June 2, 2023 • 34 mins
Another All-Star episode, this time with one of the producers of this film, Jonathan Fernandez! Jonathan was kind enough to join me to discuss, for-real hanging a semi truck above JT Walsh, for-real Kurt Russell hanging on the side of a moving truck, Jonathan Mostow's similarities to Kurt Russell's character, producer Dino De Laurentiis mortgaging his home to get the film made, and more in this fun look at a movie that only gets better with age, Breakdown.
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Watch This Tonight is a movie recommendation podcast and TV recommendation podcast, produced by Voyage Media. You can find other Voyage Media podcasts at voyagemedia.fm
Thanks for listening.
Trying to figure out, "What should I stream tonight?" Come back to Watch This Tonight as your podcast for the best movie recommendations for what to watch on streaming platforms. Please leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts if you're enjoying the show, and mention a movie or TV show you want me to cover (and I will). Subscribe for future episodes.
Reach out to us @BenamorDan (Twitter), watch_this_tonight (Instagram) or @watchthistonightpodcast (TikTok).
Watch This Tonight is a movie recommendation podcast and TV recommendation podcast, produced by Voyage Media. You can find other Voyage Media podcasts at voyagemedia.fm
Thanks for listening.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Voyage. Welcome to watch this tonight. I'm your host, An Bettimore.
(00:22):
I'm a producd writer of film andtelevision and now a podcast producer. And
despite having every streaming service, Inever know what to watch. So anytime
I watch something good, I talkabout it on the show. This way,
you'll never have the same problem Ido. I watched this tonight.
There's always something good to watch.Let's get started, all right. Today
on the show, we're doing oneof our all star episodes about the film
(00:44):
Breakdown. I am honored and thrilledto have Jonathan Fernandez, who is one
of the producers of the film,and Jonathan also wrote and produced Rob the
Mob with Michael Pitt, Andy Garciaand Ray Romano. And I was just
telling you I've been having a littlemini film festival of your films because when
I when we connected, you werelike, you should watch Rob the Mob
too, And I had remembered whenit came out and I had missed it
(01:07):
for whatever reason. And I have. I think I have like half an
hour left and I'm loving it.It's so fun, it has such a
great energy to it. Um It'swe could almost do a whole separate episode
of Rob the Mob, but it'sit has an amazing cast, just a
stacked cast, and it's totally abit like Breakdown that we're gonna talk about
(01:29):
today, one of the movies thatthey don't really make anymore. So for
people, if anybody who hasn't seenRob the Mob separately from this, go
watch that movie. It's on Amazonon the freevie thing. You can watch
it for free if you have Amazon. Yeah. Rob the Mob was great
fun to make, and Breakdown wasgreat fun to make. I really am
(01:49):
very lucky and fortunate working with twoamazing directors, Jonathan Mostow and Ray Defalita.
Yeah, Ray to Falida, bythe way, and Rob the Moob
did a great job. There's athere was a moment there's a shot of
like, um, I think it'sNina Arianda standing and she's silhouetted against the
setting sun as money is floating inthe air, and I was like,
wow, who directed this movie?So yes, the big recommendation for that.
(02:12):
I do want to tell people alsothe sort of hilarious way that we
connected after a fashionable two year delay. Had I had tweeted at you what
I had my old show movies.I love to know what talks about to
do an episode of Breakdown, andthen you liked my it was funny.
I was like, I saw itwas like you liked my tweet from like
two years ago. I was like, oh, that's funny. And then
you had a message to me andyou were like, am I too late?
(02:35):
And I fortunately I have another showwhere I talked about movies, So
here we are two years it becauselike that it's a global pandemic. What
happened? All good? What Imissed on this particular show. When we
do older stuff, we do itas a watch This Night All Star meeting.
A movie that you can watch againand again, and it's the years
passed you look at it differently.And it was really interesting rewatching Breakdown with
(02:58):
that in mind, because I don'tknow when the last time you saw it
was, but watching it now,especially with the stunt work I think particularly,
which is sort of a weird thingabout it, but because of where
we've gone with how action is done. When you if you go watch Breakdown
today, you feel like you're watchingTom Cruise hanging on the side of the
airplane, like there's stuff going on. You're like, how did they do
(03:20):
this? Because we're so used toeverything being done with the computer. Yeah,
I rewatched it today and I haveto tell you, the biggest thing
was how awesome the effects look becausethey're real. They're all practical. Like
Kurt Russell is hanging off the sideof the truck, off the side of
the truck, is hanging off theside of the bridge, and when he's
in the water, he's in thewater. So it's kind of crazy when
(03:46):
I think there's something about the humanbrain that you know when something's real,
Like you know, over millions ofyears of evolution, you can tell when
something's real and when something's fake.And I think intuitively, you look at
that and you go, how KurtRussell was hanging off the side of a
truck on the side of a bridge. Holy cow, he's in the middle
of the river, floating down.That is all real. That was all
(04:08):
done practical, And I almost feellike watching it, it's kind of the
last old school movie that way.You would not do a movie of that
size of that budget today practical.It would all be cgi. And I
think it's very difficult to get thatsense of hanging and all the physicality and
(04:29):
all the muscles in the actor tobe just right, and I do kind
of think that movie is like kindof the end of an era. Yeah.
You know, there's an ai artapp it's called mid Journey, and
I used it for a pitch deckfor something. And the premise of the
thing that I used it for wasit was basically aliens pretending to be human,
and so there's something a little bitoff, and mid Journey is actually
(04:51):
perfect for that because if you justtype in a mid journey a happy couple
in bed next to each other,the art that you will get back ai
R is frightening. It's not likeyou can tell that something is wrong and
you can't put your finger on it, but you could sort of tell this
is not something is weird about this. And I think visual effects, no
(05:12):
matter how sophisticated they are, arekind of the same thing. Like you
said, like people can just tell. Yeah. I think that's right,
and I think just intuitively, yourmuscles are moving differently, there's a little
bit of fear that like that isjust genuine like I think everything's gonna go
right, but I don't know thateverything's going to go right the actor is
(05:33):
experiencing. In other words, KurtRussell when you're hanging off the side of
a thing. You really hope yourstunt team really has their act together,
you think, finger And I willtell you I was on set for that
final chase scene and I was like, where do I want to stand?
Because I knew it was like carsgonna be flying and eighteen wheelers flying and
(05:54):
trucks flying. And I was like, I'm going to stand behind the camera
cruit because those guys know what's gonnahappen. And I'm standing behind them,
and all of a sudden, thecar goes flying up in the air.
It doesn't flip. The front bumper, which is metal again, old school,
not like the kind of plastic bumpersof today's cars, but a metal
(06:15):
truck bumper goes flying in the air, and all of a sudden, it's
gonna it's coming at me, It'scoming at the camera crew. We all
camera crew included hit the deck becausewe were gonna be decapitated. It was
real. It was unpredictable in away that none of us could have desk
where that was gonna go. AndI think that kind of randomness keeps the
(06:38):
actor, keeps the crew, keepseveryone on their toes, you know,
There's a movie that they made withJar Butler. It's called Last Scene Alive,
and it actually hit number one onNetflix, and it's I think it's
a really useful comparison to this film. So that movie is basically Jar Butler
goes to like a gas station andthe wife disappears, and now he's got
(07:00):
to go find his wife. AndI liked the movie. I did an
episode on it, like I thoughtit was fun, but it was not
people are the realities. I don'tthink people will be talking about that movie
even six months from now. AndI was trying to sort of isolate down
on why because it's pretty similar toBreakdown in terms of the premise, Right,
It's kind of like a seemingly regularguy, you know, loses his
(07:21):
wife, has to go find her. There's a little bit of like a
backwoods quality to it, which alsowas a Breakdown. And I was like,
why is Breakdown sort of I thinkstood the test of time, whereas
that movie probably will not send thetest of time. And I think part
of it is just the really reallyhigh quality of the execution. And I
was trying to figure out what wherethat comes from and maybe where we've lost
(07:45):
that in streaming because Breakdown is verywell written, like it is not this
is not a tossed off thing.Like there's a lot of moments, and
I want to actually call out one, particularly because it was one of the
only things that I had remembered vividlyfrom the first time I saw the film.
JT. Walsh. You know,they kidnapped Kurt Russell's wife obviously spoiler
alert U And then JT. Walsheventually comes clean about it. Obviously was
(08:07):
Sam that did it, and etc. And he has this moment where he's
talking about Kathleen Quinland and he's describingher to Kurt Russell in a very sexualized
way that is grotesque, And eventhe first time I saw it and then
seeing it now it's like, sir, I was like, how dare you
talking about Kathleen Quinland like that?But it was very well written, like
(08:28):
it was written impeccably, And atthe end of it he says, you
know, if you let the copsknow, I'll send you pieces of her
from time to time, which isa great line. So it's just it
evokes development, like people really workedand cared about the script. So could
you talk about like maybe like fromyour perspective where there might be a difference
there in terms of these processes.So first of all, you know,
(08:52):
you have to give huge, huge, huge credit to Jonathan Mostow and Sam
Montgomery who wrote the screenplay and allof that, all of that, all
of that was in their first draft. And as Jonathan Mostow will tell you
it, Kurt Russell will tell youit's exhausting playing Jonathan Mostow because that all
of that paranoia, all of thatthat comes from John Mostow, and it's
(09:16):
very much his worldview how he sees, you know, everything, and so
all of that was on the page. All of that was on the page.
So when I first read the script, it was just, you know,
holy cow, it was a tightscript from the very beginning. And
Mostow will tell you that, youknow, he was marketing back to you
(09:37):
know, Spielberg's first film, likeDuel. So films like that are all
part of the tradition. And thenI think the other thing that, well,
what's the difference is, well,you had one of the world's greatest
producers, literally one of the greatestproducers of all time in Dino de Laurentis.
I mean, Dina de Laurentis isa legend. He's the guy who
started in Italy after the war,produced Lestradas, produced a Bitter Rice.
(10:01):
I mean, just an amazing,amazing filmmaker, and this story really spoke
to him. In one hundred percent. Dino got behind this film. And
you know, there are scenes inthat film of like when Kurt Russell goes
to the police station and he seesall the missing people the posters up on
(10:22):
that was Dino. Dino really feltthat, and Dino's vision was started right
from the beginning with the casting.So one of my favorite stories was when
I was head of production for Dino'scompany and he said to me, Jonathan,
(10:43):
you know who'd be great for thismovie, he says to me,
and he says, Coralozo. Andso this is again kind of pre internet
days, and I was new.We didn't really have a shorthand Dino and
I and so I go back tomy office and I pull out books you
know you had to look up.And I'm thinking, I don't know this
Cardo Looso person, and he mustbe some Italian cinematographer who I don't know.
(11:05):
And I'm calling my friends at allthe agencies I need to get Cardo
Looso and everyone's like, I don'tknow who you're talking about. So I
go back into Dina's office and Isay, Dino, I'm really sorry,
I don't know who this Coodo Loosoperson is, but I really want to
find him for you, And Dinosays, looks at me, just completely
dismissive. He goes, how yoube in the movie business, and no,
(11:26):
no, the Coto Loza. Everybodyknows the Cardo Looso. So now
I double down on this, andfinally I go into Dino's wife, Martha's
office, and I say, Martha, I am so sorry, but I've
looked everywhere and I cannot find thisCardo Looso person. And I know everyone
must know, and I'm sure he'ssuper important in Italian cinema, but who
is this? And she looks atme and she goes, I don't know
(11:46):
what you're talking about. So nowMartha and I go into Dino's office and
Martha asked him, Dino, Dino, who is Cardo Loso and Dino goes,
Coudo Looso, hell of them?And finally we understood it was Kurt
Russell that was that was who hewanted for the film, and again that
was Dino. And Dino was theone who made the offer on the salary
(12:11):
for Kurt Russell. He offered Kurthis previous salary, which I believe at
the time was eight million dollars,and he offered it to Rick Nasita,
and Rick offered it to Kurt,and Kurt said, I love the script.
I'm just I want to take thespring off. Dino thought about it.
He then offered ten million dollars toRick Nasita, and and and and
(12:31):
finally, uh, Dino de Laurentisoffered fifteen million dollars to Kurt Russell,
and Kurt Russell came into our officethe following day with Rick agreed to do.
It meant with John Mostow, andthat was Dino. I mean,
so when you say why don't movieslike Get That get made, it's because
Dino de Laurentis willed that film intobeing. It's absolutely Jonathan Mostow's vision,
(12:58):
it's absolutely his talent, his writing, his directing. But it was you
know, you talk about the powerof a producer. I mean, I
don't know of many producers today whoare at that Dino de Laurentius level.
I remember vividly. I had ameeting. Um. It was me,
Nicholas Cages manager UM and then twodifferent teams of producers for a particular project.
(13:20):
And we had we spent I'm sureit was at least an hour.
I think the director was there too, UM, just going over notes in
the script and they were good notesand they'd like toil script apart. And
we walked out of that meeting andI was like, I don't think Nicholas
is doing this movie. And thenthe next day they were like, we've
put X amount in escrow and andhe's up not doing anyway. But it
(13:45):
just goes to show you, Um, this is the part of it that
people don't really understand. This iscasting. Casting is basically. I mean
I've had I had a Radioto movielike this. I had a bunch of
movies. In fact, I thinkmost of the movies where we've had a
are involved. They first said no, They usually say no, and then
depending on the producer, sometimes theproducer will just refuse to accept no,
(14:09):
and they'll just go back and saywhat did you want more money? Do
you want less time? And thelike? Does he have to be there
for a week? What do wehave to do? And yeah, it's
like if you have that person whojust refuses to accept no. And even
in this is where it's like thiswhere it was a good script, it's
just all right, fine, howmuch money do we need until finally this
is actually going to happen? Andyou got there. Yeah, And then
(14:30):
we tried with Kurt Russell with JonathanMostow directing with the script, and we
had half the financing from Spelling.First we went to Warner Brothers, and
Warner Brothers committed to it, andthen Warner Brothers dropped out, so we
literally were going into production. AndI will say that when we couldn't get
(14:54):
anyone, we went to every studioin town. They all passed. And
Dina to make up the budget shortfallof Warner Brothers having dropped out, he
mortgaged his own home to come upwith the production funds. I mean,
think of another producer who would dothat, who would just literally mortgage his
(15:15):
home to get the funds to doit, And he did. He literally
mortgaged his own funds, so hisown home. So it's just kind of
crazy when you think about that levelof commitment, that amount of faith and
belief. And John Moss down inthe script in the film. Yeah,
it's crazy. And it's not thefirst time I've heard a story like that
either, which shows you how terriblethis business is. If you have any
(15:37):
interest to do anything else, listener, go to something else, and I
will tell you this. So,after I produced Breakdown, I started writing
and I wrote the film Robbed theMob. And I would go to these
meetings and people would hear that Ihad been the executive producer on Breakdown,
and they would say to me,and this was just crazy. They would
say to me, Breakdown, now, Breakdown, that's exactly the type of
(16:00):
movie we'd want to make. Andit took all my self control and all
of those kind of water bottle needingsto say, I think to you,
I came to your boss two yearsago when the script with Kurt Russell with
half the funding and they all hadpassed on it. And so you know,
everyone loves to Monday Morning quarterback.Everyone loves to say that, oh,
(16:21):
after Breakdown open number one at thebox office. That's the type of
movie we would want. But inthe moment with the script with the actor,
with the director, nobody, nobody, nobody would kill to it.
But they all said it a yearlater when I was going out with Rob
the mob Now that's the kind ofmovie we want to make. Was hilarious.
(16:41):
Is it's not like it's like aFellini like art film, Like it's
a very commercial movie. So it'sjust funny. I thought. Also,
what was interesting and rewatching it isthat I had forgotten is very much like
a Western, like the themes ofit, you know, civilization versus savagery.
You know, the idea that inWesterns a big thing is civilized society
(17:03):
versus like they have the town wherethey're trying to be civilized. Then they're
faced with some sort of threat thatthe town that is civilized not able to
handle, and so that's when theyneed the guy with the gun to solve
that problem. And that's the wholeethos. So basically ninety percent of Westerns,
and in this it's like the modernversion of that where her Russell and
they make a big point, youknow, the Benetton sweater and all that
(17:25):
kind of thing, and he's he'seven he even says some stuff that's sort
of pejorative about the locals and andysthey set up that he is very much
like a guy from the city,and it's like, great, get twenty
miles outside of the city, nobodygives a shit. And this, by
the way, has not disappeared froman American life. I produced a podcast
called Borderline, which the true crimeshow about a crime that happened in a
(17:48):
small town in Texas and the geographyof it that hasn't really changed, meaning
that that town today is still youhave to go like ninety miles to get
to the next town. And there'splaces like that in America and I don't
care how civilized you are, whereat a certain point you're sort of on
your own. And that's what's greatabout the premise is that the second the
(18:10):
car breaks down and he's by himselfand the wife's gone, You're like,
what is that's it? He's onit, like how the hell is he
going to get out of this?And uh, And it has a real
edge to it that I think alsoagain has been sanded down over the years,
and we don't see movies that muchanymore that our mainstream movies that have
the edge that this has. Itotally agree. I also think that John
(18:30):
Moscow was sort of prescient in againthat nineties where the whole world kind of
the middle of the country. There'sa lot of jobs that are lost that
and when you actually I've thought aboutobviously I've thought about this movie way too
much, but I have thought like, well, what really was this this
(18:52):
cruise plan? Right? What wastheir m for stealing things? And it
kind of like it's it's kind oflike whoa, you could also get a
job, because like you're like,if you think about what were they really
trying to steal? What was theirinitial plan? It's not much money they're
going to get. What are theygonna get his his jeep, his clothes.
(19:15):
They didn't know he had the ninetythousand dollars when they start their plan,
and when you kind of look atthe barn, it's just kind of
like a big old garage sale ofcrap, right, So so how what
was their plan to make money?And I think of like, well,
maybe there were no other choices,right, Like it's kind of that era
of when those kind of jobs disappear, and I thought that was very kind
(19:37):
of prescient of where the country hasgone. Yeah, I think also,
um, and it is funny.I mean it's not like we don't have
we just still have movie stars.But I do think that there was something
about like there's a moment early inthe movie when JT. Walsh is pretending
that he hasn't seen carlsal before andI've never seen it before in my life,
(20:00):
and Kurt Russell has this really smallmoment. He doesn't go big with
it. He just goes like,what are you? What are you doing?
And he's so it's almost like hiswhole worldview collapses in that moment,
his whole belief in society. Andit's a real movie moment. And I
was trying to think of, like, if we make that movie today,
who's playing this part? Is itgoing to have the same gravitas to it?
(20:22):
I think in part it's also likeback then, the guys who were
the movie stars, you almost feltlike there was another world where this guy
was, like Harrison Ford was acarpenter or whatever they had. They sort
of came from real life and thenbecame actors. And I feel like now
it's like this person was always anactor. They're pretending to be this character
(20:45):
and it doesn't have that same feelingto it. I totally agree, And
I think, first of all,I think you look at Kurt Russell and
you inherently trust him and you trusthim going all the way back for the
computer weren't ten issues. He wasthe Disney kid all the way through all
of those movies. So you youtrust him, so you're with him in
all of that emotional goodwill. WhenJT. Wall says I've never seen you,
(21:07):
I remember reading that moment and justbeing like, why, what's going
on here? And it's that goodkind of confusion that happened. So I
love that. But I agree thatthere's something about Kurt Russell. I always
believe that plays working class done good, Like like he's a guy who owned
a started out working at a garagepumping gas but now owns five gas stations.
(21:33):
He just plays that guy. There'sa great documentary on his father who
had a minor league baseball team,and it was a fantastic documentary. Everyone
should check it out. I believeit's on Netflix. But that was another
(21:56):
like you just feel like, yeah, the battered Bastards of baseball. All
that was what it was, thebattered bastards of baseball. But definitely worth
checking out. But you feel like, yeah, he's not he's not a
major league baseball owner. He's aminor league baseball owner. And you just
kind of feel like it's very relatable. Kurt Russell. Yeah, I mean
it's it's almost like you look backat it too, when we had stars
(22:18):
like like a Lee, Marvin GeneHackman, Curry Russell, and then it's
sort of morphed out of that andwe sort of went away from where the
star you could see them being aregular person. I think now in a
weird way, it's almost like allof our movie stars are too good looking.
They're so handsome that you're like,I don't know that I believe that
you were ever a regular person andwould say that by the way he would
(22:42):
say he in another life, hewould have just been a minor league baseball
player trying trying to make it intothe majors, you know, like that's
he's like, by the way,the baseball team we're talking about wasn't even
Triple A, was a single Abaseball team. You know, like this
was like, you know, ifthey got five hundred fans, it was
a good night. You know.I think in terms of like it makes
(23:04):
me think of regards to ordinary peopleor people that look like real people.
JT. Walsh it's like the kingof that, right, JT. Walsh
obviously one of the best character actorsof all time. This is his final
role if I remember correctly correct Andshortly after he has a moment in this
that is so great where his wifehas discovered his like essentially the equivalent of
(23:27):
like a rapist den Like it's thiscreepy the barn and the woman in there
and all that, and I thinkKurt Russell is saying to the wife,
like get out of the hole orsomething like that, and JT is nonplussed.
He's not upset that she's discovered this. He doesn't care. He goes
just pull the chain, Arlene.It's like, I again, it's not
(23:51):
like we don't still have great actorslike that. But I just think the
casting of this film is so impeccable. And I do wonder if part of
that is it's a programmer kind ofconcept, but it is executed at such
a high level. Yeah, Imean everyone involved. I mean you can't
underestimate the music by Basil Polydora asyou can't. The casting was phenomenal.
(24:15):
Everyone was just they were just terrificactors and it was a very I mean
it's an actor's piece. I mean, John got phenomenal performances out of everyone.
It could have been over the top, it could have been cheesy,
but JT is just fabulously understated.And when that mom is telling her son
Paul the trigger, You're just like, oh my gosh, it's completely believable.
(24:38):
He's such a good actor that Iwas almost like JT. Walsh,
good dad. Like I was almostlike, yeah, you got that kid.
The kid was ready to go.He was ready to protect his dad
with the gun. I also wantedto kind of circle around to what you
said at the beginning fort of thepractical stuff. So I'm watching the thing
at the end where they dropped literallydrop a tractor trailer on JT. Walsh's
(25:00):
face. Essentially, I'm trying tothink, how did you do it practically,
like like just like how So theanswer was there was a japanned crane
because you couldn't literally have that there, but it was basically a crane,
and it was basically a crane asa harness to make sure that it didn't
(25:22):
look on JT. Walsh. Nowthat's a lot of trust JT had,
and I don't know that I wouldhave the same amount of trust that he
did, but it was a itwas an eighteen the cab of an eighteen
wheeler, and it was hanging ona truck on a crane on a bridge
that had been out of service thanthe nineteen fifties. So this was a
(25:45):
lot of trust on a lot ofdifferent levels that I'm going to be honest,
I don't know that I would have. So I'm JT. Wash I'm
laying in this riverbed and I'm lookingup and there's a truck lowering towards me.
I'm hoping, and I don't remember. I mean, we're talking.
It's a bunch of years now.I'm ninety nine percent sure that when the
truck was coming down, they atleast took him out and put a I
(26:08):
don't even think there was a stuntdouble there. I think at least they're
like, all right, you're good. I'm talking about when the truck was
hanging. So that still took alot of faith, you know what I
mean. But I'm assuming, Yeah, I'm gonna go with I'm committing to
this that JT was not there whenthe truck fell. Yeah. So I
(26:30):
mean, if it for someone likehim for his career, it's almost like
a perfect final role because it's sucha great role. It was such a
great role. It was such agreat role. And yeah, Carol Lewis
did an amazing job casting the film. Vicky Paul's production design was amazing.
I mean, it was a greatteam of filmmakers, really really wonderful people.
(26:52):
But yeah, Carol was amazing inall those different people she brought in.
And a great, nice little gracenote at the end that Kathleen is
the one you know, pulls thething and it takes him out, And
that was actually a decision made byKurt and Kathleen on the set. They
felt like it needed to be Kathleento do it. I think I'm ninety
(27:14):
nine percent sure it was originally scriptedas Kurt's character, but it really was
on the day they felt like itwould be best if Kathleen did it.
And I loved Kurt's reaction to it. It just felt really strong. You
know. Another thing is the filmoriginally had a much longer act, one
like a fifteen pages of Kurt Russellwas a photographer and he was down in
(27:38):
Central America and he sees something awfuland he comes back and he wants to
quit his job and wants to changeand they're broke and all of that was
It was such a great lesson inwhat an amazing actors Kathleen and Kurt are
and were able to do in thatwhich was they were able to convey all
of that love that was written overfifteen pages. In my opinion, the
(28:00):
film really works, really comes togetherin that moment when they're broke down on
the side of the road and she'steasing him and they're kind of laughing together,
and you just see again you talkabout movie stars, but the two
of them are able to convey theirlove, their emotion. It's just fantastic.
And you didn't need any of theother stuff. You didn't need the
(28:22):
discussion in their apartment. He didn'tneed why he was they were deciding.
He just needed to know it's ayoung couple, they're in love, and
they've decided to start their lives againacross the country. I've mentioned this before.
You know, you sometimes get thenote from when you're developing a project
where it's like, you know,a character comes into the house and he's
got whatever, a bag of goldor something, and it's like, where
(28:45):
did the bag of gold come from? Let's find out, let's show him
going to the mind and getting thegold, taking the bag, driving all
and it's like, you don't needthat. The audience will pick all that
shit up in two seconds. Justgive them the visual. Yeah. I
had something similar happened on Rob theMob where I was given the note of
like, well, where exactly dothey get the gun? And you know,
you write out these sequence of hegoes here, he goes there,
(29:08):
he negotiate and like I wrote itlike, you know, as a good
team player, but fully knowing thatthis was never ever ever going to get
shot. So a good script,a good actor, is a good director.
If they can't get across that thisis a couple in love, then
you've got bigger problems going on.And you never doubted that Kathleen and Kurt
(29:30):
were in love. Like it wasa very powerful It's just it was such
a great reminder of and that momentwhere she's teasing him and all of that,
you just felt like, oh,this is the shorthand of like,
oh, they're gonna meet it.You know. It's that feeling of like
you see a couple and you're like, oh, they really do love each
other, and you can see itin real life and just as much as
(29:51):
you can see it in film.Yeah, as we wrap up, just
um, I'm curious what you seein the landscape now. So particularly,
it's actually interesting your two films,Breakdown and Rob the Mob. So Breakdown
is the sort of you know,high concept but like you know, genre
programmer kind of movie that now isprobably made for I don't know what is
(30:12):
Netflix making these movies for like twelvemillion bucks or something, and they kind
of throw it out there and peopletalk about it for like a week,
and then we never hear about itagain. And then Rob the Mob.
I assume this is my guest becauseI know Millennium distributed. It is this
old model where it's like foreign saleswill get a whole bunch of recognizable actors,
will build a big package, andback then foreign sales were still robust
(30:34):
enough where you could cast it.Because Rob Mob's cast is insane. There
is like seven hundred people that you'veseen before in that movie, even down
for very small supporting parts. Andit feels like both of those kinds of
movies no longer an option in ourcurrent landscape. Do you think it's gonna
ever the pendulum will swing back thatway or what do you see in the
(30:55):
future, I mean, I don'tknow. I mean, see a film
like Rob the Mob with with youknow, forget Andy Garcia and Ray Romano,
but like Frank Whaley, you willVasquez, Michael Rispolly. I mean,
it's kind of crazy, Bert Young, Kathy Moriarty, and then you
(31:15):
know, Jeremy Allen White is ina supporting role and now you know he's
the star of the Bear. Imean, I mean, part of it
is a testimony to Raymond day Felia, the director. Part of it is
I don't I don't know. Imean, I mean they're all still I
mean, every every one of thesepeople is still a talent, is still
(31:37):
available, you know. So Ifeel like somehow the people producing these movies
don't seem to think that that matters. I don't know why, because I
think it does. But I don'treally know the answer to the question.
But I too have noticed it,so I see exactly what you're talking about.
I don't know the answer, youknow, I don't what do you
(32:00):
think the answer is. I reallydon't know. I think that a lot
of this is predicated on what's goingto happen with Marvel. I really do
believe that actually is meaningful, meaningthat we've seen some slowing of audience for
the Marvel films, which have beenso reliably just gangbusters again and again and
again. And I think that ifthat continues, then there will be a
(32:21):
reaction towards more original stuff. Youknow, both Rob the Mob and breakdown
our examples of that right where basicallyit's an original idea. I know,
the Mob is based on a truestory, but they're not based on whatever
comic book, graphic novel, etc. So yeah, I think it depending
on how that goes, then thisother stuff might swing one way or the
(32:42):
other. I mean, what's interestingto me is I teach at AFI,
the American Film Institute. I teachscreenwriting there, and my students, when
I asked them what they're watching,what they want to see, they kind
of go two different directions. Formost of them, movies are the Marvel
movies. They want to see theMarvel movies opening weekend. They talk about
the Marvel movies. But the otherway they go, which I think is
(33:02):
equally interesting, are the kind ofsuper micro budgeted films that you see on
shutter like kind of these like underone million dollar movies. And they've been
amazing to me because they throw outthese movies at me and I love them.
So I've seen a lot of littlefilms that I kind of think,
well, maybe that's how these moviesget made. I mean they're very small
(33:25):
and scale. I mean, it'slike taking place in someone's living room kind
of thing with five actors. ButI don't know, I don't know,
I don't like. I think you'reright. I think Marvel has kind of
sucked all the air out of theroom, so I don't know. I
also think, you know, Marvelkind of works globally, Like I think
(33:45):
no one's going to get in troublemaking a Marvel movie because it takes place
in a fantasy universe, and Ithink for a lot of countries they don't
want to touch on real topics.I think that's risky. So when you
say it takes place in the Marveluniverse, no one I mean and quite
literally is going to get through tojail for screen of Marble movie. Yeah.
(34:06):
Well, thank you so much forcoming on the shows. It's a
real pleasure to have you on here, and I appreciate your insight. That
is the episode for today. Iwant to thank everybody for listening as always.
If you enjoy the show, giveus a rating and review on Apple
Podcasts, and subscribe for future episodes. Jonathan, thank you so much again.
Thank you for having me, lovebeing here. Until next time,
(34:27):
Bye bye,
Voyage. Welcome to watch this tonight. I'm your host, An Bettimore.
(00:22):
I'm a producd writer of film andtelevision and now a podcast producer. And
despite having every streaming service, Inever know what to watch. So anytime
I watch something good, I talkabout it on the show. This way,
you'll never have the same problem Ido. I watched this tonight.
There's always something good to watch.Let's get started, all right. Today
on the show, we're doing oneof our all star episodes about the film
(00:44):
Breakdown. I am honored and thrilledto have Jonathan Fernandez, who is one
of the producers of the film,and Jonathan also wrote and produced Rob the
Mob with Michael Pitt, Andy Garciaand Ray Romano. And I was just
telling you I've been having a littlemini film festival of your films because when
I when we connected, you werelike, you should watch Rob the Mob
too, And I had remembered whenit came out and I had missed it
(01:07):
for whatever reason. And I have. I think I have like half an
hour left and I'm loving it.It's so fun, it has such a
great energy to it. Um It'swe could almost do a whole separate episode
of Rob the Mob, but it'sit has an amazing cast, just a
stacked cast, and it's totally abit like Breakdown that we're gonna talk about
(01:29):
today, one of the movies thatthey don't really make anymore. So for
people, if anybody who hasn't seenRob the Mob separately from this, go
watch that movie. It's on Amazonon the freevie thing. You can watch
it for free if you have Amazon. Yeah. Rob the Mob was great
fun to make, and Breakdown wasgreat fun to make. I really am
(01:49):
very lucky and fortunate working with twoamazing directors, Jonathan Mostow and Ray Defalita.
Yeah, Ray to Falida, bythe way, and Rob the Moob
did a great job. There's athere was a moment there's a shot of
like, um, I think it'sNina Arianda standing and she's silhouetted against the
setting sun as money is floating inthe air, and I was like,
wow, who directed this movie?So yes, the big recommendation for that.
(02:12):
I do want to tell people alsothe sort of hilarious way that we
connected after a fashionable two year delay. Had I had tweeted at you what
I had my old show movies.I love to know what talks about to
do an episode of Breakdown, andthen you liked my it was funny.
I was like, I saw itwas like you liked my tweet from like
two years ago. I was like, oh, that's funny. And then
you had a message to me andyou were like, am I too late?
(02:35):
And I fortunately I have another showwhere I talked about movies, So
here we are two years it becauselike that it's a global pandemic. What
happened? All good? What Imissed on this particular show. When we
do older stuff, we do itas a watch This Night All Star meeting.
A movie that you can watch againand again, and it's the years
passed you look at it differently.And it was really interesting rewatching Breakdown with
(02:58):
that in mind, because I don'tknow when the last time you saw it
was, but watching it now,especially with the stunt work I think particularly,
which is sort of a weird thingabout it, but because of where
we've gone with how action is done. When you if you go watch Breakdown
today, you feel like you're watchingTom Cruise hanging on the side of the
airplane, like there's stuff going on. You're like, how did they do
(03:20):
this? Because we're so used toeverything being done with the computer. Yeah,
I rewatched it today and I haveto tell you, the biggest thing
was how awesome the effects look becausethey're real. They're all practical. Like
Kurt Russell is hanging off the sideof the truck, off the side of
the truck, is hanging off theside of the bridge, and when he's
in the water, he's in thewater. So it's kind of crazy when
(03:46):
I think there's something about the humanbrain that you know when something's real,
Like you know, over millions ofyears of evolution, you can tell when
something's real and when something's fake.And I think intuitively, you look at
that and you go, how KurtRussell was hanging off the side of a
truck on the side of a bridge. Holy cow, he's in the middle
of the river, floating down.That is all real. That was all
(04:08):
done practical, And I almost feellike watching it, it's kind of the
last old school movie that way.You would not do a movie of that
size of that budget today practical.It would all be cgi. And I
think it's very difficult to get thatsense of hanging and all the physicality and
(04:29):
all the muscles in the actor tobe just right, and I do kind
of think that movie is like kindof the end of an era. Yeah.
You know, there's an ai artapp it's called mid Journey, and
I used it for a pitch deckfor something. And the premise of the
thing that I used it for wasit was basically aliens pretending to be human,
and so there's something a little bitoff, and mid Journey is actually
(04:51):
perfect for that because if you justtype in a mid journey a happy couple
in bed next to each other,the art that you will get back ai
R is frightening. It's not likeyou can tell that something is wrong and
you can't put your finger on it, but you could sort of tell this
is not something is weird about this. And I think visual effects, no
(05:12):
matter how sophisticated they are, arekind of the same thing. Like you
said, like people can just tell. Yeah. I think that's right,
and I think just intuitively, yourmuscles are moving differently, there's a little
bit of fear that like that isjust genuine like I think everything's gonna go
right, but I don't know thateverything's going to go right the actor is
(05:33):
experiencing. In other words, KurtRussell when you're hanging off the side of
a thing. You really hope yourstunt team really has their act together,
you think, finger And I willtell you I was on set for that
final chase scene and I was like, where do I want to stand?
Because I knew it was like carsgonna be flying and eighteen wheelers flying and
(05:54):
trucks flying. And I was like, I'm going to stand behind the camera
cruit because those guys know what's gonnahappen. And I'm standing behind them,
and all of a sudden, thecar goes flying up in the air.
It doesn't flip. The front bumper, which is metal again, old school,
not like the kind of plastic bumpersof today's cars, but a metal
(06:15):
truck bumper goes flying in the air, and all of a sudden, it's
gonna it's coming at me, It'scoming at the camera crew. We all
camera crew included hit the deck becausewe were gonna be decapitated. It was
real. It was unpredictable in away that none of us could have desk
where that was gonna go. AndI think that kind of randomness keeps the
(06:38):
actor, keeps the crew, keepseveryone on their toes, you know,
There's a movie that they made withJar Butler. It's called Last Scene Alive,
and it actually hit number one onNetflix, and it's I think it's
a really useful comparison to this film. So that movie is basically Jar Butler
goes to like a gas station andthe wife disappears, and now he's got
(07:00):
to go find his wife. AndI liked the movie. I did an
episode on it, like I thoughtit was fun, but it was not
people are the realities. I don'tthink people will be talking about that movie
even six months from now. AndI was trying to sort of isolate down
on why because it's pretty similar toBreakdown in terms of the premise, Right,
It's kind of like a seemingly regularguy, you know, loses his
(07:21):
wife, has to go find her. There's a little bit of like a
backwoods quality to it, which alsowas a Breakdown. And I was like,
why is Breakdown sort of I thinkstood the test of time, whereas
that movie probably will not send thetest of time. And I think part
of it is just the really reallyhigh quality of the execution. And I
was trying to figure out what wherethat comes from and maybe where we've lost
(07:45):
that in streaming because Breakdown is verywell written, like it is not this
is not a tossed off thing.Like there's a lot of moments, and
I want to actually call out one, particularly because it was one of the
only things that I had remembered vividlyfrom the first time I saw the film.
JT. Walsh. You know,they kidnapped Kurt Russell's wife obviously spoiler
alert U And then JT. Walsheventually comes clean about it. Obviously was
(08:07):
Sam that did it, and etc. And he has this moment where he's
talking about Kathleen Quinland and he's describingher to Kurt Russell in a very sexualized
way that is grotesque, And eventhe first time I saw it and then
seeing it now it's like, sir, I was like, how dare you
talking about Kathleen Quinland like that?But it was very well written, like
(08:28):
it was written impeccably, And atthe end of it he says, you
know, if you let the copsknow, I'll send you pieces of her
from time to time, which isa great line. So it's just it
evokes development, like people really workedand cared about the script. So could
you talk about like maybe like fromyour perspective where there might be a difference
there in terms of these processes.So first of all, you know,
(08:52):
you have to give huge, huge, huge credit to Jonathan Mostow and Sam
Montgomery who wrote the screenplay and allof that, all of that, all
of that was in their first draft. And as Jonathan Mostow will tell you
it, Kurt Russell will tell youit's exhausting playing Jonathan Mostow because that all
of that paranoia, all of thatthat comes from John Mostow, and it's
(09:16):
very much his worldview how he sees, you know, everything, and so
all of that was on the page. All of that was on the page.
So when I first read the script, it was just, you know,
holy cow, it was a tightscript from the very beginning. And
Mostow will tell you that, youknow, he was marketing back to you
(09:37):
know, Spielberg's first film, likeDuel. So films like that are all
part of the tradition. And thenI think the other thing that, well,
what's the difference is, well,you had one of the world's greatest
producers, literally one of the greatestproducers of all time in Dino de Laurentis.
I mean, Dina de Laurentis isa legend. He's the guy who
started in Italy after the war,produced Lestradas, produced a Bitter Rice.
(10:01):
I mean, just an amazing,amazing filmmaker, and this story really spoke
to him. In one hundred percent. Dino got behind this film. And
you know, there are scenes inthat film of like when Kurt Russell goes
to the police station and he seesall the missing people the posters up on
(10:22):
that was Dino. Dino really feltthat, and Dino's vision was started right
from the beginning with the casting.So one of my favorite stories was when
I was head of production for Dino'scompany and he said to me, Jonathan,
(10:43):
you know who'd be great for thismovie, he says to me,
and he says, Coralozo. Andso this is again kind of pre internet
days, and I was new.We didn't really have a shorthand Dino and
I and so I go back tomy office and I pull out books you
know you had to look up.And I'm thinking, I don't know this
Cardo Looso person, and he mustbe some Italian cinematographer who I don't know.
(11:05):
And I'm calling my friends at allthe agencies I need to get Cardo
Looso and everyone's like, I don'tknow who you're talking about. So I
go back into Dina's office and Isay, Dino, I'm really sorry,
I don't know who this Coodo Loosoperson is, but I really want to
find him for you, And Dinosays, looks at me, just completely
dismissive. He goes, how yoube in the movie business, and no,
(11:26):
no, the Coto Loza. Everybodyknows the Cardo Looso. So now
I double down on this, andfinally I go into Dino's wife, Martha's
office, and I say, Martha, I am so sorry, but I've
looked everywhere and I cannot find thisCardo Looso person. And I know everyone
must know, and I'm sure he'ssuper important in Italian cinema, but who
is this? And she looks atme and she goes, I don't know
(11:46):
what you're talking about. So nowMartha and I go into Dino's office and
Martha asked him, Dino, Dino, who is Cardo Loso and Dino goes,
Coudo Looso, hell of them?And finally we understood it was Kurt
Russell that was that was who hewanted for the film, and again that
was Dino. And Dino was theone who made the offer on the salary
(12:11):
for Kurt Russell. He offered Kurthis previous salary, which I believe at
the time was eight million dollars,and he offered it to Rick Nasita,
and Rick offered it to Kurt,and Kurt said, I love the script.
I'm just I want to take thespring off. Dino thought about it.
He then offered ten million dollars toRick Nasita, and and and and
(12:31):
finally, uh, Dino de Laurentisoffered fifteen million dollars to Kurt Russell,
and Kurt Russell came into our officethe following day with Rick agreed to do.
It meant with John Mostow, andthat was Dino. I mean,
so when you say why don't movieslike Get That get made, it's because
Dino de Laurentis willed that film intobeing. It's absolutely Jonathan Mostow's vision,
(12:58):
it's absolutely his talent, his writing, his directing. But it was you
know, you talk about the powerof a producer. I mean, I
don't know of many producers today whoare at that Dino de Laurentius level.
I remember vividly. I had ameeting. Um. It was me,
Nicholas Cages manager UM and then twodifferent teams of producers for a particular project.
(13:20):
And we had we spent I'm sureit was at least an hour.
I think the director was there too, UM, just going over notes in
the script and they were good notesand they'd like toil script apart. And
we walked out of that meeting andI was like, I don't think Nicholas
is doing this movie. And thenthe next day they were like, we've
put X amount in escrow and andhe's up not doing anyway. But it
(13:45):
just goes to show you, Um, this is the part of it that
people don't really understand. This iscasting. Casting is basically. I mean
I've had I had a Radioto movielike this. I had a bunch of
movies. In fact, I thinkmost of the movies where we've had a
are involved. They first said no, They usually say no, and then
depending on the producer, sometimes theproducer will just refuse to accept no,
(14:09):
and they'll just go back and saywhat did you want more money? Do
you want less time? And thelike? Does he have to be there
for a week? What do wehave to do? And yeah, it's
like if you have that person whojust refuses to accept no. And even
in this is where it's like thiswhere it was a good script, it's
just all right, fine, howmuch money do we need until finally this
is actually going to happen? Andyou got there. Yeah, And then
(14:30):
we tried with Kurt Russell with JonathanMostow directing with the script, and we
had half the financing from Spelling.First we went to Warner Brothers, and
Warner Brothers committed to it, andthen Warner Brothers dropped out, so we
literally were going into production. AndI will say that when we couldn't get
(14:54):
anyone, we went to every studioin town. They all passed. And
Dina to make up the budget shortfallof Warner Brothers having dropped out, he
mortgaged his own home to come upwith the production funds. I mean,
think of another producer who would dothat, who would just literally mortgage his
(15:15):
home to get the funds to doit, And he did. He literally
mortgaged his own funds, so hisown home. So it's just kind of
crazy when you think about that levelof commitment, that amount of faith and
belief. And John Moss down inthe script in the film. Yeah,
it's crazy. And it's not thefirst time I've heard a story like that
either, which shows you how terriblethis business is. If you have any
(15:37):
interest to do anything else, listener, go to something else, and I
will tell you this. So,after I produced Breakdown, I started writing
and I wrote the film Robbed theMob. And I would go to these
meetings and people would hear that Ihad been the executive producer on Breakdown,
and they would say to me,and this was just crazy. They would
say to me, Breakdown, now, Breakdown, that's exactly the type of
(16:00):
movie we'd want to make. Andit took all my self control and all
of those kind of water bottle needingsto say, I think to you,
I came to your boss two yearsago when the script with Kurt Russell with
half the funding and they all hadpassed on it. And so you know,
everyone loves to Monday Morning quarterback.Everyone loves to say that, oh,
(16:21):
after Breakdown open number one at thebox office. That's the type of
movie we would want. But inthe moment with the script with the actor,
with the director, nobody, nobody, nobody would kill to it.
But they all said it a yearlater when I was going out with Rob
the mob Now that's the kind ofmovie we want to make. Was hilarious.
(16:41):
Is it's not like it's like aFellini like art film, Like it's
a very commercial movie. So it'sjust funny. I thought. Also,
what was interesting and rewatching it isthat I had forgotten is very much like
a Western, like the themes ofit, you know, civilization versus savagery.
You know, the idea that inWesterns a big thing is civilized society
(17:03):
versus like they have the town wherethey're trying to be civilized. Then they're
faced with some sort of threat thatthe town that is civilized not able to
handle, and so that's when theyneed the guy with the gun to solve
that problem. And that's the wholeethos. So basically ninety percent of Westerns,
and in this it's like the modernversion of that where her Russell and
they make a big point, youknow, the Benetton sweater and all that
(17:25):
kind of thing, and he's he'seven he even says some stuff that's sort
of pejorative about the locals and andysthey set up that he is very much
like a guy from the city,and it's like, great, get twenty
miles outside of the city, nobodygives a shit. And this, by
the way, has not disappeared froman American life. I produced a podcast
called Borderline, which the true crimeshow about a crime that happened in a
(17:48):
small town in Texas and the geographyof it that hasn't really changed, meaning
that that town today is still youhave to go like ninety miles to get
to the next town. And there'splaces like that in America and I don't
care how civilized you are, whereat a certain point you're sort of on
your own. And that's what's greatabout the premise is that the second the
(18:10):
car breaks down and he's by himselfand the wife's gone, You're like,
what is that's it? He's onit, like how the hell is he
going to get out of this?And uh, And it has a real
edge to it that I think alsoagain has been sanded down over the years,
and we don't see movies that muchanymore that our mainstream movies that have
the edge that this has. Itotally agree. I also think that John
(18:30):
Moscow was sort of prescient in againthat nineties where the whole world kind of
the middle of the country. There'sa lot of jobs that are lost that
and when you actually I've thought aboutobviously I've thought about this movie way too
much, but I have thought like, well, what really was this this
(18:52):
cruise plan? Right? What wastheir m for stealing things? And it
kind of like it's it's kind oflike whoa, you could also get a
job, because like you're like,if you think about what were they really
trying to steal? What was theirinitial plan? It's not much money they're
going to get. What are theygonna get his his jeep, his clothes.
(19:15):
They didn't know he had the ninetythousand dollars when they start their plan,
and when you kind of look atthe barn, it's just kind of
like a big old garage sale ofcrap, right, So so how what
was their plan to make money?And I think of like, well,
maybe there were no other choices,right, Like it's kind of that era
of when those kind of jobs disappear, and I thought that was very kind
(19:37):
of prescient of where the country hasgone. Yeah, I think also,
um, and it is funny.I mean it's not like we don't have
we just still have movie stars.But I do think that there was something
about like there's a moment early inthe movie when JT. Walsh is pretending
that he hasn't seen carlsal before andI've never seen it before in my life,
(20:00):
and Kurt Russell has this really smallmoment. He doesn't go big with
it. He just goes like,what are you? What are you doing?
And he's so it's almost like hiswhole worldview collapses in that moment,
his whole belief in society. Andit's a real movie moment. And I
was trying to think of, like, if we make that movie today,
who's playing this part? Is itgoing to have the same gravitas to it?
(20:22):
I think in part it's also likeback then, the guys who were
the movie stars, you almost feltlike there was another world where this guy
was, like Harrison Ford was acarpenter or whatever they had. They sort
of came from real life and thenbecame actors. And I feel like now
it's like this person was always anactor. They're pretending to be this character
(20:45):
and it doesn't have that same feelingto it. I totally agree, And
I think, first of all,I think you look at Kurt Russell and
you inherently trust him and you trusthim going all the way back for the
computer weren't ten issues. He wasthe Disney kid all the way through all
of those movies. So you youtrust him, so you're with him in
all of that emotional goodwill. WhenJT. Wall says I've never seen you,
(21:07):
I remember reading that moment and justbeing like, why, what's going
on here? And it's that goodkind of confusion that happened. So I
love that. But I agree thatthere's something about Kurt Russell. I always
believe that plays working class done good, Like like he's a guy who owned
a started out working at a garagepumping gas but now owns five gas stations.
(21:33):
He just plays that guy. There'sa great documentary on his father who
had a minor league baseball team,and it was a fantastic documentary. Everyone
should check it out. I believeit's on Netflix. But that was another
(21:56):
like you just feel like, yeah, the battered Bastards of baseball. All
that was what it was, thebattered bastards of baseball. But definitely worth
checking out. But you feel like, yeah, he's not he's not a
major league baseball owner. He's aminor league baseball owner. And you just
kind of feel like it's very relatable. Kurt Russell. Yeah, I mean
it's it's almost like you look backat it too, when we had stars
(22:18):
like like a Lee, Marvin GeneHackman, Curry Russell, and then it's
sort of morphed out of that andwe sort of went away from where the
star you could see them being aregular person. I think now in a
weird way, it's almost like allof our movie stars are too good looking.
They're so handsome that you're like,I don't know that I believe that
you were ever a regular person andwould say that by the way he would
(22:42):
say he in another life, hewould have just been a minor league baseball
player trying trying to make it intothe majors, you know, like that's
he's like, by the way,the baseball team we're talking about wasn't even
Triple A, was a single Abaseball team. You know, like this
was like, you know, ifthey got five hundred fans, it was
a good night. You know.I think in terms of like it makes
(23:04):
me think of regards to ordinary peopleor people that look like real people.
JT. Walsh it's like the kingof that, right, JT. Walsh
obviously one of the best character actorsof all time. This is his final
role if I remember correctly correct Andshortly after he has a moment in this
that is so great where his wifehas discovered his like essentially the equivalent of
(23:27):
like a rapist den Like it's thiscreepy the barn and the woman in there
and all that, and I thinkKurt Russell is saying to the wife,
like get out of the hole orsomething like that, and JT is nonplussed.
He's not upset that she's discovered this. He doesn't care. He goes
just pull the chain, Arlene.It's like, I again, it's not
(23:51):
like we don't still have great actorslike that. But I just think the
casting of this film is so impeccable. And I do wonder if part of
that is it's a programmer kind ofconcept, but it is executed at such
a high level. Yeah, Imean everyone involved. I mean you can't
underestimate the music by Basil Polydora asyou can't. The casting was phenomenal.
(24:15):
Everyone was just they were just terrificactors and it was a very I mean
it's an actor's piece. I mean, John got phenomenal performances out of everyone.
It could have been over the top, it could have been cheesy,
but JT is just fabulously understated.And when that mom is telling her son
Paul the trigger, You're just like, oh my gosh, it's completely believable.
(24:38):
He's such a good actor that Iwas almost like JT. Walsh,
good dad. Like I was almostlike, yeah, you got that kid.
The kid was ready to go.He was ready to protect his dad
with the gun. I also wantedto kind of circle around to what you
said at the beginning fort of thepractical stuff. So I'm watching the thing
at the end where they dropped literallydrop a tractor trailer on JT. Walsh's
(25:00):
face. Essentially, I'm trying tothink, how did you do it practically,
like like just like how So theanswer was there was a japanned crane
because you couldn't literally have that there, but it was basically a crane,
and it was basically a crane asa harness to make sure that it didn't
(25:22):
look on JT. Walsh. Nowthat's a lot of trust JT had,
and I don't know that I wouldhave the same amount of trust that he
did, but it was a itwas an eighteen the cab of an eighteen
wheeler, and it was hanging ona truck on a crane on a bridge
that had been out of service thanthe nineteen fifties. So this was a
(25:45):
lot of trust on a lot ofdifferent levels that I'm going to be honest,
I don't know that I would have. So I'm JT. Wash I'm
laying in this riverbed and I'm lookingup and there's a truck lowering towards me.
I'm hoping, and I don't remember. I mean, we're talking.
It's a bunch of years now.I'm ninety nine percent sure that when the
truck was coming down, they atleast took him out and put a I
(26:08):
don't even think there was a stuntdouble there. I think at least they're
like, all right, you're good. I'm talking about when the truck was
hanging. So that still took alot of faith, you know what I
mean. But I'm assuming, Yeah, I'm gonna go with I'm committing to
this that JT was not there whenthe truck fell. Yeah. So I
(26:30):
mean, if it for someone likehim for his career, it's almost like
a perfect final role because it's sucha great role. It was such a
great role. It was such agreat role. And yeah, Carol Lewis
did an amazing job casting the film. Vicky Paul's production design was amazing.
I mean, it was a greatteam of filmmakers, really really wonderful people.
(26:52):
But yeah, Carol was amazing inall those different people she brought in.
And a great, nice little gracenote at the end that Kathleen is
the one you know, pulls thething and it takes him out, And
that was actually a decision made byKurt and Kathleen on the set. They
felt like it needed to be Kathleento do it. I think I'm ninety
(27:14):
nine percent sure it was originally scriptedas Kurt's character, but it really was
on the day they felt like itwould be best if Kathleen did it.
And I loved Kurt's reaction to it. It just felt really strong. You
know. Another thing is the filmoriginally had a much longer act, one
like a fifteen pages of Kurt Russellwas a photographer and he was down in
(27:38):
Central America and he sees something awfuland he comes back and he wants to
quit his job and wants to changeand they're broke and all of that was
It was such a great lesson inwhat an amazing actors Kathleen and Kurt are
and were able to do in thatwhich was they were able to convey all
of that love that was written overfifteen pages. In my opinion, the
(28:00):
film really works, really comes togetherin that moment when they're broke down on
the side of the road and she'steasing him and they're kind of laughing together,
and you just see again you talkabout movie stars, but the two
of them are able to convey theirlove, their emotion. It's just fantastic.
And you didn't need any of theother stuff. You didn't need the
(28:22):
discussion in their apartment. He didn'tneed why he was they were deciding.
He just needed to know it's ayoung couple, they're in love, and
they've decided to start their lives againacross the country. I've mentioned this before.
You know, you sometimes get thenote from when you're developing a project
where it's like, you know,a character comes into the house and he's
got whatever, a bag of goldor something, and it's like, where
(28:45):
did the bag of gold come from? Let's find out, let's show him
going to the mind and getting thegold, taking the bag, driving all
and it's like, you don't needthat. The audience will pick all that
shit up in two seconds. Justgive them the visual. Yeah. I
had something similar happened on Rob theMob where I was given the note of
like, well, where exactly dothey get the gun? And you know,
you write out these sequence of hegoes here, he goes there,
(29:08):
he negotiate and like I wrote itlike, you know, as a good
team player, but fully knowing thatthis was never ever ever going to get
shot. So a good script,a good actor, is a good director.
If they can't get across that thisis a couple in love, then
you've got bigger problems going on.And you never doubted that Kathleen and Kurt
(29:30):
were in love. Like it wasa very powerful It's just it was such
a great reminder of and that momentwhere she's teasing him and all of that,
you just felt like, oh,this is the shorthand of like,
oh, they're gonna meet it.You know. It's that feeling of like
you see a couple and you're like, oh, they really do love each
other, and you can see itin real life and just as much as
(29:51):
you can see it in film.Yeah, as we wrap up, just
um, I'm curious what you seein the landscape now. So particularly,
it's actually interesting your two films,Breakdown and Rob the Mob. So Breakdown
is the sort of you know,high concept but like you know, genre
programmer kind of movie that now isprobably made for I don't know what is
(30:12):
Netflix making these movies for like twelvemillion bucks or something, and they kind
of throw it out there and peopletalk about it for like a week,
and then we never hear about itagain. And then Rob the Mob.
I assume this is my guest becauseI know Millennium distributed. It is this
old model where it's like foreign saleswill get a whole bunch of recognizable actors,
will build a big package, andback then foreign sales were still robust
(30:34):
enough where you could cast it.Because Rob Mob's cast is insane. There
is like seven hundred people that you'veseen before in that movie, even down
for very small supporting parts. Andit feels like both of those kinds of
movies no longer an option in ourcurrent landscape. Do you think it's gonna
ever the pendulum will swing back thatway or what do you see in the
(30:55):
future, I mean, I don'tknow. I mean, see a film
like Rob the Mob with with youknow, forget Andy Garcia and Ray Romano,
but like Frank Whaley, you willVasquez, Michael Rispolly. I mean,
it's kind of crazy, Bert Young, Kathy Moriarty, and then you
(31:15):
know, Jeremy Allen White is ina supporting role and now you know he's
the star of the Bear. Imean, I mean, part of it
is a testimony to Raymond day Felia, the director. Part of it is
I don't I don't know. Imean, I mean they're all still I
mean, every every one of thesepeople is still a talent, is still
(31:37):
available, you know. So Ifeel like somehow the people producing these movies
don't seem to think that that matters. I don't know why, because I
think it does. But I don'treally know the answer to the question.
But I too have noticed it,so I see exactly what you're talking about.
I don't know the answer, youknow, I don't what do you
(32:00):
think the answer is. I reallydon't know. I think that a lot
of this is predicated on what's goingto happen with Marvel. I really do
believe that actually is meaningful, meaningthat we've seen some slowing of audience for
the Marvel films, which have beenso reliably just gangbusters again and again and
again. And I think that ifthat continues, then there will be a
(32:21):
reaction towards more original stuff. Youknow, both Rob the Mob and breakdown
our examples of that right where basicallyit's an original idea. I know,
the Mob is based on a truestory, but they're not based on whatever
comic book, graphic novel, etc. So yeah, I think it depending
on how that goes, then thisother stuff might swing one way or the
(32:42):
other. I mean, what's interestingto me is I teach at AFI,
the American Film Institute. I teachscreenwriting there, and my students, when
I asked them what they're watching,what they want to see, they kind
of go two different directions. Formost of them, movies are the Marvel
movies. They want to see theMarvel movies opening weekend. They talk about
the Marvel movies. But the otherway they go, which I think is
(33:02):
equally interesting, are the kind ofsuper micro budgeted films that you see on
shutter like kind of these like underone million dollar movies. And they've been
amazing to me because they throw outthese movies at me and I love them.
So I've seen a lot of littlefilms that I kind of think,
well, maybe that's how these moviesget made. I mean they're very small
(33:25):
and scale. I mean, it'slike taking place in someone's living room kind
of thing with five actors. ButI don't know, I don't know,
I don't like. I think you'reright. I think Marvel has kind of
sucked all the air out of theroom, so I don't know. I
also think, you know, Marvelkind of works globally, Like I think
(33:45):
no one's going to get in troublemaking a Marvel movie because it takes place
in a fantasy universe, and Ithink for a lot of countries they don't
want to touch on real topics.I think that's risky. So when you
say it takes place in the Marveluniverse, no one I mean and quite
literally is going to get through tojail for screen of Marble movie. Yeah.
(34:06):
Well, thank you so much forcoming on the shows. It's a
real pleasure to have you on here, and I appreciate your insight. That
is the episode for today. Iwant to thank everybody for listening as always.
If you enjoy the show, giveus a rating and review on Apple
Podcasts, and subscribe for future episodes. Jonathan, thank you so much again.
Thank you for having me, lovebeing here. Until next time,
(34:27):
Bye bye,
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