#195. 'Mission: Imposible — Dead Reckoning: Part One'
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Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One gets a near-unanimous rave from all three hosts: Sonny (after initially misremembering the big car chase as being in Venice rather than Rome) calls it the "non-shitty Fast and Furious," loving how thin the AI-MacGuffin plot is in service of the stunts, and singles out Pom Klementieff's silently grinning, mantis-like henchwoman as the highlight of the Rome sequence; JVL, who calls the franchise his all-time favorite and this entry more Hitchcockian and tension-driven than its predecessors, praises the submarine sequence as the best since The Hunt for Red October and predicts it'll be an all-four-quadrant hit, just short of Maverick; Mike loved the practical motorcycle-cliff-jump stunt and the alley/train intercut fight but admits the connective plot tissue (how the AI, the key, and the recovered bodies all fit together) went over his head, and all three needle Ving Rhames's bulked-up physique and worry about a suddenly gaunt-looking Simon Pegg. The first third is the usual grab-bag of banter: Sonny and JVL compare disappointing Prime Day hauls (a TV hunt gone bust, a kids' Alexa), JVL reports that his son Flash came through elbow surgery fine, and a listener email from "friend of the show" Jason Cooper about softball bat compression and 90-mph exit velocities prompts JVL to formally retract his stance from the softball-brawl saga of the previous episode, complete with a detour into 1950s barnstorming pitcher "King and His Court." They also dig into the box office, noting Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny's soft hold, the surprise overperformance of Sound of Freedom, and the odd IMAX-contract maneuvering that let Dead Reckoning start previewing nearly a week before its official Friday release. The episode closes with an outtake about Mike assembling a secondhand bunk bed as a surprise for his kids returning from grandparent camp.
From the show notes
There are spoilers in this episode, so if you haven't watched the movie yet please don't listen! Don't yell at us if you do listen!
Full transcript
JVL00:00:00Your life will always matter more to me than my own.
Guest00:00:12None of our lives can matter more than this mission. I don't accept that.
Mike00:00:26Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I'm your co-host, Mike Warren. Joining me, as always, are my two co-hosts who have chosen to accept this mission, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. You can follow us at SubBeacon.com, where you can sign up to become a patron, hear episodes the day they come out, get exclusive access to our bonus episodes, comment, join the conversation, and be a part of the Sub-Beacon community. We'll be talking later in the show about Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1. But first, Sonny, what's going on?
Sonny00:01:01Uh, hey guys, how's it going? You guys, you're having a, you're having a good, did you have a blessed Prime Day? We didn't even, we didn't even do our Prime Day bit last week.
JVL00:01:12I didn't buy a single thing. I kept looking. I kept looking. I had my phone out almost the entire time. I kept trying to find things. I wanted to buy a TV. I've been waiting to buy a new TV for Prime Day and they were just pushing, I need a 65 inch TV that is not like super great, but like good enough. I need a good enough 65 inch ultra high def. I want it to be on the Roku platform. Uh, and because this is a disposable TV, I don't want to spend a ton of money on it. Like this is, this is disposable level TV. I'm sorry to explain. Basically this is for a room of, what do you want me to explain?
Sonny00:01:48When you say disposable TV, are you planning on taking it camping and then chucking it in a, in a garbage carrier on the way home?
JVL00:01:56No, no. I just, it's for a room that is not going to be a high TV watching room, but you know, we're gonna do like 30%, 35% of TV watching from this room. And because of the seating in it, the seating is really far back. And so when you do things like watch baseball or tennis, it's very hard. We have a 42 inch TV in there and it's very hard to like see the scores and see the stats and stuff as they. And so I just want something that's gonna be good enough with a wide viewing angle. That's pretty good. And, and point is all the pro all that Bezos was pushing. Well, it's not, this is why Lord Bezos is no longer in charge of Amazon. I know he's moved on to other things. I think that that is why prime day, this was the worst prime day ever. Oh, wow. And all they were pushing was year old and two year old fire TVs, because they got, I guess they're sitting on a lot of stock of that stuff that didn't sell. And so they're trying to push it out the door. And I, I'm like the kid who, who came down and there were no Christmas presents, or I don't, I don't even know what the analogy is. I kept trying to give him my money on prime day and I couldn't
Sonny00:03:08do it. So you didn't get the, get the throwaway TV. No, I was also vaguely unimpressed by, by prime day this year. I mean, like the only things I usually, I, I, I did end up getting a couple of things because I needed, uh, I'm getting presents for my daughter. Uh, she doesn't, she doesn't listen to the podcast. So I can tell people I want to, I'm getting, uh, like a little Alexa for kids so she can listen to music in her room. Um, and I like, well, so I, maybe this is a question you guys can answer. It's too late now. Cause I've already bought, I've already bought the Alexa and the wireless headphones so she can listen to music. But like we were trying to figure out what we wanted to get her a device. We basically wanted to get her an iPod. We wanted to get an iPod that could like just stream, uh, Spotify or something. And that doesn't exist anymore. The iPod, they don't make the iPods anymore. I mean, they still exist. You can, you can buy them, but you have to buy them like used or refurbished and they're all really expensive because people still want iPods. Um, but it, uh, anyway, it was, it was very vaguely frustrating. Uh, the, the, did you go and buy her a Zune? No, no, we ended up again, we got that. We got an Alexa. We got a kid's Alexa with like a bunch of built-in parental controls and, um, and, uh, and, uh, and a set of wireless headphones. But like, I don't, I like the, the options are like get an iPad. I don't want to, I don't want her to have an iPad. That's the whole point of a, you know, iPod touch or something. I don't want her to have a, I don't want her connected to the outside world. I don't want her to escape the prison of my house, uh, for as long as possible, you know? So anyway, uh, so anyway, I like, do you guys, so you didn't buy anything? No, well I did. I did again. I, I bought, I got the kid's Alexa and I got the, the wireless
Mike00:04:56headphone. So the wireless headphones. Yeah. So, um, yeah, I mean, I, I'm not a prime day person. Um, I sort of, I sort of feel like a secular Jew around Christmas time. Like I'm like,
JVL00:05:12it like you went to get Chinese and then saw a movie. Yeah. It exists around me. Like
Mike00:05:17I'm not going to turn away a Christmas present, you know, a prime day present, but like, uh, you know, it's not, uh, I don't observe. Um, but this, this year I did, because there were like some, but like, I don't do it right. You know, I, I sort of like, they're like very specific things that I need at the moment. And I just am like, oh, if it's a good deal on Amazon, I'll, I'll, I'll get it. Um, but it's not like big purchases or anything like that. So it was very stupid. Like we got a, we got a, a hand-me-down for free, um, or actually for, uh, for a very small amount of money, uh, gas grill. And so like, I need to replace parts of it and so like I bought replacement parts, very boring, very uninteresting. Um, and it's the socks of primed. I mean, like, but this is like what primed. Totally. It says I, I got a whole bunch of socks, but isn't this what prime day is for is to offload Amazon's, uh, inventory ahead of, uh, you know, the fall and the Christmas season and all of that. I mean, like that,
JVL00:06:19that's all it's for. That's what it is now under Jeff Bezos. It was about bringing joy to consumer. Hmm. Okay. Okay. Don't you agree, Sonny, the lightning deals you would open up your phone on prime day morning and the, oh, look at this lightning deal. I needed flash drives with 64 gigs of memory for a dollar 50. I'll buy 30 of them.
Sonny00:06:42Yeah. I, I do wonder how much of prime day, I wonder how much of this has to do with, uh, with like the, the overall flattening of, of, uh, prices and whether or not they think they have captured all the people that they can capture by like loss leader prime day specials. So like Amazon no longer is like, we need to get people to sign up for prime day to join prime. So we're gonna offer, you know, like $5, 4k blue rays. Everybody's already there.
JVL00:07:12Yeah. Uh, I don't know if you guys have, have read about this, but there is a, a big, big thing going on in logistics community where people are discovering that non prime members are still getting prime delivery because the Amazon logistics are just so good. Yup. And, but this means that there are a whole bunch of people freeloading and getting their free two. In fact, we have one of them here on this podcast, Sonny, what isn't this close to
Sonny00:07:44being, uh, an IP pirate? No, no, I mean, it's not, it's not even close to the same thing. Do you want to cut off his left hand? No, but I, if I were, if I were at Amazon, I would actually like, I would make it more painful for them. If I was at Amazon, I would, I would make it so that the, uh, they got all of their deliveries on Lord on the, on delivery day a month later. Yeah, no, I mean, I w I like, so if you're a member of prime, you can choose, uh, like an Amazon day where everything comes on the same day. And it's like, it's like a, it's a thing. Um, right. Uh, and, uh, I'd never choose that because I either I pay for prime. I want my things to, even if I don't need the thing 24 hours later, I want it 24 hours later on general. So on general principle, if I worked, if I ran Amazon, I would delay everybody else's deliveries until some specific day. And I, I imagine it wouldn't be that hard to do with logistics and
JVL00:08:43all that, but I don't know, JVL what's going on. Uh, flash is okay for anybody who cared. He came through surgery. Fine. The surgeon was, uh, happy with what he saw and happy with his repair. So yada, yada, yada. Uh, but we need to talk about you, Michael, because I, I received a great number of communications after last week's show about your softball league and about your near brawl. And the people, the people were saying that I am dead wrong. And that your guy, your captain, your pitcher was absolutely right. May I explain? Yes,
Mike00:09:25but can I say before you do that, I feel like I kind of fell down on the job last week in defending my teammate. Um, because I, I was asking for what you guys thought and you, you were convincing to me. So I just want to say me a culpa. I maybe should have been more spiritually. So long as
JVL00:09:46you backed him up on the field, that's all that matters. Oh, absolutely. So long as you were willing to shed blood for him, even if he was wrong on the baseball field, that's all that. Matters. Okay. All right. So tell us, I, uh, I am, I'm going to rely on a friend of the show, Jason Cooper. Hey, Jason, who emailed to say that, uh, he is a very serious softball player. Uh, and in their league, when any, anybody hits it up the middle, that is like in tennis, when you hit a let chord, something that the you're supposed to basically like put your hand up and apologize for. Uh, and so I said, come on, man. And he said, no, you gotta realize these balls are coming off at 90 miles an hour exit VLO. And you're only 46 feet away. And I said, hold up, hold up now, 90 mile an hour exit VLO that does not scan like in the bigs in the bigs. Maybe you see guys at like 1 0 4, maybe 1 14. If they have absolutely crushed a ball, uh, at flashes, super elite level 90 or 95 is absolutely top, top, top notch. Uh, you're telling me that a bunch of beer guys who are middle aged men are getting 90 mile exit VLOs off of a looping 15 mile an hour softball pitch. And Jason said, yes. And here is why it is about bat construction. So, uh, BB core bats, which are the bats that high school players have to use, uh, have a standard for the minimum amount of compression that, uh, that they can have. And I believe the standard is I'm going by memory here, 1100 PSI, but for softball bats for adult softball leagues, the minimum compression is 240 PSI, meaning that you can get a trampoline effect off of the softball bats. And so softball bats are as Sonny will remember from tennis. And you also, Michael, right. You want more power, loosen the strings on your racket. Right. Uh, and so you, anybody can routinely hit a 90 mile an hour exit VLO because you're using essentially a corked bat. That's that's what you're getting. You're using a corked bat, which is gonna, you know, trampoline and slingshot the ball out of it. And I did not realize, I mean, you're saying hard hit balls. I thought we were talking like 70 miles an hour or something. 90, 90 is a different 90 is a
Mike00:12:19different thing from 46 feet. I told you it knocked him on his ass. Like it was, it was unreal to
JVL00:12:25see. And, uh, and Jason maintains that in most softball leagues, 70% of the players can hit the ball where they want to. Now that seems a little much to me, but I don't play adult softball and Jason does, and I'm happy to believe him. And so all of these, I retract my previous statements. I stand with your boy and, uh, maybe you guys should have rumbled. You know, these, these unwritten codes are only as good if they're enforced, Michael, and they, they get enforced on the field with fists.
Mike00:13:01I don't think it was going to go to fists at least, but I would say the, uh, going back to that, to that evening, the, the amount of verbal fisticuffs that were going on with, with the bleachers. I mean, that was something I have never seen before. I mean, it was, it was intense and people were, people were, um, people were mad. So I'm glad to know that, uh, that others who have more experience than I do with, with, uh, adult softball saw it for what it was. Sonny, are you convinced?
Sonny00:13:31No, suck it up, play the game, feel the position.
Mike00:13:35Uh, yeah. So, uh, I will say again to, to reiterate, I think the other team we were playing were, they were, um, sort of, they were unaware of their own strength and talent vis-a-vis us. Um, and, uh, that seems to be a theme with this group.
Sonny00:13:52But wasn't, wasn't part of the argument here that the, uh, that the, the, the hitters could definitely control what they were doing. JBL wasn't, wasn't, weren't people saying that on Twitter that are in the comments that people should be people,
JVL00:14:05you know, this is what Jason said. Yeah. Jason, the argument here is that people can absolutely
Sonny00:14:09control the argument here is that it was happening intentionally and that's bad. And I don't know, maybe it is. I, but also, you know, you're going to be on, if you're going to be on the field,
JVL00:14:19you got to protect yourself. Part of the game when you played tennis and you want a point off of a net cord, did you raise your hand in the universal sign? Hey, sorry. Didn't mean to do that.
Sonny00:14:30No, I dropped to my knees and pump my fists in the air. I was like, yeah, every time
JVL00:14:36I do not believe that. I don't believe that for one second. I wish I was by the way,
Sonny00:14:42I wish my camera was on. So you can see me doing my, doing my arms in the air screen.
Mike00:14:47Um, the, but like, again, it's, it's less the intentionally hitting it up the middle and more. Intentionally or not intentionally hitting it away from up the middle. I think that seemed to be, there was a sort of sense that like, Hey, our pitchers getting rocked here. Can you try not to hit it to them? And, and they weren't. And I think that is the, was the sort of the feeling that, Hey, at a certain point, you've got to, um, like give us a break here. Like we're not, we're not playing in the big leagues. This is why you gotta have this,
Sonny00:15:20why you gotta have like a ringer fast pitch softball pitcher, uh, just on the bench. Like one of the, one of the like lady softball pitchers who can, you know, get it up to like 90, uh, over that 60 feet. And when, when this starts happening and they don't pull out, you bring her in for the next inning and just have her nail a couple of people just right. Just just throw it right at them. And then, and then, you know, maybe they back off a little
Mike00:15:42bit. I'll flip that on the game changer app. I got to throw this in here. So I, with my,
JVL00:15:48my father-in-law earlier this week, he asked me to go, he's like, can you look up Danny Fagy? Or some like guy from his youth. And they're short. I thought he was like, you know, being a little addled, but this is sure as shooting. This guy was a professional softball player back when men's fast pitch softball was a thing in the fifties, sixties, and seventies, uh, who threw 114 miles an hour. Ooh, 114 from 46 feet. And he was so dominant that he became a barnstormer like the softball version of the Harlem Globetrotters where he with three guys. So a four man team, they would barnstorm the country playing exhibition games against professional, you know, or semi-pro men's teams four on nine. Jeez. And they, you know, like the Harlem Globetrotters, they won 95% of their games or something like that. Absolutely nuts. He would throw blindfolded, uh, between his legs, go, go to, go to YouTube and search King and his court. And you'll see it. It's amazing. They did an exhibition game where they played against a bunch of major leaguers. Yeah. He struck out
Mike00:17:04Willie Mays. It's amazing. Jeez. All right. Well, uh, we'll see. I, we, we, we did not have our games this past weekend rained out. Uh, we'll see if the next weekend, if we, we have another brawl and I'll update the show. Um, anyway, uh, shall we move on? Yeah. I think so. Let's, let's talk a bit about, uh, before we get into the main event a bit about the box office, uh, because there's a kind of, there's a, there's an odd element to the movie we're talking about with regard to the box office and when it's opening, but let's just real quickly here. We've got number one last weekend was insidious the red door, which I guess is a horror movie of some kind screen gems, right? So it's a horror movie. Uh, number two, Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny dropping. Uh, just 54%. Um, and then at number three sound of freedom, which is the, the anti sex trafficking, Jim Caviezel, uh, movie, uh, coming in at number three, uh, in its debut, um, making just under $20 million, uh, box office thoughts about this. And then maybe we can talk a little bit about how mission impossible fits or doesn't fit into this.
JVL00:18:20Yeah. Pretty good for Indiana Jones. Something, uh, it's, it's
Sonny00:18:24a, it's a solid hold the 50, uh, 55% drop is a solid hold, but, uh, you gotta remember it's, it was opening from a fairly weak opening. I mean, like it, it, it's on, it's on track to gross less than, uh, last crusade without, uh, adjusting for inflation. So that's not ideal. That's that's not ideal. Um, you know, I mean, look, I, I, I, if it drops like 33% this weekend, then okay. Maybe, maybe it's gonna have less legs, but it's, it's got, uh, it's got the mission impossible movies up this weekend, which are gonna eat up a, you know, big chunk of the same audience. Um, I don't know. I like everything about this movie is, uh, screams box office disaster to me. Uh, and it's very funny to watch people try and spend it as not a box office disaster, but whatever. I mean, like, look, here's, here's the simple fact of the matter. You have insidious, the red door opening at $33 million off a $15 million budget. Um, it's a bloom house movie, right? It's, it's, uh, it's gonna, it's gonna end up, you know, that it is basically already profitable, uh, from, from opening weekend grosses, um, or compare it to, uh, even something like elemental, right? Indiana Jones and the dial with destiny is probably gonna end up grossing more than elemental, but at the same time, elementals also got a solid, like four and a half time multiple already. Uh, so like, or, I mean, I, I don't know. It's, it's just a, it's, it's such a, the, the, the problem again is that you cannot have these movies cost $300 million and have them make money. That's, that's just not how it works. And, and some of this again, is there a pandemic costs like, uh, this, uh, mission impossible dead reckoning part one, uh, costs, uh, almost $300 million, but there was an a hundred million extra dollars in pandemic costs, uh, from shutdowns and from, from testing and all that. Uh, and they are going to recoup a fair amount of that from the insurance company. Um, as a result, you know, maybe the, the cost is closer to $200 million. So if it costs $200 million, you could, you'd make $750 million in it. It breaks even, um, the, the weird thing about, uh, this new, the movie that we're discussing today, long time listeners of the show will, will maybe surprised that we're discussing this movie today, right? Because usually we discuss, uh, the movie that came out the weekend before, uh, on the episode that goes up on Friday, right? So like, for instance, Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny, we talked about. Um, you know, after it had been out in theaters for the better part of a week, this movie we're talking about, uh, before it has had a full weekend, but that's because it is coming out on, uh, it, it, the, the official release day is Wednesday, but there was a full day of previews on Tuesday. And then on Monday there was a one showtime of sneak previews, uh, all around the country in a bunch of theaters. And then the day before that on Sunday, there was a Walmart sponsored day of previews. So like this movie has. Has basically been out for like a week now already by the time you're, you're listening to this, which is, which is very unusual. I assume they are mostly doing this in order to placate Tom cruise and get him as many IMAX days as possible. Right? So the way the IMAX contracts work is my understanding at least is that you go by weekend. So Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny was guaranteed one weekend of, uh, IMAX premium large format screens. Right. Uh, or maybe two weekends of premium large format screens. Um, and as a result, uh, usually that would end up being, uh, that would usually end up being like 13 days because it's first weekend, then the second full week, and then you go up until the Thursday and then the next movie starts, you know, Thursday at 8:00 PM or whatever. Right. Um, and instead what they have done is subbed mission impossible, dead reckoning, uh, part one into the Tuesday, uh, slot. Right. Does that make sense to, am I explaining this well to you guys?
JVL00:22:27Yeah. If that's true. When I saw it on Sunday though, it was not in a large format premium theater, but the Sunday and Monday preview days were in the largest non-premium
Sonny00:22:41auditorium. Well, so in, uh, so the Sunday one, again, the Sunday one is this, this weird sponsorship with, uh, with, uh, Walmart, but also that would be part of the, uh, Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny exclusive day. Right? Like, so that, that weekend, that would be the second weekend. That's the end of the second weekend. Um, uh, I will say that the, the pre the preview screenings on Monday that were not the Walmart ones, those were actually in the Dolby theaters in my, at my AMC. So I would, anyway, so I didn't, I didn't go see that one. I, I just ended up seeing it at my local draft house. Um, but the, uh, but the, anyway, I, I think, I think that's what's going on here. Basically they are gaming the system to get as many IMAX days as possible as you, as you guys may or may not be aware. Uh, Tom Cruise was vaguely annoyed that Oppenheimer has the premium large format screens for like three weekends. It got three weekends of, uh, PLF, um, exclusivity, which is obviously going to lock out some other titles that, that may, may be bigger audience draws. I don't know. I mean, I like, again, I, you know, you guys know, I love Chris Nolan, uh, and, and believe in him, but I'm not sure that, um, three hour are rated historical drama shot partly in black and white about, uh, uh, that comes to a crashing climax that leaves audiences, uh, you know, with tears in their eyes, unable to stand because of the horror of humanity of it all. Um, I'm not sure that's a big, uh, you know, uh, IMAX spectacle, um, draw three weekends, but there, there might be boobs. So that's true. I mean, IMAX boobs. Think about it. Um, uh, all right. So anyway, but that's, that's kind of where, where we stand right now. That's why we're talking about mission impossible dead reckoning part one this weekend is because it's been out for so long already. It's, it's basically been out for a full week. Uh, by the time you'll, you'll listen to this on Friday. So, uh, we will talk, there's going to be spoilers here. If you're worried about spoilers for the movie, you haven't seen it yet, because again, it hasn't been out for an actual weekend. If you're going to see it on its first weekend, its first proper weekend, then you can, um, you can, you can shut off the show. Now you can come back to us. We'll still be here, but, uh, but yeah, sure.
Mike00:24:59Can I, can I ask real quickly before we move on to that, uh, about sound of freedom, something we should, what, like, what, what am I supposed to do with this? Is it over performing? Is
Sonny00:25:10it Oh yeah, it's definitely over performing. Look, uh, so, so, uh, you know, like this is a, this is a movie by a Christian film studio, angel studios. Uh, they are the guys behind the chosen films, which have, or the chosen TV show, which has had, they did, they debuted like the season, the, the, the most recent season. And it did pretty well, uh, in, in theaters. Um, uh, so this is definitely over performing. Um, it, it could end, I mean, it could end up getting to a hundred million dollars. Uh, you know, there, there's a lot of talk about, I don't want to get into all of the, uh, Q Anon stuff, you know, a lot of liberal critics are, are like, well, this Q Anon movie is, you know, do it. And I'm just, I like I, I understand, I understand the argument that they are making here that, you know, the, the, the Q people are all obsessed with child trafficking and the, the guy, um, whose story this is based on has kind of played footsie with the Q people to get them, you know, interested in the topic of child trafficking, whatever. But I also think it's an enormous, enormous mistake for, uh, for progressives and liberals to be like, well, you, the only reason you could possibly care about child trafficking is if you believe in QAnon, like that's, that's, that's, that's a giant cell phone. Don't, don't do that guys. Um, the movie itself, I mean, I haven't seen it yet. I was thinking about going to see it this weekend, just, just out of curiosity, uh, but we'll see if I have time. Um, you know, it's, uh, I, as such, I have no, I have, I can't talk about the quality of it. I will just say that from a business perspective, um, it is, it is obviously very successful. The other thing I will say though, about the Q stuff. One of the, one of the funny, one of the funnier responses to this film is people who go to see it. Uh, you know, probably their first time in a multiplex theater in, you know, a few years because they don't believe in, you know, the devilish Hollywood agenda. Um, and they, they get to an AMC and like, they're like, the air conditioner wasn't working. They're trying to, they're trying to smoke us out or like, you know, the lights were still on in the auditorium, they're, they're trying to ruin the experience for us. And like, guys, it's not a conspiracy. That's just multiplex movie going, that's just, you're just out of AMC folks. That's a, that's just how it is. Uh, so, you know, the other, the other, again, I, I, I really don't want to get into a whole thing about the conspiracy people. But the other thing that they're saying is like, well, you know, we, we go to these movies and you know, uh, and half the seats are empty and we think, you know, it is Disney trying to like ruin the, the shows for us. It's like, no, you, you guys bought a bunch of tickets. Yes. And tried to give them away to people. And then they didn't, they didn't show up like, so, you know, anyway, it doesn't matter neither here nor there. The big story I, I mentioned, I, I very briefly mentioned elemental and it's worth noting that, uh, that movie is, um, that movie dropped just 17%. Uh, last weekend, uh, it's holding really well. It's holding like a fairly standard, um, Disney animated movie would hold the, the problem is it opens so low because expectations were so low for it. It's, it's still gonna have trouble lagging out to $150 million cause I assume it's gonna lose a bunch of screens here over the next couple of weekends. But, uh, you know, that movie, that movie has, uh, greatly outperformed, I think what anybody expected after it's fairly disastrous, $30 million opening as, as opposed to Ruby
Mike00:28:42Gilman, teenage Kraken, which appears to have like disappeared. Even though I feel like I saw a zillion previews for that movie and I, it looked like garbage. And apparently everybody agrees.
Sonny00:28:54Well, no, I mean, it's, it's, it's fun again. It's a, it's a perfectly fine kids movie. Um, I, I took my kids to see it, uh, and it, but they, they did no advertising for it. Like nobody knew that movie existed. Uh, so anyway, unless you went to a movie, yeah, unless you went to a movie and saw previews for it because you, I mean, you saw the same previews I did at the, uh, the draft house cause it was, it was playing at the draft houses. So you know, the, they were, they were, they were actually advertising it there. But if you, if you were not a, a rabid movie. Go where you were not going to, uh, to know that movie existed. All right.
Mike00:29:29Uh, okay. Well, let's, uh, let's move on to the main event here and, uh, and talk about mission impossible dead reckoning part one. Uh, let's, uh, by the way, which like, like my wife had no idea this was a part one as well. She's like, I got back and she was like, wait, part, like there's two is every movie two parts now. Dune part one, part two.
Sonny00:29:51Well, at least it was, at least. It was transparent about that. At least it was like, uh, not like dude, you're right. Not like, not like dune and not like, uh, across the stats or not like fast. Yeah.
Mike00:30:05Uh, Sonny, give us a big boy review of mission impossible dead reckoning part one mission
Sonny00:30:12impossible dead reckoning part one, one more colon subphrase. Um, I, uh, it's funny that we mentioned, it's funny that we mentioned fast and the fear is right before this, because my, my big take on this movie is that this is the culmination of the mission impossible series as basically like the non shitty fast and furious movies. Like these are this, this movie is ridiculous and absurd and over the top. And it's just a series of set pieces with like as little interconnecting plot as possible to get us from point a to point B. Um, that it made me, it made me kind of laugh. I mean, I, uh, I. I could, I could sit here and try and reconstruct the plot for you, but basically all it comes down to is, uh, an AI exists. The world's intelligence agencies want to get the AI. Ethan Hunt wants to get the AI so he can destroy it. That's it. That's, that's the whole, that's the whole of it. Um, and there's something, there's something very kind of amusing about this whole series, this whole, like the second half of the mission impossible series, basically starting, starting, uh, with the fifth one, which is where Christopher McQuarrie comes on as writer director, um, which is how intentionally vague everything is in these movies. Like here's the plot of rogue nation, right? The syndicate, which is comprised of rogue agents wants to bring down the system by getting the lock box. That's, that's literally it. And I'm like not inventing generic words here to, um, to like make it sound more generic though. Those that's dialogue. From the movie, those are like names and descriptions from the movie. That's like, what is, what is actually happening in this, in the movie? So again, like the, the plot here is, uh, the entity, which is an AI is loose in the internet and they have to get a key to unlock a mainframe that's in a sub under the ocean, but nobody knows about the sub under the ocean. I guess that's going to be in dead reckoning part two, where they, they go under, you know, mission impossible under the sea. I don't know. I don't know. Uh, look the, again, the, the whole, the whole reason this movie exists is to, uh, showcase Tom Cruise trying to kill himself for our amusement. And I'm all for that. I'm all for that. That is like, that is the, uh, that is what we come here for. That is what we show up to a mission impossible movie for. We show up to watch, uh, Tom Cruise ride a motorcycle off a mountain and turn it into a base jump and crash into a train. That's what we, that's what we are here for. That's what we want to, that's what we want to see. And I've got good news for you guys. That does it. It does all the, it does all that. And more, there's a car chase through the streets of Venice. There's a Lawrence of Arabia desert shootout, uh, that shows John Wick how you should really do this sort of thing. Um, uh, there's, uh, uh, a, a, the best fight sequence in the whole series, I think so far takes place about two thirds of the way through this movie. That it's this great, um, uh, uh, kind of, uh, two part fight. There's a, there's a fight in an alley. Ethan Hunt is fighting, uh, two, two people in an alley and it's very tight and compact and claustrophobic. And then, uh, we intercut that with a fight between Ilse Faust and, uh, Gabriel who's played by Esa, Esai Morales, um, and a new character, uh, a, a, uh, pickpocket named Grace played by Hayley Atwell and, and we're cutting back and forth and Ethan has to do defeat his enemies and also save the women and can he do it in time and the score is just building and building. It's wonderful. Um, again, uh, this movie is dumb and I couldn't tell you, I couldn't explain to you the plot of it really, if I, if I wanted to be on the very basic elements of it, but it doesn't matter because it's so well done in every other respect. It's so it it's generic on purpose to pay attention. So you pay attention to the actual, um. Things that matter, which are the big extravagant action scenes. Uh, and I, before I, before I kick it over to JBL, who I think probably has more interesting and coherent thoughts on this than I do. My favorite sequence in this movie is the, the car chase through Venice, uh, and specifically because, uh, it has, there's this character who's played by Palm Clemente F who is the. Probably best known to audiences as mantis from the guardians of the galaxy movies. Um, she, uh, she plays. Like an almost mute joker, like a crazy person. And as she's driving through the streets of Venice in this massive, like armored personnel carrier, and she's just pancaking cars and like smashing through mopeds and stuff, they keep cutting back to her and her face has this demented grin of joy on it. And I could have, they do this like 10 times. And in any other movie, I would have been like, get to the stop it, stop it with this. Get to just focus on the, the, but I would have taken 50 more of those cuts if this movie had to be an extra 45 minutes. So we could just cut back to her like 27 more times. I would have done, I would have been fine with that because it, it's the most joyful expression of manic, uh, insanity that I've seen on screen in a, in a long time. She's great. She's wonderful. Yep.
Mike00:35:40Um, anyway, I, I like this movie a lot, but before, before we go to JVL, uh, I have to correct you, Sonny, the car chase is in Rome.
Sonny00:35:47Oh, it's in Rome. Whatever. It's not in Venice.
JVL00:35:50Okay. Sorry. Okay. Uh, I, I liked it. It's very good. Uh, I don't know that I like it as much as fallout. I have to see it again to, to know, um, it's, it's less extravagant in its set pieces than the last two Macquarie movies though. I mean, this really only has one gigantic, holy shit. Can you believe that they did it stunt, which is the motorcycle base jump. Right. Uh, everything else is much, much better. It's much more, I don't wanna say normal, but normal-ish, uh, where this differs is that, uh, it is Hitchcockian in its tension building. And, uh, I mean, this is, I, I think a much more intense movie than any of the other mission impossible movies, uh, in terms of really edging you, you know, like it's pushing you out, pushing you out. And it doesn't give a lot of, uh, you know. Like humor or comic relief, there are a couple moments of that, but it really pushes the tension in ways which I think are very effective, uh, because of the, the script and the story and the acting and the score, the score is really good. Yeah. Um, I don't know. I don't, you know, I, I liked it. I liked so much. I love all of these movies. This is my favorite store, my favorite series. It's my favorite franchise. I cannot think of another franchise, which, uh. Has improved with age and improved as it has gone on. Like as, as mission impossible has in which the first, the first entry is fantastic. And then it sort of lets off a little bit, but then entries four, five, six, and seven are all incredibly good. Like that doesn't, that doesn't ever happen ever. This is, it's a, it's a, it's an adult action movie, so a grown, a grownup action movie made for people like us to be able to go and see. And enjoy, and I just don't understand why Hollywood doesn't make more of these except that, uh, you have to, to make, to make grownup action movies, you need an auteur and that auteur can be Christopher Nolan. It can be Jim Cameron, or it can be Tom Cruise who's doing it as the actor producer, but you need somebody who really, really cares about it and is passionate about making it. Sort of auction it off to committee and have some random director, even if that director is a very good director, uh, like, uh, I don't know, James Mangold, James Mangold, one who did Indy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I, you know, like somebody has to really, really drive the, the, the, the whole enterprise from soup to nuts from the business side of it, to the marketing side of it, to the script side of it. Like somebody has to be deeply invested and, and be in total control of it. Yeah. So you can't do a movie like this.
Sonny00:38:54Let's uh, let's, let's table that a bit for the, we'll, we'll discuss this more in the bonus episode, uh, on, on Monday, because I think we're gonna, we're gonna talk about, uh, Tom cruise and kind of his evolution as an action star. Um, and I think that, I think you can, you can basically track his, uh, his career and the way it has changed through these movies, uh, very, very interestingly, but we'll, we'll get to that.
JVL00:39:18Yeah, I will say I, and I'm, I'm curious as to whether or not you thought this Michael, I, for the first time ever got a little bit of old man vibes in the way that Tom cruise was moving physically,
Mike00:39:35not just moving, but there was the scene on the top of the train and it's like, yeah, the wind is kind of rushing through and kind of blowing his face up a little bit, but he looked really old on the top of the train, every part of it. Um, yeah. So first of all, can I, the reason I, the reason I corrected Sonny about the car chase being in Rome is because I thought as I was watching it, um, you know, this chase is good, but it could use a giant round bomb going through it and that one that has to get knocked by a crane to avoid blowing up the Vatican.
JVL00:40:14So like it missed opportunity to take a Fiat down the Spanish steps.
Mike00:40:19That's true. That's amazing. No, I loved it. I loved it. I loved the action, but I will say the, I, I came away from this more confused by the skeleton of a plot than I have in any other mission impossible movie. Like I don't understand how certain things got us from point A to point B. I really don't care because it, that's not why I'm watching this movie, but like, so I have some questions. So like, so the AI is in. The submarine.
Sonny00:40:53Well, the AI was, the AI was implanted by the CIA into the submarine. So uh, the, the United States could track its movements.
Mike00:41:05But who created the AI? Was it the CIA?
Sonny00:41:07The CIA.
Mike00:41:08The CIA. Okay. So they did create the AI. Yes. Okay.
JVL00:41:13That was what that whole meeting. Okay. Um, submarine sequence by the way is the best submarine sequence I've seen outside of hunt for red October.
Mike00:41:20Oh yeah.
JVL00:41:21It was great. It's like a mini, it's like a short, you know, like it's own submarine short within the mission of Boswell movie. And just as a genre piece is absolute a plus.
Mike00:41:32No, I loved it. Um, yeah. So I didn't, I still don't understand though how the keys, because I thought we saw the key on the guy on the sub. So how did it get above wall?
Sonny00:41:46Like how did we get above the bodies? They recovered the bodies. So they did.
Mike00:41:50Okay.
Sonny00:41:51So I missed that too. Right? It's just, it's just discussed in a line of dialogue. It's like they recovered. The body is, you know, when the ice broke up or whatever.
Mike00:42:00I, I, okay. So, okay. That, that makes some sense. I don't understand what the AI is doing with tricking people into seeing things that they, so like, does it, does it generate hologram? Like what, what was going on with that? Isn't there something where like people are not there, but they think they're there or it was that a misdirection that am I missing something?
JVL00:42:25Any, anything that, uh, is electronically sensed, it can create ghosts of. So if you are looking at a sonar, right, those are not real returns. You are seeing an electronic interpretation of things. And so it can create like, look, there's a, another submarine over there and now the submarine is gone.
Mike00:42:44Yeah. I guess I had this thought that Gabriel was not real at first, like they made it seem like he was like AI generated and I was very confused about that. No, he's real. Uh, yes. Well, I figured that out.
JVL00:43:00He was real, but it was, and the AI is just chat GPT. I mean, it, it's, it's so, I mean, they, they really go to pains to talk about it as a, a program which, which is language learning, but, but which is simply like going through and guessing the next step, which is how chat GPT works. Right. It's, you know, it, it doesn't know anything. It's just guessing the next step. And that's why the AI seems omniscient because it is, you know, just guessing the next steps based upon all the inputs it has, which is very interesting way of, of doing it. Right. And this is why Gabriel seems able to predict the future. Right. And he says, I don't know how it's going to happen. I just know that tomorrow at noon, I'm going to be on that train and I'm going to get the
Mike00:43:42key. Okay. Yeah. I didn't understand any of that either. Okay. So like it all went over my head, but I, the point is that I didn't care because it was just, it was just getting to those. Yeah. Action sequences. So you have the, the car chase, which was terrific. Um, the, yes, the whole motorcycle jump, which, so like that's in all of the promotion for this movie is the motor cycle jump. Like if you are interested in seeing the movie, you know about it because of that. And I was still blown away by the whole fricking thing. Like I was listening to a podcast where that Simon Pegg was on and he was talking about, maybe this has been said elsewhere, but how many cameras they had. Either in the sky or like attached to the motorcycle itself. And like, just like all of the work that went in, it just, it was awesome. And you could tell it was him who could tell it was Tom Cruise because they have the shot and it follows him and you see his face and it's very clearly not CGI. It's very clearly him. And the camera kind of pans from looking at it coming on to going over the mountain. And like, it's him. And I just thought like, take all my money, Tom Cruise. You can have it. How about the train thing at the end? Was that, was that practically done? Which part? Cause I think the, the.
JVL00:45:09The rail cars. So as they are moving up the rail cars, as the rail cars are coming down over the bridge, again, I just assume that that is not practically done and that that is CGI in some, but I would,
Sonny00:45:21I would bet. I would bet a very, a very good amount of money that it was done in the same way they did the inception hotel rooms, basically you have, you have essentially a, um, uh, imagine like a, a, you know, a, a shipping container on a gimbal and you just move it around like that.
Mike00:45:41That is how I would assume they did that, but again, on a soundstage or, or yeah, yeah.
Sonny00:45:47On a soundstage. Yeah. Yeah.
Mike00:45:50They didn't drop it off a mountain. Right. They didn't. Did they blow up the bridge? That's my question.
Sonny00:45:55Yeah. Is that, that they did. They found a bridge. They found a, they found a bridge that wasn't being used somewhere in Europe and they blew it up.
JVL00:46:02Are you serious?
?00:46:03No, no.
Sonny00:46:04I'm joking.
JVL00:46:05Are you making a joke about that? Okay.
Sonny00:46:07I was like, I'm making a joke. Yeah. What? No. But remember, so this is, uh, again, going back to Christopher Nolan, the dark night, you remember, so they blow up the hospital, right? Right. Yes. They did that practically. They did that. Yes. They, they found a, they found an unused parking garage, uh, put a, put a facade around it to make it look like a hospital. And if you watch the explosion, just go, Joe, just go watch that scene. You can actually see how it's very clearly a parking garage when the facade comes down, like the way it's the way it looks on the inside. Um, but it's, they, they literally, they literally imploded a parking garage, uh, and, and just filmed it with the IMAX cameras. Um, but I don't think, I don't think they actually demolished the bridge in this movie.
Mike00:46:46Um, the, uh, did anybody else, by the way, on the, in that scene, did anybody else get, uh, the lost world? Yeah. Vibes when they're hanging on the, uh, you know, when the member of the loss is going down. Yeah. That was the first thing that were my, were my head.
?00:46:59So.
Mike00:47:00All right. Sorry, Sonny.
?00:47:02What were you saying?
Sonny00:47:03Um, nothing I, I, the, uh, that you guys had mentioned, uh, the, the, I'm sorry, the, um, motorcycle jump and the, and how it was definitely Tom cruise and how it's so like the advertising campaigns for the last three movies have essentially been. I mean, really the last four movies, you go back to the Burj Khalifa sequence, right? Like the advertising for these movies has been watch this YouTube short of Tom cruise, who was definitely out here doing these things. Look, here he is. He's got wires on. We're gonna, we're gonna paint those out later, but like, here is how we did this scene. Here is how we did this scene on the side of the Burj Khalifa. Here's how we did, um, Tom cruise hanging off of a jet as it's taking off, right? Here's how we did the halo jump, the halo. I must have watched that. Halo jump making a video 20 times in the lead up to, uh, the, the release of rogue nation or the, the release of fallout, because that was, uh, that was just a like amazing sequence that Tom cruise did like 50 halo jumps, just jumped out, just jumping out of airplanes, just jumping out of airplanes with camera crews everywhere. Um, you know, and that's one reason these movies cost so much money is not because they're spending, you know, a hundred million dollars on 5,000 CGI artists in the Philippines. Somewhere it's because they are sending a C 17 jet up into the atmosphere and Tom cruises jumping out of it 40 or 50 times to get the two minutes of light that they can use every day to have the sequence at sunset. You don't like, I like it's, it's one of these movies where you see all of the money on the screen and you don't, you appreciate it. I appreciate it. Um, so, uh, you know, look, um, the, the, what do you guys think of Hallie out well, I'm pro Haley at well, she's, she's, she's, uh, a pleasant to look at on the screen.
JVL00:48:59Okay. I, I, I did not mean in that way, I did not mean in an objectifying way, but I meant as a screen presence for this type of movie where she is now a new member of the team and she is going to become an agent. And uh, I imagine is going to become our lead in the post cruise mission impossible era.
Sonny00:49:21No. I, I tried to do that with Jeremy Renner. Yeah, I guess that didn't quite Tom Cruise is not, Tom Cruise is not stopping making these movies for as long as he lives. He will be 90 year old Clint Eastwood during shooting. I mean, it's, he's gonna die doing one of these stunts and that's like the best way he could possibly go out.
Mike00:49:41Totally. Uh, look, I Haley at Wells is, is fine. I really like Vanessa Kirby who played the white widow. Um, right. She's fantastic. And she's, she's, um, she's. She's the Empress Josephine in the new Napoleon movie. Um, I noticed in the trailer, I was like, oh, Hey, there's Vanessa Kirby. And she was, uh, uh, she was, uh, Margaret in, uh, in the first seasons of the crown. I, I'm a huge fan of hers.
JVL00:50:04I think she's great. Yeah. She's wonderful in this and compliment. I mean, this, this can't be said enough. She's got, uh, five lines of dialogue and yet we have a total and complete sense of her character just from reaction shots and that's, that's good acting. Oh yeah. It's just, it's just good acting.
Sonny00:50:24And there's certainly a lot of acting.
JVL00:50:26Yeah, but it's good acting, I think. And the idea this is I'm interested. So you mentioned the, the fight sequence in the alley. I was interested in that because it is essentially a two-dimensional fight where, yeah, you know, it is, it is a, a pure two-dimensional fight, which is interesting. There's interesting constraint to impose upon a fight and fight choreography and it comes out great.
Sonny00:50:50And I don't know.
JVL00:50:52I'm, I'm sorry. These movies are just, they're just great. Everybody should see them. I think this is gonna make a lot of money. Do you guys have over under guests on, uh, opening weekend?
Sonny00:51:02I, I, well, I, I don't have any idea how to judge opening weekend on this because again, it's, it's, it's by the time it comes out on the weekend, it's gonna have been open for like three days. So I, I, I don't know, I mean, over the five days I would guess somewhere between 90 and a hundred million, but I don't know.
JVL00:51:20Yeah. I bet it'll hold pretty well. I know. I surely think so as well.
Mike00:51:25Yeah. I, I, I, I am a, uh, a, a newb when it comes to this stuff, but like it, it feels like the kind of movie that will also do well with word of mouth. Like people will say, oh yeah, you gotta go see it in a way that, um, nobody's saying that for dial of destiny.
JVL00:51:42And I think all audiences, I think, you know, teens will love it. I think grownups will love it. Uh, I just think this is an all four quadrant hit, not quite Maverick. Because it doesn't have the nostalgia play to it, but it's gonna make a lot of money
Mike00:51:56and it should. Yep. Uh, any thoughts on, uh, the acting abilities of Ving Rhames? I was, I was sort of like laughing at like how bad his line readings were in this movie.
JVL00:52:10I was like, oh my gosh, I don't know, man, you can't talk about Marcellus Wallace that way. Uh, Ving is, Ving has been getting, he's been getting bigger, but I feel like he, his physical transformation is a little bit like Barry Bonds as physical transformation. Now he didn't, he didn't start out as skinny as Barry Bonds was, but you know, even when he was Marcellus Wallace, he wasn't as wide as he is now. And it's just, you know, like his neck is now maybe wider than his ears. Hard to say.
Mike00:52:40Uh, I just thought about this about like the, the last film as well. Like he just feels superfluous when you've got Simon Pegg as well. Like I don't know.
JVL00:52:49Oh no, I gotta have a, and Simon Pegg is the opposite. I mean, Simon Pegg looks like he weighs 120 pounds now. Yeah. Yeah. So I hope his health is okay. I've been thinking of this for like three movies now that Simon Pegg looks, uh, scarily thin.
Mike00:53:03I'm sure. I'm sure he's just vegan or something.
JVL00:53:06I hope so, man.
Mike00:53:08Um, all right. Well, uh, any other thoughts on, uh, on mission impossible dead reckoning part one, when is part two coming out? When can we expect this?
Sonny00:53:19No idea.
Mike00:53:20Sometime. No idea. Okay. Uh, any other thoughts? No.
JVL00:53:25Yes. Uh, no. We'll, we'll do the rest of it in the bonus.
Mike00:53:28All right. Well, that's all the time. Uh, we're giving to this episode. Thanks for listening. Go to sub beacon.com and, uh, thanks so much for listening. This podcast will self-destruct in five seconds. Any outtakes? Oh, I should say this is a dude's chatting outtake. Uh, so. So, uh, the, the, the big boys are coming back this weekend, um, from their two weeks at a grandparent camp and, um, and we have, um, we have some surprises for them. The biggest one being, they will now have bunk beds when they get back and that is a surprise. Um, so did you have some assembling mouse? Uh, actually it wasn't that bad. So we bought a, we bought secondhand, a pretty inexpensive one and it was mostly put together. Yeah. I was putting it in my, in, in the van and getting out, but it was actually, it was, it was great. The only thing there was, um, uh, there was one difficult aspect of it, which is there was a, um, I was trying to get the, the bolt and the nut, uh, you know, to, uh, the locking nut work. And like, I couldn't get it in this, in this one, this one redrilled hole and I'm like, what is going on? I can't figure it. It's like just stuck. Like looked into it. And there was somebody had accidentally shoved one of those wooden dowels, like tiny little dowels into it. But I pulled it out. I eventually pulled it out. Did you drill it out? No, no, no. I pulled it out with, um, with some, uh, needle nose pliers and, um, but, uh, yeah, so there's going to be so much room for activities. They're going to lose their minds and, uh, you know, that'll be a nice little welcome.
JVL00:55:19Welcome home for the kiddos until they start fighting. Talking over who gets to be in the top bunk.
Mike00:55:23Uh, no, this has already been discussed. Like they don't know they're getting them, but they've already like, without knowing they're getting bunk beds, they already know which one's getting the top of which one's getting the bottom. It's, it's one of the, just one of those brother things.
Sonny00:55:36I'm sure.
?00:55:37I'm sure.
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