Bridge of Spies (w/ Elijah Davidson)

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
It wasn't closely. What's the secret thing?
Just got to find something you love.
To do and then do it for the rest of your life.
I don't want to be a product of my environment, I want my
environment to be a product of me.

(00:38):
Hello and welcome to the Establishing Shot podcast where
we do deep dives into directors and their filmographies.
I am your host, Eli Price and weare here on episode 105 of the
podcast. It is exciting to be just
rolling along in this Spielberg Series.

(00:58):
A couple of I guess like really like a few like historical
dramas in a row of sorts. So three kind of different, but
also like in the same vein. So yeah, we're we're getting

(01:19):
into Bridge of Spies today. So excited about that.
But before we do that, I have tointroduce a returning guest.
Elijah Davidson is returning. He is a real storky music, I
would say. And as as old Rudolph Abel and

(01:39):
in the film says, I probably butchered the pronunciation of
that, but that's OK. I'm I'm not Russian so can't
hold it against me. Just how we know you're not,
yeah. I'm not a Tony winning.
Yeah, Tony and Oscar winning. Actor either.

(02:00):
Yeah, that's all right. Not many better than Mark
Rylance. Yeah, yeah.
But how are you doing? Doing good.
Yeah, doing just great. Yep.
Enjoying the enjoying the summer, doing an extra time with
the kids. No worry about that.
So yeah, good times. Yeah, great.
Elijah. He has been on a couple episodes

(02:21):
before and you may or may not remember that he is a is it is
is the your title like Co director?
Is that what it is at the at brim film at Fuller Seminary in
California blanking on the city.What city is Fuller in?

(02:41):
It's in Pasadena, OK. Here in Los Angeles, yeah.
Yeah, Yep. And so, yeah, they, they have a
lot of stuff going on all the time over there.
But you also have personal projects that you work on with
your writing. Do you, do you have anything
that's come out recently or coming out soon or that you're
just like haven't have rattling around in your brain?

(03:05):
Oh, there's always things rattling around in my brain.
I get the doctor to check that out and they said I'm OK.
So no, I yeah, I don't, I don't have any projects, large
projects that I'm working on right now.
I I've been, I've been doing a lot of kind of prep work for a
project that I don't really wanna talk about yet, but it's

(03:29):
been fun to start to get in my head around.
I don't know if you've met this is like, but there's times where
I like I know the next thing I'mgonna write and but I don't know
exactly what it's going to look like, but I have kind of an
over. I have a big view of what it is

(03:51):
and I tend to be more of a forest first in the trees kind
of person, like in every circumstance.
I'm also kind of like bad at bird watching and things like
that because I'm more of a see the forest, not the trees, not
the details kind of person. Yeah.
So I get AI get like a feel for the forest and then I try to
figure out what trees are there,what trails I got to draw down,

(04:11):
all that kind of stuff. So I'm currently in the the
forest is taking shape and you know what?
I'm trying to figure out what goes where.
So yeah, it's it's kind of a funprocess.
I've, I've learned over the years to distrust that process
and know that eventually I'll, I'll figure it all out.
So that's fun, though. No, that's cool.
Yeah, I definitely. Can relate to that.

(04:32):
I'm. I'm kind of like the, you know,
get home. Wife says how was your day?
Pretty. It was good.
It was fine. That's the forest was fine, you
know, Yeah. Have to dig in for those
details. Yeah.
Yeah. But no, that's cool.
Yeah, other than that, I don't know.
I, I've started, I'm always, I'malways writing and like

(04:52):
exercising and I, yeah, that's fun.
I've started, I started doing a little review writing, but not
for not for Fuller, OK, some Fuller stuff, but a little extra
different on the side kind of review writing kind of kind of
feel something out like a way ofwriting about movies that I'm,
that I'm interested in, in doing.

(05:14):
So I've been doing that in my newsletter when, when a movie
like really connects with me. I've been trying to figure out a
way to write about, write about it a little bit differently, a
little more personally. I've, I've, for the longest time
I've, I've been very, I've been very particular about keeping
myself out of like review writing and writing about films

(05:37):
and put the focus in the movie. And it, it was just a practice
for a long time. And I'm now trying to work like,
how do I, how do I include myself in this experience in a
way that's helpful for a reader and helpful to like, you know,
cuz when you're writing an interview, you're always just
communicating your experience inthe film in a way that hopefully

(06:00):
opens the film up, I think to somebody else.
And so trying to work myself into that a little bit
differently. It's been fun.
But anyway, I, I, I've been doing that writing for my
newsletter. I had an e-mail newsletter.
So. Yeah.
And I I am subscribed to that and I I did, I meant to bring it
up before we started recording and forgot, but I did.

(06:21):
I did see that you had a very lengthy exploration of the new
Mission Impossible movie. So it did.
That was fun. Yeah.
Full disclosure, I don't think Ifinished it.
I think I I got like halfway through and then something came
up and then I forgot to go back and finish it.
Yeah. So I'll have to do that.
But but I was AI was a little mixed on it.

(06:43):
The to me like the lows were lowand the highs were very high.
Yeah. And and and, you know, kind of
comes out as like one of those like really fun 7 out of 10
movies for me. But I really enjoyed like your
like enthusiasm for it as just like a like super fan of the
franchise. Yeah.

(07:04):
So that so yeah, that that kind of personal element can be fun
even if you're like, I don't, I don't necessarily agree on the
take, but I love how much you love it.
Like. I love reading.
Reviews like that. Yeah, yeah, me too.
Me too, you know, And it's, I think if, if someone can like

(07:24):
communicate their enthusiasm or their distaste, I suppose that
would be fun to read too. Or are there any difference?
That's kind of a hard review to write is indifference.
But I don't know, I, I, I'm, I'mkind of inclined to think if the
writing is fun to read, you can write whatever you want.
And then, you know, there's ethical considerations with
staying true to the film and allthat.

(07:45):
But yeah, yeah, if the writing'sfun to read, you can do whatever
you want. So I'm trying to, trying to work
some of that in. So yeah, it's been fun.
Thanks for reading even half of it.
Yeah. I need to now.
I need to go back and read the full thing.
But yeah, so you what, just before we like get into the
weeds of the movie and forget what if you want to like plug

(08:08):
where you can sign up for that, What what's the best place to do
that? Yeah, you can just go to my
website. It's just my name, Elijah
davidson.com, and it's pretty easy to find in there.
Yeah, I've. Done that Once Upon a time, but
you can. Even get a free a free little
ebook when you do that too. So, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, and you have a few of those.
The Miyazaki was the most recent.

(08:30):
Miyazaki was the most recent one.
Yeah, Yeah. There's also one on Christopher
Nolan and one on Guillermo del Toro as well.
Yeah. So, yeah.
Very cool. And I think the other thing that
I always love to plug is the theCome and See book.
Which you can. Also get an e-mail form.
I have. The book but I rarely I rarely

(08:53):
open the book but I read the theemails every Sunday.
Yeah, great. So I.
Think I'm at I think the last one was Umbrellas of Scherberg.
Fun. Yeah.
Which? Which I showed to my wife.
She she was not a huge fan, but I love it.
It was a bit like, I think it was a bit too melodramatic for

(09:15):
her. Yeah, it's a bit of a melancholy
film for sure. Yeah, and but yeah, I I love
that one. We did musicals March, so we
watched. Oh, neat.
We'd watched some musicals with the kids, but we also like
watched some Just Us 2 back. In home so.
That was one of my picks that she didn't love, but yeah, she

(09:41):
appreciated it I guess. Yeah, even a bad movie is over
pretty soon. Yeah, not that that's a bad
movie. I mean, the movie you don't
like, even the movie you don't like is over pretty soon.
It's definitely not a bad movie.It's actually a great movie.
Pretty amazing, yeah. But yeah, go check out Elijah
davidson.com to see everything that Elijah's doing.

(10:03):
Come and see. I should say a little bit more
about that, actually. OK, Do it.
Yeah, the I wrote this book and it's, it's the 250 greatest
films of all time. Yes.
And I wrote very concise devotions based on devotional
interactions with each of those,each of those films.
So all 250. And there's a little written

(10:25):
piece and then a little model prayer at the end.
And it just takes you through film history and otherwise go
through the material too, that just takes you through film
history and you kind of learn about all the all the great
movies and not the movies I think are great necessarily.
I mean, I do think a lot of themare great.
But it's the movies that film scholars and film makers and

(10:48):
film critics have kind of named consistently as the greatest
films of all time. So you learn a lot.
I don't spoil the movies. It's like 1 movie in there that
I spoil. But I warned you first
everything else about spoil. So it's a fun way to learn about
film history and learn about what I see God doing throughout
the mystery. And then it's a book.

(11:09):
But it's also an e-mail, completely free e-mail you can
sign up for. And like Eli was saying, you can
get every Sunday morning, you'llget a new one in your inbox.
And they just take you all the way through.
So it is a five year, A5 year e-mail list.
It's a long, long time of getting emails from me every
Sunday morning. Yeah.
I don't know how how long I've been in it to be at Umbrellas,

(11:31):
but it's been a while, yeah. In the 60s, you're, you're, you
know, you're more than halfway through and there's a lot of
movies in the 60s in there. So yeah, yeah, you're moving
along. Yeah, I will say it.
And just because, like, wheneveryou sign up, you start at the
beginning of film history. So even though Eli's had
Umbrellas of Shoreburg, if you sign up, you'll start right with

(11:53):
the very first films ever made, which went.
Through SO. Yeah, yeah, I have.
I have a like running. So when I get the e-mail every
Sunday, I add it to a letterbox list.
It's a private list because I don't want other people to be
spoiled on what the movies are without like signing up or
getting the books. So it's just for me, but I but

(12:16):
it, you know, letterbox, let's show you like how many you've
seen, right? And I've been like hovering like
around like 52 percent 5152 and I think umbrellas bumped me up
to 53%. I was like, yes, so.
That's good. Yeah.
When I started that project, I Ihad seen, I had seen about 55%
of the films that were on the list.

(12:37):
I had a lot of watching to do. Yeah, which was which was great.
And then I had a lot of rewatching to do because I
rewatched anything that I wrote about too.
But but it was cool. I'm certainly a completionist
now. I would be a liar.
So I don't know if you I have, Ihave another private list.
I think it's still private. I don't think I ever made it
public, but I I ranked the filmsas I watched them and wrote

(12:59):
about them in my own private, kind of like what's the best,
what's not the best, what's better than whatever.
So when I was all done with the writing project, I had like, the
250 films of greatest films ranked as well.
Yeah, just privately, which was pretty fun.
Yeah, I don't have them ranked. I've just been like keeping them
like a chronological running list.
That's good. But it would be quite the task

(13:21):
to to rank them. Yeah, I had to just do it movie
by movie as I had them in. That was kind of like my reward
for having watched and researched and what about each
film was I could, like, add it to that list and ring.
Yeah, it's like when I was done with that movie, I can move on
to the next one. Yeah, yeah.
I love, I love, I love like arguing about ranked lists that

(13:45):
actually, like, mean nothing but.
Yeah, it's really fun to. Just, like, argue with people
about what's the best of whatever list you're making, you
know? Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, and we'll, we'll do that alittle bit with a movie draft
we're doing next week to go along with this.
But cool. But but the movie we we should

(14:06):
jump in. I'm glad you explained.
Come and see because I just likementioned it and didn't explain
at all what it was. So that's good.
Yeah, no happy. To thank.
You for mentioning it, I appreciate that.
But yeah, go go check out again Elijah davidson.com.
But now we're going to jump right in to to Bridge of Spies.
Elijah mentioned that he was going to try to get some

(14:28):
sniffles ready for this podcast in a e-mail, but I haven't heard
any sniffles yet. So pretty healthy.
Pretty healthy. That's that's good.
But. We should start.
At the beginning. Like I always like to do and
actually a little bit before thebeginning, we were talking a
little bit before the podcast about this kind of run of films

(14:51):
that Spielberg is in. And it's funny because I
actually kind of wanted to like start off the conversation with
that a little bit. So Spielberg has been really
since the kind of Jurassic Park Schindler's List, what really

(15:12):
like hook Jurassic Park Schindler's List.
He's been on this run of like 3 films within like 2 years and
then like a three-year break. And so this movie is actually
coming off of a break after likea frenzy of projects.
So he had 1010 War Horse and Lincoln where the, the projects

(15:34):
that actually like came out, buthe actually had some other
projects that like went through a lot of the process but just
never came out. One I had, I had never really
heard of either of these, just because I wasn't plugged in back
around this time to all this stuff, all these like unrealized

(15:55):
projects that might come out or might not, but one of them was
this based on this Daniel H Wilson novel Robo Apocalypse.
Which I had never. Heard of?
Have you ever heard of this roboapocalypse?
I haven't. No, Yeah, so.
There was this screenplay that Spielberg was working with from

(16:16):
Drew Goddard, who just to name afew stuff that you might be
familiar with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alias and Lost for TV.
But he also wrote World War Z and the Martian adaptation, so
had a little bit of sci-fi adaptation experience there.
But it was set for release in July 2013.

(16:38):
At one point it was postponed toApril 2014.
They had Chris Hemsworth on board, I think, as the lead, and
Anne Hathaway was signed on Ben Wishaw.
So some some honestly, some actors that I would love to see
work with Spielberg. Yeah.
They had Guy Hendrix Dyas on board for production design who

(17:03):
who had worked with Spielberg onKing of the Crystal Skull.
But it's probably most famous for his work on Inception, which
we did, you know, a little bit of call back.
We did an episode together for that.
Yeah, this. Huge.
It was supposed to be this huge,like $200 million project and

(17:25):
just it was just one of those things where Spielberg just
never felt right about it and ended up just shelving it.
So we'll never see the Spielbergro apocalypse movie, I think.
I think at one point it got moved over to Michael Bay, which
I would have been way less interested in seeing, to be

(17:46):
honest. Yeah, they're friends.
I I I Yeah, yeah. Transformers.
Yeah, there. Is Spielberg, you know, produce
Transformers and stuff like I, Ican see.
I've always found that curious, that they're friends, that
there's that there's affinity there because there's so much
about them that seems so different.
And I remember reading one time about Spielberg telling Michael

(18:08):
Bay, like, you shouldn't do any Transformer sequels, you'll get
stuck doing these forever. And like Michael Bay, like, I
didn't really listen. I should have.
Yeah, that's funny. I can see it at that time too,
like that was that was like highlike Michael Bay working with
the Miss Boberg time. So I can see how that would make
it passed over. Yeah, yeah.

(18:29):
For sure I do Michael Bay. I do want to see that movie
Ambulance that came out a few years ago.
I've heard. Decent things about that so, but
never seen it. Another unrealized project was
called It's What I Do. It was supposed to be an
adaptation of a Lindsay Addario memoir and it was supposed to be

(18:52):
starring Jennifer Lawrence. So Dario was, I don't know
anything about this person or this project other than she was
a photojournalist. It was going to be a women
focused film, which we kind of talked about, you know, this run
of political movies with The Post kind of culminating in The

(19:15):
Post, which was a woman focused film.
So I guess he did eventually do his woman journalist film.
It just wasn't this one. Yeah.
But yeah, interesting to see that he he had something like
the post in the works. Yeah.
Before the post. Got picked up but I saw this.
Too, In doing research about this movie, that this was one I

(19:37):
read AI don't remember what where who was in, but they
mentioned that he was working onthis.
And I I didn't look anymore intoit really, but it it sounded a
bit like like Alex Garland's Civil war, like that's about,
you know, a woman who's a photojournalist and it it's a
fictional story, obviously, but I felt like it had some of the

(19:58):
same DNA in it made me want to look up like how long Alice
Garland had been working on thatand if there just happened to be
any crossover, you know, there'salways like, yeah, yeah, seems
there are always like similar projects floating around all the
time. Yeah, yeah.
Civil. War is another one that I'd like
to revisit sometime, but it's itwas interesting, I think.

(20:21):
I don't. I didn't know.
I didn't know fully what to do with that one, so yeah.
I think. Spielberg would have.
The Spielberg version of that would have been.
A little bit. I mean, probably a lot
different. Yeah, I wonder.
You know, I wonder he but at thesame.
Time, you know. You know, there was a lot of,

(20:43):
there was a lot of Full Metal Jacket in that movie.
And I mean, you know how much Spielberg loves Kubrick and
worked with them. And, you know, I people always
look at Spielberg as the sentimentalist, but he has that
mean streak. Yeah, for sure.
It's kind of fun to think about what his civil war would look

(21:04):
like. I I mean, he directed.
The opening of Saving Private Ryan.
He's yeah. Yeah.
So it's not always. Sentimental.
That's right. So.
I like. I wonder like.
It may have been it. May have been something similar,
you know, I don't know. Interesting.
Interesting. To imagine.
Yeah, for. Sure.
Yeah. And he so Spielberg kind of

(21:24):
talks about this time he was, hekind of said, you know,
obviously he's he's had many like films that he's dropped
during this time. He he says there are no rules or
set patterns. There are times when a project
keeps me awake enough nights in a row that I end up making it
just to get some sleep. So some projects, I guess keep

(21:47):
him awake long enough where he drops him and somewhere he just
makes them. But he's also been what I, what
I thought was cool was just realizing like, or, or just
sometimes we forget that directors, these like directors
and actors are like actual people with families at home and

(22:08):
stuff. And, and it, when you think of
it in that light, it makes totalsense that he was taking these
like obviously he's working as aproducer and stuff still in
those those off years, but that's, that's way less
intensive work than being on a movie set And so getting a lot
of years with his family in there.

(22:30):
So but at this point he mentioned that his youngest
child which they had 7 both biological and adopted children,
his youngest was starting college.
So now he's like empty nest. I'm I'm getting back to work so.
So that's kind. Of what he's he's coming out of

(22:52):
that season of having the familyat home.
And it's I, I think that we maybe that might come up a
little bit with just kind of thecontent of this movie.
And there's a little bit of, there's definitely the dad stuff
in there that might come up as we dig into it a bit more.

(23:13):
But that's where Spielberg is. But as, as we know, like
Spielberg a lot of times gets he's, I mean, he's a, he's a
movie mogul now. So a lot of projects that he
ends up doing at this point are projects that come to him, not

(23:34):
always projects that he like thinks of himself.
So this this movie actually started with a young English
playwright named Matt Sharman. He pitched the idea to
DreamWorks, which he had found. He had kind of found after this
like Bunny trail of research he did.

(23:55):
He. He.
Discovered this Donovan guy thatwas a lawyer in this footnote of
a JFK biography he was reading where it talked about, you know,
JFK sending him to negotiate with the Bay of Pigs situation
and coming away with not it's kind of that that ending title
card at the end where he goes into try to get 1000 people and

(24:20):
ends up getting 9000. So he's like, well that's
interesting. Let me let me read more about
this guy. Then he finds out that Donovan
was connected in the movie industry.
He had worked with John Ford andGeorge George Stevens on this
one hour documentary about the death camps in in Germany and
Poland. He was credited as the the legal

(24:42):
supervision on those. Yeah.
And. Spielberg said.
That was like the most graphic Holocaust footage that anyone's
ever shown and that it was only shown at the trials, Right?
Yeah. And then not shown after that.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
And so he did. But he also, I think, did some

(25:05):
legal work at the trials as well, right?
Yeah, he's a lawyer. And so, yeah, so he, he's
digging into this guy and eventually he comes across this
kind of able able powers exchange story connected to
Donovan. And that's what he ends up
latching onto and starting to build this story out.

(25:27):
So it's interesting that he wentthrough like all that other
stuff and like finally came downto this one.
And that's the one where he was like, this is the story.
This is the story. Yeah, it is I.
Mean it. It's it's funny because you
would think like, oh, negotiating big pigs and getting
all that. There's a movie you know or even
like. Testifying at the Nuremberg

(25:47):
trials and, you know, working with John Ford, you know there's
a movie. Or yeah, for sure, yeah.
But no, it goes. Down to this one.
And of course this story, when it comes across the DreamWorks
desk, it appeals to Spielberg. Anytime something that like
connects to his childhood in some way comes across his desk,

(26:10):
he's like, oh this is mine. Yeah, and this.
Is, I mean, his dad was his dad went to the Soviet Union as a
part of a engineer exchange thatthey did.
And so his dad was over there and like saw the YouTube plane

(26:31):
and the pilot suit of powers displayed as kind of like this
is what they're doing. He was like harassed by some
German soldiers at one point when because he he had an
American passport and they're like, look what your country's
doing to us and stuff. And so his dad came back telling

(26:53):
him those stories. But also, Steven Spielberg just
grew up in that Cold War era. So he was near a military base
in Phoenix when they moved therein 57.
Like the height of the Cold War,You know, paranoia.

(27:13):
He. He.
Even said that like I read that he as a kid had looked at like
how the blast radius was and determined that his house would
get blown up if they bombed thatmilitary base near Phoenix.
Just like he. He was a very anxious kid.

(27:34):
Spielberg. Which he he talks about a lot.
And so that the whole like filling the bathtub with water.
He did that as a kid. At one point his dad came home
and the the tub was filled with water and he was, you know,
telling him, you know, we've gotto be ready or whatever.
So all of that, like all of those Spielberg childhood
anxieties, Matt Sharman ends up like working into the script as

(27:57):
we see. And it's fun to see him like.
It's fun to see him tackling like that Cold War thing like
very directly and to to center it so much on like a normal guy
and like a pretty normal family,because I feel like like the

(28:18):
Cold War like hangs over a lot of his movies going back.
I mean, going back so far. I mean, like you could, you
could say like there's, there's like Cold War kind of anxiety
stuff like built into close encounters, you know, like, like
it's definitely in there or ET, you know, the way that the way
the government operates ET feelsvery Cold War ish.

(28:42):
And then it you know, it can be a little bit more explicit in
things like in something like like Munich or king crystals,
crystal skull, you know, explicit Cold War stuff in it.
But it but you know, it, but it,this is like very much like
we're going to make a spy movie.We're going to make a good old
spy movie and do it straightforward.

(29:03):
I think that's cool to do explicitly.
I think there's an aspect of allof these these, I call them
social conscience movies that hethat he makes here in a row here
with Lincoln Bridges, Spies and the Post where they they are a
bit they are a bit more like on the nose and explicit about what

(29:24):
they're about. They're a little almost preachy,
but it kind of feels like your, your uncle like telling you what
matters, you know, sitting you down over over over a holiday
and telling you what matters in the world.
And so I think it's OK that it'sa little bit more like directly
Cold War. We're doing this thing.

(29:44):
Yeah, kind of thing. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. And Munich was that too.
And I would, I would say Warhorse is equally like along
the same line like it's not as. I don't know, I.
Mean it's it's it's still political it's a war it's it's
light hearted in moments but also very serious in moments and

(30:06):
and definitely has like a very direct message about what we
should take away from that historical event through the
eyes of that horse and so yeah yeah I mean he's really on a
roll with with this sort of stuff and.
Yeah, it. Is it's interesting to see him
using like his just like cachet with society, like his the the

(30:33):
pool. He has to really like lean into
messages he thinks are important.
Yeah. It it's funny, like, you know,
there's I was thinking about this when you're talking about
like this stage of his career where he's, you know, things are
coming across his desk and he's trying to decide what he wants
to do. And there's a lot more projects
where he's where he like talks about doing them or they rumored

(30:57):
that he's going to do it, but hedidn't do it.
I'm like that's kind of more common in this part of his
career. And it feels like to me there
was an early part of his career where he just wanted to make,
there were movies he wanted to make.
He wouldn't make any movie he could, but he was just like
happy to just do a lot of stuff.And then there becomes a point
in the middle of his career where it feels like he's making
them now. He has like all the cachet to do

(31:18):
it every once. Now he's going to make the
movies that really matter to him, you know, like really,
really matter. And then and then we get like, I
was trying to decide where I think the line is.
I think it's somewhere, somewhere around like AI, like
say in private ride and AI. And kind of after that, it feels

(31:38):
like he's being a little bit more like responsive, a little
more searching, a little more like, Oh yeah, let's try this
now. Oh, let's try this now, let's do
this now. And there's a little more apt
to. Experiment.
A bit and then but they're but all these movies, I mean, I
would say really from like minority report on through they

(31:58):
have a they have a moral weight to them where it's it's like
he's trying to do something. Useful and.
Good for the world. Yeah.
It feels like a bit like, like the Lost world was, the Lost
World was the last one where he was like, OK, I'm just doing it
because I have to do it. And then after that, like all

(32:20):
these movies have a purpose. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. Well, I.
Think I think like. All the way up.
Until Schindler's List, he just like he was, he was taken
seriously as a filmmaker, but not as serious, not seriously as
like like an artist with a capital AI guess you know which

(32:42):
you know, I think me and you would both say is like.
A little bit. Like, ridiculous that he had to
like that he had to endure that criticism, but I mean criticism.
Is criticism and. You know he's yeah when you.
When you break Hollywood by making, you know, Raiders and
Jaws and Jurassic Park. Yeah, Jurassic.

(33:03):
Park eventually. But yeah, I mean that there's
some self criticism going on in there.
But like when you, when you break, when you break New
Hollywood and create the blockbuster and you're going to
get a lot of people who aren't going to look at you as anything
other than someone who makes theme park rides and sells toys.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And.
So I think when when he made Schindler's List and proved

(33:24):
like, no, no, I can do this too.Yeah, I think proved.
Proved. To like the world, but I think
especially like proved to himself because, you know, as
much as like we would, we would like to say like artists like
Spielberg, like just make it forthe art.
Like he like he puts a lot of weight in what people think of

(33:49):
his work. It really does.
And I don't think there's anything.
Wrong with that, I think, I think we, I think a lot of the
great Spielberg movies we get are because he is, he does have
his audience so, so heavily on his mind.
And so, you know, there's space for those sorts of artists, too.
But yeah, it's been kind. Of fun to figure out like

(34:09):
because he obviously cares and he'll like he's one of those
directors who will say like, Oh yeah, I screwed that up.
Like he'll talk about Hook and say that Hook's not very good.
He's kind of responding to like audience like feedback on that,
you know, or he'll he'll say Oh yeah, I shouldn't have changed
the guns in ET and he'll fix it back.
You know, could be more upset about it, but I've noticed that
he doesn't, He doesn't really listen to, like, critics.

(34:33):
Yeah, or whatever. He listens to people, like,
actual fans of the movies and like, has it has it is seems to
be very good at figuring out what people really think about
his films. Yeah.
No, all film makers are like that.
They can't separate the things. Yeah.
It's cool, yeah. I think it is cool and I think I

(34:53):
think with that Schindler's Listkind of like proving himself to,
you know, the critics and to himself.
I think at that point, like you said, he he did, he did do like
the lost World is kind of like you could probably say is the
last like one. But I mean, all the ones after
that have some sort of like eventhe fun ones had like War of the

(35:18):
Worlds. Yeah.
I mean, it's very much like a a 9/11 coded movie and absolutely.
You know and. So even like the fun ones like
War of the World still have thatready.
Player 1, there's one that's like you could say it's like
light and nothing. Yeah sure.
But there's like a whole self criticism thing going on about
that movie or maybe even a The BFG is maybe the only one.

(35:42):
Yeah, Tintin. Tintin, I think, has no message.
It's just a fun movie, It's so. Complicated Tin tin.
'S so complicated though, right,because like on one level he was
never supposed to direct it sureand it was just kind of a
complicated production that's I feel like radio player 1's the
same way you know like he's he ended up doing it because he was

(36:04):
like well I don't want anybody else to do it you know and it's
like Bobs and Meccas can't do it.
I guess I'll do it you know likeI only messed and messed this up
because like the other version of this that somebody else does
is really crap so I might as well be the one you know for
sure fixes things that are wrongwith the book and stuff like
that. So anyway, every once in a while
there feels like 1 where he's like OK fine.

(36:27):
I think with. Tintin, he wanted to, he wanted
to play with the technology as makes anything else.
Yeah, yeah. And.
Yeah, and Riley, so we you know,I we talked about that a lot on
that episode and it was one of those, if you haven't listened
to that one, it was a it was a good one because I had some like
I didn't go for Tintin all in. It was a bit.

(36:51):
It was. Part of that is.
Maybe because I'm doing this series where I'm like so focused
in on Spielberg and like, Tintinto me was just like watching
Spielberg, like play. With a new.
Thing which is which you. Can which is.
You should which is. Fun but like it ends up being
like very distracting for me as like very.

(37:13):
Distracting. Yeah, but.
My guest, Daniel, how it like, really like, loved it.
And he was like, yeah. Yeah, I loved.
Watching Spielberg play. And so that's a fun one to
listen to because we have like, we have like the same take but
totally different perspectives. Yeah.
It's a. It's a.
Weird movie. Like I, I enjoy watching him

(37:33):
play for sure, for sure. But that's one where you're
like, who? I mean, it's kind of like if
it's like if Superman just decided to let loose and do
whatever the heck he wanted, youknow, it's like, whoa, dude, you
got to check your powers becauseyou're Superman and that's not
good. And that's kind of what what
watching Tintin feels like to me.
It's like, whoa, Spielberg, you could do a little too much.

(37:56):
Why don't you just check yourself a little bit?
Oh, man. But yeah, he does play.
He does. Play though, and I feel like a
lot of these movies are him playing in different ways or
just trying stuff out. Like he, you know, almost like
it feels like he takes some of these projects because it would
be fun to figure out how to do them.
And yeah, we'll talk about that with Bridge of Spies, because

(38:17):
there's a a big part of why I like Bridge of Spies is I feel
like you can feel him. Figuring it.
Out as he goes along, there's a kind of a, there's a like a, a
wet clay aspect to Bridge of Spies.
Yeah. That I don't feel a lot of his
movies that are a whole lot more.
You can tell they're much more planned out and, you know, we'll

(38:39):
get to that. But yeah.
Yeah, and I. I think this one is.
This one it. Feels it's been a while since
I've seen Lincoln and I that episode of Lincoln will have
already been out at this point, but I'm actually recording it
after this so I'll be revisitingit soon.
So I don't you know, I'll I'll this opinion might be like

(39:02):
reversed after I revisit that, but.
This. Feels like one of his just most
and. And this.
Is just how it how it turns out like the end product, you know,
setting aside what he does alongthe way, but it feels like one
of his most just like a classical.
Oh yeah, straightforward story. You know, you go, you go

(39:25):
straight through. There's not anything like super
flashy. Like even the Kaminsky
cinematography is just like justright on the line.
Like it doesn't cross the over stylized line.
They're really, they're really like, he's really like holding
the reins in on this one. It feels like.
Yeah, he's very, I mean. He's working in that like, like

(39:46):
John Houston most, you know, like he's definitely trying to
do the he's trying to make the kind of movie he would have
loved watching when he was a kid.
Yes. And there's only like 1 the one
the only sequence that kind of deviates from that is the actual
YouTube crash. Sure, which is full of all the
things you can do now, you know,and but even though that's it's

(40:07):
OK to have one sequence like that.
Yeah, that's when the rest enjoyed that sequence.
I thought it. Was great, well made, yeah.
But yeah, this is like, yeah, I like that you said that, that
this is like a movie he would love to watch as a kid.
I think this is like the the great version of Always which is
the other movie he made that he would have loved to watch as a

(40:29):
kid and Always just doesn't workfor me.
It's weird. It's a weird.
Movie Yeah yeah, I even watch how unlikable Richard Dreyfuss
can be. I even.
Watched like the original 1 and that didn't help at all.
And yeah. What a strange.
Movie that one is I like his weird movie though, like I I

(40:51):
mean it it was funny you know I.My wife and I.
I just, I don't know, I get thislike.
Into. It itches intuition.
I don't know where. I just like have to watch a
movie. I don't really know why.
And it was a few months ago and I, I just like, I don't know, I
got to watch bridge Spies first,watch Bridge Spies tonight, Just
turn Bridge Spies on. I had no idea why.

(41:11):
And I as I was watching it, I was like, I wonder if Eli's
done. I got to find out and the
message was like, if you do this, I want to do this movie,
which is so weird because it's not like my favorite of his
movies. Like even as this has been
coming up, I'm like, part of me is like, I should have, I should
have said Lincoln because I loveLincoln.

(41:32):
Like I love Lincoln so much. Like it's like top tier
Spielberg for me. And I've done like tons of
research on Lincoln and written like lots of things on Lincoln
and all this stuff, whole presentations on Lincoln and all
this whatever. But but I don't know, Bridges
spies is a little bit more fun to talk about for me, kind of
for the same reason I feel like it was fun for Spielberg to make

(41:53):
because it it just is. It just is more it's not a rough
draft. There's nothing rough draft
about this movie at all, But it's more just kind of off the
cuff and looser in a way than what I feel like a lot of his
movies are. I'm I'm.
Skipping way ahead in the notes,but I think this is relevant.

(42:15):
I wrote down this quote. This is.
It's not a quote, it's more of like a summarization of.
So Molly Haskell is one of the has one of the books that I've
been like reading through as andthis is actually the last movie
covered in that book in the. Book.
So I won't have that going forward, unfortunately, because

(42:36):
she has some very, like, interesting perspectives from
like, kind of a feminist worldview on Spielberg.
But she had noted A Manola Dargis review at the time that
found, she said in her review that this movie was less
weighted down by a created history or a sense of duty to

(42:58):
its significance than Lincoln orMunich.
Yeah. And I think that matches totally
what you're saying. Absolutely.
Yeah, I mean, even Spielberg says doesn't say it's a true
story. Like they don't put that on on
it. Like they just kind of like,
yeah, because they he said. It took so many liberties.
Take as many. Liberties as we do that we don't
consider it a true story, even though it's, I mean, pretty

(43:18):
accurate. It is, yeah.
Like the the. Example he gave in.
So there's like a, I think it's actually the first episode of
the director's cut, which is like the DGA podcasts where they
they record like film makers having conversations about their
films. I don't know if you've ever
listened to that, but it's, I think it was the first episode

(43:41):
of that. That podcast feed was Bridge of
Spies, but it was Scorsese and Spielberg talking about this
movie. I.
Have watched that video. Yeah, it's it's an amazing
conversation. It is fun to watch those guys
talk. It's great.
Yeah, but and I think in that hewas talking about like, you
know, we didn't put true story, but like most of it is like true

(44:02):
with just like I tweaked it for dramatic effect, you know, and
the example he gave was the the shooting the house scene.
The window? Yeah, like.
At that point in Donovan's real life, they had actually moved
into an apartment. Yeah, when the house was shot
at. He wasn't even living there at
the time in it. Yeah, they weren't in.
It and then there was only like 1 bullet that went through the

(44:25):
window and spill was like you know, I had I put it up to like
5 bullets through the window andScorsese was like well I would
have done way more than that. So it's like.
Liberties like that like for. Dramatic.
Effect he felt like it was important to show.
You know, it was, I think this too, like shows like just the

(44:48):
importance of Spielberg and his like, collaborative crew at the
time because originally there was a lot more family scenes in
the movie. That.
Ended up having to get cut out. Spielberg, you know, he just
talks about, you know, you, you kind of learn even all these
great scenes that we filmed withthe family, like they just don't

(45:12):
push the story forward in the way that you want it to.
But this is like the one, the one like big family scene along
with like the little dinner table one.
Yeah. That does enough like in that in
that short, quick moment to to build that family relationship
the way it needed to be built. So yeah, it's just it's just

(45:34):
kind of like the the wisdom at this point of his career of
knowing like how to work with work with Michael Kahn to edit,
edit out what needs to be there and what what doesn't.
And yeah, so I've got. I wonder if this is the time for
this or not. I'm going to tell you there's
something I do want to talk about with this movie and I it

(45:55):
maybe should come up later. I'm.
Going to tell you what. It is and you try to hold it.
It should come up later in the next ministry.
So I, I have a theory of what exactly it was about this story
that drew Spielberg to it, beyond the fact that his dad saw
the YouTube play. Like I, I, I have AI have a
little theory. I, I have no, it's just my own

(46:16):
little theory. As far as I know, he's never
said this thing that I'm going to say or commented on this
aspect of the story. So.
Let's hold. It let's hold it, OK Yeah, let's
hold. It cuz I think that'll be
interesting yeah. As we dig into like our thoughts

(46:37):
on the movie, let's let's along with talking about Michael Kahn,
let's like talk through the crew.
Cool. Real quick.
So we you know, Spielberg produced it with I think I can't
remember if he's produced with Mark Platt before, but I
recognize that name. Christy Christy Mccasko Krieger

(47:02):
didn't recognize her name, but she was all up in the special
features. I bet she's the German producer
because this was a Co productionand they filmed a lot in
Germany. She didn't have a German.
Accent though in the Oh really? Yeah, not at all.
And they? Hired a bunch of like, German
crew when they shot over there. Yeah, they did.
Yeah. Yeah.

(47:22):
Who knows? Yeah.
You had to be somebody, though. Yeah, I.
Didn't I just, I forgot to clickon her little letterbox profile
to see what else she's produced,But she might be important.
I just, I didn't recognize her name at all.
Screenplay is where it gets interesting.
You have Matt Charman, who we talked about already found the

(47:44):
story, wrote the script, pitchedit to DreamWorks, but at once
the script was completed. It must have been Mark Platt's
kind of like idea because he's the one that talks about it in
the special features. They sent it to the Coen
brothers. So Joe and Ethan Coen have a

(48:06):
pass at the script and. I think you.
Know I think it's one of those things where like they we'll
talk about with the script I think it's Matt Sharman's script
yeah I think so too yeah so from.
What I can tell just from like? What's what I've heard in
Spielberg interviews and just from like the reading I've done,

(48:27):
the Cohens really like just liketweaked up and tailored and like
perfected the dialogue sequences.
So especially like the negotiations anytime like the
anytime there's like those thosequick exchanges with Hanks and
someone that's like that's whereyou feel the Cohens come

(48:48):
through. Yeah.
It's like the whole like. Your guy, my guy.
Like Spielberg explicitly said that was Co the Cohens.
It feels like the Cohens it does.
Yeah. And then the whole like.
The whole stands out a little bit A.
Little bit honestly, the thing that stood out to me that I was
like this. Is 100% Cohens is when he gets

(49:10):
to East Germany and you have like the fake family there.
Yeah, I was like, this is Cohensall the way for sure.
Yeah. It is kind of funny I.
Started feeling bad for Matt Sharman when I was reading about
the movie cuz I was like, this is really his thing.
It is really his thing. And everyone is talking about
the Cohens all the time, and they kind of stand out.

(49:33):
And I'm not sure. I think, I think Tom Hanks,
who's worked with them before, kind of knows their their thing.
And then Mark Riley, it seems that he can do anything.
Yeah. You know, it just kind of like
it ends up working because they can do it, you know?
And I don't even know that they really wrote.
I don't. It seemed, from what I can tell,
like we'll never know exactly what what they did, but it seems

(49:57):
to me that they weren't really doing any a whole lot with the
able scenes, right? Yeah, I think they were.
Trying to help. The negotiation thing.
Yeah, makes sense and and the other thing that like they.
That you that you'll read and hear Spielberg say is that they
kind of like took the Donovan. Character.

(50:18):
And infused it with more of Tom Hanks personality, which if
that's something they did, I think that is a really big part
of the movie because at one point I was watching this movie
and I told my wife after becauseshe's a huge, huge, you've got
male fan. I was like, this is Joe Fox.
Like, yeah, just just a little older and as a lawyer, you know,

(50:40):
as a lawyer. But it's totally like you, you I
felt Joe Fox is probably a lawyer.
Let's be. Let's be real.
He's probably a lawyer. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I felt that character all through this.
And that character also feels, like infused with Tom Hanks's
personality, you know? Yeah, yeah, I think it was like

(51:01):
that when I got like. When I had that itch where I had
to watch the movie, I think whatI kind of figured out was that
it, it was, it was that thing that I wanted to that I wanted
to like spend some time with, like his lawyeriness and the way
that he, the way that he negotiated and the way that he

(51:22):
like the particular way he was able to like.
It's not just that he's trying to accomplish what he wants to.
Accomplish. He's trying to let them
accomplish what they want to accomplish as well, and trying
to convince them that the best way for them to accomplish what
they want to accomplish is to let him accomplish what he wants
to accomplish, and trying to keep all the egos down

(51:48):
throughout all of. That and keep the focus.
On the thing that they're doing and not any way that they might
feel about what's going on and the particular way that he kind
of negotiates all of. That I think that's the thing,
that. I needed, when I needed to watch
this movie more than anything else.
I, I, there's, I don't know if it's just stuff going on in my
life where I found myself in some negotiating positions or

(52:10):
just trying to just trying to like learn how to like be
involved in a situation in an ethical broad, broadly speaking,
an ethical. Way, Yeah.
To stay true to yourself throughout it, but then to like
also have that little bit of distance that he has in those

(52:32):
moments of like, we're trying toaccomplish something here.
Yeah. If I could step back a little
bit from this and kind of work the room, work that work the
situation more than the person, maybe we can get this done.
I think that's the thing. I like that I felt like I needed
in that moment and it's all there.
I mean, it's all in the way thathe interact, the way that he

(52:54):
talks. We're definitely jumping around.
In the notes, but like one of the things that I had noted was
when you when you pair this, this character with Lincoln,
which I'm sure you'll you'll being a huge fan of that will be
able to speak to you really see like some of like Spielberg's.

(53:17):
Obsession at this. Time and one of the big ones is
like these men like kind of standing up against all odds and
you know justifying their actions with their moral values
yeah but but but doing it in a way where they're like adapting
the rules of the game because they know the system is rigged

(53:39):
so like you you kind of see thatwith.
With. Donovan and this he's he kind of
like adapts, like he kind of figures out OK, like they're not
going to let me go through due process in.
A in a. Legitimate way So like how can I
keep my moral values and do whatI feel like I need to do but

(54:02):
play it on their terms? Which is interesting and I think
I don't know it's it's. I heard.
Recently someone talking about like Ruth Bader Ginsburg and how
like when she when she passed away, like all of the justices

(54:22):
that you would think. Like.
Would have hated her, like lovedher.
And it's because she operated inthis way where she she she kind
of adapted and and, you know, she stood on her, her morals and
what she thought was right and fought for those things, but did
it in a way where she was able to like, come alongside people

(54:43):
and, and befriend them and play and even like, do do things the
way she wanted, but on their terms, but still get done what
she wanted to get done. Very interesting.
For sure. Yeah.
And you see that with Lincoln, too.
I just got done listening to theabridged version of Team of

(55:03):
Rivals. Yeah, Super.
Super. Out.
I want to. Eventually listen to the whole
thing, but yeah, it's a great book.
It's like 41 hours. On the audiobook.
And yeah, it's a big one. I didn't have time for that so.
But yeah. Fascinating the way that Lincoln
operated in that that same kind of way.
Like what? Yeah.

(55:25):
It's funny. You know I.
I said I love Lincoln and there are there are definitely some
similarities between, I mean, I would say all three of these
movies, I would include the postas this other conscience movie
in here. And in all three of these
movies, you have someone who's trying to do what they see is
the right thing with a lot of people around them trying to get

(55:47):
them to not do that. And they're having to be people
of moral conviction to see that through.
What what is very different about all three of these movies,
though, is how much power the person has who is at the center
of the the center of the story. Because Abraham Lincoln,
President of the United States, you know, I mean, it's heavily
contested, but he is the president of the United States

(56:09):
and he is, he is willing to use every, every, he he's willing to
turn every dial, use every lever, anything he can do some
of it not maybe the question will be legal by his own
admission, because the question is legality of it all anyway.
And so he has to do it to find out if he can do it or not.

(56:29):
It's probably being president inhis case.
And but he's he. He.
He's not sure. Exactly what the rules say, he
can. Do so he's going to try.
To do anything he can. He's a man of great power.
But Donovan's not a man of greatpower.
That's kind of the whole deal with him.

(56:50):
Like we know when they send him over to Germany, he is
explicitly not a representative of the United States government.
He's just a guy. He's just a guy.
He has no one's going to save him.
Like he's just going to do this thing.
He's just a man, just an American who believes in America
and the things that it stands for.

(57:10):
And he is someone who can't bendthe rules.
It's very important that he not bend the rules in the way that
Lincoln does. He has to, he has to know and
believe what the rules are and live for them.
Absolutely. You know, he's he's going to,
he's going to find every way he can to make the rules work for

(57:31):
him. But he's he exists in many ways
to like remind people of what the goodness of the rules
themselves very different and that way very different than
Lincoln, I think and very interesting.
Like you with Lincoln. I think you have a movie where
Spielberg is like looking at what's.

(57:51):
Going on during the Obama. Administration and the kind of
divisions that were exacerbated throughout that time and the way
that people in leaders in our country, people in power were
not working together only gottenworse since then.
But could see then just how their unwillingness to
compromise, their unwillingness to work together was just a non

(58:14):
starter. Like you don't have a country
when you're when you're not doing that anymore.
And he made a movie that showed a time that was arguably even
more divided and how people of courage, Tommy Lee Jones
character, for instance, in thatmovie, like how they were
willing to find the conviction to reach across aisles and to

(58:35):
work together to accomplish something greater than them.
But now here we have, we have inthis movie, we have a man who is
not no one special. He ends up doing special things.
He's a gifted negotiator, but he's just a man with a family
and he has to believe and hold up.
It's kind of like the Spielberg saying like, yeah, the leaders

(58:56):
got to do what they're supposed to do, but the people have to
believe in this thing as well. The people have to hold this if
it's ever going to survive, because the people are the one
who hold the people on the hold the leaders to hold the hold
them accountable. They they, we have to be better
than them, you know, like we have to normal people have to do
it with the Post, which you'll get to bit of a messier film, I

(59:21):
think. But it, you know, it's about
it's about business leaders, it's about captains of industry.
It has to be journalism in this case.
But there are others who, you know, are running that, who are
on the board of that newspaper. And it's like, what are what are
they owe society and that kind of power.
So and different positions of power and how that works out.

(59:42):
Yeah, yeah. And I think that's like.
I think that is a big thing in the script is this kind of like
this persona that Tom Hanks is like leaning into and at this
point of his career of the everyman that I think that I think it
had to be Tom Hanks it. Couldn't be anybody else.
Right. And he's not trying to be cool

(01:00:03):
either in this. Movie like he's way beyond that
in his in his career and. It Yeah, and I.
Think, I think that's what like Drew maybe Charmin to this part
of Donovan's story in particulars, because at at this
point he really like, like he had been, I, I think there's a

(01:00:27):
degree to which like, OK, the, this guy wasn't like just a
nobody like he had, he was, he went to Fordham and Harvard.
He like he, you know, was, he did some stuff with the
Nuremberg trial. So like he's he's an attorney,
like that's very well respected apparently.

(01:00:50):
But the way that I think what attracted Charmin and then
eventually Spielberg to this is just that thing like the OK,
what is it about this guy where he can get way more than he's
ever supposed to in a million years?
You know, like, you know, that footnote that Charmin found him

(01:01:10):
in where like he gets 9000 people when he was sent to get
1000. It's just like fascinating, like
who is this guy? I've never even heard of him.
You know, this kind of like blipin American history that that
did something so big. And then this is where it all
starts kind of. And so I, I think that really,

(01:01:36):
and I think that's like, you know, the Cohens did did I think
great with the character personality and the dialogue
sequence they did. But I think Sharman's script
really does like is where all that is found in his, you know,
his script. So shout out to Sharman.
He he got the. Short end of the stick with.

(01:01:58):
The screenplay credits on this one, but yeah, I think he did a
great job. Yep.
Me too, yeah. I mean, so did you, did you hear
that? Did you read the thing about?
He, you know, he'd been pitchingthe story around and then he he
got a he got, he got told that Spielberg wanted to be pitched
directly. He wanted Spielberg to pitch him

(01:02:19):
directly. Oh, no, I didn't hear that is.
Yeah. And so like he, he was like, so
expect a phone call. And so like the phone rang.
It was Steven Spielberg. And he was like, I wanna I I
love your, I love your, I love your pitch.
Like, I wanna hear it pitch me. So like, he just, like, he was,
he said he was like, so nervous.Yeah.

(01:02:40):
He like, he like, he said, like,stripped down to, like, T-shirts
and boxers because he was, like,sweating so much and, like,
just, like, so nervous about it all.
And he just, like, started talking and, like, telling the
story and, like, you know, pitching it to Spielberg.
And he, like, went on for a longtime.
And there was, like, no sound. And it kicked pause.
There's like, no sound on the phone.
And, like, paused for a second. And then Spielberg was like, I'm

(01:03:01):
loving every word of this. Don't stop talking.
It's like he kept going again orwhatever and said he wanted to
make the movie. Yeah, that's so cool, Spielberg.
Thrives on like people. Excited about?
Stories because he's the same way.
Like. When he's excited.
About a story, it seems like. Yeah.
Especially when you like. Look at.
Behind the scenes stuff in his younger days and he's just like,

(01:03:23):
he's so excited and, and, and like, not that he's not when
he's older, but just that young energy, you know?
Yeah, he just has that. He always kind of like.
Scorsese, like there's a little bit of for that conversation
between both of them is so good because they both have this
thing where, like, they're like some of the most famous and
accomplished film makers of all time.
And yet there's still an aspect of them that you can feel the

(01:03:45):
kid that's like, I can't believeI get to make movies, You know,
like every movie I get to make. I can't believe I get to make
movies for sure. And I can't believe I get to
work with these great people, but I can't believe I get to
make movies. Yeah.
Oh man, so fun. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, just to run through the the rest of the crew.
A lot of these are like, so someof these are like new, you know,

(01:04:10):
kind of the typical Michael Kahneditor, Yanush Kaminsky, DP, You
got Adam Somner, assistant director, has been working with
Spielberg forever. Same with Mitch Dubin.
With the camera you have Gary Rydstrom.
Doing. Sound, I mean, but do you also

(01:04:31):
get some new names? Thomas Newman doing the music?
Not, I think, John Williams. I think, he said.
Was dealing with some sort of illness but but I think also
working on Star Wars yeah this is fascinating so I.
I read him. I heard Bill Barr talking about

(01:04:52):
this. Yeah, He said that he has a deal
with John Williams, that he willalways do Spielberg's films.
And whenever he signs on to do something else, that whenever
Williams sign and do something else, there's a thing in his
contract that says I can pause doing this to go work on
something for Spielberg if he has a movie coming out.
And so he had the same deal on Star Wars.

(01:05:12):
He on The Force Awakens, what hewas working on at the time.
And so it was all all lined up to do.
He was going to stop doing that and spend two months doing
British spies because there's only about 30 or 40 minutes of
music in the movie. It's not a square heavy film.
And he was going to just step aside, do that and then go back
to working on Star Wars. But he had heart problems and he

(01:05:34):
had to have a stint put in. Oh wow.
And the his doctor told him likeyou're, you're fine, you're
going to be fine. But you can't do any, you can't
do any of your conducting work, anything like that for like 7
weeks. And it just knocked out the time
he was going to use to work on this.
Yeah. And Spielberg, he said.
Philberg said it was the worst phone call he's ever received.

(01:05:54):
Oh, man. Was both finding.
Out that. That he was that John Williams
was having heart surgery, right.And that he wasn't going to be
able to do the score. Yeah.
For British spies. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, Thomas Newman.
Good, good. Composer, I mean, he's done.
Oh yeah, done some Pixar work. Oh, yeah, Shawshank, I think.

(01:06:17):
But yeah. And there's a degree to where,
like, it was kind of like a breath of fresh air.
I've been listening. I've been just like hearing John
Williams scores non-stop throughthis through this series.
And I've shared a few times thatthere's a degree to which like
they all start to like blend together and sound the same at
some point. That's why, I think that's why.

(01:06:38):
I like Catch Me If You Can has become like my favorite John.
Williams score. It's fun because it's so
different. But.
But yeah, Thomas Newman. He did a good job.
There's not a whole. Lot like you said in this movie,
and it's not it's kind of like the rest of the movie.
It's not really overbearing, which I think is strong.

(01:07:01):
That's how movies were in the 50s though.
That's. What these movies were like,
they used to have like a theme. You have music coming in
moments, yeah, to really punch up something.
But for the a lot of a lot of the time of those old movies,
like they're they're scoreless for the most part, Yeah.
Yeah. And I think maybe that maybe.
It was good for this movie that that Thomas Newman did it

(01:07:22):
because Williams has a tendency to like, really like, amp up the
the emotion. Yeah, for for better and for
worse, I think. In some.
Instances most I would say mostly for better but sometimes
for worse. And I think in this movie it,
you know, we'll never know, but but Thomas Newman did did a good

(01:07:43):
job, I think. Oh yeah, he did a great job.
Another newcomer was Adam. Stockhausen.
Who? Even Spielberg and that
Scorsese, that little interview with Scorsese was like, Oh yeah,
that's the guy that does all of Wes Anderson's movies.
Yeah, cuz anytime I see Adam Stockhausen, I was.
Like, oh, that's the West. Guy yeah.
And so it felt good to like think in the same way as

(01:08:05):
Spielberg for that half a second.
Yeah, yeah, that's fun. Stockhausen, cuz he's a great
production designer, obviously to to put together all those Wes
Anderson sets. Yeah, this is way different than
that, but looks great. I mean, I mean he enjoyed it.

(01:08:27):
Working in a real world and. Not a Anderson world.
Yeah. And this does feel very real.
Like this like between his work and Kaminski's, which you know,
it's funny because Kaminski sometimes can his like the
haziness of his movies can become like over stylized in in

(01:08:50):
good ways, but sometimes in likedistracting ways.
Like that's to me, like MinorityReport.
I think I would love even more if like I wasn't blinded by
backlighting like every 5 seconds.
And that's just like a stylistic.
Choice. That doesn't work for me.
Maybe it works for others, but Istill really love Minority

(01:09:13):
Report. But that was like one of the
weaker things. But he's really toned down.
And Adam Stockhausen, I guess istoned down too from from his
typical W fair. Yeah, this one looks great.
I think. I think the, I think the
locations are doing a lot of work too.

(01:09:33):
Yeah. So whoever's, the usually
production designers are all up in the location scouting.
So I'm sure he had, he had a lotof decisions on that, but he
wasn't in the special features. So I don't know.
I'm busy working on the Wes Anderson movie.
Probably. Ellen.
Lewis does the casting. She's.
She's. Done always, Yeah.

(01:09:55):
A bunch of Spielberg stuff. Yeah.
And then, yeah, costume, costume.
So here's where you definitely get some.
You get some Germans with the set decoration, Bernard Henrik.
That's got to be a German. German guy.
And Rina D'Angelo. Probably not, but.
Costumes Cassia, Willika, Maimone.

(01:10:17):
Maimone. Who knows how to say that name.
She does, but I don't good costumes in this movie.
It's. Oh yeah, it's.
Just when you don't. Notice the costumes?
I think that's a. Good thing, yeah, I guess.
Not always. It's good to notice them, but.
Yeah, costumes play a big part in this movie.
They do. Coat taken away.

(01:10:37):
The coach thing I had that coat Saks 5th Ave.
Is that what he? Says it is.
Yeah, Saks. Hello again.
Do you know? How?
You can really support the show.For free in just a few minutes
or less. That's right, just.

(01:10:57):
Leave a. Rating and review on Spotify and
Apple or wherever you listen that might allow for ratings and
reviews. These really help the visibility
of the. Podcast.
In fact, just hit that pause. Button right?
Now and drop the review right now and then you can get.
Back to the show. I'd greatly appreciate it.

(01:11:20):
OK, I trust that you when? Left that rating.
And review. Now back to the show.
Yeah, it's. Tom Hanks, 4th.
Collaboration with Spielberg this is this is a good like
decade ish after the terminal. So it's been, it's been a while
they've I guess would, would their TV.

(01:11:45):
Work have come. Out in between there maybe.
Yeah, they did the miniseries between there, right?
Yeah, it. Seems like it, yeah.
Band of Brothers, I think was around that time.
So yeah, it's not like they haven't been working together,
but just not on feature films. Yeah.
Band of Brothers and the the. Pacific, The Pacific, Yeah,

(01:12:06):
yeah. But yeah, this is not not the
last collab. He comes back for the Post.
Yep. But but yeah, close to last.
And, you know, of course, Spielberg didn't really have
anybody else in mind for this part.
And if Tom Hanks gets a call from Spielberg, then he's

(01:12:27):
probably going to say yes. So yeah, you needed Gary Cooper.
That's so you needed. We need you.
Needed our Gary Cooper. Yeah, that's that's Tom Hanks.
Yeah. Hanks.
He's ready to go. Loves history, loves military
history, like dude just likes history.
So he's he's all on board. Mark Rylance is a little bit of

(01:12:51):
a different story. He's somebody that Spielberg had
a kind of circled what I read was like for 30 years, he had
been kind of aware of Rylance and he.
Saw him. In a performance of
Shakespeare's 12th night in London.
And was like, I've got to get this guy.
Yeah, because he was with the Royal Shakespeare.
Company for like. Like 25 years or something like

(01:13:14):
that. Yeah.
He was the first, first directorof the Royal Space Shakespeare
Company as well. I think something like that.
And from what I can. Tell he did a lot of also just a
lot of like reimagining of stuffand yeah, just a lot of
creative. Work.
With those, with those productions, yeah, it's kind of
fun to read about someone like that where like.

(01:13:36):
People like Tom Hanks, the Steven Spielberg know about this
guy because he's like a legendary stage actor, right?
You know, And then I've never heard of him before, 'cause I'm
not metal Fall. A stage actor.
Exactly. Yeah.
And for them to be, like, geeking out over the fact that
they get to work with Mark Rileyas it's pretty fun.
Yeah. You know, it's fun to think of
Tom Hanks geeking out about getting to work with somebody.

(01:13:56):
Yeah, for sure. Yeah.
And I mean Spielberg. I guess like when?
You're a a movie producer, you you just like have to be tuned
in to playwrights and stage productions like Warhorse.
Obviously. For sure they made because they
loved the play, the Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall saw

(01:14:17):
it and then they're like told Spielberg, you've got to go see
it. So he went and saw.
But yeah, I mean. Yeah, he's.
He he's goes to to plays and it's like sees Ryland.
Seems like I've got to get this guy.
Obviously like idea ideal for this particular character too
because it's a Soviet spy but born and raised in Scotland, so

(01:14:41):
ideal for that. Doesn't.
Have to do a Russian accent. But yeah, I.
Wrote down this Spielberg quote about Rylance.
He said Mark played it with inscrutable ease, which I think
is a great description. He goes.
On to say he invites you to look.
Deeply into him to try to discover his secrets.

(01:15:04):
And we get inexorably drawn intohis character.
Then we're left with a decision,our own moral values.
Do we want to like him, or will we prevent ourselves from liking
him too much? And I wrote that down because I
think it just comments very wellon, like, what Rylance is doing
with that character, which is, like, just enough to, like, make

(01:15:26):
you wonder more about this guy. Yeah.
Yeah. I I.
Love. I.
I love spy movies forever, but you know, most of the time spy
movies are, you know, there's someone like James Bond you.
Know or like it's. Someone that like when that guy

(01:15:46):
walks in the room, everybody in the room looks at that guy,
Ethan Hunt, you know, You know? Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. Ethan Hunt.
Jason Bourne, You know, it's like these people are not
invisible, but like when you read about like, actual spies,
being invisible, being not noticed is everything.
And to be like a just a small, unassuming, forgettable human

(01:16:13):
being, that's a spy, you know, Nothing interesting about you at
all. If you can, if you can manage
that. He plays that so well, you know?
Yeah. He.
Rylance. Is so one of the things?
That. I loved was hearing Spielberg
talk about Hanks talk about Highlands.

(01:16:37):
Spielberg like shares a story about how like after they're the
first thing they shoot together is like that first meeting and
the after like a few takes Hankslike pull Spielberg aside and
he's like, he's like, first of all, this guy is incredible.
And second of all, he's like, I've got my work cut out for me

(01:16:59):
because I've got to keep my my guy in his like his like
talkative, energetic character. You know, in Spielberg talked
about like as an actor, sometimes it's tempting to like
match stillness or quietness with with stillness and
quietness, which can be a mistake.

(01:17:22):
And in this case, it would have been because the Donovan
character is not a still quiet character.
And so but it just it was cool to see like Spielberg recognize
that, but also like Hanks immediately just as an actor
recognize, OK, like I've got to work really hard to not fall
into that temptation as an actor.

(01:17:44):
And I it just speaks to. Also it speaks.
To like the the acting acumen, Iguess of Hanks, yeah, but also
like just the black hole gravityof that Rylance brought to that
part of a great of a great actora.

(01:18:04):
Great job, you know, Yeah, totally, totally.
Yeah. Just like.
I mean even. Just.
Micro, you know, expressions that he makes that you can tell,
like something's turning around in that mind, but you just don't
know what it is. Yeah.
And I love characters like that,you know, I, I think it's
pretty, I mean, he had. Ryan has done.

(01:18:26):
Like a few little roles before just a couple, a couple of small
roles, Nothing, nothing. This, this in the in the middle
of things and the I guess it's pretty amazing that he was good
enough to know, being a stage actor and doing.
Shakespeare. You know, and stuff like that,
which is, which is very, which is much bigger.

(01:18:46):
Yeah, You know, has to be much bigger, like, to know how to be
so small and so still. And you give just these small
looks that do everything. Yes.
So that's film acting compared to stage acting, you know.
Yeah. And the pauses, too.
Like pregnant pauses. Like he.
Like. Kills in this movie, you know

(01:19:06):
there's moments. Where like.
He looks at, you know, as as. Able.
Like glances at at Donovan for like, you know, it feels like
longer, but it's probably like 11/2 seconds or so.
Yeah. Before he makes his remark or
whatever it is and that like. 1 1/2.

(01:19:28):
Seconds is like so full of something.
You know, you have to, you have to kind of like figure out what
you think that something is, butand it does like it, it's taking
that quote. Like you have to decide what
you're going to do with him and like Donovan has to decide what
he's going to do with him. Like in those moments, right?
Like it's it's almost like Kuleshov effect of a human

(01:19:49):
being. You know, we're like you're he's
giving you nothing. He's giving you nothing.
But like a very blank kind of thing that invites you to
project upon it. And like so, everybody else in
the world is looking at. Is is looking at Abel, Abel,

(01:20:09):
Rudolph, Abel, Yeah. And and seeing everyone in
America look at him and seeing evil Soviet spy.
Traitor, horrible person and. They're just projecting that
onto him, and Donovan has to go through the work of not doing
that right, of thinking well, hemay be those things, he may have
done great harm to this country,who knows?

(01:20:31):
But he is still owed, he's so owed our justice.
If our justice means anything, he's owed it.
And having to like, not project that stuff onto him, How hard
that must have been to do. I mean as a for a human.
Being just for Donovan. To do that in the in the real
world, real life, to not do that, you know, so hard.
Yeah, I agree. It's.

(01:20:54):
It's. It's one of those.
Things that like. I would love to.
Think I would be the same. In the same situation, but
there's just there's just so it's so hard when you're
actually in those situations to it's because it's very, it's
like. It's.
The epitome. Of like.

(01:21:14):
Loving your enemy in a way that that whole idea and loving them
and not in the sense of like, oh, you're like loving them.
Like you love your family. It's it's a love your enemy in
the sense of like you're going to do your best to help them be
treated as a human. Yeah.
And that's. It it it it.

(01:21:36):
Gets it like. Why that is such a daring thing
to do? Yeah, because the, the reason
that we want to like, like project suspicions or to decide
about who a person is, is it then we can deal with that thing
that we decide that they are. We can protect ourselves from
the harm that they might otherwise do to us, you know?

(01:21:59):
But letting someone be ambiguous, taking that step away
and like, letting, like, lettingthem be whoever they are and
still doing the right thing, youput yourself at risk in that
situation. And Donovan puts himself at
risk. I mean, quite himself.
Yeah. The whole time and it.

(01:22:19):
It's that's that moral courage thing, you know, that he's
looking for for amazing. Yeah.
And it's it's great that it's like right there in the
performances. It is as much as it is in the
story itself. It's right there in the
performances. It is.
And the way they interact with each other.
Yeah. So cool.
Yeah. Yeah.
What were there? Any other like characters or
actors that stood out, stood outto you in this?

(01:22:42):
Because there's a lot, there's alot of them.
There's a whole bunch of people,you know.
I mean it. It's tough though, right,
Because the those two actors, yeah.
And those two characters are. So they're not big, but they're.
Kind of big you. Know they they have a lot of
gravity. Yeah.
They're they're dense. Everybody else can kind of get

(01:23:02):
lost a little bit. But they don't really get lost.
But it kind of can almost feel that way sometimes.
They don't matter as much. I'm the Francis Gary Powers.
I think that Austin Stowell. Yeah.
Does. A terrific job in that.
Role it's it's also a hard role.It is.
There's not much to work with there's really.

(01:23:23):
Not, but it's really important. That for like for us to
understand, like the way that the rest of the world felt rest
of America felt about that guy. And there's almost like this
parts of me when I watch that every time I watch this movie
where I feel like, Oh, I wish there was like an extra half
hour that just gave us more about powers and like helped us

(01:23:44):
to like we're already asking these moral questions about
about Abel. What about, you know, Donovan,
whatever. Like let's and the movie does
ask them about powers, but like,let's just do it a little bit
more, you know, because there's there's a whole extra like layer
of that going on here. Yeah, as well.
I almost wonder though, if that's like.

(01:24:05):
The choice was like. OK.
For to do that with powers wouldbe like preaching to the choir.
And that's not as interesting aslike, let's do it with the guy
that we're not supposed to like,you know.
Yeah, I think for sure, yeah. Yeah.
And. And I mean, Diamond doesn't
really. Interact with powers, right?

(01:24:26):
So, right, it kind of would takeit away from his story a little
bit too. Yeah.
It already feels like you're a little bit away from his story
when you're with the stuff with Powers.
Yeah. Yeah, that's that's one of my
only like quibbles. With if I have any that it's
hardly a quibble, but like. Just.
All of those powers, you know, sequences.

(01:24:48):
It's not anything to do with like Stole as the actor or even
like the writing. It's just like within the
structure, you feel like you're being pulled away from the real
story a bit in those moments. But it is necessary.
So it's, it's, it's a catch 22 really.
I think it's two things. I, I, I mean, I think it's.

(01:25:10):
I think it's probably. Something that Spielberg really
wanted to shoot. And a story he wanted to tell,
you know, he didn't want to cut that out because, right, one of
the reasons he wanted to do thiswas because the YouTube plane
and his dad seeing it, all that kind of stuff.
So like there's a personal aspect to it.
And I think he just wanted to, he wanted to fly a YouTube
bomber around and film it, you know, and he wanted to make it,
make it explode. You know, that stuff is fun to

(01:25:31):
do. The guy, the guy who the guy who
was making war movies with his Boy Scout troupe wants to make
the YouTube play going down. Yeah.
And so there's that. But it's also it, it is
narratively connected, narratively important.
It is. But it's it's more than
important. I think more, though, it's
thematically related because it gets back at that thing about

(01:25:54):
how we look at someone and judgethem for what they've done, what
we think they've done or haven'tdone.
Yeah, because everyone was doingthat to, you know, Francis, Gary
Powers. People talk about they think he
should have died with the plane if he.
Hadn't died, and then there's been a problem.
You know, so that it's thematically related to SO and I

(01:26:15):
think it's fine. I think too like.
Maybe to a lesser degree, but it's still there.
I think with the Frederick Pryoreven that's sort of there.
Like what is that dude doing over there?
Like what? What was this dude thinking?
Like he maybe he deserves to be,you know, in the German prison.
You know, he's. Not worth.
Our time. Yeah, I know.

(01:26:35):
Yeah, he's funny. He's almost like a bonus.
Yeah, right. Which I.
You know, I think Powers does. I think both of those actors do
a good job of like. Kind of projecting.
This, it's a, it's a similar blank slate to Abel, maybe a

(01:26:55):
little less blank. You still have to like project
onto them what you think of thembecause you don't see, you don't
see, I guess with Prior you see him like trying to save the girl
and stuff. So you get a little bit with
him, but you don't see a lot of who they are other than maybe
that, other than maybe like the scene, the interrogation scene.

(01:27:19):
But even then you like, you don't know if he said anything
or not. Yeah.
So there there's a big bit of like, like you said, parallel
there with the blank slate you have to project onto them.
What you think. I mean, you also have.
I mean you have to have. Prior as well, because he he is
part of what Donovan does, gets him out and he uses that as part

(01:27:42):
of his his negotiation. And if they cut that pull out
like you would have, you would have missed one of the one of
the points on your triangle thathe's trying to work out.
So lost tension. So, yeah.
And I think those actors do good.
I I think the. Few moments you get with.
Amy Ryan are good as his wife. Oh yeah, a little Shilberg's mom

(01:28:04):
stand. In Yeah, now, now it's like
every time I see someone like that in the Spielberg movie,
like, oh, that's just his mom. That's Spielberg's mom.
I mean, yeah. She's a little.
Baby Ryan, Yeah. I mean, the Vogel character I
think is good. Sebastian Coke.
Coke. Yeah.
Coach, I don't know how to say that name.

(01:28:25):
He's he's solid. Real quick on Mary Donovan.
I'll say. Like Spielberg talks about when
when his dad said he was going to go do this engineer exchange
thing, whatever, like good goodwill exchange, that his mom
was so angry at his dad and theyhad to like they had to like
they had a big fight with the kids present and then had to

(01:28:48):
like make up and figured out later or whatever.
But she was very upset about it.So you feel that resentment in
the movie. I think you too like.
I like the look whether it was like whether.
Whether Mary Donovan really feltthat way about what Ray was
doing, like, I think like Spielberg had to have that in
there because that was what he experienced.
Yeah, you know for sure. Yeah, I mean, you definitely

(01:29:11):
feel. I think I even wrote in my notes
scribbled like resentment from the wife at one point.
Like you really feel it. I mean at the.
Dinner table sequence. Is it's there, but it's
especially there like after the and rightly so after the
shooting, the. The other.

(01:29:34):
I'm trying to find in my the other character that I thought
was really good was where is theguy Mikhail Gorvoi?
Yeah, the Russian guy. Yeah, or.
A German guy, I guess, or whatever.
Yeah, the guy that's great. He first meets when he gets
there. That's like, yeah.

(01:29:57):
The character, I think, is Ivan Shishkin.
Shishkin. Yeah, He's great.
So good. That one was very.
Like Co. Again, that whole, like sequence
was like very Cohen's brother Cohen, brother Bills, and that
character definitely had that feel to him.
So maybe that's why I liked him.A little bit of a quirk, yeah.
A little bit of quirk to him, that kind of like sly, like

(01:30:22):
smooth talk talkingness to him for sure.
Is there. Yeah.
I mean a lot of the other. Characters are.
Like they like it's. It's one of those.
Spielberg things where he can build a character very
efficiently when he wants to, and so it's one of those things.
Where? All the other characters kind of

(01:30:43):
like fall into the background ofDonovan and Abel, but they still
feel fully formed in a way. It's this like magic I think
that Spielberg is able to do with the way he I mean, it's
it's got to be, it's got to be there in the script for him to
work with. But I do think it is just how

(01:31:06):
good Spielberg is at like. I mean, just think about like.
The the. Scene with the daughter, you
know, being stood up and his like junior lawyer assistant
guy, like coming in. It's like you get everything you
need to know about his daughter even though that's the only time
you hear her or see her. Really all you need to know

(01:31:29):
about her, all you need to know about his assistant, all from
that one like thing. Yep, and you know they you
forget. About.
Them. They just kind of fade into the
background, but in that moment they feel like fully formed
characters and I, I just. Love that that.
Thing that Spielberg does with that the.

(01:31:52):
I guess we should also. Mention there was a a Jesse
Plummons sighting in this movie.There is.
Yep. Jesse Plummons jump scare.
There's a bunch of those back inthe back in the teens, yeah.
Before we knew who he was. Oh man, Yeah.
Yeah. We definitely you.
Definitely don't know who he is in this movie.

(01:32:12):
He is not, yeah, he is not the not really there.
He's. Not the Jesse.
Plemons we we know and are frightened of now.
I think my favorite Jesse. Plemons character is.
Still game night though. Oh yeah, he's so good.
But. Yeah, I mean.

(01:32:32):
He's he's fine in the movie. He's he's just kind of only
there for little role. Yeah, 2 minutes maybe.
I also really. Liked Max?
Moth, who plays the Harold Otts secretary for that one scene, I
think because it's a very good scene, but I think he kind of

(01:32:55):
has that, like, anxious assistant energy really well.
So figured I'd shout that guy out too, Yeah?
Yeah, let's, let's. Talk a little bit about the
production before we and then weI think out of the production,
we'll jump into your theory. OK, cool.

(01:33:16):
Because I'm excited to hear. That.
Yeah. So yeah, this was made.
Between. September and December 2014,
they started in in New York City.
I think Spielberg mentioned thisis the most he had ever shot in
New York because I mean, you do get a good, I guess half, half
the movie in New York. They were.

(01:33:39):
In Brooklyn, they were in Astoria, Queens, lower
Manhattan. So they, yeah, they, they they
really just spent a lot of time shooting in New York, which he
said was great, a great time. Other locations they went to
Bill Air Force Base out in your neck of the woods in California

(01:34:02):
for the YouTube plane stuff. I think they so I I'm pretty
sure the YouTube plane was like a built in like 1980.
They they said the program. Is still in operation.
They still in the YouTube spot? They're still used.
Yeah, yeah. I.
Kind of doubt they have giganticcameras coming out of the bottom

(01:34:25):
of them anymore, right? That kind of maybe they do them.
Yeah, maybe they do them they. Might I don't.
Know we wouldn't really know. They got IMAX cameras to get
off. The.
Bottom of the six they got to get even IMAX cameras are.
Like a portion of. The size of.
The ones you see in the movie, those things are huge.
They probably do. I mean, they got to get like,
really? High resolution, like, like

(01:34:49):
pictures. Yeah, from really, really far
up. Yeah.
You know, you would need a really large aperture to be able
to do that, I guess. So that's true.
It's just, it's one of those things where it's like, you
know, this is real, but like thesize of it is just kind of
comical, right? Because you just, you're not
used to seeing lenses that big. Yeah.

(01:35:12):
But yeah, they those things so. I think they were hitting like,
I think they say 70,000 feet in the movie, but I think that at
the time, I think I read that that was like the an altitude
record at that point in time. And so but they but they
couldn't like brag about that. Because they didn't want

(01:35:34):
anybody. To know, yeah, that's the.
Whole point, yeah. Yeah, nothing.
Nothing. Digital in the plane take off
stuff. They just were driving vehicles
along the YouTube plane really taking off.
So but the it's really the only thing digital in the whole movie
is the crash sequence. They, you know, you got the

(01:35:59):
actor in a cockpit on a mechanical arm in front of a
blue screen for that sequence, but it looks really good.
It does. They they did a really, really
great. Job with that.
The digital effects movie magic worked for that one, I think.
I think they had like. Just enough.

(01:36:19):
Practical stuff with the with the like real cockpit.
That he was working. With, you know, for it to work.
But yeah, love. That stuff, it's.
Kind of a throwaway part of the movie, but really exciting to
watch. Oh yeah, yeah, it's almost.

(01:36:41):
Like I, I just, I thought it wasone of those things like, well,
if I'm going. To do this movie, I'm going to
do this thing, yeah, as well. Let's put this on film best we
can. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean.
Then they go to Berlin about after about a month in in New
York, they go fly to Berlin. They they already have like a
second team working there. Hanks, Tom.

(01:37:02):
Hanks said it feels. Like a city of ghosts, which I
thought was an interesting observation.
Definitely see that being the case with the history of the
city. So but yeah, they, they shot at
Templehorpe Airport, which had been converted into a park in
2010. And so they they did a lot of

(01:37:25):
the shooting and building of sets there the.
One of the only. Things they didn't.
Do there in Berlin was the Friedrich Stock Friedrich
Strauss station, which is where they, you know, they have the
like checkpoint line that he cuts in line at.
They weren't able to shoot that at like the actual station

(01:37:47):
because it looked too modern. They found like another one.
Nearby. That worked.
Better sort of thing, but then they to.
Get all the. Wall sequences, so like the the
kind of border with the wall building and all that.
That was all in real call. I think it's how you pronounce
it. Poland.

(01:38:09):
It's so Kaminsky and other people talked about like this
was like on the border. So it used to be a part of
Germany. So it had like very German
architecture. But then also like in Berlin,
everything's kind of been rebuilt and so you don't really
have anything that looks like early 60s Berlin anymore.

(01:38:35):
Whereas they found in this town in Poland, there were still
some, you know, a good bit of streets that had very like 60s
Berlin feel to them, even like, you know, bombed out St. kind of
stuff going on. And so, yeah, they.
I mean they built. A wall, I think, I think

(01:38:58):
Spielberg's had a good like 300 yards of wall there along one of
those streets. They even had like advisors of
people that were there when it went up and were there when it
was up that kind of like advisedthem on what to do for that,
what it was like. So yeah, I mean, they really.

(01:39:18):
Went for it. For that, for that, yeah, I had
this weird, this weird life thing that.
I do. Is I like to see pieces of the
Berlin Wall they're like in museums and yeah, presidential
libraries and stuff like all over the place now like they're
just all over the place, huh. OK, they're use.
They're usually set up somewherewhere you.
Can. Like touch them and like get

(01:39:39):
real close to them and stuff. They're not like they I've never
been to a piece that's like a walled off wall.
Like it's always something you can like interact with.
Yeah. And I don't know why.
I The first one I ever saw was at the the George the Bush
President Presidential Library. And College Station in.
Texas. And it just like really struck

(01:40:01):
me, I mean, because that's like a the wall, yeah, it's like a
huge deal. It's a huge thing.
And like, it's a symbolic, hugely symbolic, but like actual
literal thing too. And it's always neat to see.
I've seen a half dozen pieces ofit standing up in various
museums and stuff now and. I'm gonna have to keep an eye

(01:40:21):
out for that now. It's a thrill.
I'm. Trying to put the whole wall
back together in. My mind, yeah, that's what I'm
trying to do. So one day you got to experience
all the pieces that are still inexistence.
It is cool though, like there's not very many like important
pieces of. History like that that you can.
Just go up and touch. Yeah, there's something very

(01:40:41):
like tactile. About that, that I'm sure.
Is yeah, interesting. I've never asked I.
Want to one of? These days, I'm going to ask.
One of the museum curators, one of these museums where I see
this thing, I'm like, why can you always touch this?
Yeah, like I can't touch anything else.
I guess you can't mess it up. It's a cement wall, always.
Touch the concrete wall. Yeah, you know.
Oh man, yeah, I mean. They did.

(01:41:03):
So, you know, I guess that's where stock housing comes in.
They did a really good job with that.
The, the only other location that that I really like noted
was the Glenna Key Bridge, whichis they kind of have, they even
have now a sign up that says Bridge of spies kind of

(01:41:27):
commemorating this, this moment.But but yeah, they were there
for like 6 nights. They they so this bridge.
Is like it connects. Berlin to Potsdam, it's like the
East West connection. And so that's why it was so
important and it was closed all during this time.

(01:41:50):
It was closed to civilian traffic and it wasn't open up
again. For traffic.
Until after reunification. So, so yeah, they, what you see
in the movie, it was just like that this whole time, that whole
time just I guess they. Probably.
I'm assuming they. Had, you know, the towers with

(01:42:12):
people with rifles up in them just constantly.
And yeah, like the DMZ in Korea.You know, yeah, yeah.
So just wild. It's just.
Wild to me to think about a city, you know?
I was. I was.
Born after this. All you know, kind of was
resolved and so it's. Just.

(01:42:34):
You know, I guess. Korea just feels so.
So distant. And yeah, I don't really think
about like that. In Korea.
Much but so it's just wild to meto think about there's here's
this city that's like split in half it's.
Literally like. You mean you can have?
Aunts and uncles on the. Other side yeah.
It's just, yeah, just mind blowing to think about that that

(01:42:57):
was going on. Yeah, I mean.
And then you have like. They talked about one day
they're. Celebrating the 25th.
Anniversary of the wall coming down and the next day they're
shooting Tom Hanks on that bridge.
So I mean, yeah, just. Well, so.
I mean, they had high emotions. On set, Yeah, with all that

(01:43:20):
going on too. I.
Mean freezing cold. And then the other cool thing.
About the bridge was Spielberg and I guess some others of the
probably Tom Hanks, I'm sure. And other people got invited to

(01:43:40):
meet the German Chancellor Merkel, who was.
I had to look it up. I didn't.
I don't really know a lot about German politics, but basically
the chancellor of Germany is like the president.
Yeah. And so it's kind of yeah.
I mean not exactly, but. It.
For all intents and purposes, it's yeah, she's like the
administrative leader. I think it's kind.

(01:44:01):
Of more like the Prime Minister in sure, right in England,
right? Yeah.
So they got to meet. Her but and then she actually
came out to the bridge for the to the set one day and, you
know, meet shaking hands and stuff.
So I thought that was cool. Yeah.
Go meet Tom Hanks. Sure.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Why I became Chancellor in the 1st?
Place. Because this happened.

(01:44:22):
Yeah. As far as the the way the movie
looks, I think it looks. Really good I think.
Kaminsky did a good. Job.
We we talked a little bit about that, but I guess like the most
like I guess interesting. Thing that's like a.
A strong choices to the to kind of split with a with a fade to

(01:44:46):
black fade back in in the middleof the film from like a colorful
vibrant New York to like the blue Gray the classic Kaminsky
blue Gray cold haziness of Berlin yeah I I don't know I I.
I think a lot about this every time I watch it.
Like how much? How much I like the look of the

(01:45:10):
film or not I I don't know. Spielberg kind of goes through,
I mean. He's in the middle of it, right?
He's in the middle of it with this movie, but his he likes a
lot of. Blue and grey.
There's a lot of blue. And green, a lot of these
movies, and if he's not blue andgrey, he's deeply saturated

(01:45:32):
colors, Sure. And there's kind of nothing like
in the 90's, the movies felt a little bit more real.
And he's like moved far from real.
I feel like in all of these movies in the 2000s, it's almost
like going back to the 80's, theway his movies felt in the 80s.
This very like hazy fantasy feelvery hazy fantasy even when the

(01:45:53):
story is very. Realistic and I don't, I don't
know, like I, there's part of methat would like him to work with
someone other than Jonas Kaminski because I, they start
to feel a little samey. And as one reason I love, I
think it works really well in Lincoln because you can
everything's muddy and smoky andthat just kind of works a

(01:46:15):
little. It like makes more sense.
But yeah, but that's why West Side Story, I love watching West
Side Story so much because West Side Story feels different,
right? It looks kind of different.
It's much sharper, less less magic haze everywhere.
And I don't know, I just, I, I like that a lot.

(01:46:37):
Fableman's too. Fableman's.
Is not is not magic not magic glowy lights in the same way
super realistic. And I I'm hoping I'm optimistic
that maybe Spielberg and Youngs have moved out of there have
moved out of there this this era.
Yeah, I don't know. I'm.
I love the movie and I understand why they did, but

(01:46:58):
they did. But I'm just a little bit like,
OK, yeah. I mean, it's, it's like it's.
The way. I feel about it.
So you know, I've just I've beenwatching these like so the last
one I've I've kind of like watched and covered.
I haven't done Lincoln yet, but you just spoke to that.
But war horses is a it has that feel of like The Color Purple

(01:47:22):
empire of the. Sun.
Where it's like, it's almost like there's this like fantasy
haze of like, yeah, this is like, this is a story.
But it's. Also, like a fable.
Yeah. And to be honest, like I didn't
feel that as much in this comingoff of like some movies where

(01:47:44):
that's definitely there and in this one it feels gifted
warhorse like you would definitely this would
definitely. Feel much more this grounded,
this feels like toned down from that so.
It could just be because I've been watching all these
Spielberg movies that to me thiswas kind of like more.
Of a breath. Of fresh air, but I could see if
you just like, jump into this once you get to Berlin.

(01:48:07):
Yeah, it's there. I guess to be fair, it sort of
makes sense to have like haziness in Berlin in the
winter. Oh sure, but I mean everyone
smokes like chimneys in. You know, the United States too,
so like it's you and I can understand why that kind of
stuff would be there, but did you, did you read the?

(01:48:27):
Did you hear? The thing about the the way they
did that. Speaking of cold, the breath.
Yeah. Did you did you see this?
This is. So cool, yeah.
It was in and it has one particular scene.
One particular scene. In the in the offices there,
yeah. In, in East Germany and the way
he came up to do that, because they, they would lose the

(01:48:48):
breath, they turned the lights on because it would dry the air
out. Yeah.
And so they instead, what he didis he turned the lights back
off, put people in black masks so you couldn't see their face
and had them say the lines. And then they digitally put that
breath onto the actors. Yeah.
So cool. Yeah.

(01:49:09):
But a way to get that that haze,that real haze back in there,
even though you're drying everything out with your
Hollywood life, you know? Yeah.
Yeah, I think he shared that in the in that DGA thing.
Yeah, that's Scorsese. Yeah, I had so.
Smart. I had forgot to note it down,
but yeah. I'm glad you brought that up.
Because it is very cool and it reminds me that like, you know

(01:49:32):
the. That Kaminski hazy light thing.
Has been has become such a. Spielberg, like, cliche almost,
but there are usual. Almost always there are diegetic
reasons for it. Yeah.
In the films, you know, So it's not just like a lazy cheat, Like
there's reasons for what they doand they take them in there.

(01:49:54):
Yeah, for sure. Even if it does feel a bit rote
at some point in here. Right.
Yeah, yeah. And I think.
I think like. It's at its height on.
The bridge, probably, Yeah. The haziness and the Blues.
With the, you know, filming at twilight, you get that deep blue

(01:50:14):
sky and the reflection on the water.
And yeah, they love that stuff. And so.
They're probably at their most like Spielberg Kaminski collab
with the bridge stuff for sure. Yeah.
Yeah, you know what? I what?

(01:50:34):
I really think about this movie when.
I watch it. Is I feel like this is a black
and white movie shot in color iskind of how it feels to me.
I can see that, yeah. And it it kind.
Of follows a lot of those. Kind of classic ways of lighting
things and staging things and framing things and all that kind
of stuff, yeah. And so when we get to the, we

(01:50:55):
get this stuff in, in Germany, Imean, it's so blue and grey, it
might as well be black and white, you know?
And but even the, even the American stuff feels like, yeah,
it feels like a black and white movie.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The the the other thing.
I wanted. To talk about what the structure
of the movie, which is, you know, this is, I put it in the,

(01:51:17):
in our like editing and post production stuff, even though
like really the way Spielberg and Michael Kahn work the the
post production is kind of happening during the production.
It's kind of how they how they make their movies so quickly
because they're doing less like they're, they're, they know.

(01:51:39):
What? Takes they need to do before
they like strike a set because they're they're editing as they
go. So there's not a whole, they
don't have to go back and do a whole lot of reshooting because
they're kind of getting what they need as they go.
But one of the things that came out of that was the the original
opening was going to be the Donovan scene that that we get

(01:52:02):
as his introduction. Yeah.
But then that's not my guy. Yeah.
Not my guy. Exactly that.
That whole, that whole scene. With like the the traffic
accident, which is great, yeah. They're calling him my guy,
yeah. And so they that.
Was. That was what they had planned,
but then they they shot the whole like able sequence with

(01:52:26):
the with the, you know, him painting, going out to to paint
with the getting the nickel and the whole like chase scene,
which I think is. Incredible.
Yeah, so fun. Yeah, the spy scene.
The one, the one. Spy scene.
It is the one spy. Scene, Yeah.
It reminded me of. Funnily enough, it reminded me

(01:52:50):
of the Taking of Pelham 123. Sort of just like in a.
In the subway, people chasing. Each other and getting lost in
crowds and it just reminded me of that.
I watched that. Movie not terribly long ago for
I think for a draft of I think it was like a we did a hostages

(01:53:10):
draft. Oh yeah.
So I had watched a great movie. The movie's perfect, yeah.
So it reminded me of that. Not exactly a spy movie.
But in a. Hostage movies in a similar
vein, I guess. Yeah.
And so. I thought that.
Was so good. It was, it was like a little
like silent movie opening. Yeah.

(01:53:32):
Yeah. Not, not really.
Anything being said just. Like communicating everything
with, you know, the camera work,the the editing, the the
glances. It was very, very good.
Yeah. It's really fun.
It really puts you in the moment.
Like in the time frame moment and then let me know what kind
of movie it's gonna be too. Yeah.

(01:53:53):
And it shows that he's really a spy.
It's important you to know that he's really a spy.
It really is. That's that's important.
I love the little nickel. I.
Know. Yeah, that's like the kind.
Of thing I would have read. About when I was a kid reading
about, like, true spycraft stuff, whatever.
And I want to build nickel like that, and I could just, like,
open up and take stuff out. Yeah, well, they like handmade.

(01:54:15):
All of the the spycraft stuff and and kind of talked about how
like the like all the spycraft. Stuff in James.
Bond was was based off of like real stuff like this that they
really had in, you know, in the 50s and, and early 60s for, for
stuff like this. Yeah.

(01:54:36):
But yeah, the the really like, Iguess like shooting that
sequence, Spielberg kind of likehad the wise idea of like, no,
this I think this is our openinglike yeah and yeah, very.
Smart Scorsese. In that interview, like he went

(01:54:57):
on and on about loving this opening.
And lack the. Visual brilliance.
And he was really like, it was really some like, you know,
you're my buddy and I'm going tolike kind of lift you up above
the rest kind of talk. But it's but it was all true.
He was talking about like some, some directors will get a script

(01:55:18):
like this and get great dialogueactors like Tom Hanks and
they'll say, OK, my movie is a dialogue movie because it's so
well written. It's so well acted.
That's what my movie is, is the dialogue.
But it takes people like. Mike Spielberg.
To to have that yes, but like that's not the whole movie you

(01:55:42):
so you start off with this visual sequence where there's
nothing being said but you're communicating everything you
need to communicate visually yeah, even just.
That opening? Image Yeah, Norman Rockwell.
Reference. Yeah, the mirrors, yeah, yeah,
for. Sure.
I mean, Spielberg loves Rockwell.

(01:56:02):
Yeah, he's a collector, I think.Yeah, he is.
There's a there's a good book where Lucas and Spielberg both
write about the importance of Rockwell in their own, like in
their own work and like, talk about the different, like,
paintings that they own and why and like how it's just like

(01:56:23):
influenced them and stuff. It's a cool book about them and
Rockwell. But I was going to say the other
thing about that opening sequence.
The reason I the reason one reason I enjoy it because this
is a very talky movie. And, you know, if you start
that, if you start the movie with that, not my guy, seeing
what you're telling the audienceis this is a movie where you're
going to enjoy watching people talk to each other, you know,

(01:56:47):
and Aaron Sorkin and so key, yeah, could key into that, you
know, and that's really not how the movie works.
I mean there's great dialogues and it's fun to watch the
negotiate but the most of the movie is isn't the story is told
to the edits and that's what becomes like more fun to watch.
The more times I've watched the movie The more what I really

(01:57:08):
enjoy is how one scene will set something up and then the next
scene will answer that thing that's set up in the previous
scene. It's like question answer,
question answer, question answer.
But the question that is asked in the 1 scene is not answered
in that scene. And it like is constantly like

(01:57:29):
shifting your focus back on whatthe, the, what is at stake
morally or civically. I would say civically, what's at
stake civically in each scene? So like, like in the courtroom,
you get like all rise and then you don't actually see like then
you cut to the classroom and thekids rising for the Pledge of

(01:57:50):
Allegiance, you know? And so, like, it takes like here
we're having this very importantcourt case, but what's at stake
here is the soul of the nation. It's like what we're teaching
kids in school, you know, like that.
That's, that's what this is really, it's a civics lesson,
but it's like the best kind of civics lesson.
This is what we're fighting for is the future of this country.

(01:58:12):
And so it does that throughout the entire movie.
And by starting the movie with ascene that is mostly silent,
that is edited together, like you train the audience, you're
going to be watching edits. That's what this film is not
just conversations and it's I mean, I think it's why the movie
is one that you can that I can keep coming back to and watching
and enjoying again and again andagain is because it is it's that

(01:58:35):
kind of movie. Like it said, it's a movie
movie. It's not something.
I could read. And get just as much out of or
watch a black, black theater production up and get just as
much out of. It's a movie, right.
I think the only movie can do right.
Exactly. Yeah, Yeah.
And I think so. One of the things.
I've I've kind of like learned, I think, especially in this
Spielberg series and it, you know, it's something that, you

(01:58:59):
know, I'm maybe very well could have learned in the Wesser Nolan
series if I would have done themlike later on in this endeavor.
But just like being so far into this with two full directors and
then one, you know, director that feels like.
Could be two. More full directors so far,

(01:59:21):
yeah, is. That.
I think the Spielberg Michael Kahn collaboration is probably
the more important than the JohnWilliams collab, the Kaminsky
collaboration. That Spielberg Michael Kahn
collaboration is the most important collab of his whole

(01:59:45):
career. Yeah, for sure.
And I've, it's just I've, I've learned so much more.
About. Editing and the importance of
the edit going through this series and not to say I mean
it's there in Wes Anderson and Christopher Nolan absolutely
like obviously, but I guess justlike for me and this series and

(02:00:09):
seeing. Spielberg and Michael Kahn talk
about, you know, the way they edit and their their choices.
I've just learned a lot about like the importance of that.
And, you know, I've heard peoplesay like, the story is in the
edit. That's where the story is told.
And this has been this, this series I think in particular has

(02:00:31):
just been like. A a great.
Lesson in that, I guess a great course in how the story is.
Told through the. EDIT And yeah, this movie is
that like, you know, you mentioned the cut to the
classroom, but I mean, even justlike it's all throughout the
movie, even just the. Negotiations don't.

(02:00:53):
End in. Resolve right you you cut out.
Of those scenes. There's no decisions made.
There's no, that's right. There's not even like really.
Like. There's nothing sure at all,
right? And because it's not resolved
till they show up at the bridge until it.
Happens, right? Yeah, until it.
Happens and it it can't be. Right, All it is is he gets he

(02:01:14):
gets the question asked in the scene.
He takes that question to the next conversation, and the next,
and the next, and the next. The CIA that he that he asked
the. Question then they say did you
get an answer and he says no yeah, we'll get an answer when
we all show up the. Bridge.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but yeah, and it the.
But it's not just like a trick to keep you, like, on edge.

(02:01:37):
That's just how it happened the way it is.
Yeah, just what it is. Yeah, for sure.
Yeah. And so like, yeah.
I mean, it is a a trick to keep you like on edge.
Like there's definitely like intention there, but it's also
like it just is how it happened and just how it works.
So it, yeah, it's like the perfect, the perfect movie for

(02:01:57):
that. Yeah.
Perfect story, yeah. Yeah, go Michael Klein.
More love for Michael. Yeah, he's editor.
They don't get enough attention,especially with these great.
I mean, you think about like Scorsese and Thelma Shoemaker,
you know, Sally Minky and and Quentin Tarantino for the, you
know, first part of Tarantino's career, like how important those

(02:02:19):
collaborate collaborations are just different movies,
different, different careers without this class.
Yeah, yeah, I've, I've. Become a huge.
Advocate for editors shouting out editors in this podcast.
I guess like a. Wrapping up that sort of stuff

(02:02:41):
I, I kept hearing when I was like listening to other people
talk like reviews of the time talk about how like the trailers
like really did this movie wrong.
They made it seem like it was going to be like a more intense
spy thriller. And it's just not that that sort
of movie. But.

(02:03:02):
But yeah, also, this is really like the last proper DreamWorks
movie, which doesn't get talked about a lot because really at
this point, DreamWorks was beingrestructured.
I mean, you have like DreamWorksAnimation has branched off and
they're kind of their own thing now.
And at this point, DreamWorks isreally just kind of like a face.

(02:03:29):
Like you still get the DreamWorks intros and stuff
after this, but they're not really DreamWorks.
They're really financed by the Indian company Reliance and
distributed by Disney's Touchstone.
And then you just have the DreamWorks intros and stuff on
there. Because people.
Recognize it and so really this is like I'm pretty sure this is

(02:03:55):
like the last like proper DreamWorks movie.
Spielberg's stuff after this is just is Amblin, just goes back
to be an Amblin, really. So kind of.
Kind of just. Interesting.
I guess like it. I mean, DreamWorks was kind of

(02:04:15):
like a. Failed project.
That, you know, people don't really know that because you
still see DreamWorks and you think like, oh, DreamWorks is
still successful, but really like just the animation is and
everything else kind of unfortunately.
Failed. With.
It but yeah, yeah. But this is.
Yeah, this is. The last one.

(02:04:38):
Yeah, released October 2015, almost three years to the day
after Lincoln pulled in a. 165. Million dollar, I guess,
worldwide box office on a $40 million budget.
Not bad. Hey, that'll do it.
It opens #3 at 50. 1,000,000 number one was of course,

(02:05:03):
goosebumps that weekend. October release, right?
Yeah, Jack Black kind. Of a halfway scary.
Movie and take your kids. Too with Jack Black in it,
that's going to win. Oh yeah, yeah, Jack Black.
Jack Black is man. He's sticking around.
He is not. Jack Black is the best.
He's not going away anytime soon.
That's fine with me. No way.

(02:05:24):
No Jack Black. Is my dream casting for the
eventual Adam? McKay movie about Donald Trump.
Oh, OK. I want Jack Black to play Donald
Trump. That'd be great.
That'd be fun. Yeah, yeah.
All over that that. Does feel like an inevitable
movie. It does, yeah.
For better or worse. Jack Black needs to EGOT.
That's the other. Thing Jack Black.
Needs to egot. He does.

(02:05:45):
He does. So what does he?
He needs an Oscar. He has a he has a Grammy for his
work. Tenacious D, he has, I think he
has an Emmy. He's a daytime.
Emmy that. Makes sense for a voice work on
something you don't Tony yet have.
I don't think he has a Tony or an Oscar.

(02:06:08):
Yet but come. On y'all, I mean, he should have
won. He should have won an Oscar for
the for the Princess Pete song in the Mario Brothers movie.
Yeah, he should. Come on, He's right there.
Yeah, one day. I agree with that.
That was the best part of the whole movie.
By far, yeah, it it did. It did well critically.

(02:06:29):
It did well commercially, yeah, for just buys critic.
I guess critically is kind of mixed at the time.
I think it's. Become a little bit more like
people have come around on it a little bit over time.
It's a it's a weird movie. It's just it's 2 movies.
Nobody really talked about two movies.

(02:06:50):
This cut right in half. It is you know, it's it's a
strange movie. It's it's 2 movies that that's
weird for anybody as you're never going to have that get
like cheered the same way and more conventional.
Yeah, film, yeah, for sure. But.
Yeah, I just in my research, I'dreally just didn't see a whole
lot of like what people were saying about it at the time.

(02:07:13):
It it seems like people were like, yeah, it was pretty good
Spielberg movie. Yeah.
And that was kind of that was kind of it.
I mean, yeah, yeah, we. Take him for granted.
Yeah, yeah, I really do. It did get the Oscar
nominations. It got Let's See 6 with sound

(02:07:39):
mixing, production design, music, screenplay, and it got a
Best Picture nomination. And that was the five
nominations it did win for Best Supporting Actor for Mark
Rylance. So well deserved.
I didn't. Remember this?
But but it makes sense thinking back, but apparently like for a

(02:08:03):
long time he was like the front runner.
But then by the time the Oscars rolled around, everyone was
like, oh, this is a shoe in for Stallone and Creed and so this.
It was so when. Rylance won.
It almost felt like an upset, even though, like for forever he
was like, he's great. Yeah.

(02:08:23):
So. You know it.
I guess in true like it seemed Iguess Stallone kind of got.
Rockied. In a way, yeah.
You know, good. So.
I. I love.
Rocky, I do too. I think the worst part of Creed
is everything was Stallone, so that's that's honestly fair.

(02:08:44):
The. Best parts of Creed are.
Not still on the best parts of Creed are the parts that you can
tell Coogler, like was really loving, like infusing his
culture into the the rocky universe.
Those are the best parts of Creed.
Yeah, yeah. Everything else is just like.
Rocky Balboa as like a heavy bagon the back of another electric

(02:09:04):
baby. Anyway, Gilmark Rylas, he.
Deserved it. Yeah, he did.
He. Really did.
Yeah, it's a quintessential. Supporting Actor.
Like role as well. It really is it's like exactly
what you want a supporting actornomination enrolled to be Yeah.
It to to like have a. Lot of gravity to it to enhance

(02:09:25):
like the performance of the leadactor and like I mean they
really are enhancing each other with their their interactions.
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Hi, quick reminder that you,
yes. You can be a huge help to the

(02:09:46):
production of the show. If you visit
establishingshoppod.com/donate, you'll find out how to join the
establishing. Shot.
Family through some giving peersstarting as low as $5 a month.
You heard that right. Only $5 a.
Month. And not only will you be
helping. Me keep.
The show going but you'll also get some perks yourself like

(02:10:09):
early and AD free episodes, bonus episodes, access to a.
Discord. Server where we can chat it up
about the show and movies in general and more.
Might even let you choose a movie.
For me to. Review for the show.
Check out that link in the show notes to learn more.
Back to the show all. Right I.

(02:10:30):
Think this is the time. Where you tell me your theory
let's your theory of. Why Spielberg made this movie?
Why? Why this film?
OK. So here's here's here's the
here's. The wonderful thing we are, we
are. Living in a We are.
We are living in an AF. World is what we're living in.

(02:10:53):
OK, yeah, it's an after fable man's world.
It's the world we live in. That's true, right?
Yeah, and it is it. Is wonderful to live in an
after. Fable man's Spielberg world.
I think as a as a film, it's a live, It's a great, it's a great
time, it's a great time. And I'm so glad that movie is as
good as it is. And it's all the things that it
is, because otherwise it would be a sad, a sad world to be in a

(02:11:16):
after fable man's world. But it's a good world.
And I mean, I do you have. This like I cannot watch this
blobring. Movie now without thinking about
that movie and like how it connects to some aspect of
whatever I'm watching. You can't and you can't.
Not now. And my favorite part?
Of that of the Fableman's. Probably is the film he makes

(02:11:38):
for his senior senior ditch day at the beach.
And what the effect that that film has on his on the bully and
the way he shows him as like a golden child and how he how it
like a Golden Boy or something like that.
He says and how it makes him angry and it makes him feel sad

(02:12:00):
and it makes him it like convicts him.
Basically, he's convicted that he is not that thing.
And by by Spielberg showing him,showing that boy what he should
be, what he what he has the ability to be if he would only
live up to it, it like convicts him that he's not that thing.
And for me that that is like, oh, that is exactly what

(02:12:24):
Spielberg does in his these conscience movies, these these
civics movies, conscious movies.He he wants to show.
Because I think Spielberg being a Jewish American, like he feels
like an outsider looking at thiscountry of Wasps, you know, who
are in charge of everything, these golden boys like that

(02:12:46):
bully or whatever, or like, or like Donovan, you know, like
this is a WASP family at the middle of this thing.
And he's he's holding, he's holding him up and saying this
is who you should be. You know, this to make this
movie. This isn't my theory.
Making this movie is an opportunity to do that.

(02:13:07):
It's to make his senior ditch day movie all over again and to
show someone but who, who actually was a kind of a paragon
of, of civic duty and responsibility, the kind of
people we actually should aspireto be.
I think that's what this is. I think that's what for the most
part, all his conscious movies are, are just making that senior

(02:13:29):
dish state movie all over again.Yeah.
And it I love that. I mean, I, I, I, I, I don't like
preaching movies. And it it's part of growing up
in Christian subculture and being exposed to too many
preachy things and being old enough and wise enough and

(02:13:51):
mature enough. And learning enough now.
To know that that is not effective, that all you're all
you're really doing is preachingto the choir and they aren't
even really listening. It isn't doing any good.
And so I, I, I tend to be very allergic to preaching movies,
but I like Spielberg preaching movies for the most part.
And I like, for a long time, like couldn't figure out why

(02:14:12):
that was. You know, I would like, I can
watch a movie like this and see very clear that it is preaching
to me and trying to get me to bea certain way.
And, but what I, what I figured out thanks to the fable that's,
and, you know, re watching Lincoln a ton of times.
I love Lincoln and watching thismovie a lot of times too is

(02:14:33):
like, oh, that's why this works.This works because it works when
Spielberg does it one, because he's Spielberg and he can.
He could tell me a story about agum wrapper blowing down the
street and it'd probably be great.
But it works because. He's.
There is a, there is an aspect to it where it's not simply

(02:14:58):
like, it's not saying this is who you are.
Yeah, you, yeah, it's saying. This is who you.
Should be. There's like an inherent
criticism kind of built in that says you're not this.
Yeah. And I think like the fact that
he made this movie and Lincoln in the post during the era of

(02:15:19):
American like politics and said that those years in there where
the the things that like separate us and divide us and
the the rancor, political rancorand all that kind of stuff is
like so high pitched. You know, it's like, this is
Spielberg's way. Spielberg who loves Norman
Rockwell, Spielberg who like to drench everything in light.

(02:15:40):
Spielberg who has been accused of being overly sentimental.
Like all this. This is his way of criticizing
American Society, criticizing his audience and saying like, be
better than you are, you know. And and like, you know, when the
story is told in a way that likeyou, he challenges you to like
throughout to like, will you judge this man or not?

(02:16:04):
How will you do that? How will you?
Can you be like Donovan and continue to?
I wouldn't go as far to say love.
Him but to. Like, respect him.
Enough to give him the. Fullness of the law and the way
that it should be practiced on his side.
You know, do you love your country enough?

(02:16:24):
Do you love America enough to like make America be the thing
it says it wants to be? You know, it's like that, that
James Baldwin quote about like James Baldwin says something
like, I'm still waiting for America to be the thing that
says this. And I believe it can be that,
you know, and I think Spielberg believes it can be that and says

(02:16:44):
like, okay, now be this, do this, stop being the thing you
are, be this thing. And so that's my theory.
That's why I think Spielberg reads this script.
And it's like, hey, I could do the YouTube thing.
That's fun. I remember that from my
childhood. I can recreate this part of my
life. And also, and, you know, he was

(02:17:04):
born in New Jersey, by the way. So he's like, from New York as a
kid, basically nobody in Jersey was either from New York and
vice versa. But still, for people who aren't
from there is all the same. And so he gets to recreate his
childhood. But it comes right down to it.
It's also a way to like, do senior ditch day all over again.

(02:17:25):
Yeah, that's my thing. I love that.
And the Fableman. 'S has kind of become my like
lens through which to watch all Spielberg movies and like
answers a lot of. Questions.
That you might have about why hemade certain movies the way he
did for sure. Yeah.

(02:17:46):
I mean, it's it's all there in the fable men's, but yeah, I I
think it's a. Great theory.
I think 1. Of the things that I.
Think this movie. Certain parts.

(02:18:06):
Of War Horse for sure and then like again like I will be
revisiting Lincoln soon and I'm sure it's there in Lincoln it
was definitely there in Munich for me Munich was like a
surprising like absolutely went for it totally it's amazing

(02:18:28):
movie for. Me.
Yeah. It it might be like my.
Favorite surprise? Of the the series so far because
it was a blind spot and one of the things that I've that I've
found is all those movies war horses a little bit more like
hit and miss, but it has some moments like better.

(02:18:50):
It's like Spielberg finds this like line to ride where
something where he makes these either entire films or at.
Least moments in films. That are genuinely
inspirational. They don't feel forced somehow,
even though like this definitelythere in the writing and the

(02:19:13):
acting and the camera work. And like, I mean, it is forced,
but it doesn't feel forced somehow.
It's like this magic, like genuine inspiration.
And I think it just comes from like there's a sense in which
like the mature Spielberg isn't isn't like fully devoid of like

(02:19:38):
his child likeness. And there's a.
You know. We both have young children and
there's a sense in which sometimes like the simpleness of
the way like a child can see, things can like that simplicity.

(02:19:59):
Is maybe? Sometimes even more like
inspiring or convicting than like deeply feel something
deeply philosophical or like, you know, pre like.
Overly preachy or? Theological or whatever you want
to say. And I think that's there in

(02:20:20):
Spielberg still. And maybe that's how he pulls
this off is like, yes, he's the mature Spielberg and he can
examine like the problems with the world and explore those
themes. But there's like this, there's
this still this like childlike simplicity in the way he sees
it. Like this man just wants to do

(02:20:43):
his job well and like. Follow the rules.
And like try to like respect people in in a civilized way.
And it's like it's very simple. But like when you I mean, yes,
you're adding like Tom Hanks into the mix, which helps a lot.

(02:21:04):
But it's it's so simple. It should, it should be like
maybe in a lot of other directors hands like cheesy or
like you said, way too preachy. But I think it's that like
maturity mixed with the childlike perspective that I
think make it just work. Yeah, Yeah, there is that.

(02:21:30):
He's having fun making a spy movie.
Yeah, right. Yeah, it's there.
That's. Definitely.
Part of it, he's just having funmaking a spy movie, too.
This happens to be a spy movie. Has to be this spy movie.
But he's making a spy movie. Yeah, pretty a real spy movie,
like a spy movie, like a John Lecar kind of spy story, You
know, it's just. It's.

(02:21:52):
It's fun. It's just fun.
Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, yeah. And I mean.
Too, Like you also have, I thinkthe other like Fableman's lens,
you can look at this through is like the fatherhood and family
and manhood lens. Oh, sure, yeah.
This it's. Almost like this movie is like

(02:22:13):
making up for all the other Spielberg dads that have
abandoned their family because this is the one.
Yeah, It's the one Spielberg dadthat, like, really just wants to
get back home to his family in his bed.
That's right. Yeah.
I mean it's. Notable that it's made after
whatever this point is in Spielberg's life, when he
finally understood what really happened when he was a kid.

(02:22:33):
Yeah, because for years and years he blamed his dad, right,
for the for the divorce, which is what they took, which is what
they said told the kids at the time.
And then later on he learned thetruth, Yeah, about what really
happened. And you can kind of see a change
in his filmography, right, wheredads certainly start being.
It's sad often that dads are gone.
Like I, I love Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

(02:22:56):
I really love that movie. And I really love it because
it's a very sad movie. It's a very sad movie that all
this time that's that they've wasted when they when he could
have had a we could have been a father and he could have been
living, having a living relationship with Marian and he
wasted all this time because of other stuff.
So it's a very it's a movie thatlikes like Spielberg becomes
kind of forgiving and graceful towards fathers in the latter

(02:23:20):
part of his career, which is really, really, it's really
cool. It's amazing.
Yeah, I. Along those lines.
I, I had to write down this, another quote from Molly Haskell
because I thought this was really good.
Just talking about like the ending and how some, you know,
he makes it home. But sometimes, like family

(02:23:42):
reunions, like aren't quite living.
They don't quite live up to yourexpectations.
I mean, we get a little bit of that in this film.
Like, you know, another filmmaker would have ended with
him, like, standing there, you know, and the kids looking back
and he's there and he like, you know, gives a little knowing nod
and then goes up the stairs. This ends with him just like,

(02:24:04):
passed out on the bed. Like they look back and he's not
there. He's like passed out.
He's tired, tired but also like his job, right?
Yeah. But also like you, you get a
foreshadow of this idea with, like, the phone call that he
makes in the phone booth in Berlin.
And he's like asking for the kids and they're, you know, none
of them are. They all are doing other stuff.

(02:24:25):
They have their own preoccupations and.
You know. There's a sense in which they
can never understand what he did.
And so. So along those lines, this
Haskell quote, she says quote, aweary Donovan ascends the steps
like Jamie and Empire of the Sunor Elliot and ET.

(02:24:45):
He is alone with a lingering sense of loss.
The deeper bond lies elsewhere, with an alien and soulmate who
has returned to the mothership. End Quote.
I was like so. I.
Was like man. This is.
It's good. These those are like the the
things you like read that are like, this is what film
criticism is all about, like finding those connections.

(02:25:08):
And yeah, yeah, I loved that. It's funny.
It's funny to think about the shift.
In perspective here, like you'd go back to something another
like one of I mean, maybe Spielberg's most personal film,
but like close Encounters and the third kind and how that
movie, you know you, I watch that now and you know, Spielberg
has said he would he would make it differently if he made it

(02:25:31):
later in his life then but. But.
What's so great about that is it's it's a movie that like
it's. Almost like the best possible.
Scenario for why your dad left you know, and there's like a a
mystery and mystery in that movie.
I keep making the kids perspective like later, you're

(02:25:52):
like, where did that go? Why did that go?
I don't understand any of this. I don't understand.
I don't know my dad. I don't understand my dad.
I never did, you know. And so like, here's this wish
fulfillment movie about well, itwas aliens, of course, you know,
and now you switch here to the end toward the not the end of
his career, hopefully, but much later in his career, much later
in his life. And you have like the movie

(02:26:14):
about the death and how the kids, they don't understand the
death, but it's like from the dad's perspective, right?
That like it's not that they'll understand they're.
Dad, they're just not aware. Yeah.
What's going on? They're not aware.
Kids live with their they're notaware.
And then, yeah. And then like and isn't that
great actually that they don't have to be?
Worried about what's going on and and like and you.

(02:26:35):
You know, there's a sense in which like, yes, like I love the
the Haskell quote, like there's this lingering sense of loss he
has, but also like he's there. Like at the end, he's there.
Like he's passed out on the bed.He's you.
Know he's going to take some Nyquil.
And get over his sniffles. But he's he's there at home, and

(02:26:59):
the kids are ensconced in a. Freedom and a security that they
don't they don't even see or understand.
And it's all because of work that people like him and I get
they do. I guess the parallel is.
It's the same thing for for the country and yeah, exactly it's
that. It's that, it's that shot on
the. Train of the kids climbing the
fence, which is a call back to the people getting shot, right?

(02:27:20):
You know, they don't even know, you know, Yeah.
They don't even know and like the.
Work that he did made it possible for those kids to be
climbing a fence yeah and havingfun and playing instead of
climbing a fence getting shot you know like yeah it's it's
that's what it's for yeah it's so that they can be unaware of
the piece in which they live yeah yeah yeah for sure and the.

(02:27:43):
Fun fact about that, that was actually Hank's idea to have
that shot. Oh cool, because he was he.
Was asking this. Is like one of the last things
they shot back in New York. And he was asking Spielberg,
like, what am I looking at out the window, I guess trying to
get some direction. And Spielberg's like, it's, it's
freedom. Like you're back home, you know,

(02:28:05):
And Hanks just had this idea there's as they were going, I
guess of like, what if we have like some kids climbing over a
fence to kind of like call back to that shot of the scene?
Cuz I'm looking I guess he was. Thinking like.
I was looking out of a train window, then motion, Yeah.
And. So spill.
And Spillbrook was like, yeah, perfect.
We're we'll. Do it.

(02:28:27):
That's cool. Yeah.
Yeah. So.
Really cool. That's a good collaboration.
Yeah. Yeah.
Cool. Yeah, I.
Mean this. Movie I think.
I mean it it definitely like reverberates with with like.
Contemporary. Anxieties too.

(02:28:47):
Because I mean. At the time there was a lot of
Guantanamo Bay questions and, you know, I mean.
Now. We're dealing with we have ICE
raids. Going on.
You know, it's no due process, all that stuff.

(02:29:09):
Yeah, yeah. This move that due process.
It is you. Know anything else move back to
it's about and how important that it's about if you believe
it, it's a it's a right that should be afforded to every man
woman and child in the world, not only the ones that were born
in this country. That's that's what we used to
say, that we believe that we still, some people still say
that we believe. And there's a whole bunch of

(02:29:30):
people who don't believe that, who think that the the rights
that we say are inalienable, inalienable, are inalienable for
all people. Yeah, yeah.
Not just the ones that yeah. And.
It's it's. I think in that way.
It's 1 of Spielberg's. Most.
Like humanist movies, just like humans deserve to be treated

(02:29:53):
like humans and where you're. Born is.
Where you're born or where you're from should be
inconsequential to that, that that ethical foundation.
And yeah. You know.
I I personally want to ask people.
Like what? Like.

(02:30:13):
You you get more human rights because you were born in a
particular place other than oversomeone.
I don't know. That's that's a whole another
Bunny trail. We could we could go down.
Well, I mean it. It's what this movie is about.
It is. Like what this movie is about is
like, it's the, it's the, there's a, there's a lot,
there's a lot of bad things about the kind of triumphant

(02:30:39):
American colonialist. Thing of the 19. 50s and 60s,
seventies, there's a lot of bad.There's a lot of bad.
But one of the good parts of it,and so I think is what Spielberg
is getting at here, is that these American values are things
that should be shared. The good, the good of them are
things that should be shared andshould be spread.

(02:31:00):
Like we should believe that the whole world should be this way,
these good things. And when we say, when we like
build walls, you know, Berlin walls in this case, when we
build walls and say, no, these, these, these rights are only
people on the inside, not peopleon the outside.
What you've done is you've made,you've made America smaller.

(02:31:22):
You've made the values not more precious.
You've made them less precious. You've, you've, you've, you've
shrunk us is what you've done. And what Spielberg is saying
here that no, anywhere a man like Donovan or a woman like
Donovan, it couldn't if it was awoman.
Anywhere someone goes who believes in these, in these

(02:31:44):
inalienable rights, anywhere they go, they are America.
And so when he goes into East Germany, America is there
because he is there. And the values and the rights
and the things that he believes are important are there then and
established there. I mean, it's, it's, it's the
Christian thing. I mean, if you want to, you can,
we can make that leap, you know,and say that like, you know,

(02:32:07):
Jesus said we're two and we're together in my name.
There I am too, you know, because we take this thing that
we believe wherever we go, thereis no border.
There is no border. There's nowhere to put a wall
out. There is no border to what these
things are, or at least there shouldn't be.
Yeah. Yeah.
And I think it's. Just, you know, there's.
No, there's no wall you can build up that can that can stop

(02:32:30):
goodness, you know, with a capital GI think that's what
this movie is like really ultimately like trying to get
across, you know, in that in that like trying to give you
like an ideal to reflect back toyou like you were saying the the
whole like convict you by way ofshowing you the ideal.

(02:32:54):
Yeah, and you? Know.
Was Donovan. Really.
Like this Angel of a guy, like like, yeah, definitely not.
I mean. Who?
Who knows? What he was really like other
than the people that were aroundhim.
But but like the point of the movie.
Isn't like. To portray this real guy in a
real way, it's like portray this, like you said, this ideal,

(02:33:18):
this kind of humanist ideal thatwe should be trying to live up
to. It's, I mean, it's you know
what, what Christians should be doing with with Jesus is not
using him as like a a hammer of sorts, but using him as an image
to which like you try to like belike, yeah, which but you.

(02:33:44):
Talked about. Last week or you?
Will talk about soon, but because Spielberg's Jesus movie
is Lincoln, sure, you'll get you'll get a lot more of of the
Jesus stuff. It's coming up soon and you're
watching and discussing. Yeah, but yeah, for sure.
I guess a. Few other points to hit.
On before we wrap up the discussion, some Spielberg

(02:34:07):
distinctives. We've we've touched on these
kind of all through, but I, you know, I wanted to mention these
the the the classical focus storytelling is like all, you
know, you get it spurts of it throughout his career, but it's
definitely here. The efficient character building
fun. One thing we haven't talked,

(02:34:27):
we've like we've mentioned in passing, like there's some
really fun transitions in this movie, really good ones, though.
One of the ones that stood out to me is like the there's this
crossfade where from Abel's faceis on one side of the screen to
powers on the other side of the screen showing, you know, yeah,

(02:34:48):
the the two spies. Yeah.
But I, I liked that little crossfade.
And then like, you know, the other Spielberg distinctives are
going to be like the way the camera work, you know, the low
angle close-ups he that he lovesand silhouettes and, you know,

(02:35:08):
all that stuff. Oh, yeah.
But yeah. The.
Other. So a fun fact, fun facts
section, Gary Powers Junior was in the movie, I forgot to
mention that, in the cast. So he was like Acia agent, just
kind of like an extra walking along with.

(02:35:30):
So he was in there. He was in the extra features,
one of the extra features a goodbit, talking about his dad and
stuff. And yeah, that's neat, you know?
Just kind of talking. About how like kind of what you
were mentioning earlier, how his.
Dad was seen. As like.
Just like a problem. And really, like, it wasn't

(02:35:52):
until after his death when all the classified stuff came out
that showed like, no, like he was, he was like held his
integrity and didn't give up anything that he posthumously
got like four or five awards. The other fun fact is.

(02:36:12):
That this is also something thatSpielberg and Scorsese talk
about is in the background of one of the scenes.
There's this Berlin cinema and it has I'm going to read out the
movies that are that say are showing at this Berlin cinema. 1
is Village of the Damned, a WolfRilla movie from 1960 which was

(02:36:34):
a sci-fi movie with strong. Anti communist.
Slant One was Billy Wilder's comedy 123 and 61 which is set
in the German Capital, One was aGerman movie The Secret of the
Black Suitcase by Werner Klingler from 1960 which is a W
German thriller and the last oneis Spartacus Kubrick movie.

(02:36:59):
Which I guess if. We're going to keep making the
connections. The script of that was Dalton
Trumbo, who was blacklisted in the Hollywood Communist which.
So some fun, some fun stuff going on there in the
background. How fun I.
Don't you like Spartacus? I don't like you've seen
Spartacus. It's.
A blind spot? Haven't seen it.

(02:37:20):
Oh yeah. It's like maybe my least
favorite. Of all Kubrick's, I've been
slowly filling in my Kubrick. Blind spots so I'll get to it
eventually, but yeah I used to do like 1 Kubrick a year.
And I feel like I needed that myson to recover.
Yeah. Like between them.
But I've, I've since worked through all of them, so I don't
feel that way as much. Yeah.
But yeah, Spartacus is here. OK.

(02:37:41):
Yeah, it's still Kubrick for. Sure.
I think as Spielberg, Spielberg really likes.
Spartacus. Yeah, I can see that.
He has a he has a great affinityfor Spartacus.
It shows up like a lot of times in a lot of his movies.
But it's also a movie about moral conviction.
So it kind of makes sense that that would be, that'd be a good

(02:38:02):
one to call out in a movie like this, you know?
Yeah, I am Donovan. I'm Donovan.
Yeah. And I guess like.
The were there. So before we wrap up with some
final thoughts, were there any like other just like moments or

(02:38:24):
quotes or like things that we haven't touched on that like
really stand out to you? No, I'll just I'll.
Just kind of say. It again and it was it was kind
of fun to do a little more research in the movie and find
out that this thing that I felt in the movie where it feels like
that wet clay thing that like. Spielberg.
Is like his hands are in it and he's kind of figured out as he

(02:38:45):
goes along and it's it's a little bit more alive in a way
that some of his movies, none ofhis movies don't feel UN alive,
right. Some of them feel much more
planned out than this one does and it's I think that's fun to
watch and I did I did hear him. He said in something that like a

(02:39:06):
lot of days he would show and belike, I don't know what we're
going to do today exactly. I I know what we're shooting,
but I don't know how I'm going to do it.
And he would like figure it out on on the day.
And he enjoyed doing that after coming from a lot of movies
where they were much more storyboarded out and planned
out. So I I just like that you can
just is it a thing I enjoy to steal a line from Hamilton is a

(02:39:29):
mind at work. And I like when you can feel
someone working and figuring it out as they go along.
And you can feel that in this movie.
And it's fun. Yeah.
Yeah. And I think that's.
Something too like as he he goesalong in his career, you start
to see like him more and more like in, you know, you know,
I'll watch all the special features of all these movies and

(02:39:51):
more and more he talks about like, yeah, I didn't really
storyboard for this one for as much for this one.
And it's like more and more of that and more of him talking
about yeah, I like to just show up on set and like fill out the
space and and see like what the space feels like.
And. And then we we kind of like go
from there on like like they have a general like, OK, we're

(02:40:14):
shooting these scenes today, butlike the details of like.
Where exactly you're putting thecamera and the actors and like
the composition of the shots. Like he's kind of like feeling
out on the day on the set. So yeah, you can definitely feel
some of that in this movie. I think it.
I think it. Contributes to what I, what I

(02:40:36):
with some people might call likea there's like a less urgency in
his film. Is this kind of later films of
his career. And it's kind of a more of a
slackness to some of them. And I'm OK with it because I
don't need every movie to feel like the edge of the lost art,
you know, or Jurassic Park. It it's I like that he gets to
do this. He's Spielberg.

(02:40:57):
Go for it. Absolutely.
And then you can come along and you can you can put something
out like West Side Story that isevery bit as crisp and sharp and
urgent as anything he's ever done.
And so, you know, he's still gotit.
If he wants to, he's gonna have to, right?
Yeah. Yeah.
I think one of the ways. It plays out in this one is just

(02:41:19):
like that Donovan Abel relationship because I know at
one point he had talked about, you know, wanting to have way
more scenes of them together. But realizing at some point in
the movie as they were like approaching the bridge scene,
realizing like, oh, this absenceis actually going to make this
scene more powerful. And so like ended up not adding

(02:41:43):
in all any more extra scenes with them together in between.
And so like, and you really feelthat too.
Like the you, the the character Abel is Abel is Abel.
In that scene. But you can see he's really like
assessing. Where Donovan?

(02:42:05):
Has come at that point from their standing man conversation,
you know, and like assessing, you know.
He has it's it's one. Of those pregnant pause moments
where he looks at him before he says I can wait.
That's that's really. Powerful and.

(02:42:26):
Kind of comes out of that like absence that you've been missing
from them two together up to that point.
That was one of my favorite moments.
Was that just that simple? Like I can wait?
Yeah. Like recognizing the, the
integrity and the hard work and he, he's kind of just taking all

(02:42:47):
of that and then that moment putting together like he's, he's
a smart dude like you, you know,cuz he's a spy.
He's just putting together all the pieces of like realizing
what this guy has been up to andsaying like, OK, I can wait, you
know? Yeah, yeah.
Love that moment. Yeah, I had this.

(02:43:11):
Like final thought. That I wanted to like throw out
there and then you can tell me like if you what you think about
this so I think I. Think.
There's this progression becausewe've been talking about Donovan
a lot and his his moral like hismoral stances and I, I.
Think those are there? Through the movie, But I think

(02:43:33):
there's this like progression. So I, I think he starts off his
leading virtue. The way you're introduced to him
is he's a guy that does his job well by the books and that's
what his virtue is. His virtue is, is this like it's

(02:43:54):
it's kind of this ethic of like following the rules and doing
that and following the rules well that it seems like he he
kind of goes by. And I think over the course of
the movie and his interactions with Abel and just there's
there's this like natural ambition that he has that like

(02:44:15):
drives him into that ethic. And I think it morphs into a
greater ethic over the movie or maybe like maybe a better way to
put it as a deeper ethic. Even it's I don't think it's
explicitly like named obviously,but I think so I think he starts

(02:44:36):
basically my my take is this. He starts off with this lesser
value of like I'm going to do with integrity, my job well and
pushing following his ambition into that ethic leads him to a
deeper ethic of like of compassion.
Really. I think he over.

(02:44:58):
I don't think he starts off the movie like feeling great
compassion for Abel. I think he's just like this is
my job, I'm going to do it well,but I think by like leaning into
that lesser. In a way not.
Lesser in the sense that like it's not important, but just
like at a, at a more shallow level ethic of doing your job

(02:45:23):
well, it leads him into a deeper, yeah, into a deeper
ethic of compassion. And I don't know, I think
there's this like one of the things I was thinking about.
Was just. How impatient we've become with
those lesser virtues. And it just feels like people

(02:45:47):
are less and less, or I guess I should say more and more like
giving up on those lesser virtues before it leads them
into deeper virtues like compassion.
And I don't know, that's just something that I saw in the
movie. This progression of Donovan that
I think is just another way thathe can be like held up as this

(02:46:10):
ideal of like this is what can happen if, if we really like
lean into these this it's it's almost like an easier ethic, you
know, to follow of like, OK, I'mgoing to have integrity in my
profession and do this. Well, if you can lean into that,
then eventually, like if you push into it far enough, you're

(02:46:30):
going to get 2 of some deeper ethic underneath that, which I
think in this case is compassion.
I think he really does grow a great compassion for, for Abel
is the main one. But even like he has the
interaction with powers on the on the plane where he like
throws that bit of wisdom at him.

(02:46:51):
I think he has great compassion for him in that moment and I
don't know, that's just another.Thing I saw.
That I thought it would be a funfinal thought.
Not fun, but like a good take away.
Final thought. I don't know.
Do you do you think that's there?
Yeah, I do. I do.
I think that the. I think that I like, I like that

(02:47:14):
I like that framing of it. I feel like his his like first
commitment is to the law, right?And and this is what the law.
Says to do this is what we should do.
You know, it's like it was very matter of fact about it.
And it's interesting because I mean, you can think we can think

(02:47:36):
of the law as like Paul says, like being something that points
out our sinfulness to us. You know, like could we can't
live up to it or whatever. But we can also think about the
law as in like, well, this is what it was meant for.
It was meant for why don't you practice these easy things and

(02:47:58):
they can lead you to the greaterthings, you know, practice the
easy thing of not eating that kind of meat.
You know that's not that's not in.
The grand scheme that hard of a.Thing to do whatever, but it can
lead you to a, you know, a respect for your body.

(02:48:21):
For other people's bodies. For help for the environment,
you know, for all these things like, so you'll lead you, like
you're saying, from like a lesser virtue to a, to a greater
1 to a deeper one. Yeah, maybe that's what God
intended for the law to do. And I think that's that's why
Jesus is so. Angry with the religious leaders
because he's saying no, no, no, no.
You've taken these in it, in the, in the way we're talking

(02:48:46):
about it, the language we're talking about it.
Yeah, You've taken this lesser virtue and you've just added a
bunch more, maybe even shallowerthan that virtues around it.
No, you're supposed to go deeper.
With it. You were, you know, you've heard
it said. And I say, like the whole Sermon
on the Mount stuff, it's like him showing like, no, no, no,
you've gotten it all wrong. These lesser things were

(02:49:07):
supposed to lead you to these deeper things.
These like negative instructionswere supposed to lead you toward
the positive actions. And yeah, I think that is subtly
there in this movie. Yeah.
Yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Yeah. I think that's.

(02:49:29):
It I mean, I think we've I thinkwe covered everything.
There's nothing else to talk about with this movie ever
again. Despise I've never had, never
have to watch it again, never think.
About it ever again. Again.
Yeah. So where so you mentioned a
little bit where does this, where do you think this falls
for you with like Spielberg in your arbitrary ranking, very

(02:49:50):
arbitrary making? I mean, Spielberg, one of those
film makers were like. There's like a.
Whole tier, the distance between.
The distance between the. Top and the bottom is not a very
large distance, you know, because even even a movie like
always is interesting and even movie like Hook has a lot of
amazing things. And so I don't know though, if

(02:50:14):
I'm going to use the tiers. It's mid tier Spielberg.
I think that's only, but it's like high mid tier.
It's high mid tier Spielberg. Really good mid tier Spielberg.
Yeah, you know, well, I was looking and it's like I was
like, oh man. I can put this like after I
finished, I was like, this is sogood.
I could put this up toward the top, but then I was like looking
at the movies and I was like, I can't put it above so many of.

(02:50:38):
These and. Yeah, but it feels like it.
You. Know a lot of other directors.
It would. Be at the top.
You know they'd be their best movie, right?
Yeah. Yeah, I know it's AI mean when
you're Spielberg and you've mademovies that change the world.
I mean, you know when you've when you've made when you've
made Jaws, close Encounters and Raiders and ET and Jurassic Park

(02:51:02):
and Schindler's List and it justgoes on and on.
Private ride. Yeah.
Oh man. In Lincoln.
Yeah, yeah, I'm excited to afterthis conversation.
I'm excited to. Get.
Get. To Lincoln.
So yeah, I'll give you a little.You'll have a great.
Conversation about Lincoln, you'll get into it.

(02:51:23):
But I, I did, I did a thing withLincoln for a, for a New
Testament class, OK, I was doingan independent study with a
professor at Fuller and he was teaching an intro in New
Testament class. And he wanted me to do a thing
to help the students in the class like treat the Gospels as
stories and not just as like, you know, a textbook.

(02:51:46):
And so I was like, OK, let's useLincoln.
And I had the class watch Lincoln.
And we talked about how Lincoln is structured and how Lincoln is
structured like a gospel, like the Gospel of Mark or something.
And we like parallel the two. And that was lots of fun and it
works. Really.
Well, that's. Cool, because it's a story about

(02:52:09):
a savior who just like. Walks around telling.
Stories all the time about stuffand is trying to accomplish
something so everything is communicating these stories
around them. Ragtag group of disciples.
Ran anywhere out. There causing a ruckus and he's
he's you know he's crucified andmaybe resurrected in the end you

(02:52:31):
know so it's a very Jesus movie it's yeah yeah no that's cool
fun yeah I'll. Definitely like keep that in.
The back of my mind. Yeah, watching it.
Yeah, that. Was last week actually.
Lincoln or a couple weeks ago, Iguess.
Yeah. And next week we're gonna do a

(02:52:55):
movie, a movie draft to go alongwith this.
We're going to do a Cold War movie draft.
Pretty exciting to to dig into some of these.
So yeah, that'll be next week. Then we'll be getting into the
BFG, so that'll be fun too. Yeah, that's, that's really all
we have this week. Just a reminder, if you want to

(02:53:20):
find out more about Elijah's work and where to follow him and
sign up for his newsletter and see all of his his books and
like come and see and stuff, youcan go to elijahdavidson.com
real easy. Yep.
And I'll link that pretty easy episode description too.
So that'll be. Easy to.
Click on. But yeah, can I just say it real

(02:53:42):
quick? This is a goofy thing.
This is. You can cut this out if you
don't care, but it's, you know, it's my, it's my own website.
Yeah, like that I run and it's kind, it's just fun to have my
own website. Yeah, that's like is on my own
server and like has my own setupand all that kind of stuff.
I've been, I mean, being at being at the age that I am, I've

(02:54:03):
been on the Internet since I wasin junior high.
Sure, like. Forever and I've gone through
like so many iterations of like having a blog here, A blog there
or whatever. And it's fun to be at a place
where I'm like, Yep, I just havemy own website and it's
affordable to run and I can do whatever I want to do with it.
And I can like have a sign up thing for come and see and I can

(02:54:24):
like do a book and work. All of your stuff is
centralized. I can just do that.
It's fun and I don't. Have to worry about like anybody
coming along and adding ads to it or screwing it up, you know,
it's just like my own website torun.
It's fun, neat, it's goofy. There's a little I'm saying
this. Part because there are little
tucked away corners of that website that one that a visitor

(02:54:45):
might not find as they click around just right and that's
kind of fun too it's like a DVD menu with like Easter eggs.
You know, that's kind of my my thought process of so that's
what you should do when. You finish listening.
To this episode. Click the click the link in the
episode description and they just start clicking stuff on
online. Clicking around, see what you
find. You might find stuff that he.

(02:55:06):
Didn't even know was there. Oh no, I know it's all there
but. You you may.
Find stuff you wish you hadn't found.
That could happen, That could happen, so who knows?
The. That's.
Yeah, again, Elijah davidson.com.
There's all kinds of fun stuff on there.
The DVD menu, circa 2000. And five.

(02:55:27):
I love it. Yeah, that's all we have for
this week. Next week is our Cold War movie
draft. But yeah, we are done.
I have been Eli Price for ElijahDavison.
You've been listening to the establishing shot.
We will see you next time. We will not.
Be here for a little while, but look I figured this way better

(02:55:52):
to. Be king for a night than.
Smoke for a lifetime.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

24/7 News: The Latest

Dateline NBC

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Bridge of Spies (w/ Elijah Davidson)

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}24/7 News: The Latest

Dateline NBC

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show

All Episodes

Bridge of Spies (w/ Elijah Davidson)

24/7 News: The Latest