The Grey NATO – 188 – Film Club Vol 7

Published on Thu, 14 Apr 2022 06:50:34 -0400

Synopsis

The podcast discusses a film club episode where the hosts, Jason and the speaker, each recommend five movies for listeners to watch. Jason's picks include Zodiac, Memento, Road to Perdition, A Most Wanted Man, and The Reef. The speaker's selections are The Game, Pig, Clear and Present Danger, Jojo Rabbit, and Thief. They provide brief synopses and insights into each film, touching on genres like thrillers, dramas, and comedies, and highlighting the work of acclaimed directors like David Fincher, Christopher Nolan, Sam Mendes, and Michael Mann. The episode aims to introduce listeners to a diverse range of films, both well-known and lesser-known.

Transcript

Speaker
Unknown Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Graynado, a loose discussion of travel, diving, driving gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 188. And it's proudly brought to you by the recently formed TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegraynado.com for more details. Jason, how you doing?
Jason I am doing well. It's a It's a weird episode as we've both admitted to each other here. You know, we're recording this in mid-March, but I'll be gone the whole month of April. So we're doing some weird kind of pre-recording stuff and trying to record some things remotely. And this is one of those episodes, but it should be fun. And I think it's a, it's, it's a good one to do a month, a month before it'll air. Don't you think?
Unknown Oh yeah, absolutely. I think a film club makes sense. You know, we're not going to have a lot of chit chat on this episode simply because it wouldn't make any sense. It's a month delayed. So, anything I bring up or Jason, anything we might bring up in this episode, we'll actually be talking about something similar or resolve said issue by the next episode, which will be one that you guys listen to quite a bit sooner. So it's a, it's a bit of a blended schedule with Jason being a remote for the, the bulk of April. And of course the watches and wonders pressure and the rest of it. So we're doing some prerecords, I think for a film club who cares that much about the chit chat. You're here for the movies and, uh, and we can probably have a little bit of fun with wrist check. Cause you and I are both kind of dealing with a similar conundrum in that we have some travel coming up and we haven't really figured out what watches to take with us.
Jason Yeah. You'll be in Geneva. I'll be in Sri Lanka. And by the time people hear this, uh, it'll be a, it'll be a known thing. Uh, what, what's on our wrists and what we decided to take, you know, I I've got this trip to the far side of the world. And I'm, I'm as often as the case with trips like this, it's like, what, uh, what watch do I wear? What do I take as a backup? And I've got a few options. I'm guessing it'll be the Omega, uh, just because I've been wearing it so much. And then I'll, I'll probably tuck something else in like a CWC or a vertex or something. But, um, today I'm wearing the, the Tornik Rayville, the TR660. I've, I've been, I've been loving that one, but, uh, you know, whether that makes the journey with me, um, remains to be seen. But, uh, what about you? And now you've got Geneva coming up and yours is kind of a different sort of trip. You're not going somewhere tropical with potentially some diving and hiking involved. You're going to be at the Pell Expo.
Unknown Yeah, exactly. So I've got Geneva with Watches and Wonders coming up, and I probably will take two watches, a dress watch and something a little bit more sporty. Almost all of my dress watches, or really all of my dress watches, are out for repair. They've been with Roaldorf for some time. So there's that. And then just literally just when we started the conversation, which would eventually be this recording, DHL dropped off a watch for me that all of you will already know that I have, but it's brand new to me in this moment. And that's this Seiko Dolce SACM 150. So it's this cool little dress watch. I bought it from SIEA. I'll put a link in the show notes, of course. But again, we would have talked about this a couple episodes ago. It's just brand new to me. So you're getting the raw kind of fun of it. It was this weird watch that I came across, you know, I, I was saying to, to, you know, I'm on record really loving the very early grand Seiko, um, 31 eighties. Uh, I like their kind of clean dial and the mountain hands and the very subtle dial furniture and the finishing and the gold case and the rest of it. But those, even if you found, if you could find a ratty one, we're talking like several thousand dollars.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown So I'm always on the lookout for things that kind of capture that structure, but would, would kind of, hit at a lesser price point really, right? Yeah. And so this Dolce is under $400. It's about 34 millimeters, 33 and a half millimeters wide. So it's a small dress watch with a tiny crown, but it has very similar generalized features. It's 5.3 millimeters thick. So it's way thinner than the 3180. It's got 16 millimeter lugs. They're drilled lugs. It's gold plated. And then what I thought, what kind of tipped me over the edge with this one, was one, it's quartz, which I think is kind of fun for a dress watch for me. Yeah. Especially a dress watch that I'll probably put on a casual strap and then try to dress it down rather than up. And, um, and then the, the other kind of added bit is it uses, uh, uh, an eight series, super accurate quartz movement. So it's an eight J 41. So it's plus minus 10 seconds a year. And it's a ticking seconds hand that aligns quite nicely with the markers for those who are concerned about such things. And for, I don't know, like with the taxes, it was less than 500 bucks Canadian. It'll make a great story. Uh, you know, I've long been hemming and hawing over buying a tank must, or, uh, you know, various smaller dress watches. And I think this is roughly the same size being circular. It does wear quite small and I'll see if it kind of grows on me or if it, or if after a couple of weeks, it just feels like a small watch, but I, I'm thinking that right now, because I have several vintage watches that are like 36, 37 millimeters. Right. And I really enjoy that. So I don't think it's that big of a stretch to go down to 33 and a half. And so far I like it. It came on this thin kind of patent alligator leather, very shiny sort of thing. And I swapped it out for a sort of brown lizard scale strap that I have just laying around. There's a couple of straps on the Hodinkee shop that I think would be perfect. I'm going to do a little Photoshop and decide which one I like the best. and pick that up. But at that point, the strap is starting to cut in on half the price of the watch, which is fine if you get something you really like. But it's a weird thing. It's so thin and light. It has a bit of that Calatrava feel to it. And then it has this really beautiful, this mica effect gold and silvery dial. Take a look at the photos and that kind of thing. It was between this and was the one we were just talking about, the SRPH37? Yeah, the Starbar Cocktail Timer, right? Yeah, which I think is also kind of a nice looking watch. It's 40 millimeters, it's a mechanical watch, but a similar dial texture, the mountain style hands. This one, that has a date, this Cool Quartz one doesn't. So yeah, maybe this one will scratch the itch or maybe I'll flip this one and try the new Precise Limited Edition. You can find both of those in the show notes, I think I'm leaning towards probably this and maybe the Bremont S302 or my Explorer, something that I could do a second time zone with. Luckily, when all the dust settles with DST, it's six hours, which I really don't need help remembering how to go backwards or forwards six hours. Yeah. And I'm not changing times, I'm just making the one change. I'm going to Geneva, I'm staying in Geneva and then I'm coming home. Sure. So there's not a lot of bouncing around. So yeah, I think that's where I'll land. In your case, you've got a route in which you might want to change the time. Plus you're, you're going to have to account for a half an hour. Uh, so it's sort of a different scene in which almost a GMT plus you're there for a month. Like who cares? Yeah.
Jason True. Yeah. Other than, other than when we record.
Unknown Oh, well there's that, but like you, Shani's with you. So you're not constantly like, Oh, is now a good time to send a text or a call or that sort of thing. So yeah, there's, there's times where you can travel pretty far and not really need a GMT.
Jason Or I should, or I should bring two and wear one on each time zone. How about that?
Unknown You could do that for sure. And then it'd give you a chance to break in the pocket watch.
Jason Yeah.
Unknown Pocket watch on, on home time and tuck it into your waistband.
Jason Yeah. Yeah. But maybe we should jump into the film club. We've, uh, I think it's a great, it's a great, uh, episode to pre-record. It's a bit timeless. So we've, we've chosen some, some cool movies that, uh, you could watch, uh, for the next decade if you wanted to. So.
Unknown Yeah. So we haven't done a film club since episode 161, which is when we did film club volume six with my brother, Tim. In that one, we kind of did a blended one where we each picked three movies. But this one, we're going to go back to the normal format that we've established for these. So Jason and I are each bringing five movies, no double ups, nothing we've talked about on Film Club before. Some of these you'll you'll know we've talked about on the show and others. I think we kind of pulled, you know, just from movies that we've enjoyed in the last little while. They're not necessarily current movies. They're just movies that we think should be on your radar. And sometimes they're very famous movies and who knows, maybe you missed them. And other times they're kind of subtle ones or older ones and that sort of thing. So it's It's a film club and I'll find some way to share the full list of the film club in the show notes. I'm not super sure how to do that yet, but I can find some manner of doing it. Uh, if you want to see all of them, because now that we're at seven, that's quite a lot of movies. Like at this point we're, we're working on our own little criterion collection.
Jason You know, I mean, before we start, I mean, I, I, uh, I was looking back at my past picks and I realized I was kind of starting to get a little predictable. I was doing a lot of like diving, climbing, spy kind of movies, uh, you know, very TGN stuff. And I thought I'm going to branch out a little bit here and kind of look at, look at movies that I've, I've just loved that are maybe some, some films from great directors or, or big name actors, kind of those marquee films. And, and I think all but one of them here kind of hits that Mark. And so the, the, where I'm going to start is, uh, let's see, uh, I'm gonna start with Zodiac. Um, this is, this is the film from 2007. Uh, directed by David Fincher. Um, all but one of mine, my picks today are from some, some fantastic directors and Fincher's right up there. You know, he's, he's done such great work. I think you have a Fincher film in your list as well. And, uh, this one's, you know, chock full of good, good acting. I mean, everybody from Brian Cox is in it. Mark Ruffalo, of course, Jake Gyllenhaal is the star of this and a great Robert Downey Jr as well. Oh yeah. He's fantastic. Yeah. So, It's about the hunt for, or the scenario surrounding the Zodiac Killer in the San Francisco area, Northern California area, back in the, I guess it was the early seventies. And Gyllenhaal plays, uh, I don't know what you call him, a newspaper reporter. He's, I think he's like the political cartoonist or something like that, but he, he takes it upon himself to, to start tracing the clues and, and kind of searching and trying to decipher the, the cryptic notes that the Zodiac Killer has been providing to the papers and kind of this, this path of clues. And it's, it's a very unsettling film. I mean, it's so well done and I love kind of the, the sense of, of time and place and kind of of that era that it projects. And then, and then it's, it kind of keeps you guessing. I mean, the Zodiac Killer case has captivated people for a long time. I was trying to remember if they ever definitively found out who he was. And I think recently they might've, gotten close, but I can't remember exactly how it all sorted itself out. But, uh, I, it kind of leaves you with that jittery sort of paranoid sense when you're watching this movie, I think to the credit of Fincher and, um, and the cast and just the way they filmed it. I think it's, uh, just a, just a superb film and one of my favorites. And I've gone back and watched it a few times. It's been probably a couple of years now. I did revisit a couple of the movies on my list last night. We actually watched two to refresh my memory, but this one's next on the list. I got to watch this one again.
Unknown Fantastic. Yeah. I mean, Fincher's Fincher, right? Like he's, he's just easily one of the best. And, and I think you could make the case if you, if you want to put your flag in the ground and say like Fincher's the best director.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown I don't know that I could disagree. Like every, like even just going backwards. Like I really enjoyed the Mindhunter TV series. He directed a series of those episodes through episode season one and two. But like Gone Girl, an amazing film, an excellent adaptation of a great book. Social Network won all the awards, established a lot of people, incredible music, beautifully shot. Curious Case of Benjamin Button, not my favorite storyline, but you can't really fault the delivery. A little fanciful for him, if you will. And then you get down into Panic Room, right? Fight Club. Geez. I mean, like there's just a lot, there's a lot here. He did the third alien film in the early nineties. He did, um, you know, just a lot. Like he's got 94 director credits. Oh my gosh.
Jason Wow. And let's give, give, uh, all credit to Gyllenhaal as well. I mean, he, he's one of those actors that just one of my favorites. He just doesn't bubble to the top when I think of big actors, but like he's done so many good movies and he has this intensity. Mm. in the roles that he plays. And I think this is one of his better ones.
Unknown You see a lot of what he kind of figured out in this role. You see it played out to a deeper, kind of darker space in Prisoners, which we've talked about in a past film club. That's a Villeneuve that I really like, where he plays in this one, a cop proper, a detective that's trying to track down two missing girls.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown And I mean, Zodiac's the better film of the two. Definitely the better script. And there's something really special about the color that Fincher uses. It crosses a lot of his movies, the yellows, the oranges, the warm light. Yeah. And you see it a lot in this because it's Northern California. So, you know, a couple of the really gnarly scenes are backlit by headlights. Right. Or are kind of in like sun soaked, you know, mid desert spaces that are very remote and feel really creepy, especially when you have a killer. uh, kind of moving through them. The tone of the film is something that's really hard to forget. It's great.
Jason Yeah. So that's my number one. I'll start strong.
Unknown That's a, it's a great pick for sure. And I'm going to, I'm going to start also with, uh, with my Fincher. It's one that I just rewatched. I'd watched it, you know, back in the early two thousands when it was closer to being a new movie. Uh, but this is an early Fincher from 1997. It's called the game. This is a great movie. This is such a good movie. It's a movie that I could easily see them turning into a Netflix run and eight series. you know, an eight episode Netflix run or, or even somebody redoing it. Although let's be clear, I don't think this movie needs to be remade in any way. Um, it's great. It's Michael Douglas and Sean Penn. And then basically every great character actor you can think of, but whose names you don't always remember. Yeah. So Deborah Cara Unger kind of plays the other, like a, a third lead in some ways she comes in and out of the film several times. And then there's just a cat, a literal cast of people. They are a cast in the movie and they are cast for the movie. And the concept is, is Douglas plays Nicholas Van Orton, who's like an investment banker, sort of a rich San Francisco elite. Classic Douglas. Absolutely. Yeah. He's born to play these sorts of roles and he's so good in this movie. Yeah. Basically the idea is his brother for his birthday, Sean Penn plays his brother and his brother's kind of the black sheep, you know, has a drug addiction problem. Clearly a guy that's like had some trouble in his life, but that Nicholas hasn't cut out. And for his birthday, for Nicholas's birthday, his brother Conrad gets him a game. And it's this very vague, almost ominous card to go to this business and sign up for your game. Yeah. And his brother doesn't really tell him that much. It's kind of creepy, but intriguing at the same time. He goes there. It's this nondescript sort of business building with a very bland name. I'm going to try and give away as little as possible, really what you'd get from the trailer. And he signs up for this game and they basically tailor an experience. But you don't really know what it is. And basically the process of this game kind of unravels his whole life. It's a little bit like going insane. He doesn't know what's real or fake. He doesn't really know how much control he has or this company has. Maybe people are trying to kill him. Maybe they're not. Maybe it's real. Maybe it's fake. Am I even really talking to the cops? Or are they also actors in this game? It's this fantastic psychological thriller. Um, it's very adult. I'll put that out there. Uh, this isn't one that you're going to watch with your kids, but if you haven't seen it and any of that sounds interesting, it's this really oppressive sort of you're on, you're on Michael's team throughout the whole thing, but you can't tell if he's making good decisions or bad decisions and you can't also tell who's in on it and who isn't. Huh?
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown And I don't know that you'd be able to predict the ending. I'm a huge fan of this movie. It's super fun. Yeah. But in a Fincher way, like where it's a lot of it shot in the dark and it's scary and, and, and there's points in the movie that feel very hopeless and kind of dialed up to the point of like loose insanity. And I like, I like it kind of wall to wall.
Jason Yeah. I mean, as you were, as you were recounting the plot, it was starting to kind of come back to me. I hadn't remembered this movie. Um, other than a lot of Michael Douglas movies kind of blend together in my mind, Um, but yeah, I, this is another one I need to rewatch, but, uh, I do remember really enjoying this when it came out and this was, gosh, I think this predates a Zodiac by a decade, I think, or thereabouts close. Maybe Zodiac was 2007. Yeah.
Unknown So 10 years earlier. Yeah. So it's a decade. And then, so this is the movie that Fincher made after seven kind of blew everyone out of the water. Yeah. So this movie is not, uh, the game is not as challenging as seven.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown I think in some ways it's aged better than seven. There's some stuff in seven. Then you're like, how did they put this in a movie, even an R rated film and then put it in theaters and people and people didn't revolt at a certain point. The game is not quite as gnarly. Uh, it doesn't, it doesn't dip so deeply into like the world of a serial killer. Uh, it really at all. Um, but there's because even from the name, the game, like you're allowed to enjoy what's happening to Douglas, even if it seems Like, how is he going to get out of this? When is it going to end? When are they going to all like, ah, just joking. It's like, I'm kidding. It's the game, right? Like it just keeps amping up and up and you're like, well, man, is this even a game? And there's this whole conspiracy that runs through the whole thing. Yeah. I like it. This is a fun movie.
Jason Yeah. Good pick.
Unknown Geez. Fincher, Fincher, a Fincher double play to start.
Jason Exactly. Yeah. So, so my, uh, my second one's another strong pick from another really strong director who does very unique films. Uh, this is Memento. by Christopher Nolan who went on to do obviously Batman and Inception and Tenet and you know, just a slew of other very challenging plot line movies. And I haven't gone into Nolan's background to see kind of what predated this, but this had to be one of his early ones.
Unknown I think his only other feature length before this is the following.
Jason Oh, okay. The other thing that stood out with this movie. So this is from 2000 and it's, it's a real mind bender because you're, you're seeing this movie through the eyes of its protagonist played by Guy Pearce, who is just superb in this role. And, um, it's someone who the concept is fascinating. He's, he's lost the ability to create short-term memories. So he remembers things from his past, but not his immediate past. So he might see somebody at a restaurant, um, and then, you know, three minutes later, like go to the restroom and come back out and see the same person again. And it'll be completely new to him. And so he has to overcome this by, you know, taking Polaroids. This is, this is pre pre smartphone days, of course. So he's, he carries around a Polaroid camera and he has to take photos of everything and everybody and, and make little notes to himself and write things down all the time. Otherwise he'll forget where he's staying, what room he was in. Um, and then people take advantage of him because of this. And the whole concept is he's trying to unravel, uh, this horrible crime in which his wife was murdered. And he only remembers bits and pieces and, and he has this kind of half-baked police report that he's using to, to, to carry out his own investigation, even though he's not a cop himself. And, uh, And because it's told through his point of view, it's the movie itself is very unsettling and it's very disorienting. So you're watching a scene and then the scene will be replayed later to explain how he got to the previous scene. And it's just, it's, it's just a nutty, crazy movie. And it just, for me, it almost foretells where Nolan was headed with so many of his other movies and kind of his style.
Unknown Yeah. Yeah. And I think it's interesting because this movie, I've only ever seen it maybe a couple of times and it was right when it came out. So It was a long time ago, right? And... Yeah, yeah. I remember it doesn't have his style yet. Yeah. It's a little bit brighter than a lot of his movies are, but it has all of the rest of it. It is this meticulous, patient... And then the other thing I remember is, one, I remember watching this movie and finishing it and being gobsmacked. Yeah. I'd never seen anything like this. Yeah. I couldn't wrap my head around about half of it. And so little of it, like in tenant, they, they need some special effects to tell you the timeline stuff.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown There's no special effects in this movie. Like there's some, there's some special, there's some via like, like stuff for fake fights and blood and stuff, but like, sure. There's no like portals and time travel and that kind of stuff. Like, yeah, it's a theater of his mind and his mind is broken.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown And when he believes he knows a universal truth, he tattoos it on his body.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown which is an insane thing to behold when certain things start to crumble around him, who he can trust, who he can't trust, who might be his friend, who's actually responsible for some of the things that have happened to him. And then I do remember way back when you rent a DVD, the DVD that came with this included a second disc that had the movie in linear order. No way. Really? Yeah. Oh my gosh. And you watch that and it's a different movie. Yeah. Yeah. So you finish it the first time and you go like, I don't really what, what, what? And then you put on this other one and you're like, oh, this is a pretty straight forward movie of and I'm not gonna finish that sentence because it'll give away, yeah, kind of the crux of the film. But yeah, if you get a chance to do the linear version, if you're that into into the filmmaking, yeah, it's pretty special. Yeah, this is a very cool movie. I've never seen one like it to the day. You know, this is kind of like if you've ever seen primer which was a time travel movie from a while back, probably around 2000. Huh. Even then, like now I watch a time, any other movies that have time travel in them and go like, but Primer did it better. Yeah. Yeah. So there's, this is a great one. Great pick. That's a movie I haven't thought about in a decade. I bet.
Jason You know, I had neither, although it always comes up because it was, uh, it was a movie that I saw, I think with Ghoshani when in our very early days of knowing each other. And, and it always comes up, we always say, Oh, you know, it reminds me of Memento or, or, you know, it always just sort of pops up as this sort of milestone. And finally, uh, as I said, I mean, last night we literally watched it last night because I was like, I want to add this to the list because it's such a strong movie from my memory, but I just don't remember the plot specifically. So it was so good to rewatch this film and it really holds up. It's really great. I'm glad to hear that.
Unknown Yeah. What a thing. Yeah. If you haven't seen Memento, that one might be the front runner for like, you have not seen a movie. Like memento.
Unknown It's cool.
Unknown Cause there's, and now so many movies have kind of ripped on the idea, right? Yeah. Yeah. But to take amnesia and take it out of the realm of like corny soap opera stuff and make it this thing that, that is essentially the mechanic of the film. Yeah. Nolan's so talented and he's made such a wide swath of films since then.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown But I think this one really speaks to just how dialed he was. I believe the, um, the screenplay was also written by his brother. I was wondering that.
Jason Yeah. Jonathan Nolan. If I remember correctly.
Unknown And I know that Christopher Nolan works with his wife a lot as well. And I think you can see it in the work. Like he's surrounded by people who are on the same page. Yeah. And he's not fighting with screenwriters or producers or like, like when you have a team like that, you can really turn out kind of an endless run of hits. Like, I don't, I don't love all the movies, but I also can't fault any of them really. Right. Like The Tenant was the only one where I really watched it the first time and I didn't even know if I liked it. Yeah. Yeah. The second time was great. Yeah.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown Another tough movie, uh, to, to, to wrap your head around. That's a great one. Good pick.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown That takes me way back. All right. You've got some old ones here. I do. Yeah. I'm going to go with the older one. Uh, this is a movie I think I've actually talked about on the show. I went for a real, also we almost can't do, although I think we're coming up near the end, but it's hard to do a film club without a Michael Mann. Uh, I'm such a fan and this is Michael Mann. I think his first, feature length. He might have done a, um, he definitely did like a sports documentary before this, but this is thief from 1981, um, stars, James Kahn, uh, Tuesday, Weld, Willie Nelson, and like some people who had never, like, I believe Robert Prasky had never acted in a movie before. I might have that wrong, but like he delivers this incredible role. Uh, Jim Belushi's in it, Dennis Farina is in it. So there's a lot of like, Oh, I know that guy. And obviously like James Conn has become a, Oh, I know that guy. Right. Like, yeah, this is a guy that would later be in, you know, the, the dad and elf and star in major TV shows. Like he's had a great, a big career, but this movie is, it's so deeply Michael Mann. There's shots in this movie that he, you know, this is 81. So this is film it's at night it's in Chicago. And of course he eventually develops his at night in LA. sort of persona that you see throughout Big Pieces of Heat and an entire movie called Collateral, both past film club picks. This is an incredible movie. Some of the reads are weird. The quality of the film itself makes it feel maybe even older than 1981 at times, but the set building and the scenarios and then the... This is a very Michael Mann thing to do, but the painstaking level that they went to make the the robberies real. So he's a safe cracker. And at one point, I don't, it's, it's so hard. I get so excited. I don't want to give anything away just because I enjoyed it a lot, but you basically watch, um, as they're using like Michael Mann found actual guys who were either previously incarcerated and were out, or we're still actively working as very high end robbers and use their equipment and their techniques. And, and so like, you know, there's, there's some wild stuff in here that we're not just using drills and, and turning little tumblers really carefully. They're cutting doors in half with thermite rods and really wild stuff. And I've never seen... This is another one where I've never seen a movie quite like Thief. It's a little weird. It's just old enough to feel special old, if that makes any sense. Yeah. And Khan's really good in it. It's really easy to watch. And it has this style and kind of bravado that's partly Michael Mann and partly James Khan. And I think they come together you know, and typically he loved using or loves using the leading man at the time, right? Yeah. Right. In his movies. And I think whether that's a Tom Cruise, a De Niro, a Pacino, a Val Kilmer, you know, you could go on for a long time, but I think that he really started something with this one. This is his memento in some ways, right? Like it kind of set up his career path. And if you're a, if you enjoy, um, if you enjoy Michael Mann stuff and, and especially some of his earlier stuff, whether that be something more like heat, which came out, 14 years later, um, or even back into man hunter, which is another one that I absolutely adore. Uh, and then I think thief is kind of where it kicked off and I think it's a winner.
Jason Oh, that's cool. I've never heard of this movie. Uh, I'm, I'm definitely gonna have to check it out. I liked James Kahn. He's one of those guys that, you know, you said, Oh, I know that guy. I mean, he's nowadays he's, he's the ultimate, I know that guy, guy, you know, um, back in the seventies, I mean, he was the godfather, right? I mean, he was huge. big, big name, but it kind of faded away from that. And, and this is, this is clearly like right in his prime early eighties.
Unknown So, and, and just, I'm just throwing this out there. If you, if you go to the show notes and you click on the IMDb link for thief, it has one of my all time favorite movie posters. It can be framed as a piece of art, like the welding goggles there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so cool. It's going to be super fun. I'm going to rewatch this movie sometime.
Jason That is cool.
Unknown This is great. Yeah. So yeah, that's a, that's my second pick. All right.
Jason What do you got? All right. I'm onto my third pick and this one is another great director. Um, Sam Mendes, this is road to perdition. Uh, just like tour de force, really, really strong movie with, with just such a mega cast in this movie. There's just, you name it, they're in this movie. Um, this is, it's, it's, it's a gangster movie sort of, um, well squarely it is, but it's, it's, you know, Tom Hanks is a lead character in a gangster movie tells you kind of half of what you need to know in this movie. It's just like, it's, he kind of plays the, the honorable guy. He's a father, um, but he's a, he's a gangster and he's kind of wrapped up with, you know, some, some bad dudes and, and bad deeds. And, and, uh, and you've got Daniel Craig in this movie and huge, you've got Paul Newman, um, Jude laws in this movie. I mean, it's just, it's like a who's who and, and it's beautifully shot.
Unknown It's very moody.
Jason Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he plays this like ultimate sort of villain character. And, uh, yeah, this is like another one of those movies that I need to rewatch. It was, um, it's, it's been such a long time. And I looked at the date of this thing and I didn't realize it was this old. I mean, it's from 2002. So this is a 20 year old film kind of along the same era as memento. And it's probably been almost as long since I've seen it, but it just keeps coming up. It just keeps coming up as one of those great films. And this is, This is four years before Daniel Craig made it big as, as Bond and Casino Royale. And he's got a really strong role in this movie as well. And yeah, I don't know the way it's shot too. I mean, Mendes is a, is a tremendous director. He's got a real sense of kind of mood and, and ambiance. And there's a lot of kind of scenes in like in weather, you know, like snow and rain and darkness and, uh, just, just really, really well done. And it's a period piece. I mean, we're, we're talking 1930s in like the Chicago area. And, uh, and so you've got old cars and, uh, just, it's, it's a lot to sink your teeth into. I just love this movie.
Unknown Yeah. And, and, you know, a few things I would say about this movie. One, I don't like mob movies.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown It's like, it's like one of the biggest genre of movies that like, I don't have time for. I've seen casino, I've seen good fellows. I don't really want to see him again. I'm not a big Godfather fan. I know that, that, that upsets people. Yeah. Um, they're, they're all so similar. And then this one for me, they did something special. This is the same cinematographer. His name's Conrad L. Hall, who did a Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid and American beauty and has done some, some like really, really, really incredible movies. So this movie looks great. Yeah. Um, and, and he might've been the director of photography on some of those, uh, which he was for American beauty and for road to perdition. He was also a cinematographer and DOP. So it's, it's a great looking movie. I think that, I think it's really impressive what they get out of Tom Hanks in this one. Cause you see him, his whole persona, both in a lot of movies and in normal life, is just as like a regular nice guy who's also talented and charismatic and all of that. And in this, they maintain all of that. And then they add this edge.
Unknown Yeah.
Jason Yeah. And I don't know if it's, you know, the movies you mentioned were all kind of Italian mob, East Coast stuff. And this is this is so Irish mob, Chicago or Illinois based. And it's just it just it's that much different. And I don't think it's the focus to me wasn't so much about mob bad guys. It was, it was this child, father, family. It was real kind of, there's the family tension in this movie, you know, even Paul Newman and his sons. And it's just, it has that, that, that real human element to it that I think really works. So.
Unknown I mean, Thief and Road to Perdition, we've got two, two, two Chicago mob adjacent movies.
Jason Yeah. I mean, I mean, strong directors here. What we've got Michael Mann and we've got, you know, Fincher, we've got Mendes. Yeah. Nolan. Some great ones.
Unknown What are you going to follow that up with? Hmm. Well, I've, I'm going to put my, what I think is kind of the most fun movie on my list right here in the middle. And it's, um, it's from 2019. I don't know if we've ever talked about it on the show. It's called Jojo rabbit. Nope. This is, uh, directed by Taika Waititi. Uh, he also plays one of the main characters and this would be the one of my five where I said like, almost ignore what I'm going to say about it. Cause I don't know how to sell you on this movie. It's such a weird thing. It was up for Oscars. It may have won some. I'm not sure. I don't follow the Oscars that carefully. You know, it holds a very strong rating. It is a great movie, but it is a weird premise of a young boy who's in the Hitler youth during World War Two. His hero is an imaginary friend that is Adolf Hitler played by Waititi. Wow. And it's like insanely funny. And this boy is shocked when he finds out that his mother, who's played by Scarlett Johansson, is harboring a young Jewish girl in a crawl space in their home.
Unknown Wow.
Unknown And it's all about this boy learning about what this world that he lives for, the Nazi party and the rest of it, what it's actually about and how inaccurate all of these weird statements are. And his internal dialogue is with a sort of joke, hilarious version of Hitler. Huh. It's such a strange movie to try and explain to somebody. I remember the first time someone was like, Oh, it's about a boy who's in the Nazi party and you're like, Oh, this sounds really depressing. I don't know if I'm, I'm on board. And they're like, well, it's a comedy. And you're like, huh? Like a comedy in the same way that like springtime for Hitler was a comedy. Like, I don't really, what, what, what, what are we getting into? Check out the trailer. If you don't know this movie, if you haven't seen it since 2019, it's, it's worth a rewatch. It's super funny. Uh, really poignant, um, has a couple like genuinely hilarious performances. If you've seen any of white TVs movies, I think you'll know exactly the tone. Even if it's just like the Thor one that he did, or maybe he's done two Thor movies, I'm not sure. But if you've seen Hunt for the Wilderpeople, same guy, same tone, hilarious, but thoughtful and sort of heartwarming and deals with things like life and death and pain and grief. And I haven't seen it. I saw it a couple of times when it first came out in 1920, but I haven't seen it a little while. And it's one I remember really, really enjoying. Sam Rockwell, great performance by him. It's just wall-to-wall like a lot of
Jason I remember when it came out and I remember when it was up for Oscars, it, it, it garnered some controversy if I recall. And I don't remember why, I don't know if it was the Nazi angle or kind of, you know, making Hitler a humorous character or something, but it was objected to by a number of people. And I, I just never got around to watching it, but, uh, you know, your recommendation is strong, so I'll have to check it out.
Unknown Yeah. And if it's, if it's the sort of thing that ends up offending somebody, I apologize if I missed some controversy with the film or whatever. A lot of great performances and, and, uh, a very funny movie at times as well.
Jason All right. My next one is a most wanted man. This is from 2014, uh, strong cast. And the director of this one was Anton Corbine, who if I'm pronouncing his name correctly, he was better known as a photographer. Uh, at least before this film, he had shot a couple of the U2 album covers. I think he shot the Joshua tree album cover. If you know that, okay. That image. Um, very stark black and white a lot of times. Uh, not this film. This film's got a lot of color in it. Kind of moody though.
Unknown A lot of music videos in his, in his filmography.
Jason Yeah. And it's based on a novel by John le Carré. So right there, you know, really strong story, a strong kind of visual oriented director. Um, and then the cast, you've got Philip Seymour Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, uh, Willem Dafoe plays a big role in this movie. Wow. Uh, Daniel Bruhl, who you might know from, Rush. He played, uh, Nicky Lauda.
Unknown Oh, sure.
Jason Yeah. He's excellent. He has kind of a smaller role in this one. Robin Wright is in it. It's very Le Carré, uh, story-wise, not quite, you know, Tinker Taylor, soldier spy caliber story, I would say, but it's, uh, it's in that same vein. It's, this is not cold war though. This is post nine 11, uh, kind of hunt for terrorists in this time set in Hamburg, Germany. And I guess if I had one critique of this movie, it's kind of a critique I have of a lot of shows and movies, uh, in general. And that is, you know, nowadays we're getting used to, to watching, you know, movies with subtitles or with, you know, actors from the countries in which the films are being set. And, and in this one, Philip Seymour Hoffman, who's the lead character, he plays a German, uh, intelligence officer and Willem Dafoe is a German banker. And it, it always kind of, sets me a little bit off if, if like they're doing accents and it's like, why didn't you just get, you know, German actors to do this? But setting that aside, the story is, is very good. It's got a really interesting twist at the end, really nicely shot. And you know, if you like a good spy film, you know, which I do, of course, um, this one, this one's a really kind of a, a thinking man spy film. It's not a, not a James Bond kind of spy film.
Unknown So yeah, I haven't seen this. Yeah. But I know that this is the same guy that did, um, the American, Yes, which is kind of this quiet patient. I've never really known if it's a great movie or just an OK movie with a few great scenes. I think it's I think it might be an OK movie with a few great scenes. But George Clooney playing sort of a James Bond without any of the hype, this kind of quiet. Yeah. Yeah. You know, assassin spy sort of guy. Right. So I'd be keen to see this a most wanted man. Man, do I miss movies with with Philip Seymour Hoffman?
Jason He's tremendous in this movie. He's very good. He projects this very, and maybe it's looking at him retrospectively, um, given that he's died a few years ago, but you know, he, he, he projects this image of this very unhealthy man, you know, who just, he doesn't care much about his own physique or health or lifestyle. He's just kind of driven to do his job. And he's every scene, he's got a cigarette in his mouth and he's always, you know, taking a flask of whiskey to put in his coffee and that sort of thing, you know, kind of hard boiled. investigator. And, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's a good one.
Unknown I, I highly recommend this one. Yeah. His son, you know, now, now we've, we're starting to see what his son's capable of with licorice pizza. Uh, and he's, it's, that's going to be, I hope, I hope he, I hope he decides to be an actor if he enjoys it. Right. And, and go that route. Yeah. Uh, really, really good. But yeah, Philip Sumer Hoffman, anything from, yeah, anything I can think of, I enjoyed. Right. Yeah. For me, I'll always think of, you know, his role as the, as the sort of, you know, overly sensitive guy from Almost Famous, the famous cream writer that didn't like most things or why music was changing. Oh, yeah.
Jason Capote. That was the one. Yeah, Capote.
Unknown Yeah, for sure. There's another great one with, I think with Marissa Tomei called Only the Devil Knows You're Dead. Oh, sure. Which was a pretty good uh if somewhat disturbing sort of movie as well though he had a lot of great performances for sure yeah sad to sad to have him gone look back at his work yeah all right what am i up to four hmm i'm gonna go with 1994 is clear and present danger this is so great yeah so i recently we've talked with this i recently went through that like dad thriller list yep yep And my wife and I agreed after watching a ton of these movies that either this Clear and Present Danger or Harrison Ford's other Jack Ryan one called Patriot Games were kind of the peak. Like I think Hunt for Red October for me is way up there. Yeah. It's just but it's that that is such a submarine movie. Right. Right. Whereas what they did here is they had a mix of like an action movie and a thriller and this sort of family man element. It all kind of wraps up in one. This is another Philip Noyce. is obviously based on a Tom Clancy novel. And in this one, CIA analyst, I love that, Jack Ryan is drawn into an illegal war fought by the U.S. against a Colombian drug cartel. So, you know, they're breaking laws. They're going down there. There's some, you know, high end weaponry, fancy rockets and missiles and all this kind of stuff and some really great performances. That's another Willem Dafoe. Joaquin de Almeida plays a great role. Henry Cerny is in here. Uh, there's, there's so many like, you know, the movie's just kind of wall to wall full of some of my favorite. Oh, that guy, right? Like Benjamin Bratt, Raymond Cruz. You see Raymond Cruz in anything and you're pumped and you may not know his name, but you'll know his face. Yeah. Uh, he's in some very memorable scenes from some great movies. James Earl Jones, sign me up for any movie with him and Archer.
Jason I mean, she's, she's like peak nineties. I mean, right alongside Harrison Ford.
Unknown No, I highly recommend this one. It's a little bit more pulpy. You know, there's a lot of, um, mid 90s sort of shooting a thousand rounds and not hitting anything, all that kind of stuff. But, um, it doesn't make it any less watchable and it takes you through these various settings. They move around a lot in these Jack Ryan movies and, and the South American theater I think is, is fantastic against a drug cartel. That, that whole concept has aged really well. Um, and, and it's peak Harrison Ford for me, like maybe, maybe the fugitives better. Sure. But I don't, I don't want, I don't want a world in which I have to pick between the fugitive and his Jack Ryan films. I like them both so much.
Jason I mean, Harrison Ford is such a hero. I mean, he's like, he's, he's, I don't know. He's just such a hero in every respect. I mean, his run of movies, he was kind of like, and maybe this is a really bad comparison. He's like the Phil Collins of movies in the nineties. I mean, everything he did was turned to gold and he was, he was just so good at it.
Unknown It was like, Well, I mean, look at the start. Let's start in 1989, right? So that's last crusade, which could have been, you know, he'd done temple of doom. He'd done return of the Jedi by this point and raiders of the lost arc blade runner. This was all behind him. He could, his career could have been over here if he'd wanted it to, or if, or if he had made a bad decision instead, you've got a last crusade presumed innocent Patriot games, the fugitive air force one, six days, seven nights. Uh, what lies beneath? And then he like K-19 Widowmaker, like another, you know, that was in the, in the vein of another submarine movie, like just a decade of like movies that people are still watching.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown Yeah. Impressive. And then I could, I'm still scrolling up. He's got 83 credits. Apparently they're doing post-production on Indiana Jones five. Why not? Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Right.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown He's great in 2049. Another, another one that we've had on, on, uh, on film club before. Yeah. No, I'm a huge fan of this one. And if you, if you don't love, if you watch this one and you don't love the trailer, make sure you check out the trailer for Patriot games. They just work together. Yeah. And who doesn't like a Sean Bean IRA thriller? I love that movie. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's great. Yeah. It always kind of felt like a soft extension for me or, or a, a, a sequel in some ways of Ronan. I know that he, that, that doesn't work for Sean Bean because Sean Bean does what he does in every movie he does in both of those films. But, uh, It's just that same sort of spirit. Uh, I think Ronan we've, we've talked about on a past one that might've been a pretty early pick. Another fantastic, a fantastic film, but that's, that's my fourth clear and present danger, 1994. Check it out. If you haven't seen it, it's a winner.
Jason Well, I'm going to finish with a really oddball one. This is not a left field. This is a, this is not from a great director. Um, and there are no actors in it that I recognized. Uh, this is a, a small film. I believe it was an Australian made movie called the reef and it's, Really funny because if you look at the movie poster, you watch the trailer, you read anything about it. It's, it's, it's, uh, categorized as a horror film and they really played that up with all of the, the promotional materials around it. It is, I would not have called this a horror film. There's a shark involved. There's some open water swimming. Um, but it's just wasn't a horror film to me. It was, it was almost like something you could set on in a stage play. It's about a small group of friends that, uh, is, is out in a sailboat. I believe they're delivering a sailboat like from one place to another and a couple are along for the ride to kind of help out with this. And the boat hits, uh, hits an underwater reef and splits and starts to take on water and capsizes. And they're, they're kind of trapped sitting on the hull of this boat, uh, out of reach of any help or any nearby help and really no way to contact anybody. And it's this dilemma of these. I think it's four people that are just sitting on the upturned hull of a boat trying to decide what to do. And, you know, as luck would have it, uh, they are being kind of stalked or surrounded by a shark or, or sharks. Um, and it, so it presents this dilemma of like, do you stay on the hall and wait to be rescued or do you swim for it? Or how do you get out of this scenario? Taking the risks that are obvious by the fin that keeps popping up out of the water. But each person's decision and kind of the way they each deal with the stress, uh, and the scenario and kind of deal with each other, I, I've, I've found much more of a, kind of a human relationship kind of film. And like I said, it could almost be a stage play because it's, there isn't a lot of moving around, you know? I mean, it's, it's a, it's a boat, a very small space and I'm not going to give anything away because, you know, certainly, uh, there is some, some blood curdling screams and bloodshed and that sort of thing, but you know, carnage, yeah, carnage. But, uh, yeah, it was a good movie. And I think there was another film, a followup movie. Maybe I'll have to add that to a future film club, but I think it was kind of a followup to this that was set in like some mangrove swamps and involved crocodiles or something like that. But it was like, it was so miscast as this horror film. And I remember watching it, you know, one night when Gashani was out of town and it was kind of like, Hey, what's this? And, and really enjoying it. So, Yeah. Check it out. It's been, it's been a while since I've seen it. Um, Andrew Trockey or Trockey is the director. Never heard of him. He also wrote it and there's only like four stars in the movie. It's from 2010. Yeah. Rated R probably for some gore and, and that sort of thing. But, uh, foul language or something, but, uh, otherwise, uh, yeah, check it out. It's a, it's a fun movie. I mean, it's not the caliber of a memento or a Zodiac, but it's, uh, right. It's not, uh, not as the, uh, as the movie poster would, would indicate. So if you, if you run across this one and you're like, huh, what's this one about? Give it a, give it a go.
Unknown Fair enough. I know I've seen, I haven't seen this, the reef, but I know I've seen, I think it's called the shallows and I've seen another one that open water was kind of a famous one. Yep. Yep. I was going to do open water. Yeah. Which was good. Good movie. Yeah. I remember open water being pretty actually just like hard to watch. It was that good. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I saw one, another weird one that was about, The title was the depth of how deep they were. They were stuck in a cage, a shark cage. Oh, okay. Yeah. Oh, here it is. 47 meters down. Oh, it's just down the page. Yeah. Yeah. There was a lot of dubious sort of science happening in that one. But yeah, this looks cool. I could see this. I, and I like that, that it looks like it's presented sort of like an indie film. So like, yeah, kind of take it, take it for what it is. Um, and if the performances are good and believable, then yeah, why not? And as long as the special effects for the sharks, yeah. are acceptable. And according to the, did you know element of, um, IMDb, the sharks are real, mostly filmed in South Australia. So that's pretty, pretty interesting. Yeah. A good one to add. And another one I haven't seen. That's cool. Yeah. The reef. Um, all right. I'm going to, I'm going to close out my five with, uh, with a movie that I loved. And then I found out yesterday that you and Gashani really didn't. So I'm going, I'm going last on this one and who knows, maybe this is the gamble.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown Maybe I've lost my mind. I don't know. It's called pig. I believe we've talked about it on a past episode, or maybe you and I just spoke about it before you had seen it. Yeah. This is a 2021 film by Michael Sarnoski, and it stars Nicolas Cage, Alex Wolff, Adam Arkin. Like I said, I really enjoyed this movie. It kind of opens in a Dick Preniky fashion. Nick Cage plays a guy who's clearly running from something and has settled in the woods outside of Portland. And he lives with a truffle pig that helps him find truffles. It's how he finances his life. A person shows up, buys his truffles, brings him some stuff, and leaves. And he lives alone in the woods and seems quite content doing so. He's clearly grieving someone you believe to be his wife. He's playing old recordings on a battery-powered tape deck and otherwise lives a very remote sort of disconnected lifestyle. And then this is all in the trailer. And I would actually say the trailer in many ways let this movie down. The trailer and the poster really kind of set this up as being like a John Wick, like somebody took the pig and Nicolas Cage, you know, remembers his training from the military and goes and gets his pig back. And it wasn't even remotely like that. Somebody does steal the pig. Somebody in the Portland like food scene that wants more truffle steals his pig. And it's about Nick Cage kind of deciding to reenter this world that he had run away from years before following a tragedy. And in that process, he, um, he, he has to address many things that he kind of left behind when he left the world. And, uh, there's, it's not a perfect movie, Jason, uh, when we were chatting about it yesterday, you brought up a fight sequence. And I think any editor that maybe didn't feel strongly about that didn't, you know, like it had some distance would have cut that scene. It didn't make any sense to the greater film. So if you get that far, please don't quit at that scene because the movie really becomes this warm sort of emotionally challenging thing after that. But it is opaque at times. It's a little bit challenging. You know, I'm a huge Nick Cage fan. When he's good, he's as good as anyone. But he's not always good. I think he's great in this. And the story, when it starts to really link into tragedy and dealing with pain and trying to run from your problems, and then having to go back and address them and see these sorts of things all surrounding essentially the food scene in Portland, the restaurant tour scene in Portland. It was just a movie I hadn't really seen before. I like, like I said, I like a good Nic Cage performance, but I don't know, Jason, give people the other side of the story.
Jason Yeah. I mean, I've never been a big Nic Cage fan, so it took some persuading. I think I would, if I saw Nic Cage, you know, in the list of actors for a film, I probably would I mean, it's strong to say, but I would probably skip it based on that because I've never really liked his movies, but it on your recommendation, we watched it and, and then, and you didn't like it. Well, then it got to that. It got to that fight scene and, and it went, it was like, we were already a little bit like, okay, I, I get this, but, but then I think that unraveled it for us. And I think it was like, I guess if you can sit through past that, I think the relationship between cages character and the, Um, I guess it's Amir, right?
Unknown The, the, uh, yeah. Alex Wolf.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown Young man. That's driving him around Portland.
Jason Yeah. Yeah. I thought that was strong. Um, I, I thought it was a movie that had some good scenes in it, but overall, um, and, and it can oftentimes come down with films to kind of the mood in which you watch it. And it seemed a bit of a downer.
Unknown Um, Oh, the movie is a downer. That's a, that's a fair call. Yeah. Yeah. I like, I like songs in a minor key. I don't mind the downer of a movie.
Jason You know what I mean? I don't usually either, but I think you combine that with Nick Cage and then the inexplicable fight scene. And I was like, okay, I'm I've lost.
Unknown I mean, I should, I should give you a little list of like genuinely, like not challenging, just genuinely great. Nick Cage performances, adaptation, matchstick men, moonstruck. Uh, he's like, he's done some, he's done some real stuff, you know, uh, leaving Las Vegas.
Jason Yeah. Arizona. Was it, uh,
Unknown Oh yeah, Finding Arizona.
Jason Something like that. Or a very early film of his.
Unknown Yeah, I remember that being good. But yeah, so maybe you'll like Pig, maybe you won't. Watch the trailer. I think the trailer lets it down. It's not an action movie. Like I said, aside from that one fight scene, it's actually a pretty quiet sort of indie style film that hits on these special moments. I don't think the whole movie's special, but these moments really made it something for me. And I like Nick Cage out in the woods, or I like anyone out in the woods with a truffle pickle. That seems like an interesting lifestyle, right? Kind of Dick Pernicky adjacent. Yeah. Dick Pernicky with a friend, right? And you know, Adam Arkin is amazing in everything you see him in, and he plays a kind of pivotal character in the third act of the movie. Yeah. It's one of these people that seems like an enemy at first, and then there's some common ground. It's just the movie wasn't at all what I expected, I guess, is why I enjoyed it. And I've seen a couple of the recent stuff from Nick Cage, and I enjoyed not all of it, certainly. Escape from Ghost Town, I think is what it's called. That one you can skip in my world. But I think Pig was cool. I don't think, you know, they're not going to win Oscars for it, that sort of thing. But I definitely enjoyed it.
Jason Yeah, I wouldn't not recommend it. Like, I wouldn't say it's a terrible movie. It just wasn't a favorite of ours. certainly I think part of film club is to present some challenging ones here. I mean, the reef isn't one that a lot of people might like either. So, you know, we've got to throw, we can't, we can't be all, uh, Nolan's and Fincher's and Michael Mann's.
Unknown Well, I mean, and, and you, yeah, I'm, I'm prepared for, I'm sure there's people in the audience that are not going to align with Jojo Rabbit's sense of humor. Yeah.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown But yeah, so that's, that's our, that's our 10. Jason picked 2007's Zodiac, 2002's Road to Perdition, 2010's The Reef. 2014's A Most Wanted Man and the wonderful 2000 Memento. And I have 1997's The Game, 2021's Pig, 1994's Clear and Present Danger, 2019's Jojo Rabbit and 1981's Thief. Jason, I think if someone hasn't seen any of these movies, Memento is probably the pick, I think.
Jason It might be. I mean, having just watched it last night, I'm still kind of buzzing from it. It's a good one. Yeah. I mean, there's some really good ones in here. I need to go back and rewatch. You should check out the game. Clear and Present Danger and also Thief.
Unknown Oh, Clear and Present Danger. Yeah. Thief is great. Yeah. Yeah. There's some really good ones here. There's a few I haven't seen, which always makes me happy. So that's Film Club Volume 7. Nice. Find a link to all of these movies in the show notes, of course. And if you have any feedback, if you want to suggest movies for Film Club 8 or even just to the audience, get in the show notes. Get in the comments, drop us in. Let's, let's, uh, we can, we can vote with our likes and, uh, and have a chat about movies and that kind of stuff. I'd be thrilled to, but yeah, this is a, this is that time of year. I think we're, we'll all start watching fewer movies, but now at least if you've got a free evening and, uh, it's raining outside or something like that, you've got a list to, uh, to kind of pick at.
Unknown Yeah.
Jason Yeah. This one's ripe for comments. I can't wait to read what, uh, what the listeners think.
Unknown This is a different spread than we normally do. Yeah, I agree. Between some, some of the weirder picks and then some of the more predictable ones as well.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown So yeah, we'll see if people enjoyed it. Yeah. How about some final notes?
Jason Sure. Yeah. Um, I was turned on to a, uh, a vinyl music marketplace called discogs, D I S C O G S.com, uh, as a good source to buy, uh, vinyl. I've been kind of slowly rebuilding my vinyl record collection. Oh, nice. A friend of mine, actually the guy who were cat sitting for right now, um, now a month ago, uh, He, he kind of told me about this and cause I was playing some records while he and his wife were over here for dinner and he said, Oh, have you ever heard of Discogs? And I said, no. And so he turned me onto it and I signed up for an account. It's kind of like a low budget sort of eBay style or Craigslist. Well, not Craigslist. It's sort of an eBay style marketplace where you, you don't bid on stuff, but you can, you can search by title and by format and where in the world you want to buy from and condition. Right. For anything. I mean, it's not just vinyl. I think you can buy a, CDs or, you know, other media as well. But, um, I, I, so far I've, I signed up, I created an account and I kind of searched for something and found it and found a number of examples of it. I bought a 12 inch promotional single that was created by a band called propeller heads of on her majesty secret service. They did the sort of techno updated version of that soundtrack with the composer, David Arnold. And it was a 12 inch promotional single that had a B side that was a different version of it. And I just wanted it and it was cheap and it shipped really quickly. It came from a seller in the Netherlands. The review system that they use for, you know, uh, the seller and buyers and kind of members is, is reassuring. And then the, the, they have quality ratings that are very, uh, strictly defined in terms of, you know, do you want, you know, what What are you willing to accept versus, you know, what you want to pay for something. And, um, you know, it arrived well packaged and, um, so it's, it's just this, this nice community of, of buyers and sellers of, of vinyl music. And, you know, if you're looking for, you know, to kind of build up your LP collection and you don't want to kind of wade through local record swaps and you just want something, uh, it's a good, good place to look. So very cool. Yeah. Check it out. It's a little clunky, like the interface, like to sign up for the account was Like I had to go through a bunch of steps and kind of redo stuff because it was a little bit, kind of felt a little bit outdated. But once I, once I got into the system, it's, uh, it's great. So check it out.
Unknown Super. Yeah, that's a great one. You know, my, my brothers are bigger fans of vinyl than I am. I really find that, um, that's not the way that I like link up with listening to music.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown Um, I, you know, I think we've talked about on the show before I went through several phases throughout the pandemic of upping my, um, audio game and I'm kind of at a point where I'm pretty happy with it.
Unknown Yeah.
Unknown And, and weirdly, like it's only a couple of times a week where I want to sit down and listen to an album and can do so in a vacuum, um, you know, without, without any interruption. And then half the time you go like, Oh, I would like to go listen to whatever. And then you realize, Oh, it's 10 o'clock and I can't listen to it at any volume. units above and below me in an old home in Toronto. So you do have to be kind of cognizant of the noise and especially when you've got a giant system, but with headphones or whatever, it makes a different thing. And, uh, it is nice because that was something I remember, like, you know, I go to Zulu records in Vancouver and you always kind of wonder like, all right, this is an old album. Like what's it going to sound like when I actually get at home? Um, I like the idea of being able to buy from something where there's everybody's on the same page about how to explain the condition of it. Yeah. Yeah. Which makes a lot of sense. So that's cool. Yeah. A good... It kind of sounds like if you've ever used BrickLink, which is a way of buying Lego sets that have been retired, that people are selling. Sure. Yeah. It's not that different than if you imagine if they took Watch Recon or one of the watch sales forms and just took it up a level. Yeah, yeah. So there was a buying, selling, a little bit of eBay injection into the format, and that's what BrickLink does. And it looks like they do it with Discogs too. That's cool. Good pick. Anything, any albums that you plan on buying in the next little while?
Jason No, I mean, I just wanted to kind of buy that one to kind of experiment with with how the whole thing worked. So now I guess the floodgates are open and I'll just kind of start picking off the ones that I've been wanting for a while. So very cool.
Unknown Yeah, that's great. All right, so for mine, I've got a YouTube channel. It's actually one we've talked about in the past, but we spoke about a specific series, the Rad Ventures series that Ryan was doing. You know, there was that great Defender review. Oh, yeah. A while back, which is super fun to watch. And basically, what I want to offer is a shout out because I can't even suggest one series right now. The whole Hagerty YouTube channel is just on an unbelievable pace. Huh. You can have almost any taste in cars and they've got a show for you and the shows come and go. They do six episodes of something and then some of them never come back. Some of them come back for another season later. They've got a great series. So they had originally started one with Magnus Walker, the sort of Porsche adjacent car aficionado and style guy, Magnus Walker. And so they were doing the next big thing. But the problem was that all of those things weren't the next big thing anymore. They were the big thing. already, right? It's so hard to find hidden gems when the car market was exploding like it has in the last two years. Right. So now they're doing the big thing, and he looks into superlatives of various automotive footnotes around the world. Yeah. But the one that I've come to really enjoy, and it's the most simple, the most straightforward, even in terms of... The production's lovely, but it's a very straightforward thing. It has a little bit of that Antiques Roadshow feel to it. It's called The Appraiser, with this guy Colin Comer, I'm going to guess that Colin's a watch guy. He wears a Mille Miglia in, in these episodes. And, uh, and, and I'm going to keep watching and see if he changes that up, but it's very simple that in an episodes, you know, maybe 15 or 20 minutes long, and he'll have somebody bring a car into his garage. And he walks you through how you appraise a car, how you give it a grading scale, what to look for in this car or that car. And if you're, if you're a vintage watch fan where it's like, oh, well, you can tell that a case is over polished because of this it's that, but for cars, So he goes in and pulls the carpet up in the back and he goes, Oh, you see where this is cracked. That means it was hit at some point, but it was repaired nicely. Then he'll kind of give the whole thing a grade. He'll have the person come back in the owner of the car, come back in. They say, Oh, I think my car is worth $150,000. And he'll either go like, well, I'm sorry to tell you it's worth 120 or he'll go, Oh, you're way off. It's worth 250. Like who knows? The car market is such a thing, but he's a, this is what his living is, is in appraising cars. And the little lesson of like, Some of it's very specific, like he'll get into a car and he'll go like, well, this is the wrong gauge pod for, uh, you know, uh, a GT three 50 or something like that. And, and you go like, well, I would, I would never know that this is so fun to watch. And, and he can, he'll go around and do the paint measuring and all that kind of stuff, but it's edited in a way that isn't boring or slow. And some of it, it gives you a history lesson on the car. So you kind of understand why someone would collect it. Uh, if that's kind of opaque to you, if you're not hugely into cars and then you get to watch someone kind of walk around and tell you what they look for when they appraise a car and why it's a grade three or grade two or grade four or whatever. Very watchable, super chill.
Jason Huh. That sounds great.
Unknown Yeah. I enjoy it quite a bit, but the Hagerty channels, like it's just on absolute fire. Like Jason Camisa is one of my favorite automotive personalities. He has one called Icons now, and I'll put this in the show notes as well, but he just did one for the new Lucid Air electric car, California-based electric car. And it's like the cinematography is not, it might outdo most of what Top Gear ever did. Wow. Like they're just operating on a really high level. The writing's amazing stunt driving. Uh, I'll, I'll put a couple in the show notes that you can get. He did, he did, he's done a couple of really incredible pieces. He does another great one called, um, um, revelations like REV, like a engine revving. Oh, and it's the history of a car. Uh, so, you know, it could be the history of, uh, three series. It could be a history of like, like of a specific model, why it did or didn't work or whatever. And there again, the writing's clever and fun and fast and the audio production or the video and audio production is really good. Uh, yeah. So I would say if you, if you dig the car thing, subscribe to Hagerty and start giving some of the shows a chance because they've got standard stuff about super cars and collector cars, and they've got stuff out kind of to the end about the history of cars and appraising cars and the rest of it. And it's super fun.
Jason Huh? Nice. It's cool to see. the name Hagerty, you know, they've been around forever and they've been, what, they're into like auctions and insurance and that sort of thing. Right.
Unknown And, and. Well, now they own Amelia Island, the car show.
Jason Yeah. And to kind of reinvent themselves and in this new medium, not new, but you know, to kind of in a different way and, and produce some really good stuff is, is exciting to see.
Unknown Yeah. And they're not slowing down. Like I said, the, the, the Hagerty name just bought Amelia Island, which is a huge car show. One of the biggest ones in the world, the collector car, really high end car, car show. Yeah. And then they just bought, um, Radwood as well, which was that eighties and nineties themed. Wow. Uh, car show and, and website and stuff. So they're, they're growing and expanding and kind of doing their thing. And man, if I don't, if I don't click and enjoy pretty much every video they put out, there's some of them, I really wish they'd come back with other seasons. I'd love to see more rad ventures with Ryan Semensek. Yeah, it was really good and very much kind of in, in our zone for the way we would actually use and maybe one day have those sorts of vehicles. Yeah, it's great. Give it a run if you're into cars, if not, easily skippable.
Jason Could probably say that about almost anything on our show.
Unknown Yeah, I suppose so. Yeah, yeah, for sure. You don't like movies. I mean, this one was a quick no thank you. Yeah, right. Well, hey, as always, thank you so much for listening. If you want to subscribe to The Show Notes, get into the comments for each episode, or consider supporting the show directly, and maybe even grab yourself a new TGN signed NATO, please visit TheGreyNATO.com. Music throughout is Siesta by Jazzer via the free music archive.
Jason And we leave you with this quote from the late film critic Roger Ebert who said, We live in a box of space and time. Movies are windows in its walls. They allow us to enter other minds, not simply in the sense of identifying with the characters, but by seeing the world as another person sees it.