#246. 'Monkey Man'
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On Monkey Man, Dev Patel's directorial debut and star vehicle, Sonny hands out a "half-hearted thumbs up," praising the brutal knife-fight choreography and especially Sharlto Copley's scenery-chewing South African-accented villain, but dings the film hard for a broken structure — it seems to reach its climax about thirty minutes in, then essentially restarts and drags for another hour and change, making a movie that should have been ninety minutes run two hours; he also argues the "Indian John Wick" label undersells John Wick's own tight efficiency. Mike agrees it's "fine" but overlong and dizzying in the fight scenes (shades of the Bourne movies), and admits the specifics of the film's Modi-adjacent Indian politics were inscrutable to him, prompting Sonny to needle him for supposedly wanting to know "what these villages are really contributing to society anyway." JVL, only half-joking, says he wanted an actual John-Wick-with-a-monkey creature-feature instead, and spins off into a theory that John Wick "perfected" the revenge-thriller the way Seinfeld killed the traditional sitcom, leaving nothing but pale imitations in its wake. Before any of that, the trio spends a long opening stretch on JVL's ongoing "Shed Saga": lumber from his unbuilt Costco Yardline shed kit is now stacked in his garage, the company won't install his Northport model, and the mysterious "Shed Michael" who promised to build it has gone dark and stopped responding to texts, prompting extended riffing about hiring an Amish barn-raising crew. Sonny recounts half-assing a repaint of his kids' backyard playhouse and attending a live Across the Movie Aisle taping (watching Arrival) at the DC Alamo Drafthouse without getting murdered, while Mike details Little League opening day, including a bit where kids pelt the Chick-fil-A cow mascot with wiffle balls, and gripes about an opposing coach who dragged a blowout game into extra innings. Box office chat covers Godzilla x Kong holding the top spot, Monkey Man opening at number two despite Netflix selling it off to Universal for roughly what it paid after acquiring it, and The First Omen landing at number four, which sends Sonny on a tangent mocking the prequel's plot as Catholic-church-mandated abortion horror. The episode closes with a plug for a two-part Steve Martin documentary on Apple TV+ that JVL confesses leaves him cold (he's just never been a Steve Martin guy) and a passing mention of wrestler Bray Wyatt's death at 36.
From the show notes
SB: Sorry, forgot to send out the preview email because I was running around DC this week. I'll do better next time!
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00You need to fight for your mother, for all of us, and there will not quiet your soul my son.
?00:00:18Don't call me son.
Mike00:00:29Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I am your co-host Mike Warren. Joining me as always are my two co-hosts who are paid to bleed. I couldn't do it in a South African accent. Paid to bleed. Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Mike Warren. And me. Yes, thank you. It's like New Zealand, but also not. All right. Join us over at subbeacon.com where you can become a patron. Join the conversation in the comments. It's been really lively the past few weeks. It's been really great to see. So join us over there. Get new episodes every Friday morning. Tell your friends and family that they can do that at subbeacon.com. We are going to be talking about Monkey Man later in the show. But first, JVL, welcome back. I hope you had a nice week off. Tell us what is going on with you. You got something to tell us, right? Proposed.
JVL00:01:27Spring break is neither spring nor a break. Is that the truth? I got some big news for you guys. Okay. Big shed news.
Sonny00:01:37Shed news. Big shed news. Shed what?
JVL00:01:41For people who have joined us recently, I purchased a DIY shed kit from Costco last September. And it came and it was delivered by a nice gentleman named Michael who dropped it in the center of my driveway. It was a 600 pound pallet full of pre-cut lumber and intricate directions. And it's just been sitting there since then. And this weekend, I just, I got, I woke up with a fire in my belly and I thought it is time. It is time to make this bitch happen.
Mike00:02:28You had a fever and the only prescription was.
JVL00:02:31So I went out there and I opened that bitch up and I moved all of the wood into my garage. So to recap, I purchased a shed so that I could empty all of the shit out of my garage. And instead I moved all of the shed pieces into my garage. So that there's now even less space.
Mike00:02:58The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, JBL. And you have taken that step.
JVL00:03:05So I got a, I got a, you know, I keep going back and forth. Do I just pay somebody to do it or do it myself? Pay someone or do it myself. And it's harder to find somebody to do it than you would think. It's hard. It's hard to find someone to do it. And, but also it's like, I've got to go out and get 12 foot. Long, uh, ground treated, you know, pressurized. So ready for ground contact four by fours. Yep. How the fuck am I going to get 12 foot long four by fours from home Depot to, to my house and to, to order them, you're paying $170 delivery fee. I get, I'm going to have to go get shingles. I'm going to have to buy a nail gun. I found the nail gun. I'm going to get the Metabo HPT. Did you know that, uh, Hitachi? Is now Metabo. I did not know that. Yeah. Hitachi power tools are now Metabo HPT, Hitachi power tools. Um, and, uh, so I'm, I'm going to get that, but then I've got, I mean, I, I looked at the instructions. Now that I've opened this thing up, I looked at the instructions. Look, this is more complicated than a Lego set. This is not like building the Lego death star.
Mike00:04:24You don't separate things. Stop by colors and then start with page one.
JVL00:04:28Yeah, it's, uh, and then do I need two nail guns? So I need a framing nail gun, obviously, but then do I need a finishing nail gun or a bread Brad nailer? I don't even know what a Brad nailer is. Um, but for the siding, right? For the smaller gauge nails, I don't, I'm not gonna lie. I've been putting on a brave face, but the shed has got me pretty down right now.
Sonny00:04:54Uh, I mean, maybe I should.
JVL00:04:55Just give it away. Sonny. Maybe I should just burn the pieces. Maybe we should burn all the lumber.
Sonny00:05:00You could turn it into firewood. I think that would be, uh, one way to go. One way to go. Um, no, look, I told you at the time that this was, this was exactly what was going to happen. I don't, I don't want to do a victory lap here, but I did say, I did say that that thing was never going to be built unless you paid somebody to build it immediately when you got it.
JVL00:05:20Run the tape. I remember that. The, uh, the company, which, which makes this shit is Yardline. And as I've been searching around for people to install it, I thought, well, I'll just call Yardline up and I'll ask them if they have any vendors that they use in my area. And so I went to the website and the first pop-up on web on the Yardline website is that they're having an installation special and, you know, click right here and we'll tell you how much we'll charge for installation of your zip code. And I got a stiffy and I, I just, I couldn't even click there. I just called customer service for Yardline. I was like, oh, I saw that you guys are having a special. Installation.
Mike00:06:01Installation special.
Sonny00:06:03I saw it. What are you wearing right now? I got it.
JVL00:06:08It's in my yard. And so she said, yeah, we are. We are having an installation special. It's great. What model do you have? And I said, I have the Northport. She said, oh, sorry, we don't install that. So what do you, what do you mean? She goes, no, we don't do installing for that one. Why? Because it's like harder than the other ones. Or what's the reason? She's like, we just, I can't say. I said, well, do you have. Surely you Yardline. Do not have salaried Yardline employees from Yardline HQ in Columbus, Ohio, driving out to do these installations. What you have are you have vendors. Right. You have Yardline certified vendors who you subcontract this work out to. So when a person with a non Northport shed calls you up to buy this installation special package, you take their money and then you keep like two hundred fifty dollars of it and you give the rest of it to your subcontractor. Could you just give me the name of one of the subcontractor you use in the North Jersey area? She said. No, we don't use subcontractors. I was like, OK, now you're fucking lying. That's not true. She's like, sorry, I can't help you. Why? Why? Why can't they help me? Why can't they just give me the name of the subcontractor that they use so I can hire him to install the Northport shed that they say can't be installed?
Sonny00:07:47When you bought this thing, wasn't there an option to have somebody come and raise it like the Amish and install it? In your yard?
JVL00:07:56I'm trying to remember because some of the Costco sheds have that option and some don't. Now, what happened was that Michael, Shed Michael, who delivered it, what happened was he said, you know, you can install this yourself. And I said, yeah, that's what I was thinking of doing. And like, unless do you do you do it? He said, yeah, I build these things all the time. And I said, oh, great. And so he gave me a quote, gave me a quote. Right there. Gave me his card. So give me a call if you have second thoughts. And I said, why is it? Is it hard? And he goes, well, do you have any construction experience? I said, no. I mean, I've done some some light woodworking. I know how to make a dovetail joint. And he said, well, good luck. And since then, I spoke with Shed Michael a couple of times and he has subsequently ghosted me. I sent him a lot of text messages on the order of magnitude. I've called him three or seven times, received zero response from Shed Michael about installing the shed, which he claims to install all the live long day.
Sonny00:09:09Maybe Shed Michael died.
JVL00:09:10I don't think Shed Michael died. Shed Michael is a young, healthy man.
Sonny00:09:16He could have been in a car crash.
JVL00:09:18Maybe a Northport killed him.
Sonny00:09:19Maybe he was constructing a shed and it collapsed on him. And that's why nobody will install the Northpoints anymore. Think about it.
JVL00:09:27It's possible. My Northport is in my garage, which is now... That side of my garage has gone from too cluttered to be useful to utterly impassable.
Sonny00:09:40I told you... I just want to... Once again, I told you this was precisely what would happen, that this would be a burden on you and your family for generations, that it would just... It would sit there and it would molder and eventually you would sell the house. And you would have to pay somebody to come and haul it away. Unconstructed and unloved.
JVL00:09:59They hated Sonny because he was right.
Sonny00:10:02They hated Sonny because he was right. I went through this exact thing with my parents. My dad bought one of these and it just sat in the backyard for literally years. Years and years. Eventually. Eventually somebody came out and built it. But for years it just sat there. And I was like, all right. Every time I would come home, I'd look at it and I'd be like... Shed's still there, huh?
Mike00:10:26I guarantee you, JVL, if you are either on Nextdoor or you've got some kind of community Facebook group, like you send out a can anybody construct this ask, you'll be able to find somebody.
JVL00:10:47What kind of somebody? Somebody who knows what they're doing like Shed Michael or just some... How do you even know that Shed Michael, you don't know anything about him?
Sonny00:10:55The thing about Shed Michael, Shed Michael could have been a grifter. He could have never put one of these together before in his life. He was just trying to hustle you out of your money and he's gone now.
Mike00:11:04All of a sudden, he's got this guy texting saying, hey, can you do that? And he's been called out. You know, the jig is up for Shed Michael. So he's, that's why he's ghosting.
Sonny00:11:16I would, yeah, I would, I would, I would look on Nextdoor or like call or just go to Home Depot and find the line of guys who are standing there. Just waiting to work. Be like, your trabajo.
JVL00:11:29How exactly do you think that's going to work? I don't know. Would you trust just some guy? No, I wouldn't do any of this. I wouldn't do any of this. I wouldn't have bought the Shed. Yardline certified.
Sonny00:11:42There's no such thing as Yardline certified. Yardline has Yardline people. They told you. They said they don't subtract, subcontract. That's a lie. They just, they, they have, they have roving bands of employees who go around the country.
JVL00:11:55Health insurance and 401ks who just assemble Sheds for them.
Sonny00:11:59They ride, they ride the Shedline helicopter to your yard and rappel down on their Shedline ropes. And in six hours later, you have a Shed. But you bought the wrong kind of Shed. You bought the wrong, you bought the wrong kind of Shed. You did not buy the, the helicopter concierge service Shed. You bought, I, I, is, is your Shed. So I guess here's my question. Is your Shed too nice or not nice enough to get?
JVL00:12:25Uh, constructed by looks just as nice of all of the other yard line Sheds that seemingly you have this. So I, the other option is Costco's return policy is a little bit like LL beans return policy. Like doesn't matter when you bought it, where you bought it or what condition is in. If you're not completely satisfied with it, you bring it back to one of our warehouses. Well, we'll take that as a return. You can return an empty Shed. I mean, from the food court, I could, I suspect take all 600 pounds of this lumber, stuff it into minivans and take it over the course of like five to 10 trips to the Costco and just unload it in front of the customer service door.
Sonny00:13:18Is the pallet still assembled in your yard? Is it in your garage? No, you had to take it apart.
JVL00:13:25Take it completely apart to walk each piece of lumber individually to then stack it in a way which vaguely made sense to me at the time, but which will make it impossible to find the piece I need when it comes time to actually assemble the thing.
Sonny00:13:39I just want to look. No offense. No offense, JBL. I feel like every decision you've made at every point of this process has been wrong. I don't think you've made one correct. I don't think you've made one correct decision. And I say this out of love and also and also, you know.
Mike00:13:55And that means JBL, you're due for a good decision and your good decision should be find somebody online next door or wherever who's like a basic contract or what you do is go hire an Amish person, go to Home Depot, go to go to the go to the Dutch Pennsylvania country and and just like walk around with a sign that says kidnap an Amish need.
Sonny00:14:17Hey, Hezekiah need need help with barn raising.
Mike00:14:22I can tell you're an English man. Kids who needs a barn raise.
Sonny00:14:27You got you got to rent one of those white paneled vans and paint paint barn raising on the side of it and and and drive through the Amish country. And I'm sure you'll find somebody. Just make sure they're not on Ruma Springer. Yeah, I was going to say Ruma Springer. They'll mess you up.
JVL00:14:44I'll give you I'll give him drugs. If they're on Ruma Springer, I'll give you cash and drugs.
Sonny00:14:48You can pay them in alcohol.
JVL00:14:50Yeah, there you go.
Sonny00:14:50Here you go. Here's some.
JVL00:14:51So, Mike, what would I what would I have to give you to get you to come on? I'm up here for a weekend and you and I just get out there with my Metabo HPT frame nailer. Do you already own this nail gun? It's sitting in my Amazon.
Mike00:15:05You could not. You could not.
JVL00:15:06Just yet.
Mike00:15:07You could not afford me because I would. I would really not know what I was doing. And so the amount of research that I would have to do, it would just be prohibitively expensive because I would I would have it would take me like two weeks. To do it.
JVL00:15:26So I found a guy on on YouTube who did this and he's a guy kind of like us, a normalish guy, not a construction.
Sonny00:15:35I got to be honest. I'm just going to fact check this right now. If this guy is putting together YouTube videos of building his own shed, he's nothing like us. Exactly.
JVL00:15:45And so he sort of videoed his process and it was less like one of those fast assembly videos and more like a documentary. And he he said when he was done that the assembling the yard line Northport was it was a decision that he was nervous about. But just in in retrospect, he was so grateful he did it because it was such an incredible sense of accomplishment. And he totaled it up and it only took him fifty nine hours.
Sonny00:16:17You do one hour a day. That's you're done in two months.
Mike00:16:21Ready for summer.
Sonny00:16:25I my my issue with assembling it. So here's the thing. If it was if it was my shed and I was putting it together and I was like fifty nine hours, I would be like, OK, I can do that myself. The problem is it's a it's a shed with walls and you need two people there at all times. Like you can't just do this by yourself. Right. Correct.
JVL00:16:44Correct.
Sonny00:16:45You need you need a second person there.
JVL00:16:47And if one guy did it by himself, he said there was only the only point at which he needed another person was when they were lifting the arches up. For the roof.
Sonny00:16:57Well, maybe maybe I mean, maybe you can do it by yourself, then. I would not. I would again, I would just I would I would hire somebody or I would I wouldn't have made shed Michael do it by himself.
JVL00:17:07I would have been out there helping.
Sonny00:17:09It's probably why shed Michael doesn't want to do it. He wants to do it by himself. He's like, what's this? Who's this person hanging around all the time? I got to deal with him. Thanks. You with any questions about a nail gun on Amazon.
Mike00:17:19He bought a nail gun.
Sonny00:17:20He thinks he can do what I can do. He's to see. Has he ever papered a roof before? Has he ever tarred? I don't even know. I don't know. Where do we go with that? I don't know. Well, I don't you tar roofs still? Is that like like in Shawshank?
JVL00:17:34What we will do, what I will probably do when I do this myself is I need a roofing nailer. And first you staple it in all the tar paper and then you shingle over top of it. But don't forget your drip coat because you got to put the drip coat on the edges. Right, Michael?
Mike00:17:51Let me tell you here. Here's the JBL. You know what? When this shit when you build this shed yourself, Sonny and I will fly to New Jersey and and have throw you a party when you when you build it yourself.
Sonny00:18:09OK, so and this is you're you're you're like, all right. So I want to I want to tell folks about my adventures in in construction, home construction construction, because this last last last two weekends ago. Um, it was spring break, which, again, is neither spring nor break. And I I had I had a little project I wanted to do, which was paint the kids playhouse. So the kids playhouse, like, I don't know if you realize this, but wood takes a beating in one hundred ten degree summers in Dallas.
JVL00:18:43You had some pain today. Yeah.
Sonny00:18:44So, well, I mean, it was there it was there when we when we moved in. So it hadn't been painted in some number of years. It had been painted at some point. But you could like see if you looked at. Photos from twenty twenty when we moved in to twenty.
JVL00:18:58I just texted you a picture of my garage.
Sonny00:19:01If you if you looked at you could see the fading JBL. You're they're going to do an episode of hoarders at your house.
JVL00:19:09Well, it looks a lot better before there was all the wood in there.
Sonny00:19:12Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure. But when so so I wanted to paint this thing because it was starting to splinter. It was, you know, it's good. And there there there are two ways that you can paint. Right. There's there's the good professional. Way of doing it where you tape everything off. So you make sure there's no dripping. Sure. You know, you sandblast the wood to make sure that the paint really sticks on it. Prime it. Then you prime it. You put it. And then there's the way I did it. There's the way I did it, which is I just bought I just bought some paint and I slapped on a coat and there are streaks everywhere all over the plastic bits. And it's I just painted over all the screw holes. And I was like, I'm doing it. I'm just doing it. I'm just doing it. Doing this thing because my theory on this this playhouse is this. If we ever sell this house again, which is on a corner lot in a fairly hot Dallas neighborhood, the person who buys it is going to tear down everything here and put up a put up a big McMansion style home. Yeah. So I'm not I frankly do not worry about the resale value. I don't care if my neighbors judge me because there's paint over everything. That doesn't that doesn't bother me. I don't care about that. And I don't care. I don't care how it looks, because I'll tell you what, it looks a million times better now than it did two weeks ago when it was all chipped in brown and, you know, looked like it had been sitting out in the alkali flats for 100 years, you know, and now it looks like now it looks nice. So you see it when you're coming around. You see it. You literally see it when you're coming around the corner. It looks like a bright beacon of playtime.
JVL00:20:52And you didn't just go to Home Depot and pick up a. Yeah, I'm waiting for work to do that.
Sonny00:20:56I did it myself. I half-assed it myself. And that's my lesson to you here, JVL. My lesson to you is that you can half-ass this thing all by yourself. In fact, you should half-ass it all by yourself. And every week we will put a new picture of your half-assing on the Patreon and people can come see it. And they'll they'll we'll watch it happen in not quite real time, but real-ish time. I mean, what do you think about that?
JVL00:21:23Kind of into it. If I go click, click buy on the Metabo HPT.
Sonny00:21:28You should buy two nail guns. You should buy one for the roof and one for the frame. Think about how much money you'll end up saving in the long run with all of your nailing projects. Exactly. Rather than rather than paying somebody to come and do this, who and he'll bring his own nail gun, charge you for the nails, probably. But you buy your own nail gun and you'll be able to nail anything you want.
JVL00:21:48So if I just spend six hundred dollars on the nail guns so that I can then do it myself. That will be better than spending fifteen hundred dollars on somebody to install it.
Sonny00:22:01Oh, sure.
JVL00:22:02Think of it again. Think of the content.
Sonny00:22:04Amortize it out.
Mike00:22:05Think of the content we're going to we're going to mine out of this. And it all makes sense. It all it all works out. JVL.
JVL00:22:12All right.
Mike00:22:12How are you? Stay tuned. Sonny, how how are you? You had. Sorry, I didn't mean to take up 20 minutes with. Oh, no. Shed talk is we got plenty of time for shed talk. Sonny, what is going on with you? You were you had an event in Washington. Yeah, we did. We had to go.
Sonny00:22:30We did across the movie aisle live. It was fun. It's always it's always nice to see the people who come out to these events because half the time they're like, yes, I'm a sub beacon listener or a rare like frequently, actually, not even rarely. It's like I'm a substandard listener from the weekly substandard listener. The old days. So long, long time, long time listeners coming to the events. Always fun. It was really nice to see folks. I'm glad they showed up. And I hope everybody had a fun time. It's a it's a these are fun events to put on. We should do it. We should do a sub beacon one.
JVL00:23:04What did you guys watch? Was it a rival?
Sonny00:23:06We watched a rival. Yeah. Denny Villeneuve.
JVL00:23:09Feel good. Feel good.
Sonny00:23:10Feel good. The feel good. Denny Villeneuve masterpiece. But it was fun. It was fun time. People people showed up. We were at the Alamo Drafthouse in the D.C. Bryant Street. Alamo Drafthouse. I don't know if you guys have you been there.
Mike00:23:24Mike, I have been there.
Sonny00:23:26It's nice. It is. It's a it's a it's a solid location.
Mike00:23:32There's a lot of parking for for being in the city, which is I really appreciate.
Sonny00:23:37Well, I didn't I didn't park. So I walked. So I was staying in a hotel that it was. About a mile and a half away, but it's right on the Metropolitan Branch Trail, more or less. I had to walk a couple blocks to get there. But the but I just walked down that like walked out. I didn't even get murdered, which is was a plus, you know, D.C., D.C. Dangerous town these days.
Mike00:24:02That's that's an accomplishment.
Sonny00:24:03But I did not get murdered. There were lots of people out running and walking dogs and stuff. So it was it was it felt relatively safe, all things considered. And it was nice. It was fun. It was good. It was a good event. Good to see people glad glad they showed up and always nice to hear from folks.
Mike00:24:24Anything else, Sonny?
Sonny00:24:26No, that's it.
Mike00:24:27All right. Michael, how are you, buddy? Fine. We we started the officially started the baseball Little League baseball season this past weekend with the opening day ceremony and and then the first triple A game of the season. So that was very nice. How did it go? It was fine. It was very chilly on the opening day. The ceremony was. On the big field at the main of the main of the three parks that we that we that are literally plays that it's it's always, you know, it's always kind of a charming little bit of Americana. You know, everybody really is lines up. They've got their banners, all the teams I was with. I'm assisting the coach pitch team. So we had our team and then my my oldest went over to his triple A team and then did all the teams get to process in. Oh, yeah. So everybody lines up in the outfield. And they have like kind of a couple of speeches. And one really cool thing they have is they have all the kids who are on the local high school baseball teams who played in this little league. They all come in there, you know, in their duds and walk around. And that's pretty cool. The my my fellow coach on on the on the coach pitch team, his oldest is on one of the high. School team. So he was there walking around. We had the the young his his youngest sibling. And so there's a there's a nice bit of, you know, it's like poetry. It rhymes, you know, everybody's sort of like there and together. And the problem this year was it was very windy and we could not hear anything as a result on the PA system. Or it was a very low rent PA system because usually we can hear they have some announcements. They do this, you know, parent pledge. Or every parent in, you know, who was there stands up and says, basically, I'm not going to be an asshole this year. And we couldn't hear any of that West Springfield. What's that?
JVL00:26:36Are you technically in West? No, no, no, no. This is this is this is the this is the Annandale North Springfield and the West Springfield is the the superpower in Virginia Little League. Correct.
Mike00:26:49So we are we are we border it and we're Ansel in Annandale North Springfield. So we also border Fairfax and I think Paul's Church. Anyway, so it was very nice. And everybody says that they do a fun first pitch where the Chick-fil-A cow is out there and everybody gets a little ping pong, wiffle ball, ping pong size ball, wiffle ball and throws the pitch at the at the cow. It's just a weird thing. That's lovely. So participating in a stoning. Exactly. Exactly. And the cow knows what he did.
Sonny00:27:25You should be able to you should be able to eat the cow later with the man inside the cow. It should be like the wicker man. You take them.
Mike00:27:33Not the big ball. Balls.
Sonny00:27:35Not the big ball. Balls. Put them up and you put them up in a giant chicken effigy and light it on fire.
Mike00:27:42But he's a cow and you're supposed to eat more chicken. Not eat.
Sonny00:27:45You got to sacrifice one cow to get the chicken. The tasty chicken within.
Mike00:27:51Anyway, so we had that. That was very nice. I'm moving on. We had.
Sonny00:27:55You don't want to do 10 more minutes on sacrificing cows to the pagan chicken gods. We'll have enough. I feel like we could.
Mike00:28:02We'll have enough gory violence to talk about with this movie. But anyway, the long story short, we had a game. We've had a second triple A game. Our team is not great, but they got a lot of heart. And there's talk right there. The thing that has changed things is now stealing home. Is allowed at this level. And so we just have a lot of past balls and the teams just. It's a coach around. No, no, no. This is triple. This is kid pitch. Oh, kid pitch. Triple. Yeah, but you still have five run limits, right? Correct. Five run limits. We did have this situation. Every single. Yeah. Turns into a scored run. Not always.
JVL00:28:47I mean, I would say the level of defensive play has gotten like besides besides eventually because they can all steal second. They'll steal third on a pass ball in the next pass ball. They steal home.
Mike00:28:59Usually, but I would say what I'm saying is the the defense is a little better. So, like, for instance, we got a we got a forced out. I guess you would call it a forced out a surprise, a surprise line drive catch. And the kid hadn't tagged up at second. And so we got him out that way. So, you know, it's like a little defensive plays that they're getting a little better at. Idiot. I will say this. I want to get your you guys's take on this. So on Saturday, it's cold still, like blustery is how I would describe the weather. And we've got a twelve fifteen game we're playing. We're getting creamed. The other team is is is is demolishing us. And we get to the point where because the rule is six innings or two hours. Right. Whichever comes first. And the rule is that if you start a new inning. In that two hour mark, you finish the inning. OK. So the game starts at twelve. Oh, sorry. Twelve thirty. No, twelve fifteen. Twelve fifteen. So two fifteen is the two hour mark. The fourth inning ends at two twelve. OK. OK. The coach comes out. Our our coach's main coach is. Not there. He had to be out of town. So one of the assistant coaches comes out. They meet up with the blue in the middle and the other coach says at this time. Oh, it's something like. Fourteen to seven.
JVL00:30:37OK.
Mike00:30:38Still within reach. Well, not really, because it's not if there's a five. There's a five run.
JVL00:30:44Typically, the rule is, though, that limit doesn't apply to the final inning.
Mike00:30:48Correct. But we would be going into the final inning in this situation. So the. The other coach goes, oh, yeah, we should we should we could play more one more inning. We're literally two minutes away by the time they're having this conversation conversation two minutes away from the two hour cutoff. And the and everybody is cold. The kids are cold. The parents are cold.
?00:31:14And.
Mike00:31:14The collective sigh from the parents when they get from on both sides from from hearing this coach say, yeah, let's play another. Inning and then our assistant coach just kind of went along with it, which was a mistake, but that's OK with the home team. We were the home team.
JVL00:31:36Oh, so that means you would have had to play the full inning. So if you were the visitors, you could have just done a half inning because you're still losing. Then the game's over.
Mike00:31:45Tuesday's game worked out that way where we played the final half inning just to make sure everybody on our side got enough times.
JVL00:31:51Got enough times to bat.
Mike00:31:52Yeah. So, yeah. So we played an entire. Other inning. Nobody won. The kids didn't want to be there. Most of the coaches didn't want to be there. The parents certainly didn't want to be there. So I guess my question to you guys is. Is this other coach like like like he deserves it. He deserves to die, right? Like this is like this is like torture. No, no. Come on.
JVL00:32:15This is torture. Look, in this situation, it is clearly acceptable for both coaches to say, yeah, let's go. It's it's mellow time. Let's call it. But for one coach to say, yeah, sure, we can play another one. Like not demand. Like, hey, there's still two minutes left. Look at the clock. Look at the clock, blue. We got it. Don't you ever miss it. We got to do another thing. We got to score more runs. That would be jackass. But be like, yeah, we can play another inning with two minutes left. That's what I would have done.
Mike00:32:45OK. I thought it was. Yeah, I know it was. I would say this. Apparently, this coach has a reputation for being extremely. Extremely competitive. And it was just it was just a little much. But to each his own, I guess it was a little much.
JVL00:33:05I can say either either way would have been fine. And so long as he wasn't demanding that you play another winning, because that would have been dick. But if you're saying, yeah, no, we can play another one. I think your coach agreeing to it is perfectly fine.
Sonny00:33:18Honestly, it's it's just it's all of a piece with children's sports, which is a series of punishments. Like, it's I don't see any difference between the fifth inning here and the first inning. Frankly, you might as well just like just let it keep going until you're dead inside or frozen.
Mike00:33:37OK, close your eyes and lie back and think of America. All right. So that's all that we got. I'll give some updates as the season progresses. I do want to say in Tuesday's game, my son had he's struggling. At the plate quite a bit, but he had a terrific defensive play at first. He's a lefty and he really thrives at first base. So hooray for him. Good job. It was a great out. Beat the runner on a on a six three, you know, grounder. And so you teach him how to hold the runner. What do you mean?
JVL00:34:22In that situation, run around first, how to how to.
Sonny00:34:24Oh, this is this is this is a million times worse than Shed Talk. We have to we have to. All right.
Mike00:34:31We're going to move on here.
Sonny00:34:32I do not. I'm sorry, Mike. Get to the box. I'm excited. I'm excited that your kid is having a good year at first base.
Mike00:34:39Well, no, he's he's not. It was just one. It was just one moment. And I got it. I got it. I got to sing his praise. Exactly. It was one shiny moment. But let's move on to the box office box office thoughts. Number one at the box office, Godzilla. X Kong, the new empire.
Sonny00:34:57But number two is silent.
Mike00:34:58The X is silent. So it's Godzilla Kong.
Sonny00:35:00Godzilla Kong. It's not Godzilla.
Mike00:35:03Because it's not Godzilla V Kong.
Sonny00:35:05No, it's just Godzilla Kong. Godzilla Kong.
Mike00:35:08Godzilla Kong.
Sonny00:35:11Godzilla Kong.
Mike00:35:12I saw Godzilla. Godzilla. OK, no. Moving on. All right. Number two is Monkey Man, though. That's the movie we're talking about. An impressive number two performance, although it's only made, what, $10 million? Not maybe not that impressive, but at least it's a number two, because number three, Ghostbusters Frozen Empire falling to number three. The first omen we talked about the original omen last week, JBL, when you were gone coming in number four, any box office thoughts, gents?
Sonny00:35:43No, no huge box office thoughts. The one thing that is interesting is that so Monkey Man was picked up by Universal from Netflix. Netflix sold it to Universal for $10 million. Um, because they, uh, there's some, there's some discussion about why this happened after
JVL00:36:00having paid $30 million for it, or did they just void that?
Sonny00:36:04They paid $30 million to, uh, acquire it is my understanding for 10 and then sold it for 10. Uh, but the, but it's going to make it up in volume. Yeah, but it's, but it's, it's interesting. I mean, look, it's interesting because the, the, uh, the reason all this happened, there's the Indian government is not thrilled with this movie, which is very critical of the nationalist style. Like it's, it doesn't name Modi or anything, but it is very much about how Modi style politicians are bad. Um, uh, and, but the, but like, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's just an interesting little moment where for, for years and years now, we've seen movies since in, since the pandemic moved from theaters to streaming, um, uh, and to see the opposite of that, even for weird geopolitical reasons. Is kind of fascinating. So, I mean, universal will probably end up making money on this, even if it doesn't do a ton of business at the box office and it is a potential franchise kind of, um, you could, you could, you could see them, uh, making this into a series of movies, uh, in the, the John wick mold that kind of depends on how it holds though. I don't think this is going to hold very well because I think a lot of the, well, we'll, we'll discuss that in a minute. Um, but, uh, but yeah, I mean, the, the other interesting thing is the first omen coming in fourth. Like, again, this is a movie. They got a lot of buzz and, uh, people on Twitter were talking about how girl this film Twitter loves this movie. It's so great. The first omen. Um, and it, it's very, it was, it was very interesting. I went to go see the first omen and I, as the movie was unspooling, I was like, I understand why film Twitter is very into this because it's, it's the horror equivalent of claptor. You know what claptor is? Claptor is like Jon Stewart style comedy.
JVL00:37:48You know, it's not horror equivalent of claptor.
Sonny00:37:50Well, so, so let me, let me, I'm going to spoil it. If you're, if you're really worried about first omen spoilers, skip ahead a few minutes because I want to, I'm going to explain to you what the plot of this movie is. So in the omen, remember the omen is the story of, uh, Gregory Peck is the, uh, the ambassador to the court of St. James. His son, uh, his son dies in childbirth. They give the, the priest at the church lets him adopt this new baby Damien turns out day. Oops. Damien's actually the antichrist. Um, and that's, that's how the movie. So this is a prequel to that. Find out, uh, where the baby that was born that day came from. But the, the, the whole, uh, I, I'm just gonna, actually, I'm just gonna read my letterboxd review because I, I explained it perfectly there and I, I don't want to, I don't want to mess it up.
JVL00:38:40Uh, he does say so himself.
Sonny00:38:42Yeah. All right. So look, so, so, uh, here is what is actually happening in the movie. Uh, it is revealed that the antichrist is being bred by the Catholic church. As part of like a Benny Jesseret style eugenics program to, I swear to God, this is a line from the movie to quote unquote combat secularism because the birth of the antichrist will drive people back to the church. They're not wrong. You understand? Uh, and the heroes, the heroes of this movie are, and I, I gotta remind you, they're a Catholic priest and a Catholic nun. The heroes of the film decide that the only way to save humanity is for this pregnant nun who has been bred to give birth to the antichrist. She must have an abortion. So like this is, again, when I say the horror equivalent of claptrap, that's what I mean. It is just like, yes, this is very good and brave. This is this movie in which the Catholic church is like, yes, you must get an abortion to save humanity.
Mike00:39:40The Catholic church supports an abortion.
Sonny00:39:43Well, the renegade portion of the Catholic church, the official Catholic church is giving birth to the antichrist. I mean, again, it's like, it's, it's, the whole thing is ridiculous.
JVL00:39:54I raise a practical question.
Sonny00:39:56Yes.
JVL00:39:58All of this presupposes that the Catholic church is actually right about God, the father and the son and the Holy spirit and the existence of the devil and all his works. Right. I mean, it sure it posits then that the secular people who say none of that stuff is real are wrong. So it's actually an incredibly conservative movie.
Sonny00:40:18Well, this is so that I have a long running theory that the only, uh, the only way for horror movies of this sort to work is if you take ideas of faith seriously, which makes horror like a weird, weirdly, a weirdly reactionary genre instead of a weirdly liberal genre. But this is, I, again, like the, the, again, the whole point of this movie is look at this, this priest and this nun got to get an abortion to save humanity. Yeah.
Guest00:40:46Yeah.
Sonny00:40:47What do you think about your pro-choice beliefs now? Your pro-life beliefs now? Makes you think. You know. Makes you think.
Mike00:40:54Doesn't it?
Sonny00:40:54Anyway.
JVL00:40:55Wait, so does this then invalidate the, the omen movie? Like if they get the abortion, then Damien's never born and so nothing ever happens. They change. Well, spoiler.
Sonny00:41:04They don't get the abortion. Oh, I see. So she's forced to give birth to the antichrist. I see. Just like you, just like what would happen in. In 2024 America. Antonin Scalia's America. In Handmaid's Tale.
JVL00:41:18Okay. Gotcha.
Sonny00:41:19All right. So anyway, that, that, that, uh, anyway, I, I don't even know. I don't even know how I got on that tangent, but I just wanted to, I wanted to rant about that because it cracks me up. It's at four.
Mike00:41:29It's at four. It's at four on the box office list. So is that, is that bad for a, for a horror movie?
Sonny00:41:36I mean, $8.4 million is not a good opening. That's what I thought. For a, for a movie. So it's, you know, it's, it's not, it's not, it's not doing very well. Uh, anyway, that's, that's the end of that. Okay. So monkey man.
Mike00:41:49Well, let's move on. Yes. Let's move on to monkey man. And I think, by the way, I've had the Rolling Stones song monkey man, like rolling around in my head ever since we, nobody knows that one.
Sonny00:42:00No, I have no idea what that song is.
JVL00:42:01I'm a monkey.
Mike00:42:02All right. Okay.
Sonny00:42:04Oh, that. Yeah. That's, that's a, that's a, that's called monkey man.
Mike00:42:07That's monkey man. Yeah. From, uh, let it bleed. Okay. Sonny, why don't you give us a big boy review of monkey man.
Sonny00:42:13Monkey man written, directed by and starring Dev Patel, who folks will remember from slumdog millionaire and chappy, uh, is the, is, the, uh, the story of a, an untitled or an unnamed young man. He goes by Bobby for a bit of, of the film, but he, he, he officially has no name. He's the kid in the descriptions. Uh, he, he, uh, is, is, his village was destroyed. His mother was killed and then burned. Their body was burned and he wants revenge against the people who did it. And that's, that's the basic plot here, right? That's the, that is the, the it's John wick, but with a dead mother instead of a dead dog, and in India instead of nameless, instead of New York city. So, uh, that's the, that's the long and the short of it. Uh, I, uh, I am, I, I find this movie kind of fascinating for a couple reasons. Uh, one is that it has, it has a real structural problem to it, which is that it, it, in the first 30 minutes, we build to, uh, the kid's confrontation with the police chief who destroyed his village and burned his mother and, he, the whole first 30 minutes again has been like getting him in place to do this. He gets a job at a nightclub. He works his way up the nightclub. He gets himself to a point where he is in alone with this guy in the bathroom and then he can't pull the trigger and there's a big fight. And then we, then we spend the next hour and 15 minutes of the movie getting us right back to this point again, getting us right back to this immediate same point. And, you know, you, the counter to this is, well, he needs to learn that he has to fight for, more than himself. He needs to become an avatar of the people. He needs to, uh, you know, montage and, and I'm sorry, but I don't care about any of that. You know what I care about? I see. I care about this kid getting revenge on the guy who killed his mom. That's what I care about. I don't care about the trans priests of Shiva who are going to lose their temple because of the, the evil Modi government or Modi fill in government. I don't care about any of this. I don't care about any of this. What I care about is revenge. I care. I care about straightforward revenge aspect here. And that is, that's a real problem for this movie. This movie is two hours long. It could have easily been 90 minutes. Um, uh, and, uh, all of the extra time is filled with these kind of languid flashbacks where we see him walking through the jungle with his mother and we see, uh, but I, again, I don't, I like you do that once and then we're good. We're good. And it really, uh, the, the description of this movie as Indian John Wick isn't fair to the John Wick movies on, for a couple of reasons. One of which is that the John Wick, or at least the first John Wick is extremely efficient. That movie is a hundred minutes long. And even with like a, a basically taking 40 minutes to get to the fireworks factory, once you get to the fireworks factory, it's great. Uh, it's just shoot out after shoot out. This takes much longer. Um, the, the fights themselves are pretty good. They're solid. They're not, they're not fluid and, uh, dance like, like the, uh, the John Wick. It is clearly not put together by a Chad Stileski type director. This is, uh, you know, Dev Patel is doing a, a slightly more immediate and visceral thing. Uh, but the fights, I, I enjoyed them. They were pleasingly brutal. The knife work was great. Um, again, it's just like this movie, uh, I can see why Netflix was like, you know what? We're not even going to put this on Netflix because like people are going to click off in the first 10 minutes because it takes forever to get going. Um, that's a problem. That's a problem. Uh, I still, I look, I still give this a kind of half-hearted thumbs up because it is, uh, it is entertaining and enjoyable. The actors are all very good. And I love, uh, as Mike kind of hinted at in the opening, Charlton Copley, who is the, uh, South African actor from district nine, uh, the A-team, um, uh, Elysium. I, I, here's what I want in a movie. I'm a very simple man. I'm the simplest man who exists. What I want in a movie. Is a villain with a ridiculous South African accent who shows up for like 20 minutes and just yells things. So I liked, I liked this movie and I liked beekeeper. Remember the beekeeper, how the beekeeper had the, the guy who shows up at the end with his ridiculous South African accent, not even, he's actually not even South African. He's British, but he had a great accent. Uh, and, uh, if you, if you, if black Panther, yes, black Panther, exactly. Uh, who's played by what's his name? The motion.
JVL00:46:52Uh, Andy circus.
Sonny00:46:54Uh, if you put, uh, if you put a villain with a, with a South African accent in your movie, you're going to get a thumbs up from me. So thumbs up monkey man, Shalto Copley is great. He plays a crooked fight, uh, promoter. Uh, and I would just listen to him yell gibberish all day long. By the way, that's my review.
Mike00:47:13Speaking of the South African, uh, villain, I, when I was in Ireland in college, um, a bunch of my Irish roommates. God almost got into a fist fight in a bar, uh, with some South Africans. So like it works in real life too, is, is what I'm trying to say. Uh, okay. They make good villains. They do make, I wonder why JBL monkey man, your thoughts.
JVL00:47:40I was disappointed. I, I was expecting an actual monkey doing revenge and like planet of the apes. No, see, this is the thing I, I want, I want a revenge. Movie, John wick with a monkey. So it's not, it's not a creature movie, right? Which is what you like. Like Congo is, and it's not a dystopian sci-fi movie like planet of the apes. It's more like rubber. Remember how rubber just was like, yep, there's a tire. This tire is going around on a revenge killing spree. And then we just rolled with it. Yeah.
Mike00:48:13I would like that to speak.
JVL00:48:15And, uh, I'm agnostic as to whether it, what kind of ape it would be. It probably shouldn't be. Maybe a gorilla. Cause they're sort of too big. Maybe a chimp, maybe an orangutan, a baboon, maybe a baboon, all the baboons. Maybe they're not big enough to be scared. I don't know, but I'd like that. A man drill. Just a straightforward revenge with John wick with a, with a monkey.
Sonny00:48:37What if it was like a golden lion tamarin? They're very small. They can get in tiny places. They're tiny people.
JVL00:48:44Maybe I bet they, that would be like the jet Lee of, of ape revenge movies at the, at the end of
Sonny00:48:51monkey man, you could have a golden lion tamarin come in and say, I would like you to join the monkey initiative. Yes.
JVL00:48:58So I, I got two questions, two serious questions. Uh, the first is, did this movie undergo a title change? Because I could swear that months ago I saw a trailer for this in the theaters and the, the title card on it was called something like primal and not monkey man, different movie.
Sonny00:49:20That's a different movie.
JVL00:49:21Okay. There we go. Second, do you remember how Seinfeld killed the sitcom? Yes. Right. It just, we underwent a nuclear winter for sitcoms where, I mean, there were sitcoms after Seinfeld, but none of them were any good. They were lowest comm denominator shit. It was just like CBS sitcoms and it wasn't until Malcolm in the middle and arrested development recreated it as a single camera format that the sitcom was able to sort of reinvent itself. Has John Wick killed revenge movies because it's just, it's perfect in a way? I mean, that's how Seinfeld did it. Seinfeld perfected the format, right? There was no, there was nothing left. You couldn't do anything with it.
Mike00:50:06Seinfeld also subverted the format, whereas John Wick more perfects. I mean, that my, my initial reaction to that, otherwise, uh, I think very astute observation, is it's not as if it's, it's not as if the revenge movie is undermined by John Wick or sort of like subverted by it. It's, it's just, it's, it's just the best. And so you can't do as, as great as John Wick, but like imitation, like if it's a good imitation, why, why can't that work?
JVL00:50:44Maybe, but it's like the purest distillation of it. Fair enough. Right. It's, I, I don't know. And the more I've thought. I haven't gone back and watched the final John Wick movie, but in, I mean, it's just grown on me at the time. I liked it a lot, but thought it was a bit much. And now I'm just like, if I wanted to go watch a John Wick movie, that's the one I would want to go watch.
Sonny00:51:06See, that's interesting. Cause that's how I feel about the second one. The second one, I was kind of iffy on the first time I saw it. I was like, ah, this is covering a lot of the same ground above. But I, I actually think it's the, uh, I actually think it's the, the best of those movies just in terms of like, it gets, you get going right away and it does not stop. And it has the, it has so many just good, distinct sequences to it. Um, doesn't have Donnie Yen though. Donnie Yen is fantastic. Donnie Yen is fantastic. Marco's a roar. He's so good.
JVL00:51:38Those are my only thoughts on it. My Michael, what did you, did you like it?
Mike00:51:42Um, so I agree with Sonny's assessment. I feel like I say this every week now. I agree with Sonny's assessment. Of the movie's flaws. It's too long. Like I was, I was like, I was like, let's wrap this up. Come on.
Sonny00:51:57I was, I, I, I, I very rarely check my watch in a movie theater. And I will, I will say that I, I, I was at like the hour mark. I was like, how is there still an hour left of this movie?
Mike00:52:09Well, and it's because in part, as you say, you feel like you're reaching the climax half an hour in. Yes. And, and so there's a, there's a, there's a weird. You're like, where, where are we going from here? Like, I can see how he does it. I assume he doesn't do it because like, what are we going to do for the rest of the movie? Um, but I don't like the same plot of Madam Web, right?
JVL00:52:34Like he gets, he gets there to, to face the final, the final boss and then, uh, loses. So has to go on a journey of self-discovery to understand what he should be fighting for. Something like that.
Mike00:52:46But here's the thing. I don't get the journey of self-discovery he goes through. Like, I don't understand what he really learned about himself. I guess he learned that like revenge needs to be about something more than that. But did he really learn that? I don't think so. He just was like, oh, okay. Now I've got some friends who will help me carry out the revenge. Um, can I, you go ahead, Sonny.
Sonny00:53:11I look, I, I, I, I hate, I hate to come across as the conservative prank film guy, even though that's what I, oh yeah.
Mike00:53:18Don't start now.
Sonny00:53:20But I will, I will say, I will say, look, here's, this movie comes out of South by Southwest with a huge, with huge critical acclaim. You know, audiences are like, I can't believe how great this is and how profound it is. Dev Patel is an enormous generational talent. And I'm watching this movie and I'm like, this is fine. As, as I'm watching it, I was like, yeah, this is fine. I guess it's okay. I'm like, I'm not bored exactly until I started to get bored. And then, uh, and then the moment, the moment where I was like, oh, I see why everybody was praising. It was when they get, when they get to the temple, the trans priest. And I was just like, oh, now I get it. Now I get why everybody was falling all over themselves to praise this movie. And, uh, I'm vague. I'm like more annoyed now than I was two minutes ago. Um, and I, it's like, it's so trans, it's so transparent. I don't, I don't think, I don't think. I think critics are often unfairly tarred as like they're liberal hacks, but I, I like don't buy that narrative for the most part. But every once in a while, there's one where I'm like, ah, I get it. Yeah. I, I see what's happening here.
Mike00:54:25And it's, it's, it, here's the other problems with this. Um, so the, the Indian politics were inscrutable to me. Like I know who Narendra Modi is. I know that he's a nationalist, but I don't understand any of the sides in that political fight. Like it, it is, again, I could probably read a couple of articles in the financial times to like catch myself up, but like. I'm not going to. And, and I found, so I found, so I found the, I found just the whole. And I read some, some things where, uh, Dev Patel was like, I want to make this deeper and I could see where he's trying to do that. He's trying to make a political film, but I don't understand the politics. So it doesn't work for me.
Sonny00:55:09So I will say, I will say in defense of the movie there, there it's operating on two levels at the same time. One is, one is the political level, as you, as you mentioned. And like, frankly, that's all. Unscrutable to me and I don't care about it, but I will say that it works. It works on the more generic level of like, here is a guy standing for the underdog here is a guy who was standing for the street rats. And the, the trans priests were being displaced and the foresters who are the forest people who are being removed from their land. And like, and, and on that level, it works, it actually works. And, and so this is the thing it does. This is the thing it does relatively well. And I will, I will give it credit for that, which is that it, it creates, it creates the general. Out of the specific, right? It creates the general idea of standing for the underdog, standing for the, the downbeaten and the downtrodden. And it gives it an individual patina, a specific patina of Indian politics that even if you don't understand it, you feel like, okay, here's, here is a different place that I haven't seen before. I haven't seen a movie like this, uh, specifically though. I have seen this movie generally a number of times.
Mike00:56:16Okay.
Sonny00:56:16And that's, and that's, and that, and that's, that's, there's. There's something to be said for that. It, it was never, here's the thing. I guess what I'm saying is it was never boring to see what was happening on the screen. It was always like interesting and individual and, and unique in a way that, that a lot of movies like this kind of don't have.
Mike00:56:35That's fair. I think that's a fair rebuttal, uh, to my, to my criticism is it's not even really a criticism except that, because I, I agree with you. I enjoyed it without understanding that. And yet I kept, I felt like the movie kept. Sort of like kept that story going in a way where it made by the end of it. I was going like, what, what was that about? Like, who are the, why, why is this guru like, and it's like, again, I don't expect anybody to have an answer for that. I would just have to understand the, the, the, the political system and the, and the culture. Um, and that's another issue here, which is like, I find, um, sort of the, the, the nods to kind of. Um, to the Hindu religion to be like, that's all lost on me as well in a way that I'm sure that like these movies that we've certainly watched in on the show that have sort of Catholic imagery would be lost in somebody who's not even, who's not like from a Western culture. I felt that same kind of like, okay, the Hanuman guy, like, I don't know who he, where he fits in the Pantheon, this monkey God. So like, it just.
Sonny00:57:44Well, Mike, you know what, what, what has happened here? Mike, Michael, Michael. Michael Warren is that your, you are a conservative and your moral foundations are towards, uh, trusting authority and law and order. And your, this means you are running up against the, the foundation of this film, which is based on empathy and fairness and equity and equality. So you, you watch, you watch this movie and you feel a dissonance because it, it comes up against your basic, uh, moral framework. And so you want to read about it to understand why the movie is wrong. What you want, what you want is to be able to say, here's what, here's how the movie really treats the authorities unfairly. That's what you want.
Mike00:58:31You read my mind, Sonny. I know. Trust me.
Sonny00:58:34I, I've, I was feeling, no, because I know this because I was thinking the same exact thing coming out of the film. I was like, I really want to know what's, what's the actual deal with these villages? Like, are they, are they, are they filled with like drug runners or are they like, you know, are they, are they really, they're probably pretty useless, right? You could build a, you could build a, a, a sweatshop temple on top of it. It'd be fine. Exactly. It'd be fine. Be a better. Wait, like, what are those, what are those people contributing to Indian society anyway? Exactly. Probably nothing. Probably nothing.
Mike00:59:05How? You read my mind. Anyway, no, I mean, it was fine. JVL? JVL's like got a, got an aneurysm going on. What are you, what are you thinking there?
Sonny00:59:13You gotta, you gotta look on your face.
JVL00:59:15No, they make sheds.
Sonny00:59:18It's just, uh, build a factory to make. Put together prefab.
JVL00:59:21Put together prefab shed kits.
Mike00:59:23Yeah, that, that's what they, that's what the, uh, they should have done. Anyway, I, I, I thought, I, I will say I got a little dizzy in the fight scenes. It reminded me of the Jason Bourne movies, um, and I, which I don't like. So, um, all in all, like it was fine. It was a fine way to pass two hours, but, oh, it's very fun. Oh, the other thing, the gore, little much for me, like I had to look away a few times, like, like the biting the nose off the guy and like the shoving the, the
JVL00:59:54knife, you wait till you get the actual monkey revenge movie with those fuckers. Dude, kingdom of the face and genitals. Yeah, exactly. Face and genitals. That's how chimps fight. Oh, that's, that's, that's great.
Mike01:00:08I can't wait to see that movie. Uh, okay. Any other thoughts on monkey man? No. Um, Sonny. No. Okay.
Sonny01:00:17I, again, I, I. I think this movie is very fun and I, I, I do think, I think it has been done a few favors by the like raves coming out of South by Southwest. If this, if people's expectations were keyed down like one octave, if it was like, this is a solid B instead of like, this is the most revolutionary action movies. Like it's not, it's fine. It's, and it's, it's also very much an actor's first directorial effort. Like there are just, there are just weird pacing and blocking and, uh, framing issues throughout. Now, look again, it looks, it, frankly, it looks better than I would have expected from a, from a debut. He, his cinematographer did a really, really good job. Um, but the, but like, let's, let's just, let's bring it down one notch while we're, when we're talking about monkey.
Mike01:01:04By the way, loved, loved all the, all like the Bollywood and other Indian cinema actors who were like, they're like, they're all terrific. Um, I thought, um, and it was, it was like, it was also good to like see, cause you know that like there is this whole movie industry in India that is opaque to me and it's like, oh yeah, like they have like this whole like slate of actors that I like got to say, I didn't recognize any of them and that was, but I enjoyed that. So, all right. All right. So that's all the time we're going to give to this episode.
Sonny01:01:36You like the idea of Bollywood. Yeah. I would never actually watch a Bollywood movie. I would never watch, I would, no, these, these Indian action movies are like, I, are, I, I find them terrible. I was gonna, I'm sorry. Are, are, are, are, are.
Mike01:01:49Terrible. I was going to say, at least there was, there wasn't a dance sequence at the end.
Sonny01:01:53Well, this is, and this is, and this is, so yeah, well, I could do, I could do 10 minutes on the, the, like the completely, uh, weirdly pandering and condescending way. So many Western critics talk about these movies, stuff, they accept stuff in those movies that they would never accept from a Western Hollywood movie. And it drives me a little bit bananas.
Mike01:02:15But I like the actors.
Sonny01:02:16Which is what monkey man eats. He eats bananas.
Mike01:02:20All right. Now that really is all the time we're going to give to this episode. Uh, go to subbeacon.com, comment, and we will talk to you next time. Uh, got a recommendation from a friend last night or a potential. I know we've got some movies, actual movies in the theater, uh, coming up. Uh, but if we are looking on a, for a, something to do. And maybe people in the comments can, uh, weigh in. Uh, there's apparently a two, two part documentary on Steve Martin on Apple TV plus that.
Sonny01:02:56Oh yeah.
Mike01:02:56Um, I've heard his, I've heard his excellent. So JVL looks thrilled. I got the prospect.
Sonny01:03:03You're not a Steve Martin guy.
JVL01:03:05I didn't know that. It's a, it's, this is a me thing.
Mike01:03:08No, my wife is the same way.
JVL01:03:10Not as I do not. It is like saying I don't like pistachio ice cream. Right. It doesn't mean pistachio ice cream is bad. Just the flavor of Steve Martin has never really worked for me. He's an enormous talent. He's beloved. He seems like a great guy for an actor. He seems very smart, uh, and well-read and it has an interesting thing going on. I love the idea of Steve Martin.
Mike01:03:34Well, you might, you might, based on what my friend told me about this documentary, you might get something out of it because it apparently goes into quite a bit of his, um, not only his struggle on the road early on as a comedian, as a standup, but the kind of, um, there's a kind of pathos or a, it goes into a little bit of his, of his, um, depression about that. And the apparent interest is interesting thing is he in the late sixties and early seventies would like videotape or whatever the, that the version of that kid set up a camera in where he lived or where he was staying and do like diary entries. Of how his performances went is like, uh, you know, I played a really, you know, crummy crowd, uh, and this didn't work and this bit failed and this one did. Okay. So maybe, you know, like, so, and apparently the documentary is like built on that.
JVL01:04:32So that sounds like it would be kind of, uh, there's a new Bray Wyatt documentary out, but I'm guessing you guys don't want to watch that. The wrestler, the wrestler who died.
Sonny01:04:42What did he die of? A wrestler died.
JVL01:04:45Yeah, I know. 36 year old wrestler died. Died with heart problems. You know, it's just a thing that happens.
Sonny01:04:50Facts.
Mike01:04:51All right. Well, I'm sure it's fine.
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