Mike's Top 10 Christopher Nolan Movies + Movie Review: Talk To Me + Trailer Park: Exorcist: Believer

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to movie Mike's movie podcast. I am your host Movie Mike. Today I want to share with you my top ten Christopher Nolan films of all time. We'll rank his entire filmography. In the movie review, we'll be talking about the best horror movie I've seen this year called Talk to Me. And in the trailer Park we'll keep the horror theme alive and talk about the new Exorcist movie. It's being rebooted yet again. We have Exorcist Believer coming to us later this year. Thank you for being subscribed, thank you for listening every single week. And now movie crew, let's talk movies.

00:00:30
Speaker 2: In a world where everyone and their mother has a podcast, one man stands to infiltrate the ears of listeners like never before in a movie podcast. A man with so much movie knowledge, he's basically like a walking IMTB with glasses.

00:00:48
Speaker 3: From the Nashville Podcast Network. This is movie Mike's Movie Podcast.

00:00:54
Speaker 1: We are coming off the hype of Oppenheimer, and in my review last week I said that Oppenheimer is not a top Christopher Nolan film, and some people lost their minds. I was not saying in.

00:01:05
Speaker 3: Any way that it is a bad movie. It is a five out of five film.

00:01:09
Speaker 1: But Christopher Nolan is one of the best directors of our lifetime, so those top five spots are so coveted to me, and there are movies that have been with me for so long now that to me, after watching Oppenheimer, it did not penetrate that top five, although it was so good and it moved me in a way I was not expecting coming off of it. I didn't want to be like, this is the best movie I've ever seen. That's how I feel sometimes there's recently biased. When you go watch a movie like that, you automatically think it is number one. I think we'll look back in a couple of years and remember how good it was. But comparing it to the work we've been able to sit with of his and know for so long and have time to study and divulge it fully, I still think it will not be top five in another two or three years. And that is how much I know Christopher nolan movies. You really had to sit with him and chew on them and really dive into all the things he covers in one movie, and Appenheimer being a three hour movie, there's a lot to dive into. So that is a movie I will spend a lot of time with in the years to come. But looking at my top five of the movies he has made over his career, it is not quite there to me. So after saying that and seeing some people outraged by that statement, I decided to dive into this fully and share with you my thoughts on his top ten movies of all time. Now Christopher Nolan has directed twelve, we're doing a top ten because I'm looking at this long term. I will update this list as he puts out more movies, so I will let you know what makes my top ten and what I think about those other two movies that sit out of this top ten.

00:02:43
Speaker 3: But let's look into Christopher Nolan.

00:02:45
Speaker 1: If you're not fully familiar with his work, he has directed twelve movies. His movies have made five billion dollars worldwide. He's been nominated for five Oscars, but surprisingly has no wins. I think that changes after this year. His movies have one Oscars, but he hasn't won the Big Prize for Best Picture or Best Director. He is a British American filmmaker, screenwriter, and producer. He was born on July thirtieth, nineteen seventy in London, England. He is known for movies that are very innovative in their storytelling. They have these very complex narratives you really have to chew with a lot of the themes, and oftentimes, as we'll get into in this list, you have to rewatch them to fully get them, at least for me anyway. He also has very visually stunning films that really pushes the envelope on filmmaking. So all the things that make up a Christopher Nolan movie are very mind bending concepts. He also uses a lot of practical effects and very minimal cgi, which is important to the integrity of filmmaking. Is the way he sees it. His movies have a lot of emotional depths. They are very tense and suspenseful in their storytelling. He also has very ambiguous endings that sometimes stories just kind of end and then as the viewer, you have to decide where the characters go from there, and a lot of people love or hate this approach. Personally, don't like it when everything's wrapped up into a nice little package. I like to have some thought after watching a movie, thinking where these characters are going to go next, so if done correctly, I like an ambiguous ending. He also has a lot of collaborators that he works with with Michael Caine, Tom Hardy, Killian Murphy, Christian Bale. The list goes on and on. It's like he has this palette of paints that he likes to paint his pictures with and that is what makes up his cast for the most part. So let's get right into this list now, not making the top ten. At number twelve, I would put nineteen ninety eight's following.

00:04:37
Speaker 3: This was his directorial debut.

00:04:40
Speaker 1: It was directed, written, and even edited by Christopher Nolan himself in a very very cheap way, so the film is only an hour long, making it his shortest film to date. It's about a struggling writer who tags along with a thief on a series of burglaries to gain inspiration for his novel. To me, this movie is kind of like when a musician puts out their initial work, maybe an EP or a mixtape, to really put them on the map. But I don't really feel that as their first collaborative work. I always look at their first full official, full length, So that's why I would put this movie at number twelve. At number eleven, I would put twenty twenty's ten. And that's even with how much I wanted to love that movie and what it did with the technology, the boundaries that tried to push, it just didn't really make sense to me, even after watching it for the second time. Christopher Nolan is a director who doesn't miss, but with this one tenant twenty twenty he missed. And I'm sorry to say that, but everything in the top ten, I would say, is not a miss whatsoever. These are all top tier movies that would be any single director's one claim to fame. But the fact that he has ten of these is amazing. So here we go into the top ten. Now, at number ten, I'm putting two thousand and fives Batman begins, and you gotta think of the landscape of superhero movie in the two thousands, and also just the way we viewed Batman movies, which in the nineties for the most part there towards the end, really struggled and left a bad taste in everybody's mouth. With movies like Batman and Robin in nineteen ninety seven, they were viewed as more comical and cheesy and seemed like they were only being released in order to sell toys to kids. And eight years later you have another Batman movie, and everybody thought, Oh, they're making another Batman movie, but we were not expecting it to be as dark and gritty. And even though we didn't fully get that picture and Batman Begins, I remember kind of losing interest in Batman at this time. I was probably fourteen years old, and I remember the thought of another Batman movie. As much as I loved Batman, I wasn't fully invested in this, so I didn't go see this movie in theaters and didn't watch it until later when it came out on DVD. So over the years, I've been able to love what this movie did in this entire triller and what it went on to do for the superhero genre in general. But I almost feel like this movie did all the legwork to get us to the Dark Night.

00:07:09
Speaker 3: So I appreciate this movie for what it did.

00:07:12
Speaker 1: It just to me, even looking back at it now, doesn't really feel like a true Batman movie because it deals so much with the liga shadows. So it's still a good movie, just not my favorite. That's why I put Batman Begins from two thousand and five at number ten. At number nine, I have Momento from the year two thousand. This was Christopher Nolan's breakout hit and maybe, to some his most confusing film. But I think I went into it knowing that it was gonna be confusing, that I allowed myself to be confused. And I think if you go into a movie like this and know that you're not gonna fully get everything, it allows you to enjoy it a little bit more. And that is kind of how I feel going into any Christopher Nolan movie that maybe I don't fully get it, but I'm going to interpret it how I want. I'm going to draw my own conclusions as the viewer and take everything that he puts on screen and make my own assumptions of it. And that is exactly how I felt after watching Momento, especially once you get to the ending of this movie, where it seems like everything you just watch was an entire lie and.

00:08:15
Speaker 3: You have no idea what to believe.

00:08:18
Speaker 1: Can you believe this narrator, this guy you've been following this entire movie. I just love the concept of this movie, and I believe this was his most ambitious film in storytelling, and this is the reason he was put onto the map in two thousand. Without this movie, he really wouldn't have been able to make anything else. It was Momento, and then it was the Dark Knight trilogy. This is the one that really set him apart as a director. So maybe it didn't fully hit with everybody, but this movie was so important on all the movies that were to follow, and I feel like, at its core, this is what a Christopher Nolan movie needs to be. Now, it may take you one, two, or even three or four or five views to fully get this movie, and maybe you have different interpretations after each time.

00:09:03
Speaker 3: You watch it.

00:09:03
Speaker 1: But the power of that, the beauty of that, is the reason I think Momento is such a great movie. So even though I do have it ranked on the lower side, I still really love this movie. It's just not one that I would throw on in a random time and just have on in the background and watch over and over again. But if I allow myself to be fully invested and sit down with Momento, it is a great movie. But that is why I rank it at number nine. Moving on to number eight, the movie he made after that one is two thousand and two's Insomnia. I really enjoyed this movie and maybe it's one of his more straight ahead crime dramas and probably his most thriller like movie of all of his movies. And it is the only movie that Christopher Nolan did not write or even co write the screenplay, and I think that does show when watching this entire movie. But I feel like the story is so good. It is one that he probably sat down with and thought, I need to make this movie, even though it is not my full creation. But what Insomnia is about. It's about two Los Angeles detectives who are investigating a homicide in Alaska. And the main detective is played by al Pacino, who is so good in a Christopher Nolan movie, and he accidentally kills his partner and it involves a cover up of his murder. You have another murderer played by Robin Williams, who, Oh my gosh, just seeing Robin Williams in a movie again just warms my heart. I actually rewatched this movie in preparation for this episode, and it brought back all these feelings. So the cast in this movie is really great with Al Pacino, Hillary Swank and Robin Williams. Maybe not as tacked as all his movies would be to follow, but to have all these actors in one movie is amazing. And what I love about Insomnia is it really starts to show the way Christopher Nolan handles pacing and handles building tension. You really get the first taste of it here. It's not his full style yet with the score and everything, but you really get that anticipation in this entire movie that you're building towards something that isn't going to be pleasant.

00:11:08
Speaker 3: And as the viewer, you.

00:11:09
Speaker 1: Experience the insomnia that al Pacino's character is facing. He can't sleep, He has all these thoughts swarming through his head, he has a lot weighing on his heart, and it all goes back to the fact that he can't sleep. He's not thinking clearly, and through his filmmaking, Christopher Nolan allows you, as the viewer to also feel more and more tired and more and more just not thinking clearly, just like the character, just by watching this movie. So I think it is his most anxiety inducing movie because you feel that character having no rest as the viewer. So at number eight, I have two thousand and two's Insomnia. At number seven, I'm going with twenty fourteen's Dunkirk, which is the story about several Allied soldiers as they are trapped on the beaches of Dunkirk, France, as German forces attempt to wipe them out.

00:11:59
Speaker 3: The reason I.

00:12:00
Speaker 1: Love this movie is I love stories that immediately drop you into the action of the film, and that is exactly what Dunkirk does.

00:12:08
Speaker 3: I feel like this is also.

00:12:09
Speaker 1: One of his most renowned movies because it was nominated for Best Picture, he was nominated for Best Director, and it is the highest grossing World War Two film ever made. And not only that, you get Harry Styles. And I remember being so excited about seeing Harry Styles in a movie like this and thinking it was just gonna be the guy from one direction in a war movie. But I think he surprised us all in being such a great actor, even though he did have a smaller part in the grand scheme of this entire movie. But everything about this movie was so well executed. And I remember from seeing the first initial teaser of Dunkirk that it immediately had me drawn into the action. And that is what really sets this movie apart from any other Christopher Nolan film, because he is great at putting you in the shoes of these characters and allowing you to feel what they feel. And I feel like Dunkirk is the best example of that, putting you in the war zone. I remember that first teaser of seeing all the soldiers looking up at something approaching them, a bomb or a missile. In that teaser, you don't really know what it is, but I remember having that feeling while watching this entire movie. So it is anxiety inducing in a different way. I guess in movies, I'm just always trying to feel something like that, because maybe I don't always feel it in the real world, but I feel like visually too. This is one that I just love because the color palette has this very rich kind of blue color to it, and it feels very cool and inviting, even though it is a war film. And this is also one of the most memorable theater experiences I've had while watching a Christopher Nolan film. So at number seven, I have twenty fourteen's Dunkirk at number six. You should already know what it is because I said it is not a top five Christopher Nolan film. It is twenty twenty three's Oppenheimer. I've had a week now to process this movie, and I still feel really comfortable putting it right now here. This movie is very profound with its bold visuals. Seeing it inn iMX seventy milimeter the way I did really emphasized and highlighted all of the visual aspects of this movie. It has a great soundtrack, a great score that is very memorable, and out of every movie on this list, there is really no action to it, but it doesn't need it.

00:14:22
Speaker 3: It is all dialogue.

00:14:24
Speaker 1: But through that dialogue it is able to build this tension and move you in places that you didn't think a movie driven.

00:14:31
Speaker 3: By dialogue can move you to. So it's still a five out of five.

00:14:35
Speaker 1: Film, but it's not a five out of five Golden plated platinum film that will make it into my top five. So Oppenheimer just misses out of the top five slot, but still a perfect film. But let's get into it now. My top five Christopher Nolan films of all time. At number five, I have the Prestige from two thousand and six. It is a movie about two rivals magicians played by Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale, and they are trying to sabotage each other because they.

00:15:06
Speaker 3: Performed the same trick.

00:15:08
Speaker 1: And I think the reason I love this movie so much is because it does deal with magic. I think there is something about magic that no matter what kind of person you are, you are going to find fascinating because you are trying to figure out the trick. And I feel like this movie created a trademark of Christopher Nolan. It is the misdirection. I feel like after he made this movie he became a magician himself, because in all of his movies he is trying to push you onto one thing and look in one way when really there's something else going on over here that you're not paying attention to. It is the classic misdirection that a magician does. They try to make you look at their right hand when they are actually doing something with their left hand that is causing the trick to happen. That is what he does in the Prestige, and that is what he does in a lot of his other movies that create these mind bending moments. And sometimes a twist can be seen as kind of cheesy, like oh, this person was dead the whole time, Ah, I didn't see it coming. Christopher Nolan doesn't do that. He does the misdirection. And although on paper. Maybe it's a twist. It is much more mind blowing when there's been something in front of your eyes the entire time, you just haven't seen it. You've been thinking about it one way when it is really this way. And that is what The Prestige was. And I remember watching this movie for the first time and thinking, this is the best movie I've ever seen, and I will never see anything greater than The Prestige. It's because I'm fascinated with magic. I am fascinated with psychological thrillers. Aside from probably superhero movies, they are my favorite genre of movies. So this movie has both of those things going for it. You also have Hugh Jackman, who I wish could have been in more Criscipher Nolan films, just like I wish Al Pacino would have been in more Christopher Nolan films. And oddly enough, in two thousand and six, there was a similar movie put out, a film, if you will, call The Illusionists with Ed Norton. I watched them both, but by far The Prestige was the better movie. So at number five, I have two thousand and six The Prestige. At number four, I have from twenty twelve The Dark Knight Rises. This is the one that people always want.

00:17:17
Speaker 3: To rip me to shreds for.

00:17:19
Speaker 1: But I will stand by The Dark Knight Rises and being such a great film because I love this opening scene, one of my top ten favorite opening scenes of all time, rivaled only by its predecessor, that scene with Bain and that airplane. It just gave me this daunting feeling going into watching The Dark Knight Rises. I honestly believe the reason people don't like this movie as much is because everybody was comparing it to The Dark Knight. You can't compare the two. You really can't compare all of the movies in this trilogy because Batman Begins is the rising action, the Dark Knight is that climate of the entire story, and The Dark Knight Rises is the falling action and conclusion. But I feel like it is such a great ending on the trilogy, and it is due to the fact that Bain is such a force and such a great villain. At times, I would argue that he is actually a better villain to Batman than the Joker was, because the Joker was just chaos. He was gonna do what he wanted to do no matter what Batman just happened to get in the way, but Bain literally broke the back of Batman, got under his skin and not only broke him physically, but also broke him mentally to a point of no return.

00:18:38
Speaker 3: So I felt like the opening scene was great.

00:18:41
Speaker 1: Bain was such a great villain throughout this entire movie that you think, like, is Batman really going to be able to break him down. It also has one of my favorite scenes of the explosion that goes down at the football field, which watching that scene in a theater is one of my core memory moments of movie watching. The only issue I had with The Dark Knight Rises was the way Batman eventually defeated Baine. I do feel like they kind of minimize his entire character, and that is the only thing I would change in this movie.

00:19:13
Speaker 3: I wouldn't even change the ending, which.

00:19:15
Speaker 1: Has that classic Christopher Nolan ambiguous ending. I like drawing my own conclusions of what happens next, what Batman does when he goes into hiding, what Robin does after discovering the back cave.

00:19:28
Speaker 3: I thought it was the perfect.

00:19:30
Speaker 1: Ending, especially with Christopher Nolan saying recently that he has done with that he will never make another one, and they shouldn't. Even though Christian Bell says he would be on board. If Christopher Nolan ever had a story to tell, I just don't think there would ever be one. He did it in the trilogy, he did it so well. So at number four, I have The Dark Knight rises. At number three from twenty ten, I have inception this is a movie. First time I saw it in theaters, didn't fully get it, but I knew I loved it. I knew I was watching something really and this movie was highly influential on my love of watching and reviewing and talking about movies. If it wouldn't have been for this movie in the twenty tens, I don't think I would be doing this right now because I love the complexity of this story of going from a dream into a dream into another dream.

00:20:18
Speaker 3: And I think even.

00:20:20
Speaker 1: Now, this is the movie that just gets referenced so much in pop culture and in different situations that it was so important in the twenty tens and so important to Christopher Nolan's career to not just be the guy who made the Dark Knight movie.

00:20:34
Speaker 3: So without this.

00:20:35
Speaker 1: Movie, I don't think he would have been able to make all the other movies.

00:20:39
Speaker 3: Outside of the Dark Knight genre.

00:20:40
Speaker 1: So essentially, he made the Dark Knight trilogy to be able to make any movie that he wanted, and the first one just happened to be Inception, which was so great and different. So I think we've all seen and know the story about Inception, But it's about Leonardo DiCaprio's character, who is the leader of this band of thieves and they are trying to steal information from a very high profile person played in this movie by the one and only Killian Murphy, and the idea is to be able to do that in their dreams without them ever knowing. So the objective of the mission is to plant an idea inside their brain to make it seem like they're the ones that came up with it, the perfect crime. But the twist is that a subconscious has all these layers, and in the movie, they have to keep going a step further and further, going a dream into a dream, and things get a little bit more complex every time you do that, time slows down a little bit more, and if you die there, you die.

00:21:38
Speaker 3: In real life.

00:21:39
Speaker 1: So I feel like that concept for me was pretty easy to understand.

00:21:44
Speaker 3: I think where we all get lost a little bit.

00:21:46
Speaker 1: Is what's going on with Leonardo DiCaprio's character and where exactly he is at the end of the movie, which again you have that trademark Christopher Nolan ambiguous ending is he in a dream, is he in Israel life?

00:21:59
Speaker 3: Is that his time?

00:22:00
Speaker 1: Or is he imagining the situation in his subconscious And Christopher Nolan actually talked about this in a recent interview and said essentially that Leonardo DiCaprio's character doesn't care where he is. He doesn't care if he is still dreaming or if he is in the real world. His totem just spins indefinitely. I also think this movie was so highly influential in the visual aspect of it, and it has been ripped off by so many filmmakers, but no one has done it quite like Christopher Nolan. So at number three I have twenty ten's Inception, and at number two I have from twenty fourteen Interstellar. This is the movie that took me the longest to fully appreciate. Quite honestly, the first time I saw this movie, I did not like it. I would probably have put this movie at the bottom of my list. I thought it was very long, I thought it was very boring, and I fully didn't get the emotional aspect of this movie, but I gave it another chance.

00:23:03
Speaker 3: Still didn't get it.

00:23:04
Speaker 1: I gave it yet another chance, and I was like, Okay, I get it a little bit more. And I realized the passion that some people had about this movie, and I felt like there was just something I was missing. And it wasn't really until about two years ago in twenty twenty, where I started rewatching a bunch of things because there were no new things coming out that I really sat down with Interstellar and really allowed myself to be immersed in this movie. And after rewatching it in twenty twenty, I finally realized the beauty I was missing in this movie. I think I was just trying to look at it as a sci fi film. I was so focused on that aspect of the film that I was looking past Matthew McConaughey's character, this ex astronaut turned farmer sent to find another planet to save humanity, and thinking about the journey his character goes through in that emotional moment of realizing that he has been communicating with this daughter and how far ahead of time he went into that all those things just kind of resonated with me, and a light switch kind of went off in my brain and I fully got it, and I understand the complexity of the story. I understand the complexity of the ending. And then, for some reason, in that moment, the score of the movie just fully hit me, and it made me so emotional that I realized I had been missing it the entire time, and Christopher Nolan had been showing me and trying to tell me the effects of going through a black hole and leaving behind the ones you love the most and not following through on this promise. It just hit me right in the gut and moved from the bottom of my list to being number two. And I think for that reason that of any movie on this list, this is the movie that he really struck something that will be remembered long after he is no longer on this planet, long after he is no longer making films. And that is the other thing about Christopher Nolan. Some directors of his caliber maybe moved past their prime. He is still in it, so he may still have another Interstellar in him. But I think I don't know him personally, but I feel like of all the movies he would save in a fire, or the movie he would only want to be remembered for. If he could only be remembered for one, I truly feel like it would be Interstellar, and if it wasn't from my personal connection with the number one movie, this could easily be my number one. But nonetheless, Interstellar is at number two. So number one is The Dark Knight from two thousand and eight, the movie that I credit with changing the course of superhero movies. I have referenced this movie so much on this podcast, and for the longest time it has been my number one movie of all time. This movie has all of my favorite aspects of what makes Christopher Nolan great in one movie, starting with that opening scene, the best opening scene in any movie I have ever witnessed, and it is the bank robbery scene. Everything from the last minute detail from the wardrobe choices and the Joker mass being a reference to one showcase in the TV show way back in the day, the way the Joker is revealed in that opening scene and how he drives the bus out into traffic, showing that the entire thing was so well orchestrated, showing you the mind of the Joker and knowing that he is going to be madness to deal with in this entire movie. And then of course it is Heath Ledger stealing the show in the Dark Knight, giving us one of the best on screen performances of all time, winning an oscar after his death, and making it a performance that no one else can really touch, and making the character of the Joker something that now is so coveted to play. Yeah, Jack Nicholson did it back in the day, but now there is just so much of a standard on anybody who puts on the Joker makeup to live up to even a fraction of what Heath Ledger did, no one will ever touch it. I will argue that they can make a better Joker movie post Heath Ledger, allowing you really get into the little things that make him tick and having an entire movie to focus on one character, but no one will ever give a performance like Heath Ledger did. Everything is so refined in this movie and the story is just bulletproof where there is not one second, not one scene, you would take away to make this movie better. And there are just so many great and memorable scenes from the opening, from the Joker crashing the party. But I think still the best scene out of the entire movie is that interrogation scene between Batman and the Joker. Where in that scene or do you realize the greatness that is Heath Ledger? That you are looking at this character he is portraying, But at no point in that scene do you see Heath Ledger underneath that makeup. In my mind and probably a lot of people's minds, you just feel like this Joker character exists in this world like you are in Gotham looking at a LifeCam in this interrogation scene, because he plays it so well that there is not even a glimmer that there is a real human underneath that person, because the character is so convincing.

00:28:18
Speaker 3: And it is that scene alone that cements this movie as my number one.

00:28:23
Speaker 1: And this was the movie that paved the way for every other superhero movie that came after it, whether it be in the MCU or whether it be in DC. So that is it at number one. I have The Dark Knight from two thousand and eight, and that is my list.

00:28:39
Speaker 3: Whenever he makes another couple.

00:28:40
Speaker 1: Movies, we'll go back and maybe rerank the list after I rewatch him again.

00:28:44
Speaker 3: For the fiftieth time.

00:28:45
Speaker 1: If you want to let me know what your favorite Christopher Nolan film is, you can hit me up on any social media platform at Mike dstro or email me Moviemike d at gmail dot com. My socials and emails are always in the episode notes, so if you are like me, like to just copy and paste, just go there. All right, we'll come back and talk about the A twenty four movie Talk to Me. Let's get into a spoiler free movie review now. I want to tell you about the new A twenty four horror movie called Talk to Me, which is now easily my favorite horror movie of the year. It is a story about this group of teenagers that come into possession of an embalmed hand. It's this little sculpture looking thing and they put it on the table and whenever you put your hand next to this hand and say talk to me, you are suddenly able to communicate with the dead. And what I love about this story is that it just kind of puts you in this world, doesn't really give.

00:29:43
Speaker 3: You a whole lot of origin of.

00:29:45
Speaker 1: Why this is going on, how they got the thing. It really sets the stage in the opening scene pretty quickly. Within three minutes, you see this guy essentially get possessed by some kind of demon, stab his brother and then kill himself, and that is the introduction to the story, and then you fully get engulfed into the lives of these teenagers who have just somehow have this hand in The possession doesn't really get a whole lot into the backstory, which I love. You just kind of exist in their world and they are having these parties where they put the hand on the table, they light a candle, somebody gets on the other end. They strap them in and while they're holding the hand, they say, talk to me, and suddenly somebody appears across the table, somebody dead, and they are able to communicate with them, and then they say the other phrase, I let you in. And after that all hell breaks loose because that demonic presence suddenly inhabits their body and they just start saying all these random phrases, all these weird things come out of them. Their eyes go black, and then it's the job of the person who essentially puts them under to snap them out of it. So you can only stay in this state for about a minute or so, otherwise something even more awful is going to happen. And what I love about this movie and really all a twenty four films, is they always feel very novel, even though the concept isn't anything out of the realm of what.

00:31:07
Speaker 3: We've seen in a horror movie.

00:31:09
Speaker 1: What it does it does really well and it has this very specific style from these new directors who are Australian, who are twin brothers, and I think they completely crushed their film debut. So you have Australian twins, Danny and Michael Philippo, and I am so impressed that they just had this clear vision that they wanted to do and were able to completely nail it in their film debut, because sometimes as a movie fan, I get worried that people aren't going to want to direct new movies anymore. I feel that it's harder and harder to get a movie made in the world of YouTube and TikTok, that it'll get harder and harder for a kid to live out his or her dream to have their vision come to life. So I want to get into the things they really nailed in this movie. It really starts off in the first three minutes. Really, that's the tone and for me, Demonic Possession movies are just my favorite genre of horror movies, dating back to any Exorcism movie. I also have kind of a soft spot for all the paranormal activity movies. I know, on paper, those aren't the greatest movies, but there's just something about those storylines and the fact that those movies are made for such a low amount of money but provide so many big thrills and scares that.

00:32:23
Speaker 3: I just really love what those movies did for horror.

00:32:26
Speaker 1: So anything that involves anybody being possessed or talking to the dead, or just things moving around in a room, that is what I look for, and this movie had a lot of that, But it never felt cheap or cheesy in any way. And I think that is really what kind of set this movie apart from anything else being put out right now, is it had this tone that it carried throughout the entire movie. Now, however, I don't think this movie is just all out scary. You're not gonna watch it and immediately have nightmares. It is just very, very creepy, and I think the reason that really shines through is because all of the performances from the actors in this movie, that their performances were really able to ground this movie in reality when you have all these bizarre things going on, and I think it's their connection and able to portray these characters and really buy into the storyline of what was happening, and also at the same time not questioning everything to some crazy extent where I feel like if this movie was Americanized, that's where it would have gone. It would have been them focusing on the origin of the hand, going to somebody's house who's like eighty years old and asking them about it, and that eighty year old person like shooting them away and telling them never come back here.

00:33:36
Speaker 3: That did not happen in this movie.

00:33:38
Speaker 1: And I feel like by avoiding that and a lot of other cliches and tropes and horror movies, it was able just to live in that world, accept it for what it is, and continue.

00:33:48
Speaker 3: The ride all the way throughout.

00:33:49
Speaker 1: So I felt a lot of authenticity in their performances, but also their use of very practical effects, which was also able to give this movie a sense of all the demons in this movie were people in costumes and makeup, which made it feel a lot more realistic, and that also allows you as the viewer to find it a lot more believable and think, what if this was happening to me, Because it doesn't look like just the random CGI ghost. It looks like a real person right there that you could sit across from and touch. So I think that level of practical effect was also really important to making this movie creepy. But what really makes this film work is it has a good story, which sometimes I feel gets overlooked in a horror movie because you're trying to spend so much time on the jump scares and all the scary elements to make sure it is frightening to the viewer. But if you don't have that good story, I'm not gonna care about it. I'm not gonna be invested in this character getting out of the situation, or somebody getting saved or somebody dying. I'm just gonna be like, Okay, you're gonna come at me with another scare. That is fine, But you actually care about the characters in this movie, most importantly seventeen year old me, who is the main character who is struggling with the death of her mom, and as a result of the death of her mom, her dad is having a hard time accepting it. He's become very distant, so their relationship is so fractured that she has gone to look for a family in other places. So her best friend's family has become her own family, and they have been the ones who have really taken her in, which leads to a very complex situation with everything that unfolds, because it all comes back to them messing with the hand and doing things they are not supposed to do and finding enjoyment out of it, which I thought was a unique take on a possession story where most oftentimes, whenever there is something creepy, they don't want to be a part of it. But I guess since because they are teenagers, they find it fun. They are filming these things and uploading them on the internet, sharing them with their friends, so it's almost like they see messing with demons as like this roller coaster ride. It kind of reminds me of that episode of SpongeBob when SpongeBob and Patrick knowingly ride the hooks of fishermen and they ride it all all the way up and then right before they get caught, they let themselves fall all the way down, but knowing that if you stay on that hook long enough that you're gonna end up as somebody's dinner and you find out what happens in that episode. And at ninety minutes, this movie really has no time to mess around and doesn't do that by any means. You get to know the characters a little bit, but for the majority of the movie, there is always just something building towards that next moment, and it kind of reminded me of the first time I saw The Ring back in the two thousands. It had that two thousand psychological supernatural movie feel to me with a modern edge. The other thing I really loved about this movie is the fact that it didn't leave anything on the table. The thing I usually end up complaining about the most when it comes to American horror movies, especially big budget blockbuster ones, is it always feels like they leave things on the table in order to set up a sequel, and that results in me feeling like, as the viewer, I don't have the best story here because they had to add something in to make sure it sets up for a part two, or to make sure they're building on a franchise. With this one, I felt like the Filippo brothers knew like, this is our one chance to make a really great movie. Let's throw everything at the viewer in this installment and not count our eggs before they had to start thinking, well, we.

00:37:21
Speaker 3: Got to make a franchise, we got to make a sequel.

00:37:23
Speaker 1: I was satisfied with every single aspect that happened in this movie and didn't feel cheated in any way.

00:37:29
Speaker 3: And even though I.

00:37:29
Speaker 1: Feel like this is the best horror movie so far of twenty twenty three, if I compare it to other A twenty four films, or really just any other horror film in general in the last five years, I don't think Talk to Me necessarily push the envelope to new heights and did something completely novel. But what it did accomplish in this movie, it did really well and it felt very effortless. I never lost interest in the story, and they didn't really rely on jump scare moments. Unless you're really kind of on edge a horror movies, I don't think you're gonna go into this movie and be like, like caught off guard by anything. But with that creepiness throughout the entire film, it'll definitely keep you a bit on the edge of your seat. So for Talk to Me, I give it four out of five and balmed hands.

00:38:19
Speaker 3: It's time to head down to movie mikes. Traylor Paul.

00:38:23
Speaker 1: The Exorcist from nineteen seventy three is one of the most scary movies that has ever entered my eyeballs.

00:38:31
Speaker 3: And now we are getting a whole new trilogy.

00:38:34
Speaker 1: So they have made several Exorcist movies. This one, coming out on October thirteenth of this year, will be the sixth installment in the franchise, but it's the first of a whole new trilogy, so it's not a full on remake, which I'm happy about because if they ever tried to remake that original movie, that would be a travesty on film. Because still it is one movie that I watch and it still gives me the chills, and the movie came out in the seventies in a time where.

00:39:05
Speaker 3: They were not making movies like this.

00:39:07
Speaker 1: One of my favorite things to watch on YouTube is audience reactions from the very first Exorcist movie. And I didn't want to play you a clip of this because this movie was so terrifying that people were walking out of it. People allegedly were barfing at the sight of what happens in this first movie. So to get you back in the mindset before we talk about this new one. This is real life audience reaction that you can find on YouTube after people went to go watch The Exorcist back when it premiered in nineteen seventy three.

00:39:37
Speaker 3: I'm not going back in there. I have a friend in there alone, and I don't want to leave her in there alone. I'm not standing here shaking for nothing. I about Yeah, it's very, very real.

00:39:50
Speaker 1: I don't like it. I want to go home. I want to say if it's gonna make me throw a walk. Is one of the most growth of movies in the world, one of the grossest movies in the world.

00:40:00
Speaker 3: I love that line.

00:40:01
Speaker 1: That is footage from its opening night on December twenty sixth, nineteen seventy three. The movie caused mass hysteria, which really doesn't happen with horror movies anymore, because I think you could probably turn on the news and watch something more scary. Then you can go into a movie theater and experience. But I have a lot of expectations going into this movie because it is a part of the Exorcist franchise.

00:40:24
Speaker 3: Fifty years ago, there were.

00:40:26
Speaker 1: Things that you could show in movies that would be unsettling to people. You hear it there in that clip, But now the bar is set so high, And I was just talking about it in my review of Talk to Me.

00:40:38
Speaker 3: That the playing field has changed.

00:40:40
Speaker 1: So whenever this trailer first dropped, I was wanting to see something different. I didn't really care so much about the nostalgia factor. I think the movie has been out so long, it's fifty years old. There's really nothing going to get me hype about seeing a character from the original movie again. I just wanted them to kind of capture that same chilling, haunting feeling with giving it a modern edge.

00:41:05
Speaker 3: Do I think they will be able to do that?

00:41:07
Speaker 1: After the first glimpse of this trailer, I'm not entirely convinced, and I will tell you why. But before I give you my full thoughts on the Exorcist Believer, here's just a little bit of the trailer.

00:41:17
Speaker 3: Exorcism is a ritual every culture, every religion. They all use different methods. It's when to take all of them. Don't be scared. We've met before, mother.

00:41:30
Speaker 1: So this movie centers around a story of two young girls who disappear into the woods and they return days later, there's all these weird things happening with them now. And in the trailer you hear their dad talking to his daughter and she thinks she's only been gone for a couple hours, and she's been gone for three days. And then, much like in the original Exorcist movie, all of these demonic things start happening, and death and despair follow these daughters around everywhere they go, and they realize they need to find somebody who has experience with this, and they seek the help of Chris McNeil, who was the mom in the original Exorcist movie and in that one, her daughter is the one possessed. Her daughter was played by Linda Blair. So, just like in real life, this movie also takes place fifty years after the original and the character Chris McNeil is the only one still alive from that original movie.

00:42:25
Speaker 3: It seems like.

00:42:26
Speaker 1: So that seems to be the overall plot of this movie. And again, this is the first one of a whole new trilogy. It's coming out on October thirteenth this year, and the next one is called The Exorcist Deceiver, and that's supposed to come out on April eighteenth, twenty twenty five. And after watching this trailer, I have to say I was pretty underwhelmed. It felt a little bit safe to me. And that's weird to say, because you do get a little bit of a glimpse of the possession and the fact that this one is dealing with not only one, but two victims who will become possessed. There's kind of like a tag team demon situation going on here, but it kind of relies a little bit on nostalgi debating and having some references to the original one. I quite honestly don't want it to have anything to do with that original movie. I wish it was an entirely new story. And again I don't really think her returning as the mom and this one is gonna have.

00:43:21
Speaker 3: A whole lot of effect on me.

00:43:22
Speaker 1: I would have rather seen maybe something with Linda Blair and her character being repossessed again as an adult, or some way that she connected with the daughters in this.

00:43:33
Speaker 3: Movie outside of that.

00:43:35
Speaker 1: So in a way, to me, this kind of feels how they tried to keep the Halloween franchise going and having some connection to the original movie. I think they should have just moved on made it an entirely new story, because I think they're gonna waste a lot of time in this movie doing that and setting that up. And that is what I got worried about after watching this trailer, which is three minutes long, kind of long for a trailer. I like a two two and a half minute max, just to give me a taste of what to expect in the movie, because when it starts giving you a little bit too much in the trailer, that's when you really got to worry, especially with a horror movie, which for me, for the most part now, I don't like watching an entire horror movie trailer because they always use some of the best parts of the movie in that trailer to hook you in, and then, much like a comedy movie, when they put all the funny parts in the trailer, you go see it in theaters and it's all kind of ruined for you already. I like to go into horror movies really just knowing about the premise, maybe one scene at most, and then I just want to experience all that action, all that scariness in the actual theater. So that's very much the approach I had this week going in to talk to me, and the thing I worry about is the movie has a two hour runtime, and I even feel like in that trailer it kind of lacked on the pace, which was surprising to me that you would put out a trailer that I get bored in. I should not get bored in a three minute trailer. The trailer is just too long. It should have been ninety seconds if that was the case. And you also give a lot of way about the entire story. I almost feel like I just watched the abbreviated movie on YouTube and the entire thing is just gonna feel like a almost watered down story. So there was nothing impressive to me about this trailer, and that is a bummer because I was really excited to see the first look at this movie. I had such high hopes at them bringing back the Exorcist and making it even just the fraction of the amount of terror that is captured in that original movie. I'm not really seeing it right now. Probably my favorite thing in the trailer is Jennifer Nettles, who is getting a lot of really great roles right now. I love her in the Righteous Gemstones on Max and out of anybody in this trailer. For some reason, I'm just drawn to her character being the mom of one of these daughters who gets possessed, so I can't wait to see what her character goes through in this movie. So really, what I'm hoping on is that they saved so much of the actual scariness for the movie, because they do give you a pretty big chunk of it showing what happens with the two daughters there at the end of this trailer, you heard it there and that clip of them making a reference to recognizing the mom from the original movie. But there's just something telling me that they showed so much about what is going to happen, how that final showdown is going to go down, that all of the other elements aren't really going to be that scary, and it's gonna be a very slow burn horror movie, which I just want to avoid at all costs. And maybe it's also because I have a pretty high standard on exorcism movies. My favorite one, hands down is the original one from nineteen seventy three, but also two thousand and fives the Exorcism of Emily Rose, which was the movie in the two thousands that gave me the most vivid nightmares I had ever had, and I feel like that was the last movie to really capture any sort of essence of that original Exorcist movie. Again, that's coming out on October thirteenth. I mean, I'm still good to check it out, but I might not be as happy about it. That was this week's edition of Movie Live Tram or Bar and that's gonna do it for another episode here of the podcast. But before I go, I got to give my listeners shout out of the week. This week, I'm going over to YouTube. If you ever want to just go watch an individual movie review, or you think, oh I wonder if Mike ever talked about this movie, check out my YouTube channel. It's listed in the episode notes, or you can just go to YouTube dot com slash Mike Distro. The full individual movie reviews are up there, or if you just want to watch him instead of listening to him, every single one is up there. And there's also like a little community in the comments too, so if you ever just want to give me your initial reactions to my reviews, that's a great place to post them. So this week I am shouting out from the YouTube comments. Jose Isiza, who commented on my Oppenheimer movie review with just the timestamp of thirteen thirty eight, and that was because he is the one who recognized my Drake and Josh ref friends when I was talking about Josh Peck.

00:48:02
Speaker 3: So maybe if you.

00:48:03
Speaker 1: Missed that, this was the reference that I was doing, and it's spherical, spherical, So you can go watch that review on YouTube if you missed it, and then click on Jose's comment and it will take you right to that part when I do that.

00:48:18
Speaker 3: So thank you for listening.

00:48:19
Speaker 1: Hope you have a great rest of your week, and until next time, go out and watch good movies and I will talk to you later.