565: Faith, Courage, and Standing for What Is Right. With Jim Caviezel

>Join Jocko Underground Full Episodes< https://app.redcircle.com/shows/64a89f88-a245-4098-8d8d-496325ec4f74/exclusive-content Actor Jim Caviezel joins Jocko and Echo to discuss his Hollywood career, faith, personal sacrifice, the physical and spiritual challenges of The Passion of the Christ, and his latest film, Ghost Soldier. 00:00 – Introduction: Jim Caviezel 01:27 – Basketball, Childhood, and Early Discipline 05:21 – From Basketball to Hollywood 11:14 – Finding Faith and Purpose 16:24 – The Thin Red Line and Mental Toughness 27:05 – The Passion of the Christ: Faith and Sacrifice 32:31 – Physical Suffering and Near-Death Experiences 40:12 – Playing Evil, Fatherhood, and Adoption 56:18 – Sound of Freedom and Protecting Children 01:04:21 – Ghost Soldier: Courage, Duty, and Doing What's Right Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

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

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jocko Podcast number 565 with Echo Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo.

• 0:05Speaker 01

  Good evening.

• 0:06Jocko Willink?

  We are a people in danger of succumbing to our excesses. Set yourself apart from this corruption, this corrupt generation. Be saints. Freedom exists not to do what you like, but to do what you ought. And that right there is a quote from Jim Caviezel, who is a son, a husband, a father, a man of principle and a man of faith and an actor who has starred in such films as The Thin Red Line, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Passion of the Christ, Déjà Vu, The Sound of Freedom, and he has an upcoming film called Ghost Soldier.

• 0:47Jocko Willink?

  And he is with us here tonight to share some of his experiences and lessons learned along the way. So Jim?

• 0:54Speaker 01

  Yes, sir.

• 0:55Jocko Willink?

  Thanks for joining us.

• 0:56Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 0:57Jocko Willink?

  Really cool to be able to sit down with you. I know The Thin Red Line, watching that in the movie theaters way back in the day and then, and then obviously The Passion of the Christ, The Sound of Freedom. Looking forward to seeing Ghost Soldier. I haven't seen it yet. And then Echo Charles is a, he has seen Déjà Vu 100 times.

• 1:14Speaker 01

  Approximately, yeah.

• 1:16Jocko Willink?

  So you've got a, you got, you got some fans here. Um, I know we were a little bit tight on time today, but a little bit of background from you growing up. So what was, what was the situation? Was your dad a chiropractor? Is that right?

• 1:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30Jocko Willink?

  And then what was your mom doing?

• 1:32Speaker 01

  Housewife.

• 1:33Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:33Speaker 01

  And raised five children.

• 1:36Jocko Willink?

  That's, that's legit.

• 1:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:38Jocko Willink?

  That's, that, that's a job in its own right, for sure. And what, you had a younger brother? And then some sisters along the way?

• 1:45Speaker 01

  Younger brother and a younger sister and had two younger sisters and then an older sister.

• 1:52Jocko Willink?

  And then what were you into when you were growing up?

• 1:54Speaker 01

  Basketball. Every day.

• 1:55Jocko Willink?

  Every day?

• 1:56Speaker 01

  All the time.

• 1:57Jocko Willink?

  And how good were you?

• 2:00Speaker 01

  Very good professionally. Um, no, but professionally shooter, yes. So I was a, you know, shooting is a,

• 2:10Speaker 01

  is a, when you're a kid, you're pushing the ball to the rim and eventually it becomes something like this. And then when you have to break it all down and eventually learn how to shoot here and the difference between this and this, that's a streak shooter. That's a pure shooter. A streak shooter doesn't have backspin. If you shoot 18 feet out, for every reaction, there's an equal and opposite reaction. So when the ball hits the rim, it doesn't bounce, bounce 18 feet in another direction. About 20%, you'll increase your, uh, your, the, the, your shot from going in. If you can, you know, once the ball hangs out on that rim,

• 2:54Speaker 01

  can either be tipped in or hangs out and it goes in. So about 20% increase of your percentage, even a little bit more than that. And, um, so that was kind of my, uh, discipline and then many, many coaches, uh, four or five basketball camps, uh, every summer. Um, Georgia Avling, uh, Washington State Basketball Camp. My dad played for John Wooden. I went to John Wooden's basketball camp. And then a lot of NBA players, 1979. Uh, the Seattle Supersonics won the NBA World Championship and, uh, it was our only championship,

• 3:32Speaker 01

  in, in Seattle and until the last two Super Bowls that we've, uh, had with Seattle Seahawks. But, um, basketball was kind of the, the, the, the, uh, thing that really changed my life. And then I went to a five-star basketball camp, um, in, um, Robert Morris College in, uh, my junior year. And that's when I started like, hey, he might be pretty, you know, good. And then I, uh, transferred into Bishop O'Day High School in Seattle and, uh, you know, played against some guys that eventually played in the NBA.

• 4:10Speaker 01

  And then played against some great NBA players and I realized there's a difference and, but I, I, I knew how to, how to, how, I knew that if I moved my game a certain way, for example, coming off screens and stuff and be able to get my shot off, uh, much quicker, um, that I would have, I know, had advantage. Um, and so I really became a three-point specialist. Uh, I was a point guard. Um, my senior year, we were a nationally ranked high school team and then state. Um, we were really good. In the summer, we were second in the state. Um, and then,

• 4:50Speaker 01

  and then, uh, uh, I went to junior college, had a shot, you know, I could play at Division two.

• 4:59Speaker 01

  And then injured my first year. Um, I had ankle surgery and then, and then the following year it tore, uh, my, partially tore my ACL. And, um, you know, then I had a couple, you know, preferred walk-ons. So I was a preferred walk-on for the Huskies, Washington. And, uh, really things didn't really take off, but acting was starting to really kick in when I was injured. I took an acting class.

• 5:27Jocko Willink?

  Did you, so did you have any acting in high school at all? Were you interested in it? Did you watch a movie one time and say, that looks cool?

• 5:34Speaker 01

  Oh, it was always cool, but I just didn't conceive that that was something that I could do, you know?

• 5:41Speaker 01

  I was in eighth grade and I remember they had this play, Christmas play. Nobody wanted to do this one particular role. It had too many lines in it and I didn't want to do it. And then, anyway, uh, I ended up doing it. And there was a, a part in there, uh, the Lord is my shepherd, um, one of the Psalms. And something happened in the play and, and out came, uh, something that, that, uh, hit the audience and people started crying. Uh, and then the teacher, you know, said, you should be a priest.

• 6:22Speaker 01

  You know, the nuns were saying you should, you know, be an actor or whatever. And then I didn't want to be an actor or a priest. I wanted to be a basketball player. So.

• 6:33Jocko Willink?

  So when did the, when did the, the basketball dream officially die?

• 6:39Speaker 01

  Well, uh, officially when I stopped, uh, my, uh, 1990, when, uh, Lynn Nance was the basketball coach at Washington, or 89, I stopped playing and started, uh, getting like, I was auditioning for stuff that like, have you acted before? Had, and I said, no. And so there was a gift there, but, um,

• 7:06Speaker 01

  one thing that, and I got to meet, um, Michael Jordan, uh, talked about it. Michael Jordan had a natural gift at the highest level. But he also had something that's quite remarkable, which is he had a walk-on gift. Walk-on gift, somebody that is so hungry. And he, uh, it was just unrelenting. And when he was sick, he had the flu in the finals. He, he, John Stockton had that as well. John was a,

• 7:38Speaker 01

  although he wouldn't remember me, but, you know, I got to cover him a few times on the Gonzaga basketball court.

• 7:44Jocko Willink?

  Oh, nice.

• 7:44Speaker 01

  And, you know, but that, those guys, Gary Payton, another one, those guys were like, you know, it just, this is what they were born to do. Acting was what I was, what I was born, born to do. But the athleticism still was an important part. And when I did, uh, the Ridley Scott, G.I. Jane movie,

• 8:07Speaker 01

  toughness, you know, mentally tough, um, is an important, uh, piece of it. And your community really helped me when I was doing The Passion, because I was, uh, you know, had to deal with five and a half months of hypothermia. And, uh, uh, the first time I ever encountered that was when Hash, Hashim Shalom, the, uh, SEAL that was working, uh, kind of was closer to me and, and under, uh, instructor Scott Alveston, um, under Harry Humphries, doing the surf torture was really tough. The water was a killer. And, uh, and because of that, I, I became a master's swimmer.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  I started, you know, I used to have this, uh, 86-year-old man, Lowell, kick my ass every day. I couldn't do the Speedos thing for a long time. Um, you guys had them small, short brown shorts that.

• 9:02Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. We had the UDT shorts, which there was guys that some of the instructors would wear Speedos. Speedos was, uh, not particularly ever one of my things either.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  That was tough. But I went from lane eight and then over to lane two, you know, um, and, uh, work, got better and better and more proficient and, and, and then, but that, um, your community helped me a lot, uh, over the years and all of the films I've done. Um, basically it's like this basketball, I can tell right away.

• 9:35Speaker 01

  If I'm watching an actor and he's trying to play a basketball player, I can tell you the moment he picks that ball up. I can tell you the moment he presents himself to the foul line. I know whether he plays or not and it drives me nuts. And so like Ghost Soldier, you know, um, just that's why, you know, talking to guys like, uh, Leif and, um, our friend, and he, he really helped me out a lot on, um, you know, Person of Interest and, um, Chris, helped me tremendously in, in, uh, several films, just going up to a door, you know, where the door jam is where, you know, how, where, things like that. And I'd videotape it and yeah, you don't want to do it that way, man.

• 10:22Jocko Willink?

  It is weird how how much it throws you out of a movie if you have some kind of technical, you know, expertise. You're like, I'm a jujitsu guy. So when you see something happening and you're like, well, that's just really not that realistic. Or I guess, you know, shooting, obviously, that you know, any kind of tactics you go, that doesn't make much sense. I don't know if there's anything else. I'm surfing, you know, I've been surfing my whole life. So when I if there's something dumb in surfing, you're kind of like, that's dumb. But a lot of time, I mean, ninety seven percent of things that I watch, I'm not smart enough to, you know, critique how they're doing their crochet, or critique how they're doing their, you know, uh, I played a little bit of hockey, but you know, this random stuff, you can't really critique. Um,

• 11:08Jocko Willink?

  when you so when you decided to actually go go all in to acting, how do you do that? Did you just move to LA and start auditioning? Well, and what'd you tell your parents? Because they must have been, I can't imagine a lot of support from parents telling your kid to go, you know, play the lottery.

• 11:28Speaker 01

  That's right. Uh, I would, I would say that my parents could have locked me in my room and I would have found a way out and and nothing was going to stop me from doing it.

• 11:43Speaker 01

  But I had a, um, one of those experiences. This summer, we went to, uh, I took my family to all the places where St. Francis of Assisi was. He was a warrior before he was who who he was. And he had a huge calling from God. And like King David did, you know? And so, um, I had that happen to me in a movie theater. And in the summer of nineteen ninety, I was watching the movie Ghost. Movie ended, and I had my basketball on the left side of me. This presence landed on the ground, a thousand yards away. I don't know why. I know

• 12:25Speaker 01

  that that my soul knows how the distance, uh, how far it was. And then the presence came into the theater. I felt the most love and it got closer and closer. And then it enveloped me and I felt like I had the this, um, like I was the only child of this God, the most love I ever felt. And it went from love to peace. And then the voice said, and it was an audible sound in my heart, never, nothing like this ever happened. And, um, and it was, I guess it's called a locution, instead of an apparition, it was a locution. And the voice said, I'd like you to be an actor. Exactly. Did not say, I would like you to be. It said,

• 13:10Speaker 01

  I'd like you to be an actor. And I, I didn't, I would never have done it if that hadn't happened. And so, when you go and look at what eventually would that would happen, which would be, um, that I was thirty three years old, my initials were J C, and I was asked to play Jesus in this movie. And the only way I would have done it is if it had to be what was in the Bible. And I didn't want to play a transgender Jesus or a something outrageous. I had to had to be the right stakes, that it was the most controversial thing that ever

• 13:53Speaker 01

  was. So when they say, it's the controversial passion of the Christ, I, you know, I, I, I love it because I know we got it right. Um, and, uh, and it woke up a lot of people. It changed a lot of lives. And, but I, I do believe that, you know, the hand of God brought me into your community on that film, really, uh, because just the mentality is just, I think you're, you, you're born that way. You have a gift, like a mark on you from heaven.

• 14:32Speaker 01

  And it also goes with it is persecution, but you continue to strive and and pray in your own way deeply to what that, that purpose is. What is your purpose? And it literally becomes a purpose driven life. So it's not like a, I didn't, I know how to be popular. I know if I want to fit into a high school, or I went to three different high schools. I remember I dated this girl, and she, uh, used to date the most popular guy in the school,

• 15:11Speaker 01

  and she broke up with him. He was a jerk. So I started dating her, and I became unpopular overnight. I didn't do anything wrong, and I didn't stop dating her, because I didn't do anything wrong. But you can be, um, um, not popular in the group anymore because of what the choice you made. So for example, I made the choice to do the passion, but I became unpopular. When I did the Thin Red Line, I was popular. I did the right thing, but the political movement environment said, no, you're, if you do this movie, we will take you away from, you know, popularity and the magazines and the GQs and the Vanity

• 15:55Speaker 01

  Fairs. And I said, no, this is right. It's the right thing. I got that from your community, really.

• 16:01Jocko Willink?

  When you were getting ready for the Thin Red Line, or even really, I guess, G I Jane,

• 16:09Jocko Willink?

  um, you know, a lot of times you see guys going through some kind of boot camp scenario to get people ready for the filming. Did you do anything like that for the Thin Red Line, getting ready for the kind of, the tactical maneuvers and being suffering out in the jungle and all that stuff?

• 16:25Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. I stayed in touch with your community. Uh, and those guys would give me advice, you know, like, for example, I, we were talking about, you know, crossing from one, uh, side of the jungle over the other. And, um, this guy was amazed at what I, the knowledge I had. And he said, where are you getting this from? And he's a guy, um, they did, um, Private Ryan as well. And, um, he's like, no, no, no, no, listen, man. Who, what, he says, that hasn't happened yet. A lot of guys have to die before we can

• 17:10Speaker 01

  do that. And in fact, what we're doing right now, guys died and and they figured it out. So you're way too far in the future. Some of the stuff that I was doing, but I, I ran all the time, ran quite a bit. And I, um, you know, Terry Malick, the director asked me, he says, look, we're going to do a lot of hills and not really difficult shots and stuff. Um, it would be great if you could really handle the hills. So I just ran up hills all, all the time, ran up. I used to go down to Manhattan Beach. There was a sand

• 17:49Speaker 01

  dune hill, uh, Loyal Ameramout University Basketball Team that played under Westhead, Paul Westhead, he used to be the Lakers coach. But anyway, they had Hank Gathers and Bo Kimball. This was after Bo had died, but they, uh, this one guy was up at the top, and he said, I'll give you this hundred dollar bill if you can run up this hill in one minute. And I just took off running. And about halfway through, I was just dead running in the sand. It just like sucks everything out of you.

• 18:25Jocko Willink?

  Now, from what I understand, in the Thin Red Line, you know, you had like these really big actors in it, Bill Pullman, Mickey Rourke was in it. Um, and they got like, cut completely out of the movie. Apparently, the first cut was five hours long. And I guess that's the way Terrence Malick films. He just films like hundreds and hundreds of hours of material, and then, and then kind of creates the movie in the editing process. And so it seems like you may not have known what a prominent role you played in the movie while you were actually acting in the movie. Is that, is that an accurate assessment?

• 19:04Speaker 01

  That's accurate. Two and a half million feet of film. I remember John, John Toll, who shot Braveheart, he goes, wow, two and a half million feet. That's a record. And, uh, you know, that was on Guadalcanal. One, you didn't know, but I knew this. If I just, everything that I did, that I was great in, you know, um, and that's, and I've said this before, that the difference between me and other actors that are known, they think they gave themselves the gift. God gave me my gift. I'm a carrier and a bearer of that

• 19:48Speaker 01

  gift. And, um, I'm just a dad, father, and, and I happen to, you know, be what I'm doing. But every film is, um, you know, it is a, uh, going to be, I'm going to be called out for what I choose to do. And if I'm any good at it, and it'd be the last one I ever do. I enjoy it. It's a privilege. And so, um, you know, you're only as good as your last thing. So when I went and did the movie, it was like, man, I, I'm around some of the best actors in the world. I get to go head to head with them. And every day I would get

• 20:32Speaker 01

  on them. Uh, if I wasn't filming, I was, um, running, I was training, and I was in the water, uh, swimming. And, uh, took that from me when we did, uh, G I Jane. And then I would go from there and get on the basketball court and dribble. And, uh, then they had these games every night, you know, they will come out and play, but none of them can stay with me. It's fun.

• 20:59Jocko Willink?

  So, so when that movie come, when you finally see the screening of the movie, and you realize, you're the star of the movie?

• 21:07Speaker 01

  I didn't know. Well, here's what happened.

• 21:12Speaker 01

  Uh, they, uh, the first interview I ever gave, I walked into a room and they told me, Jim, you're significant, you should see it. I said, no, I want to see it with my family. So, uh, I'm thinking, maybe I'll never get another shot at this, but, um, we, it was the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, big round table. And there must've been thirty, forty big round tables. And New York Times was, uh, at my, uh, would you say three o'clock over here on my right? And, um, the first question was, um, you play like a Jesus character in this movie.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  And they said, have you, you know, and I said, well, I haven't seen it yet. So what do you mean? You haven't seen it? And I said, well, I wanted to wait for my family to see it and everything. And, and, uh, you know, and they said, well, you were like a Christ-like figure in this movie. And I said, yeah, I guess you're right. And the person that my publicist, Pat Kingsley, she, uh, PMK, she said, you know, how she asked you that question, that was a loaded question. You know, you could say, I could, I can see how you can, you might say that, but this is what I think it is.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  So you direct that in the interview. And I said, I don't know anything about this stuff, man. And so, uh, Mel Gibson happened to read that article, Christ-like figure. And that began the conversation. He said that this might be Jesus, my Jesus.

• 22:53Jocko Willink?

  Now, you, did your world kind of change after The Thin Red Line as far as, you know, money and fame, people recognize you?

• 23:02Speaker 01

  I think they paid me a hundred thousand dollars to do that movie. I could've gone to the bank and got a loan for two hundred and fifty thousand. It would've been the best investment in myself ever. So I, I lived in a one-bedroom apartment with my wife. And, um, we, uh, you know, our both cars paid for, we paid a thousand dollars a month. One-bedroom apartment. And I was like, just let's keep stocking it away. I got done with that movie, Ang Lee hired me on a, uh, a part. Uh, got a, you know, I think that was like sixty thousand dollars. So, you know, half of that,

• 23:43Speaker 01

  and give to the IRS and your agents, managers, and they stocked another thirty thousand away. And I just kept stocking it away, getting up in the morning, going swimming. Still, I kept the habit of swimming with masters. Then I got into ocean swimming. I was already into it with you, from your community. And, and I just loved that world, you know, getting up early in the morning and training. And then the next thing, uh, what happened was frequency came. And they were going to fire me, uh, on that movie, um, two, first few weeks. Um, and, and luckily I had this, uh, woman, Penny Allen, who, uh, worked with Al Pacino.

• 24:26Speaker 01

  They were very, very close. And Penny and Charlie, Charlie was, uh, Al's, uh, teacher. I had an actual teacher, John Kirby, but Penny Allen was the one that worked with me, um, towards the latter part of The Thin Red Line. And she said, look, this, Al went through this on The Godfather. They're going to take a scene, it's going to be a very difficult scene, they're going to move that in the front. And again, I go back to, you know, the, what your community, the easiest day was yesterday. So expect that this is, I was ready for a fight and I had it all laid out. They did exactly what was going to happen. They moved a really difficult scene. I got a Dear John letter that you're-

• 25:09Jocko Willink?

  So do they do that just to kind of test the actors out?

• 25:12Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 25:13Jocko Willink?

  Just, let's, let's find out if this guy can do this or not.

• 25:15Speaker 01

  I, well, they're, they, they started looking at some of the stuff you did. They, they do some, a lot of times when you start filming, you, you get an easy scene to do. You know, much dialogue, just being on character. But some of those are really, really difficult scenes. For example, when, uh, Al Pacino was in The Godfather, he was just sitting there, uh, at a, uh, watching the wedding. And it was kind of, he's doing a lot, but they, the studio executives, a lot of these people that, look, they're either failed directors or failed actors. And they, then they end up dictating, uh, to the performer or to the, um,

• 25:57Speaker 01

  and they don't know what they're talking about. And so there's a lot going on there. And so now they're going to fire him. And, uh, Al, they take the scene where he shoots the cop, the dirty cop in the, in the, uh, Italian diner, goes into the, into the toilet, pulls the gun out. And when they see that, they went, okay, he's the right guy. They didn't know he could do that. So they did this scene where, um, I present myself to the serial killer that killed my, uh, mom in the future. Um, and I basically say, you know, um, I'm coming for you. And then it was like, oh, okay, he can do this.

• 26:42Jocko Willink?

  You roll through, um, a bunch of other movies, Pay It Forward, um, you're playing a drug addict, Angel Eyes with Jennifer Lopez, um, I Am David, you're helping a kid escape, uh, The Count of Monte Cristo. You're doing some, some, what is it, what do they call it, swashbuckling? Is that right? Sword, sword work and all that stuff? Um, and then you're, you, you kind of got, started getting into this a little bit, but at some point Mel Gibson had had the idea that you would be a good individual to play Jesus. And he approaches you to, to see if you would do it.

• 27:26Jocko Willink?

  And he seemed to have more apprehension about you doing it than you did. At least it seemed that way.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:33Jocko Willink?

  From, from, I've heard you tell a story a few times, is, you know, he, he kind of gave you a warning.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  Yes, he did.

• 27:39Jocko Willink?

  If you do this, you won't be able to, you'll be ostracized from Hollywood.

• 27:43Speaker 01

  You won't work in this town. You may never work in this town again.

• 27:50Jocko Willink?

  And I, I think a lot of people, myself included, you kind of think, well, it doesn't make sense to, to, to think that. Unless in some way you're saying, hey, someone might think, well, what are you trying to, you're trying to play Jesus? Is it, that's, that's impossible. Why would you do that? But the feeling is more like you're trying to represent Jesus in a positive way. And so we don't really want you around here. Is that kind of, is that kind of what it is?

• 28:16Speaker 01

  I've said this before, where not much has changed in two thousand years. Jesus is more controversial today than he's ever been. Um, the ruler of the world, uh, does not like that story. And the only story I was interested in was that, the real one. And I thought that it would be like, uh, climbing the hardest side of Mount Everest. Then no one's ever done it. That was appealing to me. That was something like, well, it probably won't work out. But what if it did work out? You know, what if we were able to figure this out?

• 28:59Speaker 01

  And so most people, you just come to them and you say, look, here's a big bag of money. Just go the other way. And, um, then my, my mindset would be like, why are you even offering me this money to not do this film? And I'd sleep on it and go, nah, that doesn't sit well with me. Remember that voice that spoke to you in the theater? Yeah, I'd like you to be an actor. That's probably why you were asked. And I said, so I was, um, with my, uh, lawyer. Uh, we met Frank Stewart, God rest his soul, he passed away, but he, he and I, I met him swimming.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  And he had multiple educations, uh, in, uh, just, he even taught acting. He was brilliant, brilliant guy. Went to Northwestern, went to Harvard, went to Virginia, went to, he, in, and he, uh, uh, built his house by hand, uh, up in the mountains. And just, oh, I said, how'd you do this? You know, looking at it. He goes, all you gotta do is read a book, you know? I said, well, I'm not that good at that. But we were wa- walking, uh, um, beach. And, um, um, we're going to swim in the water and, uh, the ocean. And I, I love the, the quiet in the morning and just walking. And, uh,

• 30:25Speaker 01

  the physical pain of getting in the freezing cold waters, you know, and especially in the winter, you get, uh, about ten minutes of brain freeze. It's like you're eating ice cream too fast. But if you hang in there, your head will get real hot. And when you come out of the water, you just feel like, like it's the greatest thing ever, ever existed. And I thought, man, I could give something like that to the world if I do this movie. Something like very painful, but then they can come through it. And on the other side, they can help them overcome any kind of addiction drug or just the worldly pleasures that are taking them. Uh, maybe open up their lives to a purpose, a purpose-driven life like the saints, you know?

• 31:10Speaker 01

  And so we're walking along the beach and he, uh, Frank says, you know, look, you're going to have a great career. It, no problem. So I guess you gotta look at it like this. If this is one of those things where you look back and you regret it, um, you might want to consider what that is. Because once this ship sails, and I was JC, I was thirty-three years old at the time, and I, that really also kept hanging on my neck. If I pass this up- And I think, you know, watching you guys go through, they've taken me a few times to Hell Week

• 31:52Speaker 01

  and watching it. And I think that guy, that's the question, can you quit right now? What, it just gets easier and easier in your life to do that. Will you regret it? Heck, yeah, you will. And, but just, so there's a lot of little tricks that you can do along the way to stay in the moment. And staying in the moment is, in the present, it's a gift and you stay right there. Boy, you can do, because the time is gonna pass. And if you can get past just the, your central nervous system, all the pain that is going in, and you connect into that eternal spot in your heart where it's just you and, and, and God, and, and connect to that. Because really, if you really get into it, it's love, it's the deepest,

• 32:36Speaker 01

  deepest thing. So when I got on the cross, and I accepted it, all of these things start happening. Number one, I get a dislocated shoulder. And anybody that's ever experienced a dislocated shoulder, it, it's hell. And it really helped me in the movie. Because at that point, I said, Jesus, I don't want them to see me, I only want them to see you. And that's when his adversary came for me. And, and he had to, because, and first they come, they, they offer you everything, which they were doing at the time. Then comes the, if you do this, you won't work in this town.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  We'll take this from you, that. So what? I always looked at it like, you saved my life, you saved my soul, give you, and you love me. Because you love me, I'll give you everything I got. Because I don't deserve that. And I love you, because you, you, you see something in me. And I didn't think much of myself. So I was on that cross, and I was like, devil, he, if I die here, that, that's the third part, is they come and they say, you're gonna be dead. And I was hit by lightning, struck on the fifth shot. And I had two open heart surgeries, had my second surgery

• 34:01Speaker 01

  at Cleveland Clinic, Dr. Gyllenoff, Dr. Griffin, saved my life, but I died. And they had to bring me back. And when I was dead, it was the most amazing thing, is that peace and love that I felt the moment he came to me. And it was, God has a sense of humor, because I felt him like, you know, it's okay, just hang in there for a second, they'll flip you back on in a second. But he didn't say those words, but I could, there was like a, a presence of laughter, like, I've got this, it's not a problem. I could hear the horns going off and everything. I talked to my anesthesiologist,

• 34:39Speaker 01

  and Dr. Griffin, Dr. Gyllenoff, after, you know, a couple of weeks later. And, and I said, I was looking at you guys, through my eyes, and how did I look? And they said, well, you were dead, you had dead eyes. But I said, I had the most love and peace around me. It was amazing. I came back. And so I still believe that I have a, a purpose in this, in this life. And this movie, Ghost Soldier, is, I was just, you know, I thought, man, if I could ever find something that was represented, your community, that, that, because they helped me so many ways,

• 35:21Speaker 01

  just overcoming pain, dealing with, you know, affliction, and, and their, and their drive. And as I wasn't getting in it a lot in, in my own church, and the reason why is because a lot, they have like, patty cake Christianity. I wanted to be around real warriors, guys that weren't gonna leave you in a foxhole. Those are the, that's where my heart was really drawn to. And, and I wanted to make things that would inspire young, young boys to become men, not guys. There are a lot, a lot of, a lot of thirty, forty, fifty, sixty year old guys, they never became men. And

• 36:03Speaker 01

  then a man has to accept responsibility if he wants to earn that right. So, the, the,

• 36:14Speaker 01

  the Ghost Soldier had that, was written in it, Chris Papasidero, I knew it wasn't a Hollywood script right away. I knew it had to be a real dude that fought. And that's the movie that we made. And forgive, you know, us if some of it's like, oh, okay, well, that's Hollywood. It, it, the, but I would think, I'd say that eighty percent of it is pretty, pretty good, really good. I'm hard on my stuff. I, I always want the best. And I always feel like we could, we did pretty darn good. But it should have been better. But it's pretty damn good. Don't let perfection get in the way of good, you know?

• 36:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. When, when you were reading the script for The Passion, did you, could you tell how physically crazy it was gonna be? I mean, you know, you, you kind of know the script going into it. But did you, did you look at and go, wow, this is really gonna be a, a physical torture, in a way? Could you tell that from just reading the script?

• 37:27Speaker 01

  No, I didn't. And I read it without a dislocated shoulder, when I read it. And I thought, and what's hard about it is that when we were filming Meterra, the cross had to be put on my left side. And, you know, this shoulder injury happened when I was doing cast and recovery. During the movie, I severed my left peck, my bicep, my rotator. And I had my arm taped. I ran with one arm. And, and I just imagined that we were at war. And I was really fighting for my

• 38:05Speaker 01

  life, my career, everything. And I, I had nowhere else to go. I just knew that this is where I had to be. And so, I went through that, and I thought, you know, this is kind of, you know, just take it one moment at a time. But the, the, the killer was the freezing conditions. And that forced me in the arms of my God. Because I had nowhere else to go. So, that was, is, when at the end of the movie, every time I watch it, my body's blue, there's no special effects, it's just blue.

• 38:48Speaker 01

  And I was willing to give my heart to, to God, I was willing, you know, because he, it, I couldn't have done, I don't know. People have asked me, would you do it again? No. Would you want to go to Hell Week again? No. I mean, but if you look at it, it's like, thank you that I went through it, because it, it, it did exactly what I wanted it to do for people. And, and I did the same thing in Ghost Soldier. It wasn't, it was, there's always a hard, there's just different types of

• 39:29Speaker 01

  hard. And, but if you embrace that, embrace the suck, as you guys say, you can find incredible glory, you know, that you will make your mark in this, in this world. And I think that's really the treasure that, that, that I, that I, I bond with. But ultimately, you know, my friend said, in my father's house are many mansions. And I said, well, I don't need a mansion, I'll sleep in the ditch next to Jesus's house. That's where I want to be, in heaven.

• 40:12Jocko Willink?

  You get done with, you know, The Passion of the Christ. And there was a couple of movies that you had filmed before, which then came out after it. But eventually, so you did Bobby Jones, The Highwayman, and, and The Final Cut. And eventually, you get, those come out, and then eventually, it's deja vu. Echo Charles, do you have any, you want to hit on deja vu real quick? Any questions about that?

• 40:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, many, but in the spirit of time saving. No, not a fan.

• 40:42Jocko Willink?

  You're playing, you're playing a kind of a villain in that movie, right?

• 40:45Speaker 01

  Yeah. On that one, it was really interesting. There was a, there's a, a scene in there with Denzel and I, interrogation scene. And I got to see ATF, FBI. And, you know, they gave me a lot of interrogation scenes that I got to watch. And, and they, and so I, I'm just, during the interviews, I would circle words, and, you know, listening to people say like, I got to watch Dr.

• 41:24Speaker 01

  James Dobson's interview with Ted Bundy. And as a serial killer. And then, when you're looking at someone who's willing to blow himself up, they, they, they talk in different words, like, destiny, it's my destiny. And, but the, the demonic oppression, or whatever it is in them, it's, it's a different, they're willing to exchange their life, and, and end it, and, and they're completely committed to do it. That's who this guy was. And it was written more like

• 42:01Speaker 01

  Ted Bundy, or Jeffrey Dahmer, in those interviews that I got to see. And he wasn't. I said, you've written him like a serial killer, not a Unabomber. Different, a guy that's gonna put a suicide vest on, it's a different cat. But both, most people, you know, if you, general sheep are gonna look at and go, they're all killers, they're all the same. No, they're different. And if you know that, then, and, and so the, I didn't go to the devil to play the devil. I went to God to tell me who the devil was. And that's why it was freaky watching that.

• 42:47Speaker 01

  Film and and and not being able not being afraid to go to those dark spots. The dark spots is really important because Lucifer is is loosened means light. He remembers what it was to be like, but he cannot duplicate God's love. So he uses lust. You know, tries to get close to it. But when you're looking at, um, think of Peter jumping out of the boat. And he sees Jesus and he runs to the light, the real true light. And then he starts to drown. What's what's happening? Takes his eyes off him. Same thing when I'm working, I I focus clearly on the Holy Trinity and I and he really helps.

• 43:31Speaker 01

  Move me at as to where this character is to make him seamless. Um, any house builder that's building, a bad builder will try to make it look like this. But a great builder does it in such an organic way and is very organic that the grout lines look almost like you can't tell. I mean, the the the failure rate as far as um, something that looks fraudulent. Looks like it was added on to the house as opposed to was organically already there. That's kind of what we're doing as actors is that we're.

• 44:12Speaker 01

  It's a um, you're trying to suspend the belief that, you know, there's obviously a camera. This is all fake, but you want to tell the story and film and and. Over the years, you know, back in the 1920s, when they get pissed off, they would go say, say. Why I ought to and uh, and we accepted that, you know, if I saw that now, I'd go, God, this is comedy, man. That's ridiculous. You you don't get angry like that. So they brought in this method acting. Method and uh, going into uh, your community and seeing and feeling what hypothermia was like. Oh, wow. You know, this is whole different kind of thing here. Okay.

• 44:57Speaker 01

  But going through it um, is important. Hollywood and the reason why Hollywood, the fakery was like, well, this is how we perceive it to be. And you'd watch it and go, you don't do jujitsu like that, you know, you can tell it's fake. So um, the the that film I wanted to um, make it where you have, you know, good versus evil. Um, they that's essentially what the what this thing was was about. And this uh, force that was coming in was willing to do whatever it took.

• 45:36Speaker 01

  To remove um, Denzel's character and to the point where um, I'll find you, I'll kill you. And you know, when they use that, well, we'll kill you. I said, that's okay. Please do it because I'm going to take all of you with me. That's how my character returned it.

• 45:54Speaker 02

  Um, so you know how like they say, so I've heard that like a the most compelling bad guy is a bad guy who really thinks he's the good guy. And they, you know, did do you so when you do play a good, you know, as a as a human being, you know, okay, this is a bad guy I'm about to play. But do you as an actor, do you put yourself in the mindset of like, no, no, I'm the good guy?

• 46:16Speaker 01

  That's exactly right.

• 46:17Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 46:17Speaker 01

  A hundred percent.

• 46:18Speaker 02

  It really portrayed that if you watch that, you're like, brother, this guy thinks he's literally the good guy. No, I'm saying it's great.

• 46:26Jocko Willink?

  Um, around this time is when you started uh, uh, adopting your kids. And and how did that change your your outlook on the world?

• 46:35Speaker 01

  So um, uh, we had a uh, a try for, we had a couple of children that didn't make it in the pregnancy. And um, that's like, well, okay, it's not going to happen for us. And then uh, one day. I was uh, was at the end of mass. I went in the back and this woman, um, Suzie McAvity, who's the wife of Steve McAvity, who produced The Passion and Braveheart. She had a picture of my soon to be son, uh, Bo, who had a brain tumor. He was from China and I looked into that um, boy's eyes and uh, in the picture.

• 47:18Speaker 01

  And um, he had a um, a tumor sticking out of his head with the skin. So he had hair around, but on the top, it looked like he had a like a a skin cap. And she said, will you adopt him? And the, I heard this in my heart. Uh, I said, um, I heard, uh, will you love him? Will you love me? And I said, yes. And so she um, I I turned to my wife and I said, um, we should we get and do this. This is right after The Passion. And uh, we went through the uh, uh, the surgery with him.

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Um, it's a long process and I just remember, you know, this little boy has nobody. And um, and I get to uh, love this child and I went through the surgery with him. Um, and it's tough because uh, when you go to children's hospital, there's other parents that their children don't make it. And you know that when I he came out of surgery and his head was like two heads, it was so swollen. And uh, you don't ask him questions. You just, you know, give statements. You look good. You I love you, you know, I don't don't ask him because he won't be able to speak uh, before you go in the room.

• 48:43Speaker 01

  The screaming and the crying um, from other kids, the intensive care where the parents um, um, don't make it. It's hard. Uh, but so I'm I'm good to be used uh, to hold them, hug them. Um, and you know, life is like that, you know, you have great, great moments. And it's also part of the death, but um, and and the um. I just knew that this was a plan that I'm supposed to follow. My son made it through.

• 49:22Speaker 01

  Uh, and then we went through uh, that and then we've um, they came to us again. So we found a girl. She has the same kind of issue. And uh, that was two years later and we, you know, went through that together. And what ends up happening is is that you bond together. You, what you thought was a your best friend really becomes your life partner through, you know, the deepest, deepest level. And then the our uh, then the third one was um, uh, a just a one year old. And he had a cancer in the leg, but it was supposedly be a tumor.

• 50:06Speaker 01

  And it turned out to be non-rabdomio sarcoma, which is one of the worst cancers you can get. And uh, um, it was long, arduous with that one. And uh, it one miracle after the other. We did not know if it was going, we'd lose any of them. But we we went through it together and uh, I have three healthy children miraculously. The right doctors were there at the right time. And uh, took a lot, a lot of prayer. And then in all that whole process, there's always these other movies that come up.

• 50:43Speaker 01

  Which takes me to a profoundly deep, deep level to be able to convey whatever that is in the story. That is, because ultimately, all of these films are some kind of weapon. The weapon, here's a great weapon. It's a wonderful life. You ever seen that movie? Jimmy Stewart wins an Academy Award.

• 51:08Speaker 01

  He goes to war, flew 26 missions over Nazi Germany in a liberator. He's the head of the entire wing of the command. And you know, there's eight men in each um, plane, B17s, liberators. One of those, they have to go quiet on comms. And I remember one of his exos saying. The screaming from 25,000, 17, 25,000 feet. And because we did all the missions in the, in the, in the day, the Brits did the night. And you hear the screaming on the way down. And that never leaves you.

• 51:50Speaker 01

  And Stuart came back in one of the most powerful moments ever in history of film. Frank Capper has him on camera and he says, you know, he's in a bar, he's on it, on the outs. And he's not buying the whole angel story. And his life, his man searched for meaning, he wants to take his own life. And he says, Heavenly Father, I'm not a praying man, but if you're out there, please help me. Man, I got to tell that man, I got to be with Jimmy Stewart. Before I did The Thin Red Line, I got to be with him, talk to him. And he, he told me, young man, you go make good movies.

• 52:30Speaker 01

  And when he passed away, I think it was July 7th, 1997. I was doing The Thin Red Line. And at that time, I did not know in 2002, that Mel Gibson was going to offer me that film. But he was in heaven at that point. I can imagine Jesus saying, what you did with this young man, this boy? He's going to lead a lot of people to me, we need to pray for him right now. And I have him in my mantle at, at home. It's a wonderful life. Every year I always, I always watch, I don't watch my stuff, I watch his. And there's something about, there's a connection there, he's like a guardian angel with me from heaven.

• 53:12Speaker 01

  And his stuff really takes me to a place. And I, and I believe that Stuart is receiving all the blessings from all of the, for what he did for me. And then, and then the work that I've done, I think it, it's an annuity in heaven. People just keep coming back to God because of it. If you can handle that and not worry about the popularity stuff.

• 53:42Speaker 01

  Just find out what God wants and keep moving in that direction. Because ultimately you will always be worth your salt. Salt has a taste. Taste, when you lose that taste, what have you lost? You lost the Holy Spirit. You lost your ability to be grateful and your ability to appreciate. And those are the two things I can never lose. And this industry can remove that. But it, it, it's only if you get rid of it. And, and I would say, then when I came into the business, I had this image of Jesus holding me. How will I do this, Lord? And he's like, don't worry, I'll protect you.

• 54:27Speaker 01

  I was the lamb that he held. But then there was a point on The Thin Red Line, I had a dream and I was now holding the lamb. And I could do whatever I want with it. I could slaughter it and give it and feed it to my friends or protect it like the most cherished baby. And I still, I, it's inconceivable to ever give that up. It's inconceivable. We were just talking about life and death before this whole thing started here today. And I know I want to be on the feast in heaven with our Lord and my family and have the greatest,

• 55:06Speaker 01

  whatever that's going to be someday with God, our heavenly family and, and, and be that. And, but right now, it's the test, it's the fight. It's, but it's also, you know, living in such a way that you can help bring people to the eternal word of God and, and real peace, real holiness, holy body, mind and soul. Whole in your body, your mind, but your spirit is your nuclear reactor. Your spirit is what drives the brain and, and, and the, and the heart, the body, the mind. It, it, most actors just work from body and mind, but the spirit is so much more. It keeps it going, keeps it alive.

• 55:53Speaker 01

  And it, and when you look at it, Christ's life, it's, it's not about me. He's, he came as a servant, king, but he is the king. And he was always about others. And so that, that is, you know, the service that I do. And, uh, uh, as in my job, it is a job, but it, uh,

• 56:17Speaker 01

  but it's not about me.

• 56:22Jocko Willink?

  You spent some years on Person of Interest. I know my buddy, Leif Babin, our buddy Leif Babin, helped you out with some of that stuff. Eventually, you know, fast forwarding through some other stuff, you, you end up in this movie, The Sound of Freedom, or I guess it's called Sound of Freedom. And that was a really powerful movie that opened people's eyes to, you know, the, the trafficking of children. Uh, how hard was it to even, you know, enter that world and start, start learning about things that are just absolutely demonic?

• 57:04Speaker 01

  Well, you see the passion of the Christ, you get to see the devil in that. Very real. And, um, that was the first, like, training ground that I had to take me in a place where most Christians today are, are afraid, even modern day Christians are afraid of devil more than, than they are of God.

• 57:31Speaker 01

  And they should fear actually God. But, um, I changed when I went through that training.

• 57:41Speaker 01

  The, uh, the devil, when you say devil in, and, or if he is there, I, I look at him.

• 57:51Speaker 01

  But what's looking at him is this, uh, Jesus says, I'm the vine, you're the branches. If leaves in me shall have eternal life. That presence in me is the warrior that hunts him down, goes after him. And I was very, uh, also, uh,

• 58:15Speaker 01

  I just played this movie, um, where I played Herod. It's, um, comes out, um, December 11th. I did five hours of makeup in there.

• 58:30Speaker 01

  And, um, in that movie, I'm the one that orders the killing of all the babies in there, that my character. And, uh, I just basically, all the chinks on my armor, I, I reversed it and was able to, uh, kind of read the devil of what he was going to be through all the chinks in my armor and throughout all of Hollywood. So that I could be seamless and, and put that out there. The, the children, um, Moses killed was, they tried to kill Moses and they killed the children. They did it again during the time of Herod and they're doing it now. They're doing it in the womb, outside the womb.

• 59:15Speaker 01

  28 days after, in California, you can kill the baby after it's born. Look that one up. Massachusetts, Pat's some outrageous thing.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  All men are created equal, we have inalienable rights in this country. And, um, this is where my, your community helped me overcome my own

• 59:42Speaker 01

  life, like, to live is Christ, to die is gain, St. Paul says. And I know that that, is it, is it a righteous fight to fight to the, to the point of where you could lose your life? No greater love of you than to lay your life down. And I think about the child and the children. That as that was, my wife is very, uh, when I first married her, I was kind of just, you know, people say, well, I'm pro-choice, I'm this. So to answer your question, that's how it all started with me. And I saw the first abortion ever on a movie called Eclipse of Reason with Charlton Heston presenting it. I couldn't believe what I just saw.

• 1:00:26Speaker 01

  That was the beginning of it. Then I learned, and through the passion, the greatest, most beautiful thing that ever was made, how it, he was murdered. And we allowed it, we all do it through our own sin. But as I go deeper and deeper into the whistleblowers that I've been working with over the years, started giving me information that got deeper and deeper, which is, you know, everything from the border to adrenal crumbing, to organ harvesting.

• 1:01:00Speaker 01

  And the, and it just kept opening up more and more that these, that the media was not, was covering that up. And, uh, and this is a, uh, something that has been going on for a long, long time, thousands of years. And it's time it needs to stop. And if you were going to exchange your life, would that be a good?

• 1:01:22Speaker 01

  Would that be a good reason to? And I said, for children, 100%, 100%, I can't the hurting the little ones like that. And so after I'd seen what I saw, I wanted to make a film that would open up the eyes to the public about the border, about everything, about what's really going on. And, and I think that we did, oh, I know we did, actually. We were able to, now the public talks about it all the time, but before that film, boy, they went after us. And

• 1:02:05Speaker 01

  I was used to that off the passion. They went after me, my career, everything after the passion. That was prior to the public saying anything, you know, a Trump saying, you know, the lying media. I already knew they were lying after the during the passion. And so that was my first training ground. And then this film came up and I said that, you know, we could do a lot of good with this. And again, the devil is always, I'll kill you if you do this. Like, well, you did try to do that on the passion, and you did that to a lot of great saints. I would just be joining my brothers and sisters in heaven. So never thought that, you know, doing a film,

• 1:02:50Speaker 01

  or films could drive people to that kind of insanity. But I go back to the part in the passion where Jesus's father forgive them, they know not what they do. A lot of people are just brainwashed. And then, then let them do what they're gonna do, but I have to do what I have to do. And then, so the, the gazillions of dollars later, we shot that for like eight and a half million dollars. And it's a beautiful film, a beautiful film. And it's really helped

• 1:03:30Speaker 01

  a lot, a lot of people as far as just protecting their own children, you know, you really, parents have to go into a park now, you have to pick these guys out when you see these pedophiles that are, you know, going to prey on our children. That has to stop too.

• 1:03:52Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's so disturbing to watch. And, you know, it's disturbing because it's, it's what's happening all the time around the world. And I think one of the quotes at the end of that movie says that there's more slavery now than there was at the peak of slavery, when they had slavery in America. There's more slavery now. And a lot of those slaves are child sex slaves.

• 1:04:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:04:19Jocko Willink?

  Which is just absolutely sickening to think about. Now, your latest thing, you've mentioned it a little bit, is this movie Ghost Soldier is written by a former Green Beret. So that's awesome. So that's how, you know, as soon as I saw that, that was written by a guy that, you know, has experience in this world, I was definitely excited to see about, see that. And it's about a guy who's, a guy named Fitz, who's kind of, kind of a, some kind of a weapons designer technology guy. But he's kind of doing that while he's off the grid. And he's just trying to live what I assume to be a peaceful life doing his job. And some big corporation comes

• 1:05:03Jocko Willink?

  in to try and start taking land and whatnot. And well, you might be able to imagine what plays out from there. What made you, what made you pick this, this one?

• 1:05:15Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, all over America right now, you can't dig a well. You can't, you can't get access to, you own land that you can't use water. You don't have water, you can't grow food. It's useless. And the corporations through the IMF, ECB, Private West Central Bank, the biz, the Rothschild banks, they're controlling these monopolies, which Vanguard, State Street, you know, I think we, what do we call it, Brownstone in ours, Blackrock. But anyway, it, the, our country is not controlling, it's not by the people for the people, simplified.

• 1:06:00Speaker 01

  It's just not by the people for the people any longer. We don't have any control of our own destiny. And that's not the way our constitution's written. Even through inalienable rights, all men are created equal, not born equal, created equal, that we have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Where does that life come from? Where, who wrote, quoted that, Thomas Jefferson? Where'd he get that from? John Locke? Where'd he get that from? Father Suarez, most people don't know this. Life, liberty, and the right to own property. But what good is owning property when you don't have your own life? And so we were born with these inalienable rights. And,

• 1:06:43Speaker 01

  you know, I, just in this time, I saw it as Mr. Smith goes to Washington. But he's in this little area, and this guy was like, look, I'm happy doing what I have to do. And then this little boy comes along, and then he helps the boy, served with his father, helps the family out. And then he's one of those guys that's like, look, I just want to do my, have my own little world. And, and, but he can't sleep at night unless he does the right thing, which is these people have no way to protect themselves. And he knows that. So he's got to get, he's got

• 1:07:28Speaker 01

  to, he's got to involve himself. And I kind of related, not militarily, because I've never been in your position, but I've, I've done it in a way where I adopted my children. I got involved when I didn't want to. My flesh didn't, but my soul knew, this is, you got to do it. No one else is going to love this boy, but I'll love him. And so I, that, that's what I connected to. And then, and then just all the years with, you know, like Leif and Chris and all their, they're like my brothers. And I look up to them and was given an extraordinary, they were given

• 1:08:11Speaker 01

  extraordinary gifts and were able to, no, I can't, I can do what I can do, and they can do what they can do. But together, we can help this narrative of, of making America where it was supposed to be. And all the other countries that they all can be sovereign, and that they should be free, that not living in slavery. So there's a bit of that. And that's why I think it's right to come out on Veterans Day, 1111. And, and I, and we showed it last night, and this guy was like, this movie is very unusual, because there's a very spiritual center in it

• 1:08:55Speaker 01

  with Michael the Archangel. I remember meeting Harry Humphries, and he had Michael on his neck. And I said, you're a religious guy. And he goes, no, no, I'm, I'm not. But it's better than a lucky rabbit's foot, you know? You guys have such a sense of humor to you. And this guy has that. And so, the, America is really simple, you know, people want to have a beautiful little piece of land and, and, and their water and kind of, and, and have a connection to neighbor

• 1:09:35Speaker 01

  and friendship. And, and, and so there's a bit of spiritual, you know, Good Samaritan, where now we're always fist bumping, but there was a time when we had an open hand. And it's hard to fist bump someone when you're going over there and trying to pick someone up like the, this, Jesus talks about the Good Samaritan. And, and how do you fist some, fist bump some poor guy on the street, you know, he's lying there, you got to open your hand up and pull him up. We don't tend to shake anybody's hands anymore. So I, I think that there's a value there. And again, it was like with Jimmy Stewart told me, Jim, you know, you make, you make good movies. And this is one of those good movies.

• 1:10:19Jocko Willink?

  And that comes out November 11. You ever heard of Michael Monsor?

• 1:10:24Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:10:25Jocko Willink?

  Okay, yeah, just making sure. Because he was, you know, he's a Catholic kid and grew up in Garden Grove, California, named after St. Michael. And then, you know, was sacrificed his life for our buddies on September 29, you know, St. St. Michael's Day. Yeah.

• 1:10:45Jocko Willink?

  Uh, does that get us up to speed? I know you get a little bit of a timeline. Where can people find you? You got it. You got an organization I want to mention real quick, theinnocent.org. It's out there trying to help train law enforcement on how to protect kids. You're also on Instagram at the real Jim Caviezel and then at Twitter and Facebooks, you're at re- really Caviezel.

• 1:11:12Jocko Willink?

  With that, any, any questions Echo Charles?

• 1:11:14Speaker 02

  Real quick, just as far as nowadays, as far as the roles that you choose. Do you require, for lack of a better term, require like some depth and some meaning behind these roles? Or is it sometimes just for the fun and the vibes?

• 1:11:31Speaker 01

  There's always a redemption to the story. There's a mathematical reasoning. I can't do two and two is seven. You know, this is, there's gotta be a substance there that, that does not mean that I have to play the good guy. Obviously you've seen some of the films that play the really bad guy in it, but I am whatever I have to be for the team to work together to make something where you take two hours of your time that you walk out and go, that was well worth my time. And I think this film, what if you have a son? You know, I always kept in mind like, what would you do if this was your boy?

• 1:12:12Speaker 01

  And, and it, it challenges, I think it's going to be great for a lot of them to go, I want to be a man like that someday. And, and it shines a light on the best part of our military warriors that have stayed on the good side. Cause you get to see the bad guys that are really bad that get offered a lot of money. And go the wrong way with it.

• 1:12:38Jocko Willink?

  Anything else Echo Charles?

• 1:12:39Speaker 02

  No, good to meet you, sir.

• 1:12:40Jocko Willink?

  Jim, any, any closing thoughts?

• 1:12:43Speaker 01

  No, I, I actually wanted to interview you.

• 1:12:50Jocko Willink?

  Next time.

• 1:12:51Speaker 01

  You'd probably be saying like, no, I gotta kill you if I tell you that.

• 1:12:59Jocko Willink?

  Well, thank you so much for coming out. Thanks for sharing your lessons. Thanks. Thanks for creating some of these incredible films and passing on some, some of the most, if not the most important messages to the world.

• 1:13:11Speaker 01

  It's a pleasure, Jocko.

• 1:13:13Jocko Willink?

  Thank you.

• 1:13:15Jocko Willink?

  And with that, Jim Caviezel has left the building.

• 1:13:21Jocko Willink?

  Definitely went through some chaotic evolutions. Have you seen The Passion of the Christ?

• 1:13:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:13:28Jocko Willink?

  There's a lot of, there's a lot of brutality.

• 1:13:30Speaker 02

  It goes hard. Oh yeah. So it was back in the day, when was that? 2004 ish?

• 1:13:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, they filmed it 2002, something like that. Yeah.

• 1:13:38Speaker 02

  Okay. So it, I remember watching it. It was me and my wife. She wasn't my wife at the time. We weren't even dating at the time, by the way. And my brother and his.

• 1:13:50Jocko Willink?

  You just broke one of my theories.

• 1:13:52Speaker 02

  Wife, why?

• 1:13:53Jocko Willink?

  Why were you, wait, why were you at a movie with a girl that was not your girlfriend?

• 1:13:56Speaker 02

  It was at Jade's house.

• 1:13:59Jocko Willink?

  Were you, so it was just a whole friend group?

• 1:14:01Speaker 02

  Yes, exactly. So my current wife is the friend of my brother's ex-wife. They were friends.

• 1:14:08Jocko Willink?

  Oh, got it.

• 1:14:08Speaker 02

  So I met her. Anyway, so we all watched it together. Actually, I don't even remember if my wife was there. But nonetheless, my brother's ex-wife was there. We were watching. I'm like, bro, this movie goes hard, hard. Like hard, hard. And you know, the, like the, it wasn't, yeah, it was like the final evolution of that part. You know, when he was getting like whipped with those, those spiky like things and all this. All that part of whatever, I'm looking over at my brother's wife and she's just crying the whole time. Like it was too much for her. And I was like, oh, I could see it. I could see all the controversy. See, but um, I was unaware of all the political stuff about like, oh, this is gonna, which I guess now it makes sense, but um, yeah, it went hard for sure.

• 1:14:49Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, it definitely, definitely goes hard and that's another thing I read about it was that Mel Gibson didn't even want to subtitle it. He, he's just like, people know the story. You know what's happening. You, you'll be able to tell by just the expression and what they're saying. You know, so it's just gonna be in Aramaic. Boom, go.

• 1:15:12Speaker 02

  Here was the little thing.

• 1:15:13Jocko Willink?

  Which I thought would, would, was, is pretty dope.

• 1:15:16Speaker 02

  Might've been pretty dope.

• 1:15:17Jocko Willink?

  I read this book in college called Tom Jones. It's, it's probably like 500 pages, very thin pages with a little tiny writing on it. And they made a movie of the book. And in the movie, there's almost no dialogue at all. It's all just acting.

• 1:15:41Jocko Willink?

  But, but it's fascinating. You know, you hear the thing that body language is 80% of it or whatever expressions are 80% of it. The physicality of what you're saying is 80% of what's being communicated. And in this movie, Tom Jones, it's really amazing that they pull off that whole story. So if they could do it with Tom Jones, then they could definitely do it with The Passion of the Christ. They didn't, you don't need to want, you don't need to do subtitles. You could just, you know what's happening. You, you can, you even know, I mean, part of it, you kind of know what they're saying just from the Bible. So yeah, but yeah, crazy.

• 1:16:18Speaker 02

  That um, you're right. Uh, actually there's a thing in, I want to say writing or making movies, whatever. They say, show me, don't tell me, you know, like too much exposition is like not a good thing. Anyway, um, two things.

• 1:16:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there's always those scenes where, where so he has to kind of explain the plot to you. Yeah, the info dump.

• 1:16:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:16:38Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:38Speaker 02

  That's, you know, in the writing.

• 1:16:40Jocko Willink?

  It's always unfortunate that that has to go down.

• 1:16:43Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. Where it's like, let's, they're literally pausing what they're doing for one guy to explain to the other guy. What's like some.

• 1:16:50Jocko Willink?

  You know what's interesting? They made some interesting choice. We did, we did a good job of not doing that in the way of the Warrior Kid. And look, I know it's a kids movie. It's not like there's super like complicated things going on, but there was definitely some things where you, you're gonna see it and unless you kind of think about it, you won't recognize the heaviness or the, the deeper, until you watch it a couple of times, you go, oh man, that's why he's saying that. Oh, that's why she, you know, there's a bunch of things in there where you go, dang, um, okay. So.

• 1:17:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. There's a big thing about understanding the people in the movie's motivation. That's like a big thing. So if a movie can answer those questions, you know, as far as like, okay, Uncle Jake will say, or Mark or whoever. If we're like, oh, at any given moment, I can understand this person's motivation, you know? Then that means you did a good job. So a lot of times if you, cause we don't ask this question to ourselves consciously when we're watching a movie, like watching Ghostbusters, like what's freaking Peter Venkman's motive? We don't do that. We just have to feel it, you know? So if you have someone with these, this deep history, you can understand their motivation and over time you understand it more and more and more. See what I'm saying? Which is like, that's why, that's, that's why Star Wars went so well.

• 1:18:09Speaker 02

  Cause if you do that with like a lot of the, the OG Star Wars, they do a good job with that. I'll say this with the, so Jim Caviezel, Passion of the Christ and Déjà Vu, two quotes from there that I always use in everyday life.

• 1:18:22Jocko Willink?

  Let's hear them.

• 1:18:23Speaker 02

  From Déjà Vu, it's, I believe so. Right. I believe, instead of yeah, yeah, yeah. Or I think so. He says, I believe so. Yeah. And then Passion of the Christ is my heart will be, or my heart is ready. Cause he says that, but I'll text that to you or whoever, you know? So that's where I got that from.

• 1:18:39Jocko Willink?

  When I say, hey, we've got to record at such and such a time tomorrow and you text me back, my heart is ready.

• 1:18:44Speaker 02

  Yep. That's what that's from.

• 1:18:46Jocko Willink?

  Check. Well, there you go. Um, really, really interesting to talk to him. And definitely you can see he's, um, he kind of learned a lot from when he was doing some of the like, some of the Hollywood variants of SEAL training for a movie. And took that away and, you know, continued running and swimming and all that stuff, which is good.

• 1:19:12Speaker 02

  I do that too sometimes, not on that level where I'll, but it'll be by proxy fully. So like, um, I'm like doing something that I'm like, bro, I don't want to be doing this at all. Like I'm like, it's too hot out here or it's too cold or I don't know, whatever. I'm uncomfortable. I'll be like, oh, wait. Like Jeremy and Kate nuts went through the, this stuff, you know, like just treat it like that, kind of a thing.

• 1:19:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, look at you digging deep with a SEAL motivation.

• 1:19:39Speaker 02

  My freaking leaf blowing excavates, excavates.

• 1:19:43Jocko Willink?

  Jack, well, um, get in shape. That's what we're doing. And if you're gonna be working out, running, swimming, sprinting, doing jiu jitsu, training. And actually Jim just said, as we walked out, he was saying like, if there was a gym like this where he lived, he'd be training there. He'd just get, he could go full in MMA because, and I said, there's gyms like this where you're from. And he goes, not like this. And I go, oh, that's true. Not like this. But we're at the gym, we're training and we need fuel. Check out jockofuel.com. Check out the Warrior Kid Nutrition. We got protein. We got vitamin gummies. We got sleep gummies. We got focus gummies. And we got some tasty, I'll be, uh, straight up, you seen me. I'll roll in because I don't, I don't really eat breakfast a lot, but sometimes we're coming in here.

• 1:20:28Jocko Willink?

  And we're gonna record and I'm kind of hungry, but I don't want a big, I don't even want a full protein shake before I come in here, but I bro, I'll just, I'll just get into a little Warrior Kid protein. Seriously, so good. And by the way, we just released the, uh, the fruity cereal for Warrior Kid. So it's like a little box, 12 grams of protein, tastes good as hell. So get in there and get whatever you need. Get energy drinks, get hydration, get protein, ready to drink protein. Powder protein.

• 1:21:02Jocko Willink?

  Time war.

• 1:21:04Jocko Willink?

  Super krill.

• 1:21:07Jocko Willink?

  Joint Warfare. I'm kinda going through my

• 1:21:10Speaker 02

  I could see you go.

• 1:21:12Jocko Willink?

  My stack. That's what we're doing. Check it out, jockofuel.com. Also check out originusa.com. We make clothing 100% in America from American-made materials. And this is not, this might, you can just, you can just go, oh, American-made, no big deal. No, no, no. It's actually a very, very big deal. Because we're not just, we're not just buying materials, sourcing materials from all over the world, and then just assembling them 94% down in Guatemala or Mexico or something. We're taking, all the pieces are from America, and we're assembling them 100% in America. That's what we're doing. And this is a big deal, because this is how we rebuild our manufacturing capability in America. We're making jeans, we're making boots, we're making hoodies, we're making t-shirts, we're making jackets, we're making all kinds of stuff.

• 1:21:56Jocko Willink?

  So get out there to originusa.com and get yourself some American-made clothing. Jiu-Jitsu clothing as well. Gis, rash guards, the whole nine yards. That's what we got for you. OriginUSA.com. Check it out. Communist, free.

• 1:22:10Speaker 02

  It's true. Don't forget about Jocko's store. So right now, on JacoStore.com, this is just a little equals freedom merch, if you will. That's understating it, because it's like legit. But there's a shirt that we released recently. It's called All Your Excuses Are Lies. You know, the OG thing where you write it in the chalk and, you know. So I messed up. I didn't get enough. Again, so we sold out real quick. But, but we're restocking them. They're gonna be, you know, they're gonna be available very soon.

• 1:22:42Jocko Willink?

  By the way, the ad that we made, I gotta say, I thought, you know, you kinda set me up, like I was making, I think you did this on purpose.

• 1:22:54Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:22:54Jocko Willink?

  You set me up, and I'm saying like, oh, you know, Echo makes these dumb things, whatever. But then you made, then it, so you showed that part of me saying Echo does this dumb stuff. But then you stepped up your game and made like a really cool video, so it makes me look bad. You know what I'm saying? Make me look like I'm an asshole, right? Oh, yeah, Jocko's over here ragging on Echo, saying he makes lame stuff, but then Echo made something super kinda dope.

• 1:23:17Speaker 02

  Not so much lame. Yeah.

• 1:23:18Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. So you set me up on that one. It won't happen again. You can pay for that.

• 1:23:22Speaker 02

  No, no, no, no, no.

• 1:23:23Jocko Willink?

  On the mats of justice.

• 1:23:24Speaker 02

  I felt like it all just came together nicely. So you did a great job. And the shirt came out very good, too.

• 1:23:29Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:30Speaker 02

  Looks like it's written on chalk. It's a good shirt. And I've seen people wearing those shirts even before that, because it was part of the shirt locker before, whatever. But yes, good. And I'm very sorry. I thought about enough. I didn't. I'm restocking them, so be on the lookout for that. You can enter in your email in there.

• 1:23:45Jocko Willink?

  You get notified?

• 1:23:45Speaker 02

  You get notified when they get.

• 1:23:46Jocko Willink?

  What about a bunch of spam? Are you spamming people?

• 1:23:48Speaker 02

  No spam.

• 1:23:49Jocko Willink?

  No spam. Spam-free.

• 1:23:50Speaker 02

  That email entering location is on the, it's different than joining the email list, which you should have done. You would have got the heads up. If you're on the email list, you get the heads up. See what I'm saying? Because we send it to you. But if something's out of stock, you put your email, it says notify me when restocked. It just, it didn't notify you. So you're all good. So you didn't miss out that bad. Just time-wise, you're not, you didn't get the first edition, as one might say.

• 1:24:12Jocko Willink?

  Right on. Check out the movie Ghost Soldier. And then you got, that's November 11th, and then November 25th, you got a little movie called Way of the Warrior Kid, which is based on the Way of the Warrior Kid book series. So you can get the books right now. All of the audiobooks for the kids' books are now available. So if you like audiobooks, or your kids like audiobooks, you're going on a drive, you wanna listen to, you wanna listen to Mark talk about jiu-jitsu and all that stuff and all the issues, and they're funny, too. They're funny books. They're good. They're good listens.

• 1:24:48Jocko Willink?

  So check those out. And then, of course, I've got a bunch of books about all kinds of different stuff as well. Mostly leadership, but also discipline. And then we got Put Your Legs On by Rob Jones. We got Need to Lead by Dave Burke. And we have a leadership consultancy, which you can find out about at EchelonFront.com. If you have problems inside your organization, you go to EchelonFront.com and find out how we can help you lead. And when you learn how to lead, you will solve the problems that you have in your life and in your organization. EchelonFront.com. And then ExtremeOwnership.com is our online learning academy, where you can learn the skills of leadership online.

• 1:25:27Jocko Willink?

  And then, if you wanna help service members, active and retired, you wanna help the families, you wanna help Gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an amazing charity organization. If you wanna donate or you wanna get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. Also, check out HeroesandHorses.org and Jimmy May's organization, BeyondTheBrotherhood.org. And if you wanna connect with us, if you wanna connect with Jim Caviezel, you can go to TheRealJimCaviezel for Instagram, and then Twitter, X, and Facebook, he's at ReallyCaviezel. And then also check out TheInnocent.org is another charity organization, helping train law enforcement to protect children. And then for us, check out Jaco.com. And then on social media, I'm at Jocko Willink and Echo's at Echo Charles.

• 1:26:12Jocko Willink?

  Just, actually, you're better off if you don't do that. You're better off if you just don't go on social media. You just ignore it.

• 1:26:21Jocko Willink?

  Thanks once again to Jim Caviezel for joining us here today, for making films with a

• 1:26:27Jocko Willink?

  much-needed message for the world. Check out his movies, including Ghost Soldier, out now. And of course, thanks to our military personnel, who are also, right now, stationed around the globe in harm's way. And they're out there to protect us and protect our way of life. We are thankful to all of you. Also, thanks to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, as well as all other first responders. Thank you for protecting us and our families here on the home front.

• 1:26:58Jocko Willink?

  And to everyone else out there, a great message from Jim Caviezel that we started this podcast with. Freedom exists not to do what you like, but to do what you ought.

• 1:27:13Jocko Willink?

  What that means is do the right thing. Not the easy thing. Not the thing that you might like to do in that moment, but the thing that you need to do. The thing that you ought to do. The right thing.

• 1:27:27Jocko Willink?

  Stay on the path. And you do that by getting up each and every day and getting after it. And that's all we've got for tonight. And until next time, this is Echo and Jocko, out.