Apple TV’s Matchbox The Movie Is a Movie For No One, plus Slow-Burn Horror Movies | SVU

0:05 A reunion of childhood matchbox car-loving friends takes a turn... Can't even say it. No, no. Keep going.

0:13 This is how it should be. This is how the opening should be. I demand you to keep going.

0:18 Okay. A reunion of childhood matchbox car-loving friends takes a turn for the implausible when one of them turns out to be a super spy. But their matchbox car-driving skills are really put to the test. when it's left up to them to save the world. It's somehow actually Matchbox the Movie, now on Apple TV. I'm Matt Singer.

0:45 And I'm Jordan Hoffman. With more movies, more series, more stuff going straight to streaming than ever before, it felt like the right time for a podcast that keeps track of it all. And that podcast is FilmSpotting SVU. This week, we've got a review, God help us, of Matchbox the Movie.

1:03 Plus.

1:04 Some related streaming recommendations. Movies about childhood friends. Movies about matchboxes. Movies about saving the world. Movies that exist but shouldn't.

1:14 We'll also tell.

1:14 You about this week's new VOD and streaming titles. And, as always, a game.

1:21 It's all coming up. Vroom Vroom on FilmSpotting SVU. Welcome to Film Spotting SVU, I'm Matt Singer, and we're gonna get to our Matchbox review in just a second, but I did, we did want to give an update, because last week on the show, we reviewed a TV show. We reviewed Carrie on Prime Video. We had, at that time, watched three episodes each, and I would say, generally, we were pretty positive on the show. In the week that has passed since then, I have watched exactly zero more episodes.

2:04 But Jordan, Jordan Hoffman, a completionist, a professional... maybe a little OCD where he can't let things lie unfinished. Jordan watched some more Carrie. So very briefly, what do you think? Was it worth it? Should I now go back.

2:21 And watch the rest? I watched the whole thing.

2:24 I said, damn it.

2:25 I want to see her kill her classmates at the prom.

2:29 And damn it. That's what brought me here.

2:31 So I continued with five more hours of Carrie, mostly actually like the kids do these days, pretty much all in one Sitting. I think I did four of the five all at once. And it goes like this. At the end of the day, in conclusion, I am positive on the new Carrie series. Mike Flanagan's Carrie on Amazon Prime is good. However, it's not great, unfortunately. The first three episodes that we watched together, I thought were really strong.

3:05 Episode four, even stronger. Episode five, Crazy strong.

3:09 Wow.

3:10 Episode six.

3:11 I'm loving it. I'm loving it.

3:13 It's getting really good. Episode seven. I jotted it down. The 42 minute Mark or whatever it was dumb. Oh, it just like, like the carry has telekinesis and she's holding it all together, crashing down.

3:27 The bucket of pig's blood comes tumbling down. It got dumb. Metaphorically speaking.

3:32 And then the final episode, dumb. And also made me a little bit annoyed retroactively.

3:39 I'm like, ugh.

3:40 Because it doesn't really end. It's supposed to be a limited series.

3:45 It's not.

3:45 It's Carrie part one. It ends with like a now the excitement begins.

3:50 Like, F you, buddy.

3:51 I'm here for Carrie. I wanted to kill her.

3:53 We want to speak to you about the Castle Rock Initiative.

3:58 Well, that is what it is. They've made note. Now the secret's out. They're extending this into a Stephen King verse, which we kind of figured out from the first three episodes. But I will say this. There's a lot of good stuff in there. And it's mostly what we talked about last time. The lead performance is really good. The mom, she gets really deviant. There's a lot more of her at the office. She's working, if you recall, at like a Walmart type place. And there's a lot of really funny stuff that goes on there. And it's pretty great.

4:29 But then like the big ending, spoiler alert, they make it so that this wider universe, there's this like good versus evil. Maybe it's Dark Tower.

4:38 I don't know. There's this big, there's this angel and devil on Carrie's shoulder.

4:44 And they make it so that the big ending, like she's, like literally the devil on her shoulder is like, let me take control. So it's like Carrie doesn't kill everybody. The evil force possesses her for a moment. And then when- The evil force kind of gives her her consciousness back. Carrie's like, what have I done? It's like, come on, give me a break.

5:05 And then.

5:07 The big reveal of like, oh, there's a Carrie King. It's Mike Flanagan's wife is like the big, you know, the big reveal. The woman you only see her shot from behind in episode one.

5:16 It's like, who is it?

5:17 We talked about her. And then they go, who is it? It's Mike Flanagan's wife. Okay, that's a big deal of the Flanagan household, but not to the average bear.

5:23 Who gives a shit? An incredible casting coup. Yeah, I thought it was going to be somebody important. So that's annoying. And then the final thing is this.

5:32 I mean, there are elements of the filmmaking in Carrie, the show, that are quite good. The performances are great. I like the music choices. Some of the editing is great. But in the big showdown, they're in the middle of town, in the middle of Nowheresville, Maine, or wherever this is supposed to take place. And they're in front of the old-timey movie house. And Carrie's lighting the streets on fire.

5:52 And she's got blood all over her. And she's looking real spooky. And there's a wide shot in front of the old movie house. And the marquee is boasting, Brian De Palma Festival, all 35 millimeter. And I'm like, I can suspend disbelief about telekinesis. But I can't suspend disbelief that some tiny little town in the middle of nowhere has secured a 35-millimeter print of Body Dovel and Sisters and Phantom of the Paradise and that this town would show it. And then also, Mike Flanagan, you're not bad.

6:27 But don't– in your climax, don't remind me of the guy who did it better.

6:31 Right, right, right.

6:33 He really gave himself a seat in the cuckold's chair there. I mean, it's like, come on.

6:38 You are no Brian De Palma. Few people are. So in this universe, Brian De Palma exists.

6:45 Yeah.

6:46 But Carrie the film does not. Well, we don't know. So what was his breakthrough film in this alternate.

6:54 Universe if not Carrie? It was that one with the Smothers Brothers. It sure wasn't High Mom.

6:59 I'll tell you that right now.

7:02 I love High Mom, but it wasn't High Mom. I love it too, but I don't think that was the breakout.

7:06 That's for sure. I don't know.

7:07 So these are my gripes, and my gripes are amusing, but I do want to say– Ultimately, for a streaming show based on a property that's been done to death, should you find yourself in a household of like, hey, I wouldn't mind watching a new show. I heard the new Carrie is pretty good. Yeah, the new Carrie is pretty good. It's not great, but it's pretty good, and it's more up than down. Were I to vote on the tomato meter, I would give it a.

7:34 Fresh, but it's not an enthusiastic fresh. It is a– if they did continue it either in a second season or in some sort of King verse that Flanagan is overseeing, would you be interested in that?

7:46 Yes, but that's also somewhat due to my OCD because now I'm already in.

7:52 You're pot committed.

7:53 I mean, this is the sunken cost fallacy. As I buy a ticket to the third Matrix movie, absolutely hating the second one and hearing that the third one was just as bad, I still had to go see the third one because I was already in.

8:05 Right. You'd already gotten the full back tattoo of Neo. You had no choice at that point.

8:11 But no, actually, no, I will watch the next one because it's pretty good. And the Melee character is good. And I do care about her. I want her to do well. And I hope that things work out for her. And it's a B. It's not even a B plus.

8:24 It's a B. But on the other hand. It's a B. It's not a B minus. It's not a C plus. A B is pretty good. Pretty good, yeah. And I'm sure we're going to have just as much success with this week's main review, which is Matchbox colon the movie.

8:41 It's been a long time since we played Matchbox Cars together.

8:44 Hey, Amy.

8:46 Hey, Sean.

8:47 What the hell have you been up to? It's a bit of a longer story. You look big.

8:53 Yeah.

8:55 Three years ago, the world went ahead and did a funny thing. The Mattel Corporation pulled the trigger on a Barbie movie. Director and co-writer Greta Gerwig, co-writer Noah Baumbach, producer-star Margot Robbie, producer David Heyman, and co-stars like Ryan Gosling, Will Ferrell, America Ferrara, Kate McKinnon, and remember this, Rhea Perlman, they ended up collaborating and making a not altogether terrible film.

9:20 Barbie is clever. Barbie is kind of fun. It somehow made $ 1. 48 billion with a B dollars and was nominated for a great many Academy Awards, which is evidence of mass insanity at work. But the movie is better than okay, considering that it is ultimately a toy commercial. Well, folks, I'm here to tell you that you will find no such success in Mattel's Matchbox. Produced by the Elon Musk of entertainment, Mr. David Ellison, and his company Skydance, this slapdash piece of dreck was written by some hack named David Cogginshall, whose resume includes movies like The Family Plan 2, Orphan First Kill, and The Haunting of Connecticut 2, Ghosts of Georgia, which I guess is some kind of salute to the undead along Interstate 95. It is directed by

10:16 Sam Hargrave, whose previous work includes Extraction and Extraction 2, and the forthcoming Extraction 3. I've actually seen the first two Extraction movies, and they are slightly better than usual action pictures in that they have at least one gimmick, extremely well-choreographed lengthy chase and fight sequences which either have no cuts or they have those fancy hidden cuts. Sadly, there is none of that in Matchbox. Or, if there were, I didn't notice because my mental receptor's had already short-circuited due to the intense stupidity of this project. You will see how much this movie truly sucks in its very first shot. It begins with a high shot from above of a sleepy town. Oh, cute, you might think. This

11:04 is clearly a miniature because the movie's about matchbox cars, so you figure it would be miniatures. And as we get closer... that gag is going to be revealed, right? But this is not the case. It's not a miniature. It's simply bad CGI. And there's no commentary involved in this in any way. It's just terrible filmmaking made by people on a deadline to make their streaming release date.

11:28 The story. A group of kids.

11:30 Bond when a mechanic, played by Bill Camp, lets them hang out in the back room and play with cars. One shy boy has a crush on an adorable girl, but he's too shy to ask her out. Cut to 30 years later, and he's channeled his frustration into becoming a Jason Bourne-like CIA assassin. But he comes back to his hometown when he hears that Bill Camp has died, though he missed the funeral in which the adorable girl, now Jessica Biel, eulogizes him while also praising the act of collecting Matchbox cars. The old Matchbox gang, as they literally call themselves, they get back together. It's Biel, it's Sam Richardson, it's Teyona Paris, who are now married, and Arturo Castro. They go out for drinks, but are drugged

12:15 and extracted and end up on a plane because, you know, Cena.

12:18 Is a CIA assassin.

12:20 There is one truly funny scene where the others realize what their old chum has done with his life. And there are some funny zings, mostly from Sam Richardson, who's pretty much innocent in this bad film. And then there are escapes and chases and hijinks, and they eventually meet a Russian arms dealer played by Golshifta Farahani, who is one of my favorite actresses working today, and I'm glad to see she got a paycheck. But I don't know why a Persian woman is playing a Russian, but that's okay.

12:48 I don't really get into that. But then there are some more dull action scenes, a lot of unimpressive jokes. They make comparisons to the Terminator, which really doesn't help the movie much. And then they shoehorn in A few more ads for Matchbox cars when you least expect them. For now, I feel like I've talked too much. Matt Singer, what is your take on Matchbox the movie? I think this is the film of the year.

13:14 10 out of 10.

13:15 I don't know.

13:17 The first thing I want to start with is just very interesting. You talked about Carrie. You talked about the part of the climax of Carrie that got your attention where they panned to a marquee. With Brian De Palma movies listed on the marquee. I don't know if you clocked this, but after that opening that you pointed out, which I, you know, I hadn't even thought about this.

13:40 I'll give you some credit. If it had been an opening panning shot of like a miniature. Or, you know, at first it looks real and then you realize it's a miniature because this is a movie about matchbox cars. That actually would have been kind of clever. That is not what they do. I agree. It is just a bad, ugly CGI shot. But that could have been something. Well, right after that, we meet the young version of two of the characters, including, you know, the John Cena character as a young man. And there is a movie theater in the background and we can see the marquee. The movie's playing. It's 1998 and the movie's playing on the marquee.

14:16 are Good Will Hunting, The Wedding Singer, Fallen, and Deep Rising. Now, these are not all good movies. No. But they are totally original movies. Not one of them is based on anything. Not a novel, much less a crappy line of toy cars. That your grandma would buy for you at the dollar store. Because she didn't have any Hot Wheels that day. And then you just have to watch the rest of Matchbox the movie. And I'm thinking. Like why would you. I guess you put that shot there to like establish it's 1998. Right? Yeah.

14:52 But I think. Between these two texts that we've just talked about, there needs to be a moratorium on shots of marquees with in-jokes or, you know, homages. Do not put the name of a movie I would rather be watching than the piece of junk you have made. You are just making it worse for yourself.

15:15 Everyone you've mentioned is something I would rather watch.

15:18 Right. Even the ones that aren't great. At least there's something. This is not something. No. Other than another kind of frontier that has been crossed in the world of product placement. Yeah.

15:33 Now, I have to give the actors credit. I mean, acting is hard. You have to pretend something unrealistic is real. It's not a natural thing. And the way that they're able to get through their dialogue without laughing is is amazing because there are multiple scenes in which they stop the action, the incomprehensible action, short, to quickly sell you a Matchbox car.

16:00 Yes, yes. It's shocking. You pointed out the one that my jaw was on the floor, and you're right. Let's give credit to Jessica Biel, who plays the woman who has to say this. She has to deliver a eulogy for a character while making it a commercial film For Matchbox Cars. And I transcribed this scene because I watched it twice. I watched it. I was so in shock.

16:25 I rewound and I watched it again. And this is what she says. This is referring to the character played by Bill Camp. He is Smalley. As you mentioned, he's a mechanic. For some reason, he's an adult man who lets children spend their time unsupervised in his working garage.

16:47 With all the power tools.

16:50 Somehow this is okay. I don't know. It's very sketchy to me. Would I let my children hang out in a mechanic's garage unsupervised playing with his matchbox cars? No.

17:02 No.

17:02 But they did. In any event, here's what she says. I can't imagine what my life would have been like without him. And I'm not the only one.

17:12 Smalley's place was so much more than just a garage. It was a haven for my friends and me. A place that we could come to to feel safe.

17:26 Seen. Every day he would let us play with his insane collection of Matchbox cars.

17:34 We even got to call on ourselves the Matchbox Gang.

17:38 This is a eulogy!

17:43 Sam looks like he's about to throw up.

17:45 This is a eulogy.

17:46 Sam looks like he's about to give up on cinema.

17:48 He's like, I'm done. This is after the opening has a scene where Bill Camp explains the origin of matchbox cars.

17:55 Right, yeah.

17:57 And oh, by the way, during the funeral, all the members of the matchbox gang all put their matchbox car on the casket as if Barry Smalley with my matchbox car. And what you didn't mention when you were talking about this scene is that you said John Cena doesn't show up to the funeral. That's not true. He's there like in the distance watching.

18:21 Oh, of course.

18:21 And when they put their matchbox cars on the casket, he looks down in his hand and he has his in his hand as if they have all made this pact. You know, if Smalley ever dies... We're going to have to bring our matchbox cars and put them on the cat. They planned this. This wasn't a spontaneous thing because he did it too. Even though he's not part of the group.

18:46 No, he left because he's been in Kabul strangling people with his bare hands. And also, turning down, if I may speak bluntly, a Russian, maybe KGB agent, but whatever. The fringe benefits of being James Bond is you get to sleep with the enemy once in a while.

19:07 Some actress....

19:10 Flings herself at John Cena.

19:11 Propositions him in a bar, yes. Very James Bond, and he's like, thanks, but no thanks.

19:15 He says, thanks, but no thanks. I'm not interested, because he's still pining for Jessica Biel, who he last saw when she was 11.

19:23 Do you have a matchbox car? I'm sorry, I'm not interested.

19:27 She was really into the Dodge Charger, and so it implies that John Cena has never been intimate with a woman because he's just still in love with 11-year-old Jessica Biel.

19:37 I guess that's true. You make a good point that I had not considered, perhaps. Don't take this personally. We were gonna share a few more drinks. You asked to see my room. I'd be tempted. Believe me. But the truth is, I just don't feel like showing anyone my room tonight, so.

19:59 Just saving time.

20:02 You know me so well.

20:07 There are several other slam on the brakes to put it in Matchbox terms, moments to advertise Matchbox. But my favorite is this. Cut to, I believe they're in Casablanca, and there's a chase scene, and the chase scenes are fine. I mean, I mentioned Sam Hargraves in the past has directed some good ones. This is not in his best of reel, but they're competent chase scenes.

20:32 There's one, there's.

20:32 Cars flinging, and they're always hitting the fruit vendor as they always do.

20:36 They're flying around. Of course, of course.

20:38 There's some explosions, and during the twists and turns through the little, the shook and whatnot in Casablanca, they cut to a little boy, a little North African boy at a table at a tea shop, and he's out on the street, and he's playing with his matchbox cars.

20:56 Vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom. Sam is hysterical.

20:59 Okay, so he's like, oh, you're inside the little boy's mind. It's like adventure, excitement.

21:04 Yes. Cut back to the action, and there's a big explosion. Yes. Cars blow up. People are on fire. People are dying. There's glass. There's blood.

21:16 There's sinew right in front of the little boy.

21:18 What does he do, Jordan?

21:21 Well, in real life, the kid would freak out, panic, cry for his mother, be in therapy for the rest of his life. But instead, he looks down at the cars in his hands, then looks over to the real.

21:34 Explosion and doesn't see. As if to say like, huh?

21:37 No, I mean, whatever, however you translate awesome into Arabic is what he, he's like, yalla. It's very, very excited, but it's just like, you know, it's an incredible moment.

21:51 There are, you know, car crashes are not that great in real life.

21:54 You know, this little kid would not really, I mean, I know suspended disbelief for a matchbox, the movie, but it struck me as a little bit tone deaf. And then there's another one where, Oh, God. So they're running around. They're trying to stop a bomb sale.

22:07 There's helicopters. There's running. They go to Budapest.

22:10 They're on the chain bridge. And then there's something where they're all dressed up James Bond style. And Jessica Biel looks like a million bucks. And she's all sexy. And Sam Richardson is.

22:20 Looking cool in a tux. And the gang has to help.

22:25 You know, they're all they're all all for one and one for all, even though there's only one trained CIA black ops agents.

22:31 For some reason, the others are along for the ride. They played with matchbox cars as children, and somehow they are capable of doing these incredible things and feats with very little like. like they're just incredible. They're fairly competent. There's a little bit of wackity schmackity about them. Like, what are we doing here? But by the end of the movie, they are essentially a team of fast and furious ask team of super spies. Yeah. Toyota Paris. I believe she was like a reporter for the local news.

23:02 She's like, yeah. Imagine like a helicopter pilot, like for the local news, doing weather reports or traffic reports.

23:08 So now she can, you know, whatever the F 15 of helicopters is.

23:12 Yeah. She's doing that. Exactly.

23:14 Um, so, uh, all I'm saying is like, there's the moment, there's like the down moment when they all in screenwriting classes, you know, the dark moment where they all have to buck each other up. And it's, and it's another goddamn speech about the power of matchbox cars and how playing with these little rinky dink cars, uh, which yes, by the way, as we learned in matchbox, and this was corroborated in Wikipedia, the creator of matchbox, what wanted to give his daughter a toy, uh, But it could only fit in a Matchbox. And so he had to make a little car, and that's what gave us Matchbox. Hot Wheels, by the way, didn't come for a few decades later.

23:52 Hot Wheels and Matchbox, by the way, both.

23:53 Owned by Mattel.

23:54 So don't worry about any of that kind of thing. It's a pretty lousy movie.

23:59 10 out of 10. Oh, and then the guy from... 10 out of 10.

24:02 One of the guys from Game of Thrones shows up, the big Icelandic dude.

24:05 I thought he was kind of funny. Yeah, he was funny. He plays the Russian.

24:10 Golshifte Farahani, who I love, is in there.

24:15 We've really kind of just talked about the Matchbox product placement in Matchbox, colon the movie, of which there is a lot of it, and it's very fair to point it out. I do want to say, as much as I'm not interested in seeing a Matchbox car movie... I'm open to the possibility that there could be a good one.

24:36 I mean, as you pointed out, Jordan, the Barbie movie far exceeded my expectations and everyone's expectations. And of course, that was in some ways a subversive movie. It was using, you know, the language of these toys to tell a story about all these different things, commercialism, you know. And, you know, how women are treated in society. But I don't even think a Matchbox, I don't think you need to even do that. Like, I think you could just make a movie about great car chases. And the thing that kind of confused me about Matchbox, colon the movie, was there are car chases and most of them look fine.

25:13 But like, why are there so many fight scenes and shootouts? Like, Matchbox, they're cars. It's not about... I get it. We're trying to make an action movie and all that. But then, but like, I just was so surprised there was so much of like generic fistfights in a movie about matchbox cars, right? Like why isn't there more exciting and interesting car chases?

25:37 Because the people who made this movie suck shit because they don't have any creativity. And it was an Ellison production. Skydance is the future of Hollywood. There's, there were, these were morally and creatively bankrupt people that, Didn't know how to do it. And at some point along the way, they should have pulled the plug, which they almost did.

25:57 This movie's not playing in theaters. It's playing on Apple, which is one of the lesser, no disrespect to Apple products, but nobody's watching your.

26:05 Movies, really. Well, they have TV shows that people like. Yeah, they have a few. They have a lot of very successful and very popular TV shows. Pluribus is very good.

26:13 Severance is very good.

26:14 And people love Ted Lasso. People love Widow's Bay. For some reason... The movie side of things is a lot. Their track record is a lot spottier, and I don't know why.

26:24 Despite the great irony of they are the only streaming service to have won the Academy Award for Best Picture.

26:29 That's a great point. For a movie, 15 people have seen Coda, and it's not even that good. It's okay. It's okay, but you're right. It's certainly not among the better Oscar winners of this century. And again, I don't understand the conception of this movie. The last thing I wanted to mention was, Why, okay, so there's, you know, we mentioned the Matchbox gang, this group of, you know, childhood friends, they're grown up, they're all working together now.

26:54 Two of them, as you said, Sam Richardson, Tiana Paris, they're like a married couple. Yeah. Why, and I'm going to assume, maybe this is, I'm wrong, like Matchbox cars appeal to young children. And presumably if you're making a movie called Matchbox the movie, you want to appeal to that young audience. You know, you mentioned that scene with the little boy, As stupid as that scene is, like that's obviously there for that audience. Like put yourself into the shoes of this kid. Imagine. And okay, fine. So why are there so many scenes in this movie about this like married couple talking about where they're going to live? And, you know, there's this whole running subplot about like Sam Richardson doesn't like getting on planes. He doesn't want to

27:37 move to a big city. for her job even though she's so great she should get a great job in a big city and he's nervous and he's holding her back this is Matchbox this is a movie for babies why why are we doing.

27:51 This there is a there is a movie in in in American cinema history that is derided for so many reasons it's one of the the first truly abhorrent and deplorable marketing driven films it's called Mac and Me mmm Which was, of course, the first and pretty much only McDonald's tie-in movie.

28:14 Right.

28:15 Mac and Me is an astronomically more successful creative work than this. Now, I'm not saying Mac and Me is better because Matchbox, the movie, does have a few jokes. Sam Richardson is a naturally funny person. And John Cena is charismatic. And Jessica Biel looks terrific.

28:34 In that outfit. And Golshifte Farhanani does look terrific also.

28:38 And some of the action scenes are fine. But in terms of what it should be as a creative statement, Mac and Me tried to be an E.T. ripoff and it is an E.T. ripoff and it works in that context. This works in no context. No one wants this movie and no one will like this movie because it's for no one except for the momentum of lawyers and producers who who have the rights to the name Matchbox and want to keep the churn of production in motion. Nobody had the sand to say, David Ellison, don't make this movie.

29:19 It's not going to work.

29:22 They had to do it.

29:23 They had a deadline and they met it and they moved on. And God knows what the next Mattel movie is going to be. And unless they hire Greta Gerwig, who has the sand to say, I'm only going to do Barbie if it's good.

29:37 Because Barbie was in development for years. Sure. And it went through many iterations. You're right. Yeah.

29:42 And I'm sure if we ever got our hands on a pre-Gerwig version of Barbie, it was as junky as this. But she said, I'm going to do it.

29:51 Yeah.

29:52 Again, it sounds funny to stand up for Barbie as some sort of artistic achievement. Because it really isn't. It's not that good. But compared to this, it really is. And I think that's pretty much all I have to say about Matchbox the movie.

30:09 Yeah. I think Barbie is great, but it does feel a little bit like we are now paying the price for Barbie being as good and as successful as it was. Because now we're getting the offspring of it, which are not as good. Let me tell you a funny story.

30:26 Hold on, Sam.

30:28 Mark the time code. We're going to need the sound effect.

30:38 And so is Matt. We both work in film criticism. The lowest possible rung of the entertainment field.

30:46 We're not even on the ladder. We're in the dirt. We're in the dirt below the ladder, but go ahead. The ladder, the pressing down into the mud, we're underneath that. That's how low we are, where we deserve to be. The scum of the scum of the scum. But as film critics, we occasionally do meet people in the film industry.

31:03 And sometimes we can become acquaintances and maybe even friends of people who are doing well in career writing, directing, acting, blah, blah, blah. So I happen to know someone who's doing pretty well in their career as a creative in Tinseltown, Hollywood, California.

31:22 And they're on the up. They're doing well, taking meetings. And he confided in me. I'm taking a meeting with a big producer. And the way it works in Hollywood sometimes is a producer has a property and then they go to creatives, writers, directors, writer-directors, other producers.

31:38 Do you have a take on this? Do you have a take? What's your pitch on X?

31:41 Right.

31:42 What's your pitch on X? I got this.

31:44 And what this person who was very excited to meet the popular producer or the successful producer was, this is in the wake of Barbie, as a movie like Matchbox is in development, Took the meeting.

31:57 I love what you're doing. I love your vibe. I love your look. I want you to come back with a pitch. I got something. Oh yeah? What is it? Is it a great new book? Is it a classic book? Is it a work of literature? Is it a play? Is it even like some scripted podcast? What is it? What is it? Come to me with a pitch on McDonald's.

32:19 Oh no! Oh no! what, what, what about McDonald's?

32:26 Give me, give me your, give me that old Barton Fink feeling on McDonald's. Come back to me in a week with your pitch on McDonald's. And my friend was like, what the fuck do I say? And I'm like, well, clearly Grimace and Mayor McCheese are having an affair. I mean, I don't know.

32:39 What do you do?

32:40 What about Mac and me again? I don't, I, you know, I don't know whatever happened. I think I did say at some point, like, whatever happened with the McDonald thing? And he was like, ah, forget that. I don't want to talk about it. So I, It could be that he put his heart and soul into it and got passed.

32:55 Or it could be that producer was arrested. Who the hell knows? But I'm saying that's Hollywood, baby. That's what's going on right now. And, you know, we all have Barbie to blame, I guess.

33:11 And you know what? In two years, when McDonald's, the movie, comes out, and it goes straight to streaming... We will review it here on Film Spotting SVU. But in the meantime, this was our review, I'd say pretty positive overall, pretty positive, of Matchbox, colon, the movie, which is currently streaming on Apple TV. Hey, when we tell this story, you leave this part out, okay?

33:39 Okay, and I never drop the gun.

33:41 Deal.

33:42 Yep. We must soldier on.

33:46 Yeah.

33:46 And we must get to the recommendation segment, which is known far and wide as... Rexig. The Rexig! Yeah. Woo!

34:00 Rexig.

34:01 Heavy duty. Heavy duty rock and roll. It's a good time, yeah. It's a time to recommend things on this segment. So Jordan, what will you recommend? A film? You only have to pick something that's better than Matchbox. Good luck.

34:17 Go to any streaming service, roll your thumb around and hit play and it's probably going to be better. No, I mentioned it a couple of times in my backhanded compliments that Sam Richardson's pretty funny in this. He's a charismatic actor, best known for Veep, right? But also a million other things. We all know Sam Richardson. So Sam Richardson was in an independent film that came out not that long ago. It was a Shudder exclusive at the time, so it's appropriate for Halloween season. but it has now been released everywhere. You can get it on a lot of the free services, Tubi and whatnot, Canopy without ads, blah, blah, blah.

34:59 It is a movie from, I want to say 2021, directed by a fellow by the name of Josh Rubin. Not a household name, but Josh Rubin was the co-creator of collegehumor.com. So the guy knows how to make three minute movies, but you know, and knows how to maximize jokes and editing and reaction shots and whatnot, but can string together a good movie too.

35:23 This movie is called Werewolves Within. Okay.

35:28 Which is based on a video game that I've never played and frankly never heard of before I saw the movie. And Matt Singer, have you even heard of this movie?

35:38 I have heard of it. I have not watched it, but I have heard of it.

35:41 Let me tell you, The basic premise. It's set in the Hudson Valley, New York State, wintertime. There's a new sheriff in town played.

35:51 By Sam Richardson. He's a funny guy.

35:53 He comes to town. He immediately meets the local postal officer, postal worker played by Melania Weintraub, who you definitely know because she's in a lot of TV and she was in the very, very funny Paul Feig web series called Other Space, which I adore.

36:13 Yeah, Other Space.

36:14 By any chance, is that like any other shows? It's similar to Star Trek. Is it now? Yeah, but you definitely know Melania Weintraub. She's in 700,000 commercials for... Oh, God, what the hell was it? Like T-Mobile or something like that. You know her. You know this woman. She's one of the great character actresses.

36:35 Anyway... They're in this town. It's a small town. It's wintertime.

36:40 Everybody's a little wacky.

36:42 There's a death.

36:45 Who had this person died? It looks like they were mauled by a bear. No, it was a werewolf. Then they're all trapped inside of a hotel. And it's kind of like The Thing. They don't know who to trust.

36:55 But it's with jokes.

36:57 And it's a werewolf and not a space alien. And it's very, very... cleverly shot for a movie on a very low budget. It's got a little bit of that Sam Raimi-esque feel with the way it's shot. And the character actors in it are all very, very good, particularly Sam Richardson and Melania Weintraub. They're both really, really likable and fun.

37:21 Rachel, you look like you just seen a corpse.

37:26 Well, the roads are amped and something's wrong with the generator.

37:30 Which generator?

37:42 I saw this movie when it came out and I said this is everything that a little independent.

37:47 Movie should be and you know.

37:49 It's it's quite good and it's a little bit scary you know there's spooky stuff in there it's it's a it's you know maybe are maybe pg-13 I don't know which one it would be probably one you could watch with kids it's not too scary but But it really plays to the strength. And I remember watching it. I mean, I'd seen Sam Richardson a little bit here and there and other things. I mean, he's one of these actors that shows up in small parts in a lot of other bigger comedies. But this was like the first thing where he's clearly the star that I saw him in.

38:24 And I was just really impressed. And it's just a very, very likable dude. So it was on Shudder. When it first came out. But if you don't have Shudder, it can be found elsewhere. So my rec seg is Werewolves Within. Oh, and you don't need to know anything about the video game either. But I think if you do play the video game, there might be an Easter egg or two for you. But it's really just like a haunted house movie with comedy.

38:53 And is there a scene where there's a eulogy and someone is eulogizing someone they love and saying... I used to go to their garage and play the video game Werewolves Within. It was more than a video game to me. It gave my life meaning and purpose. We even named ourselves the Werewolves Within gang.

39:13 Let me ask you, how would, from In the Hand of Dante, how would Jason Momoa... Give that eulogy.

39:25 Like a pussycat. I cannot imagine what my life would be like. have been like without him.

39:32 I am looking, by the way, at Sam Richardson's appearance, like his credits. It's filmography, I think that's called? Well, credits, but specifically for TV. He is in a lot of films. Every single funny show of the last 20 years, this guy, you know, The Office... Arrested Development, Veep, New Girl, Portlandia, BoJack Horseman, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Star Trek Lower Decks.

39:57 I don't even remember him being in that. That's good to know. Red alert. The guy is just one of these guys. He was on Poker Face, too. I didn't know that either.

40:05 So it's just he should be more famous than he is. And it's not going to be Matchbox, the.

40:10 Movie that did it. I hope that he was able to maybe buy a car off of that one.

40:16 No pun intended.

40:16 A full-sized car. A full-sized car, a real car.

40:19 I hope that gave him a nice paycheck, and I hope that it'll inspire people to watch a movie like Werewolves Within where this great character actor plays the lead for once, for God's sake, and he's very funny.

40:32 I decided that I would not go what seemed to me the obvious route, which would be a film about cars or racing. I decided, given how bad and how shameless this movie is about its Matchbox inspiration, and boy, does it feel gross using the word inspiration in any context with Matchbox the movie, it seemed like the more challenging and fun route would be to pick, besides Barbie, another good movie that's based on a toy. And I did come up with one. And it is a film that I have seen many, many times, perhaps more than any other movie that has been released in the 21st century. Really? Yes. Yes.

41:14 Because when I was a young father, when my oldest daughter was little, about a year old to like 18 months, her favorite thing in the entire world, for reasons I have never understood because she was, you know, still kind of a baby and couldn't really explain it and can't explain it now. was Batman and I think the reason she even knew who Batman was was because like we had I would buy superhero board books and we would read them at bedtime and Batman was in some of them and she just got very into Batman and then we bought her these like little people little people are these Fisher Price toys and they're just for like they're they're very cute and they don't have any moving parts so they're safe for babies and babies can play with

41:58 them and She had a bunch of princesses and she had a bunch of superheroes, including Batman. And she played with the Batman so much he got, like, worn out. She just loved Batman. And so one day, when my wife was not around, I decided to show her a Batman movie. And the one that I picked to show her that shattered her mind. I got a guess. What's your guess? Well, it's got to be Lego Batman, right?

42:23 I showed her the Lego Batman movie and... This is a movie based on a toy that is very, very good. And unlike a lot of the things that I have watched many times with my children over the last 11 years, Lego Batman was a movie that I never got sick of. And any time she wanted to watch it, I was quite delighted to do so. Because, like the Lego movie, the first one before it, it's not simply a feature-length commercial for Legos. It has... A little bit of a gently subversive attitude about the concept where, you know, it really embraces the openly artificial-ness of it. They're blocky little toys, and so... You know, you use that in the case of the Lego Batman movie. You get to have Will Arnett playing this puffed up spoof of how dark mainstream

43:20 live action Batman movies had gotten by this point, by the 20, you know, mid 20 teens. What's up, Bat fans? You're watching Gotham Cribs. And today I'm taking you on a sick tour of Wayne Manor. Let's go. Adam West was a thing of the past. Yeah, this was like Adam West 2.0 in some ways. You know, like he... Batman...

43:42 Lego Batman sings songs about how sad he is, how he's filled with darkness in his life. He has no parents. You know, he boasts about how many abs he has. He refuses to allow himself to let sidekicks or friends into his life because he has to be alone, Dark Knight, waging a war on crime, you know. And yet... Batman comics, as you and I, Jordan, both know, they are sometimes they're dark, but sometimes they're absurd. They're over the top.

44:14 They're ridiculous. There's 85 years of Batman comics and Lego Batman embraces all of the weirdness of this mythos. You know, there's Condiment King makes an appearance in Lego Batman. And it does have callbacks to lots of different weird Lego or rather Batman detritus. including the Adam West TV show.

44:39 And one thing that the movie, after watching it so many times, one thing that I realized that the movie does very well, something that Matchbox does not do well, is that the Lego Batman movie, yes, it has all these very pointed, cute jokes about deep lore of Batman, but it also just has the freewheeling logic of a child playing with their favorite toys. where at any moment, any character might show up and there could be a weird plot twist and there's goofy songs and there's these great vocal performances and there's running gags.

45:16 Look, Batman's been on the job for a very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very long time.

45:25 He has aged phenomenally.

45:27 However, despite all the great work Batman has done for us, Gotham City is still the most crime-ridden city It.

45:35 Is an exuberant... play for children it works for adults too but like that was what my you know my daughter loved this movie it brought her so much joy just the the silliness and the wackiness and she's seen it lately now that she's a little old no we haven't watched it in a couple of years but maybe maybe we put it on a year or two ago and we laughed at it all over again but it's like she's she's never been into superheroes again and She pooh-poohs anything related to Spider-Man, which, of course, that's very near and dear to my heart. And she has no interest.

46:17 And she doesn't really... She reads a lot of comics. She doesn't read superhero comics. She has almost no interest. This is a special... It was like a moment in time, and this was the perfect movie for that moment. But it's also just a lovely, charming, funny... Adventure for the whole family.

46:40 Was there ever a third Lego feature?

46:42 There was. It wasn't that great. The Lego Ninjago movie was the third one. It's not so great. It's certainly the weakest. I don't even know. What is Ninjago? Ninjago is a popular brand, like a proprietary brand of Legos that are like ninjas and they're affiliated kind of action martial arts kind of vehicles and things. Yeah. Were Lord and Miller involved in the Batman one? They may have been producers, but they certainly weren't the guiding creative forces, I don't believe. It's funny.

47:13 I liked the first Lego movie. I don't know that I... I think I saw the Batman one, but I don't really remember it that well.

47:22 I have seen... enough times for you and for half of the American people because there was a period where we were watching at least parts of it almost every, certainly every week. That's what you gotta do. That's how it works. She just wanted Lego Batman.

47:39 Well, that's sweet.

47:40 So that's my pick. It's available to stream on HBO Max, Lego Batman movie.

47:44 718 here at WOTW. We got a sound we'd like to play that seems to be bouncing around the valley tonight.

47:53 Yeah.

47:57 I can tell you what's going on. The sound we heard out in the desert. It was coming from thousands of feet higher than anything could fly.

48:08 Next on the Rec Seg, we do like to take questions from the listeners.

48:13 That's you.

48:14 And by the way, you too can send us an email at feedback at filmspottingsvu.com if you would ever like a recommendation. And we have some in the bank for people that have sent them, and we're going to get to those good ones, but we always want more. So send us a query, send us a query, feedback at filmspottingsvu.com.

48:35 A woman by the name of Melissa sent us this. Dear Matt and Jordan, and also Sam, one movie from the last few years that has really stuck with me is The Vast of Night, which is a good movie.

48:53 I like it too.

48:54 Melissa continues, that's sci-fi though, not horror. We asked specifically for horror this month because it's Halloween month. That's sci-fi though, not horror, but it still does a remarkable job of slowly building dread to a satisfying conclusion, which is my favorite feeling in a horror movie. By contrast, so many of the small horror movies of the last decade or so are good at the slowly part but not always so great at the satisfying conclusion part this sounds like my ex-wife so.

49:28 God any Any good, I have only never, I don't have an ex-wife. It was just a joke. Okay, so she continues.

49:39 Any good slow burn horror movies that have largely flown under the radar to recommend?

49:45 That's a good one.

49:48 Have you got a slow burn horror movie to recommend to Melissa and the wider listening audience?

49:55 I ask you, Matt Singer. So I thought a lot about this. I'm not sure if I know the exact definition of a slow burn. And I think my pick might be a little too quick of a burn, maybe too bright of a burn, if you will. Maybe. But my movie does have the word burn in the title. And I also think it is definitely an under-the-radar film.

50:22 It does kind of build to an amazing conclusion. It's a good horror movie.

50:27 It's got the word burn in the title.

50:28 Yes.

50:29 It stars, burn Gorman. Nope.

50:31 Nope. Incorrect. Okay. I'll tell you the movie that I'm recommending here is called bright burn from 2019 directed by David. Yeah. And it's a very simple movie to describe. What if Superman was evil? What if an alien baby from another world landed in the Midwest and was discovered and adopted by a nice young couple, but instead of absorbing all the love and the classic American values, his extraterrestrial soul turned him into an unstoppable killing machine? Simple, but very smart premise for a horror movie. And because everyone knows that Superman origin story, we all just take it for granted.

51:15 But think about what that entails. A kind couple from Kansas finds an alien in a spaceship and they just decide to raise it as their child. And when he starts showing that he can like lift tractors over his head and shoot laser beams from his eyes, they just take it in stride and tell him to keep it quiet.

51:35 How do they know he won't eat them? That's, you know, that's the point of Superman, of course, that Ma and Pa Kent's decency is, And their kindness and their empathy, they mold this baby into Clark Kent. He grows up. He fights for truth and justice in the American way as Superman. That's, you know, I think the thing that's kind of fun to think about, though, is that that was a character that was invented in the 1930s and 40s, which does make you wonder, what kind of a Superman would the America of the 21st century produce? Uh-huh. And ultimately what you have in Brightburn is a horror film about nature versus nurture. With nurture definitely winning out. Because you have this couple played by Elizabeth Banks and David Denman.

52:26 They find a baby, they raise it. And their son, in quotation marks, who's played by this young actor who does a very good job in this movie, Jackson A. Dunn. He plays their son, Brandon. You know, he has this very sweet look about him at first. His eyes just express pure innocence. And then later, those same eyes express fiery death as he shoots people with laser beams. He's a creep. Help him up.

52:58 What are you doing?

53:01 Terrible. Oh, we shouldn't know from it. Strictly speaking, again, I admit this maybe this doesn't quite fit the slow burn because it gets pretty gory. It's not a tiny, tiny little movie. But I appreciate what I liked about this movie is that, look, if you're going to go for it, go for it. If you're going to make a Superman horror movie. be dark, be gory, be scary, really go for it. And this movie does. And I'm not sure why people were not fans of this movie.

53:31 Generally, it was not a hit. I remember most critics liked it and people were jazzed and then it flopped. I don't know what was going on in society at the time.

53:39 It was produced by James Gunn, who then went on to write and direct an actual and very good and not horrific Superman movie, a Superman movie that really embraces all those old fashioned values, tries to make them new again. So how about that? But If you want a dark twist on that idea, and I don't know if it's a slow burn, but it's a bright burn. Oh, very good.

54:02 It's bright burn. It is currently streaming on a few places. You can find it on Tubi. You can also find it on Peacock.

54:08 I want to do good, man.

54:11 I do.

54:14 Well, I have two quick things to say about that. Number one is that's not really a slow burn, so you failed.

54:19 But it's a good pick. Number two....

54:23 For those who are intrigued by the concept of Superman, but what if, I want to give a shout out to, I really, Matt might start doing the nerd voice soon. There is a particularly good graphic novel by the name of Superman Red Son. Written by Mark Millar. Matt, you've certainly read Superman Red Son, right?

54:47 I've certainly read Superman Red Son by Mark Millar, yes.

54:54 Red Son, the premise is this.

54:59 What if, what if, man? Listen to me, man.

55:03 What if that... Baby in a basket from Krypton did not land in Kansas, but instead landed in Kazakhstan.

55:11 The Soviet Union instead of Kansas.

55:15 The Soviet Union. What if Superman was raised by commies during the Cold War?

55:21 What if? What if? What if? And that's all you need to know. Like, you're intrigued. You're either not... You're either.

55:28 Most people hear that and go, oh, I'm intrigued because the Soviet Union is interesting.

55:32 Or they go.

55:34 Comic books are for children and I'm an adult and I'm not going to listen to any of this crap.

55:37 And I respect that. Believe me, I respect that. How dare you, sir?

55:46 If you are slightly intrigued by the concept of Superman on its head, Soviet Union, go check out Superman Red Son. It's one of the better graphic novels that I've ever read.

55:58 I really like it. So did you do a better job than me? Do you have a slow burn?

56:04 Can I jump in here for a second, guys, and just say just that Superman Red Son was adapted, it looks like, into an animated feature film in 2020 by Sam Liu, Superman colon Red Son.

56:17 It is available VOD.

56:19 It's an animated. Yeah, it's part of the DCEU, the DC Extended Universe, or DCEUA, DC... animated universe of extension.

56:31 Just give up. You're way off. Just forget it.

56:33 What does DC stand for, Matt?

56:35 DC Comic!

56:41 I think we need a different name. They can't both be Matt. That voice needs a different name. And it could just be Matthew is fine, but we've got to think about that.

56:50 Matthew, stop slobbering on the comics.

56:52 When we call him into being, we need to use his.

56:55 It's like Candyman. You say his name three.

56:57 Times and he appears.

57:01 So here's what I would like to pick. Mine is the epitome of a slow burn because it ends with burning. But it's not a deep cut. But you know what? I don't ever know who's listening. And to some people, a movie that is table stakes to you and me is a deep cut to others. I mean, this is certainly an older film. It's from the early 70s. And it's one of the greatest horror movies ever made. It's probably in most people's top 10. It is slow in that it's a mystery. It's a mystery. It's a mystery.

57:33 What's going to happen? There's deception. There's confusion. There's vexing.

57:41 Interact. You can't.

57:42 Vexing?

57:42 And then there's fire. There's vexing?

57:45 The movie is about a guy.

57:46 Yeah. From the mainland. Who's vexed. He's a police officer. He's conservative. He's a virgin. Whoa. Goes to a small island.

57:53 Perhaps like John Cena's character in Matchbox. He goes to a small island somewhere in the British Isles. It's a self-contained little island that seems to have turned their back on modernity and certainly on Christianity. And they seem to be into Celtic pagan society. And at first, oh, that's very nice. That's charming.

58:18 Perhaps even could be good for tourism. but it's no show. It's the real deal.

58:24 The movie I'm referring to, of course, is The Wicker Man. And The Wicker Man is something that maybe you've heard of but never saw, or maybe you know the remake with Nicolas Cage, but I say unto you, the 1973 version of The Wicker Man is.

58:39 Just about perfect. It was written by a fellow by the name of Anthony Schaefer, who wrote Sleuth, he wrote Frenzy, and.

58:45 He wrote four great Poirot movies. It stars Edward Woodward as the detective that I mentioned, and more importantly, it stars Christopher Lee as Lord Summerisle, who is not a very righteous man, but he is, it's one, it's Christopher Lee, the most Christopher Lee-eth. He's got wacky hair, he's got a patrician way of speaking, but he also is into humanism.

59:10 sacrifice and blood rituals. And there's also 1973, nudity, nudity, nudity. You got Britt Eklund running around the hotel room trying to seduce this guy. By the way, her voice dubbed by Annie Ross of Lambert Hendrickson Ross, which I just learned today as I was looking this up. She is not Britt Eklund's voice, but it sure is a lot else of her, let me tell you.

59:36 All right, all right, all right. Control yourself. But what I'm saying is this. The movie actually is a great commentary on 60s, 70s counterculture.

59:48 And in America, we think of that as, you know, psychedelia and, you know, modern living. But in England and elsewhere in the U.S. as well, it was sort of the back to nature movement. And this is taking that to its most extreme, which is, you know, back to older rituals and, you know, human sacrifice and blood oaths and all kinds of stuff.

1:00:17 Masks, crazy stuff, the maypole.

1:00:21 The movie ends in a way that you probably have seen clips of. I don't want to give it away, but it's pretty scary stuff. The ending is truly terrifying. It is a great performance that I've seen the ending. I've watched the last few moments on YouTube a few times. I watched it again today. And it works so well because of the performances. You actually react to.

1:00:48 Edward Woodward's reaction of what he sees in the big finish. And this is why I think this is a slow burn that really works. Because you're like, what's going to happen? What's going to happen? The craziest shit at the end happens. And Edward Woodward's character realizes his fate before you, the audience, does.

1:01:08 Oh my God!

1:01:11 Christ!

1:01:13 No, no, dear God! No, Christ!

1:01:17 It brings a chill to your spine and you don't even know yet what's going on. You're reacting to him. And I really like that in movies. And this is a really good example of that. And it also treats religion seriously. I mean, it's mostly a dopey horror movie with lots of crazy masks and nudity, but it has some serious themes. And there was on Shudder. I would say about two years ago, maybe two and a half years ago, a really good documentary called Woodlands Dark and Days Between. And it was directed by the author and critic Kier La Janisse, who's, you know, pretty, pretty terrific scholar of horror. And this is all about folk horror.

1:01:59 And I remember putting this on because a lot of times when you put on a, you know, a documentary about movies on a, on a streaming service, it's not the world's longest movie.

1:02:09 It's 82 minutes. And I remember saying, Oh, documentary about folk horror. I'm interested in this.

1:02:13 I'll press play. It's like three and a half hours long and it zooms by. It's incredible. So my secondary recommendation is if you like the wicker man, and I would say most people do cause it's awesome. If you like the wicker man, check out this documentary, um, called, um, Woodlands Dark and Days Between, because The Wicker Man is like the classic example of British folk horror, of Celtic British Isles folk horror. Well, guess what? This tradition exists everywhere. Scandinavia, Russia, Africa, Latin America, the USA. There's all kinds of great folk horror movies and not just movies, mythology, and this documentary plunges it all And I remember watching this documentary and just got my notebook out and I was taking the

1:03:03 rec seg.

1:03:04 I learned a lot about this. I saw it really cool.

1:03:06 I immediately then went on Shudder and saw that they had a Russian one that they had recommended that I watched that blew me away. So hats off to this whole thing. I love the folk horror genre. I want to do more about it. And I recommend to you, start at the beginning, start at the best one, The Wicker Man and The Nicolas Cage one, we'll.

1:03:25 Talk about that some other day. That singer, you love the Wicker Man, right?

1:03:29 Quick correction. Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched. History, colon, between, I believe. Days Between.

1:03:37 What is the name of the actual movie, Sam?

1:03:39 Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched, colon, History of Folk Horror.

1:03:44 There we go. All right, let's run down all the titles on this week's Rex Egg. Jordan recommended for our related recommendation, he recommended Werewolves Within with Sam Richardson. That's available a lot of places. You can watch it on Shudder, AMC +, Tubi, Canopy, Plex, and VOD. I recommended the toy-inspired The Lego Batman movie, which you can watch on HBO Max or VOD. Our listener, Melissa, requested slow burn horror.

1:04:13 I said, well, Brightburn has the word burn in it. That's good enough. It's streaming on Peacock, Tubi, and VOD. Jordan said, hey, Superman Red Son is also good. That's on VOD. And what about The Wicker Man? You can watch that on Prime, Tubi, Canopy, Plex, and VOD. And then he threw in an extra one there just for fun.

1:04:34 Woodland's Dark and Days Bewitched, The History of Folk Horror. You can watch that also on Shudder. or on Prime Video. And remember, if you want to see all the movies we have recommended over the course of FilmSpottingSVU, go to Letterboxd. Look for the list called Now Streaming on Bazooka. Bazooka is the fake streaming service we invented on the show.

1:04:58 And that list has all of the titles we have discussed and recommended on the show to date. You can also find descriptions of what we liked about them if you click the Read Notes tab on Letterboxd. And if you would like your own personalized streaming recommendation, once again, the email address to send a note to is feedback at filmspottingsvu.com. Bazooka When you gotta scream All right. It's time for the game. And with us as always producer, Sam, Sam, how are you doing this week?

1:05:43 I'm really good. I just want to mention a quick thing.

1:05:45 We talked about Melissa who sent in the listener request, uh, that was inspired by vast of night. She, she wrote us in via the film spotting discord and vast of night, which was a great film. Uh, you know, uh, uh, what's his name? Patterson here. Um, who made The Rivals of Amziah King, just came out this year, also a great film. Vast of Night, really great, slow burn kind of horror movie set in the 50s, not available to stream anywhere, was a Prime Video original that has been dropped from the surface, and it's just gone.

1:06:18 It's just gone. And a terrific film.

1:06:21 And I have heard, though, that Patterson has acquired the rights to it and is planning an actual.

1:06:28 Physical release. So anyway, I just wanted to note that. It made me very excited.

1:06:32 That's so weird because that was like one of the first really good streaming only movies for Prime. It was like a feather in their cap because they had had some good movies before. They had Jim Jarmusch's Patterson, funnily enough, because the guy's name is Patterson, which was the Adam... Adam Driver movie, which I really liked. And they've had a few other good ones, but this was the first one that was, that was a theatrical film that was produced by Amazon Studios. So it had the Amazon logo.

1:07:02 Vast of Night was like their first slam dunk. I mean, it's a little movie, but it's great.

1:07:07 And it came out, I think you guys talked about this a couple of weeks ago. I think it came out during COVID. So it was a movie that people largely saw on Prime and didn't see in the theaters. I can play the festival circuit and- But very sad.

1:07:18 This is the problem with streaming is that you're at the mercy of, you know, if they don't want to pay for the rights or they got to, hey, the hard drive's too full. We got to clear some space off for more stuff. And there it goes. Can you imagine dedicating yourself to like making a podcast every week talking about this thing? Unbelievable. What's this week's game? Let's focus on something positive. What's this week's game? Well, I won last week's game. Yes, you sure did. So that means I'm in charge of this week's game.

1:07:48 Yeah.

1:07:48 Which means it's time for the return of America's fastest growing quiz sensation, Portmanteau to toe. I wasn't going to do it, but as soon as I won last week, both Jordan and Sam started saying, yay, we get to play Portmanteau to toe. So I bowed to the will of the masses here. Sure. You got to do it.

1:08:12 If you haven't heard us play this game before, A portmanteau, of course, is a new word formed by blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two distinct words. So, I give Jordan and Sam the plot synopses of new imaginary movies I create by smooshing two movie titles into one. And they have to tell me the portmanteau title. So, for example, this is just an example. If I said...

1:08:40 Ryan Gosling plays an amnesiac astronaut who awakens in outer space and must piece together his memory and his mission with the help of a stranger he meets in outer space. Who just so happens to be a kindly British nanny with an amazing singing voice who flies around on a broomstick. you would say another broom an umbrella.

1:09:03 An umbrella whatever project hail mary poppins correct very good okay so i've made practically perfect in every way if they ever made that film i have to say yes.

1:09:16 I've already copyrighted that title. You can't have it. It's mine. So I've made seven portmanteau titles. And to make things a little easier, inspired by our main review this week of Matchbox Cole and the Movie, one of the films in each portmanteau is a motion picture of That stars the man who will forever be linked with his iconic Matchbox character, Sean. John Cena. So these are all, they all have one John Cena film in each of the titles.

1:09:50 Now what sucks is that this is our second John Cena related game.

1:09:53 It is, I was going to say that.

1:09:55 We had a game called Cena.

1:09:58 I forget what it was.

1:10:00 It was the other guy. It was Cena or Batista.

1:10:02 Batista.

1:10:03 Yeah, Cena or Batista.

1:10:04 And I bombed out on that one because I am not a John Cena scholar. So I don't know how I'm going to do on this one, but.

1:10:11 I'm going to do my best. I think you're going to be fine. They're pretty well-known movies, all of them, whether you know John Cena or not.

1:10:17 So there'll be at least one of them, right?

1:10:18 Not both. Just one. Just one. He appears in one of them, and I've often even specified which one he's in just to make it as helpful as I can, because we don't really want to stump. We want to... No, no. We want someone... We want there to be a clear winner. So are we ready to begin? I do.

1:10:35 I want to say, by the way, Matchbox movie... Cena is a charismatic actor, and it could be... Matchbox sucks, but he's... It could be a hell of a lot worse if it weren't for him.

1:10:47 He's fine. He's pretty charismatic. We've talked enough about that. All right. Let's get to the games. Yeah. Here we go. Yeah, yeah. Portmanteau number one. Yeah. In this high-octane installment of two long-running franchises, John Cena plays the black sheep brother of the main character, who is a heroic race car driver who somehow routinely saves the world by driving cars between skyscrapers or off the top of the Hoover Dam. And this time, the heroic driver discovers that his remarkable abilities...

1:11:25 like being able to reconstruct car crashes just by touching the pavement where they occurred, are actually a mutant power, and that he and his close-knit team are actually the next evolution of mankind, who are now threatened by a world that hates and fears them.

1:11:43 I think I got this. I think this is Fast X-Men.

1:11:47 Correct! Fast X and X-Men.

1:11:52 Fast X-Men.

1:11:53 Fast X-Men.

1:11:55 Well, I mean, I was like the Fast and the Furious X-Men, so I was sort of.

1:12:01 I'd forgotten about Fast X. Did you not say Fast X? No.

1:12:06 Now, would Matthew approve of this combination of franchises?

1:12:10 The Fast X-Men are the greatest combination franchise in the world.

1:12:15 Oh, my God.

1:12:17 All right. All right, Sportmanto number two. Here we go. Judd Apatow was known for only directing his own screenplays until he made this romantic comedy about a screw-up of a woman whose life is one calamity after another, including her romance with the enormously muscly but surprisingly sensitive John Cena, who, in a major twist, turns out to be a video game character who has escaped. Jordan!

1:12:50 Trainwreck it Ralph.

1:12:52 You got it! Trainwreck Wreck it, Ralph. Train wreck it, Ralph. We are tied one to one. Well done. Oh, yeah. All right. Here we go.

1:13:07 Who wrote the script to Trainwreck if it wasn't Apatow?

1:13:10 Amy Schumer. Amy Schumer.

1:13:12 Hey, is there a new book out that probably talks about Trainwreck?

1:13:17 You get to Trainwreck? Do you make it there?

1:13:19 No books I'm familiar with. No, of course. Funny business. Available on sale wherever books are sold. If you want to read more about Judd Apatow, thank you. Okay, back to the game. Yeah, yeah. We would dare never insert product placement like Matchbox. We have class and dignity on this show. Funny business, funny business, funny business. All right, portmanteau number three. In this wacky comedy, John Cena plays a straight-laced husband and father and aspiring reality TV star.

1:13:55 whose happy domestic life is rocked by the arrival of a grown-up version of the kid he used to mentor as a child, who, in a major twist, is actually a mute alien from outer space with superpowers and a Jordan. Jordan.

1:14:13 Big Brother, which just so happens to be a film discussed on a previous episode of.

1:14:20 Phil's Finding SVU. Big Brother from Another Planet. Incorrect! You've gotten one of the two titles wrong. Sam, can you correctly.

1:14:28 Little Brother from Another Planet.

1:14:30 That's right!

1:14:32 It is Little Brother from Another Planet. I'm a little tired.

1:14:36 I don't feel good about that.

1:14:37 It's late at night.

1:14:38 I meant to say Little Brother.

1:14:40 That's all right.

1:14:41 No, no, no. I made a mistake.

1:14:42 You made a mistake. When a guy throws the free throw and it bounces off the rib, you don't say he should have gotten it in.

1:14:49 But I just dunked it on your hoop. It was my bad.

1:14:52 No, it's Little Brother from another planet. Little Brother from another planet. All right. Sam, now in the lead. When was the last time you saw Brother from another planet?

1:15:01 That is a weird-ass movie.

1:15:03 It's been a minute. It's so good. All right. Sam up two to one. John Sayles. John Sayles, yep. Okay. In this wacky children's comedy, a doctor discovers he has the ability to speak to animals. But that does little to help him with his latest, even more remarkable discovery. A mysterious plant that feeds on human blood and is eventually revealed. Sam got in there first. I heard Sam first.

1:15:34 Doctor Dolittle Shop of Horrors.

1:15:38 Technically, that is not correct. Oh. You have misnamed one of the films, just like Jordan did. Jordan, if you can correctly name this title, you can steal. It's not Doctor Dolittle. That's not the title. What is the correct title? Doctor.

1:16:02 He does a lot. He doesn't do a little. He does so much.

1:16:05 Wait, Dr. Doolittle Shop of Horrors.

1:16:08 Dr.

1:16:08 Doolittle 2? I'm afraid no one's going to get this one. Is it Intern Doolittle?

1:16:14 Is it just Doolittle? Is that what they did?

1:16:16 It is just Doolittle. It is Doolittle Shop of Horrors. This was the misbegotten Robert Downey Jr. Doolittle. John Cena voiced one of the animals. He sure did. It was just Doolittle, didn't it? Wow. I cannot give a point. Sam retains his 2-1 lead.

1:16:35 Wow.

1:16:36 You guys don't remember Robert Downey Jr. 's Doolittle? I do, but clearly not enough for Shane.

1:16:42 Not enough of the title.

1:16:44 Still 2-1 in favor of Sam.

1:16:45 What animal did John Cena voice?

1:16:48 I didn't care enough to look that up. I'm sorry. We can check that in when we stop down. We'll look it up.

1:16:53 I'll put it in show notes, all right?

1:16:55 Yeah.

1:16:55 Okay. Okay. This big budget blockbuster set in the 1980s features more aliens. The last one had aliens. This one has aliens. Ah, but these aliens are in disguise. And one of them befriends a young woman named Charlie. But then Charlie makes an even more remarkable discovery. There's so many discoveries in these movies. Her discovery, honeybees can talk.

1:17:23 And they have hidden this skill from humanity for all of recorded history, at least until one beast strikes up a friendship with a beautiful young woman and then sues mankind for its mistreatment of his species. Yeah. What are the two movies, Jordan? You seem to know. I know one of them. I know one of them. You know the first one or the second one? I know the second one. I know the second one. The first one is a later entry in a very successful film franchise.

1:17:52 This one, a prequel set in the 1980s. These aliens are in disguise. Dare I say, even robots in disguise. So I don't, it's something.

1:18:06 What's the second part? Remind me what your second part. I got confused trying to figure out the first part.

1:18:11 I don't know.

1:18:11 The second half of the.

1:18:13 The second half is about a film where honeybees can talk, but they hide this skill from humanity for all of history. But then.

1:18:20 Is this just a, is this a bumblebee movie?

1:18:24 You got it, Sam. Oh, jeez. Bumblebee.

1:18:27 The Seinfeld movie is Bumblebee.

1:18:29 And Bee Movie starring Jerry Seinfeld. Oy vey.

1:18:32 I was trying to get Jupiter Ascending in there.

1:18:34 Oh, you're way off. You are way off.

1:18:36 But Jupiter Ascending has Bumblebees in there. Wait, as the first movie or the second?

1:18:39 The second one.

1:18:40 Jupiter Ascending, if I'm not mistaken.

1:18:42 There's talking bees? Yeah, aren't there magical bees?

1:18:46 Doesn't Melania Weintraub, and it's not her, it's the other one.

1:18:49 I know, right?

1:18:51 What is her name?

1:18:51 Mila Kunis.

1:18:52 It's Mila Kunis has bumblebees that she shoots out of her mouth or something like that.

1:18:57 I don't know what she does. Melania Kunis has.

1:19:01 Melania Trump has Bumblebee power.

1:19:05 Jordan is lost. He's gone. Let's get the last two.

1:19:08 She has a pet dog that looks like Channing Tatum.

1:19:10 We got to get Jordan to bed. Let's get these last two here. Sam, I think you're in great shape. He's way out of it. Here we go. I'm going to get the next one right. I got to get the next one. Okay. I hope so, because this one has your name in the description. Here we go. Okay, here we go. In this straight-to-streaming favorite of one Jordan Hoffman, John Cena plays the President of the United States.

1:19:32 Oh, I like this movie.

1:19:34 I know you do. Who teams with his counterpart from the United Kingdom to stop Russian arms dealers after assorted action scenes and chases. The duo find themselves... In a small town in Vermont. That has been Jordan. Heads of State and Maine. You got it. Heads of State and Maine. Heads of State. State and Maine. All right. State of Maine.

1:19:58 David Mamet back when he was still cooking. That's right. Everybody in the world is in State of Maine. That's right. Very, very good move. Okay. So it is three to two in favor of Sam. Jordan, you can tie it up with this one.

1:20:08 Oh my gosh.

1:20:08 And I'm going to. I'm going to. And I don't know what we'll do after that. We'll arm wrestle. I don't know.

1:20:14 All right.

1:20:14 For all the marbles. Here we go. Ready? Yeah. In this comedy sequel, a rivalry between a dorky stepfather and his stepkid's cool biological dad is renewed around the holidays by the arrival of the two men's own fathers, who turn out to be street racers who embark on a cross-country race in their 1955 Chevy 150 against another racer.

1:20:44 With all three men fighting for the affections of an unnamed young woman. This is a tricky one. It sure is. But if you can figure out the first movie, you may be able to figure out the second.

1:20:59 So the first movie is a sequel.

1:21:01 It is a sequel. And indeed, the number two appears as the connector between these two titles. Let's see it, Sam.

1:21:10 Is it.

1:21:12 I feel weird about saying daddy, but I'll say, is it Daddy's Home 2 Fast 2 Furious?

1:21:18 Wow.

1:21:19 No.

1:21:19 It is not. Oh. You got halfway there.

1:21:22 Halfway there.

1:21:22 Okay. There's another film.

1:21:24 I put it on the platter, Jordan.

1:21:25 All right. That second half describes. Daddy's Home 2. Would you like me to read the second half for you one more time, Jordan? Please do. Please do. It's a film about street racers, not the Vin Diesel kind of street racers. No, no, no. who embark on a cross-country race in their 1955 Chevy 150. Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.

1:21:46 Daddy's home two-lane blacktop. You got it.

1:21:51 Wow.

1:21:52 Daddy's home two-lane blacktop.

1:21:57 Wow.

1:21:57 Jordan, you have tied the game, and we have a tie.

1:22:01 It's appropriate that with this game, yeah, that it takes two of us to come up with one answer.

1:22:05 I like that.

1:22:05 Why don't we take a minute, Matt, crack open the IMDb and craft a tiebreaker.

1:22:11 While we go to commercial. Okay, I have three titles I didn't use. Maybe I can put one of these together.

1:22:17 I'm going to snack on a sunflower seed while you do that.

1:22:21 The listeners can. It can listen to you. God almighty. No, wait.

1:22:28 What Sunflower Seed brand is sponsoring this segment of the game?

1:22:32 Matchbox the Sunflower Seed. All right, hold on.

1:22:35 Oh, these are David's.

1:22:36 All right.

1:22:49 For the first time ever, in Portmanteau to Toe, we had to stop the clock and let the creative process continue.

1:22:58 That's right.

1:22:59 As Matt Singer, when we hit pause, created a new one.

1:23:03 Yes. Before our very eyes. Sam and I. I had a few extra titles. I always have extra titles that I haven't written descriptions for. So I very quickly whipped a description up. And this is going to be the tiebreaker. Are you ready, gentlemen? I'm really excited. This is it. It all comes down to this. In this animated film, John Cena voices a bull who grows big and strong but remains gentle. But then the bull meets an ethical Baltimore defense lawyer disgusted with rampant legal corruption who is forced to defend a judge he despises in a trial under threat of being disbarred.

1:23:50 Okay.

1:23:52 I'm really winging it. Let's see. Let's hear it. Let's hear it. Ferdinand, Justice for All. Jordan, you have won. Portman, toe to toe. Ferdinand, Justice for All. Wow.

1:24:09 That's a good one.

1:24:10 Ferdinand.

1:24:10 Wow, well done.

1:24:12 And Justice for All.

1:24:13 Al Pacino in Justice for All.

1:24:16 Al Pacino.

1:24:17 Is it Lumet? Who is it?

1:24:19 Is it? It is Norman Jewison. Jewison. Is it Baltimore? It's not New York? Look, I've never seen And Justice for All.

1:24:27 Oh, I've seen that.

1:24:27 That's according to the Letterboxd description, which I ripped off almost word for word. I'll be honest. We were in a rush.

1:24:34 I've never seen Ferdinand, but I am familiar that Ferdinand the Bull.

1:24:38 Is a thing. And for some reason, I did know that John Cena voices the bull in Ferdinand of all people and of all concepts. So there you go, Jordan. You won, and your prize is you have to come up with something next week. Congratulations.

1:24:53 Great, great. Maybe, you know, I've never done Portmanteau. You can.

1:24:57 It's not a monopoly. You can certainly do it. Let's wrap things up by running down some of the new titles on streaming this week. First up, theatrical releases You Can Rent or Buy. And this one I know we both have seen and liked. Ethan Hawke and Russell Crowe in The Wait. This is a really good, tough little...

1:25:18 I guess it's a drama. It's sort of a thriller. It's a character study, all of the above. Really good movie. Excellent from Ethan Hawke. Excellent from Russell Crowe. That one's definitely worth watching.

1:25:29 And a first feature, too. That's a first film from a guy who's going to have a great career.

1:25:33 It's a really good movie. Next up, theatrical releases that are now on streaming on Wednesday, October 21st. We have Moana, the live-action Moana on Disney +. I watched this on my flight when I did my book signing for Funny Business in LA. I watched Moana on the flight. Not good. Not good. Did you see it, Jordan?

1:26:01 No. No.

1:26:02 On Friday, October 23rd, though, a good movie you'll be able to watch on HBO Max, Olivia Wilde's The Invite. That stars her and Seth Rogen and Penelope Cruz and Edward Norton. I thought this was a very good movie, actually. This one is worth watching if you have not seen it. A good old-fashioned sex comedy. That's what it is. It's a good movie. It's a good movie. Funny.

1:26:27 Now, for those who are listening, you may not know that The Invite is a remake of a Spanish play.

1:26:34 Did I talk about this in a previous episode? You did. Yes, you did.

1:26:38 I'm going to make it very brief. There is a Spanish version, an Italian version, a South Korean version, a French version, and one more. Did I say Italian yet?

1:26:52 I don't know.

1:26:52 There's six with a seventh.

1:26:54 Oh, Swiss. There's a Swiss-German version. They're opening up invite franchises all over the world.

1:27:02 And I wrote an essay about them all, which I'm very proud of. It's a funny essay. You can Google it.

1:27:07 What's the best one?

1:27:09 The Hollywood version actually is the best.

1:27:11 Wow.

1:27:11 Not just because I like Seth Rogen and Olivia Wilde and Penelope Cruz and Edward Norton.

1:27:16 It really is the best. But the French one is quite good as well.

1:27:18 Okay.

1:27:18 The original, the Spanish one, kind of sucks.

1:27:20 Wow.

1:27:21 Well, they always say remake a bad movie. Don't remake a good one.

1:27:24 That's what they did. The Spanish version kind of sucks. The Italian version is terrible. The South Korean one is interesting for reasons you can read in the piece.

1:27:33 The cultural differences.

1:27:34 That's what kind of makes the article, if I may pat myself on the back. The cultural differences between the South Korean version and the French version versus the Spanish version.

1:27:41 Blah, blah, blah. So that's what I got to say about that. But the movie's good. I like it. Libby Weld, good director, good actress.

1:27:48 She kicks ass in this production.

1:27:50 Okay. And then some new movies that are going direct to streaming. Actually, this first one is a series, not a movie. It's coming on Wednesday, October 21st. The. It's like, is the dystopia that we live in getting a little too on the nose? I can't tell. But it's the new Stanford Prison Experiment. The title should have an exclamation point, I think. It's a Netflix series. Call it the movie. In this modern reimagining of the infamous study, 30 people enter a real prison for two weeks and shifting power dynamics expose what they're capable of. This is I mean, has anyone ever said the quiet part loud, louder than the new Stanford prison experiment? Okay. And on Friday, October 23rd, Paralyzed by Hope, the Maria Bamford story. This

1:28:44 is a new, a documentary about the comedian co-directed by Judd Apatow. I have not seen this one yet, but I just watched it also on Netflix, the new Norm MacDonald documentary called Norm, the Tale of Norm MacDonald, which is also a Judd Apatow documentary. which I thought was really good. If you like Norm MacDonald, it is really good and a very interesting approach to making a documentary about him. It is not just a talking head doc where people are like, man, Norm was funny. Man, it was great when he did this. I appreciated the unusual approach that Apatow took here. And I don't profess to have any inside knowledge of Norm MacDonald, but I think he probably would have liked it. I think he probably

1:29:28 would appreciate what he did. I'd like to see it. And I will at some point. And I'm sure I will watch this one too. Judd Apatow makes very good documentaries about comedians. The guy, you know, when he was in high school was interviewing comedians for the radio because he wanted to become a standup comic. And so he's like, uniquely qualified to do these kind of projects yeah facts you could learn by reading funny.

1:29:53 Business on sale now also yes funny business you all should get it it's bright orange book written by matt singer um i will be watching the stanford prison experiment because i um volunteered to do so for another outlet so i can give a check in on that great when i'm on parole next week i suppose uh It's funny that this project is coming out because recently I talked about Experimenter, the Stanley Milgram film, which of course ties into the Stanford Prison Experiment. So, you know, maybe Netflix is– they are listening to the show.

1:30:25 Absolutely. That's why they greenlit this. Who knows? I do want to briefly mention, speaking of funny business, my last couple of book tour dates– If you are listening this when when this podcast drops or in the next day or two after it drops, I will be at the Refocus Film Festival and the Iowa City Book Festival the weekend of October 22nd through the 25th. I'll have events at both of them. You can find out more about that online. And then I'm going from there to Chicago on Monday, October 26th. I'll be at the Davis Theater.

1:30:57 We'll be watching Step Brothers. I'll be talking with FilmSpotting family member Scott Tobias about the movie. I'll be signing copies of Funny Business. It'll be a great night. He's a nice guy. We've already sold a whole bunch of tickets, but there's still some left. So come on out. Come see Step Brothers. Come get a copy of Funny Business.

1:31:16 And there you go. And next week, we're going to wrap up our October scary-tober, spooky-tober, frightening-tober, our month of scary things. We're going to do something a little different. We're not going to review something new. We are going to talk about the scariest movies we have ever seen.

1:31:38 Right?

1:31:38 That's the plan?

1:31:40 Well, I had conceived it a little differently. I thought it might be kind of interesting. We're both movie buffs, we're movie lovers, and this was instilled in us when we were young, all three of us, and probably many people listening. When you're young, you're more prone to be scared by scary movies. What was the one that really made us shit a brick? The one that really.

1:32:01 Made us- And what if that title is not on streaming? What do I pick then? It's on stream. Everything's on stream. Okay, everything except The Vast of Night. What if The Vast of Night was the movie that scared me as a child?

1:32:12 Then we talk about it and the listeners will have to, you can find The Vast, let's be honest here.

1:32:16 Okay.

1:32:17 There are Russian websites that you can find The Vast of Night on.

1:32:21 So I think it's the movie that made us, when we were a little too old, but still said.

1:32:27 Formative, our favorite formative horror films.

1:32:31 Can you put the light on? Can I sleep in your bed? But son, you're 14.

1:32:36 Why are you doing that?

1:32:36 You know, like really too old to be scared. Yeah, but you know what I'm saying? The one that really said, holy shit, I can't go to bed.

1:32:43 I wish I didn't see this movie. I'm too young for it. But I did, and I'm.

1:32:47 Terrified, and we'll talk about it.

1:32:49 Okay, so that will be how we close out October. That should be a lot of fun. In the meantime, if you want to send feedback to the show, send it to feedback at filmspottingsvu.com. And remember, that's also where you can email us to request listener recommendations. If you want a particular kind of movie or a TV show, I suppose, you can write to us. Tell us what you're looking for, what streaming services you use, and we'll try to help you out. You can also find us online.

1:33:15 You can find me on Instagram and Letterboxd at Super Pulse. You can find me on Blue Sky at Matt Singer. Jordan's on there at Jordan Hoffman. Don't forget. No, just Jay Hoffman. Jay Hoffman, excuse me. Jay Hoffman. Of course, you can also find Jordan on the Starlog podcast. That's right. Don't forget. You should listen to Starlog. Go to Starlog.com and sign up. Please, please do a Starlog. The Starlog magazine is coming soon, right? It's coming soon. Like in a month, in a month. It's crazy. You sound so excited as you pour those sunflower seeds into a cup while we record the outro. Film Spotting SVU is produced by Sam Van Halgren, and we are a part of the Film Spotting family of podcasts. Learn more about us

1:33:57 and the other shows in the Film Spotting family at filmspotting.net. And I am Matt Singer.

1:34:04 And I'm Jordan Hopp, and thanks for listening.