Mike talks to Alex Convery (@AConvery) about his first produced screenplay Air. Alex talks about how he decided to write the movie after watching the Last Dance, what the initial script was like and the call he got from Ben Affleck that he was interested. Alex shares stories from the set of the movie, seeing his script come to life and what he kept from the set as a momento. Alex shares his passion for watching movies, where his creativity comes from and what career advice Ben Affleck gave him. In the movie review, Mike talks about The Super Mario Bros. Movie and where it ranks among video game movie adaptations, who was the best voice actor in the cast and what this could mean for a possible Nintendo cinematic universe. In the Trailer Park, Mike shares his theory on what Miles Morales will go through in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome back to movie Mike's movie podcast. I
am your host Movie Mike, and today I have an
interview with the writer from Air that even if you
haven't seen the movie yet, I think you will be
inspired by a story and his passion for writing makes
me feel like Hollywood is in good hands with the
next generation of writers. In the movie review, it's finally
time to talk about the Super Mario Brothers movie. And
in the trailer Park, we're diving into Spider Man across
(00:22):
the Spider Verse and all my theories going into that movie. Welcome.
If you are new here, I hope you subscribe and
stick around. And now let's talk movies.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
In a world where everyone and their mother has a podcast,
one man stands to infiltrate the ears of listeners like
never before in a movie podcast. A man with so
much movie knowledge, he's basically like a walking IMTB with glasses.
From the Nashville Podcast Network, this is movie Mike's Movie Podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
About to get into my interview with Alex Conberry. He
is thirty years old and Air is his first first
produced screenplay ever. He wrote it as a spec script
after he watched The Last Dance on Netflix back in
twenty twenty. And what a spec script is. It is
when a screenwriter writes a script to a movie in
hopes that will be purchased by a producer, a production company,
(01:14):
or a studio. Kind of along the same lines as
a songwriter would just write a song hoping that someday
a big artist would find it, like it and want
to record it. So Alex's story is very unusual that
the spec script he just wrote ended up getting made
into a movie and has had so much success. And
even if you haven't seen the movie Air, which is
all about the creation of the Air Jordan's show, I
(01:37):
think you will enjoy this interview and be inspired by
his passion for writing, his love of movies and wanting
to create things that he himself will want to sit
down and watch. So let's get into this interview now
with Alex Convery. What has the last month been like
in your life?
Speaker 3 (01:53):
The last month has been a lot of cruss screenings, premieres, interviews.
You know, I'm like an introverted writer at heart, so
this has been like you got to come out of
your shell a little bit and have a bunch of
small talking answer, a bunch of questions, which has been good.
You know, it's a good exercise, but we're winding down
(02:14):
a bit, so I'm excited to, you know, just be
back at my desk writing.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I find that I kind of identify with you in
that way, Like outside of this, I'm a pretty quiet
and reserved person. From my main job, I am a writer,
but I have such a passion for movies and talking
about movies. This is kind of how I've had to
get out of my show being more extroverted. For you,
your entire life, You've just been writing things, and now
everybody wants to talk to you. They're all inspired by
(02:40):
your story. So what was that like initially of like,
oh man, now I got to speak to people. People
want to know my story.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You know.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
It's interesting, like the life of a working screenwriter, Like
a lot of the time is spent not writing. You
do meetings, right obviously, but you also are putting together pitches,
and whether it's you're pitching an original project or you're
pitching on like a studio's ip, there is an element
of it where you know, there's a bit of performance,
you know, which is which is really kind of antithetical
(03:06):
to what a screenwriter should be, you know, like it's
what you're saying, we're like the nerds who you know,
like being alone with with with you know, just with
final drafts. So it's interesting, man, I don't know, it's
there's a lot to the job more than than than
just writing, you know, Interior Nike, nineteen eighty four. You know,
it's like there's all this other stuff that comes with it.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
When it comes to your creative process. And we were
just talking about how much of your creativity is sparked
by just being bored, because I find that sometimes when
I'm so busy doing so many things, it's hard for
me to sit down, like, all right, now's your time
to be creative.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Well, I look for characters first and foremost, you know,
characters that are that are interesting, that have like a
clear journey to go on that I think would be
fun to write, that I'm excited to write.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
You know.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
It's so hard to write, you know, truly, Like the
easiest thing in the world is just not to write.
There's so many other things you could be and things
that can occupy your time, Like you really have to,
at least for me feel passionate about something to like
actually get in final draft and get going on it.
So I look for characters that spark, you know, and
you know, for Air, it was sunny, you know, like
(04:15):
it wasn't even so much the shoe or or the world.
It was just Sonny was such a fascinating character, and
to me, this is such an interesting way into his story.
And he was such a fun character to write, you
know that because of who he is in real life
and the life he's lived and the places he's been.
So I chase characters, you know, and I try to
find stuff that I'm excited to write about, which sounds
(04:37):
like obvious orry Well, obviously you want to write about about,
but like it's easy to lose that passion very quickly, right,
you have to do rewrites a million times, or especially
where I was as like an unproduced screenwriter, you're chasing jobs,
you know. So it's like sometimes you can talk yourself
into being passionate about it, but like really deep down,
it's like it wasn't there, and the script and the
movie really has been a lesson for me in chasing
(05:00):
those projects that like deep in your core are exciting,
you know, and like you want to be at the
desk working, you know, because so so you know, usually
it's it's the exact opposite feeling. It's like, oh gosh,
I guess I have to do some pages today, right,
But when you can find something that's like, man, I
can't wait to get back into the script and get
back to working, like that's a that for me is
(05:20):
can be a rare feeling. So it was this one
was a lesson and like chase that because this was
a script that, especially written on spec you know, they
would tell you not to do right. I mean, it's
about real people and there are rights issues and all
of that, and like the odds of it getting made
are just so so low. But for me, it was
it was the passion that that really kept me going
(05:41):
because it was like, man, I just I love these characters.
I love writing in this world. And it was a
real lesson, you know, like going forward, that's really the
type that's really the only type of stuff I want
to be working on, right, And that's easier said than done,
But you know, it was kind of chasing that gut
feeling that that you know, got got the movie to
to where it now.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
I love hearing you talk about your passion because when
I watch air A lot of what drove me to
the story of Sonny is how passionate he was about basketball,
how passionate he was about pursuing Michael Jordan, how he
just felt it in his soul, like I know this
guy is going to be the guy. So what else
are you just that passionate about, like Sonny?
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Well, you just look back to my past scripts and
it's like, you know, you don't have to like the
line isn't too far from like stuff I love to
to what I write about. You know, the script I
wrote before Air was called an Excelsior, and it was
a biopic about you know, stan Lee and Jack Kirby
and kind of those early origins of Marvel comics. And
that was because I grew up as a huge comic
(06:40):
book kid, you know. But I love the people behind
the thing, you know, and like finding those type of stories.
And obviously, you know, we don't have to go into
the whole history of Marvel, but it was a very
unlikely story to get from you know, two guys working
in a janitor closet at a magazine company in nineteen
sixty two to you know, Guardians of the Galaxy three
coming on in a couple of weeks you on, that's
(07:00):
just like, what an incredible journey that that marvel has
has gone on. I justaid, like, gosh, it would be
cool to tell kind of the beginning of that. Before that,
it was script about college football, right, and kind of
like the underbelly of college football. And that simply came
from me being a massive college football fan.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
So it's like you hear a lot in film school,
they tell you write what you know, you know, which
can be taken very literally, right. You could write a
movie about your childhood or growing up, I mean, and
there's many examples of that, from Moonlight to Dazed and
Confused to Lady Bird. You know, those are all very
personal stories that feel like, you know, they're almost like
(07:38):
someone's guts being spilled on the on the screen, not
in a gory way, but in like a passion way.
For me, I didn't really have that story, right. I
grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, basically in a
John Hughes movie, right, which was very nice and pleasant
and and all of that. But I certainly didn't have
some you know, a movie out of it. Maybe one
day I'll find, you know, that idea but I didn't
(08:01):
have it. So it was like, okay, so what do
when you say write what you know? What do I know?
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Well?
Speaker 3 (08:05):
I know about Michael Jordan in the nineties, bulls, right,
I know about Marvel Comics and Stanley you know, I
know about college football. So it was like, you know,
it was it was kind of looking at the stuff
that left to my own devices. I'm going to geek
out over anyway, and it's like, is there a movie
in there? Is there a script in there? Is there
a character in there that that you know you can
kind of latch onto and and go from there.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
I'm fascinated with the writing process and how this movie
started out. You've been talking about, you know, watching The
Last Dance. You see that part in the documentary where
they briefly mentioned the Michael Jordan Nike connection. How do
you sit down after you're inspired by that, after you
google it and see that you know, there hasn't been
a movie made about it, how do you sit down
and write that script?
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Well, you start with Faden on page one. Now I'm
kidding it. It It goes back to what we're talking about,
which is finding the character right, because this is a
movie that Obviously you could tell from a lot of
different points of view. Right, it could be an actual
Michael Jordan biopick. Right, it could be about Phil Knight,
it could be about David Fok, Jordan's agent. It could
(09:08):
be about Peter Moore, who actually designed the sneaker, you know.
So it's it becomes a question of, Okay, what angle
is is you know, kind of the most interesting and
most compelling on this. Now, because I was doing it
as a specscript, I knew right away, like I'm not
going to do the Michael Jordan biopick, right, that's just foolish.
And if like this is already unlikely enough to get made,
that actually trying to do the Michael Jordan biopick on
(09:28):
spec that's just like there's no chance. And by the way,
Jordan should be the one to tell that story, right,
And maybe there will come a time and day when
he wants to do that and is prepared to do that.
And I think every studio in Hollywood would line up
at backup the brink strug to do that story. So, okay,
what are the different angles on it? And it gets
back to what we're talking about. To me, Sonny, what
(09:50):
was most compelling because you know, you go through all
the research and at the end of the day and
there's a lot of you know, varying accounts and people
wanting to take credit for different things. But at the
end of the day, all the accounts land in the
same place that there was only one guy who said,
I have this feeling in my gut that Michael Jordan
is a guy we should go all in on. And
that's just what an interesting epiphany, you know, like in
(10:12):
terms of its ripple on history. I mean, it is
it's hard to fathom, you know, if Sonny had had
that feeling about any other player in that draft, you know,
not to be hyperbolic about it, but the world is different.
You know, we have air stocked in or Air Booie
instead of Air Jordan. So it is it was, gosh,
what drives someone to have that sort of conviction and
(10:34):
determination and feeling And that's all stuff I just found,
you know, universal in a way too, right, in a
way that you know, obviously this is a movie about
basketball and Nike and you know kind of like the
nitty greed of how that process works. But I just figured, man,
anyone sitting in that audience has probably been where Sonny
was at some point, right, like employee number five hundred
(10:55):
at a company where no one's really listening to you,
but you have this feeling. And it's like everyone has
had a feeling or a dream or a gut instinct
at some point in life and you know, wanted to
chase it. So for me, it was like that that's
a really accessible place to tell the story from.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Now.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
The way to reach a universal feeling like that is
through specificity, right, which is where like the nitty gritty
of the draft process comes from. But no, I mean really,
and this was a specscript, right, So it was like
I just wrote it all on my own, and I
really just wrote it in order. Like this isn't one
that I outlined or did a treatment to for or
like got notes on in advance. I just one it's
(11:31):
a true story, right, so like the outline is kind
of already done for you because it's it's you know,
it's history. So it was really it was kind of
a nights and weekends project, right. I had other stuff
that was paying me to write at the time, and
that's always the stuff I was focused on focusing on,
like during the day, but this was like you know,
nights and weekends. I mean I really wrote most of
the script from between the hours of like ten pm
(11:52):
and like two am, you know, like after my wife
would gone to bed. It was just me alone and
like with my headphones, and I would just go back
and like you know, work a scene or two, and
I really just wrote it in order. And it was
an interesting process because sometimes I would most of the time,
I would just start right at the beginning, you know,
and I would read through the script as if I
was just like back in my intern days, reading some
(12:14):
random script by some random guy named Alex Convary, and
I would say, like what would I think of this script,
you know, like really trying to remove myself from the process,
and I would just keep going until something bumped, and
then I would work on that and then keep going
and something bumped, I do it again. So it was
like it's a very unique process and not necessarily one
I would recommend, because it's hard to replicate this obviously
being a true story in a very like short period
(12:34):
of time, like kind of gave me the frame, the
framework was already inherent in the story in a way
that isn't there for like most ideas, So I don't
know if I could ever replicate this exact process again.
Certainly wasn't the fastest process in the world either. I
mean it took me a year to write, which is,
you know, a long time for the for a first
draft of a you know, one hundred page screenplay. But
(12:56):
you know, it's what worked for me on this one.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
You know, a lot of this movie, a lot of
the conversations take place over the phone. And I grew
up in the nineties, but this movie made me nostalgic
for the eighties, just so the fact that I could
slam a telephone. What has been the most important phone
call that you've ever received in your life?
Speaker 3 (13:12):
There are a couple, you know, like I mean dating
all the way back to like getting the first call
from you know, the guys that would end up being
my agents saying like we read your script, bag man
and are interested in meeting with you for representation. It
was like, oh my gosh, you know, that's the call that, like,
you know, in a lot of ways, I've been dreaming
of since moving up here for film school. Now at
the time, I was like, oh my gosh, I made it.
But it's like, Nope, there's still so much work that
(13:35):
has to go into it, you know. You know, obviously,
getting the call on this one that that you know,
Ben was interested and I was going to meet with him,
that was an important one. I mean, the call after
Ben had met with Jordan basically saying, like, Jordan has
given his blessing with a few you know, as long
as we can accomplish these notes and we're good to go.
I mean, that was that was huge. And then I mean, finally,
really the call from the producer saying, like, you know,
(13:57):
Amazon is going to finance the movie be that. That's
like again, like in terms of calls you dream dream of,
like that's that's kind of the list on a spec script,
you know, like those are all the ones you need
to get, and every one of them is very unlikely
in its own way. And I had come to learn that,
you know, over my thirteen years living out here, that
it's those are very few and far between. Usually it's
(14:19):
getting a phone call saying like, yeah, they didn't like
the script, that actor passed on it. Well, time time
to move on to the next one out. This project's dead,
like you know, so it's just like you get used
to it. That that the good ones definitely stand out.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
What was the stress like waiting for the final approval
that Michael Jordan has given its blessing on the film?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
You know, like, what can you say? I mean, it was.
It doesn't get more stressful than that. I mean, it's
just like when you lay out what that meeting kind
of meant for, you know, again, I was just like
I was an unproduced screenwriter and like we had everything
else ready to go on this one, and it was
basically like, if Jordan gives his blessing, then like we're
going to do the movie. And obviously it was Ben
and Mad and She's like, oh my gosh, what a
you what a dream scenario on this one. But just
(14:57):
as easily it was like I, you know, I kind
of figured what what incentives Jordan have to do any movie?
You know, like he he doesn't need to do anything
unless he wants to. So look, it's a credit to
Ben that Ben was able to like earn his trust
and lay out all of what we were wanting to
do with this movie. And and you know, have Michael
recognize that that's a very like a person. I would
(15:18):
have been scared on my mind sitting there for that meeting.
You know, shocker, Ben knows what he's doing, you know,
so it was yeah, I you know, it would be hard.
I'd be hard pressed to think of like a more
stressful twenty four hours than than that one when professionally
at least.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
So you got to be on set during the filming
of this movie, which is pretty unusual for a writer.
What was your role being on set?
Speaker 3 (15:42):
You know, look, mostly I was just there to take
it all in. You know, the script was fairly locked
by the time we got there. You know, like like
Chris Tucker had already done a lot of work on
his character Howard, and and you know, Ben and Mann
had done a pass on the script and a lot
of that was already in place. Now when you know
when we every day when we showed up, there was
a little bit of invention here and there, you know,
from like Bateman like really bringing comedy to his scenes
(16:05):
and like that dry sense of humor. You know that
it was in the script a little bit, but like
he really embodied it to you know, like, look, it's
one thing to write the movie, but then you show
up on set and it's like, well, the blocking's not
quite right and like maybe we cut this line and
move that around, and like that's just the creation that
that that that happens on set. You know, it's not
like I was sitting there like directing it or you know,
adding a bunch of input. You know, Ben Ben obviously
(16:25):
knows what he's doing. But no, it's just there, you know,
kind of kind of taking it all in and enjoying
it and you know, helping when it was needed.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I feel like Air is more a comedy than actual comedies.
When I went to go see it in theaters, the
entire theater was laughing throughout the entire movie. And you
mentioned a little bit of you know, Jason Bateman adding
some comedy to his scenes. Was all that comedy written
into the script or was it just once you had
all these characters together, once you see it all unfolding,
that it kind of came naturally. It was just a
(16:56):
little more just like, oh, this is actually a funny movie.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
I mean, look so much of that in the performance,
and and all credit to the cast. You know, like
a lot of the like dry sense of humor in it,
Like look, you could play that straight, or you could
play it humorous, or you could play it somewhere in between,
you know, and that what I love about the movie
is like, those are the type of movies I like watching,
you know, Like, and I'm a big believer in you know,
not putting something in a box, you know, just like, oh,
(17:19):
this is a comedy, this is a drama. You know.
It's like, to me, the best work, I like, the
best dramas have moments of humor in them, and the
best comedy is always rooted in dramatic stakes. You know.
So it's like the type of movies I like exist
somewhere in between those two. And you know, I certainly
tried to write it that way, but no, without the
(17:39):
cast we had, like, there's no chance it would be
nearly as funny as as the movie is.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
You know.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
That's been one of the real joys of getting to
watch it in a theater. You know, this was supposed
to be a streaming movie, and you know, all credit
to Amazon. They they you know, really took a chance
on it and and said we're gonna, you know, we're
gonna put it out there. And it's just been such
a joy to be able to go into you know,
a pack instant in the back and just you know,
kind of watch people go on that ride with the movie.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
So when the movie comes out and you see that
ninety nine percent rutten tomato score come out after that,
is there any whispers, any text messages or emails going
around like hey, maybe there's a chance for an oscar here?
Does that ever kind of come into existence or it's
just something nobody else.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
Like make Oh no, I mean gosh, it's just it's
just so far out and like there's just so many
different things that can happen. It's like, look, my job
is done, right. It's just it's you write the script,
you film the movie, and you put it out in
the world, and you know it's not your place to
say how it should be received and who should receive
it and why, and you know what you should be
awarded for it. Like that's the part of the process
(18:42):
of zero control over. So you know what I've learned,
you know, over my thirteen years out here, is like
you can't emotionally invest in the results, right, you have
to emotionally invest in the process. So it's like, as
long as I am enjoying writing it and believing that
the script was, you know, the best I could do
at that time then, like, you know, the rest is
(19:03):
really up to up to which way is the wind blowing?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
And it's like, if you can't control that part of it,
which I don't, then it's not worth losing sleepover, you know,
because life is short, and if you have no control
over it, then then what's the point of sweating it?
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:16):
This is why I always wonder why I'm a sports
fan to begin with, because I have no control over
how the Bulls are playing or how the Bears are playing.
Yet I somehow emotion invest myself in in the results
of their games. But no, that's about as far as
I could go.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
So you're about the same age as Ben Affleck and
Matt Damon when they wrote Goodwill Hunting and this being
your first you know, credited movie, do they offer you
any kind of advice of where to take your career
from here next?
Speaker 4 (19:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
I mean, you know, not so not not like directly.
I mean, you know, the getting sole credit on the
movie and all of that, and having you know, Ben
tell me, you know, personally about that was just a
very like surreal to be kind of part of that
like lineage. You know, it's still hard to out my
head around but no. You know, something ben As said,
(20:01):
which I've really taken the heart, you know, over the
last couple of months here is like, you know, he
really is a believer in good scripts, you know, and
that if it's not there on the page, it's not
going to be there on the stage, as they say.
Speaker 4 (20:13):
You know.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
He's also talked a lot about the projects you turn
down and say no to are in a way just
as important, if not more important, than the projects you
do decide to take on and say yes to, and
goes back a little bit to what we were talking
about earlier about like really having to love a project,
you know, and really feeling the passion for it, and
if it's not there, then you know you shouldn't do it.
That's hard when you're young and you've been wanting to,
(20:37):
you know, do all the projects in the world for
so long. You know, it's like the gut instinct is
to say yes to everything, because it's like Hollywood is
crazy and you just don't know, you know, how long
a moment like this can last. So you know, take
it all while you can get it, and and that's
the that's kind of the gut instinct. But one hundred
percent see where he's coming from. Where it's like, you know,
(20:57):
like we were talking about, you really got to love something.
You really really have to be married to a project
to want to do it and take it on.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Did you keep anything from the set?
Speaker 3 (21:09):
I'm going to get in trouble, but you know the
cafeteria where they where they steal the candy from in
that scene where Mann and Jason are working later over
the weekend, on the last day, I was like, well,
it would only be fitting if I also take something
from here. So yeah, I have a I have one
of those coffee mugs that that was sitting on the shelf.
(21:30):
So it's like, you know, it's right what they say,
it's not stealing it.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Yeah, there's no work in the register, you can take it.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
That's right exactly.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Did you get any free Nike stuff from working on
this movie?
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Not free, but I was, you know, like when these
things happen, there's like you get like a start gift
when the movie starts in a rap gift when the
movie and so from like you know, multiple agents and manager,
you know, producers and the whole deal. So you can
imagine on this film what most of those gifts were.
But yes, those were you know they kindly uh you know,
(22:03):
bought those shoes. Uh. And then yeah, it's it's been
a nice part of it that I've definitely expanded my
my Jordan collection by a bid.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Do you get a rap gift from from that or
from Ben?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Well?
Speaker 3 (22:14):
You know, like the way it works is like the
whole production gets it right. So it's like, you know,
it's you get like a production T shirt that that
you know says casting through like you can find you
can find those for almost every movie that you know
that's been made on eBay. You know, did you see Nope.
You know that's King Orange hoodie that that he's wearing.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
That.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
That's like that's basically what what like a rap gift is.
So you know, I love that part of Nope because
it's like it's it's very kind of inside Hollywood. You know.
I I when I was in college, I interned on
the set of mad Men and similar thing. You know,
I got like my season five T shirt and on
that one we got some rap gifts, like from the
(22:54):
companies that Don Draper was pitching for. So we got
like a Samsonite suitcase like a pair of Ravens, which
is funny and yeah, like a similar thing on this one.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I don't know why, but I find it so refreshing
that you're also just so into every new movie. Like
as a writer, do you just have to stay up
to date on like every movie that comes out because
maybe like you want to write something like that or
you want to avoid copying another movie.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
It's not even that, it's just I love movies. I mean,
that's it, you know, Like I I this's how I
grew up. I'm just going to the movie theater every
single Friday and just seeing whatever was out, you know,
And I miss those days because it was like movie
going to the movies without pretense, you know, like when
you're that young, you don't really have a taste yet,
so it's it's it was you just take everything in.
And that's still the way I am. I mean, I
just you know, I'm my friends will tell you I'm
(23:38):
much more pretentious now than I was when I was
eight or nine or whatever. But no, man, there's nowhere truly,
there's nowhere else I'd rather be, like in the world
really than than than sitting in a dark theater and
watching a movie. Like there's just still something about it
that is uh, you know, it's kind of it's my
favorite art form and it's just it's it's I just
love the theater, you know, sadly shout here in La,
(24:00):
like we've lost my favorite ones, you know, like ArcLight
Hollywood gone, the Landmark on Pico gone, The Vista in
most feels is finally reopening. But it's been very painful
losing those theaters. Man, I like it feels like a
part of me is is and like a piece of
the fabric of the community is gone. So it's actually
(24:20):
went to the last the I don't know if you
know La at all, but the Pico, the Landmark on Pico,
one of my favorite theaters, especially on the West Side,
closed down last March and the last I went to
the last showing ever there just because I was like,
I it's like that's where I've seeing almost more movies
than anything, and there's when I saw everything everywhere all
at once. There was very just surreal way to see
(24:43):
that movie.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, I do go to La a lot for work,
and I remember seeing Black Panther at the Arc Light.
So whenever that closed down, that felt like a piece
of me went with it. Two.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
No. One hundred percent. I mean in the Cineramadome, it's
like there's just there's nowhere else like it. Man, It's
just the great thing about the ArcLight Hollywood was it
just felt like a community for film lovers and people
working in Hollywood, you know, from you know below the
line to above the line. I mean you'd see celebrities there,
but you'd also just see like other aspiring writers like myself,
(25:14):
you know, all kind of together, which which like there's
something you know, I'm sappy and romantic at heart, so
like I'm going to it that way. But like there
was something really special about that place, and.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
It would feel like an event when you went to
a movie there, because they would have things out in
the lobby and it just felt like there was an
energy to it where sometimes you don't really get that
movie you just go in there's an empty, bare lobby,
but there it felt like something.
Speaker 3 (25:39):
I know. That's one of the painful things now going
to you know, look, I'll go to any movie theater truly,
but you know, really being restricted now to kind of
these chain theaters that don't have like the love of
the of the form and like the artists in nature
to it like you're talking about, I mean the lobby
of the arc light, from costumes from movies to like,
you know, I remember seeing the scale model of the
Grand Budapest Hotel in there. You know, it's just like
(26:00):
that stuff that doesn't exist in your average chain theaters.
And you know, even like the bar, there's just nothing
better than going and like you know, having a beer
before or after the movie and talking about it. And yeah,
that's just something really painful about losing that.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Well, because it's been great talking to you, aside from
just talking about the movie Air, I just love talking
about movies with you. Is there anything you can say
about what you're working on now?
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Kind of Yeah, I'm doing another I'm working on another
script for sky Dance and Mandolid too, of the production
companies on Air. It's another sports movie, So that's really
all I can say. You know, it's another true life
story with real people, so I just want to respect that.
And you know, we're still kind of in the early
early stages of the process here, but yeah, hopefully that'll
be the next one. You know, we'll see. I'm into
(26:44):
the script and you know, working on it as we speak.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Well, I wish you the best of luck. Man. I'm
rooting for you and I hope you talk to you again.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Yeah. Thanks man, this is fun.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Let's get into a spoiler free movie review now. I
want to talk about the Super Mario Brothers movie, which
is now the highest grossing video game adaptation of all time,
but it's on pace to be the highest grossing movie
of twenty twenty three. There's no signs of this movie
slowing down, and as a kid who grew up playing
the video game, this movie was everything I needed it
(27:18):
to be. So before we get into this full review,
here is just a little bit of the Super Mario
Brothers trailer.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
My army upas cupas whatever those things are.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
We will Kingdom. Yea Bowser is coming. I'm not afraid.
I'll do anything for my brother.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
We're going to save him. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
So, if you are like me and grew up playing
Super Mario Brothers, this movie is gonna be a trip
down memory lane for you, and I think that is
the reason this movie is working so well and resonating
so much with audiences. The trouble you always have when
going into a video game adaptation is how are you
going to incorporate those things from the video game that
we all know and love without it feeling cheesy. Now,
(28:12):
this is one of the first ones I can think
of that has done it so perfectly because it's animated,
so what you were seeing on the screen is exactly
familiar with what you experienced playing this video game. You
get the characters looking exactly like they did in the
video game, you get a lot of that same level design,
so it all feels familiar. The only difference is now
we are hearing actual actors voice our characters that we
(28:36):
really haven't heard say more than a few words at
a time. And after watching this movie, I have to say,
I think Chris Pratt deserves an apology you from the
internet everybody saying that he was going to ruin the
Mario character. He didn't do that at all. We needed
somebody like Chris Pratt to voice Mario, to be able
to really make him feel human and not just a
(28:56):
bunch of catchphrases, and I think Chris Pratt did a
really good job at that. A lot of standout performances
in this cast from Anya Taylor Joy as Peach, Charlie
Day as Luigi, which he just sounds like a cartoon character,
and it's always suddenly in Philadelphia, so that was a
really easy casting for him. Then you have seth Rogen
as Donkey Kong, but the one who crushed this movie,
(29:18):
and I would say carry the entire movie on his
back because he was so good at getting into his character.
Was hands down. Jack Black as Bowser. Jack Black is
so great at his comedic timing, and he is oftentimes
a very physical actor, and I felt like he put
all of that into voicing Bowser. I feel like this
character took a bit of toll on his voice to
(29:39):
make it more gravelly sounding. I know they did add
some special effects on his voice to make him sound
a little bit more gruff than he normally is, but
that combined with his singing ability and just overall comedic nature,
I thought Bowser was the best thing in this movie.
I love how the entire movie works through different levels
of different Super Mario games. Right from the very beginning,
(30:00):
when you're doing that side scroll opening scene, it goes
into that classic looking Super Mario side scroll game. I
thought that was perfect and as soon as I saw that,
I knew I was in for a good time here,
and as an adult, I was watching for all the
little Easter eggs that you would really only know if
you grew up playing Nintendo. So everything from Mario in
the opening scene of playing kid Icarus on his own Nintendo.
(30:24):
That was like some Nintendo inception. And I love the
subtle use of different Super Mario scores and themes throughout
the entire movie. Just hearing that sparks some nostalgia for me,
so I love how they use that subtly. With as
iconic as the Super Mario theme is. I love the
way they used it, and I love the way they
use all different elements from all different games. The one
(30:45):
thing they showed that I wish there would have been
more of, but I completely get it, is they kind
of tease this with some Yoshi in there. There's one
scene where you see a big group a herd of
Yoshi running across the screen and you just get a
small little glimpse at him. I'm sure they're setting that
up for a sequel. And speaking of that, I often
feel that sometimes movies don't give you everything in the
(31:06):
first one because they want to make you come back
for the second one. I feel like that wasn't the
case with the Super Mario Brothers movie. Maybe since the
first live action one didn't work that well, and they
haven't made one since. They were very careful of what
they put in, and they also wanted to make sure
that all different types of fans would be satisfied after
(31:27):
watching this movie, so they kind of threw it all
in there. So visually this movie was perfect. I thought
the voice acting was great. Where this movie lacked for me,
I think it's because I'm an adult now and the
story felt very watered down and very basic. So I
think the intention with that is because they wanted this
movie to resonate not only with kids, but also with adults,
(31:50):
but also they needed it to appeal to a world
wide audience, which this movie is not only crushing it
in the United States but crushing it everywhere in the
world because Mario is worldwide. So I feel for that reason,
the storyline was very basic and I wanted something a
(32:11):
little bit more to chew on. It was a very
quick origin story of why Mario and Luigi started a
plumbing business and then very quickly get sucked into the
mushroom Kingdom. Mario and Luigi gets separated in the beginning,
so Mario makes it his mission to save his brother
before Bowser gets to him and probably kills him. So
he does that with the help of Princess Peach. I
(32:33):
did enjoy the role reversal here because Princess Peach was
awesome and she's not the one who needed saving. It
was Luigi. So Princess Peach in this movie was the
one who was the most knowledgeable, the one who was
the strongest, and had been in the Mushroom Kingdom the longest,
so she was the one teaching the ropes to Mario,
and it's his rise to being the hero in this movie,
(32:54):
but I still think above him is Princess Peach. So
I think that's a great message for any kid watching
and maybe is so used to just seeing that normal
thing of the guy being the hero. That is not
the case with this movie. Although oddly enough, I did
find this movie to be kind of dark for a
kid's movie. There is one character in particular that is
(33:15):
infatuated with death, which I found funny just on a
comedic level. But it was a little bit darker than
I was expecting for a kid's movie, and I guess
I just wasn't expecting a kid's movie to go there. Also,
with Bowser wanting to kill Mario, kill Luigi, and kill
all these other people. A lot of death around this movie,
so I guess I was expecting it to be completely
(33:39):
bubble gum and kid friendly. And then even with the
message in this movie, it is Mario trying to prove
himself and also trying to get the approval of his dad,
who kind of thinks he's a loser, and it shows
you that he has to go through such extremes to
prove to his dad that he is not just some
worthless dude who hasn't done much with his life. That
(34:01):
was also an interesting plot line to explore in a
kid's movie. Is just a guy named Mario trying to
get approval from his dad. And then you also have
Bowser's character trying to force upon a marriage on Princess Peach.
They have a lot of death issues with dad and
a forced marriage proposal. I have to say now what
I was expecting in this movie. So what I take
(34:22):
away from it is that your parents are never going
to be satisfied with you unless you save an entire city,
an entire world, and then finally they'll say, hey, good job.
So after watching this movie, I now think that every
video game adaptation should be animated before this one. I
would say the Sonic franchise is my favorite video game adaptation,
(34:43):
which is more a live action franchise. Those movies are
just a lot of fun to me. I like Jim Carrey,
and I feel like they got the character of Sonic
down in those movies, But I don't completely put that
one on this same level. I did have fun watching
Mortal Kombat. I think if they make some changes going
into the Sea to that, that one could be a
pretty solid franchise as well. Uncharted was fun but pretty forgettable,
(35:06):
And the other one I would probably compare this one
to would be Detective Pikachu. But the problem with Detective
Pikachu is I think as Pokemon fans, that's not entirely
the movie we wanted. We wanted just straight up Pokemon
trainer Pokemon battles, and that one feels kind of adjacent
to that story. While it is in the world, it
doesn't really deliver like this Super Mario Brothers movie delivered
(35:28):
because it is exactly like the video games. So I
think what this movie opens up is definitely more movies
in the Super Mario franchise. They'll make it two they'll
make a three. I'm curious to see how since because
they incorporated different games in this movie, like Mario Kart
and Super Smash Bros. If they just explore that a
little bit more, or they go into maybe some of
(35:50):
the other games, I think there is a lot to
work with here. I think the Nintendo movies that I
would like to see after watching this one easy call
would be a Donkey Kong solo movie because Seth Rogan
is so great in this one, and just that entire
world of Donkey Kong Country, I think would be a
fun one to explore that one could even go more
into the comedy space. Another movie I would like to
(36:11):
see would be a legend a Zelda movie. That one
would be a tricky one to make because I think
that world kind of teeters on that line of it
could be great, but it could also just as easily
be a bomb if you don't cast their pride, if
you don't have the most entertaining story when it comes
to Zelda. But I think visually that would be a
stunning one to make, especially just seeing what they can
(36:32):
do with the world of Super Mario. I felt like
a lot of the costume and character design felt very
real to me. I like seeing the texture of denim
on Mario, the attention to detail on the hat and
the face. I would love to see that in a
Zelda movie. I think the coolest thing ever and we
got a little taste of it in this movie, would
be a Super Smash Brothers movie. I think you make
(36:54):
that the same way you make a Marvel Avengers movie.
You have your Donkey Kong, maybe Luid's mansion, maybe your
Yoshi story, maybe a little Metroid, a little star Fox,
so many of those original Nintendo movies. You have your
solo films, and they all build into a Super Smash
Brothers movie. There are just so many stories you can explore,
(37:14):
and there is so much money to be made off
a Nintendo So I'm glad this one was a big success.
I also think this one is doing so well because
it's right at ninety minutes. Before you get a chance
to even get tired of it, it's already over. It
didn't feel like I needed more, didn't feel like I
needed any less. So ninety minutes animated movie is the
sweet spot for the Super Mario Brothers movie. Who see
(37:37):
this is tough because as much as I enjoyed all
of the visual elements. I did find myself not spacing out,
but finding that it was hard for me to grasp
on to a real story here. But I would still
go four out of five mushrooms. I think that is
top level for a movie that both appear adults and kids.
(38:02):
But I think there is a lot more advances they
can do story wise. But now that the world is built,
the stages set, I think Super Mario Brothers Movie Part
two will be in that four point five, maybe even
a five point range.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
It's time to head down to movie Mike trailer.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Paul, I keep getting more and more excited for this movie.
My highest anticipated movie of twenty twenty three. I'm talking
about Spider Man Across the Spider Verse, and I've been
sitting with this trailer for a couple of weeks now
itching to talk about it because it looks like they
took this movie to an eleven.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
Now.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
The first one costs ninety million dollars to make, which
is a lot for an animated movie, but this one
is nearing about one hundred and fifty million, and just
by the look of this trailer, it looks a little
bit more refined. It looks like what they already did
with the original one, with creating such a unique animation style,
which is what makes this movie so fun to watch.
It's all the little d tails they add in there
(39:01):
that makes it look like a live action, living and
breathing comic book. And that is why I enjoy this
franchise so much and why I think this is the
franchise that is going to change the way people think
about animation. And also in a world where we're getting
a little bit oversaturated with superhero movies, this is kind
of what they need to do to evolve, create these
(39:22):
different worlds to keep it fresh. Nobody really questions another
into the Spider Verse movie because it's so different. On
a mainstream scale. There's really not anybody else doing a
movie like this, so I don't see anybody complaining. That
is great for me. So before I get into my
full thoughts, here's just a short little clip of it.
What's the guy I gotta do to join this Spider team?
You can never be part of this comma. Go easy
(39:45):
on the kid. He had a terrible teacher. Peter Farles,
you have a babe, I have a babe. Everyone keeps
telling me how fun story is supposed to go him.
So what was so exciting to me about the first
one is it felt while watching that movie that that
(40:07):
had no rules going into it. It could be anything
it wanted to be. And it was a love letter
to all the people who grew up with Spider Man,
who grew up with the cartoon, playing the video game,
reading the comic books, and it took all of those
elements and put it into this movie and there were
no rules, and then also into the Spider Verse, gave
us all these different variations of Spider Man. And now
(40:30):
on this movie they are taking it to an entirely
different level by creating a cast of hundreds of Spider Man.
So this was really the first movie when it came
out back in twenty eighteen to dig into the multiverse first.
And now everybody's doing it, but I think they do
it the best because it's just fun to see all
these different kind of Spider Man that exists in all
these different universes. So in this trailer you see all
(40:51):
these different Spider Man. You have Oscar Isaac who plays
Miguel O'Hara. He is leading a group who is trying
to protect the multiverse, and Miguel Harah kind of has
this Stanos things going on of he is fine with
sacrificing some of them for the greater good, but Miles
Morales doesn't see it that way and he wants to
protect everyone. You also have some new characters voiced by
(41:13):
Essa Ray as Spider Woman and Daniel Caluya as Spider Punk,
who is probably the one I'm the most excited to see.
The movie is coming out on June's second, so I
feel like in this movie we are going to get
what is known as the classic Spider Man dilemma, the
one that Tom Holland, Toby Maguire and Andrew Garfield have
all had to face of that struggle of wanting to
(41:35):
be Spider Man and also wanting to be the person
underneath the mask and wanting at the end of the
day to always help everybody out and be the good guy.
Where this movie seems to take a different turn is
that Miles Morales is struggling with not wanting to end
up like every other Spider Man. He wants to create
his own journey. And you have all these people in
(41:55):
this movie telling you this is your fate, this is
what's going to happen, can't really change and alter your
destiny because we've all experienced this, We've all experienced loss,
we've all experienced the same struggle you're going through. We
know exactly what you're going to do. But you hear
Miles Morales in that trailer say nah, I'm gonna do
my own thing, and delivering that with such confidence. You
feel Miles Morales really coming into his own in this movie,
(42:19):
which in the first one he was really trying to
figure out how to be Spider Man. He was just
some kid who just had these powers and was trying
his best to just navigate them and save the world.
But he really wasn't that strong in that movie, even
in that final scene where he still struggles to defeat
the villain, but you get a sense of him really maturing.
(42:39):
So I feel like this movie will follow his journey
and wanting to change the course that everybody tells them
he is on, and him wanting to escape the inevitable.
Inside that trailer, there's also an Uncle Ben reference, which
we all know the story by now. I feel like
in superhero movies we overtell their origin story so much,
but that is what Spider Man has always had to
(43:02):
deal with, whether it be the death of Uncle Ben,
the death of Gwen Stacy, it is dealing with that
loss and coming back from that kind of like a
change person. Because whenever Spider Man experiences a loss, it
alters their chemical makeup, It changes what they are fighting for,
It changes their decision on whether they want to continue
(43:22):
being Spider Man or they want to just go back
to being that same regular human. So, by the looks
of this trailer, even though it's not giving us a
whole lot, I feel like that is what we are
going to see. It's usually what we get in the
part two of a Spider Man movie. They have to
deal with some kind of loss, They have to deal
with something that's really good. To tighten the screws on
our character creates some tension. Will Miles lose his dad
(43:45):
Jefferson Davis, Will he lose his mom Rio Morales or
maybe Gwen Stacy, Or will he be the first to
change history and be able to save the loved one
that always gets lost in every Spider Man movie. I
would like to see that. But I would also hope
that they do with this one is avoid the love story,
which they hinted at. It a little bit more in
(44:06):
the initial teaser trailer, but I didn't really get that
vibe in the first one that there was going to
be a romantic relationship sparked between Miles and Gwen. I
feel like it's a lot different because her character has
the Spider Man abilities and she is fighting alongside them,
So I hope they just continue that relationship of wanting
to save the world together. I think it's the better storyline.
(44:27):
The most frustrating thing to me about Spider Man is
that all the movies are owned by different entities, whether
it be Sony or Disney. And I did see that
they just added on Disney Plus the Original Spider Man
trilogy and the first Andrew Garfield Amazing Spider Man movie,
and then they are going to add Homecoming, I believe
next month in May. But there's just not one place
(44:48):
where you can watch all these movies. And I was
hoping that they would add into the Spider Verse on
Disney Plus because it would just make it so much easier.
And I feel like if this movie was a little
bit more accessible, more people who haven't seen it would
be able to watch it. But there's not a home
for this one, so I hate that the solution would
be for Sony to have its own streaming service because
I'm not ready to add another streaming service to my arsenal.
(45:10):
I just wish that they would all be available on Disney. Plus,
I just need one place where I can get every
single Spider Man movie and watch them all when I
want to. Is that too much to ask? I think
it's probably too much to ask. But again, Across the
Spider Verse is coming out on June second, twenty twenty three,
will probably be my favorite movie of the summer, if
not easily enter the top five of the year. And
(45:34):
then Beyond the Spider Verse, which will be Part three
in this series, will come out next year on March
twenty ninth, twenty twenty four. It is a great time
to be a Spider Man fan.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
If that was this week's edition of Movie by.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
Framer Bar, and that's gonna do it for another episode
here of the podcast. Before I go, I got to
give my listeners shout out. And before I even get
into that, I have to let you know that we
went viral last week. If you missed it, I had
the Broken Lizard guys aka the guys behind Supertroopers on
the podcast, and I posted a clip of that interview
on my TikTok where they talked about how they chugged
(46:09):
actual bottles of maple syrup in that movie Supertroopers.
Speaker 4 (46:12):
I drank two and a half and I made him
drink three and a half because you don't have it yet. Afterwards,
we laid down in the dark in my trailer and
just shook. And then when I got back to the hotel,
I saw him coming out.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
He goes, have you pooped yet?
Speaker 4 (46:27):
And I'm like no. He goes, report back to me
after you wait for it, and he goes, there's a reason.
It's part of maple Syrp's part of the of the
master clets.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
So I posted that clip on TikTok, didn't expect anything
of it. Posted it one morning and checked back on
it later in the afternoon, and it had a quarter
of a million views. I went to bed that night
it was probably sitting around seven hundred and fifty k,
woke up the next morning it had crossed that one
million mark, and at the time of recording this right now,
we're at one point five million views on that clip,
(46:58):
which is amazing. The first time I've experienced going viral
on a clip, and I'm glad that the name of
the podcast is right there on the clip. So maybe
you listening to this now are new because you discovered
that clip on TikTok and decided to check out the podcast.
So welcome to the podcast. Welcome to the movie crew.
On every single episode, I like to shout out a
listener who just comments on my page, sends me a DM,
(47:21):
or emails me Movie Mike d at gmail dot com.
Since there was an interview last week, I always give
a secret emoji, and it was the Lizard, so I
went through all the comments and picked one at random.
And this week's listener shout out of the week is
Amanda Meyer and Amanda Road. Favorite interviews so far. I
love the Broken Lizard guys. I've been a huge fan
of them since Super Troopers. Still waiting for my sequel
(47:42):
of beer Fest aka weed Fest that was teased at
the end of the movie so many years ago. But
I love listening to them talk about their process and
how many movie projects they have in the works that
haven't seen the big screen yet. They can do no wrong,
So thank you, Amanda, I did see them talking about that.
Your best sequel. Apparently Warner Brothers owns the rights to it,
(48:04):
so could possibly see the light of day down the line,
but they are working on Super Tubers three again. If
you miss that interview, go back one episode here on
the Feed. And this week, since we had another interview,
time for another secret emoji. If you enjoyed the Alex
Convery interview talking about Air, comment on my page with
(48:24):
the basketball emoji and I'll pick one of those comments
to be next week's listeners shout out. Thank you so
much for listening, and until next time, go out and
watch good movies and I will talk to you later.
Hello, and welcome back to movie Mike's movie podcast. I
am your host Movie Mike, and today I have an
interview with the writer from Air that even if you
haven't seen the movie yet, I think you will be
inspired by a story and his passion for writing makes
me feel like Hollywood is in good hands with the
next generation of writers. In the movie review, it's finally
time to talk about the Super Mario Brothers movie. And
in the trailer Park, we're diving into Spider Man across
(00:22):
the Spider Verse and all my theories going into that movie. Welcome.
If you are new here, I hope you subscribe and
stick around. And now let's talk movies.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
In a world where everyone and their mother has a podcast,
one man stands to infiltrate the ears of listeners like
never before in a movie podcast. A man with so
much movie knowledge, he's basically like a walking IMTB with glasses.
From the Nashville Podcast Network, this is movie Mike's Movie Podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
About to get into my interview with Alex Conberry. He
is thirty years old and Air is his first first
produced screenplay ever. He wrote it as a spec script
after he watched The Last Dance on Netflix back in
twenty twenty. And what a spec script is. It is
when a screenwriter writes a script to a movie in
hopes that will be purchased by a producer, a production company,
(01:14):
or a studio. Kind of along the same lines as
a songwriter would just write a song hoping that someday
a big artist would find it, like it and want
to record it. So Alex's story is very unusual that
the spec script he just wrote ended up getting made
into a movie and has had so much success. And
even if you haven't seen the movie Air, which is
all about the creation of the Air Jordan's show, I
(01:37):
think you will enjoy this interview and be inspired by
his passion for writing, his love of movies and wanting
to create things that he himself will want to sit
down and watch. So let's get into this interview now
with Alex Convery. What has the last month been like
in your life?
Speaker 3 (01:53):
The last month has been a lot of cruss screenings, premieres, interviews.
You know, I'm like an introverted writer at heart, so
this has been like you got to come out of
your shell a little bit and have a bunch of
small talking answer, a bunch of questions, which has been good.
You know, it's a good exercise, but we're winding down
(02:14):
a bit, so I'm excited to, you know, just be
back at my desk writing.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I find that I kind of identify with you in
that way, Like outside of this, I'm a pretty quiet
and reserved person. From my main job, I am a writer,
but I have such a passion for movies and talking
about movies. This is kind of how I've had to
get out of my show being more extroverted. For you,
your entire life, You've just been writing things, and now
everybody wants to talk to you. They're all inspired by
(02:40):
your story. So what was that like initially of like,
oh man, now I got to speak to people. People
want to know my story.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You know.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
It's interesting, like the life of a working screenwriter, Like
a lot of the time is spent not writing. You
do meetings, right obviously, but you also are putting together pitches,
and whether it's you're pitching an original project or you're
pitching on like a studio's ip, there is an element
of it where you know, there's a bit of performance,
you know, which is which is really kind of antithetical
(03:06):
to what a screenwriter should be, you know, like it's
what you're saying, we're like the nerds who you know,
like being alone with with with you know, just with
final drafts. So it's interesting, man, I don't know, it's
there's a lot to the job more than than than
just writing, you know, Interior Nike, nineteen eighty four. You know,
it's like there's all this other stuff that comes with it.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
When it comes to your creative process. And we were
just talking about how much of your creativity is sparked
by just being bored, because I find that sometimes when
I'm so busy doing so many things, it's hard for
me to sit down, like, all right, now's your time
to be creative.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Well, I look for characters first and foremost, you know,
characters that are that are interesting, that have like a
clear journey to go on that I think would be
fun to write, that I'm excited to write.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
You know.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
It's so hard to write, you know, truly, Like the
easiest thing in the world is just not to write.
There's so many other things you could be and things
that can occupy your time, Like you really have to,
at least for me feel passionate about something to like
actually get in final draft and get going on it.
So I look for characters that spark, you know, and
you know, for Air, it was sunny, you know, like
(04:15):
it wasn't even so much the shoe or or the world.
It was just Sonny was such a fascinating character, and
to me, this is such an interesting way into his story.
And he was such a fun character to write, you
know that because of who he is in real life
and the life he's lived and the places he's been.
So I chase characters, you know, and I try to
find stuff that I'm excited to write about, which sounds
(04:37):
like obvious orry Well, obviously you want to write about about,
but like it's easy to lose that passion very quickly, right,
you have to do rewrites a million times, or especially
where I was as like an unproduced screenwriter, you're chasing jobs,
you know. So it's like sometimes you can talk yourself
into being passionate about it, but like really deep down,
it's like it wasn't there, and the script and the
movie really has been a lesson for me in chasing
(05:00):
those projects that like deep in your core are exciting,
you know, and like you want to be at the
desk working, you know, because so so you know, usually
it's it's the exact opposite feeling. It's like, oh gosh,
I guess I have to do some pages today, right,
But when you can find something that's like, man, I
can't wait to get back into the script and get
back to working, like that's a that for me is
(05:20):
can be a rare feeling. So it was this one
was a lesson and like chase that because this was
a script that, especially written on spec you know, they
would tell you not to do right. I mean, it's
about real people and there are rights issues and all
of that, and like the odds of it getting made
are just so so low. But for me, it was
it was the passion that that really kept me going
(05:41):
because it was like, man, I just I love these characters.
I love writing in this world. And it was a
real lesson, you know, like going forward, that's really the
type that's really the only type of stuff I want
to be working on, right, And that's easier said than done,
But you know, it was kind of chasing that gut
feeling that that you know, got got the movie to
to where it now.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
I love hearing you talk about your passion because when
I watch air A lot of what drove me to
the story of Sonny is how passionate he was about basketball,
how passionate he was about pursuing Michael Jordan, how he
just felt it in his soul, like I know this
guy is going to be the guy. So what else
are you just that passionate about, like Sonny?
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Well, you just look back to my past scripts and
it's like, you know, you don't have to like the
line isn't too far from like stuff I love to
to what I write about. You know, the script I
wrote before Air was called an Excelsior, and it was
a biopic about you know, stan Lee and Jack Kirby
and kind of those early origins of Marvel comics. And
that was because I grew up as a huge comic
(06:40):
book kid, you know. But I love the people behind
the thing, you know, and like finding those type of stories.
And obviously, you know, we don't have to go into
the whole history of Marvel, but it was a very
unlikely story to get from you know, two guys working
in a janitor closet at a magazine company in nineteen
sixty two to you know, Guardians of the Galaxy three
coming on in a couple of weeks you on, that's
(07:00):
just like, what an incredible journey that that marvel has
has gone on. I justaid, like, gosh, it would be
cool to tell kind of the beginning of that. Before that,
it was script about college football, right, and kind of
like the underbelly of college football. And that simply came
from me being a massive college football fan.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
So it's like you hear a lot in film school,
they tell you write what you know, you know, which
can be taken very literally, right. You could write a
movie about your childhood or growing up, I mean, and
there's many examples of that, from Moonlight to Dazed and
Confused to Lady Bird. You know, those are all very
personal stories that feel like, you know, they're almost like
(07:38):
someone's guts being spilled on the on the screen, not
in a gory way, but in like a passion way.
For me, I didn't really have that story, right. I
grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, basically in a
John Hughes movie, right, which was very nice and pleasant
and and all of that. But I certainly didn't have
some you know, a movie out of it. Maybe one
day I'll find, you know, that idea but I didn't
(08:01):
have it. So it was like, okay, so what do
when you say write what you know? What do I know?
Speaker 1 (08:05):
Well?
Speaker 3 (08:05):
I know about Michael Jordan in the nineties, bulls, right,
I know about Marvel Comics and Stanley you know, I
know about college football. So it was like, you know,
it was it was kind of looking at the stuff
that left to my own devices. I'm going to geek
out over anyway, and it's like, is there a movie
in there? Is there a script in there? Is there
a character in there that that you know you can
kind of latch onto and and go from there.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
I'm fascinated with the writing process and how this movie
started out. You've been talking about, you know, watching The
Last Dance. You see that part in the documentary where
they briefly mentioned the Michael Jordan Nike connection. How do
you sit down after you're inspired by that, after you
google it and see that you know, there hasn't been
a movie made about it, how do you sit down
and write that script?
Speaker 3 (08:48):
Well, you start with Faden on page one. Now I'm
kidding it. It It goes back to what we're talking about,
which is finding the character right, because this is a
movie that Obviously you could tell from a lot of
different points of view. Right, it could be an actual
Michael Jordan biopick. Right, it could be about Phil Knight,
it could be about David Fok, Jordan's agent. It could
(09:08):
be about Peter Moore, who actually designed the sneaker, you know.
So it's it becomes a question of, Okay, what angle
is is you know, kind of the most interesting and
most compelling on this. Now, because I was doing it
as a specscript, I knew right away, like I'm not
going to do the Michael Jordan biopick, right, that's just foolish.
And if like this is already unlikely enough to get made,
that actually trying to do the Michael Jordan biopick on
(09:28):
spec that's just like there's no chance. And by the way,
Jordan should be the one to tell that story, right,
And maybe there will come a time and day when
he wants to do that and is prepared to do that.
And I think every studio in Hollywood would line up
at backup the brink strug to do that story. So, okay,
what are the different angles on it? And it gets
back to what we're talking about. To me, Sonny, what
(09:50):
was most compelling because you know, you go through all
the research and at the end of the day and
there's a lot of you know, varying accounts and people
wanting to take credit for different things. But at the
end of the day, all the accounts land in the
same place that there was only one guy who said,
I have this feeling in my gut that Michael Jordan
is a guy we should go all in on. And
that's just what an interesting epiphany, you know, like in
(10:12):
terms of its ripple on history. I mean, it is
it's hard to fathom, you know, if Sonny had had
that feeling about any other player in that draft, you know,
not to be hyperbolic about it, but the world is different.
You know, we have air stocked in or Air Booie
instead of Air Jordan. So it is it was, gosh,
what drives someone to have that sort of conviction and
(10:34):
determination and feeling And that's all stuff I just found,
you know, universal in a way too, right, in a
way that you know, obviously this is a movie about
basketball and Nike and you know kind of like the
nitty greed of how that process works. But I just figured, man,
anyone sitting in that audience has probably been where Sonny
was at some point, right, like employee number five hundred
(10:55):
at a company where no one's really listening to you,
but you have this feeling. And it's like everyone has
had a feeling or a dream or a gut instinct
at some point in life and you know, wanted to
chase it. So for me, it was like that that's
a really accessible place to tell the story from.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Now.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
The way to reach a universal feeling like that is
through specificity, right, which is where like the nitty gritty
of the draft process comes from. But no, I mean really,
and this was a specscript, right, So it was like
I just wrote it all on my own, and I
really just wrote it in order. Like this isn't one
that I outlined or did a treatment to for or
like got notes on in advance. I just one it's
(11:31):
a true story, right, so like the outline is kind
of already done for you because it's it's you know,
it's history. So it was really it was kind of
a nights and weekends project, right. I had other stuff
that was paying me to write at the time, and
that's always the stuff I was focused on focusing on,
like during the day, but this was like you know,
nights and weekends. I mean I really wrote most of
the script from between the hours of like ten pm
(11:52):
and like two am, you know, like after my wife
would gone to bed. It was just me alone and
like with my headphones, and I would just go back
and like you know, work a scene or two, and
I really just wrote it in order. And it was
an interesting process because sometimes I would most of the time,
I would just start right at the beginning, you know,
and I would read through the script as if I
was just like back in my intern days, reading some
(12:14):
random script by some random guy named Alex Convary, and
I would say, like what would I think of this script,
you know, like really trying to remove myself from the process,
and I would just keep going until something bumped, and
then I would work on that and then keep going
and something bumped, I do it again. So it was
like it's a very unique process and not necessarily one
I would recommend, because it's hard to replicate this obviously
being a true story in a very like short period
(12:34):
of time, like kind of gave me the frame, the
framework was already inherent in the story in a way
that isn't there for like most ideas, So I don't
know if I could ever replicate this exact process again.
Certainly wasn't the fastest process in the world either. I
mean it took me a year to write, which is,
you know, a long time for the for a first
draft of a you know, one hundred page screenplay. But
(12:56):
you know, it's what worked for me on this one.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
You know, a lot of this movie, a lot of
the conversations take place over the phone. And I grew
up in the nineties, but this movie made me nostalgic
for the eighties, just so the fact that I could
slam a telephone. What has been the most important phone
call that you've ever received in your life?
Speaker 3 (13:12):
There are a couple, you know, like I mean dating
all the way back to like getting the first call
from you know, the guys that would end up being
my agents saying like we read your script, bag man
and are interested in meeting with you for representation. It
was like, oh my gosh, you know, that's the call that, like,
you know, in a lot of ways, I've been dreaming
of since moving up here for film school. Now at
the time, I was like, oh my gosh, I made it.
But it's like, Nope, there's still so much work that
(13:35):
has to go into it, you know. You know, obviously,
getting the call on this one that that you know,
Ben was interested and I was going to meet with him,
that was an important one. I mean, the call after
Ben had met with Jordan basically saying, like, Jordan has
given his blessing with a few you know, as long
as we can accomplish these notes and we're good to go.
I mean, that was that was huge. And then I mean, finally,
really the call from the producer saying, like, you know,
(13:57):
Amazon is going to finance the movie be that. That's
like again, like in terms of calls you dream dream of,
like that's that's kind of the list on a spec script,
you know, like those are all the ones you need
to get, and every one of them is very unlikely
in its own way. And I had come to learn that,
you know, over my thirteen years living out here, that
it's those are very few and far between. Usually it's
(14:19):
getting a phone call saying like, yeah, they didn't like
the script, that actor passed on it. Well, time time
to move on to the next one out. This project's dead,
like you know, so it's just like you get used
to it. That that the good ones definitely stand out.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
What was the stress like waiting for the final approval
that Michael Jordan has given its blessing on the film?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
You know, like, what can you say? I mean, it was.
It doesn't get more stressful than that. I mean, it's
just like when you lay out what that meeting kind
of meant for, you know, again, I was just like
I was an unproduced screenwriter and like we had everything
else ready to go on this one, and it was
basically like, if Jordan gives his blessing, then like we're
going to do the movie. And obviously it was Ben
and Mad and She's like, oh my gosh, what a
you what a dream scenario on this one. But just
(14:57):
as easily it was like I, you know, I kind
of figured what what incentives Jordan have to do any movie?
You know, like he he doesn't need to do anything
unless he wants to. So look, it's a credit to
Ben that Ben was able to like earn his trust
and lay out all of what we were wanting to
do with this movie. And and you know, have Michael
recognize that that's a very like a person. I would
(15:18):
have been scared on my mind sitting there for that meeting.
You know, shocker, Ben knows what he's doing, you know,
so it was yeah, I you know, it would be hard.
I'd be hard pressed to think of like a more
stressful twenty four hours than than that one when professionally
at least.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
So you got to be on set during the filming
of this movie, which is pretty unusual for a writer.
What was your role being on set?
Speaker 3 (15:42):
You know, look, mostly I was just there to take
it all in. You know, the script was fairly locked
by the time we got there. You know, like like
Chris Tucker had already done a lot of work on
his character Howard, and and you know, Ben and Mann
had done a pass on the script and a lot
of that was already in place. Now when you know
when we every day when we showed up, there was
a little bit of invention here and there, you know,
from like Bateman like really bringing comedy to his scenes
(16:05):
and like that dry sense of humor. You know that
it was in the script a little bit, but like
he really embodied it to you know, like, look, it's
one thing to write the movie, but then you show
up on set and it's like, well, the blocking's not
quite right and like maybe we cut this line and
move that around, and like that's just the creation that
that that that happens on set. You know, it's not
like I was sitting there like directing it or you know,
adding a bunch of input. You know, Ben Ben obviously
(16:25):
knows what he's doing. But no, it's just there, you know,
kind of kind of taking it all in and enjoying
it and you know, helping when it was needed.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
I feel like Air is more a comedy than actual comedies.
When I went to go see it in theaters, the
entire theater was laughing throughout the entire movie. And you
mentioned a little bit of you know, Jason Bateman adding
some comedy to his scenes. Was all that comedy written
into the script or was it just once you had
all these characters together, once you see it all unfolding,
that it kind of came naturally. It was just a
(16:56):
little more just like, oh, this is actually a funny movie.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
I mean, look so much of that in the performance,
and and all credit to the cast. You know, like
a lot of the like dry sense of humor in it,
Like look, you could play that straight, or you could
play it humorous, or you could play it somewhere in between,
you know, and that what I love about the movie
is like, those are the type of movies I like watching,
you know, Like, and I'm a big believer in you know,
not putting something in a box, you know, just like, oh,
(17:19):
this is a comedy, this is a drama. You know.
It's like, to me, the best work, I like, the
best dramas have moments of humor in them, and the
best comedy is always rooted in dramatic stakes. You know.
So it's like the type of movies I like exist
somewhere in between those two. And you know, I certainly
tried to write it that way, but no, without the
(17:39):
cast we had, like, there's no chance it would be
nearly as funny as as the movie is.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
You know.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
That's been one of the real joys of getting to
watch it in a theater. You know, this was supposed
to be a streaming movie, and you know, all credit
to Amazon. They they you know, really took a chance
on it and and said we're gonna, you know, we're
gonna put it out there. And it's just been such
a joy to be able to go into you know,
a pack instant in the back and just you know,
kind of watch people go on that ride with the movie.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
So when the movie comes out and you see that
ninety nine percent rutten tomato score come out after that,
is there any whispers, any text messages or emails going
around like hey, maybe there's a chance for an oscar here?
Does that ever kind of come into existence or it's
just something nobody else.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
Like make Oh no, I mean gosh, it's just it's
just so far out and like there's just so many
different things that can happen. It's like, look, my job
is done, right. It's just it's you write the script,
you film the movie, and you put it out in
the world, and you know it's not your place to
say how it should be received and who should receive
it and why, and you know what you should be
awarded for it. Like that's the part of the process
(18:42):
of zero control over. So you know what I've learned,
you know, over my thirteen years out here, is like
you can't emotionally invest in the results, right, you have
to emotionally invest in the process. So it's like, as
long as I am enjoying writing it and believing that
the script was, you know, the best I could do
at that time then, like, you know, the rest is
(19:03):
really up to up to which way is the wind blowing?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
And it's like, if you can't control that part of it,
which I don't, then it's not worth losing sleepover, you know,
because life is short, and if you have no control
over it, then then what's the point of sweating it?
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:16):
This is why I always wonder why I'm a sports
fan to begin with, because I have no control over
how the Bulls are playing or how the Bears are playing.
Yet I somehow emotion invest myself in in the results
of their games. But no, that's about as far as
I could go.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
So you're about the same age as Ben Affleck and
Matt Damon when they wrote Goodwill Hunting and this being
your first you know, credited movie, do they offer you
any kind of advice of where to take your career
from here next?
Speaker 4 (19:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (19:41):
I mean, you know, not so not not like directly.
I mean, you know, the getting sole credit on the
movie and all of that, and having you know, Ben
tell me, you know, personally about that was just a
very like surreal to be kind of part of that
like lineage. You know, it's still hard to out my
head around but no. You know, something ben As said,
(20:01):
which I've really taken the heart, you know, over the
last couple of months here is like, you know, he
really is a believer in good scripts, you know, and
that if it's not there on the page, it's not
going to be there on the stage, as they say.
Speaker 4 (20:13):
You know.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
He's also talked a lot about the projects you turn
down and say no to are in a way just
as important, if not more important, than the projects you
do decide to take on and say yes to, and
goes back a little bit to what we were talking
about earlier about like really having to love a project,
you know, and really feeling the passion for it, and
if it's not there, then you know you shouldn't do it.
That's hard when you're young and you've been wanting to,
(20:37):
you know, do all the projects in the world for
so long. You know, it's like the gut instinct is
to say yes to everything, because it's like Hollywood is
crazy and you just don't know, you know, how long
a moment like this can last. So you know, take
it all while you can get it, and and that's
the that's kind of the gut instinct. But one hundred
percent see where he's coming from. Where it's like, you know,
(20:57):
like we were talking about, you really got to love something.
You really really have to be married to a project
to want to do it and take it on.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Did you keep anything from the set?
Speaker 3 (21:09):
I'm going to get in trouble, but you know the
cafeteria where they where they steal the candy from in
that scene where Mann and Jason are working later over
the weekend, on the last day, I was like, well,
it would only be fitting if I also take something
from here. So yeah, I have a I have one
of those coffee mugs that that was sitting on the shelf.
(21:30):
So it's like, you know, it's right what they say,
it's not stealing it.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Yeah, there's no work in the register, you can take it.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
That's right exactly.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Did you get any free Nike stuff from working on
this movie?
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Not free, but I was, you know, like when these
things happen, there's like you get like a start gift
when the movie starts in a rap gift when the
movie and so from like you know, multiple agents and manager,
you know, producers and the whole deal. So you can
imagine on this film what most of those gifts were.
But yes, those were you know they kindly uh you know,
(22:03):
bought those shoes. Uh. And then yeah, it's it's been
a nice part of it that I've definitely expanded my
my Jordan collection by a bid.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Do you get a rap gift from from that or
from Ben?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Well?
Speaker 3 (22:14):
You know, like the way it works is like the
whole production gets it right. So it's like, you know,
it's you get like a production T shirt that that
you know says casting through like you can find you
can find those for almost every movie that you know
that's been made on eBay. You know, did you see Nope.
You know that's King Orange hoodie that that he's wearing.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
That.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
That's like that's basically what what like a rap gift is.
So you know, I love that part of Nope because
it's like it's it's very kind of inside Hollywood. You know.
I I when I was in college, I interned on
the set of mad Men and similar thing. You know,
I got like my season five T shirt and on
that one we got some rap gifts, like from the
(22:54):
companies that Don Draper was pitching for. So we got
like a Samsonite suitcase like a pair of Ravens, which
is funny and yeah, like a similar thing on this one.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I don't know why, but I find it so refreshing
that you're also just so into every new movie. Like
as a writer, do you just have to stay up
to date on like every movie that comes out because
maybe like you want to write something like that or
you want to avoid copying another movie.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
It's not even that, it's just I love movies. I mean,
that's it, you know, Like I I this's how I
grew up. I'm just going to the movie theater every
single Friday and just seeing whatever was out, you know,
And I miss those days because it was like movie
going to the movies without pretense, you know, like when
you're that young, you don't really have a taste yet,
so it's it's it was you just take everything in.
And that's still the way I am. I mean, I
just you know, I'm my friends will tell you I'm
(23:38):
much more pretentious now than I was when I was
eight or nine or whatever. But no, man, there's nowhere truly,
there's nowhere else I'd rather be, like in the world
really than than than sitting in a dark theater and
watching a movie. Like there's just still something about it
that is uh, you know, it's kind of it's my
favorite art form and it's just it's it's I just
love the theater, you know, sadly shout here in La,
(24:00):
like we've lost my favorite ones, you know, like ArcLight
Hollywood gone, the Landmark on Pico gone, The Vista in
most feels is finally reopening. But it's been very painful
losing those theaters. Man, I like it feels like a
part of me is is and like a piece of
the fabric of the community is gone. So it's actually
(24:20):
went to the last the I don't know if you
know La at all, but the Pico, the Landmark on Pico,
one of my favorite theaters, especially on the West Side,
closed down last March and the last I went to
the last showing ever there just because I was like,
I it's like that's where I've seeing almost more movies
than anything, and there's when I saw everything everywhere all
at once. There was very just surreal way to see
(24:43):
that movie.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, I do go to La a lot for work,
and I remember seeing Black Panther at the Arc Light.
So whenever that closed down, that felt like a piece
of me went with it. Two.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
No. One hundred percent. I mean in the Cineramadome, it's
like there's just there's nowhere else like it. Man, It's
just the great thing about the ArcLight Hollywood was it
just felt like a community for film lovers and people
working in Hollywood, you know, from you know below the
line to above the line. I mean you'd see celebrities there,
but you'd also just see like other aspiring writers like myself,
(25:14):
you know, all kind of together, which which like there's
something you know, I'm sappy and romantic at heart, so
like I'm going to it that way. But like there
was something really special about that place, and.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
It would feel like an event when you went to
a movie there, because they would have things out in
the lobby and it just felt like there was an
energy to it where sometimes you don't really get that
movie you just go in there's an empty, bare lobby,
but there it felt like something.
Speaker 3 (25:39):
I know. That's one of the painful things now going
to you know, look, I'll go to any movie theater truly,
but you know, really being restricted now to kind of
these chain theaters that don't have like the love of
the of the form and like the artists in nature
to it like you're talking about, I mean the lobby
of the arc light, from costumes from movies to like,
you know, I remember seeing the scale model of the
Grand Budapest Hotel in there. You know, it's just like
(26:00):
that stuff that doesn't exist in your average chain theaters.
And you know, even like the bar, there's just nothing
better than going and like you know, having a beer
before or after the movie and talking about it. And yeah,
that's just something really painful about losing that.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Well, because it's been great talking to you, aside from
just talking about the movie Air, I just love talking
about movies with you. Is there anything you can say
about what you're working on now?
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Kind of Yeah, I'm doing another I'm working on another
script for sky Dance and Mandolid too, of the production
companies on Air. It's another sports movie, So that's really
all I can say. You know, it's another true life
story with real people, so I just want to respect that.
And you know, we're still kind of in the early
early stages of the process here, but yeah, hopefully that'll
be the next one. You know, we'll see. I'm into
(26:44):
the script and you know, working on it as we speak.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Well, I wish you the best of luck. Man. I'm
rooting for you and I hope you talk to you again.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Yeah. Thanks man, this is fun.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Let's get into a spoiler free movie review now. I
want to talk about the Super Mario Brothers movie, which
is now the highest grossing video game adaptation of all time,
but it's on pace to be the highest grossing movie
of twenty twenty three. There's no signs of this movie
slowing down, and as a kid who grew up playing
the video game, this movie was everything I needed it
(27:18):
to be. So before we get into this full review,
here is just a little bit of the Super Mario
Brothers trailer.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
My army upas cupas whatever those things are.
Speaker 1 (27:33):
We will Kingdom. Yea Bowser is coming. I'm not afraid.
I'll do anything for my brother.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
We're going to save him. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
So, if you are like me and grew up playing
Super Mario Brothers, this movie is gonna be a trip
down memory lane for you, and I think that is
the reason this movie is working so well and resonating
so much with audiences. The trouble you always have when
going into a video game adaptation is how are you
going to incorporate those things from the video game that
we all know and love without it feeling cheesy. Now,
(28:12):
this is one of the first ones I can think
of that has done it so perfectly because it's animated,
so what you were seeing on the screen is exactly
familiar with what you experienced playing this video game. You
get the characters looking exactly like they did in the
video game, you get a lot of that same level design,
so it all feels familiar. The only difference is now
we are hearing actual actors voice our characters that we
(28:36):
really haven't heard say more than a few words at
a time. And after watching this movie, I have to say,
I think Chris Pratt deserves an apology you from the
internet everybody saying that he was going to ruin the
Mario character. He didn't do that at all. We needed
somebody like Chris Pratt to voice Mario, to be able
to really make him feel human and not just a
(28:56):
bunch of catchphrases, and I think Chris Pratt did a
really good job at that. A lot of standout performances
in this cast from Anya Taylor Joy as Peach, Charlie
Day as Luigi, which he just sounds like a cartoon character,
and it's always suddenly in Philadelphia, so that was a
really easy casting for him. Then you have seth Rogen
as Donkey Kong, but the one who crushed this movie,
(29:18):
and I would say carry the entire movie on his
back because he was so good at getting into his character.
Was hands down. Jack Black as Bowser. Jack Black is
so great at his comedic timing, and he is oftentimes
a very physical actor, and I felt like he put
all of that into voicing Bowser. I feel like this
character took a bit of toll on his voice to
(29:39):
make it more gravelly sounding. I know they did add
some special effects on his voice to make him sound
a little bit more gruff than he normally is, but
that combined with his singing ability and just overall comedic nature,
I thought Bowser was the best thing in this movie.
I love how the entire movie works through different levels
of different Super Mario games. Right from the very beginning,
(30:00):
when you're doing that side scroll opening scene, it goes
into that classic looking Super Mario side scroll game. I
thought that was perfect and as soon as I saw that,
I knew I was in for a good time here,
and as an adult, I was watching for all the
little Easter eggs that you would really only know if
you grew up playing Nintendo. So everything from Mario in
the opening scene of playing kid Icarus on his own Nintendo.
(30:24):
That was like some Nintendo inception. And I love the
subtle use of different Super Mario scores and themes throughout
the entire movie. Just hearing that sparks some nostalgia for me,
so I love how they use that subtly. With as
iconic as the Super Mario theme is. I love the
way they used it, and I love the way they
use all different elements from all different games. The one
(30:45):
thing they showed that I wish there would have been
more of, but I completely get it, is they kind
of tease this with some Yoshi in there. There's one
scene where you see a big group a herd of
Yoshi running across the screen and you just get a
small little glimpse at him. I'm sure they're setting that
up for a sequel. And speaking of that, I often
feel that sometimes movies don't give you everything in the
(31:06):
first one because they want to make you come back
for the second one. I feel like that wasn't the
case with the Super Mario Brothers movie. Maybe since the
first live action one didn't work that well, and they
haven't made one since. They were very careful of what
they put in, and they also wanted to make sure
that all different types of fans would be satisfied after
(31:27):
watching this movie, so they kind of threw it all
in there. So visually this movie was perfect. I thought
the voice acting was great. Where this movie lacked for me,
I think it's because I'm an adult now and the
story felt very watered down and very basic. So I
think the intention with that is because they wanted this
movie to resonate not only with kids, but also with adults,
(31:50):
but also they needed it to appeal to a world
wide audience, which this movie is not only crushing it
in the United States but crushing it everywhere in the
world because Mario is worldwide. So I feel for that reason,
the storyline was very basic and I wanted something a
(32:11):
little bit more to chew on. It was a very
quick origin story of why Mario and Luigi started a
plumbing business and then very quickly get sucked into the
mushroom Kingdom. Mario and Luigi gets separated in the beginning,
so Mario makes it his mission to save his brother
before Bowser gets to him and probably kills him. So
he does that with the help of Princess Peach. I
(32:33):
did enjoy the role reversal here because Princess Peach was
awesome and she's not the one who needed saving. It
was Luigi. So Princess Peach in this movie was the
one who was the most knowledgeable, the one who was
the strongest, and had been in the Mushroom Kingdom the longest,
so she was the one teaching the ropes to Mario,
and it's his rise to being the hero in this movie,
(32:54):
but I still think above him is Princess Peach. So
I think that's a great message for any kid watching
and maybe is so used to just seeing that normal
thing of the guy being the hero. That is not
the case with this movie. Although oddly enough, I did
find this movie to be kind of dark for a
kid's movie. There is one character in particular that is
(33:15):
infatuated with death, which I found funny just on a
comedic level. But it was a little bit darker than
I was expecting for a kid's movie, and I guess
I just wasn't expecting a kid's movie to go there. Also,
with Bowser wanting to kill Mario, kill Luigi, and kill
all these other people. A lot of death around this movie,
so I guess I was expecting it to be completely
(33:39):
bubble gum and kid friendly. And then even with the
message in this movie, it is Mario trying to prove
himself and also trying to get the approval of his dad,
who kind of thinks he's a loser, and it shows
you that he has to go through such extremes to
prove to his dad that he is not just some
worthless dude who hasn't done much with his life. That
(34:01):
was also an interesting plot line to explore in a
kid's movie. Is just a guy named Mario trying to
get approval from his dad. And then you also have
Bowser's character trying to force upon a marriage on Princess Peach.
They have a lot of death issues with dad and
a forced marriage proposal. I have to say now what
I was expecting in this movie. So what I take
(34:22):
away from it is that your parents are never going
to be satisfied with you unless you save an entire city,
an entire world, and then finally they'll say, hey, good job.
So after watching this movie, I now think that every
video game adaptation should be animated before this one. I
would say the Sonic franchise is my favorite video game adaptation,
(34:43):
which is more a live action franchise. Those movies are
just a lot of fun to me. I like Jim Carrey,
and I feel like they got the character of Sonic
down in those movies, But I don't completely put that
one on this same level. I did have fun watching
Mortal Kombat. I think if they make some changes going
into the Sea to that, that one could be a
pretty solid franchise as well. Uncharted was fun but pretty forgettable,
(35:06):
And the other one I would probably compare this one
to would be Detective Pikachu. But the problem with Detective
Pikachu is I think as Pokemon fans, that's not entirely
the movie we wanted. We wanted just straight up Pokemon
trainer Pokemon battles, and that one feels kind of adjacent
to that story. While it is in the world, it
doesn't really deliver like this Super Mario Brothers movie delivered
(35:28):
because it is exactly like the video games. So I
think what this movie opens up is definitely more movies
in the Super Mario franchise. They'll make it two they'll
make a three. I'm curious to see how since because
they incorporated different games in this movie, like Mario Kart
and Super Smash Bros. If they just explore that a
little bit more, or they go into maybe some of
(35:50):
the other games, I think there is a lot to
work with here. I think the Nintendo movies that I
would like to see after watching this one easy call
would be a Donkey Kong solo movie because Seth Rogan
is so great in this one, and just that entire
world of Donkey Kong Country, I think would be a
fun one to explore that one could even go more
into the comedy space. Another movie I would like to
(36:11):
see would be a legend a Zelda movie. That one
would be a tricky one to make because I think
that world kind of teeters on that line of it
could be great, but it could also just as easily
be a bomb if you don't cast their pride, if
you don't have the most entertaining story when it comes
to Zelda. But I think visually that would be a
stunning one to make, especially just seeing what they can
(36:32):
do with the world of Super Mario. I felt like
a lot of the costume and character design felt very
real to me. I like seeing the texture of denim
on Mario, the attention to detail on the hat and
the face. I would love to see that in a
Zelda movie. I think the coolest thing ever and we
got a little taste of it in this movie, would
be a Super Smash Brothers movie. I think you make
(36:54):
that the same way you make a Marvel Avengers movie.
You have your Donkey Kong, maybe Luid's mansion, maybe your
Yoshi story, maybe a little Metroid, a little star Fox,
so many of those original Nintendo movies. You have your
solo films, and they all build into a Super Smash
Brothers movie. There are just so many stories you can explore,
(37:14):
and there is so much money to be made off
a Nintendo So I'm glad this one was a big success.
I also think this one is doing so well because
it's right at ninety minutes. Before you get a chance
to even get tired of it, it's already over. It
didn't feel like I needed more, didn't feel like I
needed any less. So ninety minutes animated movie is the
sweet spot for the Super Mario Brothers movie. Who see
(37:37):
this is tough because as much as I enjoyed all
of the visual elements. I did find myself not spacing out,
but finding that it was hard for me to grasp
on to a real story here. But I would still
go four out of five mushrooms. I think that is
top level for a movie that both appear adults and kids.
(38:02):
But I think there is a lot more advances they
can do story wise. But now that the world is built,
the stages set, I think Super Mario Brothers Movie Part
two will be in that four point five, maybe even
a five point range.
Speaker 3 (38:18):
It's time to head down to movie Mike trailer.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Paul, I keep getting more and more excited for this movie.
My highest anticipated movie of twenty twenty three. I'm talking
about Spider Man Across the Spider Verse, and I've been
sitting with this trailer for a couple of weeks now
itching to talk about it because it looks like they
took this movie to an eleven.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
Now.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
The first one costs ninety million dollars to make, which
is a lot for an animated movie, but this one
is nearing about one hundred and fifty million, and just
by the look of this trailer, it looks a little
bit more refined. It looks like what they already did
with the original one, with creating such a unique animation style,
which is what makes this movie so fun to watch.
It's all the little d tails they add in there
(39:01):
that makes it look like a live action, living and
breathing comic book. And that is why I enjoy this
franchise so much and why I think this is the
franchise that is going to change the way people think
about animation. And also in a world where we're getting
a little bit oversaturated with superhero movies, this is kind
of what they need to do to evolve, create these
(39:22):
different worlds to keep it fresh. Nobody really questions another
into the Spider Verse movie because it's so different. On
a mainstream scale. There's really not anybody else doing a
movie like this, so I don't see anybody complaining. That
is great for me. So before I get into my
full thoughts, here's just a short little clip of it.
What's the guy I gotta do to join this Spider team?
You can never be part of this comma. Go easy
(39:45):
on the kid. He had a terrible teacher. Peter Farles,
you have a babe, I have a babe. Everyone keeps
telling me how fun story is supposed to go him.
So what was so exciting to me about the first
one is it felt while watching that movie that that
(40:07):
had no rules going into it. It could be anything
it wanted to be. And it was a love letter
to all the people who grew up with Spider Man,
who grew up with the cartoon, playing the video game,
reading the comic books, and it took all of those
elements and put it into this movie and there were
no rules, and then also into the Spider Verse, gave
us all these different variations of Spider Man. And now
(40:30):
on this movie they are taking it to an entirely
different level by creating a cast of hundreds of Spider Man.
So this was really the first movie when it came
out back in twenty eighteen to dig into the multiverse first.
And now everybody's doing it, but I think they do
it the best because it's just fun to see all
these different kind of Spider Man that exists in all
these different universes. So in this trailer you see all
(40:51):
these different Spider Man. You have Oscar Isaac who plays
Miguel O'Hara. He is leading a group who is trying
to protect the multiverse, and Miguel Harah kind of has
this Stanos things going on of he is fine with
sacrificing some of them for the greater good, but Miles
Morales doesn't see it that way and he wants to
protect everyone. You also have some new characters voiced by
(41:13):
Essa Ray as Spider Woman and Daniel Caluya as Spider Punk,
who is probably the one I'm the most excited to see.
The movie is coming out on June's second, so I
feel like in this movie we are going to get
what is known as the classic Spider Man dilemma, the
one that Tom Holland, Toby Maguire and Andrew Garfield have
all had to face of that struggle of wanting to
(41:35):
be Spider Man and also wanting to be the person
underneath the mask and wanting at the end of the
day to always help everybody out and be the good guy.
Where this movie seems to take a different turn is
that Miles Morales is struggling with not wanting to end
up like every other Spider Man. He wants to create
his own journey. And you have all these people in
(41:55):
this movie telling you this is your fate, this is
what's going to happen, can't really change and alter your
destiny because we've all experienced this, We've all experienced loss,
we've all experienced the same struggle you're going through. We
know exactly what you're going to do. But you hear
Miles Morales in that trailer say nah, I'm gonna do
my own thing, and delivering that with such confidence. You
feel Miles Morales really coming into his own in this movie,
(42:19):
which in the first one he was really trying to
figure out how to be Spider Man. He was just
some kid who just had these powers and was trying
his best to just navigate them and save the world.
But he really wasn't that strong in that movie, even
in that final scene where he still struggles to defeat
the villain, but you get a sense of him really maturing.
(42:39):
So I feel like this movie will follow his journey
and wanting to change the course that everybody tells them
he is on, and him wanting to escape the inevitable.
Inside that trailer, there's also an Uncle Ben reference, which
we all know the story by now. I feel like
in superhero movies we overtell their origin story so much,
but that is what Spider Man has always had to
(43:02):
deal with, whether it be the death of Uncle Ben,
the death of Gwen Stacy, it is dealing with that
loss and coming back from that kind of like a
change person. Because whenever Spider Man experiences a loss, it
alters their chemical makeup, It changes what they are fighting for,
It changes their decision on whether they want to continue
(43:22):
being Spider Man or they want to just go back
to being that same regular human. So, by the looks
of this trailer, even though it's not giving us a
whole lot, I feel like that is what we are
going to see. It's usually what we get in the
part two of a Spider Man movie. They have to
deal with some kind of loss, They have to deal
with something that's really good. To tighten the screws on
our character creates some tension. Will Miles lose his dad
(43:45):
Jefferson Davis, Will he lose his mom Rio Morales or
maybe Gwen Stacy, Or will he be the first to
change history and be able to save the loved one
that always gets lost in every Spider Man movie. I
would like to see that. But I would also hope
that they do with this one is avoid the love story,
which they hinted at. It a little bit more in
(44:06):
the initial teaser trailer, but I didn't really get that
vibe in the first one that there was going to
be a romantic relationship sparked between Miles and Gwen. I
feel like it's a lot different because her character has
the Spider Man abilities and she is fighting alongside them,
So I hope they just continue that relationship of wanting
to save the world together. I think it's the better storyline.
(44:27):
The most frustrating thing to me about Spider Man is
that all the movies are owned by different entities, whether
it be Sony or Disney. And I did see that
they just added on Disney Plus the Original Spider Man
trilogy and the first Andrew Garfield Amazing Spider Man movie,
and then they are going to add Homecoming, I believe
next month in May. But there's just not one place
(44:48):
where you can watch all these movies. And I was
hoping that they would add into the Spider Verse on
Disney Plus because it would just make it so much easier.
And I feel like if this movie was a little
bit more accessible, more people who haven't seen it would
be able to watch it. But there's not a home
for this one, so I hate that the solution would
be for Sony to have its own streaming service because
I'm not ready to add another streaming service to my arsenal.
(45:10):
I just wish that they would all be available on Disney. Plus,
I just need one place where I can get every
single Spider Man movie and watch them all when I
want to. Is that too much to ask? I think
it's probably too much to ask. But again, Across the
Spider Verse is coming out on June second, twenty twenty three,
will probably be my favorite movie of the summer, if
not easily enter the top five of the year. And
(45:34):
then Beyond the Spider Verse, which will be Part three
in this series, will come out next year on March
twenty ninth, twenty twenty four. It is a great time
to be a Spider Man fan.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
If that was this week's edition of Movie by.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
Framer Bar, and that's gonna do it for another episode
here of the podcast. Before I go, I got to
give my listeners shout out. And before I even get
into that, I have to let you know that we
went viral last week. If you missed it, I had
the Broken Lizard guys aka the guys behind Supertroopers on
the podcast, and I posted a clip of that interview
on my TikTok where they talked about how they chugged
(46:09):
actual bottles of maple syrup in that movie Supertroopers.
Speaker 4 (46:12):
I drank two and a half and I made him
drink three and a half because you don't have it yet. Afterwards,
we laid down in the dark in my trailer and
just shook. And then when I got back to the hotel,
I saw him coming out.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
He goes, have you pooped yet?
Speaker 4 (46:27):
And I'm like no. He goes, report back to me
after you wait for it, and he goes, there's a reason.
It's part of maple Syrp's part of the of the
master clets.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
So I posted that clip on TikTok, didn't expect anything
of it. Posted it one morning and checked back on
it later in the afternoon, and it had a quarter
of a million views. I went to bed that night
it was probably sitting around seven hundred and fifty k,
woke up the next morning it had crossed that one
million mark, and at the time of recording this right now,
we're at one point five million views on that clip,
(46:58):
which is amazing. The first time I've experienced going viral
on a clip, and I'm glad that the name of
the podcast is right there on the clip. So maybe
you listening to this now are new because you discovered
that clip on TikTok and decided to check out the podcast.
So welcome to the podcast. Welcome to the movie crew.
On every single episode, I like to shout out a
listener who just comments on my page, sends me a DM,
(47:21):
or emails me Movie Mike d at gmail dot com.
Since there was an interview last week, I always give
a secret emoji, and it was the Lizard, so I
went through all the comments and picked one at random.
And this week's listener shout out of the week is
Amanda Meyer and Amanda Road. Favorite interviews so far. I
love the Broken Lizard guys. I've been a huge fan
of them since Super Troopers. Still waiting for my sequel
(47:42):
of beer Fest aka weed Fest that was teased at
the end of the movie so many years ago. But
I love listening to them talk about their process and
how many movie projects they have in the works that
haven't seen the big screen yet. They can do no wrong,
So thank you, Amanda, I did see them talking about that.
Your best sequel. Apparently Warner Brothers owns the rights to it,
(48:04):
so could possibly see the light of day down the line,
but they are working on Super Tubers three again. If
you miss that interview, go back one episode here on
the Feed. And this week, since we had another interview,
time for another secret emoji. If you enjoyed the Alex
Convery interview talking about Air, comment on my page with
(48:24):
the basketball emoji and I'll pick one of those comments
to be next week's listeners shout out. Thank you so
much for listening, and until next time, go out and
watch good movies and I will talk to you later.
Host
Mike D
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Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com