November 21, 2024 • 47 mins
Are you not entertained!? Well, whether you are or aren’t entertained, Rosie and Jason are here to recommend their favorite underrated movies and shows of the “Swords & Sandals” genre to watch after Gladiator and in preparation for Gladiator II.
The recommendations:
Spartacus
The 13th Warrior
Rome (HBO series)
A Knight's Tale
Kingdom Of Heaven (Directors cut)
Immortals
Honorable mentions in this episode:
Quo Vadis
Ulysses
Ben-Hur
Troy
300
Clash of the Titans
The Eagle
Fall of The Roman Empire
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Warning.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
This episode contains mild spoilers, but pretty concrete spoilers for
a variety of swords and sandals movies in film history
over the last fifty years, So be warned, be warned.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Hello, my name is Spartacus.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
No, my name is Jason Gczepsio, and I am also Spotacus.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I'm also Jason Cacepsio. No, I'm merthday Night, I'm merdy Knight,
And welcome back to.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Next mention of the podcast where we dive deep into
your favorite shows, movies, comics, and pop culture. Coming to
you from My Heart podcast, where we're bringing you three
episodes a week every Tuesday Thursday, with extra episodes every Wednesday.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
In today's episode, we are exploring some of the best
why how much fantastical Swords and Sandals movies in anticipation
of gladiat It's two's released this Friday, and how did
we pick them? Well, we're recommending the best movies to
watch if you like certain very specific and hilarious moments
(01:16):
from Gladiator.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Let's get into it first, Let's talk about what we
mean when we say swords and sandals. This is a
film genre popularized in the middle of the twentieth century,
and it encompasses movies that are often set in antiquity,
(01:41):
that have often biblical themes or Greco Roman hystory Jeo
Christian kind of basis, and they are set in the
ancient world, you know, the levant to Greece to anciently.
And there are various subgenres here and affect some of
(02:03):
our picks, kind of our picks definitely, uh, you know,
pushed the boundaries of the true swords and sandals mostly
it's yeah, yeah, I think it's mostly swords and so
and a lot of sandals. But the subgenres here are
obviously fantasy movies, swords again, historical fiction, yeah, you know,
(02:25):
things like Master and Commander, gladiators and rebelling against their rulers,
pirate movies, those kinds of things. Uh, they often contain
elements of uh, you know, man struggle for freedom, that's
basically it.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah, coming up against ambitious rulers.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yes, that's that's a lot of that.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
And a lot of these epics were shot in Italy.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Yes, it's very Spaghetti Weston in that way. Like lots
of original like what were essentially cheap auctions made in Italy,
like Cuivades or ulysses Co direct Benjamin Bava. Yeah, by
the way, like claszy, crazy stuff. But yeah, Helen of
Troy with Sergio Leone as uncredited second unit director, So
(03:16):
you can see this was kind of the proto kind
of wave of pre spaghetti Western.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Yeah, I mean, I think this was these this genre
and this movement to film, you know, in Italy, I
think was important for seating future talent from Italy and
in countries with opportunities that they could then take to
make the movies that they would then go on to
(03:43):
be famous for Bava with his various Giallo horror movies
and Leoni with his basically creating the Spaghetti Western genre
whole cloth.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
What about the modern era?
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Lots of examples of this in the modern Gladiator, which
is the most famously.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
And successfully I think.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, I mean it's Oscar winning film, and it's the
reason we're doing this episode. Gladiator from two thousand Troy.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Not a good movie, no, but it was. It was
an attempt to capitalize on the success of Gladiator and
bring back this swords and sandals, space.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
And some there's some fun action there.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Alexander, Oh, what about that? I Forget Don't Forget Colin.
Colin Ferrell's Don't Forget Colin Farles Alexander, where.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Angelina Jolie, who was only like three years older than him,
played his mom famously.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Very very strange. Although I will say valcam Are kind
of stealing the movie three hundred of course, who could probably.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
The most culturally impactful release of that mid zero's era.
That kind of obviously launched the career and stylistic chops
of one of the most contentious but definitely successful filmmakers
of his era.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
And then twenty tens Clash of the Titans and it's
nineteen eighty eighty.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
One, Yeah, eighty one. That's that's what I was gonna say.
The one thing we didn't touch on here, and they
are They are not as necessarily impactful now, but definitely
when we were growing up, the Ray Harry Housen animated
Clash of the.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Titans, Argonauts, Jason and the Argonauts, and The Golden Fleece.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Where you would have these kind of a fighting skeletons
brought to life with stop motion. I think for me,
those were definitely the most impactful and memorable movies, especially
because in England. When I was growing up, we only
had like four channels, Channel one, two, three and four
literally ITV and Channel four BBC one and two, and
whenever it was Christmas or Easter or Bank Holiday, they're
(05:46):
showing those Harry House.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I know that.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I know that because of National Lampoon's European vacation exactly.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
And it's true. They were correct.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Okay, we've set the stage.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
To this break and word from our sponsors, we will
get to our picks.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yeah, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
We're back.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Here's the format.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
We're gonna pitch these movies to you based on things
from Gladiator or things that you may have liked from Gladiator.
So for instance, you know, if you liked the action
and Gladiator, you will like this movie. I'll start off
if you liked this quote from Lucilla in Gladiator today
(06:46):
I watched a slave become more powerful than the Emperor
of Rome. Then you must watch Spartacus from nineteen sixty,
an absolute classic. It's Stanley Kubrick. It's slyly subversive for
a movie in nineteen sixty that deals with, you know,
man's struggle from up pressers and being enslaved. There's a
(07:09):
lot of winks and nods to then contemporary social struggles.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
That were going on.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Here's a fun fact for you about Spartacus. This is
based on the life of an actual freedom fighting gladiator
took who basically sparked what was the last of the
three slave rebellions in each Rome called the surviv Wars.
These happened like two hundred ish years before, like you know,
Augustus and all these guys. It's the first one, and
(07:39):
then they happened like basically every fifty years until the
last one, in which Spartacus broke free of his gladiator
school and then just kind of rampaged across the southern
Italian peninsula for two years. That's the thing that people
don't dialize, yeah, when they watched this movie. That's important
to think about. Spartacus was just out there for two
(08:02):
whole years, running around freeing enslaved people and you know,
looking for a way off the peninsula. Further fun fact,
he was brought down by Marcus Lucinia's Crassis his army. Crassus,
then known as the richest man in Rome, was later
(08:23):
slayed by the Parthians in Syria, and like the legend
is that after they killed him. The Parthians, as a
mockery of his lust for wealth and his greed, melted
gold and poured it down his mouth, an echo, of course,
of the death of visaras Targarian in Season one of
(08:46):
Game of Thrones.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
One of my favorite moments from this show.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And by the way, the I Am Spartacus, which we
were the I am Spartacus line, which we referenced, the
iconic moment from the movie in which you know, the
the victoriaious Roman legions promise their surviving gladiators that they
will be mercifully dispatched if only they will point out
who Spartacus is, like either his corpse or amongst those living,
(09:15):
who are you know, sitting side by side of them,
And just as Spartacus is about to rise up and
say I'm Spartacus, various other gladiers saying I am sport,
I am Spartan, not letting them get the satisfaction of
finding him. And that is a moment that retains its
like pop culture impact. The Office referenced it like there's
a million references to this despite the movie coming out
(09:37):
over half a century ago.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
I think, to me, the one that is most unbelievable
and kind of showcases how you can put a moment
in a movie and never know where it will go.
In the fantastic Netflix series Sex Education, there is a
episode at wonderful series does an episode where somebody shas
nudes and people are mocking it, and there it's of
(10:01):
an intimate part of somebody's body, and then it's causing
a big problem in the school. And then all the
girls stand up and do an I Am Spartacus saying
it's their nude so that the girl won't get in
trouble and so that people will stop, you know, mocking
this intimate part of her body. And I remember watching
that and thinking, like, Stanley Kubrick just never knew, but
you know what you would Actually, you would probably have
(10:22):
loved this, Stanley Kubrick, Actually this specific version of it,
I think you would have been into it. But yeah,
like the way that you could never imagine that you
would have a bunch of teenage girls referencing I Am
Spartacus about revenge porn. Sixty years later you're like, Okay,
but that's the power of the I Am Spartacus moment
and that kind of coming together of oppressed people to
(10:44):
protect each other in the face of tyranny.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
You know we were talking about before we turned on
the mics doing a episode about they had it coming scenes,
And I'll just say the escape moment in Spartacus is
one of the great things had it coming moments in film.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
What's your pick? What's your first pick?
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Okay? I love that I get to do this one.
So if you like the opening battle scene and gladiator,
which I do think is often forgotten about compared to
the rest of the movie, is very different in tone
in which the Romans squared off against the Germanic tribes,
watch The Thirteenth Warrior. I was so happy when you
picked this one, Jason, because this is such an enjoyable,
(11:25):
fun movie, but forgotten and forgotten and great. It was
a crushing bomb, the biggest flop of the box office
year of nineteen ninety nine. The Thirteenth Warrior is a
fun movie, and as Jason points out in this fantastic
little note that he wrote a fantastic pedigree of cast
stories by Michael Crichton, the novelist who gave us Jurassic Parks.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Ever heard of It?
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Ever Heard of It? And director John McTiernan predator Diehard
hunt for any One of all time, and the story
is a kind of like a medieval tinge our Arab
academic in the tenth century AD who finds himself attached
to a band of Viking mercenaries who go north to
(12:07):
fight an evil army of bear men. The film is
thirty three percent on rot On Tomorrow's, which.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Is really I think that's it's very unfair.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Very unfair. It's actually very good and very fun and
a complete riot to watch. I just actually think it
was a bit ahead of its time. I think because
tonally it is more akin to kind of the action
adventure weird vibes of movies that would be made like
ten years later rather than the late nineties.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
I completely agree with you. It kind of just doesn't
fit anything. I see why it bombed. It's definitely the
type of movie where we've talked about these type of
movies the Friday night like blockbuster movies. Yes, yes, this
would have excelled as a Friday night uh, you know,
blockbuster movie.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
And it's absolute worth your time.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Mc tiernan is a wonderful action director of the His
camera moves in war wonderful ways. There's like this great
shot of these like evil the evil army of bear men,
which is a little bit of a spoiler, sorry about that,
Like riding shoulder to shoulder on their like grim looking
war stallions, like towards the cameras, the cameras like I guess,
(13:16):
like on a jeeper the back of a jeep or something,
and it's just like awesome, awesome battle scenes. One of
the great like noble deaths in recent action history.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
And Antonio Bandera, who at this time was just playing
so many outrageous historical characters he shouldn't have been playing,
but he was doing a great job at every point.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Here is my one, and I agree with you he
is playing an Arab man in this.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
Yeah, here's the here is the here is my one.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Maybe it works, yes, yeah, the you know, the Arab
conquest of Spain was complete by this time, and it
was kind of like the pinnacle of as as this
movie makes a lot of hay about. Yeah the tenth century, uh,
you know, Arabs were much more scientifically, medically advanced.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
And another reason I think this movie didn't do well
because I don't.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
I think that's a great point, because you know, it's
it's it's it's a lot like you know, the Kevin
Costner Robin Hood.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
But that was like a side plot.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Like this is the main character is the more advanced guy,
and he's looking at these Europeans like, you guys are savages?
Speaker 1 (14:30):
What the fuck is going on? Good point? I think
that is why.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah, exactly, I think it is possible that like a
guy from Spain could be and like any.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
And also, you know what else, at least they didn't
cost Sean Connery.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Okay, up next. If you love the bros.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Being rose energy, my favorite, my favorite.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Of Maximus, Juba and Hey from Gladiator just bonding over
their shared trauma and learning how to how to be
a team, then you're gonna love oh Rome, which aired
from two thousand and five to two thousand and seven
and is currently streaming on HBO and.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Oh my God.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
In the days before Game of Thrones, folks, Little Old
Rome was the most expensive show in the history of television.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
I'm telling you, if this show hadn't been made, there
would be no Game of Thrones, no question. This show
is so underrated. I'm just sotterly fantastic. Like every time
somebody actually takes the time to listen to our advice
and sit down and watch this show. They always come
back going, oh my god, how did I not know
this existed? It's so so good.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
You will get sucked in.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
If you like Gladiator, and if you like the Extra
Division podcast program, you'll likely like Rome.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
Yeah, and you've probably heard us talk about it. It's wonderful.
It costs a million zillion bucks.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
They built these wonderful sets to, you know, create this
immersive feel that you are in ancient Romes. You watch
characters move through the streets to the forum.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Et cetera.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Bruno Heller, the co creator of the show, talked about
it being canceled after two seasons. He said this quote,
I discovered halfway through writing the second season, and the
show is going to end. The second was going to
end with the death of Brutus, Third and fourth would
be set in Egypt. Fifth was going to be the
Rise of the Messiah in Palestine. But because we got
the heads up that the second season would be it,
(16:36):
I telescope the third and fourth season into the second season,
which accounts for the blazing speed which which we go
through history near the end. So that's true by season
Season one ends on the most absurd high point.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Yeah. Yeah, it's so so crazy.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
So good.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Season two moves you through like twenty five years of
Roman history and civil war in ten episod that said,
and basically it ends with the rise of Augustus to emperor.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
That said, well worth your time.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
Casting in that is still to this day some of
the best TV casting. I also think it established the
notion of almost like a crossover between British historical fiction TV,
like you know The Tudors, which was really big at
this time too. That's a great point where it's this
kind of like conversational chamber drama, a little bit scandalous,
(17:30):
a little bit interpersonal, mixed with the huge Spartacus esque
set pieces and incredible and that obviously became the pre
cast to Game of Thrones. But this was definitely like,
my mum loves historical fiction, she loved The Tudors, and
I got her a box set of this and this
was definitely one of those shows where I don't think
she thought she was gonna like it, but it ended
(17:51):
up becoming a fave.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
To your point, I believe that Bruno Heller was the
producer of a series of of BBC programs that were
like historical, uh dramatic reenactments of various moments throughout and
he has Roman history and then they basically just turned
that into this HBO show. And those reenactments and I
(18:17):
forget which with the name of them are, but they
cover various things, including like the Gracchis brothers and other
moments ancient Roman history are really cool too. You can
watch those on on YouTube probably. But to your point
about the casting, I mean in Dera varba is niobi.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
Oh, I love her.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Kevin McKidd who as Lucius Verinus, you know him from
Gray's of Anatomy and many other things. The late and
wonderful Ray Stevenson as Titus.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
Vernon maybe one of the best time.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
He's just truly wonderful. The always nude, full frontal nude.
James Purfoy.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
I love him. I love so much this guys.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Loves to show the meat in every role.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
He is such a blessing. And guys, I'm gonna tell
you there's a James Perfoy show that you may be
never seen. It's not in the context of this. If
this is also only the first James Perfoy is gonna
show up again, just in this episode in this list,
but I will say it's off it's off topic, but
go watch it. I'm not gonna tell you anything about it.
There is a Kevin Bacon James Perfoy show called The Following,
(19:29):
and you will watch the whole show in like twenty
four hours. Everyone has ever said it again, nude in it?
You know what? There are many near nude scenes. I
believe it was actually I believe it was not like
an HBO production and was instead a like broadcast TV production.
But still he does get to be sexy and evil,
which is what he loves to do most.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
James Perfoy is the villain in the recent adaptation Netflix
adptation of Ultra Carbon Hyper Violent UH Future dystopian story
and guess what, James before gets nude in it.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
I think he's just gonna get nude and everything.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
He's like, I can do it, baby. It's like it's
like you know what us Love's James buffact is full
frontal and the beautiful, very tall six foot lee pace.
You know, he he doesn't wow, you know what. You know,
that's just the Internet. You know, that's just the internet.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Other wonderful folks in this Rome television program Kuren Hines,
who's gone by to do a million things and to
Bias Menzies as brutus, like, it's just great. If you
haven't watched it, you're in.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
For a treat. You're gonna like it.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Yeah, and you're gonna like this word from our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
We'll go right back by the work and we're back. Wow.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
And I've been blessed because the next pick is one
of the best movies ever made. People might not have
got it at the time, but we get it, we
get it, and now you know it's a masterpiece. So
if you like the fact that Gladiator is actually a
sports movie, which it is, lots lots of sporting men competitionally,
it's lagitmily sports movie, then you've got to watch a
(21:18):
Night's Tale, which I do think if we're pushed, I
think this is pushing swords and sandals. We are more
into that medieval space. But it's but they are. There
are both swords and sandals, So I think we're doing it.
We're saying it's it, and it is. So this movie
is so great. Summer two thousand and one, very much
in the era of like a post kind of you know,
(21:40):
she's all that like the teen movie Craze Ten Things
I Hate About You, and we get Heath Ledgers William
who's a peasant pretending to be a knight, and then
you think, oh, well, you know he's hunky. I love
Heath Ledger. I'll watch it for that. No, you're gonna
stay because you have Paul Bethany Stealings as Jeffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
A gambling addicted Jeffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Who's like a crew as crude and crazy as you
would think. The man who were at the Canterbury Tales
was Mark Addie Game of Throne Zone Bobby b. We
also have Alan Tudick.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Doing we Gotta talk about This.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
One of the worst English accents of all time, which
I think was the point, because this is a man
who can do a great accent. I think he was
doing it for fun. Laura Fraser from Breaking Bad and
my own personal very seminal teen crush, Shannon Sosserman, who
she's so underrated, her in this and her in Forty
(22:39):
Days of Night, The Really Weird Forty Days and Forty Nights,
The Really Weird Celibacy, Josh hartnet teen Romance. I don't
know what that was about, but she was very hot
in that and actor and former drummer in the La
band Warpaint, and also one of my favorites who were
about to bring up who is kind of on that
Perfoy vibe. They're always evil looking rufus Sewell, who's been
(23:02):
in like every kind of movie looking evil.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
This is like, he's just got an evil look.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
He's just got an evil vibe. He just loves to
be vibing and being a little bit evil, and he's
always in a great B movie. This is so funny
because if you were really like, what is this movie about,
you'd be like, Okay, it's a historical jousting drama that's
also a comedy that is also an achronistic, like musical right,
(23:29):
because they use contemporaneous They use contemporaneous music something like
the movie opens with them singing like we will rock.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
You, so you stadium rock they throughout this movie.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
The costuming in this movie is fantastic, which I think
you will appreciate if you enjoyed Gladiator. It is definitely
more of that anachronistic style, like they're wearing clothes that
are a little bit more fashion to the day. But
I do think that the the sports nature of it,
the interesting way that they bring jousting to life. The
(24:01):
core intrigue is very gladiaty. Who is gonna get married to? Who?
The Can you be a peasant and rise to your station?
It's very similar to Gladiator. This is just such a
fun movie. Every time I'm like some I'm just like
check it out again, guys. This is like a delightful watch.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
It's so true.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
One of the things I thought while rewatching this was
one how everything on TV looks better than this, Like
this looks like if you were to throw this on
now you your immediate reaction maybe that this looks like
a Nickelodeon movie from c.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
W or a.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
Disney Channel movie. That said, the writing is so good
and so witty, and all of these very talented actors
are just going forward in wonderful ways, like ye Bettany is.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Jeff Chaucer absolutely.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Steals scenes because he gets to have these monologues in
which he's like pumping up William and William's ability as
a knight. William is pretending to be this night from
like somewhere in Germany, and all of the characters have
these like little scenes like that mark Addy has these
wonderful moments where he's like he's leading high with his
(25:20):
coaching William through stuff like oh, you know, if you
turn your shoulder at the last moment and you'll be
able to do this. Laura Frasier is wonderful as like
this female armorer who's not respected in the world of armors.
Just a great movie and way better than you think
it is.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Just are looking at a still from this movie.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
I think another thing that makes it really enjoyable and
a reason why I think people will like it if
they enjoy Gladia, is it has a similar kind of
framing of like, oh, well, this is a fictional character
meeting real historical people. Like it's the name is taken
from The Knight's Tale from Chace as Canterbury Tales. They
(26:01):
you know, James Perfuy is in it, as Edward the
Black Prince. Obviously Chaucer is in it.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Does not get nude in this On.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
To Our Hopes and Dreams because it's pg. Thirteen, But
like it has that fun nature of like, well, what
if I was just in this time and I could
meet some famous people, you know, but not in that
over the overwhelming forest Gump he did everything that was
ever important in history, way more in that kind of
If you're into the Canterby Tales, if you ever had
to study it, if you're somebody who likes British history,
(26:32):
you'll likely catch some fun historical nods. I just I
really love this movie. I feel like I didn't even
love it that much when it came out, but now
I'm like, I am a big proponent of this movie.
So I'm very glad, and you're a big proponent of
the next movie.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Oh, I am specific Kingdom. If if you liked the
Will They Won't They? Between Maximus?
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Who do that?
Speaker 2 (26:55):
And and you like that, you know, kind of buried
in a action epic, then you will love Kingdom of Heaven.
The director's cut, Ridley Scott Director's Cut. Let's take you
back to the post nine to eleven aughts, in which
(27:16):
far and entertainment would struggle in trying to make sense
of the era that it found itself in in which
Islamic extremists apparently had a.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
Beef with America.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
You got always know why you got all these movies
trying to unpack that, and the result was movies like
the George Clooney vehicle Siriana, which is this very naughty,
complex kind of bad film that has interesting elements to
it and will we be feeling depressed? You have an
(27:50):
absolute like propagandistic movie like The Kingdom that says, so,
you know, if only we could all join forces, uh,
you know, the Islamic world and uh and US imperialists
side by side could take care of this problem. Bad
movie with several good shootouts. And then you've got a
movie like Kingdom of Heaven that tried that is Ridley
(28:14):
Scott basically saying, let's go back to the beginning.
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Let's go back to it.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
Yeah, let's go let's go back to the Crusades and
see where this problem started. Now, of those movies I
just mentioned, only one is worth your time, and it's
Kingdom of Heaven. And only one version of that movie
is worth your time is the director's cut. It's just
a fantastic, uh action set piece, historical drama. You have
(28:41):
Edward Norton in one of his most underrated roles as
the leper King of Jerusalem. And then you have two
people who should have been stars, Rosie.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Oh, let's talk about it, because this was we actually
did it. We started recording maybe half an hour later
that we were supposed to because we were, yeah, being
about the potential of these stars.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
First will be Eva Green, Well, we'll mention her first
because we can move all.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
You know, I've seen The Dreamers. I know that movie
was I yes, she should they made her a bone girl.
They killed her. She's a bonde girl, but like she
should have been bigger, she should have been having and
she had many missed opportunities, the Missus Pereguin's Home for
Odd Children, that was obviously meant to be a franchise
(29:29):
for her. She just never got the role she was
supposed to. And I'm a huge stan I'll watch Jenna
think she's in, but she still hasn't had that breakout
moment and it was definitely supposed to be post this.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Next is Wow Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Now here is I unveiled my my hair dependency theory.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
Let's talk about it to.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
The production team this weekend.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
And here's my theory on what went wrong with Orlando
Bloom's career. Not that he's not had a nice career.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
He's married Katy Perry, so he's a great friend.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
So very clearly after Lord of the Rings, the guy
that everybody was betting on to be the star coming
out of Lord of the Rings was Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Now, the teens loved him.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
The teams loved him. Unfortunately, I think Orlando Bloom made
one key mistake, and that is he kept taking notable
roles in which he had to have his hair long.
Of course, Lord of the Rings you get three movies
in which, as Legolis, he's got that beautiful long flowing locks.
He then follows that up with Pirates of the Caribbean,
(30:36):
in which he's got to have the long flowing locks.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Then comes Troy, a.
Speaker 3 (30:40):
Movie with long flowing locks.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And then uh, you know, very sadly comes this movie
Kingdom of Heaven, long flowing locks. Not to mention the
various Pirates of the Caribbean sequels, long flowing locks, and
what happened?
Speaker 1 (30:55):
What happened to Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
We reached a point where like Tom Selleck, like a
clean shaven Tom Selleck or a clean shaven Sam Elliott,
nobody wants to see it. We only want to see
Orlando Bloom with long hair. And it continues he deals
with to this day blowing hair.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
It really is, you know what we need? I think
for Lana Bloom to get his you know, respect, to
get his chops, to get recognized, that he to maybe
let him know he has the juice. He's going to
do like an Ariasta movie or something. I feel like
he's got to be like he's going to short hair,
but Pattenson route and do like a good time but
(31:31):
with a shaved head.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Oh my god, you know, I forgot one. I forgot
in this whole run twenty eleven's the Three Musketeers.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Long flowing locks locks.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
I just think, you know, when you look at Robert
Pattinson is somebody who I think he did this significently.
Trap trapped by Brad pitt also who showed up in
Film and Louise with the with the wonderful like you know,
abs and hair, Legends of the Fall, grew it all out,
then shaved it for you know, seven switched it.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
He had a different look. Even Leonardo DiCaprio, you know,
because he is he was somebody who had the He
had the curtains right, and that was like, you've got
to have them. He has it in Romeo and Juliet,
he has it in Titanic, but then he does Man
in the Iron mask, and he has a long flowing
locks wig, but his other character's short hair, and suddenly
he's mixed out. He's not stuck anymore smart the Curtains lifestyle.
(32:28):
I do believe the Orlando Bloom has been hampered by
his long flowing locks. And I say this because I
am a Tom Selik Stan I love magnum p I.
But you're right. Nobody's nobody wants and nobody wanted to
see Indiana Jones with a mustache.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Nobody wanted to see that. And he was trapped man.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Sadly, Selik was, could not, you know, do anything. The
only like quickly down Under is like an Australian Western
where he's able to have the mustache is like the
only hey he could make.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
It's like Chicago Fire where he can.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
He looks years of twenty years of blue Bloods.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
Because cops can have mustaches, Jason, And guess what we know,
still rocking that thing, still rocking it, baby. And you
know what, the aunties, the grannies, they still love him.
They do maybe and maybe in the future Orlando Bloom
will be on a long time procedural with long flowing locks,
and we'll be eating our words. Because he'll be getting
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars an episode.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Look at the stills. If you haven't seen the movie
Grand Turismo, Oh twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
Look at based on a true story.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Look at Orlando Bloom in that movie with the with
the below the ears hair that clearly they were like,
he listen, Orlando, don't do that locks.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Don't you dare show.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
Up as his film without your co star the long
flowing line looks.
Speaker 3 (33:48):
They were like even in this driving movie Grand Tarismo
based on a true story, which is a full and
me and my friends were assessed with the fact that
was the full title from a real story based on
a guy who was a videot professional video gamer who
then got to race in real racing. Unbelievably strange turn
(34:10):
of events to make that your official Grand Tarismo movie.
But yes, Orlana Bloom was there with his long flowing locks.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
He could have been a star. If the only cut
his hair cut off that hair.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
He could have better stuff. Yeah. Maybe when the new
Peter Jackson movies come, maybe he's gonna be brought brackets
legal us. He's looking youngster. They maybe they're gonna put
him back in those long flowing locks wigs and it
will will be in our words next Okay, So this
one is very close to my heart because I am
a big fan of this director. If you liked the
(34:40):
overstylized cinematography and like beautiful theatricality of like the rose
petals falling in the final battle, which always kind of
takes my breath away because it's very unrealistic and just fantastic.
And from what we've heard about Gladiator too is continued
over in the new movie, So very excited for that.
You got to check out Immortal by Tarsem Singh. Now,
(35:01):
this is definitely a Vibes movie because Tarsem is a
Vibes director, after his two thousand horror classic The Cell
starring Jennifer Lopez and his two thousand and six masterpiece
The Fall, which I have to say is currently in
theaters for the first time in like twenty years. So
just go and see it. You don't need to know
what it's about. It's got Lee pace in it. It's
(35:23):
one of the best movies ever made. Tarsem then was
like successful enough to kind of go for Hollywood with
a high budget fantasy take on Grecian Roman mythology. It
has like an unbelievably stacked cast, so you know that
they thought that this was going to be super popular.
Henry Carvill, Luke Evans, one of my favorites, John Hurt,
(35:43):
Kellen Lutz, FRIEDA. Pinto, and Mickey Watt. Also Stephen Dorf,
who look, you might be like, oh Stephendorf, but that
man was in Blade, which really launched the MCU, so
he always gets an extra shout out for me. They
did Short Steve Short, King Loves Steven. This movie is
not Sing's masterpiece by any realm of experience, because his
(36:08):
other films have so much more freedom and strangeness. But
if you like vibe visuals and you just want to
like watch a movie where you're gonna see unexpectedly beautiful,
strange cinematography and unbelievable use of color, fantastic production, besignd,
this is the movie to watch in this realm.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
When I think of Tarzan Sing, I think, of course,
those extremely trippy, melty, unforgettable visuals, and I also think
of like the color palette, which is yeah, is it
feels like this is obviously going to be an oversavment
what I'm about to say, But it feels like you're
looking at a epic painting. The colors are where the
(36:54):
colors are so saturated and kind of on the darker
side of the luminescence.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
The blacks are so black.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
And everything feels there's a depth to it, but it
feels like you're watching something in two D. You're watching
flat action like a painting. I just love the way
his films.
Speaker 3 (37:13):
Look in The Fall, which is at least partially Swords
and Sandals inspired, so I would say we can. But
in that I mean the joke used to be that
if you were lucky enough to have a copy of
the DVD, which was out of print for many many
years but is now streaming on movie and I'm sure
with a new four K restoration there will be a
physical release, you could pause it at any moment and
it looked like you were watching a paint. You were
(37:34):
looking at a painting. Like his work on his color work,
his cinematography. He is truly I think a master, and
Immortals is like a very interesting space of what happens
when you take someone like that and you put them
in the Hollywood system rather than just letting them kind
of fight it out on their own, but yeah, great
(37:56):
weird addition and definitely I think a very fun to
see an entry to the swords and sandals genre, which
I was gonna say, Jason, what are the other underrated
or notable swords and sandals movies that we didn't hit
on here because they didn't fit into our kind of
hilarious way of putting this together.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Yeah, I think if if you're listening to this, you're
you're you might be saying, hey, what about this movie?
First of all, I think we wanted to pick movies
that maybe maybe you haven't seen. Maybe you haven't seen
this movie, like why didn't we talk about three hundred?
Speaker 1 (38:31):
Three hundred was a massive hit.
Speaker 3 (38:33):
Yeah, and change the belief for a lot of people,
and you've changed the game.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
You've probably seen it. I will say that I kind
of like three hundred except for the the the the bad,
like racial politics of this movie, where like all the
good guys are white and all the bad guys are brown.
Speaker 3 (38:54):
Not realistic, but you know what, g butts, we love him.
And also as well, it's very homo erotic, so that's
like it's not a mean is it's not amazing.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
The most homo erotic action movie that has been released
in the last twenty years.
Speaker 3 (39:08):
To me, I'm like, I'm not I'm not a three hundred.
I'm not three hundred super fan. But if somebody is like,
let's watch three hundred, I'll be like, I can look
through the problematic aspects because it's Gerald Butler and it's
homo erotic, which to me is to.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
This guys getting greased up and like doing it up,
like do it like crunches all the time.
Speaker 3 (39:29):
The way that it avoids the realities of Spartan men
being gay, which is like a very obvious historical thing
that's been you know, looked at for many hundreds of
years and thousands of years in history, it makes it
more gay, which is like repression, and the homo eroticism
is there. So you know what, we didn't talk about it,
but that's because you've already seen it and it was
(39:49):
a huge success and it launched that exit his career,
so good for him.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
The same with Braveheart, which is directed which is a
I think a really good movie that you've probably seen
that's direct by a person that is terrible Style Gibson
and starring a person's terrible and you've seen the movie
probably which contains some of I think the greatest medieval
action scenes that you'll ever see in a movie directed
(40:14):
by a terrible person. Yeah, why didn't you talk about
ben her Good?
Speaker 1 (40:19):
This is a notable one. Why are we talking?
Speaker 2 (40:22):
I've just never been whether it's the the more recent
remake or the classic original, which I think is from
sixty or fifty nine or something starring Charlton Heston.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
It's just too overtly.
Speaker 3 (40:38):
Jesusy for me, like very religi, big religious overtones in
that movie, and.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
I've never been The chariot scenes are great, but like,
I've never been a ben her guy.
Speaker 3 (40:48):
I also feel like, if you're our age like it was,
ben HAIs one of those oversaturated movies that they always
tell you to watch, that like if it's a faster times,
always on a time that if you film, they're like,
you gotta watch it. Action's great, True, but you guys
have already had about it. You already knew about it.
That's why we're out here recommending the Weirdow choices.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
Why didn't you pick if okay, okay, Rosie and Jason
Weirdo picks, then why didn't you pick the Channing Tatum
vehicle from twenty eleven, The Eagle.
Speaker 3 (41:19):
This is a great question. I will say that's a
good movie. Actually did this one almost made the list,
So Jason List talk about The Eagle momentarily.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Twenty eleven The Eagle. Channing Tatum is a Roman centurion
posted on Hadrian's Wall at the edge of the empire.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
It's at the border of you.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Know, England and Scotland, although those nations did not exist
at the time, and he's having a deal with this
influx of Pictish warriors who have stolen his eagle and ambushed.
This meant and I'll say this, Janitatum. When I saw
this movie in twenty eleven when it came out, surprised
me with this movie because I was like.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
Oh, Chanitatum, he's like a good acta.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
Yeah, like his accent is passable, his acting is really
good and this the action is wonderful.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
This is a good movie.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
And I'm sorry he didn't make the list, but we
liked the other ones better for it.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
But that's a good movie. The Eagle.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Incredible cast to Jamie Bell, Donald Sutherland, Jamie Strong, Tier
Ryan who I love who is in this incredible movie
called The prophet also in Madam Ware Hilariously that was
a strange choice for him, But yeah, this is a
fantastic cast, also very practical movie. That's actually why I
went to see it, because there's this kind of march
(42:32):
that they do. They had lots and lots of extras,
and yeah, this is a weirder choice. Also what was
going on in twenty eleven that they had this and
immortals at the same time. That's very very deep impact
armageddon of them.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Them And then you might say, okay, what about The
King twenty nineteen for Netflix, story thing.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
From Pattinson and Timmy Chamalay.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Into wonderful roles by.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
The Australia some weird stuff.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
Yeah, by the hardcore Australian director David Michaude, who I
love Ben Mendelsson seemingly in every single DA showed movie
that said, Uh, I like The King. I think that Chalomey.
You know, I'm a schalome fan. I think he's good.
I liked him in almost everything he's done, whether or
not I like the movie, and I think that to
(43:25):
your point, Pattinson as the French King, the French Prince,
I forget. Yeah, he's the French air to the throne
whatever the case is so good and weird in this,
Like there's various points where the French king and Chalomey
like have these like head to head like but like
meetings where they talk about it you surrender me no,
(43:47):
you know, And it's just Patterson is so good as
the bad guy in this.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
I can't recommend that highly enough. You know.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
It's mostly a political intrigue movie, yes, or like a
royal intrigue movie. So I think that was why it
didn't fully make it.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Also, I will say, and we would, we would only
we could only put like one medieval thing in there.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
Okay, So I want to say, what it speaking of hair,
what are the over unders on Timmy shallow May's future
because he does always have the curly locks, and in
the new movie that he's in where he is playing
Bob Dylan, I feel like they were like, he's gotta
have curly locks, so let's have him play Bob Dylan.
(44:31):
So I'm like, is he gonna be trapped in the
curly locks? Even Willy Wonka is Willy want had curly locks? Like,
is he gonna keep them or is he gonna veer
to what Is he gonna get like a shaved head?
Is he gonna try and break out of curly locks?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (44:45):
I think it's a good note. And I'll say this,
Chalmy's got to have a beard in a movie soon.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Can he grow a bit?
Speaker 1 (44:52):
We got to see we can we can paste something.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Little spirit gum on there. But I think we need
that big. I do think that we're we're almost at
like full saturation of Timmy face card like in popular culture.
I think to your point, the hair is the hair
in the face together. We might need to patent sit
it up, switch it up a little bit, because I
(45:17):
do think we might be getting there with Tim who again,
I am a fan.
Speaker 3 (45:22):
Of me too, big fan.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
It was great And since you mentioned the Bob Dylan thing,
that looks fucking bad.
Speaker 1 (45:29):
I don't know that.
Speaker 2 (45:31):
Trailer felt like SNL like one of his appearances on SNL.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
I was a little concerned me too.
Speaker 3 (45:38):
I'm shocked because I feel like Bob Dylan, Timothy shallow May.
I feel like that feels like it should be a
kind of Indie Dolling Can movie. But I will also say, guys,
Bob Dylan, we've had the perennial Bob Dylan like biopic
already done with like ten of the most famous actors
of all time. It was a game change are in
(46:00):
the way movies were made. I don't know if you
need to do it again, but you know what, good
luck to me because I think you're always making me laugh.
I love that you showed up to your own lookalike competition.
You got good humor and honestly, like, I'm sure you'll
be fine.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
I wish, I wish, I wish you, I wish you
the best, and I wish our audience the best. As
as we wrap up this culmination of Sword and Sandel's
movie recommendations that have been inspired by Gladiator, on the
next episode of x ray Vision, we're diving into Gladiator two.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
Here and go, Here we go.
Speaker 3 (46:32):
I want to see the Sharks in the coliseum.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
Show me the Sharks. Wrigley Scott, you crazy man crazy.
And Tuesday we're doing our Canes series final. It's already
it's already over, folks. And Wednesday it's Dune Prophecy episode two.
Speaker 1 (46:49):
That's it for this episode. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (46:51):
Bye.
Speaker 2 (46:59):
X ray Vision hosted by Jason Consumpsion and Rosie Knight
and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive producers
are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is
a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
And Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Speaker 3 (47:20):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Laude, Kenny Goodman
and Heidi. Our disco moderata
Warning.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
This episode contains mild spoilers, but pretty concrete spoilers for
a variety of swords and sandals movies in film history
over the last fifty years, So be warned, be warned.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Hello, my name is Spartacus.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
No, my name is Jason Gczepsio, and I am also Spotacus.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I'm also Jason Cacepsio. No, I'm merthday Night, I'm merdy Knight,
And welcome back to.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Next mention of the podcast where we dive deep into
your favorite shows, movies, comics, and pop culture. Coming to
you from My Heart podcast, where we're bringing you three
episodes a week every Tuesday Thursday, with extra episodes every Wednesday.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
In today's episode, we are exploring some of the best
why how much fantastical Swords and Sandals movies in anticipation
of gladiat It's two's released this Friday, and how did
we pick them? Well, we're recommending the best movies to
watch if you like certain very specific and hilarious moments
(01:16):
from Gladiator.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Let's get into it first, Let's talk about what we
mean when we say swords and sandals. This is a
film genre popularized in the middle of the twentieth century,
and it encompasses movies that are often set in antiquity,
(01:41):
that have often biblical themes or Greco Roman hystory Jeo
Christian kind of basis, and they are set in the
ancient world, you know, the levant to Greece to anciently.
And there are various subgenres here and affect some of
(02:03):
our picks, kind of our picks definitely, uh, you know,
pushed the boundaries of the true swords and sandals mostly
it's yeah, yeah, I think it's mostly swords and so
and a lot of sandals. But the subgenres here are
obviously fantasy movies, swords again, historical fiction, yeah, you know,
(02:25):
things like Master and Commander, gladiators and rebelling against their rulers,
pirate movies, those kinds of things. Uh, they often contain
elements of uh, you know, man struggle for freedom, that's
basically it.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah, coming up against ambitious rulers.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yes, that's that's a lot of that.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
And a lot of these epics were shot in Italy.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Yes, it's very Spaghetti Weston in that way. Like lots
of original like what were essentially cheap auctions made in Italy,
like Cuivades or ulysses Co direct Benjamin Bava. Yeah, by
the way, like claszy, crazy stuff. But yeah, Helen of
Troy with Sergio Leone as uncredited second unit director, So
(03:16):
you can see this was kind of the proto kind
of wave of pre spaghetti Western.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Yeah, I mean, I think this was these this genre
and this movement to film, you know, in Italy, I
think was important for seating future talent from Italy and
in countries with opportunities that they could then take to
make the movies that they would then go on to
(03:43):
be famous for Bava with his various Giallo horror movies
and Leoni with his basically creating the Spaghetti Western genre
whole cloth.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
What about the modern era?
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Lots of examples of this in the modern Gladiator, which
is the most famously.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
And successfully I think.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, I mean it's Oscar winning film, and it's the
reason we're doing this episode. Gladiator from two thousand Troy.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Not a good movie, no, but it was. It was
an attempt to capitalize on the success of Gladiator and
bring back this swords and sandals, space.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
And some there's some fun action there.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Alexander, Oh, what about that? I Forget Don't Forget Colin.
Colin Ferrell's Don't Forget Colin Farles Alexander, where.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Angelina Jolie, who was only like three years older than him,
played his mom famously.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Very very strange. Although I will say valcam Are kind
of stealing the movie three hundred of course, who could probably.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
The most culturally impactful release of that mid zero's era.
That kind of obviously launched the career and stylistic chops
of one of the most contentious but definitely successful filmmakers
of his era.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
And then twenty tens Clash of the Titans and it's
nineteen eighty eighty.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
One, Yeah, eighty one. That's that's what I was gonna say.
The one thing we didn't touch on here, and they
are They are not as necessarily impactful now, but definitely
when we were growing up, the Ray Harry Housen animated
Clash of the.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Titans, Argonauts, Jason and the Argonauts, and The Golden Fleece.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Where you would have these kind of a fighting skeletons
brought to life with stop motion. I think for me,
those were definitely the most impactful and memorable movies, especially
because in England. When I was growing up, we only
had like four channels, Channel one, two, three and four
literally ITV and Channel four BBC one and two, and
whenever it was Christmas or Easter or Bank Holiday, they're
(05:46):
showing those Harry House.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I know that.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I know that because of National Lampoon's European vacation exactly.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
And it's true. They were correct.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Okay, we've set the stage.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
To this break and word from our sponsors, we will
get to our picks.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yeah, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
We're back.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Here's the format.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
We're gonna pitch these movies to you based on things
from Gladiator or things that you may have liked from Gladiator.
So for instance, you know, if you liked the action
and Gladiator, you will like this movie. I'll start off
if you liked this quote from Lucilla in Gladiator today
(06:46):
I watched a slave become more powerful than the Emperor
of Rome. Then you must watch Spartacus from nineteen sixty,
an absolute classic. It's Stanley Kubrick. It's slyly subversive for
a movie in nineteen sixty that deals with, you know,
man's struggle from up pressers and being enslaved. There's a
(07:09):
lot of winks and nods to then contemporary social struggles.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
That were going on.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Here's a fun fact for you about Spartacus. This is
based on the life of an actual freedom fighting gladiator
took who basically sparked what was the last of the
three slave rebellions in each Rome called the surviv Wars.
These happened like two hundred ish years before, like you know,
Augustus and all these guys. It's the first one, and
(07:39):
then they happened like basically every fifty years until the
last one, in which Spartacus broke free of his gladiator
school and then just kind of rampaged across the southern
Italian peninsula for two years. That's the thing that people
don't dialize, yeah, when they watched this movie. That's important
to think about. Spartacus was just out there for two
(08:02):
whole years, running around freeing enslaved people and you know,
looking for a way off the peninsula. Further fun fact,
he was brought down by Marcus Lucinia's Crassis his army. Crassus,
then known as the richest man in Rome, was later
(08:23):
slayed by the Parthians in Syria, and like the legend
is that after they killed him. The Parthians, as a
mockery of his lust for wealth and his greed, melted
gold and poured it down his mouth, an echo, of course,
of the death of visaras Targarian in Season one of
(08:46):
Game of Thrones.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
One of my favorite moments from this show.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
And by the way, the I Am Spartacus, which we
were the I am Spartacus line, which we referenced, the
iconic moment from the movie in which you know, the
the victoriaious Roman legions promise their surviving gladiators that they
will be mercifully dispatched if only they will point out
who Spartacus is, like either his corpse or amongst those living,
(09:15):
who are you know, sitting side by side of them,
And just as Spartacus is about to rise up and
say I'm Spartacus, various other gladiers saying I am sport,
I am Spartan, not letting them get the satisfaction of
finding him. And that is a moment that retains its
like pop culture impact. The Office referenced it like there's
a million references to this despite the movie coming out
(09:37):
over half a century ago.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
I think, to me, the one that is most unbelievable
and kind of showcases how you can put a moment
in a movie and never know where it will go.
In the fantastic Netflix series Sex Education, there is a
episode at wonderful series does an episode where somebody shas
nudes and people are mocking it, and there it's of
(10:01):
an intimate part of somebody's body, and then it's causing
a big problem in the school. And then all the
girls stand up and do an I Am Spartacus saying
it's their nude so that the girl won't get in
trouble and so that people will stop, you know, mocking
this intimate part of her body. And I remember watching
that and thinking, like, Stanley Kubrick just never knew, but
you know what you would Actually, you would probably have
(10:22):
loved this, Stanley Kubrick, Actually this specific version of it,
I think you would have been into it. But yeah,
like the way that you could never imagine that you
would have a bunch of teenage girls referencing I Am
Spartacus about revenge porn. Sixty years later you're like, Okay,
but that's the power of the I Am Spartacus moment
and that kind of coming together of oppressed people to
(10:44):
protect each other in the face of tyranny.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
You know we were talking about before we turned on
the mics doing a episode about they had it coming scenes,
And I'll just say the escape moment in Spartacus is
one of the great things had it coming moments in film.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
What's your pick? What's your first pick?
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Okay? I love that I get to do this one.
So if you like the opening battle scene and gladiator,
which I do think is often forgotten about compared to
the rest of the movie, is very different in tone
in which the Romans squared off against the Germanic tribes,
watch The Thirteenth Warrior. I was so happy when you
picked this one, Jason, because this is such an enjoyable,
(11:25):
fun movie, but forgotten and forgotten and great. It was
a crushing bomb, the biggest flop of the box office
year of nineteen ninety nine. The Thirteenth Warrior is a
fun movie, and as Jason points out in this fantastic
little note that he wrote a fantastic pedigree of cast
stories by Michael Crichton, the novelist who gave us Jurassic Parks.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Ever heard of It?
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Ever Heard of It? And director John McTiernan predator Diehard
hunt for any One of all time, and the story
is a kind of like a medieval tinge our Arab
academic in the tenth century AD who finds himself attached
to a band of Viking mercenaries who go north to
(12:07):
fight an evil army of bear men. The film is
thirty three percent on rot On Tomorrow's, which.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Is really I think that's it's very unfair.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Very unfair. It's actually very good and very fun and
a complete riot to watch. I just actually think it
was a bit ahead of its time. I think because
tonally it is more akin to kind of the action
adventure weird vibes of movies that would be made like
ten years later rather than the late nineties.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
I completely agree with you. It kind of just doesn't
fit anything. I see why it bombed. It's definitely the
type of movie where we've talked about these type of
movies the Friday night like blockbuster movies. Yes, yes, this
would have excelled as a Friday night uh, you know,
blockbuster movie.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
And it's absolute worth your time.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Mc tiernan is a wonderful action director of the His
camera moves in war wonderful ways. There's like this great
shot of these like evil the evil army of bear men,
which is a little bit of a spoiler, sorry about that,
Like riding shoulder to shoulder on their like grim looking
war stallions, like towards the cameras, the cameras like I guess,
(13:16):
like on a jeeper the back of a jeep or something,
and it's just like awesome, awesome battle scenes. One of
the great like noble deaths in recent action history.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
And Antonio Bandera, who at this time was just playing
so many outrageous historical characters he shouldn't have been playing,
but he was doing a great job at every point.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Here is my one, and I agree with you he
is playing an Arab man in this.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
Yeah, here's the here is the here is my one.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Maybe it works, yes, yeah, the you know, the Arab
conquest of Spain was complete by this time, and it
was kind of like the pinnacle of as as this
movie makes a lot of hay about. Yeah the tenth century, uh,
you know, Arabs were much more scientifically, medically advanced.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
And another reason I think this movie didn't do well
because I don't.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
I think that's a great point, because you know, it's
it's it's it's a lot like you know, the Kevin
Costner Robin Hood.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
But that was like a side plot.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Like this is the main character is the more advanced guy,
and he's looking at these Europeans like, you guys are savages?
Speaker 1 (14:30):
What the fuck is going on? Good point? I think
that is why.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah, exactly, I think it is possible that like a
guy from Spain could be and like any.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
And also, you know what else, at least they didn't
cost Sean Connery.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Okay, up next. If you love the bros.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Being rose energy, my favorite, my favorite.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Of Maximus, Juba and Hey from Gladiator just bonding over
their shared trauma and learning how to how to be
a team, then you're gonna love oh Rome, which aired
from two thousand and five to two thousand and seven
and is currently streaming on HBO and.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Oh my God.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
In the days before Game of Thrones, folks, Little Old
Rome was the most expensive show in the history of television.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
I'm telling you, if this show hadn't been made, there
would be no Game of Thrones, no question. This show
is so underrated. I'm just sotterly fantastic. Like every time
somebody actually takes the time to listen to our advice
and sit down and watch this show. They always come
back going, oh my god, how did I not know
this existed? It's so so good.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
You will get sucked in.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
If you like Gladiator, and if you like the Extra
Division podcast program, you'll likely like Rome.
Speaker 1 (15:59):
Yeah, and you've probably heard us talk about it. It's wonderful.
It costs a million zillion bucks.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
They built these wonderful sets to, you know, create this
immersive feel that you are in ancient Romes. You watch
characters move through the streets to the forum.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Et cetera.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Bruno Heller, the co creator of the show, talked about
it being canceled after two seasons. He said this quote,
I discovered halfway through writing the second season, and the
show is going to end. The second was going to
end with the death of Brutus, Third and fourth would
be set in Egypt. Fifth was going to be the
Rise of the Messiah in Palestine. But because we got
the heads up that the second season would be it,
(16:36):
I telescope the third and fourth season into the second season,
which accounts for the blazing speed which which we go
through history near the end. So that's true by season
Season one ends on the most absurd high point.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Yeah. Yeah, it's so so crazy.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
So good.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Season two moves you through like twenty five years of
Roman history and civil war in ten episod that said,
and basically it ends with the rise of Augustus to emperor.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
That said, well worth your time.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
Casting in that is still to this day some of
the best TV casting. I also think it established the
notion of almost like a crossover between British historical fiction TV,
like you know The Tudors, which was really big at
this time too. That's a great point where it's this
kind of like conversational chamber drama, a little bit scandalous,
(17:30):
a little bit interpersonal, mixed with the huge Spartacus esque
set pieces and incredible and that obviously became the pre
cast to Game of Thrones. But this was definitely like,
my mum loves historical fiction, she loved The Tudors, and
I got her a box set of this and this
was definitely one of those shows where I don't think
she thought she was gonna like it, but it ended
(17:51):
up becoming a fave.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
To your point, I believe that Bruno Heller was the
producer of a series of of BBC programs that were
like historical, uh dramatic reenactments of various moments throughout and
he has Roman history and then they basically just turned
that into this HBO show. And those reenactments and I
(18:17):
forget which with the name of them are, but they
cover various things, including like the Gracchis brothers and other
moments ancient Roman history are really cool too. You can
watch those on on YouTube probably. But to your point
about the casting, I mean in Dera varba is niobi.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
Oh, I love her.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Kevin McKidd who as Lucius Verinus, you know him from
Gray's of Anatomy and many other things. The late and
wonderful Ray Stevenson as Titus.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
Vernon maybe one of the best time.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
He's just truly wonderful. The always nude, full frontal nude.
James Purfoy.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
I love him. I love so much this guys.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Loves to show the meat in every role.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
He is such a blessing. And guys, I'm gonna tell
you there's a James Perfoy show that you may be
never seen. It's not in the context of this. If
this is also only the first James Perfoy is gonna
show up again, just in this episode in this list,
but I will say it's off it's off topic, but
go watch it. I'm not gonna tell you anything about it.
There is a Kevin Bacon James Perfoy show called The Following,
(19:29):
and you will watch the whole show in like twenty
four hours. Everyone has ever said it again, nude in it?
You know what? There are many near nude scenes. I
believe it was actually I believe it was not like
an HBO production and was instead a like broadcast TV production.
But still he does get to be sexy and evil,
which is what he loves to do most.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
James Perfoy is the villain in the recent adaptation Netflix
adptation of Ultra Carbon Hyper Violent UH Future dystopian story
and guess what, James before gets nude in it.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
I think he's just gonna get nude and everything.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
He's like, I can do it, baby. It's like it's
like you know what us Love's James buffact is full
frontal and the beautiful, very tall six foot lee pace.
You know, he he doesn't wow, you know what. You know,
that's just the Internet. You know, that's just the internet.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Other wonderful folks in this Rome television program Kuren Hines,
who's gone by to do a million things and to
Bias Menzies as brutus, like, it's just great. If you
haven't watched it, you're in.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
For a treat. You're gonna like it.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
Yeah, and you're gonna like this word from our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
We'll go right back by the work and we're back. Wow.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
And I've been blessed because the next pick is one
of the best movies ever made. People might not have
got it at the time, but we get it, we
get it, and now you know it's a masterpiece. So
if you like the fact that Gladiator is actually a
sports movie, which it is, lots lots of sporting men competitionally,
it's lagitmily sports movie, then you've got to watch a
(21:18):
Night's Tale, which I do think if we're pushed, I
think this is pushing swords and sandals. We are more
into that medieval space. But it's but they are. There
are both swords and sandals, So I think we're doing it.
We're saying it's it, and it is. So this movie
is so great. Summer two thousand and one, very much
in the era of like a post kind of you know,
(21:40):
she's all that like the teen movie Craze Ten Things
I Hate About You, and we get Heath Ledgers William
who's a peasant pretending to be a knight, and then
you think, oh, well, you know he's hunky. I love
Heath Ledger. I'll watch it for that. No, you're gonna
stay because you have Paul Bethany Stealings as Jeffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
A gambling addicted Jeffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Who's like a crew as crude and crazy as you
would think. The man who were at the Canterbury Tales
was Mark Addie Game of Throne Zone Bobby b. We
also have Alan Tudick.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Doing we Gotta talk about This.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
One of the worst English accents of all time, which
I think was the point, because this is a man
who can do a great accent. I think he was
doing it for fun. Laura Fraser from Breaking Bad and
my own personal very seminal teen crush, Shannon Sosserman, who
she's so underrated, her in this and her in Forty
(22:39):
Days of Night, The Really Weird Forty Days and Forty Nights,
The Really Weird Celibacy, Josh hartnet teen Romance. I don't
know what that was about, but she was very hot
in that and actor and former drummer in the La
band Warpaint, and also one of my favorites who were
about to bring up who is kind of on that
Perfoy vibe. They're always evil looking rufus Sewell, who's been
(23:02):
in like every kind of movie looking evil.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
This is like, he's just got an evil look.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
He's just got an evil vibe. He just loves to
be vibing and being a little bit evil, and he's
always in a great B movie. This is so funny
because if you were really like, what is this movie about,
you'd be like, Okay, it's a historical jousting drama that's
also a comedy that is also an achronistic, like musical right,
(23:29):
because they use contemporaneous They use contemporaneous music something like
the movie opens with them singing like we will rock.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
You, so you stadium rock they throughout this movie.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
The costuming in this movie is fantastic, which I think
you will appreciate if you enjoyed Gladiator. It is definitely
more of that anachronistic style, like they're wearing clothes that
are a little bit more fashion to the day. But
I do think that the the sports nature of it,
the interesting way that they bring jousting to life. The
(24:01):
core intrigue is very gladiaty. Who is gonna get married to? Who?
The Can you be a peasant and rise to your station?
It's very similar to Gladiator. This is just such a
fun movie. Every time I'm like some I'm just like
check it out again, guys. This is like a delightful watch.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
It's so true.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
One of the things I thought while rewatching this was
one how everything on TV looks better than this, Like
this looks like if you were to throw this on
now you your immediate reaction maybe that this looks like
a Nickelodeon movie from c.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
W or a.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
Disney Channel movie. That said, the writing is so good
and so witty, and all of these very talented actors
are just going forward in wonderful ways, like ye Bettany is.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Jeff Chaucer absolutely.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Steals scenes because he gets to have these monologues in
which he's like pumping up William and William's ability as
a knight. William is pretending to be this night from
like somewhere in Germany, and all of the characters have
these like little scenes like that mark Addy has these
wonderful moments where he's like he's leading high with his
(25:20):
coaching William through stuff like oh, you know, if you
turn your shoulder at the last moment and you'll be
able to do this. Laura Frasier is wonderful as like
this female armorer who's not respected in the world of armors.
Just a great movie and way better than you think
it is.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Just are looking at a still from this movie.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
I think another thing that makes it really enjoyable and
a reason why I think people will like it if
they enjoy Gladia, is it has a similar kind of
framing of like, oh, well, this is a fictional character
meeting real historical people. Like it's the name is taken
from The Knight's Tale from Chace as Canterbury Tales. They
(26:01):
you know, James Perfuy is in it, as Edward the
Black Prince. Obviously Chaucer is in it.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Does not get nude in this On.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
To Our Hopes and Dreams because it's pg. Thirteen, But
like it has that fun nature of like, well, what
if I was just in this time and I could
meet some famous people, you know, but not in that
over the overwhelming forest Gump he did everything that was
ever important in history, way more in that kind of
If you're into the Canterby Tales, if you ever had
to study it, if you're somebody who likes British history,
(26:32):
you'll likely catch some fun historical nods. I just I
really love this movie. I feel like I didn't even
love it that much when it came out, but now
I'm like, I am a big proponent of this movie.
So I'm very glad, and you're a big proponent of
the next movie.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Oh, I am specific Kingdom. If if you liked the
Will They Won't They? Between Maximus?
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Who do that?
Speaker 2 (26:55):
And and you like that, you know, kind of buried
in a action epic, then you will love Kingdom of Heaven.
The director's cut, Ridley Scott Director's Cut. Let's take you
back to the post nine to eleven aughts, in which
(27:16):
far and entertainment would struggle in trying to make sense
of the era that it found itself in in which
Islamic extremists apparently had a.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
Beef with America.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
You got always know why you got all these movies
trying to unpack that, and the result was movies like
the George Clooney vehicle Siriana, which is this very naughty,
complex kind of bad film that has interesting elements to
it and will we be feeling depressed? You have an
(27:50):
absolute like propagandistic movie like The Kingdom that says, so,
you know, if only we could all join forces, uh,
you know, the Islamic world and uh and US imperialists
side by side could take care of this problem. Bad
movie with several good shootouts. And then you've got a
movie like Kingdom of Heaven that tried that is Ridley
(28:14):
Scott basically saying, let's go back to the beginning.
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Let's go back to it.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
Yeah, let's go let's go back to the Crusades and
see where this problem started. Now, of those movies I
just mentioned, only one is worth your time, and it's
Kingdom of Heaven. And only one version of that movie
is worth your time is the director's cut. It's just
a fantastic, uh action set piece, historical drama. You have
(28:41):
Edward Norton in one of his most underrated roles as
the leper King of Jerusalem. And then you have two
people who should have been stars, Rosie.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Oh, let's talk about it, because this was we actually
did it. We started recording maybe half an hour later
that we were supposed to because we were, yeah, being
about the potential of these stars.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
First will be Eva Green, Well, we'll mention her first
because we can move all.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
You know, I've seen The Dreamers. I know that movie
was I yes, she should they made her a bone girl.
They killed her. She's a bonde girl, but like she
should have been bigger, she should have been having and
she had many missed opportunities, the Missus Pereguin's Home for
Odd Children, that was obviously meant to be a franchise
(29:29):
for her. She just never got the role she was
supposed to. And I'm a huge stan I'll watch Jenna
think she's in, but she still hasn't had that breakout
moment and it was definitely supposed to be post this.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Next is Wow Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Now here is I unveiled my my hair dependency theory.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
Let's talk about it to.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
The production team this weekend.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
And here's my theory on what went wrong with Orlando
Bloom's career. Not that he's not had a nice career.
Speaker 3 (29:58):
He's married Katy Perry, so he's a great friend.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
So very clearly after Lord of the Rings, the guy
that everybody was betting on to be the star coming
out of Lord of the Rings was Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
Now, the teens loved him.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
The teams loved him. Unfortunately, I think Orlando Bloom made
one key mistake, and that is he kept taking notable
roles in which he had to have his hair long.
Of course, Lord of the Rings you get three movies
in which, as Legolis, he's got that beautiful long flowing locks.
He then follows that up with Pirates of the Caribbean,
(30:36):
in which he's got to have the long flowing locks.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Then comes Troy, a.
Speaker 3 (30:40):
Movie with long flowing locks.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And then uh, you know, very sadly comes this movie
Kingdom of Heaven, long flowing locks. Not to mention the
various Pirates of the Caribbean sequels, long flowing locks, and
what happened?
Speaker 1 (30:55):
What happened to Orlando Bloom.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
We reached a point where like Tom Selleck, like a
clean shaven Tom Selleck or a clean shaven Sam Elliott,
nobody wants to see it. We only want to see
Orlando Bloom with long hair. And it continues he deals
with to this day blowing hair.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
It really is, you know what we need? I think
for Lana Bloom to get his you know, respect, to
get his chops, to get recognized, that he to maybe
let him know he has the juice. He's going to
do like an Ariasta movie or something. I feel like
he's got to be like he's going to short hair,
but Pattenson route and do like a good time but
(31:31):
with a shaved head.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Oh my god, you know, I forgot one. I forgot
in this whole run twenty eleven's the Three Musketeers.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Long flowing locks locks.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
I just think, you know, when you look at Robert
Pattinson is somebody who I think he did this significently.
Trap trapped by Brad pitt also who showed up in
Film and Louise with the with the wonderful like you know,
abs and hair, Legends of the Fall, grew it all out,
then shaved it for you know, seven switched it.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
He had a different look. Even Leonardo DiCaprio, you know,
because he is he was somebody who had the He
had the curtains right, and that was like, you've got
to have them. He has it in Romeo and Juliet,
he has it in Titanic, but then he does Man
in the Iron mask, and he has a long flowing
locks wig, but his other character's short hair, and suddenly
he's mixed out. He's not stuck anymore smart the Curtains lifestyle.
(32:28):
I do believe the Orlando Bloom has been hampered by
his long flowing locks. And I say this because I
am a Tom Selik Stan I love magnum p I.
But you're right. Nobody's nobody wants and nobody wanted to
see Indiana Jones with a mustache.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Nobody wanted to see that. And he was trapped man.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Sadly, Selik was, could not, you know, do anything. The
only like quickly down Under is like an Australian Western
where he's able to have the mustache is like the
only hey he could make.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
It's like Chicago Fire where he can.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
He looks years of twenty years of blue Bloods.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
Because cops can have mustaches, Jason, And guess what we know,
still rocking that thing, still rocking it, baby. And you
know what, the aunties, the grannies, they still love him.
They do maybe and maybe in the future Orlando Bloom
will be on a long time procedural with long flowing locks,
and we'll be eating our words. Because he'll be getting
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars an episode.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Look at the stills. If you haven't seen the movie
Grand Turismo, Oh twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
Look at based on a true story.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Look at Orlando Bloom in that movie with the with
the below the ears hair that clearly they were like,
he listen, Orlando, don't do that locks.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Don't you dare show.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
Up as his film without your co star the long
flowing line looks.
Speaker 3 (33:48):
They were like even in this driving movie Grand Tarismo
based on a true story, which is a full and
me and my friends were assessed with the fact that
was the full title from a real story based on
a guy who was a videot professional video gamer who
then got to race in real racing. Unbelievably strange turn
(34:10):
of events to make that your official Grand Tarismo movie.
But yes, Orlana Bloom was there with his long flowing locks.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
He could have been a star. If the only cut
his hair cut off that hair.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
He could have better stuff. Yeah. Maybe when the new
Peter Jackson movies come, maybe he's gonna be brought brackets
legal us. He's looking youngster. They maybe they're gonna put
him back in those long flowing locks wigs and it
will will be in our words next Okay, So this
one is very close to my heart because I am
a big fan of this director. If you liked the
(34:40):
overstylized cinematography and like beautiful theatricality of like the rose
petals falling in the final battle, which always kind of
takes my breath away because it's very unrealistic and just fantastic.
And from what we've heard about Gladiator too is continued
over in the new movie, So very excited for that.
You got to check out Immortal by Tarsem Singh. Now,
(35:01):
this is definitely a Vibes movie because Tarsem is a
Vibes director, after his two thousand horror classic The Cell
starring Jennifer Lopez and his two thousand and six masterpiece
The Fall, which I have to say is currently in
theaters for the first time in like twenty years. So
just go and see it. You don't need to know
what it's about. It's got Lee pace in it. It's
(35:23):
one of the best movies ever made. Tarsem then was
like successful enough to kind of go for Hollywood with
a high budget fantasy take on Grecian Roman mythology. It
has like an unbelievably stacked cast, so you know that
they thought that this was going to be super popular.
Henry Carvill, Luke Evans, one of my favorites, John Hurt,
(35:43):
Kellen Lutz, FRIEDA. Pinto, and Mickey Watt. Also Stephen Dorf,
who look, you might be like, oh Stephendorf, but that
man was in Blade, which really launched the MCU, so
he always gets an extra shout out for me. They
did Short Steve Short, King Loves Steven. This movie is
not Sing's masterpiece by any realm of experience, because his
(36:08):
other films have so much more freedom and strangeness. But
if you like vibe visuals and you just want to
like watch a movie where you're gonna see unexpectedly beautiful,
strange cinematography and unbelievable use of color, fantastic production, besignd,
this is the movie to watch in this realm.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
When I think of Tarzan Sing, I think, of course,
those extremely trippy, melty, unforgettable visuals, and I also think
of like the color palette, which is yeah, is it
feels like this is obviously going to be an oversavment
what I'm about to say, But it feels like you're
looking at a epic painting. The colors are where the
(36:54):
colors are so saturated and kind of on the darker
side of the luminescence.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
The blacks are so black.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
And everything feels there's a depth to it, but it
feels like you're watching something in two D. You're watching
flat action like a painting. I just love the way
his films.
Speaker 3 (37:13):
Look in The Fall, which is at least partially Swords
and Sandals inspired, so I would say we can. But
in that I mean the joke used to be that
if you were lucky enough to have a copy of
the DVD, which was out of print for many many
years but is now streaming on movie and I'm sure
with a new four K restoration there will be a
physical release, you could pause it at any moment and
it looked like you were watching a paint. You were
(37:34):
looking at a painting. Like his work on his color work,
his cinematography. He is truly I think a master, and
Immortals is like a very interesting space of what happens
when you take someone like that and you put them
in the Hollywood system rather than just letting them kind
of fight it out on their own, but yeah, great
(37:56):
weird addition and definitely I think a very fun to
see an entry to the swords and sandals genre, which
I was gonna say, Jason, what are the other underrated
or notable swords and sandals movies that we didn't hit
on here because they didn't fit into our kind of
hilarious way of putting this together.
Speaker 2 (38:15):
Yeah, I think if if you're listening to this, you're
you're you might be saying, hey, what about this movie?
First of all, I think we wanted to pick movies
that maybe maybe you haven't seen. Maybe you haven't seen
this movie, like why didn't we talk about three hundred?
Speaker 1 (38:31):
Three hundred was a massive hit.
Speaker 3 (38:33):
Yeah, and change the belief for a lot of people,
and you've changed the game.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
You've probably seen it. I will say that I kind
of like three hundred except for the the the the bad,
like racial politics of this movie, where like all the
good guys are white and all the bad guys are brown.
Speaker 3 (38:54):
Not realistic, but you know what, g butts, we love him.
And also as well, it's very homo erotic, so that's
like it's not a mean is it's not amazing.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
The most homo erotic action movie that has been released
in the last twenty years.
Speaker 3 (39:08):
To me, I'm like, I'm not I'm not a three hundred.
I'm not three hundred super fan. But if somebody is like,
let's watch three hundred, I'll be like, I can look
through the problematic aspects because it's Gerald Butler and it's
homo erotic, which to me is to.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
This guys getting greased up and like doing it up,
like do it like crunches all the time.
Speaker 3 (39:29):
The way that it avoids the realities of Spartan men
being gay, which is like a very obvious historical thing
that's been you know, looked at for many hundreds of
years and thousands of years in history, it makes it
more gay, which is like repression, and the homo eroticism
is there. So you know what, we didn't talk about it,
but that's because you've already seen it and it was
(39:49):
a huge success and it launched that exit his career,
so good for him.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
The same with Braveheart, which is directed which is a
I think a really good movie that you've probably seen
that's direct by a person that is terrible Style Gibson
and starring a person's terrible and you've seen the movie
probably which contains some of I think the greatest medieval
action scenes that you'll ever see in a movie directed
(40:14):
by a terrible person. Yeah, why didn't you talk about
ben her Good?
Speaker 1 (40:19):
This is a notable one. Why are we talking?
Speaker 2 (40:22):
I've just never been whether it's the the more recent
remake or the classic original, which I think is from
sixty or fifty nine or something starring Charlton Heston.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
It's just too overtly.
Speaker 3 (40:38):
Jesusy for me, like very religi, big religious overtones in
that movie, and.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
I've never been The chariot scenes are great, but like,
I've never been a ben her guy.
Speaker 3 (40:48):
I also feel like, if you're our age like it was,
ben HAIs one of those oversaturated movies that they always
tell you to watch, that like if it's a faster times,
always on a time that if you film, they're like,
you gotta watch it. Action's great, True, but you guys
have already had about it. You already knew about it.
That's why we're out here recommending the Weirdow choices.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
Why didn't you pick if okay, okay, Rosie and Jason
Weirdo picks, then why didn't you pick the Channing Tatum
vehicle from twenty eleven, The Eagle.
Speaker 3 (41:19):
This is a great question. I will say that's a
good movie. Actually did this one almost made the list,
So Jason List talk about The Eagle momentarily.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Twenty eleven The Eagle. Channing Tatum is a Roman centurion
posted on Hadrian's Wall at the edge of the empire.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
It's at the border of you.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Know, England and Scotland, although those nations did not exist
at the time, and he's having a deal with this
influx of Pictish warriors who have stolen his eagle and ambushed.
This meant and I'll say this, Janitatum. When I saw
this movie in twenty eleven when it came out, surprised
me with this movie because I was like.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
Oh, Chanitatum, he's like a good acta.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
Yeah, like his accent is passable, his acting is really
good and this the action is wonderful.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
This is a good movie.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
And I'm sorry he didn't make the list, but we
liked the other ones better for it.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
But that's a good movie. The Eagle.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Incredible cast to Jamie Bell, Donald Sutherland, Jamie Strong, Tier
Ryan who I love who is in this incredible movie
called The prophet also in Madam Ware Hilariously that was
a strange choice for him, But yeah, this is a
fantastic cast, also very practical movie. That's actually why I
went to see it, because there's this kind of march
(42:32):
that they do. They had lots and lots of extras,
and yeah, this is a weirder choice. Also what was
going on in twenty eleven that they had this and
immortals at the same time. That's very very deep impact
armageddon of them.
Speaker 2 (42:49):
Them And then you might say, okay, what about The
King twenty nineteen for Netflix, story thing.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
From Pattinson and Timmy Chamalay.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Into wonderful roles by.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
The Australia some weird stuff.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
Yeah, by the hardcore Australian director David Michaude, who I
love Ben Mendelsson seemingly in every single DA showed movie
that said, Uh, I like The King. I think that Chalomey.
You know, I'm a schalome fan. I think he's good.
I liked him in almost everything he's done, whether or
not I like the movie, and I think that to
(43:25):
your point, Pattinson as the French King, the French Prince,
I forget. Yeah, he's the French air to the throne
whatever the case is so good and weird in this,
Like there's various points where the French king and Chalomey
like have these like head to head like but like
meetings where they talk about it you surrender me no,
(43:47):
you know, And it's just Patterson is so good as
the bad guy in this.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
I can't recommend that highly enough. You know.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
It's mostly a political intrigue movie, yes, or like a
royal intrigue movie. So I think that was why it
didn't fully make it.
Speaker 2 (44:03):
Also, I will say, and we would, we would only
we could only put like one medieval thing in there.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
Okay, So I want to say, what it speaking of hair,
what are the over unders on Timmy shallow May's future
because he does always have the curly locks, and in
the new movie that he's in where he is playing
Bob Dylan, I feel like they were like, he's gotta
have curly locks, so let's have him play Bob Dylan.
(44:31):
So I'm like, is he gonna be trapped in the
curly locks? Even Willy Wonka is Willy want had curly locks? Like,
is he gonna keep them or is he gonna veer
to what Is he gonna get like a shaved head?
Is he gonna try and break out of curly locks?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (44:45):
I think it's a good note. And I'll say this,
Chalmy's got to have a beard in a movie soon.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Can he grow a bit?
Speaker 1 (44:52):
We got to see we can we can paste something.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Little spirit gum on there. But I think we need
that big. I do think that we're we're almost at
like full saturation of Timmy face card like in popular culture.
I think to your point, the hair is the hair
in the face together. We might need to patent sit
it up, switch it up a little bit, because I
(45:17):
do think we might be getting there with Tim who again,
I am a fan.
Speaker 3 (45:22):
Of me too, big fan.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
It was great And since you mentioned the Bob Dylan thing,
that looks fucking bad.
Speaker 1 (45:29):
I don't know that.
Speaker 2 (45:31):
Trailer felt like SNL like one of his appearances on SNL.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
I was a little concerned me too.
Speaker 3 (45:38):
I'm shocked because I feel like Bob Dylan, Timothy shallow May.
I feel like that feels like it should be a
kind of Indie Dolling Can movie. But I will also say, guys,
Bob Dylan, we've had the perennial Bob Dylan like biopic
already done with like ten of the most famous actors
of all time. It was a game change are in
(46:00):
the way movies were made. I don't know if you
need to do it again, but you know what, good
luck to me because I think you're always making me laugh.
I love that you showed up to your own lookalike competition.
You got good humor and honestly, like, I'm sure you'll
be fine.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
I wish, I wish, I wish you, I wish you
the best, and I wish our audience the best. As
as we wrap up this culmination of Sword and Sandel's
movie recommendations that have been inspired by Gladiator, on the
next episode of x ray Vision, we're diving into Gladiator two.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
Here and go, Here we go.
Speaker 3 (46:32):
I want to see the Sharks in the coliseum.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
Show me the Sharks. Wrigley Scott, you crazy man crazy.
And Tuesday we're doing our Canes series final. It's already
it's already over, folks. And Wednesday it's Dune Prophecy episode two.
Speaker 1 (46:49):
That's it for this episode. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (46:51):
Bye.
Speaker 2 (46:59):
X ray Vision hosted by Jason Consumpsion and Rosie Knight
and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive producers
are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is
a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent.
Speaker 1 (47:16):
And Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Speaker 3 (47:20):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Laude, Kenny Goodman
and Heidi. Our disco moderata
Hosts And Creators
Jason Concepcion
Rosie Knight
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