The Odyssey

7:39David Sims:You know what's so cool about the Odyssey is I wouldn't be surprised if all of us had a different favorite section of the movie. Okay, let's go around. Let's do this. Let's go around the horn. David, favorite section.

7:52Griffin Newman:I think Marie and I have the same favorite section, though.

7:54David Sims:Well, I have two favorite sections. Oh, I know.

7:56Griffin Newman:My favorite section is certainly Cersei and the pigs.

7:58David Sims:Yes, Cersei was a big standout for me, but I also was really, really moved by the flashback to... Odysseus' experience of carnage in Troy.

8:16Griffin Newman:Oh, sure. That was very, yes. I was very impressed by the narrative thing he was doing in the third act. Certainly, yes. That is fair. Ben? Okay, I'm gonna attempt to say the name of these people and I'm sure I'm gonna butcher it. The Last Dragonians. The big guys. The big fucking crazy knights. You like a big guy. Oh my God, it was so sick. Yeah. Yes.

8:43David Sims:And that was crazy when it was like, who's that man? And then it turns around and it's a giant kid. Sure. And he's laughing. Well, that was great. It's weird that Ben liked the sequence with the taunting child and the giant brute army. And I liked the sequence with the emotionally wounded monster. Just in a fetal position in a cave. Played by one of America's finest clowns. I didn't know it was Bill Irwin until after the fact. Yeah, I had to tell you. It's such a good performance. Very cool. This is Blank Check with Griffin and David. It's a podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers, such as making a Bartman movie, and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want.

9:25David Sims:Those checks have not run out for one Christopher Nolan. They keep getting bigger. He has been on an uninterrupted run of checks being handed to him for now 21 years. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. What are we counting as the...

9:42Griffin Newman:Batman Begins, right?

9:43David Sims:That was 21 years ago?

9:45Griffin Newman:Yeah, it was, 2005. That's what's crazy.

9:47David Sims:Oh, my God. I was but 19, maybe 20 years old, yeah. You could say that Batman Begins was the guarantor, but I think the circumstances around Batman were so weird at that point in time that they basically gave him a blank check because they were like, we got no better ideas.

10:00Griffin Newman:But we already said this with him. He constantly has guarantors. He said about this movie, like, this is my biggest budget movie ever and it's because Oppenheimer did so well. Like it's like it keeps everything.

10:12David Sims:But you don't get to make a movie like Oppenheimer at Oppenheimer's budget without that being a bit of a blank check as well. Of course. So it's like, I have no idea what he does from here. He can do whatever he wants. I don't either. I think he has to go smaller and I think he's even sort of talking about that now. But we covered him many years ago. His success has only grown since we covered him. At the time, he already was arguably the filmmaker of his generation. And with every successive film, he has only become more and more important. And now he's making what feels like the biggest movie you could possibly imagine.

10:48Griffin Newman:Yeah, sure.

10:49David Sims:I mean, we had this conversation after Oppenheimer, all of us. We were just like, the fuck does he do next? When Oppenheimer, which on paper was a one for me, makes nearly a billion dollars and wins every Oscar. and performs as high as most of his films have ever achieved, then what is there even left for this guy to cash in? And there were all the rumors that he was doing Blue Thunder. That's made up. Is that the helicopter cop movie? Those are code word things. Oh, is he doing a horror movie? Is he doing a this?

11:22Griffin Newman:He has said he wants to figure out a horror movie, which is interesting.

11:28David Sims:But do you remember we were all in the office together? I can't remember what episode we had just recorded or were about to record. And I went, holy shit. And I showed you there was a tweet and it was Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey filmed entirely in IMAX coming summer 2026. Right. It was just all at once. Suddenly the announcement was out there. We had known the cast. The cast had been started, been growing, had been pinned to the board, but we didn't know what it was. And then we just went, holy shit, of course he had to do this. It was either The Odyssey or the Bible. It was the only move for him to do next.

12:02Griffin Newman:As he's pointed out, there's no Hollywood version of the Odyssey ever. That's what's wild. He's like, it's like a weird gap. And that's why it had to be this. No one had ever tried this. Obviously, there were a couple sort of Italian versions. Well, there was the Amandasante. That's a TV movie.

12:20David Sims:I tried watching that on YouTube last night. I turned it off after 30 seconds.

12:23Griffin Newman:Do you want to see what the Cyclops looks like in it? Yes. Someone posted it to my work slack.

12:27David Sims:Oh. You know, he looks kind of good. He looks like a big baby. Let me see this guy. I like this. I like this guy a lot. He looks pretty good. That's some Griffin shit right there.

12:36Griffin Newman:It's a little bit dinosaurs vibe, you know? Yeah. A little early Holland there. Did the Jim Henson Creature Shop work on this at all? I mean, one assumes, right? I mean, let's find out.

12:47David Sims:They did a lot of those TV movies. I was going to say, that was how they kept the lights on, right? Exactly. There's like the Ted Danson Gulliver's Travels around that time. Oh, that was huge. Remember the Ted Danson Gulliver's Travels? Well, he was huge. Remember how big he was? He was big.

13:01Griffin Newman:He was. And you know what, Griffin?

13:02David Sims:And the Lilliputians were small.

13:03Griffin Newman:I can confirm for you that the creature effects for this miniseries were provided by Jim Henson's Creature Shop. They had a talking animatronic pig roasting on a spit. That's cool. Love that. They had a rod puppet sea slug sea monster. And they had, you know, a psychos. Well, maybe I'll try.

13:21David Sims:I'll give it another shot, but I'll just fast forward to all the cool. To the puppet stuff. Puppet stuff. last night for research I was like I want to watch some stuff to like get me in the the Odyssey mood again because we saw the movie what like three days ago uh so I watched the episode of Arthur where DW retells the Odyssey yes uh and I watched the episode of Wishbone I was gonna say Wishbone must have spun that tale but it's very interesting because okay in the Arthur version with DW, there's none of the, like, what's happening back at Ithaca stuff. It's just DW on a boat encountering monsters.

14:01David Sims:Uh, sure. And then in the Wishbone version, barely any of the monsters. It's all back at Ithaca.

14:07Griffin Newman:Well, I really hope Christopher Nolan's listening right now as we talk about this. Um...

14:11David Sims:I just think it's crazy that children's media used to do this shit. It's the first story. Well, yeah, well, they, you know,

14:17Griffin Newman:they still do it. I'm sure Gabby's Tall House has done an Odyssey episode.

14:21David Sims:Because Gabby's Tall House

14:21Griffin Newman:She found a new room in her dollhouse. I'm not sure. I'm not sure if she's gotten there yet. I just have to read this review for the 1997 miniseries that's cited on Wikipedia because it's such a good burn by Richard Nilsson of the Arizona Republic. Even though the made-for-TV movie is only four hours long, I wasted a fifth hour stewing over how god-awful it was. That's pretty good. He's saying this shit was so bad. It ate into further time in my life.

14:50David Sims:It ruined an additional hour of my life That miniseries had its own controversy at the time Because they cast Baby Sinclair to play Helen of Troy Because they had him kicking around the creature shop And people got really upset

15:03Griffin Newman:And that's a Muppets reference? Not the mama That's the dinosaur I didn't know his name was Baby Sinclair

15:10David Sims:You didn't know his name was Baby Sinclair? I think he's handsome But people thought he didn't have a face that would launch a thousand trips That was the argument I think he's handsome

15:17Griffin Newman:He's iconic

15:18David Sims:I mean, I don't know if I would call him handsome but like everyone knows the baby. He is literally the moment.

15:25Griffin Newman:You think he's currently the moment right now?

15:28David Sims:I think baby Sinclair has never been more relevant as proven by how quickly all three of you understood the joke I was making. I didn't like the joke, but... I just forgot that they're called the Sinclairs.

15:38Griffin Newman:Why are they called the Sinclairs?

15:39David Sims:Because they're just a normal family.

15:41Griffin Newman:But they should have had like a pun name. I agree.

15:44David Sims:You know? Wait, isn't there like a Sinclair oil or like a gas station called Sinclair with a dinosaur on it? Oh, I think you're right. That sounds a little, that sounds like a stretch though. No, see, look, Sinclair Oil Corporation. Fossil fuel. Yeah, the name is a reference to Sinclair.

15:59Griffin Newman:Okay. This is funny. This is really good. It's a really good show. I am so smart. That's too sophisticated. Okay. Let's talk about. The Odyssey. The Odyssey and our screening experiences.

16:10David Sims:So. Okay, great. We have three different screening experiences. Three different experiences. Three different experiences. Three different major cities. Three cities. Wow. Much like the Odyssey, the movie, this is an episode that spans multiple countries, multiple cities, multiple formats, multiple formats.

16:28Griffin Newman:Because, yes. OK, so. All right. Well, Marie and I saw it at the AMC IMAX Lincoln Square. 70 millimeter IMAX, 70 millimeter IMAX, where I guess you can't get like a seat at like the 3 a.m. screenings in August right now. Like it's like right sold out for the rest of time.

16:45David Sims:We are checking our privilege. It was, I feel, enormously blessed to have had the opportunity to not only see this film in the, you know, the director preferred format.

16:58Griffin Newman:Big old theater.

16:58David Sims:But also in the best seat in the house.

17:01Griffin Newman:Of course. We had my favorite seats in the back of the house, near the secret bathroom.

17:05David Sims:Yes, which I really took advantage of. This is on the IMAX screen. Yes, on the IMAX screen. Okay.

17:10Griffin Newman:But it was 70, and you know, the picture, There were little spots and pops. Yeah, I liked that. It was very cool. I liked the texture. Exactly. I liked the imperfections. Now, Ben, where did you see this film? I was in Chicago. The Windy City! Visiting. And I went to an AMC theater in downtown Chicago and saw this film in 70 millimeter. And at that theater, there's no ketchup, and it's like a giardiniera, right? and a big pickle in your popcorn. He's talking about hot dogs. I'm doing a Chicago bit. Yeah, and there was celery salt. You saw inside the bean, right? I did, and the perspective was a little weird.

17:52Griffin Newman:Right, right. The picture was a little weird.

17:55David Sims:What's the deep dish version of a movie theater? Is it that the chairs are behind the screen?

18:00Griffin Newman:It's like the whole theater is kind of like a conversation pit.

18:03David Sims:Yeah. But it just goes way down. It's pretty funny. Or maybe it's like Ben's original pitch of the underwater upside-down movie theater. Right, right.

18:13Griffin Newman:That would be good, especially for that. Anyway, okay. So, yeah, you were in Chicago. Chicago. And so you went to a press screening there. Yes. And unfortunately, IMAX not available. They don't have an IMAX in Chicago.

18:26David Sims:I just learned this today. I am shocked. That's pretty wild.

18:29Griffin Newman:Yeah. For such a major market. Or I guess if they do have one, they don't do press screenings there. I don't really know.

18:36David Sims:Do you know what format you saw, Ben? Was it 35? Was it a digital? You saw it in 70? Okay, so you saw it in a gentleman's 70.

18:42Griffin Newman:gentlemen 70 obviously most people around this country will not be able to see the film in like fancy fancy IMAX obviously there's you know digital IMAX out there and there's 70 out there there's a lot of formats I'm going to see it on

18:54David Sims:35 on Saturday where

18:56Griffin Newman:Nighthawk wow crazy

18:58David Sims:I saw I think the number is there's somewhere between 40 and 50 screens on the planet that show it in the kind of complete preferred Nolan format now I I have been in Spain filming. Griffin's in Spain. In the entire country of Spain, there are only two iMac screens, both of which are digital. Wow. I had purchased tickets for one of them at midnight. So I was going to see this movie at midnight on Thursday, record with you guys the next day. And then my buddy, let's say friend of the podcast, he came through in a major way here, Sam Clements, who works for the Picturehouse chain in the UK, the great movie theater chain.

19:38David Sims:I was texting with him and he said, I might be able to get you into the press event, which was at the BFI South Bank IMAX. The big, big fancy theater in Waterloo.

19:47Griffin Newman:Very, very large.

19:48David Sims:One of the biggest IMAX screens.

19:49Griffin Newman:Yeah.

19:50David Sims:And he pulled off a miracle. His buddy David at Organic Publicity got me in. I had a handful of days off from filming. I, in fact, have more than a handful of days off from filming. Yeah, it seems like you're barely filming. Are you doing any work? A little bit. A little bit. I've been doing a lot of siesta-ing. But a little bit of work. a little touch of work on the side, a kind of pinchos amount of work, just small tapas work. How many other phrases can I appropriate here? But I got to see it at the South Bank in 70 IMAX, which was quite a treat. It's a fucking big-ass movie. It really is. And this is, Nolan's been working on this project for a decade of how much more, more than a decade, almost 20 years now, because I guess it starts with Dark Knight 18 years ago of how much IMAX can I get into a commercial release film.

20:42David Sims:And this is the first movie where he's gotten it up to 100%, right? Every single shot in this movie. I gotta say, this movie's epic. It is quite epic. Pretty epic. And I think regardless of what format you see it in, the actual fidelity of the image that has been captured is pretty fucking astonishing. Yeah. David Ehrlich, friend of the pod, friend of my life, was at the same screening as us seeing the movie for the second time. He saw it in IMAX for the first time and then for the second screening he saw it in 70. And he said he preferred it in 70 which we were like, hmm, interesting. We think you're just making stuff up.

21:23Griffin Newman:You know, the first screening of a movie like this where it's all hyped, you're so like, you know, buzzed up watching it and it's hard to concentrate even. You know, the second screening you can focus more at what he's doing. Maybe that was part of it. And if he's listening right now, he should throw a wallet at himself. Yeah, he should actually. Yeah, that's right.

21:39David Sims:I'll say this. We've all seen it one time. We've been fortunate enough to see it one time before release in order to get this episode out quickly. I don't think I had any like adjustment to how high my expectations were or the hype. I felt pretty settled into meeting the movie where it was at. It does feel like a lot of movie to absorb on one viewing. Yes. I feel like I'm struggling even two days later to get my head around some of it. I think the movie's excellent.

22:05Griffin Newman:I'm strong as hell.

22:07David Sims:Strong. You're strong as hell. Yeah. You feel like you got a complete take.

22:10Griffin Newman:He was saying before we started taping, he's got the names locked down.

22:15David Sims:Yeah. He's got the names? I was saying, I'm not going to remember all of the names. Okay. And he was like, don't worry about it. We're just going to say the actor's names. And I was like, okay. John Leguizamo. Can I say he's my MVP in this movie? Well, of course he is, Griffin. Of course he's your MVP. He's the Krumholtz of this film, right? He's the Krumholtz of the movie. I personally, and I don't know, maybe, David, you will agree with me on this, I think Samantha Morton is the, like, standout performance.

22:44Griffin Newman:I mean, I really think that everyone in this movie is very well cast and used. But it was so nice to see people like Morton and like Wazama, who Nolan's never worked with before, where Nolan clearly immediately was like, Like that is the person. I don't need to identify like whatever, a bigger star here or what, you know, what like a glitzy or like he matched the actor so perfectly. Like Guizamo in the Odyssey, you're like that. What? Like that doesn't automatically. And then you see it and you're like, I understand this completely. Morton makes total sense. That, you know, that was not.

23:18David Sims:I think, I think they're the two MVPs. Morton, you know, we've talked about Morton a lot this year. And on the Morvyn Caller episode, So we were talking about how much in the late 90s and the early 2000s she was seen as like one of definitively the great actresses of her generation. And she's receded a little bit. And this just feels like Nolan wanting to remind everyone how good she is and how powerful she is. Legazamo, I don't feel like I've ever seen him used like this before. It's interesting. I was trying to think about this. Unlocking new chambers for me. Because he's like kind of the heart of the movie.

23:51David Sims:He's like in a way the emotional spine of the thing. who all the other characters are filtered through.

23:57Griffin Newman:I, for some reason, kept thinking about John Wick because Odyssey does have a John Wick vibe of, like, he's coming back and he's mad. Which I feel like maybe John Wick has an Odyssey vibe. Of course, absolutely. Odyssey is calling him and being like,

24:11David Sims:do you still have my car?

24:12Griffin Newman:Yeah, right? I mean, it was a little bit that where it's like, Leguizamo's just playing the guy where it's like, everyone agrees that this guy is reliable and wise. Yes, as hell. Like, that is what we turn, Because I'm looking at Guzamo's, I mean, he works. Guzamo's always working. But what's the last time he was, it might be John Wick, that he was in something where I was like, oh, what a great use of him.

24:38David Sims:I didn't see Bob Trevino likes it, which everyone said he was really excellent in. I should see that. He's the lead of that, right? He's Bob Trevino? It's him and Barbie Ferreira, yeah. And Barbie Ferreira, by the way, she's having a hell of a year.

24:52Griffin Newman:She is. I'm loving Barbie Ferreira. No? Everyone knows? Mylon Tick is great.

24:58David Sims:Our buddy Chandler Levick's great film. That movie is so good. Chandler. It's so good. Are you listening? Chandler. I liked your movie. The Canadian film explosion of 2026 is, to me, the big story.

25:09Griffin Newman:That's so true. Yes. Canada's everywhere right now. Let's see. He's in The New Exorcist, Leguizamo. Okay. I bet you he plays like a priest who's like, I don't like the looks of this. We've got to get this team now. I bet you're right.

25:21David Sims:That sounds very good. I can see it. I bet he talks out of the center of his mouth exclusively. Right down the center of his mouth.

25:30Griffin Newman:Those front teeth getting a lot of exposure. Is he like, you know, has he done, like, should we throw him like a glitzy miniseries so he can grab an Emmy or something?

25:40David Sims:He was in an Apple TV series called Smoke, which wasn't very good. But he was in it. He was in it. It feels like he's primed, though. That's a good point, David. I feel like we got Leguizamo in like third position on an FX series. He's like winning every award.

25:59Griffin Newman:Like who doesn't who's not happy to see legs?

26:03David Sims:Johnny Legs. Well, King Koopa.

26:05Griffin Newman:Well, that's true. Although actually, I don't really know that King Koopa registered Luigi as a threat. Did he? I mean, I can't really remember.

26:12David Sims:You know, I haven't watched that film in a little while.

26:14Griffin Newman:Do they do battle even?

26:16David Sims:If King Koopa doesn't register Luigi as a threat, I would say that's a narrative shortcoming. I would say if King Koopa does not recognize one of the two Mario Brothers as a threat at any point, that movie might have some script issues.

26:29Griffin Newman:I do think I've seen the Super Mario Brothers movie several times in my life. I think one could accuse it of having script issues. I think that's fair. I think everyone would bear that accusation with grace and respect. This is the first time hearing this.

26:42David Sims:Oh, my God. What do I say here? put my finger up behind my ear

26:46Griffin Newman:so here we are we saw the Odyssey so Griff you saw it at the BFI was that nice that's a lovely theater I haven't been there in a long time but it's very cool it's a big old circle

26:54David Sims:it's in a circle you gotta go a little bit underground in a tunnel

26:57Griffin Newman:cool yeah cause it's in like in the middle of a giant roundabout like it's like there's cars going around it's cool it's in the middle of like a

27:04David Sims:traffic circle yes and so you gotta take an underpass to go into the secret chamber cool that's

27:10Griffin Newman:great see any pals there

27:14David Sims:uh honey ross friend of the podcast okay uh and sam sam clements was there with me i don't think i saw anyone else fair enough but i was i was immediately taken aback by and i think i wasn't reading early responses you guys had gone with marika brownlee ben was seeing at the same time that i was vaguely i'd gotten general thumbs up from people i knew but i wasn't reading anyone's deeper thoughts. And I was taken aback immediately because I was Sam. Some help me get into the screen, but he had already seen the movie and there was a whole kerfuffle with me being his plus one where they wouldn't let me in without him.

27:54David Sims:So he said, I'll come and I'll sit through the first like 30 minutes again and then I'll leave. And I said, is like the opening particularly good? I was wondering, like, does it have one of these classic Nolan sort of James Bond style Dark Knight, Tenet, you open with something kind of just so fucking insane. Right. And he was like, the opening is great, but it's not like that. And the movie starts and immediately it was just like, this is not where I thought this film would start. This is not how the first hour I imagined would progress. And the structure of this movie for a guy who likes to play around with structure is so different than I was expecting because he doesn't diagram it.

28:30David Sims:usually when he does funny structure tricks it's like really set up and explained and this movie almost immediately reminded me so much of thin red line okay yeah and that it feels like it's

28:44Griffin Newman:editing based on emotions um that's interesting great so you know i will say the odyssey i'm gonna am i the only reader of the odyssey in the room right now not to not to an odyssey mog anyone I mean, I studied it in school. Sure, okay. So you read it. I have no memory of it really, but I have brushed up a little bit in just watching some YouTube guides.

29:09David Sims:I bought a graphic novel version of it with pictures. Who did this graphic novel?

29:15Griffin Newman:It would be a disaster if the graphic novel did not pictures. That would be a huge misstep.

29:20David Sims:It would be a big bummer. Garrett Hines. I've seen this.

29:23Griffin Newman:I think my wife has used this as a teaching aid because she teaches the Odyssey. Your wife teaches the Odyssey. She does. She does. But like, you know, the first four books of the Odyssey are from Telemachus' perspective. They do have this kind of prologue-y kind of like, where's Odysseus? Son of Odysseus, we should say. Telemachus is the son of Odysseus and he is played by Tom Holland in the film. You guys notice that? Yes. Peter Parker. Peter Parker himself. Nathan Drake himself.

29:55David Sims:did you guys see the video of Tom Holland and Matt Damon doing a like junket thing where they had to guess

30:02Griffin Newman:make a pizza I did not see the one where they had to make pizza what did they have to guess

30:06David Sims:they have to guess which of their films by just the colors of the frames you ever see the movie lutz thing or whatever yeah that's a fun game it's tough to put those two filmographies next to each other well that was what was really fucking funny right Damon has like eight masterpieces so it's like the departed interstellar or Good Will Hunting.

30:27Griffin Newman:One of the 14 Soderbergh movies I made and Tom Holland's like, is this chaos walking?

30:32David Sims:No, for Tom Holland, they gave him three Spider-Man movies and he had to guess.

30:39Griffin Newman:That's so lame.

30:40David Sims:They all fucking look the same. I wouldn't be, it was so sad. I felt so bad for him.

30:45Griffin Newman:Is this the best, I mean, I think The Lost City of Z is my favorite movie that he's ever been. You love that film. Yeah. But then I think this is a, this is a huge challenger. I don't see anything else in his filmography that I would really vault up the list here.

30:59David Sims:It is wild that, I mean, obviously, No Way Home was so fucking humongous and was, you know, one of the first in a series of movies that saved Hollywood after the pandemic, right? And it got a little erased by Top Gun and Maverick and Top Gun Maverick and Barbie and Oppenheimer. Yeah, but it was a phenomenon. humongous is one of the 10 highest grossing films of all time and he's been a little silent and i think there's been a couple years for all of us to stroke our chins and be like is he juiceless like where the fuck does his career go at this point especially because everything he tried to do outside of spider-man really didn't work and yet he's about to be the undisputed king of the summer box office it's true he's about to have a humongous fucking summer he's gonna have a huge It's just July.

31:46David Sims:He's the king of July. Sully could have only dreamed of the kind of July he's having. That's so true. I think he was very well cast in this movie.

31:56Griffin Newman:Yeah, I thought he was well deployed in this movie. I think he's, you know what? I'm going to give him his flowers. I think he's good in the film. I know some people are like, ah, no, I just sort of felt like Tom Holland-y to me. But no, I think he's good. I think he's good at playing someone who needs to learn and mature and grow.

32:14David Sims:And I'm not saying that as a neg on him. No, the problem with him is going to be the, can he ever age into anything else?

32:22Griffin Newman:I'm not sure.

32:23David Sims:I don't know.

32:23Griffin Newman:Because I saw him saying in an interview, like, I think this will be the last time I'm kind of playing a kid. And I was like, maybe. Like, it is cool.

32:30David Sims:I know that he is 30. He is 30. I cannot believe that he is 30.

32:36Griffin Newman:He do have a baby face. But it reminded me a lot of his Lost City of Z performance. Like, it did, you know.

32:42David Sims:like there's that John Mulaney joke of I'm sober which I know is surprising to people because I look like someone who hasn't done anything before right he's like I'm just sitting in a room eating crackers yes right a lot of this Odyssey Spider-Man promo tour has been Tom Holland pushing bureau his non-alcoholic beer alternative yeah and that's another thing where you're like I can't believe you're old enough to be sober now I'm happy for him that he's got whatever equilibrium

33:08Griffin Newman:him he desires or whatever but yes it is it is interesting but he reads as perpetually 16 yeah he does he does which is why he's in this role in which literally the point is that he is not of age yet like the point of the odyssey is like you are Odysseus's son you're a strong young man but you cannot inherit his throne yet so I gotta keep weaving this fucking thing until he comes back. Can I say Hollywood,

33:35David Sims:thank you for your service. How about you sit here in the corner and you do your thing and we're just going to wait on Matt Damon to come back.

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36:55Griffin Newman:so the odyssey uh it is a film directed by christopher nolan and it does begin with travis scott uh the great travis scott a friend of christopher nolan's right they're best buds right don't they like send each other gifts and shit like they're like

37:09David Sims:friendly.

37:10Griffin Newman:Because Travis Scott had a song in Tenet. I feel like that was their initial... And he's got the end credit song in this. And it begins with him trying... He's going to sing the song of Odysseus. And it's clearly Nolan taking you by the shoulders and being like, you have to understand that this storytelling form exists now and has just evolved. It has just changed. But he's like... It's a real mission statement moment for him where he's just like, This is still what we do. We tell, like, stories through verse to each other. It's so good. I was so startled by it.

37:46David Sims:The first five minutes of the movie played in front of another movie. Is that true?

37:51Griffin Newman:No, no, no, no, no. The prologue, which I saw, is the Trojan sequence, which is much later in the movie.

37:57David Sims:Okay. Because I really tried not to see a ton of marketing for this movie. Like, I saw the teaser trailer. Whatever it was where Tom Holland was like, my dad's coming home or whatever. And I saw that and I was like, this doesn't look good to me, but I'm so I'm not going to watch anything else because I trust Christopher Nolan. And you want to see it in context. I want to see it in context. But then I know that I don't know what movie they put it in front of an IMAX, but some people get to see the prologue.

38:27Griffin Newman:You could see it if you bought a ticket to an IMAX. So I saw I bought a ticket to the Sinners re-release just to watch it. It was also in front of one battle. I can't remember. Like it was it was the fall of it was like a little sizzle reel, basically. OK, so it was not like the first fight. It wasn't like Dark Knight Rises where it was truly just like, let's watch the opening.

38:45David Sims:Because I, too, was genuinely shocked that the movie, the first shot of the movie is Travis Scott.

38:50Griffin Newman:Yes.

38:51David Sims:Saying sing. Oh, muse. And so I was like, oh, did people know this was coming if they saw the preview? I'll also say Sam Clements of Picturehouse, aforementioned, goes to like the European equivalents of CinemaCon. And he said that a month or two ago they showed what they said was the opening of the movie and it was very different than this. It was constructed differently. So it feels like they've been the editing of this movie feels very free flowing. I could see this being a thing that he kept iterating on until the last second. but to your point of the Travis Scott thing and the stupid controversies that existed around this movie which Nolan very wisely didn't really weigh in on until recently he had to do the press tour and then I thought he put it perfectly which is you know a lot of people were complaining that there were things in the trailers and the posters and fucking whatever that seemed too modern or too casual or didn't seem historically accurate and this is partially a trap of Nolan's own making in that his fans have come to build this sort of mythology around him of being like the guy who takes everything the most seriously, whereas that has never been his thing.

39:58David Sims:There's always been silliness in his movies. There's always been flights of fancy and stylization in his movies. He is a literal minded guy in a certain kind of way, but it doesn't mean that he's a guy who just is like nothing but the facts, ma 'am. And he said, you know, so much of what people consider to be accurate in these types of movies is based on iteration of theatrical traditions of how we tell these stories. these things like that we like to think of, of people speaking in Shakespearean accents in a certain language, is like a theatrical form that we use to connote seriousness that is put on epics like this.

40:35David Sims:And as you said, this movie is starting out in being like, this is the tradition that this is in, and we're going to translate this into something that feels urgent to you right now, a modern audience, rather than trying to gloss it up in some sort of sense of seriousness. Right. And then you almost immediately go to the beaches with the horse, right?

40:57Griffin Newman:Well, you sort of do. It's basically like he's starting to tell the story. And you see Elliot Page getting pinned to the horse. But then, isn't it Penelope? And Hathaway is like, no, I don't want to hear the fucking story. Because the point is, it's like, enough of this. We've been singing the song of Odysseus for so long. But where is he? If we heard he did this, then why hasn't he come back? If they won.

41:20David Sims:Other guys came back. Where's my husband?

41:22Griffin Newman:Right. The other guys came back. And meanwhile, Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg came back. Odysseus is on a beach with Charlize Theron and, you know, send help vibes, obviously. Nice work if you can get it vibes.

41:34David Sims:I love when she wears that little like fishnet thing. Yeah. And I was like, ooh, that's so couture. She's the catch of the day.

41:42Griffin Newman:She really is. David, she's the catch of the day. I understand what you're saying. I would say Odysseus actually is the catch of the day. She caught him. and she's like I like what I caught she's been feeding his ass lotus I know he really likes that lotus flower it doesn't look that it's very pretty it didn't look appetizing to me it doesn't look filling to me

42:03David Sims:it's about how it feels yeah I understand

42:05Griffin Newman:I could use some lotus sometimes definitely lately well I mean once in a while

42:10David Sims:you got a lotus night yeah

42:12Griffin Newman:I mean you know I'll tell you

42:13David Sims:you need to pull a petal

42:14Griffin Newman:yep or two Mike White he could use the lotus

42:19David Sims:he could use it I think he's got more than enough of it He should share the Lotus.

42:22Griffin Newman:You're right. He should share the Lotus. I don't know. I was trying to figure out a White Lotus joke. Can Mike White share the Lotus, please? Just share the Lotus, Mike White.

42:29David Sims:Just share the Lotus, Mike White.

42:31Griffin Newman:I just saw something that he wrote. What was it? Oh, yeah. Despicable Me 4. Despicable Me 4.

42:36David Sims:Yeah.

42:37Griffin Newman:Okay. He has a writing credit on that one.

42:40David Sims:And on three, maybe? He's got on two of them. Am I wrong?

42:44Griffin Newman:Let's find out.

42:45David Sims:He also wrote Migration. He wrote Migration. He wrote Migration.

42:48Griffin Newman:He has no other minion credits. But of course he wrote the Emoji movie.

42:54David Sims:That's okay. There we go. Which is not Illumination, but I lump in in my mind. And he did write Pitch Perfect 3 and no others. Yes. Weird. We both were watching through all the Despicable Me and Minions movies in anticipation of Minions and Monsters simultaneously. Yes. And it was very funny for you and I to check in with each other and be like, yep, still don't like these very much. Not too much.

43:19Griffin Newman:I like the Minions. I'm looking forward to watch.

43:21David Sims:Right, yeah. No, but they never really got me those earlier ones. See, you were like way out on Gru and really in on the Minions. And I'm a little bit in on Gru and I'm not that in on the Minions. And both of us were just like, not my cup of tea. Some stuff I like. Anyway. I don't like Gru. I'm sorry. I'm sorry to Gru. I kind of like her. And you know who I really like? Gru's mom? No, Gru's wife, Lucy, who is her own person who has a lipstick taser. and I think is quite fetching.

43:53Griffin Newman:Yeah, she's okay. Played by Kristen Wiig. I'm glad she's cashing the checks. I'm glad everyone's cashing their checks, you know?

43:59David Sims:That's fine. Direct deposit on that one, right? No one's taking the time to run those to the bank. No. They're doing mobile deposit. Or at worst, they're taking the photo on their phone. Do you think that the Cyclops in Christopher Nolan's version of the Odyssey would have been harmed by stepping on a Lego in the way that the Cyclops in the Minions version of the Odyssey was. I mean, that whole sequence would be over in two minutes if Odysseus had thought to carve a Lego block. That's all he needed to do. The Minions had the answer, Henry and James. I wanted to bring up that we see Elliot Page, whose character is Sinon.

44:40David Sims:Sinon, yes. And the horse so early, because this movie feels very haunted by the horse. The horse is very forward in the marketing. It's on the poster. They've been putting the horse up outside of theaters. There's a horse popcorn bucket. And I assumed, oh, there's probably a big horse set piece. But that's not the main story that Nolan wants to tell is just the Haydn and the horse. But this movie keeps cutting back to the horse as like this thing that fucking haunts Odysseus. Yes. That the thing that he's most known for, what is seen as his greatest triumph, he can kind of never get over what feels like the dishonesty of it.

45:18David Sims:Yes.

45:19Griffin Newman:So this is, I would say, the brilliant conceit of this movie. And it's clear that Nolan, you know, is like, okay, I'll do the Odyssey. He's sitting in his chair, drinking a cup of tea, not having a smartphone. And he's like, perhaps the Odyssey. But like the Odyssey is the original great tale of Western storytelling or whatever. But like it is not something that you can locate emotion in easily. And but it is if you read the Odyssey, it is obsessed with hospitality. Like that's a huge part of the poem. The idea, the ancient Greek notion of hospitality. And, you know, they call it Zeus's law here.

46:03Griffin Newman:you know the sort of like be kind to you know welcome a stranger to your home and like you know

46:09David Sims:any simple beggar might actually be your co-host in disguise over exactly and might have wonderful

46:14Griffin Newman:seth bullock has facial hair and all that and it's a simple idea because like both the iliad which is also by homer quote-unquote you know we don't really you know and the odyssey those things are not like and we really fucked Troy over like those things are like it wronged when we smashed Troy to pieces and you're like great you know yourself but like it's very simple for Nolan but it's very clever for him to be like it's kind of fucked up yeah you know we we you know kind of lied our way in there and then we sacked the city and a bunch of soldiers in a horse and to make this this sort of like notion of like Odysseus right is weighted with the guilt of like, we did kind of defy the gods by doing that.

47:01Griffin Newman:Yeah. And like, we are the ones who maybe have contributed to the feeling that society is ending around us and makes the film feel contemporary without it feeling didactic to me. Like, I was just kind of like, they broke the social contract. I kind of can't believe he pulled that off in this movie. Much like Oppenheimer's the same way, right? Where it's very haunted by like the world we live in now. Oppenheimer made the terrible world we live in now. He didn't mean to. He was just smashing bits together in his particle accelerator or whatever, right?

47:33David Sims:You know, and fucking everyone's wives. Nolan movies, because he has become the guy at the top of the mountain, he has become the person who represents filmmaking globally, sort of as an idea and certainly as an industry. And now is literally also the president of the DGA. A guy at his level of career rarely takes on an elected position like that, except it feels like he's like, there's too much at stake and my people need me and I have to fight for them. All of his movies have increasingly become about two things. One, I am the only one who can do this. The burden is heavy on me, but I must do this for everyone else.

48:10David Sims:Two, what have I done? Oh, sweet Jesus, what have I done? and this is a movie about a guy who's like i need to do this for everybody else and the final shot of the movie is literally the shadow of the trojan horse it's like he cannot get out from under that shadow it's one of the first things we see in the shadow the silhouette is the last

48:31Griffin Newman:thing we see um you know it's it's beautiful stuff uh do you guys know about the sea people theory of Bronze Age collapse? Can I very briefly?

48:44David Sims:That's like what they were talking about

48:45Griffin Newman:in the movie.

48:47David Sims:The sea people that were ruining everything.

48:49Griffin Newman:You know, so sort of during the late Bronze Age, all of the major civilizations in the Mediterranean basically collapsed and no one knows why because it was so freaking long ago. So we can't really. We're talking like the 12th century BC or whatever. But it led to the first Dark Age. Right. Not not the lovely dark age we like to think about, which is like, you know, whatever, like the eighth century and people rattling, you know, I don't know, carts and stuff. What do people do in that dark age?

49:20David Sims:Wearing big rattle carts.

49:22Griffin Newman:Yeah. Rattle and blood into rats everywhere. You know, but like the, right, the old, old dark age. And one of these notions is like the, the sea people were like, it's like an academic theory that like these kingdoms were done in by invaders and no one knows who are even why or except for it. But like, and I just love Nolan picking up on that and having that be this like looming threat in the movie. And then of course at the end, it's like, well, no, but we are, we're the,

49:51David Sims:we're the, you know, we're the ones who ruined civilization.

49:53Griffin Newman:Like going to do a stupid war that sucked for no good reason. And then returning home to like, you know, like places, you know, our homes were in turmoil and like with civility gone and everyone at each other's throats. and getting stabbed. Right?

50:11David Sims:I also think, yes. And within that framework, you realize that the big set pieces of the Odyssey as a story are mostly about them being bad guests. It's like, we just got to get home and they land in a different place and come across a different creature and just kind of are shitty house guests over and over and over again.

50:31Griffin Newman:There's that early moment where they show up on some beach and the guys have burned their houses and are in a bad mood. And Pemish Fratelli's like, we're Greeks. Like, we're not threatening. Like, you know, even though he's like in armor and has his sword. Why are you scared of us? And the guy's like, oh, fuck you. Sea people. Leave me alone.

50:53David Sims:Let's clarify. They pull up. Their whole town is on fire. He's like, why? He's like, we saw people coming. We thought we'd just get this over with. Like, rather than let you burn us to the ground, we'll burn ourselves down. Like that's the level of paranoia and exhaustion everyone's at.

51:10Griffin Newman:Yes. But okay. So let me try and unpack the flow of the story here. So the first bit obviously is just we're in Ithaca. We're with Telemachus. Penelope is in a bad mood.

51:25David Sims:She's many a suitor. I was really impressed by how cunty Anne Hathaway was in this role. She's great in this movie. She's great. David, what did you text about Anne Hathaway the other day? I thought you worded this very well.

51:39Griffin Newman:Someone was noting what a busy year she's having. Six movies. Is it six?

51:45David Sims:I'm going to look it up. Mother Mary, Devil Wears Prada 2, The Odyssey, Variety, Oak Street, and I believe there's one more that I'm forgetting. No, it's just five.

51:56Griffin Newman:It's just five? There's a movie called Alone at Dawn that's a Ron Howard movie with Adam Driver, but I'm not sure if we know when that's coming out. It'll come out eventually.

52:09David Sims:Now that I know it's only five, she seems like a slacker.

52:11Griffin Newman:I said, Anne Hathaway is a gift to Hollywood that we should always be thankful for, and I certainly believe that.

52:18David Sims:The range of just even the three movies she's had out so far is pretty astonishing.

52:24Griffin Newman:Well, it's also interesting because, like, it's not like Anne Hathaway had... She's been working. She didn't, like, go dark. But it was sort of like... the size of the movies had shrunk a little bit. Yeah. And like after Ocean's eight, which she's great in, but even that's a supporting role or whatever, you know, she's got that weird Serenity, the hustle, dark waters year where like, we love Serenity, but it's, it's a weird one. The hustle was filmed like seven years prior. Right. Dark waters is a wonderful movie, but she's kind of just showing up to help it along the lines.

52:59David Sims:Yes. As you said, that was a tax deductible. last thing he wanted disaster right last thing he wanted is one of those movies where you're like

53:07Griffin Newman:did they forget to finish it like sorry right that movie the witches the witches obviously was five stars a plus we love that one on blank check like all these movies are in one of two

53:17David Sims:categories she tried something smaller and more interesting and it worked or it didn't or a real failed attempt at a major movie so the stuff she's doing that's good is not really at the center of the culture and the stuff that's attempting to be at the center of the culture is not working

53:31Griffin Newman:But then like, you know, locked down, we're going to give everyone a pass on that one. The pandemic made everyone. Right. Armageddon Time. Again, she's great, but it does it a little bit. Again, kind of like, I'm here to help this movie along. I'm not. And then Eileen I did like, but it didn't really go anywhere. So good. She's excellent in that. She's great in Eileen. I did not see the Rebecca Miller film She Came to Me.

53:54David Sims:Me neither. No, which is her and Dinklage. And who's the other guy? Marissa Tomei? Oh, Marissa Tomei. All right. and then and then there was The Mother's Curse or whatever that movie's called right

54:05Griffin Newman:her very kind of like trashy 2024 of Mother's Instinct and The Idea of You

54:11David Sims:The Idea of You is good

54:12Griffin Newman:no it's not

54:13David Sims:yes it is it is good

54:15Griffin Newman:she's good in it and I respect her that movie is not good that movie

54:18David Sims:that movie is good sure the boy band in it good

54:22Griffin Newman:was a streaming hit it was a big streaming hit I don't think Michael Schulwalter is capable of of telling a story like that with sincerity.

54:31David Sims:You don't think he knows how to put on a show, Walter? You know what? I found it very sincere. I liked when they were in their hotel room kind of like kissing and dancing to dance all days.

54:46Griffin Newman:Yeah, there you go.

54:47David Sims:But you were saying, basically last year she was quiet because a lot of her 25 movies got pushed back to 26.

54:53Griffin Newman:Right, Mother Mary got pushed to early.

54:55David Sims:And Oak Street got pushed.

54:57Griffin Newman:Yeah.

54:58David Sims:Can't wait for whatever the heck that is. I know this is kind of her big center stage year and I love that it's such an array of even different sized roles and different styles of performance. She's so kind of stripped down in this. Like she's really just sort of laser focused. yeah um and she's not doing any of the theater kid stuff that people sometimes bristle at and i think it's it's why she's so good and why as you put it she's a gift to hollywood because it's like she's like an old school movie star who can do any type of thing she really is and you know

55:32Griffin Newman:like the scenes she has the flashbacks with damon before he goes to war are really like simple and beautifully done and get all the emotion across very fast. Also, fucking sexy. Yeah.

55:45David Sims:A little sexy. But like you have very little time to establish a sense of genuine chemistry between those two characters. And you're doing it late into the film and immediately you're like, there's heat here. There's a reason why she's not remarrying. Yeah, no, for sure.

56:01Griffin Newman:I mean, look, Robert Pattinson is a handsome fellow, okay? I wouldn't fucking marry this asshole, right? Would you? This guy, this guy's an asshole. Are we, can we say he's an asshole?

56:13David Sims:He's an asshole.

56:14Griffin Newman:He is so good. I just love that he is always game. Like, you know, that he's not like whatever, like looking for the sympathetic role or looking for the, you know, like he just wants to play little slimy freaks and he's so good at it.

56:28David Sims:They just announced that Batman is being pushed back another six months and people are wringing their hands over it. And I'm like, there is no better outcome than Robert Pattinson having six years in between Batman movies to do whatever weird shit he wants to do. Batman's the ultimate hammock. In between, he's just given latitude to do whatever because they go like, as long as you promise you're going to put that cowl back on, we'll let you play your worms.

56:53Griffin Newman:He's got five movies in this year too. He's having a crazy year.

56:57David Sims:Okay, wait. So it's this. Yeah. It's primetime. Yeah, which I hear is great. It's the drama. Yeah. And then the other two are Let me put it here. Neither of them have yet to come out. Correct. One we just got a trailer for. Dune part three. And then what's the fifth movie?

57:17Griffin Newman:It's the Fernando Merrill film Here Comes the Flood with him and Denzel Washington. Oh, which sounds awesome. It's a Netflix thriller, but does sound very cool. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. So he's all over the place and he's doing different voices and he's having fun, being a little sicko. And he is, yeah, he's the lead suitor here. he likened the character to James Woods character Lester Diamond from the 1995 film Casino

57:42David Sims:which we will be talking about soon just a classic Robert Pattinson poll to like read the Odyssey and go like you know what this character's like James Woods in Casino you've also got the great

57:53Griffin Newman:Corey Hawkins those are the main two suitor jerks

57:57David Sims:he's sort of the right hand man I think he's just a total fucking gem he's always good

58:04Griffin Newman:Love to see Corey Hawkins.

58:06David Sims:Yes. Yeah, he's not working enough. No. Yeah. And then Logan Marshall Green and Mia Goth are the two kind of grandma worm tongues of the palace. She is like this. She's a servant to Penelope. Yes.

58:23Griffin Newman:I think it's unspoken in the movie, but they are twins. They're siblings. Logan Marshall Green and Mia Goth in the myth of the Odyssey. Yes, they're working together. They're the bad servants. They're not being, they're not, you know, tending to Odysseus' flock. Now, who is? Leguizamo.

58:42David Sims:Leguizamo.

58:42Griffin Newman:Holding a stick. Being blind.

58:45David Sims:He can see more clearly than everyone.

58:48Griffin Newman:There is a bit of a, you know, there's an irony there. It's true. It's a real irony. So a little rude for him to throw a dog off a cliff. Right at the top of the movie.

58:59David Sims:David and I were concerned. One of the first things we said after we got out of the movie was we were worried how Ben was going to take the dog violence in this film. It's the kind of thing that does turn Ben off completely. Yes.

59:09Griffin Newman:But I think because he did it so early in the film, it felt like just pulling the Band-Aid off. And then, of course, they treat the other dog, Odysseus' dog, really well, even though he's old and sad and waiting for Odysseus to return home.

59:27David Sims:I think they also, the inhumanity of how the animals are treated is used as a dramatic storytelling tool for the rot of society. Yes. It is not something that is done callously. It's not using it just to shock you.

59:43Griffin Newman:No, no, not at all. No, it's... I think all the stakes of the... Because, yes, there's the argument for, shouldn't we shoot this movie out of a cannon? Shouldn't we start with something really exciting? And it's like, now you just sort of... It's not just that he wants to go home. You're like, his home is ruined without him. It's like, he's... You're starting with the feeling of his absence.

1:00:02David Sims:There's a vacuum and he's missing and it's just like, yeah, it's ruining everything. Which is what the story is really about, is the fact that this guy's fucking gone. There are like two main sort of narrative or storytelling devices, I guess. The first is Tom Holland hearing stories about his father. Sure, right. As he is on his... Who he's never met, essentially. Right. He was a baby when...

1:00:25Griffin Newman:A wee baby when he left. When he left.

1:00:27David Sims:So he is traveling and hearing stories from other people, most notably Jon Bernthal. Yeah, Bernthal. Let me tell you something. You're a pretty cool guy. Jon is like the fifth season of Serial and pull enough stories together from his dad to get a good narrative going. And then on the other end, we have Matt Damon with Calypso played by Charlize Theron. And she is kind of goading him to remember how he ended up. How did I get here? What happened to my men? But also being like, do you really want to remember? Doesn't remembering suck? Doesn't it suck here? Have some more lotus, baby. Yeah, take some lotus.

1:01:11Griffin Newman:we're right we're we're sort of like trying to put the pieces together of like okay what happened where are his men what happened why did he why hasn't he come home and then i feel like the first then we we do find you know okay what do you remember we do finally get to them like getting on the boat and i guess is the first place they go to the to you know the the cyclops right like

1:01:33David Sims:that's the first sort of major sequence first major set piece in right but we also establish what life was like back on Ithaca before Odysseus left. We meet young Robert Pattinson and young Elliot Page. That's true. I was going to say, yes. Which sets up a, you know, a very upsetting dynamic of... What is Pattinson's character's name again?

1:01:59Griffin Newman:It's like Antonius or whatever, Antonius. He's, yeah. Yes.

1:02:05David Sims:But the volunteering Murray. Right.

1:02:08Griffin Newman:Antinius, maybe. Antinius. I don't know.

1:02:12David Sims:What do I know? Every time I watch something where it's like little boys going off to war, this also happens in Horatio Hornblower and in Master and Commander. I just get very upset. I think it shouldn't happen.

1:02:29Griffin Newman:But they're drawing sticks. They're drawing lots. Yeah, like a short stick gets you on the boat. And Odysseus' cousin, Sinon, draws— Elliot Page. Elliot Page draws whatever the stick that means that he has to go to war. Right.

1:02:46David Sims:They say there's a lottery draft going on. They need to build an army. It's a lottery draft. And Sinon gets picked, who is a very small child. Yes. And the Pattinson character sort of volunteers to go in its stead, not just out of some generosity, but also because of, I think, an ego of wanting to be a big, tough boy. He's a little older. He's a teenager. and Odysseus puts his foot down and goes like, it's gotta be who's chosen and also says to the Pattinson character.

1:03:10Griffin Newman:No, no, no, no, no, no. Antonia, you know, it's Pattinson draws the short stick. Sinon is put in his place. Right. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The whole point is that Antonia's ducked the draft.

1:03:21David Sims:Correct.

1:03:21Griffin Newman:That's why him giving the lot back to him is like, this is your shame. I misread that. See, I also didn't get that. Right, like, it's like Antonia is the, I think, you know, the richer, because he is like one of the big wigs or his family right on Ithaca, one assumes. That's why he's a cheap suitor.

1:03:37David Sims:So he pays the littler guy to take his parents.

1:03:42Griffin Newman:And like they're saying that Odysseus basically kind of knew what was happening and overlooked it or like didn't put his foot down because like he knows, like he doesn't want to wound the pride of the parents. Like they say. And this will all be helpful on rewatch, I will say. Because like this information, it's the classic Nolan thing of this information is being like hydraulically delivered to you in voiceover and flashback. And you're like, okay, okay, okay, okay. And you can tell, like, it's the Nolan thing where he's like, this will matter later. Like, you need to know all the context. I mean, that happens in like the first 10 minutes.

1:04:14David Sims:Very early on. You barely met the characters.

1:04:16Griffin Newman:We have not met the characters and I did not even totally track that, you know, that Sinan had become, you know, Elliot Page had grown up to be.

1:04:24David Sims:Because like, it's almost as something to the effect of, you know, he needed to do things to help the ego. And basically Odysseus says this thing of, no, it's actually good if you stay because you need to watch after your family and watch after my family as well. Which kind of poisons him with the idea of, oh, I have a responsibility to watch your family. I should probably fuck your wife if you disappear. That's kind of the implication, is it not? I mean, you know. He goes, message received. I got it. So if you're gone for like five years, I should start trying to fuck your wife? Maybe Greek law should have some rules on this, okay?

1:04:59Griffin Newman:Maybe there should be time limits. Yes. But okay. So, but no, no, we're with Odysseus and it's post-Troy. We still haven't really seen the sack of Troy, but we've seen little glimpses of the horse and all that. And... God, the horse looks so good. The horse looks really good. It do look pretty cool. Really awesome. It's awesome. And he sees, you know, Agamemnon played by Benny Safdie in this crazy imposing armor. Nolan wanted him to have... He has what's it called? it's called black bronze and sulfur in his armor which Nolan was like these were like the most expensive sort of materials back then so we wanted him to have this oh fucker's got a gold spine on the back of his helmet he's got a spine he's got a visible spine it's so funny that it's Benny Safdie not that he's not good he is good

1:05:42David Sims:we never see his face in the movie

1:05:45Griffin Newman:we see his beautiful hair

1:05:46David Sims:yes I mean we see his face

1:05:47Griffin Newman:through a slit we see the yeah the

1:05:50David Sims:it is interesting though that that was the main like one of the main posters for the film was the back of Agamemnon's head I wonder how much he kind of just likes that imagery and how much it is that much like the shadow of the horse the sort of like image of Agamemnon's armor without ever seeing the guy inside represents this force that's pushing everything along

1:06:16Griffin Newman:right I mean and you know I interviewed Benny Safdie last year I told you this Marie yes and he had just finished the Odyssey and I was like, who are you playing? And I just assumed he was going to be playing some weirdo. Of course Safdie's going to play like, I don't know, yeah, like a weird little trickster or, you know, right? Like a mean suitor. And he was like, I can't tell you, but we were just in Iceland like shooting on this like black beach is what he gets to. And then obviously that's the like afterlife sequence.

1:06:49David Sims:That was another favorite sequence in the movie. This is really great. But you basically never see his face. It's like the idea of him looms so large. And most directors, I think, would go, oh, so then what you should cast in this role is either a stunt performer, because this is mostly going to be physical. It's going to be who fills the suit or cast a guy with a voice like Clancy Brown, because it's mostly going to be booming voice if you're not going to see their face. And as you say, it's so funny that he cast Benny Safdie, who's such like a presence energy guy.

1:07:21Griffin Newman:Yeah.

1:07:21David Sims:And is also like a sensitivity guy.

1:07:24Griffin Newman:But Safdie is, I will say, he's very tall. He's like 6 '1". And he has this great hair. And maybe Nolan just kind of liked the physicality.

1:07:32David Sims:I appreciate it. I think, you know, you guys bring this up. You brought this up a lot in the Peter Weir series. The casting for the final color thing.

1:07:41Griffin Newman:Oh, yeah.

1:07:42David Sims:And I do think that when we get the backstory of what happened to him. and when he is in Hades and he is speaking from the dead, there is like a pathos to it that it really got to me. You need to be able to unravel this guy. You need to be able to strip away the sort of imagery and the mythology of him to get to a sort of broken person inside eventually. So I'm not really a big ancient Greece person and I was asking David Sims on the subway home from the movie. I was like, I want to keep living in this world. So like, what movies should I watch next? Oh, I wasn't even thinking movies. I was going to suggest a time machine.

1:08:32David Sims:That seems a little expensive. But, you know, I did pay$4.99 to rent Troy on Amazon Prime. I want to talk about this briefly. I'm very confused by this recent holding up of Troy as the gold standard. Griffin, we got to get into it. That movie is fucking dog shit. I hadn't seen it until like this week when I watched it after the Odyssey, which is a masterpiece. And there is, you know, it's a the the Iliad is part one, the Odyssey part two, you know, so it's like a prequel. A lot of the same characters are in there. What the fuck? What's going on there?

1:09:11Griffin Newman:It's a very hollow movie in my memory. Right. I hated it when it came out. I thought it was a bomb. People didn't like it when it came out. It got bad reviews. It made money. It made a lot of money. It made money. It was a hit. But it was not taken seriously. Yeah, it got no Oscar attention. After, like, you know, in the warm-up, because of movies like Gladiator, people were like, maybe this will be epic. Totally. You know? And I pointed out to you, it was the same year as Alexander. There were two, like, giant budget swings that, like, great. Well, if Gladiator wins Best Picture, what other, like, epics can we do?

1:09:41Griffin Newman:and they did the most obvious, they did the Iliad and they did Alexander the Great. Like they did the most obvious ones possible. Both of those movies are flawed. Troy made a lot of money, but sucks. Alexander didn't make enough money, but is very interesting, in my opinion. And then they both have

1:09:57David Sims:the director's cut DVD re-edit legacy. Where they're like,

1:10:00Griffin Newman:I fixed it. And you're like, no. Did you? Yeah. I'm not sure that you did. I mean, the big problem with Troy, it's the ultimate pit thing of like, he sucks at this. Yeah. He's so good at playing squirrely weirdo. He's actually not good at playing the alpha.

1:10:16David Sims:That's not what he likes. It's also, that's his cat in the hat. He has to make that movie because he pulled out of the fountain. Warner Brothers were like, you fucking owe us a movie. And he was like, do I have to do some movie star shit? He's really blonde in it. I remember him looking great. I wasn't into it. Yeah. But the thing that was really sending me, like watching it immediately after the Odyssey, was that Brian Cox is playing Agamemnon. He is Agamemnon. Yes. Very similar to Benny Safti. And I'm just like, wow, these are two very, very different interpretations of this character. Brendan Gleeson plays Menelaus.

1:10:58David Sims:Yeah. And who plays Odysseus? Sean Bean. Sean Bean. He's the best part of the movie. Yeah, Sean Bean's fine. See, I don't even remember it that well. But I just remember it being like, It's all surface level. It feels like an impression of a type of movie, a type of epic that actually has ideas within it. And it's only absorbed the aesthetics. The ideas that are in Troy are not ideas about, like, man and psychology. They're more like mapping, like, political and historical ideas of war onto a myth. which is not that interesting to me. I agree with you. I don't find that interesting. I'm more interested in the interiority, which is what The Odyssey is.

1:11:46David Sims:It's like, it's such a psychological story while also being really epic visually. It's why I related this to Thin Red Line is A, your perspective character is changing a lot throughout the movie. And B, it feels like you're often kind of editing laterally through the characters' memories and thoughts and feelings. It is so much trying to find a way to put you in the inner life of these people rather than zooming out and turning it into mythology. Right.

1:12:19Griffin Newman:So, Dave, I got to ask, since we're talking about the Iliad and how that story then relates to the Odyssey, how do you feel about them not really including a lot of the gods in this story, in this film. We really only get mention of Zeus and his law. They talk about the gods on Poseidon. And Poseidon. Mention Poseidon. But I'm saying we only really see Athena. So the thing in the Odyssey, the story is, for example, one of the important moments in the Odyssey is that Odysseus is stuck on the island with Calypso. In this movie, he has this emotional realization of like, right, I'm ready to go home.

1:13:08Griffin Newman:I'm accepting the loss of my men. Right. You know, it's this big. In the Odyssey, Hermes, the messenger god, shows up and is like, hey, time to go. And this is like, oh, fuck. Okay. He's like, come on. Boat's this way. That happens a lot in the poem. The gods show up and they're like, whoa. Totally. I mean, even the reason that Helen ends up in Troy is because of intervention from the gods. Right. And so obviously that's a little dramatically not going to, you know, that won't work. I think it totally makes sense that he, you know, he made that choice. It's just when you go back to the source material, I mean, especially in the Iliad, it's like the, like, the children of the gods are, you know, are all kind of connected.

1:13:50Griffin Newman:Zeus sees a lady and is like, he's a freaking swan. I want to fuck this lady. Yeah, I'm going to turn into a swan. Fuck her. She has eggs, and one of the children that come out of the eggs is Helen.

1:14:02David Sims:Can I do a tiny little Merc spotlight? Look at what they were giving out at the screening. Oh, you got the pin! Oh, you got the Athena pin. I got the Athena pin. Oh, we didn't get pins. What did you get, Ben? I got the Athena. You got the Athena? They had the Athena and the horse, but you could only take one. I tried to take two, and I got yelled at very loudly. Well, the Athena pin feels like that would be my pick, because the pin itself is such an important part of the movie. It was before the movie, but I had a feeling this is closer to the movie object, which I always like in my merch.

1:14:32Griffin Newman:Penelope gives this pin to Odysseus as a way of remembering her, but also as a symbol to prove that it is him.

1:14:42David Sims:Yes. I saw Interstellar again last week, David, because it was just playing in 70mm in Spain every night. They're just rolling out the classics, right?

1:14:54Griffin Newman:Yes.

1:14:55David Sims:and you said that's a smart rewatch. I have a feeling these two movies are going to be really paired together. And there certainly is. I mean, Nolan loves his I feel so bad for leaving, how do I get back home kind of movie. I need to get back to my family. I need to get back to my wife. I need to get back to my job. He's so tormented by it. But he works with his wife.

1:15:18Griffin Newman:I know, but I just feel like it's clearly this thing that Ren, You know, because like so many of his movies have that.

1:15:24David Sims:Well, yeah, I think it's less about the way that he runs his life as an adult, a husband and his father, but more of what he experienced as a child when his family was split up. I think it's 50 percent that. And I think informed by that, it is his worst nightmare. It's the reason he works with his wife and he makes everything a family production is because he can imagine no worse fate than being stuck on a shoot for six months away from his family. like he is just such an ultimate wife and family guy that he needs that unit around himself and so if he's writing an emotional story of a challenge it's the biggest challenge he can imagine in so many ways which is why you know people go why is he so obsessed with the dead wife thing i like that he has moved away from dead wives and has found a way to tell stories about men longing for their wives that did not require them to be dead um but that scene is so fascinating because the dialogue, even though it's a very different scene where she hands him the pen, feels so similar, having watched it recently, to the final child Murph scene of like, I'm coming back.

1:16:25David Sims:I'm coming back. When are you coming back? I can't tell you, but I'm coming back. I just promise you that I'm coming back.

1:16:31Griffin Newman:Yeah, I mean, I think Christopher Nolan is by and large a charmed man who leads a wonderful life and he knows that. Like he's got a great thing going on. But that's clearly the fear that drives him a little bit or whatever, keeps him up at night, I guess. I mean, he's just, he's very similar to Shyamalan, in my opinion, in this regard. He's just so concerned with, like, the world we're leaving our children, with, like, what the future's gonna look like for his family, and he can blow it out, you know, to big, epic scale, but it's, you know, it's what makes these movies tick.

1:17:08David Sims:The key difference between him and Shyamalan is obviously that Nolan is not very concerned with what if the devil was in an elevator. Other than that, I do think they were very... Not yet. He wants to do a horror movie.

1:17:19Griffin Newman:What if he's like, I'm remaking Devil, the M. Night Shyamalan-produced thriller?

1:17:24David Sims:That would be the greatest move in the history of movies.

1:17:27Griffin Newman:I saw Logan Marshall Green on the set of The Odyssey, and we started talking about Devil, and I said, who has the rights to Devil? And he said, I have them. They cost$1. You can have them right now for one whole dollar. Who directed Devil? Because it wasn't Shyamalan.

1:17:40David Sims:John Eric Dowdle

1:17:43Griffin Newman:what else has he done? he did the remake of the Spanish film Wreck Quarantine oh sure yeah he did the Poughkeepsie tapes which is one of those like fucked up tiny budget horror movies that everyone talks about yeah that kind of never got a proper release right and then he did As Above So Below oh sure that's the Catacombs movie yeah and then something called No Escape oh yeah that's like

1:18:05David Sims:that is like Owen Wilson is stuck in a country that is having like some sort of like political uprising yeah it's owen wilson trying to do behind enemy lines again it's like straight survival action movie yeah except he's a family man there yeah um the athena pin is handed to odysseus as a if i can't stop you from leaving then let athena watch after you which does feel like talking about nolan imagining his worst nightmares it's like handing him a smartphone it's saying if you're gonna leave and be awake for a really long time at least take this pin so athena can pop in and talk to you all the time.

1:18:41David Sims:It is such an incredible display of Christopher Nolan's clout that you're like, what does Zendaya play in this movie? Zendaya plays Athena, Athena the god watching over Odysseus. She shows up at certain times over his shoulder and gives him a look and says like one line. Zendaya as an actor is really, really good at doing like disappointed face. Unbelievable at it. Yes. When she makes that face, I'm like, oof, I feel bad. You don't want her silent judgment. But this is the kind of role where you go, oh, it's pretty small. You can't shoot her out three days because she has to be in 20 different countries.

1:19:18David Sims:Yeah. She has to keep showing up on different ships.

1:19:21Griffin Newman:Yeah. I mean, she's obviously like in the movie probably for five minutes total.

1:19:27David Sims:Yeah. She makes an impression.

1:19:29Griffin Newman:She makes a huge impression. And she must have been, yeah.

1:19:31David Sims:I mean, every small part in this movie is played by someone that has a Wikipedia page. Yes. Like, our mutual acquaintance, Griffin Shiloh Fernandez, is in this movie. Yes. Somewhat briefly? He plays one of the Trojan soldiers who I think approaches Elliot Page in the beginning of the movie. Never takes his mask off. But it is crazy that, like, even those guys are played by guys.

1:20:04Griffin Newman:Totally. Right. I mean, who wouldn't want to be on these sets, right?

1:20:10David Sims:The beggar in the beginning is James Remar. Yeah, I asked David and I didn't know who it was. I believe it's James Remar. No, no, no. No, James Remar is the prophet. Is he Hades?

1:20:21Griffin Newman:Yeah, like, Taurus, yes, or whatever his name is. But yeah, he's the guy buried in the sand.

1:20:27David Sims:Yeah, I recognize the bottom of his job.

1:20:29Griffin Newman:Yes, while I was trying to pay attention to that scene where he kept being like, is that Richard from Sex and the City? I was like, yeah, big summary. Be quiet. I knew James Remar was one of the two cloaked guys.

1:20:42David Sims:I don't know who the guy was at the beginning, but he seems so familiar. Yeah. By the time this episode comes out, we're going to point out.

1:20:49Griffin Newman:Marie and I were trying to figure out who that was.

1:20:51David Sims:We couldn't figure it out, but I'm sure we will know in a bit. It speaks to the Nolan mystery box kind of thing. There's still so many actors for this movie with unlisted characters on IMDb. like the cast has been announced but it was not really told who was playing what other than the top 10 people right right

1:21:21David Sims:david yes you hear that uh vaguely yes and you're wondering who's that knocking at your door right i have no idea well it's us of course because blank check is returning to the bell house a place famous for having a door. They do have. That place is lousy with doors. Lots of doors. Marinos.

1:21:41Griffin Newman:We will be live Friday, October 16th at 730 at the Bell House in Brooklyn, New York. You can join us for a night of pure cinema.

1:21:50David Sims:That was a quote and accompanied by the hand gesture. He's got the meme, right. David is doing the Marty meme, which is almost as good as the whale face because that's sort of the theme of our live show.

1:22:00Griffin Newman:Yes, we'll be joined by some special guests to discuss the man, the myth, the Marty for an episode accompanying our miniseries on the films of Martin Scorsese. More details to be revealed, but it'll be Scorsese adjacent in some way or other.

1:22:12David Sims:It'll be a Marty Palooza, and tickets will go on sale to the general public Thursday, July 23rd at noon Eastern time. For more information, go to thebellhausny.com slash show.

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1:23:45David Sims:Let's just talk, because the movie is a bit of an episodic structure. Let's just talk about the scene. Okay, so all right, Cyclops.

1:23:51Griffin Newman:Cyclops is the first big thing. They go to island. They follow some sheep, as you do. Yep. Into a cave.

1:23:59David Sims:There was that nasty moment where Odysseus just sees giant bags of cheese hanging on the walls of the cave and just eats some.

1:24:07Griffin Newman:They're hungry. They're tired.

1:24:09David Sims:I guess. I don't know if I would eat cave cheese.

1:24:12Griffin Newman:I don't know that I would eat random cheese hanging in a cave in a sack. That's sort of where cheese comes from. But usually it's been, for me, inspected by a government, one assumes, or at least by somebody, like a merchant, a trader.

1:24:29David Sims:If there was a stamp on the bag of Agamemnon giving the thumbs up, would you feel okay if that was the inspection? Of course.

1:24:36Griffin Newman:Or if it was like, you know, Cyclops, Polyphemus is, you know, beloved homespun cheese cave. You know, he had a little sign.

1:24:45David Sims:Some sort of branding, you know. I will admit this because it was a special screening. The BFI South Bank, the concessions was not open. And I really wanted a popcorn and a soda the whole movie, especially because it's a long film. So when he goes over to the bags of cheese, I went like, that's disgusting. Is he really going to eat this? And then the more he started eating it, I started getting jealous of him.

1:25:07Griffin Newman:You were like, kind of go for a bag of cheese right now. Do they sell cheese bags? I had to, Griffin, they had popcorn going at the IMAX, but they had shut down all the other things. So I had to go downstairs, talk to the ticket taker and be like, hey, I need to go buy some food because I'm going to faint if I don't eat something during this three-hour movie. And she was like, yeah, whatever.

1:25:29David Sims:So you got chicken nuggets, nachos, and popcorn? That's right.

1:25:32Griffin Newman:Is that a problem? A three-course meal. I also got orange soda, and the freestyle machine kind of spat some orange, you know, the sort of concentrated stuff on me, and it looked like I had robbed a bank and like a dye packet exploded on my hand. Yeah, it was a very good time.

1:25:51David Sims:I did feel borderline faint towards the end of this movie. I was talking to you guys before a recorder just how fucking hot it has been in Europe. Yes. And halfway through every day, I get exhausted just from taking steps. And I think Europe has like one air conditioner per country, right? They keep moving it around. Right. So this week, I think Spain has it. And sadly, I'm in London. Right. I do, you know, it was bad timing to take a Euro trip, you know, for some amount of work, right when a heat wave is hitting the entire continent. On the other hand, I feel great that I left the United States and New York in particular at the time that the Diarrho wave is hitting.

1:26:32Griffin Newman:There is.

1:26:32David Sims:One of my friends has it. Yeah. There is some diarrhea out here. Didn't your sister have it? Everyone has the diarrhea. Did your sister have it? I don't know if we want to announce that on the podcast.

1:26:39Griffin Newman:Well, she posted a sub stack about it. She stacked it? Yeah.

1:26:44David Sims:She stacked it and she grammed it. She grammed the Rhea?

1:26:47Griffin Newman:Yeah. No, it is fun. No, Griff, I think you're wrong. You would be thriving right now because basically the government is like, you can only eat the most processed food imaginable. Do not touch a vegetable. Leaves are not for you.

1:27:02David Sims:Look, everyone's complaining about how bad it is. I go, yeah, welcome to my world. Now you know what it feels like for a minute.

1:27:09Griffin Newman:Griffin, you're also missing the wildfires. This is causing a lot of residual smoke down here. So you also can't really, or you're not supposed to go outside, which is perfect for Griffin Newman.

1:27:19David Sims:There's also like the Legionnaires outbreak on the Upper East Side, so you wouldn't be able to visit your grandma. That's a good point. My grandmother does live on the Upper East Side. Two docks her. I also say I mean Ben if the wildfires from Canada are brushing over into New York City I imagine it wouldn't be a good time to barbecue any smoking I would try to do would get intercepted by the smokes that were not in my control I'm very particular you know I'm fruit woods only have you been trying any of the barbecue in Europe? it's not really

1:27:50Griffin Newman:a barbecue hub that consonant I've been trying to make my own of course you lugged a a Weber green egg or whatever. Smoking some jamon.

1:28:01David Sims:Some jamon. Some smoked jamon. Yeah, I'm smoking some jamon. Right, I mean, they smoke meat well there. Yeah. Yeah, I am smoking meat well here.

1:28:11Griffin Newman:So why do you like the Cyclops? Because he's a big boy. We did talk about this a little bit, right? It's quite scary.

1:28:17David Sims:I think the sequence is a marvel. I think it is something so uncanny to just make him a guy. I think it gets to... What's the opening title at the beginning of this film? It's something like... It was a time of magic, something like that. I can't remember. Yes. Fucked up. And this is obviously a fantastical story that asks you to believe that centuries and centuries and centuries ago, magical things happened, and at some point they just disappeared from the world, right? It's true. It's all true, actually. Okay, it's all true.

1:28:48Griffin Newman:Sorry, the opening title is, It is a Lawless Time Crime Syndicates Compete for Resources, Food Medicine, and Hyperfuel. on the shipbuilding planet of Corellia, the foul lady Proxima, forces runaways into a life of crime in exchange for shelter and protection.

1:29:02David Sims:And coaxium, you can smoke that, right? You can keep it hot?

1:29:06Griffin Newman:Coaxium needs to be cool as hell. So we got to keep it away from Madrid right now. It needs to be so cold.

1:29:13David Sims:And Paris, they got no AC. Right, right.

1:29:17Griffin Newman:Yeah, it is funny. The Paris, they're just like, no, no, no. The cigarettes have no filters. The apartments have no air conditioners.

1:29:24David Sims:Yes, no air conditioners, but we're going to smoke all the time. Right.

1:29:27Griffin Newman:And they take some damn naps.

1:29:29David Sims:They do. They do.

1:29:31Griffin Newman:Have you been taking siestas?

1:29:32David Sims:Napping. Oh, yeah. You're kidding me. You siesta maxing out there? Sorry, I know we were making jokes, but I did look up the actual opening prologue line. Please. It is a time of apparent magic. Oh, that's cool. There we go. Love that. Yeah. This is a thing I like about the realization of the Cyclops tied to that is it feels like you're witnessing something that could they make him a scale that clearly becomes magical. Right. But other than that, you're like, am I just looking at a person with facial differences? am I looking at something that could have been misinterpreted and through the oral tradition of the story being told and retold and reprocessed got more and more extreme?

1:30:23Griffin Newman:Right. They don't, you know, in the story he talks to the Cyclops more because the whole thing is he tricks him into thinking his name is nobody. He also gets him drunk. And that's how he ends up falling asleep. Right. And, you know, that's when the Cyclops is asked, like, who did this to you? He's like, nobody did this to me. You know, it's the trick. You know, it's a classic Odysseus, the cunning guy. Right. And Nolan has said, like, I just couldn't figure out how to make that work. Like, it's just a different movie, I guess. If it's just like he's talking, you know, like he wanted it, I guess, to feel more primal, which it does.

1:30:58Griffin Newman:He does talk. He makes noise and he says Poseidon.

1:31:01David Sims:And it made me so sad.

1:31:03Griffin Newman:It's very, it's quite effective.

1:31:04David Sims:This is the other thing. It's that it makes the character more sad because you're sort of like, is he almost being bullied by these guys? right they treat him like he's not you know intelligent at first they're dealing with him like he's a wild animal and then the realization that he has the ability of speech which implies obviously like deeper internal thoughts has come after they've already fucked with him a bunch he also crunched a bunch of them he did that's true be crunching there's some self-defense of crunching I liked that the aesthetics of... They went in his cave and ate his cheese.

1:31:40Griffin Newman:But I guess Zeus' law says you should offer your cave cheese to anyone who shows up. They made a nice fire for him. Yeah, that's true.

1:31:47David Sims:I thought the aesthetics of the Cyclops design really reminded me of 90s. I could have seen him in the Madonna Bedtime Stories music video.

1:31:58Griffin Newman:That's a Marie thought right there. I like that his eye is sideways.

1:32:03David Sims:Yeah, it's kind of vaginal. A little bit. And that's another Marie thought right there.

1:32:08Griffin Newman:A little bit. Anyway, he burns his frigging eye. He does. He does.

1:32:13David Sims:He lights the sword on fire. They poke him to wake him up and then stab him in the eye.

1:32:20Griffin Newman:Yeah, and then they have the hay and they're pretending to be the sheep, which is, you know, that is classic.

1:32:26David Sims:In the Arthur version of the Odyssey, because they don't want to really show violence, the Cyclops is embodied by Buster, the rabbit, and D.W. just ties his ears around his eyes. His eye. Is the Odyssey episode of Arthur from the Stephen Crowder era, or was he not voicing Brain at that time? I have to admit that I am not super familiar with the cast and crew behind the show, Arthur.

1:32:58Griffin Newman:He only voiced the Brain for two seasons, Griffin, out of 25. So it's hard to, you know, narrow it down here.

1:33:06David Sims:I think he did do Jekyll, Jekyll, Hyde, Jekyll, Hyde, Hyde, Jekyll, Jekyll, though, if I'm not mistaken. Someone will check that. I'm a little lost here, but that's... I'm assuming that's an Arthur episode. There's so many goddamn memes about children's entertainment,

1:33:20Griffin Newman:and it's hard to keep up. So they escape.

1:33:23David Sims:Yes.

1:33:24Griffin Newman:They do escape, but... Odysseus... Odysseus does fire a little parting shot out of an anger.

1:33:29David Sims:Shouldn't have done that

1:33:31Griffin Newman:In the story, in the poem He just says his name triumphantly And that's what gets them in trouble But it's the same basic idea Now they've invoked the gods Now I think that Nolan keeping the gods at a distance Is good because It keeps the men's Sort of opinions Kind of up in the air Where they're like, no, the gods have cursed us But I like the idea that it's like Or maybe you cursed yourselves Just by the way you've behaved Over the years It's like without it not having magic. Odysseus has hubris kind of throughout the story.

1:34:06David Sims:Let's call out another thing here. One of I think it's maybe our true introduction to Odysseus in the movie. But in that first 30 minutes, we're getting so much information in different times thrown at us. We're watching Tom Holland train with mentor, who, of course, is Ryan Hurst, our friend from the Lady Killers, who played Lump. he's got a real

1:34:27Griffin Newman:he looks like he just walked off like the set of Sons of Anarchy or Vikings or whatever he's looking great

1:34:32David Sims:David would you be surprised to hear that in fact he was on Sons of Anarchy yes and of course next is playing Kratos in the God of War series that everyone thinks looks perfect

1:34:41Griffin Newman:oh everyone's grumpy about that one which is the first time that video game fans have had some objection to an adaptation of their material

1:34:47David Sims:what I was going to say is we're introduced Tom Holland is training with Mentor and they're sort of explaining the way that his father used to fight and his rules and everything. And then there's like a flashback within a flashback. And Odysseus is explaining his whole method of stringing his bow, which is sort of his like Milner test of no one can take the throne unless they can string his bow, a thing that only he can do. But also that he loves to pluck the bow to sort of play the musical note before because he thinks it's the honorable thing to do to alert whatever he is about to shoot at, that he's engaging them in battle.

1:35:25David Sims:Whether prey or opponents. That hunting is the same. You know what? He doesn't... The Trojan horse is the complete denial of the warning. But even here with the Cyclops, you know, he, like, tricks him, and then he turns around and yells, like, another one. Yeah. And just fucking, like, spikes.

1:35:47Griffin Newman:He does briefly slip into Khaled mode, and he regrets it the rest of his life.

1:35:51David Sims:And he brings out, like, 20 guest acts. Yeah.

1:35:55Griffin Newman:Right. Himesh Patel! That guy you've seen in a lot of movies playing heavies! What's his name again?

1:36:04David Sims:Can we shout out Himesh Patel for a second, who we were introduced to, obviously, in yesterday. Andrew Howard is who I'm mentioning there.

1:36:10Griffin Newman:Okay. Yeah, and Will Yun-Li. But yeah, no, Himesh Patel, who's in Tenet. Yes. And is wonderful in Tenet.

1:36:17David Sims:Plays kind of an Adam Goldberg, gum-chewing, annoyed asshole in that. Yeah, he's in the one set piece,

1:36:24Griffin Newman:Basically, I guess he's in two. He's but, you know, he's like a helper guy. You want me to do what? Like he's that kind of guy.

1:36:30David Sims:Crash a plane into a Freeport. Right. And then yesterday, he's obviously like doing a Hugh Grant thing. I think incredibly well. And then in this, in this, he's just playing like ultimate straight arrow right hand man who's increasingly questioning what what is this mission we're on? I got like, can I trust this? Yeah, I got a bone to pick with Wikipedia for the Odyssey in parentheses to 2026 film. They list Himesh Patel as Odysseus' second-in-command and incompetent brother-in-law. Perhaps in the—again, I have not read the poem.

1:37:06Griffin Newman:Yeah, in the poem, he is cowardly. He's a fool. He's sort of like the emblematic thing of the men just not listening, not heeding the signs and going into— One of the characters in the original poem that he's gifted that bag that controls wind. And then he and some of the other crew members think there's gold hidden in it. Yeah, because they're like petty, silly men.

1:37:35David Sims:I think in this he is hyper-competent. I think he is portrayed as hyper-competent in order to cast more doubt on Odysseus. In order for Odysseus to doubt himself more. I also think him being such a, like, earthy, reliable character makes the ultimate loss of him.

1:37:58Griffin Newman:Right. He's the one you're really attached to among the men.

1:38:01David Sims:Really, really, really sting. You need one of those guys to really be kind of delineated and fleshed out in that sort of way. Yes. Walt, sorry, just to rewind a bit, we're talking about the Matt Damon bow trick. not the plucking of the bow but the stringing of the bow I'm just gonna come out and say this I've never really been a Matt Damon is hot girly sure

1:38:29Griffin Newman:Matt Damon's reliable he's a cutie pie

1:38:35David Sims:but like I've never been like Matt Damon

1:38:40Griffin Newman:takes the roles in things like Ford vs Ferrari or Air or whatever where it's like, well, he's the kind of doughy, you know, middle of the road guy. Like, he's not the sexier guy.

1:38:51David Sims:He's become a little America's dad. We were talking about this in our True Grit episode with Stavi, that, like, it's funny that Matt Damon had this big action star run with Jason Bourne, and it feels like he's firmly settled into his I am dad mode. And then we remembered, oh, right, his next movie is The Odyssey. Like, he's doing his one last seemingly I'm gonna get fucking swole as hell. Went off. He's ripped, yeah. But he's ripped in a really attractive. He's sinewy.

1:39:17Griffin Newman:Realistic.

1:39:18David Sims:Realistic way. Earthy. Where I was just like.

1:39:23Griffin Newman:I think they should have put the bodysuit from live action Moana on him. I think that would have worked better.

1:39:29David Sims:Don't you think? Yeah. My problem with Odysseus in this movie is that he had nipples. And I wish we could just take those off and just have smooth rubbery pecs. Have you seen it yet, David? Are you seeing it? No, I won't be seeing it. None of us are seeing. No, no, no. Unfortunately, Ben had to see it.

1:39:45Griffin Newman:Unfortunately, I did see it.

1:39:46David Sims:Why? Because we are Critical Darlings.

1:39:50Griffin Newman:Oh, sure, sure, sure. Right. So you had to help out there. Yes. But no, no, my daughter. I should mention, it sucks so hard. Not good? It sucks on ice. Yeah. When I saw it, the theater smelt like vomit, which felt really right. Which theater? Which theater was it? Oh, Alamo. I've been walking around vomiting in theaters recently just to kind of like, you know, mark my territory. No, my daughter has seen the trailer for it multiple times And is always just kind of like That's grown up Moana And I'm like, yeah And she's like, hmm You know, she's not like, I can't wait to see that And so I haven't even suggested that We were opening Weekend Minions and Monsters We were right there And she was like fucking Bernie Mac at Def Comedy She was just like Pointing at the screen And screaming at like everything the Minions did Good I mean, as were many other children in the audience And adults like Marie Barney Salinas.

1:40:43Griffin Newman:I was just very touched by that movie. I was just watching it kind of with my hand to my chest going like, this is so sweet. They love the movies. You got verklempt. I love James. I love James.

1:40:56David Sims:James is an artist. I've quoted before Robert Downey Jr. saying that his performance in Jodie Foster's Home for the Holidays is the most relaxed performance in the history of cinema because of how much heroin he was on. I think The Rock's performance In live action Moana would make him jealous

1:41:14Griffin Newman:Yes

1:41:14David Sims:I want to know what he's taking So I can use it to fall asleep at night

1:41:18Griffin Newman:Griffin, do you think How about this theory though? I'm going to throw this at you Dwayne Johnson, as we all know Actually loves independent cinema Made The Smashing Machine You know, he's out here Supporting artists

1:41:29David Sims:He's saying he's making another movie With Benny Safdie An adaptation of a Daniel Pinkwater book We'll see if that happens It'd be cool if it did

1:41:35Griffin Newman:I mean, I think the issue there Might be no one will give them the money but we'll see. Possibly. But he brought down the Snyderverse. Okay? He did it himself. The hierarchy of power did change. Exactly. He has now brought down possibly Disney live action remakes. Is he a man on the inside? Is he actually doing God's work?

1:41:54David Sims:Yes. Yes. You know what I mean? I love this conspiracy. I've been viewing him as the enemy for a while, and yet I loved his performance in Smashing Machine. You and I both like that movie. I do. I like it a lot. And he has been successfully killing the things I hate the most in modern American cinema. I think he might be just like here to help.

1:42:15Griffin Newman:This is all I'm saying. Like, I just think now is this perhaps, you know, challenged by things like he's in Jumanji 3 this year, which is hard to get excited about.

1:42:24David Sims:But I'm trying to remember, did Bella Tarr direct Jumanji 3? Yeah, he directed that and it killed him. Yes. It's his final film. It's his eyes wide shut.

1:42:35Griffin Newman:Yeah. And, you know, I did get served up that interview recently. Did you see this griff that was going around from the Black Adam time where the guy is like, so which Joker would be in Black Adam? Like Jared Leto or Joaquin Phoenix or Barry Keegan? And he's like, Barry Keegan. And they talk about it seriously for two minutes where he's like, what he's doing is. And I'm just like, what are you guys talking? It's like it's the ultimate just like how everyone just went insane about multiverses and didn't know what they were talking about anymore. And he was acting like Black Adam could just like bring all the worlds together.

1:43:11David Sims:I know I know we've already made this joke within this conversational circle, but I just need to underline it. There is nothing funnier in the world than a year long marketing campaign that was all framed around the hierarchy of power in the DC universe will change. and he conclusively did do that. Yes. Not in the way he intended. Or maybe he didn't intend it. Maybe he's a force of good. Anyway. Moana's dog piss.

1:43:40Griffin Newman:Yeah, I believe you. I won't be seeing it ever.

1:43:45David Sims:Okay, we talked about Cyclops.

1:43:46Griffin Newman:Cyclops. Okay, so then... So Poseidon friggin' pissed. Poseidon mad. Because they fucked with his son.

1:43:54David Sims:So they get driven to another island. Cyclops is dead.

1:43:57Griffin Newman:Which is where they meet the large men, Ben, that you were... Oh, sure. Dude, you approved of so much. And I do... The nightmare of the kid who's, like, laughing and... Yeah. Yeah. A little stinker.

1:44:11David Sims:He's got kind of wilder energy.

1:44:13Griffin Newman:Yeah. What's that? Oh, sure. Yeah.

1:44:15David Sims:Yeah, your arch nemesis.

1:44:16Griffin Newman:Right, right, right. The 10-year-old that I'm feuding with. And so they're driven...

1:44:22David Sims:The 10-year-old who has your number.

1:44:24Griffin Newman:Nolan is so good at this, like, stark nightmare stuff. Yeah. Yes. But when they go to the other side of the island and they're just seeing the animals, you know, like the tiger and the lion, you know, like the weird... Oh, that's on Circe's island. It's the same island.

1:44:38David Sims:Oh, it's the same island.

1:44:39Griffin Newman:Yeah, same island. Oh, I've been to the island. And they, right, and they encounter Circe. And this is, I mean, it was just like, I know, so I know that Circe will turn them into pics, right? And I know that Christopher Nolan really tries not to use CGI, obviously. I mean, I'm sure he used it a little bit in this, Griff, because he's... you know, he's making the guys big. There's the big whirlpool. Like there's stuff.

1:45:02David Sims:There's the creature when they have to make the bargain, the rock creature with that. Yeah. That's the one thing that felt conclusively CGI. Right. Where it's like, what are you going to do? I mean, right. Some of this has to be, I know so much of it for him is he doesn't want these stages in the process that will degrade the film. That when you run these things through optical printing and then you have to, right. Or rather, unless you do optical printing, if you're running them through a computer and then you're sort of outputting it again onto film you're losing fidelity and uh so i know he tries to keep those things to an absolute minimum but it it is just sort of striking to just see guys who are big and not 80 feet tall big yeah right but just just just a

1:45:46Griffin Newman:little too big yes but uh the way they so simply have her just like stretching the faces to turn into pig. Oh, my God. And just the grossness of the, like, entrail soup. Oh, my God. So gross. Because it starts forming this, like, waxy kind of, like, weird icicle coming out of their throats.

1:46:08David Sims:I wanted to throw up. Did it not remind you all of Spirited Away? Of course. Well, Spirited Away is referencing that. I mean, sure. Yeah, yeah.

1:46:15Griffin Newman:That's, you know, this is the first time anyone told these tales.

1:46:19David Sims:So the TV version of the Odyssey that we were talking about that was being really bad. Do you know who plays Cersei in that, Griffin? Tell me. Fran Sinclair from the TV show Dinosaurs? Close. Bernadette Peters. Oh, which does sound cool. Yes. As soon as I found that out, I was like, oh, I could see her just like feeding slop to pigs. Like, you know, just be like, all right, eat, you know. Eat my slop. Eat my slop. Eat my slop. She looks pretty hot.

1:46:49Griffin Newman:God, Bernadette Peters. We love her. We do love her.

1:46:53David Sims:I... But yeah, Cersei's sequence, incredible.

1:46:59Griffin Newman:But again, like, so, okay, so in the poem, Odysseus does fuck Cersei and have a couple kids with her and lives there for like a year. They cut all that out. Good. I just love that, again, this sort of simplicity of how he solves this problem of understanding that there's something wounded and dark about her, grabbing the bird, realizing it's important to her, and then the way Nolan solves that puzzle so simply of she's just like, I like her better as a bird. It's her sister. But it's also that he breaks off from his crew to go hunting. Well, also because they don't like him. Yes, they're already kind of doubting him and thinking that the gods have smited him.

1:47:44Griffin Newman:And they have. The gods have smited him. They're questioning his leadership. You know, but he might be the first to defy the gods and successfully and maybe prove the gods wrong. What's that tweet? I'll look up the tweet. But yeah, he shoots a deer and it turns into a very, very handsome naked man. Yes, I saw some tight little tushy. Exactly. This is the famous tweet. RIP to everyone killed by the gods for their hubris, but I'm different and better. may be even better than the gods. I'll send it along to you guys. And that's from Senator Ted Cruz?

1:48:14David Sims:While we're talking about Samantha Morton, do we think that she is in the supporting actress Oscar conversation? Sure.

1:48:26Griffin Newman:I think this isn't everything Oscar conversation right now. Yeah.

1:48:30David Sims:Right? I think this is such a kind of reemergence for her and such a scene-stealing role. And even in the way that Nolan's been talking about her performance in the movie, he's been really spotlighting her in interviews, even though she's not part of the core press team that they're pushing out there. And he said there are two times.

1:48:49Griffin Newman:He compared her to Heath Ledger's. Oh, sorry. I'm stepping on your thing.

1:48:52David Sims:No, he said there are two times in my filmmaking career where an actor has done something that when I called cut, the crew broke into applause. Wow. And it was Heath Ledger, I think, during the pencil trick scene. Right. And this. And when John David Washington said, I ordered my hot sauce an hour ago.

1:49:08Griffin Newman:That was the third time.

1:49:10David Sims:But to be fair, they applauded the hot sauce. That's actually what they were applauding.

1:49:14Griffin Newman:And when Elizabeth Debicki opened a car door with her foot, even though she was on the other side of the car. Oh my God, remember that. Yeah, when she height maxes. When she leg maxes. I gotta watch Tenet again. You gotta watch Tenet every single day of your life. That's a big time commitment.

1:49:28David Sims:I don't have that much time. I don't know if you noticed, but there was applause in our audience when her name came up in the credits.

1:49:37Griffin Newman:Oh, that's nice. I did not notice that. Yeah.

1:49:41David Sims:My crowd had one guy, like the Not Another Teen Movie guy, who was trying so hard to get applause breaks happening throughout the movie. And the movie's a little too contemplative and moody. Yeah.

1:49:53Griffin Newman:Our only applause breaks were for the moment where Corey gets the arrow to the throat upon saying, you're Odysseus, which rocks. Correct.

1:50:03David Sims:That is the only time it successfully happened in my theater. This guy truly tried 10 times. Right. There were 10 times where you would hear.

1:50:14Griffin Newman:Maybe he was trying to turn on a light and he had a clap. He was clapping. You think it could have been that?

1:50:20David Sims:He was clapping on. Clap on. I want to say about the Cersei sequence that much like the village that burns themselves down preemptively, her whole rationale is, I know, man, they were going to do something, right? That Odysseus is like, why did you do this to them? They didn't do anything to you. And she's like, I know where it's going. that there is a time of such incredible distrust happening that people have started defying the gods, that they've started defying each other, that they're defying the laws of behavior, and that everyone is just on the defense all the time.

1:50:59Griffin Newman:Yes. Like, she can't trust anything anymore, as we have said already. Everyone's speaking of these invaders from the sea who don't follow Zeus's law. And, yeah, I mean, could she have maybe asked five to ten questions before she served them pig soup? Maybe. I don't know. She's gone a little mad up there by herself. She's also just got pig soup on the back burner all the time. They are like oh you have food and she's like yep slop it up sloppies. It's so gross looking.

1:51:28David Sims:It was so disgusting.

1:51:29Griffin Newman:So she is the one who says you're going to have to go to hell Hades. Sorry. And he's like nobody ever does that and she's like I don't know what to tell you man. You're going to be the first. You're going to pull it off. And so they go to the underworld. Pretty rad. Oh, my God. It's so sick. The black beach. The black beach. The black Icelandic beach. Yeah. I need to go to Iceland. It's beautiful. And it's a four hour flight.

1:51:55David Sims:I know. You got to do it. I'm going to do it. I've been. Yeah. It's been on my list. Sit right over there. They have hot dogs. Oh, good. Okay. That was the only thing holding me back. I'm glad you know they have hot dogs.

1:52:05Griffin Newman:Pop over there for an Icelandic hot dog. Okay. Perfect. That's great news. And yes, and this is James Remar. First, he inquires as to like, did Samantha ever show up and is just like that and just like that. And Damon's like, yeah, but it was weird. They clearly just kind of shot it separately and she just kind of like has a one-sided phone call and it wasn't really satisfying for anyone.

1:52:28David Sims:He tells Odysseus to meet him at the top where the air is crisp. That's a girl next door reference. Cannot.

1:52:34Griffin Newman:Wow.

1:52:35David Sims:Remar cooks in that movie.

1:52:37Griffin Newman:He's always cooking I mean the guy cooks Apart from Mortal Kombat Annihilation Where the stove was broken I guess The gas was cut Marie did remind me On the subway ride home Of the other next door movie What's the Jennifer Lopez movie?

1:52:54David Sims:The Boy Next Door The Boy Next Door Where someone Either she gifts The Boy Next Door Or The Boy Next Door Gifts her A first edition Of The Odyssey Yes A first edition Of The Odyssey

1:53:05Griffin Newman:Yes Iconic

1:53:07David Sims:Could we do a Next Door Patreon series?

1:53:12Griffin Newman:Well, okay. Are we doing movies with the title Next Door in them? There's also kind of a lot of fucked up neighbor movies. You know what I mean? Next Door, Girl Next Door. He's on Next Door.

1:53:27David Sims:Girl Next Door, Boy Next Door.

1:53:30Griffin Newman:We've got a 2020... Oh no, that's a TV miniseries. I'm out on that. Are there any other good ones? The girl next There's two girl next doors Sometimes we are

1:53:40David Sims:The spy next door Okay Jackie Chan The spy next door

1:53:45Griffin Newman:Uh-huh I'm not seeing a lot of good stuff here I think you would have to more do a neighbor series, right? Like rear window Well, that But, you know Kind of thing, right? Yeah, exactly Like, what's the one where Samuel L. Jackson's the cop Who doesn't like things? I like that Lakeview Terrace Lakeview Terrace You know? That's an insane you'll abuse it. Pacific Heights, which is really fun. Pacific Heights, I love. Any movie where people are like kind of peeking through blinds, you know, and then like, ah, like something happens that makes them go, ah.

1:54:14David Sims:Wasn't there like a, a racist, uh, Dennis Quaid, Bad Neighbor movie recently? Yes. Where again, it's like.

1:54:21Griffin Newman:The Intruder. All right. The.

1:54:24David Sims:Dennis Quaid plays the racist? Yeah. Yeah. Because it's Michael Ely

1:54:28Griffin Newman:and Megan Good move next door. Yes. He's like, hi, I'm your neighbor.

1:54:32David Sims:In a transformative performance, Dennis Quaid plays like a somewhat unhinged reactionary. Well, this is the Dennis. The Dennis Quaid thing is so funny. It was this thing in The Substance 2 where I'm like, you're in this movie playing a character that is like satirizing the kind of guy that you associate yourself with politically. So like. It's fascinating.

1:54:52Griffin Newman:It's got some self-awareness. Are you self-aware? Arlington Road. What if your neighbor was possibly a terrorist? Another fun one. I've never seen that one. Yeah.

1:54:59David Sims:You've never seen Arlington Road?

1:55:00Griffin Newman:I gotta see Arlington Road. I do think Rear Window is the king and origin of it, Ben. Like, I think you're right. Rear Window, I would say, is the best one. I don't know. Have you seen The Intruder? Disturbia.

1:55:15David Sims:Disturbia, which is just Rear Window. Which is just Rear Window. That Simpsons episode, Bard of Darkness, is that what it is? That's a great episode.

1:55:22Griffin Newman:Love that episode. That's the one where Milhouse tries to write Milhouse, but he wants to go to the pool, so he writes Milpool.

1:55:31David Sims:Milhouse rules. David just smacking the table laughing. Milhouse is so good. Everything's coming up Milhouse, I think, about once a day. Of course, yes. The Simpsons did an Odyssey. They did. Did they? Yes, Homer told the Odyssey. What season's that? It's one of those anthology episodes where it's three stories in one, right? Oh, yeah, sure. I sent this GIF to one of our group techs the other day, David. I think it was Blank Doe. but of the lineup of the suitors who are coming for Marge in their version of the Odyssey. Because I remember that being the best section is just like Disco Stu and Moe and everyone courting Marge.

1:56:10David Sims:Oh, I see. Yes. It was called Tales from the Public Domain.

1:56:14Griffin Newman:Which is really funny. The Odyssey is the first and then they have a... Lisa Simpson as Joan of Arc. Lisa as Joan of Arc and then a Hamlet episode called Do the Bard Man.

1:56:25David Sims:Really funny. And I believe the final joke in that episode is he finishes telling the story of Hamlet. And he goes, and of course, it was adapted into a movie called Ghostbusters. And then they play the Ghostbusters theme and Homer dances to the Ghostbusters theme for one straight minute over the end credits. Marie's laughing. Marie is laughing. I'm laughing. The title of the Odyssey section is, oh, brother, where art thou? Yeah, which is, that's pretty good. That's pretty good.

1:56:54Griffin Newman:But still, it's like a season 14 episode I'm skeptical that this was very funny It's so funny that I have to keep bringing Back to the friggin' homework Ben, you're doing great Thank you People have been saying lately on the Reddit or whatever Like, wow, Ben's really like He's become kind of the taskmaster No, Ben is doing his job

1:57:16David Sims:Ben's doing his job

1:57:16Griffin Newman:And that mood will persist on this He is the producer of this show And he is keeping us somewhat on track They just try to help out.

1:57:24David Sims:Come up to Ben, tears in their eyes, and they say thank you for producing.

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1:58:36Griffin Newman:So, yes, the sequence on the beach, speaking to the blind prophet, beautifully done. Oh, Tyrese. Yes.

1:58:42David Sims:Speaking to Elliot Page.

1:58:44Griffin Newman:Right, so like, Elliot Page kind of emerging as like the heart of the movie as the sort of avatar of the men Odysseus sacrificed for what exactly? And the betrayal,

1:58:56David Sims:because basically what happened with Sinon is that...

1:59:01Griffin Newman:They convinced Sinon they actually did leave. Correct. Like, Sinon did not know

1:59:06David Sims:about the Trojan horse. In order for the trick to work, Sinon needed to be tricked as well, so they believed it.

1:59:12Griffin Newman:And Odysseus defends himself of like, look, I needed you to believe it. I needed it to be real. Yes, you died, and I heard you die, and I was sad about it, but it meant others didn't have to die. But you can tell he knows like this is a bit of a... Because it's like, what so for what so that we could pillage a city like the whole reason of the trojan war is like literally the dumbest thing it's a trade routes or whatever you know come on bring up jar jar binks it was the it's some guy's wife well okay the stated reason obviously yes is that uh paris of troy stole helen from uh menelaus yeah her face too pretty right and brought her but they say in this, it's like Agamemnon would, like, even if we got Helen back, like, Agamemnon wants to disrupt Troy's, like, control over the trade.

2:00:04David Sims:It's what the fucking Republicans do. They blame it on some other thing.

2:00:07Griffin Newman:Wait, the Republicans? I thought that was, like, a stand-up party founded by Abraham Lincoln that's never done anything wrong, Griffin.

2:00:12David Sims:Oh, you're right. I'm sorry. They were actually the good ones all along.

2:00:15Griffin Newman:We see Agamemnon. He has been murdered. Yes, this is right. So then we're right. We're moving over to Telemachus, who goes to see Menelaus, played by John Bernthal. Brother of Agamemnon. Right. Very good Bernthal.

2:00:31David Sims:When is he bad? Only when he hosts a podcast.

2:00:34Griffin Newman:I would say

2:00:35David Sims:sometimes Bernthal can hit the gas a little too heavy. Did any of you guys see Dog Day Afternoon? No, I did not, because I heard it was bad. This is what I heard as well. I heard some very loud rumors that it was not good.

2:00:47Griffin Newman:Someone told me that it opened and people were laughing and they had not anticipated that. And so then they leaned into it. That doesn't sound good to me. But I think... Bernthal's excellent

2:01:01David Sims:in this.

2:01:02Griffin Newman:He's excellent. And it's like Talamachus is seeing in Bernthal. Bernthal's like, yay, I won. Now I'm here. Shit's mad. Helen doesn't like me. You know, her face is all scarred. Yeah, my hot wife

2:01:15David Sims:isn't even hot anymore. Right.

2:01:17Griffin Newman:And then... She's only going to launch 500 ships now. Right. And Helen's like, And don't forget what happened to Agamemnon. It's like, I don't want to talk about that. We're not even going to talk about that. But it's another thing that we had been seeded. It's seeded very early in the story where Odysseus tells Penelope, like, Agamemnon, like, sacrificed his daughter for favorable wins or whatever. And Penelope's like, what? And, like, Odysseus is like, I don't know. You know, it's a spoilery. You know, it's war. What are you going to do? And, like, the minute Agamemnon comes home, a champion, like, his wife is still mad about that and murders him.

2:01:50David Sims:Yeah.

2:01:51Griffin Newman:And both roles, of course, played by Lupita Nyong 'o. The Great.

2:01:55David Sims:Yeah. We also get, at some point around here, the fuller sequence of the Trojan horse attack. Yeah. We see that before they go to the underworld, right? Because we've seen sort of like Sinon's sacrifice more in full. Oh, sure. We also see, I like that this movie answers some of the practical questions I have had about the Trojan horse since being a child. It was stinky in there. They were just shitting, pissing, puking. This reminds me of Dunkirk. Yeah. Yup. Mm-hmm. I also love that they show that anytime the horse is, like, turned over, that all the guys inside need to, like, rebrace themselves.

2:02:32David Sims:Have to, like, reconfigure their bodies. Yeah. Yeah.

2:02:34Griffin Newman:At one point, the Troy soldiers are stabbing the horse, and one guy gets stabbed, and they all, like, cover up his mouth.

2:02:42David Sims:Yeah.

2:02:42Griffin Newman:The guy's just drowning at the bottom of it. Oh, yeah. You don't want to be at the bottom. A bunch of guys dying at the bottom of the horse. You don't want to be near, like, the head. Yeah. Get me near the head of the horse, please Very jackass Not that Very jackass of them

2:02:54David Sims:Very jackass Great jackass

2:02:55Griffin Newman:Yes Yes I'm Odysseus And this is jackass Then it's just like the horse It's the wooden horse

2:03:07David Sims:Oh man And there would be one point where like Preston Lacey would fall on top of Wee Man inside the horse Sure That would be really funny Yeah What I was going to say is that John Bernthal another thing that was like very much out of context in the teaser for this movie of him just being like hey you want to hear about my brother like just talking like john bernthal or whatever and that was another thing in the trailer i was like all right you got tom holland whining about like my dad's coming home and then john bernthal just talking like john bernthal and i was like but it's all it's removing the distance from these things and i was also talking to a friend who was saying that like, you know, there are a million different translations of these things and some of them are like, no, the wording is something more casual than father.

2:03:53David Sims:It totally works for me in the context of the movie. The characterization of these characters, like the way that these characters are portrayed makes absolute sense and ultimately makes the story really relatable for, you know, contemporary audiences but not in a way that feels forced. Yeah. Um, but, you know, I was... They're not saying hello, fellow kids. Right. I just rewatched Amadeus last week, which, you know, perfect movie. But again, that to me is like the classic version of we're going to apply sort of like modern sensibilities to it.

2:04:31Griffin Newman:Yeah.

2:04:32David Sims:Um, to a, you know, historical story. But it just, it just works.

2:04:38Griffin Newman:Um, to wrap the, uh, yes, the black sand beach, like the scale. It's so cool that they come out of the sand. Right, when they all come out of the sand and start charging where it's like all the shades want is like news of people who are alive, right? Like this is where it's sort of seeded for Odysseus of like you're going to need to pay tribute to the men you lost. Like you haven't been honoring their deaths enough. And then Telemachus, I feel like from Menelaus, is getting the sort of the information of like you can't just walk back to your house and think everyone's going to be happy to see you.

2:05:11Griffin Newman:Odysseus will need to survey the landscape when he arrives, you know? Yes. Yeah, and you've got, you know, you've got the intrigue of, like, Pattinson and Corey and all these guys are like, maybe we should kill Telemachus, you know, whatever. That's all a little bit of kind of like, that's screenplay chaff or, you know, like.

2:05:28David Sims:But Pattinson's big seduction scene is pretty excellent. Yeah, yes. He does a good job of towing the line between being actually really convincing, but also winking at the audience. he plays the character as a fairly good actor yes which is hard to do to show that he's almost pulling it off uh and then what happens next

2:05:50Griffin Newman:well so he gets the prophecy and he knows Odysseus knows what's to come yeah but he does not tell his men which is that they will come across a whirlpool as well as this I don't even know how to describe the monster it's like a spider a bunch of different arms it's an octopus spider it's called Scylla you know and it's a man-eating monster of, you know, sometimes it's depicted as like a maiden with like dog heads coming out of her body, which is kind of a Ben notion, I would say. Yeah, punch that turns into a bite. Yeah, he cools out. But it's, you know, Odysseus keeps being told by people like Circe and the, what, Tiresias?

2:06:35Griffin Newman:Tiresias. Tiresias. Like, your men are going to die. And Odysseus is like, no, you're telling me how we can avoid that. And they're like, that's true. And you will live, but it's not going to work. And their ultimate fallibility is they make it to this island where they're like, don't eat those juicy cows. And those cows look good.

2:06:58David Sims:Those cows look good. They belong to the sun god Apollo.

2:07:01Griffin Newman:So you can't fucking eat them. You can't fucking eat the cows. But it's just like a marshmallow test of like, but the minute you're here, you can't leave. the winds die down and you're just gonna get hungrier and hungrier until you're like well maybe we have to eat the cows and then you know they all get struck down in a store they go in their little barbecue hole Griff they do go in a secret barbecue hole

2:07:21David Sims:they smoke those cows

2:07:23Griffin Newman:yeah that is true

2:07:24David Sims:we also see the sirens we do we do

2:07:28Griffin Newman:and again you know Nolan connects this to like Odysseus' like longing for what is lost like versus just like he's so horny for these hot-ass singers, which is sort of the classic Sirens thing of him being like, let me out of him! I want to get there, you know? Instead, he's just wailing and crying.

2:07:48David Sims:A great performance moment from Damon there. Yeah. Oh, incredible shit. When he says the thing of like, it's like the tastiest itch and when you go to scratch it, you realize it's under the skin. It's so evocative. It's good shit.

2:08:03Griffin Newman:This is some good shit. I think he pulled off some good shit here, Nolan.

2:08:07David Sims:I'm going to tell him that in a typed note. Ben, I assume that you believe if you listen to the sirens, everything would turn out okay and you'd marry all of them.

2:08:15Griffin Newman:They would just be like, you're so chill. You rock. Now you can go. Here's a bunch of money. Thank you for your time. They give you money. Yeah, of course. Here are our wallets. And so, yes What else? I wanted to ask about the boat stuff What do you think of the boat stuff? Because they shot on a freaking real ass boat, man I think the oldest available boat Is what they used It's like a Viking boat I read in Bilga's piece for New York Mag The boat is called the Draken 115 foot boat From Norway Right, I guess It's a modern built boat. Because obviously, I guess you're not allowed to take items of antiquity out to the open ocean.

2:09:10Griffin Newman:They just go by some London museum and they're like, can I have that? But it's imitating, obviously, like an ancient Viking longship or whatever.

2:09:20David Sims:I would have thrown up.

2:09:22Griffin Newman:Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of people did. I read some story about Nolan being like, do you mind if I shoot you throwing up?

2:09:28David Sims:Yeah, I read that too.

2:09:29Griffin Newman:Cool. Which is cool. Yeah, I mean... Rowing seems relaxing. I don't know. It does not seem relaxing in this movie. I could get into the groove of it, I'm telling you. Oh, sure. Just a kind of repetitive thing. You know, put on some ambient music in the AirPods. Toss some Aphex Twin on and let's go. He doesn't need ambient music.

2:09:48David Sims:He just listens to the sirens. That's true. Yeah. Right. Good rowing music. Yeah. I think I would have died at Troy. No, I would have died before we even got to Troy. Like, I wouldn't have made it. that far. Right, I wouldn't have made it that far. Right, exactly. They would have eaten me. Let's be honest. In this time, I would have died in the cradle. Yeah, exactly. Die right away. I would have died of, like, air allergy or some shit. Maybe I would have been sacrificed. Because I am, like, a firstborn child, you know? They would have tried to sacrifice me, and the gods would have rejected me.

2:10:21David Sims:They'd be like, no, thank you. What am I supposed to do with that shit?

2:10:27David Sims:Okay. Also, throughout this whole time. We keep, you know, cutting into Odysseus with Calypso. She keeps being like, remember more. What happened to your men? What happened to your men? And finally, he breaks down.

2:10:41Griffin Newman:Yes, finally Calypso. Right. And he is mad at Calypso, but she's kind of like, look, man, you needed to. Like, I feel like traditionally Calypso is just a trickster. Like, Calypso literally means, like, steel drum. Right, yeah. She who conceals. you know, like that she's like a liar. Right. You know, but like, she's just kind of like, if you wanted to go, you would have remembered. Like you're only remembering now because you're finally ready. Yeah. To sort of. Accept the emotional truth. Now, like would Penelope be thrilled to hear this? No. No. But, um, and so yes, he goes home. In disguise as a beggar.

2:11:18Griffin Newman:God bless Nolan. Like he is very true to the tale of the Odyssey, which is like the last part of it is Odysseus disguised as a beggar hanging out in his house, being like, hmm. you know.

2:11:29David Sims:Yeah, I loved all the beggar stuff. I also love that Leguizamo gets to shine so much in this section. So much more legs. Because he becomes the one ally he has. Right. Well, there's that nice old lady. Yeah, who notices his leg scar.

2:11:45Griffin Newman:Also the dog. The dog. The dog. What's the dog's name? Argos?

2:11:50David Sims:Argos. Oh, I'm so sad.

2:11:52Griffin Newman:Poor boy.

2:11:53David Sims:Apparently it's very controversial that in this film, he touches the dog it's controversial that he doesn't sound that controversial to me i don't know people are like he's not supposed to touch the dog i did find it so funny in that interview that they were asking nolan like are you worried about this backlash at all and he was like one i don't consider backlash from people who have not seen the film yet two everyone forgets that i worked on batman movies for a decade i don't think people forget that but he's right no but he was just like I dealt with fucking nerds for a decade. I don't give a shit.

2:12:28Griffin Newman:So by touching the dog, Tom Holland recognizes, this is my dad. Yes, that is when Telemachus puts it together. Thank God, because Telemachus would seem really dumb otherwise, I think, at a certain point. Sure. Where this guy's like, no, I'm not Odysseus, but I know him, and he's coming this way soon.

2:12:47David Sims:Okay, sorry. So the dog, the thing with the dog is the, the dog is what potentially gives him away. Yes. His identity. So the question is, does Odysseus kill the dog or does the dog die?

2:13:04Griffin Newman:Dog dies.

2:13:05David Sims:The dog does die in the movie, but some people are like, actually it should have been Odysseus killing the dog.

2:13:10Griffin Newman:Name an important or learned person who has said that. You cannot simply cite randos on Twitter. Is there a real person who has talked about this?

2:13:20David Sims:Probably not

2:13:21Griffin Newman:No, it is a bunch of comments from And I will say this confidently Fools So Penelope has set up this test For all of the suitors Which is the trick we see Odysseus do way earlier in the film Where they line up a bunch of axes It's basically like this incredible target trick It's a party trick he would do, yes he would string his bow and then he would fire the arrow along the axes and it would be really cool and everyone would say, Odysseus, you're the best, never leave.

2:13:53David Sims:Fucking rules.

2:13:54Griffin Newman:And so now all these suitors are lining up. They can't even get this bow strung. It's so good.

2:13:59David Sims:Yeah, they're fools. We gotta go back a bit. No, we don't. Yes, we do because we have the whole scene when he talks to Penelope through the screen and that's important. Because that's before...

2:14:11Griffin Newman:It's all happening in this final act. It's before the trial.

2:14:14David Sims:But that sequence when it's finally revealed what actually he witnessed at Troy and that.

2:14:22Griffin Newman:Right. That is the right. We've talked about it a little bit already. But right. That's the emotional thing Nolan's getting. This is what he can't get over. And he's not revealing himself to her. He's using a fake name. Again, he's going kind of like, yeah, what if a guy who knew Odysseus knew that he felt really shitty about the sack of Troy? Because it had been kind of gnarly and bad.

2:14:43David Sims:I had tears in my eyes Oh no, it's so good The revelation of Zendaya

2:14:49Griffin Newman:That really just crushed me That worked for me so well Like the use of her in the sack of Troy And then him looking at Athena You know, yeah Because Zendaya basically was just Some peasant woman Who gets struck down But then kind of embodies Athena Then throughout the rest of the film Like his guilt, his story. And the sequence is exciting. Like it's also genuinely thrilling to watch.

2:15:18David Sims:Yeah. I mean, I think with these stories get passed down and by virtue of them being passed down, you lose some of maybe the more unsavory elements. Like the fact that there is an adaptation of the Odyssey on the show, Arthur.

2:15:36Griffin Newman:I think that is, of course, the peak of...

2:15:39David Sims:Of the telling of the story. Homer was happy about it. The cruelty of tying Buster's ears together is something that Nolan Darent depict. But there is so much emphasis on the heroic moments and the moments of valor that like maybe some of the other aspects of what happened don't get passed out. yes but it's also a movie that's it's so explicitly about guilt that i think it it's not like it's uh whitewashing the character you know no no no i'm not saying it's whitewashing the character i'm saying that like when there's i think of like i'm tired of hearing these stories about odysseus or other people that are like really really great when it doesn't really like like mirror the feeling of the loss and the guilt and the tragedy and finally we get to see that part of the story and it breaks you and yes like it's be good it's really good look iliad and the

2:16:44Griffin Newman:odyssey the poems are about triumphant victories over barbarians like they he is he is putting this in a completely modern context. This is not something that, you know, he is like borrowing from Homer. But he's putting it in very well, I think. We should shout out that a big influence for him was a somewhat recent adaptation by Emily Wilson, which is an important distinction just mentioned. It's the first time that this poem was ever translated by a woman. Right, which I don't approve of, to be clear. I think she should be translating raw food into cooked food in the kitchen. Sorry, that's a joke.

2:17:21Griffin Newman:Actually, the lead of my review was, which I think is very, for one, I couldn't think of a fucking lead, so I used this instead. But like Emily Wilson, you know, famously, the Odyssey usually kind of begins like, tell me of Odysseus, like the man of twists and turns, right? Like that's the sort of Greek translation of, and she renders it much more simply as like the complicated man. And like, I think that's what Nolan is responding to. Like this is not just a person who had twists and turns that he navigated. Like this is, you know, there is something introspective we can find in this man.

2:17:54David Sims:Yeah, no, there is. Yeah. The other thing this movie reminded me of a lot, and I don't know if I just, I haven't been reading or watching a ton of interviews with Nolan, so I don't know if he's already called this out a bunch. reminded me a lot of Excalibur in sort of the vibe of it being this kind of like earthy dreaminess. Even just the way he uses fog and smoke throughout the movie and sort of finding this way to make a tactile version of magical ideas.

2:18:20Griffin Newman:To me, he cited Last Temptation of Christ and that to me is also what you're talking about a little bit. That moment where he stands up and he's got like bits of the beach on him, on his back, that felt very crazy. What are some other things? I feel like he's been talking about some other movies.

2:18:36David Sims:Andre Rublev.

2:18:37Griffin Newman:Sure. Hey. Good looking movie. Yeah.

2:18:39David Sims:Ron.

2:18:40Griffin Newman:Right. Right. That feels like, you know, anytime we're zooming out to a bunch of guys running on the beach, that felt very cursed, like Lake Kurosawa to me.

2:18:48David Sims:Girl Next Door. I've seen him call that out a couple of times. Because of the fact that she's next door and James Remar. And also, is the juice worth the squeeze is kind of a common refrain in this movie.

2:19:00Griffin Newman:That's the Elisha Cuthbert movie? Yes.

2:19:02David Sims:Correct. And Timothy Olyphant. I would put him on the supporting actor ballot for that year.

2:19:06Griffin Newman:He's the kind of like the Joey Pants who shows up late and he's like...

2:19:10David Sims:All I remember is that Paul Dano and Emile Herscher in that movie. They're in it. Right. Yes. He's like the Ray Liotta in Something Wild. Right. He's the spark plug at the third act. Right. He's really good. Yeah.

2:19:22Griffin Newman:Okay. He makes the five. So, yeah. So, he does the trial reveal himself.

2:19:29David Sims:None of those other men can string that fucking bow.

2:19:31Griffin Newman:He can string the bow. Pattinson is like I won't even play the game Like he's trying to take The kind He's like I won't fall for your trick I know what you're trying To say here But he ain't coming back So you just gotta Pick one of us anyway And that is I feel like Around when Odysseus Do shoot Corey Hawkins Yeah He did In the throat And his last words Are you're Odysseus It just It was really cool It just made me very happy

2:19:55David Sims:And it was really fun To see Matt Damon Go apeshit Yeah

2:20:02Griffin Newman:Dude, that fight sequence is incredible.

2:20:05David Sims:Yeah. Quiet age shit. It does feel like this is the last time he's going to go action star mode.

2:20:10Griffin Newman:I mean, probably, except for maybe Odyssey 2? 2 Odyssey 2 Furious?

2:20:15David Sims:I just feel like Damon is not a guy who's, like, desperately holding on to his ego of being a certain type of leading man. No, I mean, when's the last time he made an action movie? Exactly. The last Born, right? Well, actually, The Rip, which I guess was this year.

2:20:30Griffin Newman:yeah but that's a different kind of thing that's more of like a thriller that movie but it has some action in it

2:20:35David Sims:gun action is different from

2:20:38Griffin Newman:this action

2:20:39David Sims:and I guess the instigators which everyone remembers so well Jesus Christ it took me a second to even pull what you were talking about that was kind of capery he spends a lot of them his character is they take his therapist played by Hong Chao hostage with them so it's a lot of It's like him talking to his therapist while other people do stuff. I do think gun heist stuff is different.

2:21:05Griffin Newman:It's different. It is. I mean, and then obviously even like The Last Duel or whatever, like.

2:21:11David Sims:A movie that I love.

2:21:12Griffin Newman:A great movie. Incredible movie. And it does have, you know, action in it, but it's brutal and kind of, you know, and he's, I mean, he's playing a guy who has to go to court to argue he gave his wife an orgasm.

2:21:23David Sims:What? I'm sure he will do action sequences again, but I'm saying I think this feels like his final big action hero movie.

2:21:33Griffin Newman:Although, I don't know anything about this Daniels movie that is his next project. Like, what is that?

2:21:41David Sims:The rumors I have heard do not make it sound like that's what it is. And in fact, I think a lot of why there was such a musical chairs of which A-list star was going to play that role. is that that role is a little secondary to the narrative. That he's in a lot of the movie, but he doesn't get to have the big wins.

2:21:59Griffin Newman:I feel like that's something Damon is happy to do.

2:22:01David Sims:Exactly. That's what I'm saying. I think he's happy to surrender that and go, I'll let the younger cast sort of drive the story and I'll just service the plot. Wait, I'm so sorry. I just clicked on the Reddit. Did you fucking see this?

2:22:16Griffin Newman:Yeah, I was talking about the highway sign. Yes!

2:22:18David Sims:Do you know there's a highway exit in Georgia that just says Griffin Newman?

2:22:25Griffin Newman:No, no, no, but it's... What? It's...

2:22:28David Sims:Noonan. Noonan. Griffin Newman. Oh, okay. But from far away, it literally just says Griffin Newman. Why is this happening? I don't know. Is that the name of the town or something? It's very... It's really upsetting. I feel like I'm witnessing some sort of glitch in the fact that it's reality. It's a little back-roozy. Oh, sorry. Okay. And you know the best thing about it, about that sign? You can eat it, too.

2:22:53Griffin Newman:Yes. Here, I will tell you the answer. It appears to be that there are two separate places, Griffin, Georgia, and Noonan, Georgia. And I guess you can access them both from this exit? That is wild.

2:23:05David Sims:I should move to that intersection. I think you need to move there. We got to go there maybe when we drive eventually to Disney World. Live show in Griffin, Noonan. Live show on right by the side. for the bookers down there. The Griffin Noonan sign. Okay, sorry. Back to the Odyssey.

2:23:23Griffin Newman:Yeah, he'd kill everyone.

2:23:24David Sims:He'd kill everyone. And, you know, there's some, it's just like a fun sequence where you got Tom Holland and what's his fucking, what's his name? The guy who used to, Logan Marshall Green.

2:23:36Griffin Newman:Logan Marshall Green. Oh, sure.

2:23:38David Sims:Three-name guy who used to look like Tom Hardy.

2:23:40Griffin Newman:Right, I was going to say, when Tom Hardy and Christopher Nolan have not worked together in a while, you can at least get Logan Marshall Green.

2:23:45David Sims:I think that role was supposed to be Cosmo Jarvis, and Cosmo Jarvis probably had to go film Shogun.

2:23:52Griffin Newman:Go to Japan, right.

2:23:54David Sims:But, you know, they're upstairs, and there's a hole in the floor slash ceiling.

2:24:00Griffin Newman:They removed all the weapons before. They removed all the weapons. They removed all the suitors showed up, so now. Right, but then he goes, and he tries to put him through the hole, right. There's that moment where Pattinson just goes, Spears, Spears! He's not even doing anything. Pattinson in that scene is so funny. He's so funny. He's so good at playing this kind of like desperation and this like faffishness.

2:24:21David Sims:I cannot wait to see him play Chris Hansen. I just think it's like such genius casting. I'm so excited for that movie. He's really cool.

2:24:29Griffin Newman:I want to see it.

2:24:31David Sims:But yeah, Odysseus, it's like him versus like 60 guys. and when he finally is victorious at the end of the battle, he's just got spears poking out of his body.

2:24:48Griffin Newman:He does get a couple, yeah, a couple pokes there. He doesn't make it through Scott Fury. No. He takes some L's. Nolan has a little bit of fun making you think like maybe he's going to die. Right, but he's not a superhero. No, no. We're going to do Dark Knight Rises. It's like what we talked about. We're going to fucking retire. We'll go off.

2:25:06David Sims:He and Anne Hathaway are going to go off into the sunset together.

2:25:09Griffin Newman:Well, McTelemica's king. He's proved himself. He's done great. And then when he gets on the boat is when he might finally reveal, like, by the way, I did spend eight years on the island with Charlie's throne anyway. Let's go. And we might have hooked up a little bit. Yeah. Just over the clothes stuff. Yeah, no, totally. She always had her fishnet thing hat on. And it was the lotus. Look, what can I tell you? It was all lotus. Blame it on the lotus.

2:25:34David Sims:I feel like back in ancient Greek times, There was like an understanding that like sex is different. Over the jeans doesn't really count.

2:25:43Griffin Newman:I mean, they had so many jeans then. It was such a denim-y society.

2:25:46David Sims:This is such a dungaree movie. It is funny. It's the last thing I expected for it to be so heavy on the Levi's product placement.

2:25:53Griffin Newman:Although the costuming is awesome. It is. And I love that it's not like corny, like sandal and sword, like over the top. No, it's very like simple and kind of rough-hued. David literally wears a cut-off t-shirt at one point. But it's just like, you don't need the over-the-top robes and all the nonsense.

2:26:14David Sims:You know what movie's costuming is dog-ass? Dog-ass. Troy. Nominated for an Oscar.

2:26:21Griffin Newman:They made all of the costumes out of dogs' asses. That's why it was the issue.

2:26:25David Sims:That's why it was impressive. They got Brad Pitt wearing crop tops, like cerulean blue crop tops and sarongs. It was Devil Wears Prada era. Where does this come from in history? What do you mean? It's actually before. They beat them to the cerulean punch. I was researching ancient Greece crop tops. I could find nothing.

2:26:47Griffin Newman:Oh, yeah? You couldn't find anything when you Googled that?

2:26:50David Sims:I could find nothing.

2:26:51Griffin Newman:Although it is funny how in Bushwick right now, Caesar haircuts and crop tops on Madness are so popular. Yes.

2:26:58David Sims:Hot Odyssey summer. Yeah. Yeah. There you go. I remember Troy being a very naval forward movie. Yeah, a lot of boat. A lot of boat. No, I meant like belly buttons.

2:27:08Griffin Newman:Oh, yes. You're right. You're right. It does have, it's both navel with an A and navel with an E. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes. I'm not sure if you see Eric Bana's cute little innie or outie. I'm not sure what. I wish. I'd love to tickle that. I'm a little worried about Googling Eric Bana belly button. I don't know what that'll do to my algorithm. Looks like an innie. It looks like an innie. A classic innie. Okay. A classic innie. that was just one of those movies where everyone I think was just like I need biggest arms on this set you know like everyone's just like hitting the gym constantly

2:27:40David Sims:no they're not that bulky they're not that bulky like you see what's his Orlando Bloom like naked a lot and it is it is peak twink look at this Banner looks good Banner looks good final thoughts on Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey very good Really fucking good. I can't wait to see it again.

2:28:04Griffin Newman:I just, I'm like, there's so much more to just unpack and notice. I think it'll be a very rewarding second view. Yes. Yeah.

2:28:13David Sims:I, you know, I think it kind of had a little bit of everything. Sure. You know? A little bit of this. A little bit of that. Really firing on all cylinders. I thought it was well-paced. I was never bored. No. Same with Oppenheimer.

2:28:28Griffin Newman:where it just kind of moves like crazy. Tight 250.

2:28:31David Sims:Yeah. David, your wife wants the bucket. She does. How do I get that fucking bucket? God, the horse. I'm keeping my eyes on the orders. If it goes back in stock anywhere, I'll send it to you. I am so, I am really looking forward to your wife's review.

2:28:45Griffin Newman:I'm really excited for her to see it because she's been somewhat skeptical. She's not like a diehard Nolan fan anyway, but we're going to go see it.

2:28:53David Sims:Yeah, and her review will be on a Patreon tier that doesn't exist and will never exist. Right, but we haven't come up. with a tear that high. Yes. Yeah. The bucket is huge. The bucket's really big. It's really big. And then there's also the IMAX camera bucket. Yeah, which is cool. So I think that one, one of them is Regal and one of them is AMC. I can't remember which is which. I want both of them. Can we say quickly, they had to, I mean, Nolan basically threw the challenge down to IMAX. They've been refining the technology to help him make these movies, not just in terms of the filming, but even in terms of the projection because there was a time limit on how long an IMAX movie could be for a while.

2:29:30David Sims:Right, there's sort of a three-hour cap, right, yeah. Right, but he helped them work up to three. I think it used to be two-something. Right. But they finally made the smallest version of an IMAX camera possible for this movie, and they also developed what they call the blimp, which is a case that goes around the camera that suffocates the sound.

2:29:50Griffin Newman:Yes, because everyone says it's so goddamn loud you can't hear yourself think.

2:29:54David Sims:The dialogue scenes, It's why usually he only shoots the more visual scenes in IMAX and the dialogue scenes aren't. And this because he was going to do the whole thing. They had to blimp it up. It was all IMAX. That aspect ratio never changed. I'm very curious because I am seeing it in 35 millimeter. Like it really did feel like he was using the entire IMAX frame. I'm curious. I mean, there have been the infographics that have been going around at the different formats. and some people complaining that if you don't see it in a perfect square, is the framing all going to look weird?

2:30:26Griffin Newman:No, to me that only looks bad if you're watching them next to each other.

2:30:29David Sims:It only looks bad if you know what you're missing, but if you don't know what you're missing, you don't know what you're missing. I'm sure it works. I'm sure it'll look great.

2:30:37Griffin Newman:It would be funny if it's like you don't see Damon's eyes. It's horrible. They did no work thinking about it. His head is out of frame. It's just like jaws talking to each other. No, it's very good. I'm very happy. It's going to make a ton of money.

2:30:51David Sims:I think it'll do very well. My father-in-law has texted me, you know, being like, you heard of this? And I'm like, oh, I've seen it, Manny. I've seen the movie and it is phenomenal. You should go.

2:31:03Griffin Newman:And now, Griff, do you have box office predictions? I mean, we assume Moana will jump 100%, so it'll be number one and then Odyssey number two?

2:31:11David Sims:Yes, with 80. No, I think people are assuming that this is going to open over 100, right? I mean, Oppenheimer opened to 80 against Barbie. Yes.

2:31:18Griffin Newman:Because we should mention we're recording this Thursday after the day before. We're recording this, yes.

2:31:23David Sims:The night it's coming out, basically. But I think it's probably going to open to like 100, 110. The thing with these format forward movies is the opening weekend cannot be totally humongous because a lot of people wait until they can get the ticket they want. Yeah, yeah. So you have a lot of people who are going to wait two or three weekends, which means this thing is going to hold incredibly well. But I think it's probably going to open to like 100 or 110. would be my guess. 200 worldwide? I think I end up at like, yeah, yeah. I'm guessing it ends up around 350 domestic. I don't know.

2:31:59Griffin Newman:I bet this plays well in Greece.

2:32:00David Sims:A billion worldwide? Yeah, it'll play well in Greece.

2:32:03Griffin Newman:Yeah, I think that's true.

2:32:04David Sims:We should demerit, you know, offer some demerits for this film casting. No Stavi. No Stavi, no Zooks. No Manzookas, right. No Stamos, the big three.

2:32:15Griffin Newman:No Stamos. Who does Stamos could have been? He could have been one of the suitors. Yeah, exactly. He could have been the horse. He's in there. And, you know, who are the other guys from Full House? Oh, well, Bob Saget isn't with us anymore. Who's the third?

2:32:28David Sims:Joey. Dave Coulier. Coulier. He could be there. Yeah, he could have had a puppet. Lori Loughlin, convicted felon. Yeah, geez, wait. What's going on with Full House, actually? It's bad. It's bad over there.

2:32:41Griffin Newman:House too full. I mean, and Penelope does have a full house. It's a good, right? That's a point. David. That house has too many people in it.

2:32:48David Sims:Sometimes you remind us that you're the film critic, that you're the one real professional in this field. That is a great point.

2:32:55Griffin Newman:Penelope does have, as I'm being like taken out of my office by security, you have been fired. I'm like, no, no, no, let me, let me. My friend, I think you finally found your lead. I think it'll be Odyssey, Moana, Minions. I don't know what else is out there. Evil Dead.

2:33:09David Sims:I would not be surprised if there is a Moana drop that is so significant that Minions or Toy Story are actually ahead of Second Week in Milano. Yes.

2:33:19Griffin Newman:The invite has been growing quite nicely. I think that might continue to do well. Have you seen that one yet, Griffin?

2:33:24David Sims:No, it is not playing in Spain. I think it maybe doesn't come out for another month or two. I'm trying to see it while I'm here in London. So I may go see it after this record or I may go see it tomorrow. I really enjoyed it.

2:33:34Griffin Newman:You should just watch The People Upstairs, the Spanish film that it's based on in Spain. This is true. But I mean, which should I watch first?

2:33:43David Sims:I don't know which one I should watch first

2:33:45Griffin Newman:I don't think it matters I think you're fine no matter what well well well well yeah let's wrap it up I mean you know you can't be cooking in there forever in that London studio

2:33:56David Sims:this is one of the most relevant films of 2026 it's one of the biggest films of 2026 it will certainly go down in history as one of the films that represents this year which of course means that next week we're talking about In the Blink of an Eye

2:34:09Griffin Newman:no yes yes yes that's true that is true but hey my brother's on that episode I remember us having a lot of fun

2:34:16David Sims:your brother Joey Sims is cooking

2:34:18Griffin Newman:yeah we have a good time on that ep maybe not talking about the link of an eye that much

2:34:23David Sims:a 2026 Hulu release that you might be hearing about for the first time right now I'm excited to watch it are you? no I like one of the three sections in that movie a lot and I'm curious when you watch it I'm not going to tell you but I'm curious when you watch it if you have the same response I think you will.

2:34:43Griffin Newman:And yeah, so we've got two more Stanton films, right, to fill out that little mini. So we got In the Blink of an Eye and Toy Story 5, two films he directed in 2026. And then over on...

2:34:53David Sims:Let's also... No, I was just going to call out, say the Patreon, David.

2:34:58Griffin Newman:Yeah, on Patreon, we've got the final Robocop entry, which is Robocop 2014. Five stars, if someone I remember. Yeah. Illegal. It should be. Right. No suicide is contemplated on that episode. I'm kidding.

2:35:13David Sims:I was just going to call out, we have announced our John Carter screening, which sold out really fast, in which Andrew Stanton is going to be doing a Q &A with us. What a fool he is. We are not sure if we will be able to record and or release that, but we are going to be doing a sit down with him in studio. So that will be coming later and we will figure out the deal with the Q &A. But for a number of factors that we can talk about later, we're not totally sure what form that will have down the line.

2:35:47Griffin Newman:But look forward to a release on the main feed as just a bonus episode.

2:35:53David Sims:Yes, it'll be a kind of old school Thursday bonus, I think, is the plan. And on that note, Griffin. Oh, sorry, please. Wait, no, there was one thing. Griffin, before we started recording, you said you had a big joke you wanted to make. Did you make that joke? Oh, it was the joke about how funny is it that I left New York and everyone has diarrhea now. I made the joke. Very good joke. Oh, that was the joke. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank God we got that in there. Because you did tell us put a pin in that. And so often we put pins in things that never get unpinned. I want to start a new segment called the cork board, in which anytime we say we're going to put a pin in something, Ben, you write it down.

2:36:25David Sims:And at the end, we check the cork board. What do you think about that? That's a good idea. That's a good idea, right? I can also see that working as a fun social media asset, too.

2:36:32Griffin Newman:So I'll write down cork board for the cork board idea.

2:36:35David Sims:Yeah. Cork board for the cork board. So we're announcing the cork board. Unfortunately, the next two months of episodes have largely been recorded. get ready for a bunch of episodes that don't have the corkboard. No, and probably have a lot of unfinished tangents.

2:36:46Griffin Newman:Let's be honest. There are a bunch of Mark Scorsese episodes.

2:36:48David Sims:tell us what to add.

2:36:50Griffin Newman:Anything we miss in the upcoming episodes.

2:36:52David Sims:Throw it on the corkboard and be polite. And for all the Arthur talk in this episode, I must say, and as always, Jekyll, Jekyll, Hyde, Jekyll, Hyde, Hyde, Jekyll, Jekyll, Jekyll, Jekyll, Hyde, Jekyll, Hyde. Three people will be so happy.

2:37:13Griffin Newman:I'm going to get a seltzer. One second.

2:37:15David Sims:Yeah. David, can you get me a seltzer too? David, can you grab Griffin a seltzer? He almost did a double take. Okay, good. Now, can I do a little... Can I do a little... Yeah.

2:37:27Griffin Newman:...towards the camera?

2:37:28David Sims:Yeah. If you pour it into the soundboard, it will come through my headphones.

2:37:33Griffin Newman:Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hosley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas, and our associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy. Research by J.J. Birch. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in The Great American Novel, with additional music by Alex Mitchell. Artwork by Joe Bowen, Ollie Moss, and Pat Reynolds. Our production assistant is Minnick. Special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish, and Nate Patterson for their production help. Head over to BlankCheckPod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit.

2:38:12Griffin Newman:Join our Patreon, Blank Check Special Features, for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us on social at BlankCheckPod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook, on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Production.

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