Emile Hirsch on Speed Racer, Into the Wild and Quentin Tarantino + 2000’s Cult Classics + Movie Review: Mortal Kombat 2 + Trailer Park: The Odyssey

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Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to Movie Mike's Movie Podcast. I am your host Movie Mike. Today, I am talking to actor Emil Hirsch, who I believe is such an underrated actor, especially when it comes to movies. Of the two thousands. Will be talking speed Racer into the Wild, his friendship with Quentin Tarantino. We'll also get into a discussion before we get into that about two thousands cult classics. In the movie review, I'll be talking about Mortal Kombat two and in the trailer park finally going to break down The Odyssey and all the backlash that Christopher Nolan is receiving over this movie. I think people need to chill out a little bit. And I say that as somebody who is overly critical about movies at times. But thank you for being here, thank you for being subscribed, Shout out to the Monday Morning Movie crew. And now let's talk movies from the Nicet Podcast Network Movie Mike's Movie Podcast. I will say at the beginning of this episode, I am coming to you from a new space. Kelsey and I moved getting everything figured it out. So if things sound a little bit different this week, that is why I am in the process of totally rebuilding my studio space. So just wanted to be upfront with you at the beginning of this that my life has been a little chaotic the last week and a half. I also currently don't have internet, so I'm having to find ways to even upload these episodes. But that is so behind the scenes. But if you follow me on social media or you listen to the Bobby Bones Show, you've maybe heard or seen some of that. So just so you know, if you start seeing some clips online that look a little bit different, I'm not quite there yet. Moving is terrible. I highly recommend you never move in your life. Just stay where you are because moving sucks so bad. Just stay where you are. But I do want to talk about two thousands cult classics because we were about to get into an interview I did with Emil Hirsch, who is out promoting speed Racer and speed Racer is a movie that came out and I was like, that is such a unique movie. I remember being so defining when I was growing up, and there were all these movies of the two thousands that I feel didn't get their flowers when they came out. But it's because of time that we have looked at these movies differently, and we look back on the good memories of when everything was right in the world, where gas was under four dollars. Oh, do you remember days when gas was under four dollars? Those days where movies were great regardless of the score that you would read online. So these are what I believe to be are the ten cult classics that define the two thousands. Kicking it off with number ten that I believe is the best worst movie ever made. This movie is the standard for movies that are so bad that they are funny and enjoyable. And I'm talking about The Room, which came out in two thousand and three, directed by Tommy Wiseou and starring time Yuaizo. This is hands down the worst movie ever made. That is historically significant because a lot of bad movies get made. If you go to Dollar General like I used to as a kid, and just pick out a movie from the shelf, you will find some really terrible movies. But those terrible movies don't make headlines, are just terrible movies for the sake of existing. The Room is the worst movie to ever be made that has this strange cult following because it is so bad. It's something that could probably never be replicated. Right now. The only movie of recent history that gets close but not on the same level because there's not that same charm to it is War of the Worlds with ice Cube. It's kind of in the same realm, but I don't think War of the World has that fun factor that The Room does. The delivery of lines, how awkward it is from characters going from one scene to another just so abruptly, so you have the worst dialogue of all time. The tone is all over the place, continuity errors out the butt, and just really strange editing choices that make this movie a chaotic experience to watch. But this is one of those movies that exist as a comedic event. So even if now they have screenings for The Room, it's because you want a bunch of people to go into a room and have a funny experience, which wasn't the intention of this film. Because it may surprise you, but this movie actually cost six million dollars to make, but only made around eighteen hundred dollars in its initial theatrical run from two thousand and three to two thousand and four, so completely unintentional, but now one of the most longest lasting bad movies ever. And if you've ever seen the movie that was made about this movie, The Disaster Artist in twenty seventeen, I almost feel like you could start there first. If you watch The Disaster Artists, you get why this movie was so bad. You see James Franco portraying Tommy, and you get more of the backstory, where I feel that's a little bit more palatable to watch than the original Room movie. So that is how significant this movie is. They made a movie about the movie at number nine, Josie and the Pussycats, which came out in two thousand and one. I rewatched this movie recently, and I forgot how much of a jam the song three Small Words is. I think Josie and the Pussycats obviously a great fictional band, but I think that song on its own is probably one of the best songs written by a fictional band in a film of all time, easily top three six Houle House and five Long Day, like That's hit so hard. And that movie came out in the heyday of the pop punk punky pop takeover of the two thousands, where Blake within eighty two some forty one Green Day was still riding pretty high around that time, even though they were kind of on their first decline, But that is what I craved at that time. In an era of hot topic, you had a movie like Josie and the Pussycats that was a flop because at the time it was a little bit too smart for the target audio, which the way they marketed this movie is like it is Josie and the Pussycats, it's based on the animated show, and now they're a real band. It was supposed to kind of be a rom com. But rewatching this movie, I realized how much of a criticism on commercialism it was on pop stars and how a record company can basically create industry plants, which I think now would resonate a whole lot more with TikTok and YouTube. But essentially the record company would build up this band and then just sell them like fast food. That's what it was. They sell these singles. They put subliminal lyrics inside of the music to control people, to get you to buy things, which at the time in two thousand and one was probably seen out that's just in a movie and now in terfeting all the time, which is wild. But Josie and The Pussycats was a satire on just that, on consumerism, on product placement, and I think that is why the movie just didn't do as well as it was built to be. Had a budget of about forty million dollars and only made about fifteen million dollars at the box office. But I love this film. You have Tara Reid, Rachel Lee Cook, Rosario Dawson Parker Posey is also in this movie. A fantastic cast. It just didn't do that well. But I think right now it's kind of having another little moment because for some reason, it just popped up on Prime for me and I watched it, and then within that same week, I saw Rachel Lee Cook doing interviews on People, and I saw other people rewatching this movie. So it's just one of those movies that just makes me kind of feel good when I go back and watch it. So at number nine, Josie and the Pussycats at number eight maybe a controversial one because this movie was actually successful and had a moment in pop culture, But I'm going to go with Napoleon Dynamite from two thousand and four. I actually watched Napoleon Dynamite opening night. I still remember that weekend, I went with my cousins to the mall. It was the AMC, I believe in North Dallas, and we went to the mall. AMC obviously always connected to a mall, and my older cousin went to go watch another movie. Maybe at the time there was a fast interfior, some action movie that I didn't really want to watch, and my brother and I said, we got to go watch Napoleon Dynamite. I don't even remember how we heard about Napoleon Dynamite, because it came out that same day. I might still have my ticket stub from watching this movie, which in this process of moving I did find some really old ticket stubs. I found my ticket stub of when I got to go see Black Panther opening weekend in Los Angeles at a movie theater that's no longer there, at the arc Light Theater in downtown LA no longer there. I found a lot of my old movie stubs that you just don't have anymore. But I think if I really looked hard, probably at my parents' house, I could find my Napoleon Dynamite opening night ticket, but the movie only coused four hundred thousand dollars to make and ended up making forty six million dollars at the box office. But I still kind of consider this movie to be a cult classic because it's the little movie that could. But I find it to be a cult classic because of how awkward the humor is. It's so deadpan, and even though it did really well in theaters, the major success I believe came from the DVD and the cable cells and is one of the most defining movies of the two thousands and maybe of all time when it comes to comedies. So maybe controversial to consider it a cult classic because it is a successful movie. But at number eight, I have Napoleon Dynamite. At number seven, I have Jennifer's Body from two thousand and nine with Megan Fox and Amanda c. Fred. I think this movie was just marketed incorrectly, which at the time Megan Fox was still massive because of the Transformers movies in two thousand and nine, still writing off the high of that first one, which came out in two thousand and seven. It sexualized a teen horror movie, that's what it did. It took Megan Fox from Informers and try to sell it the exact same way, and I think the advertising just completely misrepresented what this movie actually was. If it came out today, it would be right up there with the best horror movies that come out any given year. Most people who went to go see this movie expected a straight up slasher or a teen comedy and expected Megan Fox to just be Megan Fox. But this movie has a complete tonal shift. And if you just saw that trailer and saw Megan Fox and it, you would think, oh, yeah, I want to go see this movie, and you would be completely let down on what the movie actually is, only because what it sets you up for so not the movie's fault. It was just marketed incorrectly. At number seven. I have Jennifer's Body at number six. We have a tie because I know I talked about this movie in last week's Trailer Park, but it is between Super Troopers and beer Fest. I couldn't pick which one, and I think any of the Broken Lizard movies are so defining of the two thousands, So just for the sake of talking about a different movie, I'm gonna go with beer Fest, which costs about seventeen million dollars to make and only made twenty point three million dollars but box office numbers really don't represent any of the Broken Lizard movies. It all comes from that cult following that is going to buy the DVD and pass around that DVD, And these are movies that are never going to win over the critics. They just never will. With the new Super Troopers movie coming out, it is going to get probably one of the lowest scores for a major release this year, but you know where it's going to score high in our hearts. Each movie of Theirs is an instant cult classic because of that fan base, and they make movies specifically for their fan base, mostly four eyed nerds like me who just want to watch a random comedy from a bunch of best friends who look like they are just having a good time, creating a good vibe on set, and something that we don't really have any more party movies. What happened to all the good party movies where you go Olbert at somebody's house and you can throw on just a fun movie that has that party environment. I think, aside from people going to the theater less, we also have less people enjoying movies together because it's such a just for you experience now where you're watching things on your phones. You're watching on your own streaming service. You can't really bring over your streaming service to somebody else's house anymore unless you sign in on their TV, and then you don't want to do that because then they're watching you streaming and you wake up at like two am and you're like, what are all these things somebody is watching? But at number six, I have beer Fest. At number five, I'm going with speed Racer. And not just because we're about to get into a conversation with Emil Hirsch, but this is another movie that was done so dirty. When it came out, and in two thousand and eight, I was seventeen years old, and this movie blew my mind because it was so visually striking. I was already into anime at the time, probably not as much as I am now, but it was so hyper realistic and fun and color full and over the top. Even though I wasn't the biggest speed Racer fan. My older brother, who grew up in the eighties was definitely more of the speed racer fan. But rewatching it now, I thought, Man, if this movie came out now, it would crush because I think we have an appetite for something like this that does create so much spectacle to your eyes. There are so many colors in any given scene of speed Racer that it kind of blew my mind rewatching it. Of how much depth there is in this movie. And maybe the technology isn't as good as it would be now if they made it. Some of it looks at times a little bit dated, but with the upgrades they have done, especially now that it's coming out on four KUHD, it just kind of brings all those colors and makes them work on your screen, which is something that I love to go back and rewatch movies that I watched as a kid and see them in a completely different way. The style reminded me so much. Obviously it came out before it, but Scott Pilgrim versus the World and kind of had that similar experience of kind of having the same anime style which Speed Racer is based on an anime, feeling very cartoonish, but also having all these real people at the forefront that gives it this really unique depth. If they could do the Pokemon treatment with the Speed Racer style, get the Wachousekius to do a Pokemon movie, that would be amazing because you kind of you feel that a lot in Speed Racer, where all the backgrounds are very cartoonish and at times it almost feels like you are in a completely different world where it kind of reminds me of Watch Nickelodeon as a kid, where they would have all these animated or puppet like characters and then you have the humans and there's just this great contrast which there's even a monkey and speed Racer that's very much the anime style. And I think in two thousand and eight people just weren't ready for this movie. But now you have the people who were young in two thousand and eight, and you feel this momentum shift of this movie finally getting gets flowers, finally resonating with audiences. So at number five, I have Speed Racer. At number four, I'm gonna go with Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle from two thousand and four, had a budget of about nine million dollars, which is crazy, went on to make about twenty three million dollars, which is a pretty good clearance. But I think when it comes down to the comedies that people talk about from the two thousands, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle often gets left off that list, and it goes joke for joke with any of the other movies that people talk about, like The Super Bads, the Hangovers, the Old Schools, basically Will Ferrell's entire run in the two thousands, that oftentimes just gets maybe a little bit too overglazed. But Harold and Kumar goes to White Castle. I love because you have two people who don't look like anybody else in a comedy. That was something that I did not realize how much it impacted me growing up seeing somebody who was brown like me. That is why those characters probably had such a cult like following, because we just didn't get that that often, especially when it comes to major studio movies, which even now you look at the lands game of things, when it comes to just any good comedy coming out now, you get that less and less. So at number four, I have Harold and Kumar go to White Castle because that movie also motivated me to want to go to White Castle. As a kid, I thought, man, if I could go to White Castle, it would be the most delicious meal ever. And now I live really close to a white Castle. We have one in Nashville. I've never gone there. I've kind of moved past that dream. But at number four, Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. At number three, I have Idiocracy from two thousand and six from director Mike Judge, who is also the creator a Beavis and butt Head and King of the Hill. The movie costs about two point five million dollars to make and only grossed half a million dollars in the But this is a movie that if I didn't know that, I would think it was a huge success, because it is a movie that people reference so much, especially when you look at the world of today and in two thousand and six, it seems so crazy. All the values in idiocrasy, on how the world is controlled, the people win power, the foods we eat, the things that we consume, all the bad things that are kind of the underbelly of society that you think we're never gonna get there. This is just the movie. Even the use of crocs in this movie. Whenever Mike Judge was looking for a shoe that looks so stupid and that nobody would ever wear and it would be fitting in so well into the world of idiocrity, he chose crocs, which weren't successful at the time. I think the ones used in this movie were like a prototype, the really bright orange one, and he thought, these will never catch on, but it could look like something in the future that people would wear. And now I'll admit I have a pair of crocs and I love them, but I don't really wear about in public. But they caught on so hard. And to think that this was created to be a satire and now we're kind of living in it. I think that is why now it has such a cult following is because it's become the internet's favorite satire that, as painful as it is, to compare ourselves and our society to idiocracy is just kind of the way things go. So you think about what movies are being created now that we think, oh, that'll never happen, and there's a good chance that it probably could happen. But it gets referenced now so much in politics and pop culture that the movie has surpassed whatever it did in its initial run. It is now a part of the American film fabric of movies that have built us, and it's got electrolytes. It has a lot of electrolytes. So at number three, I have idiocrisy and number two is Donnie Darko from two thousand and one. This is just one of those movies that if Donnie Darko is your favorite movie, you're cool. That's it, end of story. If you had a Donnie Darko poster in your room, or maybe you created your MySpace page and put a quote from the movie, or you put Jake Jillenhall on your page from Donnie Darko, You're cool. It is one of the coolest movies ever made, and it has that cult classic following that. It's a green flag movie. If you love Donnie Darko, I probably would listen to your film takes, and it's one of the ones that isn't too pretentious where you have these film ro movies that if you had this poster on your wall, I take it. It's a bit of a red flag. Fight Club is one of those movies. If fight Club is your favorite movie, it's a bit of a red flag and it's a great movie. But I don't think it should be your favorite movie because if it is, I have some questions about your mental state, which is okay, we can talk about your mental let's talk about it. But Donnie Darko became massive because of DVD's. You have all these fan theories built around the world of Donnie Darko. Frank the Bunny became iconic, which I think now is probably more famous in the movie itself. Just that image alone, I think, is what I remember the most from Donnie Darko. When I first saw in two thousand and one, I probably saw the VHS case at Hastings. Oh Man browsing the VHS selection at Hastings, even though we only had a membership there for very short maybe a week or two, because we rented some stuff and then let someone else borrow it and trusted them to return it and they got a late fee, and my mom was like, this is why I didn't want a rental card. That's why we never went to Blockbuster. I'm not paying for late fees. And that was the last time we ever rented from Hastings. And I always felt so sad walking the aisles of all the rentals because that's where all the good stuff was. All the good new releases went there, and I'm like, man, all these things I can just never watch u once we get them at the flea market. But at number two, the movie that helped launch Jake Gillenhall's career, influence psychological sci fi for years. I think people still rip off Donnie Darko to this day. I'm looking at you, Hokum. At number two, I have Donnie Darko. But at number one, what I believe to be the most important cult classic of the two thousands is Grandma's Boy from two thousand and six, one of the funniest comedies ever made, cost about five million dollars to make, only made six point six million dollars at the box office. But out of all the movies on this top ten list, it is the one DVD that I burned into the ground rewatched it so much. Talking about party movies earlier, Grandma's Boy is the perfect party movie. I think my cousin owned a copy of the DVD or maybe the VHS, and we would just put it on every night to go to sleep. That was our comfort movie. You just go to sleep to Grandma's Boy. It doesn't matter after the first time you watch it. Where you pick this movie up, you can watch it at any point. Obviously have Nick Schwartzen, Alan Cobert, Doris Roberts is in this movie, Rob Schneiders at the beginning, Hey you forgot smoking lamp? And Jonah Hill, a very young Jonah Hill is in Grandma's Boy. Heard Nick Schwartzen talking recently they might be doing a Grandma's Boy too, which I don't really think is time. Don't do it. Don't ruin the legacy of this movie. Even if you have the original people back, It's just gonna feel very much an ode to Grandma's Boy rather than a continuation. At this point, you just gotta wait until Alan Covert is old enough to be the Grandpa and you make Grandpa's Boy. I think that's the only way to make this movie successful. But so many great quotes from this movie. Annie Els turn nuggets? How much do close cost? In the Matrix? Or Nick Schwartzen challenges the other guy to dance dance Revolution and then beats him against high score? High score? What does that mean? Did I break it? I'm way too bake to drive to the Devil's House? All right, monkey play my head like. There are so many quotes from this movie that have become part of my vocabulary. I also think if you were a gamer growing up, you love this movie even more. I believe it is the most important cult classic of the two thousands. That is the top ten now let's get to my interview with actor Emil Hirsch. You would know him from Into the Wild, one of my favorite dramas growing up that completely changed my life. I'll talk to him about that man. That is a powerful movie. You would know him from Alpha Dog. That is the movie that had so much of an emotional impact on me. It genuinely made me sad. The third act of Alpha Dog is so gut wrenching. Emil Hirsch is great in it, justin Timberlake is pretty good in it. Ben Foster is way over the top in it. But that movie traumatized me in a really weird way growing up and again to young to probably process the emotions that come along with that movie. Before that, he was in The Girl next Door talking about raunchy teen comedies, although that one had a little bit more heart than your average raunchy teen trying to hook up comedy. And what some people might forget is that he had a role in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, directed by Quentin Tarantino. So when we get into talking about Quentin Tarantino, that is their connection. I believe he actually asked Emil Hirsch to be in that movie by messaging him over Facebook, which is crazy, the power of Facebook in MySpace. That is why I'm sitting here talking to you right now, all because I message Bobby over MySpace. So don't be afraid to message some people that could change your life. But he also played speed Racer and speed Racer which came out in two thousand and eight, which if you're listening to this on release day, which is Monday tomorrow, May nineteenth, speed Racer is available on four K, UHD and digital. If you're listening to any other day beyond May nineteenth, it is available now for you to check out. Like I was talking about earlier, you get an entirely different experience watching a movie in four K. It feels like watching it for the first time again. So right now, let's get into my interview with Emal hirsh Hey. Emil, I was super obsessed with my video store growing up. I would go all the time rent as many movies as I can. Oftentimes in the early two thousands, they were a lot of your movies. What were your go to Reynolds as a kid, Because I heard you were also super obsessed with going to your video store.

00:25:37
Speaker 2: Oh man, I was burning through so many different films at the video Library in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I wish I wish I had the the paper charts with all the titles I had each week filled out, because I filled up a bunch of those, and there were you know, I mean, I would kind of burn through different genres sci fi, horror, drama, know I was. I was kind of like into into it all. There was like a lot of Peter Weir, Spielberg, Kubrick, you know, just just cool directors. I would like get into and want to watch all their stuff. A lot of action, kung fu and yeah, you know, I don't quite have Quinton's memory. I can't read a lot of battles as easily as he can, but uh, there was there was a lot of them. That was actually one of the things that Quinton and I originally bonded over was just like mutual kind of like I think, if you like film, film, film, nerd, he's cool with you know.

00:26:35
Speaker 1: You mentioned Quentin. Was there anybody else that maybe you watched as a kid that ended up you being able to work with him later on?

00:26:42
Speaker 2: Well, to come back around to speed Racer, I saw the Matrix in theaters when I was thirteen years old, and that for me was like one of the one of the big I mean it, that movie truly blew my mind. And to get to work with the Wachowskis all those years later was like I couldn't have been more excited, because it really was that intense of an experience for me in the theaters of it like so six Anyway, I remember I ran home after the film and sold my sister. I was like, you have to go see this movie right now, like, go see it. Then she went and saw it. She was like, thank you so much for telling you, Like she.

00:27:28
Speaker 1: Was like thanking me. You know.

00:27:29
Speaker 2: It's like it was like that kind of movie where you couldn't wait to tell someone to.

00:27:33
Speaker 1: Go see it. You've been a part of so many just defining movies of my lifetime. When people run into you in public, what did they recognize you from the most?

00:27:43
Speaker 2: To be honest, I don't really know. I don't think there's like a clear there's not really like a clear one.

00:27:52
Speaker 1: Weirdly enough, I do find that odd.

00:27:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, Weirdly enough, there's not like sometimes it's it's one movie and sometimes it's another, But there's not really like one that people are like, oh, you were in that, you know, I don't know. Maybe speed Racer will just gain more and more cole following then I'll do that.

00:28:13
Speaker 1: Of all the characters you've played, who do you think would have the best chance of beating speed Racer in a race? J Adams.

00:28:21
Speaker 2: From Lords of Docktown. Yeah, the only crazy enough to go for him.

00:28:25
Speaker 1: I heard that you rewatched all fifty two episodes of the original anime before you did the movie. You are very just particular about how you prepare for your movies. Has there been anything that you've done, whether it's watching a show or maybe learning a skill, maybe learning some racing for this movie that has stayed with you in your life that you still use it on like maybe a daily basis or every now and then you're like, oh, yeah, I enjoyed that. Maybe I'll do it again.

00:28:48
Speaker 2: I feel like the kind of the sweetness of speed and the sort of the integrity and him really being connected to his family. I know that's not like necessarily like an activity, but it was a very important quality of the character that it's the kind of quality where afterwards you're like, I would like to carry that quality with me, you know.

00:29:14
Speaker 1: I love.

00:29:15
Speaker 2: I love playing character. I like playing bad guys and stuff like that. But it's really fun to play characters that you feel enhance your own life after you play them, you know. And I think Speed is Speed is the character where after I played Speed, I felt better off than I would have been otherwise because I think, you know, he stands for a lot of noble things, and he's very mild mannered and sweet and a good person, and it's just a character that I like.

00:29:51
Speaker 1: I did find that rewatching the movie before doing this, that I found it to be such a wholesome movie about family, about his connection with his brother and how from a very early age he knew he wanted to race, Like that was it. He knew he wanted to race his older brothers racing, he wanted to do that. Is that how acting was for you? Did you know, like immediately when you were a kid, like I want to grow up be an actor?

00:30:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, kind of yeah. I was really young, like really young, and I just I don't know, I just was super into watching like in Living Color on TV when I was like four or five, and my parents probably didn't even know I was watching, and kind of fell in love with like Jim Carrey's wildness and hilarity and all that cast, And then just watched a bunch of different TV shows, and I don't know, I just got more and more, you know, really loving movies and performances and just see, I don't know, it's weird. It's weird looking back on it now. It's been so long, But looking back on it, I remember I was like really into it. I was like really excited about every part of the process.

00:30:56
Speaker 1: You know. Whenever Speed has his first win in the movie, that's where his life kind of changes. He gets the big sponsorship offer. What was your first big win in your career?

00:31:04
Speaker 2: The first big win was probably it wouldn't have it, wouldn't I think in hindsight, like it wouldn't necessarily sound like a big win. But probably when I was a kid just getting a little like guest star on a TV show, you know, like one of those first guest stars I got on a TV show, or I did this show Kindred the Embraced two episodes, was like the short lived kind of vampire soap opera. But it was like the first like speaking role in a show, you know what I mean, I'd done like one line or I'd been an extra, and so this was actually like like a little part, so that stuff like that, you know, where you're like, oh my gosh, this is this is exciting obviously getting you know, the part of speed Racer after you know they had done worldwide search. Its like, it's ridiculous how big of a search they did. It was like if you were an able bodied male in Planet Earth you were expected to submit yourself on tape for speed and so that that obviously was awesome. But you know, I think it's a lot of the little winds that you know that don't necessarily sound cool, but at the time they mean a lot to you.

00:32:16
Speaker 1: You mentioned going from getting a couple of lines in a couple of episodes. What does that jump like whenever you have here's a quick role where I just have a few lines to okay, now I'm a supporting character.

00:32:27
Speaker 2: It's pretty wild. I mean, there's a little bit of like a learning curve where suddenly you're like, whoa, I'm like talking on camera and moving around and I have to do this again and what this is? This is a bit odd, you know, And I remember actually it was kind of funny on Kindred the embraced. I found some of the acting because they're like vampires and they have like they're dressed like vampires, but they're talking like it's like a soap opera, like all dramatic. And I remember just thinking it was really funny. And I had the loose tooth at the time, like on the inside, and it was one of those things where I would bite my tooth that was loose because it hurt, and I would bite it to try to not laugh. And the tooth came out after like a day on sec because I kept biting it so much because I was like trying not to laugh. Every now and then you'll be you'll do a you'll do a scene and something will be funny, and it's just it's so hard not to laugh. It's so hard not to laugh.

00:33:32
Speaker 1: My final question, I was sixteen years old when Into the Wild came out. That movie completely changed my life. I got really into transcendentalism. I read Walden by Henry David th Row at sixteen years old because of how much that movie changed me. We were talking earlier about you taking away the family aspect from Speed. How did that movie change you as a person.

00:33:51
Speaker 2: I think it, you know, I think it like sort of made me a little bit more worldly, you know, traveling the world, being a part of this kind of international film, getting to meet all these actors from different parts of the world, getting to shoot it in Berlin, getting to work with incredible directors like the Wachowskis, and you know, I feel like, I don't know, it's hard to know necessarily how it changed me because I don't have any I don't have any alternative to compare it to in a certain sense. So it's like it's hard to know, But I know that I'm extremely proud to have been a part of a movie that is that people are appreciating as much as they are, you know, and some movies that are great people people never appreciate, you know. Sometimes that just doesn't happen for a film. So it's really it's very heartening to see this film that we cared so much about organically make this resurgence. You know. It's it's not something that's like been manufactured by Warner Brothers or anybody else. It's like the the people and the word of mouth is what pushed the four K upgrade into existence, which then pushed the IMAX theatrical re release into becoming a thing. You know, it was never it was never this really pre planned thing. It was just Warner Brothers gauging the level of interest that people had for speed Racer and responding accordingly.

00:35:24
Speaker 1: Well, it's awesome to see people loving the movie again. Really great to talk to you. I appreciate it, Thanks Mike. Let's get into it now. A spoiler free movie review of Mortal Kombat two. If you're watching on YouTube, I am from a very temporary set right now, as I mentioned earlier in the episode, in the midst of moving, so this is not the final setup. Have a different microphone, try to put some things around me, so it's not just the blank space right now. But we're gonna get there. But we're here to talk about Mortal Kombat two, or as I like to call it, Costco brand Infinity War, because this movie was basically doing a Marvel impression, and not a very good one at that. What Martal Kombat Too is about Shao Khan is the big bad. He is the off brand Thanos, the Kirkland brand Thanos, if you will, and he is trying to take over Earth Realm. He even has his own Gomorra Katana is basically Gomora in this movie because Shao Khan becomes her adopted father, murders her father, and then he's like, I'm your daddy. Now I'm Shao Khan. And he is this big, muscly dude. If you went to the theater, you maybe saw his popcorn bucket, which I did see that. By the way, it looked really cool. I wanted to put it on my head, but I got a really big head. Almost wear a Scienze eight hat, so I knew that thing would not fit me. But the thing was fifty bucks. It looked really cool, though. I will say that was probably my favorite design of all the characters in the movie. Oh but then they got worse. But he is trying to take over Earth Realm and he need to do he needs to win Mortal Kombat. He has to take on and beat all the people in order to take over Earth Realm. You have Johnny Cage, you have Sonya Blade, you have all these people who are basically trying to be the Avengers in this movie. And then your main character, Carl Urban plays Johnny Cage. I love Carl Urban and the boys who will get into that series finale right now. And I think he is a fantastic actor as Butcher. But as Johnny Cage, oh boy, he was not good. He was very stiff. All the acting in this movie was just very made of cardboard where it was kind of trying to be cliche eighties movie, nineties movie action style lines, but all their interactions just felt so cringe worthy and it just didn't work in this But he is a washed up actor from the nineties basically did like John Claude Van Damn movies, and now present day he is just going to conventions. But even now nobody wants to his autograph, nobody cares about his movies anymore, and he feels like he really missed his opportunity in life. But going to Mortal Kombat would be his one chance to win it all back, to do something finally meaningful, and Raydon and the rest of the crew ambush him and say, come be in Mortal Kombat, and that is really what the entire movie is. They are trying to stop Shao Khan from taking over Earth Realm and becoming basically a god, becoming unbeatable. What this movie really lacked for me was good fight scenes and the thing that's most memorable about the og Mortal Kombat movie from the nineties, which I love the video game growing up, it was that one video game that we were all banned from our parents from playing because it was so bloody. That's the first time I saw blood in a video game, and it was wild. It was crazy, all of the finishing moves and then the postgame animations. I almost enjoyed losing because you would go down that pit of death with the spikes, which they kind of did a version of that in this movie. But the game is so bloody, over the top and campy and fun. This movie is not that it has no fun. There is no fun to be had in Mortal Kombat one or Mortal Kombat two. It takes itself so seriously, almost trying to be Game of Thrones ish, with all of these wizards and mythical people and sorcerers and people with lightning coming out of their butts and bringing people back from the dead, and it leans way more into that than the fun nature of Mortal Kombat, which they probably did that because of the overly cheesiness and gringuitiness that people look back at the original movies with. But if you ask the real fans like me of those movies. That is what I loved about those movies. So it was trying to be something so different, to not be any resemblance of its past. In doing that, it made it boring. There wasn't a fight until about thirty minutes into it, and it leaned way more into all of the backstory of why all these people were getting together and why it was important. Things I just didn't care about. I wanted mindless, senseless, bloody action, which is why I go watch a movie like this in theaters. I knew it was going to be a film where I go in, turn off my brain and just see a lot of people fighting and having fun. That is what I wanted, and I didn't even get that. And the thing that was so memorable about Mortal Kombat from the nineties is every fight felt so well choreographed and memorable. It had a strong beginning, middle, and end. I remember how all of those fights ended very vividly because they were that memorable, sob Zero Goro, even Johnny Cage in the original one. For the most part, it was very limited by the special effects back in the day, where if you look back on some of those it looks a little bad, but even the first time you see Scorpion in Mortal Kombat at one and you see it come out of his hand, that was awesome. The fight scene would Sells Zero was my favorite part of the entire movie, and it was so short, especially the guy who goes to fight sub Zero and uses all of his crazy moves and basically struts on him for no reason and goes way over the top and then sub Zero just basically kills him with one swoop of ice like that is so memorable. And like I mentioned, we don't get a fight until about thirty minutes into this movie. And the first two were pretty good. They were decent. They did kind of do an ode to the Spikey Pit, but I wanted to see something a little bit more intense. The second fight was pretty good, but then by the time the action was really going and you had all these characters on screen, things just became a little bit too convoluted and nothing was very memorable. Carl Urban's performance to me was so bad it made me feel like Johnny Cage wasn't a good character, like they should have not put him on the poster made him the selling point of this movie, and they should have focused on somebody else, because really this was Katana's story. She should have been way bigger on that poster. But Carl Urban is the name here. Katana was better, even Jack's was better. It just really felt to me like Carl Urban was doing a Hugh Jackman impression as Wolverine, and I don't know if it's just because they are both Australian, but he was trying so hard to be the lovable butthole, making all of these offhand pop culture references that really didn't fit inside of this world where you have something so mythological on one hand, and then you have all of these odd twenty tens and twenty twenties pop culture references that are going to feel so dated in about five, maybe even seven years. And then it came down to their interactions with each other just felt awful, super corny and stiff. It got to the point where it felt so unbelievable, even inside of this world where it was already crazy for Johnny Cage to be sucked into Mortal Kombat. He didn't want to go, and then all of a sudden he was there. So it just overall felt like the tone was just not right in this movie. The fun wasn't there. It needed more blood, and it needed a different lead. So for Mortal Kombat Too, I give it two point five out of five. Get over heres God to head down to movie. Mike Traylor Parr, I am now ready to run through a wall for The Odyssey. Somebody give me a wall, I'm gonna run through it. And I was so hesitant about this movie going into it, even though it is Christopher Nolan, who I love, who I rarely, if ever doubt at this point one of the greatest living directors. But I just thought after Oppenheimer, which was really good, but that movie was so dialogue heavy. And I feel that because of the reason that I haven't seen that movie since I experienced it in theaters, I think, was I just buying into the hype? Was I enamored with seeing that movie in seventy milimeter Imax and opening night in Barbenheimer That maybe that heightened my love of that movie just a little bit. And I thought, maybe for his next movie, he does something a little bit more action packed, something more like an inception, maybe goes back to something like the Prestige, something not set in any kind of literature or reality or based on anything. And then he says, all right, my next project is The Odyssey, and I think, oh no, the genre I hate the most, at least as far as the one that is hardest for me to get into a period piece. And the thing that is so hard for me about a period piece. And I know I'm dumb. This is probably not the case for everybody, but when it comes to period pieces, for me, it is hard to get into because of the way that they speak. And it's not because of a language thing, because I have no problem watching an international film and its native language. It has to do where it comes down to, I have to decode all these phrases in these names, and it starts to feel like homework. But the reason I feel a little bit better about this movie and why some people are actually upset, is because they are all speaking in American accents. And there have been people so critical about The Odyssey because of all these historical inaccuracies. When you have somebody like Christopher Nolan just trying to make the story better, and he is doing this for somebody like me, the dumb American brain who just wants a movie that they can digest and I am seeing that now. Whenever we went to go see Project Hill Mary, the only trailer that played before it was for The Odyssey. You see the Trojan horse scene. It was an extended maybe three four minutes, and I got the feeling of it, I got the depth of it. I got the understanding of why this movie needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible. But what this movie is about. Matt Damon plays Odysseus, the King of Ithaca, and he is on his journey back to his wife and son after the Trojan War. It gets hindered by a series of epic challenges and obstacles separating him from his family. Classic Matt Damon in a movie where he's just trying to get home. So before I get into more about The Odyssey, which is coming out in theaters on July seventeenth, here is just a little bit of the trailer. They're pineyming her for daddy. He didn't even know, like some snackling bastards.

00:46:33
Speaker 2: Who's looking after your wife?

00:46:34
Speaker 1: And silence do you see my dad is coming home? And cubics bringing it all. The trailer has ignited controversies. Like I mentioned earlier, because of the accident. You hear Matt Damon. There, you hear Robert Pattinson using standard American accents, which is also interesting because Robert Pattinson, Tom Holland these people are not American. But people are upset because they are not being historically accurate because it takes place in a Greek setting and people are saying it feels a little bit too modern. There are also people who say the armor is off or the cyclops eye, all these things that people are being so heavily critical of, and you forget that a movie is supposed to be a vision of the director. Christopher Nolan is making this movie his own, which he is not new to doing this. He did this with Batman and Batman Begins and In the Dark Night and In the Dark Knight Rises, where he made those characters feel like him. He put them in a Gotham that felt more modern day. It didn't feel like the old, classic, campy Batman, where even if you take out the Batman elements, those movies stand on their own as just crime thrillers. You take away the Joker, you take away all these other characters that are so historic in comic book culture, all those elements are the foundation of those movies, and Christopher Nolan made sure to put those in those movies. And then, even though to some would argue this, I still feel like the Batman elements are secondary while they are important. The Batman suit, the batmobile, that classic rover, all those things that makes that movie a Batman movie. Underneath it at the foundation, at its core, it is a Christopher Nolan story of him maybe making his best interpretation of heat. I think he found his style in that movie, and you see a lot of that influence in this armor. It has kind of that Batman style that is very three D, has fine lines, is kind of bulky, very big and bold, which I love. He got so much heat that he had to defend himself, Christopher Nolan said. The theory is that they probably could have been blackened bronze in those days. You take bronze, you add more gold and silk to it, and then sulfur. There you go. Our costume designer is trying to communicate how elevated he is relative to everyone else. You do that through materials that would be very expensive. So you got people upset about the armor. You also have people upset about its score. Granted, nobody has seen this full movie yet. It is just people talking about the trailer, which I open up that conversation. I do that every single week on this podcast. But Christopher Nolan actually instructed Ludwig, who is one of my favorite composers when it comes to movies. He did The Mandalorian, he did Black Panther, He just won an Academy Award for Sinners. You put Ludwig behind a movie score and it is probably gonna be nominated for a bunch of awards. And I was a fan of his way before he was doing all the movie stuff because he is a frequent collaborator with Childish Gambino, one of my favorite rappers of all time. I've actually seen Ludwig perform live with Childish Gambino. He also put out an EP in the twenty tens that was my jam. I played that thing all the time. But Christopher Nolan instructed Ludwig to not use an orchestra for The Odyssey's score. He said, it's not like the orchestra existed back then. It was a challenge and also an opening to try to make something unique. That's what Ludwig said. So he's out here defending the armor, defending the accents, and also defending Travis Scott, saying I cast him because I wanted to nod towards the idea that this story had been handed down as oral poetry, which is similar to rap. So what I see is Christopher Nolan putting in all these details to make this story more palatable to American audiences and also international audiences, but mainly just trying to hit that broad scope of making people interested in something they probably otherwise would have never been interested in, same thing I feel that he did with Oppenheimer, even though the idea of the moral dilemmas behind making the Adam Baum is probably something that most people would be interested in. I don't think people would necessarily sign up for the idea and pay money to see a biopic of the creator of the Adam Baumb Oppenheimer, but we all did it and it went on to be one of the biggest R rated movies of all time and one of the biggest movies of the decades so far. So there are so many people in this movie. You have Matt Damon, Tom Holland and Hathaway, Robert Patson, Lupita Naga will be playing two characters in this movie, Zendeia Charlie's than John Burnhal, Ben Safti, John Lookazama, who looks wild in this trailer in the old Guy makeup. Out of all those people just in the top building of this cast, each one of those on their own could carry their own movie. Those are all leading actors right there, and some of these are supporting roles of This movie is going to be massive. I think the only one that is questionable is Ben Safty. I still see him more as a director, but he's really been making a push towards acting. Maybe this gets him over the hump, but he was also in Oppenheimer. You have Bill Irwin, who was playing the cyclops in the movie. He was also responsible for that metallic monster robot thing from Interstellar, and now Christopher Nolan has hired him back. Mia goth is also in this movie. It is a stat cast and I am so ready for it now. I love a summer blockbuster that Christopher Nolan puts out, no matter what it is, and I don't really associate him with being a summer blockbuster director. But I think if this movie is as successful as all this hype is building up, I think it's going to be a smash hit. I think quite possibly could be one of the highest grossing movies of the year. Because if you think about when this movie was announced last year that tickets went on sale, they sold out immediately, and a little bit of that is a marketing scheme because it was billed as the movie sold out, but it was only one showing and only a handful of select theaters, primarily the ones that would be showing it in seventy millimeters IMAX, which is how I need to see this movie. I still don't have my tickets, but I gotta get those tickets. But if you think about the most successful movies in the last year, it has been the ones that have prioritized the premium movie going experience, meaning it is the IMAX movies. It is the movies that lend themselves to the RPX where your aye, your chair shakes, and your butt jiggles, does all those fun things. It sprays water at you, it'll insult you, it'll I don't know, slash your card irons in the parking lot and then help you fix it. All those bells and whistles to make the movie going experience more exciting and even though it is at a premium rate because those movies do cost more to go see like that, it is those experiences that are getting people to go back to the theater, not just millennials, not just the boomers, but jens Z they see it as a social experience. And I think that is why this movie is going to do well, because it is a movie you want to go and experience with other people, and it has that exclusivity because it does feel like a spectacle because it is so large, because if you look at this trailer on your phone, you're not getting the full scope with that. And I say that from seeing the trailer itself in seventy milimeter Imax, where I felt that movie. I kind of thought I was in that Trojan Horse. So that is why this movie is going to be successful. I mean, with Christopher Nolan's name alone, doesn't really matter. What he puts out is going to be a banger. But look at that incredible cast. I cannot wait for The Odyssey, which comes out in theaters on July seventeenth. And that goes this week's edition of Movie Mike Trailer Bars, and that is going to do it for another episode here of the podcast, but before I go, I gotta give my listener shout out of the week. How do you get a lit a shout out of the week. Well, you can send me an email, which is the most old school way to reach me, but it is movie Mike at dremail dot com. You can DM me on Instagram, comment on my TikTok. Go over to Facebook, where some things have been popping off lately. Man if I post anything from the Michael movie. People love to argue about the Michael Jackson biopic. Or my favorite way to reach me, go over to YouTube dot com slash Mike dshro, hit that subscribe, hit that bell so you get notified when I put new movie reviews over there also longer segments from the podcast. If you want to go see the interview from this week with Emil Hirsh. Go check that out over there. And this week I'm going over to my review of Hokum from last week and shouting out Kevin beg or is it Cavin cee av I N I guess it's Cavin. That kind of sounds like if you were trying to hide your identity and your name was Kevin, and so he said what's your name, sir, And you're like, uh, Cavin, that's kind of what it is. But hey, cool name Cavin Begg, who said, I'm not really a fan of horror movies in general, but I am so glad I saw Hocum in theaters. It is a genuinely good movie and also extremely scary. Appreciate you for watching that review, Cavin. I will say that was a movie that was greatly heightened by going to see it in a pack theater. It was one of the smaller theaters, so it wasn't the huge, huge rooms that maybe we saw The Devilwar's product in two And there's something about being a little bit more pack in a theater like that, where my entire row was filled, the row behind me was filled, and you can see the other people reacting to it, and I think being a little bit more enclosed the movie feels a little bit darker because there aren't as many lights, you don't have people opening the door throughout the movie. It kind of feels like you go into that world a little bit more. And when you can go see a horror movie like that in theaters, it is definitely scarier than watching it at home. The bigger screen, the louder sound. I really think that's where it is because when those moments happen and you're just like boom, you feel that you get that anticipation more watching it in a theater because you feel a little bit more vulnerable. So appreciate that. Cavin for watching, for subscribing, and you wherever you are right now, at the gym, in your car, maybe you're going for a walk, or you're like the few people I know who run while listening to this podcast. I am an avid runner, but I can never run and listen to a podcast. But if you do, more power to you. But until next time, go out and watch good movies and I will talk to you later.