#292. 'Conclave' (Peacock)
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The main event is Conclave, which Sonny calls a glossy "airport novel" of a movie — silly and predictable through most of its runtime but redeemed for him by a twist ending (the secretly intersex Cardinal from Kabul becoming Pope) that suddenly explained why it's a Best Picture contender; he thinks there's a real chance it wins, especially with an actual papal conclave looming given Pope Francis's hospitalization. JVL pushes back less on the ending and more defends the film's plausibility, arguing that nothing in it is much crazier than how real conclaves actually function. Mike is the most disappointed of the three, praising the visuals, Ralph Fiennes's performance, and Isabella Rossellini (and recounting his own stay at the real Domus Sanctae Marthae on a press junket) but finding the film's telegraphed plot and surface-level politics deflating, especially the final twist. Before getting to the movie, the guys spend a long stretch remembering Gene Hackman (who died the morning of taping) and Michelle Trachtenberg, debating Hackman's best performances and most underrated movies (Night Moves, Heist, The Conversation); JVL then makes an extended, contrarian case for reappraising Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith as better than The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker, sparking a Star Wars digression about Kathleen Kennedy's exit from Lucasfilm and the "lower the stakes to raise the stakes" theory of action filmmaking. They close with quick box-office chat about the Stephen King adaptation The Monkey and a rundown of Oscar precursor wins (Anora, BAFTAs, SAG) as they handicap the ceremony.
From the show notes
Note: we had some audio issues on this episode (I blame the Internet myself) so there's slightly more crosstalk than usual. Apologies in advance.
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00The pope is dead, the throne is vacant, the conclave begins now, we're about to choose the most famous man in the world and one and a quarter billion souls watching, let's say this is a pretty fair vision of hell, well don't be blasphemous Ray, hell arrives tomorrow when we bring in the conclave.
Mike00:00:32Welcome to the Sub-Beacon podcast, I am your co-host Mike Warren, joining me as always are my two co-hosts who do not have the spiritual depth to be pope, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch, join us over at subbeacon.com. Tell your friends and family if they want to listen to this show, they've got to do it at subbeacon.com. New episodes every Friday morning, join the conversation in the comments, lots of fun discussion going on there and every once in a while you might see a bonus episode if you go to subbeacon.com, which you should. On this week's show, we're going to be talking about Conclave, that's Conclave the film, not Conclave the potential future. A very near future event that could be happening, God forbid, soon in the Vatican. But first, before we talk about that, let's check in how everyone is doing. Is it bad, guys? You guys can't hear me?
Sonny00:01:39You're real pixelated and fuzzy again. Maybe turn off your mic or your camera and let's try that for a bit. Yeah.
Mike00:01:49Is this anybody?
Sonny00:01:51Turn off your camera. We'll see if we can listen to you. You sound better. Yeah, my camera is off. Yeah, you sound better.
Mike00:01:58Okay, I'll turn the camera off.
Sonny00:01:59Your camera is messing everything up. Leave your camera off. I'm leaving all this in. I want the people to hear what we struggle with every day. Sure.
Mike00:02:05I mean, it's my fault. This is hard. Yeah, it's all my fault. Yeah, so what's going on, guys? What should we talk about?
Sonny00:02:18Who goes first? Send it to someone.
JVL00:02:21So here's the thing. We obviously have to talk about Gene Hackman, who died Thursday morning. I would also like to talk about Star Wars and a little bit about Kathleen Kennedy and a lot about Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. I'm sure you guys have things to talk about. I don't even know if we're going to have time to get to the conclave. Maybe we should wait until the actual conclave begins because Pope Francis is in the hospital still. And according to my very, very close Vatican watchers, is unlikely to emerge from the hospital. So we are headed towards a real life conclave.
Sonny00:02:58Not dead yet.
JVL00:03:02So I don't know. Where do you guys want to go first? Sonny, you have control of the board.
Sonny00:03:07OK, yeah, let's talk. Gene Hackman first. Gene Hackman has died hours, hours ago, hours before we taped this. Well, he probably died like two weeks ago. He's been found dead hours before we taped this. So. Uh, let's let's do Gene Hackman.
JVL00:03:23He's great. So what should we talk about?
Mike00:03:26Yeah, I mean, he's like great in everything.
Sonny00:03:28So I wrote I wrote I wrote an obit for Gene Hackman, and I realized after I had written it and, you know, I mentioned I don't do I don't do the exhaustive obit thing where, like, there are people who will just list all of the books somebody has written or all of the movies somebody has been in. I that's not my style.
?00:03:49There's.
Sonny00:03:49There's a place for that. But, like, I don't need to just go down somebody's IMDb page and list all the things they've done. But Hackman was one of those guys where I finished writing my obit. And, you know, I mentioned the French Connection and Unforgiven and the Royal Tenenbaums and Get Shorty. I mean, I like five other movies, you know, little bits and pieces here and there. But there were there were literally I could have written an entirely different obit using this same exact style. And. And mentioning 10 movies that I'd never once brought up in this in this in this obit. I mean, like big ones, not not little ones, big ones like Hoosiers or the conversation, which, you know, was like about the birdcage, the birdcage.
JVL00:04:41In which he might be the funniest thing. He might actually be the funniest thing in the birdcage, which is the movie that. Introduced Nathan Lane to the world and which is a very funny movie. And yet Gene Hackman steals every scene he's in.
Sonny00:04:58Yeah, he you could have you absolutely you could have done an entire thing on that. You could have done an entire thing on him in comedies, right? I didn't mention heist. I love the movie heist. I did not mention heist. Let's see. Let's see what else. I'm now I am just going down his IMDb.
JVL00:05:12Yeah, he was a great place. Remember that great movie that he was in? He was great.
Sonny00:05:16Yeah, but like this is like it's it's it's wild. It is he has the sort of career where it is it is it is entirely possible to celebrate a number of good things he was in and completely ignore in an entirely different tranche of good things he was in. Like it is I put here I like I'm very serious when I when I think he should be considered for like the Mount Rushmore of American actors like he he became he became an enormous star. At a time at the the the seventies and eighties were weird the seventies you could be the is the sixties and seventies really more than the seventies and eighties you could be an enormous movie star and just look like a guy like Gene Hackman just kind of looks like a guy now he he obviously has that magnetic appeal that charisma that comes across on screen and that's hard to harder that's harder to quantify right but he is just he's a guy who looks like a guy he doesn't have like the main. Male model good looks he doesn't have the Arnold Schwarzenegger physique everybody now in Hollywood is either either or both like the male model good looks and like the steroided out jacked you know chiseled and he was he's just a guy and there were other there were other actors at this time who did kind of the same thing right like Richard Dreyfuss right or Roy Scheider or whatever but like I there's no there's no other I just. There I really think that's why Adam Driver is such a throwback what's that Adam Driver is a throwback in that way because he is maybe the only exception I can think of who is like a guy when he takes his shirt off he's cut he's he's he's got that body like I you know I can't there's there's a there's this movie another movie I didn't mention night moves there's this very there's this great scene in night moves where he is like shirtless in his bed eating fondue with the woman he just banged and it's just like and he's just like he's like a 70s guy eating fondue he's got like kind of the hairy chest you know not a he didn't have a gut or anything but he was like yeah dad bod yeah that was like that was like the original version of dad bod it was normal guy body he just a normal he was just a guy he was a guy and he became the man and it's amazing it's just amazing to watch on screen and you know isn't it worth noting I mean he sort of got it's not like he got a super late start but he really didn't become like a movie star until
Mike00:07:49a little later into his career yeah right he was he was like in his 30s and then and then he stops being in movies 21 years ago and at a time when like nowadays people are acting well into their 80s you know who have been movie stars in the past and he just kind of quit so like it's actually a pretty limited time period that is the Gene Hackman period and and he
JVL00:08:19killed it you know for a good 35 years so Hackman is one of these actors who I think had to age into his prime years like often especially for leading men youth is when they are at their height right you know the 25 year old maybe 30 year old but there are certain guys and I think of George Clooney first among these and maybe Gene Hackman who really don't start peaking until their mid 40s like they were just
Sonny00:08:49born to be older as as stars you can't really imagine a 21 year old gene Hackman on screen you know like that that's not that's not where his thing is gonna pop and yeah that's part of his longevity I think right yeah I think what Clint Eastwood you know doesn't become a star until he's like 40 it's the same it's the same same basic thing like Clint Eastwood has been around forever and he and like he's 92 like it's you know that's that and gene Hackman is kind of and you mentioned him retiring Mike and it's funny because he did he he like makes welcome to Mooseport in 2004 and he's just like I'm done with this I'm done I'm done with this acting thing it's not for me anymore I'm just gonna go read books or what I'm gonna go I think he wrote he actually wrote some some some novels I think he may have that's how he may have spent his his final days I don't know man I like one of the all-time greats are IP I you know it's it's it's a shame but you know he had a he had a long good life good for him very sad for five years we also lost Michelle Trachtenberg this week yeah I know that that was a that was a much that was a much shock more surprising blow yeah I like she was my first celebrity crush you were a Buffy fan right weren't you I was a Buffy fan I just thought Michelle Trachtenberg was a really nice
JVL00:10:19teen comedy presence yeah like in road trip she's great in Buffy she's you're a trip you're a trip not right you're a trip you're a trip right and and she shows up in a Disney movie which is one of these Disney made for TV movie type things I think it was a Disney Channel flick where she is a high school ice skater like struggling to make and it's one of these you know like dumb ice princesses kind of stories and it's actually probably the best of its genre like
Sonny00:10:49you know this is literally called ice princess is that what it's called yeah and it's just it's great and it's great because of her she's just fabulous in it and she's 39 39 it seems like she was sick she'd had like a liver transplant like she was not she was not healthy the the it's funny the first place I remember seeing her was on the adventures of Pete and Pete which you know that that's like oh yeah oh yeah Nickelodeon yeah the Nickelodeon show that's like that's an early early to mid 90s Nickelodeon show and she was like that she did Harriet the spy the spy right that one too is like where I fell in love with her I was like you know she's like not she's basically my age and I was like oh this is exactly quirky cute girl like on TV I like her yeah exactly no she's like she's like two years younger two or three years younger than I am and and but like she was in like she was in like shows as an elementary schooler when I was in elementary school she was in shows as like a middle schooler high schooler when
JVL00:11:49I was in middle school high school and then Eurotrip came out when I was in I what was that third year of college so like it was 2004 yeah no that was just a god that that's a that's really that's depressing that see that's we celebrate we celebrate the good life of 95 year old Gene Hackman Gene Hackman and then we we we who also the does seem to have denied in a tragic way like it seems like it was carbon monoxide poisoning that kills something like that everybody in the house well
Sonny00:12:19I don't wife the the latest out of so the new max I don't worry again we're taping this on Thursday midday like who knows what's going to change but the the New Mexico police have opened up a suspicious death inquiry because they there was no obvious sign of a carbon monoxide leak there were two other dogs that hadn't died there were pills pills strewn about I reserve the right if it turns out the Gene Hackman did something absolutely horrible like I don't want this to be like a crisp end
JVL00:12:49wah situation where the WWE is doing a tribute to him on the night that he is discovered dead and then by the next morning everybody understands that he was a monster who killed his family I don't know if you remember that happened it happened the WWE has gone very far out of their way to memory hall all of that but it did happen they did a tribute show to Chris Benoit like four hours after he was found dead oops yeah but yeah conditionally very sad and the work the work stands the work is the work the work is the work there we go do you guys have a favorite gene hackman because this is a he's one of these guys where I suspect your favorite gene hackman performance will be very different from your favorite movie that gene hackman was in that's a very good is it the same are those the same thing because he gave amazing performances and movies that were fine but but not special
Sonny00:13:49yeah if I'm if I was going to make this breakdown it would probably be performance the quick in the dead movie the royal tenenbaums though I also really really like his performance in the royal tenenbaums like his work as a royal tenenbaum is very very good and also I really really like the quick in the dead like quick in the dead and royal tenenbaums not that far off in terms of like where my enjoyment level of them is so I don't know I would say my favorite like performance
Mike00:14:19is Hackman in the conversation because it's so I mean it's it's so like he's so tightly wound and you just have this sort of experience of watching a great actor kind of break down and he does it in such a it's a such a natural performance but my favorite my favorite Gene Hackman movie is unforgiven just it's that's like on my on my top five movies of all time so
JVL00:14:49which he's which he's also great at he's also fantastic at so what about you Jim yeah I'm for me it might be crim it's if it's not favorite performances either quick in the dead or crimson tide and crimson for for similar reasons which is that when you put Hackman next to a absolute stud movie star peer and just let them go at each other on screen it's astonishing and so he and Denzel together in that movie are just so good in this and that's actually a lot of what happens quick and then right it's him and DiCaprio on screen it's him and Russell Crowe on screen it's him and Sharon Stone at the height of her powers on screen but for me favorite film absolutely Royal Tenenbaums absolutely I mean one of my one of my favorite movies of all time certainly one of my favorite comedies of all time and yeah the Royal
Sonny00:15:49Tenenbaums is so so good I like I have trouble talking about the Royal Tenenbaums because I have trouble separating the experience of seeing that movie for the first the Royal Tenenbaums is a very weird movie for me because it was definitely like I didn't see it when I was that young I was like 18 or whatever but I saw it and I was like oh this is what this is kind of what movies can be film
JVL00:16:13right you saw you were like this is film yeah it's not a movie this is film and look I had seen like
Sonny00:16:19I had seen you know a bunch of you know Stanley Kubrick movies before that or whatever so it's not like I was you know a naif exactly but at the same time like watching that in a theater with my with friends who like weren't entirely on its wavelength and just being like oh this is it this is this is what it's like to see a great movie for the first time you know in the in a
Mike00:16:49with a lot of other great performances you know it's like it's like the movie is so packed with great actors and and then and Hackman's like on top of it all so oh great uh my guilty pleasure hack which I've mentioned a couple times now is the replacements just because like it's such a it's such a fun movie and um it's not like a great movie but it's fun and um and he does a great job
Sonny00:17:12so um not great but fun Hackman movie uh no way out the the Kevin Costner Gene Hackman oh yeah
Mike00:17:19way out love that one it was so good all right well um is there any other any other stuff we want to chat about I mean like there's nothing going on by the way in my in my life this week so uh beside my shitty internet um it's so anything anything else fellas well I mean I I so I uh
JVL00:17:41I did get through many of the movies that we discussed with the boys while we had our two-week boys room springing but uh we really we really delved deep into the star wars canon gee money evil well you wanted to go all the way into the star wars canon maybe it's because we've been playing the star wars card game so often really making some good friends over at our local
Sonny00:18:04game store are you oh yeah oh yeah are you guys go are you going there and playing it with other
JVL00:18:10people we go there and we play with each other once a week and we are uh gonna go to the pre release tournament for the next set of star wars uh it's on saturday the 4th i want to say and we're going and it's a casual tournament i believe so i believe so so next weekend and uh it's gonna be it's gonna be great um but i want to submit to you guys i i'm having a reappraisal of attack of the clones and revenge of the sith because i have long hated those two movies and thought that attack of the clones was the worst of all the star wars filmed products i don't think so anymore okay no longer i would now slot those two movies on top of the last jedi
Mike00:19:05and the rise of skywalker that's an easy one to like that's that's not like a that's not super
Sonny00:19:12controversial though i feel like i think it's pretty controversial like you're very wrong i there are uh there are people who will tell you that the only reason you could possibly dislike the last jedi is that if you are a maga alt-right oh right racist probably uh and i can assure you that the experience i had coming out of the last jedi was me turning to my friend alissa rosenberg noted washington post commie uh and us both being like so that was bad right that was that was there was bipartisan agreement that that movie did not work between the two of us and i was shocked i was the the way that movie has become a culture war flashpoint has been like was always very weird to me and also really fucking depressing because like it like at one point ryan johnson was like russian trolls were feeding the flames of anti the last jedi hate and that's why people online were saying they didn't like it and like i'm here to tell you man lots of people didn't like that movie because lots of the movie didn't work now i also have very like i jbl you did you just re-watch the last jedi or anything or did you are you just reappraising them by after having watched attack
JVL00:20:31of the clones and revenge of the sith so i am reappraising them having having just watched attack of the clones and revenge of the sith multiple times over the last two weeks let's hear let's let's hear your case so the the first case i would make is that unlike last jedi and revenge interesting design work going on in the filmmaking both on the level of ships and creatures there there are some of the creatures are interestingly made general grievous is kind of so general grievous doesn't make any sense because he's he's a robot but he's he's got real person eyes and he coughs and that like that but it's interesting right it makes you you're like wait a minute why is this robot coughing it piques your interest the the cruisers for both the rebels and the separatists are interesting-looking many of the space fighters are interesting-looking and it has it has
Sonny00:21:34memorable things in it now some of these things are memorable because they're
JVL00:21:38terrible the sand I hate it it's course it's rough it gets everywhere but we remember that do we remember a single fucking thing from those other two movies we remember Mary Poppins princess Leia but that's just like an image you know and right I somehow Palpatine returned so that's what I read the only thing we remember is let the past die kill it if you have to and Chewie were home right those are the only two things I think that we remember from from any of those movies but I'm gonna I'm gonna put force awakens aside because I think force awakens is absolutely like a total class above any of these other four movies like you know I'm gonna think it's good but it's better yeah and I don't think it's fair to lump it in with these and it also has I am sorry but dead sexy Natalie Portman now actually oh yeah she is oh yeah she is stuck trying to make sexual chemistry happen with somebody who's the equivalent of a blow-up sex doll in Hayden Christiansen which maybe isn't fair to him maybe I like maybe it's George Lucas's fault that they feel so frigid with one another yeah but but Natalie Portman has never been sexier and I include the Black Swan in us I mean she is just she's like I'm glad you went that
Sonny00:23:11direction yeah I was gonna say there's there's another way you could have gone there that would have would have made this episode but generally Vic a little
JVL00:23:18bit right I'm losing both of you are you losing me guys no I'm no I'm hearing you fine well so I I just I think when you put it all together there is something interesting happening with Christopher Christopher what's his name with the deep voice Saruman and Christopher Lee and he's interesting and you've got in who is having fun on screen like actually having fun as an actor on screen and these are bad movies I'm not saying they're good I I think it's more interesting than I gave it credit for it's not good it's still very bad it's still these are they you know the the third and fourth worst of the Star Wars
Mike00:24:11movies but they're better than the other two do you feel JVL that because I've read Revenge of the Sith like I always thought Revenge of the Sith was even was sort of better than people gave it credit for like for all the the badness of Revenge of the Sith like there's something compelling in that in that kind in that final battle like the final battle between Obi-Wan and Anakin is
JVL00:24:38it's like it's good it's pretty good no no it's not the most of our battle is maybe the worst of the climactic laser sword battles from the prequels the best of these is far and away the duel of the fates from yes from the first and I think it is probably less interesting even than watching Count Dooku just thrash the shit out of both Anakin and
Sonny00:25:09Obi-Wan at the end of Attack of the Clones I gotta disagree with that but that that's a bold statement I think that's wrong in part because I'm pretty sure Steven Spielberg came in and helped helped with the shooting in that Mustafar sequence it looks it looks better and more dramatic like on a shot composition level than any other exactly sequence in the films maybe but are you
JVL00:25:33are you guys gonna tell me that Last Jedi and Rise of Skywalker are better
Mike00:25:37than these two movies no no no no no I I don't I I definitely feel like Revenge of the Sith certainly belongs above those two movies I'm Attack of the Clones is just I just have such a maybe I need to go back and watch it but like I have such a garbage view of that oh it's very bad through it's very bad don't I just have to get me wrong I have it yeah Dexter Jetster I mean really we talked about this last week Dexter Jetster the other hand you
JVL00:26:06do have a boner the entire time because Natalie Portman is like showing so much skin like it is weird you don't know that JVL you don't know that about me I I can always tell
Mike00:26:19kind no I yeah yeah well okay so so should we should we I mean should we discuss briefly the the news of Kathleen Kennedy leaving some toxic fandom you would like to indulge in Michael no I just like like good riddance that's all
Sonny00:26:39I have to say oh wow look at the sexist over here don't you don't you respect the thing she did for Lucasfilm I look here's the thing Kathleen Kennedy has a fine career as a producer of Steven Spielberg directed and Amblin produced and distributed movies right like that that's a she she had she had a fine career and I don't think I don't think we can undersell how initially successful a lot of the Star Wars stuff with Disney was right like The Force Awakens is still the highest grossing film domestically of all time that is that's a fact that is that's that's a true fact you can't you can't take that away from anyone and and Rogue One might
JVL00:27:28be the best Star Wars film I don't I don't agree with that but Rogue One
Sonny00:27:32grossed a billion dollars just just from a pure business perspective Rogue One grossed a billion dollars huge hit there it artistically and commercially very successful and then The Mandalorian was an enormous hit for Disney Plus and like probably I think if you are breaking it down on things that have made Disney the most money over the last 15 years there's a decent chance The Mandalorian is the thing that has made them the most money and she she you know she she was in charge of Lucasfilm when that happened you got to give her credit for all those things but everything else that is Star Wars related at Disney has been a disaster just an absolute an absolute mess from all the from all the movies that were announced and never got made like the Lando movies or the the Patty Jenkins X-Wing movie yeah the Patty Jenkins Rogue Squadron movie to the to all of the bad Disney Plus TV shows and there are many more
JVL00:28:30bad ones than good ones what about this point director changes the director changes and this is Han Solo and on on Last Jedi or on Rise of Skywalker right
Sonny00:28:42yeah yeah yeah no I mean this is this is the biggest sin the biggest sin the the entire tenure is creating a sequel trilogy where you don't have a coherent vision to guide the film's through to a satisfying narrative whole it like it doesn't have to you don't have to have a great movie or a great series but you do have to have one that makes internal consistent sense and that is that's the biggest sin of The Force Awakens The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker is that the the films are all at war with each other and that's that's a real problem yeah there's there's no
Mike00:29:24it's it we have the example right of the Kevin Feige MCU I mean yes it's been it's been a disaster since since the end of endgame or whatever but like that's that's a comparison point right to say like look how a franchise can work together and like build on itself and continue to do great you know numbers and you know make pretty good movies too and Star Wars just looks like like they just had no idea what they were doing so good riddance I'd say
JVL00:29:58Can I throw one more unrelated tidbit but we we also did New Hope and all this and I picked up on something during the climactic Death Star battle in New Hope that I had never picked up on before when the rebels attacked the Death Star we get one of the Death Star kind commanders informing Tarkin that they have picked up 30 rebel fighters and then we hear the rebel chatter as they are storming the Death Star and there are 20 laser cannons when you compare this against the visual assault that is every other Star Wars movie in which they put like 4,000 spaceships within two square miles of one another and you cannot tell anything that is going on and ships are exploding everywhere and there are it's so dense a thousand laser blasts happening at any time and that is why those things leave zero impression on the audience but watching a squadron of 30 x-wings where you actually see 1/3 of the pilots over the course of the battle and you get like oh that's the mustache guy well that's Porkins way that's where edge liquid and you when they die you're like oh no Porkins I liked Porkins you
Sonny00:31:25know not Porkins not Porkins and it just like that it I just want to tell every
JVL00:31:33single filmmaker to lower the stakes because when you lower the stakes you raise the stakes and I don't understand why this isn't obvious well this is the
Sonny00:31:43Lord of the Rings this is the Lord of the Rings series lesson right is that I like I know there are folks out there who are like oh Return of the King is the best in the series but that's just wrong like Fellowship is the best in the series and it has the best concluding battle sequence because it's the smallest every every battle sequence gets bigger and therefore less interesting as the series
Mike00:32:05goes along totally and it's almost like you know everything about George Lucas and what inspired him to make the original Star Wars it's like he forgot it right right it's like that's what all of those you know war you know dogfight movies that he was kind of drawing on that's what they were all about and it's like that's what that's what you have always said Star Wars is sort of inspired by so like where did you forget that George
JVL00:32:33where George almost everybody does I mean the John Wick movies don't like the John Wick movies keep remember who they are stakes of well they keep the stakes reasonably small it's always like John Wick in a room full of guys right or John Wick and two guys on a staircase you know like it they don't ever decide oh we're gonna drop 4,000 people here and like I do you know why filmmakers do
Sonny00:33:00this they get more money they get they get more money to make bigger films and then they're like well I need to justify my budget here and then it things get as I mean look even John Wick 4 has this problem and it's not in the individual fight scenes it's in the fact that they kept all of the individual fight scenes right like so John Wick 4 is two hours and 45 minutes two hours 50 minutes something like that and that is too long for those movies it just is it really is and I like John Wick 4 don't get me wrong I like I like all the John Wick movies a lot that movie is too long for what it is which is a John Wick movie like a John Wick movie should be shorter than that the first the first one was like an hour 45 something like that the second one is a little under two hours little bit of bloat with the second one when he gets to like two hours 20 minutes or the third one where he gets to two hours 20 minutes and then the fourth one is just way too long all of the individual sequences are good watching them one on top of the other is mildly punishing it's exhausting yeah
JVL00:34:06it's an exhausting experience that's all I'm sorry all right well now done
Mike00:34:10minutes yeah yeah well let's let's move on though very quickly to box office here because we've got to talk about the the latest weekend number one at the box office once again Captain America brave new world number two coming in this this latest Stephen King adaptation the monkey number two at 14 million dollars any box office thoughts I went and saw
Sonny00:34:36the monkey because I thought I might write about it and then Gene Hackman died and I decided to write about Gene Hackman instead believe it or not Gene Hackman more important to me than the monkey shocking but the monkey is actually kind of interesting in that it is a lot a lot of Stephen King movies aim or Stephen King adaptations aim for like serious scares and wind up being silly as a result this is a movie that very much leans into the silliness of the idea of deadly like a magical monkey causing murder and mayhem across the the universe of this of this movie and as a 80s and 90s Stephen King adaptations my problem with the movie is that it is so winkingly jokingly unserious that it feels like a movie in search of meme hood like it feels like feels like a movie that was made to be a meme and I that always rubs me the wrong way like I it's one thing when I'm it like for instance the movie we're gonna discuss in in an hour or so conclave is a movie that ended up having memes made of it because it was because it like had a lot of like cool images and like things that kind of worked as as visual ideas that could propagate ID but like the but but the monkey is just like kind of silly and it's like does it's got these big over the top gory kills that uh you know that horror hounds really like and that could be like kind of funny standalone things I guess but don't really work as visual language like memes should be does that make sense am I am I explaining this right like a meme the idea of a meme right like the very basic kernel of a meme is like it is it is memetic knowledge it is like this idea that an image can stand in for something else and the monkey can only really stand in for itself which again is kind of fine but like I don't know didn't well if you
Mike00:36:43try to make a meme you're gonna fail it's memes have to be found have to be like found footage they have to be like foraged from the wild of pop culture not like yeah not not not like generated for the purpose of being a meme so right
Sonny00:37:00right and that and this movie feels this movie feels like it was constructed by somebody who like lives in a meme factory it was like we got it we got to turn out got to turn out 10 meme widgets today folks let's get it done and like
JVL00:37:12okay clear this monkey is different than the Robbie Williams monkey the Robbie
Sonny00:37:17Williams monkey is is a singing monkey who performs all of Rob Robbie Williams is big hits he just looks like a monkey because underneath it all Robbie Williams feels
Mike00:37:31unevolved you see this monkey but yeah this is a symbol monkey symbol toy this
Sonny00:37:37is a monkey wind-up symbol toy like a organ grinder monkey and when you wind the key and make it go on its last strike of the the drumstick somebody dies who doesn't you don't know who you don't know who's
JVL00:37:54gonna die but somebody dies cool yeah maybe it was Robbie Williams who died I
Mike00:38:00wish not yet Lord all right all right well okay well that's all the box office talk should we talk about Conclave this movie that came out last year but is in talks now it's a box office or it's a I should say an Oscar nominated film and up for Best Picture and other other things and as we discussed earlier the Pope is in the news because he's he's ill and gravely ill we hope he makes it through this but we could be seeing a Conclave in for real very soon so we watched Conclave Sonny you want to give us a big boy review of Conclave
Sonny00:38:38Conclave starring Ralph Fiennes as mr. Conclave now so the Conclave is a essentially a a all right I will describe this in the most neutral way possible Conclave is a drama set during the days following the death of a Pope in which various Cardinals politic their way to the top of the the Pope rankings to become next Pope okay that's that is the most neutral way to describe it here's how I would actually describe it it's an airport novel that looks real nice on the big screen because Edward burgers a accomplished film director director of film he also made the recent all quiet on the Western Front which was another movie that I didn't like very much but I will happily acknowledge looked great this movie looks great and it has some really good performances again Ralph Fiennes is the what the secretary of the Vatican is that the Dean the Dean of the Vatican you the Dean of the College of Cardinals whatever he's he's cart he's he's a big muckety-muck in the Cardinals and he is he was friends with the Pope Pope dies got to get new Pope who is who's it gonna be is it gonna be the liberal played by Stanley Tucci is it gonna be the arch conservative African or I guess the the economically liberal but socially conservative African Cardinal is it gonna be the wildly racist conservative Italian Cardinal is it gonna be the the moderately conservative John Lithgow from from America I think he's actually Canadian Canadian yeah I'm not American in this or will it be Ralph Fiennes himself or will it be a dark horse candidate say the mysterious Cardinal from Kabul who shows up it nobody ever heard of before who nobody has ever heard of and is like who is this Cardinal from couple well it must be he must be keeping it secret because it's in a Muslim country they don't want him to be to be harmed and it turns out guys guys you'll never believe it you'll never guess what's gonna happen it turns out that the least political of the Cardinals is the most Christ like of them can you believe it I didn't see that coming at all and then - can we can we do spoilers can we go all the way to the end of this or spoiler alert now crying game spoiler alert well not quite the crying game I'm so in the in the in the last ten minutes in the last ten minutes of the movie it is revealed that this secret Kabul Cardinal is intersex not quite train it's not trans Pope this isn't fully woke Pope this isn't you know the the trans Pope not trans Pope intersex Pope there's a difference there's a big difference this movie doesn't really get into the difference that much but like the the long and the short of it is just because this Pope was born with ovaries does not mean that he can't be Pope and that's the big lesson the the movie it when I saw this so when I see this movie in I want to say it was November it was October November whenever it came out and there was a lot of talk about it being a early best picture contender the end and the further for the whole for the first you know hundred minutes of the movie I was like yeah this is nice this is this is nice but it's kind of it's like again it's an airport novel turned into turned into a movie it's like nice but it's kind of silly frankly and like whatever looks good it's got some great performances I wouldn't even I wouldn't mind if Ray finds one best actor he won't it'll be Chalamet or Brody but like I wouldn't mind that and then I but I was I sitting there like this is this movie looks very nice it's a it's fine but like best picture I don't get it then the last ten minutes of the movie happened I was like oh I get it I understand why this is a best picture the possibility now and I think there's a decent chance it wins I think there's I would say there is a not zero percent chance that this movie wins best picture at the Oscars which would be very funny on a whole number of
JVL00:43:06levels but there's an active conclave especially if there's an active that
Sonny00:43:12would be right I mean well the Pope's gotta get him he's really got to you know get the lead out if he's if he wants
JVL00:43:18to get that I know I think we're quite close when I don't know so anyway they're on Sunday so it's entirely possible you did the conclave won't have started but
Sonny00:43:29it's entirely possible he could pass away by Sunday yeah anyway I again I found conclave it totally enjoyable ultimately very silly but it it has that kind of Sorkin Aaron Sorkin liberalism of like hey you know who would be the best Pope is the most decent one and we're all gonna vote for him because we're actually we're not we're not we're men of God and we will succumb to the you know the whole thing is so dumb well things so dumb anyway yeah I'm just gonna be guided by
JVL00:44:07the Holy Spirit or something nobody believes that for a second
Sonny00:44:13nobody believes that for one millisecond so anyway I enjoyed this movie I do find it faintly ridiculous but I do find it also very hilarious that it is an
Mike00:44:22award season uh firm runner all right JVL your thoughts I'll tell you I'll tell you
JVL00:44:28this we will have a trans Pope before you have an American Pope that's what would have been a truly ridiculous movie is a conclave which produced an American Pope of any kind yes that's never gonna happen uh it's yeah I know you know when I first saw the first trailer I saw for this I was like wait did they make a real version of Satan's Alley um but uh that's not that's not what's happening so good here's the funny thing as weird and ridiculous as you say this all is Sonny I don't think there is anything in this which is all that more ridiculous than things that actually go on in real conclaves like it is yeah the conclave is one of the craziest things that any human institution has ever done on the reg like it's it's a it is a weird way for an institution to choose its leadership I think it is hard to I think it's it's honestly hard to understand it's hard to conceive of it having worked for this long without believing in the Holy Spirit quite frankly I don't know Michael maybe you could maybe you could back me up on this but you know it has produced terrible horrible popes who are wicked men and you know murderers it's uh it's produced saints like it's it's just a whole weird thing they like they get together they're sequestered they they're being manipulated by people who are trying to like get them to move it along sometimes it's done in a matter of days sometimes it takes for forever I there's the white smoke the black the whole thing is the whole thing is crazy and I submit to you that there's actually nothing in this that is all that far outside of the realm of yeah of the real life of the catholic church
Mike00:46:25Michael is this is am I wrong about this yeah I I'm honestly kind of surprised it's taken this long for a movie about a conclave to to kind of be a a hit just because it's like inherently dramatic and yeah and interesting um yeah I don't know I mean I I found I found the the matter and the treatment of the subject matter was was fine and and and I agree with you JVL it's like probably very close to reality I just thought as a movie it it ended up disappointing me because for some reasons like I think Sonny you you kind of telegraphed this that um it tells you what's gonna happen throughout the whole movie you know it's I mean it it couldn't be more obvious
Sonny00:47:18this was all going to to play out like this and this is my my honestly my biggest problem with it as a movie qua movie is that like it could not possibly be more transparent about uh about how it was uh you know gonna all turn out yeah exactly and and you know I mean and I will say like for
Mike00:47:40all of the accuracy about the kind of human elements the the way in which the cardinals sort of plot and and how close to reality that is you know it's treatment of the actual politics of the church is very surface level fine right right like this isn't supposed to be you know a a deep dive into that but you know just the the way in which um the way in which like the liberal cardinal Stanley Tucci is just like just like reads off a list of of of like kind of lefty uh social goals or you know social social political goals and it's like that's what i want to do with the church which is like which is not how like this quote-unquote like liberal cardinals would talk about it it's it's just it took me a little bit out of uh out of it and then just the the the twist at the end it just i was compelled the whole movie i was sort of like watching with rapt attention and then like like sort of in this in spite of myself but just because i oh this is like well-made movie and then the final twist was like i just felt like come on come on really really this is how this is how this movie is going to end so it it just soured the whole experience for me boom i'll tell
JVL00:49:03you what i want what i want is a movie about a conclave that is done like death of stalin so like a yes a huge like a dark comic farce about a conclave so i'm combination of death of stalin and yes minister but about a papal conclave i would watch the
Mike00:49:23hell out of that that's great that's great tv right there right you should do or there
Sonny00:49:28could be there could be like a veep style uh veep conclave we're like we're like like the whole thing the whole thing about veep is that you never actually see the president so you would never see the actual pope it would just be like the it would be like the dean who has to like manage all of these people yeah the people who are essentially unmanageable
Mike00:49:48the whole thing again i but so a couple little things that i i do love i mean i love the visuals of this movie it's it's beautiful to watch um yeah it looks great as somebody who has stayed at the actual domus uh sancta marta uh which is where the current pope lives but it is generally like where like visiting dignitaries and when the college of cardinals is in session that's where they stay i've actually stayed in that building yes how did you swing that it was a it was a junket it was a press junket uh that i went on about about seven years ago and uh it was it was great for many reasons that i don't have time to go into but um it doesn't look like it looks in the movie and i think the the film does a better job of like it's it's it looks better in the movie than it does in real life which is which is all you can kind of ask for in a movie um and i love like the little shots of like you know the especially the beginning the cardinals like smoking or like the one card like scrolling on his phone before he has to give it up to go into the into the conclave that was all enjoyable and ray fines i mean i don't know if you guys know this but ray fines is a really great actor um turns out and yeah um wood the detour wood the detour wood the detour so simple um and and so i just enjoyed i enjoyed seeing him uh and and being with him for most of this movie also isabella rossolini great loved her so
JVL00:51:24those are my thoughts it has to win this picture right like this is i would say so i mean look i
Sonny00:51:32the the oscars are weird this year because like on the one hand on the one hand you have a nora which won at the producers guild directors guild and screenwriters guild like it won all three of those in a row which like that's i don't even know what that movie is about but you would love it it's about a new york stripper who marries a russian billionaire and then the russian billionaire's parents try to break them up and it turns into a coen brothers farce oh spends a lot of time in the strip club jvl i've been trying to i've been trying to get us to do this this shot this this movie maybe we'll do a nora next week i don't know i feel like uh if it wins best picture we should do it anyway definitely um uh but the um the so a nora won again producers directors screenwriters but then uh conclave won baftas which wasn't that surprising a lot of british people involved and then the sag it won best best ensemble which is again like not terribly surprising because it does kind of have the best ensemble but at the same time that is like the sag best picture uh category so it and the actors are the biggest block of voters in in uh the academy of motion picture arts and sciences artsy movie with a liberal message that
JVL00:52:53was a box office success like ding well it did okay it did it did a hundred million dollars
Sonny00:53:00on 20 million dollar budget right it did fine it did it let's not let's not go crazy i'm not
JVL00:53:06saying it's a hit but like it did a hundred million dollars of of domestic revenue on 20 million dollars of budget like that counts by the standards of what gets best picture awards
Sonny00:53:18like parasite what movie are you talking about conclave conclave conclave didn't do a hundred
JVL00:53:23million dollars domestic i thought i saw somewhere that no million domestic no no no uh conclave has
Sonny00:53:30grossed a hundred million dollars worldwide it grossed 32 million dollars domestic okay okay i take i i take it back uh anyway like it's it's done fine though like i i it's it's it's a perfectly acceptable amount of money for a movie like this to to look back in back in back in october i 100 called this hold on i will read the tweet uh uh this is dated november 5th 2024 okay my actual prediction conclave is going to clean up at the oscars a handsomely shot procedural with great acting by older stars that hammers home it's fundamentally silly sorkin-esque messaging with the unrelenting ham-handedness boomer oscar voters will love it green book 2.0 i mean like that's what this movie is that's like but this was all before a complete unknown well so a complete unknown is interesting because i like that is the sort of movie that should kind of appeal to there's a reason i think timothy chalamet might beat adrian brody and ray fines is because i think there are a lot of boomers who are going to be like yes this is what my childhood was like let's let's reward this movie uh but i also think there's a decent chance that the uh um that all of the major categories to go to different act go to different movies every every every major category might go to a different movie which is an un almost unheard of in recent years phenomenon i like i could not tell you the last time that happened but i think there's a decent chance that best picture goes to uh the conclave and best director goes to like brady corbett for the brutalist and breast screenplay goes to sean baker for anora um uh i don't i can't remember what best adapted would be but best actress is going to be demi more for the substance probably um best actor best actor could be timothy chalamet for you know anyway like it there's there's a lot of there are a lot of uh possibilities in play here which is which is interesting and unusual it's going to make for an exciting oscar night i'm excited for oscar night are you guys excited for oscar night pass uh so any other final thoughts on conclave i think you two you two catholic squishes are like oh this is totally we could the spirit could move the the card tell you the church is way
Mike00:56:01weirder than you have yes that's what i yeah that i'm more on the it's it's a weird place and a weird institution and and it's probably and it's run by sort of like very i think sunny in general sequestered people like i think sunny has a cardinals are very sequestered
JVL00:56:17normalized view of what the catholic church is really like which is not at all reality
Mike00:56:24yeah all right well that is all the time we are going to give to this episode i can't believe we made it all the way through uh this week join us over these files come out
Sonny00:56:34not not a hundred percent sure that's gonna happen this might end up being a lost episode
Mike00:56:38we'll see who knows uh join us at subbeacon.com tell your friends tell your family until next so i will say i am mildly compelled by the idea of conan o'brien as the host of the oscars and like he's great he conan is fantastic and i love everything conan does so like maybe i want to tune
JVL00:57:08in now um where i normally probably would that dude is so self-satisfied oh are you anti-conan anti-conan i'm i'm vaguely anti-conan i i don't i have never i'm not truly anti-conan but he has never worked for me in the same way that like letterman never worked for me
Sonny00:57:31oh well maybe this is a me problem it's the same comedy tree and uh but conan was much more
JVL00:57:40self-satisfied than letterman even like conan his whole affect is like i'm so fucking funny
Mike00:57:47and i it's so it's i would not i would not agree with that assessment at all i feel like conan's whole affect is uh i really don't belong here and it's kind of hilarious that i am here like in in doing this that's that's that's my takeaway and like almost like hey what if like one two as a comedy nerd myself it's like i see myself in him and it's like he's kind of like looking at me and going like what if like one of us actually got to do this um and and that's me and that's you know i have
JVL00:58:24a lot i am happy to stipulate that you guys are right because literally every person i know who is really smart about comedy just thinks he's awesome and so i i this just could be like i don't like the taste of butter pecan ice cream and so i'm saying i don't like you don't like
Sonny00:58:40the taste of butter pecan ice cream i'm just making a metaphor sonny oh i'm sure it's fine
?00:58:47Thank you.
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