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TSP Ep 117: Oh, the Places We've Been: Or how I Learned to Stop Worrying About the Work and Just do it. PART 1!
29 Plays9 months ago
Tom and Steve are back for 2024 with the first part of their first episode for the first of the year! In this episode, they discuss the future of franchisees, an AI comedy special of George Carlin, and they talk shop on their projects in this first part!
So come along with us as we get back to it!
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Transcript
Unexpected Podcast Hiatus
00:00:00
Speaker
The longest break ever in our podcast. It is, yeah. In like six years or something. And it feels far too soon. One more week, Lord. We kept saying one more week. That was the problem. I know, huh? One more week turned into two months. Well, you know what I find during the holidays?
00:00:20
Speaker
I don't know if you intentionally mean to like slow down and not podcast, because I know it's like, you know, it's the holidays, we'll just kind of, we'll just power through it. But damn, man, once it starts going, it's like, I'm so tired. Can we just take that break? Well, yeah, especially with with families and stuff like the holidays just get
00:00:44
Speaker
I mean, it was like I'm going, we were going down the Palm desert to be like Katie's sister and it's like, my mom's coming over and like Katie's parents were always coming over and it's like, okay, I guess. When do I get a break from all the fucking family visits? Well, yeah, you were telling me cause I was wondering like.
00:01:01
Speaker
Well, you were just saying how you went to vacation and you haven't had a day off to just relax. I was like, yeah, man. Yeah. Most vacations are even more busy than... Yeah, it really kind of sucked because I took Thanksgiving off and then everyone got COVID. Oh, that's right. And then I took off the week before Christmas and I got sick.
00:01:23
Speaker
And then, cause I was really sick on Christmas. Like the flu? Yeah. Cause I kept thinking, did I get COVID? And I kept testing and I went through like four tests and all negative. And then I was like, oh, I guess it must be the flu. Like, I don't know what the hell this is. And then I went to work with like a fever and stuff. And I was like, what am I doing? And then I was like, it just- Yeah, why'd you go to work? Oh, cause you have a bunch of stuff to do. There was no one else there. Everyone else was on vacation.
00:01:49
Speaker
So it was pretty lax, but I had to like do like the basic stuff. Just basically keep the machine running. Yeah, exactly. Keep it on idle, essentially. Yep. And it was like, yeah, you know, well, it is what it is. But, you know, it's good to take a break.
Twin Shadows Podcast Returns
00:02:08
Speaker
Like at least right now we don't have like any kind of obligations to anyone to like always podcast. Like if we had like a lot of viewers and interaction and stuff, it would definitely I probably wouldn't like let us take a break.
00:02:23
Speaker
Like, yeah, once we saw that green, and we're like, all right, baby, we're quitting our jobs. Yeah, exactly. Right now, this is just really for us, in our growth and discussions. But yeah, everybody, even though everybody, Karen, I mean, every person. We're back, and we can rip into the intro. Welcome, everyone, Twin Shadows podcast. This is episode, I think, 117 or 118.
00:02:52
Speaker
And yeah, the podcast about film filmmaking and filmmakers. And you're joined as always by your two co-hosts, Tom and Steve. So Steven, how you doing, buddy? I'm all right, man. I'm tired. I'm always tired now. You know, a lot of big surprises. Did you want to announce why you're tired on the podcast? I guess. Kind of a little bit. I mean, ain't going away. That's true.
00:03:21
Speaker
Well, I had my first little one, so.
Steven's New Fatherhood Journey
00:03:25
Speaker
I was like, that's a way to put it, buddy. Your first little one. Yep, the first one. So. That he's aware of. That I'm aware of, yeah. But yeah, so that's been very tiring and very consuming. Steven is now being called daddy by people that are not
00:03:47
Speaker
that are appropriately calling him daddy. That's true. So yeah, so that's one of the main reasons why we took a break. The break is so long too. And Sophia was born on Halloween. What a kick-ass birthday. I know, right? Yeah. I was like, hell yeah. Halloween, baby. That's cool. That is really cool, yeah. And so what's that experience been like, buddy? You've been watching a lot of movies with her?
00:04:15
Speaker
I was at first. Yeah, I was watching like a bunch of TV shows. I think I was telling you, I was just checking out Attack on Titan. Her and I were watching that while I was watching it. But now slowly kind of getting into grooves and more energy as she sleeps more. So it was a lot of video games, a lot of TV. And now I'm trying to put her down and actually get to all the work that I've been putting off for like these months.
00:04:45
Speaker
Yeah, but I mean, you got to get into a rhythm. I think that's the hardest part is understanding the rhythm. Well, that's why I'm starting slow and I'm really only working on the house, like just cleaning up at night, which doesn't really get you anywhere because, you know, it's always dishes to wash, trash to throw. Yeah.
00:05:07
Speaker
but just like working on Karen's office and trying to really get that going. And you know, eventually I want the studio to be in the garage. So that move will eventually happen, get it all nice looking and daydreaming about how that will look like. So yeah, just trying to get into that and then be like, okay, you got that done. Feeling good. Well, you know, let's try to work on the podcast a little bit. Let's try to work on editing a little bit.
00:05:36
Speaker
I don't know about writing, that's a little too hard for me right now, I think, because it just requires too much of me. And I think that's why I really haven't touched anything film related, unfortunately, is because it just requires a little too much of me. But yeah, I'm just trying to slowly, but you know, before she was born, like I left off on a really good spot, like a jog at night. I'm pretty much done with it.
00:06:05
Speaker
I'm probably jumping a little bit ahead on topics, but no, it's fine because I wanted to show it to you and get your final Input. Yeah, so I just need to like actually put all the clips together. So it's cohesive for you to watch Yeah, and then same thing with scene six. I mean you've seen it. It's pretty much done Yeah, I shouldn't say it's done but it's
00:06:28
Speaker
It certainly passed the draft I did. You gave me your notes. I just need to put those together. Yep. And then we watch it, you know, a couple more times, a couple small changes here and there. And then it's pretty much done. I mean, it kind of feels done already. It does feel pretty much done. I think you just needed to just get it in the like timeline ready format. Um, because wasn't it like there were like layers and layers of, of different clips that we need to kind of get rid of? It's not supposed to.
00:06:55
Speaker
No, I mean like with the there's like because I had like different takes on yeah in sections Yeah Yeah, and there was like we were like hiding to mute tracks and stuff. So gotta get that. Yeah, it's a single timeline, right? So we can just drop it in Yeah, so I just got to do that. Um, but I mean like you saw it It's still a little rough. So, you know, there's some finessing that still needs to happen. It's a little rough Yeah, I was gonna say but also it's just a little rough. It's just a rough scene. Like yeah, it's a movie is a rough movie
00:07:22
Speaker
We should call it a rough dick, you know, Jesus Christ. But I mean, I was really excited when we were watching it.
Art of Film Editing
00:07:30
Speaker
The thing that I was thinking that was really cool that I really like about editing, especially when we're editing together, is that
00:07:37
Speaker
most of the time there's no right answer. Yeah, there's only wrong answers. There's a lot of wrong answers, but also it's like this could work and this could work and it's just like really just thinking of
00:07:53
Speaker
You have to really just boil down to intention. What are you trying to tell with the scene? We were arguing that facial emotion is more sad or more happy, and it's like we're really getting down to that. Where it's like, well, she's more expressive here, but should she be more expressive or less expressive? And there she's less expressive in this take and more expressive here.
00:08:16
Speaker
And that's where it's like, well, damn, like you're like, it's like really at the, how much is it really changing? Like, you know, but it's also a really fun though, I think it is really, you know, cause like there's some takes where it is radically noticeable. You know, it's not just like a subtle audience probably wouldn't catch it. Like sometimes, sometimes it is really like, oh yeah, this, this feels a lot different.
00:08:41
Speaker
And that's fun. And it's like, oh, well, if we go with this, this is kind of what it's saying about the whole scene and how she is as a person. It's like, oh, well, if we go this, now she's this kind of person. And it's this kind of take on the scene and characters are responding to it like this.
00:08:58
Speaker
You know, for instance, like Lexi, within when we wrote that scene, she's just kind of the sweet girl trying to get her friend, Jennifer, to come to the party. And then in the edit, she kind of turns into this manipulative double agent, playing both sides, kind of doing it to her own ends. And there's just extra richness that
00:09:22
Speaker
I feel like maybe that was a little unintentional with Lexi, right? Because there's a bit of a love triangle and we didn't really mean for that to be anything more than just this is this character's past. Yeah, exactly. And it was kind of just like the chemistry and Suzanne's performance kind of led it into a direction of her own thing, which I think that's what actors really bring off the page is their interpretation and also just their performance.
00:09:51
Speaker
because like her interactions with Chris slash Kevin is so much more like, like, she plays off of him very well. And so you want to like play up that because it works better for the scene, because it's just the deliveries and stuff are better. And then it kind of changes the dynamic, right? Because it's like, okay, interesting. And then you get something kind of better out of it. Yeah, it just adds this extra layer that
00:10:20
Speaker
You know, it doesn't need to be there, but it's there and why not? And it just adds this extra layer of depth to it and it's fun. It's a fun thing to see come to fruition and come to light. It's nice that it's there because it adds realism to it because
00:10:37
Speaker
they're not characters. The best characters in movies aren't characters, they're just people, right? Yeah. And everyone has their own life and their own motivations and that's why it's kind of nice because it's like we know we put it in there. Like I know you have a big fear about like how we sell Richard's character, but it's like we know what we put in there. If people get it, they get it, right? But we know it's there.
00:11:02
Speaker
to a degree. The intention and the editing is trying to nudge people in a direction. And it's just how far you nudge or how far you pull back, right? And that's kind of where we're like, that's where... Well, I think in that respect, we're in the issue of it's not necessarily there
00:11:26
Speaker
in the writing. Yeah. So it has to be more there in the edit. Right. You know, because I don't know if there is a good flip, although maybe how we originally wrote it with how he flips out on her and just goes completely ballistic with all the words added, maybe that would have sold it a little better because then it would have been like, oh, wow, he's just having a blow up here. It's not just that was the it's not just he was
00:11:54
Speaker
He had these ulterior motives this entire time. Now it's like, oh, no, no, no. He just, a flip got switched right there.
Challenging Cinema and Audience Preferences
00:12:02
Speaker
Yeah. Cause that's how I, I always imagine it as it is just an, a sudden explosion of uncontrollable emotion. And cause I'm trying not to spoil too much, I guess, but. And here's a piece of advice. Always take, do a take the way it was written. Yep.
00:12:22
Speaker
because we were talked out of doing it the way that we had wanted to do it. And I think that was very detrimental to some degree. I don't think it was at the time. It was very understandable. But then when you see it as a whole in its entirety, it's like, oh man, we really needed our original vision there. It was like, oh yeah. Like that happened for a reason. Yeah, we actually, there was a reason why we did stuff. Yeah.
00:12:53
Speaker
And this is something that I'll never forget and I always go forward in filmmaking is I want to make the audience feel uncomfortable. I want to make them feel something. And we're going to talk about it with Willem Dafoe. He had like a little quote thing when people are interviewing him about
00:13:12
Speaker
how the more challenging and I air quoting challenging films don't do well on streaming because people don't want to watch challenging films at home. And I mean, he's kind of right. I know because in the article he says like people want to go home and put on something dumb.
00:13:30
Speaker
And I've definitely said that. I just want to watch something dumb. I tell you that all the time on this podcast. I've seen so many B-movies, horror films and action films. Usually when I come home after a long days of work, I don't want to watch Stalker.
00:13:47
Speaker
I don't want to watch Killers of a Flower Moon. Yeah, it's like, I know it's a masterpiece. I know it's probably got great everything. Every aspect of that filmmaking is probably great, but it's like, I don't want to see a boring, slow, dull film that's probably subtitled, but I really got to pay attention to. And then most of all, because I wrote it in our notes, or my notes, is I don't necessarily want to feel
00:14:15
Speaker
Mm hmm. Yeah, exactly. Not only do I not necessarily want to be challenged mentally, I also don't necessarily want to be challenged emotionally, especially after a rough day. You know, and it's nice to watch these schlocky films, maybe if you could apply that to that. Yeah. Where.
00:14:34
Speaker
Yeah, sometimes I just wanna be a little numb. I gotta go to bed soon and then restart the day and get back to the grind. And sometimes I wanna be a little numb before I go to bed and start that rigorous life. And also, I wanna give the film it's due. Yeah, that too. When you're gonna sit down and watch, like I said, I just, because I just watched Killers of the Flower Moon, I would just watch it last weekend.
00:15:02
Speaker
You don't wanna just put that on and then start doing dishes. You don't wanna put that on, you wanna put that on and engage with it. Because if you're not, it's gonna feel like the longest slog of your life. Because you're not really, you're just not engaging with the film.
00:15:23
Speaker
And you're not catching every little thing that Scorsese is just pouring into this movie, right? Like you're missing, you're going to miss stuff. But when I put on, you know, Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3 or something, or Hellraiser 5, it's like, if I just so happened to miss the characters, like poor delivery, that's fine. If I went to the bathroom and I took a half hour there and come back out, I'll be able to catch up.
00:15:49
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, yeah. I watched this great B movie because I was like, I watched Killers the Fire Moon and then I told myself I was going to watch a bunch of B movies afterwards. I watched a movie called The Wraith. I don't know if you've ever heard of it, but Charlie Sheen plays a spoiler, but he's a ghost. A Wraith? He's a Wraith. And he is hunting down and killing everyone that murdered him when he was alive. But
00:16:15
Speaker
they're all like drag racers. Makes sense. And he starts coming in and he's gonna bang the head drag racers girl and he's like a ghost and it's like so schlocky and they like force people into racing and so they force people in the race, take their cars, sell it for money and like use it to soup up their cars and they like cheat like to win the races and shit. So it's like, it's, yeah.
00:16:41
Speaker
It's a kind of a movie like that and like the one of the they're like snorting like motor oil and shit and stuff like that. And it's just like, man, that movie is perfect. Yeah, it's so bad. It's so schlocky, but it's it's a beautiful movie. I was going to ask you, though, like when you do put on these challenging movies. Yeah.
00:17:02
Speaker
Don't they always hook you though, right away? Maybe that's a bad way to work. I wanna say yes, but sometimes there's just too many distractions going on. Yeah. Like it's like, oh, I got a, the kids are bouncing around and it starts to bug me because I'm like, I really want, like when I was watching Killers to Fire Moon, I was like, I really just wanna fucking like. Watch it. Just get involved in it because this is a movie I can tell, like from the, like you said, almost immediately you're like, okay, I'm in.
00:17:31
Speaker
Like, yep, you're doing something good here. Yeah. Because you're and but because then you ought to give a movie it's due. Yeah. Some movies don't necessarily require your insane attention span. I would say most don't. Yeah, honestly. But these challenging films like I'm willing to focus. He was in what was that movie called? That he was in. So many. Oh, this year. Pretty Liars or no, what was it called?
00:17:57
Speaker
It's not salt burn. I know that's the big one. The Frankenstein movie. Nosferatu? He was in a Frankenstein movie. Pretty little simple things or little things. Oh, poor things? Poor things. He's in poor things. And I think that was part of what he was being interviewed about.
00:18:14
Speaker
Oh, okay. Well, yeah, that guy makes pretty challenging films, I would say. One of the folks is like one of the best actors. Not to say that I'm necessarily crazy about his films. He's the one who did the lobster and stuff like that, right? The lobster, the favorite.
00:18:31
Speaker
Dogtooth. He did some other movies. Didn't he do the... the fawn or... I keep wanting to call it Kastusa's film, but it's not. Oh. It's like something with fawn. It's another animal name, isn't it? Oh, yes, Killing of a Sacred Deer. I was gonna say Killing of a Sacred Fawn or whatever. Yeah. What's her film called? A Wounded Fawn. A Wounded Fawn, yeah. I keep wanting to think, like, confusing those titles. Killing of a Sacred Deer. I'm pretty sure I saw that one. Yeah. And I was like, uh...
00:19:01
Speaker
Well, I love the favorite. I was a big fan of the favorite. The favorite was really amazing. Have you had any desire to watch it again? I have, but also it's one of those movies where you got to be in the mood. And it's not something I can just throw on. I don't have any desire to see it again, but I always think about it a lot.
00:19:25
Speaker
Yeah, that movie, there's just some scenes that really just stick out in my head. Also just the acting was just so great in that film, like the characters and their interplay between each other. I mean, it was just, it was a good movie, man. The favorite was really solid. The favorite, yeah. Who did it go up against? That was, that wasn't Parasite Year, was it? That was the Parasite, let me, let me, let me look it up to confirm.
00:19:51
Speaker
or at least maybe two films that came out that year that were like really strong contenders. It was parasite year. Yeah. Okay. Good luck. Yeah. Any other year though. Any other year it stomps. Any other year it's probably the best picture. Cause it was 2018 and 2018 was like the last year for like, cause that year I was so stacked and that was your green book one, the best Oscar.
00:20:17
Speaker
No, Parasite won. Yeah, Parasite won. So Green Book won the year after or before?
Film Industry Evolution
00:20:22
Speaker
So was the favorite up against Green Book? No, we said it was up against Parasite. And that was like the same year as Roma, I think. Honestly, probably since 2018, it's been a bit of a downhill. Oh, yeah. And strangely enough, 2020 kind of was a strong year.
00:20:38
Speaker
like looking back in reflection, this new year that we have here, looking back in reflection, yeah, 2020 kind of was that strong year, because it had Sound of Metal, which, you know, I like. Yeah, and Nomadland, which was pretty good. Nomadland, because after, I think Minari might've been that year. Yes.
00:20:56
Speaker
You know, and I've heard a lot of good things about that one or 2021 like they, those kind of blend together because it's kind of hard to know the releases were really weird. Um, during COVID, but I mean, you know, going back to like normal seed post COVID 2023 is that year, right? And man, there was a lot of stinkers this year. In fact, I don't even know if there's.
00:21:19
Speaker
Like jumping to the next one. I don't think there's any movies that I really even liked this year the only movie I really that really stood out to me and I Well, I recommended to you was talk to me. Oh interesting. Yeah, I have I made a list So for my favorite movies of the year, I put killers of the fire moon talk to me the holdovers Godzilla and Godzilla minus one
00:21:48
Speaker
Oh yeah, I forget that movie came out. Yeah, because I loved Godzilla minus one. The more I think about that movie, the more I dislike it. I think the more I think about it, the more I appreciate the original Godzilla more.
00:22:03
Speaker
Oh yeah, usually when I see a Godzilla movie, I appreciate the original more. Because the thing, and I will say this, the thing about Godzilla minus one is it takes full advantage of how badass Godzilla is. Yeah. And then it shows a very slog worthy drama. I mean, I guess if you're really into the World War Two drama,
00:22:28
Speaker
You'd probably really love that movie. But then you want to see a World War II drama. I wasn't really into that story. But once it got into them clearing the mines and fighting Godzilla, I was so on board. I was just like, like I said, just cut that section out. And I know it's like character building and shit, but I don't need it, any of it. It just couldn't land for me because it's like, a big green lizard came out and ate everyone.
00:22:57
Speaker
You know, this is supposed to be a, what is it, metaphor? Is that what you would call Godzilla? Yes. Yeah. For nuclear annihilation. And that's why I love the original so much because how do you defeat it with a bigger batter weapon? Yeah. And it's like, God, that is so depressing. You get a bigger stick. Yeah, exactly. And so the guy that makes the bigger stick kills himself so that no one else can make the bigger stick again.
00:23:23
Speaker
Well, at least it ended on that positive note. Yeah, no, like, that's like, damn. But I did have some honorable mentions that I want to go over. Dark Harvest. Yes, Dark Harvest was a lot of fun. I thought that was a really fun. I was kind of like, eh, this is going to be whatever. It was totally like, if you were a kid, that would be a movie you grew up to. It would be nostalgia. I quite liked it. It reminded me of like those made for TV horror movies that would just like randomly appear on like sci-fi.
00:23:52
Speaker
um cobweb yeah uh the creator oh yeah the creator should get a little nod yep sisu yeah oh i thought you hated it uh
00:24:03
Speaker
You were shitting on it when you talked to me, you were like, well, I hate John Wick, I hate these people, I was like, oh, okay, I thought you would have liked it a little bit. It's not John Wick. It's not, it's way better, I think, actually. Well, not better than the first John Wick, but it's a really, I was shitting on it more than I gave it credit. I think we were just pissed off at John Wick and took it out on CC, because I mean, it's essentially it's, you know, spiritual cousin there.
00:24:27
Speaker
Yeah. And then, uh, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles mutant mayhem. I like a lot. You're the one who made me want to actually check it out. I watched it with the, with Luke and he loved it. And I was getting really into it because he was getting into it. And the animation is fantastic and the art style is really cool. Did you guys see Spider-Man? Yeah. I liked it. He latched onto that. He didn't, you know. Okay. Um, and I wanted to put Spider-Man on my list, but eh,
00:24:55
Speaker
I felt pretty let down that they had such a hardcore cliffhanger. Like it was like jarring. Yes, it is. Because it felt like as soon as I started getting into the movie, it ended.
00:25:10
Speaker
And that's how I felt, because I thought, because I was really starting to get into it, and I was like, fuck yeah, this is really picking up pace, because it felt so slow in the beginning. I don't really care about all the cool multiverse Spider-Man. It was like, we have seen, this multiverse shit has been just shoved down our throat. Who cares? And once you see it once, you kind of see it all right.
00:25:38
Speaker
Yeah, the concept isn't that original because it's been kind of way over-exploited. It's like, oh, it's cool. It's like, if we were cubes, if we were this. Play those Spider-Man. Yeah, and it's like, no one, okay. It's like, okay, whatever. Just let me see Roger Rabbit. Yeah. But, you know, I think part of the problem too in Spider-Man multiverse kind of falls into this where
00:26:07
Speaker
It's not really the conventional story, right? Where it has a three act structure and it kind of follows that, you know, rising climax and then deflating conclusion. But it, cause it ends abruptly. It's like half a movie, literally. It is, right? It's like you got to see act one and mid of act two.
00:26:28
Speaker
yep and wait next year for the rest of the actual film yeah exactly and i pissed me it really pissed me off that's why i removed it from the list and there are a few movies i didn't see that may have possibly made the list if i'd watch them i didn't watch
00:26:46
Speaker
because I love Evil Dead and I haven't seen the new Evil Dead yet. Oh, okay. Yeah, that came out this year. Yeah. That was a solid, it was like the other one, the other remake where they're just solid horror films. Oh, okay. They don't necessarily capture Evil Dead because also this is a different book of the dead. Oh, interesting. Yeah, I guess there's different like volumes or something. Interesting. And so this is a bit of a different one. And as a result,
00:27:12
Speaker
What is the evil dead even called? What are they called? The Necronomicon? No, but the bad guys. Oh, the deadites? The deadites. They're kind of different than the ones Ash faces. Oh, okay. So it kind of has that. And the end monster is a pretty cool concept if it wasn't CGI.
00:27:31
Speaker
Oh, okay. But yeah, it's just a solid little horror film. Yeah. Very, I mean, just to see a solid film nowadays feels that's a huge success. It is. Like when I was thinking about it, cause I was like, I saw a lot of movies this year that were came out this year and that I hated so many of them. Yeah. And to go into that 2023 was kind of like the death of the franchise. No.
00:27:59
Speaker
I don't think so. I think it's the death of comic book films. Because I think a lot of franchise films, they came, I think they made money, but I think a lot of, but they all sucked even worse than normal for me. Like the Marvel films or franchise anything? Franchise anything. Other than there was like a couple standouts, Mission Impossible being one of the standout franchise films, but I was thinking like I hated the new John Wick. I really didn't like the new Creed.
00:28:28
Speaker
I didn't like the new scream. I hated this new scream. I'm surprised I actually sat through the whole thing. I wanted to turn it off so many times. I think there were a few more franchises that came out this year. I didn't watch any of the Marvel movies. I haven't seen a new comic book movie. I watched The Flash. I thought that was just okay. Yeah, I saw Blue Beetle with my family. It was actually not bad.
00:28:55
Speaker
But let me ask you this then, to rally back with you. There was Super Mario Brothers. There was Barbie. There was Oppenheimer. I mean, those are the starting of new franchises. And this is- Oppenheimer? Well, not Oppenheimer. And this is where I think you're gonna see a lot of franchises lean towards now, because Last of Us came out and that was huge.
New Franchises: Video Games vs. Comics
00:29:23
Speaker
Video games.
00:29:25
Speaker
We haven't had a really good video game movie possibly ever. Well, I liked Super, I actually liked- At the state side, state side, I should say. Yeah, I liked the new Super Mario Brothers movie. I thought that was, like the kids love it. So I've watched it a few times. But that's one of the best, right? It's one of the best, yeah. And see how successful that was. I mean, it made like 1.3 billion. So the franchises, I think they're gonna move away from comics and now video games. And video games are better
00:29:54
Speaker
for many reasons, but I think one of the better reasons too is, you know, like we were watching Blue Beetle and it was just so cheesy to see the bad guy transform into the, you know, stronger version of himself. And that's who Blue Beetle really has to face. And it's just like, oh, it's just so cheesy to see someone, ah, they put on their super armor, you know? It's like, damn, I've seen that so many times. It's so tired now.
00:30:20
Speaker
But with video games, I mean, you literally have Super Mario Brothers, you have Zelda, you have Metal Gear Solid, you have Dead or Alive, you know, our Resident Evil even, our Silent Hill. Like you have this,
00:30:37
Speaker
this, uh, base that goes in so many different genres and directions and unique stories, you know, from child to very adult to fun and happy to some of them just downright like sad and moving. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So that Gammel Dutrow's Shadow of the Colossus movie, if it ever comes out. Oh, he wants to make it. Yeah. Well, if there's anyone who could do it,
00:31:01
Speaker
Damn, that'd be amazing. Could you imagine just with that art design alone and to see what he would then... I mean, it's essentially like, it would be like a better Pacific Rim.
00:31:13
Speaker
Because the thing that, the best part about Pacific Rim is Charlie, what's that? Charlie Humman? Oh, I was gonna say how he captures the scale of the Kaiju and the robots, because they actually feel like they're giant. Like the way everything moves around the screen. Denny Valin, who did that really well with Dune. Oh yeah. That's the movie where I felt like I felt the scale. The scale in Dune is like, oh fuck, these things are big. Yeah, that felt like,
00:31:41
Speaker
I don't know. I don't know how some people are able to do it and some don't. Yeah, I don't know either. Because he did a arrival. Yeah, arrival. Yeah. I mean, you felt this. Oh, yeah. You could feel the. Just like when they're going up the like the anti gravity elevator shaft thing. Yeah. You're like.
00:31:58
Speaker
when it's like whoa yeah you realize you're going into something huge you know those there's a lot of those classic like silent films that did the big epic like Cleopatra where they had like a hundred thousand extras yeah and like uh i've never seen it but the david lean uh movie uh Lawrence of Arabia i've never seen it favorite
00:32:18
Speaker
But, like, apparently, like, they just capture, like, the vastness of the desert in a way that... That's one of the most beautiful movies, literally. It's one of the most beautiful you'll ever see. And then some movies, like, they just can't capture scale. Or, like, it's so off. And you're like, size doesn't matter. Well, like all these Marvel films, you know? Yeah. It's always bigger, right? Scale is always bigger, but you just don't feel... Like, it feels big, you know? Mm-hmm.
00:32:45
Speaker
Yeah, for some reason watching like all the in the affinity war, infinity war, it's like it's just like watching a bunch of clay blocks like jump at each other. Yeah.
00:32:58
Speaker
But it's also like, well, how big is Thor? Is he still a six foot person or is he a hundred feet tall? Like I don't really fucking know. Can he change his size? Is everyone Ant-Man? I don't fucking know. Like I thought only Ant-Man was small. It's so weird. Yeah, it's so weird how some people just can do it and some can't. It's also how characters move around the sets.
00:33:22
Speaker
For some reason in Marvel movies, characters just are flinging around the screen like all the time. So you really have no idea where you are. And in Dune, it was just like he just planted the camera down and just pointed it and like it was like and you just watch this wide of, you know, this giant sandworm or the big ships or the giant wall that they built just to be like a back set piece.
00:33:47
Speaker
for like one scene and it's just this massive intricate wall that's real. Yeah. And the characters are standing next to it and you feel it. And it's weird. It's weird because it makes a difference. Yeah. Cause I saw this, I don't know what movie it was.
Undervalued Films and Storytelling
00:34:01
Speaker
Um, but it was like this big movie, but every scene took place. You could tell it was on a little set and it felt like it was a set, even though I think it was probably some sci-fi film.
00:34:14
Speaker
And you just didn't feel the scope. Are the world building, I guess, as part of scale, perhaps? Whereas, you know, the creator came to mind. I thought that film did pretty decent on world building. I mean, you'll always compare a film like that to Blade Runner. Oh, yeah. You know, and it's like, well, shit.
00:34:35
Speaker
You can't really top that for sci-fi. Creator definitely had its problems, but I was just so happy to see a movie like that again. No, I mean, it kind of makes me sad that it did so poorly.
00:34:47
Speaker
Even though I think it was considered a bit of a success cuz well had a very small Relatively small budget size cuz I think it was like 90 million. Yeah 91 Yeah, which is like the same budget as underwater, which is kind of like whoo Yeah, and I think it made now went to TJ Miller and that he wrote in that fucking movie I think both films made and combined ten million dollars. So yeah, I
00:35:12
Speaker
I mean, I still love Underwater. Whenever someone says, like, what's like the most underrated movie in the past, like, five years, it's like, it's Underwater. Oh, probably Underwater, yeah. Because I love that movie. I watch it all the time. Yeah, probably Underwater. That's a perfect movie to, like, just shut your brain off and, like, just because it's like an amusement park ride, kind of. Well, yeah, I mean, when we were watching it, you just kept saying it's a video game. Yeah.
00:35:37
Speaker
That's all you get you're like, dude, this is a video game. I could fit Yeah, it's like a video game where you don't have to actually control anything and you just like in Kristen Stewart is perfect in that movie But yeah, I love under one. Sorry. We're getting off topic. I if there is a topic I don't even know where we are. Well, you were talking about other bad films Oh, no, you were doing the films you liked and then
00:35:59
Speaker
Oh, franchises. We're talking about franchises. I'm actually, well, I'm hoping franchises die. I don't think so. There's too much money to be made. Yeah, but I, well, I've been really disillusioned, I think, by just the, like, there's gonna be no real change. Like, the amount of money that they just shove in, like, are faking to make these movies, like, there's overinflated budgets. Yeah.
00:36:24
Speaker
Like I was thinking like if someone was like, instead of making like the $200 million avatar movie, whatever is next, what if they made $201 million movies?
00:36:38
Speaker
That'd be dickhead. I mean, if we could make, with a million dollars, we could make like a thousand dickheads. Yeah, could you imagine? But everyone would get paid, I guess. If everyone got paid. Yeah, everyone would definitely be paid. Right, that would, we could maybe make like two dickheads with a million dollars.
00:36:57
Speaker
if everyone got paid properly and we weren't every crew member. Yeah, I was going to say we'd actually have a crew. Yeah. I mean, we had a pretty nice crew for Dickhead. We had a great crew. We didn't have enough crew members, literally. Yeah.
00:37:11
Speaker
Yeah, so I was thinking about that and I was like, why isn't that? Because it wouldn't be that hard. Only a couple of those movies would have to be successful to make all that $200 million back, right? Yeah, well, that's what Blumhouse does. I mean, again, franchises, Five Nights at Freddy's. That was like $10 million, I think, or something, somewhere around there. Yeah, it was really low budget. And it made like $100 million. It wasn't that bad either. It was pretty average.
00:37:37
Speaker
Oh, you were lying. No, it was like it was awful. The movie was so funny. You got to watch that movie. I was surprised I made it through. You got to watch that movie with Luke.
00:37:49
Speaker
Okay, cuz I I will say that probably changed how I watch that part is Yeah, cuz he was like it's that character and I'm like I don't know who that character is But he's excited to see it and he's freaking out and he's flipping out and I was like, oh, that's really cool Like yeah, it's like when I was a kid watching Street Fighter and like Ryu does like his really shitty like I do kid. Oh my guy. I'll finally did his one. Uh What is that call that kick that backflip? Yeah, and you're like, oh my
00:38:16
Speaker
Yeah, Jean-Claude actually did, it was like, holy shit. He doesn't have like flames or anything coming off his feet, but it's still cool. Yeah, I know. Sonic, boom. What was that? I was waiting the whole movie. And then you got Kylie Minogue as Cammy. Oh, yeah. You know,
00:38:38
Speaker
And it had one of the greatest actors as M. Bison. Yeah, Raul Julia. Like literally one of the greatest actors. Yeah, that movie literally killed him. Well, you know why he did it, right? No. I don't know if it's true, but Facebook always shows those little meme things. And I guess, well, he already knew he... No. Did he? I don't know if he knew he had cancer yet. He probably did. But he did it for his kid because his kid loved Street Fighter.
00:39:07
Speaker
So when he found out the movie was coming out, he decided to do the movie so his kid could enjoy it. Aww, that's, dude. Yeah, so that's how they got him. I mean, his kid probably was like, Daddy, why? But I have a real sweet spot for that movie.
00:39:22
Speaker
Oh, I hated it. But I mean, I was older than you. Yeah. So, you know, you're like Luke watching Five Nights at Freddy's. But I love video game movies. All of them. I like Doom. I liked Mortal Kombat. I like Street Fighter. Did you see Mortal Kombat Annihilation? Oh, yeah. I love that movie. You do? I do. Oh, God. It's so bad, but I love R. I was like, the first one was so good.
00:39:45
Speaker
I loved all those, like, yeah, I liked all those video game movies because I'm just a loser. I watched Alone in the Dark because I thought it was based off the video game, but it, like, was, but wasn't. It was and wasn't, right? They just pretty much stole the title. Yeah.
00:40:00
Speaker
Yeah, and what's his name? Wasn't it Christian Slater? Did you see Max Payne? I did. I liked Max Payne and I liked Hitman and I liked... Hitman, Agent 47. Did you see that one? Yeah, with Timothy Oliphant as Agent 47. No, it's a different person. Oh, that's a sequel. The sequel is Agent 47. It's just a reboot. I didn't see that one. They did like a year later. I didn't see that one. But Max Payne with with Marky Mark, Wahlberg. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I liked that movie. I liked it.
00:40:30
Speaker
I like video game movies, cause I liked Prince of Persia. Let me ask you this, did you see Uncharted? No. Yeah, I didn't think so. Okay. I, you know, that only worked up to a certain point. It was probably like 2007 or 2008 is when I stopped liking video game movies for the most part. They got to do a, what's the space one? Dead space? Dead space? Yeah. That would be cool. Cause well, I think they have a movie.
00:41:01
Speaker
But it's awful. They do have a movie. It's an anime. Well, they have the anime too. I think they have a live action. They do? I don't think I've seen it. I think it's like a Super B bad movie. But the anime is not too bad. Speaking of good movies, video game movies, I love the Resident Evil, all the Resident Evil movies. I like the first one. Well, yeah, you see Mila Jovovich doing action stuff.
00:41:28
Speaker
Very action-packed. Yeah, multi-path. You know what I thought was pretty decent, but it kind of gets a lot of hate. Silent Hill. Yeah, Silent Hill. I like Silent Hill. It was like, okay, well, if you're not going to go with necessarily the video games' initial premise and really follow it, well, you can be a spiritual successor. And that film was that. I liked both Silent Hill movies. There's three. Is there a third one? Yeah.
00:41:56
Speaker
Which one? I guess you'd get like the third one. I probably haven't seen it. They kill Silent Hill, monster. Oh. Cause the second one had that Abigail girl in it, whatever that chick's name is. And I liked her. I like her. She's an actress. Adlai Clemens, I think her name is. Well, isn't that the third one?
00:42:16
Speaker
Maybe I've seen the third one. Maybe I haven't seen the second one. I saw the first. Yeah, because isn't the second one more with Sean Bean? The first one was Sean Bean. They're both are. Sean Bean's in two? Pretty sure. Yeah. Then I have. I've only seen one Sean Bean one, so.
00:42:29
Speaker
Yeah, and I think it's follows him a lot more. I like they realize like, I like that Sean Bean, we did it put up with the movie. Because yeah, you're right. It does. That first one is like, I know it's like, I don't remember them being like witch trials and shit inside Hill. Like, what was that? Yeah, like it really doesn't follow the first game or really any of the lore or anything. But
00:42:49
Speaker
It still references it and keeps it in mind. And I thought it was a really good spiritual successor to Silent Hill. Like if you're not gonna follow the video game verbatim necessarily, are very close to the source material, then do something like that where it's like, I respect it. Not like Mario Brothers, regardless if you like that movie or not.
00:43:11
Speaker
And I mean the one with Bob Hoskins. I love that one. But that's nothing spiritual or anything related to Mario. There are very few references because there's the bombs. Yeah, there's the Koopa Troopers. Koopa Troopers that they call Toads. Why? I don't know.
00:43:32
Speaker
Because they never played the game. Technically, there is a Yoshi, a character named Yoshi, but he's actually just a baby velociraptor. Oh, that's cute. That has a long tongue that licks Princess Daisy. Oh, Yoshi. And it's Princess Daisy, not Princess Peach.
00:43:51
Speaker
But that's fair, Daisy's a character. Yeah. And they have boots that make them jump instead of just being able to jump. Don't they also use rocket launchers and guns and stuff like that? They use the super scopes that were from the SNES. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, that's kind of cool.
00:44:11
Speaker
That movie's great. It is legitimately a great movie. No, I know you love it. I love that movie. But I'm just saying, as far as like... Mario? Yeah. I mean, like, this was a video game movie. Yeah. It is so bad.
00:44:25
Speaker
They just slap Mario onto it. The problem, though, with the new movies, especially the new Mario and every movie that has anything connected to it, they're so self-referential and they're so meta that it kind of gets lost in the references, like where there's no story. It's just you remember that thing? You remember that thing? Oh, look, it's the thingy. It's it's the star that makes you invincible. Here's the music. And you're like, I like the music.
00:44:54
Speaker
I remember the music. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it gets, it really, um, distracts because they're, it's just like, let's just, we don't need a reference every five seconds. Give us a break here. Like, what are the care? How, like, how does Mario feel right now? Well, that's how you felt about super Mario, the new one that came out. It was just all super. It's just all jokes. Cause once you mentioned that, I was like, Oh, okay. And then I just kept looking for jokes and,
00:45:23
Speaker
I guess maybe Wreck-It Ralph was kind of a predater to that with video games, to that approach of self-referentialism.
00:45:33
Speaker
Yeah, but I feel like that's like everything nowadays. No, it is. Like they saw that worked and that people loved it because Wreck-It-We're-Elf, it was kind of cool to see all these other video game characters
Nostalgia in Modern Films
00:45:43
Speaker
in there. Yeah, it's like, it's on geef. Oh, shit. Even for Ready Player One. I'll admit that was a bit of a hook for me to see all of this older stuff. So to see those references, it's like, yeah.
00:45:55
Speaker
but now they've just gone overboard. Yeah, it's cause like when you were a kid, you remember when you were a kid and you would watch TV and like someone was playing with like a controller and then they would show the screen and it was like not a video game at all. It was just like some shitty like 10 second loop of a graphic, but they had like the controller. Yeah. And you were like, I know what a controller is. Like I use one of those and you'd get so excited. At least I would always get excited.
00:46:23
Speaker
Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, I guess that's it, right? Just that nostalgia little hit right there. Yeah, and it was just something you never really saw. That's why Super Mario Brothers made a billion dollars. It hit the old guys and the kids. Speaking of kids, Jodie Foster.
00:46:41
Speaker
was in the news. She was in the new season of True Detective and she was doing an interview about that and how annoying it is to work with Gen Z kids because they don't show up on time and they're lazy and they whine a lot.
00:47:04
Speaker
And I was curious about this because I've worked with a few Gen Zers and you're like surrounded by them. Yeah. So do you think she's accurate? Are they like too coddled in a sense? I think that's a perfect word to use to describe it. Yes. I don't even know if it's that they're coddled, it's that they demand it. They demand to be coddled. Yeah. Yeah. Right? Exactly. No, you need to accept this for that reason.
00:47:33
Speaker
And it's really annoying because, you know, people then see it as very entitled. Yeah. And I think there's a truth to that. Yeah, I think there's a big truth to that because it's a lot harder working with them now. It is. But also, I don't think they're necessarily wrong. That's what I that's what I meant. And by that's what I was trying to get at with my question, too, was it's like they want a better life for themselves and not to like essentially
00:48:02
Speaker
We, like, I always would joke like, cause, uh, we, like one of the kids, like younger guys are that we work with, he like, we'll take like a mental health day. And we like are just like, what the fuck is that? Mental health day? No, you just put your fucking clothes on and you go to work. Like, all right. Like he's like, I remember it was like, well, he like sprained his,
00:48:27
Speaker
wrist or his elbow or he like, no, no, he stubbed his toe. That's what it was. He didn't go to work. He called out of work because he stubbed his toe and we were all looking at each other. All the older guys were looking at each other like what the fuck?
00:48:43
Speaker
stuff this toe like I can't work with like my arm like fucking broken and like hanging on down the side right like with a fucking fever and shit because like I had to do like three things and it's like that's like that was what we did like it was always like that or like you get fired for dumb shit like that like they just feel like they can't or they just they just jump to a new job
00:49:04
Speaker
Yeah, which is crazy like I don't understand that thing where they like it's like their resume is like 14 pages when they print it because they've had like 15 jobs Like in one year, which is like yeah, what the fuck like So it's so different Yes, but and I was gonna say that's also the other thing. It's like a different generation, isn't it? Because I mean
00:49:28
Speaker
us millennials, we grew up in a very different world where probably the biggest difference is we didn't have technology like you see today. It wasn't as readily available. Like the internet was this sacred thing that you could find if you knew someone with an actual computer and then you had to wait 20 years. And then if you're older than that, well, internet didn't even exist.
00:49:51
Speaker
Like you got to use the yellow pages and encyclopedias, you know, you got to read books Yeah, hell just having phones. No one had phones when I was in high school Yeah, it was just barely like no like the shitty Nokia phones and then you was like nine hundred dollars a minute Yeah, you know your mom your mom was like if you fucking call me on this phone I will murder you like unless you are dead. Do not call me. Yeah Yeah, and then so it was like I
00:50:19
Speaker
Yeah, but nowadays, those kids are like fucking, it's like surveillance state, it's like 1984. Everyone is recording everybody all the time. Yeah, that's a tough one to live in. I would have hated that. That sounds way worse, honestly. Way, way worse. And see, that's why I think they're not necessarily, like, they're not wrong, right? Because this is what they've grown up into. They're having to deal with, like, a mental health day.
00:50:45
Speaker
Yes, I laugh at that, yeah, I scoff. But that's like, sometimes you do actually need a mental health day. It would be nice to take one. Yeah, it would be. You'd probably be less likely to put the gut in your mouth if you took a mental health day every now and then. Yeah. Right? So it's like, yeah, I don't, now it's stubbing your toe, that seems, I mean, maybe he broke his toe and I would say I broke my toe. I don't know what, I remember, because when I heard that I was just like,
00:51:14
Speaker
What the fuck? Remember when we used to, when we were kids, everyone always would talk about the greatest generation. Well, the greatest generation fought the Nazis, right? The greatest generation, like they survived the Great Depression and they fought the Nazis. And also the self-righteousness. The Walter cry. What's really annoying about it. Oh yes. You know, it's like, I'm better than thee because I have this,
00:51:40
Speaker
I've never said the technology that shows me all the crimes you guys have done is like, well, I didn't know about half of that. I've never said the N word out loud and it's like, sorry. Yeah, I mean, growing up to the 2000s, right? Like, yeah, I like Nelly. What can I say? So so there's that, you know, where it's like. I mean, it's it's literally a different generation and I don't like it. It doesn't feel as fun.
00:52:07
Speaker
Honestly, dealing with this generation, it's just too high strong, man. No wonder why they need mental days. It's a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress. Oh my God, I said this, or I said that, or I did this, or oh my God, I was born white.
00:52:22
Speaker
Oh my god, I was born white. It's cool, man. It's cool. They should watch Killers of the Flower Moon. Usually white power in action. It's just like, it's just like, yeah, I get it. That movie really stuck to me, man. Killers of the Flower Moon. Yeah, maybe you want to watch it.
00:52:38
Speaker
It's so fucked up. Like, you're like, we should have just killed a lot of white people, shouldn't we? Like, that's what we all say too, buddy. Because, uh, and this may be a hyperbole and I haven't seen every moving in existence, but Robert De Niro plays the most evil character probably ever. Really? I think so. Wow, that's a high... It's like Ralph Fiennes' Schindler's List level evil.
00:53:05
Speaker
And then this is based on a true story? Based on a true story, which is what cements like the evilness, which I really want to see that zone of interest. Have you heard about that? No. It's a movie that came out just like two weeks ago. It's a German film about, or it's a French film maybe, but it's a foreign film about the head of Auschwitz. And it's all told from his house that was next door. So it's like his family, he moved his family into a house next to Auschwitz.
00:53:35
Speaker
And so like the whole movie has like, it's like all took taking place in that little compound that is his house. So it's like his family having like barbecues and like having like the family over for swimming. And then behind them is Auschwitz. Right? Really? Yeah. Whoa. And so it's like he gets home from work and puts his hat down. Right. And it's like, bring me my beautiful, you know, or whatever. Right. And he does this.
00:54:04
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. And like, they're like eating food, right? And then like, just 10 feet away from them is like the camps. Damn. And that's all like, that's the premise of the movie. That'd be intense if that's a German like, it's either German or French, I think. I'd imagine the French. Sounds like a thing of French people would do those goddamn Frenchies.
00:54:30
Speaker
Oh, so I'm getting back into the podcast.
00:54:38
Speaker
Where are we? But I wanted to talk about, you mentioned it, because you watched the whole special. Oh yeah, cool, because I wrote it down to talk about. So I know we talk about AI a lot
AI-Generated Content in Media
00:54:50
Speaker
on this show. It's just because I think it's like this inevitable, it's like a wave, it's like you're standing below the tsunami. Like right now I feel like we're at this place where we're like standing, the tsunami, like the water's all retreated and we're just like looking out. It's like the abyss.
00:55:04
Speaker
What the fuck? And I feel like we're just waiting for that wave to crash. That's terrifying. So that set up was to talk about how there's this podcast, and I wish I remember what the name of the podcast was.
00:55:20
Speaker
But this podcast with Will Sasso, they essentially generate AI specials and content and they critique it and talk about it. So they did a... Oh, they actually critique the stat? Oh, that sounds really interesting.
00:55:37
Speaker
This was the George Carlin special. Yeah. Which I guess is generating buzz. Yeah. Okay. Because his daughter spoke out and said like, this is like an abomination. But why would she feel that strongly? Because it's, I think also one thing that I was thinking about too is like, imagine if your father passed away and then people were making content with his voice that kind of sounded like him.
00:56:03
Speaker
Sounds just like him. It's supposed to be him. Literally. How does that make you feel as a person? Isn't that a Black Mirror episode? Literally a Black Mirror episode with the guy, the robot that they bring back to replace the dead husband? Oh, uh-huh. How weird is that? You're hearing your father say things he's never said.
00:56:26
Speaker
But it sounds like him, and it is falling along the lines of what he would say because the computer has just digested everything he's ever said and is just trying to copy it. Because it released a new special by George Carlin after he's dead. Yeah, thank God I'm dead. And it was basically kind of like a...
00:56:45
Speaker
Would you use, what is it, aggregation? Yeah. Of all of his standup bits and whatnot. And then they fed in like all current news and then boom. Oh, is that how they did it? Yeah. So he took all his interviews, then took all of the news. Yeah, like he asked it like specific questions. How would that, wow, that's really, that's way more interesting.
00:57:09
Speaker
Yeah. Damn. So that's why it talks about mass shootings, because the mass shootings bit were actually kind of funny. Well, no, if you watched it at the end, I thought I was going to say that the second half, especially like the last quarter, it got pretty good, man. It actually had me thinking, I was like, wow, that's kind of deep, George Carlin and laughing. Yeah. So it got much better, which is kind of scary. It's terrifying. I mean,
00:57:37
Speaker
There's two, well, I have two aspects about this myself. Hold on, can I say two things that made it so terrifying initially? Yeah. Was it's like he's doing a performance at a club, right? It's like a recorded standup special. Yeah. You hear the crowd cheering and whistling and enjoying it. Now they sound a little fake.
00:57:54
Speaker
But then you hear George Carlin come on and just the cadence and the delivery and his voices and there was even like imperfections and the way he was saying the words and whatnot. It just created this much more real thing just by the mimicry of his voice, let alone then when it gets into the points of views and the concepts and all that deeper stuff.
00:58:22
Speaker
Okay, so I like I said, I'm of two minds on this one. It's like terrifying and like really bad. But I'm also like, kind of in love with it. And they really to an extent because I've been thinking because the more I think about it, I'm like, just imagine the possibilities.
00:58:44
Speaker
Like, you're gonna be able to, anything that you can imagine, this robot is gonna be able to create it. How fucking insane is that? Like, I wanna see Tom Hanks sword fighting Antonio Venderos on top of a speeding train in like the middle of like winter. And then it just happens.
00:59:09
Speaker
But do you think it'll be that good? But I'm like, well, I think eventually it will be. Yeah, you really think it can get to that level? I think eventually people are just going to write essentially pitches and it's just going to A.I. generate movies. So you think the A.I. will get to the quality where it creates a movie and you're like, man, masterpiece like the way I feel when I watch.
00:59:33
Speaker
you know, anything of such caliber? Um, no. Only because I think most people have really shitty ideas and have no idea how to tell a story. You think AI will be better? No. Oh, I think it's, humans are still going to be feeding into it. Uh-huh.
00:59:49
Speaker
But it's because a lot of it, it's just more like for personal reasons, right? It's going to be like, I want to see Gene Kelly in a movie with Grace Kelly, like, and we're going to put them in together and then somehow we're going to make it work. And I think that it's going to be fun to play with. It's going to be a fun thing to play with. I don't know if it's necessarily going to take over emotionally because I think it's going to generate so much garbage.
01:00:11
Speaker
there's gonna be so much garbage. There's gonna be so much shit, right? Every 12-year-old kid's gonna make some Lucy Lou porno video and there's just gonna be a million of these things. Every kid's gonna make a Dragon Ball Z ripoff. Every kid's gonna make, right? And it's just gonna be a million iterations of garbage. It's gonna be so much garbage. So hopefully the nice stuff will shine.
01:00:38
Speaker
But yeah, nice AI work, right? Because it's like producers won't need the directors or the writers or the actors. Yeah. Right. But that's why the strikes and stuff are so important because they were kind of like, we're not going to stand for this shit. Like George, like, I don't know if there's like legal grounds to sue over what they did. Like if they're not making money off it or maybe they are, I don't really know.
01:01:04
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know enough about it. But like, if they are making money off it, that's really weird. And then that's really wrong. That's way wrong. Wait, what's more wrong? Creating someone's fake voice and opinion? Or getting paid for it. Or getting paid for it. Which one's the worst one here? This is when you know we're Americans. I mean, getting paid for it is bad. Because that's too far. Now you're getting paid for it? No, no, I draw the line. Wait a minute.
01:01:32
Speaker
I want to get paid for it because I think it's pretty bad. That's disgusting, man. It is, but could you imagine? It's like, I want to see Solid Snake. Give me a stand-up comedy special as Solid Snake. I want to see the Nick Cage as Superman, Tim Burton's Nick Cage Superman movie. Or like, hey, make me Napoleon.
01:01:55
Speaker
Kubrick's Napoleon. Like they might have the script still, right? Yeah. That script might be floating around somewhere. Like you just feed it into the AI and it makes it. And you're like, I mean, will it be, it would just be interesting to see what it can do. Yeah.
01:02:11
Speaker
Because, but I think then you, there's probably some denial that kicks in, right? Some like on County Valley denial, where like with this George Carlin episode, you hear the jokes and whatever. And if someone didn't tell you, and they said, yeah, this is just a George Carlin stamp, or episode special. Yeah. That no one's really seen, but if you listen to it, it's like, he's talking about all the topics now. You probably listen and be like, whoa, man, he fucking knew what he was talking about. You know,
01:02:40
Speaker
Like I think, I don't know what I was talking about. I was talking about uncanny valley. Yeah. So just because you know, like if you were to hear it in that context, maybe you would like get more, find it more interesting or maybe neither of those words really, or what I mean to say, but.
01:02:56
Speaker
Certainly once you find out like, oh, it's AI generated, you kind of like, eh, Carlin would be better. He'd be more clever. He'd have a more nuanced opinion. Do you think that ever kind of just that automatic negative bias? I think that's, there's definitely negative bias towards it because it's being generated by a non-human. But I also think that is human arrogance coming out big time because that was a lot of the comments.
01:03:24
Speaker
was like, George Connor wouldn't be wittier. He'd be cleverer. And it's like, how the fuck do you know? Yeah.
01:03:29
Speaker
Like maybe he wouldn't have been. Maybe he would have been worse. He could have been worse. He could have been better. Like I hate when people talk in such absolutes with something that can never be an absolute. Yeah. Because you know, I was thinking about how like depressing it is to be human sometimes. Cause it's like, there are just some universal things that we will never know. Like we will never actually know who Jack the Ripper was.
01:03:56
Speaker
And like, could you imagine that? So AI actually figures it out. That's what I was gonna get to. It's like AI could figure it out. But like, as humans, like, right, we will never really know, like, who Jack the Ripper was. Like, who really was the Zodiac Killer? Or like, who really, like, what really happened, like... To JFK. Yeah, to JFK. Exactly. I mean, like...
01:04:20
Speaker
There are probably people that know. Obviously the person that was Jack the Ripper knew who he was. But we'll never know. We'll never have the answer. Jack the Ripper knew here is Jack the Ripper. Exactly. And he didn't write it down, unfortunately.
01:04:34
Speaker
Hey, by the way, guys, I know you'll be curious in a few years. King Richard II. I'm Jack the
Philosophical Reflections
01:04:39
Speaker
Ripper. You know, like that didn't happen, unfortunately, because it's like I was thinking about that. It's like, man, that's the universe. This was, by the way, the two ring day. And I was thinking like, man, human existence is so fucked up because like we think there's this order. There's like, like there's someone guiding a guiding hand. But then if there was like, why would there be so many unanswered questions like
01:05:03
Speaker
Fucking like what happened to like who built the pyramids. We don't even fucking understand that shit. Yeah, that's a guess. It's all guesses. Yeah. And we're just accept that those guesses because so many people have came to the same guess that we're like, it must be what happened. Right. Yeah. That's fucking nuts. All right. That's insane. Yeah. Yeah, it is. But also, I mean, that's because that's like if you ask 10 people if they loaded the gun.
01:05:31
Speaker
And they all said yes, but none of them were sure. And you put the gun in your face and you pull the trigger. Like, you don't know if it's gonna kill you or not. It's like a Schrodinger's gun or something. Yeah, Schrodinger's gun. Casper's gun. Did you load it? I thought I loaded it. Maybe I did. Maybe it was a different gun I loaded. I don't know. And then... Or no. I did it. You're dead and alive at the same time. Or dead alive beach volleyball. But you'll know you're dead.
01:06:00
Speaker
You're alive. Or will you? I don't know. What is reality? What if you just blink out? Well, that doesn't sound so bad. It doesn't sound bad, but it's also a little disappointing.
01:06:13
Speaker
I had this this thought that when you die, you just get really like born your consciousness just gets like in the future. People get so bored like it's like the super super like in like 10,000 years there gets so bored. The only thing that they do for fun is like they revive the consciousness of like
01:06:33
Speaker
the people from the past. Oh, that's really interesting. And so, like, you die and you just go to, like, the infinite void of nothing until, like, someone reassembles, like, your consciousness and then you're like, oh, I'm back and they're like, why? And so then you get to, like, have, like, some crazy adventures with, like, beings made out of energy or something. I don't know. OK.
01:07:02
Speaker
Let's see, after many changes, ups and downs, okay.
01:07:09
Speaker
That doesn't really make sense. Speaking of work, we are nearly locked on Dickhead, which is nice. I think it's pretty cool because we talked about scene six, how we're going to... Once scene six kind of gets locked in, we're going to do like a really nice like temp audio cut to see if we so we can kind of like get those like little tweaks in. So because like, you know, there's like a scene where the killer like slams Jennifer against the wall.
01:07:38
Speaker
and like where her head slams and how we make that special effect sound, that will change like the length of the clip, right? Yeah. So like there's stuff like that that we got to do and then it's kind of like picture locked, which is kind of cool.
01:07:54
Speaker
Honestly, beyond that, if we get a really good temp audio cut of it, because then we could just send that out and be like, look, this is pretty, if you want to know what we had in mind, like we can write you notes, we'll have the notes to give them. And then it is like, or just watch this. And that gives you a really close idea of what we like. Yeah, I mean, like,
01:08:15
Speaker
we'll be even further out. We'll be on to the next steps just because we did that. Yeah, absolutely. Once we're done with editing, it's gonna be... Well, then it's probably gonna be a matter of money, right? Yeah, that's the scary thing. Speaking of money, we're working on that short with Alex, Mr. and or Uncle Rico, depending on, I guess, your relation. Do you wanna spend money on it?
Budgeting for Film Projects
01:08:41
Speaker
That's what something I was thinking about too, or I was like, because we, we had pitched or I had pitched initially like having like a $5,000 budget and I was like, should we really be spending and like trying to spend $5,000 on like a short, in a sense, because I was like, maybe we should try to cut that budget down to like, maybe a, like
01:09:01
Speaker
a thousand dollars or less because like shorts, I think you should try to be making shorts as often as possible, but as cheaply as possible because they're just money pits. Like a short is never gonna, there's no return on investment on a short. I don't know if that's true.
01:09:23
Speaker
I mean financially. Yeah, financially. You can get- But I don't think you can- I don't think you should look at it short as a financial gain. No, no, no, no, no. That's what I mean though. It's not. But when we also are like, hey, we're probably going to have to put like $10,000 into finishing Dickhead. Yeah. No, I think more.
01:09:42
Speaker
Yeah, spending more money to get on like on the short would be crazy because I think the potential for dickhead is much higher than any short could be. Yeah, well, I see it two ways is.
01:09:59
Speaker
in the practical way, which is like, yeah, one, we should just be doing this as cheap as possible, no matter what, always. I think that's just a good thing to learn. If you're gonna be a filmmaker, you gotta learn how to come in under budget as much as possible. If you can ever achieve that, you're gonna be successful. But also, I see it the other way where, you know, if we do spend money, I don't see that as,
01:10:27
Speaker
Like, uh, sorry, the cards were just, uh, it's hitting me hard. Um,
01:10:34
Speaker
Yeah, I don't see, like if you guys want to spend the money, I'm down to pitching and spend money. I mean, granted, I don't have a lot, and granted, I want to save what I have majority for a decade, because that's going to cost a lot. That's what, that was my point. But I think also, you know, you got to spend the money to at least have some production value. For instance, we went to the set of, or the location in Amboy, and it's pretty expensive to rent that. You can actually rent the place to film at.
01:11:02
Speaker
And it's not that expensive to, to rent it overall, but for us, pretty expensive. Yeah. But, you know, we were talking to the person, they're like, Hey, you know, if it's a student film or something, maybe we can offer you a discount or something. And so it might be in a more feasible range for the short, although would be an expensive short.
01:11:27
Speaker
But you know, spending money on stuff like that, that's just gonna make it feel less amateurish. Not amateur, that's a bad word. Less real, right? Because you want to feel like you're in a good location. You don't want to feel like you're, you know, in my kitchen, being the gangster lord, you know, trying to make it look like a mansion. It's like, nah.
01:11:53
Speaker
that shouldn't be who this person is if they're going to be in that location. And like Amboy, that's like the legit location. So whatever happens in that scene, yeah, that's going to look great. And so then it is like, yeah, well, you got to pay for that if you want that. Yeah. And I think my concern was it's not that because one, I want to make the best thing that we can make, obviously. I always want, that's always the goal is to make the best thing you can make.
01:12:22
Speaker
But fuck, shit can be, can get, you know, the money starts just piling up real quick. And then that's where I'm starting to think like, well, should we be sinking in thousands of dollars into making a short when we like have a feature that we really need to kind of get done? And that's where I was kind of like juggling in my head. And then I was like, well, no, I want to help Alex get this movie out. But then it's like,
01:12:47
Speaker
Because I remember you were saying in the meeting, I was like, Alex, you're going to have to come up with this dough. And then I'm thinking, is he going to be able to do it?
01:12:57
Speaker
It hasn't really been brought up, we gotta talk about it, we gotta discuss all this stuff. We set this budget at 5,000, but it's like, there's still zero dollars in the coffers. I know we haven't done any casting or anything yet, but it's like, there's still like, I'm like, how are we gonna fill that budget? Yeah, no, you make a really good point. And like I said, I wouldn't mind pitching in.
01:13:24
Speaker
Exactly, but but it's like I'm This this has a majority of it. Well, yeah I mean this instance specifically come from Alex because I don't got a lot of money in the exact money I want I wanted to go to to dickhead cuz that's gonna cost a lot and then I still got a jog at night I gotta finish so that's gonna cost a lot too exactly, you know and Ultimately dickheads the thing that has to be done cuz even for Alex because that makes a
01:13:52
Speaker
That's a good calling card for him. He shot the opening. Yeah, he shot the opening. He's a DP on that. It's like, dude, you were on this film. Cause the thing is, and I know it may be arrogant or cocky or whatever, but it's just like the big feature film is like that is going to be the calling card.
Creating Impactful Films
01:14:12
Speaker
That's bigger than the short. Like, yeah, once, if that gets, if Dickhead gets any traction, it sets us on a path where we just stop what we're doing and start filmmaking.
01:14:22
Speaker
Yeah, like that's it's where it's like if dickheads like gets picked up by studio or a producer season and says, hey, I want you guys to make another movie. It's like my job, like, well, not just that, you know, not just that, like if it generates any amount of like, hey, this was great. You guys should keep on it. Yeah. It's like, yeah, OK, I'll do another one. It'll.
01:14:44
Speaker
a lot smarter, like, because I won't have any money, so I'll be a lot more smart in the way of the story that's written. Yeah, and also, yeah, I'll do it like, like, Lucky McKee, right? That's his name, Steve McQueen. Lucky Mc, Steve? Lucky McKee. But, you know, he said, yeah, it's, it can be difficult and there can be ups and downs, but his,
01:15:09
Speaker
job has become making films. That's the dream. How cool is that, man? I literally can't imagine. I've been so shackled. What's your job? Oh, yeah, I just make movies. I just make movies. I don't know, for me. Because even if we were just make... The thing is, I think about... I know you're not a big fan of it, but that Santa Claus robot movie. Oh, gosh. What's that?
01:15:39
Speaker
It's a wonderful but right like if you were making like shitty movies like that. It's like you at least you're just I know I'd be having a blast and it's like it it's just fun like I mean we would I I would hope that we would make better movies than that but well, that's the also the goal of our
01:15:57
Speaker
ambition, right? It's not just to be content to make movies, it's also like- To make movies people want to watch. Have an opportunity to make something that, like, people will be like, hey, hell yeah, okay, you're not a complete Neanderthal. Yeah, you know, I mean, I want to make, like, a dark harvest, right? Like, something like that. Or even something- Just any movie where you can tell the filmmaker put a little extra love and care. And that's, you know, where a lot of those Marvel and franchises movies go.
01:16:26
Speaker
wrong because they're so soulless man they're soulless and also i i want and this is what i love when about us editing daket is like like i said like there's we are putting in every every scene there's something there to look at there's a reason why that scene is there
01:16:48
Speaker
And sometimes I think a lot of people just go for, I'm gonna do this because it's cool, or I'm going to- Well, we certainly did that too. I mean, we can't- Sometimes, yes. But in the edit, we also cut all of it out. We literally did.
01:17:05
Speaker
All of it except for one thing and it's because we painted ourselves into a corner a little bit on that. Yeah, exactly. But I think that's the big problem with a lot of filmmakers and indie filmmakers in particular is they're just like, I have one cool scene in mind and I'm going to build the story around that. Where it's like, no, we need characters to do things. You should be building around the character.
01:17:35
Speaker
Yeah, always not around like, Hey, we're going to have like this cool, like long screwdriver fight or something like whatever. I don't know. But what were we talking about? Did we answer all the questions? Time out.
01:17:52
Speaker
I don't know. Yeah, I think we did. All right. Wait, did we? Did you wanna jump into the main? Oh, no, no, no, hold on. Let's... You take over. Yeah, you got it, buddy. Where are we going? I just wanna ask this one. You asked, we took the longest break we have had in a long while. You're in the main discussion. Aren't we in the main discussion? I haven't read the quote. We're not even in the main discussion? No. Holy shit.