Top 5 Portrayals of Musicians in Movies + Movie Review: Elvis + Trailer Park: Clerks 3

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome back to Movie Mix Movie Podcast. I am your host movie Mike. Today I want to share who I think have the top five portrayals of musicians and movies, and just so you know, my number one is not going to be Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash. So if it's not him, who could it be? And then I'll finally get to my movie review of Elvis and talk about Austin Butler portraying Elvis. So I wanted to tie all this into a fun music episode. And then in the trailer Park we'll talk about one of my favorite movies coming back with yet another sequel, but I think this one could be the best out of the entire franchise. That's right, Clerks three is coming from Kevin Smith this September, so shout out to all of the Monday Morning movie crew listening on release day. If you're new to the podcast, welcome. I hope you hit that subscribe button wherever you're listening now and get brand new episodes every single Monday. Follow me on TikTok and Instagram at Mike Destro. Everybody, you already know what this is. Let's talk movies in a world where everyone 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 AUDIENDV which classes from the Nashville Podcast Network. This is movie Movie Podcast. I think we all have a fascination with music biopics. Music is a very personal thing, and when we think about some of the most iconic artists and we think about their lives, if they haven't had a movie about them, you have, we always wonder, how are they going to depict this person. I only think that music biopics can really be done justice when the artist has already passed. I think you have to look at their entire body of work. You have to have the most objective view on their entire life. You also have to include not only the highs of their career and all the cool things they did, but also the lows. What made them human, what made them tick, what made them these complex figures that were able to create this music. Know what it was like for them with those struggles sharing that with the world. So when combining all these factors together, I came up with my top five portrayals of musicians in movies. And I will start a little bit by talking about Austin Butler portraying Elvis, which he just missed out on my top five list. I think he did a really great job. The thing people probably talked about the most with this portrayal was that he didn't look enough like Elvis to some people's liking, and I found that a little bit discouraging. I think when you want to find the right actor to play somebody as iconic as Elvis, you want to find somebody who's really going to do the work and doing the research and finding out all about Elvis's history, learning his mannerisms, learning how to sing like Elvis, and then just trying their best to get down the look. So I more so want to feel like they are doing a good job, like they have the acting capability to portray that character like that far exceeds me wanting to see a splitting image of that musician. I think a lot of that comes through the wardrobe, the makeup, the hair, All of those things can make you resemble an artist. And as long as I'm watching that movie and it feels authentic in that sense, I don't think they have to look exactly like the character, and even looking at a side by side, I think Austin Butler does look like a younger version of Elvis. Of course, not an identical, splitting image, but that combined with him spending so much time getting down the dance moves, actually learning how to sing like Elvis, and having some of his own voice inside of the movie, I think that really played the biggest part for me. And as I was watching that movie, he really helped me feel like I was watching elvis story being told from his perspective. So I think he did a really good job of taking himself out of that movie, dedicating so much of his life to living as Elvis for two plus years, and that really showed in the movie. And also with that, I think his portrayal of Elvis will stand the test of time. And as I get into my list here, I think all of these, except for this first one I'm about to get into here, have already done that. They've been out for over ten years. So I'll get into more about how his character in the entire movie worked for me in Elvis, But now let's get into the rest of this list. At number five, I'm putting Rammy Malick as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rapsody, which came out in the band Queen was before my time, and even growing up, I never really got into their music, but I understood how important it was to rock music pop culture in general, and I always had an infatuation with Freddie Mercury and his singing abilities. I could listen to Queen and know how important that was and know how different he sounded and what that meant to people. But when it came to me identifying with Queen's music, it was never really there. With that being said, I was really excited when this movie came out because Rammy Malick is a really great actor and was able to bear a really close resemblance to Freddie Mercury when it came to the fake prosthetic teeth and just his signature look. And they did a really good job with wardrobe at this entire movie to where it felt like he really did him justice. And I think this one, aside from that, really all comes down to Remy Maleck's acting ability, Like he is just an Oscar worthy actor, whether he's playing Freddie Mercury or whether he's in a James Bond movie. He just has this very captivating thing about him, So I think he was the perfect person to play Freddie Mercury, although I would argue that the original person who was meant to play him a Sasha Barrick Cohen, who's you probably know him as ball At. I really think he would have looked exactly like Freddie Mercury and he would have been great for it. So I was sad to see him not be a part of the project because of issues he had with the band what they wanted to do with the movie. So I also would have liked to see that version of Bohemian Rhapsody. But it's hard to argue with what Rommy did, and he proved that by winning Best Actor at the Oscars the following year after this movie, And this is probably the last movie that I really loved him in. But when it comes to my favorite musical moment in the movie, it has to be that final performance at Live Aid. And throughout the entire movie, you know, Rammy is not actually singing in it. They had somebody else come in and recreate some of Freddie Murgrey's vocals, but when it came to that final performance, they used the actual audio from that live Aid concert, so I think that made it sound a lot more authentic. But what I found so cool about it, which Elvis also did later in this movie, is they were able to cut it pretty much scene for seeing exactly how that whole live event went down, down to the placement of everything on the piano, down to the crowd, which was a pretty cool feat, even though I'm pretty sure a lot of that was c g I. But if you put the two performances side by side, Rommy Malick did such a great job recreating that, which is a really hard thing to do shot for shot, movement for movement while staying in character. So I thought that was put together beautifully and that was my favorite part probably the entire movie. God Against Much Forgot. I think my biggest criticism when that movie came out is the entire story felt very rushed. It went from them being kind of a nobody band to immediately stardom. For me personally, the movie got kind of boring there in the middle, and then it wasn't until the very end where all of this stuff happens that it came back to life and really left on a high note. So I did leave the movie theater feeling like that was actually pretty cool and inspiring, and it made me want to go and listen to Queen and discover their music. We're really the first time after this. But if it wasn't for that ending, it wasn't for the fact that he died and it had that tragic ending, I don't think I would have loved it as much. And the crazy part about that is that Freddie Mercury died twenty four hours after announcing he had aids. He died on November So I just feel like this movie has been in the works for so long before it was made, and they did get into a little bit of the dark side some of the demons he dealt with, But man, I want the grit in a biopic. I don't want those early details to get glossed over. I think that's where some of the great story was and some of the crazy party stories that I know about Queen were nowhere to be seen in this movie. Maybe partly due to the band being so involved in the story and how they were portrayed, Maybe some of that stuff was let in, but if there would have been a little bit more grit to it, I think overall, as a music biopic, I would have liked it a lot more. But I can see and pick apart Remy mall like as Freddie Mercury as being one of the best, so I put that one at number five. At number four from two thousand and four is Jamie Fox is Ray Charles in Ray another case where the lead actor took home the Oscar for Best Actor, And again that all comes down to the dedication that the actor takes in playing the character, which Jamie Fox was super involved in the research process. He learned how to play pianos so it would look more authentic on screen, and you think that he would also learn all the songs and sing them in the movie, because not only is Jamie Fox a great actor, he's also a great singer, a great comedian. He's a triple threat. But the director wanted to use the real recordings of Ray Charles, a lot of old demo stuff, unheard stuff, and then the actual recordings themselves. So you see Jamie FOXX playing in this movie, but what you're actually hearing is Ray Charles voice, which sometimes I like to see an actor who can sing actually do the singing in him movie. I don't think it's necessary in this case. I love the grit and the gravel of Ray Charles's voice and think it adds that much more emotion to the movie and more authenticity. So that worked for me. And when you watch this movie, you can see that the characters themselves are so invested in their characters when they're singing. Even though they are lip syncing, it's very skillful. It's not distracting in any way. What I love about Ray is that it also dives into the darker side of his character. I mean, starting out from the very beginning of the movie of watching his seven year old brother drowned at the age of seven, losing his eyesight at the age of nine, him coming up through the Seattle jazz scene, and then it gets into, you know, his struggles with drug addiction and fidelity, his womanizing, like all of that is in this movie, and it was all things that I had no idea about. And my favorite musical moment in this movie is one that I really liked the contrast in and there's a scene where she tells them that he's pregnant and he tells her taket rid of it, and it's a very just raw seeing raw emotion, and it goes from him dealing with something as serious as that that would probably shatter anybody else's world. But the fact that he's sitting there at his piano trying to work out a song, he really is able in the movie just to put that to the side and just continue working on the song. And the song he happens to be working on is Hit the Road Jack, having this argument, her being so angry at him, and then taking that anger into helping him with the song and write it. I just thought that was a really powerful moment. Don't come back, No mo, No, don't you come back? No Mo? Hit the road to come back? No mon, hit the Road, Jack, don't come back. So yeah, Jimmie Fox did a great job at pulling that emotion out, and he also took it a step further of putting prosthetics on his eyes so he couldn't see while they were filming, went twelve hour days with no vision to get further into that character. At some point even forgot that he could actually see. And this movie was actually made while Ray Charles was still alive. They said he was able to experience the movie before he passed away. I believe they provided a verbal audio track that provides some description of what's going on with the movie. And he passed away on June tenth, two thousand and four, and the movie came out on October two thousand and four. So I feel like the timing of that is a little bit eerie to know there's a movie coming out about you, you're able to experience it, and then you pass away and don't really get to see you being celebrated again, seeing your music sales go up again. It's just crazy how that all kind of time. Now. Ray Charles passed away from liver failure on June tenth, it was after filming ended. So with that at number four, I put Jamie Fox as Ray Charles in Ray. At number three, I'm going with Jennifer Lopez as Selena in the movie Selena, which came out in nineteen seven. This movie had a big effect on me as a kid. Selena died at the age of twenty three. She was shot by the former manager of a boutiques and fan club, Yolanda Saliva, And this was maybe one of my earliest memories as a kid. I was four years old and I remember vaguely watching it on the news and my parents being sad, my entire family being sad because Selena was such an icon for Mexican Americans. And I remember getting a T shirt with her face on it, and I didn't really know what death meant at the time. I didn't really know what everybody was sad, but I remember everybody listening to her music. And then here, just a couple of years later, this movie comes out, and I really feel this movie and Jennifer Lopez as Selena is the reason her legacy has lived on for so long. I think if it wasn't for this movie telling her entire life story and exposing her music to, you know, the generation that would come after her, not knowing her when she was alive, and really Jennifer Lopez being the vision that we had of Selena, that is who I picture when I think of Selena first, I think of Jennifer Lopez before I think of Selena Condonia, because I just remember watching this movie so much and just greatly associating Jennifer Lopez's face with her music. Even when I hear it now, I think of Jennifer Lopez, so I feel like she already looks so much like her and It was also that Selena had so many iconic wardrobe pieces, and when you put your character in that wardrobe already striking a resemblance to her, it's gonna feel like she has come back to life in this movie. And not only that, Jennifer Lopez is already a musician, already a performer, so she was able to nail sele as Cadence on stage, so there's really no one else that could have played this part. My favorite musical moment out of the entire movie had to be when Selena went to make to play a concert at the concert started getting pretty rowdy to where people were getting crushed at the front gate and they were telling her, you gotta get off the stage. It's about a collapse, and she is able to come back out on stage and single Mala Floord totally slow it down, calm down the entire crowd which is about to erupt into a riot, and through this song, everybody stops the pushing and just listens to her sing. I think, aside from Jennifer Lopez in the movie, aside from the music, this movie also really resonated with me of portraying what it's like to be Mexican American, and I think, above all the other themes in this movie, all the other aspects, that is kind of what I always take away from it. This was the first movie to do that, and maybe since really the only one to get it down of showing the struggle to need to feel and be American when you're here in America, but then you going back to Mexico, if you don't speak Spanish, they look down on you. So I was always glad they included that part in this movie. And then it also just has one of my favorite quotes that I say from time to time because I also love punk rock and found the scene where her boyfriend at the time, Chris and his other rambunctious rock star friends trash a hotel room were not so. At number three, I with Jennifer Lopez Selena in Selena from At number two, I'm putting Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash in Walk the Line from two thousand and five, and I'm also going to include Reese Witherspoon as June Carter Cash. I feel like she gets left out of the conversation a lot because they both did really great jobs in singing in this movie and having so much great on screen chemistry and really doing the story of Johnny Cash. Justice debatable on how much Joaquin Phoenix looks like Johnny Cash. I think if you were just going out in public and randomly bumped into him, you would never think, oh, you bear a striking resemblance to Johnny Cash. But when you put them in all black, you slick the hair bag and then do a black and white side by side, you're like, yeah, you kind of do look like Johnny Cash. But more important than that, I think he really got a stage presence down, and that's probably the most important thing out of this entire movie. Stage presence and just the way he talked and how you know, Johnny Cash wasn't a big exuberant character like an Elvis. He had this somber tone always, and I think Joaquin Phoenix was the perfect one to really be able to dig in and bring that out in Johnny Cash and the moment I knew that this movie was going to be great, And my favorite musical moment and the entire movie is when he first goes in his very first audition with Sam Phillips at Sun Records. And I often think about the scene because I work in country music, and we have a lot of new artists come by the radio station for interviews and performances. And when I see a new artist, I always want them to bring like their very best song, like the song that they would just want everybody to hear and feel like this song represents me. And it always takes me back to this scene and what Sam Phillips told him after he played After Johnny Cash played a gospel song, he thought that was the song that defined him, that was the song that was going to get him a record deal. And Sam Phillips was like, really, like, this is what you bring to me, Like, this is what you want to say. One song, one song people would remember before you're dirt, one song that would let God know what you felt about your time here on earth, one song that would sum you up. You're telling me that's the song you'd sing. So that's what I go back to you, like, what's the one song you would sing? Like you had one song left, somebody could either buy a sandwich or buy that song. What song would you play? And I think sometimes that would change a new artist's perspective. Maybe they play a better song, Maybe they go back to the drawing board and think of, you know what, I'm not really saying anything in this song, because in that moment, Johnny Cash realized, well, I was just playing that because I thought that's what I should be playing, Like, that's what I've been playing. That's you didn't let me bring it home. But then he digs deep and I don't know if it is actually how it happened in your life, but he's like, all right, you want a song that's more me? How about the song I wrote while I was in the military. I hear the train of coming, it's rolling around the bend and nine seeing the sunshion. I don't know him. I'm stuck in fulsome prison and time keeps dragon on, but the train keeps a rule and on down to the sun tone. So I felt like that really just defined the entire movie. And from there his performance is Johnny Cash only got better, and then you throw in Reese Witherspoon and in real life, June Carter Cash passed away on May fift thousand and three, and Johnny Cash followed soon after on September twelve, two thousand and three. Sadly, they both did not get a chance to see the movie since it came out two thousand and five. They had died two years before, but before their desk, they did know that this movie was being made about them. They did know that what Keen Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon were going to play them. They'd worked with the director on the script, so they were aware of the movie involved in the movie. Gave their blessing to the movie, But sadly we're not able to see it. But at number one, did you really think I would pick anybody over? My favorite portrayal ever? My favorite music bio pick is La Bamba, and I'm going with Lou and Diamond Phillips as Ritchie Vallens from nineteen eighties seven. This movie became the blueprint for me on what I expect out of a music biopick. I want the story of the artists. I want the music in there, but I need something else to grab onto. And while La Bamba shows Richie Vallens rise to fame and Lou Diamond Phillips portraying him and bringing life to a character that you know, there aren't even that many video clips of him out there, not really a whole lot of performances or music videos, mainly because his career was cut so short, and he died at seventeen years old, quickly after his rise to fame. There wasn't a whole lot to work with here, and really kind of along the same lines as Selena, how I know and picture Richie Vallens is through lou Diamond Phillips in this movie, but again it shows his rise to fame, how much of an impact quickly his music had. But at the core of La Bamba, it is a story about two brothers. It's Richie Valens and his brother Bob, their struggles early on with their parents, of Richie kind of always being the favorite one, being the one who had his stuff a little bit more together, and Bob seen as the kind of the screw up, the reckless one, the one always in trouble, and how Bob struggled with that, and it was their relationship that was really the driving force of this entire movie and what really makes his death's so more impactful at the end because they are able to, you know, have their struggles, have their fights, and come to a point they're ready to reconcile, and then Richie Ballens gets taken away. So you have that story of brothers and then you also have the story of a mom losing your son, and then you throw in the love story of him and Donna, which brings me to my favorite musical moment of the entire movie is shortly after he gets his record deal, he cuts his first single and then he has this song Donna, that he's been working on to, you know, profess his love for her at a time where they couldn't be boyfriend and girlfriend. And then he got super popular and he was able to convince her he didn't want all those other girls, he wanted her. Writes and records this song, and it's a bit of a music montage of his rise to start him since she left me? Does love Donna? Can you be? So that's just hands down my favorite. You can argue with me, and you probably will, and you're probably wondering, where are these other ones that didn't make the list. I'll do some honorable mentions now. One that almost made my list was Jason Mitchell as Easy and Straight out of Compton. I think when it comes to music biopics, straight out of Compton often gets overlooked, and I feel like that movie is not only the story of all their lives, but It's a really good depiction of what America was like in the eighties, the social issues that we're going on, and how n w A and their music was so impactful on that. And Easy Ease also feels like this mythical character that I also don't know a whole lot about, so it was cool to see his story be told and somebody really bring his character to life. And of course I have to include O'Shea Jackson, who played his dad in the movie. His dad is ice Cube, literally was born to play this part, looked exactly like him, just where out he was around the same age when they you know, we're making this movie. And O'Shea Jackson actually tweeted me in response to this question. So this is all the more reason to follow me on Twitter at Mike Destro because I always tweet out the question for the topic that week. And I don't know how he saw this tweet. I don't know if I got pushed to his feed for some reason because of it being musical adaptation where he searches this thing out on Twitter. But he replied to simply me with this gift of this goat, saying may and then even quote retweeted it with a Ricky Bobby gift. He also surprisingly followed me. So now it's our mission to get him on the podcast. So if you would like to hear O'Shea Jackson come on and defend his claim, go reply to the tweet. You can find it on my Twitter at Mike Distro and say you gotta go be a movie mis movie podcast. I thought that movie was great, should have got more attention. Even though I loved Buddy Holly being concluded in La Bamba, I think I wouldn't be doing this list justice if I didn't include Gary Busey as Buddy Holly in The Buddy Holly Story without a doubt, probably Gary Busey's best role that he's ever done. When I asked a question online, a lot of people said Angela Bassett as Tina Turner and what's love got to do with It? I think that is a great one. Also, Val Kilmer as Jim Morrison in The Doors movie, Sissy Space as Laretta Lynn and coal Miner's daughter. And another one that a lot of people sit in that I'll tell you I didn't really like was Taron Egerton as Elton John in Rocketman, even though I thought he was a good Elton John. I didn't love that movie, and I think it was me struggling with the idea of a movie like that being made while Elton John is still alive. I feel like the story is a little bit incomplete and just be a little bit self serving to me. Some of you online also said Chadwick Boseman as James Brown and get on up what should be an injustice not to include? And then of course a lot of people said Austin Butler as Elvis in the movie Elvis, and I probably would have ranked that one a little bit higher, but I do feel like that came out so recently. I don't want to have that bias of just being fresh off of that movie and look back in five years and like, well, it wasn't really Top five Worthies. So I'll get into more what I thought about Elvis after this. Let's get into a movie review now, spoiler free, although I don't really think you could spoil this movie, but I won't. But let's talk about Elvis. I've been wanting to do this review for a while now. I kind of wanted to give myself a little bit of time of separation because I love this movie. So much more than I was expecting to, and when I was going to rank it among all my other favorite music biopics, I didn't want to come off fresh from watching this movie, but like that's my favorite. It's my favorite, And I think why I enjoyed it so much is because it wasn't your straight ahead biopic, and I probably credit that a lot to the director bos Lerman, who this is the kind of movie he makes. He makes big theatrical pieces, whether it's movies he's made like The Great Gatsby or Movelan Rouge, they're very cinematic, they're very elaborate. They he really focuses in on the music, combining combining sounds that would be out around the time the movie is set in, but also combining it with modern day music, which we saw in this Elvis movie. So I felt all those things combined gave it a different feel. And right from the beginning of the movie, I felt like I was watching a Christmas movie. I felt like I was watching a fairy tale, and I found that really entertaining. With Tom Hanks narrating the entire movie as Colonel Tom Parker, and from the very beginning of the movie, he's talking about how he was accused of being the one to kill Elvis, and then the entire movie plays out of him trying to defend his claim of he's not the one responsible. And it also just provided an entirely different dynamic between Elvis and Colonel Tom Parker. What you don't normally get in a music biopic is a villain. Most times, the artist themselves is the actual protagonist and antagonist because of all the things they have going on in their life. Usually they're the ones keeping themselves down. Maybe it's a record company, but usually that's where you find an antagonist and protagonist in a normal biopic. In Elvis, you get a villain, Colonel Tom Parker. So it's almost not so much about the rise and struggles of Elvis and his entire career. I think at the root of this entire movie, it's about their relationship, him screwing over Elvis, him manipulating Elvis, which I found the most entertaining thing out of the entire movie. Really sad when you think about it, and some of the scenes in this movie just really make you hate him, which was an interesting thing to watch a movie where you're not rooting for Tom Hanks, but I like that different emotion enemy when going into watching a Tom Hanks movie, and that's what the entire movie follows. You get his early career, you get him as a kid and how he kind of grew up around this music, where he was influenced, who he was friends with. I really like that they included that of him going to Memphis and going into those clubs, even when he was already a superstar, to go meet with his friends BB King, Little Richard and be inspired by those guys. I thought that was a really important thing to include in the entire Elvis story because oftentimes that doesn't get talked about. And it also focused on the struggles during that time, the social issues of Elvis rising to fame and people hitting him for different reasons. It also told a bit of the dark side of his story, probably not fully as I was expecting, which was what I was going to be the most curious and maybe critical about if they didn't get into the darker side of his character. Not saying they covered every single thing, but I like that they did at least address some of it, being with a relationship with his wife and then also later in his career. You know, taking drugs. The movie also really helped me kind of lay a timeline to his entire career. I'm a fan of the music from the fifties. I'm really in to do up if he didn't know, I like, you know, groups like the Drifters, the Platters, Frankie Lyman, Little Anthony and the Imperials, the Sharell's, like all those kinds of things. I gravitate towards, you know, listening to music from the fifties, and I love movies said in that time period. And this movie was really able to help me place Elvis into that which he was just such a huge icon throughout his entire career that it kind of helped me place to where his career was at its height, where he started to fall, where he did all his movies, and then where he started to come back on the rise before he died. So while this wasn't your straight ahead music biopic, it did provide me at least with a bit of a history lesson and kind of a refresher. Before this, I think my biggest exposure to knowledge of Elvis, who was probably Uncle Jesse and full House and later Leelo and Stitches. Love for Elvis and I always just knew when you thought of Vegas. When you go to Vegas, you think of Elvis, you think of impersonators, think of wedding chapels where it's a you know, a guy is dressed as Elvis. And this movie really helped to explain where that comes from. And I found that fascinating. I think above all, it just really made Elvis seemed like a much more complex individual than I really ever imagined, like he cared about what was going on in the world, what his music was doing to affect the world, and how he could not just be this musical icon but also use this platform when he had something to say. And then it just also shows you how awful his manager was to him, how he manipulated him, and how even though Elvis is one of the biggest things to ever happen in America and in the world, he could have been a lot bigger. So I really enjoyed this movie. I think some people may have a bit of an issue with it having that kind of fairy tale theatrical feel to it, even with some of the music. It does have all the classic Elvis songs. I feel like, maybe more in the beginning of the movie. It had more of that walk the line type vibe, and then it kind of got bigger and bigger as the movie went along. I felt like it also drew a lot from Bohemian Rhapsody and some of the styling. But I, for one, like the use of some modern songs in there, like the Doja cad in there to where with your eyes you know you're watching something set in the fifties, but then you have like these hip hop drums in the background, or later you have Casey Musgrave singing. I just found it made the movie that much more unique. So I love that stylistic choice, and I also love the fact that this movie had so many people in the theater that maybe haven't been to a movie in a very long time. The line was packed to get into this movie, which was a rare thing for me to see, and I think it's one that really greatly benefited from being seen on a big screen. And it is at a boast full two hours and almost forty minutes. I think that first hour flew by the second hour felt just as fast to me. But if you have a problem with longer movies, I feel like right around that two hour mark, you'll probably start itching a little bit, wanting to get to be wrapped up. So if you just don't like longer movies, you could probably wait a little bit longer and watch this one at home. But I think the scale of it just benefits so much from being seen on a big screen. And the movie also just crossed the hundred million dollar mark at the box office here in the United States, which is rare for a modern day non franchise movie. This is in a sequel, this isn't part of a whole series that's going to be made, so it making a hundred million dollars is a pretty big deal. It also came out during a time that was pretty competitive at the box office. The only other movie this year in that same category of being a modern non franchise movie was The Lost City, which also crossed the hundred million dollar mark. So I feel like that's also a pretty big win for this movie. And I think this movie will stand the test of time. I'm already ranking You Get Up There is one of my favorite music biopics. I thought Austin Butler did a really great job as Elvis. I think we'll look back on his performance in ten years and see him as one of the best. So I give Elvis four point five out of five jumpsuits. If you haven't seen it yet and you're looking for something to see on the big screen, definitely go see Elvis, whether you're a fan of his music or not. I don't even consider myself that much of an Elvis fan, but I just found this story fascinating. It's time to head down to movie Mike today. I want to talk about a movie I'm very excited to see part of my I would say one of my favorite comedic franchises, from one of my favorite comedic directors, in part of one of my favorite movie universes that I think people don't give enough credit to then it deserves. And the movie is Clerks three, directed by the one and only Kevin Smith. It's coming out pretty soon on September, and you have all the old characters from Clerks one and Clerks to coming back, and the movie is about the main character, Randall, suffers a heart attack, comes back from it with a new lease on life, and decides to make a movie because his entire life he's loved movies. He's been talking about movies and now is deciding to finally put his money where his mouth is and finally make a movie. So before I get into more about this movie, here's just a little bit of the Clerks three trailer. I'm living on borrowed time, no more watching movies. I'm gonna make your movie. What's the movie going to be about? It's about him working here met up. Everything in the script is something either me or someone I know said, I'm not even supposed to be here today. Maybe Jane Silent Bob could be characters Jay and Silent Bob or like see three po in art two d do. They've been here since the first movie, which was the last time they were cool, But they've been with the franchise so long they still give them cameos and put them on the lunch boxes. I just find this kind of humor is so funny. In the movie, you have all your favorite characters back randall of course, Dante Aliah's Jay and Silent Bob. You have Kevin Smith's old friend Ben Affleck making a cameo in this movie playing an entirely new character. And Kevin Smith wrote, produced, directed, and edited this movie. This is all Kevin Smith, and this will be a sequel to the movie A sequel to the two thousand and six movie and the ninth overall movie in the view Eskew universe, which is all of the Kevin Smith movies, so movies like Mall Rats, Jay and Silent Bob, Strike Back, Chasing Amy Dog, mall all those movies. But Clerks is the one that's been the ongoing franchise, and this is a movie I've been wanting to see be made for a very long time. Clerks one in nineteen four is the movie that put Kevin Smith on the map. Was very well received even though it didn't make a lot of money. He put his entire really everything into that movie, maxed out credit cards to get that movie made, and has been able to create a really awesome career by doing things he is passionate about. He's been able to work with some of the biggest actors of all time and is one of my favorite directors because he's a big nerd. He's a guy who loves making movies for people who love movies, and he also just includes his character's love for movies or some kind of filmmaking element into every single one of his movies, whether it be with Jane Simon, Bob who did movies like, oh, this is the big studio movie, this is the reboot movie. And then in Clerks one and two, his characters just talk and criticize and make fun of different kinds of movies. And he's saying that Clerks three will serve as the indie movie and is really putting his own life into Randall's story here of making an independent movie. And in a way, it's the telling of the filming of Clerks. And out of the other two Clerks movies, Clerks Too was my favorite. I thought having the real budget really attributed to making that movie look a lot better. I thought that jokes in that movie are funny. It's also still the test of time as I go back and watch that movie and still enjoy it. You have Rosario Dawson added to that cast, and she'll be coming back in Clerks three. And growing up, these were just movies that I watched and looked forward to coming out every single time. And I think it was because they always had this feeling of I knew my parents didn't want me to watch this type of movie because of the language, because some of the content, because some of the jokes. But I just found this stuff so hilarious that there's a type of movies that if I was a director, if I was a writer, these are the kind of movies I would make. And I think that's why Kevin Smith has been so successful is his style just speaks to people like me. He's also just a very loyal guy of casting all the same people actors that you don't really see in any other type of movie and maybe wouldn't have had a career if it wasn't for him being friends with them and putting him in his movies. So that aspect to makes me love these movies even more. And it's like going back and watching some of your old friends because these characters have been around so long. Jane, Silent Bob, I feel, are some of the most important characters to come out of movies since I've been alive. Even though you've maybe never seen a Clerk's movie, maybe you've never seen a Jay and Silent Bob movie. You just know those characters from pop culture. And if there's one on screen character that I relate with the most, it has to be Silent Bob because in my personal life, I don't talk a whole lot, especially in social situations, but every now and then I say, like one important line that people remember like that is me and a character. I am Silent Bob from Jay and Silent Bob. I think my favorite movie he's ever done, aside from the Clerks movies as Mallrats. I just think that's a perfect nineties comedy. And although I didn't love the latest installment of Jay and Silent Bob, the reboot, it was good, not what I was expecting, but I think this one has the potential to be the strongest in the franchise of Clerks. So again, that is coming out on septembo. I will be checking that out for sure that opening weekend. This makes edition and that's gonna do it for another episode here of the podcast. Before I hop out of here, I gotta do what I do every single week, give my listener shout out of the week. How do you get a listener shout out of the week? All you have to do is tweet me at Mike Distro, send me a d M on Instagram, or if you're at to send an email, you can hit me up at movie Mike d at gmail dot com. I just want to say thank you to everybody who commented with the alien emoji, which was the secret emoji on the Chris Sanders interview last week. I think without a doubt that has been the interview I've done that's just had the biggest response. So it really was cool to go and read all those comments. I tried to reply to everybody, tried to like them all. So, first of all, just shout out to everybody who listened to that episode who commented. If you missed that episode, I did talk to the creative year of Lelo and Stitch, and he's the voice of Stitch on last week's episode, So just go back one in the feed and check that episode out if you missed it. So the shout out is to all those comments, but I'll give one person a specific shout out, and it is ce Trout on Instagram, who commented such a wonderful episode. I've already shared it with friends. That would meant a lot to me, because not only did you listen to the episode, but you thought this was so interesting that you felt the need to share it with a friend, which as a podcaster helps me out immensely. Of sharing it with somebody who's never listened to this podcast, maybe they check that episode out and then subscribe, maybe eventually tell another friend about it, and we're able to have more people here part of the movie crew, listening every single week and being a part of this. So it's also not too late to do that. Go back and share that episode with a friend. That's definitely taking it up a level. But thanks everybody for listening this week. I'll be back next week to talk about book movie adaptations after watching Where the Cry Dad Sing. And until then, go out and watch good movies and I'll talk to you later. M h.