Dial M For Murder (1954) / Hard Target (1993)

[00:00:02] Let's get together, talk about the movies that we saw this week We'll have discussions, talk film news, we'll laugh a lot and act like geeks Sometimes we'll have a guest or two, sometimes it's just the two of us Let's crack some jokes and tell some folks to come along and hang with us I guess Chosen wisely Hello and welcome to the podcast that is secretly plotting a murder

[00:00:31] that will be unraveled by one small mistake It's Mike and Mike go to the movies I'm Mike Smith and joining me as always is a guy who just punched a snake in the face to set a trap for his enemies Mike Decrecio How you doing today Mike? I'm doing great, not only did I punch the snake in the face I ripped its rattle off with my mouth I feel like nobody talks about that part of the scene That is true The punching of the snake is such an insane moment on its own Yeah

[00:00:59] That it sort of overshadows the fact that immediately after that another equally insane, if not more insane thing Yeah Also happens right there Just ridiculous Yes, absolutely What's been going on Mike D? I feel like it's been a little while since we've done a Mike and Mike go to the movies episode I don't know Podcast time travel is crazy I don't remember when or where I am Yeah But otherwise, yeah, great Everything's fine, you know Living the dream Watching the movies Wish I was watching more Although I did go to the theater twice in a week, I think

[00:01:29] Yeah Pretty cool I saw Obsession Oh, nice Yeah, what did you think of Obsession? I saw that a while back Great Incredible I went to see it in like whatever, its fourth or fifth week Which is insane In a pretty crowded theater on like a Wednesday I was like, what's happening? What's going on? And then I went to see The Furious Nice Which, uh, hopefully it's around for a while Because that movie fucking rips I'm so excited for it to come out And I can own it forever Because holy shit Yes, it rocks I've seen both these movies as well The Furious I was worried I wasn't gonna get to see

[00:01:58] Yeah Because it was playing in one theater here Like the AMC 12 It was like one show time a day You know, that kind of thing And my schedule this summer is basically nothing but baseball Yeah I started working at a baseball organization And I have to be at all these games Which has really put my movie watching numbers In sort of a downward spiral Yeah Which is a little bit distressing for me, honestly It's very difficult for me to accept that And I've been trying to figure out ways To squeeze in movies where I can

[00:02:27] But there are long stretches Where often I'll be working like six days a week And then I'll have the Monday off And then suddenly I'll be back to another six days Kind of thing And that's actually As we're recording this now That's what I'm staring down the barrel of right now Like two straight weeks of games With one Monday off in the middle Woof It's gonna be a lot But that Monday off is like This is my movie watching time, baby Yeah It's time And so last week We didn't record the podcast on our usual Monday We took a week off So that I could go see Disclosure Day Yeah, you did

[00:02:57] Yeah, we did You know, which was one of the things Like when I figured out what my job was gonna be And how often I was gonna have to be at all the games and stuff My first thought was like When am I gonna see Disclosure Day On the big screen, you know And so I was able to make that a double feature day Did the Furious and then Disclosure Day right after Nice And yeah, that was a pretty great day I mean, both of those movies Among my favorites of the year As well as Obsession You know, Obsession also very high up there for me as well Yeah So yeah, no, I'm glad you made it out to the theater, Mike I'm glad you made it out for both those movies

[00:03:25] Yeah, me too, I hadn't gone in a long time And I was like Let me take a look While I have a chance You know Before I Not knowing Obsession would still be going I was like I'll probably go to like the last show You know, possible Like the last available thing It's like Well, I gotta see this while I get the chance And I was worried

[00:03:55] I looked And there was no showtimes For the weekend And I was like Damn, that's crazy And then like the next day I was like Well, let me just look again And it was then Like they had added the weekend showtime I was like Yes, let's go Yeah So I got up early on a Sunday And went to see The Furious At like 10 a.m. And it was awesome Nice That's great Yeah And I think we'll be talking about Both those movies more In an upcoming discussions I'm sure at some point Like kind of dive a little bit deeper into them Yeah And Disclosure Day We'll probably talk about If you get the chance to see it I'm not sure if you'll see it in theaters or not But we are talking about doing

[00:04:24] A Spielberg sci-fi retrospective episode Right Which was of course Kind of meant to lead up to Disclosure Day And I did a whole sci-fi Spielberg rewatch Before Disclosure Day came out Which is kind of where the idea For that episode came from But we still haven't recorded that yet So one of these days We'll do that in the next few weeks or something Yeah, I'm sure We'll do something Yes But today It's time for Mike Makes Mike Watch Mike We are doing our monthly tradition In which I make you watch something That you've never seen before And you make me watch something That I've never seen before Yeah

[00:04:54] And this month I think you also The thing that you made me watch Is also something That you had never seen before too Right? Correct Yes Yeah, I had never seen the movie And I knew you hadn't And I was like Well this will be a fun excuse To make us both have to watch it Yes And it was kind of one of those Like slam dunk picks We're like We're gonna like this Yeah It's kind of right up our alley Exactly But yeah So this month on the podcast I am making Mike D watch Alfred Hitchcock's 1954 film Dial M for Murder Starring Ray Milland and Grace Kelly Released the same year

[00:05:23] As Rear Window by the way Which That's crazy Yeah, pretty wild The Jurassic Park Schindler's List Of its day You know 1954 Meanwhile Mike D is making me watch The 1993 John Woo film John Woo's first English language film Hard Target Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme Lance Henriksen And The Mummy In it Good old Evo Tep He's right there Arnold Vosloo Pops up in this movie And when his name Popped up in the credits I was like Oh man Mike D doesn't even know He's in this I bet He's gonna be so excited

[00:05:52] I had no idea It was hyped Yes So that was pretty awesome So we'll be talking about that Soon I'm sure as well But yeah That is our double feature For this month Dial M for Murder And Hard Target Which of these movies Should we talk about first Mike? I mean If you always Like we say for these If you were to do them A double feature What order would you want To watch them in? And you have to not Start with Hard Target Right? That'd be psychotic Yeah let's talk about Dial M for Murder Alright let's do it It's time for

[00:06:21] Mike Makes Mike Watch I hope they choose right Mike's watching Mike's movie Whoa Mike's watching Mike's movie Do you really believe in the perfect murder? Yes absolutely On paper that is But I doubt if I could carry it out Oh? Why not? Well because in stories Things usually turn out The way the author wants them to And in real life they don't

[00:06:56] You're trying to blackmail me Into Into Murdering your wife? For two minutes work That's all it is One thousand pounds in cash Alright that was from the trailer For Dial M for Murder The Alfred Hitchcock film From 1954 And Mike D The reason I wanted to make you Watch this one Is because A I think you've said That you've only really seen A couple of the big Hitchcock movies right?

[00:07:26] You haven't watched You haven't like dived deep Into Hitchcock filmography right? Correct yeah I've only seen you know Well I was gonna say Only the ones like You know The Birds Psycho Rear Window All that But it's like Oh those are the Major Those are the big ones But yeah I feel like Dial M for Murder Is one of those But I had never actually Gotten around to that one Okay fair enough So that was part of the reason Why I wanted to make you Watch this one Because it was a Hitchcock movie You hadn't seen And I went through A big like Hitchcock kick Back in like college And like kind of post college

[00:07:56] Where I watched most of There's still a couple Of Hitchcock movies That I still have to Cross off the list too But I watched like Pretty much all the big ones And like most of the ones That I was really interested in And all that kind of stuff And Dial M for Murder I think I initially watched My freshman year of college And I ended up watching it again In a class A couple years later And I have maintained For a very long time That it is my favorite Alfred Hitchcock movie Really interesting And so I wanted to make you Watch it because A I have always said It's my favorite B I wanted the chance To rewatch it Because it had been

[00:08:26] A very long time Since I watched it I don't think I'd actually Seen it since college And I wanted to see If I still felt that way You know If I still felt like Dial M for Murder Was my favorite Hitchcock movie Or if I was like A contrarian college kid Who was like Yeah Vertigo's alright But have you seen Dial M for Murder Like that Yeah yeah Which is certainly Part of my psychology Absolutely And I do still think I do kind of like this More than Vertigo Just gonna throw that out there I like Vertigo too

[00:08:55] You know who hates Vertigo That I just found that out Like recently Jake who Gives us money on this podcast Every once in a while Really? Yeah he is not a fan Of Vertigo Thanks to the sucks Interesting Wow Deep cuts That's a hot take Yeah absolutely But I assume he likes Dial M for Murder Because it's a good movie But what did you think Of Dial M for Murder Mike? Well I guess I will say I have seen Vertigo I have seen North by Northwest I don't think I mentioned Those before At the beginning there Yeah But I have seen those But I don't think Vertigo is my favorite either I think probably

[00:09:25] Rear Window Is my favorite I think You know If I was gonna have to Choose a different one Besides Dial M for Murder And again It's been a long time Since I've watched A lot of these movies But I have watched Rear Window More recently Than a lot of them I did a few years back The Roxy showed The Rear Window In the Roxy Garden Cool Which I think I've told this story In the podcast before But the Roxy Garden Is like in the apartment complex Outside the theater And so It was a very immersive experience Because you were able To watch Rear Window And also watch People in the apartments

[00:09:55] Above the screen You're in an apartment courtyard Watching the movie About an apartment courtyard Exactly Which made for a very fun time So that was great screening Yeah But yeah Dial M for Murder Is pretty great I had a really fun time With this movie It's got It's so fun I don't know Maybe that's not even The right word But it's like I think it's very fun It is fun Yeah I don't know It is It's like So funny To introduce A character That is a Murder thriller

[00:10:24] Like a mystery thriller Author Into this movie Just to be like That guy That'll be important You know And that is very fun When they start When he starts Piecing the things together And there's the great The great Like moment Like I think Right before they leave To go to dinner Where like He set this whole plan In motion All this stuff And the husband Says to him Like Oh yeah Could you plan The perfect murder And he's like Oh no Like I could Never pull it off Because there's Always one detail You don't think of And it's just like What Like oh no

[00:10:55] It's so fun So yeah Yeah I mean it's all The Hitchcock stuff I think I think maybe The one gripe Is for me Is like We kind of Go through Great lengths To explain The whole thing At the very Like you know At the very end We have to walk Through every single Step twice Basically Where the author Figures out The whole thing And then the inspector Figures out The whole thing Or whatever So that's maybe The one time Where I was like Kind of Not dragged Or whatever I don't know That's not Like that's the Mildest Tiniest little nitpick To pick in this movie But

[00:11:25] Sure Otherwise yeah Great Chris Kelly Amazing Performances are great All this stuff The guy Rameland Rameland No I was trying to I don't know The name of the The like College friend With the Like the murderer Guy That Oh yeah Yeah The character Played by Is that Robert Cummings Mark Halliday Mark Halliday Is the guy That Grace Kelly Is having the affair With He's having the affair With Yeah What's his name Something Leggett Leggett Swan

[00:11:55] Yeah Swan Yeah Swan is his Character's name Yeah Yeah That guy's great I don't know It's just like It's just sort of Gets pulled into this By accident For no reason At all Because the Rameland's character Is evil Basically So yeah Have fun It was a great Great time Great time With Dial In For Murder Yeah I'm glad Yeah No Dial In For Murder Like I said I rewatched that For this podcast And yeah Similarly Had a great time With it Like I always did I think this movie Is so much fun And I think a big part Of it You know Years ago

[00:12:25] We talked about On The Complete Works A TV movie Starring Jeff Goldblum Called Rehearsal For Murder Yes Yep Which was written By the guys Who created Columbo Oh yeah And similarly Is a very Like dialogue Heavy movie That is about Like kind of Planning a murder And all that stuff Which is what Every episode Of Columbo is And all that Right And I think I'm just like In the bag For that Kind of thing Done very well Yeah You know And Dialing For Murder Is based on a stage play And I think you can tell When watching the movie Because so much of it

[00:12:54] Is just talking about The murder Yeah In just that apartment Like yeah Yeah And the first like Half hour of this movie Is just like Ray Moland Talking to his college friend Who he's blackmailing Into doing this You know Killing his wife And all that kind of stuff And it's riveting I don't know The dialogue is so good The performances are so great All that stuff is really terrific And then the actual Action happens Where he sneaks in And he tries to kill Grace Kelly And he doesn't succeed She accidentally kills him instead Right And then Wendis Ray Moland's character

[00:13:23] Has to now frame Grace Kelly For killing him Yeah And starts to get away with it Yeah It's crazy Yeah And so all that's happening And all that And then you know That happens And you have this great scene Where Grace Kelly Is like being interrogated And it's just like These different Like flashing lights And voices Kind of coming at her at once With this one shot Just stuck on her face Real Hitchcock Yeah Yeah really true It's the one like Like I think it's It's Hitchcock's a good director It's a very well directed movie But it's the one like Very flashy sequence In the movie I guess Right

[00:13:53] Yeah Is it What's the Is it Vertigo That has the Dream sequences By Salvador Dali I think that's right Yeah I think it's Vertigo Yeah That's what this felt like Where like All of a sudden It's very impressionistic She's just like Against a blank wall And we're just Cutting to other people Like the jury The foreman The judge The lawyer And her face It makes me think Of that one The one scene In High Anxiety Which is Where he's like I'm caught in a web Of lies And it's just He's framed In front of A big giant window That the

[00:14:22] Shadow window frame Makes him look like He's in a web And that's basically What's happening To her in that scene Nice Yeah absolutely But then like As soon as that scene's over We're just kind of back to Very dialogue driven Just normal stage play stuff Yeah normal stage play stuff But also framed and blocked In a very exquisite way Like just really well shot And everything like that One other thing about this movie Is that it was originally Filmed for 3D Yes This was a 3D film In the 50s You know when that craze Was happening And it's a weird example of it

[00:14:51] Because the other 3D movies Of the 50s are like Creatures in the Black Lagoon And The Blob And you know That kind of stuff Like the you know The B movie Sci-fi kind of stuff And here's Dial-In for Murder Which is using 3D I've never seen this movie In 3D I would be very curious To do so The Blu-ray that I own Is actually a 3D Blu-ray Whoa But I don't have a 3D TV So that doesn't help me It doesn't help me at all But that So I would be very curious To watch this in 3D To see like how it plays And like how it uses That kind of depth of field

[00:15:21] Because I feel like It probably uses it In the same way That like Avatar uses it Where it's like 3D is like actually Pushing the image back Instead of forward And so you're kind of Creating a more Immersive experience That way Like that feels like That's probably how it's done But I don't know if like 50s 3D was like Capable of that You know The red and blue Yeah Cause I saw I did see that I was looking to see If this movie was in Technicolor And so I saw That it was made for 3D So I don't know Whatever if it's Technicolor or not But it looks incredible And I saw that And there was a great quote From Hitchcock

[00:15:51] Where he was like Because it like flopped Right if I remember right From the Wikipedia The 3D version Like it just completely bombed I think so yeah And so then they put it out In regular 2D And I think the quote From Hitchcock was 3D was a 9 day fad And I arrived on the 9th day It was like damn What an incredible line Yes Now that you're talking About that Like the depth Like that must have Looked so fucking cool In 3D Where it is

[00:16:21] After the murder And the inspector Has come to the apartment And he's asking Grace Kelly to like Act like Go through the motions Of what happened last night And she like Goes around the corner Of the desk You know And she's like I answered the phone From over here And it cuts to like A reverse shot Of the inspector In the foreground And her And Raymolan In the background Behind him Yeah Like just over his shoulder Like watching her Like a haw And it's just like Holy shit And I even Like that stood out To me as like Whoa that's a crazy blocking And I wonder What that must have Looked like in 3D That must have been so cool Yeah absolutely

[00:16:51] And yeah There's just moments Like where you can Kind of tell It's like oh yeah This is framed for 3D There's a moment Like towards the end I think too Where the phone Is in the foreground And it's like oh yeah The phone's like Popping out Like at the Screen starter thing So you can kind of See that which is Really interesting But I do think Like I've never seen This movie in 3D And I think it works Perfectly Like perfectly fine Without the 3D Aspect of it And yeah The stage play aspect Of it is something I really latch on to I think the murder Itself is really fascinating And you know You know who the murderer Is right away Like the movie opens

[00:17:20] And you know that Ray Moland is the bad guy He's the one who's Trying to kill his wife You know because She's been having An affair with You know their writer Friend Mark Halliday Right And so the entire Back half of the movie It's kind of just like Waiting for the other Shooter drop Like well how are they Going to catch this guy Right Yeah yeah And they finally do Towards the end And like you said You kind of have to watch Mark Halliday put the pieces together You have to watch The inspector put the pieces together But then I think That final like moment That last like 10 minutes Of the movie Is so satisfying Where like the detective

[00:17:49] Has like you know An ingenious plan Where he like switched out The latch keys Yeah And all that stuff And he knows that like If Wendis realizes That he has the right key Or that Where the key will be Then he is in fact The one who did the murder Right Or like plan this From the beginning And of course that happens And I think the final moments Of this movie Are so funny Where he you know He opens the door And everyone is in the room Right They're all waiting for him Yeah they're all waiting

[00:18:19] For him in the room Grace Kelly And Mark Halliday And Chief Inspector Hubbard And all that stuff And he They're all waiting for him In the room And the second he sees them He realizes The mistake that he has made With the different latch key Yeah And then he turns around And then there's people Like behind him Like waiting for him Like police Detectives And he's kind of like Well good show Old sports Well done You caught me Anyone fancy a drink Yeah Yeah It's basically The end of Cash on Demand Also Where he's just like Well this was fun Yes

[00:18:48] It really reminded me of When Michael Fassbender Dies in Inglourious Bastards And he's like Oh my god yeah And he's like Well this is it old boy I hope you don't mind If I go down Speaking the kings You know There's just This classy Britishness To everything That is very fun Yeah Yeah Yeah No that's a good Catch But back to the Columbo thing I thought of that Because there's even A moment where the Inspector goes to leave And he's like Oh excuse me Just one more thing Like he does The Columbo He says the Columbo thing And that's so funny I was like Oh shit Is this where

[00:19:18] They got that from For Columbo I wonder But yeah All that is great Because yeah It's interesting You know There's sort of no There's no mystery Necessarily If the tension is Will they catch him Because we know Which is an interesting Little you know Inversion Of that whole Of the genre Basically Yeah Which is how Columbo always works And it's how Poker Face always works Right The TV show Poker Face Which is heavily Inspired by Columbo Right And it's also how At least the first Knives Out Kind of works that way too Right Where at least

[00:19:48] Until you Like realize Towards the end Like the extra twist That in fact Chris Evans Was behind it all Right But like For most of Knives Out You're thinking like Oh Ananda Armas Accidentally killed Christopher Plummer Like how Does she go about this Like how do we figure This out Kind of thing Right Yeah Yeah And I think I mean Grace Kelly man Just like wow She's so good She's incredible Yeah She's somebody who Is not in that many movies You know Nine movies or something Right Something like Something like Nine movies And then she becomes Like the queen of Morocco Right

[00:20:17] She like Monaco I think Monaco I think you're Actually yes Yeah but she like You know Leaves Hollywood behind Becomes the queen of Monaco And then unfortunately Dies in a car crash A few years later Right But yeah No she's I think she's in Three Hitchcock movies I want to say She's in this She's in Rear Window And something else I'm blanking on what The other one is It's not Vertigo Is it I think you're right Actually I'm pretty sure It is Vertigo I think it is Vertigo I'm pretty sure You're right Actually But yeah Obviously No she's in Dialing for Murder Rear Window

[00:20:47] And To Catch a Thief To Catch a Thief Which is Kim Novak Kim Novak's in Vertigo Yeah obviously We're mixing up Our Hitchcock blondes Together This has a very funny Oh sorry You can finish your thought Sorry No I was gonna say Yeah she has like A crazy 50s Where she's in High Noon And she's in A bunch of stuff like that She's in a John Ford movie She's in the three Hitchcocks And then in the 60s She's like Well I'm done That's it Yeah Hey good for her Until bad for her Yeah Yeah I guess But this has a very funny Hitchcock cameo When he's in the like

[00:21:16] College reunion photo That's so funny That is really good Yes That's I think one of the better Hitchcock cameos Actually is that one Because he's just so He's like Just so clearly Hey that's how That's how Which is funny I think What are my favorite The picture from The Shining But It does like the picture From The Shining Yeah absolutely One of my favorite Hitchcock cameos Is actually in Lifeboat I don't know if you've Seen Lifeboat I have but it's been so long I don't remember What the cameo is The cameo in Lifeboat Because it's hard It's hard to do a cameo In Lifeboat The entire movie

[00:21:46] Takes place in a lifeboat With like seven people Right But there's a moment Where they pick up A newspaper And there's a picture Of like a weight loss Like a weight loss campaign And like the fat one Is Hitchcock And then there's The thin guy Incredible That's very funny Which is a good one Yeah that's great There's another I think it's The Birds Where he had He's just like walking A dog in the background Or something like that Yeah Yeah Hitchcock cameos Are always fun Big fan They're a good bit I like it Yeah Absolutely Yeah Grace Kelly's Last movie was 1956 High society

[00:22:16] Not high anxiety High society With Bing Crosby And Frank Sinatra Wow Yeah And then she got married And she's in Monaco And that was it But yeah So among the Hitchcock Movies you've seen Mike I mean where do you feel A dial in for murder Kind of ranks for you Hitchcock Challengers Ranks Like kind of Near the top Top part Top five maybe I don't know I mean I don't know How many I've seen Necessarily But yeah It's pretty high up there Like I said Probably Rear window Number one for me North by Northwest Maybe two

[00:22:45] Sure But yeah This is pretty Pretty high up there I did recently watch You know in the last Couple months Foreign Correspondent Which really ripped Yeah So that went up Pretty high also But it's like One of those things Where it's like I guess they're all Like one One A One B One C You know I haven't seen A bad one Necessarily That I can think of Off the top of my head I was I was kind of boring You know It's like Vertigo kind of boring I don't know I went to see that Actually with A friend of the show Laura Colinari

[00:23:15] We went to see that At the Madison Theater In Albany They were doing a Hitchcock retrospective Month thing there Or something And we went to see Vertigo together And it was like Yeah okay I mean obviously It's Vertigo Like well of course It's incredible But like I don't know It's not real window Like you know I don't know I mean interesting And I feel like Maybe that's a result Of Vertigo Topped the sight and sound Poll in 2012 Right It was It was the movie That dethroned Citizen Kane As the sight and sound Pick for number one Movie of all time Yeah And so I feel like That then put

[00:23:45] A huge weight Of expectations Behind Vertigo Right Like behind what That is And it's a movie That I've been meaning To rewatch for a long Time I remember liking it A lot But I haven't Seen it in forever And it's not one That I've rewatched Probably since college So yeah It's one that I feel like I'm due to Give Vertigo Another shot But I would also Put several other Hitchcock movies Ahead of Vertigo Personally Again I like it But I would put Dial in for Murder In Re-Window Ahead of Vertigo I would put Strangers on a Train Ahead of Vertigo Oh wow I haven't seen that In so long That movie's awesome That movie's great Yeah

[00:24:14] That movie's fantastic North by Northwest I might put in front Of Vertigo Psycho is great But I haven't seen That in a very long time You know what I really Love is Marnie I think Marnie's Incredible Okay I've never Seen Marnie That's the movie He made after The Birds And I think It's kind of You know It's not nearly As well known As some of his Other movies Because I feel Like The Birds Is kind of The last major Hitchcock movie For a lot of people Right But Marnie's great Marnie's fantastic I also really like Family Plot I think Family Plot's A lot of fun It's no Vertigo But it's pretty fun

[00:24:44] It's fun Is Rope the one That's like all The 10 minute takes Or whatever Yeah Yeah Rope is Yeah Completely comprised Of like 10 minute Long takes And also very good I like Rope a lot Got Jimmy Stewart In there You know Yeah Shadow of a Doubt Is good Saboteur The Lady Vanishes Is great You know I'm just looking Through the Hitchcock Filmography And being like Man a lot of Good movies in here Turns out He's a good director Yeah The 39 Steps Is very fun Which actually One time I went to

[00:25:13] There's this Theater company In New York That's like Sort of near where I grew up That would normally Do like a Shakespeare in the park Like theater Kind of thing Yeah But this one year They did the 39 Steps Whoa Like as a stage Production And it was a comedy Version of it Which like heavily Referenced other Hitchcock stuff Okay Throughout In a similar vein To High Anxiety And there was a Recurring bit In that version Of the 39 Steps Where they would Just keep wedging in Hitchcock titles Into dialogue

[00:25:44] And like At some point Somebody like Disappeared and It's like Oh and the lady Vanished as well You know That kind of thing It was very fun But the 39 Steps The movie is also Pretty good Okay Pretty cool I'll have to check it out Yeah Both versions of The Man Who New Too Much Are pretty good You know So Vertigo Really good I feel like I'm going to Rewatch it And be like Oh actually Yeah This is the Masterpiece This is really good But yeah I think for me Dialing for Murder Is probably still My number one But it might be A rear window And it might be Strangers on a Train Like any of those

[00:26:14] Three I feel like Are very high up there For me Yeah I'll have to rewatch Strangers on a Train It's been a long time Since I've seen that But I remember Really liking it Yeah And I loved the The like titular shot Basically in this movie When Ray Moland Is at the restaurant With his boys Whatever it is And he's like Oh I have to step away To call my boss Which is what His excuse to get on the phone Yeah And he calls his wife And it just like Zooms in as he dials The first number Is like six or whatever That has M Right Yeah It's like oh He's doing He's doing the thing He's dialing M For murder

[00:26:44] Exactly Yes This is good Good stuff Yeah Absolutely All right Well that is Dial M for murder The Alfred Hitchcock film From 1954 I'm glad you enjoyed it Mike I'm glad you had a good time Yeah Thanks for making me watch Some classic cinema It counted It was able to count As my like Sunday morning Criterion Even though it's not On Criterion channel But But it had the vibe Of something That would be on there Yeah Spiritually Yeah Exactly And now for something Completely different Let's move on Into the movie That Mike D Made me watch This week Which is John Woo's

[00:27:13] Hard Targets In the city Of New Orleans In a darker side Of Dixie Away from the music And the lights There's a new game In town You'll be provided With a guide Trackers And the weapons Of your choice I need to file A missing person report The competitors Are deadly We pride ourselves In hunting only Combat veterans

[00:27:42] Men who have The necessary skills To make our hunts More interesting And They always win You want to find Your father Get somebody Who knows the city To show you around Now The opposition Is about to get One last chance What kind of a name Is Chance My mama took when My friend Mr. Boudreaux Silver star Marine Forced Recon

[00:28:11] He's obviously Not someone We should underestimate All right That was in the trailer For Hard Target The action movie Directed by John Woo From 1993 Starring people like Jean-Claude Van Damme Lance Hendrickson Yancey Butler Arnold Vosloo And Wilford Brimley Also popping up In this movie As well God damn right He's in this movie Lest we forget So Hard Target Why did you want to Make me watch this one Mike? Yeah I had never seen This movie And I know you Had never seen it We had kind of Talked about it And I think maybe In all of the

[00:28:41] Mission Impossible Final Reckoning Kind of rewatch Stuff I had been doing I rewatched Two So I'm I You know Part of that Mission Impossible 2 The John Woo one We watched Mission Impossible 2 When we were rewatching Before Final Reckoning And then we also Had to watch it again Last year for the No More Late Fees podcast Right we did an episode Maybe that was it actually Mission Impossible 1 and 2 back to back Right That might have actually Been when I like Realized this Which is hilarious Because that's what We've seen 8 million times Yeah Because it was the First DVD we ever rented Which is very funny Right

[00:29:10] But there's the moment Towards the end of the movie Kind of like Final Assault on the Bad Guy's Base Where I forget exactly What the line before it is But they give Ethan Like kind of vague information And he says Do you care to harden The target a little And I was like Oh shit Hard target I've never seen that movie And so I was That was part of all Us talking about How neither of us Had seen it And we're big woo guys Particularly after the Nick Cage season Of course And you know Watching Face Off And Windtalkers And any The Michelle Yeoh movies

[00:29:40] I don't remember If she's actually In a John Woo movie But Michelle Yeoh No I don't think she is No she's not But we talked about Those Hong Kong Action movies right Yeah A bunch So yeah Wanted to fill in A pretty major Significant John Woo Blind spot for both of us And also I know This is a little bit Of like redemption For you personally With this movie I don't know if you Want to talk about that But Sure I can Yeah So that's why I picked her target For us to have an excuse To watch a cool movie Yeah absolutely

[00:30:09] So what my team's Referring to is that I used to work At the Roxy Theater The Indy Theater Near my house In Missoula Montana And I was about I was about to say Where I also work Because I used to Add that to it But now I don't anymore The Indy Theater In my house Near Missoula Montana Where I used to work And when I was at the Roxy I hosted a series Called Inferno of Danger Which was a monthly Celebration of great Action movies And due to circumstances Beyond my control I no longer work At the Roxy However I was still Programming Inferno Or I was Programming Inferno Up to the day That I was no longer Working there Right

[00:30:39] And you know So once a month And I had I had mapped out Inferno For the rest of the year Basically And so When I left The next movie That I had programmed Was Hard Target Whoops And so After I was Not there anymore I felt weird going And so I didn't end up Going to see Hard Target At the Roxy Which is a bummer Because I think this Would play great in a crowd This would be a lot of fun This would be a lot of fun To watch in a theater But actually It was not the movie I was originally Trying to program The movie I was Originally trying to program Was John Woo's The Killer

[00:31:09] From 1989 And I think the reason I wanted to do that Is because A it's awesome And And B I think a new restoration Had just come out Or something like that Didn't they remake it That John Woo himself Did a remake of it That went straight to Peacock And I think that That happened I think shortly after I was trying to schedule This screening So maybe that was An issue too But yeah We couldn't figure out Who like owned the killer Or like We weren't able to get it For whatever reason And so After we couldn't get it I pivoted it And was like Well let's do another

[00:31:39] John Woo movie You know Let's do something And we had already done Hard Boiled Kind of recently And I had already done Face Off for Inferno Right Like a year earlier So I was like Okay What's left in the repertoire What should I do And I think I was kind of debating Between A Better Tomorrow But I thought it would have A similar issue With The Killer Where it's just like Sometimes the Hong Kong stuff Is kind of hard to find And the John Woo stuff Especially was kind of like Sort of The Hong Kong John Woo stuff The rights Were kind of in limbo For a while I think until very recently Until very recently Yeah There was I think

[00:32:09] Arrow maybe Had like a John Woo box set Or something like that Yeah Or What's the other one Shout Factory Really is like Doing like a Hong Kong Classics line Or something Yeah Something like that And so all like The John Woo Hong Kong movies Are now getting like You know Beautiful restorations Right And coming out on Blu-ray And all that stuff Which is awesome I'm glad that's happening But that wasn't happening When I was trying to program Yeah yeah yeah And so I figured Okay better tomorrow We probably can't find So I was kind of debating Between some of the American John Woo movies

[00:32:39] I had already shown face off And I was like You know what I've never seen Hard Target I've heard it's great Let's do it And so I programmed Hard Target It played for Inferno But unfortunately It was after I was No longer working there So I didn't get to go see it Which was a bummer But Hard Target I'm glad that you finally Made me watch this movie Mike because It rips It's really fun It's a great time Yeah Holy shit So one thing I think we should also Mention before we Kind of get into Hard Target Is that one of the Credited producers On this movie Is Sam Raimi Right Too And so you know

[00:33:08] That credit comes up And you know You see movies produced By Sam Raimi all the time He produces a lot of stuff But there is a lot of stories About him being on the set Of Hard Target And specifically I think the studio Wanted Sam Raimi there As like somebody As like Hey you know John This is first John Woo's first English language movie He doesn't really speak English that well We need somebody on set Who can kind of like Reign him in Do his thing Like you know All that stuff And according to Sam Raimi Like he was on set Learning from a master And being like Yeah let him do his stuff Like let him do his thing

[00:33:37] Like whatever You know So according to Sam Raimi He didn't really contribute That much to this movie However I think if you watch The opening scene of this movie There's a lot of like Point of view arrow shots That feel like Lifted straight out of Your evil deads Or what have you You know That's so funny I kind of forgot All about that Yeah Like I saw those shots And I was like Oh the eyeballs That's interesting Yeah the movie even starts With like a POV Like camera shaking Going through the street Kind of thing Yeah Yeah that's hilarious So it is funny You can I think Still feel a little bit

[00:34:07] Of the influence Of Sam Raimi And Robert Taper Who was Sam Raimi's partner You know as producers On this movie And this is weird No wonder Ted Raimi's That one guy on the street Oh my god It's all coming together It all makes sense But yeah This is like a little bit before This is like right around The time Army of Darkness Comes out So it's not easy It's not as if Sam Raimi's Like a staple studio guy Yeah You know It's like he's He made a couple of Cult classic horror movies He made Darkman Which you know Is awesome But like wasn't a huge hit Or anything like that

[00:34:35] Like also a cult classic Kind of thing Army of Darkness Also a cult thing Like he doesn't really have Like a studio hit Until you know Quick and the Dead Maybe in 95 Is that even a hit? I have no idea Yeah I don't know But he has his own Like studio stuff I mean you know A simple plan And for love of the game And all that stuff Yeah You know and obviously He has the Spider-Man Like down the line But he's not like A safe studio pick Kind of thing You know Which is weird Which is why it's weird That like he's the guy That they assigned To you know Watch over John Woo But I'm glad they did

[00:35:05] Because he recognized The job should be like Let's let John Woo cook Let's let him do his thing You know Exactly But yeah So before I get into Hard Target Mike What did you think of this movie? You were watching it For the first time also Yeah I was I was kind of like You know the first 20-ish minutes Maybe First act I was like Okay Like yeah I mean I get it I'm not the hugest JCVD fan He's not bad Or anything But I don't know I'm not like Super He's not like my guy You know Like whatever The way like Stallone

[00:35:35] Or Schwarzenegger Might be your guy I know Schwarzenegger Is one of your guys Right Yes So I was kind of like Okay this is like Interesting But alright But once they kind of Get over the hump Of like This is the most dangerous game And it's just evil guys Hunting Homeless veterans And it's just psychotic action From there on out I was like Locked in I was like Here we go This is the greatest movie Of all time This has maybe There's an Absolutely What would be Like a number one Motorcycle stunt On the bridge

[00:36:05] When he like Jumps over the car If Michelle Yeoh Had never jumped The motorcycle Onto the train Yes In Police Story 3 So Yeah like From there on I was like Oh actually I'm fully in I'm all on board For this movie So it took a little while To get cooking for me But once it was cooking Oh baby I was having a total blast Nice I feel pretty much Exactly the same way Where I think You know I think you could say For maybe like The first like Yeah half hour To like Even the first half Of the movie Yeah It kind of feels like Again there's some energy To some of the scenes

[00:36:34] Like the action is good But I think From a storytelling level I think this feels like Like an above average JCVD movie You know Right Like a solid Like a little bit Above average What you get from your Average Jean-Claude Van Damme movie And I've seen a few Of those from the 80s and 90s But similarly Like not one of my guys Like not somebody Like a Schwarzenegger Or something like that And I don't think He represents that I feel like Schwarzenegger And Stallone And like Bruce Willis They're like A-list Like these are the guys Right And then I think You're Jean-Claude Van Damme And you're Steven Seagal You're Dolph Lundgren's

[00:37:04] You're Dolph Lundgren's Right They're more of like The B-list action guys Who are around the same time Who are like Making much lower budget Action movies Sometimes direct to video But you know Most of these are theatrical For a long time Right Like you know Action movies That on the same level As of budget As like a Schwarzenegger But like you know He makes them They make their profit They do their job And you know In some ways He's a better like Physical actor Than some of the Like A-list stars Right Like these guys Are actually like Martial artists Compared to Arnold Schwarzenegger

[00:37:34] Or Stallone Who are like You know They're movie stars And these guys Are like martial artists Who they train to Speak in front of a camera Kind of thing Right Yeah exactly And so with JCBD You know You have movies That I've seen Like Bloodsport Or Kickboxer Or Cyborg I think it's a movie You made me watch Actually for the podcast A while back I think so yeah You know All that stuff And I feel like The ones that I've seen For the most part I've had kind of Mixed reactions to Like I generally like him As a presence But sometimes he kind of Feels like You know Tommy Wiseau-esque

[00:38:04] In certain scenes I think that's fair to say Just that thick You know Brussels accent And all that kind of stuff Universal Soldier Also a movie that I've seen From this era That Roland Emmerich Joined Which I do enjoy But I think the first half Of this movie Kind of plays like A slightly above average Jean-Claude Van Damme movie From this era And then the back half Of the movie Is like Alright And now the John Woo stuff's Kicking in And suddenly the action Starts becoming much more Like balletic And operatic And it's just getting Crazier and crazier And there are doves Flying everywhere

[00:38:34] And there are just Unique and crazy Motorcycle stunts And gunfights Until it eventually Like builds and builds In this kind of insane way Where it's finally It's Jean-Claude Van Damme Versus Lance Henriksen And there's fire Everywhere Everywhere And it's just like You know Kickboxer Or whatever Right Yeah And it's just It's cool It's really Really fun And engaging The action's great And it really feels like There are moments

[00:39:04] In this movie That feel like Like obviously Jean-Claude was already A very established Hong Kong action filmmaker At this point He had already made Hard Boiled He had already made The Killer Right He made some Already all-timer Action movies This is his first American action movie And obviously A couple years later He makes Face Off Which is like Generally considered Like his best American movie And there are moments In Hard Target Where I'm like I see Face Off In this Like I see Face Off Coming out of this You know Yeah Towards the end Of the movie When they like Are back to back On either side Of a wall And they're like Yep

[00:39:33] 100% That's the moment I'm thinking of Yeah Yep That's the shot For Face Off Yeah There is the moment Where you know There's sort of This investigation This character's Father was a homeless Veteran And he's like Gone missing Or I think at this point He's died in the fire Right Which they kind of Don't really believe The story And Jean-Claude Van Damme Is like Gonna investigate more Or whatever I forget the whole situation But he like Gets the clue Or the inspiration From a like John Woo

[00:40:03] Dove Like he's standing In his doorway With the door open And a dove like Flies in And lands on the Like bed stand Or something Where JCVD Has his dog tags And realize They come in pairs But they only recovered One from the fire And he's just like Smirks And he's like Yeah You're right And it's like What? John Woo Is just having a dove In part this knowledge To him And that was where I like Steepled my fingers And leaned forward It was like Oh we're about to Lock in baby Yes And that's kind of Where it like Starts to pick up And that's like

[00:40:33] Yeah 20-30 minutes Into the movie Where that starts happening Yes So you kind of have to Get through the first Half hour Where it's like You know It's very stiff acting From Jean-Claude Van Damme Which you know Part of the course That makes sense Also very stiff acting From the love interest Yancey Butler Playing Natasha Binder The woman whose dad Has gone missing Yeah You know I don't think She's very good In this movie either And you know There's a moment Like early on in the movie Where they're like JCVD is like Trying to find work On the docks Or something like that And it's so weird Because he like Doesn't have a union card

[00:41:03] And so he like Has to make the money To get the union card To get the job And all that kind of stuff But like everyone else Is dressed like A longshoreman Right And JCVD looks like He's walking out Of the matrix Or something He has like The long black trench coat And it's like You're not ready For a fishing job man What are you doing Yeah Then he gets inside Lewin Davis He doesn't He owes back To his on his union card Yes He can't take the job All that stuff And that's how He kind of gets Roped into this You know She's offering money To help To help find her father

[00:41:32] And all that stuff Because she saw him Like take out A couple of thugs earlier And he saves her She's getting mugged Yeah Yeah And so he's Obviously he's got He's got the moves He can do it But yeah It's very stiff acting From him And it's very stiff acting From Yancey Butler However Lance Hendrickson A plus bad guy Oh man One of the greatest To ever do it We used to have movies With Lance Hendrickson As a bad guy That's what I'm saying You know He's one of the greatest So good to see him In this movie I did not know He was going to be in this Me neither I was very stoked To find out That he was in it

[00:42:02] And playing the bad guy Of course he's in So many movies He's in the He's in Aliens He's in Predator 2 You know All that stuff Terminator Right He's I think The only One of the only actors I think it's him And like Bill Paxson Who have been killed By a Terminator An alien and a Predator Right I think so Something like that And now also Jean-Claude Van Damme He can add That's the resume as well Near Dark He's great in Oh yeah Near Dark of course Fantastic And so yeah He's great in this movie He's a terrific villain And his henchman being Arnold Vosloo In the hotel From The Mummy Yeah You know

[00:42:31] When that credit Popped up I've seen The Mummy Quite a few times But not nearly as many times As you have Mike Yeah But when that credit Came up of Arnold Vosloo I had in my mind I was like I feel like I know that name That's not The Mummy No way There's no way That's The Mummy And then it turns out Yeah he's The Mummy Which was cool to see Yeah with hair He's got a full head Well hair Thinning hair In this movie at least Yeah but this is a couple years Before The Mummy came out This is 93 So this is six years earlier Yeah And he's great And I was like Is that him

[00:43:01] The first time he shows up Because he's like In the background He's like They're like talking to the Bartender guy or whatever And he like interrupts them And I was like No way And then yeah He shows up later Or whatever And I was like Holy shit It's incredible This is awesome That he's in this And he's like talking a lot Like he's the main henchman You know In The Mummy He's very silent obviously Right And he's like In all the makeup And stuff for a long time Or the CGI stuff So yeah that was A real fun surprise for me Everything about this movie Was a real fun surprise Basically

[00:43:31] Yeah And I love just how Like you know You don't have to think about The plausibility Of all this stuff Kind of Like in a John Woo movie Like it's not about that You know Like it's just about the The image Or the story Like the final Or not the final But the kind of like Inciting incident Or whatever In the second act When the other friend His other homeless Veteran friend JCBD's friend Gets most dangerous gamed Basically Right He gets released In the city And he kills The rich guy

[00:44:00] That was supposed To kill him And so Lance Hendrickson And his thugs Have to hunt him down And he just like Blows him away In the middle Of a crowded Like Mardi Gras street And it's just like Everybody Like it's totally packed And it just is like No Like it doesn't It doesn't matter Like you know Like the rest of that scene Is there It's like the whole Background is Packed full of people They start shooting the guy They all hit the deck And they all just lay there On the ground While he walks over And like takes his dog tags It's like It's like a whole thing And nobody reacts Or moves after that

[00:44:30] They all just lay on the ground And wait for the scene to end And it's fucking awesome It's so cool To see a movie It works within like The world of the John Woo Action movie That has been established Right Yeah Yeah And it's just so cool To see a movie That is not Like you know We're all so concerned About like Continuity and logic And like cinema sins And like all that stupid shit Yeah yeah In modern movie But no It's not about that It's about the It's about the image And it's like Yeah It's so cool Absolutely Yeah No that That scene's great Of course Wilfred Brimley Also in this movie As well Oh my god

[00:44:59] Who plays Jean-Claude Van Damme's uncle I think right He's Yeah Just a guy who lives Like deep in the bayou And is a weapons expert And helps them out In the final shootout And yeah He's incredible in this movie It's just good to see him too He's basically playing the bad guys In Walter Hill's Southern Comfort Which I just watched Where they like Traipse out into the bayou And mess with like The local creole people Or whatever And that's what That's what Wilfred Brimley's Talking with the like Weird French accent

[00:45:29] And all this stuff And it's just like Hell yes He's so good And I've always seen That gif of him On the horse With the bow and arrow And the explosion And I had no idea It was from this movie So like when he showed up And I was like Putting the Connecting the dots I was like That looks like It would be from a John Woo movie Is it this movie? Like holy shit And sure enough it is And he's probably like what 45 or something In this movie Yeah I think Wilfred Brimley Was like not that old Compared to You know What people thought he was I mean he only died in 2020 Right

[00:45:57] He only like died a few years ago Yeah Well it's one of those things That he's in Cocoon And he's like Oh he's 40 Or something Yeah But he's playing like The grandpa in Cocoon Or something like that Yeah Right It's like all about the olds Yes I've also actually Never seen Cocoon That's Wow Never happened Have you seen Cocoon? I have seen Cocoon But not in a very long time But that's one of those Like infamously Never been released movie Like the rights to it Doesn't exist or something I don't really know The whole story But Yeah it's weirdly It's a movie that gets Referenced a lot Because of that reason It's like the Brimley Cocoon line or whatever Right And you know

[00:46:27] Because Wilfred Brimley Is like old Like younger than you Would think he is In that movie Yeah I think I have seen stories About how like Cocoon 2 Readily available You can get Cocoon 2 Anywhere Easy to access Cocoon 1 For whatever reason Very rarely on Video on demand Right Very rarely on streaming Never streaming I don't think there's Ever been a Blu-ray of it That kind of thing It's like a hard movie To find Yeah We're lousy with Cocoon 2 But Yeah We're drowning in Cocoon 2 over here But We're dying of thirst For Cocoon 1 Oh man But yeah Hard target Total blast

[00:46:57] Once it kicks off You know Once we finally get there Yeah And Lance Hendrickson's Got that like weird Big bullet pistol That can only shoot Like one bullet at a time Yes I don't know It's just cool Everything's so stylish All that Yeah All the style is so good And I love the way The movie ends Where it's It's a Very Hong Kong Action movie ending Where Yeah Lance Hendrickson dies They ride off into the sunset Roll credits They're done Like that's it Get us out of here We slap the handcuffs on him Cut to credits Yes Oh okay

[00:47:26] Which is very very funny Other random scenes This movie We referenced it Early on On this podcast But you should mention again Jean-Claude Van Damme Does punch a snake in the face Oh my god Like he and Yancey Butler Are like wandering Through the woods They're like you know Stranded out there And they're trying to get Like find shelter I think they're trying to find Wilford Brimley right And Yeah They're in the woods And you know He says like hey Close your eyes And she thinks like He's about to kiss her Or something And there's a snake Behind her And he grabs it And he punches it In the face

[00:47:55] And then bites the rattle Off the Yeah And thing And then uses that snake As like a trap For like the people That are following them Right yeah Because he's removed the rattle It won't be able to alert The people that they're near it So he like hangs it From a branch So the people Tracking them Walk under that branch And get attacked By the snake Which is just insane Like he punches it And it like slowly Falls unconscious If you've never seen That image It's hilarious Yes It's so funny

[00:48:25] And awesome It rules Yeah It's crazy Yes And yeah The movie's filled With stuff like that And also just The physicality Of Jean-Claude Van Damme You know You get the The reason why He was a movie star Is because he kicks Better than anyone else And he can roundhouse For sure Exactly Real good at kicking And you know That opening fight scene Where he is Taking out those thugs That are trying to mug Yancy Butler You just get a full display Of like Yeah no He's really good At what he does Like you get a sense Of like why he was A movie star At this time Yeah

[00:48:54] It's just all kinds Of slow-mo All kinds of awesome stuff There's the one moment That really like shocked me Where it's like Just a crazy squib Nobody Nobody does squibs Quite like John Woo Yeah Where it's Emotep And he goes over To the bad guy Who I forget the whole situation But he's trying to flee town The like bartender Or bar owner guy That like gives them The homeless people To most dangerous game And he Is like Trying to leave town And he's like

[00:49:23] Throwing all of his stuff In the car And he walks up to him And puts the shotgun Against his head And he's like Oh you're trying to Skip town What's going on And he's like Oh no Don't worry And then it's just A slow-mo Like And he blows him away And just the whole Inside of the car Turns red It's just like Like an insane Like The head explosion In scanners level Like squib Going on in this movie And it rips Yeah Absolutely A lot of fun Really enjoyed Hard Target This is a I bought this on Blu-ray years ago Actually Nice It was a

[00:49:53] Kino Lorber Blu-ray And so it's been Sitting on my shelf Forever And hadn't gotten Around to watching it So thank you Mike D For making me Watch Hard Target Finally Yes I'm glad I'm glad To have done The Lord's work Right after we Watched The Furious Like oh man What a Perfect We're in action Movie mode right now Baby It's happening Any other thoughts About Hard Target Mike Should we try to Connect these two Movies in any way Dial in for murder And Hard Target Hmm How do we get There's no There is technically A murder investigation Type thing going on At the beginning Of Hard Target That's true Yes

[00:50:23] But hmm That's kind of Really it There's nothing About the sort of Abandonment of our Veterans You know The system Spitting these people Out Yeah One's a very Like classy And subtle movie I think And the other one's Dial in for murder No There could be Something about The kind of The kind of Upper crust Rich of society Thinking they're immune And can get away With things like this Because that's sort of Ray Moland's whole There you go His whole thing Yes There you go I like that Yeah

[00:50:53] The And eat the rich Movie if you will Right Sure Sort of Yeah They're selling The most dangerous Game to people They're back Yeah No I can get behind That Okay yeah I think that's a Good thematic tissue Between these two movies Yeah sure I feel like that Could apply to Almost everything It's like well The rich people Are bad Yeah Yes Interesting Interesting This keeps coming up In media Yeah But Alright Any last thoughts About Hard Target Mike before we start Wrapping this episode up Not particularly

[00:51:22] About Hard Target But I think I did Like you said I'm kind of in Action movie Like Hunger Give me What's a Scott Atkins movie Let's do that next Come on Like you know I need more of these Yeah absolutely No always down for that I feel like there was One like kind of I feel like there's Another action movie That I saw a trailer For in front of the Furious I'm blanking on what it was But I remember it Looking really cool So we'll see what that is I do want to watch I do want to watch Normal I think was that movie The Oh yeah The Ben Wheatley Bob Odenkirk Action movie

[00:51:52] I missed that in theaters I think it's interesting That this is just What Bob Odenkirk does now Exactly Yeah Is these kind of Action movies But I've heard good things I've heard good things Oh really Okay cool Yeah I would like to watch that I missed it when it was in theaters So I gotta catch up with that one Yeah what's the next Mike Mixed Mike watch Mike What are you making me watch In July Let's see In July Oh I think it's Yeah next July 4th of July The Patriot By Roland Emmerich Okay Speaking of action movies Speaking of action movies Yeah And does this like

[00:52:20] Conclude our Roland Emmerich run Over the last few years Are we like I think we've got All of the big ones Yeah Unless you really want To make me watch Anonymous or something I feel like we've Pretty much hit All the major stuff I guess except for I could make you watch Universal Soldier Which I do like I thought it was pretty good When I saw it back in the day So yeah Maybe that one But yeah I think we've pretty much Hit all the major Roland Emmerich stuff At this point Yep Yep That's the last one That we have Holding out So I'm surprised I can't believe I mean you never saw Gladiator either So I can't believe You never saw The Patriot Well I have seen

[00:52:50] Gladiator now Now you have Just to be clarified Yes Which was a Mike Mixed Mike watch You did make me watch That movie And then I Tossed out Everyone's expectations And said Gladiator 2 Was better You mad man But yeah Just never got around To watching The Patriot For whatever reason So very curious To see what that's like It's Mel Gibson right Yes And he doesn't play He doesn't play George Washington right But it's like That's not That's not what The movie is right No it's a Revolutionary war thing But he plays a Like a soldier Or something

[00:53:20] Yeah Yeah Militia guy Or something Gotcha Yeah so you will Be making me watch The Patriot Which you know Is 4th of July America 250 It's a perfect movie For that For that era I suppose Everyone knows We're big American Patriots Here On the podcast It's all we talk about Alright so you're Making me watch The Patriot I am making you watch Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia Whoa From 1999 Some light viewing huh Yeah A movie that I really love A movie that

[00:53:50] I think for a very long time I have said Is my favorite PTA movie I don't think That's the case anymore Because I think One battle might have Eclipsed that for me But I am very curious I haven't watched it In a very long time either So I'm very curious To re-watch Magnolia Hopefully I will find The time to do so In between my Hectic baseball schedule To fit in this Three hour PTA movie Yeah I can't wait But it rocks I think you're gonna Really enjoy it Yeah I somehow Missed that I remember in college My like You know Friends on my floor Or whatever Got together

[00:54:19] And they were like We're watching Magnolia man And I Every weekend in college They're like We're watching Magnolia again man No Yeah No I don't And I just remember I didn't really know Anything about it At the time Yeah And they were just like Yeah I don't know Like whatever It rains frogs Or some bullshit I was like Oh okay Sure man Sounds like You know Surreal Like I don't know Trying not to be My pretentious film Boy To my new friends

[00:54:56] That and eyes wide shut Which is a crazy Have you seen The eight Mission Impossible Yeah I mean obviously Okay Removing Ethan Hunt From the equation Okay okay okay Maybe Tom Cruise's Best performance Although if you had to pick Of all eight Mission Impossibles Which one do you think Tom Cruise has the best Performance in Oh god That's tough It's probably Fallout Maybe it's Fallout I was gonna say Maybe three I was gonna say three Yeah Genuinely I know Three is towards The bottom of my ranking But I think it's still

[00:55:26] Great But I think that's the one That gives him the most Emotional stuff to work with Yeah I think about the line Every day when I'm driving To work When he's pretending To be a department Of Transportation Guy And he's like You can watch A single Press of the break Ripple for miles As I'm just in Bumper to bumper traffic Trying to drive to work Like fuck And it's the hottest Thing anyone's ever seen Exactly When he's talking about that Yeah absolutely Yeah No I I think

[00:55:55] Maybe it's Fallout Maybe it's three Maybe it's four I don't know Ghost Protocol You know Maybe But then you also have The Elsa stuff In five and six Which is You know He's so good In that stuff Yeah Honestly You know Rewatching Rogue Nation Maybe the end of Rogue Nation Where he's doing the Like the speech When he has the glasses on Yeah Rogue Nation The living manifestation The adaptation of destiny Yes Well that's Alex Baldwin's performance Although Tom Cruise Is there under a mask You know what we should do We should rewatch All the Mission Impossible I think forget The Spielberg sci-fi

[00:56:25] It's Mission Impossible Ranking time again It's been a little over a year Since Final Reckoning Came out I think it's about time For a re-evaluation I think we'll I think we should do that And then follow it up With the Fast and the Furious Rewatch I mean that one I actually do want to do soon I haven't re-watched Most of those movies Since Seven came out Right So or maybe it was Actually it was since Eight came out Because I did Five, Six, and Seven Around that time I haven't re-watched the first four In a very long time But yeah I've never I haven't done like a full series

[00:56:55] Rewatch in a very long time And I recently re-watched Fast Five on a plane And it was just like This is the best movie ever made Why aren't Why aren't I watching this all the time All the time You know And so I think Before Fast X Part 2 comes out Which I think is currently dated For like March of 2028 Or something along those lines We should do a big Fast and Furious Retrospective I think that should That'd be a lot of fun I think we've done a Fast and Furious Retrospective in the past I think we have But it was like When Nine came out maybe So there's been like Three movies since then

[00:57:25] You know Yeah We got Or maybe You know There's been one movie since then I guess It's been It's been a while Since we've done it We've got new thoughts About Fast and Furious To get through You know Yeah You know You don't have to twist my arm To talk about the Fast and the Furious And or the Mission Impossible movies Exactly But we are talking about Neither one of those next week Next month For a Mike's Mike watch We will be doing Magnolia And the movie that Mike D Is making me watch Which we've talked for so long That I'm blanking on what it was The Patriot The Patriots Which That'll be another

[00:57:54] Interesting double feature Maybe both about the rod At the core of America You know Hey We'll see Could be You know I'm guessing The Roland Emmerich movie Starring Mel Gibson Called The Patriot Is exactly what that I'm guessing That's a major theme What if it's his one Like super thematic Heavy movie No conspiracies None of that shit Yes Exactly I do think Whenever Roland Emmerich Does come out with a new movie

[00:58:24] I feel like we gotta talk about it We gotta go On this podcast I mean Obviously The last one he came out with Was Moonfall Right Which was at this point Four years ago Which is crazy That's insane I still have my Moonfall poster Hanging off in my room I'm so glad But yeah No we gotta Whenever Roland Emmerich Has a new movie coming out We'll talk about it But next month We're doing The Patriot And Magnolia Mike D Where can we find you Online this week Oh god We still have to do this part You can find me At MD Film Blog On Letterboxd And Blue Sky Where you can

[00:58:54] What else can you do You can find us Support us on the Kofi page Kofi.com Slash Mike and Mike Pods Where you can donate $50 To pick a bonus episode Here on Mike and Mike Go to the movies You got a movie You want us to talk about Like a Like Anonymous I guess If there are any Anonymous heads out there Who want to make us Watch that movie Again Another conspiracy theory Movie In which it's about Did Shakespeare Really write his plays You know That's certainly something I mean Midway Is another Roland Emmerich Movie we've never seen But

[00:59:32] It's been a fun journey So I guess we'll have to End the podcast After that episode That'll be it We gotta wait Until at least Shrek 5 comes out That's the thing Yeah And if you want merch We have merch available On our Redbubble Mike and Mike Pods Redbubble.com That's right And you can find me Online at M. Smith Film Blog On Twitter and Blue Sky Mike Smith Film On Letterboxd Radio Mike Sandwich On Instagram And you can find this Podcast on Instagram As well At Complete Works Pod Thank you for listening To Mike and Mike Go to the movies I'm Mike Smith I'm Mike Decrecio Don't forget to Rate and view the show On Apple Podcasts

[01:00:00] Or any other podcast app And if you want to Contact us Go to Blue Sky At Complete Works Pod You can find the Rest of our podcast In Rapture Press Alongside many other Podcasts About kinds of comic books And movie news And all that good stuff Our theme song Was created by Kyle Cullen Who can reach for Your own podcast themes At Kyle's Podcast Themes At gmail.com And our logo Was designed by Mac V Or at Fearless Guard On Blue Sky Check out the main Podcast The Complete Works Where season 5 Is underway We are talking about Various Elijah Wood movies And I think by the time This episode comes out This should come out This week

[01:00:30] So I think Paradise was the most Recent episode of the podcast And next week I want to say It's Radio Flyer Question mark We'll find out Sure But we're so far In advance That I'm blanking On the order Of how things Operated But when it comes out You'll know You'll know And that is the end Of this week's episode Of Mike and Mike Go to the movies We'll see you on The other side We'll see you on