Schindler's List with David Ehrlich

Our Early Spielberg series concludes with a movie that is a super fun time and not at all distressing to watch in our current political climate! David Ehrlich joins us to discuss 1993’s Schindler’s List, the film that defined the visual language of the Holocaust and finally got Spielberg his Oscar. We’re getting into the critical debates about this film’s “watchability,” the fact that this was only Ralph Fiennes’ second screen performance, and our (likely controversial) definitive ranking of Spielberg’s full filmography. Sign up for Check Book https://blankcheckpod.substack.com/welcome, the Blank Check newsletter featuring even more “real nerdy shit” to feed your pop culture obsession. Dossier excerpts, film biz AND burger reports, and even more exclusive content you won’t want to miss out on. Join our Patreon for franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. http://www.patreon.com/blankcheck Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter https://x.com/blankcheckpod?lang=en, Instagram https://www.instagram.com/blankcheckpod/?hl=en, Threads https://www.threads.net/@blankcheckpod?xmt=AQGzctAh4mbWTwYzCV1pzNT6AMV9o99EOfymi8TLR5mTde0 and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/blankcheckpodcast/! Buy some real nerdy merch https://kinshipgoods.com/blankcheck Connect with other Blankies on our Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/blankies/s/gpcOkQr8Sv or Discord https://discord.gg/Q6YGSR3JrA For anything else, check out BlankCheckPod.com https://www.blankcheckpod.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Griffin Newman?

  David.

• 0:03David Sims?

  Yep.

• 0:03Griffin Newman?

  We did a live show.

• 0:04David Sims?

  Yeah, remember?

• 0:05Griffin Newman?

  Ranking Scorsese at the Bell House in Brooklyn. We did the definitive power ranking of Martin Scorsese things.

• 0:12David Sims?

  Uh, it was so fun. Uh, it was very silly.

• 0:15Griffin Newman?

  Ben and Marie were with us and they're with us right now.

• 0:18Speaker 02

  Hey, everyone, or should I say, oh?

• 0:20David Sims?

  Oh.

• 0:22Griffin Newman?

  And thanks to our friends at Dynasty Typewriter. It was livestreamed for the first time ever. But also, the replay is still up there, but only until October 30th.

• 0:31Speaker 02

  So just a few more days.

• 0:33David Sims?

  Yes.

• 0:33Speaker 02

  You can get it at dynasty.tv.

• 0:36David Sims?

  Dynasty.tv.

• 0:37Speaker 02

  It's $20. We had a blast and the Spreadmaster really got to work.

• 0:43David Sims?

  Oh, yeah. I was moving things around.

• 0:45Griffin Newman?

  Laptop was on.

• 0:46Speaker 02

  I don't know if I'd have seen you that happy.

• 0:48Griffin Newman?

  You were thrilled. You were like a pick and share.

• 0:50David Sims?

  I was locked in.

• 0:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, very locked in and you were funny.

• 0:53David Sims?

  Thank you. You were funny. You were also funny.

• 0:56Griffin Newman?

  Oh, thank you.

• 0:57David Sims?

  And if you want to see like, you know, Griffin's shine box on camera, it's the only way to see it.

• 1:02Griffin Newman?

  You might see me shine Marie's shoes.

• 1:04David Sims?

  Exactly.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, if you're into that sort of content.

• 1:07Griffin Newman?

  If that gets you off.

• 1:09Speaker 02

  Okay. So once again, that's at dynasty.tv.

• 1:39Speaker 03

  All around its bits, by the gulf.

• 1:41David Sims?

  Wait, is Nosferatu in the room?

• 1:43Griffin Newman?

  How do you do, Ben?

• 1:45Speaker 03

  The podcast is live. I do the podcast.

• 1:50David Sims?

  I can't stop doing Nosferatu. It is a problem.

• 1:54Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:55David Sims?

  Um, no, I think that was a very good Ben Kingsley in Schindler's. Oh, that was supposed to be Ben Kingsley?

• 2:02David Sims?

  Well, who else was it supposed to be?

• 2:04Griffin Newman?

  I was like debating whether to put the word bits in the quote.

• 2:07David Sims?

  I think you did a great job.

• 2:09Griffin Newman?

  Well, no, because I was like, look, this might be a more serious episode. No bits. And then within 15 seconds, we're doing Nosferatu again.

• 2:14Speaker 04

  We're going to keep the Becker talk limited to like a tight 20.

• 2:17Griffin Newman?

  It's a tight 20.

• 2:17David Sims?

  I am also a fan of Becker.

• 2:20Griffin Newman?

  If we're doing decade of dreams, Becker talk is in the top 10 most hated sections of any episode ever that people will not stop bringing up.

• 2:28David Sims?

  But then there's the 10 percenters who are like, wish they do more Becker talk.

• 2:31Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:32David Sims?

  I like the Becker run. Come to my castle and watch Becker with me for an entire night.

• 2:38Speaker 03

  I think they should have talked about the movie less.

• 2:41Speaker 04

  We could get into all the ways that Count Orlok is coded as Jewish and the legacy of those characters throughout the history of the Empire.

• 2:49David Sims?

  Count Orlok isn't coded in like the original Nosferatu. It's pretty plainly painted on.

• 2:55Speaker 04

  Well, I'd say in the Robert Eggers, everything coded.

• 2:57David Sims?

  Germany? Wait, what's this country?

• 3:00Griffin Newman?

  Which decade, though?

• 3:01David Sims?

  Don't worry. It must have been after the World War II stuff, right? Oh, no, way before. Cool.

• 3:06Speaker 03

  Would you mind turning on the light switch for me? It is the Sabbath.

• 3:12David Sims?

  Cut all of this out. This is a terrible way to introduce what if Spielberg listened to this episode?

• 3:20Speaker 04

  Oh, he's definitely bailed by now. He's already running so many word letters.

• 3:24David Sims?

  He didn't even get to hear me meta acknowledge him listening.

• 3:27Griffin Newman?

  We've done two fucking series on his career, not to mention all the new release episodes. And he was like, I just want to see how they handle Schindler.

• 3:33David Sims?

  Yeah, he's like, that's the limit, guys. They've taken a lot of swings.

• 3:37Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. And I haven't bothered to listen until now.

• 3:40Speaker 04

  Is this the first time that somebody has been on two episodes about the same filmmaker?

• 3:45Griffin Newman?

  Good point. Oh, no, no, let's go through. Let's go through. But this is a good, this is a good list.

• 3:50David Sims?

  This is a good list. Sorry, I'll stop.

• 3:53Griffin Newman?

  Lawson's on both.

• 3:54David Sims?

  Lawson did Saving Private Ryan and Always.

• 3:58Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 3:58Speaker 04

  Fuck that guy. Well, Always is not aired yet. At the time of recording, I think you guys have only gone up through ET.

• 4:03Griffin Newman?

  Correct. Ehrlich has done, uh, now will have done.

• 4:08David Sims?

  Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and an inferior film in Schindler's List.

• 4:12Speaker 04

  Yeah, we'll determine its inferiority at the end of this episode.

• 4:15Griffin Newman?

  Here's my question, though. Has anyone, are those, are you two the only two to have been on both parts? And if so, if not, has anyone done two masterpieces? Because I think both of you guys have gotten one uncontested masterpiece.

• 4:29Griffin Newman?

  And one kind of left-handed oddball movie. Is that fair to say?

• 4:33David Sims?

  Oh, you mean within this Spielberg?

• 4:35Griffin Newman?

  Within the two parts of Spielberg.

• 4:37David Sims?

  I believe those are the only two Griffin.

• 4:39Griffin Newman?

  Wow.

• 4:39Speaker 04

  I think left-handed oddball is too generous to always and rude to Indiana Jones.

• 4:45Griffin Newman?

  Okay, well, that's what I thought you were gonna say.

• 4:48David Sims?

  Do, do, do, do. Um, hello.

• 4:51Griffin Newman?

  Our energy today is normal. I don't.

• 4:53David Sims?

  Look, I'm excited to talk about this wonderful film with you, my friends. I just had a big bowl of noodle soup and a couple peanut butter cups, which is not two foods that matched up, but that's how it went today for me. Um, and here we are. Introduce the show, please.

• 5:08Griffin Newman?

  This is Blank Strike with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin.

• 5:10Speaker 04

  And I'm David.

• 5:12Griffin Newman?

  Great. We're not, we're certainly not nervous about how to talk about this.

• 5:17Speaker 04

  No, I haven't been sweating bullets for eight months since Sims text me when I was on the treadmill. And I put this like a cross to bear on my shoulders.

• 5:24Griffin Newman?

  Question you were doing.

• 5:25Speaker 04

  I trust you with speaking to the legacy of all the Jewish people.

• 5:29Griffin Newman?

  Because Sims, I was like, how are we gonna handle Schindler? Do we just do that without a guess? And he was like, no, Ehrlich really wants to do it. Ehrlich's got a lot to say.

• 5:36David Sims?

  Ehrlich and I have had, please finish that. I'm David.

• 5:39Griffin Newman?

  Podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion products they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce, baby.

• 5:49Speaker 04

  Baby.

• 5:50Griffin Newman?

  It's a pretty wild clear. This is.

• 5:53David Sims?

  Yes, but obviously one of his more passionate projects.

• 5:56Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, but a passionate project that makes $96 million domestic, wins many Academy Awards and including finally his only best picture win, his first best director win. It is the movie that in terms of this half arc we are, we have done, Potter asset cast, the early films of Steven Spielberg. This is, we're zoom out. The narrative has been a man trying to figure out how to grow up, right?

• 6:21David Sims?

  Of course.

• 6:21Speaker 04

  And I think that you guys chose a pretty natural point to split the filmography, but I also don't think it's possible that in the history of Hollywood filmmaking, there has never been a more distinct inflection point in a filmmaker's career.

• 6:35Griffin Newman?

  Your, your lovely wife's birthday was last weekend and I was, we were talking.

• 6:40David Sims?

  Who he is.

• 6:41Griffin Newman?

  David Ehrlich.

• 6:42David Sims?

  Thank you.

• 6:42Speaker 04

  Decade of Davids.

• 6:43Griffin Newman?

  Indie Wire, Fighting in the War Room, Decade of Davids.

• 6:47David Sims?

  David.

• 6:47Griffin Newman?

  And we were talking about this exact idea and just saying like, man, I know why we justified starting where we did seven years ago, but man has that paid off beautifully for us now.

• 6:58David Sims?

  Because imagine if we were, had one more episode to go and it was The Lost World. Like, that doesn't make sense as an end point.

• 7:04Griffin Newman?

  And he has the four-year break and he has the dream works that like, but the inflection point is-

• 7:08David Sims?

  What do you think he did in those four years?

• 7:09Speaker 04

  Jacked it.

• 7:11Griffin Newman?

  He set up like a fucking LLC, like he was just starting a studio.

• 7:14David Sims?

  He finally set up that LLC. He called his account. He's like, I think I should set up a business.

• 7:18Speaker 04

  But I also want to clarify that we were not talking about Schindler's List just because we were about to record this episode, but that's just always what I'm talking about at any birthday party.

• 7:26David Sims?

  You and I have had a lot of drunken conversations about Schindler's List over the years, and that is why I immediately thought of you for this episode. Also, you've been on the show before.

• 7:35Speaker 04

  It's my go-to subject whenever there's a lull in any conversation, really.

• 7:38Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, exactly. It is kind of the Schindler's List of movies, I would say.

• 7:42Speaker 04

  It's one of them.

• 7:43Griffin Newman?

  Look up. I was thinking this while watching it. It is one of those films where it's like used as shorthand almost in a like monolithic way to represent like a larger idea of a type of movie. Not just the film itself, but like the culture reputation of the movie.

• 7:59David Sims?

  Like a prestige, uh, sort of gotta see it historical classic.

• 8:05Griffin Newman?

  People will say like, look, it's no Citizen Kane. It's Citizen Kane.

• 8:08David Sims?

  Citizen Kane.

• 8:09Griffin Newman?

  Why am I fucking Schindler's listing everything? The way people will say it's no Citizen Kane or going like, look, they're not trying to make Citizen Kane here. I feel like Schindler's List has a similar kind of shorthand for like, serious, well-made movie.

• 8:23Speaker 04

  But I think that is-

• 8:24Griffin Newman?

  Deeply serious.

• 8:26Speaker 04

  It has as much to do with the film's quality as it does with the fact that it's become synonymous with the historical event that it depicts, uh, you know, in a way that it, it won't get into it, but it's sort of like inextricable now from our visual idea of a portion of World War II, specifically the Holocaust.

• 8:41Griffin Newman?

  Throwing out like, come and see is like, no, that's a deeper cut, letterbox nerd joke for a movie that is like, purposefully kind of challenging to watch versus Schindler maybe being the most successful movie that is this difficult ever? Like the most mainstream movie that is this challenging and upsetting?

• 9:03David Sims?

  I can't begin to reckon with what that list is. Sorry. I mean, I guess I sort of know what you mean. I'm trying to think of like, what? Yeah. What are other mega upsetting films that became somewhat appointment?

• 9:15Speaker 04

  Oh, you mean Rhapsody?

• 9:16David Sims?

  Yeah, so true.

• 9:18Speaker 04

  Wicked.

• 9:19David Sims?

  Now, wait a second.

• 9:20Griffin Newman?

  I know I can't back up that statement, but you get what I'm saying.

• 9:23David Sims?

  What you're saying.

• 9:24Griffin Newman?

  Where it's like, you can make the reference of like, look, it's like Schindler's List or whatever. Everyone knows what you're saying, which I do think perhaps in the last 15 years has started to become an albatross around this movie's neck.

• 9:36Speaker 04

  I would actually, I mean, again, we'll get deep into it, but I, I think we're on an interesting part in the arc of Schindler's List's reputation and his demon place in the culture right now, because I think it was freighted with a lot more baggage immediately after its release and now is reclaimed is way too strong a word for a movie that already occupies the place that it does in the public imagination. But I think it is easier with distance to appreciate.

• 10:03David Sims?

  People watch it and they're like, oh, fucking good.

• 10:06Griffin Newman?

  I feel like it had 15 years of basically being like homework. Well, but also just like undeniable, kind of like largely uncontested. This is one of the great movies. Spielberg like proved himself, shut down all the haters. I think about.

• 10:24Speaker 04

  It is one of the great shut down all the haters movies.

• 10:26David Sims?

  It is true. Shut down.

• 10:27Speaker 04

  I mean, he created a lot of new haters in the process.

• 10:29Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 10:30Speaker 04

  Among like the Jewish and telehensia in particular.

• 10:32Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 10:32Speaker 04

  But he shut down a lot of them.

• 10:34Griffin Newman?

  Yes. Uh, I, I think about the, the original AFI top 100 list, which I want to say came out in like 98 or 97. And Schindler made the top 10. And going over that list with my parents and being like, whoa, they put a movie that recent in the top 10. And my parents, who are noted Spielberg skeptics were like, yeah, but it's Schindler's List. There was this feeling of this.

• 11:00David Sims?

  It's just very interesting to see Griffin's relationship with this movie so far.

• 11:05Griffin Newman?

  But that's stuck in my head.

• 11:06David Sims?

  Basically like, you know, it's the word you use for a serious movie and it really crushed the AFI top 100.

• 11:13Griffin Newman?

  I'm talking about this immediate canonization, which I then think turned into it being like homework, which then turned into a notion of like, well, like Spielberg doing the Holocaust is that thing like?

• 11:24Speaker 04

  I like how in Griffin's head, Spielberg's relationship to Schindler's List, how it's somehow separate from him is kind of similar to Griffin's relationship to his own lateness.

• 11:33David Sims?

  Oh, wow.

• 11:33Speaker 04

  And that like it's somehow.

• 11:35David Sims?

  We are going right to this.

• 11:37Speaker 04

  Before you came here.

• 11:38Griffin Newman?

  You guys talk, you guys say stuff.

• 11:40David Sims?

  I will say the first Oscars I really remember watching is the 94 Oscars for the 93 films of 93. And I remember, you know.

• 11:47Griffin Newman?

  You're like seven?

• 11:48David Sims?

  Uh, yeah, I would have been almost eight and um, like a lot of those 90s Oscars are defined by movies that's sort of sweep. So Schindler, uh, English Patient, right? Titanic, where you're watching a three plus hour ceremony where it's like, okay, time for another award. Schindler's List again, obviously, let's keep it going, you know? And I do remember being like, what, you know, cause it's like, I'm watching the Oscars. People are laughing and dancing and you know, and then occasionally they'll play like very somber, black and white footage and someone will come up and be like, this is a very important thing. And I'll say to my parents, like, so what's this movie? And they're like, eh, we'll get to it later. Look, you know, like they're not mad about it, but they're just like, we can't start to explain the Holocaust.

• 12:29Griffin Newman?

  Let's add another wrinkle to that too, which is like by 1994, if you're a child, right? And you're interested in movies in any way. Not only are you like, oh, right. Steven Spielberg, Jurassic Park guy, ET guy.

• 12:41David Sims?

  I guess I sort of knew, I was pretty young. I'm, yeah, I might, might've known who Spielberg was.

• 12:46Griffin Newman?

  But there are also like four cartoon shows that all have Steven Spielberg presents on them that are like dominating 90s pop culture.

• 12:53Speaker 04

  This is the Animaniacs guy?

• 12:54Griffin Newman?

  This is, but no.

• 12:56David Sims?

  I don't think that was true for me. Yeah. I don't think I knew about Spielberg, the whatever, like what you're talking about.

• 13:02Griffin Newman?

  Shows all had him baked into the title.

• 13:05David Sims?

  I know. I just wasn't watching them yet, right? Like, when is Animaniacs?

• 13:08Speaker 04

  I think it's like, I think it's like 94.

• 13:10Griffin Newman?

  Animaniacs.

• 13:12Griffin Newman?

  Tiny tunes.

• 13:13Speaker 04

  But there's a bit in the, in the book that I have in front of me because I always like to bring a prop. I'm also clutching the.

• 13:19David Sims?

  You're clutching the paranoia and symbol of horror and despair.

• 13:23Speaker 04

  The giant, yeah, pink puppy. It's my comfort animal during this record. But there's a bit in, in this book by Franciszek Palowski, The Making of Schindler's List, which was written before the movie came out, before the author had seen it, where he talks about how some of the young extras couldn't will themselves to be afraid in some of the background scenes because they couldn't imagine a Steven Spielberg movie. Those who are familiar with him, like the guy who made E.T.

• 13:45David Sims?

  Like how scary could it be?

• 13:46Speaker 04

  Right, exactly.

• 13:47David Sims?

  Sure. And I was like, oh, clearly you never saw 1941.

• 13:51Speaker 04

  But in terms of the, geez.

• 13:53David Sims?

  Talking about scary.

• 13:54Speaker 04

  Sweetness of it all, though. I mean, it's so hard to parse Clint Eastwood's delivery when he's giving Spielberg the best director trophy. Because he says, he's like trying to make a joke about how.

• 14:03David Sims?

  First he tries to give it to a chair and everyone's like Clint, Clint, Clint.

• 14:06Speaker 04

  But he's like, oh, big surprise. And he looks at it, but his delivery is so stilted that it sounds out of context. Like it was a huge surprise because Spielberg had never actually won the award before.

• 14:16David Sims?

  This fuck. I mean, surely Clint Eastwood was happy for. I've never really thought about like, what is Clint Eastwood's relationship with Steven Spielberg? Have they ever interacted?

• 14:25Speaker 04

  When, when Spielberg, when they wins best direct, uh, best picture, but five minutes later, he's standing backstage waiting in the wings and he hands his best director Oscar to Clint Eastwood to hold. And Clint Eastwood just fucking throws it at his head. Uh, no, he seems funny. He smiles.

• 14:41Griffin Newman?

  Animaniacs premiered September 1993, so it premieres in between Jurassic and Schindler. It was the new hotness and Tiny Toons had actually finished its main run.

• 14:51David Sims?

  It's storied run.

• 14:53Griffin Newman?

  It's storied run.

• 14:53David Sims?

  I'm try, I'm looking at the Oscars of this year, trying to think if there was like any movie I had seen that was nominated. Because I remember those early Oscar years when like The Mask had like a makeup nom. I would be like, The Mask better fucking win. And then they'd be like, English patient. I'd be like, what is this crap?

• 15:09Speaker 04

  Children, children across the world these days are like this year are gonna be thinking the same thing about A Better Man.

• 15:16Speaker 04

  Raging at their televisions.

• 15:17David Sims?

  I don't think I'd see, you know, I don't think I'd made it to the cinema to see the Remains of the Day or The Fugitive.

• 15:23Griffin Newman?

  Had you seen Jurassic in theaters? So that's in the tech categories.

• 15:27David Sims?

  I don't think I saw Jurassic.

• 15:28Griffin Newman?

  Wow.

• 15:29David Sims?

  Did I? I don't, I can't remember.

• 15:31Speaker 04

  Also fucked up that they had Harrison Ford, star of Best Picture, nominated The Fugitive, handing out the Best Picture award that year.

• 15:38David Sims?

  They do that all the time.

• 15:39Speaker 04

  Do they?

• 15:39David Sims?

  They do that all the time.

• 15:40Speaker 04

  A star of a movie?

• 15:41David Sims?

  That's why, who is it? There's one year that it kinda does, it's a Shakespeare in Love year, cuz they have Harrison Ford do it again, thinking that Saving Private Ryan's about to win Best Picture. And he goes, Shakespeare in Love. And everyone's like, huh? You know, like, that was them assuming Spielberg was about to get his, you know, second crown.

• 15:59Griffin Newman?

  He takes three Red Hulk pills to prevent himself from hulking out.

• 16:03David Sims?

  He's grabbing one of the big Oscars, like, and then he crushes the big Oscar statue with a big red hand.

• 16:10Griffin Newman?

  I was late, quote unquote, to seeing Brave New World, to entering.

• 16:14David Sims?

  Well, you really wanted it to, you know, to matriculate, to stew in our culture for a week or two.

• 16:20Griffin Newman?

  I uncorked it, wanted it breathing.

• 16:22David Sims?

  Exactly. You wanted those tannins to mellow.

• 16:25Griffin Newman?

  I was astounded that that movie is explicitly about a prescription pill refill. That is what that movie is about.

• 16:32David Sims?

  I need my pills, leader. And leader's like, I won't be getting those anymore.

• 16:35Speaker 04

  Legacy of the Bourne legacy.

• 16:37Griffin Newman?

  Right. There truly is a monologue.

• 16:38Speaker 04

  They buy cams.

• 16:39Griffin Newman?

  Where it's like Harrison Ford, how did you allow this bad guy to rise to power? And he's like, I needed the pills.

• 16:44David Sims?

  They were so good. He Red Hulked me by mistake.

• 16:49Speaker 04

  I guess no one was, right, under the impression that The Fugitive was gonna win Best Picture. It seemed like a safe bet. It wasn't like cock up of the father level.

• 16:58David Sims?

  Uh, second.

• 16:59Griffin Newman?

  How many times has Harrison Ford handed out? Or that, that was best director, right?

• 17:04David Sims?

  No, no, no.

• 17:04Speaker 04

  He hands up as picture.

• 17:05David Sims?

  He does picture.

• 17:07Griffin Newman?

  I'm saying the pianist year. He does.

• 17:09David Sims?

  The pianist year?

• 17:11Griffin Newman?

  He is the one who announces Roman Polanski.

• 17:13David Sims?

  Oh, is he? Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, you're switching to a different one.

• 17:16Griffin Newman?

  I was switching that, okay. I was trying to remember.

• 17:17David Sims?

  Well, I can tell you Harrison Ford has announced Best Picture. Three times to Schindler's List, Shakespeare in Love, and of course, Everything Everywhere All at Once.

• 17:29Speaker 04

  More words than he's said in a row in several on-screen performances.

• 17:33David Sims?

  And also coming to Everything Everywhere All at Once, me on streaming television. I'm in everything, everywhere.

• 17:39Speaker 04

  All at once.

• 17:40David Sims?

  All at once. Give me my pills.

• 17:43David Sims?

  Who's done it the most, you ask? Nicholson, eight times.

• 17:47Speaker 04

  You think they might get him back this year? Post 50th SNL appearance?

• 17:50David Sims?

  I, look, I'm really happy. I was, it was lovely to see Jack for a moment. Didn't strike me as a guy who's ready to like, say more than a couple of words.

• 17:57Griffin Newman?

  What if he came out and announced that Best Picture was going to Adam Sandler? That they were like, oh, there's only.

• 18:03David Sims?

  It's only one thing he can say at this point. I hate to, you know, I, I hope he's doing well. Nicholson announced Best Picture Two, The French Connection. Rocky.

• 18:12Griffin Newman?

  Wow, starting that early.

• 18:13David Sims?

  Yeah, I mean, that's how fucking major he was, I guess.

• 18:17Griffin Newman?

  Already.

• 18:17David Sims?

  And also, he was just always there. They were like, come up. Hey, you're in your, you're in the front row. Rocky, Annie Hall, Driving Miss Daisy, which he did with Warren Beatty. Beatty was probably trying to like, say it was Do the Right Thing or something. Like reading from the back of the envelope. Oh, no, I'm sorry. It was Faye Dunaway who fucked up that thing. Okay. Unforgiven, then a long, long rest. Then he comes back to say Crash.

• 18:40Griffin Newman?

  Crash. And he holds up the two fingers.

• 18:42David Sims?

  Yes.

• 18:44David Sims?

  And then the next year, he did, announced The Departed with Diane Keaton.

• 18:48Griffin Newman?

  Conflict of interest.

• 18:49David Sims?

  How dare he?

• 18:50Griffin Newman?

  Back, we're back in this zone.

• 18:52David Sims?

  But he doesn't remember being in The Departed, if you've seen that performance.

• 18:57David Sims?

  Then, I have no memory of this. He gave it to Argo with Michelle Obama?

• 19:02Griffin Newman?

  Oh.

• 19:03David Sims?

  Was Michelle Obama like teleconferencing in or something?

• 19:05Griffin Newman?

  Yes, he comes out on stage and presents Michelle Obama live, surrounded by.

• 19:11Griffin Newman?

  Military vets? I want to active military?

• 19:13David Sims?

  Okay, sure.

• 19:14Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 19:14David Sims?

  No memory of that. The thing about Best Picture is you're really tired by that point. And the show is kind of rushing it at that point. And usually Best Picture is actually kind of a forgotten award. Because it's some producer who comes up and is like, oh, I'm so proud of all the money I spent on the, you know, like, it's not always the director.

• 19:31Griffin Newman?

  Look, we're obviously not avoiding talking about Stan Lysliss, but you pointing out that Nicholson had presented Best Picture twice already by the 70s?

• 19:40David Sims?

  Pretty crazy.

• 19:40Griffin Newman?

  What is the last time someone under the age of 50 presented Best Picture?

• 19:44David Sims?

  Uh, Rita Moreno's under 50, right?

• 19:46Griffin Newman?

  Hmm. I just feel like that award is exclusively safe for living legend.

• 19:50David Sims?

  Lady Gaga, who is only 38 years old, Lady Gaga, who's almost exactly my age.

• 19:55Griffin Newman?

  Presented Best?

• 19:56David Sims?

  Presented Best Picture to Coda with Liza Minnelli.

• 19:59Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 19:59David Sims?

  If you remember, she was kind of helping Liza.

• 20:01Speaker 04

  They balance out to be about 73 on average.

• 20:03David Sims?

  If you want to go solo.

• 20:04Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 20:05David Sims?

  Let's go solo.

• 20:06Griffin Newman?

  Cause Liza fits into the living legend category.

• 20:08David Sims?

  Julia Roberts presented Best Picture to Green Book, which we all remember so well.

• 20:12Griffin Newman?

  Jesus.

• 20:13David Sims?

  She would have been about 50.

• 20:14Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 20:15David Sims?

  Uh, like 50, 50.

• 20:16Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 20:16David Sims?

  So kind of on the cusp there.

• 20:18Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 20:18David Sims?

  Sean Penn, we all remember, gave it to Birdman and was like, making jokes about him being an immigrant or whatever. And everyone was like, it's his ribbed sense of humor.

• 20:27Griffin Newman?

  Right. He said like, check his green card.

• 20:30David Sims?

  Okay.

• 20:32Griffin Newman?

  People were like, don't, please.

• 20:33David Sims?

  He would have been like.

• 20:34Griffin Newman?

  He didn't mean it rudely. They're friends. They love joking like they did on the set of 21 grams.

• 20:40David Sims?

  Tom Cruise presented to The Artist. I remember none of these.

• 20:43Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 20:44David Sims?

  And he was about 50. So it's like, I feel like it's when you hit 50 ish.

• 20:47Griffin Newman?

  So true.

• 20:48David Sims?

  You're sort of like, it's kind of like, all right, you know, welcome.

• 20:50Griffin Newman?

  It's like you're 50 and you've been a movie star for three decades. Congratulations. You're officially part of the tapestry.

• 20:56David Sims?

  Denzel gave it to No Country For Old Men right around the age of 50.

• 20:59Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 21:00David Sims?

  Mm hmm. Uh, Kirk Douglas, when he gave it to Chicago, I remember he was like 22 or 23 years old, right? He's the one who goes, and the Oscar, like, and the winner is, like, he, he, he says the old way of saying, rather than, and the Oscar goes.

• 21:15Griffin Newman?

  Right. And then he said, Merry Christmas, famous Jew. I don't know what that joke is. Yeah. Or like, I feel like you have things to say.

• 21:21Speaker 04

  I mean, I, I was just hoping that we'd still have some time for some Becker talks. I have some thoughts. I've really gone and done a deep dive since.

• 21:29Griffin Newman?

  And here's a promise also, end of this episode, we're ranking every single Steven Spielberg.

• 21:33David Sims?

  And we're ranking every season of.

• 21:34Speaker 04

  I was basically just lost in thought, imagining if on the set of 21 grams, Alejandro Gonzales Nury too, needed a phone call from Adam Sandler or Robin Williams every night just to cheer him up. Similar to Spielberg on Schindler's List.

• 21:47David Sims?

  You know, he was like a soul vampire, though. He probably was making 21 grams of me like, this is making me stronger, more misery. Just put the camera pointed at Claire Duval for a minute. She's gonna cry. I'll fit it into the movie somewhere.

• 21:59Griffin Newman?

  It is funny that that is quietly, maybe like one of the biggest parts of Schindler's List, Schindler's List lasting legacy.

• 22:07David Sims?

  The lore around it of like, he was editing Jurassic Park. He needed phone calls from Robin Williams to cheer up.

• 22:13Griffin Newman?

  Robin Williams would just do a jazz set over the phone for an hour every night to, yeah, keep him above water.

• 22:20Speaker 04

  I mean, that's, that's some serious heavily, heavy Jew work, like having to get on the phone every night and talk to Steven Spielberg and like do a tight five just to keep him off the brink, you know?

• 22:29David Sims?

  But it's also the Spielberg thing where he's like, yeah, I called my friend to kind of cheer myself up. My friend, Robin Williams circa 1993. Like, it's like, he's, I'm friends with the most funny person of the moment.

• 22:42Griffin Newman?

  Okay. Can I throw out a big take? And this ties into this, that I had watching it again last night. This feels to me like the kind of movie that fundamentally cannot be made in a world with cell phones anymore.

• 22:54David Sims?

  Wait, wait.

• 22:55Speaker 04

  Explain.

• 22:56Griffin Newman?

  Even that anecdote is pointing to something which is like the level of like immersive concentration around this movie, right? Like, not that they were like method living the Holocaust, right? But the way he talks about it of like, we were really trying to like evoke something. And there is like a disciplined, sober focus to the idea of like bringing this thing like back in front of lenses, uh, that I feel like the second anyone is able to like, after cut, check their cell phone. Yeah, I mean, there is a mood and a tone that is sustained in this film.

• 23:33David Sims?

  Yes.

• 23:34Griffin Newman?

  I that I think speaks to him being like, I need to call Robin Williams at midnight because I've been living in this for 12 hours without break versus being like.

• 23:43David Sims?

  Look, I'm not accusing Spielberg of being performative at all. I also just think that there is a whole like, how do you do press for a Holocaust movie?

• 23:49Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 23:50David Sims?

  You have to kind of acknowledge whatever, like, oh, it's so hard and serious. And like, you don't want to be like, oh, we were fucking cutting it up on set.

• 23:57Speaker 04

  And I don't want to be disingenuous or, you know, or unkind towards Spielberg, but I do think he's also happily performing the act of making the the great film that is gonna catapult into a new level.

• 24:08David Sims?

  But he really sold how serious and how grown up he was making this movie, which I think he was.

• 24:13Speaker 04

  I agree with you. But I also want to say like to Griffin's point, I think it's more, it feels more pressing to me that there would be less of a need to make this movie in the age of cell phones, because so much of what is galvanizing this production is the act of sort of concentrating, collecting memory and serving as much of an arc in the production.

• 24:33David Sims?

  Had an incredible movie about the Holocaust that kind of felt like it was made without cell phones.

• 24:38Speaker 04

  The Boy in the Striped Pajamas? Uh, no, but I.

• 24:40David Sims?

  The sort of interest.

• 24:41Speaker 04

  It will get there, but.

• 24:42Griffin Newman?

  I'm not saying you can't make a movie about the Holocaust in a world with cell phones.

• 24:46David Sims?

  Say that.

• 24:47Griffin Newman?

  I'm saying that I feel like there is a type of like, and it's less about how much Spielberg was suffering and living in this world, which I do agree he like, not overstates, but that is part of the narrative behind this film, which he's very good at selling his own like mythology.

• 25:01Speaker 04

  And the making of Schindler's The Book makes the set sound positively buoyant. So I think a lot of this.

• 25:06David Sims?

  It feels like there was a one for all, all for one vibe on this set too, right? Of like, you know, this isn't an ego thing, right? Like, there's not really any stars in this movie. And Neeson is, you know, a little famous. Ralph Fiennes is not at all, right? Like.

• 25:20Speaker 04

  And Ben Kingsley is the biggest.

• 25:22David Sims?

  Which is crazy that he's in the movie in a way, although he had quickly become a character supporting guy.

• 25:28Speaker 04

  But what you pick up when you're reading about, you know, day to day life on the set of this movie is that every day, there would be another one of the Schindler Juden who would come to set and it would, they would be, these are people, these will be people who. May have been thought dead or have been off the radar and were summoned like moss to the flame to the production of this movie that sort of reconstituted the collective identity of this people and this group and of what Schindler was able to do.

• 25:53David Sims?

  Jojo Rabbit? There's a movie that feels like there's no sort of cellphone influence on set.

• 25:58Griffin Newman?

  Here is what I'm trying to say. I think more than anything is the level of like sustained concentration this movie has. That more than anything is like holding on to a feeling without overstating it. That feels like it very much makes sense with what you're just saying of like daily reminders of this is what we're doing. That is less about Spielberg because that's his job to stay in it. And more about like, you feel like the entire crew was on the same wavelength, you know? That like the hundreds and thousands of background actors were all on the same wavelength. In a way that I just like, as someone who now works on shitty modern productions. And you just feel that sense of like, they call cut and everyone goes off and they're like, I gotta check other shit. You know?

• 26:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, there was definitely a sense of purpose. That was very cohesive on set.

• 26:43Griffin Newman?

  Feels like a movie where people are checking their cell phones. And I don't say that out of disrespect. All movies feel like that now.

• 26:48David Sims?

  Once again, I just wish the sets I was on these days were run with the professionalism of Schindler's List.

• 26:57Griffin Newman?

  No, I'm not complaining about it. I'm just like, this is what it is. This is how we all live our fucking lives now.

• 27:02David Sims?

  When did you first?

• 27:03Griffin Newman?

  Just like shipping out and being like, we're all just gonna fucking focus on making Schindler's List for 70 days.

• 27:08Speaker 04

  I'm so happy that there wasn't like a universal studios, marketing intern who had to come up with TikToks from the set. Torpedo their own life.

• 27:16Griffin Newman?

  With all due respect to Reese Feldman, the king of TikTok, he was not sent to Schindler's List.

• 27:20David Sims?

  I'm closing the book on this conversation.

• 27:24Griffin Newman?

  When did I first see it?

• 27:24David Sims?

  When did you first see Schindler's List?

• 27:26Griffin Newman?

  I first saw it when I was like 14.

• 27:28David Sims?

  Yeah, that makes sense.

• 27:29Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. And it was in a, you haven't seen Schindler's List, aren't you supposed to be the movie guy?

• 27:34David Sims?

  Yeah, I think probably was similar for me.

• 27:36Griffin Newman?

  My friend Doug.

• 27:36David Sims?

  Teenhood.

• 27:37Speaker 04

  It's like the Jewish equivalent of Hot Fuzz. You ain't seen Schindler's List.

• 27:41Griffin Newman?

  Basically, yes.

• 27:42David Sims?

  The five nominees for best director. I'm watching this now. The Oscar clip are Jim Sheridan, Jane Campion, I think was only the second woman ever nominated.

• 27:52Griffin Newman?

  Correct. After.

• 27:56David Sims?

  James Ivory.

• 27:57Speaker 04

  Robert Altman, who did not bother to show up.

• 27:59David Sims?

  Robert Altman.

• 28:00Griffin Newman?

  For shortcuts?

• 28:00David Sims?

  Yeah, for shortcuts who never bothered to show up and.

• 28:03Griffin Newman?

  Shut up for the Gosford year.

• 28:04David Sims?

  Yes, he did. And he looked great. And he hugged Lynch.

• 28:08Speaker 04

  I mean, it's, uh, I, we, we definitely were feeling that we were, uh, doing everything in our power to delay actually confronting this movie and what it is. But I also wanted to preface this episode, at least personally, if only by way of like, as a disclaimer for any sort of future glibness that I hope to avoid, of talking a little bit about like, how I've lived with this film. And maybe that's true of how, you know, other people on this record have, uh, in, internalized this movie over the years. But like, I, I am the grandson of Holocaust Survivor. My grandfather was, uh, two of nine siblings who survived. Uh, he left Poland in 1939 as a member of the Polish Cavalry on what he described as sort of the last boat out of Poland. It was going to the World's Fair, which was his only ticket out of there. And the rest of his family, like so many of the characters in Schindler's

• 28:53Speaker 04

  List, uh, did not believe the severity of the crisis that was coming towards them. Um, and so they elected to stay. Uh, and my grandfather, who ended up owning movie theaters, and unfortunately, I don't have any memory of talking about Schindler's List itself with him, which I'm sure he played.

• 29:08Griffin Newman?

  When did he die?

• 29:09Speaker 04

  He died in, I don't know, uh, early 2000s. Um, after, he lived just long enough to tell me that he was thinking about voting for George W. Bush, which was really difficult. Uh, but, um, anyway, um,

• 29:21Griffin Newman?

  People are so fucking complicated.

• 29:22Speaker 04

  I mean, it was all about Israel. And again, we'll get to it. But, uh, um, he, he was always the funniest person that I knew. And he would always talk about his memories of growing up in Poland and like of the early years of the Holocaust with, not with like, you know, not as if it were a comic event, but with like a certain levity that he always made it very clear to me that it was important to confront these things honestly and with, uh, a hint of, you know, humor, albeit gallows humor, in order to be able to reckon with them and not make it so sacrosanct that became impenetrable and therefore, uh, something that would be allowed to repeat itself. And, uh, I don't know. I, I think that sort of seeped into my relationship with the movie Schindler's List, which I've always talked about, you know, despite what the first 30 minutes of this episode may have sounded

• 30:07Speaker 04

  like, with a certain like casualness, um, just because it, it didn't, it didn't feel right to hold it in this, in the sacrosanct, rarefied space. Uh,

• 30:16Griffin Newman?

  It does no favors to the movie itself. I think that's the case with basically all movies, you know? And there are other like serious, important movies that have kind of like, things like The Godfather are always framed around

• 30:31Griffin Newman?

  It's so watchable.

• 30:32Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 30:33Griffin Newman?

  The Godfather is undeniable, despite it being like this, like totemic best picture winner and blockbuster.

• 30:38Speaker 04

  And that's uniquely problematic for Schindler's List in a way. It isn't for The Godfather.

• 30:41Griffin Newman?

  Right, right. But Schindler's List did play in a similar way and part of the accomplishment of this movie is without belittling its, um, subject matter or the import of the messages trying to communicate. The Spielberg X Factor is, it is so fucking watchable. It is watchable in a way that somehow skirts around being like exploitative, in my opinion. Some, certain old European filmmakers disagree. But like you watch Color Purple and that's the first strike of him trying to do something like this. And it's like, he can't stop making it like it's a popcorn movie.

• 31:20Speaker 04

  Right, but I also think-

• 31:21Griffin Newman?

  He's not doing that and yet it's got the Spielberg kind of magic of just like, you're so locked into every scene.

• 31:26Speaker 04

  I think it's power, uh, it's lasting power and it's value to, to me and to the culture at large. Um, and to the memory of the Holocaust lies and how it straddles the difference between those two parts of himself as an artist and also the parts of his career. But, uh, but I also had like very humble beginnings at the start of this movie and that I watched it on a bill, a 13 inch TV with a built in VCR in the break room, uh, at the school where I taught woodshop one summer. Uh, and there's never been a human being less qualified to do that. And so like while Timmy was sitting behind me like sanding his arm off. Uh, I was like locked into Schindler's List, uh, on TV and just like watching it over the course of a day. And that was just, uh, I don't know. And when that movie ended, I popped it out and put in like Rambo two.

• 32:08Griffin Newman?

  Right. You were just like, it's a very well made movie.

• 32:11Speaker 04

  But I've seen it. I've seen it, uh, I think an unconscionable amount of times since then.

• 32:15David Sims?

  I've seen it so many times. It's weirdly a movie that would be on TV. And there's a sort of aspect that we're like, this almost shouldn't be just on TV in between Rambo's one and two or whatever. But I would watch like chunks of it all the time. I've seen it so, I, but the first time I saw it, I had the opposite. I was like, I need to know a lot more about the, I was, I guess I knew plenty about the Holocaust in a sort of vague history sense. But when you're watching that, you're just like, I don't understand. Where was this? Where's everyone else? Why don't people know? Or why do people, you know, like I, I immediately saw it much more context. I'm a context seeking boy.

• 32:50Griffin Newman?

  You're saying the context of the actual historical events?

• 32:53David Sims?

  Oh, yeah.

• 32:54Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 32:54Speaker 04

  Well, I mean, that's, that was a big, you know.

• 32:56David Sims?

  On Holocaust.

• 32:57Speaker 04

  This is a big part of the motivation for, for making it was just the idea that the Holocaust, it was sort of this, you know, twin fold thing that was happening where I think among Jews, the Holocaust was starting to assume a more central role in the collective identity of the diaspora. Um, because for decades, there had been, and again, I'm talking in sweeping generalizations, a feeling of trying to sort of minimize and move beyond it amongst our people.

• 33:23David Sims?

  Like the Holocaust survivors in my family, it was like never spoken about.

• 33:26Speaker 04

  Right.

• 33:26David Sims?

  And I do feel like that's a bit of a stereotype.

• 33:28Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, it was part of the, you know, idea of founding the nation of Israel and was just sort of like, you know, this idea of, of trying to move beyond that. And I think it's power to be, uh, you know, galvanizing for the diaspora was coming into focus at the same time as a decreasing awareness of the Holocaust on the whole in among the Goy population of the world and a rise in people, uh, not believing that it happened. I mean, there's a poll that it's something or statistic that I read that something said in the early nineties, something like 22% of people had expressed, uh, sentiments doubting that the Holocaust ever happened.

• 34:03Griffin Newman?

  It's crazy to me when you get to the end of this film and you have the real survivors appear on camera, right? In this very profound affecting way. And my immediate thought is, God, I can't believe how young they all are. Right?

• 34:17David Sims?

  Sure. Right. Whereas now it's like, there are very few living.

• 34:20Griffin Newman?

  How many are still alive?

• 34:22David Sims?

  I mean, this is the same thing with like, how many World War II veterans are still alive? It's a number that dwindled. I remember when like the last World War one veteran died when I was a teenager or whatever. It was like some ancient man.

• 34:32Griffin Newman?

  I remember being in like eighth grade in the early 2000s.

• 34:36David Sims?

  About 245,000.

• 34:37Griffin Newman?

  Close to a decade after this movie comes out. And at my school, they were like, a Holocaust survivor is coming to speak. And like everyone from every grade above, you know, third, this is like required mandatory, whatever. And it was at that time, an old woman who talked about having been a child.

• 34:56David Sims?

  That's the thing. The one Holocaust survivor I know very well is a child, was a child. She's not currently a child. She's currently a very old woman.

• 35:02Griffin Newman?

  But, but it's like, the fact that Spielberg. Options this, right, gets universal to option. It spends a decade being too afraid to touch it. Says that kind of the inciting thing in the early 90s was like, I am seeing this level of like denialism starting to grow along with a kind of like edge lord neo-Nazi kind of normalization. Had no idea how bad things were gonna get over the next couple of decades.

• 35:26Speaker 04

  Weirdly.

• 35:27Griffin Newman?

  That it was like, I have a cultural responsibility from my vantage point, my power to get stuff made and communicated. My, my like megaphone, basically, to make something, to make this feel vivid and present and understandable to people. And then to see the survivors at the end of the movie and you're like, these people still like have colored hair. You know, like a lot of them that haven't gone gray yet. This is like such- It's like, these people are kinda hot. You know what I'm saying? You watch this and you're like, it's crazy how much more recent this history was to feel that disconnect from it versus now-

• 36:01Speaker 04

  He should have shot the scenes at the end there in Israel, like Corlely Farjé shot the substance, you know, just like really slow motion.

• 36:07Griffin Newman?

  I think it is very interesting to watch this movie now as there are like four or five huge tracks of what is happening in the world around us that echo this movie and the events that this film is representing in different ways that are terrifying, that feel like going back to this question we have of like, how does this happen? What do you mean? How does this just happen overnight? And this movie is really trying to break down like the steps of understanding psychologically, like through a certain little prism. I think that's what's smart about it. Yeah, this is not a history of- No, I don't think it's its main goal. And I think through picking one specific story, it does find a way to dramatize in certain ways, the gradual shifts of how these

• 36:47Griffin Newman?

  things happen. But now what's scary is you're just sort of like, this feels far enough away from our present that people are losing their connection with it in the classic, those who forget history are doomed to repeat it kind of way. And the fact that it felt so urgent to make Schindler in the 90s- Is wild to me when it's like, this is still kind of fairly new.

• 37:10Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, Spielberg's own trepidation in approaching the subject matter, again, very meta-technically reflected in our own approach to the start of this episode. Very, very good job, boys.

• 37:20Griffin Newman?

  I think so. Right. Can we just make Jurassic Park quickly before we have to go off and do this?

• 37:24Speaker 04

  And also, I think, you know, the distance between the 90s and the Holocaust has been compounded in interesting ways between the distance between the release of Schindler's List and today, in a way that we'll talk about, especially in relation when you look at some of the reactions to Schindler's List at the time. And I think also, all those things you're saying about it being the right time to make it, it does, and again, I don't mean to be a cynic about it, but I do think he was sort of at a point of his career after Hook, after Always, you know, these movies that weren't really connecting. I mean, Hook is the ultimate, it's time to fucking grow up movie. And, you know, whatever its charms. And, well, I haven't listened to that episode yet, I have to say, this series, this mini-series has been revelatory in so many ways. Like, like Dan Candyman is from Montreal.

• 38:08Griffin Newman?

  That's big.

• 38:09Speaker 04

  I never, I never would have known.

• 38:11Griffin Newman?

  I told him people were gonna like the lore drops, and he was pushing back. He said, "Cut it down." And I said, "They need to know he's Canadian and part of a polio."

• 38:19David Sims?

  One thing Dan Candyman is always saying is, "Oh, cut that down. You should cut that down."

• 38:24Speaker 04

  That really, that really blew my head back.

• 38:25David Sims?

  Pole Deck Pfefferberg, I'm cutting off, and we're going to the dossier.

• 38:29Griffin Newman?

  Can I say something off of what Eric just said, and then you can crack open the dossier? Talking about this inflection point, a anecdote I found very interesting is that Sid Scheinberg, when he was negotiating to do Schindler and Jurassic, was like, "You have to do Jurassic first."

• 38:46David Sims?

  Yes. But I feel like that is also a huge part of Spielberg selling this movie, is that, that's something I've known my whole life. Like, this lore of like, "Yeah, did you Jurassic first?" Because he never could have done it after making Schindler's List. He had to call Robin Williams. He was editing Jurassic Park on like, Like a video, like a teleconferencing feed.

• 39:05Speaker 04

  I think he was mostly just doing the mix.

• 39:06David Sims?

  Yeah, he was doing the final stuff.

• 39:08Griffin Newman?

  George Lucas was quietly overseeing a lot of the special effects.

• 39:10David Sims?

  Was overseeing some of the mixing and right, right? All this stuff where you're just like, right, this is all Janusz Kaminski, you know, in my head became it's like, yeah, there was like a newsboy on the streets of Krakow and Spielberg sort of discovered him, you know, like all this stuff.

• 39:23Speaker 04

  It'd be funny if George Lucas was like, can I just pitch in on Schindler's on the crowd control there and someone else can do Jurassic Park.

• 39:29Griffin Newman?

  The subtext of what Spielberg was saying was not just like, look, after Schindler, it's going to be hard for you to mood pivot back to Jurassic. I think there was this notion of if you pull this off, it's going to fundamentally change you as a filmmaker in a way where it's going to be harder for you to ever go back to that.

• 39:45David Sims?

  And yet the next movie he made was a Jurassic Park movie.

• 39:48Speaker 04

  Do you think it was the rationale there was as artistically motivated as much as it was? Do the thing that's going to make us a billion dollars first. Get that done and then you can go do your fancy black and white little art project.

• 40:01David Sims?

  Do the thing that comes out in the summer before the thing that comes out at Christmas.

• 40:04Griffin Newman?

  I think part one is if you pull off Schindler, it's going to change you forever. Two is please just give us the safety movie before you you cash in the blank check, right? And the third part of it is if you fuck up Schindler, it's really going to stick to you. I think if you if you.

• 40:21David Sims?

  There was no way he was gonna fuck up this movie, but there was a possibility, I think Spielberg thought that it would be a less seen movie.

• 40:28Griffin Newman?

  That it was Empire of the Sun.

• 40:29David Sims?

  Yeah, that it would be, you know, it's a three hour drama with a lot of Polish.

• 40:33Speaker 04

  I do think there are, I mean, I do think there are ways he could have fucked this movie up.

• 40:37David Sims?

  Well, obviously he could have fucked it up like in my opinion, but I don't think people would have been like, F, what a stinker.

• 40:42Griffin Newman?

  I think if he fucked it up, though, it would have been like conclusively, he is not a grown up filmmaker.

• 40:46David Sims?

  The ego. You can't handle it.

• 40:48Speaker 04

  I mean, I admire him for having the chutzpah to to make this movie, to take on so transparently the weight of what this project entailed and but the ego required to be like, I can do this. I'm going to do this. It's extraordinary. And I think that if the movie had disappointed the people that it was meant to represent, you know, en masse, it would have been a really difficult blow.

• 41:09David Sims?

  He had already made Empire of the Sun. Which people didn't like.

• 41:13Speaker 04

  I don't know.

• 41:14David Sims?

  Empire of the Sun got good reviews, made OK money, got some Oscar. Like Empire of the Sun did OK.

• 41:20Griffin Newman?

  If Schindler had gone over the way Empire of the Sun did, I think it would have been.

• 41:23Speaker 04

  If Empire of the, if Empire of the Sun had been a disaster, he could have gone home for the holidays without having to like hide in the closet. I think that.

• 41:31David Sims?

  Guys, guys, we're getting into a very similar argument here. I'm just trying to say like, he had made grown up movies. They had gone over OK. Like, it's not like he'd never made a grown up movie before. I'm just worried we're narrativizing this a little too much.

• 41:44Griffin Newman?

  I, I, I'm gonna stand by this. I think if Schindler had gone over the exact same way as Empire of the Sun, the response would have been, OK, for every five blockbusters you deliver us, you can make one of these. Versus this being the time where.

• 41:59Speaker 04

  We need a Schindler's List every six months from now on.

• 42:01Griffin Newman?

  Anything Spielberg makes becomes this important, whether it's a dinosaur movie or a Holocaust drama.

• 42:07David Sims?

  Sure. I mean, there's nothing like what happens after you make Jurassic Park and Schindler's List in the same year.

• 42:12Griffin Newman?

  Correct.

• 42:12David Sims?

  That's the, it's one will ever do anything like that again, probably.

• 42:15Speaker 04

  I mean, have you guys, have you guys gone deep on his predilection for making two movies a year?

• 42:20David Sims?

  We've talked about it so much, but mostly on the other mini series.

• 42:23Griffin Newman?

  Right. Cause that's when he really starts doing it.

• 42:25Speaker 04

  It feels like this rhythm that must work for him. I mean, for whatever reason, he's done it like four times. I mean, obviously it's over now.

• 42:31Griffin Newman?

  Now we slow down. But yeah, I think, I think it's a, it's a tonal balance thing. And it's a.

• 42:36David Sims?

  And it worked, so why not try it again? Right? Like it worked here. So like, why not do, well, Amistad and Lost World, that didn't work out perfect. But then Catch Me If You Can Minority Report, that works out pretty good.

• 42:46Speaker 04

  I mean, the ending of the making of Schindler's List book is just like, and it's just been announced, he's about to make Amistad and it's going to be Schindler's List all over again. And they were just like, waiting for the next great American epic.

• 42:55David Sims?

  Munich and War of the Worlds, you know, sort of like a, on a single version of it working out.

• 43:04Griffin Newman?

  And then Ten Ten and Warhorse.

• 43:06David Sims?

  Which. Is sort of like, oh, okay.

• 43:10Griffin Newman?

  He just did it five times. I think part of it is, in the same way that the making of this movie is Spielberg being like, I need to tie my arms behind my back a little bit to like, limit myself and challenge myself and like, put some restrictions on my filmmaking language and all of that. The way Soderbergh talks about like, the compression of, of time, of crew, of setups.

• 43:35David Sims?

  Once is right, like faster, faster, faster.

• 43:37Griffin Newman?

  But part of that is he's like, in order to stay sharp, I have to make this challenging for myself. I have to put restrictions on it because both Spielberg and Soderbergh, I think are so fast in their kind of brain processing of these things. That I think for Spielberg, it helps him to be like, I need the challenge of the other movie to feed in.

• 43:55David Sims?

  Yeah, sure.

• 43:56Speaker 04

  I'm so happy Soderbergh didn't make Schindler's List. Would have like edited it on the train ride home and it would have just been like musty colored frames of.

• 44:03David Sims?

  It all actually just takes place in like an office, like one office.

• 44:06Griffin Newman?

  But I, I do think it is, it is a self-challenge, right? It's like, sort of like, this feeds. He will say one movie ends up informing the other movie in a way I'm surprised by.

• 44:18Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, he was working in a radically different way than he'd ever worked before. I mean, he was working with, first of all, with a predominantly Polish crew. I mean, his first movie.

• 44:23David Sims?

  There's the storyboarding.

• 44:25Speaker 04

  Storyboarding, handheld camera, which he's often carrying himself.

• 44:28Griffin Newman?

  And he's like, literally.

• 44:29David Sims?

  Biggest dick star ever.

• 44:30Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 44:31Griffin Newman?

  Evian Bott.

• 44:32David Sims?

  Having to deal with that.

• 44:33Griffin Newman?

  The, the kind of dogmatic, like, I'm not allowed to use Steadicam. I'm not storyboarding. Like, all these things where he's just like, I'm banning pieces of equipment. I'm banning the approach of how I conceive of scenes.

• 44:48Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 44:49David Sims?

  Yes.

• 44:52David Sims?

  Is that the Cineas Cow?

• 44:54Griffin Newman?

  The Cineas Cow is back.

• 44:55David Sims?

  Haven't heard from her in a while.

• 44:56Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, she's reactivated because she's horny for chicken fingers.

• 45:01David Sims?

  Okay.

• 45:02Griffin Newman?

  And she's excited for the streaming debut of Teenage Sex and Death at Camp My Asthma.

• 45:06David Sims?

  Wow.

• 45:07Griffin Newman?

  The cow likes chicken.

• 45:09David Sims?

  Remember Cow and Chicken? Let's look it up while you tell the great listeners about the great stuff on movie.

• 45:16Griffin Newman?

  What movie is a global film company bringing great cinema to the world and to you? Curating and elevating visionary filmmaking, all handpicked, always. That's what movie does. Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, one of my favorite movies of the year.

• 45:29David Sims?

  Absolutely.

• 45:30Griffin Newman?

  You can feel the rush now at home. There's a hole at the bottom of the lake where the movies come from.

• 45:36David Sims?

  That is a line in the movie.

• 45:37Griffin Newman?

  In the new movie from Jane Schonbrunn, Past and Future Guest.

• 45:40David Sims?

  Past and Future Guest, a great filmmaker, a great podcast guest, a great friend.

• 45:45Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 45:45David Sims?

  Um, this movie rocks. It's got, of course, it stars Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson.

• 45:50Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 45:51David Sims?

  Legends and I tip my cap, but Zach Cherry.

• 45:53Griffin Newman?

  Performances, friend of the show.

• 45:55David Sims?

  Friend of the show, Zach Cherry.

• 45:56Griffin Newman?

  Zach Cherry.

• 45:57David Sims?

  Also in it.

• 45:58Griffin Newman?

  This is true.

• 45:59David Sims?

  Such a cool movie, one that queer Paul McCann, if you haven't heard about this movie, I don't know what's going on with you. But like it obviously has, it was out in theaters this summer and now it's on movie.

• 46:09Griffin Newman?

  Hannah Einbinder plays the filmmaker attempting to reboot the Camp Miasma franchise, trying to track down the original final girl from the first movie to, to make some sort of legacy sequel, who's played by Gillian Anderson, who lives at the summer camp.

• 46:24David Sims?

  Yes. And you know, and then they hang out and it's regular.

• 46:28Griffin Newman?

  What happens? It's, it's one of those Hollywood's out of ideas. No, it's very much a movie about Hollywood being out of ideas while being an example of there still being new stories to tell.

• 46:40David Sims?

  It's now streaming exclusively on movie and you can try movie free for 30 days at movie.com slash blank check. That's M U B I dot com slash blank check for a whole month of great cinema for free.

• 46:52Griffin Newman?

  They got so many great movies on there to watch, but worth it for 30 days for Miasma.

• 46:57David Sims?

  Damn right.

• 47:02Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 47:03David Sims?

  Yes.

• 47:03Griffin Newman?

  He lurks in shadow. He slips into dreams. He casts no reflection. Audible presents Bram Stoker's Dracula, a new full cast audio thriller starring Ella Purnell as Mina Harker, Jonathan Bailey as Dracula, and an A-list cast, including Maggie Gyllenhaal as Van Helsing, Amy Lou Wood as Lucy, David Johnson as Dr. Seward, and many more. That is an all-star cast.

• 47:24David Sims?

  Yeah, this new full cast thriller locks Mina Harker in a battle of minds with the Count. When Mina's fiance, Jonathan Harker, Louis Partridge, vanishes in Transylvania, Mina pieces together letters, diary entries, and chilling testimony to hunt the predator stalking those she loves, only to discover Dracula's already hunting her.

• 47:44Griffin Newman?

  Joined by the enigmatic Van Helsing, Mina and a small fearless band race against time to stop this ancient terror. Using her intellect, her resolve, and a gift for drawing the unseen lines between clues, Mina may just hold the key to bring down the Count if he hasn't already found his way inside her mind.

• 48:00David Sims?

  Featuring a haunting original score by Elon Eschery and a spatial dolby Atmos sound design, Audible's Dracula invites you to welcome literature's most shadowy figure into your home. Feel the terror of being hunted and the thrill of the hunt. Don't miss this year's best new audio thriller, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Audible's new full cast original adaptation. Written by Robin Ahern, now on Audible. Listen to the darkness. Go to audible.com/listen todracula.

• 48:35Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 48:35David Sims?

  Yes?

• 48:36Griffin Newman?

  Ugh.

• 48:37David Sims?

  Uh-oh.

• 48:37Griffin Newman?

  It's November.

• 48:38David Sims?

  Ah!

• 48:40Griffin Newman?

  And you know what that means. The old stereotype about November.

• 48:43David Sims?

  Turkeys?

• 48:43Griffin Newman?

  One long sprint to the finish line.

• 48:45David Sims?

  Oh, of course.

• 48:47Griffin Newman?

  Packed schedule, questionable food choices, and somehow a social calendar that got way fuller than you planned. And I ain't talking about Sam Fuller. We're not covering him yet in the podcast.

• 48:55David Sims?

  No, though, maybe we should.

• 48:56Griffin Newman?

  We might get there eventually.

• 48:58David Sims?

  I can't remember. Big Red One. We could call it the Big Red Podcast.

• 49:01Griffin Newman?

  Listen, when things get complicated, not when life is easy and when you've got time for a whole routine, right now, when everything is full and something has to give one scoop cold water every morning before anything else, as I like to say, scoop there it is.

• 49:14David Sims?

  You do like to say that every morning. You text me, scoop there it is. And that means I now know that you had your AG1.

• 49:21Griffin Newman?

  And I'm awake.

• 49:22David Sims?

  Uh, but yeah, you're, I know you're, you're a daily AG1 user and it's basically the, uh, the glue that holds your internal organs together at this point.

• 49:30Griffin Newman?

  It's not just marketing. AG1 Next Gen is backed by four separate gold standard clinical trials, not weekend a study.

• 49:38David Sims?

  Thank you for that.

• 49:38Griffin Newman?

  Four independent studies with key nutrient levels improved within three months of consistent use. This is the thing I like about AG1. They're not resting on their laurels. They constantly work to better themselves.

• 49:50David Sims?

  Um, yes, AG1, they've got now AG1 Pro.

• 49:54Griffin Newman?

  For the professionals.

• 49:55David Sims?

  Same daily drink now with a performance and recovery layer built in. So you've got five grams of Cre vitalis, a premium German made creatine monohydrate, and one of the most studied compounds in sports science, plus CAH MB for muscle protection and zinc carnosine for gut support.

• 50:13Griffin Newman?

  Thank God.

• 50:14David Sims?

  Next gen is the foundation pro adds what your body needs to recover.

• 50:18Griffin Newman?

  You might be having some big meals this November. AG1 is what you need to keep your gut in check. Keep things, as I like to put it, regular.

• 50:26David Sims?

  Yes. So for a limited time, visit drink AG1.com slash check and get a free immune support bundle, including omega three fish oil and vitamin D three plus K two with your first subscription of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro. That's drink AG1.com slash check. And after checkout, be sure to let them know that Belank check send you.

• 50:56David Sims?

  Poldek Pfefferberg, Polish born Jewish man who survived the Holocaust, uh, thanks to the efforts of Oscar Schindler. Met, well, this is where his story begins. He immigrates to the United States in 1948, becomes temporarily changes his name to Leopold Page, uh, starts a leather goods store in Beverly Hills, continues to know Oscar Schindler. As people who know about this probably know, like Oscar Schindler sort of survived on the goodwill of the Schindler Union, like later in life when he was a broke. They were vet knowing him every month. Truly.

• 51:28Griffin Newman?

  It was like the Little Caesar CEO paying for Rosa Parks's apartment.

• 51:32David Sims?

  Yes, exactly.

• 51:33Griffin Newman?

  That's real. It sounds like me just making a dumb joke.

• 51:36David Sims?

  I was like, did Griffin just tell a joke? But then I was like, no, that can't be. Uh, turning into 50s, he's like, someone should make a movie of this. Like this is a good idea for a movie. What happened to me? Like what Oscar Schindler did.

• 51:48Griffin Newman?

  I think also was like, how do I repay this man?

• 51:50David Sims?

  Yeah, sure.

• 51:51Griffin Newman?

  Perhaps he needs to find like a vehicle to forever pin him in the annals of history.

• 51:58David Sims?

  A deal is reached to make a film called To The Last Hour, possibly starring Sean Connery as Oscar Schindler. At MGM, written by Howard Koch, the writer of Casablanca, one of the writers. And it almost happens and even like Schindler got a check for 37 grand, like, you know, to sort of get the rights or something. Dies, you know, doesn't make it. At one point, Pfefferberg approaches Fritz Lang, who must have been quite old at that point, to try and get something off the ground. He goes over to like, you know, MCA of Germany. He's like, maybe I can make it in Europe. Like, doesn't happen. He dies at the age of 1974.

• 52:39Griffin Newman?

  He dies at the age of, sorry, 1907.

• 52:41David Sims?

  At the age of 66 in 1974.

• 52:44Griffin Newman?

  Makes slightly more sense.

• 52:46David Sims?

  But a few years later, Thomas Kenali, Kenali, Australian journalist, Caneely, walks into his leather goods store after he's died and.

• 52:58Speaker 04

  After Schindler's died and Pfefferberg is telling everyone who comes in.

• 53:01Griffin Newman?

  David's looking at the dossier like.

• 53:05Griffin Newman?

  Land ballot.

• 53:06David Sims?

  Schindler's dead. Pfefferberg's alive. Schindler is the one who died in 1974.

• 53:10Speaker 04

  Correct.

• 53:11David Sims?

  There I was like, what? Sorry, I misread this.

• 53:13Speaker 04

  His disembodied spirit running a store in Hollywood.

• 53:16David Sims?

  Thomas Caneely walks into this other good store and Pfefferberg tells him the story like, I was saved by this Nazi called Oscar Schindler.

• 53:24Speaker 04

  I mean, you get the sense that anytime anyone came into the store, it was even like tangentially related to Hollywood. He was like, sit fuck down.

• 53:30David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 53:30Speaker 04

  I'm about to tell you my life story for an hour where I size up your feet.

• 53:33David Sims?

  At this point, how to put some, you know, spit on the ball, right? Where he's like, you don't get it. It's not just that this guy was a Nazi. It's not just that he was this kind of like good looking, charming guy. He was like fucking his way through Germany. He was carousing and drinking.

• 53:47Griffin Newman?

  He's like a lush and a party animal.

• 53:49David Sims?

  He's this interesting guy.

• 53:51Griffin Newman?

  Labor.

• 53:52David Sims?

  Right. He starts out with this kind of amoral, sort of like, hey, sure. Like, you know, you know.

• 53:57Griffin Newman?

  Not, not to be crass. It is like a perfect.

• 54:02Griffin Newman?

  Hollywood hook to making a Holocaust movie.

• 54:05David Sims?

  Of course it is.

• 54:06Griffin Newman?

  Which is just like guy slowly gains a conscience in the Holocaust and does a great mitzvah.

• 54:11David Sims?

  Um, and Cenely initially is like, well, look, I'm a Catholic. I'm no expert on the Holocaust. Like, I don't know if I should write this book, but he can't drop the idea. Uh, so he writes Schindler's Ark, which have you read it?

• 54:24Speaker 04

  I have not.

• 54:24David Sims?

  It's, it's.

• 54:25Speaker 04

  I've never had any desire to weirdly.

• 54:26David Sims?

  It's good. It's a novel. It's like a sort of like fiction, you know, a historical novel, right? So it's sort of written in this way that has, you know, he's using documents, but he's also sort of filling in gaps with kind of, and it's good. And it's about, you know, the paradox of this man, right? Like, you know, it's about this person more than anything. It wins the Booker Prize. Spielberg sees the book, had never heard the story before. And is very interesting. And so you're very interested. So Universal buys the rights in 1982.

• 54:57Griffin Newman?

  And his first response is, is this real? Like, yeah, it's kind of like.

• 55:00David Sims?

  Sounds fake. It sounds Hollywood.

• 55:01Griffin Newman?

  Like Hollywood bullshit. If this is real, it's incredible.

• 55:05David Sims?

  Yeah. Um, so Spielberg, of course, as we all know from watching that movie, grew up Jewish.

• 55:11Griffin Newman?

  The movie you're talking about Jurassic Park?

• 55:13David Sims?

  Babe Womans.

• 55:14Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 55:15David Sims?

  And new Holocaust survivors. When he was three years old, his parent, he has a story about, like someone coming to the, you know, to family dinner and telling stories. His grandmother and, you know, whatever, like he has a vivid memory of someone like rolling up their sleeve to show the tattoo to him with the numbers and, but nonetheless, kind of like you were saying, or like generally it's sort of like, that's not dinner table conversation. Like, we don't talk about Nazis in this house, right? We don't, we don't like dwell on it too much. We're, we're happy. Shel Williams playing the piano and buying monkeys. Dino's getting cocked all over town.

• 55:55Griffin Newman?

  I mean, like three, four.

• 55:56David Sims?

  He's kind of moved states to avoid getting cocked.

• 55:59Griffin Newman?

  Three fourths of my family are Eastern European Jews who immigrated to New York State before the Holocaust.

• 56:07David Sims?

  Yeah, in like the early 1900s, probably.

• 56:09Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 56:10David Sims?

  That's when my family mostly immigrated.

• 56:11Griffin Newman?

  Right. All of my grandparents are first generation, but were born here.

• 56:15David Sims?

  Right.

• 56:15Griffin Newman?

  And it did, I, I, I feel like whenever any of them would invoke this era, it was a like, obviously a great tragedy thing, but it did feel like there was this feeling of, we don't even want to touch that. Like this is too profound and serious and we're lucky that none of us had to live through that. And there was the kind of like general Holocaust museum, like nod seriously. Of course, a great tragedy kind of thing.

• 56:41Speaker 04

  I think it must also start to seem unreal at a certain point.

• 56:44Griffin Newman?

  I think so.

• 56:44Speaker 04

  When you're like living in America.

• 56:46Griffin Newman?

  Cause here we are in America, things are okay.

• 56:48Speaker 04

  It's like this dream that happened to someone else.

• 56:51Griffin Newman?

  It is very bizarre for me to think about like my grandparents being like children and teenagers and whatever, and just hearing that this was happening. And I think, right, you like needed to apply a certain degree of cognitive dissonance to not go insane, especially when you're like a powerless American child.

• 57:08David Sims?

  This is one thing I wanted to understand when, when I start learning more, like where I was just like, when did people know in America, say, right? You know, like they didn't know during the war. They knew the war was happening, right? But like, they didn't really know the extent of this until after the war. And like, and then how quickly, obviously the Nuremberg trial start to have, you know, like how quickly does this start to come out? Like, is this information wise? But you know, I was just fascinated by the development of all that.

• 57:32Speaker 04

  I mean, you can see that chronology take place on screen over the decades.

• 57:36Griffin Newman?

  Is one of the things.

• 57:37Speaker 04

  It's what's, one of the things that's so interesting about Holocaust cinema. I mean, it starts, I mean, it starts, I'm saying this is the first Holocaust movie, but like, I think in terms of just the, the weight and the gravity of what's happened and sharing that raw imagery. I mean, I think of Alain Rene's Night in Fog.

• 57:50David Sims?

  But that's, that's in the mid 50s. Yeah, exactly.

• 57:53Speaker 04

  It's pretty soon after World War II. Obviously, you know, in historical terms, we think of soon, it'd be like instant information. It's a decade later.

• 58:01David Sims?

  What's hard to think about now, that you had to wait years to really start to get the gravity.

• 58:06Speaker 04

  But we started getting Holocaust movies in. A relatively modern sense, not long thereafter and great ones. But you know, we'll talk about in terms of Schindler's List, like none of the ones, none of them had really penetrated mass culture in a way that any of Spielberg's

• 58:21David Sims?

  Which was

• 58:21Speaker 04

  movies ever had. I mean, like, you know, I could wax poetic all day long about Lena Vermauler's Seven Beauties, or about The Boxer and Death, or about Capo. You know, and, and these are great films that have had a lasting impression on me, but only because I sought them out.

• 58:36David Sims?

  Yeah, The Boxer and Death is a Slovak film. I don't think that one was burned off the box office.

• 58:42Speaker 04

  Screened to me in the Holocaust cinema I took with Annette Inzendorf in college. And not something that someone was just going to catch casually on TNT.

• 58:51David Sims?

  No, and then there's movies, but there's movies like The Pawnbroker or whatever, where it's like, this is about a Holocaust survivor. It's about the legacy of this, but it's not about like the history of what happened.

• 58:59Speaker 04

  Right.

• 58:59David Sims?

  Great movie.

• 59:00Griffin Newman?

  Right. There are a lot of movies about the kind of the ripple effects and the aftermath and yeah, right. Sort of psychological studies.

• 59:07David Sims?

  Universal buys Schindler's Ark, but literally Spielberg says to Fefferberg, apparently, it's going to take me about 10 years to make this. Like, he basically knows even then.

• 59:17Speaker 04

  And he tried to shop it the whole while.

• 59:18David Sims?

  That's the thing.

• 59:18Speaker 04

  The Palmas, we're saving, who, come on, someone.

• 59:21Griffin Newman?

  Right, right.

• 59:21David Sims?

  For 10 years, he was We're going to talk about that because he says, I needed more films to make more films. I wasn't about to go from Temple of Doom to Schindler's List. It would have been impossible. Right. In my burning desire to entertain, I kept pushing it back. He hadn't had children yet. Talks a lot about how having children kind of changed everything for him.

• 59:40Speaker 04

  It is hard to imagine.

• 59:41David Sims?

  He was like, make those guns like flashlights.

• 59:44Speaker 04

  It is hard to imagine someone making this movie before they have children, in a way. I mean, it's an unfair

• 59:49Griffin Newman?

  I think I could do it.

• 59:50Speaker 04

  parent brain thing to say, but

• 59:51David Sims?

  You think you could just, you're like Ben getting the Simple Plan money. You're like, I could make Schindler's List. Point the camera over there.

• 59:56Griffin Newman?

  I could roll out of bed kidless and make this movie.

• 59:59Speaker 04

  I haven't seen A Simple Plan in a while. Does one of the characters decide to spend all their money on making a Holocaust movie?

• 1:00:04Griffin Newman?

  I know I I agree with you that this feels like a fundamental you are not the most important person in the world kind of movie in a way that Spielberg wasn't always making autobiographical films, but they always felt very tied to his kind of experience and world outlook.

• 1:00:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:00:22Griffin Newman?

  If that makes sense.

• 1:00:22Speaker 04

  I mean, I think and what you're seeing in this movie is him, I don't know if the right moment to go like too big picture, but you're seeing the the defining interest of his films philosophically go from being about the family, being, you know, stemming from divorce and things of that nature to, uh, in the process of this movie, and literally you can see it in the span of a single scene, becoming about the value of a single human life, which becomes the, uh, you know, defining theme of his career. You see it obviously front and center in Saving Private Ryan, then again in AI, um, and of course in the BFG. So I think that like there's these are, these are things that, uh, I mean,

• 1:00:56David Sims?

  The value of a single jar of farts.

• 1:00:59Speaker 04

  But, but yeah, I mean, this is, this is him entering a new phase of his existence as a person really beyond, um, that's just sort of reflected through the art.

• 1:01:09David Sims?

  Spielberg presumably talking about Hook LOL, says JJ Birch, our researcher. I was seduced by my own success. I'd always played to the adult audience who are able to remember their childhood and enjoy the movies along with their own children. But when I began playing to kids directly, I found I stumbled on my own shoelaces. I realized when you're making movies, you can't do things consciously. It's interesting to hear him say that because Hook is indeed him being like, I'm making like essentially a film for seven year olds. And like, sure, he's made ET or whatever, but ET is sort of indefinable magic or like, but it's like, yeah, he mostly made movies for like everybody, teenagers.

• 1:01:48Speaker 04

  Hook for the seven year old in All of Us.

• 1:01:50David Sims?

  Yeah, sure. Seven year olds in All of Us are always like, I gotta put my cell phone down and stop working so much.

• 1:01:55Griffin Newman?

  I think it's almost always a problem when filmmakers this talented try to put those kinds of limitations on themselves, like not filmmaking challenge limitations, but are like, this is just a movie for kids. And I'm like, well, now you're not playing to the top of your intelligence.

• 1:02:10David Sims?

  Movie. Exactly. Like, I mean, that's what George Lucas Where you he's just like, I don't know, it's for kids. And I'm like, this is about senates and shit like, take yourself seriously.

• 1:02:18Griffin Newman?

  It used to be about everything.

• 1:02:20David Sims?

  Right.

• 1:02:20Griffin Newman?

  And it used to work for kids as well, which was your magic. The second you're like, well, if adults don't like this, they're not they're they're up their own ass.

• 1:02:27David Sims?

  But then again, if I made some fucking movie that made a billion dollars and children around the world enjoyed and adults were like, you're more criminal for making it. I'm talking about like the Phantom Menace. I would be like, well, the warmth of children's love sustains me. I don't need you grownups.

• 1:02:42Speaker 04

  We were talking about this a little bit before we started recording, but there is, you know, I literally just last night sat down with my son and watched the first 30 minutes of Star Wars: A New Hope, um, which is the fourth film and I don't know if you guys know.

• 1:02:52Griffin Newman?

  I think we never got to that one.

• 1:02:55Speaker 04

  He.

• 1:02:55David Sims?

  Is Sabo in it?

• 1:02:57Speaker 04

  Not not Sabo. Every all whenever Sabo was not on screen, Ace is saying.

• 1:03:01David Sims?

  Sabo but Nosferatu. Those voices aren't that far.

• 1:03:04Griffin Newman?

  We fucking did this bit before. Wato's the one who's similar.

• 1:03:08Speaker 04

  For the record, during Sundance, when I checked my phone between movies and saw that Wato had died.

• 1:03:13Griffin Newman?

  You did.

• 1:03:13Speaker 04

  I immediately texted Griffin with horror in my heart and got nothing back.

• 1:03:17Griffin Newman?

  And then I.

• 1:03:18David Sims?

  I think Griffin got 400 texts along those lines.

• 1:03:20Griffin Newman?

  We were in the middle of recording, you will not believe how many texts I got. It was more than my birthday, but also I didn't, I went texting you today. Do you want coffee for the episode record only then realized I hadn't responded to your water.

• 1:03:32Speaker 04

  I mean, I was, not that you expect something back when you send someone a condolence call really, but like, I just needed information. I was like, what's happening? You know, oh, God, that makes.

• 1:03:41Griffin Newman?

  But I. No, what were you gonna say?

• 1:03:43Speaker 04

  I showed I showed. Uh, I showed you the first, uh, 30 minutes of Star Wars. We had, I've never in my life fielded more questions about Jawa. Uh, I don't think anybody ever has. We're really just the same question over and over and over again, which is, are they bad guys? Uh, which is usually.

• 1:03:59David Sims?

  The thing with Jawa is they're in the right in the gray area, which and hate. That's one of the first things you meet in Star Wars, kind of example of what a cool movie is.

• 1:04:06Speaker 04

  But Star Wars is, uh, ultimately, you know, one of the reasons that it appeals to children so much is it's this Manichean, uh, Manichean, however you want to pronounce it, story of good versus evil.

• 1:04:15David Sims?

  Of course. I mean, obviously there's a black clad sadist who appears before the Jawa.

• 1:04:19Speaker 04

  I thought our Sater made some good points, but you're what's not mine. But I think that like. You know, you, uh, you have that good versus evil thing that kids whose only question at this age is, are they a bad guy? Can understand and that, you know, I'm not saying that I'm showing my five year old Schindler's List anytime soon. But I'm saying that, you know, it's an interesting parallel when you're looking at, uh, you know, Spielberg maturing and making a movie for adults. Here he is making the most black and white, you know, morally black and white movie he's ever made is the closest thing to the spirit of Lucas in some ways. That, uh, you know, aside from maybe Indiana Jones, the D.

• 1:04:53Griffin Newman?

  Yes, but also building it around like a weirdly gray character in a lot of ways. Quick sidebar, because you guys were starting to get into this before the record and I was like, we gotta fucking get this out on mic. At your wife's birthday last weekend, both of you, we were talking and the question came up, what is the first Spielberg movie we will show our son? Right? You were like, when will he be? Cause it was like, is he ready for ET? Will ET be the first one we show him? What is the right age for ET?

• 1:05:21David Sims?

  In theory, ET should be the first one, but then you kind of get into like, do I want to traumatize my child with?

• 1:05:26Griffin Newman?

  Your wife was like, I'm imagining his response. We maybe have to wait until he's stronger. And I was like, I think part of the right of passage of ET is seeing it a little bit before you're ready.

• 1:05:36David Sims?

  It's sort of true.

• 1:05:36Griffin Newman?

  You have to time it out.

• 1:05:37David Sims?

  I'm saying that he's also just better than any other movie that you could show your kid that age. It has someone dying or getting sick where it's like, they might be upset by that too, but ET really, you know.

• 1:05:48Speaker 04

  Avoiding the risk for trauma is sort of a futile endeavor because we're talking about a kid who is currently so scared of everything. We were watching Wreck it Ralph and when, uh,

• 1:05:58Griffin Newman?

  Someone just parked up.

• 1:05:59David Sims?

  Great movie. My daughter calls angry man.

• 1:06:02Speaker 04

  What's the name of that actress from Jane Lynch? When Jane Lynch's character shows up.

• 1:06:05Griffin Newman?

  Sergeant Callie.

• 1:06:05Speaker 04

  Yeah. Asa decided that she was absolutely terrifying.

• 1:06:08David Sims?

  Wait, wait. He didn't even see her shooting bugs? He was, he was out on just the Jane Lynch.

• 1:06:12Speaker 04

  Daddy, you have to pause the movie now. Um, and shrieking at me. And so.

• 1:06:17Griffin Newman?

  You continue to tell me that your son, more than anything reacts negatively to, uh, uh, authority figures in films, threatening to discipline characters.

• 1:06:24Speaker 04

  Yeah. Yeah. I mean, well, that would paint a picture for your listenership that.

• 1:06:28David Sims?

  I would say that that's very absent from his life.

• 1:06:32Griffin Newman?

  That's what's funny is you're like, if a character comes on screen and feels like they might get angry at the kid, your son freaks out. And you're like, when I try to tell my son to do anything, he laughs.

• 1:06:41Speaker 04

  Yeah. Maybe the problem is that like, I've done such a bad job of disciplining my kid that the idea of having any sort of discipline has become this very alien traumatizing.

• 1:06:49David Sims?

  Asa was at my daughter's birthday.

• 1:06:51Speaker 04

  Yes, he was.

• 1:06:51David Sims?

  And he was very well behaved.

• 1:06:52Speaker 04

  He

• 1:06:53David Sims?

  He was throwing himself from the tops of

• 1:06:55Speaker 04

  I will send you a video where he is having like a demonic possession over in the side of one of the booths and talking about Venom and I thought he was talking about Venom, the cartoon guy, and I was like, how did you hear about Venom? And then it came out to me that he was just talking about like being Venomized Asa, which is like Asa but poisonous, which is, I guess, poison spider. I was like, okay, more poison spider.

• 1:07:14Griffin Newman?

  Venomize is a big initiative in Marvel Universe.

• 1:07:17David Sims?

  Going Venom mode?

• 1:07:20Speaker 04

  Listen, who knows with the T, Eric Adams administration is teaching these kids at school these days, but I do think that, you know, fucking him up with ET is fine. What was I gonna say? The, yeah, Griffin threw a great pick into the mix, which was the Avengers of Tintin.

• 1:07:36Griffin Newman?

  I was like, Tintin's a fucking

• 1:07:37David Sims?

  Tintin's good because even though it has like guns or whatever, Tintin's pretty like, the stakes are silly.

• 1:07:43Griffin Newman?

  I also said in the, is that a bad guy kind of fear that

• 1:07:47Speaker 04

  They're all bad guys.

• 1:07:48Griffin Newman?

  Ace is living with, but also with Tintin, you're like, you can tell the bad guys are because of the way their faces look.

• 1:07:54David Sims?

  Like everyone is

• 1:07:54Griffin Newman?

  Face in Tintin looks normal. So caricatured.

• 1:07:56David Sims?

  What about, I mean, I guess, BFG is also obviously pretty, yeah, I mean, it's

• 1:08:01Griffin Newman?

  Because that would mean I would have to watch the BFG.

• 1:08:03David Sims?

  It's a movie for people who want to go

• 1:08:05Speaker 04

  But Ace and I used to, when he was like two and three, we would do, I don't think this is going to translate at all, and I don't know why, I'm just going to keep going with it because there's no mechanism in my mind that can stop these things. But when you do this game when he was young, where I'd say like, ET, and I'd stick out my finger and he would stick out his finger to touch and I'd go hook and I'd hook his little arm with my finger and go Jurassic Park and he'd laugh and I'd claw at his stomach and then I would always like throw in a curveball just to make myself laugh where I'd be like, always. And I try to like, I do something like

• 1:08:34David Sims?

  No, for an express, dust some sugar on that bad boy.

• 1:08:36Speaker 04

  Yeah, I'd be like, Warhorse, whee!

• 1:08:39David Sims?

  Don't show him Warhorse.

• 1:08:40Speaker 04

  Not happening.

• 1:08:41David Sims?

  He'll fall too

• 1:08:41Speaker 04

  You want to fuck that horse too bad.

• 1:08:43David Sims?

  He's too sexy.

• 1:08:44Griffin Newman?

  Too sexy.

• 1:08:45David Sims?

  NSFW.

• 1:08:47Speaker 04

  But recommend it to all the parents.

• 1:08:49David Sims?

  Thomas, I heard for Caneli, Caneli.

• 1:08:52Griffin Newman?

  Caneli, I'm guessing.

• 1:08:53David Sims?

  Writes the first script. They didn't like it. It was too sprawling. He couldn't figure out how to, you know, whatever. He's a novelist. He's not, you know, so then Kurt, I'm not sure how he stays on the same with Ludetka, who wrote the screenplay for Out of Africa. So obviously a recent Oscar winner. He is a journalist. Like he makes a lot of sense in a way, even though Out of Africa is boring. But says that interestingly, he couldn't find his way into believing what he was writing. He was like, as a journalist, like this almost feels surreal.

• 1:09:24Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:24David Sims?

  Like that someone would behave this way. So that's when Spielberg turns to, well, maybe does Sidney Pollack want to do it? Does Brian De Palma want to do it? No, Steve, I love him, but no. Take it back. Take it back.

• 1:09:37Speaker 04

  I mean, there are.

• 1:09:38David Sims?

  Go back to Brian's house and take it.

• 1:09:39Speaker 04

  You could easily, you know, trap late to split screen.

• 1:09:42David Sims?

  Yeah. Does Roman Polanski want to do it? Roman Polanski, a literal Holocaust survivor, who survived the Krakow ghetto, Krakow. And Polanski, I think, did take the offer somewhat seriously, but.

• 1:09:57Griffin Newman?

  Here's the guy that want to open this box.

• 1:09:58David Sims?

  Yes. And he makes the pianist years later.

• 1:10:00Griffin Newman?

  Right. If you are a writer being hired by Steven Spielberg to adapt this book and this story, and in your mind's eye, you're like, and then this will go through Steven Spielberg's camera. I think it is tough to figure out how to write it because even looking at things like Color Purple and Empire of the Sun, and this story feeling so kind of like unbelievable on its face, you're like, how do you prevent this from feeling like a magical fairy tale?

• 1:10:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, you can't get in the mindset of writing a Steven Spielberg movie.

• 1:10:30Griffin Newman?

  Right. How could this fit into his world?

• 1:10:33David Sims?

  Yeah. Now, Scorsese is the person who really did almost make Shin List List. Marty Scorsese, you've heard of this guy? Spielberg thought like, he's not going to back down from like the truth, the violence, you know, the sort of horror.

• 1:10:47Speaker 04

  Playing sympathy for the devil over the scene when Alvin Carter shows up.

• 1:10:51Griffin Newman?

  He was a more serious, bracing, bold filmmaker.

• 1:10:54David Sims?

  And like, it's a part, you know, I'm going to guess that this was in sort of like the late eighties, right? When, when Marty's taking it on. So it's like right around when he's doing The Last Temptation of Christ, right? He's making, you know, strides to.

• 1:11:09David Sims?

  Whatever, like, serious.

• 1:11:12Griffin Newman?

  Look, he got a lot of blowback on King of Comedy. He got a lot of blowback on Last Temptation of Christ. Spielberg coming to him and being like, here's a project. That everything that's challenging about it is like challenged because of history in a certain way. You could sort of see him like, going like, look, it's something being delivered to me, handed on a plate.

• 1:11:32David Sims?

  Okay.

• 1:11:32Griffin Newman?

  Supported by the best people.

• 1:11:33David Sims?

  Here, I have Scorsese for you.

• 1:11:35Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:11:36David Sims?

  I'm being Marty. But Schindler's List, I hire Steve Zale. So he.

• 1:11:40Speaker 04

  It's like he's in the room.

• 1:11:42David Sims?

  He hires Zalein, which I didn't know.

• 1:11:44Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:44David Sims?

  Steve Zale, who wrote the script, is, he says it's around 1990, so it's right after he did Last Temptation of Christ. And I guess it's probably after he has filmed Goodfellas, which comes out in 1990. Uh, which is a good movie, uh, but a better pizza brand. Um, and.

• 1:11:59Speaker 04

  As long as I can remember, I always wanted to be a Nazi.

• 1:12:02David Sims?

  The whole point of the movie to me.

• 1:12:03Griffin Newman?

  We're doing great work here tonight.

• 1:12:06David Sims?

  Uh, was to start a dialogue about something which is still important to me, which is the nature, the true nature of love. Uh, which could be.

• 1:12:13Griffin Newman?

  This is what Scorsese says.

• 1:12:14David Sims?

  Scorsese, it could be Jesus. I'm not being culturally ambivalent here. It's what's in us. He says it could be the force. No, he doesn't say that. Um, is God in us? I really am that way. I can't help it. I like to explore that. I want a dialogue on that. So I did Last Temptation. I did it a certain way. And, you know, I did the best I could. I went around the world and the arguments I took them on, but like, in the case of Schindler's List, the trauma I had just gone through was such that I felt like I had to take, tackle this subject matter like so seriously. And he's worried that he's, he's a Gentile and he's not like gonna be up for it. Like, he mentions that Jewish people have been upset that the writer of the Diary of Anne Frank movie, I guess, was a Gentile. I don't know. Like, it's, you know, funny, like, controversies long past at this point.

• 1:12:58Griffin Newman?

  It is one of those, uh, infamous historic sliding doors that Spielberg is seriously considering remaking Cape Fear, which is a real like, Steve, come on, you're avoiding.

• 1:13:10David Sims?

  That is, it, it's so funny, right? Like, you're totally avoiding this at this point. You were, it was like, should I just like remake some of my favorite movies? Like, cause that's what always is as well. Like, it's just like, I'm just gonna remake these movies I like.

• 1:13:20Speaker 04

  I mean, there was, there are rumors that Spielberg has, uh, Has said are not true, that he and Scorsese effectively traded.

• 1:13:27Griffin Newman?

  Correct.

• 1:13:27Speaker 04

  Projects.

• 1:13:28Griffin Newman?

  I mean, the part of it that's simplified in a way that is kind of incorrect is people missing the context that Spielberg was the one who hired Scorsese to do Schindler in the first place. I feel like the story kind of gets repeated as if like, they were just doing separate things in separate silos. And then he called one day and was like, what if we Yankee swap? Well, supposedly, according to JJ, they did swap. No, of course they swapped. I'm just saying that it was Spielberg being like, I know I offered you this. Right. But I'm kind of thinking I should make it. And of course. And as repayment, do you want to do Cape Fear? Which. Which becomes Scorsese's. Amblin produces, becomes Scorsese's first kind of like mainstream hit. Yep. Makes money, obviously. He talks about it being a huge transition in his career to like figuring out how to work within the studio system and all of that. Right.

• 1:14:13Griffin Newman?

  It's a big, big movie for him. Everyone kind of wins in this scenario. Yes.

• 1:14:18Speaker 04

  But I think that the, the legacy of English language films about the Holocaust, especially American films about the Holocaust, was really working against Spielberg in that it was all the more reason to make the movie, but it was also, you know, part of what made it so daunting. I mean, you have like Theodore Adorno's, you know, declaration that poetry is impossible after Auschwitz resonating in your head. And then you're seeing the Diary of Anne Frank movie and some other things that are really sort of trivializing or making it to kitsch, um, the Holocaust in some ways that are played with the commercial interruptions from Hallmark or whatever.

• 1:14:49Griffin Newman?

  Anne Frank feels like the main vehicle for telling stories about the Holocaust in American pop culture.

• 1:14:55Speaker 04

  For a long, long time.

• 1:14:56Griffin Newman?

  And then you have like Hitler comedies, like you have like To Be or Not To Be and A Great Dictator and these movies that are made like in progress that are sort of like poking fun at the idea of this guy without really understanding what's going on.

• 1:15:09Speaker 04

  There's some animated movie about Anne Frank where it was like Anne Frank, but modern in a way. It was like set in the Anne Frank house and she escapes into modern, into the modern world that was played at Cannes a few years ago and I saw and reviewed and has never seen the light of day.

• 1:15:23Griffin Newman?

  What's it called?

• 1:15:24Speaker 04

  Something, something Anne Frank, I would think. Uh, but, um, but then the other huge, uh, monolith that you have, I think in recent cultural memory around this time is Shoah, is Claude Lanzman's film, which is in a way, you know.

• 1:15:39Speaker 04

  It definitely wasn't a sort of last word in testament, you know, about the about the Holocaust or Shoah, but it was a definitive in a way and also an opportunity for someone like Schindler or for Spielberg, rather, because it doesn't contain a single frame of archival footage. It's all interview testimony. It is like the filmmaking in that is fascinating and alive. And like it is another movie that despite its epic length does not at all feel like homework. And I highly recommend everyone who has been afraid of it, sit down and watch it because it is really fascinating and incredible document. But, uh, but yeah, I mean, so that's the other sort of thing where it's just like, it's been kitschy. It's also the most totemic and serious version of this has been done. How do I thread the needle between these two things?

• 1:16:24Griffin Newman?

  Right, right. Which is like, there's something tonally he's getting from Shoah that is you don't have to make the stately Hollywood kind of like, and Frank is like a very traditional movie. It is like the conventional mechanism for how for decades Hollywood would turn important stories into accessible drama. The 59 film with? Yes, yes. You know, and like Shoah is sort of like, obviously this eight hour kind of like monolithic, uh, art house sensation, kind of like historically important text. But you can see him going like, is there a way to kind of like bridge the gap between these two have the unbracing like specificity and feeling of Shoah and put it in a vehicle

• 1:17:09Griffin Newman?

  that audiences can like go and see.

• 1:17:11Speaker 04

  Yeah. And I think that's exactly what Spielberg recognized to his great credit in my eye is that part of the value of him making Schindler's List is that people would see it more than anything else.

• 1:17:23Griffin Newman?

  Exactly. Of course. I think the things that certain people like to ding this movie for are all part of the strategy of what the intended impact of this movie was, which you can't really argue with because it fucking worked.

• 1:17:35Speaker 04

  And yeah, I mean, it's, it's hard to think of any other movie aside from maybe Saving Private Ryan, that so definitively created a visual language for a historical event that is almost dangerous because Becomes so ubiquitous and and limiting in that way because people think of the Holocaust as being sort of visually synonymous is one thing just like now you can't think about D-Day or or just like the nature of these ground battles in World War II without thinking of how Spielberg transformed them in our visual memory with with Saving Private Ryan. And so like it's a huge opportunity this movie, but also the danger and horses. Thank you. Sorry. Talked over that important point.

• 1:18:12Griffin Newman?

  No, I talked over your important point.

• 1:18:14David Sims?

  Scorsese gives up the project. He says, I guarantee you it would have been good, but it wouldn't have been the hit it became. Uh, had some ideas. Most of it's there. It had a very different ending. I admire the film greatly. You know, I would, I'd, it's fascinating to consider. It'd be one thing if it was like, oh yeah, he took the movie back from Turtle Top. It's like Martin Scorsese almost made this. What does that look like?

• 1:18:34Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:35Speaker 04

  Anyway, we've had so many chances to see the Turtle Top Schindler's List over the last few. And no, but it just like so many.

• 1:18:41David Sims?

  Thing about Turtle Top is he's like, I'm gonna remake it now. He's like, even though it, anyway, uh, no, he's, uh, Steven's Alien, uh, Spielberg likes the script. Because he doesn't tell the story from the survivors' point of view, but from Schindler's. And as Alien puts it, I wanted it clear. He didn't do what he did out of friendship. He didn't feel sorry for them. He eventually does it because it's the right thing to do. But Spielberg's like, we do need to longer. We need to broaden out. We need, you know, like, yes, it should be from his perspective, but we can, you know, uh, leave his perspective to take in what's happening in Krakow and like happening in the Holocaust around him.

• 1:19:15Griffin Newman?

  He would have like a sub two hour script. He was like, I mean, this is another Spielberg thing of him being like, I can get away with this movie being over three hours long. Don't feel the need to rush this and compress it into a traditional structure.

• 1:19:28Speaker 04

  In 2025, it doesn't have to be a tight 82 minutes.

• 1:19:30Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:19:31David Sims?

  At first he resists. They went to Poland together. They meet with survivors. I think, you know, they, they, they talk about like, what do we put in there? Uh, Zalian initially had this sort of hard rule of like, no, Schindler has to have been in the room essentially to have a scene, you know, to take place in this movie. And Spielberg's like,

• 1:19:49Griffin Newman?

  I think an incredibly smart decision, but Shoah comes out of the same soup, which is just like this feeling, getting back to what we were saying earlier of these people are still alive. There are people who lived through this, who are still like, young enough and cogent enough that we need to get all of these stories on record and do something with them and preserve them, archive them, because they're gonna start disappearing.

• 1:20:11Speaker 04

  Which is part of the reason why making something like Schindler's List is so dangerous, and I think was greeted by a lot of skepticism among certain critics, because it has the potential to malformed the collective memory of the Holocaust. Um, in, in a way that as we've seen, based on the movie's influence, you know, it's a real power that it had to shape, you know, our understanding of it.

• 1:20:33David Sims?

  Um, so the biggest, you know, thing that they have to figure out, and Spielberg talks a lot about, you know, going to Poland, transforming his relationship with his religion, you know, understanding the Holocaust completely differently if you go there. Um, but they're, what they also don't really know is like, what is the motivation behind Schindler's sort of transformation? Um, because I feel like the survivors are basically just like, well, he did this thing for us. But it's like, but they don't know, like, you know, why, why did this seemingly fairly amoral businessman suddenly, not suddenly maybe, but like, you know, no, fairly quickly start to, you know, behave a different way.

• 1:21:14Griffin Newman?

  Gradually in steps and it always, I think the thing that makes him so interesting as a character is it feels like for the first two thirds, if not three fourths of the movie, he is fighting against the idea of any responsibility, where every time he does something that helps someone.

• 1:21:29David Sims?

  He's like, it's good business.

• 1:21:30Griffin Newman?

  Well, and then also is just like, never fucking make me do that again.

• 1:21:34Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:21:34Griffin Newman?

  That's an aberration.

• 1:21:36Speaker 04

  I think one of the reasons that this movie is a masterpiece is because it does this very controlled sense of winnowing, uh, over the course of the movie in a number of different regards where, uh, you know, this inhabitable space that the Jews of Krakow are, have comes. Smaller and smaller and smaller in very understandable ways. You feel Schindler's sort of moral compass. This is a mixed metaphor, but like getting smaller as well as as the movie goes on. And there is a geometry to how he is reaching the sort of moral epiphany. That is reflected in the scope of the movie. And every time I watch the movie, I'm surprised all over again by how narrow its confines are.

• 1:22:13Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I also think all those, the huge shifts and the revelations. And part of it is, and it seems like this is just the way.

• 1:22:23Griffin Newman?

  The accounts supported the, I'm backing myself into a sentence I can't construct properly here. It feels like part of what was fascinating about Schindler was there was a certain degree of inscrutability. Into like, what caused these shifts and when and how, what was going on in his mind? And these sort of blurry lines of like, as you're saying, the moments where he's like, it's good for business and denying that there's any altruistic motives. Versus the moments where he does an altruistic thing and then feels angry about it. That the moments of big psychological shifts and catharsis are like in between the scenes of this movie. And even the thing that is closest to a moment in the film of him until the end, which we'll talk about. The closest to a moment of him being like, oh my God, my understanding has changed.

• 1:23:09Griffin Newman?

  Is obviously the little girl in the red coat. But yet, in that moment, the person who's having the bigger emotional reaction is the mistress on the horse next to him. Like she is.

• 1:23:19Speaker 04

  But there's a.

• 1:23:19Griffin Newman?

  It's the wife at that moment, not the mistress?

• 1:23:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, there is nothing that would have cheapened, I think, this story more than acting as though. Schindler's moral awakening was schematic enough to like be done like a save the cat like version of like him.

• 1:23:34David Sims?

  I'm shocked to learn that.

• 1:23:36Griffin Newman?

  Cause the red coat happened so much earlier than I remembered. And then even then, he's like going back and forth and fighting it. And when you get to like the last chunk of the film where he's. Where Ben Kingsley has to pull out of him that he's purposely making bad shell casings.

• 1:23:51Speaker 04

  But mine worked, damn it.

• 1:23:52Griffin Newman?

  And you're like, oh, a huge shift has happened here. Where not only has he saved people, but now he's like trying to undermine the war and everything. And those scenes happen in between the margins.

• 1:24:03Speaker 04

  Right. I mean, it's because, again, with the girl in the red coat, you are seeing someone sort of awaken to this idea of the value of a single human life. He's witnessing a crime that would have gone, uh, would have been obliterated into history if not for him having eyes on it. Cause no one else is watching this girl. I mean, uh, and girl. But, right, but it's, um, you know, I, I think also what is so powerful about the movie, uh, again, going back to the good and evil of it all, is that I don't think Schindler's moral awakening happens if not for his relationship with Amun Gerta, who is an evil that is so profound that he has to distance himself from it.

• 1:24:40Speaker 04

  That it's like only by virtue of being exposed to that degree of sociopathic cruelty is he able to sort of recognize his own morality and step back and find his own humanity.

• 1:24:52Griffin Newman?

  Most of the other Nazis you're seeing up until that point in the film, even the ones who seem to get some degree of perverse pleasure from it are primarily the like just following orders guys, which I don't think Spielberg views as any less evil. But the level of sadism and perversion in the Ray Fiennes character is, you're right. It's the thing of just like, I am fundamentally a different person than this guy.

• 1:25:18Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, and there's, uh, I mean, I think the interplay between the two characters is so brilliant. Uh, you know, there's that great scene, I mean, there are several great scenes between them, but especially when he is, you know, talking to him, he's about to bargain for, uh, Helen Hirsch's life at the end, he's talking, but like Gerta, even after everything that's happened and there, there are various negotiations, cannot fathom why, why Schindler would want these Jews to work for him. Uh, that he, he assumes it has to be some sort of financial trick that he's missing.

• 1:25:50Speaker 04

  And I think in, in Schindler's awareness of that sort of moral bankruptcy, it unlocks something in him that dealing with a slightly less, you know, profoundly evil, but still obviously evil, uh, Nazi commandant would not have maybe precipitated the same reaction.

• 1:26:11Griffin Newman?

  Well, right. The difference is the guys he has to fight with to get Kingsley off the train.

• 1:26:17Speaker 04

  I mean, OK, so that is that is the scene of I think this is the most important scene of the movie in a way, because this is the scene where you're seeing one Spielberg collide with another and sort of knot themselves together in a way that I think makes this movie what it is and makes him eventually the artist he would become, which is that, you know, it's a very suspenseful scene of him trying to rescue it's Doc Stern from being sent away to one of the camps. And he tells the guys in this like very fun movie that has owes as much as very fun moment that owes as much to something like Casablanca and like classic, you know, 50s film 40s and 50s films as it does to Holocaust narratives. He was telling them he's gonna send them to the Eastern Russia by the end of the month. And then the cut is to to Liam Neeson walking along the train saying Stern Stern. And then

• 1:27:01Speaker 04

  who enters the frame are the two Germans who you see have now bowed to his will and are and are working in his bidding. And it's a completely slick cut that is for it's foregrounding the entertainment in what is ostensibly the most consequential dramatic moment of the movie so far. And it's a perfect marriage between the entertainment value and like a choice that almost no other filmmaker would make to like really squeeze the fun out of that moment.

• 1:27:27Griffin Newman?

  It's almost a joke.

• 1:27:28Speaker 04

  And then.

• 1:27:29Griffin Newman?

  Like it's it's kind of a comedy edit.

• 1:27:31Speaker 04

  Very funny. It's a very funny edit. And then it pivots again in the span of a single shot to what is the most horrifying moment of the movie so far, which is when they exit frame after Liam Neeson says, you know, if I had been here five minutes later, then where would I be?

• 1:27:46Griffin Newman?

  It's like scolding him.

• 1:27:47Speaker 04

  Exactly. And saying like, where would I be? I don't give a shit about you. Like, where would my business be? And the camera lingers on the luggage that's being taken from the Jews who were promised that it would go with them to the camps. And we follow that into a back room where it's unpacked and sorted and obviously, you know, organized so that it can be sold and they're never going to see their own belongings again. And all of this is happening with a fluidity that no other filmmaker would think to approach it. And it's really, it's it's just so fluidly blending the Hollywood of it all with the sobriety of what the story is and the gravity of it. And I think from that moment on. You know, he's just so in the pocket, as Griffin would say.

• 1:28:28David Sims?

  But that's also when the movie has a mission, when it doesn't really before then. You know, like it's sort of, it takes half the movie.

• 1:28:38Griffin Newman?

  Everything.

• 1:28:38David Sims?

  For the sort of plot to come to coalesce. Like his plot, I don't mean the.

• 1:28:43Griffin Newman?

  Well, you, you guys have seen this movie far more than I have. So correct me if I'm wrong here. I feel like up until that moment, anything that he ostensibly does to help another person is.

• 1:28:55David Sims?

  Profit.

• 1:28:57Griffin Newman?

  No, I was gonna say is facilitated by Kingsley. It's like Kingsley going like this guy and then Neeson is stamping it.

• 1:29:06David Sims?

  Kingsley is essentially using him as a vehicle for stuff. That's true.

• 1:29:08Griffin Newman?

  Right. Which Kingsley's incredible and it's.

• 1:29:10David Sims?

  But Kingsley's also playing to his desire to save money, you know?

• 1:29:14Griffin Newman?

  Right. I mean, it's part of the magic of the performance. And then, right, that Kingsley is quietly the one who's, he's so fucking good. Is like running the miracle.

• 1:29:22Speaker 04

  Did you listen to Kingsley on Marin?

• 1:29:24Griffin Newman?

  Oh, my God. It is.

• 1:29:28Speaker 04

  One of the hardest listens I've ever heard.

• 1:29:31David Sims?

  I don't like, I love Ben Kingsley. He's given like many performances that I love.

• 1:29:35Griffin Newman?

  To this episode.

• 1:29:36David Sims?

  I might, I mean, but like he has such a rap now for being, you know, pretty, pretty tough. So I'm not surprised to hear that he and Marin didn't exactly vibe.

• 1:29:47Griffin Newman?

  Here's what's incredible about it. He's really tough in the exact way you expect him to be. And he just like immediately clams up at Marin being way too casual and conversational about stuff. And him reading Marin is kind of glib. And then also clearly like, oh, this is one of those things where this guy wants me to like break down and like get emotional or start sharing intimate details. And that's not what Kingsley wants to do.

• 1:30:09David Sims?

  I think Kingsley wants to be treated with like a lot of reverence.

• 1:30:13Griffin Newman?

  Correct. Correct. Right. He wants every interview to be like a career retrospective, like a lifetime achievement award.

• 1:30:18David Sims?

  You're here to tell us about, you know, whatever.

• 1:30:21Speaker 04

  And he talks about like the Ryan Reynolds, what was that like awful movie? He made so many awful movies in the last 10 years, but there's one with like Ryan Reynolds and like techno. I don't, I mean, I saw.

• 1:30:30Griffin Newman?

  Oh, I know the one you're fucking talking about.

• 1:30:32Speaker 04

  It was Ryan Reynolds in it? I don't even.

• 1:30:33Griffin Newman?

  It's not called Limitless, but it's got a title like that.

• 1:30:36Speaker 04

  It's like Limitlish. It's like along those lines.

• 1:30:38David Sims?

  Wait, what movie is this?

• 1:30:40Griffin Newman?

  It's a movie where like he, Ryan Reynolds consciousness is in his body or vice versa. It's a weird fucking thing.

• 1:30:47Speaker 04

  The worst part of Ryan Reynolds to have in your body, one would argue, but I think that like the, uh, the thing about Kingsley, he talks about that in the same sort of terms that he would talk about Gandhi or Schindler's List. And anyway, that-

• 1:30:58Griffin Newman?

  The thing I was gonna say about that interview is, as much as he is like putting up walls and being like, I'm not gonna play your fucking game. And if this is what your show is like, then I'm gonna give you like monosyllabic answers. By the end of the episode, even though he's doing it like with a very tight grip, he basically admits that his entire life is driven by the fact that his father never gave him an ounce of approval and then gets him to admit that he's too critical of his sons who have also followed him into acting and he disapproves of them.

• 1:31:25Speaker 04

  Maren refuses to end any interview until someone makes the same.

• 1:31:27Griffin Newman?

  It's kind of incredible.

• 1:31:28David Sims?

  The movie is, uh, selfless.

• 1:31:31Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 1:31:31Griffin Newman?

  I knew it had a less in there.

• 1:31:32David Sims?

  It's a Tarsim movie.

• 1:31:33Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:31:34David Sims?

  But like his most anonymous.

• 1:31:35Griffin Newman?

  Weird.

• 1:31:36Speaker 04

  You know that if you go up to Tarsim and tell him that you saw the fall in theaters, he will give you a like huge hug, physical hug.

• 1:31:42David Sims?

  That's great.

• 1:31:43Speaker 04

  Um, on the spot, anyone.

• 1:31:44David Sims?

  Two to three people can hear that.

• 1:31:45Speaker 04

  Guaranteed.

• 1:31:45Griffin Newman?

  I saw it in theaters.

• 1:31:46Speaker 04

  Good for you.

• 1:31:47Griffin Newman?

  Here's, uh, let me finish my point I wanted to make here, right? So like, this is the first moment in which Neeson does something not aided by Kingsley. It is provoked by Kingsley. He is saving Kingsley, but he's not just like signing off on something that guy put into motion. And Kingsley, the whole first hour of the movie is walking on eggshells. It is this incredible unspoken performance of him just being like, how much can I get away with before I get a little too loud and a little too sloppy and this guy like clamps down on me?

• 1:32:16Speaker 04

  It's sort of like a reverse assimilation that he's performing that's just like obviously deeply embedded in the Jewish experience that would follow, um, the Holocaust in particular. But like, there's that amazing scene right after the one armed worker has come to him and just to thank Schindler for employing him, which obviously-

• 1:32:32Griffin Newman?

  Never let that happen, ever.

• 1:32:33Speaker 04

  Right. And, but the way that Kingsley handles that scene where the driver comes out and Kingsley's like, fuck off, like fuck off, like go away, get in the car. Like we need to heed this off. This has to have never happened. Um, it's, it's a brilliant negotiation in real time.

• 1:32:47Griffin Newman?

  The effort he puts into saving Kingsley, which part of the magic is he doesn't do it with a sense of stakes or immediacy in a way, he's doing- His like Oh, you're Schindler bullshitter. I need that guy. Right. Freaking out the two officers kind of thing. And then you think that it's like, he's not going to say anything and he's not going to show emotion. But this is an acknowledgement that he started to care about Kingsley a little too much. Or at the very least, has started to see him as a person a little too much to let him get away. That there's some emotional calculation. Kingsley gets off the train. In in a one broke, a one unbroken long Spielberg wonder, right? He gets off the, it's like door open, train stopped abruptly. Kingsley gets off.

• 1:33:32Griffin Newman?

  He is playing the emotion of a guy who was 30 seconds ago convinced he was about to die. This was it. Even though Schindler's running after the chain, it's like, well, he's missed it by five seconds.

• 1:33:41Speaker 04

  Compounded by the understanding that that Stern has a greater awareness

• 1:33:45Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:46Speaker 04

  Of the consequence of being on that train than anyone else.

• 1:33:48Griffin Newman?

  This guy has just to some degree accepted his fate, right? Is now like being saved by a hair. Steps off the train. They close the door so quickly behind him, the train starts moving. He glances back for half a second. At like, holy shit, all of those people are about to die. Just gets behind Schindler and walking, starts apologizing profusely. He's apologizing while he's still in the car. He's like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I fucked up, I fucked up. And you're expecting that Schindler's going to be stoic and Schindler's like, no, you're right. You did fuck up. Fuck you. Never let that happen ever again.

• 1:34:21Speaker 04

  It's also one of so many different moments in this movie that hinge on a kind of divine providence, which, you know, there were some criticisms when the movie came out about how the Jews were seen as having, you know, just being this, this faceless mob in the background and not having any agency.

• 1:34:33Griffin Newman?

  Well, guess who took away all of their agency?

• 1:34:36Speaker 04

  Yeah, but it's also

• 1:34:37Griffin Newman?

  Nazi Germany.

• 1:34:38Speaker 04

  It's also saying that like, you know, the, the flip side of that argument, which is there's this famous Village Voice symposium that came out right around the time of the movie where someone was arguing that, you know, the Jews don't, it's, it's, makes it seem as if they didn't do anything to save their own skin. And I think that is countered just by like, or, you know, and like only the people who survive deserve to survive. And I think it's countered by like, just the role that we see luck play in this movie time and time and time again. One person, you know, He lines up 50 people, shoots 25 by going to every other one. You know, one person hides here, one person hides there. It's all complete happenstance.

• 1:35:14Griffin Newman?

  I, I think this movie does an incredibly good job. I want to say better than maybe any other Holocaust film I have seen of really dramatizing the drawn out psychological warfare aspect of the dehumanization. Where I, I feel like people who

• 1:35:35Griffin Newman?

  struggle to wrestle with the enormity of the Holocaust are like, I don't get it. How did they just show up one day, tell the Jews to get in cages and no one fought back? Right? Like, how did they just accept this sort of victimization? And not fight back against it? And the movie is showing that it's like, their strategy was so complicated, so drawn out, so gradual, that there are these constant steps of just like, we just have to like, accept this thing. And then find our moment to fight back against it, or to slip away, or to get our exit. And people did get away and people did survive, right? But it all felt so kind of random and chaotic that there was this gaming of even the women on the train being like, I've heard this rumor about the showers. They're like, the fuck are you talking about? That's crazy.

• 1:36:20Griffin Newman?

  What you're describing is crazy. That couldn't be real.

• 1:36:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, you feel, it's again, going back to the idea of how Spielberg, you know, the gradients by which he introduces different elements. You feel the news tightening as, as the circle where the Jews are allowed to live grows smaller. And you feel Schindler expanding in that space. And there's that great scene that could potentially have been too on the nose. I mean, this is not an overwhelmingly subtle movie, but I, I think, you know, it is very effective in doing this where we see the Jews being kicked out of their apartment in Krakow. And then who takes up the apartment is Schindler. And he says, it couldn't be any better, which is kind of a hamfisted and clunky line, but only exists so that it can be mirrored by the Jewish woman then saying, I can't get any more. Like, you know, it's, uh, and you have that scene where they're talking in the ghetto about like the get, they said, one guy says, the ghetto is liberty.

• 1:37:08Speaker 04

  And they're talking, no one stole my business today. Nobody threw me on a truck. The constant rationalizations of like, at least I have this, at least I have that. And, you know, like frogs in boiling water. You know, it's, uh, they had never, they had never been witness to a Holocaust before.

• 1:37:22Griffin Newman?

  No, and also like you get to a point where people have just so fully lost their sense of selves. You're attacking them from so many strange unprecedented angles and moving the goalposts so constantly while also constantly maintaining this looming threat of severe violence, tragedy, nightmarish experience that people just like don't even know what to fucking do anymore.

• 1:37:48David Sims?

  People also just didn't understand how you could kill people en masse because that's not something that, you know, they industrialized in a way. Something people struggle to wrap their heads around today. Exactly.

• 1:37:56Griffin Newman?

  Yes. One of the things that makes this movie very tough to watch.

• 1:38:00David Sims?

  It's also like we would also have to delve into like pre-war European, like Poland, these countries are nascent, you know, they like they've been sort of like overrun by empires many times over the last hundred, 200 years. Like, you know, this isn't a country with a sort of like completely fixed, you know, structured government, you know, like, I mean, obviously it's been, you know, invaded at this point by both countries, by both Russia and Germany. We can't, I need to go back to the compelling fact that of course Mel Gibson was one of the people considered to play Oscar Schindler. What a world. Along with Harrison Ford, who certainly makes sense both for Spielberg and for age, you know, and like, uh, time and the name you want me to name, which is Kevin Costner.

• 1:38:41Griffin Newman?

  Talked about it recently.

• 1:38:43David Sims?

  Probably a big dick, but not big enough. Lobbying for it.

• 1:38:46Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:38:47David Sims?

  And as Beatty was, Warren Beatty famously was as well.

• 1:38:50Griffin Newman?

  In the period where Costner, where Spielberg was reluctant to direct it, Costner also took a stab at like, I think I could direct this.

• 1:38:58David Sims?

  Schindler's List, part one. I mean, look, obviously Costner is what, two, two, three years removed from Dancing with the Wolves. The man is.

• 1:39:04Griffin Newman?

  He's feeling confident.

• 1:39:05David Sims?

  What if he ran out of funding halfway through Schindler's List? Had to go to Santa Barbara. Parts two to four or more on route. Spielberg instead goes for Liam Neeson. One wants someone who looks like the guy in his head at least. Two, not an unknown actor at this point, but not a star, won't bring baggage to the character, won't overwhelm the film. Obviously if Warren Beatty was playing Oscar Schindler. It probably would like, would he rock it? Possibly. Would he do great in all the scenes where he's fucking his way around town? Yeah. Can we talk? Be good at that.

• 1:39:34Griffin Newman?

  Can we talk about Neeson for a bit?

• 1:39:36David Sims?

  It's an incredible performance.

• 1:39:38Griffin Newman?

  Incredible performance and, and I, I love when this kind of thing comes up on our show. An incredible performance, one of his most important performances. And yet, when you step back, you're like,

• 1:39:47David Sims?

  It's no question the most important performance in his career.

• 1:39:51Griffin Newman?

  Complete outlier from the rest of his career. Well, this is like, first off, the movie starts, he starts speaking. Not immediately, right? But when his first dialogue kicks in.

• 1:40:00David Sims?

  The movie starts, they, they light the candles and he's like, I'm here too, by the way.

• 1:40:04Griffin Newman?

  It's not 100% unrecognizable.

• 1:40:07David Sims?

  He's doing an accent.

• 1:40:08Griffin Newman?

  It is the only time I think he has successfully changed his voice to any degree.

• 1:40:13David Sims?

  But he still has a hint of the brogue and it works.

• 1:40:16Griffin Newman?

  He does.

• 1:40:17Speaker 04

  This is some of the best accent work of any movie I've ever seen. And that of all these movies that immediately caused me to roll my eyes at English and various other, you know, actors of other nations.

• 1:40:26David Sims?

  Like I didn't want to do subtitles. Subtitles, you're reading the movie, not watching it. You're not looking at what's happening.

• 1:40:31Speaker 04

  There's something about just, maybe they're just getting the tones right. Not that I am all that well versed in what the right accent should sound like beyond my own like family. There are a lot of accents in this film. Uh, you know, it, it all feels right. I don't know. I don't question the reality of it.

• 1:40:44Griffin Newman?

  I feel like every other time Neeson tries to do an accent, he is putting a little something on top of his Irish brogue and you just kind of accept, he sounds like Liam Neeson. He's making some effort to get away from pure Irish, but he's got his own voice and no one else sounds like that. Right. When he played Quiagon, hey, Subulpa, give me that kid. This is what I'm saying. He never fully sounds American. He never fully sounds British. This is the best, I think he's done at finding a voice that is different from him while also retaining some of the core, like movie star qualities. It is also.

• 1:41:15David Sims?

  Ponio's dad.

• 1:41:17Speaker 04

  Did he bust out his Schindler's voice for that?

• 1:41:19David Sims?

  He's incredible.

• 1:41:19Speaker 04

  Um, I mean, I think it helps that part so much about the character that he's playing here is a performance in and of itself. It allows for a theatricality. Um, that he can play up and sort of disappear into. And there's that incredible, you know, first sequence where he's, you know, trivia, the, the maître d at the nightclub where you see it is Branko Lustig, who is the, not only the producer of the film, but a survivor of Auschwitz. And, uh, And yeah, he goes in there and he's putting on a show like one by one in this nightclub and bending everyone to his will. And the charisma is just like fucking off the screen.

• 1:41:53David Sims?

  He looks like he just walked out of Casablanca. He's like, you know, got the cigarette smoke hanging over him. Like it's the, this is the best black and white. This makes, this movie is like taking a shit on the idea that like, just putting a movie in black and white makes it look good. It's like, no, no, no, no. You can fuck it up or you can do what Yanush did here.

• 1:42:10Griffin Newman?

  This movie looks.

• 1:42:11David Sims?

  This movie has.

• 1:42:12Speaker 04

  The eyeshadows in that first scene alone are.

• 1:42:15Griffin Newman?

  He's also, he's got an incredible face for black and white.

• 1:42:19David Sims?

  Yeah, of course. Cause he's got a brow and crag. So the shadows can fall on his face.

• 1:42:24Speaker 04

  The movie also feels like it starts the day after Oscar Schindler has realized that his businesses fail because he doesn't make it, take advantage of the fact that he's hot as shit. Uh, like he, he's finally figured out that the fact that I am like the most charismatic and beautiful man alive is going to be my greatest asset as a businessman, because I am not a great businessman.

• 1:42:46Griffin Newman?

  David, two anecdotes. David, David, not an ad read. I apologize for everyone who got triggered by that. Sims, uh, if you can find either of these in the dossier, there's a, there's the like entertainment executive who Spielberg recommended Nissen study where he was like, this is the kind of charisma I want you to have.

• 1:43:06David Sims?

  He was the CEO of Time Warner.

• 1:43:07Griffin Newman?

  In a way where Nissen's obviously a very charismatic guy, right? And can get away with the sort of like Qui-Gon Aslani, just like this is the most important man in the world, speaking like the word of God.

• 1:43:18David Sims?

  Loved Steve Ross. Steve Ross was the head of Time Warner. I am not aware of Steve Ross actually being the greatest human alive. Spielberg seemed to think he was. I guess he was like a philanthropist and he, maybe he was like by CEO.

• 1:43:31Speaker 04

  You remind me of Oscar Schindler could be a loaded compliment. I don't know.

• 1:43:34David Sims?

  Well, but no, but he's saying like, no, no, no. Study Steve Ross. Like we're saying like, study how he walks, study like I, Spielberg seems like very entranced by Steve Ross as a kind of like good businessman.

• 1:43:44Griffin Newman?

  But I also think he's like acknowledging that this guy needs to have a certain kind of businessman charisma and not a movie star charisma.

• 1:43:50David Sims?

  That makes sense. That makes sense.

• 1:43:51Griffin Newman?

  I'm like, if it's, if it's. Gibson, if it's Costner, if it's Beatty, you're too far in the other line of that. Neeson obviously has movie star charisma, but there's also the deep well of Irish sadness in him that is always his superpower. And also knowing that he's like, not a guy who's going to be protective of his leading man image, that he's a guy who's going to view this as an acting assignment. And he's like, watch the way that people who are good at fucking winning negotiations behind closed doors have charisma, not the people who are good at like getting on camera and charming a public.

• 1:44:25Speaker 04

  But it's like, what if Charles Foster Kane enjoyed being Charles Foster Kane?

• 1:44:28Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:44:28Speaker 04

  Like, that's sort of the vibe that he's bringing.

• 1:44:30Griffin Newman?

  But that's these guys who like fucking love making deals, you know? I, the other anecdote I want to say, I can't remember if it's Kingsley, who's the one who gave him this advice, but that he like, a week or two into filming was like, I don't know if I have any handle on this thing. Spielberg is like, not giving me direction. He's not explaining it to me. I feel like I'm floundering. And I think it was Kingsley who was like, you need to just trust him.

• 1:44:54Speaker 04

  Sure. I can find that probably.

• 1:44:56Griffin Newman?

  Right. Like, you, you are a color on his palette. He hired you because he knows you can do what you want to do. He's going to make you look good. He's adjusting around your performance. Don't get freaked out by the lack of handholding. But I think there is a little bit of panic in the lack of communication.

• 1:45:12David Sims?

  I'd be pretty fucking panicked if I was Liam Neeson making this movie.

• 1:45:14Griffin Newman?

  I'm saying there's a little bit of panic that I think helps the performance.

• 1:45:17David Sims?

  Maybe, yeah, of course, because Schindler is kind of skating the whole time.

• 1:45:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, he's got enough money to fall back on. I mean, that's the first thing he says to Stern is like, I don't have the money for the kind of business that I like, I need you to trade enamelware with, you know, other Jews.

• 1:45:29Griffin Newman?

  And I, I think part of this is Spielberg being like, I want to approach this like a documentary. I want to just let the actors do their thing and then figure out how to shoot it rather than doing like perfect dollhouse arrangements, which to Neeson, he's like, why is no one giving me direction? I've never really been the lead of a big Hollywood movie like this before.

• 1:45:45David Sims?

  Darkman dead in a ditch.

• 1:45:47Griffin Newman?

  I'm sorry, I forgot. That is wild.

• 1:45:49David Sims?

  Yeah, Darkman's before this.

• 1:45:50Griffin Newman?

  The Darkman is so shortly before this.

• 1:45:51David Sims?

  It would be funny if Spielberg was like, I just loved the way he did Darkman.

• 1:45:54Griffin Newman?

  I love Darkman.

• 1:45:55David Sims?

  Darkman die.

• 1:45:55Griffin Newman?

  Well, also, let's, let's call out, this is only the second movie for M. Beth David's. Her first film is Army of Darkness, Sam Raimi universal. Is Spielberg quietly plucking the Raimi cast?

• 1:46:07Speaker 04

  Maybe he is, but you know who it's also only the second movie for?

• 1:46:11David Sims?

  Ralph Fiennes, Voldemort himself, which, you know, it's one of those like Spielberg things where, or like casting things where Spielberg's like, look, the man screamed evil to me. What can I tell you? And Spielberg lays on so much praise of like, I really think this guy could be like Alec Guinness or Laurence Olivier. Like, you know, like he's, he's the talent.

• 1:46:32Speaker 04

  He could be Pope.

• 1:46:34David Sims?

  Right. Which he kind of is. Yeah.

• 1:46:35Speaker 04

  Right. I, I, I.

• 1:46:36David Sims?

  Excuse me. He doesn't want to be the Pope. Stop voting for him.

• 1:46:40Griffin Newman?

  Close the loop on my Nissan thought to then bridge to the Fiennes thought?

• 1:46:43David Sims?

  Yes. It's just the way you say these things. Sometimes it's like, you know, you're building another skyscraper. I'm like, we barely talked about the movie. Karen, yes.

• 1:46:51Griffin Newman?

  I think the lack of guidance he's giving him is because he doesn't want to feel like he's controlling the performances and he's trying to let this movie develop more organically, which is freaking out Nissan a little bit because this is a lot, a little out of his wheelhouse. And working on Dark Man, Raimi is notoriously like, here's the shot and I'm going to do this in two seconds. Tilt your head this degree. Like so hands on.

• 1:47:10David Sims?

  Yes.

• 1:47:10Griffin Newman?

  Right. Which to Nissan, I think does subconsciously, and I don't think this was Spielberg's intent, create a certain energy of, am I getting away with this? That helps the performance.

• 1:47:20Speaker 04

  It's part of the negotiation that we see in the movie because the first sequence of this movie, the first real sequence of Schindler at the nightclub is shot like the shadow. I mean, like it's, it is hyper precise. And that gives way almost immediately when we cut to, you know, the footage of foot soldiers running down the street to the docu drama, like handheld.

• 1:47:39Griffin Newman?

  But he is almost sort of like finding his way into doing that around what the actors are doing rather than collaborating them to get to that point, which I think is mostly what he had done with his movies up until this film. Whereas Ralph Fiennes feels like he just is like incredibly studious and self-sufficient and just showed up and was like, I figured it out. Here's this guy. And Spielberg was like, great. You're ready to go. Like, fuck it. I don't know how you found this. He talks about it like he had like a voodoo doll. Where Ralph Fiennes was like, I just like, lived with this horrible creation that I like, understood and poked and prodded.

• 1:48:11David Sims?

  Right. I mean, Fiennes talks about, you know, he, like, people who play villains all the time, like, understood some sympathy for this, like, broken evil man or whatever. But, uh.

• 1:48:21Speaker 04

  I love that he, he shows up in the ghetto with the cold from Bridge of Spies. Uh, I mean, some of the, like, the two great cold acting, I think, films.

• 1:48:29David Sims?

  You watch this movie now and you're like, there's Ralph Fiennes. And I joke Lord Voldemort. That's literally, you know, like, that's why him being cast as Voldemort would, to me, at the time, I was like, can we try again? Like, that's too obvious.

• 1:48:40Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, except guess what? He fucking rocked the house as Lord Voldemort.

• 1:48:43David Sims?

  He's great.

• 1:48:43Griffin Newman?

  That performance is unbelievable.

• 1:48:45David Sims?

  I have no, to be clear, he's, he's very good in the role.

• 1:48:47Griffin Newman?

  He's one of my favorite screen actors of all time.

• 1:48:48Speaker 04

  Next year, we're casting Matt Mickelson as a villain or something crazy like that.

• 1:48:51David Sims?

  Imagine, oh, that'd be crazy.

• 1:48:53Griffin Newman?

  I, I joked the other day on text, it's gonna be Danny Houston.

• 1:48:57David Sims?

  I swear to, the Lithgow thing, I'm like, I'm in this state where I'm like, well, I shouldn't even care about this stupid Harry Potter TV show. We need less, uh, replications of these books over and over again. Like, there's plenty done already and we don't need to be feeding that beast.

• 1:49:12Griffin Newman?

  I feel a relief that we're not gonna like.

• 1:49:13David Sims?

  And then they're like, Don Lithgow is Dumbledore. And I'm like, fuck that.

• 1:49:15Griffin Newman?

  God damn it. But also, I feel the relief that it's like, thank God we're not tying down Mark Rylance for a decade, which was the rumor.

• 1:49:22David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:26Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 1:49:26David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:27Griffin Newman?

  This episode is brought to you by XYZ Films and the acclaimed new documentary, Capturing Bigfoot. On October 20th, 1967, Roger Patterson captured 59 seconds of film showing a creature walking through the Northern California woods. I wonder if you can log that on Letterboxd?

• 1:49:44David Sims?

  It is an iconic video.

• 1:49:45Griffin Newman?

  Footage that became the most analyzed and debated in history. 59 years later, a reel of 16 millimeter film discovered in a safe changes everything. Capturing Bigfoot reveals the untold story behind the world's greatest mystery, told for the first time by Patterson's own son and the people who were there. This is a story about family legacy, broken friendships, and how far people will go to protect a secret.

• 1:50:08David Sims?

  Of course, you got the classic, what they call Patterson Gimlin film everyone knows, of Bigfoot out in the woods, like, the famous Bigfoot picture. This has. Other stuff shot by him that no one's ever seen. That's what makes this movie different.

• 1:50:19Griffin Newman?

  But we're also talking brand new 4K scans of the original film taken from the Patterson family archives that some historians have called the best rendering of the footage ever seen.

• 1:50:28David Sims?

  I feel like we've all seen that footage as like grainy.

• 1:50:31Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:50:32David Sims?

  You know, that you see, you know, whatever you see in a documentary for two seconds, but this is restoring it and making it look much more clear.

• 1:50:39Griffin Newman?

  There's also a companion podcast, the Capturing Bigfoot Podcast, which goes deeper into the legend and lore of Bigfoot and the Patterson Gimlin film, featuring weekly episodes with experts in cryptozoology, urban legends and filmmaking.

• 1:50:53David Sims?

  I'm something of an expert in cryptozoology.

• 1:50:55Griffin Newman?

  Well, of course, yes, but that's more of a hobby.

• 1:50:57David Sims?

  Yeah, this podcast, Capturing Bigfoot Podcast is hosted by the director of the film, Mark Evans, and it's available for free on YouTube and Spotify with exclusive episodes and content available on Patreon to members of the Capturing Bigfoot Society.

• 1:51:13Griffin Newman?

  Capturing Bigfoot is now available to rent or own on Amazon Prime Video. Learn more about Capturing Bigfoot at capturingbigfoot.com.

• 1:51:29Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 1:51:29David Sims?

  Yes?

• 1:51:30Griffin Newman?

  Uh, uh, who are you wearing?

• 1:51:32David Sims?

  Uh, who am I wearing?

• 1:51:33Griffin Newman?

  I'm doing like an impression of a red carpet correspondent, asking who you're wearing right now.

• 1:51:37David Sims?

  Well, I am wearing Quince.

• 1:51:40Griffin Newman?

  Well, well, well, what a coincidence, coincidence, quincidence.

• 1:51:44David Sims?

  It's a Mongolian cashmere zip sweater.

• 1:51:48Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:51:49David Sims?

  It's a sort of a brown. Would you agree?

• 1:51:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it's like maybe like a, what would you, a chocolate?

• 1:51:54David Sims?

  Sure. I have been seated next to people wearing this item of clothing and they have brushed against me, not to brag, and gone like, so soft.

• 1:52:01Griffin Newman?

  Oh, a soft boy. But listen, the best pieces in your closet are the ones that you can count on, whether you're heading to work, going out or keeping things casual. And this time of year, Quince makes finding something great for everyone else just as easy. This holiday season, it's where I'm shopping for myself and everyone on my list.

• 1:52:18David Sims?

  Quince does rock. It's got high quality staples made with these premium materials like 100% Mongolian cashmere.

• 1:52:25Griffin Newman?

  Like you're wearing red.

• 1:52:26David Sims?

  14 karat gold. Italian leather.

• 1:52:29Griffin Newman?

  Mama mia.

• 1:52:30David Sims?

  All timeless, versatile pieces that feel special to unwrap and become everyday favorites long after the holidays. These cashmere sweaters, like the one I'm wearing, start at just $60. Lineup doesn't stop there. You've got premium down jackets, wool outerwear, cashmere accessories, everything your loved ones need to stay warm and look put together all season long.

• 1:52:50Griffin Newman?

  And everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen so you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag.

• 1:53:03David Sims?

  Um, so yeah, obviously I'm wearing Quince sweater right now. I've got Quince bedding at home. Ooh, they've got Christmas stockings.

• 1:53:10Griffin Newman?

  Oh, well, well, well.

• 1:53:11David Sims?

  They got tree skirts. Garlands, if you want to go Christmas mode.

• 1:53:15Griffin Newman?

  Your tree deserves to be dressed in Quince as well. And when it comes to gifting, Quince has a lot more than clothing. Think fine jewelry, leather bags, the aforementioned hotel quality bedding, chef-grade cookware, and five-star luggage. Basically, plenty of ways to find something special for everyone on your list. If you want to give the gift of quality this holiday season, download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. That's a year. Now available in Canada and the UK, too. Ding dong. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was blank check. It's the best way to support the show.

• 1:54:00Griffin Newman?

  Ralph Fiennes.

• 1:54:01David Sims?

  Ralph Fiennes. Imagine seeing this film in 1993. 99.9% of people do not know who Ralph. No, 100%. Nobody knows who fucking Ralph Fiennes is. Unless you've been, go to the National Theater in Britain or whatever, you know, like. And like, this guy shows up and I do feel like people were just like, they got a Nazi from like the 40s.

• 1:54:19Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:54:19David Sims?

  They just found one like in a time tunnel. Like, that's what it feels like when you're watching him, those first scenes.

• 1:54:26Griffin Newman?

  I find talking to people, very often, people just assume he won for this. I will hear people constantly refer to Academy Award winner Ralph Fiennes and be like, he won for Schindler, right? And then he has that immediate, like, it's very similar to the Edward Norton arc, which is like, out of nowhere, who the fuck is the supporting performance? Then like immediate elevation, a leading man.

• 1:54:48David Sims?

  I don't know if he should have won. I still, I wrestle with it to this, I wrestle with it.

• 1:54:52Speaker 04

  It doesn't matter who else is in that category. He should have won, but I also completely understand.

• 1:54:57David Sims?

  Tommy Lee Jones, which is basically the greatest supporting performance ever given in a film.

• 1:55:01Speaker 04

  But there is no performance in this movie that should not have won an Oscar, but.

• 1:55:04David Sims?

  Well, wait a second, then Bing Kingsley's losing to Ralph Fiennes. You've defeated yourself, my friend.

• 1:55:08Speaker 04

  They should have both won, split the trophy, or he could have pulled a Bing Rames. One of them could have won and given it to the other.

• 1:55:13Griffin Newman?

  I watched that again the other day. It's a really good moment.

• 1:55:15Speaker 04

  But I, you know.

• 1:55:16David Sims?

  It's like your favorite moment, because that was bad for you as a kid, because you were like, this is allowed?

• 1:55:22Griffin Newman?

  When, when Michael Caine won the Oscar for Sider House Rules, I was like.

• 1:55:25David Sims?

  You said this on our show, right?

• 1:55:26Griffin Newman?

  Sit back.

• 1:55:27David Sims?

  He's gonna do it. He's gonna do the right thing.

• 1:55:29Griffin Newman?

  He's gonna give it to him.

• 1:55:30David Sims?

  The torso.

• 1:55:31Griffin Newman?

  I was so sure he was gonna do it. I was like, it's not over yet.

• 1:55:35David Sims?

  I, I'm always like, oh, it's crazy fun to win right Tommy Lee Jones. Nobody has delivered a line better in a movie ever than Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive. I'm not joking. I'm deadly serious.

• 1:55:46Griffin Newman?

  I don't care.

• 1:55:47David Sims?

  I don't care is the greatest line reading in the history of movies. Prove me wrong. At me, David L Sims on Twitter, which I don't use.

• 1:55:56Speaker 04

  You will never be reading.

• 1:55:58David Sims?

  You could just send replies into the void.

• 1:56:00Speaker 04

  I do think.

• 1:56:01David Sims?

  And plus, he was Tommy Lee Jones. It was like, hey, man, you've been in this industry for 20 years. You're a legend. Like, it's time for you to win your Oscar. Ralph Fiennes. I think it's partly like, while he's young, he'll be back, maybe in a conclave. Two, it's like, maybe he's just a fucking crazy person they found for this role who's so incredible. And maybe it's like some magic trick.

• 1:56:23Speaker 04

  No, he had to do the English patience to be like, I actually am that hot and not a Nazi.

• 1:56:26Griffin Newman?

  This is what's nuts to me is like, within three years, it's like, oh, now you were like matinee idol in a huge sweeping epic that like ran the fucking gauntlet on, at the Oscars and was a hit.

• 1:56:37David Sims?

  Yeah, but he had to lose to Shiny McShine.

• 1:56:39Griffin Newman?

  And then they don't nominate again for 30 fucking years.

• 1:56:42David Sims?

  Obviously, I think they should have nominated him for Grand Budapest.

• 1:56:45Griffin Newman?

  Correct. He should have won.

• 1:56:46David Sims?

  Won. Should have won, but there was at the time category confusion, in my opinion, stupidly. Um, are there other Ralph Fiennes movies, though, that he should have gotten an Oscar nomination? You know, I love a bigger splash and he's on my ballot that year, but obviously that wasn't a big splash with voters.

• 1:57:02Griffin Newman?

  I feel like there was the Duchess Reader in Bruges year where people were like,

• 1:57:05David Sims?

  He's so good in Bruges.

• 1:57:06Griffin Newman?

  He kind of should get a supporting, but no one could figure out which movie to put him in for.

• 1:57:10David Sims?

  The answer is in Bruges, but that movie kind of broke late and obviously is the silliest.

• 1:57:14Speaker 04

  David Cronenberg Spider?

• 1:57:16David Sims?

  He's amazing in Spider. What about? He's, that's, that is an incredible performance.

• 1:57:20Speaker 04

  It sure is.

• 1:57:21Griffin Newman?

  I would have given him some mostly mumbling.

• 1:57:22Speaker 04

  What about?

• 1:57:22Griffin Newman?

  I mean, I'd give him a supporting actor nom for fucking Goblet of Fire, a movie that I think is otherwise trash.

• 1:57:27David Sims?

  Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, Goblet of Fire?

• 1:57:29Griffin Newman?

  Cause that's the first one he's introduced in, right?

• 1:57:31David Sims?

  He's in it for like five minutes. That's the one?

• 1:57:33Griffin Newman?

  That's the whole final set piece.

• 1:57:34Speaker 04

  You know what?

• 1:57:35David Sims?

  I'm aware that it's the whole final.

• 1:57:37Speaker 04

  He is great in a movie that I think has its fair share of flaws as The Constant Gardener.

• 1:57:43David Sims?

  He's very good in that movie.

• 1:57:44Griffin Newman?

  Which Rachel Weisz wins an Oscar.

• 1:57:46David Sims?

  The Oscars just seemed to make one rule where they were like, it gets one win and nothing else.

• 1:57:50Speaker 04

  I think that's enough for The Constant Gardener, but still.

• 1:57:51Griffin Newman?

  It's crazy how quickly he becomes a take it.

• 1:57:53David Sims?

  Not constant enough.

• 1:57:54Speaker 04

  Hmm.

• 1:57:55Griffin Newman?

  He becomes a take it for granted guy.

• 1:57:56David Sims?

  No, no, no, Griff, I disagree with you. It's, that's not true.

• 1:57:59Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:57:59David Sims?

  You're wrong.

• 1:58:00Speaker 04

  Make your own argument.

• 1:58:01David Sims?

  The whole thing with him is he makes Schindler's List.

• 1:58:03Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 1:58:03David Sims?

  This is a star making movie.

• 1:58:04Griffin Newman?

  Who the fuck is this guy?

• 1:58:05David Sims?

  You've played a villain, a Nazi, a very, the most scary Nazi in the world.

• 1:58:08Griffin Newman?

  I will say, I do think it is also a case of he doesn't win because the character is almost too evil.

• 1:58:12David Sims?

  I think that's part of it.

• 1:58:13Griffin Newman?

  Where it's like, it is so upsetting that people are like, we have to nominate it, but it feels gross to give him a win.

• 1:58:18Speaker 04

  Unless you're going full clown mode Christoph Waltz, they do not want.

• 1:58:21David Sims?

  It's why Fast Bender didn't win.

• 1:58:23Speaker 04

  They don't want to reward people for finding character.

• 1:58:25Griffin Newman?

  It's why DiCaprio didn't get nominated for Django.

• 1:58:27David Sims?

  Well, that's a bit of a over the top performance too, in my opinion. I don't know if you guys noticed this, but he's kind of like dialing it up slightly in that movie. So next year he makes Quiz Show, which is wonderful.

• 1:58:39Griffin Newman?

  Oh my God.

• 1:58:40David Sims?

  So good in Quiz Show. But that's a movie where clearly the Oscars liked that movie, got Best Picture nomination, did not know what to do. Because that movie's filled with good performances. Turturro weirdly doesn't get a nomination.

• 1:58:52Griffin Newman?

  Right. Gets the precursor nominations and then Armin Mueller Stahl gets the surprise.

• 1:58:56David Sims?

  Paul Schofield.

• 1:58:57Griffin Newman?

  I always make this fucking mistake between shine and Quiz Show.

• 1:58:59David Sims?

  And Paul Schofield is awesome in Quiz Show, but it's kind of like, right, old legend giving a couple of great scenes. So, so he misses out on Quiz Show. Also in Quiz Show, he's kind of playing a dweeb, like, you know.

• 1:59:10Griffin Newman?

  Guess what? He fucking.

• 1:59:11David Sims?

  He's so good in it.

• 1:59:11Griffin Newman?

  Rolls in Quiz Show.

• 1:59:12David Sims?

  Okay. The next year, this is, this is his career so far. He's made, these are the only two movies he's made so far since, you know. Strange days. Amazing performance.

• 1:59:21Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:21David Sims?

  Quite a curve ball from him.

• 1:59:22Griffin Newman?

  And people are like, who is this guy?

• 1:59:23David Sims?

  Man, I need my Mini Discs. We're like, this is Ray Fiennes? Okay. The next year after that, English Patient. Holy shit. Here he is as a romantic lead. He's taken a bath with K S T.

• 1:59:38Speaker 04

  Is that movie good?

• 1:59:39David Sims?

  Should I? I think it's good.

• 1:59:40Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:41David Sims?

  It's, it's very old fashioned.

• 1:59:43Griffin Newman?

  It's why they invented the word sweeping.

• 1:59:45David Sims?

  It's sweeping as hell.

• 1:59:45Griffin Newman?

  But here's like romantic Ray Fiennes.

• 1:59:48David Sims?

  Yeah, he's hot in it.

• 1:59:49Griffin Newman?

  He's such a handsome guy.

• 1:59:50David Sims?

  And he's really good. He loses to Shiny McShine. If he hadn't lost to him, he possibly would have lost to Tom Cruise and Jerry Maguire. Greatest performance ever. But he's really good in it. Okay, so the next year he does Oscar and Lucinda. Not a bad movie, young Cate Blanchett, but that doesn't really.

• 2:00:05Griffin Newman?

  He gets into some failed Oscar bait stuff. Sunshine in 99.

• 2:00:08David Sims?

  This is what I'm trying to tell you. He kind of goes down a bit of a tricky road.

• 2:00:11Speaker 04

  Sunshine kind of fucks though.

• 2:00:12David Sims?

  Well, the next year he does The Avengers. Oh, The Avengers, that movie made a billion dollars. No, no, no. The other one.

• 2:00:18Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:00:19David Sims?

  Hold on.

• 2:00:20Griffin Newman?

  There's a sort of like, okay, this guy doesn't cross over. He's, he's a prestige guy.

• 2:00:25David Sims?

  It's like 89 minutes, but like the closing credits are like 20 minutes.

• 2:00:28Speaker 04

  That, that one only made 500 million dollars.

• 2:00:31David Sims?

  Yeah. Of course, the voice of Ramses in Prince of Egypt does a great job. 1999, right? You have this sort of sunshine.

• 2:00:40David Sims?

  On Jin, you know, the, the Russian novel adaptation, End of the Affair, where you're like, has he become history's greatest homework actor? It's like the man does movies based on books you read in school.

• 2:00:50Speaker 04

  He needed Terrence Davies to cast him in something around that time.

• 2:00:54David Sims?

  He's great in The End of the Affair, which is kind of a forgotten movie at this point.

• 2:00:56Griffin Newman?

  It's the kind of thing where it's similar to Rachel Weisz. It's like, oh, and look, the actress gets the nomination. Like you're taking Fiennes for granted, being like, oh, this is that thing he does.

• 2:01:05David Sims?

  Okay, so he takes, he literally takes three years off. Doesn't make a movie. This is, I'm having fun with Fiennes' career now because it's really interesting.

• 2:01:11Griffin Newman?

  We're having a Fiennes time.

• 2:01:12David Sims?

  In 2002, Spider, an amazing movie, but small.

• 2:01:16Griffin Newman?

  Sure. Challenge.

• 2:01:17David Sims?

  The Good Thief, uncredited. Okay, that doesn't count. That's a Neil Jordan movie.

• 2:01:20Griffin Newman?

  That's a remake, no.

• 2:01:22David Sims?

  It's a remake of Bob LaFlemme.

• 2:01:24Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:24David Sims?

  It's a fun movie. It's a Nolte, very, very normal voice in it and everything.

• 2:01:28Griffin Newman?

  I am a slam bore.

• 2:01:30David Sims?

  Truly, that's the movie. I saw it in theaters.

• 2:01:33Speaker 04

  Let me flom.

• 2:01:35David Sims?

  Red Dragon, lazy casting in a way, but he's not bad.

• 2:01:40Speaker 04

  Do you see?

• 2:01:41David Sims?

  As Dollar Hyde.

• 2:01:42Speaker 04

  Do you see?

• 2:01:43David Sims?

  Do you see? And his most unnerving and strange performance, maybe in his entire career.

• 2:01:51David Sims?

  Where you're like, why is Jennifer Lopez in love with this vampire?

• 2:01:56Griffin Newman?

  This Republican vampire?

• 2:01:58David Sims?

  Like, that movie is unhinged simply because of him. Everything else in that movie, like, I get it. She's a maid in Manhattan. She takes the train. She's got a kid. She's falling in love with a rich guy.

• 2:02:08Speaker 04

  Oh, no, it's spelled maid.

• 2:02:09David Sims?

  No, it's spelled. But like, that's where it's like, well, hey, could Ralph Fiennes do this? And everyone's like, not really.

• 2:02:15Griffin Newman?

  But it was a hit.

• 2:02:16David Sims?

  Yeah, it made money. But like, again, does anyone walk away from that being like, you know who I loved in that?

• 2:02:21Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:02:22David Sims?

  And then, yeah, another three years off. In 2005, he's in a zillion things. He's in Harry Potter. He's in The White Countess, which is a late Merchant Ivory movie that doesn't really play. He's in Constant Gardner, which is good. He's in The Chums Chums Scrubber. Remember that?

• 2:02:38Griffin Newman?

  Go fish.

• 2:02:39David Sims?

  And then he's kind of, because of Voldemort, become supporting villain guy in Bruges. The Reader is a supporting role, you know, very heavily, you know, Hurt Locker rocks in it, you know, swings it like a wrecking ball.

• 2:02:52Speaker 04

  He plays another Nazi.

• 2:02:53David Sims?

  He plays old, old, young man.

• 2:02:55Speaker 04

  Nazis theaters.

• 2:02:56Griffin Newman?

  He plays.

• 2:02:56Speaker 04

  Once is enough.

• 2:02:57David Sims?

  He's the older version.

• 2:02:58Griffin Newman?

  He's the grown up version of.

• 2:02:59Speaker 04

  Have you seen The Reader more than once?

• 2:03:00Griffin Newman?

  No.

• 2:03:01Speaker 04

  In your life? Has anyone?

• 2:03:02Griffin Newman?

  No, but not even.

• 2:03:03David Sims?

  It is hard to imagine rewatching The Reader.

• 2:03:05Griffin Newman?

  I don't think Daldry watched it more than once, beginning to end. He is the grown up version of the kid who has to testify that she read the book to him, or he read the book to her, whatever. What was I gonna say?

• 2:03:17David Sims?

  Interesting.

• 2:03:18Griffin Newman?

  It's all building, obviously, to the apex of his career.

• 2:03:20David Sims?

  Grand Budapest.

• 2:03:21Griffin Newman?

  Oh, I was gonna say the re-team of him and Neeson in the Titans films.

• 2:03:25David Sims?

  Ah, of course. Hades!

• 2:03:27Griffin Newman?

  Hades and Zeus.

• 2:03:28Speaker 04

  Well, never, one of the greatest taglines of our time, for Clash of the Titans. Titans will clash.

• 2:03:31David Sims?

  He never got bad, but like, at all.

• 2:03:34Griffin Newman?

  No, no, you're right.

• 2:03:34David Sims?

  But it's crazy how, when Skyfall comes around, they're like, yeah, you're, you can play M, James Bond's boss. And it's like, he's like, not that much older than Daniel Craig, you know? And it's like, no, no, no, Rafe, hey, hey, you're, you're M now. You're not, you don't get to run around.

• 2:03:49Griffin Newman?

  There is perhaps a weird lack of strategy to his career that I respect now stepping back and looking at, and knowing that he's got a lot left to do.

• 2:03:57David Sims?

  In the nineties, the strategy kind of seems to be like, you know, prestige movies.

• 2:04:01Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:04:01David Sims?

  And then it's, yes, it starts to get more diffuse. Obviously he's done.

• 2:04:04Griffin Newman?

  Strange Days is a weird swing. Avengers is a weird swing. Made Manhattan's a weird swing.

• 2:04:09Speaker 04

  You guys.

• 2:04:09Griffin Newman?

  And it's like, anytime he went studio, it was an odd choice.

• 2:04:13Speaker 04

  You guys are forgetting his most unnerving performance, though, which was, of course, the videotaped introduction he sent in to the Toronto premiere of his recent film, Version of the Odyssey.

• 2:04:23David Sims?

  Return, another movie that in my, as I went straight to homework.

• 2:04:26Speaker 04

  Which unfortunately must not exist on, I mean, Christopher Nolan kind of announced, I think he waited like right until after the movie at theaters, but he, he like did a video from a hotel room somewhere in Europe where his eyeball was like against the camera.

• 2:04:39David Sims?

  He was probably in the bow temple where he currently is.

• 2:04:42Speaker 04

  It was horrifying.

• 2:04:44Griffin Newman?

  I love him so much.

• 2:04:45David Sims?

  I love him too. I love him.

• 2:04:47Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:47David Sims?

  And.

• 2:04:48Griffin Newman?

  No, no, you're, this is, I'm glad we took the time to outline this because it does make more sense.

• 2:04:52David Sims?

  It's a weird career.

• 2:04:53Griffin Newman?

  It is a weird career.

• 2:04:54David Sims?

  The Grand Budapest snub is outrageous. That movie is the best movie ever made. I recently watched it and I was just like, I should watch this once a week.

• 2:05:02Griffin Newman?

  I think he and Neeson are the same and that the career is so diffuse and so spread out and has so many weird eras to it that sometimes you're like, who is this guy again? If you were to sort of like Hall of Fame project, just be like, pick the 10 most representative projects and try to hit the different phases or modes of their career. If you reduce either of those guys to just 10 movies, you're like, that's insane. Right? And they still got gas in the tank and are gonna keep making stuff. But they're both sort of.

• 2:05:31Speaker 04

  Feins has a lot more range than.

• 2:05:33Griffin Newman?

  I agree with you.

• 2:05:33Speaker 04

  Has, although.

• 2:05:34Griffin Newman?

  100%.

• 2:05:34David Sims?

  And Hollywood really sees Neeson as like one of two things, right? Like either the sort of.

• 2:05:39Speaker 04

  Especially now. Yeah. But Neeson is, to his credit, a much bigger New York Rangers fan than, uh, Rafe Feins is.

• 2:05:45David Sims?

  How do you know?

• 2:05:46Speaker 04

  Because.

• 2:05:47David Sims?

  Have you asked?

• 2:05:47Speaker 04

  I haven't, I haven't asked Rafe Feins, but.

• 2:05:49David Sims?

  Do you see?

• 2:05:50Speaker 04

  I have also.

• 2:05:51David Sims?

  Rafe Feins pointing to the Stanley Cup.

• 2:05:53Speaker 04

  Oh God, it's so far in the distance now, but I have not seen Ray Fiennes at every hockey game I have ever gone to, unlike Liam Neeson.

• 2:06:01Griffin Newman?

  God bless.

• 2:06:01Speaker 04

  And I'm just like looking over there as I watch the Rangers like Panarin to puck up the ice and there's Oscar Schindler on the sideline. It's been like.

• 2:06:09Griffin Newman?

  Crowding with ladies. Does he have a bunch of ladies with him?

• 2:06:12Speaker 04

  He's there with Margot Robbie, another classic Rangers fan.

• 2:06:15David Sims?

  Good for that all. Janusz Kaminski, of course, famously Spielberg calls up, you know, Zigmund, Cundy, Alan Davia, Douglas Sokum and is like, no, thank you. No, thank you. No, no. He watches a film on TV called Wildflower, a TV movie, thinks it's beautifully photographed and is like, who shot this? And Janusz says, like, Steven watches a lot of television. Wildflower was directed by Diane Keaton on Lifetime. Crazy to imagine Spielberg being like flipping over to Lifetime, but maybe, or maybe he was like, hey, Diane made a TV movie. I'll watch it.

• 2:06:51David Sims?

  And he got offered an Amblin produced TV movie called Class of 61. And I guess Spielberg at this point learns that he's Polish and is kind of like, well, I'm making this movie in Poland, like, and starts to look at him more seriously. It's still crazy though, because like, I do feel like Spielberg mostly worked with really established names. This is DPs.

• 2:07:14Griffin Newman?

  Yes, and had.

• 2:07:15David Sims?

  Janusz is basically a nobody.

• 2:07:16Griffin Newman?

  Had his regular guys, but also like, until this point, isn't like married to one DP.

• 2:07:22David Sims?

  And, and, but the other thing is with this movie, he's basically like, do what you want. Like, he's not like, hey, this is exactly what I need to do. And like, I have storyboarded this. He's kind of like, you should take whatever approach you need. We're not going to do dollies. We're not going to do Steadicam.

• 2:07:36Griffin Newman?

  This is all part of him being like, I need to throw myself out of my comfort zone a little.

• 2:07:39Speaker 04

  It's a part of like him being inspired by Andre Wajcza, his name I just butchered even for my Polish background, who he was looking at as like the guy in his mind's eye, who he needed to be to make this movie and was never going to be. And thinking about the cinematography in those films and looking for someone who had an understanding of how, you know, Polish crew would work and what shooting in Poland looked like and could approximate those, that aesthetic. And that's exactly what he liked.

• 2:08:04Griffin Newman?

  All of that does. Make sense. It is fascinating, though, that it's just like it's this late at the like inflection point of his career that he finds the second most important collaborator of his entire life.

• 2:08:16David Sims?

  Absolutely. Yanush is the king of, to be clear, is a god.

• 2:08:20Speaker 04

  The first ET.

• 2:08:21David Sims?

  Yeah, ET, that mother crazy motherfucker who is a runner on this one. He was the best boy.

• 2:08:27Speaker 04

  Slow runner.

• 2:08:29Speaker 04

  Someone else.

• 2:08:32David Sims?

  I love this from Yanush. I know why JJ put this in because he knew I would like it. The problem with doing black and white is there's silver, obviously, in the emulsion, as we all know, because we've all seen in Glorious Bastards. And that creates a negative discharge of electricity. So it makes these little like spots on the film. So you have to avoid static being in the room. And so you like have to, you would like spray the room before you shoot, because like, there's all this static electricity and like, weather is a problem, like weird production is a problem for all of this. So that was the biggest challenge for shooting in black and white.

• 2:09:07Speaker 04

  And this movie almost fell apart because of Spielberg's insistence to shooting in black and white, because he wanted to, and his, his quote is that the Holocaust was light, was life without light. And he wanted to reflect that in the shooting without color, which he saw as sort of symbolic of light. But like, the movie almost didn't go because Universal was so stubborn about the idea that black and white movies don't make money.

• 2:09:26Griffin Newman?

  There's also a thing, and this is an axiom that is like still held to this day, that black and white films do even worse overseas, even worse on like home video and television. And so almost all cases where Hollywood studio has made a black and white film in the last 35, 40 years, they insist that they shoot it in color and convert it later so that there is a color version of the film that they can at least like play on foreign television. Where like, I know Nebraska did that, where they were like on the Epics channel, playing the color version of Nebraska.

• 2:10:00Speaker 04

  And every American was glued to their television for the premiere of the color version on Epics. I remember that well.

• 2:10:05Griffin Newman?

  Right. There's like shit like that. And Spielberg was just like, I refuse. I'm shooting this in black and white.

• 2:10:12Speaker 04

  But it's also a case of perpetuating the cinematic. Memory of an event because he one of the another one of the reasons why he wanted to shoot in black and white is because every Holocaust film he had seen was shot in black and white. The footage from the Holocaust, the archival footage was shot in black and white. And he was, you know, continuing that idea, which is a fraught concept in and of itself. But he was trying to make sort of the ultimate version of the Holocaust films that he had seen.

• 2:10:38David Sims?

  Interesting. Schindler's List. What do we want to say?

• 2:10:41Speaker 04

  It's funny. It's funny. I was just looking at my little notes on my phone and I was just the it's like the thing I see is it's funny. It's like, again, we talked so much about him trying to find the right tone, negotiating these different energies. And you see that come to a head with the scene where they're hiring secretaries, which is a great comic little sequence.

• 2:10:59David Sims?

  It's like a classic like Steve, you can't make this not fun.

• 2:11:03Speaker 04

  Yeah, exactly. He has to do it and it's it's an inherently funny idea that Schindler was only interested in having a hot secretary. And then this woman comes in who is not a young hottie and she can type three times as fast as anyone. He's like, motherfucker, like, I'm gonna have to hire her.

• 2:11:17Griffin Newman?

  Well, like, what is one of the moments that changes Schindler the most as a character? It is the reaction he gets to kissing the Jewish woman delivering the cake with the daughter.

• 2:11:26David Sims?

  Right, which is to Schindler, just like, what? I'm a horny devil who kisses everything he sees.

• 2:11:31Griffin Newman?

  Right. It almost is the thing that makes him understand the severity of the situation in a personal way for the first time is, I love kissing women. You're telling me that some women are unkissable?

• 2:11:42David Sims?

  By law.

• 2:11:44Speaker 04

  Well, yeah.

• 2:11:45Griffin Newman?

  But it also shows that he fundamentally doesn't think of them with the same level of disdain that like the the pure Nazis do, right?

• 2:11:55Speaker 04

  No, not at all.

• 2:11:56Griffin Newman?

  As much as he's like, I refuse to care.

• 2:11:58Speaker 04

  He doesn't think about them at all. You know, more of a Don Draper thing, but and like Don Draper, I guess, was also, I guess, in admitting in that statement, he's obsessed with them.

• 2:12:08Griffin Newman?

  But another, by the way, another Spielberg comedy edit moment is, if I'm gonna stay here, you have to promise me that no one will ever mistake me for anyone but Mrs. Schindler. And then hard cut to her waiting to buy on the plane, on the train.

• 2:12:21Speaker 04

  It's a really funny cut, but I'd say the other moment that is a real awakening for him, you know, this is when we talked to is When somebody calls him a good man, I really feel like nobody, you know, you have the one armed worker come in, you have, um, you know, much later in the film, you have the, the daughter of the, the married couple who he reluctantly pulls out of the camp. But, um, you get the sense that nobody has ever called him a good man before, and that was something he wasn't necessarily looking for. And he tries it out like he, it's a weird fit for him. It almost feels like he's rejecting the idea.

• 2:12:53Griffin Newman?

  Responsibility where it's like, if I crack the door open to people thinking I can help them or save them, then suddenly the obligation is going to become so great on me, a thing I cannot handle, which is what makes the end sort of like, uh, implosion so emotionally devastating of him doing the math of like, I didn't save enough. And here's a guy who spent the entire movie being like, don't make me do anything.

• 2:13:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, cause he talks so often about how the Holocaust and World War II in the whole is just bigger than he is. He just like, he's like, okay, so they're going to kill everyone. They're going to kill everyone. Like what, what does that have to do with me? What can I do about that?

• 2:13:28Griffin Newman?

  Which is part of how the Holocaust happens.

• 2:13:30Speaker 04

  It completely abstains from any sort of moral obligation.

• 2:13:32Griffin Newman?

  It becomes so extreme that it is abstract. It is hard for people to get their heads around, regardless of what side they're on.

• 2:13:38Speaker 02

  Isn't it also self preservation? Cause he doesn't really know exactly the terms or the rules of how this is all working. Like he doesn't want to be perceived by the Nazis to be supportive.

• 2:13:50David Sims?

  To be clear, he is a Nazi. Oscar Schindler was a Nazi party member and he is very much in like the German, you know, whatever, high class.

• 2:14:00Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:14:00David Sims?

  You know, the head years prior been like, we're signing up. Like even if I'm not a true believer or whatever, like I will happily join the party now that they run the country, right? Like there are some people who didn't join the party, right? And like.

• 2:14:12Speaker 04

  For its long.

• 2:14:13David Sims?

  There you go. Like, and like, you know, still existed in, but like where I'm not, he joined the party. Like he was a, probably not a, you know, deeply idealistic person, clearly, but, uh, he was a Nazi.

• 2:14:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, he joined the party out of convenience because

• 2:14:27David Sims?

  Yes, exactly.

• 2:14:28Speaker 04

  If you weren't a member of the Nazi party.

• 2:14:29David Sims?

  Fucking Germans did.

• 2:14:30Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, and

• 2:14:30David Sims?

  And I don't like them.

• 2:14:31Speaker 04

  And, you know, there's it's too bad there's no historical parallel for that, or else, you know, we might have something on our hands here.

• 2:14:36Griffin Newman?

  But that's the thing that keeps happening in the movie is I feel like Ray Fiennes has the line later where he's like, we're gonna be making so much money, we won't care. Right? That like, much like certain present day situations, there are people who are just like, if you're saying it's gonna help the economy this much, that I will personally benefit this much, then maybe I like sort of blindly sign off on whatever this other stuff you're doing on the side is. Whereas other people were signing up explicitly explicitly in support of that stuff on the side.

• 2:15:04Speaker 04

  But I think to Ben's point, it's true that he did not, and so many people would, you know, claim not to to know where this was going. I mean, I think that was the Nazis' greatest advantage.

• 2:15:14David Sims?

  Turning a such a blind eye to like, what's happening over there. Part of what's going on with Schindler is he's actually in Poland. He's German, but because of his industry and all that, he's coming to Krakow, he's seeing what's going on, where it's like, a little harder to ignore. Whereas in Germany, a lot of Jews had already left, all the Jews had already

• 2:15:30Speaker 04

  And there was also, you know, he's like Hamilton, talking about like how he was been waiting for a war his whole life to rise up. I mean, like, I know you guys, there was a play called Hamilton, you may

• 2:15:39David Sims?

  Scratching my chin at this one.

• 2:15:41Speaker 04

  Uh, no, because I mean, there's literally a line in the movie where he talks about how the one thing that he's always been missing, in addition to realizing that he's hot as hell and needs to work that angle, is a war to cause economic instability that he can use to his advantage.

• 2:15:54David Sims?

  He wants to.

• 2:15:54Speaker 04

  And, you know, I'm not likening Oscar Schindler to Hamilton in any other respect, but there is that that idea of these circumstances being uniquely profitable for him and taking advantage of that. And I think the speed at which Poland falls to the Germans, it happens in a span of two weeks, is hugely to Schindler's advantage, because everything is so up in the air, he can capitalize.

• 2:16:15Griffin Newman?

  This is a guy who loves to find an angle he can work. The scene where he meets Kingsley and is, Kingsley's like, so wait, what do you do? And he's like, I'm not good at working. I'm not good at running things. I'm good at just being like, all of you should do this and then give me all the money, right? And it's he

• 2:16:33David Sims?

  That's capitalism.

• 2:16:34Griffin Newman?

  It's part of what he's voted for.

• 2:16:35David Sims?

  Again, really funny that Spielberg was like, my idol, the guy who runs Time Warner, you really, you're right.

• 2:16:41Speaker 04

  It is very funny because like the moral arc of this movie is completely contrary

• 2:16:45Griffin Newman?

  Merger and acquisition?

• 2:16:46Speaker 04

  To capitalism. It's all about

• 2:16:47David Sims?

  What he did that was so good is gave up on capitalism and was like, I will just spend two zeros.

• 2:16:52Griffin Newman?

  That's the thing. It's like, it's not like he's the world's smartest businessman. It's just that he recognizes, oh, there is a uniquely bad set of circumstances here that I could maybe benefit from. And part of it is that he's like, the other people don't want to touch the Jews. I view them as a cheap labor force. I can take advantage of that.

• 2:17:11David Sims?

  Yes, it's, it's right. They're, they're a product to him and they're a balance book, you know, equation to him.

• 2:17:17Speaker 04

  Yeah. And as you said, he's annoyed by any reminder of their humanity. Cause it's morally inconvenienced him. He's like, I want to think about this.

• 2:17:24David Sims?

  Also not obviously.

• 2:17:26Griffin Newman?

  Viewing them as vermin.

• 2:17:27David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:17:27Griffin Newman?

  In the same way as some of his party members.

• 2:17:30David Sims?

  That many Nazis are and like then when Aiman arrives, you're like, right, this is a psychopath who's been enabled by this.

• 2:17:38Griffin Newman?

  But don't you think

• 2:17:39David Sims?

  Whereas of course, like there are other Nazis, you know, high, high ranking Nazis who after the war were put on trial and they were like, I don't know. I did what I was told. I mean, I'm the millionth person to point this out.

• 2:17:50Griffin Newman?

  But don't you think part of it, in how this character, in how Schindler is characterized in the movie is that he's just the kind of like, look, I don't let any attachment or relationship get in the way of smart business decisions, right? Like him not viewing the Jewish people with disdain.

• 2:18:08Speaker 04

  I don't invest in any enamel factory that I can't drop in 30 seconds or less.

• 2:18:12Griffin Newman?

  He keeps his hot ass wife at arms length. Like he keeps everyone at arms length. He's just like, these are just numbers.

• 2:18:18David Sims?

  Should we shout out Caroline Goodall, fourth build in this movie? And obviously she's in Hook.

• 2:18:23Griffin Newman?

  I will say.

• 2:18:24David Sims?

  An English rose. Very beautiful.

• 2:18:25Griffin Newman?

  I think it is the best thing about Hook. As a movie is that it at least led to her getting cast in this film.

• 2:18:31David Sims?

  Sure. Okay. I mean, she's good. I mean, I would say.

• 2:18:35Griffin Newman?

  A point about how little I like about Hook.

• 2:18:36David Sims?

  Right. I was right. I was gonna say.

• 2:18:37Griffin Newman?

  That's what I was getting.

• 2:18:39David Sims?

  But she's, she's good in this, but it's not a huge role.

• 2:18:43David Sims?

  Just interesting that the way that works, right? Where it's like, what's that actress famous for? Well, Spielberg really liked her for a minute there.

• 2:18:49Speaker 04

  But what's amazing about this movie is that, you know, it is one of the great ensembles, truly like one of the true ensembles ever put together in that there are so many fucking faces in this movie and every one of those faces has its own story to tell that becomes absolutely, you know, critical to the mega narrative that's happening around them. And you track these characters without even knowing it the first or second time you watch.

• 2:19:14David Sims?

  And the movie, I think, does such an incredible job not making it like not holding your hand about that. Like, maybe you don't clock like, oh, this is the person I saw 15 minutes, you know, like maybe it doesn't matter. You're always involved. And then as you re-watch the movie, you realize like, oh, I see, you know?

• 2:19:31Speaker 04

  You like very ambiently recognize that, okay, this guy is here and now I see him in this one-shot walking out of the ghetto. And then it turns out to be the guy who, you know, Gerda's gun misfires on when he shoots him outside of the hinge factory.

• 2:19:44Griffin Newman?

  She's the biggest example of it, but it is so skillful, the way he uses the Ambedevits character where especially in the latter half where she's on the train, you know, the wrong train or the train going the wrong way and whatever. And now like you could see most filmmakers saying to themselves, the reason I've set up this character is now I have a POV character who the audience is invested in, who we can show these terrors through. And she remains in the frame for most of those 15 minutes or so, and yet she is not the focus where she is constantly sort of around. Sometimes she's going out of focus. Sometimes she's moving out of the frame in moments like the fear of the shower and things like that, where what he's trying to do is remind you

• 2:20:28Griffin Newman?

  like, yes, this is a character you have pinned in your mind, who of course you're going to keep track of, but also she's not more important than any of them. Part of the mass like sort of terror of what's going on here is that everyone in this space is her.

• 2:20:43Speaker 04

  The, the characters that shoulder the greatest burden in that sense are the children. It's the, the two kids, the boy and the girl with the glasses, who we see in so many different stages and so many different places. And, you know, have such, I mean, the moment where the little kid is blowing his whistle to alert the Nazis during the liquid, the liquidation of the ghetto to her mother. And then he stops himself when he recognizes, you know, he recognizes her and she him and he hides her. And you can't tell if he's like being extra sinister in that moment or good. And then we see him, I mean, like these things all track so viscerally because they're children. And because they're so instantly recognizable. And also a factoid that I only learned yesterday that will be mind blowing for exactly three people out there.

• 2:21:25Speaker 04

  Is that one of the most memorable scenes in this movie for me is the one where Amon kills the Jewish engineer when, after she's building his house. We can't be arguing with these people. She is like, her performance, 15 seconds in this movie. People, his accent is so. It's amazing. She is played by, uh, uh, Alina Lowenstein, who plays the Clairvoyant in The Beast. That came out.

• 2:21:53David Sims?

  An actress with a bajillion credits.

• 2:21:55Speaker 04

  Yeah. These people are so tied to this movie in my mind that the idea that they exist in other realities is very.

• 2:22:01David Sims?

  A little bit.

• 2:22:02Griffin Newman?

  To paraphrase.

• 2:22:03David Sims?

  Again, Ray Fines, I think is undone by that a little bit.

• 2:22:06Griffin Newman?

  To paraphrase an early tweet that I think about a lot. In, in the year of spotlight, you had a tweet to the effect of, there are like 10 actors with five minutes of screen time in spotlight, who give the best supporting performance I've ever seen in a movie. You were sort of like, you could like, beyond the argument of like, oh, who do you put supporting actor of the spotlight cast? You were like, basically every like survivor they interview for five minutes.

• 2:22:34David Sims?

  The victim.

• 2:22:34Griffin Newman?

  Is giving the most indelible, where the fuck did they find this guy performance? And some of them are actors who were just unknown and then have gotten bigger like Michael Cyril Creighton. Some of them are like, kind of like the guy who's like the former boxer, you know? Like, some of them are like non-professional actors. And this is another movie like that where anyone who shows up for like 15 seconds.

• 2:22:53Speaker 04

  I mean, I've remembered these people my entire adult life.

• 2:22:56Griffin Newman?

  And searing.

• 2:22:56Speaker 04

  Because they were on screen for 45 seconds in this movie.

• 2:22:59Griffin Newman?

  What is the energy being captured here?

• 2:23:01Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's, it's a remarkable testament to casting directors and also just like.

• 2:23:05Griffin Newman?

  Like six credited casting.

• 2:23:07David Sims?

  Because it was like the Polish casting as well, right? All that. I want to shout out the blood. Because I feel like Spielberg had done lots of violence in movies before, but it's always more cartoonish. Or in like the case of The Color Purple or whatever, it's it's realisticish, but you know.

• 2:23:22Griffin Newman?

  But also a little bit avoided.

• 2:23:24David Sims?

  Yes, exactly. Um, I feel like he takes, he does such a good job to make like when people get shot, like blood spurts out of their head and it's gross and it's like disturbing and.

• 2:23:35Griffin Newman?

  But also is now this jet black.

• 2:23:37David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:23:37Griffin Newman?

  Like goo.

• 2:23:38David Sims?

  It looks like very like, right visceral and real in a way that like kind of gets me every time.

• 2:23:44Griffin Newman?

  There's something kind of, um, uh, you're not dealing with Rambo squibs. You know, there's something about watching in the deep background of a shot, a person just get like, uh, gunned in the head. And then you see the splurt and they fall to the ground, the blood continues to trickle. And it's like, oh, the, the, the commonality of this violence.

• 2:24:06Speaker 04

  There's a, I mean, the banality of.

• 2:24:07Griffin Newman?

  I was, banality is the word I was trying to avoid, but it is.

• 2:24:10Speaker 04

  A, um, banality to just the executions. There's just like, and the movie is always, it always has less executions and murders than I remember. I think often I conflated.

• 2:24:21David Sims?

  All of those scenes are so.

• 2:24:22Speaker 04

  Yeah. But I think like the pianist, I feel like in my mind, in the first hour, it's like every time they turn the camera, you're seeing someone.

• 2:24:28David Sims?

  The pianist is the same if you rewatch it.

• 2:24:30Speaker 04

  Is it?

• 2:24:30David Sims?

  Uh, where, right, you're like, no, I've actually just kind of been thinking of like three or four moments that are so shocking and, you know, distressing.

• 2:24:38Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, yeah, it, it does, you know, obviously the horror is meant to be sort of muffled and muted in the background and, and sort of interpolated into daily life. But, uh, they do a good job of not, um, I don't know, not making it you numb to it.

• 2:24:53David Sims?

  The pianist, which I think is a very good film, is also about from the perspective of someone who this is happening to.

• 2:25:00Griffin Newman?

  Which, which a lot of the Holocaust movies are.

• 2:25:02David Sims?

  You're watching the Warsaw Ghetto shrink around him and then he gets shipped to Treblinka and all that.

• 2:25:07Griffin Newman?

  Especially the post Hitler movies are primarily these stories of the people trying to survive.

• 2:25:12David Sims?

  What are you thinking of? Of course, life is beautiful.

• 2:25:14Griffin Newman?

  Life is beautiful.

• 2:25:15David Sims?

  Of course. Jacob.

• 2:25:17Griffin Newman?

  I was gonna say bullshit like Jacob the liar.

• 2:25:19David Sims?

  But wait, what are other? I'm trying to think of like other canonical sort of Holocaust films.

• 2:25:23Griffin Newman?

  Like concentration camp movies.

• 2:25:24Speaker 04

  Did they? I mean, maybe you guys weren't old enough, but they took me at school. They like got us all on buses and took us to see Life is Beautiful.

• 2:25:31David Sims?

  That makes sense to me that like it became a sort of like, is this important?

• 2:25:36Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:25:36David Sims?

  Right. Yeah.

• 2:25:36Griffin Newman?

  They weirdly didn't do that, but did take us to Shakespeare in Love, I wanna say.

• 2:25:41David Sims?

  Well, hey, man, they wanted you to have a great time.

• 2:25:43Griffin Newman?

  I just remember being like, I can't believe I'm getting to see boobs during a school day.

• 2:25:47David Sims?

  Hell, yeah. Well, that's that's St. Anne's for you.

• 2:25:50Griffin Newman?

  Well, hey, I was not there yet.

• 2:25:51David Sims?

  Okay, fair enough. That's wherever you were for you.

• 2:25:55Speaker 04

  This is Joseph Fiennes. You'll be our nation's most important actor.

• 2:26:00David Sims?

  2000s. Yes, there are plenty of films that, you know, involve either directly or glancingly the Holocaust. There's movies like The Gray Zone, Tim Lang Nelson's movie, which never went anywhere, which is

• 2:26:13Speaker 04

  I mean, it's horrifying.

• 2:26:14David Sims?

  Yes. Other films like, you know, Costa Gavris's Amen. But like, none of these movies really hit. And was there sort of a feeling?

• 2:26:26Speaker 04

  A lot of money in the Holocaust, despite what Schindler's List may have convinced people.

• 2:26:29David Sims?

  The closest you have is The Read, The Peoness, which is, you know, a genuinely big movie, but is made European and all. And The Reader, which, you know, nobody actually like, I guess it made like 100 billion worldwide, which is insane to consider.

• 2:26:44Speaker 04

  But there was a wild proliferation of Holocaust movies.

• 2:26:47David Sims?

  There's a lot of Holocaust movies, but they're not whatever, resonating in the culture in the same way.

• 2:26:52Griffin Newman?

  The saddled reputation is that.

• 2:26:53David Sims?

  Right. Becomes like, oh, it's this homework. Right. Yeah.

• 2:26:55Griffin Newman?

  And also kind of like failed Oscar bait, like movies that.

• 2:26:59David Sims?

  Yeah. And right. Is it some easy path to an Oscar? It becomes cynical.

• 2:27:03Griffin Newman?

  Even just things like Defiance, right? Which I know is not quite the same thing, but you where you just be like, oh, here's a serious director announces a movie with three serious actors that's about the Holocaust in some way.

• 2:27:14David Sims?

  Defiance is kind of a movie people were asking for with like, well, show me a movie about Jews resisting.

• 2:27:19Speaker 04

  Directed by Edwards.

• 2:27:19David Sims?

  The Nazis. And it's like, well, that's a story of that. And everyone was like, Well, it's okay. You know, like, like.

• 2:27:25Speaker 04

  But there was a lot of, there was a lot of concern at the time of Schindler's List, Schindler's List's release that because of the shadow that Spielberg cast, it would be treated as the last word on the Holocaust. And I think you see that in a lot of the hesitation around, you know, academics around the time it came out. And I think the opposite, well, maybe not the, again, it's complicated because the movie is, is so seared into our visual memory, but it, it, it opened the floodgates in a way.

• 2:27:50David Sims?

  You had to get to The Zookeeper's Wife, where it's suddenly like, okay, but tell me about the zoos at the time.

• 2:27:55Griffin Newman?

  I mean, Boy, the Striped Pajamas.

• 2:27:57David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:57Griffin Newman?

  Or like, it's already referenced as a movie I find basically abhorrent.

• 2:28:00David Sims?

  It's quite abhorrent. I mean, I would say the, the sort of major Holocaust films post Schindler's List that had a big impact on the culture are.

• 2:28:07Griffin Newman?

  Life is Beautiful.

• 2:28:08David Sims?

  To some extent, although somewhat of a forgotten movie now, you know, we're kind

• 2:28:12Griffin Newman?

  But at the time was.

• 2:28:12David Sims?

  At the time, very big. The Pianist, for sure. The Reader, sort of. Son of Saul, for sure. And obviously, Son of Saul is trying to take a different approach into telling that story. And it was a very polarizing movie, I feel like. Some people were so moved by it, others were right, were kind of not into it at all. Zookeeper's Wife, absolutely. Jojo Rabbit, that doesn't count. It's not even really a Holocaust.

• 2:28:35Griffin Newman?

  Our buddy, Chris White, who made Operation Final.

• 2:28:37David Sims?

  And Zone of Interest. Operation Final, I think, is a really good movie. That's not really a directly a Holocaust movie.

• 2:28:42Griffin Newman?

  This is what I'm saying. When we had him on the podcast.

• 2:28:45David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:28:45Griffin Newman?

  Talking about Allied.

• 2:28:47David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:28:47Griffin Newman?

  Zomek is a secret master.

• 2:28:49David Sims?

  Zomek is a secret, pretty good.

• 2:28:52Speaker 04

  This is secret three out of five. Yeah.

• 2:28:54Griffin Newman?

  But he was saying, like, I feel like I didn't get the memo that no one liked World War II movies anymore. That he felt like this is one of those sturdy, like Hollywood genres from the 90s onward. This is like a proven area where you can make a serious grown up movie with movie stars and legitimate production values. And then the movie kind of got like.

• 2:29:13Speaker 04

  Monuments been.

• 2:29:14Griffin Newman?

  Right, but I would put forward, does something kind of shift in Inglourious Basterds?

• 2:29:20David Sims?

  A little bit, but.

• 2:29:21Griffin Newman?

  Right? With like the, the, uh, having such a wildly different like genre based tone and the revisionist history and everything, where from like that moment on, people don't want to watch Hollywood make a serious version of this.

• 2:29:33David Sims?

  But then they did, the zone of interest did break through. I feel like it's like Son of Saul's zone of interest. Like if you are going to mess with the form.

• 2:29:38Griffin Newman?

  I'm saying Hollywood. This is my point. Both of those movies are doing unconventional things with the form. They're happening in foreign countries with like smaller budgets. I think you can't do the big shiny studio version of it anymore.

• 2:29:52Speaker 04

  No, but you also can't get to the zone of interest without Schindler's List. I think that like, you know, Schindler's List is a film that, you know, its detractors may disagree, but it's.

• 2:30:01David Sims?

  Can you please put the stuffed doll down? It's crazy to look at you making these points while you have it. No.

• 2:30:05Speaker 04

  I've been clutching it to my chest.

• 2:30:06Griffin Newman?

  It didn't totally connect, but I would put, I would put A Hidden Life in a similar vein to.

• 2:30:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, but I think that like, you know, obviously this is the, the ultimate question at the root of any conversation about Holocaust cinema is how to depict an atrocity, to what extent you are minimizing it by, through recreation, by visualizing it. Schindler's List takes it to one sort of maximalist extreme, but it's in very, into my mind, one of the reasons I have such reverence for this movie is that it's in a very real and nuanced conversation with the right to do that. And the zone of interest is, I think similarly nuanced, but obviously at the opposite end of the spectrum where it is, um, you know, taking away any sort of visual evidence and operating solely through absence. And I, I think it's not one or the other. I mean, these things have to be in conversation with each other and I think they're both valuable in their own terms. But I also think, you know, for me,

• 2:30:54Speaker 04

  one of the reasons why Schindler's List is, is bigger than, you know, it, it, the sum of its parts or its role as a movie is because, you know, there is a danger, as I've said, about one thing becoming the focal point for our memory of the Holocaust. But I think the work that it did to. Enshrine the memory of the Holocaust in the abstract, even only a one version of the one telling of it in the collective unconscious is inestimably important. And it seeded the path for all these other conversations. And you see now how, even now, you know, the Holocaust is in jeopardy of being, it's questioned all the time. We see Nazism on the rise and whatnot.

• 2:31:34Speaker 04

  You know, I think it's my mind's eye, all the stories my grandfather would tell did not coalesce into something I could picture until I saw this movie. I had seen other Holocaust movies.

• 2:31:45David Sims?

  And I do think Night in Fog, which you mentioned before, that's something where it's like, watch that.

• 2:31:49Speaker 04

  Right.

• 2:31:50David Sims?

  You'll see, right, you know.

• 2:31:51Speaker 04

  But again, that's through absence. I mean, you're seeing just the hair piles and the shoes, and that is more in conversation with the zone of interest. But I think that like, I needed like a, and I think a lot of people who were thinking about the Holocaust less than the descendants of survivors, needed a baseline understanding of what this is. They need to see it through the lens of Hollywood spectacle in order to wrap their minds around it, to let their imagination sort of touch the horror that was sort of always a little bit beyond the pale.

• 2:32:20Griffin Newman?

  As you're saying, the undeniable effect of the conversation that Schindler's List was able to force, like, everyone to have, being such a culturally important movie and a movie that even like, you know, when they aired on broadcast television for the first time, four or five years after, they're like, it will air in its entirety without commercial breaks and no edits.

• 2:32:43Speaker 04

  And the ratings are even higher than the color premiere of Nebraska.

• 2:32:46Griffin Newman?

  It was, at the time, like, I think 20 million people watched Schindler's List play as a Sunday night network TV movie. It was the highest ratings any TV broadcast of a theatrical film had gotten since Jurassic Park, and they played it without cuts, without commercial interruption, with nudity, with no censoring, and there was the sense of just like, this is so important.

• 2:33:09David Sims?

  Tom Coburn, who was a senator, I think he was a congressman at the time, who back then was like, one of the most psychotic Republicans around now, would probably be like, a pillar of decency in that party.

• 2:33:18Griffin Newman?

  But was like, what if a child changes the channel and sees a nipple?

• 2:33:21David Sims?

  No, it was beyond that. He was like, this is an all time low, like nudity, violence, profanity. I do love the idea that he's like, this Schindler's got a body now.

• 2:33:30Griffin Newman?

  And it's even worse than The Simpsons.

• 2:33:33David Sims?

  For it that he had to like publicly apologize. Of course, now he would become Secretary of Commerce for raping that way.

• 2:33:38Griffin Newman?

  But like that speaks to how active the conversation was around this movie for years. Beyond it just being a film that basically immediately went to like school rotation, a thing that is shown, a thing that does start to transform into homework. Then you have all these shitty prestige, you know, World War II movies. And then you have the good films that come out of it are like art house intellectual exercises that are critically very respected, but are not engaging in a mainstream conversation.

• 2:34:04David Sims?

  As a teenager, though, this movie, look, Saving Private Ryan was the serious Spielberg movie that all teen boys were like, oh shit, like, have you seen that? Like, you know, uh.

• 2:34:14Speaker 04

  Barry Pepper shot that guy through the scope of his cyber.

• 2:34:17David Sims?

  Like they watched a fucking awesome action movie, which it is, but it's also very serious. Um, but people would talk like about the most visceral scenes in this movie. Kind of like you had seen a horror movie. Like I remember that kind of like, you know, teen boy discussion.

• 2:34:32Griffin Newman?

  Of having Spielberg.

• 2:34:33David Sims?

  And like the scene of uh, Fines trying to shoot the guy and the gun won't work. You know, these scenes that are like drawn out torture.

• 2:34:41Speaker 04

  Right. I mean, there is a lot of consternation about the suspense of, you know, showing the Jewish women going into the showers.

• 2:34:47Griffin Newman?

  That's the scene that Hanukkah always focuses on.

• 2:34:49Speaker 04

  Right. And, uh, and, you know, one, that actually happened. Uh, and two, I mean, I think that suspense is one of the film's tools to engaging viewers in participating and acknowledging history. I, you know, I think, again, this Village Voice Symposium that came out, you have someone like Art Spiegelman, who, uh, other than Brian Michael Bendis, who by the way, sounds fucking exactly like Paul Scheer.

• 2:35:13Speaker 04

  Is, um, the only other, uh, graphic novelist whose name I recognize. Uh, so you guys got to get Spiegelman on the show. Mouse, a classic. But, uh, you know, Spiegelman hated this movie.

• 2:35:23Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:35:23Speaker 04

  Um, and I, I think.

• 2:35:25David Sims?

  A lot of people who like are very involved in telling stories about the Holocaust hate this movie.

• 2:35:30Griffin Newman?

  Homeland didn't like this movie.

• 2:35:31David Sims?

  I'm aware.

• 2:35:32Griffin Newman?

  Homeland's been a bit of a grump, I will say. Sure. But I, I think, look, this is such a, a sensitive, complicated, uh, subject matter that I think anyone who has spent so much time digging in and trying to figure out the responsible way to depict it. Is going to then butt against what other people landed on.

• 2:35:49Speaker 04

  Yes, but I also, I think that what, and this isn't to take anything away from March Beagleman, who again, Mouse is a formative text for me, and he was the son directly of a Holocaust survivor.

• 2:36:00Griffin Newman?

  He also created garbage pail cans.

• 2:36:01Speaker 04

  He, I didn't know that. And also, but he did have a huge beef with Spielberg going into this movie because of American Tale, uh, which he thought was a ripoff. But, uh, he just felt like it was.

• 2:36:13David Sims?

  I mean, points were made. I mean.

• 2:36:15Griffin Newman?

  He's not.

• 2:36:15Speaker 04

  Listen, but we all also in this house, respect Fidel Moskowitz. Um, there's room in my heart for both. But yeah, he was just like, it's just too, I, I just think that they were, this isn't any, pointing against like too close to it.

• 2:36:27David Sims?

  I just looked it up. Sorry.

• 2:36:29Speaker 04

  He's going to be cast in the new Harry Potter, though. It's good for him.

• 2:36:31David Sims?

  Wait on Bill Maher. He said some shit I don't like.

• 2:36:33Griffin Newman?

  He's selling weird brain pills.

• 2:36:37Speaker 04

  Is he still out west? Did he ever come east?

• 2:36:40David Sims?

  Fidel, he went west, he never came back.

• 2:36:41Griffin Newman?

  He bought a compound in Austin, Texas. He's yoked now.

• 2:36:48David Sims?

  Well, there turns out there were cats in America, you know, streets were empty, which is.

• 2:36:52Speaker 04

  But I think that they didn't recognize the extent to which our conception, our generation's conception of history would be formed by popular culture, by movies, the role, like they would, they looked as a negative in Spielberg's and his power over the public consciousness and could have been a negative. I think they underestimated, one, the conversation this movie would create and two, just the good that it would do to have it on those terms.

• 2:37:16Griffin Newman?

  I agree. Now, this is what I, I think I'm trying to get at here, which is like the weird, I don't want to say double edged sword, but like that this film inspires a bunch of movies that are not as good, that do not hold up as well. Ones that were dead on arrival and ones that were lauded at the time and now feel kind of embarrassing, right? And then the conversation, how we talk about the Holocaust and art becomes a much headier, more intellectual thing, rather than like a mainstream conversation. We're getting far enough away from it. The survivors are dying. It is becoming abstracted. As you said, a lot of the like collective memory or notion of this is kind of in a language, a tone, a look that this film kind of codifies. For better or worse, obviously, you make a film about any large historical event.

• 2:38:01Griffin Newman?

  It should exist in a dialectic with all other works in that space, right? Like, I always find it frustrating when people critique a movie for being like, but it didn't touch on this, if it is not the first movie to ever cover that area, because the responsibility isn't to do all of it in one film. But this film has lasted in a way that others haven't, while also sort of getting flattened a little bit into like, a notion of it being a homework movie, which I don't think it is in practice if you're watching it, which then allows for in like decades since there has been any work that has touched on this in a way that actually reached this widely, we start to now be far enough away that we're losing sight of what is going on, which leads

• 2:38:44Griffin Newman?

  to a present moment where you have like, three or four different terrifying misinterpretations of what should we take away from the Holocaust that are happening on a colossal scale on our planet?

• 2:38:57Speaker 04

  But I do think like that, you know, that plays into the entertainment value of it, which I think the movie needs to be as compelling as it is for new generations to be able to see it and come in and, and recognize the urgency of what the movie's saying, whereas if it were totally, you know, in this rarefied space where we can't really talk about it, um, you know, we, we have to talk in hushed tones about the Holocaust, it becomes that much easier to allow something that is, uh, you know, perpetuating the same crimes, but in a different guise to happen again. And, you know, I, I have to say, uh, you know, we can get to the, I don't know if we were jumping out to the end of the movie, but it is now, the end of this movie crushes me. It always has. Um, you know, we can talk, well, we will talk, I'm sure.

• 2:39:37Griffin Newman?

  The sort of the epilogue?

• 2:39:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, I'm talking about the epilogue, you know, I, I was emotionally overcome the other night, as I always am, uh, by all of these people, by the collapse of history of the actors and the people they're playing.

• 2:39:48Griffin Newman?

  That is such an incredible touch.

• 2:39:50Speaker 04

  You know, putting the rose on, uh, Schindler's grave and whatnot on the stones, but, um, I, I think it has an extra dimension, a regrettably extra dimension of tragedy to me now in that Israel, you know, representing what Israel's become, which is like, you know, it's this point you see in the movie, we can't go east, they hate you. There you can't go west. You have to find a homeland of your own. And, you know, I, it, I think it's a dark irony in much the same way as like Jonathan Glazer's Academy Award speech called attention to about, um, you know, the subject matter of this own interest with people very normal about.

• 2:40:21Griffin Newman?

  Which does kind of prove the point. I feel like we're dancing around here where it's like for that movie to be so lauded by the Academy while being a very small movie in the grand scheme of things. And yet have that percentage of the people in the audience who had voted for the film, get angry at the speech where he is just stating what the movie is about.

• 2:40:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, but, but what like the never again of it all just doesn't hold water. When you see the, the end of Schindler's List and they're now in a country that is perpetuating similar crimes on another. And it's just, it, it, you know, it, it's the unbearable. It's the idea that this is going to happen and happen and happen throughout history. And why I think in this moment in particular, I find it more resonant rather than less that we're focusing on someone who is in power in the movie. You know, a character with agency who found some sort of moral center and awakening who used his capital for good. Because these are the people that we are most reliant upon right now.

• 2:41:16Griffin Newman?

  And these situations feel powerless.

• 2:41:18David Sims?

  We're like relying on or like being crushed by like, you know, sort of.

• 2:41:23Griffin Newman?

  I mean, the never again of it all is the thing I, I have been stewing on so much for the last, uh, whatever 18 months of our hellscape, right? In a larger 10 year hellscape and a larger centuries long hellscape. But, uh, there is this, um, sense of muddling of what this movie is, uh, not just this movie's about, but the sentiment that this movie is born out of. That I feel like is very similar, not to take too big of a swing here, but the kind of like perversion of the abstract idea of the teachings of Christ to then like alienate persecuted groups, right? You're saying that Christianity has participated in the oppression.

• 2:42:03Speaker 04

  This is the first I'm hearing about this, but I'm going to hear him out.

• 2:42:05Griffin Newman?

  I'm saying that like all of this shit keeps happening where we're like, great. I got it. You're giving me the one sentence. That's the thing I never forget. Right, never again. And then people lose sight of when they're like doing the thing again, when they are actually acting the exact opposite of the mantra that they have now abstracted into a way where it can be twisted to their own means, or just fucking lose sight of it.

• 2:42:28Speaker 04

  And while, you know, the ending of Schindler's List is obviously laudatory towards the existence of Israel in that sense, it is that, that, you know, threading the needle, collapsing the space, whatever you want to call it, between the past and the present, is something that's so instrumental to what this movie is doing. I think you need, that's why those bookends work so well, why we start in sort of this like, you know, liminal present state and then fade into the past, right? You know, I think it's saying that this is a part of our world, this cannot be separated or compartmentalized. And when we do that, we invite it to happen again. And I, you know, I-

• 2:43:00Griffin Newman?

  And the perversion of the never again doesn't mean we can't let this happen to the Jews ever again.

• 2:43:05Speaker 04

  Of course, no, of course not.

• 2:43:06Griffin Newman?

  There is a larger responsibility to make sure this doesn't happen in our world again. And that twisting has led to like such horrors.

• 2:43:14Speaker 04

  And I was afraid that, I hadn't really dug too much into it because I'm very clear on where I stand. And I don't know, I don't need to parse what certain celebrities have to say. But with Spielberg, it's different because in my mind, and maybe you can understand this, like Spielberg is sort of like the great Jew of my lifetime.

• 2:43:33Griffin Newman?

  He has become like a weird kind of cultural ambassador for Judaism.

• 2:43:36Speaker 04

  And I don't mean that morally. I just sort of mean that in his stature.

• 2:43:38David Sims?

  Like a very famous Jewish person who like, right, speaks on and, you know,

• 2:43:43Griffin Newman?

  And I think already was, but then this movie makes it like, okay, great. So he's like the prominent Jew in American pop culture.

• 2:43:49Speaker 04

  Right. And that pop culture was sort of my lingua franca, you know, my whole life. This is how I, this is where I wanted to interact with Jewishness. You know, it was always more interesting to me that Superman was Jewish than reading the fucking tall, you know, you don't read the Talmud, you know what I mean? But the, and so his comments in the wake of October 7th, I was always very afraid of what they might say. And I was reading them over last night and I just couldn't imagine someone who made Schindler's List would look at this and be like, would see it, you know, in the worst possible light. It's like totally disconnected from what had happened. And I, you know, maybe he said some things that I didn't see when, when searching the internet, but at best I could tell-

• 2:44:25David Sims?

  He really only made public comments.

• 2:44:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, he was saying, you know, as someone who then founded the show, uh, Institute, and is going to be asked to for comment on something like this. He made mention of the Palestinian people and was talking about, you know, their suffering in the same breath as lamenting the deaths of the Israelis on October 7th. And it seemed like, you know, he's not going to be the guy who is coming out with Free Palestine, you know, hashtag, but I would love that for him. That would really surpass my expectations.

• 2:44:54Griffin Newman?

  So incredibly impactful.

• 2:44:55David Sims?

  I don't know. I mean, he's obviously, you know, he's a fairly, I think, long been like a fairly sort of straightforwardly supportive of the state of Israel person.

• 2:45:04Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 2:45:05David Sims?

  Yes, I, he was not, he's not, I'm just saying, you know, like there's a certain sort of streak of celebrity who became, you know, very, very polemical in a way that was kind of disturbing. He certainly did.

• 2:45:18Speaker 04

  Sure, yeah, no, he's not, he's not.

• 2:45:21David Sims?

  Released kind of measured statements on the facts of like, you know.

• 2:45:25Speaker 04

  But I, I would have, rather than saying that like I, I, you know, I didn't have any realistic hope for him to be like a leading voice in this issue, but I would have been heartbroken had he come out and said something unequivocally in support of Israel.

• 2:45:36David Sims?

  The IDF rocks.

• 2:45:37Speaker 04

  Right.

• 2:45:38David Sims?

  Like love them. No, and he talked about like killing women and children in Gaza.

• 2:45:41Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:45:42David Sims?

  Well, you know, Jerry Seinfeld's like a really normal dude.

• 2:45:44Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:45:45David Sims?

  With normal behavior.

• 2:45:45Griffin Newman?

  But I, I mean, this is part of you.

• 2:45:49Speaker 04

  Great director, though, Unfrosted.

• 2:45:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:45:52Speaker 04

  Laughed for days.

• 2:45:53David Sims?

  I laughed a couple of times.

• 2:45:54Griffin Newman?

  That movie is well shot.

• 2:45:56David Sims?

  It's lensed, baby.

• 2:45:57Griffin Newman?

  It got a pulp.

• 2:45:58David Sims?

  I know, I know. I didn't mind Unfrosted.

• 2:46:01Griffin Newman?

  I didn't hate it.

• 2:46:02Speaker 04

  I mean, one of the great trials of my life was watching and reading about that movie, but teach their own.

• 2:46:08Griffin Newman?

  What I would like.

• 2:46:08David Sims?

  Top of 93 minutes. Yeah, okay. Go ahead.

• 2:46:12Griffin Newman?

  No, I, I think watching this movie in like 2003, right? When there were not as clear, like, sort of screamed, underlined parallels in the current situation of the world.

• 2:46:27David Sims?

  You're sitting there, you're thinking about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' recent triumph for the Super Bowl.

• 2:46:30Griffin Newman?

  That was top of my mind, 24/7 in 2003.

• 2:46:33David Sims?

  You're excited for the release of the return of the, I'm trying to think of 2003 stuff. Yep.

• 2:46:38Speaker 04

  Radiohead's on tour. You gotta catch him at MSG.

• 2:46:40David Sims?

  I saw Radiohead, that's the hell of a people.

• 2:46:41Speaker 04

  It sure was.

• 2:46:42David Sims?

  It was radicalized me that summer. They opened with the gloaming.

• 2:46:45Speaker 04

  Blowing live fucking rocks. Anyway.

• 2:46:47David Sims?

  Real loud.

• 2:46:48Griffin Newman?

  I'm trying to remember what I pointed with.

• 2:46:49David Sims?

  It's 2003. You're watching Schindler's List.

• 2:46:51Griffin Newman?

  Right. You know, this feeling that I think it sounds like all three of us had watching the film as young men being like, how the fuck does this happen? Like, looking to this movie for answers of, of how, how could such a thing happen? Cause I feel like if you are a Jewish child, a certain, a couple of generations away, like we were, you learn about this in a very large.

• 2:47:17David Sims?

  A hundred percent.

• 2:47:18Griffin Newman?

  Sort of like.

• 2:47:19David Sims?

  It's not like I was like, wait, what's this now?

• 2:47:21Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:47:21David Sims?

  I certainly, right, had been educated.

• 2:47:23Griffin Newman?

  And you start pulling at strings and going like, wait, what do you mean? How is that possible? Like, how much of the terror am I allowed to dig into at this point? Right? How do I understand the steps of something escalating to this kind of point? And you watch a movie like this and you're just like, how were there not like thousands of Oscar Schindlers? How were there not more people standing up and like objecting and all this sort of shit?

• 2:47:44David Sims?

  And then I think an amazing and sort of forgotten scene in the movies where he's talking to the other businessman, trying to get him on board. And the guy's like, I already did a lot. And you're kind of like, you haven't fucking done anything. Like, but to him, even the slightest, you know?

• 2:47:57Griffin Newman?

  If we're like policing, like, why hasn't Spielberg, like, taken more of a stance? Right? Why hasn't he used his power more, like deliberating all this stuff? This is my point. A lot of what I've struggled to deal with in the last year is like, I don't know if any of this fucking works anymore. Like, I don't know if any of this has any fucking impact anymore. It is like really kind of overwhelming to be like, there has been such a loud conversation going on for so long in what feels like kind of an immovable issue.

• 2:48:25Speaker 04

  As I do unfortunately think that it does, well, maybe not unfortunately, I don't know. I mean, I, the fallout of Jonathan Glazer's Oscar speech was really, uh, blew my mind.

• 2:48:35Griffin Newman?

  So sober and in a horrible way.

• 2:48:37David Sims?

  I felt for Glazer because I feel like he was incredibly nervous.

• 2:48:41Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:48:41David Sims?

  And.

• 2:48:42Speaker 04

  But it's also like, this is what the Griffin said.

• 2:48:44David Sims?

  I know. Fucking tell me.

• 2:48:47Speaker 04

  Sorry. Threw his wallet at me and I'm keeping it.

• 2:48:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, you're taking anything you want from that.

• 2:48:54David Sims?

  No, I threw my wallet at Earl because I already threw something else at him. Um, I know, but like, I felt like he, it's not like he bobbled the speech at all, but like you could felt, he was so nervous and the speech has kind of like a rhetorical in my memory, kind of like. You know, device to it, right? Where he's like, and like, people misinterpreted the language right away in in bad faith.

• 2:49:16Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 2:49:18David Sims?

  But I felt so frustrated because I was like, I know what he was trying to say, and I think you do too. And you're like, you know, putting a comma somewhere essentially to kind of make it work for you. And it was really infuriating.

• 2:49:31Griffin Newman?

  Let me throw this out.

• 2:49:32David Sims?

  Unlike like Michael Moore getting up there and yelling where I'm like, well, some people are just not going to enjoy Michael Moore yelling at them.

• 2:49:37Griffin Newman?

  And then Billy Crystal makes a joke about him being shoved in a trunk. Can people applaud?

• 2:49:40Speaker 04

  The cognitive dissonance to do this.

• 2:49:42David Sims?

  It was a pretty good joke.

• 2:49:43Speaker 04

  The cognitive dissonance to do this like blows my mind.

• 2:49:45Griffin Newman?

  Oh, you're right.

• 2:49:46Speaker 04

  But some people did watch Zone of Interest and did not pick up on any of that. They were just like, oh, wow, this is really about the Holocaust and they should have known.

• 2:49:54Griffin Newman?

  Right. This is why we have to make sure that Jewish people are never persecuted against again. That was their entire reading of the film.

• 2:50:01David Sims?

  I mean, maybe we should cut all this out of this episode.

• 2:50:03Griffin Newman?

  We have to keep it.

• 2:50:04David Sims?

  Be bad faith interpreted by people.

• 2:50:05Speaker 04

  Or triple it because I mean, we spent the last.

• 2:50:07David Sims?

  I really don't think we should triple it because that would really take a long time.

• 2:50:10Speaker 04

  Just put like a deep reverb on it that makes it sound like everything we said is heard three times. But I think that like, what we went through for the past, and I say this to someone who was writing about movies, writing about Zone of Interest, writing about other, you know, Holocaust and Israel adjacent movies on the internet.

• 2:50:23Griffin Newman?

  Avoided talking about these things.

• 2:50:25Speaker 04

  I have been very clear throated. I mean, I feel like I have mortally fortified as been on any subject that I've ever spoken about, about the enormity of the wrong that Israel is persecuted.

• 2:50:34David Sims?

  And people said I was wrong. People over here said I was wrong to book David.

• 2:50:38Griffin Newman?

  I said you were wrong. I said that you were framing it as he's desperate to come on and he was framing it as I'm being hounded by sins.

• 2:50:45David Sims?

  Well, he's always framing it that way.

• 2:50:47Griffin Newman?

  Continue your point, Mr. Early.

• 2:50:48Speaker 04

  No, it's just that like, there was a time and only, and this feels only slightly diminished recently, where to even name the crime that Israel has been perpetuating was verboten to really mix my German and modern politics. But like, it, you know, I would have to go through rounds of legalese to use the word genocide and make sure that I, you know, there were governing bodies in the world that I could link to, to back up my decision to use such a word. And I would be accused, I'm not going to name names or go into specifics, but like. There were heated incidents, some of which I definitely went out of my way to invite upon myself that, you know, whatever, but yeah, I know. But and some of which took me by surprise,

• 2:51:31Speaker 04

  where the language I was using was was policed and seen as being aggressive. And it did not feel safe for a person employed by anyone other than themselves or by a large company to even a Jew, the grandson of Holocaust survivors, to say that what was going on. And like, and I was like, I can speak to this issue more in a more full throated way than I can to almost any other of the world's great atrocities of my lifetime. And even so, was still getting blowback for it. And and and from mostly from other members ostensibly of my community. And that, you know,

• 2:52:08Speaker 04

  it's, it's, it really has, it's really soured me on a lot of different things over the last 18 months or so. It's been really painful to watch.

• 2:52:19Griffin Newman?

  Look, I think it is, it is an incredible microcosm through which to underline all of the kind of social evils of social media, of like, the actual damage it is wrecking upon, like, our brains and our society and all of that sort of shit. What, when I say, like, I don't know if any of this matters anymore, I'm working hard to not fall into a level of despondency that is, so why even bother doing any of it? But I think what I spin on is like, let's say Glazer had somehow done the impossible and like perfectly worded the speech in a way that no one could object.

• 2:52:56David Sims?

  Given some speech that everyone was like, wow, he's really throwing things into context.

• 2:52:59Griffin Newman?

  Within 30 seconds, people are doing jerk off motions going, oh, liberal Hollywood elites in their bubble. Because even the idea of that happening at the Oscars doesn't mean the same thing it used to mean anymore. You know, like, everything is so blown up and so, like, endlessly expansive in a way, and is so loud and just this constant pit of screaming.

• 2:53:17Speaker 04

  And of course, I think to someone like Glazer, and I sympathize with this greatly, it shouldn't be that controversial to say, hey, remember that, you know, people defining thing that they did to us less than 100 years ago? Maybe we shouldn't do something similar to that to someone else. Maybe we should actually learn from that and behave differently. I mean, it would seem to be

• 2:53:37Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:53:37Speaker 04

  A benign Statement, but whatever.

• 2:53:40Griffin Newman?

  It is part of the, in certain ways, it is a danger of the death of the monoculture, right? Of just people being like, well, I'm going to my own source. I'm existing in my own bubble. I'm looking at what my social media feed is and what I watch, which outlets I pay attention to and whatever. And in other ways, the scary part is like the control of those outlets in certain ways, you know, and the bends that things are taking. It's a fucking nightmare situation.

• 2:54:02Speaker 04

  At the Oscars where Stephen, you know, Stephen, Stephen, he and I are very close. He, Stevie, he says that, you know, he wants to accept this on behalf of the one billion people watching, on behalf of the six million who perished, is six million Jews in Poland. But like, oh, billion, I mean, really, you have the feeling watching the ceremony that really this was the center of the universe. And an annoyance.

• 2:54:23David Sims?

  I will say that, though. The Oscars always used to say that.

• 2:54:25Speaker 04

  Never true.

• 2:54:26David Sims?

  They were like, a billion people watched the Oscars. And you're like, no, they don't. What are you talking about?

• 2:54:29Speaker 04

  But the Jonathan Glazer speech was one of the few moments where it did suddenly feel like the Oscars were back at the center of the universe to some limited extent for

• 2:54:36David Sims?

  To some.

• 2:54:37Speaker 04

  A half second.

• 2:54:38David Sims?

  Well, it was also just one of those things where it was like, I wonder if he'll, like, you know, make a speech versus like going up there and being like, well, thank you. This film was hard to make and I'm glad.

• 2:54:48Speaker 04

  It's gonna be very interesting in like four days from when we're recording this to see if and hopefully when No Other Land wins best documentary.

• 2:54:55David Sims?

  That will be interesting.

• 2:54:56Speaker 04

  What?

• 2:54:57David Sims?

  I imagine it's going to win. It seems like.

• 2:54:59Speaker 04

  Which is so, I mean, it's so wild that Glazer's speech would trigger that reaction a year ago among so many people in Hollywood. Obviously, maybe not a majority, but enough. And then you would have that same body award such an outspoken, you know, film.

• 2:55:14David Sims?

  But that movie has the narrative of like, who made it? And look, we're getting very deep in the weeds. Have you guys, I've shouted this movie out before. I'm moving us to a slightly different tack here.

• 2:55:24Griffin Newman?

  By the way, you're never getting your wallet back.

• 2:55:26Speaker 04

  No, it's fine. No.

• 2:55:27David Sims?

  It's funny.

• 2:55:28Speaker 04

  He threw a wallet at a Jewish, it felt like an antisemitic attack.

• 2:55:31David Sims?

  It's because I love you so much.

• 2:55:34David Sims?

  Have you ever seen, I've shouted out before, the HBO TV movie directed by Frank Pearson, Conspiracy?

• 2:55:40Speaker 04

  No.

• 2:55:42David Sims?

  It was acclaimed at the time, won Emmys, like, you know, was not like a forgotten movie or anything, but it's a TV movie. I've seen it kind of a disturbing amount of times considering it's a movie about Nazis planning the final solution. It is incredible and I feel like it gets no recognition. When did it come out? 2001. It's called Conspiracy. It's called Conspiracy. It stars Kenneth Branagh. Oh, I remember this poster.

• 2:56:05Speaker 04

  Isn't there a scene in K Street where somebody goes to see Schindler's List?

• 2:56:10David Sims?

  I don't know. I can't answer that question for you and if I had my wallet. You remember this image?

• 2:56:15Speaker 04

  Oh, sure.

• 2:56:15David Sims?

  I feel like I saw this poster everywhere.

• 2:56:16David Sims?

  You saw a poster of, and it's-

• 2:56:23Speaker 05

  Bubba Wallace here from 2311 Racing. You know what's slower than a pace car? Waiting at the car wash. That's when I fire up Chumba Casino. It turns those slow minutes into fast fun. With new games every week, you'll never get bored. Next time you're stuck in the slow lane, speed up with Chumba. Play now at chumbocasino.com. Let's Chumba.

• 2:56:44Speaker 04

  Sponsored by Chumba Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW group void where prohibited by law. 21 plus. Terms and conditions apply.

• 2:56:54David Sims?

  Is that Conspiracy? K Street is an HBO show, yes? Okay, yes, okay. That's the Soderbergh. Yeah, it's about lobbyists. Weirdly, people were not that interested. I don't know why. Even though it's hard America's favorite TV star, James Carville?

• 2:57:07David Sims?

  The whole thing, it was a classic Soderbergh where he's like, well, what if I just like point cameras at lobbyists? HBO will be interested, right? Like, nobody fucking, anyway, I highly recommend it as a sort of flip side because it's an incredibly simple film. It's basically set at a big table. There's basically nothing to it. It's about the real Van Assi, I'm probably pronouncing that wrong, conference in 1942 where Heidrick, who was a high ranking Nazi at the time, basically like gathered a bunch of people and was like-

• 2:57:37Speaker 04

  The corner, not K Street, the corner.

• 2:57:40David Sims?

  What was the corner?

• 2:57:41Speaker 02

  Now we got.

• 2:57:41David Sims?

  The corner is David Simon's mini series.

• 2:57:43Speaker 04

  I was like, as soon as you did James Carville, I was like, there's no fucking way.

• 2:57:45David Sims?

  I wish so badly that I had the wallet back.

• 2:57:48Speaker 04

  Well.

• 2:57:49David Sims?

  Because now you deserve it to the dome.

• 2:57:50Speaker 04

  And you can't.

• 2:57:51David Sims?

  You only get one wallet. That's the problem. Um, you know, he gathers the high ranking Nazis and is like Hitler has ordered us to exterminate the Jews in like, you know, beyond what we've been doing in a, in a uniform way. And we're good. And we're here to figure out exactly how to do it. And it's amazingly acted because it's so procedural and like, it, there's nothing more chilling than watching people discuss this stuff as sort of a matter of fact, like, you know, just, and there are moments, obviously where like things get more, you know, bigoted and intense or whatever. And there's also moments where it's just like fucking German army, you know, big shots arguing, like having little turf wars with each other. It, it fucking rocks.

• 2:58:33Speaker 02

  I have a question about it. I'm interested. Does America get a shout out?

• 2:58:37David Sims?

  I- in conspiracy? Wait.

• 2:58:40Speaker 02

  Because of course it's been found.

• 2:58:42David Sims?

  Oh, then America like kind of knew what was going on. Oh, okay.

• 2:58:46Speaker 02

  No, it was found in, and I'm pretty sure it was during the, the specific meetings that you're shouting out, that they were looking to America in the way that we suppressed African Americans.

• 2:58:56David Sims?

  Yeah, I do think some of that.

• 2:58:58Speaker 02

  That they could then incorporate into what they were doing to the Jews.

• 2:59:02David Sims?

  Uh, I think they, they do briefly mention something like that. I can't remember, but I, I know what you're talking about.

• 2:59:09Speaker 04

  Species we have here.

• 2:59:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:11David Sims?

  Probably series of governments.

• 2:59:13Speaker 02

  Just a nice reminder.

• 2:59:14David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:59:16Speaker 02

  Sorry to.

• 2:59:17David Sims?

  No.

• 2:59:17Speaker 02

  Pylon bummer.

• 2:59:18David Sims?

  No, but it's, that's what's so interesting is that you watch, interesting, whatever, fascinating, disturbing, distressing, like you watch Schindler's List and you're 15 years old, you're David, me or Ehrlich, and you're like, I have so many questions. Or Ben.

• 2:59:32Speaker 04

  I would choose Sims.

• 2:59:33David Sims?

  Oh, get out of here. Come on. He must've been cool.

• 2:59:37Speaker 04

  Your, your entire audience, just give them the biggest laugh this whole episode.

• 2:59:40David Sims?

  Cutie pie. At least recently sent me a picture of you in college and we were both like, what a cutie pie he was.

• 2:59:48David Sims?

  You're watching and you're like, but how could this not just like happen? It's just like, you're telling me there was like, sort of, you know, what I'm talking about, like, like people writing things down and making plans. And being like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Use that railroad. That one's good. Like.

• 3:00:05Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Use Auschwitz.

• 3:00:07David Sims?

  Auschwitz is really good because it's kind of in the middle of nowhere. So no one will see what's going on. So they know they don't want anyone to see what's going. You know what I mean? Like all of those thoughts is just like, every time you think about like the thought process or the conversations people had, you're like, how did this, you know, continue? Like, how did like it not stop there or there?

• 3:00:24Speaker 04

  Something that I'll think allows Schindler's List to not spin into the maudlin or really get overly or any sentimental toward until the very end is, it's focused on bureaucracy from the start. I mean, this is a story about paperwork. The first line of the movie, other than the prayer in the prologue is someone being like name. And then you see them just taking down names. Throughout the paper, throughout the movie, it's all just a drama of, you know, trying not to create more paperwork or less paperwork. And everyone just, you know, and then of course the miracle of it all is solved by paperwork effectively at the end.

• 3:00:52Griffin Newman?

  It is interesting that.

• 3:00:53David Sims?

  Like that the most thrilling thing they do is Kingsley fucking burning up that typewriter. Like at the end.

• 3:00:59Griffin Newman?

  It is interesting that Amistad is so transparently him trying to make his Schindler's List for slavery. And the actual successful version is Lincoln, which once again takes the approach of bureaucracy. Where it's like, the way this gets settled is through like an absolute like king shit working of our fucked system.

• 3:01:17David Sims?

  But like, I think Amistad, he thought he had it too, where it's like, well, oh, what's interesting is they put on trial the notion of like, you know, were they allowed to do this? Like, were they allowed to overthrow their masters on this boat?

• 3:01:30Speaker 04

  I think this speaks to.

• 3:01:31David Sims?

  And, oh, sorry. Like he just thought like, oh, that's another way to get at that question, right? In like a non, and like, it's not like Amistad's a bad movie. I mean, we, we put out like 53 great minutes on it. You don't listen to any.

• 3:01:41Speaker 04

  And then a four hour episode. Maybe we should re-Amistad.

• 3:01:44Griffin Newman?

  Our ad reads are 53 minutes long now. Uh, I will say this, I mean, working on my like, uh, ultimate Spielberg ranking that we'll do at the end of this episode. I was just like, man, like 10 of these I need to re-watch.

• 3:01:58Speaker 04

  But I, I do think that.

• 3:02:00Griffin Newman?

  And Amistad is one of them where I'm like, I would like to watch it again. But I think Amistad does then rely on like magic movie stars giving the great monologues to sell it. Versus like the biggest Lincoln monologues in Lincoln happen behind closed doors for two people. And then the real action is him sending out like fucking, uh, you know.

• 3:02:20David Sims?

  Mater and Hawks.

• 3:02:22Griffin Newman?

  To like work it and massage it and all this for stuff in the same way as Schindler where it's like, you have to kind of just like wheel and deal to trick people into doing the right thing.

• 3:02:30Speaker 04

  He speaks to another one of the prevailing interests of Spoh's career, which is his fascination with how history is told. How it's written. Uh, and you see it even in a film like The Post, which I think is underrated from the one time that I saw it.

• 3:02:41Griffin Newman?

  Which he also knows that he is one of the people who now is writing history, that anything.

• 3:02:45Speaker 04

  Yes, there is that, that double, that twinned awareness, which I think, you know, he was a weirdo to some degree in Schindler's List and then his fame grew. I think it became even more pronounced, but like, you know, he is aware that he is Hollywoodizing everything he touches. And perverting the historical record to some degree.

• 3:03:01Griffin Newman?

  He's trying to do it responsibly rather than denying it.

• 3:03:03Speaker 04

  And I think, yeah, he has films have a very sort of textual emphasis on what the different, what it means to create history, to write these stories. Um, what the decisions are that go into that. And really the, the documents and the paperwork that form the lives of the people that they, they touch, you see it across history.

• 3:03:21David Sims?

  In Lincoln, what we're watching is the civil war is about to end. You know, they've essentially quote unquote, won and Lincoln is like, well, we still need to put, we need to write this shit down. Like we need to put in the constitution before the southern states rejoin, before like, you know, there's any, you know, no chance of it ever happening. And everyone around him is like, do we have to? You know, like it, it, we won, like it's fine.

• 3:03:45Griffin Newman?

  Take the W.

• 3:03:46David Sims?

  Right.

• 3:03:47Griffin Newman?

  Walk away.

• 3:03:47David Sims?

  You know, like, that's a lot of work. It's hard. You have to use all your political capital on this, like yada, yada, yada, right? And he's like, no, no, no, I understand that this is going to be pivotal. And the movie has hindsight, so it knows it's pivotal, but nonetheless.

• 3:03:59Griffin Newman?

  He also is like, I have theater tickets like six months from now, so we could get it done within that window. I want to be able to see a play and not have this on my mind. You've got six months.

• 3:04:09Speaker 04

  A little bit more paperwork would have saved him.

• 3:04:11David Sims?

  Um, in Schindler's List, what's so crazy is that. There's an awful thing happens in front of Oscar Schindler every five minutes and he's laughing it off. Now, he's trying to survive like Ben saying like and just sort of escape by or you know, right? Just like, hey, like, this is, this is the way it is. But like, he's in the middle of insanity. Like, where is he? An Amistad and Lincoln, it's kind of like, well, we know about the insanity, but we're over here in Washington and we're kind of like trying to untangle it, like.

• 3:04:42Griffin Newman?

  But this guy has been, right, unlike Lincoln, Schindler, let's also call out.

• 3:04:47Speaker 04

  Neeson could have.

• 3:04:48Griffin Newman?

  Neeson was supposed to be Lincoln, yeah.

• 3:04:50David Sims?

  Yes, he was.

• 3:04:50Griffin Newman?

  For like 10 years.

• 3:04:51David Sims?

  I know.

• 3:04:51Griffin Newman?

  Lincoln.

• 3:04:52David Sims?

  We talk about it on.

• 3:04:52Griffin Newman?

  I just want to say it in this episode. For like 10 years, Lincoln was Spielberg's Schindler Part Two, where he was like, I'm not yet ready, but I know I want to make it.

• 3:05:01David Sims?

  That man was a tall drink of water.

• 3:05:02Griffin Newman?

  That whole decade, it was Neeson supposed to do it. And then when he finally got the script and was like, Liam, I'm ready to go. Liam's like, I'm not the right guy. And it was.

• 3:05:10David Sims?

  I'm not the right guy.

• 3:05:11Griffin Newman?

  It was a correct decision. Like, it would have.

• 3:05:13Speaker 04

  Is anyone going to take Lincoln's daughter?

• 3:05:15David Sims?

  I have to shoot a whole movie in a parked car.

• 3:05:18Griffin Newman?

  I was so excited about the idea of Neeson playing Lincoln.

• 3:05:21David Sims?

  There was some Photoshop that went around. You probably remember it. Like, in those early days of the internet where like someone had Photoshop the beard on him. And it was like, this is gonna rock.

• 3:05:30Griffin Newman?

  It's gonna rock, right? But beyond the fact that it's just like, you're never gonna get a better performance than you got from, from Danny Day playing Lincoln. I also.

• 3:05:40Speaker 02

  I gotta say.

• 3:05:41Griffin Newman?

  I think.

• 3:05:41David Sims?

  Wait, your buddy Dan?

• 3:05:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:05:44David Sims?

  Big D?

• 3:05:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:05:45Griffin Newman?

  A, a Neeson Lincoln coming out one year after Taken.

• 3:05:50Speaker 04

  Would have been a swing. Would have been a real pivot.

• 3:05:52David Sims?

  It's fun to imagine.

• 3:05:53Griffin Newman?

  Look at the timing. It would have flipped people's brains.

• 3:05:55Speaker 04

  I am going all in on the hope that the Naked Gun remake this summer brings Neeson all the way around.

• 3:06:03David Sims?

  We all have our eggs in that basket, I would say. If you looked at the eggs in that basket, they have the Blank Check logo on them all over them.

• 3:06:11Griffin Newman?

  There's so many things at stake on that movie, which I'm just asking to be.

• 3:06:14Speaker 04

  The future of theatrical comedy.

• 3:06:16Griffin Newman?

  Silly and consistently funny.

• 3:06:17David Sims?

  Neeson not just making movies set in parked cars.

• 3:06:20Griffin Newman?

  I'm like, this, it potentially opens up the final, last golden phase of Neeson's career.

• 3:06:25David Sims?

  Cause like, the other movie he's making is called Cold Storage, and I don't know what it's about, but here's my guess. He's like shooting eight people.

• 3:06:31Griffin Newman?

  His fourth movie with cold in the title in the last four months.

• 3:06:35Speaker 04

  I do just wanna, you know, talking about Neeson in like a funny vein.

• 3:06:39Griffin Newman?

  He's got Cold Pursuit and like cold trucks.

• 3:06:41David Sims?

  Yeah, dude, he's the ice road, but yeah.

• 3:06:43Speaker 04

  The ice road fucking blows. Cold Pursuit is a really solid movie. That had the misfortune of being the movie that he was on the press.

• 3:06:50Griffin Newman?

  Disaster press.

• 3:06:52Speaker 04

  But.

• 3:06:52David Sims?

  And one more thing, Robin, and she's like, not one more thing, turn his mic off.

• 3:06:57David Sims?

  If I can add for the context.

• 3:06:58Speaker 04

  But there is, I mean, Liam Neeson's not in this sequence, although he precipitates it, but like, I do, every time I watch this movie, I'm blown away by what has to be the most darkly comic sequence in maybe all of the last thirty some odd years of American film.

• 3:07:13Griffin Newman?

  Until make it done in twenty twenty five.

• 3:07:15Speaker 04

  Of course, which is the I pardon you sequence in Schindler's List, where, you know, Schindler prevails on Gertrude to show mercy is his power, is not control, power is that we have the, you know, ability to kill these people and we don't. And then in what is, you know, uncomfortably a comic sequence, you know, I'm on pardons, it's the follows the rule of three, it's like an SNL skit, I mean, like he pardons one person and then another, and he's like working against his demons and looking at himself in the, in the men, in the window, in the mirror, rather, and then it ultimately.

• 3:07:46David Sims?

  Does the thing where he like moves his hair across his face, yeah.

• 3:07:49Speaker 04

  And he's sort of studying himself and then in, you know, typically Spielbergian fashion, the way the information comes out, I mean, he cannot commit to having any sort of redeeming qualities and ends up murdering Lechek. But it is a, I mean, again, when I think of the sequences that sort of define Schindler's List and are able to thread the needle between these very contrasting energies, having that sort of like gallows humor is an understatement, like the incredibly morbid humor here and making it like, you don't laugh when you're watching that, but it is inherently comic. It's not the day the clown cried, but like it's, it's funny in its way.

• 3:08:27David Sims?

  Can we watch that yet or you have to like go to West Virginia? You have to like go to Fort Knox?

• 3:08:30Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Here, here's like a thing in this movie that is so risky that I think pays off so beautifully, which is Schindler basically has no ideology, right? He is so defined.

• 3:08:45David Sims?

  That we can tell, apart from money talks.

• 3:08:47Griffin Newman?

  Right, but, but that's really.

• 3:08:48David Sims?

  It's sort of Chris Tucker's ideology.

• 3:08:49Griffin Newman?

  He is defined by this sort of sense of like, I haven't quite been able to make a business work. Right? Right. Like- I never will, really. I'm sort of a disappointment. My father thinks I'm kinda like a fuck up. Right. He's sort of the ultimate large adult son.

• 3:09:03Speaker 04

  Very large.

• 3:09:04Griffin Newman?

  I mean, he's good at fucking. He's good at fucking. He's like, good at charming people, but you're like, this guy is sort of like, kinda just a dilettante to a certain extent. Hundred percent. He's like, the kind of like grindset mindset, quote unquote, entrepreneur, who you're like, who does this guy, like- Pardon me? Okay, carry on. No, but I'm like, he is the-

• 3:09:25Speaker 04

  Schindler's tweets about this were fire.

• 3:09:27Griffin Newman?

  He is the version, he is like the LinkedIn lunatic of his time, in a certain way.

• 3:09:32Speaker 04

  He's all in on crypto.

• 3:09:33Griffin Newman?

  We're about to hit the three hour mark, and I can tell. It's getting good. The kind of- You know, you can tell, because I'm getting warm.

• 3:09:40Speaker 04

  We haven't even talked about the liquidation of the ghetto sequence, really, which is like, maybe the marquee sequence in Spielberg's career.

• 3:09:45Griffin Newman?

  It's really hard to talk about. To me, the most important scene in this film, or the scene I'm kind of most impressed by the dramatic execution of, because it's not a complicated sequence in terms of the moving pieces as a filmmaker, is the negotiation for Hirsch, right, with the notion of the game of 21. And that you're kind of surprised that Schindler is willing to put his neck out to try to overplay his hand to get this, right? He's had this moment of relation to her in the basement. When he's talking to her, a move that astounds me is that you can see, and a lot of this is Yana, and a lot of this is David's,

• 3:10:26Griffin Newman?

  uh, visible goosebumps on her skin as he's sort of circling her and trying to get his head around her, and then has that moment of the like, can I kiss you, but not in that way? Where you're starting to see these gears turning in this dude. Uh, and it's also coming after like, the negative response he got to the kiss upstairs and all that sort of shit. Then he goes to Kingsley.

• 3:10:47Speaker 04

  The kiss, the kiss where he kisses later than, he kisses the Jewish woman at the party, like, a sustained kiss on the lips is such an interesting moment, because there's no clear indication as to why he is doing it, and that you have to sort of-

• 3:11:02Griffin Newman?

  It speaks once again to his lack of ideology, which is just like, you know what I like doing? Kissing women.

• 3:11:06Speaker 04

  Yeah, but it's also-

• 3:11:06Griffin Newman?

  Why would I judge any set of lips as not worth kissing?

• 3:11:10Speaker 04

  My interpretation for that moment, where he's surrounded by Nazis who are looking at each other, being like, what the fuck? Knowing that he's breaking the law is at that point, it is sort of a fuck you. I think he's saying like, like-

• 3:11:20Griffin Newman?

  Interesting.

• 3:11:21Speaker 04

  I, I think it's a fuck you. I think he doesn't need to kiss that woman. It's kind of early in the film though. No, that, that when he gets arrested, that's towards the end.

• 3:11:27Griffin Newman?

  My, my read on the movie is like, he's sort of taken aback by their response. Where he's sort of like, you actually are this disgusted by these people? Like, he's sort of like, I thought this was sort of like, let's keep the trains running. Let's all like prosper and wealth kind of thing.

• 3:11:43Speaker 04

  That's really what he shows his cards when he's pouring water on the train car. And he's like, it's completely like that point, it's unambiguous.

• 3:11:49Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 3:11:49Speaker 04

  That he is trying to respect their humanity and the Nazis are just laughing at him.

• 3:11:53Griffin Newman?

  You get there, right? Him saying to King Lacy, like, leave one extra slot blank. You don't quite understand why he's doing it. Then it gets in the negotiation where he knows Fines is going to pick up on that. And makes the play to try to win her. Get Hirsch on the list. And Fines starts short circuiting, right? Like, this guy is so unequivocally evil, but in a way where he hates himself for being attracted to her. And keeps kind of like tying himself into knots where he's just like, if I want to fuck her, then I must be vermin too. And he's trying to square this circle. And Nissen knows that that's what he can do to make him shut down. Where it's like, challenge him on all of this.

• 3:12:34Speaker 04

  He can't push his, her, like, the value that she has to him because he will collapse.

• 3:12:39Griffin Newman?

  His overriding, like, biological, sort of like, drive towards this woman is being defeated by his notion of like country and what he represents. Which is the exact thing that Schindler lacks. That allows him to gradually go like, wait, this is just a fucking person.

• 3:12:55Speaker 04

  Right. Ideology would be. Any sort of ideology would be too confining for him to navigate the Holocaust the way that he does.

• 3:13:02Griffin Newman?

  And the more these people make money for him, the more he's like, well, I'm kind of endeared to these people. They've helped make me a millionaire. Why would I view them as less than? That's so like small minded to just like categorically group a, a, a whole like section of people as less. And you just watch like. Feins is doing these insane, quick turns as he's like pacing back and forth as Neeson is putting him through the paces, being like, "Yeah, but you're not gonna take her to Vienna. Let's be honest here. That's not possible." You know? There's another moment in the movie, I'm trying to remember where it is, but it's earlier, oh, it's in the conversation, the first conversation in The Wine Cellar with Helen, where Spielberg deliberately has a cut that fucks continuity, where he goes

• 3:13:47Griffin Newman?

  from one angle to a slightly different angle on a two-shot of both of them. And in the first one, Feins' hands were on his hips, and he cuts, continuous dialogue, and Feins' arms are straight down by his side. And it is such a perfect, like, for a movie that is so tight and is so controlled and so disciplined, most people would go like, "Fuck, you can't do that. That fucks with the austerity of the film." And Spielberg clearly was just like, "This is the best combination of performances. I don't fucking care. If that throws people off of the movie, then we have bigger problems," you know? But it's a similar thing of like this scene where Feins is just like, wanting to punch himself in the face for wanting to kiss her. That I think is such an interesting counterpoint to like, here's this guy who

• 3:14:32Griffin Newman?

  is so dogmatic in what he thinks he needs to do, and has certain psychological and biological drives that he cannot override that are tearing him up inside, versus Oscar Schindler being like, "Who fucking cares?"

• 3:14:43Speaker 04

  Well, it's one character who's at war with his humanity, what little of it is left, and another who is coming to embrace this humanity as the film goes on.

• 3:14:49Griffin Newman?

  Because as he's starting out, he's just sort of like, "I go wherever the money is. I don't care about anything."

• 3:14:54Speaker 04

  The advantage that Schindler has over Goethe is that he knows who Amun Goethe is, and the reverse is not true. And that grants him all the power.

• 3:15:03David Sims?

  Well, also, Amen, I'm, Amen, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, pronounce it, is not very capable of judging other people's emotions because he has clearly like a mental disorder, which he was diagnosed with by the Nazi party. When they finally kicked him out, he was so bad at his job, he was actually fired, which is so crazy to think about that they were like- You know, you're not producing enough work, I guess, you know, like, or he was stealing, you know, quote unquote, stealing money.

• 3:15:30Griffin Newman?

  The reveal of the naked woman lying in bed alone. And then you're like, what's she doing? And then cut to him on the balcony with the sniper rifle. And you're like, this guy doesn't want to fuck.

• 3:15:41David Sims?

  Well, that scene is, yeah, obviously very chilling. And also it's right how she's like, come on, you know, while he's doing this like unbearable psychotic thing.

• 3:15:51Griffin Newman?

  And he's like barely taking the time to put his suspenders back on. He's half naked. Right. Like the drive in this guy is so frightening.

• 3:15:59Speaker 04

  The kiss, just the one weird factoid about the kiss scene earlier was when he kisses the little girl before he kisses the older one on the lips. The woman who that character really is was on set that day and.

• 3:16:12Griffin Newman?

  Is it the end of the movie?

• 3:16:14Speaker 04

  Yeah. Yeah, and Nissen goes up to her.

• 3:16:16Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:16:16Speaker 04

  And kisses her dressed as Schindler in the same way as the real Schindler kissed her on the cheeks at that party. And it's just like, that for me sort of epitomizes how the production of this movie was sort of as much.

• 3:16:32Griffin Newman?

  And people could be playing Angry Birds.

• 3:16:34David Sims?

  I know. It's so crazy to imagine how many cell phones.

• 3:16:37Speaker 04

  I would have played so many games of Marvel.

• 3:16:38David Sims?

  What if it turns out like that Spielberg had like a big brick cellphone that he did play like Snake on?

• 3:16:43Griffin Newman?

  He was naked all the time.

• 3:16:44David Sims?

  And he's actually like completely zoning out the entire.

• 3:16:47Speaker 04

  I just need this for my sanity.

• 3:16:48Griffin Newman?

  There's two ways I'm getting through this. Nighttime riffs from Robin and Snake during the day.

• 3:16:52Speaker 04

  But the ghetto sequence is, um, you know, I think problematic for some because it's so electrifying. And I think, you know, watching it in a vacuum, if I was an alien coming to earth.

• 3:17:02Griffin Newman?

  Putting the fucking burying the jewelry in the bread.

• 3:17:05Speaker 04

  I mean, it's as electric as anything in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

• 3:17:09David Sims?

  It also just starts happening.

• 3:17:10Speaker 04

  I mean, it's, yeah, well, you've got a speech about how today is history and how he's going to make the history of Jews and Poland.

• 3:17:16Griffin Newman?

  But when that speech starts, you're like, holy shit, the movie's up to that point.

• 3:17:19David Sims?

  That's the thing.

• 3:17:20Griffin Newman?

  And it's happening this abruptly?

• 3:17:22David Sims?

  The time of this movie is kind of elastic. You don't again have the political background, you know, of the title, you know, you have some titles that come up occasionally to be like, okay, now this is what's going on. But you're not understanding the progression of the war. And you're not understanding later, I mean, like that much until you sort of realize like, oh, the war's kind of over. Like, or is whatever, Germany is now on its back foot versus.

• 3:17:46Griffin Newman?

  It, it. It's a much later film, but I was reminded in rewatching this of Tar, which I think similarly you're watching and you're like, I know where this movie is going. When's it going to happen? And it does the trick of being like, this has gotten further along in the background of the story that you're focused on than you realized.

• 3:18:05David Sims?

  Tar is so good at that where you're like, oh, are we about to methodically watch her get canceled? And then we've actually cut to like now it's actually.

• 3:18:11Griffin Newman?

  This has been like nine months of her trying to outrun it.

• 3:18:15Speaker 04

  But what do you guys think of the like the way that it's shot?

• 3:18:18Griffin Newman?

  Tar was the lady, I'm saying Lydia.

• 3:18:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, I don't know. The liquidation, the ghetto sequence, I think, is as I think sort of the fulcrum of where people think the movie is problematic meet where people think the movie is more successful. I don't know. It's just like, it's such an electrifyingly staged sequence, but it's also so horrifying in what it's depicting. And there's like the, the rush and suspense of people fleeing for their lives. At the same time, they're hurted. Are they going to escape? Can they hide? Who is making the right choices here? I mean, I don't, I don't really, I don't know. I'm throwing it open to the table. I don't really know how to.

• 3:18:54David Sims?

  I don't have a problem with this. I understand the academic, you know.

• 3:18:57Speaker 04

  I don't know. I mean, I don't have a problem.

• 3:18:59David Sims?

  Lanzman objection of like, right? Can you dramatize any of this? Can you put any mustard on it? As I would say.

• 3:19:06Speaker 04

  It's just such an incredible piece of filmmaking.

• 3:19:09David Sims?

  The thinnest spread of mustard. Yes, you absolutely can. The scene where the women, this is the scene that upsets me the most, realize their kids are on the trucks and start running. It's an incredibly devastating scene. It's also, once again, incredibly well staged by Spielberg. Like the, the shot of them all suddenly moving and like, you know, that means, it means you have an indelible memory of something that's like, you know, like you need to know and remember.

• 3:19:37Griffin Newman?

  For reminding me of a point I wanted to make is one of the most effective parts of this film to me. There are no cell phones. There were no cell phones on set during the making of this film, or at least let me say smartphones. No, a thought I had while watching this is as much as he is sort of like, I'm approaching this like a documentary, let the actors figure it out. I'll sort of like adjust around them. I'm not going to like push them into place. There are obviously larger blocking maneuvers that need to be worked out.

• 3:20:03Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 3:20:03Griffin Newman?

  And this is such an-

• 3:20:04Speaker 04

  Steven Spielberg?

• 3:20:05Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, he's not just like, hey, everyone run around. I'll figure it out. Yeah. This is such an incredible, like hundreds, thousands of extras movie in a way that is like textually important. And you'll have these Spielberg oners that like start with, you know, two characters talking in a train in the background and then it follows them off somewhere else. But you can tell that in the background now out of frame, there are still those hundreds of extras who are existing just outside the perimeters because there wasn't a cut. The camera just moved. They're not just running back off to their trailers or whatever, you know, the crafty table. And it is like a constant reminder

• 3:20:47Griffin Newman?

  of the, the sheer numbers of people who were involved in this on both sides. And when, when you see those masses of just like, right, as you're saying, the women running towards the train and they don't stop coming. And you're like, there's more of them. There's more of them. He hasn't run out. The resources to be able to like put that many people on set and to let them exist is the kind of like, every one of these people is equally important. Even if the scene is now focused on Liam Neeson's face, you're never forgetting that those people are right there.

• 3:21:18Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, there's a feeling that every character you see, both the Jews and the Nazis are sort of in their own movie over the course of this. And you feel that in the, in the liquidation sequence where I think things that might feel glib, like the Nazi playing Bach on the piano after somebody steps on and alerts them to their presence. I think that symphonic feeling of it, the, the triumph sort of over being played over the sorrow and the horror of what's happening, like people being executed summarily at point blank range, you know, in front of people who are sort of like giddily doing their job. I mean, I think it's, it's, it speaks to how well the movie and the energy the movie gets from the confluence of all these different energies that are

• 3:22:02Speaker 04

  happening at once where it was, it's never just the- Unimaginable horror of what's happening. Or it is, but the horror is compounded by the fact that so many other human emotions and experiences are happening at the same time.

• 3:22:16Griffin Newman?

  The shit that Spielberg has always been great at is like having exposition that sets Brody into action in Jaws, happening in the background of a oner while in the foreground, there's like a small like domestic comedy scene playing out with his wife and child, you know? This sort of like his capturing of energy of never letting a scene be only one thing.

• 3:22:40Griffin Newman?

  It is just like, yeah, the amount of sort of like parallel action he is able to stage in a way that isn't cancelling itself out is astonishing because it is part of what needs to be reckoned with of just like how much was going on at every single moment.

• 3:22:59Speaker 04

  Which is also what pressurizes the ending so much when all of this expansive, you know, far reaching energy collapses on this one moment of, of, you know, moral recognition. And like with this ring, I could have done more, you know, I could have saved more lives. I think it's, it's a real shift in the density of what we're seeing.

• 3:23:18Griffin Newman?

  There's the moment where they send the boy out and they're pointing the guns at him and you're like, fuck, I'm about to watch this kid get shot in the back of the head at point blank. And then it cuts to Kingsley walking, sort of just like trying not to rock the boat. And you're like, oh, I guess the kid survived. And then as the camera is following Kingsley, you see the dead kid line. Right. And it's just this sort of like, oh, at the exact moment that someone's surviving someone else has been like executed in a meaningless way. And the, the scene with the rabbi where they, they test him on the hinges, which let's just say another great thing about this movie, anytime they show you the way the operations work, the way the pot gets made, that shit is so good, but them like stop watching The Hinge.

• 3:24:02Griffin Newman?

  He feels like he's passed the test and then finds is like, well, but if you can make them that fast, then why are there only this many in the bucket? He's taken out, you're like, I'm about to watch another fucking horrible scene for a guy I've now fallen in love with in 30 seconds. And then the guns won't work, they're jamming up, they're going through multiple guns. It's sustained in the background, people are escaping, people are getting shot, you're focused in on this one thing. And then only after there've been like three false starts with the gun, does he say like, I hesitate to even bring this up, but the reason I didn't have to hinge, they had to reset the machinery or whatever, where you're understanding the psychology of this guy in this moment, who's like processing, I could die at any second.

• 3:24:42David Sims?

  Well, the way he flinches every time.

• 3:24:44Griffin Newman?

  Totally. But also that he's thinking like, should I even say this? If I start to speak to explain myself, do they shoot me even faster? Like, what is the thing that helps me survive this when the chaos of what's going on is so extreme and so all over the place and feels kind of randomized?

• 3:25:01Speaker 04

  I mean, the random is, I mean, we talked about it earlier, that like so many accounts of people who survived the Holocaust come down to weird flukes of luck.

• 3:25:08Griffin Newman?

  Or just literally, I stepped out of line and was like, if I step out of line, will anyone catch me? And they don't.

• 3:25:14David Sims?

  Amen would, oh, sorry, go ahead.

• 3:25:15Speaker 02

  I was gonna say the women, when they're pricking their fingers and trying to.

• 3:25:18David Sims?

  Rosing up their cheeks.

• 3:25:20Speaker 02

  To give themselves like.

• 3:25:21David Sims?

  To look more.

• 3:25:22Speaker 02

  More alive.

• 3:25:23David Sims?

  Good at working, essentially.

• 3:25:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, stronger, more healthy.

• 3:25:26David Sims?

  That's one of those details.

• 3:25:28Griffin Newman?

  The kid jumping in the toilet and you're like, I can't believe anyone had to do this. And then there are four other kids already in there.

• 3:25:34Speaker 04

  A lot of these details came from accounts that people only learned on set. I mean, like the idea of them eating the, putting the diamonds in bread and then swallowing them, that that was something that someone mentioned to him on set and he was like, we have to work this into the movie.

• 3:25:47Griffin Newman?

  It's also so fascinating as Schindler starts to like buy off German officers, things like the lighter and the bag of diamonds later, you know, and him having the breakdown of not selling the car or the pen or whatever. It's like he's selling them on the notion of like, we all know this is going to crash and burn at some point, which makes it all the more terrifying that people are just like, well, I'll just continue carrying. Buring out orders until the last possible moment. And then he knows the morality test of that final moment, inviting them into the warehouse. And being like, if you really care about this shit, fucking execute them right now. And everyone backs off.

• 3:26:25Speaker 04

  I mean, which is a big swing.

• 3:26:27Griffin Newman?

  It's a huge swing, but part of it is that like.

• 3:26:29Speaker 04

  Really gambling with a lot of lives there, but.

• 3:26:31Griffin Newman?

  What is this guy's like superpower at the end of the day? He actually really knows how to read people.

• 3:26:37David Sims?

  And he's brash and so much of this, right? Is like, put your money where your mouth is. And some people like Amon Go that are happy to be psychos all day. And others are just like, I'm just doing my job, you know, which their job is, you know, the world's most unimaginable evil, but right.

• 3:26:54Speaker 04

  I can understand why some people would, would be allergic to the end where he's saying, you know, he's breaking down and saying this ring, I could have done more.

• 3:27:00David Sims?

  Well, cause it's the most Hollywood moment.

• 3:27:01Speaker 04

  Right. But at the same time, I don't know what other catharsis you could have at the end of it.

• 3:27:06Griffin Newman?

  And there's also withheld emotions all. Yes, the entire film.

• 3:27:11David Sims?

  But it's also the first question I would have of him. Where I'm like, yeah, why didn't, you know, like, why did it end up being this many? And why did it take you this long to figure it out? Good for you figuring it out. Weird that more didn't, but it took you a while.

• 3:27:25Speaker 04

  And also the enormity of what Ben Kingsley says to him, which is that like generations, there'll be generations because of what you did. And you just think about my own life and like so many people.

• 3:27:32David Sims?

  But like, it feels like something a movie shouldn't do, which is have a character kind of be like, what you did is a big deal and will be a big deal. And Niston being like, are you sure? And he's like, yes, you know, like, it's like movies should, like historical movies about true stories shouldn't be that.

• 3:27:44Griffin Newman?

  Don't you think that is part of what helps that movie exist in a dialectic with other stories? Is that he doesn't present it as like, and this is how the Holocaust was won. This is how we solve the problem.

• 3:27:56David Sims?

  Sure.

• 3:27:56Griffin Newman?

  Like the movie then acknowledges like, this is kind of a drop in the bucket, isn't it? A deeply impactful drop.

• 3:28:02David Sims?

  Well, but it's like, then, right, that's why Shoah exists, right?

• 3:28:05Speaker 04

  I mean, the, the statistics are mind blowing. I mean, you see in the movie that there are more people alive because of Oscar Schindler than there are, there are Jews in Poland.

• 3:28:15Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it's right.

• 3:28:16David Sims?

  If you were Jewish, where'd you live in Poland?

• 3:28:19Speaker 04

  I've never, I've never done my real pain trip. I've been, you know, I've been back and forth on the idea for so long and that movie did not really move the needle for me one way or the other, but especially if Kieran Culkin's gonna come with me.

• 3:28:29David Sims?

  I liked that movie, but you know, like, like.

• 3:28:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, but I'm just saying, it didn't make me wanna go like buy my plane tickets to Poland and go on the history tour.

• 3:28:37Griffin Newman?

  I, I went once and did not do any of the historical things and felt a kind of profound connection to like, this is where my people are from without needing to really dig into all of that. Maybe I was also like the fucking 20 and afraid of like doing emotionally overwhelming things.

• 3:28:53Speaker 04

  What I like about that movie is it's him sort of narrativizing his own conversation, negotiation with, with the pain that he's inherited with other people's pain. To what degree is it healthy to take this on? To what degree do I need to create some space from it? And I know that if I were to go on that tour, maybe one day I will, I, like Jesse Eisenberg in real life and, you know, like his character in the movie, would be so in my own head about how I should be feeling in this moment and like the solemnity I should be expressing and internalizing and how wrong am I to have my thoughts wander about whatever while I'm here, that it would be sort of self-defeating. And hopefully I can reach a point where I could go more pure. But anyway.

• 3:29:32Griffin Newman?

  Hey, congratulations, guys. We just passed the runtime of Schindler's List.

• 3:29:35Speaker 04

  And we didn't even talk about John Williams.

• 3:29:37David Sims?

  You know what?

• 3:29:38Speaker 04

  What I think is the single most iconic film score ever written.

• 3:29:42David Sims?

  I think we did, I think we did a lot and especially because we need to do. Do the ranking. Yeah, I think we should.

• 3:29:47Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 3:29:48David Sims?

  I'm gonna challenge you on that though.

• 3:29:49Speaker 04

  I know. I mean, just the theme, just the theme. I meant to say theme.

• 3:29:51David Sims?

  It's a great theme. It is not.

• 3:29:53Speaker 04

  I mean, it's been stuck in my head on a nonstop loop for 30 years.

• 3:29:55Griffin Newman?

  Make the argument.

• 3:29:56David Sims?

  There are other more iconic.

• 3:29:57Speaker 04

  Oh, there, there are more iconic film scores.

• 3:29:59David Sims?

  John Williams' Schindler's List score.

• 3:30:00Speaker 04

  John Williams wrote more iconic film scores.

• 3:30:02David Sims?

  Exactly. He wrote like five more iconic.

• 3:30:05Speaker 04

  I meant to say most iconic film theme, just that one piece of music that doesn't pop up in full until 2 hours 51 minutes of the movie, has literally been in my head on a loop for over 30 years.

• 3:30:14David Sims?

  That's weird. Could go, be a doctor.

• 3:30:16Speaker 04

  I know, it is weird. I've seen several. None of them could figure it out, but it is.

• 3:30:20David Sims?

  It's a lovely theme.

• 3:30:20Speaker 04

  Powerful.

• 3:30:21David Sims?

  The part in the documentary though, where they're all like, the most beautiful thing he'd ever done and we all cried when we heard it and it's like, you know.

• 3:30:27Speaker 04

  Cosine.

• 3:30:28David Sims?

  And you're just kinda like. It would be funnier if they were saying that about his terminal score.

• 3:30:33Speaker 04

  Well, it's not funny.

• 3:30:34David Sims?

  You know, the movie's silly, but uh, like his terminal score, I just started hugging him and was moved to tears.

• 3:30:39Speaker 04

  All right, I got therapy in 25 minutes. Let's go.

• 3:30:41David Sims?

  We've been talking for so long.

• 3:30:43Griffin Newman?

  Did this movie win any Oscars?

• 3:30:45David Sims?

  This film won seven Academy Awards. I'm shocked it didn't win more, in a way.

• 3:30:49Speaker 04

  I could have won more.

• 3:30:51David Sims?

  No, I, I like that. I'm gonna be honest with you.

• 3:30:55Griffin Newman?

  That was good. Who wins best actor this year instead?

• 3:30:59David Sims?

  Tom Hanks wins for Philadelphia, uh, which I, you know, is a performance I like, but I would certainly, uh, give it to, of the five nominees, I would give it to Liam Neeson. I pers- I, who, and I think Neeson's just amazing.

• 3:31:12Griffin Newman?

  It's his second best performance.

• 3:31:13David Sims?

  I personally, yeah, behind Ted 2.

• 3:31:15Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 3:31:18Speaker 02

  I am allowed to buy this cereal.

• 3:31:20David Sims?

  Silly rabbit. Uh, I personally give it to David Thewlis for Naked, which is like, kind of like one of the most insane performances.

• 3:31:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's hard to argue.

• 3:31:26David Sims?

  Ever put on screen.

• 3:31:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:31:27David Sims?

  But you could give it.

• 3:31:28Speaker 04

  The Oscars used to have some real heavyweights.

• 3:31:30David Sims?

  Well, he was.

• 3:31:31Griffin Newman?

  Well, Thewlis was nominated.

• 3:31:33David Sims?

  But also that year, Anthony Hopkins is nominated for Remains of the Day, which is an amazing performance. Larry Fishburne for What's Love Got To Do With It. Like, they're amazing nominations. Anyway. Uh, you know, the weirder thing is that it loses supporting actor, sure, like, we said, but like, I'm kind of surprised that it lost, you know, like, makeup or whatever.

• 3:31:50Griffin Newman?

  What won makeup?

• 3:31:51David Sims?

  Hello?

• 3:31:53Griffin Newman?

  Well, well.

• 3:31:54David Sims?

  I guess you can't argue with Matt Hemdopire.

• 3:31:57Speaker 02

  I, I think that my assessment of the movie being quotable is right.

• 3:32:01David Sims?

  Hello?

• 3:32:02Speaker 04

  Miss Delfire Schindler's List. I think they're both quotable in their own ways.

• 3:32:05David Sims?

  Both, yeah, for sure.

• 3:32:06Griffin Newman?

  I think you have helped make hello a quote in a way that solidifies your argument.

• 3:32:14Griffin Newman?

  So wait, it wins picture director.

• 3:32:16David Sims?

  Correct.

• 3:32:16Griffin Newman?

  Score, screenplay.

• 3:32:18David Sims?

  Yes.

• 3:32:18Griffin Newman?

  Cinematography?

• 3:32:19David Sims?

  Yes.

• 3:32:19Griffin Newman?

  Editing?

• 3:32:20David Sims?

  Yes.

• 3:32:21Griffin Newman?

  So that's six. What's the one I'm forgetting? Does it win production design?

• 3:32:24David Sims?

  Uh, let's see. Uh, obvi- no, it lost costumes to, I think, Remains of the Day, which, you know, great costumes, beautiful costumes. No, sorry, it lost costumes to The Age of Innocence, but it did win indeed art direction.

• 3:32:37Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 3:32:37David Sims?

  Productions.

• 3:32:38Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:32:38David Sims?

  And of course, Jurassic Park that year also wins three Oscars or whatever. It's a, you know, it's a hot year for old Steve.

• 3:32:43Griffin Newman?

  Wins sound and visual effects and?

• 3:32:45David Sims?

  Yeah, wins both sounds and visual effects. Uh, Jurassic Park, in my opinion, also a good movie.

• 3:32:53David Sims?

  Uh, the film opens, well, it's not an opening, it's opening number 14 because it opened in limited release, but it did make close to a hundred million dollars, as you said, Griff 96.

• 3:33:01Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:33:02David Sims?

  More importantly, 322 worldwide, it was kind of a global hit, I think, in a way that Spielberg might not have predicted.

• 3:33:08Griffin Newman?

  Even though it was banned in about 10 countries?

• 3:33:10David Sims?

  Oh, titties. No, I don't know why it was banned for, I assume for incredibly antisemitic reasons.

• 3:33:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, but they, they would, in some countries, I believe it was the Philippines, they over-

• 3:33:19David Sims?

  I think it's Indonesia.

• 3:33:20Speaker 04

  Indonesia, they overruled the ban.

• 3:33:23Griffin Newman?

  Oh, sure.

• 3:33:25Speaker 04

  And in some countries, they didn't.

• 3:33:26Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:33:26David Sims?

  Oh, it's banned in Indonesia because it's sympathetic to the Jewish cause. Hmm. Doesn't seem like a great reason to me, I'll say.

• 3:33:33Griffin Newman?

  Look, we live in a very complicated world.

• 3:33:35David Sims?

  So, uh, it, uh, one Spielberg, his Oscar, his long desired Oscar, of course, um, he looks great at the ceremony, hair's kind of long, gives lovely speeches, but speeches that are very much like, I'm indebted to, you know, it's like, he can't just get up there and be like, take that fuckers, Spielberg's on top, you know, which would be interesting if he'd done that.

• 3:33:58Griffin Newman?

  Which it's interesting to think that this is also the Philadelphia year where Hanks gives the famous, like, president of Hollywood speech.

• 3:34:03David Sims?

  It's definitely a bit of a self-important.

• 3:34:05Griffin Newman?

  This, this is a real, the Oscars are telling you, yeah.

• 3:34:08David Sims?

  Yes.

• 3:34:09Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it is. This is like peak, serious speeches of like, it's not about me, it's about the, the story. Um, yeah. And to think that it's like Spielberg wins all these Oscars, presumably like, goes out, parties, wakes up the next morning and then has to review story reels for Freakazoid?

• 3:34:28David Sims?

  It is funny.

• 3:34:29Speaker 04

  You think they made him do that at 8 a.m. Monday morning?

• 3:34:31Griffin Newman?

  I think he did it. He, I don't want to disrespect Freakazoid and his struggle.

• 3:34:35David Sims?

  It opens number 14.

• 3:34:36Griffin Newman?

  It is funny what?

• 3:34:38David Sims?

  Oh, just to imagine him, uh-

• 3:34:39Griffin Newman?

  Just how many plates he had spinning at this time, even if he doesn't make a move for four years.

• 3:34:42David Sims?

  So it's the Warner Brothers, but the Warner sister dot is there as well. He's like, uh huh, will there be a pigeon sort of Goodfellas thing happening in this?

• 3:34:49Griffin Newman?

  Old lady squirrel.

• 3:34:53David Sims?

  God, everything I learned about The Godfather initially came through good feathers.

• 3:35:00David Sims?

  December 17th, 1993, Griffin. So it's opening in limited release. Number one at the box office. It's a fun movie. It's based on a bestseller, a legal bestseller.

• 3:35:09Griffin Newman?

  Is it Pelican Brief?

• 3:35:10David Sims?

  It's Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts in The Pelican.

• 3:35:12Griffin Newman?

  The Pelican Brief.

• 3:35:13David Sims?

  One of those movies that has sort of gotten reclaimed because I think it kind of slipped through the cracks.

• 3:35:19Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:35:20David Sims?

  If that makes sense.

• 3:35:21Griffin Newman?

  Well, it was a hit.

• 3:35:22David Sims?

  It was a hit and the people kind of forgot about it.

• 3:35:24Griffin Newman?

  Right. Who usually was a little more serious minded.

• 3:35:27David Sims?

  It's him and his dotage a little bit. Famously, Roberts and Denzel don't kiss.

• 3:35:32Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 3:35:33David Sims?

  Right? Like, there's a little bit of Hollywood cowardice there.

• 3:35:36Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 3:35:36David Sims?

  Anyway, Pelican Brief, opening to a solid $16 million on its way to a very solid hundred. I don't know. It's a fun movie.

• 3:35:43Griffin Newman?

  It's a good movie.

• 3:35:44David Sims?

  It's a little long.

• 3:35:44Griffin Newman?

  I like it a lot.

• 3:35:45David Sims?

  Yeah, it's fun.

• 3:35:45Griffin Newman?

  It's Pelican long. It's not that brief.

• 3:35:48David Sims?

  Yeah, Pelican kind of long.

• 3:35:49Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:35:50Speaker 04

  I just canceled my therapy session.

• 3:35:51Griffin Newman?

  Did you really?

• 3:35:52Speaker 04

  Not, yeah, I mean, this is more important.

• 3:35:53David Sims?

  You can get out of here.

• 3:35:54Griffin Newman?

  We can breathe in.

• 3:35:54Speaker 04

  No, no, no.

• 3:35:55David Sims?

  Well, he already did.

• 3:35:56Speaker 04

  The people, the people need to know where on my Spielberg list Kingdom of the Crystal Skull falls.

• 3:36:00Griffin Newman?

  Three days ago, Ehrlich was like, no matter what, you have to promise me I make it out of here for the therapy session.

• 3:36:06Speaker 04

  But you know what? Griffin wasn't even that late. You were like five minutes late.

• 3:36:09Griffin Newman?

  Thank you.

• 3:36:09Speaker 04

  That's really not making or breaking this right now.

• 3:36:11Griffin Newman?

  Let the record show. I was not.

• 3:36:14David Sims?

  Mrs. Doubtfire is number two.

• 3:36:15Griffin Newman?

  I think I was 10. I was the exact midpoint between the two numbers you guys guessed.

• 3:36:18David Sims?

  I just said what number two was. Hello?

• 3:36:20Griffin Newman?

  Hello?

• 3:36:22David Sims?

  Mr. Duffer crushing it. Number three, it's a comedy sequel.

• 3:36:26Griffin Newman?

  It's a comedy sequel. David's eating a fucking ring pot gummy worm. What the fuck?

• 3:36:30David Sims?

  It's like licorice.

• 3:36:31Griffin Newman?

  Great. It's great for my home alone.

• 3:36:33David Sims?

  In my opinion, good guess, but no, not a good movie. In fact, here's what's crazy. The next three movies are all comedy sequels.

• 3:36:38Griffin Newman?

  Wow.

• 3:36:39David Sims?

  Possibly a bad idea to have these all come out.

• 3:36:40Griffin Newman?

  Is it Wayne's World 2?

• 3:36:42David Sims?

  This one is Wayne's World 2.

• 3:36:43Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, they rushed it.

• 3:36:44David Sims?

  A bad movie.

• 3:36:45Speaker 04

  I was gonna say that would have to be 94, but I guess.

• 3:36:47Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, but you know, they finally have explained what happened with that movie. That Mike Myers wrote an entire sequel. He was like, I want to, I have, I want to take inspiration from Passport to Pimlico.

• 3:36:57David Sims?

  Pimlico.

• 3:36:57Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 3:36:58David Sims?

  A very funny Eli Brothers movie.

• 3:37:00Griffin Newman?

  And it's a movie about Wayne starting his own country. And Paramount was like, great, we love it. And he wrote the script and they put it into like active pre-production. And then like two weeks before filming, they were like, we fucked up. We didn't get the rights for that movie.

• 3:37:12David Sims?

  And I forgot about this. I've read this article that you like.

• 3:37:16Griffin Newman?

  They made him rewrite the movie from scratch.

• 3:37:17David Sims?

  Beyond that, they had to like dynamite the sets.

• 3:37:20Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 3:37:20David Sims?

  No, what's weird about Wayne's World 2 is that, right, the rewrite is, should we just kind of like parody The Doors? And you're like, uh, should we?

• 3:37:27Griffin Newman?

  But that feels like a we have two weeks to go concept. And the one thing they knew was that they had to build to the concert because they had built the stage for the performance.

• 3:37:34Speaker 04

  Seeing that movie in theaters as a nine year old who had never even heard of The Doors was confusing.

• 3:37:39Griffin Newman?

  There's funny stuff in it, but one is a Stone Cold Masterpiece.

• 3:37:43David Sims?

  You know, there's funny stuff in it, but one is, one is so good.

• 3:37:46Griffin Newman?

  One is perfect.

• 3:37:47David Sims?

  Do it on this show?

• 3:37:50Griffin Newman?

  Can I make a pitch?

• 3:37:51David Sims?

  Cause I know we thought about Sphyrus, but like she's got a really long, complicated.

• 3:37:54Griffin Newman?

  You know how we folded, um, uh, Love Guru into Austin Powers?

• 3:37:58David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 3:37:59Griffin Newman?

  I think we fold Axe Murderer into Wayne's World. Do those three.

• 3:38:03David Sims?

  So do another Myers trilogy?

• 3:38:05Griffin Newman?

  I'm not saying we do it immediately, but I'm saying I want to pin it on the board as an idea.

• 3:38:09David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 3:38:09Griffin Newman?

  Cause then we basically covered all the Myers auteur films.

• 3:38:13Speaker 04

  You guys have to do Axe Murderer one way or another.

• 3:38:16Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:38:16Speaker 04

  It's too important.

• 3:38:16Griffin Newman?

  I think Cat in the Bat, Cat in the Hat's its own fucking thing. Shrek's its own thing. The ones that he is the driving force is the three powers, the two Wayne's Worlds and Axe Murderer. That's it. It's six. So I'm like, we could.

• 3:38:29David Sims?

  We do important work here. We do important work here. It's three hours, 30 minutes. Number two.

• 3:38:33Speaker 04

  There actually is a clock above my head. I'm just noticing that.

• 3:38:36David Sims?

  Yeah. It's, it's just sort of like the, anyway, uh, number four, it's another sequel. It's new this week. Uh, family movie about a pet.

• 3:38:44Griffin Newman?

  Oh, it's Beethoven second?

• 3:38:46David Sims?

  That's right.

• 3:38:46Griffin Newman?

  Is that the funniest title of all time?

• 3:38:48David Sims?

  I mean, it's a good title.

• 3:38:49Griffin Newman?

  It's up there.

• 3:38:50David Sims?

  In my memory, they, uh, they, they left work for the day after coming up with the title.

• 3:38:55Speaker 04

  I mean, Sister Act 2 Back in the Habit.

• 3:38:57Griffin Newman?

  It's very good.

• 3:38:58Speaker 04

  Up there as well.

• 3:38:59David Sims?

  Well, you've just guessed number five, my friend.

• 3:39:01Speaker 04

  I figured I was in the neighborhood.

• 3:39:03Griffin Newman?

  That and Wayne's World are both like, we got a sequel out in under a year.

• 3:39:07David Sims?

  But it feels like a mistake. Like don't rush it and then don't have them all up against each other. Sister Act 2 is the one of those three movies where I'm like, that movie's not bad. That movie has juice.

• 3:39:16Griffin Newman?

  The Great Bill Duke.

• 3:39:17David Sims?

  The Great Bill Duke, The Great Lauryn Hill. Like, you know, there's stuff going on in Sister Act 2. Beethoven second, I'm pretty sure they were just like, I don't know, there'll be a girl Beethoven too. Great. Can we go?

• 3:39:26Griffin Newman?

  Can I make? The case for Beethoven's second as a perfect title.

• 3:39:31David Sims?

  No, we already agreed with you. This isn't something you need to argue about.

• 3:39:35Griffin Newman?

  I don't think they greenlit Beethoven one being like, and obviously it's a franchise. And then later we can play on the great works of Beethoven.

• 3:39:41David Sims?

  I remember my dad trying to explain it to me.

• 3:39:44Griffin Newman?

  I have the same memory. I remember your dad trying to.

• 3:39:47David Sims?

  Seriously, where I was like, why isn't it called Beethoven two? And he's like, well, so symphony writing, you know, it was a pain in the ass to explain it to a seven year old.

• 3:39:55Griffin Newman?

  Imagine the moment where they were like, wow, I'm checking the books here. Pretty good return investment Beethoven. Should we maybe do a Beethoven sequel? And then some guy stands up from behind his desk at Universal. It's like, sorry, I know it's only my second day at the job.

• 3:40:09Speaker 04

  This is the role that you would have played.

• 3:40:10Griffin Newman?

  Or I'd remiss if I didn't point out, there's an incredible opportunity here.

• 3:40:14Speaker 04

  People in Hollywood do not understand or care about how much of a pain in the ass it is for parents to explain things to their kids. Like when fucking six minutes into The Incredibles, you have to explain to your kid how insurance companies work. Brad Bird is not spending a thought about this.

• 3:40:29David Sims?

  My whole problem with.

• 3:40:30Griffin Newman?

  Mr. Sanswe didn't ask to be saved. Mr. Sanswe didn't want to be saved.

• 3:40:34Speaker 04

  I mean, I put in Cars, I finally gave into Cars in the mistaken thinking that this one would at least explain itself.

• 3:40:40David Sims?

  No, Cars is the most archaic. We have to explain endorsements.

• 3:40:43Griffin Newman?

  Or like, you thought Cars is the one that would explain itself?

• 3:40:47David Sims?

  Cars is in, like Cars, the world's greatest minds, like fucking Zizek is like still like watching Cars being like, I don't know.

• 3:40:54Griffin Newman?

  Where is the brain?

• 3:40:55Speaker 04

  I didn't think that my kid would get to be like, wait, so they fly on other vehicles who are also sent in?

• 3:41:02Griffin Newman?

  They go inside Sidley, the spy jet's butt and they have a conversation with him inside of him.

• 3:41:07David Sims?

  Also in the top 10, you've got.

• 3:41:08Griffin Newman?

  He has a vehicle location and a character.

• 3:41:10David Sims?

  You've got Toronto, more an American legend, Walter Hill film. You've got A Perfect World, great film. You've got The Three Musketeers, lots of fun, saw in theaters. You have Addams Family Values, ditto. And you've got a all little masterpiece called The Piano, A Pianer. Now, Steven Spielberg Griffin has made, by my count, 34 films. If you include Jule.

• 3:41:30Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 3:41:31David Sims?

  Uh, so yeah, give me your top 34 for Steven Spielberg.

• 3:41:35Griffin Newman?

  I'm just gonna.

• 3:41:36David Sims?

  We're doing it all the.

• 3:41:37Griffin Newman?

  Yes, that's what we talked about.

• 3:41:39David Sims?

  Here he goes.

• 3:41:40Speaker 04

  I prepared and I have a list.

• 3:41:42Griffin Newman?

  Yep. Okay. I'm just going to try to do this fast. And some of it I bump on when I say it, but I'm just locking in the order I have right here. Okay. And I'm shooting from the hip. 34. Look.

• 3:41:53Griffin Newman?

  Thirty-three, 1941, thirty-two Terminal, thirty-one, the BFG, thirty, Ready Player One, twenty-nine Warhorse, twenty-eight Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, twenty-seven, I don't like that movie, twenty-seven Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Hmm. Come at me, bro. Twenty-six, The Lost World, Jurassic Park, twenty-five, Always That High, basically on the strength of Holly Hunter alone, twenty-four, The Color Purple, twenty-three, The Post, twenty-two, Amistad. We're now in a territory where every movie is basically incredibly good at best, at worst, right? Twenty-one, More the Worlds, twenty, Munich, nineteen, West Side Story, eighteen, Minority Report, seventeen, Sugarland Express, sixteen, Duel,

• 3:42:37Griffin Newman?

  fifteen, Tintin, fourteen, Lincoln, thirteen, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, twelve, Jurassic Park, eleven, Jaws, ten, Fableman's, nine, Raiders of the Lost Ark, eight, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, seven, Saving Private Ryan, six, Bridge of Spies, Face the Bridge, five, the biggest jump up for me in doing this series, Empire of the Sun, number four, Catch Me If You Can, number three, Schindler's List, number two, AI, Artificial Intelligence, number one, ET, the Extraterrestrial. I'm surprised you have Ryan so high. I wouldn't have thought that. Look, it's a film I find very difficult to watch. I think it is just kind of undeniable

• 3:43:21Griffin Newman?

  in terms of craft. I mean, that's one where maybe I'm like, do I, do I flip Close Encounters? You do what you want. You did what you did. That's what I listed. Great. Uh, Ehrlich, you did this?

• 3:43:32Speaker 04

  I did this on the fly.

• 3:43:33Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 3:43:33Speaker 04

  Uh, I already have great issue with my picks, but I did thirty-four, BFG, thirty-three, Always, thirty-two, Warhorse, thirty-one, Ready Player One, should have been Lawyer, thirty, 1941, twenty-nine, movie I skipped school to go see at eleven in the morning, the day it came out, uh, has not aged well, or was good at the time, The Lost World. Uh, number twenty-eight, The Terminal, number twenty-seven, Amistad, number twenty-six, Sugarland Express, twenty-five, Duel, twenty-four, Hook, twenty-

• 3:44:00Griffin Newman?

  That's high for Hook.

• 3:44:02Speaker 04

  Lincoln, twenty-two, The Color Purple, twenty-one-

• 3:44:05Griffin Newman?

  Twenty-three, Lincoln?

• 3:44:06Speaker 04

  I said what I said.

• 3:44:07Griffin Newman?

  Where's my wallet?

• 3:44:08Speaker 04

  Can't have a bad.

• 3:44:09Griffin Newman?

  Twenty-four, Hook.

• 3:44:10Speaker 04

  Um, twenty-one, I need to see Lincoln again, but uh, it is not, I don't know, never really did much for me. Twenty-one, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Twenty, West Side Story. Nineteen, The Post. Eighteen, Empire of the Sun. Seventeen, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

• 3:44:24Griffin Newman?

  I mean, the most Ehrlich move of all time.

• 3:44:25Speaker 04

  Number sixteen, Minority Report. Number fifteen, Tom Hanks has a cold in The Bridge of Spies. Number fourteen, Ace's next favorite movie, The Adventures of Tintin. Should still be a sequel, holding out hope. Number thirteen, Indiana Jones, uh, I think just Indiana Jones. The way you call it, the Raiders of the Lost Ark. No, we don't. We call this.

• 3:44:43Griffin Newman?

  You do. You call it Raiders of the Lost Ark.

• 3:44:43Speaker 04

  Nope, we don't. We call this The Last Crusade. Number twelve, War of the Worlds. Number eleven, Sammy Fabelman and the Fabelmans. Number ten, Saving Private Ryan. Number ninety-eight, Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Number seven, another movie that would have complicated my relationship, is Spielberg vs Munich. You know what I'm talking about, that in context, too. Number six, Raiders of the Lost Ark. Number five, Jaws. Number four, a masterpiece called Catch Me If You Can. Number three, Jurassic Park. Number two, Schindler's List. And number one, AI, artificial intelligence.

• 3:45:13David Sims?

  Okay, you guys ready for a third one of those? Number thirty-four.

• 3:45:16Griffin Newman?

  I'm now like, do I put Schind, do I put Saving Private Ryan, do I flip Saving Private Ryan and Jaws? I don't know, go on.

• 3:45:22David Sims?

  Number thirty-four, nineteen forty-one. Number thirty-three, The Terminal. Number thirty-two, Always. Number thirty-one, Hook. Number thirty, The BFG. We're exiting bad movies, too. Okay movies.

• 3:45:31Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I, that's like his only bad tier to me.

• 3:45:32David Sims?

  Right. Number twenty-nine, Lost World. Number twenty-eight, War Horse. Number seventy-seven, Crystal Skull.

• 3:45:37Griffin Newman?

  These are bad adjacent.

• 3:45:38David Sims?

  Right. Yeah. Number twenty-six, Amistad. Number twenty-five, Temple of Doom. Number twenty-four, Color Purple. Okay, now we're getting into good movies. Number twenty-three, Sugarland Express. Number twenty-two, Duel. Number twenty-one, Empire of the Sun. I might put that up higher on rewatch, but whatever. Number twenty, not that high. Number twenty, The Post. Number nineteen, Tintin. Number eighteen, Last Crusade. Number seventeen, Ready Player One. Number sixteen, Munich. Number fifteen, War of the Worlds. Now we're in I fucking love this movie territory. Number fourteen, Catch Me If You Can. Number thirteen, Bridge of Spies. Number twelve, West Side Stories. Number eleven, Cuck Brigade. Number ten.

• 3:46:17Griffin Newman?

  You're calling it?

• 3:46:18David Sims?

  Rogan's Cuck Brigade. Number ten, uh, Lincoln. Number nine, Close Encounters. Number eight, Saving Private Ryan. Number six, uh, seven, Jurassic Park. Number six, Raiders. Number five, Jaws. Four, Schindler's. Three, Colin Farrell Kiss Me. Number two, E.T. Number one, AI, artificial intelligence.

• 3:46:33Speaker 04

  Colin Farrell Kiss You is number three?

• 3:46:34David Sims?

  Yeah, Minority Report. That's one of the best movies ever made.

• 3:46:37Griffin Newman?

  I'm officially flipping Saving Private Ryan and Jaws in the order.

• 3:46:40David Sims?

  Take note, people who listen to that drivel.

• 3:46:42Griffin Newman?

  Otherwise staying the same.

• 3:46:44David Sims?

  But yes, I think it's interesting that we all have AI right near the top. I think it's interesting that you fools don't understand Ready Player One is good. I don't think it's that interesting.

• 3:46:53Griffin Newman?

  Look, I bought the 3D Blu-ray and someday I will fire it up and give it another.

• 3:46:57David Sims?

  I have a steal.

• 3:46:58Griffin Newman?

  Well, they didn't put the 3D out on steel, so I bought the 4K steel and then I bought the 3D Blu-ray and I put that in.

• 3:47:04David Sims?

  And people who do that are on a government watch list.

• 3:47:06Griffin Newman?

  I created my own combo pack.

• 3:47:08Speaker 04

  Is Catch Me If You Can generally accepted as being one of the top two films now?

• 3:47:11David Sims?

  I think it has of late become generally accepted.

• 3:47:14Griffin Newman?

  But I think, I think all three of us put it a touch higher than most would.

• 3:47:18David Sims?

  Well, I have it lower than you guys, but I also, like, once we're in that top 15.

• 3:47:23Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:47:23David Sims?

  We're in five star territory.

• 3:47:24Griffin Newman?

  I'm like, I mean, everything I feel like in my top 20 is four stars and above.

• 3:47:29David Sims?

  Oh, absolutely.

• 3:47:30Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:47:30David Sims?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 3:47:31Griffin Newman?

  If not even more than that.

• 3:47:32David Sims?

  Stevie, you've made me some nice movies over the years.

• 3:47:34Griffin Newman?

  This is the thing.

• 3:47:35David Sims?

  And for that, I say, muah, thank you.

• 3:47:37Griffin Newman?

  Any of our rankings that seem rude, it's like, the guy made too many fucking great movies. And even the ones I don't like all have some of the best things I've ever seen in a movie.

• 3:47:46David Sims?

  Ehrlich, is the last episode you were on Eyes Wide Shut, no, you did Vengeance after that. Cause Eyes Wide Shut went this long, not quite this.

• 3:47:52Speaker 04

  Should've gone longer.

• 3:47:53David Sims?

  Sure. This one went really long.

• 3:47:55Griffin Newman?

  I need to pee very badly, Ehrlich. Thank you so much for being here.

• 3:47:58Speaker 04

  Oh, my pleasure.

• 3:48:01Speaker 04

  You know, I.

• 3:48:02Griffin Newman?

  May your memory be a blank.

• 3:48:03Speaker 04

  I, I feel safe in saying that I have now done the single least funny episode of Blank Check, a badge that I wear with honor.

• 3:48:10Griffin Newman?

  That's not true.

• 3:48:11David Sims?

  We had a lot of fun.

• 3:48:12Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, we had, we had a good time. I think there are less funny episodes too. Once again, Almasad, 53 minutes soaking wet, I was just being like, ah, what do we say?

• 3:48:21David Sims?

  We could do a better job.

• 3:48:23Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, let's go back and do the second half of Spielberg again. Let's run it back.

• 3:48:27Speaker 04

  You could do like a How to Train Your Dragon where just like one element remains CG and whatever. It's fucking psychotic that they are just at this point now, just keeping the same CGI elements of the original movie. And now just putting human beings around them. It's.

• 3:48:42Griffin Newman?

  The other dragons at least are a little more redesigned, but Toothless looks fucking 98% exactly the same with the same director, Andrew R. Butler. I saw an interview with Dean Dubois yesterday, got fed to me on YouTube of him in 2020, saying how morally bankrupt he thinks it is that the animation studios are remaking their own movies in live action.

• 3:48:59David Sims?

  You know what helps you be less physically bankrupt is making movies like.

• 3:49:04Speaker 04

  And like pigs to the slop, I will be taking my kid opening weekend. Of course. Anything you want to plug?

• 3:49:12Speaker 04

  Great.

• 3:49:13Speaker 02

  Fighting in the war room, your podcast.

• 3:49:15Speaker 04

  Terrible podcast. Don't listen to it. Good podcast for smart people. It's even more of me if you can stand it and you probably can't. I don't know. I write on IndieWire, I write about movies. I think a lot of the people listen to the show are aware of that and wish they weren't.

• 3:49:28Speaker 02

  No one has ever had a weird opinion about your movie writing ever.

• 3:49:32Speaker 04

  They never will. What do I want to plug? My deck on Marvel Snap is fucking crushing it right now. You just inherited a new wallet full of different payment methods. I have new credit cards. What can I spend before Sims cancels them? If the first name's the same, it's all good. At the battle. Who's gonna check? I have two kids. Your kids rule. You can follow their progress on Instagram, I guess. Two of the best kids in the game. Yeah, I don't know.

• 3:49:56Speaker 02

  You should shout out that best of the year.

• 3:50:00Speaker 04

  It's all good news by now. A while. I mean, I did, I did, I did have a fundraiser that is related to this episode in support of, for the second year in a row with people of Gaza. This year is for the Palestine Requesting Society. The amount of shit that GoFundMe has given every step of the way in vetting this account to make sure that I'm not abetting their definition of terrorism, whatever, has been insane. They, I've even been able to get all the money out and to Palestine, but they have currently shut down the page for it anyway. Internet is bad. Nightmare, but I've been very proud and happy to have been able to raise money for the people of Palestine. And that has brought me joy. Related to it is a video I put together, but is seemingly inconsequential in comparison.

• 3:50:43Speaker 04

  But yes, I do that and this episode is not well timed for me to promote that, but maybe I can come on in the fall. Or like, do you know what, which filmmaker we're doing next? Uh, somewhere in my brain, I know, but I think. Why don't you announce it? What am I looking at? Oh, sure. Yeah.

• 3:51:00David Sims?

  Great.

• 3:51:00Griffin Newman?

  How about this? How about a killer three DVD box set?

• 3:51:03Speaker 04

  Hmm. That's gonna be an episode.

• 3:51:05David Sims?

  Well, we're announcing right now, of course, that next we are doing Amy Heckerling. Nobody has guessed this or seen it coming as usual. The films of Amy Heckerling, guys.

• 3:51:14Griffin Newman?

  Next week, we're straight into Fast Times at Richmond High?

• 3:51:16David Sims?

  I believe so.

• 3:51:17Griffin Newman?

  With returning guest Lola Kirk.

• 3:51:18David Sims?

  That's right.

• 3:51:19Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 3:51:19Speaker 02

  Now, some of these movies, are they gonna be kinda hard for people to get access to? Or is it all more or less?

• 3:51:25Griffin Newman?

  A couple.

• 3:51:26David Sims?

  Johnny Dangerously, I think, is the only one where it's like quite a pickle, right?

• 3:51:30Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 3:51:30David Sims?

  Some of them are maybe not as like rentable on iTunes. I don't know.

• 3:51:33Griffin Newman?

  Look, I'll say this is a great time to fire up a VPN if you have one and start scanning the internet.

• 3:51:38Speaker 02

  Right.

• 3:51:39Griffin Newman?

  Uh, Johnny Dangerously is the one that's like pretty out of circulation, but maybe that magically changes soon.

• 3:51:45David Sims?

  Like, I'm, you know, uh, like Loser, that's rentable. Uh, I could never be your woman.

• 3:51:50Speaker 02

  Either way, I just wanted to give a heads up to the audience.

• 3:51:53Speaker 04

  Oh, my God, you guys are gonna finally canonically discuss-

• 3:51:55David Sims?

  Vamps, rentable.

• 3:51:56Speaker 04

  Had the fact that Josh, that she's butt crazy in love with Josh. Oh.

• 3:52:01David Sims?

  That's a movie where we're gonna need to go four hours.

• 3:52:03Griffin Newman?

  As soon as it's gonna go hog wild.

• 3:52:05Speaker 02

  For the Clueless episode, could we have multiple, um, changes?

• 3:52:09David Sims?

  Looks.

• 3:52:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think we have to.

• 3:52:11Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:52:11David Sims?

  I don't know that we have to because you don't, maybe, you're only the producer of the show, so you might have forgotten that this is an audio show.

• 3:52:18Speaker 02

  It's important to the authenticity.

• 3:52:19Speaker 04

  The sound of Polaroids snapping between every point.

• 3:52:23Griffin Newman?

  I agree.

• 3:52:23Speaker 02

  You'll feel that we're wearing a sportier look.

• 3:52:26Griffin Newman?

  I'm so tired that I just said Ben's agree.

• 3:52:29Speaker 04

  Can you soft right play?

• 3:52:31Griffin Newman?

  My brain is like buttering.

• 3:52:32Speaker 04

  Radiohead's just in the background, or is it fake? What are they? No, it's not just. That's way too hard. They'd be fake plastic trees, right? Just over, over and over again of the background of that episode.

• 3:52:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, we'll license that. No problem.

• 3:52:43Griffin Newman?

  Anyway, normal swing from Schindler's List to Fast Times at Richmond High. Check back in for that next week and on our Patreon, we're doing the Superman films.

• 3:52:52David Sims?

  Uh, no, we haven't actually kicked that off yet.

• 3:52:55Griffin Newman?

  Really?

• 3:52:55David Sims?

  No.

• 3:52:56Griffin Newman?

  My sense of timing is weird.

• 3:52:58David Sims?

  This episode, of course, is dropping April 20th.

• 3:53:00Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 3:53:00David Sims?

  4/20.

• 3:53:01Griffin Newman?

  So, so.

• 3:53:01Speaker 02

  It looks like birthday.

• 3:53:03David Sims?

  It's also Hitler's birthday.

• 3:53:04Speaker 04

  Good job, guys.

• 3:53:05David Sims?

  Uh, but we are about to drop a Galaxy Quest episode.

• 3:53:08Griffin Newman?

  Okay, well, we'll tell you what's happening next after Galaxy Quest. Superman.

• 3:53:11David Sims?

  Superman is following that, beginning with the Richard Donner film. I'm seeing here that its title is Superman.

• 3:53:18Griffin Newman?

  That's not what it's called. It's called Superman: The Motion Picture. That is the official title. That is why the James Gunn movie is called simply Superman, because no film has ever had that title before.

• 3:53:29David Sims?

  Well, you're, I think, wrong.

• 3:53:32Griffin Newman?

  I think I'm right.

• 3:53:33David Sims?

  It was marketed as Superman calling the movie.

• 3:53:35Speaker 04

  Do you have any strong thoughts about the aesthetic of the trailer for Superman?

• 3:53:38David Sims?

  I'm not sure why he's chosen that particular color correction, and I hope he like, you know, tweaks it a little bit, otherwise I'm looking excited for it.

• 3:53:46Speaker 02

  I want to push the stop button.

• 3:53:48David Sims?

  Why is that?

• 3:53:49Speaker 02

  I don't know, because this has been going on for so long.

• 3:53:51David Sims?

  Ben, are you excited for me to talk so much about Superman, though? A guy I really like, and a guy you probably think is a bit of a square.

• 3:53:58Griffin Newman?

  I think that movie is called Superman, the most from picture. Are we going off of what it says in the opening of the film?

• 3:54:03David Sims?

  No, the film is called Superman.

• 3:54:05Griffin Newman?

  Oh, right. Well, first of all, Superman, the movie.

• 3:54:06David Sims?

  As I told you, two minutes ago, you weren't listening, but it was only.

• 3:54:10Griffin Newman?

  This is gonna be thrilling conversation for the next couple of months.

• 3:54:12David Sims?

  It was only marketed that way.

• 3:54:13Griffin Newman?

  Leading up to the release of the new James Gunn.

• 3:54:15Speaker 04

  Ben, when we're done here, I'm gonna make you be my therapist for the afternoon.

• 3:54:17David Sims?

  That the new James Gunn film is not called like Superman.

• 3:54:20Speaker 04

  It's gonna lie the chair back.

• 3:54:21Griffin Newman?

  Legacy, that's what it almost was called.

• 3:54:23David Sims?

  I know, but like, I'm trying, I was trying to think of a funnier version, like Superman checks things out, you know, just, just this whole thing where they're like, uh, Superman toddles forward, Superman begins something.

• 3:54:32Griffin Newman?

  Well, first steps is one of the worst subtitles.

• 3:54:34Speaker 02

  It's so bad!

• 3:54:35Griffin Newman?

  I think that trailer rules not very cautious, optimistic for that movie. But I, here's my pitch, no subtitle necessary.

• 3:54:41David Sims?

  Fantastic Four's first steps, what happens in the movie? Galactus tries to eat Earth. Oh, is that what happens when you take your first step? What are you talking about?

• 3:54:48Griffin Newman?

  What are you fucking talking about?

• 3:54:50Speaker 04

  MCU's bulletproof right now, can't go wrong.

• 3:54:52Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Let's all just quickly take our roach pills. We've gotten tense, let, no!

• 3:54:59David Sims?

  I must negotiate a treaty!

• 3:55:01Griffin Newman?

  Do the pills stop him from being roach, or they make him roach?

• 3:55:04David Sims?

  They stop him from being roach.

• 3:55:06Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 3:55:07David Sims?

  And keep him as the great politician he is. Freedom! You've elected an 80 billion year old man.

• 3:55:14Griffin Newman?

  The episode's over, basta!

• 3:55:16David Sims?

  Basta.

• 3:55:16Griffin Newman?

  Basta. Thank you all for listening.

• 3:55:20Griffin Newman?

  And as always,

• 3:55:22Griffin Newman?

  the podcast is life.

• 3:55:31Speaker 02

  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 Bardy Salinas, and our associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy. Research by JJ Birch. Our theme song is by Lain Montgomery and 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. Join our Patreon Blank Check Special Features for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes.

• 3:56:15Speaker 02

  Follow us on social @BlankCheckPod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook, on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.