Matinee Monday: Dragon Blade (w/ Daniel Radcliffe & Erin Darke)
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It's like the hangover all over again, but in ancient China, as these guys learn to build a wall, do some courtesy killings, and make the world's first Transformer. We saw Dragonblade, so you know what that means. Now it's time for How to Discapate. We're gonna have a good time, celebrate some failure, not just be a hater, cause you know you're one yet. How to Discapate. Let's war in the mediocrity of subpar art.

Hello, people of Earth, and welcome to How Did This Get Made? I am Paul Scheer, your host, joined, as always, by my co-host, Jason Manzoukas. How are you, Jason? Paul, I did not care for this movie. I just spent my morning watching it. It's a tough one to get through. We were made to watch this movie by our guests today, which is challenging my fondness for them. Ha ha!

Well, you'll be happy to know, Jason, this is the first movie that we've done, first Chinese language film that we've ever done on this show. So that's a very big... That's pretty big. Yeah, it's a huge accomplishment for the show. That's pretty big. Starring John Cusack and Adrian Brody. Oh, man. I don't even want to... I have so many. So much. So much to talk about in what is, I mean, unquestionably, one of the foremost features of the last few years. Yes.

that depict the Dragon Blade, the famed Dragon Blade. Is there a Dragon Blade in this movie? Is there a Dragon Blade, Paul? I don't think there is. That is my question as well. Is there a Dragon Blade? We are going to get into it. Here are words that are never said in this movie. Dragon Blade. Dragon Blade.

They're not spoken separately. They're not spoken together. Never heard the term dragon blade. I thought there was going to be a special sword. There is not. I thought so too. There is even a special sword given at one point. And I was like, here we go. Dragon blade. Nope. Not a dragon blade. Nobody says it. Nobody says here's the dragon blade. I'm giving you the dragon blade. Congrats. You've earned the dragon blade. Or is there a magical dragon blade? No. Not even a ceremonial dragon blade. No. I hated this.

All right, well, let's bring in our guests, the people responsible for this movie. Not responsible for making it. Responsible for making us watch it. Well, hold on. We will see. Did our guests finance this movie? Yes. Is our guest today the nation of China? Yes. Yes.

They are Chinese nationalists who are here with an agenda of entertainment. This is wild. Entertainment for all. All right, so we have two guests today. Are we a mouthpiece for China? Jason, all I want to tell you is that... Is this show now underwritten by Foxconn? You know, look, it's ad-free still, but we do have to say about 12 positive things about China, the government of China, and the history of China every episode. This is very awkward. It's not awkward at all. They pay great money. The Han...

The Hahn Brothers are here. The Hahn Brothers? Yeah, the Hahn Brothers. I love their logo before the thing starts. All right. We have two guests today. You know our first guest as one of the stars of Good Girls Revolt and the AMC show Dietland. She was also in a movie with me that came out on DVD last week called Summer 03. Please welcome Erin Dark. How are you, Erin? Hey, guys. I'm good. I'm sorry. Yeah, thanks a lot. Erin, I wrote this down.

when we were doing that movie together and Avril Haley, the person who helps us pick all of our films, she's like, I remember. And so, so it's, it's her memory that can also be faulted for this. No, but I said, I remember at the time I said, if we ever get to do the show, I claim dragon blade.

I like that you tried to squat on it as if tons of people were like, we gotta do Dragon Blade. The 2015 Mandarin film. Brad Pitt was like, I wanna come on and do Dragon Blade, guys. And we were like, sorry, bro. I claimed it. I'm sorry, guys, I claimed it. But I have spent the last year going like, oh, fuck, what if it's a really good movie and I've forgotten that it was a quote?

Had you not forgotten the top three people on the call sheet? I mean, but you know, I started to doubt it. I was like, I do remember Adrian Brody was giving a lot. He is. And he is giving. Boy, does he ever. He is absolutely.

Ding, and I like it. Capital A acting. And a lot of whisper acting. But you are not fully guilty in this because it was a joint decision. Our next guest is someone that you might have seen on stage or in film. And more recently, his brand new TV show, Miracle Workers, just premiered this week. And it airs every Tuesday at 1030. Please welcome Daniel Radcliffe. Hi, thank you so much for having me. Fuck you. I'm not sorry. Fuck you. I still think it's good enough.

How dare you, you turd. I am, yeah, I was also worried, like Erin, that I would have misremembered this film. I did not think maybe it's good. My thought was that it wouldn't have been as entertainingly, crazily bad in the ways that I love a movie to be. Well, no, but it was. And it was. I mean, it's fine when it's in. It really is.

This was our second time watching it. I feel like I should state that for the record. We had watched it before. And did you watch the two hour and 12 minute version or the hour and 45? No, we watched the American release. Wait a minute. The Chinese version is 20 minutes longer. I may have watched, I think I watched a longer version. Well, did you watch the bookends with the two Chinese scientists? What? What? Oh.

What are you talking about? Wait, wait, wait. I have it. There are two Chinese scientists? Yeah. Wait. Flash forward? Yes. So the movie starts in now. Is there a dragon blade in what you saw? No. No dragon blade. But they cut out, I don't know. A lot of satellite technology. You know they say you got to kill your babies. We got to cut out that.

We gotta cut this dragon blade out. Whoa! It makes no sense because... Wait, I was surprised by the screen. Why are you surprised by the screen? You do this all the time. We never use this. Oh, hey. This is brand new. Very exciting. There's a screen in the studio now so we can watch clips. Huge development. Yeah, this is a big deal. Here at Earwolf Studios. You guys are very lucky to be here for this. So basically, I will just do a little... I don't believe in rewarding you for making us watch this movie. Ha ha ha!

We should have come here and watched it all together. Oh, yeah. I would have been so happy to do that. Just instead of me standing in my kitchen fuming. It's not a morning movie. No. I will say I feel like it's better. I have an update, Daniel. It's not an evening movie either. You do need to take a break. I would question whether this is a movie. How long after waking up did you start watching this? I started it in bed. Okay.

I started it. I started playing. It went through my whole morning with me. And not to call you out, Jason, but you are a guy that, if given your druthers, you start your day a little bit later. So this is... I don't know what you mean. I started it first thing this morning when I got up at 10 o'clock. But like, so adding to that you had to get up a little bit earlier than you normally would like, you then were forced to watch this movie, which I believe...

Needs an intermission because there was a certain point where my brain was like, and enough. It was like, I don't know what's going on. I took a 15 minute break and I was able to enjoy the last 30 minutes. Wait, so with an additional 20 minutes, you still didn't know what was happening? Oh, I didn't watch that version. Oh, okay. I have just seen this version. You just have the clips. Because I did wonder, because there's a point.

in this film where it goes so deeply off the rails that I was like, I do not know what's happening. Do you mean when it fades in? Yeah. Fade in. Movie goes off rails. Yes. But that's also, so the film starts with two random shots. Yes. One of Jackie Chan, which it then transpires at the end is from the end of the movie. Correct. That is then placed next to a shot of John Cusack from just another point in the movie. Which is later on. Which is later on. And then it just, yeah, there are so many random jumps in time on a cross time. There's a lot of jump cuts. And a lot of that weird slow motion.

It's like, why are we doing slow-mo? I feel like they just gave people footage and said, I don't know.

Make a movie out of it if you can. See what you can do with this. And yet there is so much money clearly has gone into it. It is the biggest film that has ever been made by Chinese money in China. $65 million. So not on American money level, but on... No, no, that's huge budget. With the amount that they pay extras, that's probably quite a return. And it sounds like it was very unpleasant to see. Did they actually build that city?

Now I'm believing they maybe built a city. They built those walls. They built those special cranes. They did everything. That was all practical. I heard that the Chinese film industry is just an excuse to build infrastructure. And that that's all they're doing is just building. It's so beautiful. We've got to finish these things. Let's shoot a movie about it. And then tourism comes in because you have to visit the sites from the film. But just to talk about that opening. By the way, I would totally go on a group trip that goes to the sites of this film. Yeah.

Well, you meet, you know, Jackie Chan and John Cusack, and I think in the beginning, oh, this is what the movie will start here. Like, they've made peace, and we're moving forward. No. And then you're like, oh, no, not at all. It's something... What's this movie about? That was the flash-forward. Yeah, I mean, then you get into, like...

a fight scene that seems to be brought about by like there seems to be a lot about trade and taxes early on and customs oh right yeah the Silk Road is listen a lot of shit goes down in the Silk Road people are rhapsodizing what is a Silk Road fighter that's my question the Silk Road the Silk Road protecting protection squad Silk Road protection squad which I'm sure was the official title they're terrible right

They lose every fight. The Silk Road Squad loses every fight. And that's what was my other question at the beginning. So there's this huge face-off between these two warring nations and then Jackie Chan comes in and he fights with the Silk Road Protection Squad and

And he fights the lady moon. He comes in as a third person. He comes in as like an intermediary. Because he's a fighter for peace. Yes. He says it several times. Everyone who is a Silk Road. He has many weapons. Every Silk Road fighter fights for peace because they believe that it's better to make friends than foes. Yes. But yet they are like

heavily armed. So many weapons. And deeply trained at using them. Yes. And there were at least two moments in the film where I think Jackie Chan says stop fighting and don't fight as he is fighting. Yes. They go through such lengths to show that he is such a nice guy. An amazing guy. What a great dude. By the way, I will say

and I have it in my notes. And a wonderful singer. I should have done it on my phone. Get in the business, buddy. You gotta have those notes on your phone. I wrote notes and they're not here. He has so many notes. There is like, the movie starts and it is, it's this fight scene and I was like, oh no, this is terrible. This is gonna be awful. Jackie Chan showed up and I was like, oh right, Jackie Chan is awesome.

There is something that is so compelling and so instantaneously fun and funny. And even though it's a serious moment or whatever, he still finds a moment of levity. There's stuff in the Jackie Chan stuff that I always enjoy. Maybe it's nostalgia. But didn't the levity kind of undercut the seriousness of what was this? Yes, people are dying. Lives are at stake. But then we go into these comedy of airs.

moments. Like when he just grabs her boobs. Which goes on for so long. It's like he grabs her boobs, they both notice, they both look down, they both look up, she slaps him and then he's like, maybe I should stop grabbing her boobs. And then he takes off her veil and this is maybe where I don't know that much about Chinese culture, but now they have to have sex?

No, well, yes. She just then strips in front of him. Right. When did that take place? I forgot about that spit take right after the fight scene, right? So where do they go after the fight? Where do they go? Back to her

Why? So he can return the veil? Yeah, he goes back to her tent to return the veil and then she strips for him like you do, Jason. Let me ask you this, Aaron. But she takes a drink like... Do you think that she, her house, where he returns the veil is two miles from the open desert? Or does he ride for a week for him to return the veil? He's such a nice guy.

He's like, you left these earrings at my house. And it is, again, we see them, we see that veil scene in a flashback as he is riding away. He's riding away from, I think, the initial, though, I guess, from that. And his buddy's, like, giving him shit. But the language of film here is very...

bad because we see a scene the next logical scene is the stripping scene and then it's the horseback scene but what we see is fight scene horseback scene stripping scene horseback scene why why didn't we tell this is an out of order I have a big question about like so Jackie Chan intervenes in that initial fight fights that lady and then somehow the conflict's resolved like is that it like what happened to the initial dispute if she gets her veil ripped off everyone go home yeah it's almost like flag football if you get the flag

If he wins a fight, does that just hit? He's like, okay, peace reigns, I win. But the other side that was trying to fight her got nothing. They didn't even participate in the fight, but they were apparently like, ah, calm yourself. I'm confused about the idea of Chinese warfare because it seemed like you... You build an army, and then you send one person. There is, I think, a

theory. It's like Pokemon fighting. But I think there is a theory that people, like massive armies, used to just meet opposite each other and then kind of send out their strongest guys one at a time. But I don't think it was quite that order. It was very like, yeah. That's the thing. If you send your two strongest and one of them beats the other one, does your army just go like, they beat that guy, so I guess we call

Okay, we're out of here. I thought that as well. I assumed, and mistakenly now that I've heard that it's a $65 million budget, I was like, well, they don't have the budget for big, giant group battles. Oh, no, they do. So that's why they're, like, breaking it down into these smaller one-on-one combat missions that I was like...

Later on, that happens in almost every single fight scene. It comes down to just mano-a-mano fight. But if it was better fighting, I'd be all in. If it was like Crouching Tiger, if it was, you know, even like raid level fighting, it just, it's kind of neither here nor there. It's like, oh, it's fighting. It's not as cool as 300. It's just sort of like...

That's a melee of sorts. I thought there were a couple of really good moments, and there were some moments where you'd see, like, oh, there's a really cool idea that I feel like they didn't want the film to be quite as dark. There's one moment where literally there's a guy who has been shot through with, like, 20 arrows. Oh, yeah. Over backwards, entirely propped up by those arrows, but they just are panning off him from the word go. I thought that was cool looking. That's amazing.

That I believe you're right. I think they tried to veer away from true violence, true gore, anything that was like anything. There's no blood besides, I mean, spoiler alert, John Cusack's eyeballs being ripped off. You mean his closed eyes with some fake blood on them? That scene either took 10 minutes to shoot or two days. So every,

Everything that John Cusack is in in this movie felt like, you know, they do this thing where they're like, you know, we're just going to shoot the rehearsal. Just say, yeah, you're running through. And that's what it felt like. It was like, I'll give you like two takes at the most. And it wasn't like he's not trying. It's just sort of like not trying a lot. His death scene is astonishing. I love his performance in this film so much.

Take me home. But he didn't even tell him. He's like, when he says take me home, how does he even know? He's totally blind. He doesn't know what's going on. Yeah. There are so many instances the kid, too, is reacting to a fight scene consistently as if he's watching it. Only that child is blind. And he's like, oh, no. Speaking. And Doug's part of it. I think. Doug's part of it. You do not notice. No, no, no. Lips do not.

Matt Horne's about. No, no, no. He's fully ADR. But also so was like the nanny stroke aide to camp whose performance is another crazy part. That character's name is Falco. Is it? I could talk about that performance for about two hours. Falco does color commentary for some of the five. Oh, yeah.

Get in there. General Lucius is fighting with the force of a thousand men. He's like narrating the fight scenes for The Blind Child as if it's like a bedtime story. His performance is like Comedia del Arte thinks...

it makes Comedia dell'arte look like naturalistic acting. Yeah, like subtle. Yeah. He also looks nothing like a Roman. They do a real weird job. John Cusack, just so, if you've not seen the movie and you shouldn't, is a Roman who is doing- Oh yeah, we haven't explained this movie even remotely. Yeah, I mean-

Yeah, I mean, it's hard. There was a crawl at the beginning. Not a crawl, but there was like text at the beginning to give you some context and information. I went back to it at a certain point to be like, what was this even about? Well, by the way, that text is written so tiny and in the screen that my TV is not that far away from me. I was having a hard time going like, what is on this screen?

If it was closer, I get it. But this is where the opening comes in. Well, the opening, it's actually 48, but in the American translation, they made it 50. Really? Just rounded it up. Classic. Classic American move. So the opening, I can play a little bit of it, but it focuses on these. Oh, is this the scientists? These are the two scientists. This kind of sets the tone of the movie.

way better. Like if this scene was in there, I would have really liked it. So here we go. Oh no, that's a bold statement. I wouldn't have really liked it. Is that all it would have taken? Just as, okay, so this is totally, yeah, so we open up, this is amazing. We open up on all these like Audis flying through like, that's a BMW. Oh, BMW, sorry. I'm just saying, you know, they paid for these cars. So we open up

On the BMW. James says they'll float a stock offering on the market the minute we find Regan. Then we can excavate wherever we want. You know, most of the diary documents of General who established the protection squad. Oh, I see. How is he related to Regan? And why did they name this ancient city Regan? Oh, whoa. Whoa, wait a minute. Another intersection ahead. Which road do we take?

Let's split into three groups. Keep each other updated. So this group splits up into three groups. They go on a big hike. Oh, my God, this keeps going. Yeah, they find this lost city. This is so crazy. They go into the lost city. These poor actors. They got chipped in the American version. I know. And they're, by the way, speaking in English. Yes, yes. And so that's odd. Yeah, so why was that cut from the English version?

version. No idea. And by the way, it does add some, like this idea of Regum, which is like the whole city that they're building, the heaven on earth. I was just going to say, is that the city that they built? Yes. Do they ever call it Regum in the movie? At the very end. At the very end. They say like, he is naming after them. I think at the very end, yeah, it's like text on the screen. Tiny text. They find Regum there. What is it? Oh my God. And then the craziest thing happens.

They scan the entire thing with satellites, play Mozart music, and then the satellite from outer space, you'll see, I'm just playing it out, beams lights and rebuilds the entire city into

through like virtual reality. What? Yeah. Whoa, this is... So then they're like, oh, this is it. How does that technology work? I have no idea. So basically they... Is that a flash forward to the future from that? Yeah. This is further on than 2019. This is 2073. Yeah, right. So now they have this city in front of them. Boom, we're back into the movie. And at the end, what we are led to believe, at the beginning of the movie, they're staring at a statue. At the end, they just go like...

Oh, now that's the story. But no one's told them the story. They can see the world through virtual reality and like, let's never tell anybody. Do you pull back and they've been showing them the movie? Yeah.

Whoa! It's a very impressive satellite. It actually didn't just show them the city. It showed them this whole movie. And they're like, this is a bad movie. That is what a satellite does. A satellite could show them a movie. What it can't do is rebuild past structures. And so this is how it ends. Wow! This is the end of the movie where... Okay, so...

We join back with our characters. Oh, yes, we have this 360 pan of the eagle. Oh, no, this is where we didn't get this. Oh, yeah. Oh, that was kind of nice. So they see the whole city, how it's been destroyed, and now... I'm really happy we can do this together, she says. Are they a couple now? Yeah. I'm really happy we can do this together. At least we ended on a good note. What does that mean? Why have they ended? Ended what? Aren't you in the middle of your job? Oh, yeah. Look. Did you guys find anything? No.

No, we haven't found anything. No, I mean, there's literally a pillar behind you. I know you have a whole 3D mapping thing. You have like a major archaeological site on your hand. Why would they not want to tell people? They're like, we're keeping it our secret and this is their reason. Let's see. She goes, no, we haven't found it. And then... It's an enthralling fairy tale. What is? You don't know anything. It's in Harmony 1. Greed and Ambition 0. This land remains ours alone. Well, what do you say we let them shine for another 2,000 years?

Like, a week later, somebody else finds this city. And they're like, fuck. We can't. And then they just go and frolick in the snow. It's amazing that that embrace is meant to make us, like, it's meant to mean something to us. They basically say we cannot, because this true story, which, by the way, that's the one thing we haven't talked about at all. It's based on a true story. They basically go, it is a true story, but it's.

It's not. Because that's their getaway from it. It's like, it didn't really happen, but it did. They're not letting people go there to look at this as a city that represents heaven on earth. They seem to selfishly imply they want to keep it for themselves. Which is a real dick.

And the point of the story. It's just an old structure. There's no like, it isn't like, oh, we have to leave these people and this culture the way we found it. But also what it stands for is something that is truly a great message. What it stands for is wonderful and should be shared with the world. No, no, no. This place that symbolizes harmony and peace.

Let's hide it for ourselves. Keep it for ourselves. It's ours. It's our city. So the city that they're talking about, Regum, which is, I guess. Regum! Regum! That's where I do all my office space work at Regum. You rent this corporate office. That's what I consider gum that I get off the bottom of the table here. Oh, yeah, it's Regum. Regum.

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Okay, so we established that the Silk Protection Squad, not great fighters- I still don't think we've explained the plot of- No, we have still- Like, John Cusack's character is a Roman, and we haven't broached it barely at all. Yes. Yeah. He's a Roman with a good Chicago accent. I mean, his- the accent work is just so great, in that it is non-existent for him. I mean, he's just-

doing any modern day John Cusack performance. It might as well be someone saying, hey, Lloyd Dobler, put on this armor. You're a Roman now. He was like Lloyd Dobler because he's doing kickboxing stuff. I was like, all right. But I don't know because I looked at like, I went in quite deep and I was like,

was looking at, like, some press stuff that he did for the movie last night. He watched a bunch of interviews. Yeah, I watched some interviews with him, and he, like, he says all the, like, he seems really, like, into the idea of doing a martial arts movie and was saying, like, all the reasons you would do a movie like this were, like, to work with Jackie Chan and to, like, do they get to do this cool stuff? Like...

But then, like, I don't feel like he did that. No, I feel like he was there for two weeks at the max. It's slow. Like, Adrian Brody, I feel like, is in that last fight scene. He's like, yeah, you did some fighting. I believe John Cusack, yeah, showed up the day before and, like, was like, okay, what's up? And I believe Adrian Brody lived in China for two years. Yeah, but that's why, like, in armor. No, Adrian Brody is doing something. But let me ask you this, Aaron and Daniel. Like, when you're...

When you watch a movie like this and you're looking at people that are, some people are just not making a choice on advertising.

Accents. Have you ever worked in a situation where you've been like, huh, we're all doing this. This person isn't. Isn't. Yeah. I don't know that I have, but I've definitely like been aware of them on other movies. Like there was like, I mean, there was some famous. I mean, I haven't seen this. Oh, we've done a million. We've done a million movies where accents are not adding up. I mean, like Gods of Egypt. But at least people are trying. I like to believe.

Maybe. No, but that's the thing. I think, I like to believe, Dan and I were talking about this. I like to believe that like, because Adrian Brody sort of doesn't come into the end. I like to believe that John Cusack got there and was like, well, there's some British guys, but nobody else really seems to be doing an accent. And so he just did his whole performance and then Adrian Brody got there and just started doing what he was doing. And Cusack was like, it's too late now. Dude, what are you doing? I mean, I'm not going to loop my whole performance. But it's also like a bold choice to be like,

I'm just going to be American. I'm just going to be American. And not even, it's almost like Chicago. It's like, it's not even like a subtle, it's like, it's just junk. It is just typical. And in a way, there's no logic. Like, you might as well be as, like, English as be American. Like, there isn't any, I mean, you're not going to sound Latin. There's not a Roman accent that anyone's doing these days. But the guy, his number two even has a, at least it's a,

A British accent? It just sounds like American... Or, sorry, well, like, that American accent just sounds so... But that's why it's so good. That's why you like him pulling up on a horse in armor and just being like... It's just so casual. How does he introduce himself? He's like, Black Eagle Corps, Roman Empire. And I was like, what? There's no way. And at the end of the movie when he says, send me home to Wrigley Field, I was like...

That doesn't make any sense. When the arrow goes through his throat, he goes, go Cubs. Yeah.

Do you have, you don't have the moment of him, because my, I think my favorite scene in the movie, which I like, I lost my mind the first time I watched it and the second time just as much is the scene where him and Jackie Chan are first, it's after their first fight. When he's in his thinking spot. This is my favorite scene. When he needs a place to think. When he's found his place to think. I need food and water for my men, medicine for a child, and a place to think. This is it. This is it. I think you got it right here. We need food and water for my men.

Medicine for a child. And I need a place to think. This is 48 BC. Yep.

48 BC and then that scene to me is even more kind of trumped by the scene after Jackie and or after like the fight and they get into town they're both on the rooftop no this is Dan's scene this is the scene that we watched it twice last night I mean for the whole thing I'm concerned about you these are our

date night. Like the first thing when he starts off and he's just like, I can't, there's one line he says very early on which makes me laugh but the line that just, I hope you have it, is when he grabs Jackie Chan's sword and Jackie Chan stops him and John Cusick just does a really look down on, what, I just want to look at it, I've never seen a Chinese sword. And I am not doing any justice to how he does the line but it is my favourite. There's something so black

So blasé about the delivery of that lie. There's something so blasé about so many of his lies. But they also do a thing in that scene where, in the beginning of that scene, John Cusack is talking like, in my culture, we do this. And Jackie's like, oh, in my culture, we do this. And then all of a sudden, after three lines, they're like, so anyway, the stress and politics of my world really kind of bums me out. And then he's like, oh, yeah. Jackie Chan speaks English.

Every language. Yes. And everybody, every native Chinese speaker can at least understand every language everybody else is speaking. Yes. Even if they don't speak it, they can understand everything that's being said all the time. All the time. Maybe it's a skill you get when you work on the Silk Road. On the Silk Road. Yeah. Is the Silk Road like... Squad being used. Squad? Yes, squad. There's that. There's a bunch of anachronisms too. At one point, my favorite thing is...

When Adrian Brody says, when they come to him at the end of the movie and they're like, blah, blah, blah, whatever, you're busted, whatever. He goes, look, I just want to say. He says, look, comma, I just want to say. I wrote down that someone says, hey. Yeah. That too. What? Hey. Yeah. There's a bunch of like craziness. There's also a bunch of lines that I just don't understand.

Like, there's a bunch of lines that are said with huge significance that I don't... Oh, yeah, like, Decimus has returned! We don't know who this is! Who's Decimus? Oh, the Anchorman moment at the end when all the tribes arrive to fight and they just cut to the one of the other arriving. And then you're like, you don't know who these people are. No idea.

who any of them are. And then at the end when that whole... Well, they're the people, I believe they're all the people who, when he made the speech about like, when they were like, they all got bought off by Adrian Brody and he made the speech about we have to stick up and we have to blah, blah, blah. They were all the people that I believe had taken the money and now felt bad.

But the Parthian queen, when she shows up too. That's a different story. And the falcons, guys. The falcons. When this movie turns into Birdemic for a moment. And they have just like telepathic control over hordes of falcons. Yeah, and the falcons are coming in, yeah, just hard at horses. Well, we all know Parthians can do anything with falcons. That's true. But they also like make.

Or whoever it is. I feel like making the choice to do close-up shots of birds not actually hitting the ice. Yes. Missing. That's a very hard thing. Which you think that's hard to do. Yeah. Stay in the white. Yeah. You don't have to do a close-up. That would look great. Yeah. Or just CGI maybe just a little bit. Just a little bit. You clearly are doing a city light up. Like, it's fine. Yeah, it's a horse on a bird. Help your battle scenes. Use your CGI here. Why, by the way, is John Cusack an amazing engineer? Like, he's...

How were they able to do that? That's like my favorite things about the film are that like they are constructing a history where like the Romans and the Chinese meet and then the Roman engineering meets Chinese everything that they are brilliant at. It's a really nice montage. Oh, I love that.

The really nice friendship montage. That could be the movie. The movie could be about two enemies who come together to build a city to protect it from, that's a movie, right? What this is, is a whole bunch of, like there are so many components and so many players and so much chaos in this movie that is fully unnecessary. It feels to me like someone who watched like the last episode, the last aired episode of Game of Thrones trying to describe it to you. It's like, there's a boy and he's got a,

thing and then there's a castle and then there's another group. And there's a dragon and there's a cursed sword. Wait a minute, neither of those are in this. But it is, it just feels like a mishmash. City building was the only thing that I actually remembered from the film. I remembered the city building and so we're watching it last night and then the city got built and then they were having their musical numbers and then I looked and we were only 30

minutes into the film. That's what I thought too because I was like, oh wow, they did it. Wait, is this the end of the movie? Yeah, like what? What kind of thing was that? It was like, you have 15 days to rebuild the city and then they did it? And even what they did in 15 days is insane. And they also kept stopping for karate demonstrations and one-on-one.

fight. And musical numbers. And crafts time. They did a flag arts and crafts day. I couldn't figure out and this plagued me for a good portion of the movie. It didn't occur to me until the end of the movie they were building a city. I thought this was a prison. When Jackie Chan and the protection squad are sent to the wild goose. It is a prison camp.

Yes. It is. But it took me a while to realize, oh, this isn't because I was like, why are they having to build their own prison? Is that what this is? Wouldn't you just not? Yeah. But also when Jackie Chan goes there as a prisoner, he's like, all right, so I'm in charge. I'll go out here. I'll talk to John Cusack. I'll do this. Follow me. Let's do this. I couldn't figure out what his role was either. And then later he just gets on a horse. He rides to his old house. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. I was like, why can he do, why is he doing this? Why is he going home? Isn't he supposed to be going and doing a bunch of other stuff? And then how is he allowed? When Jackie Chan invents the airplane slide technology that you have. Yes. Like, so everyone knows that, you know, like when you have an airplane, maybe it does a water landing, you pop out a door and a big yellow thing would come out. Jackie Chan makes that. And then has kids.

sliding down from a school room and then makes it into a comedy scene. You know what's interesting for me? That's one of those things that I loved because that's clearly one of those shots that for me, the shots of people sliding down the thing were all slow-mo because I feel like that just didn't look good in actual fact. No way. It was just a lot less impressive. I'm sure. And also Jackie Chan has made himself the bottom of the slide so kids are going feet first to Jackie Chan. I know.

I also love that this movie teaches us a very important lesson right in the scene following where the little boy drops his school book. Oh, yeah. And because he goes back for his books in order to learn his mother is killed. Yes. Or his teacher. His teacher slash mother are not unclear. Jackie's wife. Jackie Chan's wife, I believe, is the teacher at the school. And he goes back for his books and she gets full. She gets full.

All full of arrows. I want to... She gets all the arrows. Any other object, it had to be his books. Books. That kid will literally never pick up a book again. Lesson learned, kid. I have issues with that teacher because at one point when she's protecting everybody from arrows, she just takes like a little bamboo plate, like a large plate. Like, everyone put the bamboo plates in here. Like, let's not stop making arrows. No.

Most of these people getting four to five arrows in their back. There were so many arrows. Yeah. It's interesting that that's like a fine way to watch a person die. Like everyone's kind of, they're all okay with that. Also, arrows in this movie do amazing things. Like there's that one shot where like the girl's inside the house. She fires one arrow into a horde of a hundred people. She hits one of them.

The other 99 drop to the ground as well. Yeah, they all fall down. Go like, whoa, she's really good with that thing. Very sympathetic response to good archery. You can still take her, guys. There's a hundred of you. Did you see that? She got him. I just want to go back because we talked about the teacher, Jackie Chan. So when he beats that person in the beginning, the woman in the beginning, and she reveals herself, her naked body to him, she kind of takes a slug like, let's do this. She reveals herself. Then he takes a slug and does a spit take.

And then he runs away. And then as they're riding and laughing, he goes, well, we've been gone for a long time. So wait, so is it like supposed to be like, well, I would have had sex with her if we hadn't been gone for long? Or is it like I'm committed to my wife? Like what were they trying? I think he was committed to

limited to his wife. Yeah, I think so. Okay, so that's why he got out of there. Yeah, because then he went home after that and they talked about how they were a great couple because they both love peace. Okay, because I just, I guess, right, because he's a peaceful guy. Yeah, that's what they had in common. You teach peace to different school children. This movie would be like, we're a perfect match. We're peace people. It would be like the movie Taken every time Liam Neeson kills somebody. Like, I

I'm such a nice guy. It really is. That is his character, essentially. I'm a good person. Stop telling us that. Just do it. Stop fighting. Friend and foe. Turns friends into foes, which I feel like, again, that's inscribed on something in Chinese characters. I feel like maybe that is a phrase that is just much more evocative in Chinese. Yes. Turns friends into foes coming up as a subtitle. Okay. Yeah. Well, there's whole songs about it.

Oh, well, and by the way, should we hear the Latin song? It's the little boy singing the song. You mean the operatic little boy? Who is in the middle? Okay. My favorite is when the first scene that introduces us to John Cusack and Jackie Chan is

which is the scene in which Falco is narrating their fight for this little boy. The little boy then like has a fit or a moment or something and Falco brings the boy in his arms to the fight that is happening in the middle of the desert and screams, General! And by the way,

And by the way, this point... Distracting John Cusack immediately. Well, but by the way, like, the boy was just blind. He was not, like, sickly. Or maybe he was. I don't know. He was very elusive about it. They had run... They were in a desert. I think maybe they were all fucking thirsty. Well, because remember those other generals were falling down behind John Cusack. Yeah. Just falling. Yeah. They held it up until they were in front of another army, and then they were like, oh, God, fall off this horse. And by the way, what terrible general John Cusack was like, all right, we'll take this city. What?

With these guys? With what? Like, that was my problem. You've got like 500 guys. This is a city. You've been walking for days. But that's what I, yeah. I mean, John Cusack is just, that, yeah. Jackie Chan is the world's best person who, no suit, like he arrives at Seven Gates, Wild East Gate. Yeah. And just immediately tries, like starts saving people's lives and helping people. Adrian Brody is the most evil human being who just like drinks blood and blinds children. And John Cusack is just a guy.

He's just a guy. It's wild. Just a guy. You've got this like character in the movie, this sickly child who's been rescued from certain death and all this stuff. And the kid just straight up gets killed. Oh, yeah. Boom. Adrian Bromley shows up and Falco's like, see you later. I guess we're going to take a high dive off the top of the palace. By the way, the sky plank. What purpose is the sky plank? That's very Game of Thrones. That's the purpose, Paul. That's very Game of Thrones. That's the purpose of the sky plank.

I thought the sky plank was going to come into like at the end when they're having that battle like they're going to finally fall like fall into that Falco Falco yeah that's when you jump off things with a child I did get I did get emotional with that scene though I was like I don't know why I think now whenever I see anything with children yeah because you got kids fair enough the rest of us without kids were like fuck this kid yeah

was a moment where I was like if you have to go that would be a beautiful way to go Jesus that's so sweet and dark Lord if they're pushing you off a sky bridge yeah he really meant it when he said you will never hurt this child I was like no yeah you've meant that I'm gonna hug him on the way down I will for ever Falco

I would love it if he screamed his own name. I'm dangerously close to letting that be the thing that takes over for Geostorm. Someone screamed Geostorm at me on the Sony lot the other day. Oh, my God. I was like, what the fuck's going on? Who said that?

I had actually not registered that character's name was Falco. I was also on the IMDb page for this film last night, and there is apparently a character in this film called Eugene. Oh, yeah. Who is that? Is he in the 20 minutes I didn't see? No, there is a couple of characters, and there's some people that are uncredited. Really? Just Eugene? Eugene. James Lee Guy was uncredited as Eugene. Huh.

Yep, just Eugene. It's not a Roman name. It's not a Chinese name. It's just, how do you fit into this? That's just like one of the director's friends who happened to be on set. Like, oh yeah, well, this is Eugene. That's Eugene. The guy in jeans. And then he went in and changed his own IMDb. I don't know. My favorite characters were Eugene, Sully, and Red Son. Wasn't that the kids'

Puglius. Yeah, Puglius. Well, here's a little bit of his singing, just so you can kind of... If he got to be a little bit older, he'd be Puglius. But he died Puglius. Come on, guys. And this is like a crowded scene. This is like after their dance sequence. And here we go. Oh, yeah. This is the rowdy... So long.

And he sounds like he's in a cathedral. I mean, it is not, this is not like... They built a city with good sound quality, Paul. The true stakes were a big part of it.

Yeah, he's... And this is the anthem of Regim, I guess. Apparently, yes. It's like an old Roman song that everyone knows and joins in on. I mean, but it's a... People are crying? Yeah. Romans are weeping at the song. And there's some very committed background in this. He's actually crying. Like, there was one guy who was just like, we don't even know who you are, and you are weeping. That's Eugene. And by the way, and getting back to this whole thing, like, this whole thing was brought on by, like, Jackie Chan in the middle of their hard work. They're just like, all right.

Snack time's over. Let's do training. And then they do training. And then John Cusack looks at him like, I don't like you. But we're, oh, but you're already friends. Aren't you already working together? Yeah, but I don't know. I think that was more a look of like, okay, you're going to see what we've got now. We're going to show you some Roman stuff. I think they're kind of on a team by then. Like competitive pals or whatever. Okay. And so then they, the Romans do their stuff, which is a lot more drumming. Yeah. And then the Romans just kick the shit out of them. Yeah. Oh,

all the time and the so-called... No, there's a little bit of back and forth. Yeah. A little bit, but I mean, they lose every demo fight. Jackie Chan's guy wins the first one. Oh, okay, okay, I'm sorry. And then there's the second guy that ends with a handshake. Okay, that's... And the Roman guy who loves to fight is like, that was a great fight! I am Eugene! The whole time, think about how they have...

15 days to build a city. Yes. And that they are slave laborers. I thought it was one wall. And then when you see the final shot, when they look around, it's like, oh, that's like multiple walls. They couldn't have built in 15 days two of those devices they built in order to build this city. They are building wheels and gears. They're building. They built a giant construction equipment. Yes. The size of what you would see in a modern day construction. And then built a city.

And also spackled it. I love that. That was the other thing. They spackled it. They were like, all right, here we go. We're going to blend this in with the wall. I love that they included things like, and this has to, my belief would be that this is based on how they actually built these cities and they made, this is what part of it was. He goes,

do you have gravel? Is there gravel? And I was like, wait, is this now just construction talk? Are they now just talking about what materials are available to build with? A lot of close-ups of blueprints. And Junk Coo's like really... That's another one of my favorite shots is when they just say, it's clearly, it's just Junk Coo's like standing with two Romans either side of him, just going like, one of them says, everything's on schedule. And they cut away. And then later they go back to that same shot. And Junk Coo's just goes...

Check on that. Someone was just like, can you just improv some building to me? Just say construction-y things. What I thought about this whole movie was... We'll intercut it with someone sketching it with a ruler and blueprints.

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What I thought about this movie was like, there's a moment where it felt like if this is a play, the lighting person got sick and was just trying to take lighting cues when they thought it would happen because scenes fade out. Like you're like, Oh, I guess that was the end of that scene. It was like lights out. Like, Oh, I haven't seen a movie where like, there's been so many fade outs. Like just like fade to black. And then we're in another scene now. Like, Oh, okay. It was a jar. The, uh,

The film language is very dark. And like the flash forwards and flashbacks that like in the middle of all kinds of scenes, you just flash back to things that you already saw. We flash back to that kid singing that song. There's so many like fade outs. There's so many like there is like the. And why would the Chinese people get so amped up about a song that, I mean, I would argue most of them don't understand, right? Because they're not speaking Latin. Yeah. So like what's. Well, that's the thing is all the English speaking people are now singing in Latin.

Right. Yeah. Why does that make more sense? Like, this must be, like, very confusing. This is just, it just illustrates, the movie is constantly illustrating how confusing it is. Right. By including things that just add to it rather than make it clearer, you know? And the one thing I will take away is that the Romans made a bunch of Rube Goldberg-style devices. Because at one point they show a dead body and it's like a magician's.

case like a guy's in there but there's a bunch of swords inside it's like that trick that you would see yeah it was sort of like oh that's a trick that you would see on stage it's like oh and I had no swords through me but the other one is like yeah we have like a thing where you put eight swords in one person's body yeah we put a guy in a box and we just stick a bunch of swords in and it kills the guy it's a great trick you can do it way easier

Adrian Brody also catches a sword with his bare hands. And he's fine. And he says, good throw. Yeah. Fucking sword. Sword and throw. That's why I'm like, those moments where I'm like, Adrian Brody is having fun here. Like, he came in, he's doing an axe and he's giving a

he's like, I'm the evil, I'm drinking blood, I'm blinding kids. Yeah, I don't think anyone told him to lick human blood off his hands. I think in the moment, Adrian was just like, that's what this guy would do. And somebody ran in from like, after they caught cut and was like, you should not be putting that in your mouth. Don't, don't, don't, don't. Where we are right now, that is not safe. That is real blood. They filmed this in the Gobi Desert. They filmed this in the middle of the Gobi Desert and it sounds like it was...

Hundreds of extras. Everyone wearing real Alma. In the Gobi Desert. What? Yeah. Like, it sounds... Yeah, it was heat, sandstorms, heavy costumes, and long filming hours made this movie a really difficult endeavor. Wait, real sandstorms? Yes, real sandstorms. Oh, wow. Which is funny, because they can't really muster one in the film. No, too hard. They're all like, we have to get inside because there's a sandstorm. And then when they cut back later, there's like...

You create the sand in the air. But like what I like about Adrian Brody, and I think if you are going to do a movie like this, I actually think Jackie Chan comes across the best in this. Like super fun. I thought it was odd in moments where he is this big fighter, but he fights in the Jackie Chan style, which is like, oh shit. What? What? Whoa. Whoa. It's like that kind of like cartoon. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

you know, and I'm like, well that you are a fighter. Like you should, you should at least have confidence in there. Uh,

But besides that, he's great. And I do like... How old is Jackie? When was this made? I think he was like 61 when this was made. Yeah, this came out amazing. It is amazing to me how agile and effortless he makes what is very difficult stuff look. I thought they were trying to age him down sometimes and then to then reveal it. And that was what he looks like older. But I just think it was maybe the wig or something. He looked...

I don't know. He looked younger than he looks on the poster, even. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I do think some of the fight scenes are genuinely still, like, there are really cool moments in them, and you just have to go, like, wow. I love the sword that shoots out from between. Oh, yeah. That was great. I just wish they'd done less slow-mo.

motion with it. That was the thing. I felt like anytime they actually found something cool, they either put it on unnecessary slow motion or cut away from it. Just riding on the horse. John Cusack riding on a horse in slow motion. So many people not riding horses for real. Oh yeah. So many people like cut

The frame cuts when you can't see the horse's legs. You can't see nothing. This movie probably killed more horses than that David Milch show, Luck. I do worry about, like, it's one of those things when you see Milch, you're like, oh, man. It's like when you watch The Birds now. You're like, oh, man, birds died.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. There was some poor idea. And Hitchcock was like, I don't care. I always think about this. Like, someone told me, like, on Return of the Jedi, like, a lot of the people in these Ewok costumes, they were, because they were like, oh, no, our laws are a little bit more lax. It was like, just jump on that thing and fly down. It's like, I'm just an actor. It's like...

you can do it. It's like a lot, like I was talking to one of the guys who- So you're saying a lot of Ewoks died on that movie? Not died, but the idea of this like, no, we could do it. Like our friend Owen was in a movie in India and they literally lit a log on fire and threw it at him and he had to raise it. Just as long as you run fast, it won't hit you. And he's like,

It was the most scary thing. It's like running down a plank with a flaming log like four feet behind him. Oh, that's great. But it adds to some of the great shots in this film. Absolutely. You know, you want that real fear in those eyes. You want to know if you die in a movie set, it was for something as good as Dragonblade, you know? We did an episode of The League where we were camping and there was a bear. Oh, yeah. And I was like, oh.

well, this is not going to be worth it to die shooting an episode of the league because there's a good bear is going to maul us. It was a really good episode. Great ep. But, but it was, it really, it immediately became clear. We should not be doing this. That is, that's a wild animal there. And the only thing between us and it is a man with a bag of Oreos. Distract the bear with, with cookies. Another episode of the league. We were shooting with a monkey, this ghost monkey. And the guy, the trainer was a real monkey, a real,

It wasn't a ghost monkey. We called him a ghost monkey in the show. It wasn't the ghost of a monkey. It was not a ghost of a monkey. It's very hard to hire ghosts. I mean, well, there's tricky laws. Nothing can't be done. It's true. The trainer was in the trunk of the car that I was driving and the monkey was loose in the car.

With us. And that was like the joke of the scene. Like, ah, this monkey. And I remember him saying to me, like, if he gets crazy, just give him these Sour Patch Kids and that will like calm him down. They're laced with LSD. And I was like, why are we giving him candy? And that's the only, like, that's...

Between him mauling us? Yeah. And whenever the monkey would stop the scene, we'd just start eating pieces of the car. And we were in there. And then you feel like this thing where I don't want to complain about this, but this does not feel safe. You have a monkey and three people in seatbelts driving on an open road with a trainer in the trunk. My ear will be in that monkey's mouth before that trainer is able to maneuver his leg. Oh, yeah.

But isn't that, that's like, that's why we have the best job. Like, the stuff like that happens. Like, yeah, that's, oh, I love it. I will never be in a Mercedes SUV with a monkey in real life. Right, exactly. You know what? Never say never. Yeah. Never say never. Who knows where this is going, this wild life. I actually talked to a guy who did a documentary on Bubbles, Michael Jackson's monkey. My friend fit Bubbles for a jacket once. Really? Yeah, he's a dresser, and he came in, Michael Jackson sent Bubbles alone in a limo to get

fit for a suit well this is what he was telling me he was like Bubbles had his own like hotel room where Michael was staying and they're like oh go hang out with Bubbles and they had taken out the bed and they put the cage in the center of the room where the bed was and that's where Bubbles hung out and you could take him out of the cage and watch TV with him and hang out with him but like Bubbles had his own thing going on Bubbles arrived in his own car

They made a doll of Bubbles. I remember that as a kid. You could get it at Toys R Us like a Cabbage Patch doll, but it was like Bubbles. What? Did you know that? I didn't know any of this. This is wild. Oh, yeah. Bubbles is like... Is Bubbles still alive? I don't know. Were there many Bubbles? Was there one Bubbles? Or was there multiple Bubbles?

I would love it. There was only one Bubbles. It's one of those things that Bubbles keeps dying and the handlers are on Michael Jackson. Like, we got to get it. We got to find another Bubbles. Of course, that's Bubbles. What do you mean, Michael? What do you mean he's acting different? Oh, Matt, that is, that's, yeah. Oh, that's very sad. Yeah, I don't know. I don't have much information about Bubbles. But this, I'm going to try. And I heard that Bubbles played guitar on Beat It. What?

Oh, he rope-eated. He rope-eated. A lot of Michael Jackson songs are credited to Bubbles.

I want to watch that biopic now. Yeah. Yeah, I really, I got to find it. He was like, it was. But now with the, with, you know, emotion. Oh, no, I mean, like, I want to watch, like, the Michael Jackson one, but, like, that tells the truth. Oh, yeah. It's just those bubbles running all the time. There was ten bubbles. Bubbles are just smoking a cigar like, you listen to me. You're going to sing it, and you're going to sing it good. He just, Michael Jackson just traded his overbearing father for an overbearing pet monkey that he had.

Tell me you wouldn't watch that film. Oh, yeah. So in. So there's what else do we want to talk about? The John Cusack death scene. This is a place where they build prisons either really well or really shitty. They have a one prison, just a cage where your feet could come out. So that was a Flintstones style prison where they all pushed it over a cliff. Yeah. Bad, bad engineering. But yet John Cusack, who is weaponless, they have him like in a three part

Yeah. Which is like, why is he, he's not that dangerous. Who were the guys who killed him? Who would like, that scene before, like, who was he going to meet that were then the people that like strung him up? Yeah, this is when I really was watching it and I was trying real hard, but I was like, I do not know what has happened. I don't know how he's still alive. This is where the film goes off the rails. Like once they build the city and they're like, this movie is well off the rails. Understand what's happening.

happening before that. I maintain. I don't understand all the people and what their relationships are, but I understand like here's a friend and foe. They built the city together and they're happy at that point. That's all I need. And I feel good. But then once it gets into this section, I'm like, I understand that Adrian Brody wants to kill that kid. Yes. Right. Yes. And they're brothers, right? Yes. They're brothers. And right. The kid is Adrian Brody's brother or cousin or some sort of like, I think it's his brother. I think it's his brother too. Cause his dad is being passed over for the

No, because I think it was, okay, so the dad. Oh, Bubbles died in 2009, just so you know. Oh, okay. R.A.P. Bubbles. Well, that was quite. He was 50 years old. What? Oh, sorry, that was old Michael Jackson. What are you talking about? Oh, wait, wait, so Bubbles did not go to Michael Jackson's memorial service. What? Snub. He wasn't invited. Oh, no, he's still alive. He.

So Michael Jackson died in 2009. Yeah, sorry. Sorry. I got a little confused. This is a wild ride. Yes. He is living in the center of Great Apes Sanctuary in Wachula, Florida. That makes me genuinely really happy. Yeah, he's alive and well. I don't know why. Oh. Ow. Holy cow. No, okay, so. Yes.

So, Adrian Brody's dad was like, I think Adrian Brody might be a fucked up asshole. I think Adrian Brody might be Adrian Brody. Yeah, he was like, I think he might. So, he was like, so I'm going to make my young, sweet kid with the operatic voice my ruler. And so then he made a treaty with the Parthians. Right. Being like, I just want to make this treaty so you recognize this kid as my ruler.

Do you want to hear his whole evil plan that he lays out in an amazing riff of exposition? Oh, yeah. All right, here we go. Here we go. If I hadn't purposely let you escape, purposely, do you really think you and Publius would get this far? Who could blame me for pursuing you? I mean, thank you for the perfect excuse to bring my troops here. I had already plotted this with your subordinate, Yin-Po. Yin-Po gave me the customs clearance documents.

And the Commander's Seal. Customs clearance document is sent very dramatically several times. And the Commander's Seal. They talk about these things all the time. This to me is like the reverse bad villain plan of James Bond. It's like, everything that happened, happened for a reason. And there it was. And it was all...

But none of it falls into place for you. Like, I don't know who any of the people he's talking to, talking about are. I don't, I'm not tracking commander's seals or tax documents. I'm not, these are not the components. The customs documents. As far as I'm concerned, I'm watching a movie about enemies becoming best friends and building a city. Right. And it is like, not,

anymore. In this Adrian Brody, there is like a parallel whole movie going on which we're not privy to for the first 56 minutes and then he comes in fully doing that movie. By the way, I would happily watch another movie that is the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead of this movie wherein we start with Adrian Brody and we arrive at this movie. Well, let's talk about structure for a second. Is there any problem with starting this movie with Adrian Brody and that kid and then telling that story because that seems

is the story. I think if this is a Chinese movie, I suspect the story is about the Silk Road and not about the Roman, the hierarchy of Roman royalty. But it's a weird way to start it though because it's like, all right, well, then to tell this story, we won't tell the whole first part of it until we're in the third act

So then you get context for the story. That's why they have to do weird flashbacks and flash forwards of Adrian Brody. This movie is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern because it's the inconsequential part of this story. By the way, don't tell China that. Yeah.

No offense, but Paul speaks for Paul and Paul alone. Sorry, my brothers. I did not mean to insult the film, which is a great movie. And I think Ali Baba, who put money into it. Yes, yes. All great, all great. This movie has more production credits than the population of a small town. Yeah, and it is clearly, you know, and it was, in all the press for it, you get John Cusack being asked, what made you want to do a Mandarin movie? And he's clearly there being like, I didn't. I mean, I wasn't, I'm not.

John Key's like, John Key's like, is low-key, like, making crazy fun choices now. Yes. He's like, in that Nicolas Cage territory, he was like, whoa, great. He's full-blown Nicolas Cage in this. I think he saw what Nicolas Cage was doing on Con Air and was like,

I get what I can do. I mean, this is a story I tell all the time. When we had Danny Trejo on the show here, he said the most dangerous person that he encountered on that con airplane was John Cusack. He said, that's the person I'm most afraid of. He says, because when you look in his eyes, he's got something that's crazy in there and you don't trust it. His eyes are Danny Trejo going, of that

insane cast. You got Malkovich, you got Buscemi, you have all these great people that are known for being like these wild cards. John Cusack, the guy who's in a suit and tie for the entire thing is like, that's the guy I was like, no sir. Which I always love. I love that. It's like he's not even doing an insane performance. No, no. John Cusack was the first person who made me try vaping.

Really? Yeah, I overlapped with him for like two days on a film. And I was like, I really ran into him outside. He was like, have you tried this? And at that point, I was like, no. And he's like, you gotta try it. It's amazing. I'm like, wouldn't give up until I tried. Are you still vaping? No. No, but I also I so vividly remember he was like, it's great. You can do it on airplanes. And I was like, I don't think you can.

And he was like, no, you absolutely can. And I went. He was like, you can do it on airplanes full of prisoners being transported. But I just remember saying to him, I was like, oh, no, I think you can do it on airplanes. I don't.

I think they'll let me do it on airplane. You know, when people are watching you scared as you go into the bathroom on airplane, once you're in that bathroom, you can do whatever you want. Junk Yusek does have a terrible death scene in this. His eyes have been plucked out. Jackie Chan tries not very hard to free him.

It seemed like there were leather straps holding his hands and Jackie Chan just went for the chains with a knife. And I was like, I don't think that's going to work. There might be another way. I think there's like three...

Well, there's two that I'm sure of, but three possibly mercy killings in this film. So you've got Falco going over the cliff with the toy. Then you've got Jackie Chan in this scene shooting John Cusack with an arrow in the face. I'm sorry, everybody. And then there's also a scene early on, at some point, when Jackie Chan and John Cusack are talking, they flash back to Jackie Chan and his sister when he was young, trying to escape from somewhere. Oh, yeah. And I think...

Jack, like... Did he kill her? Yeah, they see her. Was she too loud? That's the thing. I think he was saying she was too loud so they got caught, but all you see is him smothering her. Yeah, it seems like they imply that he smothers his sister. Wait, this is that scene from MASH? It was a baby!

I thought it was like she wouldn't be quiet and he was holding her mouth and then they were like who's that crying baby? It's her and then they killed her. But you're right. But then they would have killed him as well. And also all you the way they choose to tell that story is to show him covering her mouth with his hands and then her feet kicking helplessly in the sand. So he's the murderer. He's a villain. And then when he was doing it he was like I'm a nice guy. I'm a good brother. I'm a good brother.

But again, the whole thing is told in the sort of context of a story of him telling about like, we've all got, you know, trouble. We all got shit. Some of us have killed our sisters. Some of us accidentally... And by the way, that's a motivation for him to want peace forever because he murdered his sister. It really explains why he started the Silk Road Protection Squad. Yeah.

I mean, so... The SRPS. Oh, my God. This movie... Yeah, I'm a member of the SRPS. What are you talking about? SRPS here to take care of things. Oh, my gosh. Well, obviously, there's a lot to be said about this movie. We obviously have opinions, but there are people out there with a different opinion. Now it's time for Second Opinions. The movie was a piece of shit. This is so good. This person recommends it.

Tell me what is the message that art is subjective. I need a second opinion.

That is John Lejoie, who is in the car with me and that ghost monkey, and also who has five songs right now in the Lego movie. Five original songs. Lego 2? Lego 2. Sweet. Congrats, John. John Lejoie, killing it. All right, here is a great review. It's a little bit long, but I think it's worth it. It is titled Hot Mess with a Heart of Gold, five-star review.

I am a professional ancient historian, and I can assure everyone that the accuracy is not part of the equation here. I just want to interrupt for one quick second. Dan, did you write this? Yeah.

The plot is often incoherent and one gets the impression that the background research consisted of watching Gladiator a couple of times. The moral is dropped repeatedly like an anvil tied to a quasi-Vitruvian crane into the audience and the revisionism and Chinese nationalism is pretty thickly spread, but...

If you take it for what it is, a big hammy movie with its heart firmly located in the right place, then it is incredibly fun. I was not bored. I was touched. I was entertained. Yes, it's wildly inaccurate. No, you can't do that with swords. Uh...

Wow.

The sincere wish is to tell a story about how East and West and places in between can learn to treat each other with respect, and the scenery-chewing campiness is a likability factor that makes the inaccuracy kind of fun. It's a lot better than Disney's Hercules and that awful Eagle movie. I don't know what that is. What? Iron Eagle? I anticipate some... I would love it if it was Iron Eagle. Jason Gedrick and Louis Gustav Jr. Yeah.

I anticipate some very interesting conversations with my students about this thing. Five stars. Are you going to make your students watch it? I didn't write that, but he does speak for me. If I was in a class and my professor made me watch this movie, I would drop out of college. You would be like that kid who dropped the book. That would be the equivalent of that. This is not worth learning. You've misunderstood what learning is, buddy. I love the fact that he's like...

Yeah, I really enjoyed that review. Because he's come to it with the right... He knows a lot, and it's taken... Yeah, he sees all the faults. I completely agree with that review. Well, that's a great... I love that reveal that that is a made-up Latin anthem. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. That's pretty great. When they were making it up, they were like, we need it to be at least four and a half minutes long. Just like every song in this movie. The reviews here are pretty...

like pedestrian. So they only have two that are really good. This one is from Jilly. Um, and it's, uh, just titled dragon blade peace at last. I call upon all of you to come together from foe to friend. And so whatever way we shall create heaven on earth, as it was in the beginning now until forever, love will prevail. This is not a movie about war is an Epic story of the hero's journey. All,

hail our fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. One word. I am. We are all one love. Loving you forever. Love, Jilly. Five stars. Great. Thanks, Jilly. Jilly really got in there. A message of real love. I also just don't understand. They made a big deal out of this heaven on earth. It didn't

seem like Kevin on Earth. It just seemed like a work camp where people got along. Yeah, it seemed like everyone got on really well and there was something sort of... And I also do love the other review mentioned, like the Chinese nationalism, like those moments where they're talking to John Cusack about like, you're Romans, you kill people. We're Chinese, we just save people. I was like, yeah, I mean, I think war was pretty common throughout the Asian world. I did a little research too.

like this, the Silk Road, they were killing people. The Han Dynasty, which is what this, like what Jackie Chan works for, were brutal. Like, and that's no big deal. No, everyone was. That was the time. That's what we was doing. We were cutting off heads. It's a bizarre thing to be like, and we were the, we were the nicest. And we were the agents of peace. When Army,

He's like, call me back. Hey, want to get some dinner? We are part of the protection squad, guys. We are good guys. It's such a bizarre... It is a bizarre way to rewrite history in such... It's just like, but what are we hiding from? Yeah, to what end? Yeah, to what end? I mean, yeah. I'm so happy to have watched this movie because it is... It, to me, is...

It's unlike anything else because very rarely do you see like a $65 million big budget, big action movie that is shoddy.

shoving all these things in there because it is, you have everything that you kind of want. It's so cluttered. It's such a, it is so cluttered with extraneous characters and plot lines and nonsense. There's just, it's bloated and crazy. Did it do well? I mean, I'm assuming in China it did massively well. Well, you know, like, well, first of all, there's a couple of facts here. The budget, like I said, was 65 million. The opening weekend here in the States in only 14 theaters was $30,000. But, uh,

The domestic, oh wait, no, maybe it was 30 million? No. No. Couldn't have been. All right, oh yeah, sorry. So what it grossed worldwide was $121 million. So huge, huge success. This movie came in 409th place of all the movies made in 2015. Normally we've never done any of the movies that are below 200. Yeah.

Yeah, we really dropped down. That's got to be domestic box office. That's domestic. That's based on domestic. Yeah. And this is the top movies of 2015 are The Force Awakens, Jurassic World, and Avengers Age of Ultron. And it was beaten on this show by movies like Furious 7, Jupiter Ascending, and The Boy Next Door. But yeah, I mean, this- That's the thing, I would watch

this movie over Jupiter Ascending again and again. Disagree. Jupiter Ascending, I always applaud for like, you're doing something. I don't always agree with what they're doing, but I'm like, I'm on board. That's how I felt about Aquaman. We've lost so many hours to both of those movies. We're just pouring our days away on this nonsense. You tell

to do that I know now we're trapped now you're just locked in now we're trapped it's awful the tagline of this movie Dragon Blade would you like I'll just read it to you Dragon Blade wait Dragon Blade Dragon Blade neither blade nor dragon

Just friends. Anyone else want to take a shot? I think I know it vaguely. Okay. When eagle meets the dragon. Yeah. What? What? Wait, is, whoa, hang on. So the dragon is just China and the eagle is the Roman emperor. So is Jackie Chan supposed to symbolize the dragon blade? I guess he is the dragon blade. Like the blade of China or whatever? Yeah. He's meant to, oh wow, that's interesting. So when John Cusack tries to pick up his sword, he is really trying to pick up the dragon blade.

The Dragon Blade. That is the Dragon Blade. We figured it out. They just really threw it. It's interesting because Jackie Chan wants to never use his sword. Yes. His preferred weapon is the guard, the arm guard thing. Oh, yeah, that forearm guard. That he keeps on his belt. The forearm shield. The forearm shield.

this movie does a lot of sword onto shield work. I feel like they were always like, oh, you're always seeing people like jam. Oh, wow, you got shield. And like good accessorizing. There's one shot where like Jackie Chan resheathes somebody else's sword in the coolest, most aggressive way. Does he?

Did Adrian Brody kill himself at the end of the movie? Yes. But he's dying. Yeah, but does he stab himself? Yes. So even in the final moment of the film, the victory over the true villain, Jackie Chan cannot commit that murder. By the way.

Adrian Brody has to kill himself in order for Jackie Chan to win. And why are we, and why are, why is that fight scene so anticlimactic? It's like, all right, let's see a fight. I actually like didn't mind that. Oh really? Because, but I think I was just so happy to be watching. Like I was aware that I was watching a lot of Adrian Brody in it. Got it. And you're doing some cool sword stuff and you learn stuff. Oh, he practiced. He practiced. I was more into that. They,

established. They were like, here is a man who has been fighting for like, gotta be two hours at this point. He is broken. He has been stabbed. He has been shot with arrows and we are going to put him up against a perfectly healthy AB. Okay. Yeah. And so, yeah, it's not the best fight because it's mostly just AB kicking the shit out of him. But like,

not killing him so that he has another chance to get up again. And then break his arm backwards, which was like, yeah. I mean, I had respect for that. And there was another shot in the movie that I liked where there was, just in terms of like, I like a good inventive death, and there was one shot where somebody was like, somehow a gigantic bow and arrow was used to shoot something through somebody's head at very close range. Oh, yes! Well, that was cool. He used a guy's head to pull

the bow and shoot someone in front. I like when they built the transformer out of their shields. They're like, oh, we can do this like the rocks. Everything is rocks. They put a little guy in there. That was my favorite thing. The Roman shields are great against arrows, swords, but rocks

fuck them up apparently they're like throw the rocks throw the rocks if only there'd been more rocks around the Roman Empire might not have thank god they built those walls to figure out what rocks are and then they were like then it became like a comedy scene like pick up this giant ionic

Column. Paul, Paul, I hate to interrupt. It's a dork. It's a dork. It's definitely a dork. Column. Uh, this movie. How about when they put a rock on the shields and slide it through? Like, like you could layer in yakety sacks to 90% of this movie. Please do. Uh,

Also, this is the seventh film that Jackie Chan has done with the word dragon in the title. I did notice when I Googled it yesterday, I was like, this isn't even the... This is like the 10th Google search result that is being suggested. Yeah, if you Google Jackie Chan dragon... Dragon Blade, I just... I was shocked when I got...

When I wrote the note, like, so late into the movie, wait, is there no dragon and no blade? That's what I wrote down. I wrote that down, too. It was crazy. It had not even occurred to me that at no point do we see a dragon or a blade or hear what that is. I was just like, dragon blade, whatever. I kept expecting. I kept expecting that to be. Because dragon blade would be such a boring title if it was like, regum. Like, you wouldn't be like, ooh, I want to go see regum. Like, you know, it has to seem like a fighting movie. Regum sounds like it's a word backwards. Yeah. Like red rum. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I think we're going to be split on this. Dan, do you recommend people seeing this movie? I do. I do for Adrian Brody's full commitment for Jackie Chan's fighting and for John Cusack just being John Cusack in this context. It's so good. I want to just pile on what you're saying here. And I know we've talked about Adrian Brody in a few ways here, but I like the way that he commits. Nicolas Cage, I love Nicolas Cage, but he sometimes can go overboard. And I feel like

Adrian Brody's doing the right level of camp. It kind of feels like it's not like pulling you out. You're like, oh, you're going to sink you. He knows what he's in. He's making big choices. Yeah, absolutely. Aaron, what do you think? Yeah, you know, I recommend seeing it. As a two-time watcher. As a two-time viewer. As a two-time date night viewer. Oh, God. We're crazy cool. You know, I'm going to say, yeah.

I believe in this relationship. It's built on good stuff. Yeah, that's the thing. I, um, yeah, I'd watch it again. You'd watch it again? I mean, you,

Give me it. We'll give it a few years. That's what I'm saying. Give me two years. I will forget everything that we just talked about. I could watch it again and be re-amused by all of it. I can see that. I can see that. June is shooting Grace and Frankie right now, and she got home late last night, and when she got home, she walked in right at the part where Jackie Chan breaks Adrian Brody's arm, and she's walking in and she's like, what the fuck are you watching? What?

And then just walked into the next room. I'm kind of amazed I didn't even wait for this. There was a part of me that was a tiny bit relieved that she couldn't be here today because I was like, I feel like Paul and Jason are going to be mad that they had to watch this movie, but I feel like June would be really, really mad.

mad if we made her watch this movie. When I saw how subtitled it was, I was like, she is not going to be into this. Because also I was writing notes and then look up and be like, what did I miss? And then it would rewind and then I'm like, now I'm wasting time rewinding. No, when you're rewinding a movie for this podcast, you're in bad shape.

You're like just making the time longer. Jason, what do you think? You know, I did not care for this. I don't disagree, though. It is a lot of fun. There is huge choices being made here. Adrian Brody is doing like next level craziness.

Jackie Chan, I always am just delighted by. He is so compelling. It makes me want to watch a better Jackie Chan movie. It's such a compelling screen presence. It's really great. The movie is, yeah, I mean, sort of, I would say, watch it. Yeah, fast forward. Yes, if you have a fast forward,

Because that will knock out a lot of the confusion. And I think you'll be happy. I think fast forward through some of the kind of chaotic battle scenes. But watch all of the dialogue. But watch every two-person scene. Watch all of the city being built friendship montages. And any time you see Falco. Yeah, you've got to stop for Falco and the little boy. Falco is also the name of the artist who sang Rock Me Amadeus. Yeah.

Which I can only assume maybe this is that character. I would love it if the closing credits were just that actor singing Rock Me Amadeus. Rock Me Amadeus. As he's falling. I'm on the same camp as Jason in the sense that it's so rare that you see a movie that

is on this level making these choices. Like, you see it a lot more in smaller films, and I love that it's like, it's trying to be nationalistic. I love that they clearly got these two actors in, you know, because they have international appeal, so they got them, and it's a real mishmash. It's a stew, and you know what? Stews may not be the thing that you go out to eat dinner and get, but it's hearty, and it's filling, and you know what? It's always, it's gonna fill you up and not let you down, so this is the stew of movies. It's the stew of movies.

Put that on the Blu-ray box. The stew of movies. Dan, you have a brand new show which is hilariously funny on TBS called Miracle Workers. Yes. It premiered this week. Oh, cool. And you want to tell us about it? Yeah. It's a show for TBS with myself and Stevie Chemi and Geraldine Viswanathan and Karen Soni and Lolli Adafope and lots of

very, very funny people, amazing writers. It's written by a guy called Simon Rich. Who is hilarious in his books. He created Man Seeking Woman. Created Man Seeking Woman. And was an SNL, a very prolific SNL writer. Just one of the most brilliant, funny people that I've worked with. But what is it about? Yeah, it's a comedy set in heaven. Basically, I play an angel, a

who is working in, like, the Department of Answering Prayers, which is a really shitty job to have, it turns out, in heaven. And then a series of events happen which end with God deciding to end the world and open a restaurant. That's his new thing, as he wants to do. And so we, over the course of the series, have to basically...

convince him not to through various and then season two is an episode of Kitchen Nightmares we accept that it's it's God instead of Gordon Ramsay um it's an anthology so season two we don't if we're lucky enough to get one we don't know what it would be yet which is awesome but um yeah we have a so basically TBS have let us make a super long movie with an ending and everything so yeah it's really really cool that's every Tuesday night at 10.30 right 10.30 yeah that's great Aaron um

what do you got? What do you want to tell people? Cause you, you and I, we did this movie summer of three that came out on, on the DVD, which, uh, I don't know. Undemanded. Oh yeah. You can do all those things too. Yeah. You can do all those things. I like, there is a niceness to have like a physical copy of it. Yeah. Um, but there's nothing extra on it. That's why I don't think so. I didn't know. Um,

Are there any extras on the VHS? There is a lot of extras. It's one of those double VHSes. Oh, yeah. But how can people follow you online and stuff like that? Oh, I'm on Twitter. Yeah.

I can't remember my Twitter handle. Oh, no. Wait, your tweet. You're terrible at promotion. You had a tweet that made me laugh. I'm really bad. So you had a tweet where you predicted that the singer from Room 5 was going to take off his shirt. Yeah, no, this genuinely happened. Halfway through the halftime show, I turned to my friend and I was like, is he going to take off a shirt for each new song? Yeah. And then he did.

and he didn't stop at the tank top. Thank God. Thank God, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to see his shark tattoo. By the way, those are fake tattoos. That's all fake tattoos, right? It's fake tattoos, right? No. We were having a debate. They looked fake to me. I think they're real. If those are fake, that's crazy. I thought they were fake. If those are fake, he would be being roasted right now. Yeah, that's something like a teenager. Is he not being roasted?

He has the word California written across his belly in like, I don't know, 76 font. It's so big. Nothing will ever beat like, well, A, obviously Ben Affleck's tattoo. But that was a fake one. No, it's real. Was it? That's real, Paul. Oh, no. I'm pretty sure it's real. If you don't, for the people who don't know. It's a Phoenix, right? Ed Sheeran. Ed Sheeran also has crotchets.

crazy tattoos. Ed Sheeran has a lion in the middle of his chest. What? Like a gigantic lion. Why? The stuff you would not expect. Neither Ben Affleck or Ed Sheeran have made me look at them in the middle of the Super Bowl. I guess you're right. These Adam Levine tattoos are, they're real. They're real. They're real. Wow, I thought he was doing like a kick fear thing. Like, I'm going to put like funny tattoos. Not that that was a funny scene. Wait a minute. That's what you think is funny.

Do you think Cape Fear is a comedy? Yeah, I mean, that's how I got into comedy. My other favorite is Memento. Remember, he's laughing in the movie theater. It's a comedy. It's a comedy. It's like, what about Bob, but a little scarier. It's so many of my favorite comedians. Robert De Niro, Nick Nolte.

Juliette Lewis. When he, like, when he, remember when he gets his finger, like, caught in her retainer? It's, like, funny. It's, like, a... So funny. Uh, Jason, what do you want to... What do you want to plug here? Um, I will plug, um, I don't know. You can... Oh, The Long Dumb Road is available now also on, um, um,

Blu-ray and all those things. Those are great. And on demand or whatever. I really enjoyed that film. Oh, thank you, Erin. I appreciate that. And then that's about it. All right, great. And I will continue to plug Black Monday, which is on Sunday nights at 10 o'clock on Showtime. It's a show that I'm on with Don Cheadle, Regina Hall, and Andrew Rannells. It takes place in 1987 at the Stock Market Crash. And this is the fourth episode this week, and I think you're starting to see a

bunch of really fun stuff. You can catch up on it right now. If you go to a showtime.com and enter in the code black Monday, you can get a free 30 days of showtime on me, on me. There you go. Black Monday, all one word, all one word. And you can get a free subscription there. And I think you really dig it. It's fun. And I love doing the show and I'm so crazy. Funny cast. Yeah. Super funny show. Hard, hard jokes. Uh, yeah.

I had a very romantic scene with a man in a Mr. Metz costume, which I feel love that I got to do. Which you had asked for. I did. I just didn't be able to do a dramatic monologue to a man in a full costume that you cannot read any emotion on their face. It was one of my favorite things. The shot is his face is in the foreground and I'm in the background over his shoulder. And you're just watching this. That was so cool.

Monologue with no change of emotion. That's so funny. It's a fun show. So Showtime, Black Monday, every Sunday night. All right. That is the end of this conversation, but we want to continue the conversation with you. Make sure you listen to next week's mini episode where you can call in at 619-P-A-U-L-A-S-K. Leave your comments about Dragonblade or your comments about life, and I will answer your questions, concerns, life dilemmas. I'm here for you. And a big thank you.

Thank you to Averill Halle for pulling these clips and remembering that Dan and Aaron wanted to do this movie. Also, Nate Kiley for doing the research on a movie that was so hard to do research for. Of course, Kelly Alto, Cody, who puts this whole show together as our producer, now a senior producer here at Earwolf, and Devin in the booth.

We got a great team. Everybody here at Earwolf supports us and we love that. So we'll see you next week for our mini episode. People, oh, make sure you follow us on Instagram too because guess what? We got a brand new artwork up there from our friend Kyle Waldron. He's killing it nonstop. All right, and sign up for our mailing list because we have some announcements about some touring shows that are coming up. We will see you next week. Bye for now. I'm just gonna be Earwolf.

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Hear that? That's what cooked when you order juicy beef sounds like. The steaming hug of two slices of melted cheese, the crunch of tangy pickles and sliced onions, all topped with a toasted sesame seed bun. That's the sound of a quarter pounder with cheese. First Beef at participating U.S. McDonald's. Excludes Alaska, Hawaii, and U.S. territories.