Bonus Episode - Executive Decision - 1996

Mark and John Leavengood (@MFFHorrorCorner on Twitter) discuss the 1996 action film Executive Decision. Directed by Stuart Baird, and starring Kurt Russell, Halle Berry, John Leguizamo, Steven Seagal, and a straw, the movie focuses on what happens when terrorists are forced to deal with Kurt Russell (Russell wins). In this episode, they talk about lucky straws, landing planes, and Oliver Platt. Enjoy!

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Down, Bunny Down the bun Bagin a Box. Hello and welcome to

(00:25):
con Air the Podcast. I amone of your hosts, Jake Luk,
and on this show myself and myco host Mark of My Flyaway through Conner,
the ninety nine action classic, sceneby scene, chapter by chapter.
But this is not one of thoseepisodes. This is a bonus rerelease which
shows from my past, from Mark'spast, from Movies, Films and Flix,
his other podcast, and this isespecially one. This is this is

(00:47):
a film. This is an episodeon a film I have not seen.
This is on Executive Decision, theKurt Russell Stephen Seagal airplane based film.
I haven't actually listened to this episode. I haven't seen the film by film
to get hold of in the UK. It seems like it's not streaming anywhere,
and so I haven't listened to thisepisode. I haven't fully edited it.

(01:08):
I hope there's no extra swearing init. Apologies of theorist, but
I hope you enjoyed. Mark andhis regular FF contributor John Levin good talking
about Executive Decision. Hello and welcometo Movies, Films and Flicks. I

(01:51):
am Mark Hoffmayer and joining me asa man who just jumped over some shrubs.
It's John Levin good. I meanshrub jumping when you're my size,
rub jumping really feels like a significanthurdle. If they put that in the
World Strongest Man, like, itcould be a small shrub and I would
be so impressed if like Zajernasa Vicusor you know, the Mountain Straw can

(02:14):
jump over a small shrub without touchingit with any part of their body.
Oh my gosh, that needs tobe a strong man of shrub jumping.
Yeah, it'd be like a diveroll, right, because do you get
the real height you'd need to diveroll. I mean the guys to be
nervous. They need to do ashrub jumping event, and then they need
to do a hedge jumping event,and then they need to do a maze

(02:36):
run through shrubs, and they makethey need to make them do the dance
sequence from Footloose Punch Dancing in awarehouse. Oh no, I just meant
like the crisp pen. Oh evensomething We're doable, dude, I want
okay, you put a yoke yokeright on a strong man. Yeah,

(03:00):
and then they have to complete theMaze from The Shining Dude are being chased
by like a half frozen axe Nicholson. Yes, imagine that event. It's
unnerving. Well, you know whatelse, Their hands are tied so they
can't defend themselves. Well, soit makes them run. Oh my gosh,
and then they get lost and thentheir muscles just and then one of

(03:22):
them uses the right hand technique andmakes it through the right hand. Just
follow all the rights and then turnYeah, I got you, I mean
yeah, oh man. Shrub jumpingas a strong man event, that would
be devastating though they'd the injuries wouldabound, and it would wreck the mystique
so badly of strong man. Justwatching these very very very strong men trying

(03:46):
to jump a hedge or a shrub. Yeah, Jason Baton from Dodgeball calling
this sport pepper and just watching thesestrong men jump over shrubs. I want
to see this, but I don'twant to see these guys get hurt.
I feel like we're gonna it's gonnabe like one of those scenes in a
movie where the bone is sticking throughflesh. Oh man, it would just

(04:09):
be the oh God, and itwould be very uncoordinated. They would do
like little steps. They would breaka bone, do some little steps,
because whenever I think of powerlifters,I just think of tiny steps. And
this takes some big che because whenthey do like their yolk walks, they're,
um, they're they're what is itcalled the framewalk things. Yeah,
they're just walking tiny steps. Youknow why I brought that up right?

(04:31):
My head's jumping. Yeah, Idon't. Well the opening of this movie
when when Steven Seagal and his creware attacking the compound, the Chechen uh
safe house. Yeah, and they'rethey're attacking the safe house and and Travis,
you know, Austin Travis, whichI love. It could be Travis

(04:55):
Austin which which names better? John, Lieutenant Colonel Travis Austin or Lieutenant cur
Austin Travis. I think Austin Travissounds like he's trying to be the uber
American. Austin Travis. Yeah.This summer Austin Travis. That guy like
has a country album and he's touringthe South. Austin Travis, Austin Travis.

(05:15):
Absolutely, Okay, I want youto hear two things. This summer
Austin Travis stars as the sun Blazerfour. This summer, Travis Austin stars
as the sun Blazer. Which oneyou watch it? I think Travis Austin
sounds like Joe Biden's nephew, andAustin Travis sounds like a w W wrestler.

(05:41):
Oh man, Austin heel or goodguy? You know. I don't
know. He might be like therock where he hops back and forth.
Well, is he like a DanielBryan who's small but everyone loves him because
he's really technical? Oh that wouldbe good. That'd be good. Yeah,
like like like a Shawn Michael's backin the day. Whoa. So
it could be Austin Travis and TravisAustin and they could be Marty Gannetti and

(06:05):
Sean michaels As. Weren't they theflybirds? The flying Thunderbirds? I don't
wait. That was a cartoon,wasn't it. Yeah, the Thunderbirds.
They were like the sun Whistles orsomething. I don't know what there is
that, I don't know, butI really the sun Whistles sound. They

(06:28):
sound that sounds like a great band, not a band. It sounds like
a Sister Hazel type band. Thesun Blazers, No, they were the
flying They went the Rouget Brothers.I don't know they were the Freebirds.
Now that's a Leonard skinnerd song.I digress. But yeah, so watching
I was watching this this movie whenthey're attacking the compound and just watching Stevens
called Joe Morton, Beaty Wong,John Legazamo hop over shrubs. It was

(06:53):
just a highlight for me. Itwas really wonderful synchronized shrub jumping. And
I just thought to myself, youknow, yep, John, you and
our navy seals, we could bustinto any house and take people out,
but can we jump over shrubs andsync? I think that we can do
it a lot better than Steven Seagal. He does little steps too, but

(07:17):
yeah, he was. This islike the time frame where he just started
to put on a little belly,like not like not like like Godzilla opponents
Steven Seagal of modern day, butlike he was just starting to get like
the dad Bob midsection around this time. It's you know, years after has
Hard to Kill trilogy and h andhe's like six foot five or he's not

(07:41):
dive rolling and whenever you see himfight, fight, And I'm not saying
he's not an amazing martial artists,right, but it's not very showy,
and he's always like leaning back withthis backstraight while he's kind of like slapping
and chopping at people like he isa slap chopping fast forward with those arms.
Oh man, not dive rolling.He's not dive rolling. He's not
jumped kicking. He hardly ever kickshigher than his waist, even when he

(08:05):
was thin. If you think abouthis training, there's a lot of upper
body. It's that kind of disarmingpeople. It's getting their hands. But
he's not going to just he can'tdisarm a shrub that's on the ground.
No, disarming a shrub would bevery difficult for him. If it was
like a if it was like aChristmas tree, he could take a weapon
from it. But so when Ithink of Steven Seagal's fighting style, and

(08:26):
again, it's very technically impressive.But if you don't understand how it's technically
impressive, if you're not someone who'sspent a lot of time, whether it
was boxing or martial arts or something, you probably just look at him.
And especially when he throws an occasionalkick and it's again it's never higher than
someone's stomach and they're all shorter thanhim. He has a fighting style that

(08:46):
I would describe as permanently pulled hamstring. He has a permanently pulled hamstring and
he's fighting as if he's trying tominimize leg movement because he has that pulled
hamstring, so he won't even bendhis tour so forward m you know he
mean, I guess, yeah,Oh I love it, John, I

(09:07):
see him a head Well, Iguess you have to keep your feet planet
the way he fights to get thoseknives. So if you want to,
if you want to learn more abouthis fighting, I did a video for
Rotten Tomatoes. I did wed JohnClaude van dam Or Steven Seagal, So
you can go to Rotten Tomatoes versesand it's on YouTube and we have his
entire Marshal arts history. He wasthe first I think American opened a dojo
in Japan for his martial arts.Like he was legit. But you're tremendous.

(09:31):
Yeah, he's he's very He hasa very interesting style. And I
gotta say, John, if hewas the star of this movie, it
would be seven minutes long. Soyou think about this film and they don't
get onto the plane until forty minutesinto the movie. Then I mean a
couple of people are killed throughout.Then one of the henchman is killed at
one hundred minutes, the Senator iskilled at one hundred and eleven minutes,

(09:56):
and the attack doesn't start into onehour and fifty one minutes into the movie,
a twenty five minutes left at thattwinty and like, so the attack,
the total attack of this movie lastfive minutes from one fifty one to
one fifty six. So that's avery short attack scene. But I think
this movie works because of the sweat, the nervousness, the ferral brows,

(10:20):
Kurt Kurt Russell's stress, Oliver Platt'sstress. John leg was almost strong leadership.
But if Seagal was on this,he was like, Okay, guys,
I'm gonna go upstairs. I'll beright back three minutes later. Okay,
guys, i'm gonna land this plane. You take care of Cappy,
make me a cappuccino. Oh,and I got a date with that really

(10:41):
awesome stewardess later on. She's awesome, and then the movie's over. Like,
but his vibe doesn't work in thismovie, So I'm kind of glad
that he got killed at the youknow what forty minute mark of this film
because his vibe just wouldn't have fit. Does that make sense? Sure?
No, absolutely, because because he'san action star. Right, He's an
action star, and action stars gokind of raise hell for the bad guys,

(11:07):
unless you're like the rare Van Damnmark where you get your butt kicked
first and then you have to comeback. But he's less. But he
was usually less of an action starand more of a fighting underdog star.
Right. He was like a Rockybut so so Steven's Agal. He just
comes in and raises holy hell forbad guys. Whereas this movie isn't about
a badass team led by a badassleader. This is about a team that

(11:31):
is shattered, and the movie ismore and by my view, the movie
is more about rebuilding the team thanit is about them over about them beating
the bad guys. They have toovercome the team to beat they have to
rebuild themselves to beat the bad guy. But beating the bad guys, these

(11:52):
bad guys are clumsy and or they'renot impressing us with what they can amplish
in terms of combat. Right,The biggest threat that happens is because they
thought they killed the big bad guyand he wasn't dead yet, you know,
like they didn't check, so youknow what, you know what's interesting,
leg was Zamo didn't Oh, sothe guy gets killed in the beginning

(12:16):
because he doesn't sweep the room andthen Lego Waszamo gets shot after not checking
the body. Interesting, but theytook some he took some good shots,
but air Marshall got him. Youstill check. You know what I love
too is there's no there's there couldhave been. There's a major power vacuum

(12:37):
that could have happened when Austin Travisor Travis Austin dies And I like that
there's no there's no wrestling for who'sin control, if that makes sense.
There's no and there's no witch trialabout who's to blame. Really yeah exactly,
Yeah, no one does that.Everyone's just like, Okay, we
have a job to do. AndI think leg Wasamo takes the role of

(13:00):
leader, but he does so ina way that everyone's just kind of like,
yeah, I get it. He'svery level headed that he has a
couple of moments with Russell, butonce they get past that, it's just
fun watching so you have three hyperyou know, four hyper competent men.
One of them has a vertebra vertebraebroken. Then there's Oliver Platt who comes

(13:24):
through in the end, but he'sthinking about turning them in because he's just
a regular Joe. And then youhave Kurt Russell who in another really non
unselfish role, he's just an analyst. He's sort of the Jack Ryan of
this movie. And it's fun watchingthem because for me, when I think
about this movie, John, Iprobably hadn't watched this movie man in well,

(13:46):
No, I watched it two yearsago. I watched this movie with
my father in law and I alwaysknow when he likes an action movie when
we play darts on how many gamesthe darts we play. And we didn't
even finish one game of darts watchingthis movie because he just sat there staring
at the TV. So this waslike a one dart, one dark game
movie. But so I watched it, but before that was probably twenty years.
But I think the joy for methat comes in this film is You're

(14:07):
not It's okay. We talked aboutTrue Lies too. We love that movie.
But it's big, it's comical,it's loud, we talked about,
you know, I've talked about speedwith just the elevator, the bus,
the training explosions. The tension forme in this movie comes more from the
straw, comes more from the testingof the bomb, comes more from Kurt

(14:31):
Russell hanging from a wire and makingnoise with the camera or Holly Berry round
because yeah, and exactly like HollyBerry pointing at the camera. It's it's
um that's for me. When Ithink about this movie, I never think
about the gunfight. I never thinkabout the plane landing. I never think
about the shrub jumping in the beginningor the gunfight. For me, it's
all about the you know, themagic wand I think that's where this movie

(14:54):
is successful. But you know,it's pretty fun, man, I promise
I'll you talk. On IMDb ithas a six point five on IMDb,
and Rotten Tomatoes has a sixty three, and on Metacritic it has a sixty
two. So it seems like almostevery single well not every single entity,
but IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, aMetacritic all have it in at sixty percent
range. What do you think aboutthat? About that range? Yeah,

(15:18):
well, I'm a little surprised becauseI feel like IMDb gets a different kind
of psychological rating to it, andI feel like IMDb tends to come and
lower for movies that are not likeOscar winners or just utterly like that aren't
outstanding in their field. And Ienjoy this movie, but this is not

(15:39):
a true lies for me. Thisis not a die hard for me,
you know, So I would haveexpected a lower rating relatively on IMDb.
So that's curious to me. ButI guess a great popcorn value and a
great cast and maybe that's what's doingit. But you know, I'm comfortable
with those ratings. Is that highin your opinion for this kind of movie

(16:03):
for Rotten Tomatoes you're you're the RottenTomatoes scoring expert. Yeah, it's higher
for Metacritic than I would have thought, because normally, when an action film
is sixty three, the Metacritic scorewill be about forty five fifty. So
I'm I'm actually pretty curious. LikeMetacritics says that, like the meta craic
is more surprising for me because there'sa lot of action films that are in

(16:25):
the like The Rock Is sixty eight, which blows my mind. And then
there's some excellent ones like Deep Bluec I'm sorry, I'm bringing it up.
That's fifty nine. So I feellike there's a range between like fifty
nine and sixty eight where movies likethis fall in and so the Rock is
usually for me because that's such apleaser, it's a great, huge spectacle,

(16:47):
But like sixty eight, so Iguess it's I'm not surprised by that.
I'm more surprised by the meta criticand I'm more surprised by the IMDb
because, like I said, John, like the main attack doesn't happen to
an hour and fifty minutes into thismovie, so it's it's more of a
pop what a pop boiler. It'smore of a kind of white knuckle.
It's more like a breakdown I guess, which Kurt Russell did a couple of

(17:11):
years later. Just it relies moreon you know what. Also was thinking,
this is really more random things.But I just watched a movie that
a door called Moonfall, and Iremember just being incredibly happy that I was
watching one hundred million dollar movie withPatrick Wilson, Hollyberry and the guy from
so I forget his name, theguy from Game of Thrones as the leads

(17:33):
and then Michael Panion popping up occasionally. I'm just one hundred million dollar movie.
With these guys in the leads,it made me happy. So watching
this with John Leguzamo, Oliver Platt, Hollyberry, Beadywong, Joe Morton,
and Kurt Russell, it feels sosurprised. It feels so nice to me
because it's not like Holly Berry wasn'ta list totally yet Kurt Russell was probably
the main A Lister in this movieat the time. He was on the

(17:56):
Coattails trilogy. Yeah, it's true. I mean, Sigal was a big
ab and a lot of people aremad that he died. But it's just
refreshing at the end of the daywatching Hollyberry and Kurt Russell land a plane
and that, if that makes sense. It's just a I feel like it
has a different cast. I likethis cast a lot, and I remember
watching this back in the day andit was just one more reason why I

(18:18):
thought like Zama was the best,because I just like, I was like,
yeah, he's the leader, thisis great, this is cool.
But yeah, I mean I thinkI guess I understand the six point five
IMDb because it's it's I think itknows what it is. It knows it's
silly. It knows its plot aboutblowing up the entire Eastern Seaboard is silly.
And I think it just is goodat what it is, if that

(18:40):
makes sense. That's just this movieisn't great. It's good. Yeah,
but it's good at being good.Does that make it great? No,
But that's just like it's it isn'tgreat, it's but but it's it's a
good, good movie. No,I think it's I think it's easy to
please people with this movie. Yeah, just because it's not hyper violent.

(19:07):
I do it does rely on thestock nineteen nineties terrorists, like what's the
word trope? I mean, youdo have the terrorist who does establish himself
as the what's the word the extremists, whereas the other ones are just saying,
hey, I thought we were tryingto get our guy out. That's
what we thought we were doing.So I think the directors tried to lean
heavily on that. But it's Imean, but I think you're right.

(19:30):
The villains in this movie are reallynon entities. This is more about watching
people crawl around the inside of aplane and stick straws in the Bombs's kind
of what I like, Well,yeah, I mean, I mean you
deal with with film students. Imean, this is a classic case of
Chekhov's chewed straw. You don't checkout airplane, You don't put a chewed

(19:52):
straw in Act one and Oliver Platt'smouth unless Oliver Platt is going to use
it to save the day in Actthree, and he grabs that thing to
from his desk and there's a wholecup of ye oh man. I love
that they actually put an entire cutdown for him, and immediately when he
was recruited, he just grabs itand starts gnawing on it like a rat.

(20:14):
And then he just you know what'sinteresting heat when I chew on straws,
that the chewed portion looks like it'sbeen decimated by a ferrel honey badger.
When he choose it on straws,he has a really great flattened edge.
So he's a very delicate straw chure. I used to do that,
And what that is wait you did, oh yeah, And that is because

(20:37):
you're you're not directly chewing so muchas pressing it between your teeth and then
pulling it occasionally, so you chewit occasionally, which is softening it.
It's it's it's making more malleable.But then you you bite it and you
pull it. You drag it outbetwixt your teeth, and that gives it
that flat look. I used todo that all the time and try and
give it razor edges. But but, but, but the razor edges was

(21:02):
just a weird, fun teen thingto do, whereas the chewing on the
straws was an anxious, nervous teamthing to do. You know, but
you're self aware of it, soyou find something to do with it.
But yeah, that's that's from justdragging it out from between your team and
know that. Well, so that'sinteresting because I I just you know what
I mean, man, it justit looks like it looks like something blew

(21:23):
up the end of it. Likeright now, like the listeners are divided
into two camps. There's the campthat's like who does that? Then there's
the other camp that's just nodding quietlike yep, I do that. I
do that. I pull it throughthe teeth. That you either obliterate the
straw or you do the leven Goodmethod or the Hoffmeyer method. I mean,
I'm sure, I'm sure the methodpredates us, but yeah, I'll

(21:45):
take the credit. Hey, we'rethe first ones to talk about it on
an Executive Decision podcast probably maybe,yeah, so then we get to call
it maybe yeah, we might beall right, so you get half,
I'll take half, and we'll listento all of them, just to make
sure that we can claim this.But no, like, like the straw,

(22:07):
it's not like a character, andit's not a plot device per se.
Right, but even though it's usedintegrally at one point, but that
straw is with us, Like wenotice the straw as viewers because because we
see Oliver Platt anxious and he's gotthe straw, he's toying with the straw,
he's exhaling with the straw hanging outof his mouth. Like that straw's

(22:30):
there. It's like it's flagged postingthe anxieties that no one misses what's going
on in his head. Do youthink that straw gets the most screen time
of any cinematic straw? Ever,that is a good question of any single
straw. It's it's gotta be rankinghigh. All right, I need to
go through this movie and count allthe seconds of straw. Then I mean

(22:52):
there's the straw man. No,that is the scarecrow made a straw.
No, that's not a straw.Yeah, you're right, but you can't
can't You can't count straws in likepulp fiction has a great straw scene.
Cartoons have great straw scenes where theychug the drinks through there. So I
think you can't count a straw ifit's in a glass. Does that make

(23:17):
sense? I mean, if youwant to make the rules, that sounds
fun with me. I think that. I think that straws and glasses aren't
going to get as much screen timebecause they're going to be different straws in
different glasses throughout the movie in mostcases. That's a great point. Well,
I guess we got to talk aboutone straw, right, That's what
I meant, like a single straw, oh right, Because I'm assuming that

(23:38):
he did not have a pocket fullof straws. And if he did bring
a bunch of straws, they're onthe plane, they're on the Ramora that
went by by, you know whatI mean. So that was one particular
straw that he had that That's that'swhere I thought, you were like,
well, the one particular straw thatgets the most screen time. Now that
that is a statement, You knowwhat, I'm going to count that,

(24:03):
and we're gonna bestow an award tothis film for the longest amount of screen
time for a single straw almost certainly. Oh what amazing thing. Hey,
do you want to talk about whereKurt Russell was in his career? Because
one thing I really love about ourKurt Russell series we talked about a Carreussel
every Kurt Russell movie, every twentyfifth episode. I love kind of seeing
where he's at in his career atthis point. Do you mean his actual

(24:27):
career or the Jack Burton timeline.Yeah? Oh man, let's let's do
actual career. Okay, So rightnow you and I have covered used cars.
We've done Escape from New York,We've done the Thing, We've done

(24:47):
China, Escape from La We've doneTango in Cash, Captain Ron, Tombstone,
Tombstone, Stargate, Soldier, Soldier. I don't think we've done too
many of his New Earth movies,have we? No? No, no,
we've been We've been keeping it toour youth in the classics. We

(25:08):
did Bone Tomahawk back in the Gatein the day. But that wasn't a
that wasn't like a Kurt Russell specifictwenty fifth episode we did. We did
like three episode, three movies inthat one. So we can totally do
a deep dive in bone Tomahawk inthe future. Oh, I'd love to
do that Tomahawks. I think likeepisode fifteen for us. By the way,
and this is episode four hundred andtwenty five. We've covered a lot

(25:30):
of Kurt Russell. But you knowwhat, we've really stuck, John.
I don't know if we've done thison purpose or not, but we've really
stuck from the nineties to eighties us. I think that that is a mix
of the classics that we learned werecool from our friends, older siblings,
or our parents or our uncles,and the movies that we grew up with

(25:52):
in our formative movie years are highschool, middle school, high school,
college, right, Yeah, Becauseonce you get past our college what have
we done? Nothing? Right?Like, I don't think we've we've we've
passed the year two thousand with KurtRussell yet. And you make a great
point because we've done from ninety two. We did Captain Ron, then we

(26:15):
did Tombstone. I'm not going tocount Forrest Gump because that's just his voice.
We've done Captain Ron, Tombstone andStargate, Executive Decision and Escape from
La and we've talked about Breakdown andthen Soldier. So I bought the fancy
special edition Blu ray for Breakdown andI'd love to cover that soon. We
need to do that that we bothwe both love that understated Russell movie,

(26:36):
so let's do that. So then, but then, you know it's awesome,
you and I will have from ninetytwo to ninety eight all of his
movies. And we didn't plan itlike that, but I think you're right.
We were. You know, Iwas ten when these movies came out.
I remember watching Captain Ron and mybuddies and I and Are we had
a like a wood building, likea wood shop, I don't know whatever
you used to call that where youbuild like napkin holders for your mom and

(26:56):
you build signs over your door andyou get to worked the wood. Did
you ever have those classes? Whichs up, we had it. I
didn't do it, oh got it? We had that, yeah, But
we used to look through boats andthen we would just talk about Captain Ron
about what boats we would buy,and then of course you get Tombstone,
which I think for us, Johnwas I don't want to speak for you,
but between Val Kilmer, oh,I mean that movie was just more

(27:23):
than any other car Russell movie.No, there's so much. There's so
much in there. It's and thenStargate too, just going to a different
world, seeing a different kind,and then Executive Decision, and then Escape
from La, which we love.I love Escape from La. I think
it's beautiful. And then Soldier,you know, Paul Paul toomp, Paul

(27:44):
W. S Anderson, Kurt Russellgetting ripped up. It's but I guess,
yeah, that was our that waskind of this has been our stomping
ground. But I think you're rightbecause I was ten till sixteen when all
these came out. So I wasa big Russell fan at the time.
Like when you don't get to themovie theaters now, and I'm barring COVID,
so let's just say before COVID happened, right, when we don't get

(28:07):
to the movies, it's because likelike we're in our well before COVID,
we were both in our thirties.Now I'm in my forties. But you
know, like if you don't makeit the movie theater, you're exhausted after
the week. You just don't wantto deal with it, or you don't
want to deal with traffic, orgod, just wait to stream and I
don't want to deal with the people, or we have plans. When you're
a teenager or in middle school,as long as you can get a ride,

(28:33):
what do you have going on?Even if you have even if you
play sports and you have a gameevery weekend, you can still if you
have an allowance, you can goto the movie theater every weekend. In
other words, when we were younger, we got to see almost every single
movie that we were excited to seein theaters. Yeah, and at the

(28:53):
grad school. Same thing, evenvery very early twenties, same thing.
It's it's, it says, itsays, I don't know. Maturity and
adulting kind of stacked up higher inour lives that now we sometimes wait or
things fall back, or we don'tget to something until a few years after
it comes out every now and then, But back then we saw everything we
wanted to see in theaters. Andthen again we didn't have as much going

(29:15):
on. We could rent it assoon as we went to Blockbuster, you
know what I mean, And wedidn't have all these faming services, so
you did it. You're like,oh, I was awesome. I'm gonna
go rent that now, so Ineed to watch Stargate again. That's why
we I think that's why we're soon top of it at the time,
in addition to the fact that thosewere are formative years. But those movies

(29:37):
are things that we got to seemore readily, whereas now I'm only going
to see The Batman because it madeit an HBO maxim Before then I'm like,
well, I don't want to seeit a loan, you know,
I don't want to go to theateralone for a big action movie, or
you know, oh my girlfriend isn'there this weekend visiting. You know.
It's like all these reasons would comeup that I'm just like, oh,
I'll just wait, I've got abig TV now. But then you see

(29:59):
these things on delay. So insteadof seeing it for the second time once
it hits some kind of television medium, I'm seeing it for the first time.
It's all changed, Mark, wegrew up in the world changed.
Oh dude, it's nuts. Yeah, you're right, you could just hit
up a matt So let's say youhad in between classes, you can go
hit up a Mattenee for cheap.Or when I was working in a movie
theater, when we split screen moviesat midnight on a Thursday, I could

(30:23):
stay up for that. I wouldbe unconscious. Now if that happened midnight,
I wouldn't even made it to thebeginning of the movie. Mark,
Yeah, I would have been inbed for three hours right before that movie
started. Yeah. Yeah, Andyou know too. I think one interesting
thing. The more I explore talkingabout covering topics on this podcast and when

(30:45):
I write about movies, I've learnedthat I'm really drawn towards actors like Kurt
Russell, or actors like John Leguizamo, or actors like Eco Uay or Tony
Jah or Michael Ji White or ScottAtkins or it's just it's a really weird
combination there. But Kurt Russell andor John Cusack in his action movie like

(31:06):
Gross point blank, those kind offilms where Goon Jean William Scott where these
they're not like hyper Elpha's if thatmakes sense, Like I know, I
know Kurt Russell is an escape fromLa But I think what I like about
Kurt Russell is he's never been thatsuper A lister and he's never been that.

(31:26):
He's never He's never had the drawof Arnold Schwarzenegger, right, He's
never had the draw of in hispomp right, or or Jim Carrier,
Adam Sandler, I don't know.But he's always just worked and he's always
been an interesting roles. I thinkhe's always been an unselfish actor too,
and I think that's why I likehim so much. Because you know,
we talked about Stargate, that wasSpader's role. Other people shined. You

(31:51):
talked about Tombstone. I mean,would would a selfish actor allow Val Kilmer
to do what he did? Ithink he realized when he has a strong
bench. That's my long way ofsaying this. I just like that he's
never been a super A lister,even though he is an A lister,
And I like that he's unselfish inhis roles, like in Big Trouble,
Middle China and The Thing Antequila Sunrise. But then he always puts in good,

(32:15):
different work. And I think healso has that everyman quality that I
like because you think about this moviewhen he has that hoodie on like he's
out of his league. But Idon't know. I just like what he
brings to the screen, if thatmakes sense. And when I bring up
people like John Cusack he was alwayssensitive, but he could beat people up.
Sean Williams, Scott and God hewas sensitive, but he could beat

(32:36):
people up. Kanarees and Speed.He was kind of just a nice dude.
He wasn't the supers. Yeah,exactly. So I think I've always
liked the like sensitive people who canbeat people up roles, even though that's
not Snake Pliskin. But I thinkyou get what I'm saying. But also
Snake Pliskin is a rogue. Yeah, oh yeah, you know what I
mean. Like he's so like eventhough like you you you call I'm kind

(33:00):
of like an alpha, and I'mnot saying that I disagree with that at
all. But he's not an out. He's not your frontman like Dwayne Johnson
or Van dam who's just coming kickingeveryone's ass. He's trying to avoid front
combat. He's trying to sneak andget the advantage. If he could,
he would sneak his way to avoidevery fight possible to rescue the president and

(33:23):
get out, or the president's daughterand get out, depending on the movieing
question, right, and if hecould, he'd avoid it all, whereas
the other guys they don't try andlook at that zig zag trajectory. They're
like, straight line to what Iwant. And if you're in the way,
bad news. You know, he'sa good rogue. He's just a

(33:43):
strong rogue. That's a good point. No, you're right, because when
the cannibals are attacking, he getsout of there. When, yeah,
he tries to get out of everythinga fight to a cannibal. He has
good luck in cannibal movies. Escapefrom New York. You don't lick your
wounds after cannibal fight. They lickyour wounds. Oh gosh, he would

(34:07):
have been would would Kurt Russell havebeen good in Ravenous? Oh well,
you know, when I think ofthings like bone, tomahawk, and tombstone,
I'd say yes. And he canplay scared and out of his league?
Well, so yeah, I thinkthat would have been an interesting play.

(34:27):
WHOA. So we need to buildhis cannibalism trilogy. Here he was
in let's see death Proof, Noone gets eaten. We need to we
need to make more cannibalism films forhim. How do you feel about that?
I mean, that's ambitious, andI think he's a little old to
want to be involved in cannibalism films. Green Inferno? Would he be good

(34:49):
in Green Inferno? I feel likein Green Inferno he'd have the very minor
role as the dad. Yeah,you know, I see, I see
that happening, but that maybe rayLeota and Hannibal. I could see that,
but I don't want that to happento him. Yeah, there's a
certain pleasure. I'm sorry, Idon't want to see Kurt Russell get had.

(35:13):
I feel like there's a certain pleasureto watching ray Leota's brains get eaten
that only ray Leota can provide.Right, Rarely his brains are being eaten.
This is amazing. But Kurt Russell'sYeah, Kurt Russell's brains are getting
him eaten. I don't like this. I don't interest you that that's a
really random tangent for our executive decision. But I love it's. How about

(35:37):
this, Let's take a quick breakand then we'll come back. We'll refocus,
and we'll talk more executive decision.We will be right back, Welcome
back to movies, films and flicks, and let's talk about the movie,
shall we? Um? Yeah,I guess we could do that. I
mean, we've talked about every othermovie that Kurt Russell has been in a
little bit seven thousand movies. ButI do think one nice thing about this

(36:00):
movie is it's really interesting and lookingback at it now that it takes forty
minutes to get on the plane andthen at the hour and fifty mark it
the action pops off. This isa film that, yeah, the short
at for five minutes, but Iguess I like that. I like how
much time we spend with Oliver Platteand Joe Morton, and I mean even

(36:22):
the idea of the Remora with thatremember back in the nineties when Broken Arrow,
those planes were super hot at thetime. Yeah, it's like seeing
how cool that was seeing sagal die. I mean, I guarantee you John
that was kept as a really greatsecret. And I remember he didn't want
to die this so in the originalscript is head blows up and so he

(36:44):
fought a lot against the studio andthen stead he just gets sucked out,
which is a better idea. Youdon't want it's not a head blow the
upping movie, and so once hedied, you kind of perk up at
the idea of Ramora. It's silly, but like, okay, that's cool.
It's neat that it did something differentat the time, and I really

(37:04):
like that, and it wasn't Ilike that Segal had to sacrifice himself for
it. And also that fighter pilotwho shot himself out of the plane.
He's gonna be floating in the Atlanticfor a very long time. I hope
his seat has like an inflatable raftin it because he's gonna be chilling in

(37:30):
the Atlantic for a minute. Yeah, he's definitely gonna spend a few hours
out there, at least at least, but you know, they knew where
he was. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure there's a tracker. I'd
like to think he has a flareon him so that when they do come
with him, like a mile orso of him, he can shoot a
flare. And he has an industrialdinghy, not like a really cheap inflatable

(37:53):
raft, like, he has areally nice one with like a cocktail bar,
many cocktail bar and sun block insome block block shark repellent spray people
don't think about sun block. Youget fried out there. Oh gosh,
yeah, that's you know, what'sgood though. He does have long sleeve
so his head he would but hedoes have a helmet on. So the

(38:15):
good news is he could he couldstay protected from the sun. Which I
don't know what the weather was.We you know, we don't know what.
Oh you know what it was.Was it snowing when the plane land
did it was very die Hard too. I think there was snow, so
it wouldn't it wouldn't have been toohot out, yeah, keep your outfit
on. It would have gotten wetthough, that could have been a problem.

(38:36):
But if it was summer though,he might just get heat stroke.
Then yeah, I just lay inthere. But since it's no water,
wintry again, it was it feltvery die Hard too at the end,
or die Hard one. It feltvery die Hard at the end, or
die Hard three with the snow.Oh no, you're right, yeah,
no, that's that's definitely not dieHard three. Ye. I do love

(38:57):
that. Yeah, so I rememberwatching that going, yeah, this pilot
since trouble. But once they getup in the plane, I just thought,
you're right though. I like howthey had to refocus being a group.
I like that that Joe Morton wasstuck and he got his vertebe broken.
I really like that he made amistake with the bomb and how there
was multiple layers to it, whichis this a silly plot? John that

(39:17):
these Okay, so these extremists wantto free their boss who was captured,
and to do that they take overa plane to get him free. And
then when people are like, yeah, cool, we'll set him free,
they're like, nah, well oneof them is at least they decide not

(39:42):
to and it. But like whatDavid Cuche Hassan his character, but he's
gonna blow up the plane anyway,but he doesn't want to tell anybody,
But then he brings an entire crew. Couldn't they have just set one person
in a seat just blown it upwhen it landed. It was but well

(40:04):
the plan, but I think hedid want to have that extremist release though.
Yeah so he but he did wantthat to happen. So he wanted
to do that and make his terrorattack. But when would they let him
go if the plane just kept goingand blew itself up. Well, he
was already let go though, soit wasn't he on a plane. He
was on a plane with agents.So maybe they could land and then learn

(40:24):
what happened in the air. Theycould always be like, yeah, screw
this, this wasn't the deal.Yeah, we're flying you back. Maybe
that was actually just a diversion tokeep them from ever thinking that this was
just about making a terror attack.Yeah, I mean, it's a good
diversion. I mean, and itmakes sense. But couldn't you I know,

(40:46):
it's a movie plot. If youjust put one person on this plane,
the movie does not happen. Andyou know, it's funny. I've
never talked about the I've never thoughtabout the plot of this movie specifically.
But there's bakes to the bombs,and then there's it's just the bomb seems
like a lot over. Why doyou Why do you have a bomb that

(41:07):
has all these things unless you thinksomeone's going to try to diffuse it?
And at that point, couldn't youhave secured the bomb better than simply letting
someone go through cargo and find it. Couldn't you have been transporting a gun
safe with the bomb and the gunsafe, because if the stuff is that

(41:30):
destructive a gun safe, it's goingto tear through that like it's made out
of glitter. Oh yeah, youknow. So, I mean there are
a lot of things that we Idon't know the ins and outs of bomb
making. So if anyone out thereis an engineering student, please don't be
screaming at your at your computer oryour speakers at what I'm saying about how
wrong I'm But like I do feellike, like, yeah, like I

(41:51):
don't know why you're trying to againmake fail safe unless you expect someone might
be trying to diffuse your bomb andmaybe put a guy down there with it.
But I do love when when BeadWong's character, Sergeant Jung is looking
for the bomb, how long ittakes him, Because if there's four hundred

(42:12):
plus people on that flight with luggage, you're gonna be going through a lot
of luggage. So I didn't likethat they I like that they didn't immediately
find it. Well, they knewthat it was going to be big,
yeah, because that was fun easyfive they were looking for because they just
went through so many different suitcase racks. It's not the technical term. But
I do love that. I likethat it took him a long time,

(42:35):
and that put a smile on myface. But that's a lot of Yeah,
that's a lot of Das five tohave on board. They're gonna put
like that, so whatever. Forme, the villains are so secondary in
this movie that I guess I neverthought about the overall plot of the film.
Yeah, you know, if aDiehard two did this, you would
have seen a couple bad guys killa couple of cargo handlers, take their

(43:00):
name badges right, hide their facewhile they're loading something on, and then
like have someone like wave someone into bring this you know there. It
would have been like an eight secondscene. But Diehard two would have done
that with their plane issue, right, Like did two is good about showing

(43:20):
us many scenes that are brief andbehind the curtain for the preparation, whereas
this it's just like all this stuffhappened, and that's fine. I mean,
like you're bringing this up now onas you're bringing up it makes total
sense to think about it. Butwell, much of this stuff never crossed
my mind, although the phil saveson the bomb crossed my mind. That

(43:43):
that did cross my mind, Andlike you know, then you have like
all the lasers around the device,which made me think of movies like Entrapment,
with Catherine's Aida Jones doing I don'tknow power yoga or copara or whatever,
or and then Oceans To with theCapuera with Vincent Cassell and the lasers.
Like the late nineties and early twothousands loved lasers, Oh yes they

(44:08):
did. Now you want me havingan Oliver Platt laser scene. Who do
you think? You mean? Somethingmuch higher and more grand than him putting
on the goggles. Yes, likeVincent Cassell scene in yoga gear, I
mean going through him. Boy,he would be sweat and bullets. I

(44:30):
wonder if his sweat, because hesweats a lot, if his sweat drop
falls through a laser does set itoff, because if it does, he's
screwed. You know. You knowwhat is funny? Though? I watched
this movie Ambulance recently, and Idid notice that there was very uneven sweat
work. But the sweatwork in thismovie is top notch. You do feel
the sweat in this film. I'mreally happy you brought that up. Oliver

(44:52):
Platt is a progressively more sizzled pieceof bacon in terms of sweat as this
movie progressed. I'm surprised you shoulddehydrate to death without without a refreshment's cart
nearby. Cappy's laying there like he'sout. He's the hydrated At the endemy
he says he needs a good drink. And meanwhile, like him and Cappy

(45:15):
and Barry and halle Berry. Ican't remember her character name, but so
Cale, Cappy, and halle Berry'sflight attendant chamber. They are They are
like the heroes of this Not thatJohn Lguizama wasn't awesome, like taking the
reins, but these are the peoplewho strike me as being in the constantly

(45:37):
most stressed, highest stakes position.Oh for sure. Yeah, she,
I mean, Holly Berry has themost. She's unarmed and so she has
to do all of this stuff andshe gets tossed around a lot in this
movie and hurt. So then theyyeah, when she has to write on

(45:58):
her hand when she had us toread the books with the I like that.
They just has a random map withWashington, DC circled and goling like
here. But yeah, no,I always felt for her character because you
know, I guess you established earlyon that she's brave. Also, man,
I do remember Nancy played by MarlaMaples at the time, and I

(46:20):
was like, this lady, Iwas like, this doesn't feel right.
I wonder if she took the roleof Mary Ellen Traynor, who gets killed
in the beginning. Because Marla Maplesin this movie is not very good.
I don't want to hate. She'san untrained actress, so I don't know
how she ended up in this movie. But yeah, that's random. She
got it by she was married toTrump at the time, so I wonder

(46:42):
if that happened. But I dowhat, I don't know. Yeah,
she was Marla Maples Trump at thispoint. Yeah, but I do love
Hollyberry's character in this I think sheholds her own she I think it was
also smart too. In this movie, there's really kind of some neat multiple
layers. So you watch a Predatorand it's one of the greatest action films
ever made. But they're all wildlyburly, murderous men. But it makes

(47:07):
it work is they're being attacked bysomething more wildly dangerous than burly, and
that kind of makes them finds themto their fear, their anxiety. There
some of them are problems solving andsome are falling apart and they get literally
peeled, which is crazy correct,and this one does a good job of
you have you have Jean who isa flight attendant, but a brave flight

(47:31):
attendant. You have David Grant who'san analyst. You have Oliver Platt,
Dennis K Hill, who was justI guess another engineer. Then you have
what rat Cappy Jung and then whatMichael Baker and there, but none of

(47:51):
them are really super alphas. Soyou have normally you have one of either
Hollyberry, Kurt Russell or Dennis K. Hill. You don't have three of
them. Right. That was along way of saying that we have three
fish out of waters, fish outof water put into high stakes positions.
Right? Does that ever happen?When? Is that? No? No,

(48:13):
it's an interesting thing. There's alot of humility in these heroes.
WHOA That took a long time forme to say, But now I just
realize what the point was, Soyeah, it's but yeah, you never
get three fish out of water.I think that's pretty I like that though,
because Commando you get one fish outof water when he goes like speed.

(48:34):
Well, I guess Sandra Bullock isthe fish out of water. Not
counting the rest of the bus passengers, though they usually strike me as a
tag team right, So if wejust look at Cappy and k Hill,
that's kind of like Will Smith andJeff Goblum. One is professional and keeping
the nervous guy with the intelligent thatthe other intelligence skill set h common focused.

(48:58):
Right, So I feel like that'salso Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock.
I feel like that's a whereas inthis though, we also then have John
Leguizamo dealing with Kurt Russell, andwe also have Kurt Russell chili with Ally
Berry and like, so it's there. There's just there's a lot of all
this, right, It's not justlike the the nervous pedestrian and the calm

(49:23):
soldier. It's more complicated than justthat. And then to top it off,
Cappy's on morphine and he passes outfor a while and then he wakes
up and he says, don't cutthat whatever you do, do not cut
that wire. Well, Kurt Russell'slike, just go with your instincts.
You're an engineer, sure, ohman, you would have all died.

(49:51):
Yeah, with your instincts. Well, I guess the military be like,
well, I guess we don't haveto worry about that plane anymore. Right
there, I mean there are.There are a couple interesting moments so well,
of course that's just cinematic timing,right. That felt very dramatic,
But of course if he was ofanother five seconds then they would have all
been done. You know. Anothertime is when our lead terrorist sees Jean

(50:14):
halle Berry on that phone and thenshe's like, oh, I thought it.
I thought I saw, you knowwhatever, the light blinking. I
thought it was ringing. And helets that go way too easily. Yeah.
Wait, like I thought in myhead, like no, no,
no, that's getting investigated, right, but like he and then I watched

(50:36):
it again and I'm like, howis he letting this go so easily?
He kind of shrugs his shoulders andgoes sort of saunters away like after you
like kind of like man Hild's orthe ground I think, or something or
against the wall. But so therewas that. You know. Another interesting
flaw, but again it's nineties moviemaking about our lead terrorist, is that

(50:59):
he as himself Altar, and KurtRussell reveals, you know, in like
that situation room, that that meansrevenge and the fact that he called himself
Altar and that came up totally shiftedpotentially the way that they gaged his motives.

(51:21):
If he had called himself, Idon't know, firebird, anything else
or just some fireblazer, right,they would have been like, oh shit,
like he's a terrorist, he wantsto you know, he's threatening us.
You know that he's going to dothis horrible thing, and he just
wants this extremest police. But becausehis name is Revenge, you're going to
assume there's a little more to it. I think maybe right, Like,

(51:45):
but yeah, it's very cinematic.It's very even though they didn't do it
in the movie, it's very truelies. It's like calling themselves the Crimson
Gihad without calling themselves the Crimson Gihad, which is the true lies. Bad
guys root And I guess what whatCameron did was Cameron went full Looney Tunes

(52:06):
with the villains, with the waythey were set up. I think he
went full bonkers. Best this onestays more grounded, But then I guess
it shows that that keep forgetting hisname Hassan is the extreme. He didn't
tell his men what they were doingoverall, but how they get the bomb
on the plane like we're hand waving, Yeah, you're right. Although although

(52:30):
again, like one eight second scenecould have showed us this, Yeah,
because so many movies have that.I mean, if you watch remember Bad
Boys, the entire beginning of BadBoys, it's just them pulling off the
heist, but you see them doit and like playing in that cool.
Yeah, I guess they could havedone. And also John leg was Amos
and die Hard too as well,So yeah, die Hard too solid playing

(52:52):
movie Leg was Amo totally forgot thatthat he was on that. He's the
best Johnny Leggs, so yeah,he's good for plane movies. Yeah,
turbulence we should do. That wouldbe our draft. We'll do nineties plane
movies. Oh shit, So Ishould stop saying things. Yeah no,
I mean you can, but Imean, dude, I mean, look

(53:13):
how they go in waves. Right, you had you had the plane movies
and the bomb diffusing movies of thenineties, lots of those blown away.
Also Speed as it turns out,Arlington Road, Oh my god, Arlington
Road. Yeah that was early twothousands, so the right time zone,
right like they were. The Specialist. Face Off opens with a bomb.

(53:35):
Oh so many bombs and a plane. Oh my god. And even though
it's not about diffusing the bomb,the rock that's yeah, because you know,
I shouldn't call that a bomb though, because they were going to be
loaded into like missiles or something.But that's still you're still dealing with what
like he has to go kill thechips for things that will explode. Oh
my god, I would say that'sbomb maintenance. Is did the specialists have

(53:58):
bombed Broken Arrow? There's a nuclearbomb? Yeah, the nineties and only
two thousands. It loved bombs,It loved plane movies. Swordfish opens with
a bomb. That was a reallycool bomb, ball bearing bomb. That
was a really cool bomb. Althoughalthough there was no bomb diffusing. No,
by the way, it was great. There weren't too many explosions in

(54:20):
Connie Error, which was nice.But so yeah, right, it's just
it's just hit the other parameter.Oh man, yeah, it's um.
But I think what this movie does. I mean the director. I don't
know if you looked at the directorStuart Baird. He he actually went on
to go on. He directed UsMarshals, but then he did Star Trek

(54:40):
Nemesis, and I was reading abouthim. I was doing some research for
this and so he's been nominated fortwo Oscars for editing. But when he
was directing Star Trek Nemesis. Hewas bragging that he had never seen a
Star Trek Nemesis movie or Star Trekin the Next Generation TV show. He's
like, I've never watched that crap. So he goes to direct it.
He makes one of the worst StarWars movies ever. Patrick Stewart just absolutely

(55:01):
despises him for working on it.But he has gone on recently. He
has edited Skyfall, He's edited CasinoRoyale. He also did Maverick, so
he works. He did a tombRaider. I mean, this is the
edge of darkness, Salt forty sevenronin Last Boy Scout. He did Showdown.

(55:22):
He did die Hard too. Oh, he edited die Hard too.
And then he did Showdown in LittleTokyo where Dolph Linger and flips the car
and Brandon Lee tells him that he'sthe biggest penis that he's ever seen on
a man. Thanks, that's thegreat. He also did Lady Hawk,
which I love. But yeah,he edited die Hard too, So I
wonder if this sort of because that'sinteresting. I mean, they're completely different

(55:46):
movies. I don't know. Ijust think it's interesting. But I just
think it's And also the writers didof this movie. Did Predator? Oh
solved in writing this? So thiswas Shane Black, Jim to Jim Thomas.
Oh, Shane Black. Yeah,this was Jim Thomas, the two
Thomases. And so they wrote thescreenplay for Predator, and then I'm sure

(56:09):
it changed a lot. But thenthey also wrote Predator two as well,
and then they went on to doExecutive Decision, Wild Wild West, mission
to Mars behind enemy lines, andthen let's see, that was about it.
But we've covered all these films sofar. Predator. Maybe they're just

(56:30):
tired of really burly men and theywanted to put the opposite of that on
a plane and kill off the Siagal, which makes me laugh. But no,
man, I have nothing but fondmemories of watching this movie, and
because I just think when you lookat nineteen ninety six action films, it
is different from I mean, ithas the stock villains, of course,
but I just I guess I likethat there's three fish out of waters in

(56:51):
it. It's it's not the traditionalone. I mean, this was a
year with Broken Arrow, which thatmovie man had so much slack. Also,
all Travlta does that movie smoked cigarettesand strutt you have a racer who
he's just he's killing alligators and callinghim pluggage. We had Independence Day,
we had the Rock, we hadDaylight. So this, you know,

(57:13):
and this was still you know,what's interesting about this one is this was
sort of like you had You hadSchwarzenegger, you had Stallone, you had
the big names making movies, butthey didn't really do as well. But
then you had Mission Impossible or thequestion do well with you on Claude van
dam So, like the major namesdidn't have the biggest films, but then

(57:36):
you had Tom Cruise becoming an actionhero. You had Will Smith, Jeff
Goldbloom stepping up. You had NickCage getting ready to make a run.
So this is kind of almost likea hand in the So ninety four kicked
the door open a little bit.But I think this movie, am I
am I making sense to you?Like this was a it was just a
change in the way that we handledour action movie trokes. Yeah, or

(57:57):
expectations, right, I guess itwas just refreshing for me. And you
know, I remember watching Twister andjust liking the Twister team that drives around
eating steaks at places I really enjoyed, you know, food sustenance, like,
ah, you know, I enjoyedExecutive Decision, how you have the
Fish out of Water. I enjoyedhow Tom cruise in Mission Impossible. There's
an entire scene of him just hangingfrom a wire, and that's where the

(58:22):
tension came from. I think thismovie was pretty good on tension and different
kinds of action. I don't know. Also, Last Man Standing came out,
so that didn't do too well.So yeah, the big hitters not
doing too great, and then youhad kind of a new group and also
Fled. This is when they triedto push Stephen Baldwin as an action hero.
You had Bulletproof with Adam Sandler andDamon Wayne's so we had Bulletproof and

(58:44):
Fled in ninety six and then youold Glimmerman two. So then yeah,
so like, you know, what'sinteresting, the eighties heroes were kind of
fading, but then and then alsoJean claud Vandam had maximum Risk, so
they had that, but then anew group was coming up. It's in
this So I think that's why Iliked Executive Decision. It just felt a
little more sensitive, It felt moretension driven. It had a couple of

(59:08):
good surprises to it. Yeah,I mean that's I guess that's my final
thought on executive decision. What elseis there to cover in this film?
Do we have anything? You know? It's interesting though he does keep calling
Hollyberry just Jean, a stupid woman, so maybe he's just yeah, and

(59:28):
so he just keeps going like,hey, you're a stupid woman. So
maybe he didn't take her seriously.But you're right, he does look at
the phone and go, h Imean, this is after she hit the
flight logs. If if you Iwould have taken her up the first class
or something and just had her situp there away from like I wouldn't have
her help because I'm like, she'sthrifty, she's trouble. I don't know.
I don't think I would have kepther around on that What do you

(59:50):
think the hockey game is going tobe like? Between Kurt Russell and Holly
Berry? The hockey Game? Oh, I loved it. Oh my god.
When he was at that that thatbank in the beginning of the movie
and he tried to pick up awoman with hockey tickets, that guy,
in a way, there's a lotof boldness, but that's not good game.

(01:00:12):
Do you like hockey. I'll takeyou to a hockey game. He
pulls out there, but he literallypulled out the tickets. That strikes me
as crass. I'm gonna start doingthat. I'm just gonna wait. No,
no, because because because any womanwho loves hockey and thinks that he
looks charming and knows that they're atthis banquet, that you know, he's
probably some wall to do something.Even if a one was like, oh

(01:00:34):
my god, I love hockey.I have these two great tickets, she's
like, oh my god, yesthat was how they met. Well,
now they're gonna get a drink,and at some point she's gonna think to
herself, wait a minute, heshowed up here with those tickets and he
doesn't even know me. How manywomen did he ask about this before he
talked to me? This guy isa putts. And I'm not saying that

(01:01:00):
in this movie. Kurt Russell's characteris a putts. But that scene when
you break it down because we don'twe don't necessarily know like he just he
just walked up to the first attractivehim and he saw, do you like
hockey? Has he used this trickbefore? I want to see the scene
where she just goes around the partyasking women, if that you see that

(01:01:21):
guy? Did you have to goto a hockey game? Like I would
like to know how many people hehad asked beforehand do some detective work?
Well, you know, you're like, you're she goes to she does the
typical scene in a movie where shegoes to the bathroom and she's like touching
up her lipstick. For some reason, that always happens in movies. I
don't know why that's happening if you'renot, I don't know, aggressively kissing
someone. But I don't wear makeup, so I don't know. But either
way, you're doing that, andyou're talking to like a stranger next to

(01:01:44):
you casually about something that just happened, right, who's also like touching up
their makeup or something, because inmovies, that's all women do in front
of the bathroom mirror, right,I'm just saying, And she's like,
oh my gosh, someone totally askedme that like ten minutes go. But
I was there with my husband.He's like, oh my gosh, that's

(01:02:05):
so weird. What do you looklike like? Double O seven? Right?
He said he worked for the BeckleyInstitute. That's bold. You're right,
that's a bold move. That's areally bold move. Like, I
sorry, I feel like you're gonnabe made out as being shallow or a

(01:02:25):
puts or something unless the person thatyou went over is even more shallow.
It's interesting they wanted to create himas like a player, but then also
later on he's useless without his glasses. It's it's like he's kind of James
Bondian. But then I wonder ifthat was a Russell edition, I would

(01:02:46):
have liked it. Web. Yeah, this summer Travis Austin is the Debonair
dream also too. I like hisHan solo moment where he has the vest
on and then the white shirt.It looked like he was trying to recreate
a little bit of of Han Solomagic. I don't know if you got
that vibe. You know, Idon't remember that. It didn't pop out

(01:03:07):
to me. I guess yeah.I was watching this. I'm like,
because I know he tried out forHan Solo, so I just kept thinking,
I wonder if this is in herebecause he wanted to do this.
I don't know. That's kind ofrough, and he's like thinking back,
it's like, yeah, they didn'ttake me. It's like, what actor
did they take? Who was anactor? Who was some dude like,
you know, hammering some planks,some carpenter in the background. Yeah,

(01:03:28):
one of the guys back, Yeah, one of the dudes working on one
of the dudes building the set.They were like, bow, we need
somebody. You got it. KurtRussell wasn't good enough. He looks rakish,
will take him right, and alsotoo, I mean, I love
that Morse is there, like,but no one knows the worse anymore except
for Navy pilots. So it's it'sbut still it's good. It's well explained.

(01:03:49):
I think the script does try toadd things, and yes, the
villains are wildly stock, but Ido think I don't want to give him
points or trying. Remember they saythe bombmaker's family is killed in Gulf War,
so at least they're not just sayingthat he's a downright evil guy.
But I guess you could have justleft religion out of it and just said

(01:04:09):
that they were like a terrorist organizationwho just like terror. It was just
it was the style of the time. Yeah, it was the nineties.
But I do like that they wouldthrow in dials. But yeah, his
family was killed, but now he'sa bomb maker, so it's just an
interesting I guess overall, it's justa fun experience. You have three fish
out of water. It's not overlyviolent, but it still gets by on

(01:04:31):
being very stressful. And I thinkit it does a good job just creating
tension out of hanging from wires.It does a good job of creating tension
of when he burns those those cables, that covering over those cables, I
get tense. So I think itdoes a really good job of just creating

(01:04:53):
tension in non violent scenarios. AndI think I applaud that for that.
It's something different. Oh yeah,I think that's part of the magic of
having like three people who aren't trainedoperatives in the in the hero line.
I don't think. I can't thinkof too many other movies that have three
fish out of water because now,like just picking up that phone when he's

(01:05:14):
like, no, she'll pick itup. I know it. You know,
the phone's blanking, Like we createdtension of halle Berry answering the phone.
Yeah, no, you're right.And then also, who's gonna come
up on her? You know,somebody is they could have looked out for
a little bit more. Maybe,I don't know. Whatever, it was
a big plane, didn't have alot of guys though. That is a

(01:05:34):
seven forty seven. That thing ishere, and I love that he lands
it. I love that in thebeginning he's flying. At the end he
lands it. It's and I dolike the final line where was like,
yeah, they kind of line theyland themselves. That's I don't know.
And then he's gonna take her.He's gonna go to the Pentagon to get
coffee. But who's gonna drive herback to our place? Dude, He's

(01:05:55):
gonna fly her there. I'll seemovies like this, like if that was
a line, who's going to takeyou back to my place? It's like
never, You're at my place forever. Now, that seems to be the
implication at the end of these movies. We're gonna be together forever because we
just met, and then right andand then and then it turns out that,

(01:06:16):
like you know, she's a veganand he's a steak fanatic, and
it's just not gonna work. Ohmy gosh. Yeah, he likes hockey.
I like baseball. Because she wasa David Justice at the time.
So then they had her say thatit makes me happy. So she had
to get that work. She hadto get that baseball line in there,
which I still think is funny.But hey, you want to do a

(01:06:40):
plane based action film. This isa draft now, Okay, Like dude,
were we just doing like three?No? Five? Five? I
don't even even think I would gothink of five because I feel, yeah,
we can do it. There's somany it'll be fun. I'll let
you a first pick. I getfirst pick. Yeah for my plane movies,
Passenger fifty seven? WHOA all right? So you didn't take con Air,

(01:07:03):
so I will not go for thatfirst. You can take it.
Can I take hot shots? Iknew what I was doing. Can I
take hot shots? You can takehot shots. But we're doing wait action
movies. We're doing plane action movies, plane not jet, right, we
can do jet. You can dojet, broken arrow, broken arrow counts.
Okay. I feel like we're broadeningit really big here. Okay,

(01:07:25):
flying because they're pilots and then theyhave that plane, which but we're going
more than commercial plane. We're goingwe're going fighter jets and stuff too.
Oh you want to do commercial plants? I thought you meant commercial plane.
That's what I thought you meant.But that's okay. I'm still happy with
my pick passenger. Okay, howabout this, that's a great point.

(01:07:45):
Okay, let's I don't think wecould do more than That's why I thought
three all right, No, no, all planes all I'm open for all
planes. We can do. Okay, let's do Let's do all planes and
rold to the movie though the planeshave to be into rol through the movie.
Yes, not just like one,one or two scenes exactly. Okay,
all right, right, so Igot pastor fifty seven? Who are
you picking? WHOA? Would youkill me if I did Die Hard too?

(01:08:08):
You do it? All right?I'm doing top gun. Oh was
that nine eighty six? I think? Oh? I thought we were doing
nineties. Oh we're just doing nineties. Okay, wait, back up,
back up, okay, just nineties. Okay. So what was your die
Hard too? You didn't take connAir? Nope, you can go for
it. Let me think about it. Well no, no, no,

(01:08:30):
I'm not letting you. I'm notletting you fool me into that trap.
I'm gonna think I want I wantyou know what? Okay? Okay,
because there's a great line, getoff my plane. Yeah, take an
air Force one. I want HarrisonFord. I'll love it, all right,
air Force one. I'm gonna takedrop Zone, so you have drop

(01:08:56):
Zone and die Hard too. Okay, all right, all right, commercial
planes in the nineties, this isokay. Well, now we're down to
like now we're down to the wire. Now I gotta think, like,
do I want con error or isthere a better choice? I enjoyed turbulence.
I don't really think it has atop pick though, not that we

(01:09:18):
have a lot of movies to goon. This is tough, dude.
This okay. Oh no, no, no, that doesn't count. That
doesn't count once I add the twothousands in here as well. No,
no, no, no, it'stoo late. Red Eye, oh in

(01:09:39):
Final Destination. Well, to befairer. Two thousand is the tenth year
of the decade before it. Yeah, people people misjudge that. They think
it's like ninety to ninety nine,but the decade is actually ninety one to
two thousand, because there's no suchthing as year zero. True, Okay,
I think it's just easier to write. I have to do it.

(01:10:00):
I'm gonna do oh oh, no, Flight of the Phoenix Flight of the
Phoenix, Right, that was inthe nineties, right, like ninety seven?
Who's in? Is that the Quaidone? Yeah? Quaid and Tyrese
and Giovanni Ribisi. Oh yeah,I think that's two thousand and three.
Is it really? You have it? Oh? Wait if it's just doesn't

(01:10:23):
matter, it's fun. We're getting. Can I take Red Eye? Then?
Yeah? I'll give you Red Eye? So we're both avoiding Conner out
of principle. Yeah, I guess, so you can take it. No,
No, I like that. Ilike you taking Red Eye. That's
cool. So I'll take my Flightof the Phoenix for your for your Red
Eye. Those are our ringers.Those are our early two thousands ringers.

(01:10:44):
Okay, And people are going tovote on this, right, yep.
I'll be really curious about people.Hell, people vote on this. We
both have we both have a WesseleyStipes movie. Well it's beautiful, and
so you know what it is.We both have big hitters Diehard two and
Air Force one. Then we gotthe Wesley Snipes and then we got Flight

(01:11:05):
the Phoenix in Red Eye. Whatare you thinking when you picked drops?
I'm not changing my pick. I'mjust saying so don't tell me I can
go back. I'm not gonna goback if you turn velocity. No.
No, when you picked drop zone, I should have cued in on point
break. Oh there's so much playingaction in that. That was a big
missed opportunity for both of us.But but we're sticking. No, we're

(01:11:26):
sticking with this. Do you wantdo you want point break? You and
I'll take what's con air? No, that's no, because we're they're gonna
shufle. We're gonna shuffle between ourpicks. Our picks were strategically picked back
and forth. We need to stickwith it. We're just letting the viewers
know that now we acknowledge that theywere out there. Yeah, so you
can go to movie stones and flicksand you can vote for John's team or
my team. It doesn't matter.I've lost so many of these things.

(01:11:48):
Do you not worry about voting againstme? I just have fun putting these
teams together. And I just likethe you know, I just like picking
is a lot more fun than seeingwho wins. Yeah, what's you know
what's interesting? I don't really I'velost so many times, but I just
think it's fun, getting engagement,getting people to think about it. I'm
not really the most competitive person,so I just like putting putting these up

(01:12:10):
there and kind of getting people thinking, so, yeah, I love these
lists. People are gonna look athim and go, what happened here,
Alex seeing people's reactions to them,Yeah, it's gonna be good, and
I keep it nice on MF.So if there's ever a negative comment,
I just ask people not to dothat, because you know people are going
other way to put teams on here, so people shouldn't be responding negatively to

(01:12:31):
them. You should be like,you know, I'd never understand looking at
a list and going like your moviesuck? Should people do that? Terrible?
So I know a guy who's like, here, here are my favorite
movies of twenty twenty one, andsome guy goes eight should be higher.
I'll come back later with thoughts.I read that and this wasn't me,

(01:12:51):
this was somebody else and someone elsecommenting, and if someone wrote that about
mine, I'm like, no,don't, I'll come back later with thoughts.
I'm like, we're different people.I am not you. And also
these are our favorite, not thebest. I don't even know how you
come up with best, but yeah, I don't. I don't like going
after people. You know what's interesting, John, Statistically, if your list

(01:13:13):
is similar to someone else's list,that's an anomaly because if there's five hundred
movies released in a year, twohundred that could be put on your top
ten list because the other two hundredof garbage. For you to have maybe
the same four movies in the topfive, that's an anomaly. So you
should applaud having three of the samemovies in a top ten, not just
eight should be higher. I'll comeback with thoughts. I'll come back.

(01:13:36):
It's they'll come back with thoughts thatReally that's like a dagger twist. Are
you gonna go punch dance in awarehouse? Like? What are you gonna
do? That's just letting you knowthe like the level of disapproval. Because
if you say, oh Man,eight should be higher, if you just
said that, even without tone,oh Man, eight should be higher,

(01:14:00):
that's just telling readers that they reallylove your number eight, and they that's
one of their high picks. Butwhen you say eight should be higher,
I'll come back later with thoughts.That's like when a professor paints your essay
red and you're lucky that you didn'tfail the semester. It comes see me

(01:14:21):
into office hours, right, Ohno, oh no, it's horrible.
You know what I would do.I'd be like, hey, if they're
eight, was my three? Yes, you put number eight on there.
I was like, that's awesome.I had at number three. It's so
good, Like I wouldn't. Doesthat make sense? Right? Well,
I mean you know it's usually there'sa reason. Right, it's like,
oh my gosh, my number eightwould be like number one or two because

(01:14:45):
I love the Rock or Dwain Johnsonthe Rock or Nicholas Cages the Rock,
but whatever the case, Like,oh my god, I love that for
this reason, that would have beenmy number one. M Yeah, just
a well nice thought out lists.Someone saw my lists and and they're like,
Spider Man, No Way Home isbetter than all those movies. I'm

(01:15:08):
like, oh, so you watchedall ten of my top ten and I
didn't see any of them. Okay, that's stupid. If someone did that,
No, it really happened, andlike yeah, but they're like they're
like it's pretentious. So I'm like, I have I have malignant at number
two, Like this isn't Barbon Starsnumber one in Malignant number two. This
is not pretentious, isn't Isn't itpretentious to say that you know which one

(01:15:29):
is the best if you haven't seenall of them. Yeah, it's comments
like those that just it does makeit tough, but it's but I enjoyed.
So what I try to be reallynice. I'm like, oh,
so you watch the other ten.That's cool, Like I'm glad you watched
them. No, I haven't seenthem. I just know just no.
Oh John, Well, hey,thank you for joining me. John.

(01:15:49):
And where can people find you?Oh? You know if they just type
John's horror corner, They're gonna findme all over the place. They're gonna
find me on movies, films andflex and they're gonna find me on Twitter.
They're gonna find me on Instagram.And they're gonna find you right behind
him, behind you, because he'severywhere people in who knew about you?

(01:16:11):
The telemarketer, not telemarketer, thehelp desk. Oh my god, I
don't even remember who I was calling. It was like I was calling my
credit card company or like my electriccompany or something like that. And when
I gave them my email. Thisis like a year or so ago.
I gave my email and soon said, oh my god, John's Horror Corner
and they they knew the column onmovies, films and flix. I love

(01:16:33):
it. That makes me happy.That was so random. The two was
no, I remember what it was. I was calling with a complaint because
some of my Amazon Prime stuff didnot did not appear in the prime time
frame. And the person who fieldedmy call knew John's Horror Corner. That

(01:16:53):
was there. Love it. It'sa small world. It's beautiful than she
was. She had an Indian accentand she was from Texas well. She
lived in Texas. Worldwide fan basein the States. Now you got you
have you have fans overseas. Texasis like a different country kind of too.
Yeah, you're right, I've lived. They want out account. Yeah,

(01:17:14):
who you were there for a while. You were in the start of
the podcast there, it's right.But well, hey, thank you for
joining me. John a right man. All right, So from me Mark
half Byron for John lovegood. Thisis the movie something Fleix. We'll see
you next week. So that wasMark and John talking about executive decision.
Now you can hear John. Itwas a regular guest. If you can
hear him. I think every twentyfive episodes on the Movie of podcast,

(01:17:34):
Mark has him on to talk aboutDrink Russell film. It's sort of one
of these episodes. What this episodewas one of those you can find remember
there. He also writes John's HorrorCorner over a movie Films of Fleix,
which is also where you can findwhat if Mark's plugs everything he does over
there. You can find me overon Life as a Film Lot. Coming
once a month on mcast, Isink a Movie Trivia Hampy and you can

(01:17:56):
hear Mark and I everyone see thepodcast talking about deephs films. Our most
recent episode. This week's episode ison Shotgun Wedding. I was Shotgun Wedding
similar to DBC. Listen to findout that. As for decision that I've
been ja Clu, was Mark offmine, John Leavingood come back next week
or the Bunny gets it? SA Nara