The Breakdown of Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes,The Fall Guy, Unfrosted, Scoop, and Woody Woodpecker Goes to Camp

Christopher and Scott have been in hiding for a few months, but we've got five movie reviews for you this weekend. We review two big summer tentpoles in 'Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes' and 'The Fally Guy'. We also look at some streaming offerings in 'Sccop', 'Woody Woodpecker Goes to Camp' and 'Unfrosted'. 

Episode Transcript

(00:12):
They're coming to get you, Barbara. They're coming for you, Barbara.
Look that comes one of them.Now, welcome to the latest episode of
the Movie Breakdown. And this isgoing to be a little bit different than

(00:36):
your typical episode of the Movie Breakdown. As I warned you in our previous
episode, this is gonna be acut in pace job. As I have
not been hiding, I have beenan emotional mess this year, and that
has meant that even though we've recordedsome episodes, I've never got around to

(00:56):
the energy of editing them and posting. And so here we are where you've
not got weekly podcasts. The sitehas not had weekly movie reviews, but
we've got over that many times.But we're trying to catch up. We're
trying to make good. We're tryingto make this the summer of movie reviews,
the summer of the Movie Breakdown,the summer that beyond the balcony Rocks.

(01:19):
And how we're going to do thatis try to get some of these
episodes posted, or at least partsof them. And so today we have
several movie reviews over the last fewmonths that have never been heard by you
wonderful listeners. And so I'm goingto be taking two episodes and doing a
little bit of a review from thisepisode or review from this episode, and

(01:40):
so you will be hearing from me, Christopher Spicer, and you will be
hearing from Scott Martin this sort ofcollection of movie reviews that will include some
great releases that we just have notbeen discussed yet, including the Ryan Gosling
and Emily Blunt Starry action romantic comedyThe Fall Guy. We've also got the

(02:04):
big ape blockbuster in the Kingdom ofthe Plant of the Apes, and we'll
be discussing so much more as well. So, like I said, I'm
Christopher Spicer, enjoy this podcast withme and the wonderful Scott Martin. Summer
movies this season and that is Kingdomof the Planet of the Apes. And

(02:28):
I've always been a big Plan ofthe Apes fan. I watched the original
movie very young as a kid becausemy dad was a big fan of it,
and I saw the whole series ofthem, and then I remember watching
the Planet of the Apes TV seriesand then they did the reboots. The
latest trilogy that came together, Riseof the Planet Apes was one that we

(02:52):
saw before we were podcasting, andthen we of course reviewed a Doll of
the Planet Apes and Wore the Planetof the Apes, and I was a
big fan of that trilogy. Ithought it got progressively better with each one,
and I thought it was a greatstory of sort of the rise of
Caesar and the fallen Man and theirhubris to how outdid them, and how

(03:13):
Caesar was attempted to unite the Apes, and sort of the friction they had
to go through, and Caesar becomingsort of this deity type figure, but
him being but him himself, sortof having his own personal challenges he had
to go through. I thought itwas a great trilogy. I thought it

(03:34):
ended in a great way. Ididn't think there's really any reason to return
to it. But here we arein with Kingdom of the Plan of the
Apes, and it's pretty clear afterwatching this movie that they're planning on doing
I guess what you call a sequeltrilogy. This looks like they are gearing
up to do a whole new setof trilogies. And you can consider me

(03:58):
all in because I loved this one. I thought this was a fantastic picture.
And what we have here is atthe very beginning of the picture you
sort of see Caesar again and yousee where kind of spoiler for those who
haven't seen the trilogy, Caesar hasnow passed away. And but it's this
idea that the Apes are now united, they now rule the earth, and

(04:23):
that's how the picture starts. Andthen we go many decades later, many
generations ahead. So Caesar now islong passed away. Apes are very much
now in control of the earth.Humans now are considered sort of second class.
They are these animals that don't evenreally speak anymore type thing. And

(04:46):
so that's we're at this stage.And what I thought was fascinating about this
picture and what it sort of looksat modern society, is you have someone
like Caesar. He's now sort ofthis Jesus Christ like figure, right,
He's this he is this almost religioustype figure because he's the one who led
the apes to prosperity. He's ledthe Apes to be these these great the

(05:11):
rulers of the Earth type thing.But what's fascinating here is how his name
and his kind of teachings have beendistorted and what Caesar was attempted to do
he failed in the end, becausewe now have Ape factions. The Apes
are all separated, they're not united, anymore. There's different groups. There's

(05:31):
an Ape group we learned about thatis more set on nature and they are
connected with the eagles, and theygo through this ritual where you have to
get an eagle egg and bring itback to the tribe and then that become
sort of a higher member within thegroup. And then you have a more

(05:51):
warlike tribe, and the Eagle groupthey don't even know Caesar, like our
main character, he's not even aair of Caesar's teachings. They've gone that
kind of far away. And thenthere's other warlike group. They use Caesar's
name a lot, but they useit as a way to sort of justify
their domination of the other Apes,and they've distorted what Caesar was trying to

(06:15):
see. And then we eventually findanother character, a regn tain Raka who
he sort of is kind of likea monk like character that idea that he's
keeping the teachings of Caesar's sacred andhe knows that Caesar was going for peace
and he wanted things being united,and he's aware that things aren't the way

(06:35):
that they should be. And soI think it's a really the great thing
about the Ape movies. Beau iseven though it's apes that are up there,
it has always been talking about oursociety. It's always been talking about
things like religion and science and dogmaand the idea of how we distort values

(06:56):
to push certain agendas, and Ithought this pick did a great job of
exploring those ideas. And I reallythought it was fascinated how they used Caesar's
this figure that everyone kind of interpretsit different. Caesar said, his things
they are set, but people interpretedthem differently, they distorted them, and
I like seeing kind of We neverreally saw this in the original original eight

(07:18):
movies, where there was different eightetribes baaling against each other, and so
I thought that part of the variousclans was really cool. Here. Our
lead character is from the sort ofthat eagle tribe I was talking about.
His name is Noah and he isacted by Owen Taigu, and he's sort

(07:40):
of a chimpanzee hunter, and earlyon in the picture he gets separated from
his family when the other sort ofgroup I was talking about the apes that
we are led by Proximus Caesar,who is played by Kevin Durant. His
clent of apes basically just Troy murderhis village, capture his mother, capture

(08:03):
his friends, and so Noah nowis on his own to try to save
them, and along the way hecomes across a human something he's never seen
before. This human is played byFreya Allen and she is Nova, and
just because that's what they give everyhuman character is Nova. She eventually gets

(08:24):
another name too, but she startsas sort of Nova, and he goes
on this journey with her, meetsRaka and they are trying to sort of
get to that land to protect,to sort of rescue his He s trying
to rescue his tribe's been taken,but at the same time he's also trying
to protect Noah. Raka says Noahis a more intelligent human. There's something

(08:46):
about her. What we've been taughtabout humans aren't totally true. They may
be smarter than we think. Youneed to protect no Nova. And Nova
also has a secret, which alsoI'm not going to spoil in a review.
You have to watch the movie tofind out the different things she has.
But I think the reveals here arefairly satisfying the direction that they go.

(09:07):
William H. Macy plays a humancharacter who is very intriguing and ends
up being very different sort of theNova character. I like the like I
said, the ideas are exploring here, but it never it becomes didactic.
This is big blockbuster filmmaking. Ilike me and Scott have ranted about CGI

(09:28):
for years, and I've also talkedabout the fact that a lot of the
CGI I think comes from the factthat studios are overworking the CGI people.
They're rushing them, and so Iam never going to criticize the CGI artists
the special effects artists. To me, it's always going to be the pressure
above that they're not giving them thetime, or sometimes they're trying to work

(09:50):
on the CGI while the scripts arestill being written and that type of stuff,
or using CGI when you didn't needit. I think here the special
effects are absolute the amazing. Thereis so many movies where you could tell
what a big creature is CGI.The apes here are believable. They're all
CGI, obviously it's in the motioncapture suits and just incredible. The facials,

(10:15):
the visuals, the emotions that comeoff every single one of these apes.
These apes are believable, and theactors bring life to them through the
voice work they're doing here I'm suretheir facials probably help with the CGI type
stuff as well. It is justso enthralling watching the work. But all
the same time, the set designshere are great. I'm not sure what

(10:37):
stuff was on location and what stuffwas done in a studio. Also,
some of it was very much forsure done in a studio. And this
is kind of that Jungle Book levelstuff we talked about a few years ago
with that Disney remake. This allthe Jungles look real. You get to
what's really cool on their travels isyou get to see former human civilization,

(11:00):
former big cities that because it's nowbeen like generations since they actually existed.
You get to see the moss andthe overgrowth, and you get to see
something that just looks like sort ofa grassy mountain. You realize, oh,
that's like a skyscraper and all thatstuff. I just it was fascinated

(11:20):
to watch. I mean to me, dude, is still the best movie
of the year for soaking up visuals. But this challenge is it it's really
close. There is some great visualdesign here, great imagination, and I
just it kept be enthralled all theway through because there was great visual stuff
here and as well. The actionsequences are intense and well done. The

(11:43):
cameraman's not joining in jumping all overthe place. It's not the shaky cam
stuff. My old eyes could follow. The action. It's intense. There's
some creative stuff that they do insome of those fight sequences. They build
to a big, intense finale,which is except and as I said before,
there's some fun twists here. You'vegot great performances. Freya Allen as

(12:05):
Nova does a great job as sortof this human that doesn't initially trace trust
the apes, but eventually realizes thatshe has to and this idea that she
slowly becomes more confident. And KevinDurant is great as sort of our villain
here. Peter mccon is very funnyas Raka. He's sort of like an

(12:28):
obi Wan character but also a Yoda, so there's some humor in his character
as well, and so he's fantastic. Across the board, you've got people
who really bring emotion and they knowthe times where you've got to sort of
be over the top, but thetimes where you really want to have those
grounded moments as well, sort ofa post credit scene here. There is

(12:52):
definitely some big hints towards sequels.Like I said in Trilogy and I'm all
in. I thought this was afascinating world. This was a fantastic tent
pole. It's not the best ofthe year, because again Doom still stands
as my favorite kind of big eventmovie of the year. But this was

(13:13):
really close, very sassfying, andI'm totally excited to get back to the
play of the Apes again and watchsome more. This is three and a
half stars and unfrosted. This isa Netflix show or Netflix movie. This
is written and directed by Jerry Seinfeld. I have a feeling you're gonna hate
me on this one, Chris,I have a feeling you're you're gonna hate

(13:35):
me. I liked this film.Why did I like it? Okay,
here's the thing. So it's silly. This is a very very silly movie
and it is absolutely ridiculous, butI accept that. I accept the premise
because what the movie starts off withis this little kid, George played by

(13:56):
Isaiah gonna run away and he goesin to a diner, sits at the
counter, and asks for pop tarts. The guy beside him, an adult,
Bob Cabana played by Jerry Seinfeld seesthis kid, sees that he's gonna
run away, and then decides totell him a story. The kids got
pop Tarts in his hand, andso he decides to tell him. I'm

(14:16):
gonna tell him the story about howpop tarts create were created. And as
someone who loves to tell stories,if if I see someone pick something up,
I'm always like and I need tokill time. Yeah, do you
know about this? And then youjust go into a story based off of
what the person has or anything likethat. So I completely buy the premise.
I buy all the silliness, allthe rigamarole, as this is what

(14:41):
a guy is telling a kid who'sgonna run or who's thinking of running away,
and he's just keeping the kid entertained, keeping the kid. Is this
move perfect? No? No,no, no no. There's a lot
of stuff in this film that maybedoesn't hit as well. This is the
story of Kellogg's versus Post I kindof feel that you need to get a

(15:03):
lot of the jokes. You needto have an understanding of the Kellogg's and
Post Cereal brands and the mascots thatthey had. Otherwise I think a lot
of this could just be could bemissed. I'm not saying that this is
deep clever intellectual jokes, but Iwill say that I did laugh out loud
at times, Like there's a funeraland the way the funeral proceeded someone in

(15:28):
the you know, dying in thecereal industry. I accepted how the funeral
went, and someone cutting up bananas, slicing bananas over the grave, I
thought was fun. I like theidea that this chase for a something in

(15:52):
cere for breakfast, the Kelloggs andpost going for this pastry, and how
that the milkman would be just thismafia of milkman are against it because milk
was just did you know that milkwas something that was just harmlessly squirted at
each other with like playful fun gleeuntil someone squirted it into a bowl of
cereal and it became like a purposefulbeverage. There's a lot of silliness here,

(16:21):
but I like how it went.I liked how the there's a lot
of cameos. I like how theyplay their characters. Bill Burr as JFK.
I enjoyed it intellectually. Is thereanything curious about this film? No?
No, it is silly humor.I understand it's got a Rotten Tomato

(16:45):
score of like forty seven percent.I completely understand why it would have that.
However, I think I was charmedby its silliness. I accepted it
as I liked the fact that there'sthis almost like a space race between Kellogg's
and Post to crack this milkless breakfastproduct. I love the idea of naming

(17:12):
it, and how off some ofthe names were, like the Dextros,
Dillies I and and Walter Cronkite.Gotta say I loved Walter Crankite in this.
I thought he was He was afun character. If you're looking for

(17:32):
a story that will suck you in, if that's the kind of movie you
need, Unfrosted is not for you. This is not a narrative driven story.
If you're looking for something like threeand my three star rating comes from
It's a rainy Sunday afternoon. Life'sgot some stresses you need to evaporate.

(17:53):
But just remember tricks are for kids, not adults. So ah, I
made a serial joke. You didn'teven respond. You goof Chris sell my
jokes, Thank you, thank you. The Cuban missile crisis, it turns
out it was actually about sugar,and it was about nuclear weapons. There's

(18:17):
aspects in here that I think wereactually kind of fun. So I give
it three stars. I'm ready tobe just completely trotted on by Chris over
this one. But remember there's anasterisk beside this three stars. So if
it is a rainy Sunday afternoon andyou are on the dumps and you're sad,

(18:41):
and you decide to put on onfrosted and watch it, what you're
then gonna do is take out yourtoaster, put in your pop tarts,
and then stick in your knife aswell, so that you can really just
make the day but worse. Uh, you are correct, My good Fred,
we completely he saw a different moviehere. No, okay, we

(19:06):
sound the same movie. I justI watched it properly. I realized this
was just a horrible, horrible,unfunny picture. Oh yes, oh yes,
oh yeah. I think your review, your review, and you're describing
this movie was way more hilarious thananything I saw with execution on the screen.

(19:30):
I think that's the problem is isthis movie stacked? Oh yeah?
Does this movie have funny people?Oh yeah, funny at other movies,
But like am I excited that wegot Bill Burr and Jerry Seinfeld and Melissa
McCarthy and Amy Schumer and Jim Gaffiganand Christian Slater as a milkman and Hugh

(19:52):
Grant. Yeah, bring them allup. This is gonna be terrific.
No, no, no, it'sgonna be painful. And I'm looking for
my toaster. I'm looking for myknife to try to end this thing.
I just thought, I think oneof the problems is Jerry Seinfeld. We
love the Seinfeld series, but evenwhile you're watching Seifeld series, you know
Jerry Seinfeld's not really an actor.That was always obvious. He's a funny

(20:15):
man, but not really an actor. Here he decides to be the star
and the director. And so Iwalked away say, Jerry Seinfeld's not really
an actor, he's not really adirector. Because I thought there was funny
sequences here, but it wasn't directedvery well. It was one of these
things. For me, at least, I was like, this should have

(20:36):
been funny, but the way itwas directed, the way it was paced,
it fell flat. And I thoughtthis movie also never really figured out
what it wanted to be. Didit want to be sort of a humorous
take on a historical event, Likeit does have some facts in here,
like posts did make country squares,that was the real thing, And then

(20:57):
it ended up flopping because names horrible. If hop tarts is a much better
name. Kids don't want to eatcountry squares. They don't want to be
a square, but you sure wantto be a pop tart. But like,
it has those little bits, butit doesn't really have a lot of
historical facts. And then so,oh is it going to be a like
a mel Brooks style over the topparody. And I thought it didn't lean

(21:21):
into that enough. I thought ithad the ideas, but it didn't have
the energy, the pizazz, thetiming, that slapstick that makes a blazing
Saddles or a young Frankenstein pop oran airplane. I just it didn't have
that gig amitt to it. Itfelt very slow and stuck in molasses to

(21:41):
get to each of the numbers.And it did quite really let the actors,
these comedians shine into their to theirskill. And so like you mentioned
these things like the Milkman cabal,that's a funny idea. I just didn't
think it really got explored up.And then like things like the Hugh Grant
character. Those are jokes that havebeen in like so many movies, like

(22:02):
the whole disgruntled guy that actually wantsto be a Shakespearean actor, like that
was a Galaxy Quest, Like I'veseen this so many times that it's like,
what are you gonna do different hereto actually make it funny? So
for me, I was stuck withwhat I thought, but clearly not Scott.
And that's great. I'm always happywhen you're a happy boy. This
is a slog. This is whata half stars sir. Galaxy Quest as

(22:29):
a good film, much better movie, A funny I love like if you're
looking for a really good rainy Sundayafternoon movie, yeah, Galaxy Quest is
one of the best, Like thatis one of the best movies for that
situation. However, Unfrosted's not horrible, Chris, What have you believed that
this is just a terrible, terriblefilm. Yes, I would. I

(22:52):
happen to disagree. I think thatyou bring up some good points about the
directing. I don't think the directing'sact great as far as historical it's this
is this is just a guy makingcrap up to stall a kid and and
so I love the fact that everythingis just so over the top, and
you know, there's just so manyun behind the scenes things that I could

(23:15):
see a quirky storyteller adding to thisstory that we're in this film. That's
that's what I like about it.Yeah, and I get that, but
I feel like the way you're framingit did quite go like how was executed
wasn't as good as how you're framingit. I feel like, because I
feel that there's times where they weretrying to put historical accuracy, and then

(23:37):
when they went over the top,I felt they didn't necessarily go fanciful enough,
or they would do things that likewere supposedly historical accurate, but it's
biopic accurate, and it wasn't quiteeven how things were. So it's like,
well, why did he even botherputting that in? And so I
just thought it was kind of jarring, and the fact that they were trying
to do a bit of like bea little bit of a telling how things

(23:59):
were and that also be silly.I just thought it really jarred the pacing.
It just even how like some characterswere like historically accurate, real characters,
some were fake. It was justit was a weird mismash that for
me just made the story feel veryinconsistent, and I am looking forward to

(24:21):
Jerry Seinfeld maybe going back at thestand up so he never tries to direct
again. Not fanciful enough for you. There is a scene where sea monkeys
are put inside Ravioli. It becomessentient life, and then it's become becomes
a teenager that is fathered by chefboyar D and Harold von Brunnett, and

(24:48):
so not fanciful enough for you,sir, I would like to understand your
thoughts on the teenage Ravioli. Ithink it could have been funnier. I
didn't say it was funny. Ididn't say it was funny. I said
fanciful. Okay, but okay,let me then rephrase execute the faithfulness in

(25:08):
a good way. Ok Okay.That I can understand, because again,
the ideas you keep on Sane arefantastic and they're accurate. I just didn't
think they were executed well all thescreen. But the things you are enjoying,
I totally want to enjoy those twoand agree that I disagree with Chris,

(25:29):
which is always fun. Three starsfrom Scott for Unfrosted and one and
a half from Chris for Unfrosted.I did want to ben to one little
thing that that was funny about Unfrostedis the where they're trying to come up
with the name for it, andthey eventually arrived at pop Tarts. They
initially didn't want to do it becausethey thought the name was too close to

(25:53):
pop art with what Andy Warhol did. Apparently, though historically that's exactly the
reason they picked in a pop tartbecause Andy Warhol is big at the time.
They picked pop Tart because they wantedthat connection to something that was trendy.
So I just thought that's a funendeddose. That's actually why they picked
it in. And if you're thinkingI would always love to see Dan Levy

(26:18):
play Andy Warhol for like five secondson screen, then you got to watch
on Frosted to have that dream cometrue. Knock it off your bucket list.
Way more enjoyable than on frost asfar as I'm concerned, and so
far you count Kingdom Plan of theapes, which I already praised. We

(26:38):
are looking if this is if thisis sort of what is setting the tone
for the summer blockbuster season We're offto a great start. When it comes
to quality. We'll talk about boxoffice later, but when it comes to
quality, we're off to a fantasticstart. Because King to the Planet Ape
was great, but just a weekprior, I saw a movie where I

(27:00):
thought, well, this is goingto be the best summer movie for sure,
and then it kind of got challengedby Kingdom. But that's The Fall
Guy. The Fall Guy delivers everythingthat a summer blockbuster the nineteen eighties used
to deliver, the things that youwere expecting for escapist entertainment, The Fall
Guy delivers it in spades. Thisis just such a fun time at the

(27:26):
movie theater, with sort of thebiggest criticism being it's probably a bit longer
than it should be, so ifyou have any signs of it being kind
of the modern error, everything apparentlyhas to be over two hours now and
this one definitely did not need tobe over two hours, but it is
still an absolute blast. We've gotDavid Lynch here as the director, who

(27:49):
former stuntman who's given us some greatkind of action pictures in the last few
years. He was uncredited when itcame to sort of John Wick, and
there's Deadpool. He's done some otherpictures, a Bullet Train, and now
he's delivering Fall Guy, proving thatif you want action movies, this guy
knows how to do it. Especiallywe want action movies mixed in with comedy,

(28:11):
and now if you also want tomix it into romance, because this
is really a romantic comedy with amazingaction sequences, and you've got yourself a
killer cast in the lead role here, Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, And
I should mention it the Fall Guyis based off a lead, major starring

(28:33):
TV series in the nineteen eighties thatI never watched. But basically the similarities
between those two things is the factthat the lead character is a stuntman.
That's really it. They weren't reallytoo much trying to redo the picture or
redo the TV series. It's notlike a full on adaptation. But I

(28:56):
think the things that people liked aboutFall Guy, if you like the TV
series, I think this will stilldeliver the things that you liked about that
series, you will like in thismovie. But if you've never even heard
about the TV series, you willjust love this movie as an original movie.
I've talked to several people who thoughtthis was at one hundred percent original
movie, not based off anything,And I'm like, well, go for

(29:17):
it. Keep on believing that becauseit really kind of is other they kind
of sharing a name and sharing thatthe lead is a stunt person. But
where it does capture fall guy,Like I said, is this feels like
a nineteen eighties movie. This isthe stuff that we loved about the nineteen
eighties. It's got some fun comedyin here, it's got star power,
it's got leads that are really leadingin on their charisma. It's got fun

(29:41):
action sequences, it's got big eyepoppingstunts, and it has all those things
that we kind of loved about theeighties, that kind of excess type stuff
that went in there with some incrediblyfun performances. Here right gostly to me
has become probably just once. I'vealways loved Nicholas Cage, and so he's

(30:06):
right up there with Nickolas Cage isone of my I think favorite actors now
right Gossling. He's just so charismaticand he can do it all like he
can bring drama, he can bringcomedy, as he proved like Nice Guys
and Barbie, and he's a believableaction star. He apparently he did some
of the stunts in this as well, not all of them. They did

(30:27):
have stunt men, but you buyhim as sort of the hero here,
and he's absolutely fantastic. And thenEmily blunts the same thing, where this
is a lady who is willing tosort of provide humor, but she also
is someone who kind of is abelievable character. And I think the two
when they're on the screen together,you believe it. The romance matters here.

(30:49):
It's not throwaway. You want thesetwo crazy kids to get together.
You love them together. They feelnatural, they feel like they're actually in
a relationship. They've got that banter, and I think all that stuff is
fantastic. And what happens is atthe beginnings of a movie, I don't
really blunt and Ryan Gosling's character.So Colt Seevers and Jody Marino they are

(31:11):
dating and she is she's sort ofpart of the crew. He's the stunt
man, and then a stunt goesbad and then we find out I think
it's eighteen months later that he basicallyhe got in Journey that his career was
done and he has basically stopped hebasically ghosted Jody's character. I believe Blund's

(31:33):
character Jody. He ghosted Jody.He's basically cut things off with the relationship
for eighteen months, though he stillholds a flame for her, he still
loves her. And then he getsa phone call from an agent and basically
says that we needs you to trackdown our lead star. It's played by
Aaron Taylor Johnson Tom Ryder, whodoes an amazing job as an egotistical kind

(32:00):
of blow hard actor, someone whois high on himself, thinks he's great,
thinks he could do his own stunts. Just this crazy actor Eric Tayler
Johnson proves that he can have somechrisma and be a fun character that he
doesn't deserve to be lomped into theyou know, the Charlie Hunham group.
I mean, he was also funand bullet trade too, So he's definitely

(32:21):
showing himself here and he's a lotof fun in this kind of role that
he has. And so Rob Goslinagrees to essentially go in be a stunt
person. They need him to bea stunt person for his upcoming space epic.
But while he's being a stunt person, he's also asking to kind of
track down the lead actor, andthat just so happens. The person who's

(32:44):
directing this big sci fi epic isEmily Blunt, the person that he goes
to eighteen months ago and he stillloves and so the movie is part kind
of noir where he's trying to uncoverand figure out what happened to this actor
well at the same time trying towin back Jody because he still loves her.
And what I love about Ryan Goslingis, unlike some lead stars,

(33:06):
he's not scared of looking vulnerable.He's an action star, but he's not
scared of looking a bit dorky.I mean, there's a scene where he's
crying to a Taylor Swift song becausehe's not sure if he can get Jody
back, and it's funny, butI also like that there is this vulnerability
he shows that he is willing tosay I miss her and I need her
and I really love her. AndI think that's something where often action stars

(33:30):
the girl's just a trophy, butthis is someone who matters to him,
and I think that really added kindof depth and heart to this movie and
made it where you loved when thesetwo were together. The fact that Ryan
Gosly is not scared to look alittle dorky and broken, and so it
makes him a very relatable character.And so then the noir sequences he's invested

(33:53):
game sequences lead to some fun actionsequences. This is also directed by a
guy who used to be a man. You've got some incredible stunt work.
There is one part where you've gotthe car that is rolling that is absolutely
incredible because it's an actual kind ofcar roll. You've got another big jump
that's done here. There is somebig like the end sequence, has some

(34:15):
great stunt work here. At theend of the picture, there is an
end credits scene, but they're alsowhich is really funny and we're staying for
But before that sort of post creditscene, there is a bunch of shots
of how they did the stunts.It's showing sort of the behind the scenes
stuff to really show you that thisis an old school picture with some great

(34:36):
stunt work here. You're you're herefor the action. There is some twisted
turns in this movie, kind ofa mystery, and I thought that was
the weakest part of the movie.I think it's one of those things where
you kind of sort of can figureit out what it kind of builds to.
Maybe isn't as satisfying. There's abit of a oh, that's it,
this is what they're doing. Butit's still okay because again you're with

(35:00):
Colt Seaver, You're with Ry Gosslingfor most of the movie, and he's
really enjoyable and wins the Duke,so we praised on his podcast lots.
He is fantastic as sort of thefriend to Ryan Gosling, and he's got
some great moments that shot. Heoffers some humor but also feels like a
relatable and good friend here. Andso you've got a fantastic cast with some

(35:22):
nice action set pieces sprinkled throughout thispicture with a romance and actually matters.
I mean, if you want tosee kind of one of the best romantic
comedies the last few years, thisis right up there. It's so kind
of like Under the kind of LostCity vein where it's romantic comedy with a
big action in here too. It'sjust it's a really super fun movie.

(35:45):
I give it three and a halfstars. Scoop is a much more interesting,
deliberate film that is a dramatic storybased off of real life events,
and this focuses on the interview thathappened between Prince Andrew and Emily Mateless after

(36:07):
sort of the scandal about Prince Andrew'sfriendship with Jeffrey Epstein became too much and
he needed to do something about thestory because it was completely out of hand.
Of course, the real story thatcame out of this was why did

(36:27):
he do this interview? That wasmore the discussion in real life after the
interview, people were just asking,like, why why did he do this?
Because Prince Andrew did not perform wellduring the interview with Emily Mateless.

(36:49):
The story wasn't the Prince reacts.The story was the Prince did an interview
and here's what happened it. Itturned into one of the most ill conceived
pr maneuvers done by someone in recenthistory. An hour long interview where you

(37:12):
just have this sense of why Ihaven't seen the full interview, I've seen
clips, and boy oh boy,were there news stories a plenty to read
about it after the like after theinterview, the interview was the news story
for weeks. I mean that likeweeks? Am I wrong? Chris?
Oh yeah? It was top headlinestuff. For I would say months,

(37:36):
yeah, this was not a goodmove by Prince Andrew. So the movie
scoop tries to look at the behindthe scenes take on how this interview came
about. We have Billie Piper playingproducer Sam McCallister. She works for Newsnight
Gillian Anderson, who people may recognizefrom a little sci fi that came out

(38:00):
a while ago called The X Files. She plays Emily Maitliss really good performance
there, like really really good.I think Billy Piper was great as well.
I think the acting here is incredible. Rufus sewell as Prince Andrew does
a great job. The thing isoutside of the acting, the movie does

(38:23):
struggle a little bit, I thinkwith its overall look. And this just
comes down to my interpretation of howit was supposed to come across, is
that there's there's someone who works forPrince Andrew. It was Kate Fleetwood's character
correct Chris Yes, Yes, andwith the wither Ridge played by Kate Fleetwood,

(38:45):
and it felt like the movie washer story along with the story of
Sam McAllister. They're both trying totell the story, and it came across
as very very unbalanced. If thatwas the case if that was the take,
that this is two people trying toget the you know, just put

(39:07):
the news out for people to toperceive. It kind of felt in balanced
because the movie is definitely like itdefinitely wants you to make make you think
that Prince Andrew's a boob. It'sgot this one scene in it before the
interview where he's obsessed with his stuffedanimals, and it like, it just

(39:30):
feels like it's already dictating what you'resupposed to think about the character instead of
letting the story, the build up, and the interview inform your decision.
I mean, ultimately, no onewalked away from that interview and thought,
well, he's not a boob.It's just I think I think the movie

(39:51):
would have been better served if thatIf if, like the public, we
the viewer were left to discover forourselves through the interview, and it never
felt like the movie was truly doingthat. I'd say that that for myself

(40:13):
and my interpretation on what it wastrying to be, that would be the
biggest failing of the film. Outsideof that, I mean, we have
to understand that is a of fiction. It is based around a real life
interview that happened, but almost everythinghappened happening here is behind the scenes.
We have to accept that a lotof this is going to be completely fictionalized.

(40:35):
Some of it may be off ofyou know, known fact, but
how people are character development. Ifelt like the character of Sam McAllister was
almost a little cliched for this,for the fact of like, let's let's
have a character with certain aspects ofher life, you know, driving for

(40:58):
this story for success. I didn'tfeel it was necessary. I think that
the story itself that it was tellingwas riveting enough that you didn't need to
dive down that route. But thisis one of those movies that I would
say, don't watch for anything otherthan entertainment. Don't watch this to get

(41:23):
a better understanding of historical fact.You can just watch the interview that happened
between Prince Andrew and Emily Maitliss.That's easy enough to do. Watch this
for entertainment, don't watch it forfact. I give it three stars.
But the main thing is as longas people understand this is not about anything

(41:46):
other than entertainment, I'm a completeagreement with you on this one. This
is not an unfrosted situation. Yougot this one right, Scott. And
the big thing I think here isyou're doing an investigative reporting picture, but

(42:08):
you're putting it up against all thePresident's men and Spotlight. There is these
classic pictures that are able to addin kind of thrills and intrigue, but
also like depth and try to actuallysay something. And so Scoop is a
well done movie. That's why it'sgot three stars, but when you compare

(42:29):
it to those, it's lacking.And I think that's kind of the problem
is when you go into this genre, you really got to realize that this
is a genre that has a lotof weight and a lot of expectations,
and you're going class. It's thesame thing with if you're gonna do a
gangster movie, now realize Good Fellasand Godfather are out there. So if
you're going to try to make thatstyle of a movie, it's gotta be

(42:51):
really good, otherwise go to adifferent direction. And I felt this was
trying to be that all Presidents meantin that Spotlight, it wasn't quite there.
And then another challenge I think,which you sort of alluded to,
is this movie suffers a bit inthe fact that the actual interview is more
interesting than this movie. That's kindof like the Challenge. But all that

(43:15):
said, it is an interesting movie. It is well directed. The guy
who gave us the Forger did awell directed movie here, And I think
you did mention. One other kindof bit of a flaw here is when
you take the time of like letus know about Sam Mcalister's home life,
that gives you the idea and whenyou spend that much time with her that

(43:36):
we are wanting to learn a bitabout these characters, Like, Okay,
this is a movie laying us learna bit about who Emily Maltus is and
who these sort of people who arebehind breaking the news here who they really
are, And it never actually doesit. It's just a little token things,
a little bit of our home lifehere there. And so I think
that also, I think that's whereyou're kind of coming from, was the

(43:59):
idea that if you dare to gothere, then you need to dig a
bit more, you need to giveus something because I don't think I learned
anything about any character here. WhyI liked it though, is I thought
they did a good job of pacingthe picture and in adding a thriller elements
without sort of There wasn't a carchase, there wasn't some eks under cover

(44:22):
cabal. But when you got tothe interview, you felt tension, and
he felt the two sides playing offeach other, and the way that he
did the fast cuts and the waythat he sometimes did a bit of a
slow mo and focusing in on aface and then realizing, wait, the
princes actually said that he doesn't sweat. Oh man, we are in trouble.
Like just those little bits I thoughtreally were effective, And even though

(44:46):
I knew how this thing turned out, in adding a little bit of thrills
and beating the tension, So lotsof credit to the editing team and to
the director here and kind of buildingthat tension. That's what elevated the movie
for me, is they did agreat job. I do agree that I
would have liked a little bit ofbalance between the two where because you did

(45:08):
sense it you're supposed to know abit more about a net he did sense
that you're supposed to know a bitmore of that side, and that felt
like it was only given token stuff. And so if that's what they're gonna
do, they should have devoted moretime to Sam McAllister, so that her
backstory stuff actually meant something. Sosome interesting choices, But I feel like
I'm doing more criticisms for a movieI'm praising, and so I do want

(45:30):
to say, great job with thetension, and like I said, great
performances. Rufus Sirwell was greatest.Prince Andrew. I thought he embodied it.
He was believable. He came offpompous, he came off as a
guy who was completely oblivious, andthe little quirks that he put through just
this guy who you really are rootingagainst. So lots of points for Rufus

(45:52):
Serwell there. Jillian Anderson did areally good job of caturing Emily and that
interviewer. So really good performances.This was a pleasant surprise. I didn't
really know what to expect going inbased off the previous work of the director.
Yeah, that was that was thething. It's when you when you

(46:13):
look at Okay, so who's who'sthe director again? Okay, we we
have talked about his work before,and this this is like night and day
difference. This is coherent storytelling,and we both I think the reason both
of us laid out our criticisms isbecause you're right. This comes from the
line of movies like Spotlight and allthe presidents men. You need to say

(46:37):
like it's good, but it's likeit does it up there? Yeah,
And unfortunately I felt that that neededto be said about it. It's this
is not that film. I thinkthat this is it is riveting. Like
I said, it's you watch itfor entertainment, you don't watch it for

(46:57):
a fact. Like I like whatyou said about Sam McAllister's character. That
sort of finishes the thought I hadbecause I was upset that there was this
cliche character elements about her life.And I've realized that as you were talking
that My problem with that is becausethey never dug It's just like, what
are some surface things we can sayin some dialogue. Okay, there we

(47:21):
go. There's her character and itwas never fleshed out, and it was
just let's go with so single momcheck trying to prove herself check right.
Certain things that didn't didn't go anywhere. It didn't lead to anything. And
that's the problem is if you're ifyou're going to do these cliche things,

(47:43):
either go somewhere with it or youcould have left them out. Yeah,
and I feel like it could havebeen left out because we didn't need to
know anything outside of her work life. I really don't. And and I
mean there are movies that just showus someone's life and that works really well.
Like a Most Wanted Man Philip SeymourHoffman's character we only ever see it's

(48:08):
never let's give him backstory. Yeah, and it works. So that sort
of take can work where it's wedon't need to force something that doesn't belong
in this story. Yeah. Now, Scoop is a movie that I do
want to say, with all thecriticisms, it's most definitely worked. Tracking
down. One other thing I dowant to mention is it does explore a

(48:30):
little bit of what it's like tobe in the female workplace and also sort
of the tension of what modern journalismis because there's this idea that there was
a lot like cuts that were beingmade and a lot of people thought they
did would even have a job thenext day, and then also sort of
the females, that's something to proveit was still sort of a male dominant

(48:52):
place. He got a little bitof that with the Emily character, and
they don't explore it a lot toand I think It has been done much
better in other movies, but it'sat least worth mention. It's something they
tried here and it does work throughthe performances. Maybe not the script and
the focus they do, but theperformances from Uh Billy Piper and Jillian Anderson

(49:13):
I think conveyed the message. Well, yes, yes, I'm glad you
brought that stuff up. So Imentioned that The fall Guy was a little
long. The next movie we're aboutto review it was also a little long.
It was about an hour and fortyminutes too long. And that is
Woody the Woodpecker Goes to Camp,which also happens to be an hour and

(49:36):
forty minutes. I my relationship withWoody Woodpecker is he existed on TV when
I was a little kid, andwhen I was going into this movie,
I thought, I like Woody WoodpeckerR. And I watched his cartoons,
and I realized I think he wasone of those ones where I watched his
cartoons because no other cartoons were on. It wasn't a say appointment. Tell

(50:00):
vision was more like, oh,there's no Loony Tunes right now, Oh,
but there's Woody Woodpecker. Oh andhe man comes on after all right,
I w's Woody Woodpecker, and Iwas realizing that while watching this for
the first five minutes where I realizedthis is like Woody Woodpecker challenging every Nick
Warsten and Polly's short character. Ever, when it comes to most annoying lead

(50:24):
that you have to sit through,and the answer is yes, Woody Woodpecker
is one of the most annoying peopleI have ever seen as a lead character
in a picture. And that wasat the first five minutes when he was
going against some kind of like broguy who has a YouTube channel and was

(50:44):
trying to do camping, and thatguy was annoying too. So it was
five minutes of I'm sicken by everycharacter I see on here. I can't
wait till they get to the likablecharacters. And the most likable character was
the end credits. If you callthe end credits a character, that was
the most likable part because that meantI was done suffering this pain. I

(51:06):
mean, there's kids in it,So I'm not gonna say that the kids
were unlikable. Am I gonna saythey had no personality or just kind of
in the movie? Yes, Yes, I am gonna say that basically what
happens is after Woodley Woodpeckers attack withthe brew you bro YouTuber guy, he

(51:27):
has to go to camp to learnto be a better person so that he
could stay in the woods. Soreally thick and thoughtful storytelling there. So
he goes to camp and it's it'sa steam camp, and I guess they
do things at the camp. Themovie's not quite really explaining that. But

(51:47):
then we learned that the camp isdivided and there's like I guess, a
military camp and then a steam camp, but they're on the same camp property
and they're like cousins. Two peoplewho run it. Mary Lou Parker is
the uh, the steam camp one, and Joss Larsen is uh the military

(52:08):
one, and they have a yearlycompetition and the military people always win because
for some reason, though the oneis like a steam camp, they only
do like military competition events. Andso then there you go. On top
of that, you've got yourself anotheranother villain. I believe this is like

(52:32):
a sequel because there's another movie thatI never seen. I did not bother
to do my research and check tosee if the two connect. But we
find buzz Buzzard and I believe heis a bad guy from the original Rudy
Woodpecker cartoons, and he got outof jail and he wants to own the

(52:52):
camp so he can find I don'tknow why he has to own the camp
in order to look for the BuryTreasure and why he just doesn't like look
for the Barry Treasure. And asthe story goes, he basically starts looking
for the Barry Treasure anyways before heowns the camp. But he comes up
with the convoluted thing of like,have these two camps compete for who owns

(53:12):
the whole camp? And then hethinks that the military guys own the whole
camp, then he can look forthe treasure and even though it's still not
his camp. And you'll be like, Chris, I don't understand the words
you're saying. It's well, I'mtelling you what's in the movie. This
was this is the plot that we'resupposed to fall in this kid's movie.
And you're like, well, maybethe site gigs and the great visuals will

(53:35):
make up for the lack of theplot. Yeah, they do, because
they make it even worse. AsWoody wood Becker continues to just destroy my
ear drums and my head buzz Buzzardis not the least been interesting. There's
a Walrust that's an inspector, andhe's even less interesting. He's kind of
sometimes supposed to be a bad guy, sometimes a hero. Everyone seems to

(53:58):
just be kind of phoning this inthat they're appreciating the paycheck they're getting.
I mean, Mary Luis Parker isnormally just delightful and you can definitely tell
that she can't wait for her coffeebreaks. And this picture is just so
flat. Uh. This is theNick Swarston school of irritation. Is supposed
to be funny, and nothing isfunny. This is one of those movies

(54:22):
that you watch so that you realize, oh, Pixels was not as bad
as I thought. I give thismovie one star because it is a kid's
movie and so and my daughter seemedto like it more than I did,
so for that sake, it getsone star because at least I got to

(54:44):
share some time with my kids.Okay, so what about those without kids
probably liked it less? No,I didn't give it. I gave it
half a star. I gave ithalf of a are one. There's one
person here, one person in thiscast that felt like they were having a

(55:07):
somewhat good time with this movie.And now, at least I found Josh
Lawson as the director of Camp Hoorrah. He was actually trying to have some
personality and character into this movie.I'm now a Josh Lawson fan because he
was in the movie Mortal Kombat,the twenty twenty one version. He played
Kano, and he was awesome inthat and just the fact, like I'm

(55:30):
not fully awesome, say to thatmovie. Talking about bad movies, there
was okay things I liked. Ikind of liked Mortal Kombat. Okay,
well we'll go back to Woody Woodpeckersee not for another day. Okay,
I'm not saying he was good inWoody Woodpecker, but at least he was

(55:52):
the only person trying to actually bringsome chairman, some charisma into this film.
No one else was. I don'twant the bad mouth kid actors,
but I will bad mouth the castingpeople who chose them. I will bad
mouth the director who got dismal performancesout of them. And you might be
saying, well, Scott, sobasically you're saying these kids weren't good.

(56:15):
They I didn't say that. However, if we were to stand back at
an arm's length and you were tosay just yes or no. Was the
acting from the kids good yes orno? No qualifying it? I would
have to say no. I wouldhave to say hell, no, this

(56:39):
was this was this was bad.This was really I felt the exact same
way as you. I hated Ihated Woody Woodpacker. You never want the
audience to despise the main character.I despise them. And I know some

(57:00):
people are gonna be thinking this.I know some people are They're gonna be
saying, but this was This isa family film. And guess what family
films have made both of our numberone movie of the year before. Multiple
times family films have been on ourtop ten list of the year year before
been a year. Has there everbeen a year that we've done our best

(57:22):
of that an anime movie has notmade my list? I don't think so.
I don't think so. And thething is just be I always say,
just because it's for kids or justbecause it's for families doesn't mean it
has to be lazy, doesn't meanit has to be poorly written. I

(57:44):
oh, oh, I should saythere was another character in here that I
kind of liked there's a delivery guythat it's just all of a sudden,
he starts pulling, pulling fabric outof his mouth. That is happening the
end, and he says, mydad said that if you do a magic
trick, people will give you tips. And I'm like, okay, where

(58:07):
we go. Yeah, there's somethingthere that that that was good. I
appreciate that. Nothing else. There'snothing else in this movie that I appreciated.
I hated it. The amount oftimes I checked to see how much
runtime was left was insane. Iexactly this should been like our fifteen Max

(58:35):
bad idea, bad idea. Igive it half start. This will be
talked about at the end of theyear. Yeah, this is an awful,
awful movie. It's Christopher from July. I hope you've enjoyed listening to
the reviews from Christopher and Scott fromway back in May. And one of

(58:57):
the problems with not doing a weeklymovie breakdown in the last few months is
we've got way behind on the Summerbox Office Challenge draft results as we haven't
kept track of the scores going on. So right now I'm gonna give the
updated look at to see who isdoing what in the Summer box Office Challenge.

(59:22):
And let's just say, as ofright now, it's looking like the
Summer Box Office Challenge is not muchof a challenge at all. It's looking
like a big blowout as one personis doing much better than the other person.
But let's go over the picks rightnow, or at least the ones
that have had their opening weekend andlook at which ones have had the best

(59:44):
opening weekend so far the opening weekendresults. We'll start with Scott and his
number one pick. The fall Guywas a fantastic movie, but it was
a disappointment for an opening weekend,especially as the big movie to kick off
the summer season in May. Itonly ended up with twenty seven million,

(01:00:04):
seven hundred and forty seven hundred thousandand thirty five that was its opening weekend.
It ended up having some decent legsbecause it's a great movie, and
so it proved despite even going tostreaming really fast or at least vod really
fast. It ended up proving somedecent legs and people still going up to

(01:00:27):
the theater to see it. Butthis is evidence obviously that Emily Blunt and
Ryan Gosslin as themselves are not maybesuper draws, even though Goslin's coming off
of Barbie the fall Guy clearly doesn'thave any kind of massive name recognition.
I also think this is a signthat pictures that are sort of promoted as
being about Hollywood just don't seem todo super well. Hollywood types like it,

(01:00:51):
movie buffs like it, as theaverage person. I think maybe this
movie the marketing did not really conveys the fun, romantic kind of adventure
picture that it is, and soit ended up having a bit of a
disappointing opening, and they had disappointingopening's continued for Scott his number two pick.

(01:01:12):
Fariosa only ended up with twenty sixmillion, three hundred and twenty six
hundred and four hundred and sixty twohundred total for its opening weekend, And
I think this is a sign ofthe fact that prequels don't always do great
in the box office, and peopleweren't interested in a prequel. They wanted
a continuation of the story. Notonly that, but it's not Charlie's story

(01:01:35):
returning as Pariosa. It's now anawTaylor Joy who took over the role.
And anaw Taylor Joy is a superamazing actor. She's such a super talent.
But I think for the most part, it just did not connect to
people because if they're like, ifwe are going to do a prequel,
we want to see the actor thatwe are used to in that role.
And so this was obviously a miscalculationand a big disappointment. Number three,

(01:02:01):
things got a little bit better forScott Key to the play of the eighth
so many weekend scored fifty eight million, four hundred thousand and seven hundred and
eighty eight hundred. But when youhave sort of your first two not really
delivering, that's not enough to reallysort of help elevate Scott. But this
is I think it did better thanhe was expecting, but he needed sort

(01:02:23):
of that picture that's getting closer toone hundred million, which has not happened
for him. His number four pickis if Imaginary Friends. It did thirty
three million, seven hundred and fifteenhundred thousand, eight hundred and one hundred
grand total for that one for anopening weekend. As a fourth pick.

(01:02:43):
That's absolutely a little bit on thelow side. But this is also a
summer where we don't have a lotof those tent poles and so the sort
of were expecting that there's probably gonnabe a lot of lower grossing pictures here.
His next pick after that number seven, and I think Scott end up
being a little bit optimistic in theprospects of Maxine, which is the final

(01:03:05):
picture sort of that trilogy of theex trilogy. There's Ex Pearl and now
Maxine's wrapping up the trilogy. Maxinedidn't even come to theaters here in Bramford,
and so it's more of an arthouse horror limited release, and so
he ended up with six million,seven one hundred and five hundred thousand and
thirty eight is the dollars is forhis opening weekend with Maxine, And definitely

(01:03:34):
I made seventh pick. It's you'reyou're expecting things lower, but I think
this is probably even lower than whathe was hoping out of that horror picture.
But his biggest disappointment was his eighthpick, the Amy Winehouse bio pick
Back to Black only did two million, eight hundred and thirty five hundred thousand,
seven twenty one hundred total dollars therefor his opening weekend, and this

(01:03:59):
was an one they end up alimited release, and Aby Winehouse, I
think only has a certain amount offans to be good with. I mean,
I think she she obviously was astar, but clearly not enough to
make people necessarly want to see amovie about her. And again it was
limited release. This one didn't evencome to Branford either, And so this
is a case of sort of yougotta pay attention to the studios and are

(01:04:23):
releasing movies. And the tenth pickfor Scott, which has now also come
out in theaters is Bike Riders,and that ended up with nine million,
six hundred and ninety eight hundred thousand, seven two hundred and seventy five hundred
and that now Garrett puts them outa grand total of one hundred and one

(01:04:44):
hundred and sixty five million, fourhundred and twenty nine thousand and one hundred
and nineteen is his grand total thathe has, which with that many picks
with only three still to come,that that is definitely on sort of the
low side of the typical summer boxoffice challenge. But again we don't have

(01:05:05):
as many big ten poles this summerbecause of the strike and a lot of
so the bigger movies got pushed toanother year, and so we're expecting things
that maybe a bit of the lowerside. But then we go to me
and this is where the blowout ishappening. So my number one pick hasn't
come out yet dead Pull Wolverine,but my number two pick, boy,

(01:05:27):
did it deliver an inside out too. It got one hundred and fifty four
million, two hundred and one thousand, six hundred and seventy three hundred grand
total, blowing out all of Scott'spicks, and almost that movie alone is

(01:05:50):
the amount of all his picks combinedat this point, and so you can
see why it's a big blowout.This obviously proves a few things. One
that Inside Out series means something topeople. They wanted to return and see
these characters again. It also showsthat things were overblown when people were saying
that Pixar has lost its magic.It's not drawn the theater, because clearly

(01:06:13):
this one did connect to people.I also think it shows that with COVID
nineteen hitting and with mental help andsuch a concern with kids, that a
picture that is about sort of stressand anxiety and dealing with those emotions it
resonated with people. This is somethingthat mattered to people, something that people
were connecting with and I do thinkthat sort of tent poles that are willing

(01:06:38):
to deal with themes and issues thatpeople are actually experiencing their life. It's
going to connect, it's going toit has that personal feel. It had
that emotional connection, sort of likeI think how Barbie last year was a
big hit because of sort of itwas a fun blockbuster, but it also

(01:06:58):
dealt with things that matter to people, and so Inside Out two end up
being a huge opening weekend and it'sstill becoming a huge hit. My number
three pick was Despicable Me four,and it did seventy five million and nine
thousand and two hundred and ten hundred. I'm not great at reading the numbers,

(01:07:23):
as you can see, but yeah, this one did kind of where
I was hoping, and so myanime movies definitely delivered for me two big
hits. Again, those two moviesalone blew out every anything that Scott picked
so far, and so it helpedme get into the lead. My number
four pick was Bad Boys four,Ride or Die. It did fifty six

(01:07:45):
million, five hundred and twenty seventhousand and three hundred and twenty four hundred,
So that is I'm happy with that. I know clue where Bad Boys
was going to land where weld connectwith people. Obviously, it's a series
of people are still really into.And then I delivered another big one in
number five, A Quiet Place.Day one gave me fifty three million.

(01:08:12):
Then we move on to the Garfieldmovie, which so far my first really
low pick, and this is myfinal pick so far, and it was
twenty four million and six thousand andsix hundred and twenty nine hundred. This
puts me as a grand total ofthree hundred and sixty two million, seven

(01:08:33):
hundred and forty four thousand and eightone hundred and thirty six dollars. And
so I mean the reality is Ihave likely won this unless Twisters also becomes
a massive hit and all my othermovies basically generate like one dollar opening weekend.

(01:08:55):
This ended up being a big blowout. The anime movies really helped me,
and Bad Boys in Quiet Place provedto be series that are connecting with
people a bit better than Fariosa orThe Fall Guy did. It's interesting that
A Quiet Place is a prequel too, but it did much better as a

(01:09:16):
prequel than Phariosa did, and Ithink part of that maybe the Quiet Place,
the world itself and trying to figureout how the anilies took over the
world. With more appealing to people, and the fact that it was sort
of horror picture when there isn't alot of big, exciting horror pictures.

(01:09:38):
This summer made it connect more thansomething like Fariosa did. But there we
go. That's the box office,that's the current state of it. It's
looking like this one, this summeris mine to win. And so after
the streak ending last year, Scottwaiting for the first time, everything looks

(01:09:59):
like it's back to normal. Andafter you know, the crazy year I've
been through, it's nice to havesomething normal again, me winning the Summer
box Office Challenge. And now thatI have you, I also want to
let you know all our usual information. Remember you can contact us at the

(01:10:19):
Movie Breakdown at gmail dot com oron Twitter at Movie Breakdown one. We've
also got Facebook at the Movie Breakdown. And you know what helps us if
you rate and subscribe to us,if you listen to us on Spreaker,
Spotify, cast Box, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, or wherever you are

(01:10:40):
where you listen to your podcasts,that it helps us in the algorithms.
If you rate or subscribe to usas well, follow us on those and
the social media we have. Pleaseshare and like us on social media.
That also helps our exposure. Andanother way you can help us out is
listen to us on the Spreaker appas well. Another area where you can

(01:11:06):
help me is check out my websiteBeyond the Balcony if you like to read
things. And I completely one hundredpercent confess that I haven't really been delivering
when it comes to the movie reviewsor a lot of kind of pop culture
pieces. I haven't dug into thatas much as I should. It's been

(01:11:28):
a lot of sort of just quicklittle pieces I've been put up every day
just to make sure there's something there. But the plan is to really rock
this summer and have reviews on there, get those punishment movies up on their
for losing last year. I'm waybehind on that, and so there is
things you can read of other thingsthat a few things that sort of I

(01:11:53):
would love for you guys to checkout. Way back in the beginning of
June. June seve was my sixteenthwedding anniversary, and so I read write
a few pieces on sort of mypositive thoughts of what I've learned from sixteen
years of marriage, and so that'ssomething that might be interesting to you.

(01:12:15):
And then another thing I love foryou to read on June sixth is I
gave my final thoughts on my experienceof Anastasia. I pay tribute and to
some of the great cast I workedwith there, but I also sort of
talk about the experience of starting ina musical that was my second one I

(01:12:36):
did Being the Beast, and thenthis is Anastasia. It was a wonderful
experience and you can read about thatas well as there's a bunch of pictures
from the musical on there. Andfor those who care about sort of our
theater journey, the Spicer's theater journey. We are currently in a play now
with Playful Fox, and that islying the Witch in the Wardrobe. I

(01:13:00):
mister Beaver, Emily is missus Beaver. We are playing a married couple,
so we're really stretching our dramatic chops. There are acting skills, but I
mean we are playing Beaver's which asfar as I know, I am not
one. So that's a little bitof acting. And then there is a
bunch of episodes of the movie Breakdownthat have not been posted that are sort

(01:13:25):
of waiting in the vault, whichI think maybe with there, it's those
weeks where something comes up I'm gonnause as a way to make sure that
there is an episode every single week. There's a few sort of list episodes
we did looking back at sort ofour favorite movies of our childhood, our
favorite action pictures from the nineteen eighties, and those are things I'm gonna kind

(01:13:45):
of keeping the vault and then postsnippets of those episodes or those entire episodes
when something comes up during a weekthat may we're unable to record, and
we're hoping to record something new everysingle week. We want to get back
in the routine of an episode everysingle week, but there is some stuff

(01:14:08):
that will hopefully stop there from beinga period where you have to wait several
weeks to listen to an episode again. So that's a game plan. We
want to get back to having apodcast, an episode of the movie Breakdown
come in every Wednesday like it usedto be, and the next episode that's

(01:14:28):
coming we're going to for the nextlittle bit return to something we did.
I think it was back in twentytwenty, and that was the sort of
solo movie deep dives where we doa podcast and devote it entirely to one
movie. That was something we didfor a little bit. We may return

(01:14:48):
to the format of, you know, reviewing several movies in an episode eventually,
but for right now, just fordifferent reasons, it works better for
us to kind of focus on onemovie and the first movie that it's that
honor. It's going to be BeverlyHills Cop axel F. It's a horrible
name, but both me and Scotthave a lot of affection for the Beverly

(01:15:11):
Hills Cop series, and so we'rehoping that this long awaited several decade absence
and now the big return of Axelfully that this is a fun one to
talk about. We will dive intothat picture and sort of talk about the
history of the picture that really turnedAye Murphy into a movie star. So
we'll talk a little bit about thewhole series while focusing on the latest picture.

(01:15:36):
So that will be coming up thisWednesday as we get back into the
movie breakdown routine. So look forwardto that one. Thank you so much
for listening to this a little bitdifferent episode on behalf of Scott Martin.
I'll say thank you for listening.Scott doesn't sound like that at all,

(01:15:58):
but on behalf of Scott Martin,behalf myself. Thank you so much for
listening to the movie breakdown Scott Martintalked. I'm Scott Martin and I'm Christopher
Spicer. Thank you so much,and have a great week at the movies.