The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013) Why Living in the Present is Key to Self-Actualization | Becoming your True Self - The Fandom Portals Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
What if the version of you that showed up every day
isn't the real you at all, butthe quite as safest version of
you?
How often do we hide behindsafe routines instead of chasing
the life we're truly meant tolive?
In this episode, you will learnhow the Secret Life of Walter
Mitty teaches us that realizingyour potential in the real world
is the first steps to becomingyour true self.
Welcome to the Fandom Portalspodcast, the podcast that

(00:37):
explores fandoms and films tohelp us learn and grow.
I'm Aaron, a teacher and alifelong film fan, and each week
on the podcast, we explore thestories that we love to learn
more about ourselves and theworld that shapes us.
Today, I'm joined by Brash.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Hello everybody, I am Brash, I am me, we are he.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
And today we are doing the Secret Life of Walter
Mitty Brash.
What's this one about?

Speaker 2 (01:07):
This one is about Walter Mitty, a mild-mannered
photograph.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
What would you call it a?

Speaker 2 (01:09):
producer I would say producer, producer for Life
magazine who is being taken overby the corrupt business
corporation and everything isgoing online.
So everyone is losing theirjobs.
And as a last ditch effort tosort of his last hurrah, he sets
on an adventure, which he neverdoes, in search of the missing

(01:30):
photograph that was sent to himby a famous photographer, and
this sets him out on a journeyof self-discovery, Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
And in this episode we are going to be starting our
multi-episode themed arc, whichis all about becoming your true
self, and we're going to bediving into stories about
breaking free from expectations,from silence and smallness, and
stepping into the people thatwe're always meant to be.
So this is film number one ofour journey into becoming a true
self, and we're going toexplore what happens when you

(01:58):
finally realize your potentialin the real world, Rash.
Let's get into first of allwhat you thought of the film
when you first watched it,because I've watched this a few
times and my feelings about ithas evolved over time.
What did you think of it?

Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, I think when I first watched it I was a lot
younger and so I thought it wasa fun movie and it was good, it
was funny, it was fun, but, yeah, not much more than that.
Watching it now, older, with abit more life under my belt, I
think it hits a little bitharder.
It sort of made me feel bad Notin a bad way.

(02:35):
But I look back and I'm likethere's so many things I wish I
had have stepped out of mycomfort zone and did, or some
things that I wish I'd have beena bit more aggressive about or
more just spontaneous about.
Not, that wasn't thatspontaneous in my younger life,
but it wasn't for anythingdecent it was more for parties,

(02:56):
but yeah, it wasn't characterbuilding.
It wasn't character building, itwas just for the quick moments.
But yeah, I have moreappreciation of it now,
definitely.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Yeah, I can 100% relate to that because I also
watched it at a younger age.
I think I watched it when itfirst came out, which was 2013.
So, yeah, like 23.
And you're a very differentperson when you're 23 than you
are when you're 35, that's forsure, and your priorities sort
of change a little bit.
And I'm the same as you.
I kind of watched it and thoughtthere's a bit of a deeper

(03:29):
message here and it makes you bevery retrospective of the
things that you've done and thethings that you could have done
and the things that you could doin the future, I guess.
But one thing that stood out tome, just sort of on a less sort
of metaphorical, deeper meaningkind of level of this film, was
it's actually like a reallybeautifully shot movie, like

(03:49):
that's the first thing that Inoticed straight away was it is
absolutely beautiful in terms ofcinematography.
I know lots of people, when Isort of talked about this on our
social medias, said that itmade them want to visit iceland
and greenland, which iscountries that you're, like, not
even on your radar to travel to.
But the scenery in this moviewas just top tier, phenomenal.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Yeah, and that's it.
Like you see, I think it musthave been on purpose because,
you see, whenever he's sort ofat home, everything's sort of
like the same and bland, becauseit's always just him at his
house or it's him at the officeand it's just four walls.
Besides, like the life pictureswhich show these beautiful

(04:31):
places, everything else is justbare bones.
And as, just as the movieprogresses, every time he goes
back to office it's because it'sall getting torn down,
everything's getting taken onthe walls, it's getting more
bare bones, more bare bones andmore just a depressing just four
walls.
And then every time he stepsout of the office and steps into
something, even when he's goingon for a walk with Kristen

(04:53):
Wiig's character, cheryl, yousee, they go to the park and
everything, and you can see thatthe more beauty around the
place, there's more colour.
But every time, even if it's athome or it's office, it's more
dull.
And then, as the movieprogresses, even his house
starts getting a bit morecolorful.
When his mom moves in with himand there's more people around

(05:14):
him and he's not just by himself, it's a lot more colorful.
And when he goes overseas andall the beautiful places and
it's all colorful.
So I think it's a message aboutwe all have that jury nine to
five.
But you know, sometimes youneed to really step out of that
to see the beauty and everythinglike that yeah, and the
brightness that the world has tooffer.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
I agree, because the cinematography definitely tells
a story.
As you said, the blues and thegrays that's the color palette
in the office all the time.
The life magazine is completelybeautifully colored.
The other thing that's reallybeautifully colored is his dream
sequences, his imagination sortof sequences.
They just get explosive, thecolor palette completely changes
and it just goes to show thetransition from the beginning of

(05:53):
the movie to the end of themovie, where the only brightness
he finds and sees is in hisimagination.
But then as he grows out of hiscomfort zone and moves into a
truer version of himself andit's not almost, it's not like
he's pulling things out thatwere never there he always saw
that he had the potential to bethis kind of person that he
wants to be, because it alwaysonly just lived in his
imagination.
But it's becoming more realizedand more into the present and

(06:16):
into the moments of his everyday.
And the color palette and thecinematography mimic that,
especially when he starts to gointo Iceland and goes on his
adventure through there.
And I think we'll jump intothat a little bit later when we
talk about the scenespecifically.
But there's definitely aturning point in this movie
where that starts to shift andchange.
Which I liked Ben Stiller inthis movie and he directed it as

(06:39):
well and starred in it.
Yep, so this one actually was.
It was bouncing around thestudios, so to speak, and they
couldn't lock in a director andthey couldn't lock in a leading
actor and eventually it fell toBen Stiller and he was cast as
Walter Mitty before he decidedto direct it.
And then eventually, once a fewother directors sort of fell
through, he sort of stepped upto the plate to take on the

(07:03):
reins.
And before this he'd done theCable Guy, he'd done Zoolander
and Tropic Thunder three comedymovies definitely not like this
at all.
So I think there was a bit ofskepticism, but I think he
pulled it off.
He played a really nuancedcharacter, especially in the way
that he expressed himselfnon-verbally, because I think
there was a lot of bombasticways that you could show him

(07:26):
sort of snapping in and out ofreality.
But it's really just a coupleof blinks here and there and a
slight head turn that you see,and it fully takes you into and
out of his imagination, dreamsequences and it's almost
portrayed as a real life person,which is not really what I used
to from Ben Stiller.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
Yeah, and I like the dream sequences because it's
realistically the only thingthat ties it back into the
original Walter Miltie comics,back from the papers, from the
New York Times, because thatwhole run was of Guy Walter
Miltie who got on these massiveadventures.
But the Walter Miltie in theNew York Times was always very

(08:01):
depressing because it alwaysended his dream sequence right
just before the good ending orthe climax, or end up with him
just before he dies.
So like he never.
He never gets, he never getsfulfillment from these dating
because he always gets whattaken out of it either too soon
or from the fact that he's justabout to die.

(08:22):
Yeah, yeah, but I do, and theydo the same thing in this, which
is probably the only tie towhat's the actual original
ultimate.
But I do like how they createda whole world for what's media
instead of just like the fromthe comics was just every week.
That's different.

Speaker 1 (08:39):
Eventually he'd go on in his head and they created an
actual like ben still createdan actual person with actual law
, with like like a world aroundhim not there and I I appreciate
that, yeah, and I think benstiller, once he jumped onto
this role, he really saw thepotential in it, you could say,
because he was in an interviewwith tiff, which was a press

(09:02):
conference that was held in 2013for this movie, and he said the
idea that the most seeminglyaverage person might have a rich
inner life and heroic potentialreally appealed to him.
So the archetype of the WalterMitty is actually something
that's really well known throughAmerican culture at least,
because it foregrounds thisdreamer mentality usually a guy

(09:24):
who's this dreamer that doesn'tlive in the real world and it's
derived as well from thosecomics that you were talking
about.
But also there's a literatureshort story where, basically,
this guy's driving his wifearound to run errands and as
he's doing that, he'senvisioning himself as like an
Air Force pilot and going onthese heroic and adventurous
things and ordeals in his headand then retreating back to the

(09:46):
everyday.
So they took that little seed.
Ben Stiller took that littleseed and turned it into this
larger than life masterpiece.
It also has a lot of sort ofhidden gems and messages in it
as well.
This is probably one of thefirst times I also saw Adam
Scott on film as well, adamScott being Ted Hendricks.
That beard, yeah, everybodycomments on the beard man.

(10:07):
I don't know if it's real, isit?

Speaker 2 (10:09):
real?
I don't think so.
I really don't.
It's probably real, but it'sprobably like they've got the
spray on there to make it reallylike, just like a brick colour.

Speaker 1 (10:19):
It's, yeah, completely darkened and, yeah,
just puts out his sort ofjawline there.
And obviously these twocollaborate again when they do
Severance in 2020, a verycritically acclaimed series.
And yeah, I think he's theinstigator, obviously, because
he's that force of tension inthis movie that forces Ben
Stiller to then go on this sortof journey to find the frame 25,

(10:42):
as it were, that Sean sort ofsent him and always trusted him
with his work, and I liked themessage that this seemingly
unassuming man, this average guy, as Ben Stiller sort of said,
was his potential, was seen notonly by himself through his
imaginatory experiences, butalso from Sean, the photographer
, who he always had seen reallybringing to life the work that

(11:05):
he had shot and taking that careto present the everyday world
in such beauty to everybody elsethrough his magazine.
So I liked that he was seen byanother character and it was
that quiet sort ofacknowledgement and recognition
between those two relationships,between Sean and Walter.

Speaker 2 (11:22):
That was a really awesome part of the movie for me
that I enjoyed too yeah, thefact that he has sean and him
have never actually met face toface the only time.
The only thing they've actuallylike ties them together is the
fact that walter has beenpublishing his photographs.
For what was it like the nineyears or 10 years or something,
or however long it was?
Yeah and that that.

Speaker 1 (11:43):
But the fact that sean could just see the end
product and be like, wow, it's aguy who sees things differently
to everyone else and he's likethat's my guy, just how he goes
on this big adventure and at theend there was never really any
need to, because of what happens, and I was, I I sort of like

(12:07):
that, and it brings us back toour sort of mvt of this, this
movie, as well, because the thefact that he had to go around
the world to try and find frame25 is a big and massive metaphor
for the fact that he didn'tneed to go on these massive
adventures to be this version ofhimself.
He always had it in him tostart with, just like he always
had frame 25 in his wallet tostart with.

(12:29):
That's the, that's the tyingkey for it all together, which I
loved perfectly.
But you know, on a firstviewing, when I watched that at
23, I was like what a pointlessexperience.
Why the heck did he go on?
That is like check your wallet,dude, come on.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
Like it completely went over my, my head, because
when I give you a wallet, Ialways have a look at all the
pockets.

Speaker 1 (12:48):
You got it.

Speaker 2 (12:50):
And then if you had to put anything.
But the thing is I think that'sthe other thing you see, he
doesn't actually put.
The only thing he puts in hiswallet is in the big pocket.
I think he puts some money init.

Speaker 1 (13:01):
Yeah, cash, I think Cash.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
That's the only thing he.
He put some money in, yeah,cash, I think.
Yeah, that's the only thing.
Like he has.
No, he doesn't have anythingelse, he has no other.
Like he doesn't have a coffeecard or anything else that to
put in that, to put in thatwallet, for him to actually look
through that wallet with like,and I think that's another
showing of like how, at thattime, how like boring and dull
his life was, he had nothing totransfer from one wallet to

(13:23):
another yeah, that that's verytrue as well.

Speaker 1 (13:26):
So I think that that wallet, and the quote on it as
well from Life Magazine, isreally sort of poignant for the
story as well, because it'salmost like that through line
that occurs.
Let's jump into what our mostvaluable takeaway of this movie
is.
So for me, the most valuabletakeaway of the Secret Life of
Walter Mitty was that sometimesyour fullest self isn't found in

(13:49):
fantasy, but uncovered throughexperience, and that Walter's
journey reminds us that we don'tneed to be someone that's
extraordinary.
We only need to let go of fearand live boldly as we already
are.
So, as we were talking aboutbefore the fact he he began as
someone that people reallyoverlooked and he knew that he
could be more through hisimagination, sequences there,

(14:11):
but he sort of had that beliefas well that he was a little bit
unworthy.
Did you get that sort ofimpression that he he didn't
think very highly of himself ordidn't have much self-esteem?
Brash?

Speaker 2 (14:22):
oh, 100, like, like, how he'd like, and I honestly I
saw a lot like I still see a lotof walter in me as well like,
um, like, just always thinkinglike that I'm going to, like I'm
not good enough or I'm going toannoy people with my attempts
of friendship, or like it'salways just, that's like that

(14:45):
it's always sad to see, because,you see it, you're like, oh man
, that's really sad.
Then you're like, wait a minute, shit, I do that, yeah, and so
like.
And how he like sees kristenwick's character cheryl at like
a distance and he's sort of likewishing he could, he like in
his fantasy he's this big machohero man who saves the day and a

(15:06):
dog as well from a burningbuilding that has three legs,
like he.
Yeah, he just has to, becausethat's the kind of person he
thinks that they want yeah theywant some big, showy, flashy
hero can do anything, and thenin reality, they just, they just
want guy man, that's, that'sone, that's one dude, it's gonna

(15:29):
be, it's gonna be, and hedoesn't need to be so
self-conscious.

Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah he he is enough, absolutely, and I think he he
always had that little inklingthat he, he was enough.
But I feel like thoseimagination sequences, as you
said, they sort of play intosome insecurities, but it also
reveals a lot of what he desiresin terms of who he would like
to outwardly portray and yes,it's like a larger than life

(15:55):
version of that.
But really, if you break itdown, there's sort of those
three symbolizingcharacteristics that are in a
lot of his fantasies.
To start with, there's theconnection that he's always
seeking, which is through Cheryl.
Every time Cheryl appears inone of his imagination sequences
, he sees her as this attainableand somebody he wants to be
close to, to form connection.

(16:15):
That's number one.
And number two is purpose.
So that's symbolized throughhis acts of heroism, whether
it's him climbing up all themountains to try and be with her
or jumping through the buildingto save her dog from the
burning space.
He wants that sort of purpose,but he also wants that
recognition through those actsof service.
So that's number three.
He's always seeking, throughthose dream sequences, those

(16:35):
three things connection, purposeand recognition.

Speaker 2 (16:38):
And you see it change after a while, at the very
start, because we get a fair fewof those sequences at the start
, yeah.
But then when he starts goingon that adventure, the next time
Cheryl's in one of hisimaginations it's he when he
jumps in that helicopter, but itwasn't him being all heroic or
anything, it was just Cherylcheering him on with a song that

(17:01):
they both really like.

Speaker 1 (17:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (17:03):
Which was Rocket man no Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control, both really likeyeah.
Which was?
Was it Rocket man no GroundControl to Major Tom Ground
Control to?

Speaker 1 (17:07):
Major Tom, yeah, by David Bowie, great song.
But yeah, I completely agree.
And it's even externalized whenhe's talking to Patton Oswalt
who plays the eHarmony guy and Ilove that guy too.
Yeah, he's got some good lines,but I loved it when he he was
just like you've got nothinghere under like places you've
been or things you've done, andhe goes.

(17:28):
I haven't really done or seenanything.
And then as that list on hise-harmony profile expands, his
imaginatory sequences decreaseand he even asks him patten
oswald's character even askedhim.
He's just like how that, how'sthat daydreaming sort of going
and he goes.
You know a lot less lately.
So I think that's that's verytrue to point out that he starts
off wanting those three thingsconnection, purpose, recognition

(17:50):
.
But as he goes further along hekind of becomes more
comfortable with himself and thethings that he's doing
outwardly, expressing thosetraits and it's less of a dream
and more of a reality, butalways resided inside of him, to
start with you.
But there's this thing calledself-actualization, which is
realizing one's full potentialand it comes from engagement,

(18:11):
growth, risk and authenticity,which is the four things that
Walter definitely does throughthis story and he eventually,
we'll say, becomes himself.
But he was always himself tostart with.
And we sort of talk about this alittle bit in schools, because
one thing that you learn aboutis called Maslow's hierarchy of
needs, and it's a needs systemwhere the things at the tippy

(18:32):
top of this pyramid are thingsthat you need to be
self-actualized and the thingsat the bottom of the pyramid are
things that you need forsurvival.
So an example is like food,water, shelter those are the
things you need for survival andif you have them you can start
to build your self-actualization.
But if you don't have thosethings, that's what you need to
fix in order to feel like yourneeds are met, basically.

(18:52):
So in the start of this movie,walter Mitty obviously has those
things enabling him to survive,but he's not thriving.
So he's surviving but he's notthriving, and he begins to live
with intention a little bit more, and that's when he starts to
do those things where he'sengaging in the real world.
He's taking risks by jumpingout of helicopters.
I'm not recommending ourviewers and listeners do that to

(19:15):
find who you really are, but-.
No, if you do do it safely andwith professionals.
Yeah, absolutely.
And yeah, I think that wasdefinitely just a big metaphor
for jumping out of yourcomfortability and embracing
that authenticity that makes youwho you are, and that's sort of
one thing that you could dothat's purposeful to you, that's

(19:46):
something that you love,something that you're sort of
passionate about, and aligningyour inner and your outer self,
because we all have that idea ofwho we are and who we want to
present on the inside.
But is that who we'representing on the outside?
And for me personally I'mtrying to get better at that,
because it's definitelysomething that I've sort of
struggled with as well, justlike Walter Mitty has is trying

(20:07):
to bring the inside me to theouter world, and the more I do
it, the more I realize that it's.
It's kind of okay, but I'mdefinitely not all the way there
yet oh yeah, 100.

Speaker 2 (20:17):
Like I kind of blame me.
Anyway, I blame my teenageyears and, yeah, cool, like we
were always trying or I know,for me at least, always trying
to like join in and be a part ofthe bigger group, as much as
and I don't think anyone in thatbigger group actually really
knew who they were we were alljust trying to pretend to be
something.
We were to try and pretend tofit in and then as soon as, like

(20:40):
, high school was over, it'slike what was the point?

Speaker 1 (20:42):
Yeah, it didn't even really matter.

Speaker 2 (20:44):
that's that recognition as well yeah, it
didn't matter at all and then.
But now I think because of thatit sort of left, like it sort
of ingrains it in you a littlebit and because I don't think it
was until like I was 24, 25,yeah, when, no, maybe like 25,
26, when I started, like when Ireally was like I don't like

(21:05):
doing any of the things I wasdoing and I'm like I, that's
just not who I am.
Like that's when I started likeplaying dnd again and and then
we met.
And then we met and like I likeI stopped drinking and like I
stopped drinking as much as Iused to, because I used to think
that was because I was ateenager.
That's all we do Friday nightand we get on the piss, go out.

(21:28):
I do that Friday, saturday andSunday and then sleep off Sunday
night and hope that I wasn'ttoo bad on Monday for work.
I think as I've gotten older,I've started shedding off of the
whole persona that I waspretending to be and started
being more comfortable in who Iam.
And unfortunately, it did takea lot longer than I was hoping

(21:49):
for and if any young people takeanything out of this episode,
it's like high school is great,high school, you meet some
friends for life, but don't lethigh school define you.
Yeah, like high school is goingto end.
You're going to become an adultand everything that happens in
high school define you.

(22:09):
Yeah, like high school's goingto end.
You're going to become an adultand everything that happens in
high school, besides what youlearn, is not going to matter.

Speaker 1 (22:12):
I like that, I think that's really good and it sort
of falls into some of the themesof this movie too, where you're
looking at demonstrating actionand overcoming fear.
So his moment is obviouslyjumping out of the helicopter
but for us might be, you know,stopping some habits that we
used to have that don't serve usanymore, like we don't want to
do x, y and z because we want tochange our life and make our

(22:32):
color palette go from blues andgrays to beautiful colors, like
like walter middy's was.
But I like at the end of thismovie how he'd always sought
that recognition and I thinkthat's what that we can relate
that back to teenage life aswell.
You're always seeking thatrecognition, you want to fit in,
you want to be part of thegroup and part of the collective
and he's seeking connection aswell through Cheryl.
But I think through this at thevery end of it, walter Mitty

(22:54):
does get that recognitionbecause Sean does actually put
him on the last cover of Lifemagazine.
But it's not really about fameat that point for me, for Walter
and his reaction to that isabsolutely perfectly exemplified
by the fact that he's okay withbeing himself.
Now it's understated.
There's a quiet acknowledgement, there's a worthiness that sits

(23:14):
within him and even though it'sexternally validated through
that magazine cover, that isn'treally what matters to him
anymore, because at the end ofthe movie it doesn't focus on
the fact that he is now on thecover of this Life magazine and
he's immortalized forever in aphotograph.
What we focus on is thecolorful, beautiful palette of
him walking down the street withCheryl, sharing a beautiful

(23:35):
human connection.
That's completely natural.
Conversation isn't grandiose,it's just a simple sort of human
interaction at the end of it,talking about the things that
they enjoy, and eventually theyagree to meet each other again,
you know, and the relationshipand the connection flourishes
there.
So it's this movie that's fullof all of these brilliant and

(23:56):
amazing and big impactfuladventure pieces.
Core of it.
There's also the small humaninteraction moments that really
sort of matter, that make waltercome out of his shell a little
bit and realize his potentialthrough the journey that he went
on, but also through realizingthe things that are inside him
are good enough to show peopleoutside as well yeah, I, I know

(24:18):
I love that because I forgotabout that until I watched it.

Speaker 2 (24:21):
That's last time that the final photo was him.
I forgot all about that, it'sone of the most poignant parts,
but when I watched it I wasyoung and didn't give a shit.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
I think that says a lot about the movie, though is
the fact that it was sounderstated that it wasn't
really the point of the moviethat he was the very end picture
on it.
The point of the movie was thathe overcame that sense of
needing external recognition,being on the front of the cover
that it didn't really matter tohim anymore.
And the fact that it didn'tmatter to you as an audience
member was like well, that'sjust art meeting real life yeah,
I think.

Speaker 2 (24:50):
I think, though, it was a little bit more poignant
this time around.
That was when I first watchedit, when I was younger, because
this time I saw it and like,because the photo, the photo is
him sitting on steps looking attwo different photos.
Was he having lunch?
No, he's having, he's lookingat photos.
Yeah, he was looking through the, the spectacles that he sort of

(25:10):
and looking at, looking atphotos and like, and it showed,
and it just shows that, like thelast episode of time magazine,
which every, every cover of timemagazine is something large and
or something beautiful,something thing, and then the
very final thing is this is what, like all those things, this is
what life is.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
It's yeah the quintessence of life, it's just
us, yeah yeah, that's reallyawesome.
All right, let's get into someof our favorite scenes here.
All right.
So I want to start off with thefirst daydream sequence.
When we looked at that, wealready sort of talked a little
bit about it.
But we're introduced to thisscene where walter's sort of
sitting in the middle of thetrain station and he's very
isolated.
Through medium and wide shotsand you can see that there

(25:53):
there's not very many peoplearound him and the connections
that he's having really aren'tthere.
And the fact that he's so smalland positioned so small around
all these really big buildingsand structures just shows how
much of a small piece of themachine he is.
And when he's sort of travelingin the train and to work, you
can see him moving with theherds of people.
So it shows that he's notreally an individual in this

(26:13):
space.
He's moving through the crowds,he's trying to get through the
day.
The palette is cool anddesaturated and it's grays and
blues, as we talked about beforebut then jumps into this
daydreaming sequence where heliterally does a double flip off
the bridge, enters this burningbuilding that is completely
engulfed in flames and thencomes out the back of it.

(26:35):
A real hero, and that was likethe first instance where I saw
ben stiller acting like the benstiller I see in the movies and
he comes out and he's got thiscompletely silly-looking robotic
leg for the dog and you noticein that small instance that he's
obviously sort of wanting thesesort of connections and he's
wanting that recognition andhe's also a bit of a dreamer as

(26:57):
well.
But I just really liked how hisdaydreams are not rooted in
selfish fantasies.
Here it's like a longing to bevalued.
It was a of it was a bit out ofleft field for me because I
didn't know what to expect whenI watched this movie whether it
was a comedy, whether it was adrama, I don't know.
So when I was watching this andI saw this lonely guy sitting at
the train station that snappedinto that dream sequence, I was
like, oh, what's this?

(27:18):
What's happening here?

Speaker 2 (27:19):
So yeah, yeah, and there was a few of those going
through the the movie brushthose dream sequences as well.
Yeah, like I, I really enjoyedthe uh stretch armstrong
sequence dream sequence.
That was probably my favoritedream sequence because I was
fighting in the elevator yeah,fighting in the elevator with,
uh, adam scott's character andthey're fighting over the

(27:40):
stretch armstrong.
It ends up spilling out intothe streets, but they're like
earth bender rock sliding acrosslike the bitumen.

Speaker 1 (27:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (27:49):
It's just just like this huge production and I like
that to me, like watching thatscene, but like, and it was just
how, how much he wanted to sortof, why does it stick up for
himself?
Cause he's, he always justtakes it.
And this, this was his dream ofhim being able to stand up to
the bigger boss, the bigger man,and try and win, but sort of

(28:12):
doesn't.
But that was probably myfavorite dream sequence of this
movie.

Speaker 1 (28:23):
I really liked when they'd snap into and out of the
dream sequences because it wouldalways have this soundtrack
swell when he got into the dreamsequence and it'd be cinematic
because obviously it'simaginatory.
But then there would also belike it almost fades to near
silence.
It's almost like a distortionand a fade and it's a sharp
contrast between his imaginationand the real world.
And then obviously, coupled withBen Stiller's subtle reaction

(28:44):
like the, the snap back into thereality in the slow blink.
It's like who hasn't done thatbefore?
But yeah, I just love how likethat's a really artful way to to
portray that kind of transition, because otherwise I think it
would be a little bit more sortof confusing for us to to watch.
But in the end he sort ofreclaims his imagination as part
of action.

(29:04):
But to to go back to what youwere saying about Adam Scott and
how he always sees himselfagainst him as almost like a
victim against an antagonist,they do that as well by they
sort of lower the camera anglesslightly when they're looking at
him as well, to show thedistortion of power, time and
you know, work, the workplaceframing also.
It's just putting him in thisspace where he's, he's

(29:25):
completely in this social andemotional detachment, but he's
also having a lot of sort ofantagonistic, internalized
invisibility towards his bosshe's always alone.

Speaker 2 (29:36):
yeah, exactly, and the boss, adam scott, has always
got those two other guys oneach side of him, sort of like
overshadowing Walter, and thefirst time he has a daydream
about fighting back, it's justhim and Adam in the elevator
alone.
Adam doesn't have his backup.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
Yeah, yeah.
I think that's really good tonote as well, and also noting
the fact that he's also alone.
He has to travel into theunderbelly of this Life magazine
business to get to his office.
He goes down all the levels.
He goes through like theinternal structure of the
building.
He's literally alone in a dank,darkened, deep space.
So that's sort of metaphoricalfor him as a person too.

(30:16):
That's how far removed he isfrom society.
And as he gets himself out ofthere he starts to live his real
life and the color palettebegins to change as well.

Speaker 2 (30:30):
But he definitely has that detachment there, doesn't
he?
Yeah, and going on to how, fromhis daydreams, how he's all
grandiose, like how he is allgrandiose.
You see that moment when he'sin the park with cheryl and her
son and he shows cheryl's sonhow to do a kickflip.
Yeah, because he used toskateboard and he used to be
really good like skateboarding,but doesn't feel that that's, he
sort of pushes it, so itdoesn't feel that's like a
necessary life skill to make himcool or anything like that.

(30:54):
And you see him in thebackground while shell's on the
phone, just doing all these cooltricks on this board, and
you're like and like no one elsebesides the kid is there to see
it.
And then cheryl gets the phoneturns around.
That's when he's finished withall these tricks, and so cheryl
doesn't see it either and yousort of like that's cool as yeah
but you do it when no one'swatching and no one no one

(31:17):
actually sees how cool it isyeah, that's.

Speaker 1 (31:21):
That's perfect, because it shows that how
overlooked he feels, but alsohow undervalued he feels his
skills are, and that sense ofunworthiness and just how he
really shows who he is and whohe feels as a person on the
inside, because he doesn't feellike that massive and awesome
trick is worth sharing withanybody.
And I love that because whenthey shot it they've obviously

(31:42):
got Cheryl in the foregroundcompleting up all the focus and
in the background Ben Stiller'sdoing kickflips and stuff in a
sort of fuzzy outline and that'sdrawing all our focus, but we
can't sharply see it.
So we can see that yeah, it'sthere, it's in him, but it's not
fully obvious to us and it'salso not obvious to him that
it's really really cool.
And it goes back to that quotethat Sean says at the end of the
movie where he says beautifulthings don't ask for attention.

(32:06):
And that's Ben Stiller orWalter Mitty in this moment
doing a beautiful thing, askingfor no attention for it at all.
So it's that playback, too,which is really awesome.
I love that scene.
That's a really good pull out.

Speaker 2 (32:17):
That's awesome.
Yeah, that's probably one of myfavorite things in the entire
movie, besides the huge IcelandGreenlandland trip.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, thatwhole thing, but maybe
skateboarding, the skateboardingdown that road, that's
absolutely let's jump into thatscene now, because that's pretty
, pretty symbolic as well.

Speaker 1 (32:34):
You know, he's there's a scene that comes
before that that we'll sort oftalk about as well, with the
helicopter jump, which that'swhat that's his first sort of
step into realizing.
You know, know, I've got to dothings outside, I've got to step
out of my comfort zone, I'vegot to be who I am on the inside
.
And he climbs into thehelicopter and jumps out and
does something completelyreckless and unnatural to him.
But as he's skateboarding downthe slopes of Iceland, it is

(32:59):
just like he's narrowly escapingvolcanic eruptions.
In this part he's using hislongboarding skills.
It's literally a pure moment ofpresence, like he's in the
moment, to the point where BenStiller once again is depicted
as a really tiny guy, becausethey use a lot of long shots and
you see the beautiful landscapeof Iceland but instead of it
sort of pinpointing andhighlighting his isolation to

(33:20):
society, it's almost like himsuccumbing to the fact that he
is just a small part in the biggame of life in this sort of
moment and he is so small interms of the landscape around
him.
But he almost sort of succumbsto it because there's that shot
of him going down arms open,sunlight behind him, sort of
shining in that understatedmusic playing as he's going down

(33:41):
as well.
That shows he is completelypure in this moment.
It's a it's joy andself-liberation and he's just
sort of impressed by the factthat he's not daydreaming and
that's the like he's doing thesebrilliant things.
But he's actually notdaydreaming this time and he's
experiencing freedom for thefirst time.
And it's not about achievingthat greatness, but he sort of

(34:01):
feels alive in that moment.
So I think that was one of themost beautiful scenes in the
movie.

Speaker 2 (34:07):
Him jumping out of the helicopter on the wrong side
is absolutely hilarious.
Dory's just a dolphin and thenthere's going to be a shark.

Speaker 1 (34:14):
Not a dolphin.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
But yeah, like I think Ben Stiller did a really
good job of this.
When he's in that skateboardscene, just the look on his face
when you look at job of this,when he's in that skateboard
scene, just to look at his face.
When you look at his face whenhe, when he's his arms black,
when he's like down and he'sjust zooming, you see, look his
face and just looks like he's atpeace yes, yeah like it's just.
It's just like there's absolutefreedom.

(34:37):
Puts his arms out and he's justgoing take me lord.
Yeah, absolutely oh and like,because I think that's one of my
like.
My second favorite scene washim on a skateboard going down
that winding road and just justhow and like even me watching it
.
I was just like, oh, like.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
That's probably not something that I want to do,
necessarily, but it's somethingI want to feel yes, yeah, and
that that's illustratedperfectly, I think, because when
we're looking at this, if welook at the symbolism of it, the
road is like winding throughall these different obstacles,
and that represents, obviously,walter's path and the life that
he's on right now and life ofanybody.

(35:14):
It's a winding path full ofthings that we don't know.
He doesn't know what's comingup around the bend, there's no
shortcuts, there's no detours,but he's moving forward and
that's what we all want to do.
We all want to sort of moveforward.
We don't want to get stalled inthis moment.
He's got his arms outstretched,which can be like a symbol of
like rebirth and freedom,vulnerability, without fear as
well, because he seemed at peace, as we said, like the look on

(35:35):
his face.
He's just vulnerable to whateveris coming around the corner,
but he's present in that momentand the landscapes around him
the real landscapes, not theactual imaginary landscapes is
like authenticity.
He's going through thistransformation that isn't a
fantasy, but it's earned andit's lived and it's real and
it's just effortless in thatmoment.

(35:56):
And I think that there's thisintrospective moment of triumph
for him, because the song that'splaying is called Far Away, the
lyrics in it so it says stepoutside, won't you lend me your
wings?
And it echoes that emotionalliftoff that walter goes through
when he's in that moment and hereally just wants to sort of be
who he is on the inside,outside again.

(36:17):
So yeah, I, I agree.
I think that it's really againone of those moments where sean
o'connell's line beautifulthings don't ask for attention.
It's one of again one of thosemoments where Sean O'Connell's
line beautiful things don't askfor attention.
It's one of the most beautifulshots in the whole movie and no
one's around to see it.

Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yeah, but it's worthy for him yeah.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
He captures in that moment and he doesn't boast
about it, Like he doesn't lateron.
I would tell everybody.
That was me, and I did thatsuccessfully, and that might say
a little bit about me.
But like walter goes throughthat whole thing, skateboards
down one of the longest,windiest roads in the whole
entire world, escapes a volcano.
Yes, he tells pat nolswald he'sa harmony guy.
Yeah, that's all.
But he doesn't do it as a brag,he almost does.

(36:53):
Oh yeah, yeah, put that on there, okay yeah, actually do you
want to just shut that down,like later he says do you want
to shut down the e-harmony page?

Speaker 2 (36:58):
yeah, he just lives it, he embodies it yeah, because
it's not even him braggingabout, it's his patent.
I was like oh, have you beenanywhere else?
Have you been anywhere lately?
He's like well, actually, yeahactually he's asked about it
I've been here and he's likewhat and?
but he says like he's saying itso nonchalantly, like, yeah,
I've been here, but and I thinkit's the same with like his
doesn't want to, he wants toovershadow himself yeah, so he's

(37:22):
talking on his thing, so he'ssaying it's like not a big deal.
He's like, oh, I just did this.
The ianui guy was like that'sincredible, that's amazing and
it's all.
What's this all like?
It's just something I've doneit's just something I've done.

Speaker 1 (37:35):
Yeah, one fact I learned about those scenes in
particular that we've talkedabout jumping out of the
helicopter into the sea and alsothis skateboarding sequence is
ben Stiller did a lot ofinterviews when he was promoting
this through film festivals andone of the things that
everybody asked him was did hereally do that?
And he did like he didn't useany sort of stunt doubles there.
He tried to make it asauthentic as possible and he
wanted to go through as much ofit as possible, because it does

(37:57):
build that intimacy andconnection with the viewer when
you know that the actor isactually or the character is
actually doing the things thatthey're doing on screen for real
.
And I think that that reallyplays into Walter's journey as
well, because it's actually himperforming those sort of moments
.
But if we jump back to thecopter scene at this moment as

(38:19):
well, as we said, very funnysort of jumping out of the wrong
side of it.
But I think that's also ametaphor for when you do take
that leap or you do stop thathabit.
If we're going to go small scaleor you take this step forward
for the day, and for some peoplethat is the achievement is
taking a step forward in theright direction.
For the day that jump out ofthe helicopter can feel like the

(38:43):
stormy waves that are crashingbelow for him, like it's not a
calm sea.
It is a tumultuous, screaming,wave-ridden, shark-filled ocean
that is probably freezing.
That was my first thought whenI watched it.
That's going to be calm.
That would be super cold.

Speaker 2 (38:57):
Yeah.
But, yeah, he takes a step outthe wrong side of the helicopter
, so, and it's like take thatstep, like it may not be the
right step but eventually.
Eventually he got around to theright, he got to the right
place.

Speaker 1 (39:12):
That's such a good point too, because, yeah, not
every step you take is going tobe in the right direction, but
you don't know that until youtake it.

Speaker 2 (39:19):
So I think that's an awesome message that this movie
shows you as well and then itproceeds to him on the
skateboard just progressingforward, trying to get to where
he needs to get to, and I thinkthat, like the point you made
before, like it's about movingforward even if you do take the
wrong step or if you do make adecision and it's not the
correct one, just keep movingforward and just keep trying,

(39:43):
like the worst thing you do isgive up, which at one point he
sort of does in the in the movie.
After this, after he feels likehe's gotten to the point where
he can't go any further, andthen it takes I think it's his
mother, yeah, talking to hismother, and then seeing the edge
of the piano and the photo tobe like wait, and then, yeah,

(40:03):
that's another thing, back ontrack too yeah, yeah, exactly,
getting back on track.

Speaker 1 (40:08):
And sometimes it does take that support network,
those trusted friends and familymembers that you need to sort
of point you in the rightdirection and give you
assistance to get through thatnext step, to become your true
self through thatself-actualization.
Because it is a journey and ashe's going on it, you look at
that moment of him jumping outof the helicopter and it's very
courageous.
But it's that old adage.

(40:28):
They say that courage isn'tdoing something with an absence
of fear, it's being afraid anddoing it in spite of it as well.
So he didn't need to be perfectin that moment, he just needed
to be willing to do it and hewas.
And as he did that, he didn'tget his answer straight away as
he jumped out of the helicopter,it led him to the next thing.
So that's something to keep inmind as well, as sometimes it's

(40:49):
not always about the step you'retaking to get you to the answer
that you want right now.
Sometimes it's the small stepin the right direction that will
bring you to the big goal atthe end, as it sits as well and
it wasn't, and and with hismistake of jumping off the wrong
side, he lost the parts for theradio.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
And losing the parts for radio, he couldn't just get
onto the boat and then contactSean Yep.

Speaker 1 (41:13):
Yeah, which sort of made his journey harder too.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, which had to continue his journey, which,
like at the time, he's probablylike oh, now I have to do more
things, but then at the end ofit coming out, of coming out of
it, at the end, he grew more,experienced more and learned
more along the way than if itwas something as easy as jumping
into a boat, going on a boat,fixing a radio, calling sean,
saying hey, where's the thinghe's saying?

Speaker 1 (41:35):
oh, and flying over there done like yeah yeah, it's
almost that, that old sayingthat they say where you know,
mistakes help us grow.
But also mistakes sometimescause suffering, and through
suffering you also grow andbuild character too.
And that's what happens toWalter as well.
He makes that mistake, he beatshimself up about it, but then
he goes forward and tries to fixit again with the fishermen on

(41:56):
the boats there.
He sort of talks to them andmoves forward to his next step.
But if he didn't lose thoseparts to the radiator, to the
radio sorry which can happen Ifyou're going through something
new you're not going to get itright the first time.
If you're going through thatand you make those mistakes and
you don't continue on, he wouldnever have had those experiences
in Iceland that really made himself-actualize and really

(42:19):
believe in the true self that hecould be as he's going down
this of skateboarding sequence.
So I think that was animportant part of the journey
and really that was the pivotalpart of the movie for me.
That's where it sort oftransitioned, that's where the
imagination sort of moved alittle bit into the lesser, as
opposed to being foregrounded assomething that he did all the
time.
But I think with this, whenwe're looking at Walter, there's

(42:39):
hints throughout the movie thathe's a character that has gone
through a little bit.
His dad's not around anymore.
He's obviously got these photosof him when he was a youngster,
where he had a mohawk, and thetheme of Papa John's is through
the movie, where he had to get ajob and then step up into the
real world and support andprovide for his family.
At that point as well, he'svery close to his mom and his

(43:01):
sister.
So he's delivered to us as areal sort of person who goes
through real struggles, andthat's what I think.
These moments are reallypowerful for us, because we see
an ordinary guy doing theseamazing things.
But I think it also does a goodjob of balancing the fact that
these amazing and big thingsmight look awesome on the screen
, but for us in our everydaylife it might just be, as we

(43:22):
said, taking that next stepforward.
So I think that it does abeautiful job throughout.
But I want to talk now, brash,about my favorite scene in the
movie, which is when he'sclimbing the Himalayas and he
meets Sean O'Connell.
That is a beautiful thing, yeah, and for me it's after the
longest time.

(43:43):
It's an uncertain journey.
He goes through oceans,volcanoes, his own insecurities
as well.
He finds Sean, and he's likecalmly watching a snow leopard
through his camera, like notknowing anything about what's
going on, and he stumbles acrosshim.
He doesn't find him on purpose,he sort of stumbles across him
and sometimes the answer happensthat way too, in real life,

(44:05):
Like he's no longer the man fromtheir daydreams.
At this point, walter, he isthe man that he sort of imagined
.
This is the climax of the movie.
For me, like I know, the moviegoes on for a little bit further
, but to me Walter becomes histrue self at that moment in that
conversation.

Speaker 2 (44:22):
Yeah, and the whole, I guess, because you see, now
he's got like, he's still gotlike a beard and it's all got
the snow on it and you see he'slike not so much like age, but
you can see the weathering onhim for, like everything he's
been through, he's been on ajourney For sure.
Sean doesn't, because they'venever really seen each other.
Sean's like who are you, he'slike who are?

Speaker 1 (44:47):
you.

Speaker 2 (44:47):
He's like I'm walter, he's like also, and then I know
you.
And then he's like I hear youget the 25th shot, like it
wasn't in the in the with therest of him.
He's like, oh, I put down thewallet.

Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah, he's like you're sitting on it.
Yeah, he's like what, what do?

Speaker 2 (44:59):
you mean I put you on .
He's like I threw out.
He's like why'd you throw thewallet out, man?
He's like why'd you put it inthe wallet?
Yeah, but then that's thatpoint then, where he's like this
has all been pointless.
But then Sean's like no, justsit here and take it in, man.
Yeah, take in the view, take inthe scenery.

(45:21):
And then Sean sees the peopleplaying soccer.
You just come and play soccer.
We're going to be short if youdon't.

Speaker 1 (45:27):
Yeah, we'll be short, if you don't.

Speaker 2 (45:28):
Yeah, yeah.
And then you just come down andplay soccer and they just have
a good time and then, like Ithink after that that's when
he's like, yeah, it may havebeen pointless, but it was fun.

Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah, but after that I think he does grow into that
self-actualized version ofhimself.
He becomes his true selfbecause he's no longer
fantasizing and he realizes thathe's enough to the point where
he previously fantasized aboutbeating the shit out of his boss
.
But now he goes in and has averbal conversation, expresses
his feelings in a healthy wayand then walks out and leaves.
I'll jump back to the Himalayanscene in a moment.

(46:01):
I'll jump back to the Himalayanscene in a moment, but just
while I'm on it, I think thatthat ending scene with Adam
Scott, where he actuallydelivers him photograph number
25, and Adam Scott decides toput that on the page he could
have done anything with that andWalter doesn't check up on him
or make sure or check the frameitself to see that he actually
puts the right one on.
So I think it's a moment ofgrowth from Ted Hendricks too,
where he hears from Walter andhis journey, sees the

(46:23):
inspirational things that he'ssort of done and believes in him
enough to actually go and thenput him on the cover.
I just wanted to give a littlebit of a moment there for Adam
Scott and Ted Hendricks for hissmall growth.
But back to the Himalayan scene.
The most pivotal part for me isthat that moment and that scene
is silent, like there's noburst of emotion, there's

(46:44):
stillness.
It's almost like a deepinternal realignment for Walter,
and I love the fact that whenSean finds out that he threw the
wallet out, sean communicateshis feelings very openly and
honestly with him.
He goes well, that hurt myfeelings, that hurts my feelings
, you know, that's, that's just.
I love the way that those twosort of interact, having never

(47:06):
met, but there's obviously arespect there, because sean sees
walter for who he could be andfor who he is now, and walter
realizing it in this moment isperfect.
But there's there's these wideestablishing shots to show the
vast scenery.
So once again, they're small inthe environment, which means
they're standing in the presenceof mountains, which is a
metaphor for the inner climbthat he's going through On the

(47:27):
way up there.
He wanted to cancel hiseHarmony profile as well.
He's like I just shut it off, Idon't need it anymore.
The camera is framed in thissort of observational,
respectful, quiet way and itallows the audience to sit with
the characters in this moment.
I think it's like I don't knoweight to twelve minutes, but it
doesn't feel that way and you'recompletely invested.
And you know sean's face isalso always partially obscured

(47:50):
by the camera in this.
And then you know in that, inthat moment he sort of moves
away from it, which is a visualmetaphor for choosing presence
over performance, because hesort of sits there and he
embraces Walter's presence andhe embraces the presence of the
ghost cat that eventually doescome along and he lives in that
moment, the truth of the moment,which is exactly what Walter

(48:12):
did earlier on the hillskateboarding.
But then Sean Penn, who playsSean O'Connell in this, delivers
probably one of the mostbeautiful lines in this movie
and it's shown across socialmedia all the time because it is
such a powerful sort of momentand I think it's very poignant
as well for people that areusing social media a lot these
days.
But he says sometimes, you know, if I see something that I like

(48:34):
, sometimes I don't take theshot.
If I like a moment, I don'tlike to have the distraction of
a camera, I just want to stay init.
And that's so powerful and it'sso beautiful the way that it
was delivered.
You know, kudos to Sean Penn.
He had a really small part inthis but it was a pivotal small
role.

Speaker 2 (48:53):
Yeah, and Walter's growth, like you said at the end
, how he sort of makes TedHendricks, sort of makes him
think about what he's doing.
When he asked him like do youeven know what the model of life
is?
Yeah, yeah, and he's like life,I'm loving it.
He's like no, that's McDonald's.
Yeah, just do it.

(49:13):
It is how he's talking, likeyou come to these places and you
push people out.
You don't know how hard allthese people really worked to
create this, to build themagazine, and they believe in
the motto that's why we workhere.
And he's like I know you haveto do what you have to do, but

(49:40):
maybe next time don't be such adick.
And then he does this line thatTed gives him and is like put
that on a plaque at your nextjob.

Speaker 1 (49:46):
Yeah, I love the fact that you know he didn't have to
go and beat him up to sort ofput him in his place, but he
also spread that message and Ithink that's a good one too.
And I think this is what Seanembodies in the movie is that
Sean quietly recogn, recognizesthe beauty in others and what
others should feel worthy about.
Because he does that for Walterand I think that it's really

(50:09):
important to know that forWalter's job, he catalogs and
preserves these moments that arereally revolutionary, and
sometimes moments don't have tobe captured to be meaningful or
revolutionary.
They need to be felt, and Ithink Sean knows that pivotally.
But he also knows theimportance of connecting with
people and making sure thatyou're kind to others, for

(50:33):
example, and you show them, oryou try to show them or try to
help them believe in theworthiness that's sort of
sitting inside them, or at leasttell somebody that you no
longer need to be spectacular orawesome to be recognized as
great.
But this is also in this scene,where the line of beautiful

(50:53):
things don't ask for attention.
And to get a bit personal here,that's also one of the main
reasons why I really love mypartner, kalia, because she is a
really sort of beautiful personbut she has almost zero social
media presence.
She lives her life in theday-to-day, she's really
connected to her family and shetakes happiness in those small
moments in life.
And that connected to me inthis moment of this movie

(51:18):
because, as much as it's sort ofnot really nice to compare your
partner to a shadow snowleopard, but I think in this
moment when the quote was made,it's it sort of really connected
me to that in terms of her.

Speaker 2 (51:29):
So well, I mean, yeah , I love that.
I mean, sean, that is beautiful, by the way, but thank you,
sean also does the same thing.
He, because when walter askshim, like when he says he's
thrown the wallet out, he's like, well, what was it?
And Sean's just like, let'sjust call it the shadow cat.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's justcall it a ghost cat.
A ghost cat, yeah, because,like you had a comparison before

(51:51):
of, like Walter Mini to beingthe ghost cat, sean makes the
same comparison to him, to theghost cat and Walter.

Speaker 1 (52:00):
Yeah, yeah, I love that.
But I think that the mostimportant thing for this is,
like when he was climbing themountain, the mountain wasn't
like a physical obstacle, it washim overcoming his own
self-doubt.
And you know we're met withanother shot when they're
finished, of him just enjoyingthe moment once again, playing
soccer with some natives andSean, and it's completely

(52:20):
silhouetted but they're backlitby light and it really just
takes you into the presence ofthat moment, with the slow score
and it's a beautiful scene.
That sort of shows him justsort of at peace once again.
So you know I'm a sucker for areally good character
development story and I thinkthis is one that's done really
subtly and really really well.
So I think becoming a true selfoften requires, like, letting

(52:43):
go of your ego, but sort of.
Also, it's not always groundand grand and loud, which is
what this movie does reallyreally well.
So, all right, let's get intoour final takeaways.
Hey, brash, all right.
So we're not going to go intoreally detailed reviews like we
kind of used to on the fandomportals podcast.
If you want to see those, we'regoing to do them specialty
style and they'll appear likeevery now and then through our
podcast, but most notably on ouryoutube, which will be in the

(53:05):
snow show notes below.
In this part we're just reallygoing to talk about our our
favorite scene, our favoritequote, any sort of nitpicks we
have with the movie, and thenwe're just going to give it a
rating out of five and we'regoing to put it on our honor
board as well, because we'regoing to keep the honor board
going and post that on oursocial medias.
So, brash, what was the bestscene or favorite scene for
yourself?

Speaker 2 (53:25):
There's so many I really, really, really enjoyed.
But for me I think my favoritescene, I'd have to say when he's
showing off his skateboardtricks, because he's not even
doing it for Shell, he's doingit for Sun.
They have no real connectionbut he's willing to be sort of
that father figure willing totry and help out however you can

(53:48):
.
Even it's as simple as hey,I'll let me show you how to do a
kickflip and but.
But the fact that it's in thebackground with the four-round
show where it's blurred out, youcan barely see it like that.
That whole, just that picture,I think that scene just yeah, it
does it for me, that one yeah,I like that.

Speaker 1 (54:08):
So that's one of those scenes that show you know,
beautiful, beautiful things,don't ask for attention.
But yeah, mine's on a similarvein.
Mine's the himalayas scene whenhe sees the ghost cat.
Because of the personalconnection I kind of had with
that line, best quote quote forme is that one beautiful things,
don't ask for attention.
Did you have a favorite quotethat you'd want to share with
our listeners?

Speaker 2 (54:24):
I really like that quote.
Sometimes I don't.
It's like a moment for me.
Personally, I don't like tohave the distraction of camera,
I just want to stay in it.
That line, for me, is alwaysgoing to be amazing.
This one, I think, is deep andhas such beautiful meaning that
everyone should take to heart.
It's don't cheat on your lady.

(54:45):
And when you live in a countrythat only has eight people in it
, oh, that's true.

Speaker 1 (54:49):
I love that movie.
You know what?
One thing that we didn'tmention as well is?
There's like a call out to thematrix in this movie, where
there's the blue and the red car.
Did you see that?
Yeah, yeah, which is literally,like you know, going into the
real world, which is what, whatwas pointing in the matrix there
as well.
Do you have any nitpicks forthis movie?
Anything that sort of didn'thit or didn't strike?

(55:09):
I've, I've got one and I reckonit's.
It's probably one that's sortof mirrored by a lot of people.
When this came out, everybodywas a little bit perturbed by
the, the product placement, likeoh, yeah the papa john's and
and the heineken especially thatyou can see throughout like it
didn't pull me out of it.
But if I'm gonna pick knits forthis one, I think that would
probably be it for me.

(55:29):
And sometimes some of themoments they're drawn out a
little bit too long in terms ofpacing.
But on second, third, fourthwatch you realize that that's
sort of the point.
It's like staying in the momentand taking in the sort of
beauty of some of the sceneryand the situations that you're
in.
So if I'm going to nitpicksomething, that's it for me.

Speaker 2 (55:47):
Yeah, I don't think, I really.
No, it's like nothing.
I mean, all the dream sequencesare cool, the one, the fight
scene, my favorite one.

Speaker 1 (55:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:59):
I think that one's probably a little bit too long,
yep, but other than that,nothing that I would say that
I'd take out to make it betterVery good, okay, so that means
we're going to give it a ratingout of five.

Speaker 1 (56:14):
For me, I've given it 4.5 out of five.
What about yourself?

Speaker 2 (56:17):
Yeah, I'll have to say I was going to give it a 4,
but now I'm saying that I don'thave any notes for it.
I'm like that might be closerto 4.5.
Yeah, actually I'm not going tosay 4.5, I reckon I love this
movie.
It's a beautiful movie.

Speaker 1 (56:34):
So that means it gives us an average of 4.5 from
both hosts.
So that means this one sits atsecond on our honor board, brad,
sitting behind only theGuardians of the Galaxy, volume
3.
It's at 4.5, and we both sortof agreed we also have the New
Mutants at 4.5.
We kind of agreed that thismovie's messages are a little
bit more impactful for us likeboth of us sort of personally so
we put it in the second spot.
So there we go, we've got a newtop three, yeah.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
Happy with that.
So why is Phantom of the Operanow fourth?

Speaker 1 (56:57):
Phantom of the Opera is fifth, now Still in the top
five Yep, which one's fourth?
The Crow.

Speaker 2 (57:02):
Right, yeah, the Crow , of course.

Speaker 1 (57:04):
Yep, yep, yep, yeah, All right, so let's get into our
sign-offs.
All right, everybody.
This is the end of this episode.
If you've got thoughts for uson ahead of time so you can tell
us all the features that youloved about the movie or ones
that you didn't like so much,we're everywhere at fandom

(57:27):
portals, so that's instagram,and also on threads.
After we post these episodes,we're also going to post a
question for you guys.
So, obviously, walter middy'stransitional sort of moment in
this movie was when he sort ofjumped out of the helicopter and
was skateboarding down theslopes of Iceland there.
So what was your Greenland orIceland moment?

(57:47):
What was the moment that sortof changed you?
If anything you can tell us onthe social media, we'll put it
on our thread.
So join our social medias atFandom Portals there for that.
If you're loving the podcast,definitely go and tell a friend
about it If you think they'llvibe with it.
Nothing grows in the podcastworld without your help.
So, please, word of mouth isawesome for us and we also have

(58:08):
a newsletter.
So if you want a newsletterevery month we're only sending
one a month you can join that atwwwvenomportalspodcastcom.
Next week we're going to besinking our teeth into
Zombieland from 2009 to explorehow value and connection, even a
world gone mad, can help us todrop the act and step into who

(58:28):
we truly are.
That will be the second moviein our run on Becoming your True
Self, which is our themed arcfor the movies we're doing right
now, so definitely tune intothat.
It'll be a week from your timeof listening to this, or, if
you're listening to it in thefuture, it'll be there right now
, so go and check it out.
Gratitudes, brash.
We're moving these to the end.
I am grateful for our latenight conversations with Kalia

(58:51):
Having a few of those lately andit's good to have time when the
kids have gone to bed for us tochat.
It's good.
Watched a movie last night.
It was very nice to connect.
That's what I'm grateful forTime with the wife what?

Speaker 2 (59:05):
about yourself.
Recently, I think similar toyou, but not with wife, with
friends, we went and watchedSuperman together and that was
so good.
I went and watched the New YorkNight you did last summer with
a friend of mine.
That was really good.
Last night it was over at myneighbor's house.
We had a barbecue and had somedrinks and just shot the shit.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
Social calendars flourishing yeah.

Speaker 2 (59:30):
So, socially, I've done a lot more in the past
month with our trip andeverything like that now than I
have probably in the last threeyears Actually, besides when we
used to play D&D.
Yeah, yeah.
That used to be so awesome.
Look at you.

Speaker 1 (59:44):
Stephan, jumping out of those helicopters into the
Icelandic sea.
Brash Go you yeah.

Speaker 2 (59:48):
So, yes, let's go, grateful for the people I have
in my life right now Amazing.

Speaker 1 (59:54):
All right, thank you, guys, and we'll see you next
week on the Phantom Portalspodcast.
Keep learning, keep growing,keep loving fandoms.
Bye, see ya.

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The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013) Why Living in the Present is Key to Self-Actualization | Becoming your True Self

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013) Why Living in the Present is Key to Self-Actualization | Becoming your True Self