That it has this it's campier than than than it needs to be.
Sonny00:26:58Yeah, but no, but but it's it it doesn't it doesn't suffer from being forced camp. But we've no no, no, no, no. Like you can't you can't force camp. You can't like you can't create a camp classic. That's not how camp works. And I don't think that this quite does that. I think this is too self-aware to be that. And again, like the thing that. So the one sequence in particular that I'm thinking of here, there's a there's a moment where. So again, this this in this movie, there's a gang. Of youths who stumble upon the cocaine that was tossed out of the airplane, they want to sell it and one by one they die in various ways. And there's a there's a moment in this film where the surviving gang member, the surviving do champ brother or whatever, whatever it is they're called, see is like telling the origin story of his friendship with these guys. And they're all sitting on a on a bench, except like one of them has a big hole in his chest. The other one is like had his head ripped off and it's in his arms. Or whatever. And that's kind of the tone of the whole thing. It's kind of it's kind of intentionally absurdist, over the top and and silly. Again, I like this just fine. It is not it is not high art. It is it could have been better. It definitely could have been better for what it is. It is a perfectly acceptable movie about a bear doing cocaine and then killing a bunch of people. It's also surprisingly gory. That's the other thing I was not expecting. I did not go into this movie. I was expecting it to be like hard are because of bodily violence to people. But there were several moments in this movie, like when when the annoying guy from the tick tocks who worked worked at Ikea, you know him that that guy when that guy is is he's in the ambulance and his like he's an EMT and falls off his arm. He's playing an EMT in this movie and his hand. I like burst into laughter when that happened just because I wasn't expecting it. It was it was a it was a again. It's it's a shockingly gory sort of movie, which I appreciate because, like, so often with stuff like this, they really skimp out on the gore. And if you're going to again, if you're going to have a massive, you know, 500 pound bear, get high on cocaine and kill people, I want to see some I want to see some real violence. And this movie delivered on the violence.
Mike00:29:14You got that. JVL, what did you think of this movie?
JVL00:29:17Yeah. You know, I mean, there are there are parts of it which really work. And the parts of it which really work are the parts with actual written comedy. You know, like so when we wind up with a Mexican standoff at a gazebo with a police officer on top of the gazebo, but he can't get down, but he has a cocaine and a gun and then two of the the drug dealer gangsters who are there, one of whom is Alden Ehrenreich, who himself doesn't want to be a drug dealer gangster anymore. He is and he is the son of the capo and he's trying to get out of it. He's trying to make better life choices. And then his his his best friend who very much just wants to be a better drug dealer. Anyway, that's a really funny piece of work. And the movie doesn't have nearly enough of it. You know, as this is an Elizabeth Banks problem, I think she directed the second Pitch Perfect, which is a disaster because it's too broad. She's just her. Her sense of humor is simply not subtle enough. And there are there flashes of one of my favorite things about is the way that the bear is portrayed is almost as if he's a ninja. So the 500 pound bear can, you know, disappear from one spot and reappear in another spot utterly silently within the span of like 15 seconds. And I actually think that's a great bit. Like it's really funny having the, you know, how did the bear, you know, again, as if it's a gigantic bear doing that. Right. But I. I don't know, I, again, so I, I agree with both the, it isn't funny enough and it's easy to see how it could have been funnier. Like, you know, you one more pass through the script with a, a talented screenwriter could have made it funnier, but it also misses, I think an obvious thematic thing, which would have made it even funnier, which is that. So we, we really have three different plots, like three different groups of people making their way through the forest. Uh, we have the. Drug dealers and the cops. We have the, uh, park ranger and her love interest. And then we have Carrie Russell, who is a single mother who has been dragged into this because her kid and her kid's best friend skipped school to go to the forest. Right. And one of the things we, we learned very quickly is that Carrie Russell says she's going to work and she leaves to go to work so that her kid will go to school. As soon as her kid is supposed to be gone from school, she comes home to just like have a glass of wine and have a day to herself. We learn in, we learn in the movie that the bear is not a, a he bear, but is a she bear. And we later learn she has two cubs and here she is just as a single mom trying to get through the day and trying to do a little cocaine. And there is a fantastic, again, just an, an underused, a thematic bit of comedy would have been the extent to which Carrie Russell's character. And the bear character are kind of in the same journey fucking hysterical just sort of like laid there.
Sonny00:32:31There is, there is no, but there is a subcurrent of that, right? Which is that there's also, there's also the argument about, we haven't even mentioned that Ray Liotta plays the like head drug dealer. Ray Liotta is the guy who is a head drug dealer. And it's his son. Who's like trying to get out of the family business, Alden Ehrenreich's character, fantastic
JVL00:32:48in this.
Sonny00:32:49He's the best thing in the movie. And Alden Ehrenreich has like abandoned his own kid. Because his wife has died. And so like the kid is with Ray Liotta. Who's like, I don't, I'm just, I don't know what to do with these kids.
JVL00:33:00Who doesn't know what to do with these kids. Just leaves them in a Chuck E. Cheese.
Sonny00:33:02So he just throws them in a Chuck E. Cheese ball pit and, and bails. No, but I mean like I, that, that is all here, but you're right now, this is the sort of movie that needed like one more or possibly one fewer group of characters maybe. I like, there's something there is, but this, this, this movie is both bloated.
JVL00:33:19We don't need the Duchamp gang. We don't need the Duchamp gang at all.
Sonny00:33:23Yeah.
JVL00:33:24That, that would be.
Sonny00:33:25They're useless. That would be, that would be probably the place to cut. Um, if you, if you had to get rid of something, but, uh, no, it, uh, I, again, it's like, it's like, you can see, you can see where it could have been again, like.
JVL00:33:38This could have been a cult classic. This could have been an absolute cult classic and a movie that people talked about for years. Instead, I think it basically just plays as a prop comic. You know, it's like, yeah, you remember that, that movie with the bear that take cocaine. Right. Am I wrong about this Mike?
Mike00:33:58Did you? No, it's like a first, it's like a first draft, right? Uh, like, like it's, as you said, if they had had somebody else, a sort of seasoned comedy script writer kind of come through, add more jokes. And, and I do have to say that the end, I mean the, the, the sort of the, the, the saves the day, uh, moment where the, the cocaine bear comes back, saves everybody and, and the bad guys get there, come up. So it's, I mean, and it got almost a little mockish, which felt totally off from the rest of the movie. Um, and it kind of leaves you with, uh, not exactly, not ironic enough, not, yeah, exactly. Not ironic enough. Not funny enough.
Sonny00:34:39Um, and actually had Ray Liotta punt one of the cubs into the water.
JVL00:34:44Yeah, exactly. That would have been too dark for the movie. Right. Right. In a weird way.
Mike00:34:50You could tell it would have been too dark for them. Well, and, and I don't know how I'm curious what your audience. We're like, because there, cause I saw this in a Alamo draft house with a big audience on like a Saturday night. Um, and a couple things that I noticed about it and then I have other thoughts, but a couple things that I noticed watching it with a group is, um, everybody was like primed and ready to go. Like they wanted to laugh at this movie. They wanted to be grossed out and horrified and scared by this movie. Um, I think at the base level, their, their, um, their desires were. Sort of met and people were laughing. People were wrong. I was laughing, you know, it was, it was a sort of a good time. Um, but there was this, I think you're right about the, about the Cubs because when they show up, when the Cubs show up and they're, you know, oh, isn't it cute. They're playing around with, with their own little pile of cocaine. Um, there was like audible Oz through her hat. So, I mean, you know, again, it was sort of, it had this weird thing. It was like, yeah, we just watched their mother, like, you know, uh, rip apart people for, uh, 45 minutes. Um, oh, but look at the, look at the little baby cocaine bears. Maybe they'll be like their mom someday. Um, so, so it was, it was a little odd, but I actually, Sonny, I, you know, you said you liked the gore. I thought the gore and particularly the, the horror elements of it really dropped off in like the last, the last third of the movie. And I was kind of expecting more, more jump scares or more kind of pure kind of tension and horror that, um, that wasn't, I mean, look, maybe this is a 90 minute movie. I mean, this is, this is not. This is not like a long movie and maybe it was just fine. Ray Liotta's intestines are pulled out at the end Michael.
JVL00:36:27Yeah.
Mike00:36:28Well, that's true. That's true. Okay. So it was gory, but it was not, it was not like horrifying. It was not like, like, like scary in the way that I was kind of expecting it to at the beginning, the tension, the tension with like the, the European hikers, um, the, the, the tension with the kids that sort of fell away. And, and I was just hoping for a little more, um, a little more tension, a little less sort of, I don't know if that kind of standoff spectacle that, that the waterfall was at the end. Um, just my thought, but, but I guess I'm wrong.
Sonny00:37:02I will say, I will say that my audience, um, my audience is very quiet in this movie. I, there was not, there was not a lot of like raucous laughter or anything like that. It, it, with the exception again of the like unexpected moments of like very serious violence. I mean like there's, we haven't even, we haven't mentioned Margo Martindale who plays the older,
JVL00:37:22uh, uh, park ranger, mean, dumb park ranger.
Sonny00:37:26She's great. Who is, who is trying to, uh, seduce the, uh, the out of town park ranger who was there to like, you know, judge how everything is going. Um, and that, that all that stuff is very funny, but like there's played by Jesse Tyler Ferguson, by the way, who I did not recognize at all. I can't tell is it, I'm not sure if he's like put on some weight or something, but he put
Mike00:37:46it, he put on weight and he's got the mustache in the head, but like, he's got the wig that
Sonny00:37:50way.
Mike00:37:51Right. He took like 15 seconds to realize who it was. I was like, who is that?
Sonny00:37:55I did. I thought he had been cut out of the movie entirely. I literally, I wrote this in my, my like little letterbox capsule. I was like, was he in this? He's like third credited in this movie, who, where was he in it at all? And then somebody was like, Hey, he's wearing the wig. Um, uh, anyway, uh, but like Margo Martindale's death in this movie is like, again, like shockingly brutal. Like she's strapped to a gurney and like falls out face first and gets like dragged on the ground. And like, again, this is the sort of thing that my audience like kind of. Like, like guffaw dad, it was like, you know, that sort of, that sort of response, um, which is, again, this is why it was the best thing in the movie for me is I, I just like, it was unexpected in a way that, uh, that, that was kind of nice. I don't know.
JVL00:38:38You know, so what's funny is that we, you know, I, I said that it needed another pass of writing, but the truth is this project has been gestating for so long that the problem is probably the opposite, that there were just two. Too many revisions and too many versions. I mean, this is originally was gonna be a Lord and Miller, uh, yeah, they're, they're
Sonny00:38:58producers on it.
JVL00:38:59And so they get a producing credit. They, but originally they were gonna direct it. They wanted to direct this would have been, I suspect about 10 times funnier.
Sonny00:39:10Yeah. If they had, if they had made this movie, yeah, if they, if they had made this movie
JVL00:39:14themselves. Yeah. And I don't know, I like, I'm not mad at it. It was, it was perfectly great way to spend 86 minutes or however long it was. Yeah.
Sonny00:39:23You were excited for this movie.
JVL00:39:24I, yeah, I was, and I don't, like I said, I don't hate, but I do feel like it just left a lot, a lot on the table in terms of what it could have been. Right. This could have been something that we all laughed about for years to come.
Mike00:39:37It's it's no snakes on a plane, you know? I mean, like it, it, it, for, I think it falls short of this, but it falls short. No, that's the problem. It is.
Sonny00:39:46That's the problem.
Mike00:39:47Yeah. That it doesn't that that's see, I thought sticks on a plane was like a cult classic
Sonny00:39:52now, but I guess it's not, I don't think you ever watch snakes on a plane. It's not good, but actually seen, it's not funny. It's not, it's a bad movie. And like, so it's kind of interesting, you know, snakes on a plane was not originally intended to be, um, this like kind of campy cult classic that it was, it was like written more or less as a straightforward, like passenger 57 type movie, uh, where like, it was like a, it was an action movie, uh, action thriller set on an airplane. It just happened to have some snakes in it. And then the internet got ahold of it. The internet got ahold of it. Somebody, somebody wrote a blog post about the script was like, you know, this is the sort of movie where you expect to hear, you know, Samuel L. Jackson talking about getting the motherfucking snakes off the motherfucking plane. And like the internet ran with that, the, this was, uh, at the, um, at the reveal, Scott Tobias, uh, it's a sub stack I subscribed to, uh, Scott Tobias, long time film critic, AB club, uh, the dissolve, all those places. He, you know, he, he kind of tracked how this movie, this movie came about in, in turned into what it was. And like the internet rewrote to that movie, the internet like pitch lines, pitched, pitched lines to the studio and the studio was like, you know what? We like your suggestions, internet, we're going to incorporate them into the movie. And so they reshot, they did like, uh, I dunno, two weeks of reshoots that added in all of the like kind of campy nonsense stuff. You know, I, I think that's, that's what that movie feels like is like a bad crowdsourced internet joke. Um, and that is, I don't think this movie quite gets to that. It just is, is not, it's just not as good as it could have been. It, it, they're, they're, well, maybe it's just Elizabeth banks. Isn't funny.
Mike00:41:42Right. Or maybe it's sort of shaped by that culture of this, you know, they're not actually taking comments from the internet, but they're sort of making it. The internet in mind and, and sort of trying to like what, or they're, or what they're saying is we don't have to work that hard on this because the internet will take care of it. The internet will make this a hit. Um, so just finish it up, finish the script, get it out there because who's like, who's going to expect much from cocaine bear and people will love it and it will go viral with all the, the, the we'll make the trailer really good. We'll make the bear look really good and, and, and, and worry about the rest. I hope that's not the case.
JVL00:42:21We'll do a great, great cover of white lines and, uh, I, I would say, I am not saying that Elizabeth Banks isn't funny. I think Elizabeth Banks as an actress is quite funny. Yes. I think that in the handful of examples of her directorial work, she strikes me as being a director who is, whose sense of comedy is broader than I think supports the humor. Right. I, I like broad comedy sometimes, but sometimes. It needs a little subtlety to it. And I don't think she has that in her toolbox. That's all I'm saying. Yeah. Not saying women can't be funny. That's literally.
Sonny00:43:00Not saying that. That's what you were implying.
JVL00:43:02You were implying that. That's not what I was implying. I heard. I read between the lines. I think that she was not, she was not perhaps matched to this project as a director in ways which served both her and the film.
Sonny00:43:13That's what I'm saying. Before, before this, before this episode, you were sending us links to Christopher Hitchens pieces about women not being funny. And I was like, where is he going with this? I don't understand. You know, it was all set up. I don't think we're allowed to, I don't think we're allowed to talk. No, I'm just kidding. That did not happen for the record. Um, one thing.
Mike00:43:30Can I say, go ahead Sonny.
Sonny00:43:31Yeah.
Mike00:43:32No, go ahead. Oh, I was gonna say there is something I really, really enjoyed about the movie, which was the sense of place, uh, because this is a place I am very familiar with the, the Northeast Georgia mountains and where this took place, which I don't believe it was filmed there. I believe it was filmed in Ireland, which is wild. But it took place in this part of Georgia that I spent countless summers in. And in fact, we talked a few weeks ago about my hiking, the Georgia section of the Appalachian trail on that trip, I, uh, I camped out on, I climbed and camped out on top of blood mountain, which is where the cocaine bear. So I was like watching all this and they got, you know, some of the accents are better than others, but they kind of got that small town mountain town vibe that I, it looked and felt pretty authentic. I liked that aspect of it. I liked the, um, uh, the, the way, I mean, they sort of played up those, the country ness of where this was. Um, uh, I, I, I really appreciated and I love, and like blood mountain, like sounds like a joke, but it's an actual name of a place, a real place where this happened. Cause of course this is based on a true story. And, um, and so I liked that. What, what did you guys think about the kids in the movie here? It felt like they were going for a kind of old school eighties, you know, Goonies type vibe with the kids. Um, what do you think?
JVL00:45:00It felt more like good boys to me, like, you know, we're gonna, we're gonna get our, we're gonna get our humor by having children say curse words, say curse words, which again, children saying curse words can be very, very funny.
Sonny00:45:15Yeah.
JVL00:45:16But again, there's gonna have to be like jokes, right? That's why, right. That's why good boys is so funny. Cause it's full of jokes and the jokes are funny.
?00:45:24Yes.
Sonny00:45:25And the jokes here are like, the kids are gonna eat a spoonful of cocaine. That's wacky. That's a, that's a wacky thing for a child to do. We don't want, what is, what's gonna happen to them? Um, but no, it, it, uh, it doesn't, doesn't, doesn't all quite come together. And did you guys want to do, uh, did you guys want to do animal drug pitches?
JVL00:45:48Oh, I thought that was the bonus.
Sonny00:45:51Well, we're gonna, we're gonna talk, well, now we've got, now we've got your body failing you to talk about, and also, uh, Mike buying a car. So like, I, I feel like I, I, we might be, we might be jammed.
Mike00:46:02Why don't we, why don't we, why don't we do, why don't we do as an outtake? Do the, uh, the, the animals, uh, oh, I have an outtake for you though. Oh, you do.
JVL00:46:10Okay. Well, let's have too much content.
Mike00:46:12So we're bursting with content here.
JVL00:46:14Okay. Let's do the animal pitches then.
Mike00:46:16Sure. Yeah. So yeah. Uh, JVL, what, what, uh, what you cocaine bear is a smash hit. Uh, the studio comes to you. What is the next great drug animal in the wild movie?
JVL00:46:27So, so the thing is you gotta combine an animal that taps into, uh, some deep subconscious realm with people and, you know, this is why like, uh, anaconda and jaws and shark NATO and snakes on a plane all work to the extent they do, which is that these are animals that really, so I was thinking you could get like a lion. Lions are, you know, people, people respect lions, but then you've gotta have like the right drug. So for instance, weed, lion, not gonna be an especially interesting, but basically you'd have like Snoop and the lion hanging out together like, oh, Hey, right.
Sonny00:47:06That could be, I mean, that's a different sort of movie.
JVL00:47:09Yeah. So, uh, hippos, I thought about hippos, hippos are fucking terrifying, right? You could do, you could do hippos, but not that they're doing drugs. Hangry a movie called hangry, hangry hippos.
Sonny00:47:24Oh, hangry, hangry hippos.
JVL00:47:27But that's that, but that's all of that is that I actually have, I have the answer to all of this.
Mike00:47:33Yes.
JVL00:47:34Meth gator, meth gator, meth gator, right? We're down in Florida, a bunch of meth heads out in the, out in the glades, cuz they're all meth heads there anyway, and the gators are tough as shit and the gator like steals their meth. And all of a sudden we got like, it's a half wild things, half, uh, I don't know what was the, was it Gerard Butler movie with Winona Ryder or something? We did one of these dumb action movies like four years ago.
Sonny00:48:05Mm. Gerard.
JVL00:48:07No, I'll look, it's, it's not what Winona Ryder's I'll, I'll, I'll effort that while you guys talk. But meth gator, I love a hit.
Sonny00:48:15I feel like meth is gonna be a big part of any of this, I mean, meth is inherently a funny, funny drug. All right. Uh, what about you?
Mike00:48:23Mike? What are you? Uh, Sonny, why don't you go first?
Sonny00:48:26I'll, I'll, I'll close it out here. Well, I was gonna, I was gonna go with meth as well, because meth is a funny drug. You know, aside from all the human suffering, sure. Set aside the human suffering and the addiction and the crime and all that meth is meth is funny. Just hilarious. It's a, it's a funny word to say meth I'm on meth. I like that. I like that word. Um, so who's doing meth? Uh, so I was gonna go with it, but since we've already got a meth animal, I, I won't do meth. Um, instead I'm gonna go with, uh, this is, uh, sorry, home front home front Jason Statham.
JVL00:48:58So close.
Sonny00:48:59When I said Gerard Joe home front. Yeah. Right. We're in the glaze.
JVL00:49:03Yes. Yes.
Sonny00:49:05There you go. That was a good one. Um, no, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go with, uh, LSD beaver LSD beaver. So the beaver, the beaver, you gotta imagine the beaver finds, uh, Timothy Leary's secret stash and, uh, the beaver eats all of the. Uh, little, little LSD tabs. And then all of a sudden he's seeing, he's seeing giant trees everywhere and dams that need to be built. Um, and it turns out that he's, he's, uh, he and his, uh, little h h coven. I don't know what you call beavers. Like a lodge.
Mike00:49:39It's a lodge.
Sonny00:49:40He and his lodge of beavers who are all high shit on LSD are running around, uh, chewing through the foundations of, of things. Collapsing buildings. And there, there's just a, there's a mass beaver panic. Um, and, uh, also some legs get eaten, I think in this, in this scenario, but LSD beaver, just imagine the point of view, the POV shots of an LSD, uh, deranged beaver running around thinking that he is, he's building dams and he's, he's, uh, you know, creating little, little rivers.
JVL00:50:15So, so on the shots are animated, right? Sure.
Mike00:50:20So I'm imagining this is like, you know, like a scientist bringing his, maybe like it's a period piece, you know, like bringing the, you know, lysergic acid that he has, uh, you know, been, been, uh, has, has taken out of the lab to, to do experiments, losing it in the woods of like British Columbia. And that's where it's like, where, cause we gotta have a place here. We have the, the, the Beth Gator in Florida. It's this feels like a, like wilderness of the, of the Pacific Northwest kind of movie, right?
Sonny00:50:48Sure. I don't know where beavers are, but yeah. That sounds right.
?00:50:51Beavers are everywhere.
Sonny00:50:52Right? Aren't the beavers all over America? Beavers are all over. There's water.
Mike00:50:56There's beavers. Yeah. It just, just feels like those, like you could also do a lot more, you know, sort of destruction
JVL00:51:01with those due to changes in personal grooming. The beaver was extinct. Okay.
Mike00:51:09Uh, and then my, mine, which, uh, I think really, um, needs no explanation. Come on. Nothing for that Sonny.
Sonny00:51:17I don't, I don't go in for this sort of low. Humor, you know, this saved this for your Elizabeth Banks movies.
?00:51:24Yeah.
Mike00:51:25We're trying to keep it high, high minded here at the, uh, at the new Sub-Beacon here. Um, all right. Well, well, my, my needs no explanation. It's, uh, it's bath salts, Marmot, and I think it speaks for itself.
Sonny00:51:36I mean, that sells itself bath salts, Marmot. I would, I would go see that. Yeah. And that's like a, it's the big Lebowski sequel. We've all been demanding.
Mike00:51:45I made you go try to sell that one. Uh, any other thoughts on cocaine? Bear before, uh, we wrap things up, gentlemen. No, nope.
JVL00:51:53All right.
Mike00:51:54No. Well, that's, uh, it's yeah, but yeah, it's, it's okay. Uh, well, that's all the time we are giving. I'm gonna start that over. Well, that's all the time we're giving to this episode of the Sub-Beacon podcast. You're not taking that out.
Sonny00:52:08I'm not. I'm just gonna let it run through.
Mike00:52:10I want people to hear the unvarnished, the unvarnished, uh, this is my first time co-hosting here. Um, uh, that's all the time. We're giving to this episode of the Sub-Beacon thanks, uh, for listening. The, uh, Patreon, uh, website is somewhere you can find it. You can follow Sonny Bunch on Twitter somewhere.
Sonny00:52:31It's somewhere. Patreon website is somewhere I don't know where it is.
Mike00:52:36Where is it? Sonny? Where is it? Google it. Exactly. It's not hard. Sub-Beacon.com. There you go. Uh, is the Patreon. Uh, give us a follow and, uh, thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.
JVL00:52:50What you got JVL so, uh, so I, I have another podcast that I'm spinning up and, uh, first episode drops Sunday night, I think the Sunday, uh, and on the show, uh, my buddy Tim Miller and I interviewed a semi-famous actor mm-hmm and I have a story about how parenthood is the great leveling, you know, all of these things. So I, I, I think I'm not supposed to say who the actor is before, before the actual show drops. Uh, he is somebody who, uh, has recently been in a superhero movie. Got it. And when I was, when I was talking with him, I said, uh, I said, you know, it's funny because my, my youngest kid G money, who's six, I said, when, when I told him that I was gonna, gonna be talking to you today, he went crazy. Yeah. Because you are his favorite superhero in his favorite superhero movie. He looked at me. He's like, really? It's like, I mean, the movie's really good, but I've got, like, my part is very, very small. Like why, why, why did he like me? And I said, because blue's his favorite color and your costume is blue. And he broke out laughing and I was like, you know how, when you chocolate milk only tastes good out of the blue plastic cup from Ikea. And he was like, oh my God, yes, this is the. We're all living the same life. Totally. Whether we are us or like some, cuz he's got a six year old and a three year old and he's fighting it out just like the three of us are. And uh, it's the great leveler.
Mike00:54:31Celebrities are just like us. That's right. Only prettier.
JVL00:54:35I'm sure it's fine.
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