Raising Arizona with John Hodgman

Summary

Blank Check with Griffin & David

Episode: Raising Arizona with John Hodgman
Release Date: July 20, 2025

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Introduction

The episode begins with Griffin Newman and David Sims setting the stage for their deep dive into the Coen Brothers' classic film, Raising Arizona. Joined by special guest John Hodgman, the trio embarks on an exploration of the film's themes, characters, and its place within the broader context of the Coens' filmography.

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Main Discussion: Exploring Raising Arizona

Griffin Newman initiates the conversation by highlighting the film's unique opening, noting the delayed credits and the abrupt transition to yodeling music at [00:54]. David Sims emphasizes the emotional depth portrayed through the characters, particularly focusing on Holly Hunter's performance and her portrayal of Edwina Quinn's profound longing for motherhood.

Notable Quote:

David Sims [12:16]: "It's a podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want as long as their seed can find purchase."

The discussion delves into the Coen Brothers' stylistic choices, such as their mannered and stylized approach, which often oscillates between heightened cartoonish elements and genuine emotional storytelling. John Hodgman shares his personal experience watching the film, describing the electrifying atmosphere of the theater and his emotional connection to the characters.

Notable Quote:

John Hodgman [20:41]: "I had no idea what I was going into that. I still get chills thinking about."

Griffin Newman and David Sims analyze the characters' motivations, especially the protagonists' desperate measures to secure a family, juxtaposed against the absurdity and humor inherent in their actions. The conversation highlights how the film balances dark comedic elements with heartfelt moments, making it a standout in the Coens' repertoire.

Notable Quote:

Griffin Newman [12:02]: "It was kind of like, dang, right. Put Holly Hunter in your movie, by the way."

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Guest Contributions: John Hodgman's Insights

John Hodgman brings a unique perspective to the discussion, offering anecdotes about his own interactions with the film industry and his admiration for the Coen Brothers. He recounts his attempt to audition for Raising Arizona and shares humorous reflections on the casting process, particularly his interactions with Nicolas Cage and William Forsythe.

Notable Quote:

John Hodgman [26:06]: "He was like, what are you talking about?"

Hodgman also touches upon the enduring legacy of the film, its influence on other filmmakers like Edgar Wright, and the meticulous planning and execution that went into its production. His reflections underscore the film's impact on both audiences and the broader cinematic landscape.

Notable Quote:

John Hodgman [43:12]: "And even though they identify as the outlaw... They don't have it in them to be a Bugs Bunny or a Woody Woodpecker. No, they're too nice."

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Analysis of Key Themes and Cinematic Techniques

The hosts delve into the film's exploration of unfulfilled desires, the complexities of relationships, and the moral ambiguities faced by the characters. They examine how the Coen Brothers use visual storytelling, such as the iconic scenes of Nathan Arizona interacting with his kidnapped siblings, to convey deeper emotional truths.

Notable Quote:

David Sims [137:02]: "And how is it solvable? Because if we give this kid up, we're gonna be missing him for the rest of our lives."

The discussion also highlights the film's score by Carter Burwell, noting its whimsical yet poignant nature, which perfectly complements the movie's tone.

Notable Quote:

John Hodgman [73:38]: "But I'm just going to put a little tiny bit of offense."

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Interruption: Sponsorship Messages

Throughout the episode, brief segments promote sponsors such as HelloFresh, Mint Mobile, and Quint. These sections are seamlessly integrated into the conversation, maintaining the episode's engaging flow while providing listeners with valuable offers.

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Conclusion and Final Thoughts

As the episode wraps up, Griffin Newman, David Sims, and John Hodgman reflect on the enduring charm and emotional resonance of Raising Arizona. They discuss the film's ability to blend humor with heartfelt moments, making it a timeless classic that continues to inspire both filmmakers and audiences alike.

Notable Quote:

David Sims [142:55]: "It's fascinating that this movie has less of it than some of their later films."

John Hodgman expresses his deep appreciation for the film, sharing how it has remained a significant influence in his life, both personally and professionally.

Notable Quote:

John Hodgman [144:18]: "But, you know, this is an active."

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Closing Remarks

The episode concludes with acknowledgments to the production team and a heartfelt thank you to John Hodgman for his invaluable contributions. Listeners are encouraged to explore additional resources and upcoming episodes that continue to celebrate the Coen Brothers' remarkable body of work.

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Highlighted Quotes:

• Griffin Newman [12:02]: "It was kind of like, dang, right. Put Holly Hunter in your movie, by the way."
• John Hodgman [20:41]: "I had no idea what I was going into that. I still get chills thinking about."
• David Sims [137:02]: "And how is it solvable? Because if we give this kid up, we're gonna be missing him for the rest of our lives."

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Note: This summary intentionally omits advertisements, intros, outros, and non-content segments to focus solely on the substantive discussions about Raising Arizona and the insights shared by the hosts and guest.

Transcript

[Griffin Newman]

Blank check with Griffin and David. Blank check with Griffin and David.

[David Sims]

Don't know what to say or to expect.

[Griffin Newman]

All you need to know is that the name of the shadow is Blackjack. You're not that bad.

[David Sims]

If I'm as bad as you, what good are we? What good are we to each other? You and me is just a fool's podcast.

[Griffin Newman]

So you like that? Because paradise and podcasts are so.

[David Sims]

I do. I was doing the exercise last night. I was like, I don't even know if I've ever attempted it, despite the fact that we've covered her so much and she is one of my favorite actors.

[Griffin Newman]

You've definitely attempted a Holly Hunter, haven't we?

[David Sims]

Last night, I was like, I might have cracked it. And right as I started to speak, I was like, I think I've lost whatever. Whatever Rubicon I created to get there. Whatever. I had figured out my map. The map has been burned.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

I don't know who that just became.

[John Hodgman]

It's. Look, there's only one Holly Hunter.

[David Sims]

There's. This is why.

[John Hodgman]

Look.

[David Sims]

This is her ultimate value. Yeah, there is. I don't think there is a Holly Hunter sound alike alive. And I've certainly seen, like, skilled.

[John Hodgman]

If you could do an incredible Holly Hunter, I mean, you know what I just said? There's only one.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

But I would like this to be a life path for you to get there, to get there to get there, to get. Like, I want people going. Have you heard Griffin Newman's Holly Hunter?

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

They got more than they can handle.

[David Sims]

I even feel like I've. I've seen good, like, sketch comedians. Comedians who attempt it.

[Griffin Newman]

Wait.

[David Sims]

And the best I've ever heard it is like, you're 60% of the way there.

[Griffin Newman]

Women in comedy.

[John Hodgman]

Funny women.

[David Sims]

Women are funny. And I want Vanity Fair to listen up. And as I announce this, Women are funny.

[John Hodgman]

World's greatest Holly Hunter impersonator shocks world.

[David Sims]

Front page news.

[John Hodgman]

Having stolen a job from a woman.

[David Sims]

Trump steps down from office.

[Griffin Newman]

It's time for women who are funny to have a turn.

[David Sims]

I know when I'm not wanted anymore. Holly Hunter, impressionist, elected grand chairwoman of universe.

[Griffin Newman]

Holly Hunter.

[John Hodgman]

Holly Hunter.

[Griffin Newman]

Holly Hunter has only made one movie.

[John Hodgman]

No, she's made more.

[Griffin Newman]

She's only made one movie.

[David Sims]

David. I was doing this math.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay. As well before this year. 2025.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Her last credited film was Incredibles 2, in which she rocked the house.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Elastigirl slash Helen Parr.

[David Sims]

So are Incredibles 2 and Big Sick the same year as big sick?

[Griffin Newman]

Is 2017. Two years in which she is also in song to song and yes. Song. Something called Breakable you, which I'm not too familiar with.

[David Sims]

It's not true. It doesn't exist.

[Griffin Newman]

But yes.

[David Sims]

Big Oscar snub seen as sort of like, is this the start of the next era? Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

It was kind of like, dang, right. Put Holly Hunter in your movie, by the way.

[David Sims]

Absolutely.

[Griffin Newman]

And then in 2018, she's incredibles too, which is a voice role. But obviously she's very good.

[David Sims]

That movie makes the men step aside and let the women take the lead. But she is undeniably the lead character.

[Griffin Newman]

And she's really.

[John Hodgman]

She's really awesome. Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Now, of course, since then, she has done a ton of tv. She was on Succession.

[David Sims]

Great on Succession.

[Griffin Newman]

She was. She was. She was great on Succession.

[John Hodgman]

She was great on Succession.

[Griffin Newman]

She was Succession.

[David Sims]

I've always said.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, she was in the weird opinion.

[John Hodgman]

You ready for it?

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

She was great in Succession.

[David Sims]

I see. That's interesting you say, because I think she was great on Succession.

[Griffin Newman]

She was in the.

[David Sims]

Really.

[Griffin Newman]

The one. The Showtime show where I think Brendan Gleason was Donald Trump. You know, there were so many like Comey.

[John Hodgman]

The Comey one.

[David Sims]

Who she play in the Comey.

[Griffin Newman]

Sally Yates, of course. Wow. Acting Attorney General. She was in that show Mr. Mayor, which was the Ted Danson.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

She was a regular on that for two seasons.

[Griffin Newman]

And. And she's upcoming in the new Star Trek show. So she's been doing. It's not like Howling Hunter, like vanished.

[John Hodgman]

From there, which is the new Star.

[Griffin Newman]

Trek, the Starfleet Academy show with her.

[David Sims]

Our. Our friend.

[Griffin Newman]

So Mad Lips right now, our friend.

[David Sims]

Tatiana Masani, I believe, is on that show as well. Got to work with Holly Hunter.

[Griffin Newman]

Very exciting. I'm not. I think Tatiana has like a guest role or something.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

But I does. I think Giamatti.

[John Hodgman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

But I believe Dispatches of Got to work with Hunter today. Yes. Which was blowing my mind.

[John Hodgman]

Holly Hunter. Elite. Elite in that show.

[Griffin Newman]

She's the lead.

[John Hodgman]

She's the lead.

[David Sims]

Oh.

[John Hodgman]

I was just wondering, like, why has she not led a. A prestige television show? She do.

[David Sims]

Was it called Saving Grace?

[Griffin Newman]

She did a T years ago, but.

[David Sims]

Yes, but that was at a weird point where it was like the Closer had gotten really big and actual prestige TV was riding, was rising, but the other networks hadn't figured out how to make things that were actually good.

[Griffin Newman]

Three seasons of State of Grace, which.

[David Sims]

I'm sure was aggressively. Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

I think it was. Whatever. My question was, what is the film that she made this year that broke the streak of Holly Hunter not being in movies. I can tell you that the character.

[David Sims]

Has it come out already?

[Griffin Newman]

It's come out.

[David Sims]

It's come out.

[Griffin Newman]

I can tell you that the character she played was named Madeline Vance.

[David Sims]

Fuck. Why do I know that name?

[John Hodgman]

Madeline?

[Griffin Newman]

You don't.

[David Sims]

I don't?

[Griffin Newman]

No.

[David Sims]

Was this a straight to streaming movie?

[Griffin Newman]

It was STS I mean, I believe it got some sort of perfunctory. Perfunctory theatrical showing.

[David Sims]

Tell me the streaming provider, please.

[Griffin Newman]

Netflix.

[John Hodgman]

Well, that could be anything.

[David Sims]

Mandling Vance. Netflix. Give me the title. I don't know.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, I can tell you that the film's budget was $320 million. So that seems like the kind of movie.

[David Sims]

He's a voice in the Electric.

[Griffin Newman]

No, flesh and blood.

[David Sims]

Is she like a senator or something?

[Griffin Newman]

I don't know.

[John Hodgman]

She was a senator in Drink Granny's History.

[Griffin Newman]

You think I, a paid film critic who's supposed to watch movies.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Has seen one second of the Electric State.

[David Sims]

But you have written the Nutmobile, right? What is that? Mr. Peanut in the film, voiced by Woody Harrelson, rides around in what he calls the nutmobile.

[John Hodgman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

Which is a giant peanut with wheels, but also is what a lot of people call their private parts.

[Griffin Newman]

A lot of people is maybe not true.

[David Sims]

Take a ride.

[John Hodgman]

The. My nutmobile is very stationary. The wheels are off. I just have on blocks in the yard.

[David Sims]

There's five below is just lousy with. With mountains of remote control nutmobiles that I keep getting texted people being like, have you seen this? And I'm like, yeah, I was on this beat months ago.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, you were an early adopter.

[Griffin Newman]

Just insane. That Holly Hunter turn. It's called the Electric State.

[David Sims]

It's a rooster. That's the one with the nutmobile. Of the nutmobile.

[Griffin Newman]

It was a big blockbuster starring Chris Pratt and Brown.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Directed by the Russo brothers.

[John Hodgman]

I ventured to say no blocks were actually busted.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, the blocks were made. There's a big pile of blocks.

[David Sims]

Not even a chip.

[John Hodgman]

No offense to anyone who worked in the film. I would like to be. I would like to work again.

[David Sims]

Not even a trip off the old block.

[Griffin Newman]

A smidge of offense at some of the people who works on that film.

[John Hodgman]

Actually having not seen it. I'm not.

[Griffin Newman]

In fact, I'm going to put a little tiny bit of offense.

[David Sims]

And in fact, I would say this. If anyone involved with that movie at the upper levels felt good about what they did, they would not be returning to Marvel as quickly and loudly. Yeah, I See, you know Holly Hunter? Yes. I. I have actually recently, for whatever reason, gone on a couple similar rabbit holes of. Especially actresses over the age of 40 where I'm like, huh, Quietly, that person has not been in a movie in eight years. There are a lot of people who. It feels like there is a pre pandemic cut off. And I go like, oh, fudge. Did Hollywood kick them the curb? And you're like, no, just streaming bullshit.

[John Hodgman]

It's.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. It's the rise of a certain kind of television where it's like they're not. Not working. They're working. It's just they've been diverted to this.

[David Sims]

Like, I think Catherine Zeta Jones has not been in a movie since Red 2, if I am not mistaken. And yet she has done 10 TV shows that don't exist, including one for Facebook Watch. She was the lead actress.

[John Hodgman]

I don't know what you're talking about.

[David Sims]

Because it's not real. Correct.

[John Hodgman]

I thought the name of the show was Facebook.

[David Sims]

The last film was the platform.

[John Hodgman]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

The last film that she made was. Well, actually it was the. Probably not released in America. Dad's army in 2016. Okay.

[David Sims]

When is Red to Red 2?

[Griffin Newman]

Is 2013. And that is the second most recent movie she's made. She has done, of course, played Olivia de Havilland Feud. She played the cocaine godmother in some TV of.

[David Sims]

Of I. Was it not called Cocaine Godmother?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, she was in something called Prodigal.

[John Hodgman]

Is that part of the cocaine bear universe?

[David Sims]

Yeah, that was a Fox show that ran for two seasons. She of course, was on the National Treasure Disney plus show. Tying back into. Why is Disney going out of their way to make sure they never make a National Treasure 3? Why are they not fucking begging? Nicholas Cage on his hands and kneels knees.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, Nicholas Cage is in this movie too, by the way.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. He is in. And of course we have to acknowledge she played Morticia Adams in Wednesday, but just in two episodes.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Because Wednesday's mostly at camp in that show or something.

[David Sims]

We, right before this episode started, we're talking giving spicy Star wars takes that we never want to say on Mike.

[John Hodgman]

Never say on Mike.

[David Sims]

Star wars on the Internet is a writing. It's a wonderful.

[John Hodgman]

It's a wonderful trip to feedback.

[David Sims]

But it was. It was looping all the way back around to an on ramp into discussion of this movie. And I said, we need to start recording right now so we can take this energy and talk about it.

[John Hodgman]

I lost it. Sorry.

[David Sims]

You refer to it as perhaps your favorite line in all of Movies. Certainly your favorite line in this movie.

[John Hodgman]

David was talking about Yoda and he had some extremely hot takes on Yoda that I will not repeat.

[David Sims]

Yeah, stick man, speak. Yeah, walking stick.

[John Hodgman]

It's funny you mentioned Yoda because it brings us around to this movie that we're going to talk about. And one of my very favorite lines in movies. What was he wearing? Jammies. What was on his jammies? I don't know.

[David Sims]

Yoda's and Yodas and shit.

[John Hodgman]

Yodas and shit.

[Griffin Newman]

They had Yodas and shit on them.

[John Hodgman]

Shot through me like force lightning.

[David Sims]

I have talked many times in this podcast about how one of my favorite lines in the history of movies is in Superbad, where the two cops, Rogan and Hayter, are doing Star wars impressions to amuse McLovin in the backseat. And they're clearly not getting a big enough response. And Hader turns around and goes, you know, Yoda. Yoda from Attack of the Clones.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a good joke.

[David Sims]

And the specificity of.

[John Hodgman]

From Attack of the Clones.

[David Sims]

Not from Star Wars.

[John Hodgman]

No, Attack of the Clones Yoda from.

[David Sims]

Attack of the Clones gets me. And it does. I had a similar jolt to this line that I've had every time I've watched this movie. But it hit hard fresh again last night. And I was just like, is any kind of joke that sort of throws Yoda off the hump gonna get me? It's not like if there's a Yoda impression in a movie or someone does the backwards talk, right. Or they go like, your nutsack looks like Yoda. Anything like that, I'm immediately rolling your nutmobile looks like. Thank you. Yeah, but there's some. There's a commonality between those two jokes, right? Yodas and it's just.

[John Hodgman]

I mean, look, it's a perfect joke.

[Griffin Newman]

Because it's like, yes, that's where Yoda has made it that far in the pop culture to sort of be in his brain.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

But like, not like, you know, Yoda. It's almost like how like parents would call all video games Nintendo. You know, that's.

[David Sims]

Thank you. That's what the two jokes have in common. They're both people who know what Yoda is, but only kind of their understanding of what Yoda is is a little off let. Look, they assume that other people are on the exact same level as them.

[Griffin Newman]

I think my favorite line in Raising Arizona is, you know, these blow up in funny shape songs. She's like, no, unless funny.

[David Sims]

Really good.

[John Hodgman]

But let me say this. Let me take you on a trip back through Time, please. Hey, what is the name of this podcast?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, can we introduce the podcast Blank.

[David Sims]

Check with Griffin and David? I'm Griffin.

[John Hodgman]

I'm David.

[David Sims]

It's a podcast about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want as long as their seed can find purchase. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce, baby. That is my favorite line in the movie. We'll talk about that.

[John Hodgman]

There are a lot of lines.

[David Sims]

This is a miniseries on the films of Joel and Ethan Cohen, both together and separately. It is called Pod country for old casts. Probably. Probably.

[John Hodgman]

Probably.

[David Sims]

And today we're talking about Raising Arizona, undeniably their guarantor. And I found an interview quote from them in 2000, before oh brother came out, where they said, that's the last time we made a movie that actually made everyone an amount of money that they felt good about. And it is interesting to think because they've been pretty consistent since that point.

[Griffin Newman]

Normally they would make probably enough that no one's mad at them.

[David Sims]

They become, I would say, so minted after a while that even their less successful films, no one's losing money on them.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But after this movie, there is a run of like, all of their movies basically barely break even or lose a little bit of money. But everyone's kind of like, yeah, but those guys are so good that they keep giving them small budgets. And they were like, this was the last time a studio gave us money. And the return on investment worked. It's called Raising Arizona.

[John Hodgman]

Raising Arizona. Ask me, ask me if I like this movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Who's our guest?

[David Sims]

Our guest, gentleman John Hodgman of the Judge John Hodgman podcast and the brand.

[John Hodgman]

New podcast on Maximum Fund the Pluribus motto. Janet Varney and I discuss all the mottos, mammals, monsters and beverages of the states and commonwealths and districts of this country currently known as the United States.

[David Sims]

That's a good. We love Jana Varney.

[John Hodgman]

Pass.

[David Sims]

And future guest.

[John Hodgman]

Terrific.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Season two is is out now.

[David Sims]

I should also list as a credit, of course, Dicktown, still streaming on Hulu.

[John Hodgman]

For the time being, starring Griffin Newman.

[Griffin Newman]

And what about that podcast you did about I, Claudius? I'm just going to start bringing out Hodgman credits.

[John Hodgman]

There is a whole podcast that I made with Elliot Kalin about the British 1970s historical miniseries I, Claudius, I comma Claudius and looks called Ipodius.

[David Sims]

I hate to list credits that are going to hurt you that bring up open wounds, but of course, also the Author of Medallion, Status and Vacation Land, which sadly were never published in any format. Past hardback library editions only.

[John Hodgman]

I hate to jump. And large, large print, obviously.

[David Sims]

Absolutely.

[John Hodgman]

I hate to correct you, Griffin, but they're both available in paperback.

[David Sims]

If that were true, I would have.

[John Hodgman]

On a bargain table near you, I.

[David Sims]

Would have heard about it. Now I listen to so many podcasts.

[John Hodgman]

Multiple copies in a little free library, waterlogged with rain near you.

[David Sims]

John Hodgman, what were you going to say?

[John Hodgman]

Ask me if I like this movie.

[David Sims]

John Hodgman, do you like the film Raising Arizona?

[John Hodgman]

Love it so much.

[Griffin Newman]

Would be funny if you didn't like it and we were finding out right.

[John Hodgman]

Now that was all a hunter line for the movie.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

In case people didn't haven't seen this movie, you should go see it.

[David Sims]

Yeah, go see it. Run out to your local multiplexes.

[John Hodgman]

Go find a copy.

[Griffin Newman]

No, you have to run to find the copy. And the camera should kind of catapult after you in this kind of amazing way that you can't believe. Right. You wanted to take us back through time.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, I will take you back through time for a moment. First of all, I just want to take put a pin in this.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

You call this undeniably their blank check movie.

[David Sims]

I call it undeniably they're guaranteed, they're.

[Griffin Newman]

Guarantor, the movie that gets them because.

[David Sims]

This is only their second film.

[Griffin Newman]

Some creative freedom and more money.

[John Hodgman]

I think financially there is an argument to be made.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Critically I would say that their guarantor was blood simple that allowed them to make this. And after they made this, my memory at the time was that people were like, I don't know about these guys.

[David Sims]

Look, I agree with you. And the career is kind of weird in how it built. And a lot of what we keep talking about in this series is that they were given time to grow in a way that the industry is not really support anymore.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But I think it was the combination of the two of Blood simple is like heralded as these guys are major. These are careers that are going to be undeniable.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

So we got to give them space to do something and they're given the freedom to make absolutely Raising Arizona which then makes enough of a profit that even if people respond to this film and I was looking at the reviews at the time and they are so weird.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, it's. It's reviews that I think they would get maybe all the way til Fargo of like some raves, but some people being like all flash, all style, like where's that.

[David Sims]

But the thing that surprised me in how. How stated it was is this movie is so mannered, it like snuffs out any possibility of being funny.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Like rather than being like this style makes the movie funny. But the thing's frivolous. They were sort of saying like it's so overdone that like there is a void of laughter.

[John Hodgman]

Now let me say this.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

To those critics. I mean it's true. They went. They went weird fast after Blood simple and basically went.

[David Sims]

Let's do the exact opposite of what everyone loved us doing last time.

[John Hodgman]

Exactly. And what. And the people who were giving them money.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I wonder if they knew that they were basically going to try again to make Crime wave.

[David Sims]

Possibly. Possibly. I mean the great.

[John Hodgman]

I don't think they did know is my point. Like I think that they didn't understand.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

There was this element of wackadoo in the Cohen's that is not apparent in Blood simple which I believe by the way watched at 2am this morning.

[David Sims]

Hey.

[John Hodgman]

In preparation.

[David Sims]

Thank you.

[John Hodgman]

And. And in honor of my insomnia.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

But is not apparent in Blood simple and. And is wildly apparent in this movie.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And then it. It modulates between those two modes throughout their career in a way that I find absolutely compelling. But I will go back, I will say this to. To critics at the time I was there.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I lived it. 1987.

[David Sims]

Do you remember the crowd response going to see this movie? Yes. People were into it.

[John Hodgman]

Very into it now. I saw it at the Harvard Square Theater.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I'm a coastal elite. A lot of smarty pants is in the room. Charles Diggs, my high school pal, perhaps the smartiest of pants.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And I were like, what are we going to do of an evening.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Let's go see a movie. Went into Raising Arizona.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I can. I still get chills thinking about. I had no idea what I was going into that.

[David Sims]

Yeah. That was a movie I wish I could have seen in theater's opening weekend.

[Griffin Newman]

Where you're just like really like Nicholas Cage or Holly Hunter or John Goodman. Right.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

I feel like this movie doesn't really. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

William Forsyth.

[David Sims]

Well, you know, I love Williams Forsyth.

[John Hodgman]

Well, I know. Yeah. You're a big fan of the Goddess and Dead series.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And also flat top.

[John Hodgman]

Forgot about that.

[David Sims]

He was flat top.

[John Hodgman]

But like I'll just. The electricity that I felt.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

With that. Yoda's in line. Yoda's and line was very, very powerful because you talk about on this podcast movies that don't exist.

[David Sims]

Huh.

[John Hodgman]

1987. Star wars did not exist.

[David Sims]

We were talking about this. I feel like fairly recently, with Geth.

[John Hodgman]

A decade after you made the first Star wars.

[Griffin Newman]

It's the most fallow.

[David Sims]

The forgotten dead period of Star wars.

[Griffin Newman]

Where people are kind of just like scraping for.

[David Sims]

It's like the equivalent of making an old yellow record reference or whatever, where you're like, yeah, that old thing that we use a shorthand.

[John Hodgman]

And of all of the Star wars references that they might have made, Yoda's. There could have been anything. And on there.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

Boba Fett's and Skywalkers.

[David Sims]

And they knew Yoda's was the fun robots. And not just maybe.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

But even Joel and Ethan Cohen would look at lobots and go, no, let's dial it back.

[David Sims]

Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yoda's.

[David Sims]

Right. It has to be. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Making Yoda the butt of a joke in itself is really funny.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And then also I felt profoundly seen by that line.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And by. And this. I wouldn't even say that I was seen in this movie in terms of my love of this kind of storytelling because I didn't know that it created that love in me. And the only. The other moment of sheer electricity. And this is good because I'm bringing us to the beginning of the movie.

[David Sims]

Good.

[John Hodgman]

That long opening narration and then cutting.

[Griffin Newman]

To the credits.

[John Hodgman]

The yodeling and the Raising Arizona hitting the screen at 11 minutes in.

[David Sims]

It has that feeling that I felt.

[John Hodgman]

My memory is. I stood up and gave a standing ovation in that moment. But the theater truly was electric. The Harvard Square Theater.

[Griffin Newman]

Wonderful.

[John Hodgman]

I don't think it's there anymore, but it was an art house. It's also where I saw Swimming to.

[Griffin Newman]

Cambodia and The Princess Bride, late 80s classics, all it.

[David Sims]

It has the feeling of what I often only now get in the modern era from the good Mission Impossible movies where when they light the fuse, you're like, right. They haven't even done that yet. Right, right. That feeling. That Raising Arizona is going at like 8 trillion miles per hour and 11 minutes. It's like, by the way, here are the opening credits.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

You're like, oh, my God. You are like playing like you're pitching a perfect game so far. I also think.

[John Hodgman]

And can I just say this, because I'll forget it.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And 8 million miles, a trillion miles an hour describes this movie. And yet at every point in the movie, you feel like they're taking their time.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

There's nothing rushed about it.

[David Sims]

No, no.

[Griffin Newman]

It. The beginning of the movie. You are like, wow, Is this going to be like this breakneck throughout?

[David Sims]

Is it all a montage?

[Griffin Newman]

Right? Is it. Is it truly a looney Tune?

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

And then it does, you know, manage to sort of shift into a lower gear without it feeling whiplashy and that yodeling.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I mean, aside from being iconic.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

You. You did it right?

[Griffin Newman]

One year old, David.

[David Sims]

Yeah, it was good.

[John Hodgman]

I used to be able to hit those notes.

[Griffin Newman]

Iconic, like DVD menu that you're like, oh, turn it off, turn it off. Like just like on a loop.

[David Sims]

Yep. I put my disc in and was like, let me brush my teeth and then I'll like start watching it. And I just. I had to hear that yodel 8 trillion times as I got distracted to walking around yesterday. Yep.

[John Hodgman]

I didn't even have my AirPods in.

[David Sims]

You were just surrounded by Carter Burwell and his.

[John Hodgman]

No, I had a. I had a boombox on the subway.

[David Sims]

Okay, good.

[John Hodgman]

But in the moment of seeing the movie. Yes. I laughed harder than I'd ever laughed in any movie. It was genuinely funny. My Charles Diggs felt the same way. I dare say he probably does still. And I remember the audience walking out of there just on. On clouds.

[David Sims]

My. My guarantee point is more that the Holy shit, these guys are for real. Only goes so far if you've never made a return on investment. And I think that they did the two parts separately. Kind of gave them the ground and a lot of it. As. As we will continue to cover in this series is they found a couple big champions early on who were just like, we'll keep making your movies.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

The most important part of their career.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Is how closely attracts to the premise of this podcast.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And we should probably talk about like.

[David Sims]

Circle films and then working title films. They got companies where they were just. They. They kind of cracked their model of like, yeah, you guys are pros. You come in like on time, under budget, under schedule. Great actors want to work with you. Like the.

[John Hodgman]

You have great taste in actors.

[David Sims]

The risk here is low enough and it feels like one of these is going to hit and break through in some way. And when you get to Hudsucker proxy, it's Joel Silver being like. From the moment I saw Raising Arizona, it was apparent to me that these guys were going to make the crossover to being hyper mainstream, big budget comedy filmmakers. Like, he talks about making Hudsucker as if it was like they were like two steps away from their Ghostbusters and then they would continue to be Ivan Reitman, you know, And I feel like.

[John Hodgman]

Who knows whether those expectations were conveyed to them.

[David Sims]

I don't know.

[John Hodgman]

But, like, when Joel Silver comes in, he's like, I've been waiting for your big blockbuster. They're like, terrific. Here's Hudsucker Proxy.

[David Sims]

Right. Which is another example of, like, it's the crime wave element.

[John Hodgman]

Well, Hudsucker Proxy is a diff. You know, it is a crime wave spiritual sequel.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Joel and Ethan Cohen, who are. They made Blood simple without any major.

[David Sims]

Investment, of course, mostly from local dentists and doctors.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Family, friends.

[Griffin Newman]

Circle Films, however, distribute the movie as we talked about last week. And they gave the Cohens an oral commitment to produce their next picture.

[David Sims]

And the oral commitment, by the way, the way it sounded out loud, was.

[Griffin Newman]

Jim Jacks, who's been discussed on this show.

[John Hodgman]

While you're narrating, can I do a little Ode to Joy background on it?

[David Sims]

Yes. Jim Jackson, who Kevin smashed very beautifully eulogized, but was this kind of key figure who had started out as a film exhibitor and theater owner and then eventually becomes a producer, and was this guy who at universal in the 80s and 90s, kept plucking people from Sundance and being like, are you ready to make your studio film? And he is responsible for Raising Arizona. Mall Rats, Days of Confused. Several of these. You've impressed me. Here's five to $10 million to make your strike at a studio comedy.

[Griffin Newman]

They present Jim Jackson for the screenplay for Raising Arizona. He's happy to see that not only did the Cones plan to follow through on their commitment, but they wanted to sign on for even more Circle Films. Jax was kind of afraid.

[John Hodgman]

Okay, what'd you say there?

[Griffin Newman]

Can I just do the dossier, please? Jax. Jax was kind of afraid that, like, because blood was actually hot. I feel like you guys should be listening to me.

[David Sims]

We are listening.

[John Hodgman]

Listening.

[David Sims]

We're multitasking.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, we're just adding you.

[David Sims]

Checking emails.

[John Hodgman]

Layers of. Of mannered style that are distracting from the substance of the. The moment.

[David Sims]

Exactly.

[Griffin Newman]

He was worried they'd go for something bigger. Essentially, they actually had enough juice that they probably didn't need to return to Circle Films at that moment. But instead, they make a deal for four pictures. Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Miller's, Classing, Barton Fink, are the total Circle Films deal. Good.

[David Sims]

Four.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. And essentially, Jax is basically like, you can decide what you want to make, and within reason, we will fund it. Like, you know, like, it's, you know, no studio meddling whatsoever, essentially. Film was made for about $3 million, I think, and then three weeks into production. 20th Century Fox put up another $3 million.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Which I don't. You know, I guess to get the distribution rights.

[David Sims]

Could you imagine spooling the dailies for this thing?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Right. Like, if you're just seeing the raw footage, you're just like, who the fuck are these guys? And also who the fuck are Holly Hunter, Nicholas Cage? Like, we, we pour more money into this. They're onto something.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, I agree with you. Yeah.

[David Sims]

I think you watch any, like, raw footage of this.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And you're like, something interesting is happening here.

[John Hodgman]

Give them three more million dollars.

[David Sims]

Exactly.

[John Hodgman]

So people made decisions based on different things then.

[David Sims]

Very different.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

So Holly Hunters, I think because people.

[John Hodgman]

Wanted to make movies, people liked movies. People like, who made movies. Like, people who made movies didn't.

[David Sims]

Movies they took pride, in fact, in having.

[John Hodgman]

If it was their job to make a movie, they were like, yeah, let's do make that movie. Instead of finding 10 ways to not make a movie.

[David Sims]

Right.

[John Hodgman]

Sorry.

[David Sims]

And sometimes now, these days, ways to unmake a movie that has been made and instead becomes a write off.

[Griffin Newman]

Holly Hunter, of course, is an old pal of the Coen brothers and former.

[David Sims]

Roommate of Franny McDormand.

[Griffin Newman]

And they had tried to cast her in Blood simple. And we talked about that, but she basically is always on their radar for this movie. And their other big thing is just, we want to do something that's completely different from Blood Simple. We do not want something tense, we want something funny. We want a quicker rhythm and we want Holly Hunter to be in it.

[David Sims]

All great instincts.

[Griffin Newman]

They wrote the specific image of Holly in uniform hurling orders at prisoners. That was like, whatever. That's their germ of an idea of a role.

[John Hodgman]

Turn to the right.

[Griffin Newman]

Yep.

[David Sims]

But that's immediately identifying a, like, Holly Hunter can be the smallest, most like, chipmunk voiced woman in a room and yet command that level of authority and you can mine comedy out of that is like a very, very smart thing for them to locate before anyone else has captured that on film.

[Griffin Newman]

Now they are sort of getting, I guess already pretty much starting with Blood Simple. The question that I feel like they get throughout their career, which is like, are you making fun of these people or not? Right. Like the sort of like, you know, you're making these movies about like downtrodden folk or poor folk or criminals or. Right. You know, like people on the fringes or then once you get to Fargo, like honest Minnesotans or, you know, and.

[David Sims]

It'S like, are you guys elitist bullies?

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And obviously I think Raising Arizona is one of their most like, plainly open hearted and sympathetic films. And it's like, it's all right here.

[David Sims]

Look, we've recorded a lot of the episodes in this series already. Is a recurring thing that we go back to of like the strongest sort of like ideological vein you can find across all of their films is the belief in like individual people. Right, right, right. A massive distrust of. Of systems.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

But like that a good person is kind of the most valuable thing on the planet.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. They value decency.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Like for as much critique and shit eating that they were. I don't think they ever ate the shit. But they were offered shit to eat for being arch, for being set satirical, which they never were. Right.

[David Sims]

And for being mannered and reserved, stylized.

[John Hodgman]

And these were their action figures they were playing with. Not real people. In fact, they're profoundly real people. And they are all treated with incredible sympathy.

[Griffin Newman]

The Cohens. A lot of interesting quotes that JJ's dug up here from interviews over the years. This is from Joel. People have a problem dealing with the fact that our movies are not straight ahead. They prefer the Raising Arizona, which is just about a couple schmoes and a trailer for Cohen of a kid. The arrival of Bounty Hunter from Hell interrupts the comfort level people have with their world. But we feel a strong emotional connection to these characters. We're not laughing down at them. And this is also from Joel where he's like, you have a scene in a movie where someone gets shot and the squib goes off and blood runs down. You get a reaction. It's movie fodder. In a different way. A baby's face is movie fodder 2. Right. You know what I mean? Like, they don't start with it's a baby getting kidnapped, but they start with it's a couple. There's a circumstance. You know what I mean? And then they're like, well, baby, that will get blood running. Right.

[John Hodgman]

It'll make people blood simple.

[Griffin Newman]

That's true. And they did think about that at all times. But I feel like.

[John Hodgman]

And there's some incredible baby face acting in this movie.

[Griffin Newman]

That's what I'm saying. Like the image of a car stopping short and almost hitting a baby is so like, it makes your. The whole body sit up.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, like.

[David Sims]

But also the image of the baby pulling its own hood down. Like, I don't want to see. This is just like on an animal level. One of the funniest things you could possibly.

[John Hodgman]

Absolutely.

[Griffin Newman]

What if a baby had a day.

[David Sims]

Out well, the hijinks that would ensue, the chaos that went.

[Griffin Newman]

And I'm not saying a day out like at a nursery. I'm saying like.

[David Sims]

No, no, the Big Apple. Like a Big Apple.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But certainly he stays ground level. And I don't mean to crawl his way up to the, the tallest steel beams, would he?

[Griffin Newman]

That was a movie that as a kid, I was like, this is one of the eight or nine most important films ever played.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

What is the country? Is it Malaysia? There is one country where Baby Stay Out. It's like still the highest grossing film of all time.

[Griffin Newman]

And it's because it's universally like, everyone's like, can get that the baby had a day.

[David Sims]

But in one country it has a disproportionate reputation.

[Griffin Newman]

It is. It just says it's a popular film in South Asia.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

And it was remade several times in different, like, South Asian countries. But I'm not seeing the specific thing you're talking about.

[David Sims]

There's one country. I'll figure it out at some point. I do just want to call out at the time of this film, Ethan Cohen. I'm sorry. Joel Cohen, engaged to Mary Frances McDormand. I believe they get married the year this film is released. But obviously in the time between Blood simple and this, their love has flourished. In 1995, they adopt a child.

[John Hodgman]

Oh.

[Griffin Newman]

Sorry.

[David Sims]

And we were talking with the great Ray Centurion Jordan Fish last week. Guess on. On our previous episode. Yes. About this whole feeling of like, oh, are the Cohen's like, dispassionate? Are they elusive? Are they making these movies at arm's length, aloof even? Joel has this like, first marriage that is rarely talked about, that falls apart before they write Blood Simple. Right. Which is all about being stuck in bad marriages.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And obviously that situation did not heighten to murder attempts. But there's something there that feels like an extrapolation of an energy, of an internal struggle. Right. In the same way where it's just like he's marrying the woman he's going to be with to our present day.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And. And seven years, eight years after the release of this film, they adopt a child. Yes. There is something in the mix of this movie that is clearly, if not autobiographical, is at least like touching on clearly conversations, feelings of the future.

[John Hodgman]

But here's the thing that makes that, that story makes me think about, even to this day, we, among the people who love the Cohen's a lot.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

If not the most, are still sort of making arguments that like, you know, they're human beings. Yeah, I think.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. And kind of being like, I think this is what's going on with them. You know, not like, oh, they've talked about how this is what this was raised.

[David Sims]

Point of. Just like you can like draw analogs to even the limited information we know about their lives. Right. There's still a lot of extrapolation there in the middle.

[John Hodgman]

They're not particularly secretive about their lives.

[David Sims]

No. But they're also not overly candid.

[John Hodgman]

But I mean, sure, because they're. And they are literal human beings.

[David Sims]

Smart. Who have emotions to not overshare shit.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. And. But you know, and yet I think that one of the reasons that this movie and some of their other movies were that they were that they were held at arm's length even to this day, because people felt like they were being held at arm's length by them.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And that their virtuosity as writer, director, producer, editors, the absolutely innovative way that they approach story structurally and then visually as well, their ability to get these incredible actors and to spot them before other people have spotted them. It's all very intimidating.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And I think that. And they are very stylized and they are very mannered. And so I feel like we're still making this argument like, well, you know, Joel Cohen and Francis McDormand. I mean, they have human souls.

[David Sims]

I mean, not to be, not to be base about this, but there is a degree to which they feel like space aliens where like these two funky looking guys who kind of stand stoic.

[John Hodgman]

And the work is not one to one representation of what's going on with them emotionally. It's being transformed and iterated. Correct. And changed. And I, I interrupted you and I apologize.

[David Sims]

No, no, no. But I think it makes people assume and also what you're saying, like that they were so virtuosic from the beginning where it was like, where do these guys fucking learn how to do all of this perfectly right out of the gate. And even the way that people talk about them directing, you know, the thing that all their collaborators talk about, the actors who work with them for the first time are like, they really are the two headed director. It is bizarre where one guy will come up and give you a note and walk away and the second guy will come up from a different room and finish the sentence.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

You know, and even that is like, what is this weird communication between them between, you know, the fucking universe or whatever that I think makes people feel like, are there movies like them studying mankind from a remove? Right. Are they looking at us through a telescope in space and then sort of like pulling levers.

[John Hodgman]

Well, I mean, one of the reasons it really resonated.

[David Sims]

David hates when we analyze movies on this podcast. His two least favorite things are analyzing movies and talking about the career arcs of directors. And I will say recently we've been button up against this as a little bit of an issue. Ben, what's up, Griff? For some people, yes, summer is the season of doing things and enjoyment. People like activities, they like going out, they like exploring, they like having fun. Not me. Here's my summer strategy. Crank up that ac, turn the lights off, do nothing.

[Ben Hosley]

Sure, but you go see movies.

[David Sims]

I do in dark rooms with ac.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

I leave my apartment to go to a different dark seat.

[Ben Hosley]

So you're. At least you're still out and about.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Ben Hosley]

It's just, you know, you're, you're, you're leaving the subway, you're rushing to the movie theater.

[David Sims]

I think for some people who get ambitious during the summer, our sponsor, today's episode, our friends at hellofresh would incentivize. You don't have time to cook a big complicated dinner because you're too busy going to the beach and playing volleyball or going to your summer music festivals or whatever it is. But the same thing applies to me. I don't want to get out of bed. I'm trying to enjoy that AC vertical. So if I'm cooking a meal, I'd like to get it over with fast so I can get back in to the cold bed.

[Ben Hosley]

This makes a lot of sense. I mean, that's the great thing about hellofresh. They just all the ingredients arrive at.

[David Sims]

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[Ben Hosley]

The only thing with Sando's, it's not a word I'm a fan of.

[David Sims]

Well, listen. As well as over 100 other seasonal snacks, sides and treats, many of which don't use the word Sando.

[Ben Hosley]

Here's one. Chicken pita pockets with spicy mayo. I made that. That was delicious. 25 minutes easy.

[David Sims]

Well, but I'm really lazy, Ben, and I hate the heat. I don't want to turn that oven on. I need something even faster. And this summer, hello Fresh has made it even easier to enjoy delicious, healthy and homemade quality meals with their new ready made meals. This is more my speed. These heat and go hello Fresh meals are chef crafted, flavorful dishes ready in just three minutes. So you can dig in and go do summer. Right? Which for me is getting under those covers, cranking the AC all the way down to 20 degrees.

[Ben Hosley]

Oh, my God.

[David Sims]

Ben, how's your mouth right now? How's it feeling?

[Ben Hosley]

I mean, I'm kind of salivating.

[David Sims]

It's already watering.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Why? What are you looking at?

[Ben Hosley]

I'm excited to make citrus pork tacos with pickled onion and a southwest crema. I've never made crema before.

[David Sims]

Look, this is the point. They got flexibility, okay? You can choose from 60 recipes every week, including prep and bake ready made meals, some that are more of an activity and plus over 100 market items to add on to breakfast, lunch, and more. Every hello Fresh meal uses high quality ingredients, including seasonal fresh produce proteins that travel from the farm to your doorstep and are simple with easy to follow recipe cards or simple heat them and eat them options.

[Ben Hosley]

And here's the thing. I feel like they've never included in their copy, but I'm just going to say it is that you make these recipes and then you're like, I like this dish. And then it just becomes a go to dish for you to make anytime you want to impress a guest or just like have something that is your go to comfort dish.

[David Sims]

Yeah, that's. That's great, Ben. And that should be part of their copy. Listen, make your summer enjoyable and delicious by signing up for [e-mail]. check 10fm. Why 10fm? Because you get 10 free meals.

[Ben Hosley]

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[David Sims]

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[John Hodgman]

I was thinking about delayed opening credits. Yeah, the legacy of delayed opening credits. A lot.

[David Sims]

I hope you're going to make the point. I hope you're going to make.

[John Hodgman]

Well, first of all, obviously this podcast would not exist were it not for raising Arizona and the delayed opening credits habit.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

But you're wearing a hat, Jon.

[David Sims]

Thank you. I was teeing this up and I.

[John Hodgman]

Got sidetracked Listener at home or in the car or wherever you are. And the D van where you recreate. Can't see the Griffin is wearing a very specific hat.

[David Sims]

A very specific hat. I wasn't sure if he thought on.

[John Hodgman]

Perhaps the one year anniversary or close to it, just about. Of us going to the movies together to see a movie called Hundreds of Beavers.

[David Sims]

You and I have an ecstatic in theater experience. A film I talked about a lot last year and in our blankies awards this year.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

But a similar. Like where the fuck did this come from? Who are these people? But that is a movie that takes, I believe, one full hour to get to the credits. I saw that film twice in theaters and both times the audience applauds because the magic trick of like, oh fuck, I somehow I hadn't even gotten to.

[John Hodgman]

The opening credits yet.

[David Sims]

You hadn't done that yet?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Yeah. It's a great feeling. And that's. That's a movie that's similar to what I imagine seeing Raising Arizona in theaters felt like.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And Edgar Wright talks about this as like the most important movie of his life. And you think feel the influence of it so much on all of his work.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

That he sees this and goes, you can make movies like this.

[John Hodgman]

That's how I felt. And I never made a movie, by the way. But I know from seeing the movie you can make movies like this if you aren't lazy and tired like me. But I mean like you can do whatever you want.

[David Sims]

I had never considered the possibility until this moment that movies could be made this way.

[John Hodgman]

And even though Star wars didn't exist at that time, we were already, I think, in the beginning of the stranglehold of the hero's journey on screenplay writing. Both popular and artistic. And here was a movie that was destabilizing precisely because doesn't follow a pattern that you understand. You're getting a whole pre story before you get to the credits. Then it changes tone or it slows down. It has these wild comedic sequences that are basically Looney Tunes.

[David Sims]

Your heroes of the film are ostensibly doing a pretty awful thing.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

For very emotionally valid reasons.

[John Hodgman]

And then Randall Tex Cobb drives a motorcycle from hell into it. And you know, I remember people critiquing it then and revisiting these critiques. It's like, well, now I don't know if this is even real.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Like, of course it's not real. It's a movie.

[David Sims]

Saw this in so many reviews at the time. Well, I don't even know what reality this film takes place In I don't.

[John Hodgman]

Know if this is a fantasy or what does magic.

[David Sims]

Serious. Yeah. Well, David, how was your P?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Exactly.

[Griffin Newman]

Flannery o' Connor and William Faulkner are influences on them. They say they specifically took the phrase Warthog from hell from Flannery o', Connor.

[David Sims]

Preston Sturgis, and then Pumbaa took it from them.

[Griffin Newman]

Preston Sturgis is obviously an influence on them. As they say. Palm beach story in particular. The manic energy of that film. A masterpiece in every single way.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

And you guys might not have realized this, but because you haven't mentioned it all. Neither have I. Cartoons, cartoons. Ethan Cohen says, we thought about characters who rebound and collide. Simply their speed of movement. We tried to refine the spirit of animation you find in pinball machines.

[David Sims]

He's got the Woody Woodpecker tattoo. The hairstyle is a very deliberate Woody Woodpecker homage. Cage was very, very disciplined, focused, intense about the idea that his hair had to match the relationship to the character's energy in the scene. That there's a direct correlation between hair height and. Right. How. How cartoonish he becomes.

[John Hodgman]

And yet, I mean, like, even though he identifies as the outlaw. Right. And he's like, isn't my son a little outlaw and I'm a little outlaw and everything else, he doesn't have it in him to be a Bugs Bunny or a Woody Woodpecker. No. He's too nice.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

He's too decent, ultimately.

[David Sims]

Well, they don't.

[John Hodgman]

You can't say, am I a stinker?

[David Sims]

It's funny.

[John Hodgman]

Aren't I a stinker?

[David Sims]

I feel like when they talk about this movie now, both the Cohens and Cage.

[John Hodgman]

I'm talking about the characters. Yeah. It's not Cage. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[David Sims]

I feel like they. They talk about Wile E. Coyote. Right?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And Wiley Coyote is in pursuit of a thing.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

That much like them wanting to steal the baby. You're like, isn't this gonna harm other people when you do this? And yet the pursuit seems so pure and not malicious.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And driven by these, like, unquenchable human needs. And also, they're just constantly getting with, like. Even though Wile E. Coyote is the aggressor, he is the pitiful, empathetic character. Because you're just like, this guy's getting it from all directions. And also, much like Cage, there's just some kind of inherent sadness baked into the design of this character. The saddest eyes in cinema.

[John Hodgman]

That's right. I was just gonna say they really made a lot of those eyes. And then found the sadness.

[David Sims]

What if Wile E. Coyote, who is silent, instead has the inner monologue of fucking Flannery o'? Connor? That is the brilliant characterization of this movie is like, this guy's got, like, a poet's soul.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. And, you know, I. David, to your. As you were saying, like, people are like, well, how did they learn to do this? I don't know. They read books and saw movies.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And interpreted.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Well, no, but you're like that. You know, this is inspired by Preston Sturgis, is inspired by Flannery o'. Connor.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, I think the Coen brothers have the juice. I'm gonna say it. This is their first film with Donna Isaacson, who is an early casting director that they work with. Works with them on the next three films, too. Also worked with Danny Boyle later on.

[David Sims]

She made some quite good discoveries in the casting of this film.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, really? I didn't notice anyone in this movie that really had an enduring career. That's interesting. Donna Isaacson. This is a great quote from her. I will say anytime I talk to a casting director, pretty much the greatest people on earth to talk to. If you care about movies in a certain way. The thing about the Coen brothers is they embrace a concept and a place in a world, and they're completely faithful to that world. If you don't hear the music of the script, you're not right for it. You have to hear it.

[David Sims]

That's dead on.

[Griffin Newman]

Nicolas Cage quickly takes the film's story in tone, not shockingly, like, truly not like, you know, really like, he. He heard it. He. He says he understood where the humor was. What beats musically to hit. Other people considered Willem Dafoe interesting right off of, like, Platoon, essentially. Would have been too dark, probably you.

[John Hodgman]

Think.

[David Sims]

Would have been a little too scary.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, even Willem in whimsy mode usually does have a hint of malevolence.

[David Sims]

Willem holding a baby, Your immediate thought is, is he gonna eat that baby?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. I mean, it's like.

[David Sims]

And it doesn't matter the context the movie has built around the character.

[John Hodgman]

It's like, instead of. Instead of casting someone with the saddest eyes in cinema, what if we had hi McDonough have retractable jaws like Alien.

[David Sims]

The meanest teeth in cinema.

[Griffin Newman]

Kevin Costner and Nicolas Cage had the same agent at the time, Discovery from JJ Of William Morris. And the agent was like, both of my guys are too big for this movie. Like, essentially, both of my guys are hitting right now. They're about to be big stars. They don't need to be doing a tiny movie.

[David Sims]

And they certainly don't want to audition for it.

[Griffin Newman]

Exactly.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Kevin Cage, essentially a junior agent, convinces Lamana to let Cage meet the Cohen, but not read.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And I guess it's a status thing. Yeah. It's so annoying. I guess that was sort of enough for the Cohen. But then Costner is so determined, he agrees to read without telling his agent. He, like, surreptitiously reads.

[David Sims]

Costner really wants this, which is fascinating.

[Griffin Newman]

Read opposite Holly Hunter. Then Cage hears about this. So Cage is like, fine, I'll re. You know, like, they start to fight for it and Cage gets the role. Obviously, a perfect. Like, Cage must have this.

[David Sims]

Oh, absolutely.

[John Hodgman]

I don't.

[Griffin Newman]

Costner getting this role. His entire career is probably different. He might be okay. I don't know.

[David Sims]

When we did our Costner series, we talked about the Silverado thing. Right. And how much he loved playing that kind of rapscallion character. And basically right after that, he is pushed, not against his will, but they're like, congratulations, you are the grand oak tree of America.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. You're the new Gary Cooper.

[David Sims]

Right, Right. And I. I think that he was still in this point where he's like, can I play the fun, dangerous guys?

[John Hodgman]

Woody Woodpecker.

[David Sims]

Yes. Now, I think Costner would have been. I don't want to say too sincere, but I think it's the thing that Cage gets his whole.

[John Hodgman]

He would be too grounded.

[David Sims]

Yes. And the expression. I think Costner can be funny and I think he can be big, but he's best at sort of understated, you know, kind of off the shoulder kind of stuff.

[John Hodgman]

Look, Bull Durham.

[David Sims]

He's phenomenal.

[John Hodgman]

Okay, here's a. Here's a movie where obviously he plays a different kind of. Like, he's not a rap scout. Well, he is a rapscallion.

[David Sims]

He is.

[John Hodgman]

He's a rapscallion. A movie full of verbal dexterity. Like this movie.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Like lines that are big meals.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And. And also featuring Nathan Arizona is in that movie, too.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

Before he died at the age of 40.

[David Sims]

Incredible. That is the hardest 40 that anyone has ever lived to.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. But, you know, he.

[Griffin Newman]

Trey Wilson is the.

[John Hodgman]

Bull Durham is a girl. Even though it's. It's a wackadoo film with some. Some real funny parts to it. It's not a cartoon fantasy.

[David Sims]

It's also built around Costner stoic magnetism, which this movie needs to be fucking propulsive. And I also think for how much Cage has been on the record Talking about his theories and his principles on acting. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And how he thinks that acting can be impressionistic. Right, right.

[Griffin Newman]

And that is his approach.

[David Sims]

He thinks about, rather than just like embodying a character in the reality, honestly, that he's like, I'm. I'm a piece of equipment. I'm part of visual storytelling. It doesn't need to reflect reality. It needs to reflect a feeling or an idea.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And I think that's the part of him that reads the script and not only gets the language of it, but understands visually what he needs to be in the movie.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And how to manipulate his body and do things.

[John Hodgman]

There's a physical rubberiness because he matches the Looney Tunes.

[David Sims]

He's like, what I'm doing in relation to these fucking wide angle lenses is a big part of it. Rather than like, what is my motivation? My motivation is I know what the shock should look like right now.

[Griffin Newman]

The Cohens, as you guys may or may not know, are not the kind of guys who are like, yeah, do whatever you want. They are like, read the lines. We have a pretty autocratic, you know, sense of this.

[David Sims]

Never work with Cage again. No. And it's not like I don't think.

[Griffin Newman]

They did not get along basically, at all. They kind of talk about it in this way of everyone's like, happy now.

[David Sims]

Cage talks about it the same way where he's like, you know, they have that meeting. They're like, hell, yeah, this guy gets it. And then in classic Cage fashion, he shows up to set every day and it's like, here's 10 new ideas they had. And they're like, right, and what we want you to do is what we wrote, and here are the storyboards. And he's like, but what if I did that upside down? And they're like, right, and what we wrote and the storyboards are what you should be doing. And they've talked a lot about, you know, they start out with $3 million, they end up with $6 million. Whatever. The way they make this movie look this big and this great and this tight on that budget is they were just, like, obsessive, meticulous planning, which is.

[Griffin Newman]

Their story of their success, like, going forward.

[David Sims]

And as things go on, they're like, we build a perfect plan, and then we're still open to things changing on the day if a better idea comes along. But at this early point, and with them getting such a big shot at, like, the studio big leagues, they're like, we've nailed this down. And the only way this movie is going to work is if we stick to our plan. And Cage coming in and being like, what about this dreadlock wig? I think they were just like, nick, stand there.

[John Hodgman]

Have you ever seen the movie Trading Places? I'd like to because I. Dan Aykroyd on the Amtrak train.

[David Sims]

The frustrating part of it must have been to them that they're like, this guy gets it. We had the meeting. He's locked in. We're not having to trick him into this performance. We're just like, stop throwing out other stuff on top of this.

[John Hodgman]

People look. It's really hard when someone says, I know better than you.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

And it's especially hard when they do. Like, everyone hates to know it all. Especially when they know pretty much all.

[Griffin Newman]

Cage is the one who puts the Woody Woodpecker tattoo on because he's like, I think my character's Woody Woodpecker come to life.

[David Sims]

And you need the audience to understand, like, the movie's telling you how to watch it. The guy's a cartoon character.

[Griffin Newman]

The Cohens probably tolerated that because they're like, if it's just going on your body and you're not going to. If you're going to say the lines as we wrote them, okay.

[David Sims]

But they also repurpose into something that then thematically matters at the end of.

[Griffin Newman]

The movie when he tears. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cage used to make little movies called Super 8. Well, on Super 8 cameras. And so did the Cohen when they were, you know, they had. And so Cage said they had this thing called a Super 8 feeling. He. They would talk about together.

[David Sims]

Interesting.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, when they were doing something that they both were excited by, the Cohen and Cage on this movie, they would say, I were getting that Super 8.

[David Sims]

Feeling that's so linked.

[Griffin Newman]

So that's nice.

[David Sims]

To the, like, Raimi Brothers Campbell. I mean, I want to circle back to this, but there is like such a continuum, even just within the history of this show of, like, Road Warrior, Evil Dead and this movie, you know, or even you could say Road Warrior, Evil Dead 2 in this movie. All feel like a thing that was happening through connection, right? Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

The one time they claimed that they maybe were going to work together again is this movie called 62 Skidoo, which was kind of like a hippie surfer movie the Cohens would talk about sometime that they would be like, we'd like. It's like a Cold War comedy with. About amnesia. And it's like a funny Manchurian Candidate. And we want Cage to do that. So they never were like, we'd absolutely. This is in the 2000s that they're talking about this. I mean, they have the respect for.

[David Sims]

Cage, especially when the guy becomes like a fucking $20 million movie star with an osc.

[Griffin Newman]

Right, right. But it never came together. And obviously K's career kind of sputters out in the mid 2000s.

[David Sims]

We'll talk about this reviving.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

2010 is really late. Late 2000s is when it really hits a wall. But.

[John Hodgman]

Well, he really hated bees.

[David Sims]

He hated them.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. That was probably the problem. Had to work with bees.

[David Sims]

We'll talk about this in many weeks from now. But Lady Killers was originally set up as a Nicholas Cage vehicle directed by Barry Sonnenfeld. And it is when Cage. I forget what movie he ends up doing instead of that drops out that Sonnenfeld walks away and goes, I should ask my buddies, the Cohens if they want to do this.

[John Hodgman]

I've never seen that movie.

[David Sims]

I like it.

[Griffin Newman]

Holly Hunter calls it a very self conscious movie. She's not wrong, but not in a negative way. She says Joel and Ethan function without their egos. Or maybe their egos are so big they're completely secure with anyone who disagrees with them. Either way.

[David Sims]

Sure.

[Griffin Newman]

Frances McDormand's take is, I can't imagine Joel ever making a movie that would. Was actor oriented. Like a Sophie's Choice where you set up the camera and two actors work together. He sets up the mood. He talks about rhythm. Like I. Yeah, she means that. I think she's talking about her husband.

[John Hodgman]

Of course.

[David Sims]

She loves him and she's worked with him many, many times.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. But she means that. And it's sort of like that's what he does. Right. Like, you know, if you want this experience, you're not going to get it at the Coen Brothers.

[John Hodgman]

Well, they're. They're animators in a way. You know, we talk about this as a cartoon. They think of. They're creating a visual and emotional landscape that has timing and performances that they.

[David Sims]

Have previs similar to Wes Anderson where it's not like, hey, actors, what are you thinking? Let's do a blocking rehearsal. And based on what you do, I will adjust and figure out how to film this. They're like, here's my movie. And if I hired you because I trust you.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And I know you're gonna figure out how to bring humanity to this, but that's your job.

[John Hodgman]

Speaking of that.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

The, the big jolt of electricity that I had rewatching. I've seen this movie many times.

[David Sims]

Sure.

[John Hodgman]

And it is a movie that One of the. My wife is a holy meaning in her. Right. And I both love movies. We share a lot of taste, humble bread. But she doesn't like to watch movies a lot. Sure. Because they take time.

[David Sims]

You love watching them. You will text us once a week and go, guys, if I have three free hours, what should I see this afternoon?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Or what should I rent?

[John Hodgman]

And, you know, like, it's just one of those things where it's like, do you want to watch something? I don't care. Put anything on in the background. But there are a couple of movies where if I put it on, she'll tune right in. She's like, I think I've seen this movie 12 times and I'll watch it another 12. It's.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, it's an easy, easy, easy. Yeah, yeah. Like, right. You don't put this on and go like, oh, I'm so exhausted by race.

[David Sims]

I had a long day yesterday. I got home late, invigorating, and I was just like, I'm thrilled to spool this movie up at 11:30pm but the.

[John Hodgman]

Jolt of electricity that. That hit me.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

This time watching was, oh, this is Wes Anderson before Wes Anderson.

[David Sims]

Yeah, yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And I had never thought of that, but I'm sure this is very obvious to everybody, but this is a decade before Russia.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And it's very clear. I mean, I. Wes Anderson has his own set of influences, his own set of preoccupations. Obviously, I don't want to take any agency away from Wes Anderson, but it's like there is a d. A shared DNA, obviously.

[David Sims]

Yes. And I. I think the same to Shaun of the Dead. There is like. Right. A generation of guys who are coming up, like, 10 years after who see this movie and it blows their mind, sits with them. And especially making a comedy that is this visual.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

I mean, that's the way Edgar Wright describes is seeing it and going, like, if you can make a comedy look like this, then why aren't all comedies like this? And then he said the first time he directed something, he was like, oh, I get why they're not all like this now. It's impossible. And it requires you being a genius with the best collaborators in the world.

[John Hodgman]

And it also goes against. I mean, it is a completely different kind of comedy that was certainly now and certainly then as well. There is no. We're talking about it where there's no improvisation.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

There's no, like, yeah, let's just take a fun. A fun run at this one.

[David Sims]

This movie does not have many conventional jokes. Even in a way that later coon.

[Griffin Newman]

Line that's kind of a conventional is joke. But yeah. It's not a setup punchline kind of movie.

[John Hodgman]

It's a joke in the sense that it's a silly thing that's sad.

[David Sims]

It's moments that. That aren't like about buildup payoff, which so much of comedy is. You know, I wish I knew something about it. Joined the club.

[John Hodgman]

Only build up, but I someday pay off.

[David Sims]

I think there is something. We've. We've been talking around this a little bit, right?

[John Hodgman]

Okay, here we go.

[David Sims]

But that this is sort of like the first generation of filmmakers who grew up on Looney Tunes and such where impacting their work, right? There are people who are working simultaneously and people like Frank Tashlin, who started out as a Looney Tunes director and then became a live action director, who then works with Jerry Lewis, which then affects Jerry Lewis's directing style when he starts making stuff. Which of course then radicalizes the French. Like bleeds out in all this way.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But here's like the first generation of directors who grew up watching this stuff. And there's the bizarre visual language of like manic 40s, 50s, 60s theatrical short cartoons baked into their brains.

[John Hodgman]

Right?

[David Sims]

Now those things could do anything because they used a fucking pencil, right? And you could draw anything you imagined. But traditional animation was very limited in terms of camera movement. It was almost impossible to do. Disney created the multiplane camera, which was to be able to replicate the idea of camera movement within animation. But it's mostly used for establishing shots. Wasn't really used for action or dialogue scenes or anything that was really moving the plot forward. It feels like there are these three movies like George Miller with Mad Max, Sam Raimi with Evil Dead and Blood simple with the Coens that are all them trying to infuse a little bit of that sensibility into something that's a little more dramatic. And then on the second movies, they all with the confidence under their wings heighten and go like, I'm gonna try to make a live action cartoon. I wanna capture the way those Looney Tunes feel. And the big key to all three of them. And they talk about how influential Road Warrior was on them. And obviously watching Raimi do this stuff as their friend and working him and seeing how it could be done. And this movie has so much road in it.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, Road War. Yeah, both and. And Raimi too, obviously.

[David Sims]

But I think there's something to all three of these director director teams cracking the code on how do you use the Camera, the thing that animation can't do to convey the energy of what animation can do in character. Right. And in reality. And like those three movies unlock something in terms of like this is how you can use the camera to make you feel action in a way that no one has before, Horror in a way that no one has before, comedy in a way that no one has before. The magic of those movies is all three of them have elements of the other bleeding into them.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But you just watch this and you're like, some of the funniest jokes in this movie are just that this is shot that way and they know that it's not by accident. And a lot of that is Sonnenfeld, who like you look at the early part of his career, one of the few guys to have any level of actual high level success jumping from DP to director. And the movies, at least the first five or six that are so good that he directed and didn't shoot, you can see in execution everything. He kind of like the code he cracked with the Cohens of what's the funniest lens, what's the funniest place to put a camera in relation to an actor? What's the funniest camera? Movement.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And I think his innate sense of humor really helped them in that way understand how to translate that into a language.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, for sure.

[David Sims]

That's my spiel.

[John Hodgman]

Put the camera under the bed. Put the camera under the crib.

[David Sims]

Funny.

[John Hodgman]

Have a baby crawling towards the lens. Yeah, it's Baby Herman before Baby Herman. Or around the same time actually at the.

[David Sims]

Yeah, right. Baby Herman's the following year. 80s were big for babies.

[John Hodgman]

And then, and then the, and then have, and then put the camera under the car and have Nicolas Cage crawl towards it like a baby. Like a baby. And be pulled back by his awful evil doppelganger.

[David Sims]

Good.

[Griffin Newman]

John Goodman.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, John Goodman. I'm gonna say this. He's a good. Not just a good man, a good actor.

[David Sims]

John Greatman, great actor.

[John Hodgman]

Okay, but I'll hear your argument.

[Griffin Newman]

Obviously he's in, you know, he's got small roles in movies. Revenge 83, like Revenge of the Nerds, whatever. But True Stories, which is the year before, which is a great, great movie, obviously somewhat undersung at the time.

[David Sims]

I feel like astounding in that.

[John Hodgman]

And it's wonderful at all. It's, it's sung with, with the lyrics of Meow Meow. Because John Goodman did that in True Stories when he's trying to remember a song, he goes, meow meow. Meow, meow. And I've ne. That was another great moment in my life when I saw that happen.

[Griffin Newman]

So True Stories is the year before Raising Arizona. But the Cohens are very definitive. Like, we chose him before True Stories was shot. Like, they are basically like we truly discovered John Goodman. He came to fuck you.

[John Hodgman]

David Byrne.

[David Sims]

Parallel thinking.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. He came to our set. And it is funny because. Right. True Stories is Texas and this is Arizona, but both kind of tales of like lonely souls on the prairie. You know what I mean? They do have somewhat similar energies. Even though True Stories is much less cartoony, I guess. More emo. Yeah.

[David Sims]

Although it can be cartoony in a lot of ways. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

True Stories is like based on a bunch of National Enquirer articles. I believe was sort of the. Yeah.

[David Sims]

And sort of the idea of those types of articles as much as actual articles.

[John Hodgman]

But they both sat in a very established sort of cultural moment of kitschy Southwestern Americana, which in infected a lot of music and visuals and film. At the time we were talking about this. A fancy smarty pants hipster.

[David Sims]

Oh, very smart.

[John Hodgman]

Like, it was fun to exoticize for. For big city folk to exoticize the American Southwest in particular. And while it is not, in my opinion, offensive, they are doing an invented dialect that does not exist.

[David Sims]

Yes. It's not.

[John Hodgman]

It is a. It is a kind of funny exoticization.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Of a kind. It's a. It's a character. It's a cartoon. They're cartoon characters.

[David Sims]

And I even think I could. I don't know why people being like, this movie is making fun of the H I McDonough by saying, why is this idiot having these sort of like faux literary profound thoughts? Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, that.

[David Sims]

It's like a punching down of like, wouldn't it be funny if this dumb.

[John Hodgman]

Yokel has this incredibly. But I think it's the opposite way of speaking.

[David Sims]

The beauty of this guy having all this Rocky.

[John Hodgman]

A barren place where my seed could find no purchase.

[David Sims]

Right. They're like, it is. It is an active.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Because rural people can't be smart at all. Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

They're just dumbass. The implication is they're making comedy out of how unlikely that is. Whereas I think their thing is imagine a guy like this who no one takes seriously. And what if there's like a universe of emotion and thought inside of him?

[Griffin Newman]

I feel like moonstruck this and Wild at heart. I know. He's also got like Vampires Kiss and Valley Girl. He's got other iconic movies of this year, but those three, which 87 87, 90.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

He's doing the same thing in all three where he's like, yeah, he's kind of got the gift of the gab in this weird supernatural way about him. Right. He seems like salt of the earth or diamond in the rough or something, but then he'll, he'll monologue in this romantic, sincere way that you can't believe it's coming out of this wackado's mouth.

[David Sims]

The waters run deep. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's so good.

[Griffin Newman]

He is so good.

[David Sims]

Here's a good. One thing I want to say before we talk about Cage a little more. We were doing prep for the King Ralph show and you made a point that has stuck with me as we've been talking about Goodman for months now.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

A year of Goodman for us.

[John Hodgman]

A year of Goodman.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

That he so seamlessly, quietly, in such an unshowy way adjusts his dialect around wherever he's playing.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, yeah.

[David Sims]

That you always kind of when watching any movie go like, right, I guess Trumpman is from Arizona.

[Griffin Newman]

Right, right, right.

[David Sims]

Where you're like, like he, for a guy you don't think of as being like, oh, he's like an accent guy. He's a guy who transforms. He does voices or whatever. He just like very, very subtly but accurately off the cuff adjusts to wherever the character he's playing is from.

[Griffin Newman]

Missourin, of course, in by birth or whatever, but it can be from anywhere.

[David Sims]

You buy, you buy him in the bayou, you buy him in the Midwest. You buy him as a city guy, you know, a tough talker.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah. You, you, you, you buy him when he's eating fried chicken with you in a open field and he's about to.

[David Sims]

Beat you up, smacks you with a big old branch.

[Griffin Newman]

What if he wanted to tell you to go yourself, but kind of with like, you know, like adding in a little pun?

[David Sims]

I think he would need to cross reference with a kind of brash old school New York old school. They'd have to build a room together, batting ideas back and forth and then they.

[John Hodgman]

I'm at a complete loss.

[David Sims]

Or go yourself about it.

[Ben Hosley]

This, I mean, what if he was a king?

[John Hodgman]

What if of England? What if John Goodman was the king?

[Ben Hosley]

Have you ever considered that?

[David Sims]

One of the best profound questions, by.

[John Hodgman]

The way, Ben, nice to see you over there. It's great to see you. Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

Always a pleasure to have you on the pod.

[John Hodgman]

Thanks for the friendly hat, by the way.

[Ben Hosley]

You're so welcome.

[John Hodgman]

I should have worn it today.

[David Sims]

I, I, I forgot a rival Podcast.

[John Hodgman]

It's true.

[David Sims]

Hollywood hamburger.

[John Hodgman]

But I'm just. I want to. I want to say to the listeners, ben, send me a friendly hat. And I'm going to just say, I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Jesus, that's a hot hat. Hell, yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

Damn it. I got to clip that. I got to use that quote.

[David Sims]

You need it as a banner on top of the side.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. I'd like to see it embroidered on the back, over the ponytail hole in the back of the adjustable cap. You know what I'm saying?

[David Sims]

Really like that.

[John Hodgman]

That's an odd hat.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Sims, take it. All right.

[David Sims]

What year is Valley Girl?

[Griffin Newman]

Valley Girl is pretty early in his career. It's 83.

[David Sims]

Okay. And he's done, at this point, a couple of the Coppola movies.

[Griffin Newman]

He's in Rumble Fish and Cotton Club. He's in Birdie.

[David Sims]

Has Peggy sue not happened yet?

[Griffin Newman]

Peggy sue is the year before. She's not yet married, which he is good in, in like a sort of broad, you know, role. But he's good.

[David Sims]

I think he is phenomenal in that movie.

[Griffin Newman]

I have not seen that movie since I was a teenager. I mostly remember Kathleen, obviously.

[David Sims]

I think he's truly phenomenal. But it's the classic tale of like. Like, Coppola is like, nick, I got great news for you. I've convinced the studio to hire you for this part. I've been giving you these little side showy character parts, but you're the romantic lead of this movie.

[John Hodgman]

I got good news for you finally. In Hollywood, nepotism works.

[David Sims]

Yes. And he reads the script and is like, I find this character boring. I don't want to do it right. And Coppola's like, what the are you talking about?

[Griffin Newman]

And he was like, I've, like, moved heaven and earth here.

[David Sims]

Let me go to the lab and see if I can come up with a good take. And he gets back to Coppola and he's like. Like, I'm going to play him like pokey from Gumby voice. The are you talking about? But it works. It's genius. It's like one of the earliest examples of Cage in a sort of leading man. Leading man role, taking the least conventional route to something that then ends up affecting in a genuine way.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And hitting on real emotions and real thoughts, in my opinion. But I do think that's kind of a. A turnkey for him. I also think you. You talk about the Super 8 feeling, right?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

There is obviously the Copa family Dynasty, you know, the Mountain of nepotism that is that family. But also as he's always quick to call out, he was the son of the black sheep in the family.

[John Hodgman]

True.

[David Sims]

Like he was the son of the one guy who kind of didn't figure it out and had the same aspirations in the entertainment industry as did his mother as well. And so obviously he was close to the cousins who were going on to massive success.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But he was like there was always this energy of like we're the fuck up side of the family.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And they all almost treated me with a bit of pity.

[John Hodgman]

It's like you've been placed in a cage.

[David Sims]

A Nicholas Cage.

[John Hodgman]

Over to you David.

[Griffin Newman]

The film shot for 13 weeks certainly wouldn't. A $6 million movie these days would not be getting a 13 week shoot I don't think.

[David Sims]

No.

[Griffin Newman]

In Arizona. Sonnenfeld. Barry Sonnenfeld of course the cinematographer here. I feel like, I mean as great a job as he does on Blue Blood simple, this is his like calling card move. Yeah. And as I was saying to my wife last night, who's seen it before but I was just like everything about this movie is good but the what the way the camera moves was so bananas. Like people were just like I don't understand how they did this.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And Miller's Crossing is a beautiful looking movie. Right. But is him doing a much more kind of conventional, constrained. Yeah. And he's doing other stuff. Yeah, agree. He's doing other stuff in this era like When Harry Met Sally that is also like gorgeously lensed. But this is the calling card movie that.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

I think like, like makes people trust. He probably could direct as well. And his entire directing career is really built off of the language he establishes in this movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Like Right. You see Adam's family in Men in Black in this movie. Much more than you do Shorty.

[David Sims]

All of it. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

They're all.

[Griffin Newman]

Sonnenfeld says like they're all a little nervous. They got a real budget this time. Like this is nerve wracking. Like you don't want to this up in the same way of blood simple. The different way bloods and bolts. Just like ah. You know. We'll see if anyone likes this big note they got at the test screenings. They didn't like the rabbit blowing up.

[David Sims]

Interesting.

[Griffin Newman]

I think this is something the Cohen's run into once in a while where they're like why do you guys care about us wounding animals?

[David Sims]

And it's like squeezing a frog.

[Griffin Newman]

That's the number one.

[John Hodgman]

They didn't care about the lizard being Shot off the rock.

[Griffin Newman]

Maybe they cared about that too.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

For all we know, that rabbit ran away as soon as that grenade hit the ground. We don't know.

[David Sims]

You're right, though. It is.

[John Hodgman]

It's a wascally rabbit.

[David Sims]

A wascally wabbit.

[John Hodgman]

Excuse me.

[David Sims]

You're right.

[Griffin Newman]

They do work with Carter Broville again, of course. You know, continuing, obviously one of the greatest collaborators. But initially they were like, this movie might not be groovy enough for you, which is. I don't know what that means exactly.

[David Sims]

It's a rock and roll guy.

[Griffin Newman]

Burwell said the scores improvise using household objects like peanut butter jars and vacuum cleaner hoses. That's fun.

[David Sims]

Yeah, Ben.

[Griffin Newman]

And then of course, the yodeling.

[Ben Hosley]

What?

[John Hodgman]

What?

[David Sims]

Improvised score using peanut butter jars. No reaction from you.

[Ben Hosley]

I mean, I love it. I love the inventiveness.

[David Sims]

Sounds cool as hell.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah, it does.

[John Hodgman]

Busy ordering some hot hats and embroidery on them.

[Griffin Newman]

The. An honest to goodness Okie named John crowder did the ODing.

[John Hodgman]

Honest to goodness. Yeah.

[David Sims]

Okie. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I always thought that it was Pete Seeger, but it's not. Pete Seeger's on the soundtrack somewhere. But. But is.

[Griffin Newman]

I love Pete, but Carter Burwell.

[John Hodgman]

I mean, one of the only composers where I will just listen to the soundtrack. John Williams level, as far as I'm concerned, in terms of creating mood, tension, world.

[David Sims]

They feel like wordless operas even listen to on their own. What is your ringtone?

[John Hodgman]

It's the theme from Tootsie Peter Bishop. Something's telling me it must be you.

[David Sims]

That is. Is very funny. And I can't believe I have never watched this go off.

[John Hodgman]

Well, that's because I only. It's only keyed to one person in my life. Your wife, who's a whole human being in her own right. And she'll be. Remain unnamed.

[David Sims]

You know what is really funny? That I think about a tremendous amount. Weird that that movie's called Tootsie.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, she said it was a pocket dial, by the way. Oh, wow. So everything's fine.

[Griffin Newman]

We have talked about that a billion times.

[David Sims]

It's not a character name. It's one of like 40 nicknames.

[John Hodgman]

I was listening to this podcast.

[David Sims]

He's. Whatever. Move on.

[Ben Hosley]

I just want to say also for the record, that I was distracted. Yes, but I was reading Randall text cobs Wikipedia.

[Griffin Newman]

He's quite a character.

[Ben Hosley]

Here's the thing about him. He was a professional fighter.

[Griffin Newman]

Famous chin.

[David Sims]

Famous in many ways.

[Ben Hosley]

And I could kind of tell by just his vibe he was.

[John Hodgman]

He was a A professional kickboxer in the 70s.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And, yeah. Famous chin that often, paradoxically overshadowed his incredible nose, as though he were doing a headstand, because that's how the sun would cast a shadow. Yes, but you see what I mean, that nose and. I don't know. Were you going to talk about him later?

[David Sims]

I mean, we must talk about him.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm sure we'll talk about Randall Texcobby.

[John Hodgman]

Are we putting a pin in Randall.

[Ben Hosley]

Texcob or pulling a pin out?

[John Hodgman]

There we go. We'll blow up this rabbit later.

[David Sims]

Incredible. Joel quote about Randall Texcop. He's less an actor than a force of nature. I don't know if I'd rush headlong into employing him for a future film.

[John Hodgman]

Weirdly, that's the only way you can employ him.

[Griffin Newman]

This does feel like you have to.

[John Hodgman]

Headbutt him five times before he agrees to be in the movie.

[Griffin Newman]

This film has Holly Hunter and John Goodman and Frances McDormand Lifetime like Cohen folk. Right. But it also does have Nicolas Cage and Randall Dick's Cobb where they're, like, once was fought.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Like, that's.

[Griffin Newman]

We let the genie out of the bottle and we did not try to recapture.

[David Sims]

Well, even M.M. walsh, who appears in this. And it's his final tiny role.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Where he always had this kind of chip on his shoulder of, like, why didn't they keep hiring me?

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And their line was, like, he was difficult.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

We found our people who are very simpatical, and when you find a Goodman or a Hunter, you hold on to them forever.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. It's. It. I mean, it really does. It would say something to you as an actor if you do not get invited back because so many people are getting invited back.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And of course, as we alluded to the. The wonderful Trey Wilson was not invited back because he died tragically at a young age. I would have hoped that they would use him again.

[David Sims]

Yes. He was supposed to be the Albert Finney part in Miller's Crossing and died so shortly before production. Yes. Finney replaces him, like, a week before the movie starts.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, well, then I'm.

[David Sims]

So that was supposed to be. But also, clearly, that was them being like, we want to give this guy, like, a grand.

[Griffin Newman]

Didn't mean that the way it came out.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

That was a pretty brutal react. It was tough in Miller's Cross.

[John Hodgman]

I knew what I was saying when I said it. And I think I've been appropriately respectful of the. Of the talent of Trey Wilson, whose performance in this movie is outstanding, and.

[David Sims]

That it Reflection that they were like, you know what we should do? We should write like a media for.

[Griffin Newman]

Trey Wilson because he really crushes the final scene of the film, which is. Is very important to this film. Like sort of. I don't know, feeling like more than a confection.

[John Hodgman]

Everyone at the time who said that they were not human, that they were. That they were.

[Griffin Newman]

They walk out.

[John Hodgman]

They were making it. They were making a movie about movies. Or they were making an imitation Looney Tune.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I mean, what. They were making an imitation Looney Tune. But then they took their Yosemite Sam and made him the most heartfelt.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Voice of morality in the film.

[David Sims]

Right.

[John Hodgman]

That sets them on the proper path at the end of the movie.

[David Sims]

How could anyone who isn't a humanist land there, you know, and put that.

[John Hodgman]

In your movie and that, I mean, you know, when I think about, look, I, I am. I adore Wes Anderson. Very, very important movie maker to me. I love so many of those movies. Humble brag that I like him. Yeah, yeah. Okay, fair enough.

[David Sims]

And that he's his own. His own person's own. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

A whole person.

[John Hodgman]

But I, but I, you know, I spend a lot of time thinking about, you know, what are the differences between the Cohen's sense of manner and style and Wes Anderson's. Wes Anderson had a lot more. I mean, we're talking about directors that create very specific visual compositions.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

That sometimes they're. I mean, the Cohens are. In a way, they, they initiated meta into cinema in the sense that they were making homages to other kinds of movies.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And the type of movie that constantly reminds you that it is a movie.

[John Hodgman]

That it is a movie that we're referencing Preston Sturges and the Looney Tunes. Or we're gonna make a gangster film. Or we're gonna make this Barton Fink movie which is itself about movies. That aboutness that so many, many people take as being cold.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And. And reserved.

[David Sims]

And even the camera joke in Blood simple where the camera is tracking along the bar and then has to jump up over the passed out patron.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Is a joke that like, to some people goes like, holy, who the are these guys? And to other people you're like, why are you puncturing the reality of this movie?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Or you don't even see it.

[David Sims]

You're making a thriller.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And now you're making a joke that's like, you guys know this is a movie, right? We're gonna make a joke about your understanding of how a camera moves.

[John Hodgman]

And you know, Wes Anderson movies. Have profound human emotion in them as well. And my favorite of his is Moonrise Kingdom because I think so much of Wes Anderson's movies are preoccupations with lost childhood. Obviously. But I don't like for me, this performance by Trey Wilson at the end. Really like it grounded and humanized everything that had been going on. It represented a theme of real emotion.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

But just to be able to take that moment and move so seamlessly and not the word I'm looking for. They weren't creating a contradiction. Their movement between highly stylized and mannered and then highly human and naturalistic was so beautifully done there.

[David Sims]

Sometimes having the same frame within the same scene.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. And another reason people get a hard time. I'm getting a handle on them. It's like by now you know exactly what a Wes Anderson movie looks and feels like.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

But with a Coen brothers movie, you never knew.

[David Sims]

They can mix it up a lot.

[John Hodgman]

They. And they would do it on purpose.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

And they'd be virtuosic at every level. This is. This sounds like I'm picking winners and losers like the. Like the federal government.

[David Sims]

Well, I know, but I mean, I.

[John Hodgman]

Just hadn't really appreciated what they. What this movie and what the Cohen's did in terms of 90s cinema.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

You know what I mean? Like first of all, making a movie that could be about or could. Could be imitating cartoons and Preston Sturges and everything else. The. The stylistic or the. The narrative loop de loop that they do in this movie and in other movies. There's no Pulp Fiction without that.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

You know.

[David Sims]

Agreed. Another movie that banks on you understanding this is a movie.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And playing on your knowledge of how movies work and what they should or shouldn't be doing.

[John Hodgman]

And you know, meta was my language in the 90s. The. And if you know anything about my work, mostly I'm just riffing on movies and television shows that I've seen. You know what I mean? And I hate to say that maybe the Coen brothers made that habit respectable for me for a period of time. Do you know what I mean? But I do think it's respectful. I mean, all we do is make things about the things that we love.

[David Sims]

I mean, look at the room we are in and the career that we have built for ourselves.

[John Hodgman]

The other thing is that while this movie has a lot of babies in is not about lost. Childhood is about parenthood and the fear of becoming a parent.

[David Sims]

Yeah. I also think there's something interesting to like, Wes Anderson doesn't talk about his Childhood much. He doesn't talk about his relationship with his father when he's, like, doing press. Yeah, those things are kind of mysterious. And yet you watch his movies and you're like, I understand that there is stuff that he is still working through. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Weird. Because you. Yeah, sorry, go ahead.

[David Sims]

Even if I can't identify exactly what his experiences are. In the same way that, like, everyone from the beginning knew, Spielberg's parents got divorced and he never got over it.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And it took a while for us to get more a fuller picture of what happened there. Yeah, it was like, there's a thing here. I just like, I realized the other day, like, I know fucking nothing about Wes Anderson's dad. And yet we're all like, well, we understand the stuff that he's still fixated on and needing to push through.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And the Cohen's. It is a lot more oblique of like, what made you want to make this now? And is this truly just you riffing on some other genre top a type of movie you like? Or is there some animating idea within this that came out of some personal feeling or experience? And especially because they're two separate people, it is even harder to identify that.

[Griffin Newman]

Sometimes, yes, their only real thing is they wanted to do something completely the opposite from Blood Simple.

[David Sims]

Ben?

[Griffin Newman]

Hold on.

[Ben Hosley]

I'm just catching my breath.

[David Sims]

Ben, are you okay?

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah, I've just been chasing trends.

[David Sims]

Oh, you've been chasing the trends. And it's exhausting.

[Ben Hosley]

It really is.

[David Sims]

It's a full work workout.

[Ben Hosley]

I mean, I'm just. I can. I can barely catch my breath.

[David Sims]

You're going to get a Charlie Horse trying to chase those trends. Yeah, and I talk about. About the Lamb Chop character.

[Ben Hosley]

Hold on, I got. I got to drink. Drinks? Yeah, please.

[David Sims]

Oh, I've never seen you like this before. Ben, sit down. Take it easy.

[Ben Hosley]

Okay, you're right.

[David Sims]

There's a faster, easier and less taxing way to stay ahead of the trends.

[Griffin Newman]

What?

[David Sims]

Quint.

[Ben Hosley]

Oh, my God.

[David Sims]

The fine folks at Quint are once again sponsoring this episode. And quints, Let me tell you something about them. They're lightweight layers and high quality staples have become my everyday essentials. And look at me. I'm seated, nary a bead of sweat on my brow.

[Ben Hosley]

You look so cozy.

[David Sims]

Muscles unflexed. Nay, I say. Atrophied quince is the kind of stuff you'll actually wear on repeat. Like breathable flow knit polos, crisp cotton shirts, and comfortable, lightweight pants that somehow work for both weekend hangs and dressed up dinners. The two modes I Have have the best part. Everything with Quint is half the cost of similar brands. By working directly with top artisans and cutting out the middlemen, Quint gives you luxury pieces without the markups. And Quint only works with factories that use safe, ethical and responsible manufacturing practices and premium fabrics and finishes. Win, win, win, win.

[Ben Hosley]

Okay, I'm looking here on the website.

[David Sims]

Tell me about these new trends are.

[Ben Hosley]

Chase and while seeding needed, I'm seeing here they have like a men's edit, you know, suggestion of like stuff to get for summer wear. And there's a lot of 100% European linen shirts that just look really nice. Everything here looks really luxurious.

[David Sims]

I'm looking right now, they got a 50 cashmere tab at the top. That's a good price for cashmere.

[Ben Hosley]

That's a great price for cashmere if.

[David Sims]

You like being cloaked in very soft fabric. And Lord knows I do the softest boy in the world. Here are some other items I'm seeing here, Warren. Stretch denim shorts. 10 inches long, long denim shorts. Friend of the pod, past and future guest Kevin Smith would love to hear that.

[Ben Hosley]

Okay, they've got a bunch of different kinds of pants options, shorts, all different kinds of cuts. You know, if you like it a little bit shorter, like to show a little more thigh look.

[David Sims]

Talking about comfy. I'm a big comfy pants guy. I don't like shorts. Unlike friend of the show, past and future guest Kevin Smith, I'm a huge fan of their ultimate commuter pant, which is just a nice, classy looking long pant that is comfortable, that is flexible and is great for commuting, which I do all the time.

[Ben Hosley]

All right, well, Griffin, okay, you've told me about quints, but like, what's you.

[David Sims]

Want me to sort of of call to action and give you a motivation for what you should do?

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Here's my advice. Stick to the staples that last with elevated essentials from Quince. Here's what you do, Ben. You go to quince.com check for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's a full year. That's Quinck. To get free shipping in 365 days, that's a full year. Returns quince.com Check now, Ben, please catch your breath.

[Griffin Newman]

Thank you.

[David Sims]

David.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

I'm a pale man. Okay, I'm not the pale man. No, but you're a creature that could only come out of the wild imagination.

[Griffin Newman]

Of yellow skin is a, a shade of pale or whatever.

[David Sims]

Oh, you're doing a different pale bit I was talking about the pale man with the guy with the eyeballs in the hands. He's a very pale man. I'm a pale man. The point is, all summer, every summer, I'm on edge. I don't want to get burned. Just even 30 seconds of direct exposure, sunlight could get me burned. And there's very little I can do to prevent it. Which is why I want to do everything I can to prevent getting burned by my wireless deal.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, you don't want to just get burned by the sun. You also don't want to get burned by the wireless.

[David Sims]

I was setting up.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, you're planning your beach Trips and your BBQs. That's what I'm talking about.

[David Sims]

Right. That's a thing I love doing.

[Griffin Newman]

But if my wireless bill is holding me back, I'm in trouble. So I made the switch to Mint Mobile. Because with Mint Mobile, you can get the coverage and speed you're used to for way less money. For a limited time, Mint mobile is offering three months of unlimited premium wireless service for 15 bucks a month. So while your friends are sweating over their data overage. Oh, and their surprise charges, you're going to be chilling, literally and financially. Griffin.

[David Sims]

David, the words you just threw at me, they're like aloe vera on the burns I have left over from my previous wireless provider.

[Griffin Newman]

All plants come with high speed data, unlimited talk and text delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. You can use your own phone, you can bring your own phone number.

[David Sims]

All your existing content here, they don't make you use someone else's phone. That would be really inconvenient if it was a good deal. But you had to borrow someone else's phone.

[Griffin Newman]

That would be very annoying. Look, if I needed this product, it's what I'd use. And this year you can skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a [e-mail] check. That's mintmobile.com check. Upfront payment of $45 required, equivalent to $15 a month limited time. New customer offer for the first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint mobile for details. That is mintmobile.com check. This film is about H I McDonough. Herbert I. McDonough, a convenience store robber by trade.

[David Sims]

I guess a low level.

[John Hodgman]

They have a name for him. And it's recidivism. Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Who meets Edwina McDonough when she takes his mug shot over and over again.

[David Sims]

Little firecracker.

[John Hodgman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

They basically have three me.

[John Hodgman]

Plot of the movie they're talking about.

[David Sims]

Over the course of.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

The. The three arrests you witness.

[Ben Hosley]

We got to it. It's an hour and 20 minutes.

[David Sims]

But the second time he's arrested, he sees her crying uncontrollably. Right. Is that the second time?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

She.

[Griffin Newman]

She. Her fiance leaves her during the. Her fiance le.

[John Hodgman]

I didn't like that.

[David Sims]

Really?

[John Hodgman]

That was a moment where I was like, you're not treating this character with respect. That was like. It was too funny to. It was too funny to not include. Yeah, but that's the one. Joel and Ethan Cohen, I know you're listening.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[John Hodgman]

Go back and make Raising Arizona the special edition.

[Griffin Newman]

I think it's funny.

[John Hodgman]

I like it. It's funny. Of course it's funny.

[David Sims]

I don't think it's a slight on her intelligence. I think it is more about how different Ilx. Process different words, which is a thing I've noticed comes up a lot in their films.

[John Hodgman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Like even in Hail Caesar, when the original title. Yep. When. When.

[John Hodgman]

Rare Moments, Studio Interference about Alden.

[David Sims]

Aaron Reich, he goes, I. I work with actors, not rodeo clowns. And that's a joke about a guy being so pretentious. He says rodeo. Wrong. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And I view Rodeo Drive.

[John Hodgman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

I view fiance as the inverse of that joke.

[John Hodgman]

They love language, and it's obvious from everything they ever do. And it's another reason why I got so. So such a. Well, there's a literary term for it. I got a hard on that is for. For their work. Because. Because of their love of language and dialect. Even if the dialect is invented, you know.

[Griffin Newman]

Now, we spoke about this, you know, pro.

[John Hodgman]

A hard on. I'm sorry. I have a hard on.

[David Sims]

David's really happy right now.

[John Hodgman]

I can tell.

[Griffin Newman]

David, this prologue.

[John Hodgman]

I'm just gonna turn away from Griffin. I'll just look at you now. We just takes you. He pulls me down.

[David Sims]

We egg each other. Wrong.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. This prologue, that is breakneck and romantic.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And sweet and sad and in my opinion, just. I don't know how you don't. How you watch this and you're not, like, so energized by, like, the rest, you know, like the whole arc of them falling in love and, you know, getting together and she can't, you know, her womb is barren and his seed can find no purchase and they can't adopt and they, you know, like, where you're just like, yes. They're going to be okay. These like twin fires, Right.

[David Sims]

Like, well, I like that there's just some connection that keeps, like, being tested. Every time they have one interaction in between sentences. Right. It's like they have this moment and then he's like, locked up for six months and then he comes back and the moment continues.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And he has this moment of, like, lashing out at anger at the idea of her finance. Who would ever leave a woman like you that sticks with her so that the next time he's out, she's ready to lock it down and he has a reason to not go back.

[John Hodgman]

Right?

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

And that is so sweet and so powerful and is conveyed so quickly. Quickly and so meaningfully so much through these performances. Right. But then you have this thing, it is such a good setup for the movie of like their earnest belief that, like, well, yes, he's a criminal, but she works in law enforcement. Doesn't that.

[Griffin Newman]

Can't that balance out? Yeah.

[David Sims]

Neutralize each other. Them adoptable. But you're like, from this setup, you're like, yeah, you're right. This is. This is an unsolvable premise. They are never going to get approved for illegal adoption.

[John Hodgman]

Time to kidnap a Quinn.

[David Sims]

Something has to be done.

[Griffin Newman]

So local. Regional. Regional furniture magnet Nathan Arizona, played wonderfully.

[David Sims]

By Trey Wilson, 37 years old in this movie. Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And you're right.

[John Hodgman]

With the body of a 58 year.

[Griffin Newman]

Old, he gives off older. I cannot deny this. I was shocked to learn that he died at the age of 40.

[David Sims]

I know he technically died, not right. This of like hemorrhage. But it does feel like he was the youngest person ever to die of old age.

[Griffin Newman]

He has had quintuplets.

[John Hodgman]

Well, you know how I feel about him. I'm glad he's dead.

[David Sims]

Not as great.

[Griffin Newman]

You went back to that one. I was gonna set you up. And then I was like, maybe that's too mean. You did it anyway.

[John Hodgman]

I did it for you, David.

[Griffin Newman]

Thank you. So they kind of have the about as altruistic a baby kidnapping idea as I guess you can have, which is like, well, they got a lot of babies on their hands.

[John Hodgman]

We got more than they can handle.

[David Sims]

I like that part of the rationalization is almost like, that's so many kids. We'd maybe be doing them a favor. They're probably stressed out with how many kids they have to handle now.

[Griffin Newman]

You are not actually allowed. Ben's gesturing at me. You're not allowed to have all your multiple birth children in one crib as this movie depicts. So many things in this movie are A little outside of reality.

[John Hodgman]

Let me ask you a question. Is it cool to put a loaded gun down in the crib?

[Griffin Newman]

Dude, that is something that I think, I don't think I really clocked as heavily as I did on this rewatch where I'm like, he never picks the gun back up. He just leaves it in the crib, lives in bending over the hammer. Like that's about it. Like I kept waiting for the beat of him. Like, you know, like I'm like, he does pick the gun back up, right? And he's like, and one more thing. And I'm like, oh yeah. And then he talks to them some more. Then he leaves the room.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, he leaves these home invaders and kidnappers.

[Griffin Newman]

Where are the other babies in that scene, by the way? Cuz it is nighttime.

[David Sims]

Yeah, they're probably going on some Rugrat style adventure.

[Griffin Newman]

That must be it.

[David Sims]

Yeah, that's right.

[John Hodgman]

It's for babies days after out.

[Griffin Newman]

I. Yeah, right.

[David Sims]

I can't remember if you said this on mic or off mic, but you were like, now anytime you just have one of your twin boys in your arms, you're like, I. This is so easy. I can't believe I ever complained about this with my daughter.

[Griffin Newman]

100%.

[David Sims]

I'm, I'm so used having a kid.

[Griffin Newman]

For the first time, to be clear, to be sympathetic to people who listen to my show, having a kid is very hard. And it's like, you know, I'm not, I'm not trying to downplay that it's very hard to have a kid.

[David Sims]

But you're saying the intensity doubled by having two more at the same time.

[Griffin Newman]

They always say it's like more than doubles. Right? Like it's like, yeah, but yes.

[David Sims]

And so I, I think there is this sort of like perverse backwards altruism in the idea of their scheme, which.

[John Hodgman]

Is like, it's interesting that you are able to have these characters be kidnappers and you don't lose sympathy for them.

[David Sims]

They're sort of, of reacting to the imagined idea of someone like David being like, oh my God, I can't believe I have to feed two kids at once. And assuming that means if you took one kid away, they would thank you. When in reality, of course, that's not the case.

[John Hodgman]

On top of a ladder, looking in a window in Dave's apartment as whimsical.

[David Sims]

I take the left one, you take the right one. He'll thank us both.

[Griffin Newman]

As whimsical as this.

[John Hodgman]

He's got more than he can handle, Griffin.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, I do Feel like this is a film when even the first time you're watching it, you kind of know, like. Like, no babies are going to die and everything's going to be okay. The tone of the film just sort of suggests, like, there will be no sort of horrifying sort of, you know, content in this.

[David Sims]

And I feel like the thing the film identifies that makes it so powerful and is the beating heart at the center of it. What is actually the real source of narrative tension in this film? More so than the demon on the motorcycle. Right. Or, you know, the idea of law enforcement catching up with them, the two breakout hooligans who are trying to rope him back into crime, is that they get this kid. They immediately form such a genuine emotional connection to him. Not just the idea of, finally, we're parents, but they really immediately connect with, oh, my God, I'm looking in the eyes of this creature and I'm feeling love. Right? And.

[John Hodgman]

What, are you kidding? We got a family here.

[David Sims]

They are hearing on the news, not just like, I'm angry that someone stole my kid. Get him back, but, like, the actual kind of bereft. Kind of not bereft.

[John Hodgman]

The.

[David Sims]

The grieving. The public grieving of these parents, where you see on both Ed and hi. Like, we've done something wrong, right? That the level of love we immediately feel for this baby makes us understand the amount of pain that we're putting these two parents through. And how is this solvable? Because if we give this K up, we're gonna be missing him for the rest of our lives. And yet that is the exact thing we've done to these two other people.

[John Hodgman]

Still, they had four more.

[David Sims]

More than enough.

[Griffin Newman]

So pretty quickly. I mean, the line you referenced a while back, John, where Holly, you know, Ed, just starts sobbing the second she's holding the baby. I think that's so brilliant because you're like, both, like, yes, she's somewhat cracked. Like, you know, like, these people are crazy enough to be kidnapping a baby. And the intensity, her emotions are so in turmoil. But then you're also like, but she's right. All babies are beautiful. And she loves this baby. It's fully sincere.

[John Hodgman]

It's what it feels like when you have a baby. Like this thing that you felt a little bit ambivalent about, maybe, or you were looking forward to, but reasonably scared about to what the change is gonna be. And then you see it, and she's like, I love it so much.

[David Sims]

Who cries better in movies than Holly? Hunter.

[John Hodgman]

Hunter.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, totally. Good question.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Basically, I mean, this is the same year as Broadcast News. Right? Crying duo.

[David Sims]

It is.

[John Hodgman]

What is crazy when she takes the. Unplugs the phone and just sits there and cries.

[David Sims]

They start filming Broadcast News before this has come out. Am I correct?

[Griffin Newman]

We did that episode so many times, I don't remember. But I mean, obviously that is the case.

[David Sims]

They're obviously both Fox films.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. And they're similar timeline.

[David Sims]

Broadcast News was supposed to be Deborah Winger. She gets pregnant raising Arizona style. Anti raising Arizona.

[John Hodgman]

Anti raising Arizona.

[David Sims]

And they need a last minute sub in. And I think Fox was like, the woman in this Coen Brothers movie is unbelievable. Take a look at her. Right. And we talked about in that episode that the. I'm forgetting her name, but the real news producer who James L. Brooks worked with to help develop the character said, I'll admit to you something really embarrassing. Sometimes I just break down crime playing. And he wrote that into the script.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

So building that into Broadcast News so much is like pure serendipitous magic that like he had landed on that.

[John Hodgman]

That's another one of our marital movies that we could just put like everybody the best. And I could easily go down that road. But look at David.

[David Sims]

Yeah, right.

[John Hodgman]

I know. You already did a whole episode on that.

[David Sims]

He's about to start crying. Molly Hunter.

[John Hodgman]

I know.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Maybe I need to just schedule a 10am cry or whatever it is she does in broadcast.

[John Hodgman]

This podcast is too long.

[Griffin Newman]

Pretty quickly. Hai's former cellmates Gale and Evil Snoots. So Gale is of course John Goodman and Evil is the great William Forsyth. Did he ever do another Cohen's William Forsyth?

[John Hodgman]

Oh, he was left behind. He was left off the train because it's like he's so great in this movie. And I remember watching for him all the time in the 90s.

[Griffin Newman]

William Forsythe is one of those guys who starts. He's just in like eight movies a year. Right. Like in like little roles and like straight to video movies and shit. Like, he has a long, busy career, but mostly doing like fun junk.

[David Sims]

But you're right because he's standing next to John Goodman, who the Cohen's both immediately lock in on and are like, this is the love of our life.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

We have uncovered a natural element that we will use to power up the rest of our careers.

[Ben Hosley]

I would say one of the greatest introductions to a character is how you meet these two.

[David Sims]

Yeah, well, you have the first.

[Griffin Newman]

It's amazing.

[David Sims]

You're saying in the opening you kind.

[Ben Hosley]

Of see them in.

[Griffin Newman]

But I do think the introduction to basically every Character in this movie is as good as your. You know what I mean? Like, they're so good at delivering, like, a visual concept of a character to you where you're like, I think I get it.

[David Sims]

And also, I will say, like, you're introduced to so many characters in that prologue, like, M.M. walsh and all the people in the prison song.

[Griffin Newman]

You're talking about their true entrance who never repeat again.

[David Sims]

If you're seeing this movie in 87 or these are unknown actors. Actors, you have no reason to believe that those guys are going to come back.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[John Hodgman]

You might say their birth. Because they are. This is a birth scene when they crawl out of that hole.

[David Sims]

Yeah. Out of. Out of the.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah. Like, they're. They're. They're. They're being born out of a hole. Crying, screaming and screaming.

[David Sims]

Covered in poop.

[John Hodgman]

It might be asked to be. He's a breach birth. He has to be pulled out by his ankle.

[Ben Hosley]

It might have been a little bit too, like, out of reality. But I would have loved if he pulled the map out and started trying to figure out which way Albuquerque.

[John Hodgman]

I didn't even think about that. I'm so obsessed with the birth canal metaphor that I didn't even think about is like, what's up, Doc?

[David Sims]

Which way to Albuquerque? Another one of the funniest things ever that every time it's map out of hole. Which way to Albuquerque? He's always trying to get to Albuquerque for no apparent reason.

[Griffin Newman]

It's just kind of like nearby big city, I guess. Far enough away.

[John Hodgman]

He had a meth empire that he had to.

[David Sims]

I.

[Griffin Newman]

He was trying to break bad, you know, when. When she's like, you busted out of jail. And he's like, we felt the institution no longer had anything to offer us. I think is so funny. Like, they're very, like, they're interesting characters in this movie in a way in that they don't really matter to the plot that extremely. I guess they sort of just represent High's recidivism. Right. Like his. His High opportunity for.

[David Sims]

They're like the equivalent of his frat brothers who are like, don't you want to crack open a six pack? Right.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

It's like, right. She just got with this guy. Now they're trying to be responsible. Right. And the guys from the past are returning to be silly also.

[John Hodgman]

Both hyperverbal in the same. Yeah, I mean, I guess all the characters are. But.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I think there was somewhere that I read that they. They had this idea that these characters read a lot of magazines that's good that they picked like they've been in prison. Like.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, just like.

[John Hodgman]

Like the whole, like, this is we. This is our family unit. Sure. Some like, magazine. Magazine catchphrases of the day coming through there.

[David Sims]

I think they're like. They're finding something interesting in the tension between the sort of like, yokelism that is the primary language with which these types of people are expressed in movies usually as, like, inessential punchline characters. Right, right. And also the grand tradition of this, like, incredible mastery of language. Southern literary sort of giants. Yeah, right. Like the most profoundly emotional, thoughtful sort of inner life work and being like, why are these two things so apart when we're saying they're both from the same region.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And we're compartmentalizing them in our culture.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah.

[David Sims]

But I think the magazine thing is a really good take. Like, people end up in prison. What are they gonna do? Lose their mind? Get ripped and read?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, absolutely. So.

[Griffin Newman]

I haven't thought about these two guys. That is escaping me or. No, it's right. So, like, right. They're the trashy, like, why don't we go knock over some seven elevens again? And then you have Sam McMurray and Francis McDormand. Just as sort of repellent in a way as the like, bougie. Like, oh, no. Have babies. Like, enter the middle class. Like, be like us swinger couple racist jokes with. Excuse me, Polish people are not a race. They are a nationality.

[David Sims]

I guess my race.

[John Hodgman]

Sam McMurray bringing a lot of talking about cartoons, a physical goofy energy.

[Griffin Newman]

Sam McMurray is the best roles we cannot ever. Right. I mean, he's the greatest. Did he ever do another Cohen's. He did Addam's family values. So Sonnenfeld worked with him again.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, I don't think that he did.

[Griffin Newman]

I was never did he. Obviously a huge TV guy. Like, zillion TV things. Lots of movies.

[David Sims]

Yeah. Neil's dad on Freaks. Geeks. He's so good.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, God, I forgot about that arc.

[David Sims]

I. I don't know if he's talked about this publicly or other people have talked about this publicly. Yes, but he was part of the cast of the Tracy Ullman show.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. For like 60 episodes. Like, the whole thing.

[David Sims]

Most of those main cast members got thrown in to do voices on the Simpsons and he didn't get a family member. And he has a couple guest appearances in the first season. But I think it has always kind of rankled him that he was like an inch away from this.

[John Hodgman]

He was left behind by both the Cohens and the Simpsons.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

That's rough.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

That is interesting because.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

That cast otherwise has Kavner. It has Castellanetta. Azaria. They find from the outside. Because the original guy they hired was an.

[Griffin Newman]

Who's the original guy?

[David Sims]

I always forget. Or Mark Marc Maron talks about him. He was the same comedian who then primarily became a voice actor, but was so bitter about it. And he was, like, on GI Joe and a lot of big children's shows. And he was originally Burns Mo. Like all of those. I guess some of the characters end up being sheer. Some of them end up being Azaria.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

But Azaria talks about this. When they hired him, it was in a recasting, and he went, what was the other guy doing wrong? And they said, you know what? His performance was actually great. He was just such an. That we couldn't imagine continuing to work with him. And Azaria is like, that's the greatest lesson show business I ever learned.

[John Hodgman]

I thought it was because the other guy couldn't do an Indian accent.

[David Sims]

Well, that. That was also the big part of it.

[Griffin Newman]

I.

[John Hodgman]

Can I just say something that I discovered, though?

[Griffin Newman]

What's that?

[John Hodgman]

Well, so I was thinking about this dude. What's his name? Sam McMurray. Yeah. Like. So they're the. Like, Cage is Woody Woodpecker.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And a little bit Wiley Coyote, obviously set in the American Southwest. So it's got Roadrunner vibes.

[David Sims]

Right. Nathan Arizona is Yosemite Sam.

[John Hodgman]

Yosemite Sam. This guy feels like goofy to me. Carter Burwell did the score for a goofy movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Wow, that's interesting.

[David Sims]

That score is. So is it. It's another score that you feel like.

[Griffin Newman]

You know this score.

[John Hodgman]

I only know it because I was listening to Carter Burwell joints on Spotify. Yeah. And all of a sudden it popped up. I'm like, wow. Wow.

[David Sims]

It is also a score where suddenly.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, your phone was a little goofy, got a little.

[David Sims]

You look it. It is a score where if you played it for someone without telling them what movie it was, they would never guess it was a goofy movie. If you extract that score from the movie, it sounds like just a classic Carter Burwell score. I have a great super Yocky shirt that is music by Carter Burwell. His opening credit in the Goofy movie font, which is just so, so funny to see.

[Griffin Newman]

You know what else is a goofy movie?

[David Sims]

Raising Arizona.

[Griffin Newman]

There you go.

[John Hodgman]

Bringing it back around to the second half of Act 1.

[David Sims]

I like that so much. Of their justification why they so desperately want to have a child. I'm gonna paraphrase this and misquote it, but the notion that, like, we were so happy in love, that once we landed on the idea of having a child, depriving them even one potential day of the joy we were experiencing felt cruel. Right. That there was a sense of, like, they have found such comfort in each other that they created a world that they felt like we need to bring someone else into this, which then hurts them so much when they can't.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah. But it's human.

[David Sims]

It's coming from, like, a true place of, like, we want to create a zone of love that can extend.

[John Hodgman]

It's beautiful and it's human and it's not arch and it's not mannered and it's not stylized at all.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

So what happens in the movie?

[David Sims]

They kidnap.

[Griffin Newman]

They have the baby.

[David Sims]

Nathan Junior.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. They kidnap. And then. And then. Then the.

[Griffin Newman]

The cellmates show up and they're jailbreaks.

[John Hodgman]

Show up.

[David Sims]

Yeah. I love. I. Something stuck in my mind forever. John Goodman using the hand soap in the bathroom as sort of like pomade to fix his hair. Really? Yeah, it's just so white and foamy that I always think he's putting hand soap in there as well.

[Ben Hosley]

It's also public pomade, which is gnarly.

[John Hodgman]

And a gas station bathroom. It's the third. It's the third most famous men's hair pomade in the Coen brothers universe.

[David Sims]

Well, Dapper Dan, number one.

[Griffin Newman]

Dapper Dan and Fop. I don't want Fop, God damn it.

[John Hodgman]

I met the guy who designed the cans for Fop and Dapper Dan and indeed all of those products. Products.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

I profiled him for the New York Times magazine. Not for that reason.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

His name is Ted Hay, and on cocktail bulletin boards in the early 2000s, he was known as Dr. Cocktail. And his hobby was. He's a. He's a production designer for films, but his hobby was going into was recreating pre prohibition cocktails, ideally with pre prohibition liquor that he would source by going into the attics of old liquor stores in Chicago and finding stuff that was. Was 100 years old.

[Ben Hosley]

That fucking rules.

[John Hodgman]

H A I G H We've been.

[David Sims]

Close friends to nearing a decade now.

[John Hodgman]

I dare say.

[David Sims]

I cannot believe I've never thought to ask you, were you on high end cocktail message boards in the early 2000s?

[John Hodgman]

I was not.

[David Sims]

And how did you know this?

[John Hodgman]

Because I befriended and was briefly the literary agent to Dale DeGroff, who was the bartender, the famous bartender at The Rainbow Room. Yep. Who really?

[Griffin Newman]

I'm going to do a picture of him quick. From any, like, magazine he's probably ever been, like, featured in.

[David Sims]

David has perfectly affected the pose of a man shaking a drink.

[John Hodgman]

Shaking a drink. Anyway, D. Dale DeGrof was part of the big cocktail renaissance of the. Of the early 2000s craft cocktails. Yeah. And then. And in fact, his book that I Represented the Craft of the Cocktail still in.

[David Sims]

Well, look at that.

[John Hodgman]

Still available in hardcover.

[David Sims]

No paper.

[John Hodgman]

Paperback, probably. There's a paperback out there.

[David Sims]

I'll search.

[John Hodgman]

But he put me on to Ted Hay and David Wondrich, another big cocktail historian.

[Ben Hosley]

David Wondrich has some awesome books about the history of cocktails.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. David Wondrich is a cool dude and he's a former punk rocker.

[Ben Hosley]

Oh, really?

[John Hodgman]

Yes. Big time punk rocker.

[Ben Hosley]

So cool. But Imbibe and Punch are two of his books that are excellent. Highly recommend.

[John Hodgman]

I don't know that Ted ever did a book, but you can read my. My profile of the New York Times Magazine.

[Griffin Newman]

I think I saw fancy Cocktail Chat hitting the Raising Arizona episode. They don't really have a lot.

[John Hodgman]

I just had to talk about how I know excited I was when I learned that he designed the fop and Dapper Dan cans. I don't know.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't want. God damn it.

[Ben Hosley]

Speaking of doctors, Dr. Spock, we got.

[Griffin Newman]

To talk about it. It's so funny that that's the instruction manual.

[Ben Hosley]

That is a good joke.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

My parents had that book. I, I. That book brings me back to the, you know, our, Our baby years. Exactly.

[David Sims]

Our own personal baby years are.

[Ben Hosley]

Is that still a tome like, or.

[David Sims]

Has a lot of stuff been completely discredited?

[Griffin Newman]

I wouldn't say that's true.

[David Sims]

It's more just outmoded.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. A lot of his stuff is still. He's not a bad. He's not bad. Like Dr. Spock is good. Like his. His ideas are largely good.

[David Sims]

He was, he just wanted people to live long and prosperous bur.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, he was politically he was on the left and he was on the right side of things and stuff, you know.

[David Sims]

Wait, I'm sorry. Was he on the left or the right side of things? I have you teed me up there. I know you're trying to get your.

[John Hodgman]

Point out, but all I can say about Dr. Spock is I'm glad he's dead. Look, I have three points of personal connection.

[Griffin Newman]

19, 1998. So he saw Raising Arizona. I wonder if he thought it was funny to have his book in it.

[John Hodgman]

I hope he was Like, I. I hope he got a big fat check out of it. Yeah, that's a very, very funny running gag.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't think anyone involved with this movie got a big fat check. Just to be clear, I think the checks were fairly.

[John Hodgman]

What if Benjamin Spock.

[Griffin Newman]

Dr. Benjamin Spock, $6 million budget. Five to Ben.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. What if it was that? All right, so I have three points of personal connection that I must raise before the podcast ends. And the podcast must end two hours from now. This episode. Not the whole.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

One. Regarding Dr. Spock. My wife was a whole human being in her own right. Her aunt was his assistant for years.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

And it is understood within the family that she was also his mistress. Sorry, Spock family. I'm dropping some bombs. Who knows, this could be the Fletcher family mythology, but Ann Winter was her name and Winter. Yeah. Another piece of personal connection.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I met Carter Burwell at the TED conference. That's all starstruck.

[David Sims]

Did he yodel at you?

[John Hodgman]

No. He's a very sweet, down to earth dude. Actually came to David Reese and I years ago, worked on a thing for HBO that never went. And he came to the edit to look at it.

[David Sims]

He is able to. Obviously this score is not an example of this, but I think it's some of his work. He's able to tap into a feeling, a musical feeling that feels like it is. Is touching. Such an intense darkness.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

That I always wonder like, is he one of these guys who is just like. And he seems very chill and like.

[John Hodgman]

You know what he seemed like to me? What?

[David Sims]

What?

[John Hodgman]

A little goofy.

[David Sims]

It's a little goofy.

[John Hodgman]

Sorry. Sorry, David.

[David Sims]

You know what I'm saying? I'm like, I. I could listen to some of his scores and be like, is this man the Edgar Allan Poe of film composers?

[John Hodgman]

Oh, because he's so. Because he's so dark and he was.

[David Sims]

It feels like there's.

[John Hodgman]

In love with his 14 year old cousin.

[David Sims]

Well, I would not. I would not.

[Griffin Newman]

I also don't of the G thing.

[David Sims]

I think he. He is able to convey a darkness and music that I cannot think of another composer who's able to hit that consistently. Where I'm like, is this a man who is spending all of his time wallowing in the deepest thoughts imaginable? And he does not seem to be that way.

[John Hodgman]

Not in the very brief time that I've. The third point of personal connection and I will not tell the story till we are ready to end.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[John Hodgman]

Not. Not just because I want to keep moving was that I auditioned for Burn after reading.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, interesting.

[David Sims]

For what role?

[John Hodgman]

I'll tell you later.

[David Sims]

Pin.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, so what else happens in the movie?

[David Sims]

Lack of conventional jokes. But Fory and Goodman showing up does have more of a kind of classic comedy vibe. Them having to cover for their lives.

[Griffin Newman]

Silly conflict. Here.

[David Sims]

It's a welcome home sign for a baby, which is funny. So they have to explain the baby was visiting the grandparents, even though both the grandparents are dead and they're in different locations.

[Griffin Newman]

But it's also the conflict of High being tempted back to criminal life.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

This is where we. He has the nightmare about Leonard Smalls where we're sort of, I feel really introducing this concept of like Hai is sort of connected to, you know, he has the sight in a strange sort of a way. In a way the movie doesn't have to think about very hard.

[David Sims]

Well, here's the thing. The Coens have said in interviews that the way they conceived of Leonard Smalls was not what is the ultimate villain that could exist in this universe, but what is the ultimate villain that would exist in Hai's? His imagination. Yes. If he had to fear someone coming and retrieving the baby, what is the worst thing he would think of?

[Griffin Newman]

Right, right.

[John Hodgman]

And it is almost a cartoon version of an evil biker.

[David Sims]

And it comes from. In his sleep.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. And he looks like a monster. He looks like one of those Looney Tune monsters. He does, yeah.

[David Sims]

There's a quote I want to read from him from Tex Randall. Tex Cobb. Yes. He was on David Letterman 1987. Must have been for the promote the release of this movie.

[John Hodgman]

Perhaps, I don't know.

[David Sims]

And Letterman says, how does your current job compare to your old job? And he said, in the last job I had, if you didn't do it just exactly right, you got hit in the mouth. In this kind of job. The worst thing that can happen, I mean, if everything in the whole world goes wrong. Take two.

[Ben Hosley]

Nice.

[John Hodgman]

It's really good. That's really something to think about.

[David Sims]

It's really funny.

[John Hodgman]

I think he is magnificent.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, in the movie he. He's so perfect, it's crazy.

[John Hodgman]

His voice and manner.

[Griffin Newman]

His little squinty face.

[John Hodgman]

The squinty face. The high pitched voice.

[Ben Hosley]

The stained teeth.

[John Hodgman]

The stained teeth. But it's like, you know, it is absurd that this monster has his voice like this. Like, it's totally like a Looney Tunes gag. That. That nose that has been so mashed into his face that his breathing is wrong.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

The fact that his name is Leonard Smalls.

[David Sims]

His name is so somehow Tudor.

[Griffin Newman]

Many to his friends. But he doesn't have any friends.

[John Hodgman]

But he doesn't have any friends. Right. Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

He wears the out of a grenade.

[John Hodgman]

Although it's okay until he's undo it. Until the grenade wears the out of him.

[Ben Hosley]

That's very.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, he's got some little booties. What else did I like that you know that.

[John Hodgman]

Well, he was trafficked as a child.

[David Sims]

Mama didn't love me. Is the tattoo right?

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

He's got the sort of different sized guns.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Which I think is very cool.

[David Sims]

But that's what's smart about that weird.

[John Hodgman]

Fur on his boots.

[David Sims]

What's smart about the character is that the movie says like. Like this is the end result of a child being taken out of its nature.

[John Hodgman]

Right, right.

[David Sims]

Like in. In a very silly heightened way.

[John Hodgman]

And you know, the connection between the Woody Woodpecker tattoos to jump ahead in the final confrontation. It's. It's like a. It's like a fighting Darth Vader in the tree moment in Empires. You know, you got the same fish.

[Griffin Newman]

We're not so different.

[John Hodgman]

Talking about Yodas and shit here.

[David Sims]

We owe to some shit.

[John Hodgman]

We're not so different, you and I as like. So he peels back or you know, they're in this big, very brutal fight and Nicholas Cage peels back a layer of fur colored leather. Fur covered leather or whatever. Sees he's got the Woody Woodpecker. If. And that connection has always, and I think to the movie's credit remained a little bit ambiguous. Like what? It's not a very on the nose indication of sameness.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

It's like it invites you to wonder how they're the same, how they're linked. What it is now, it is Woody Woodpecker. But to be clear, that is a off brand.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Appropriation of Woody Woodpecker for a muffler company from the 60s called Thrush Muffler.

[David Sims]

It's kind of the equivalent of Calvin pissing on shit.

[John Hodgman]

Exactly.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And it was a staple of like muscle car.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

Iconography in the 60s and 70s, which.

[David Sims]

Then often became like bikers gang iconography.

[John Hodgman]

And unfortunately Woody Woodpecker not that particular design. But in general in prison as a tattoo is a white. As a white supremacist.

[Griffin Newman]

This guy's got their paws on Woody.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Is Woody Woodpecker funny?

[David Sims]

It's a really good question because I never.

[Griffin Newman]

I definitely know who he is and I know the noise he makes. I don't ever hear it lodged in my brain.

[John Hodgman]

Woody Woodpecker would make the run on afternoon cartoons on WLVI channel 56 in Boston. And I saw a lot of it, but I never remember. Ha ha ha ha ha ing at it.

[David Sims]

I remember having a distinct sort of fondness for. Oh, a Woody's coming on, right.

[Griffin Newman]

Different.

[David Sims]

I'm watching these hours long animation blocks and I'd be excited to see like, oh, it's a chilly willy, you know? Yeah, like Woody was not one I was dreading when a Woody Woodpecker cartoon camp with the rotation. And yet I watch Looney Tunes today. I laugh, I chuckle, I guffaw.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

I cannot imagine Woody Woodpecker doing anything that would make me.

[John Hodgman]

He's an imitation. I mean, yes. A purposeful and considered imitation. And even if he was Mel Blanc or blank or I don't say his name right.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I don't know. He's dead now and I'm glad of it.

[Griffin Newman]

John, wait a second. Everyone's getting bodied here. All these 20th century icons just acknowledging.

[John Hodgman]

That we all are mortal. We don't live forever. And I'm glad you are dead.

[David Sims]

Rather than being stuck on this myrtle coil long past their duty.

[Griffin Newman]

Do you think Mel Blanc had to die so that Mel B from the Spice Girls could emerge?

[David Sims]

Yeah, they're currently one.

[John Hodgman]

Right? I forgot they were both Highlanders. Yeah, good point. But Woody Woodpecker was also ran an imitation.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Sorry, sorry. The Estate of Walter Lance.

[Griffin Newman]

If Yoda told you to go into a cave of evil, would you do it?

[David Sims]

Yeah, I do anything you told me then.

[Griffin Newman]

Cuz that might be when I'm piecing out. I guess he doesn't have the X the X wing out yet. Yeah, now X files text cobs in one of those.

[David Sims]

Here's the difference.

[Griffin Newman]

I would my brain no worky as the millennials say.

[David Sims]

You've been sick for 17 years. It seems like you've had the. The endless cold. I. When I watch Empire Strikes Back, my thought is always ways I don't know if I leave Dagobah.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Actually kind of sort of a chill vibe here.

[David Sims]

I think Yoda's kind of got it figured out. And I know Luke's like, I gotta go save my friends. And part of me is just sort of like I don't know if any. Anything you can do at this point's.

[John Hodgman]

Gonna make it a good point. Well, look, I know that we like talking about Yodas and Yeah, we did. We should not because poor David.

[Griffin Newman]

I like talking about Yoda. Kidding me?

[John Hodgman]

You want to throw the rest of this movie away and just talk about Yodas and.

[Ben Hosley]

No, no, come on.

[John Hodgman]

Sure.

[Griffin Newman]

What's up with Yoda?

[John Hodgman]

I'll tell you something about Yoda. He died pretty suddenly in Return of the Jedi. Right, David?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, that was the point I made. You're taking my points.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, but that was before we were on mic.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, you want me to make it on mic? He's old. The entire fucking saga.

[David Sims]

Why is he choosing that moment to tap on?

[Griffin Newman]

And then, like in Jedi, Luke's like, hey, Yoda, what's up? It's been like, a year max since I last saw you. And Yoda's like, truly seconds from death. He's just like, luke, I'm walking in that bed, and let me tell you, I ain't getting out of it. Okay? Luke's like, oh, I have a bunch of questions for you. He's like, yeah, I think Leia's your sister or something. Check in with the Obi Wan ghost. I am out of here.

[David Sims]

He's got a Marion Kutiar, Dark Knight Rises death.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, it is actually hysterical that in Jedi, Yoda can't even give Luke a lot of the exposition. And fucking ghost. Obi Wan then sits on a log. He's like, FYI, yes, we knew Vader was your dad. Yes.

[David Sims]

Yoda didn't cover any of this. Are you fucking kidding me? The guy couldn't have held on for 10 more minutes?

[Griffin Newman]

And Luke's like, why didn't you tell me about the Vader thing? He's like, look, from a certain point of view. And Luke's like, just say George hadn't figured it out yet.

[John Hodgman]

All I remember, even though.

[Griffin Newman]

Even though I was just like, I can't believe I'm even in this one. I died two movies ago, even though.

[John Hodgman]

I was only 12 years old. Maybe when that movie came out, and I. And I think John Wolf convinced our teachers to let the whole class skip school. Oh, let's, like, go see it as a field trip. Brooks Ames was not allowed to come with us like his parents because his parents said, no, we're sith. Even though I was young in that moment, when Yoda died, I thought to myself, two things. One, that's how it is when a person gets old. If you're caretaking for an elder parent, they'll take a sudden turn for the worse. And the other thing I thought at the time was, I'm glad he's dead.

[David Sims]

I think. I think the smallest thing is right. Like, there is this fear of what feels like this incomprehensible, otherworldly, if not evil, at least scariness. Right?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Like A man who exists just to be a monster. And yet his motivating force is, I was taken away by my parents and look at me now, and I have to stop it from happening. Right. Which more than him being able to solve the problem himself. I think it kind of scares hai and Ed enough. Combined with seeing the actual sorrow of the Arizonas at the child being missing, of like, if we love this kid, we actually can't do this to him.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

This is like creating a problem that's going to hang over him for the rest of his life, whether he knows it or not.

[John Hodgman]

But the fact. Sorry.

[David Sims]

And then the second part of it is, I think seeing the tattoo is less signaling that they're part of the same white supremacist group and more just like, oh, right, this guy was a person at some point. Right. It's not that we're the same person.

[Griffin Newman]

There's emotion that's been kind of calcified or like, you know, scarred over with this guy.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Like, it is the. It is his raw flesh.

[Griffin Newman]

The last thing that Hai says to him is sorry. Like, hai has to destroy him because he's a villain, an obstacle. But hai doesn't feel great about blowing him up. Right.

[David Sims]

But like, every.

[John Hodgman]

But there's also ambiguity about what the apology is for. Like, it is that, sure, but what else is he sorry for? And I love this ambiguity. Like, I. This is what I was thinking about before with regard to trying to figure out what is the emotional core of the Cohens that they're bringing to this. It doesn't matter. Matter. Ben. I studied literary theory at Yale University, a four year accredited college in Southern Cal, Connecticut. And the first thing we were taught is the author is dead. Authorial intention does not matter.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

What is left behind? The text often reflects things that the author doesn't even think about on a conscious level. So even if they do have an intention and state it, that does not mean that they themselves, if they are alive, they're reliable narrators necessarily about their own work. And so. And sometimes they're not allowed. They're not. They can't speak for their intention because they are dead. And you know what? I'm glad, I'm glad. With that said, 10.

[David Sims]

How many points?

[John Hodgman]

The effort to try to humanize or find an emotional core for what the clones are going through is, I think, ultimately a dead end for this reason. And I love the fact that they will put in these things that feel very meaningful and yet they have no precise explanation.

[David Sims]

Well, the hat and Miller's Crossing is probably the ultimate one. We'll talk about it next week.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

And we'll get to Serious man, which embrace the mystery is them yelling that at the audience. Right. At a point in time where I think audiences had finally come to understand how to build a relationship to their movies and not bang their head against a wall. But I also. I think a lot about. I believe it was on an episode WTF where Pat Oswal was on, and the two of them were talking about how much they both love the Cohen brothers. And Marin says something to the effect of, like, you. You know, about, like, movies and. Right. Why are the Cohen brothers so good? Explain to me why I think about their movies all the time.

[John Hodgman]

Honestly, that's why he's a master interviewer.

[David Sims]

I agree. And Oswald said something that I think about a lot in relation to their work where I. I will probably paraphrase this in a way that is much worse than the way he put it, but something to the effect of. Of the thing about the Coen brothers is they're not interested in giving you answers. They just kind of casually open doors and let you decide whether or not you want to walk through them yourselves. Right. And there is that feeling of, I know there is something behind this door. And now the door has been opened, but they're not guiding you through it. And they're not telling you you need to walk through that door.

[John Hodgman]

Exactly like.

[David Sims]

And that feeling of, like, I might not have the answers, but I know there is an answer here.

[John Hodgman]

Here.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And part of the joy is knowing that you're never going to land on it definitively, but that you can wonder about what's in behind that door forever.

[John Hodgman]

I mean, you know, so much of, you know, movie quote unquote, fandom on the Internet these days is breaking it down and figuring it out.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[John Hodgman]

And getting to a final answer.

[David Sims]

And they don't design movies like puzzles of, like, we're giving you the clues, and if you put them together right, you will have.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Everything.

[John Hodgman]

They're not like Mr. Policeman. I gave you all the clues. They're not like, they're not snowmen.

[David Sims]

They're not snowmen sense. And I think, you know, this movie has less of it than some of their later films.

[Griffin Newman]

I want to be clear that I thought that was funny.

[David Sims]

I. That was very funny.

[John Hodgman]

Thank you very much.

[David Sims]

You might have heard on the. The audio David laughing uproariously at that joke, unless Ben chose to cut it out for some reason.

[Griffin Newman]

Sick guy.

[John Hodgman]

Weird.

[David Sims]

But I think, like, you know what?

[John Hodgman]

I love the ambiguity, you know, just let it, like, did David find it funny or not? It's. It's. For you to interpret corporate.

[David Sims]

It's hard to think of another, like, broad studio comedy of the 1980s that would allow you to be like. And I don't know if I'll ever have an answer for that. And I find that interesting.

[John Hodgman]

Right. Yeah. No, obviously, in a way that doesn't.

[David Sims]

Feel like a plot hole.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

It's just fascinating that even in their movie that's like, let's just try to make something that's fun. It still starts to, like, scratch at these corners of mystery.

[John Hodgman]

Absolutely.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

Okay. So I think we kind of left off discussing somewhat the. The couple, Glenn and Do Spot stop by Meet the new baby.

[David Sims]

I need to award 5 million comedy points to their son who just writes the word fart. Fart on the inside.

[John Hodgman]

I remember their wall that hits so hard.

[David Sims]

It is incredible.

[John Hodgman]

And then the callback to fart later, it's equally genius.

[Ben Hosley]

And I like how they're signaling just, like, the chaos of this family and how they're not really disciplining the children at all.

[John Hodgman]

They're gently signaling that the family is chaos.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah. They're not doing well.

[John Hodgman]

The kids are all bandaged and hitting everybody with sticks.

[David Sims]

But this basically leads, like, when they.

[Ben Hosley]

Cut to that shot and they're just, like, hitting the car.

[David Sims]

The girl's got the eye patch. This leads, like, directly into the. The Huggies heist.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. Yes. Things are. Tension is building. They stop at a convenience store. I need some Huggies.

[John Hodgman]

Huggies and all the cash you have. You know, I'll take these Huggies and. And whatever cash you have.

[David Sims]

You. And I agree, David, that the Coen brothers are underrated as being some of the best action filmmakers on the planet because it's not their primary mode.

[Griffin Newman]

They don't movie. Yes, absolutely. Again, I mean, like, it is hard.

[John Hodgman]

The.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't really know how they did this camera stuff. I've watched special features where they. They sort of explain it and some.

[David Sims]

Of its evolution of Raimi Camsha.

[Griffin Newman]

The way it rockets around.

[John Hodgman]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

It's so cool.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

But, yes. High knocks over a convenience store. He can't help it. He loves to knock over a convenience.

[David Sims]

I think a lot of it's under cranking combined with, like, incredibly meticulously rehearsed and practiced runs on complicated dolly tracks and rigs and stuff.

[John Hodgman]

It was the adolescence of its day.

[David Sims]

I couldn't think of a better way to put it.

[Griffin Newman]

I will never watch that shit.

[David Sims]

I will Never watch Billion Years.

[John Hodgman]

You haven't seen it?

[David Sims]

No. New.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, you have to see it.

[David Sims]

Do I?

[John Hodgman]

Oh, it's magnificent.

[David Sims]

I've been too busy rewatching Disney's Bonkers from the beginning, so that's going to take up the next four months of my life.

[John Hodgman]

It is a. Are you.

[Griffin Newman]

Are you okay?

[David Sims]

My.

[John Hodgman]

If you are not seeing it because of one of two reasons. One, that it is emotionally devastating. That's true.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And two, that the gimmick of shooting each episode is a single one shot. Shot.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Is distracting and mannered.

[David Sims]

I don't. I don't believe that. I believe it is well executed, yet I'm just like, I simply don't want to watch that. Mostly because of point one.

[John Hodgman]

I would say that both of those things are true, and yet you forget about them in a way that is astonishing. Both the technique that it was filmed and the fact that it is. I mean, you feel the emotional gut punch, but you are on a journey. It's great.

[David Sims]

Just to resolve this question, Dave, David, my girlfriend asked me, are there cartoon characters that you grew up having, like, early formative crushes on? And I was like, yeah, I feel like the obvious ones, you know, the generationally Spinelli and Recess and whatever. And I said, what about you? And she went bonkers. And I went, well, that's very damning for me. It feels like there's a real straight line to you being activated by Bonkers as a child and dating me now. Sadly.

[Griffin Newman]

True.

[David Sims]

And then I was like, I think we need to watch Bonkers so I can solve this.

[Griffin Newman]

This 61 episodes and four special compilations.

[David Sims]

I think we're 10 in.

[John Hodgman]

I feel profoundly older than you. I don't. This is a generational thing. I don't even know.

[David Sims]

Bunkers was like a ripoff Roger Rabbit cartoon that clearly they deny it had been developed as the Roger Rabbit animated series and then realized we're going to have Zus and Spielberg baked into these contracts and too much approval. So it becomes about a different silly cartoon animal who is partners with a gruff, fat, real world style policeman who solve cases in. In Toontown.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, all right.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

What.

[John Hodgman]

What.

[Griffin Newman]

What's next in Raising Arizona? What else do we need to talk about?

[David Sims]

Huggies. Huggies Heist. Which is just like a brava 10, 12 minute action scene.

[John Hodgman]

The payoff when. When he gives her. He's giving her those directions.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

While they're having the monologue. You have a man for a husband. You're not a real man. All that convert that subtext about what it means to be grown up. And then you realize that he's giving.

[David Sims]

Directions to the Huggies to pick him up just ca. While. While speeding. The dogs are so great.

[John Hodgman]

Good.

[David Sims]

I do not have any children. You. You gentlemen both do. Sure I do feel like. And tell me if my read on this is wrong. This is sort of metaphorically them being like you become a parent and then suddenly everything in your life feels like this all the time.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

That makes sense. How do we get diapers?

[Griffin Newman]

Right?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Everything is really hard and high intensity. Yeah. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

You feel like you're being chased by a pack of dogs the time y. And there's also that big dog. And then there's that little dog which I kind of felt was like a reference to that Looney Tune where the bulldog and the one that jumps on Tom. Hey, Rex or whatever, you know.

[David Sims]

Absolutely. Then there's also two stupid dogs which was kind of a ripoff of that bunker style. Which was another night.

[Griffin Newman]

So we're getting out of this. All right, so what's next?

[John Hodgman]

I thought. But here I just thought John Goodman and. And William Forsyth were a. A riff on the big dog in the little.

[David Sims]

No, I agree with you.

[John Hodgman]

That's all.

[David Sims]

Yeah. Okay.

[Ben Hosley]

So next is. Is his former boss, the foreman shows up with his broken nose and his neck in a brace. And he's now threatening because he's figured.

[David Sims]

Out he's put it together.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah. And he. They want the baby.

[David Sims]

Right. Which Goodman and Forsyth are also putting together.

[John Hodgman]

Cuz they're hearing it.

[David Sims]

Everyone around them now realizes they've done something wrong. And I can benefit from it.

[John Hodgman]

You know. What's up, Doc? The gig. Gig is up.

[David Sims]

And no one knows how to get to Albuquerque. No one knows the place of salvation.

[John Hodgman]

Everything's been found out.

[Ben Hosley]

Very fun fight between Goodman and Cage in the house.

[John Hodgman]

And.

[Ben Hosley]

And just the spinning and good.

[Griffin Newman]

And it's Three Stooges camera work. Right. Goodman's such a. Like a big beefer and like Cage is this weird string bean guy. Like with just like such unpredictable energy.

[John Hodgman]

The.

[David Sims]

The other thing is that this is starting to severely strain their relationship. The guilt of this is.

[Griffin Newman]

Which is also parenting. Like I get what you're saying. Like. Right. It's about the strain of parenting. Like and what it does to people, of course to a new relationship or whatever. Yeah.

[David Sims]

But also within this movie there's the sort of ends justify the means situation of this will make us so happy that maybe we have to do something wrong in order to give us the future that we Want.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And. And by doing it the wrong way, it like eats at their relationship.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

It starts to turn them against each other. Yeah. The guilt, I think is really kind of getting to them.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And this fear of are we going to up this kid?

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

So they make up with the baby.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Goodman, Goodman and Forsyth steal the baby. Steal the baby, Instantly fall in love. They love him so much. He is very. They become immediate surrogate parents.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

That's when he's got to go buy the Huggies from the old timer.

[David Sims]

It's kind of a magical baby.

[John Hodgman]

How do you put them on like. And he said, well, they have these tapettes and it's fairly explanatory. So it's also the balloon. These balloons blow up in funny shapes.

[Ben Hosley]

And then they do the whole like countdown thing and I'll be back in five minutes.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

I love that recurring.

[John Hodgman]

They go, they go rob the bank. Bank.

[David Sims]

They forget that they've left the baby carrier on top of the hood of the car.

[John Hodgman]

Huge reaction in the theater when they put that. That was such a beautiful cinematic slide.

[Griffin Newman]

Just the very image of the baby in the seat. Yes.

[David Sims]

And there's. By making the baby a little precocious, the sort of like hiding the face kind of thing. Yeah, it does. I think it buffers the actual like discomfort. Yeah. You know, you're like, I, I'm, I'm accepting that you're using the baby and a manipulative way that are fun movie stakes while also being like this baby could baby's day out if it wanted to.

[Griffin Newman]

It's never really smarter than anyone in a way.

[John Hodgman]

And when, when Goodman and Forsyth realize they left the baby on top of the car, they pop out their birthing screams. Again.

[David Sims]

So good.

[John Hodgman]

Which is such a, like I remember. Well, I don't remember what I remember, but it's such a, a clue to the movie. Like we were dealing with very primal emotions here.

[David Sims]

Yes. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Like these are primal screams that these guys are embodying.

[David Sims]

And, and Edwina is like sobbing in the car.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

While, you know, hi. Has just kind of gone numb.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

As they're trying to chase after both the baby and the, the, the jail.

[Griffin Newman]

Yard buddies at the same time. Smalls appears, presents himself to, you know, Arizona in Arizona, who is basically like not interested. And he's like, fine, I'll just do it anyway. I'll just steal the baby and I guess sell the baby. I guess that's his plan. Like just not even claim the reward.

[John Hodgman]

Well, he's saying, I'll do It, I'll do it. For what? What, what was the reward? $20,000.

[Griffin Newman]

50,000.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah, but he demands 50,000.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. It's 25,000.

[John Hodgman]

And he demands, he demands more because that's what the market will bear. Cuz he knows because he was trafficked as a child or whatever. And I guess he's got the receipts.

[David Sims]

But you also get to the. What is kind of the line of the movie for me, which is if I'm as bad as you, what good are we to each other?

[John Hodgman]

Right, right, right.

[Griffin Newman]

That it's really Coen brothers logic too.

[David Sims]

To weigh down on her that she feels like they're both activating something bad in each other that has led to this whole situation and disregard our love. Clearly this doesn't work.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Okay. Then there's a fight and then there's the end.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, I mean, well, there's the, the die pack exploding.

[John Hodgman]

Another primal squad scream.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

They do this sort of armed robbery with the baby. Yes, yes.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean there's so much fun shit. And it's all so energizing and wonderful. But again, to me it's the last 15 minutes that make the movie make sense.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Because you're watching this movie kind of being like, how can this end appropriately?

[David Sims]

Which I, I love a movie that lays out a deck of cards where you're like, there is no way for you to get out of this. Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

Right, right. Because like you're like, you're like. Yes, possibly they're just gonna give the baby back, but isn't that just kind of like. Doesn't that feel a little cheap or a little like a bit of a bummer or whatever? Right. You know like, okay, can we give the baby back? Yeah, no worries.

[David Sims]

Just to be clear.

[Griffin Newman]

Well then what was the whole movie?

[David Sims]

The double layer of. I don't know how the characters are going to untangle this situation and I don't know how the filmmakers are going to let that untangling feel like a satisfying conclusion to whatever I've been watching.

[John Hodgman]

I mean one, one thing that Looney Tunes cartoons could do. Or they were. They were never tasked with sticking the landing to a two hour long feature.

[David Sims]

They don't have to resolve any sense of an emotional narrative.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Just fall. Like the coyote falls off the cliff for the third time.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And then Bugs Bunny looks at the camera and says, fuck that guy. Right.

[John Hodgman]

That's the famous closing catchphrase of Looney Tunes.

[David Sims]

Right. Fuck that guy. Right.

[John Hodgman]

Fuck that guy.

[Griffin Newman]

The maturity defeating Leonard for high.

[John Hodgman]

Speaking about difficulty of sticking the landing to a three hour long feature.

[Griffin Newman]

On WhatsApp. No one can see or hear your personal messages. Whether it's a voice call message or sending a password to WhatsApp, it's all just this. So whether you're sharing the streaming password in the family chat or trading those late night voice messages that could basically.

[David Sims]

Become a podcast, your personal messages stay between you, your friends and your family.

[Griffin Newman]

No one else, not even us.

[David Sims]

WhatsApp message privately with everyone.

[John Hodgman]

It's hard to bring it home.

[David Sims]

It is.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Feels like some sort of like siege perilous. That high passes through successfully.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And in the sort of magic realism, magical thinking of this movie, because obviously what happens just to very quickly summarize is they return the baby. Nathan Arizona is like, it's all good. I understand that you did this out of love, even though you're stupid.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And then Hai says that he had a dream of.

[John Hodgman]

First of all, Nathan Arizona sees that they still have love even though they have given up.

[Griffin Newman]

You guys shouldn't give up on each other either way. And Hyde dreams first of just watching Nathan Jr's life, you know, from afar. Right. But then also dreams of being greeted by his own grandchildren in a sequence that makes me. Water comes out of my eyes when I'm like, what is this feeling?

[David Sims]

And Arizona has also said to them, like, he plays this so fucking well in the arcs of it of him being like, who are you? We brought the baby back. Don't ask questions. Can we say goodbye? Why he from behind? He's not looking at their faces, sees the emotion in their body language, their relationship to each other. Where he's like, you're the ones who took him. And he's not even angry. Even though they had framed it as we saved the baby from Smalls originally.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Where he's just like, something profound emotional has happened here. And I'm just grateful that you came around to doing the right thing. And then he is so quickly kind of bereft at the idea that they're about to torpedo the relationship. Where he's like, whatever's happened here is a sign of something honest. And they're sort of like, her infertility has driven us crazy. We don't understand how we have a future for this relationship.

[John Hodgman]

One of the things about this movie that a lot of stylized, mannered movies by different directors that came afterward that were primarily preoccupied with men's ambiguity about growing up. This movie is really about a woman genuinely wanting to be a mother.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

In a very sincere way. And and it's a. It's a stark difference from some of the meta. Sort of crimey. Yes. Like wackadoo movies that would come out in the 90s in its wake to a degree.

[David Sims]

But Nathan says to them like you gotta just keep trying. Which is what my wife and I did.

[John Hodgman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Despite this character, this actor only being 37 years old, he reads like a fucking 70 year old man.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

And so him saying like we kept trying and you hope that medical science catches up to you. And it caught up to us with a vengeance. Which gives hi the ability to dream of like one way or another we're going to have a family. There is a way to make this happen.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

You know.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And I do feel like the magical thinking of this movie is like something has happened in defeating Leonard and saving this baby and making the like it's. Maybe things can't be different for them.

[David Sims]

We don't know how the dragon and returning back to your village. Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Yes.

[Ben Hosley]

It's really funny that Gail and Evil return to prison through the hole that they dug out.

[Griffin Newman]

So cute.

[David Sims]

They got go back.

[John Hodgman]

But that's in his. That's in his mind. But I believe that it happened for sure. They weren't ready to be born.

[Ben Hosley]

Glenn gets arrested for being an to polish people.

[Griffin Newman]

An excellent product.

[David Sims]

Come up and spring Sergeant Kowalski. Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Sergeant Kowalski.

[David Sims]

And I just. I like this idea gets at that like in some way this experience that could not be literally processed by a baby will have some lasting effect on Nathan Jr. That sets him apart from his brothers and sisters.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean and I think it's a valuable lesson for the baby. And I wasn't a parent when I saw it. I've seen, I've seen it many times since being a parent. And I realized, oh, that is why we drove around with our kids on top of the car so many times because we wanted to give them that experience. And they don't remember it, but I think they benefit from it.

[David Sims]

Absolutely. Such a good parent.

[John Hodgman]

Thank you.

[David Sims]

And the final line, David.

[John Hodgman]

YouTube, by the way.

[David Sims]

Yeah. The, the, the picturing.

[John Hodgman]

Let that horse in here.

[David Sims]

Being old, having the grandchildren Thanksgiving table. It feels like home. If not Arizona, someplace far away. Right. Where. Where children and parents are loved or whatever. And everything is warm. I don't know, maybe Utah. It's just such a good final joke.

[Griffin Newman]

Absolutely. I mean how do you not walk out of the movie just walking on air?

[David Sims]

Yes. Yeah. I did like basically 90 minutes soaking wet.

[John Hodgman]

I walked, I walked out on air and I was a Completely as a creative. I mean, I was, I was a. I was a. I think I was turning 16 that year.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

But I mean, it's like I. I don't think I've ever stopped thinking about that movie since I saw it. And it was incredible.

[David Sims]

You are such a dear friend of the show. And we often go like, fuck. We should ask Hodgman. It's been a little too long, right?

[Griffin Newman]

About once a year it's like, what's up with Haji?

[David Sims]

But there are things like Dune where like the second lynch won March Madness. We were like, well, that. It's. It's a no brainer. It's a non question. The first person I ask. Right. There are things like Evil Dead 2 are struggling to find someone. We were like, wait a second, Hodgman. And you were like, absolutely.

[John Hodgman]

I don't know why that was a struggle, but okay.

[David Sims]

But there's also. There have been things like A Master Builder, which many people say is one of our best episodes. That was like. We cannot imagine anyone who would want to come on.

[John Hodgman]

That was our raising.

[Griffin Newman]

That is one of the great.

[John Hodgman]

We went. We went weird, hard. We did not care about any.

[Griffin Newman]

There were no rules in that Reddit thread. That's like, you know, do us the solid show up.

[David Sims]

And we trust that with you in the room, we will figure out how to make this an episode that people will want to listen to without hearing what you. Our friends from the flop house.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Stuart Wellington in particular.

[John Hodgman]

Dan McCoy, Elliot Kalin, co host of Ipodius with John Hodgman. Go on.

[David Sims]

They had been trying to do some sort of New York movie podcaster and such meetup which we've done in past years and kind of fallen away by.

[John Hodgman]

A Commonwealth pandemic bar on 12th street in 5th Avenue.

[David Sims]

New wife. But the. The new bar with his wife. What am I saying? Not new wife, new bar. Old wife. Long standing wife. But the.

[John Hodgman]

The.

[David Sims]

We hate movies, guys.

[John Hodgman]

What are we doing here?

[Griffin Newman]

What's.

[David Sims]

I know we had been struggling talking.

[John Hodgman]

About me for a second.

[David Sims]

The raising, Arizona, scheduling problem. Even though this is such a big movie where we're like, it's weird. No one's asking for this one.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

And yet it's such a big film that it feels like we can't just wantonly throw someone on it without it being worth, you know.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And you're at the bar and you're heading out and I was like, by the way, we have to get you on. We haven't done since Dune. Cohen's. And you go Like, I mean, raising Arizona. And I was like, yeah, great. I text David. I'm like, we've solved it. Raising Arizona, right?

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And then I tell you, like, scheduling this and that, we figure out the puzzle, you get back, you land later, you send a long text, and you're like, gentlemen, I just want you to know I'm not trying to throw around my weight. I don't to be greedy. I think of myself as a utility player in the.

[John Hodgman]

The.

[David Sims]

The tapestry of your show.

[John Hodgman]

I just figured people would be clamoring for all the Cohen movies and that two or three of your regs would probably going for Raising Arizona anyway.

[David Sims]

Such a gentleman's move that even after we said, yes, please, you went, I don't want to take it away from someone else. Know that I would gladly go on any episode, whichever one you're having the hardest time booking. And I said, you are lucky that this is the one we are having the hardest time booking. And also that is one that you clearly have such a. A formative relationship.

[John Hodgman]

I guess it was meant to be.

[David Sims]

We just. We love you. We thank you.

[John Hodgman]

Let me say something. I love you all.

[David Sims]

Always been of such great value to us as a friend, very much personal friend of the show.

[John Hodgman]

I'm very glad you're all alive.

[David Sims]

The ultimate compliment.

[Ben Hosley]

Thanks, John.

[John Hodgman]

Hope it stays that way for a while.

[Griffin Newman]

Look, this film came out on in February of 1987, but we're not doing. Doing that weekend. And let me tell you why. Sorry, March? Oh, no.

[John Hodgman]

Well, I think it opened small and then opened wide.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, it opened on1 Theater, March 13, 1987. We're not doing that weekend because that is the weekend of Evil Dead 2, an episode that John literally was on. So I'm going to do.

[John Hodgman]

It's a big year for Hodgman.

[Griffin Newman]

It's big, wide weekend where it's adding hundreds of theaters.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

April 10, 1987.

[David Sims]

Insane. Think about these two movies being in theaters at the same time. Time.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, yeah, it was definitely April when I saw it. I did not see it.

[Griffin Newman]

In March, it hits 2 million. Now, the film ultimately ends up grossing $22 million, which is a lot of money.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And According to numbers, 767 whole dollars internationally. My guess is they just don't have a lot of data. But number one at the box, it's number seven. Okay, so number one at the box office. Griffin is a april 87, a comedy. Sort of a youthful comedy, I guess.

[David Sims]

But it's not a teen comedy.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, that's why I'm Struggling to call this a teen. It's this actor who's kind of transitioning from teen to youngish, you know, adulty guy.

[David Sims]

Is it a frat packer? Is it a Hughes person? No, no.

[Griffin Newman]

Who's the other one in that era who made, you know, who was like, a star?

[David Sims]

Yeah, yeah. If not Cruz.

[John Hodgman]

No, no, no.

[Griffin Newman]

Comedy.

[David Sims]

Yeah, comedy. It's not an outsider's boy. I'm trying to think of who's the other one who's making the transition in the 80s. He's mostly comedy, but he's trying to broaden.

[Griffin Newman]

This is a comedy.

[John Hodgman]

This movie is a comedy.

[David Sims]

This movie's a comedy.

[Griffin Newman]

He became a gigantic star. Gigantic, gigantic star two years ago with a huge hit movie. He's a big TV star in 85.

[David Sims]

You're saying, oh, this is Michael J. Fox.

[Griffin Newman]

That's right. But what's the film?

[David Sims]

Is this secret of my success?

[Griffin Newman]

The secret of my success.

[John Hodgman]

Secret success.

[Griffin Newman]

Now you're nearby Herbert Robert Ross, of course, sort of legendary director, but near the end of his career.

[David Sims]

It's kind of a largely forgotten movie that you look at it's box office grosses and you were just like, man, Michael J.

[Griffin Newman]

Fox was just a giant hit.

[David Sims]

So beloved at the time that people were going to see anything he did.

[Griffin Newman]

And it had that Night Ranger song.

[David Sims]

Sister Christian.

[John Hodgman]

No.

[Griffin Newman]

The secret of my Success. So that's opening to. It's new this week. 7 million. $7.7 million. Number four at the box office is a sequel. Comedy sequel.

[David Sims]

Okay. In 1987. Comedy, sequel.

[John Hodgman]

Comedy sequel.

[David Sims]

Is it a two?

[Griffin Newman]

Nope.

[John Hodgman]

Is it a three?

[Griffin Newman]

Nope.

[David Sims]

Is it a police academy?

[Griffin Newman]

It is.

[David Sims]

Is it a four?

[Griffin Newman]

That's right.

[David Sims]

Is it Mission Moscow?

[John Hodgman]

Nope.

[David Sims]

I always get them wrong. Fuck. Is it Citizens on Patrol?

[Griffin Newman]

Citizens are on patrol today for the police academy. For.

[John Hodgman]

I just realized Citizens on Patrol spells out cop.

[Griffin Newman]

There you go.

[David Sims]

That is good.

[John Hodgman]

There's a lot to unpack.

[Griffin Newman]

I haven't seen that.

[John Hodgman]

I've never seen a single police. Again, same.

[David Sims]

I've seen scenes, sure.

[John Hodgman]

I don't think I'd flip through and.

[Griffin Newman]

Catch one character who's a little bit of a. Has the gift of the gab.

[David Sims]

Well, the gift of the gab or the gift of.

[John Hodgman]

The gift of the sound effects?

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[John Hodgman]

Pew, pew, pew.

[David Sims]

Back. That guy. I'd say that's not Gavin.

[Griffin Newman]

I'd say that's, let me say, his map. Magic mouth.

[John Hodgman]

Meow, meow.

[Griffin Newman]

Number three at the box office is.

[John Hodgman]

Michael Winslow still alive. Right?

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Good. I'm glad.

[David Sims]

Thank God. Is he I am all but certain. And if not, I'm going to have to come up with different evening plans.

[Griffin Newman]

He's alive as hell.

[David Sims]

Thank you.

[Griffin Newman]

This guy is so alive.

[John Hodgman]

I'm glad. I'm glad of that.

[Griffin Newman]

Nice. Lovely. Wikipedia picture. Full color looks great.

[David Sims]

I pray he hasn't died by the time this episode comes out.

[Griffin Newman]

Christ. Okay, number three at the box office, the Ram Man. Comedy from a legendary director with a legendary star. But at this point, he's a fairly new star.

[David Sims]

Interesting.

[Griffin Newman]

This is a movie that got very bad reviews, but did okay.

[David Sims]

Is this one of the Bruce Willis movies?

[Griffin Newman]

It is a Bruce Willis.

[David Sims]

This Blind Date.

[Griffin Newman]

It's Blake Edwards's blind date with Bruce Willis and Kim Basinger.

[David Sims]

Blake Edwards did the two Bruce movies back to back that were meant to be the moonlighting transition to movie stardom. And they both don't work.

[Griffin Newman]

Sunset of course, being one, which is.

[David Sims]

Sort of crime, old timey crime comedy Y and then Blind Date, which was kind of a hit but was just sort of like, I don't know if this guy's.

[John Hodgman]

These were pre Die Hard, both of them.

[David Sims]

And then the following year is Die Hard and people go holy.

[John Hodgman]

People go holy.

[Griffin Newman]

Number four at the box office is the re release of an animated film.

[David Sims]

I assume from the fine folks at Walt Disney soon.

[Griffin Newman]

That's correct.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

I put this on for my daughter once and she could not have been.

[David Sims]

Less interested in interesting. Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

Sort of confirm my me what I remember about it, which is it was never a movie I liked very much, but classes classic, classic 70s.

[David Sims]

Is it like the Aristocats?

[Griffin Newman]

It is not just like the aristocracy, but is the Aristocats.

[David Sims]

I would almost say that no movie is more like the Aristocats than the Aristocats.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Movie I put on because those Reitherman movies are often interesting. I put it on. It has I love Shaggy, you know, animation style style. But I would admit I too was always like, yeah, I never really love.

[David Sims]

This Reitherman era is my favorite Disney Animation Studios era. And yet that is the one that I feel like I never revisit and have no inclination to. I remember being at a young age where I had learned I'd started learning about how stories work. And my parents explained to me what morals were especially when you're watching children's entertainment. Most movie try movies try to give.

[Griffin Newman]

You a less story before but a really good story.

[David Sims]

And my older cousin walked in on me watching the Aristocats and I got to the end and I looked at him, I was like befuddled. And I was like, so what's the moral of this story? And he went, I don't know. Everyone wants to be a cat. Which is just the song they're singing at the end where he was like, my disaffected older like 20 year old cousin was like, I don't know. Everybody wants to be a cat. I don't think this Movie's about anything.

[Griffin Newman]

101 Dalmatians, Sword in the Stone, Jungle Book. I feel like Robin Hood. Those are the people, the ones right. Number five of the box office is giant action hit first in a long running series.

[John Hodgman]

Talk about crush worthy animated characters. That Robin Hood, Fox, everyone goes hot.

[David Sims]

You might be surprised to hear that made Mar and Fox and Robin Hood was what I cited to my girlfriend.

[John Hodgman]

Jesus Con. Those are some hot foxes.

[David Sims]

Is it Predator?

[Griffin Newman]

No.

[John Hodgman]

What was it again?

[David Sims]

Is it action? Lethal Weapon. Yes. There we go.

[John Hodgman]

Lethal Weapon.

[Griffin Newman]

Richard Donner's Lethal Weapon. You've also got Platoon still in the top 10 from winning best picture. Winning best picture the year before. You've got a little film called Raising Arizona. You have Barry Levinson's Tin Men.

[David Sims]

Huh.

[Griffin Newman]

Which is fun.

[David Sims]

Amanda Knox's dad's favorite movie. It's a runner on big pictures. They're doing their 25 for 25 where he keeps saying, where have you ranked 10 men? And she keeps having to tell her dad.

[Griffin Newman]

You said Amanda Knox. You meant Amanda Dobbins. Amanda Knox, of course is the woman who was accused of murdering someone.

[David Sims]

I'm so sorry.

[Griffin Newman]

In a group text I was like, amanda Knox is. I was. It's like I swing in a ball. I was all the way over.

[David Sims]

So sorry. In a group text containing Sean Feny. We were all joking about the fact that her middle name is Knox and.

[Griffin Newman]

And her son is named Knox for this reason. Yes, but you're like amanda do Knox's dad's favorite movie.

[David Sims]

I'm sorry.

[Griffin Newman]

Huh.

[David Sims]

But also maybe it is.

[Griffin Newman]

We'll have to check the bit on.

[David Sims]

Big picture is he keeps going, where are you going? To rank Tin Man. And she goes nowhere. And also it came out in the 80s.

[John Hodgman]

Right?

[David Sims]

The assignment is movies since 2000.

[John Hodgman]

Where are you going? To rank Tin Man.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Fun movie. Fun little movie.

[David Sims]

Never seen it.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. This is a really mixed bag. No wonder Charles and I went to see Raising Arizona. I wouldn't have seen any of these movies.

[Griffin Newman]

Lethal Weapon. Not so good for you.

[John Hodgman]

Never said saw it.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay. Number nine of the box. It's pretty good. Number nine of the box offices. Nightmare on Elm Street, Three Dream Warriors. Great movie.

[David Sims]

Do we both agree the best one?

[Griffin Newman]

That's a very complicated question.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[John Hodgman]

I believe the song from that one was a meow meow, meow, meow.

[Griffin Newman]

Great song. I think it's the best of the sequels. I think the first one has kind of crazy magic to it and is actually scary. I enjoy, enjoy all other Freddy movies, but none of them are scary. The first one is scary.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Like it's really disturbing. And the way he films the dreams are so cool.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

The third one though is the best of the. Hey, if these movies take place in the dream world, they should be wild and fantastic.

[David Sims]

But you're right, it's starting to become almost a little more of an action movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Dream warriors is where it. But the second movie is obviously so.

[David Sims]

Strange and this time it's weird.

[Griffin Newman]

And three is like, yeah, like let's. Let's get a fantasy movie.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Rolls.

[Griffin Newman]

It does does.

[David Sims]

That's so much fun.

[Griffin Newman]

Number 10 is the Hugh Wilson comedy Burglar, starring Whoopy Goldberg and Bobcat Goldthwaite. A film I have never seen.

[David Sims]

This is a big weekend for Bob.

[John Hodgman]

I know. I was just gonna say two in the top ten.

[David Sims]

I mean troll and he's burgling.

[John Hodgman]

I.

[Griffin Newman]

This is kind of the law peak, right? Or I mean like Hot to Trot.

[John Hodgman]

I would say was really though.

[David Sims]

But that's also Hot to Tr. We're going downhill.

[Griffin Newman]

Hot to Trot is a year long later.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

I'm only saying that I love Bobcat Goldwait. Obviously a wonderful guy, wonderful director, you.

[Griffin Newman]

Know, but he definitely is a guy where you're like, huh, when he was a movie star, things didn't always work out so good for Hot to Trotter.

[David Sims]

Shakes talked about that too, where he's like, you really think a whole movie of this is gonna work? And they were just like, money.

[John Hodgman]

I just saw a trailer for Hot to Try to the Nighthawk. That's what was on my mind. I'm not thinking about it all the time. I don't know why they were showing that trailer.

[David Sims]

Go see how to Trap David.

[Griffin Newman]

That's the 10. Yeah. I gave you the 10. Pretty. Pretty good 10. Although John apparently is completely dissatisfied.

[David Sims]

He bodied the 10.

[Griffin Newman]

I guess citizens on Patrol and an Aristocats re release is not the most thrilling.

[David Sims]

Best of times, worst of times.

[Griffin Newman]

Right? And I've never seen Blind Date. This film obviously was a big hit and well received. But we have, as we discussed, some critics still looking askance at the Cohen for being. Being a little slick and a Little possibly patronizing, although I don't think they are.

[David Sims]

Here's my complaint about the Cohens. Are they too good at making movies?

[Griffin Newman]

Well, basically a lot of Cohen reviews boil down to.

[David Sims]

It's a little suspicious, honestly.

[Griffin Newman]

Even post success.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, once they're deep in their success, sometimes people are like, can they stop being so impressive?

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Like I want to actually watch the movie. And I'm like, why don't you just watch them?

[David Sims]

What are they up to? Making perfect movies.

[John Hodgman]

There are some. Some perfectly executed movies beyond perfectly executed, sort of like mind bogglingly well made and acted that I can't. They're. They're a barren place where my seed will find no purchase because I feel like they don't need a viewer essentially.

[Griffin Newman]

Such as.

[John Hodgman]

Well, this is my very controversial hot take that I was reserving for off mic later.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[John Hodgman]

But because of my love for you guys in the podcast and many, many people loving these films that I had never seen, I've been watching the later Missions Impossible and they're absolutely glorious. But I'm. I just. They're just bouncing off my eyeballs because I just feel like there's no need.

[Griffin Newman]

That sounds like something Ethan Hunt should do.

[John Hodgman]

For anyone in this sounds off the big eye.

[David Sims]

That'd be a good stunt. Hodgman, can you tell us the burn.

[Griffin Newman]

After reading and then finish your point?

[John Hodgman]

Well, I was just gonna say like all of the Cohen. Even though they are virtuosic.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

And even though they are sometimes very cold, I feel like there's room for me in. In this movie.

[David Sims]

I watch all of their movies so much and I find them very comforting. Even the ones that are dark or intense.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

And I do think is because there is a core humanism to them that I find comforting. Amidst the chaos.

[John Hodgman]

I. When I my life was kidnapped by television and then by buy commercials for Apple.

[David Sims]

How rude.

[John Hodgman]

And all of a sudden I. All of my dumb pretentious dreams of watching movies suddenly became like, I could be in them. And I said when I got representation, they're like, what do you want to do? Like, who do you want to. They were like, you know, you can do anything now. You were in an ad.

[David Sims]

It's a different area.

[Griffin Newman]

You were all over America.

[John Hodgman]

But they were like, they were like, you know, we can. We can try to make some things happen for you. What are doing you year. And I was like, I'd like to be in Battlestar Galactica. And if I were to make any movie, it would be with the Coen brothers. Anything I'll do anything. And I was invited to audition for Burn after reading.

[David Sims]

Makes perfect sense. Several roles in that I could see you fitting.

[John Hodgman]

There's a very small role at the beginning of the film where I. Jeffrey.

[David Sims]

Demon, is the doctor.

[John Hodgman]

No. Interesting. Honestly, I don't know that I've ever seen that movie because I was sad that I couldn't be in it.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

And that's a. And there's. That's why I was able to be tricked later.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[John Hodgman]

So I auditioned for them. They were like. It was really a big deal. They were sitting right across from me.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

And I was playing some kind of Mormon FBI agent or something at the very beginning of the movie.

[David Sims]

Interesting. We will revisit soon.

[John Hodgman]

And I did not get the role.

[David Sims]

Sure.

[John Hodgman]

I don't know who got the role, because I never saw it. Wow. Scarred.

[Griffin Newman]

Hurts too much.

[John Hodgman]

And I was telling this story on the set of the Apple ads.

[David Sims]

Huh.

[John Hodgman]

After it was clear I was not going to get the role. But I was like. I was excited about it. And I was telling Justin about it. Long and the. Yeah, Justin Long. And the guy who. I can't. Jeff. Who operated the boom mic. He was always getting on me. Jeff. Like, one thing I learned, and this is. You know, this is a big whistling movie. Raising Arizona. I would whistle on set just to keep myself company. And Jeff would always say. And I understand this because he's the boom operator. He's listening to everything he said. You know what's funny about whistling? The only person who enjoys whistling is the person who's whistling.

[David Sims]

Good line.

[John Hodgman]

I'm like, oh, Jeff. So he heard everything I said about this. And the next time I came into work, he said. Said, yeah. I asked around, and I found out who got that part. Maybe the movie was filming at that point. Right. Hadn't even been released because I had previously told a story about this actor running into this or seeing this actor in an airport. So Jeff was putting things together, a counter narrative. And he said, yeah, I found out who got that part. Lonnie Anderson. And then for a moment, I was like, oh, well, great. I mean, if they wanted Lonnie Anderson, that's no comment on my acting.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[John Hodgman]

Like, I understand they wanted to go in a different direction. So thanks a lot, Jeff. He's like, no, I'm just with you. It's with Lonnie Anderson.

[Griffin Newman]

It's actually someone called Hamilton Clancy.

[John Hodgman]

Hamilton Clancy got the role. So I was one of those who was left off the Cohen train. And I never even got on it.

[David Sims]

I Auditioned for True Grit, but I didn't get to read for them.

[Ben Hosley]

Question about Hamilton Clancy, is he still with us?

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, fuck, he better be.

[David Sims]

Hold on, hold on.

[John Hodgman]

Jesus cock. That's a hot setup.

[Griffin Newman]

It looks like he is. As far as I can tell, he doesn't have like a Wikipedia page.

[John Hodgman]

I'm glad he's alive.

[David Sims]

John, thank you for being here. Thank you for being the ultimate utility man serving our needs. I know.

[John Hodgman]

What a stupid story to end on. I apologize.

[David Sims]

Is there anything additional you want to plug? You talked about your new podcast with Janet Varney.

[John Hodgman]

E Pluribus motto available Maximum Fun along with judge John Hodgman. Always available at Max on Wednesdays on Maximum Fun. Dicktown is still available on Hulu. David Reese, a friend of the show, working on a new secret project. But I can't say anything about it because maybe nothing will ever happen. James Bond could be they're going to do it.

[David Sims]

Denov directing a script by John Hodgson and David Reese.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah, I'm.

[Griffin Newman]

Reese is going to play Bond and John will be the villain.

[John Hodgman]

No, I'm. I'm a fresh new take on money Penny. Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh yeah, right. Yeah, exactly.

[John Hodgman]

Vacation land and medallion says out in whatever hodgman.substack.com if you you want to listen to me read aloud from Moby Dick. That's something that's happening. Hodgman.substack.com Whatever you can find. If you go to there and you subscribe, it's free and you'll find out about all the dumb stuff I'm doing if you want. And that's a good place to everyone should want.

[David Sims]

Ben has asked to do the end. As always, as I wind this show down, Ben, I want to hand you something. It will have been a couple months past by the time this episode comes out, but Ben recently celebrated a milestone birthday there.

[John Hodgman]

Oh yes, that's right. Happy birthday.

[David Sims]

And I commissioned a present for him from friend of the podcast. Kellen Jett worked on the Ninja Turtle Mutant Mayhem movie and Spiderverse and did a piece for our art show. And when we had the art show opening in March, he said, you know what I thought would be kind of a good idea for a painting. And I said, can you please do this for Ben's birthday?

[John Hodgman]

And Ben is now getting a situation scissors.

[David Sims]

I think that will immediately be able to identify what he has done. But I want to just shout out Kellen Jet for having this notion seeing it through.

[Ben Hosley]

Sorry. It's well packaged.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

To his credits, to his credit.

[John Hodgman]

And when you're Editing. Make sure to keep in all the awkward silence. Yeah, yeah.

[David Sims]

Maybe mix in a little bit of David's cup of ice as well to.

[John Hodgman]

Cover the time my story out about auditions or whatever.

[David Sims]

Keep it in. Do it like six times times. Maybe layer it in while he's opening the package again, kind of as an echo.

[John Hodgman]

There's a very small role at the beginning of the film when I went into the audition, I wore a suit and because I thought that's what you did and I can't remember, as Joel or Ethan said, you dressed up for the audition.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

Oh, my God.

[John Hodgman]

Oh, here we are.

[Ben Hosley]

All right, so number one, we have.

[David Sims]

He included some bonus sketches. I think some test sketches is to land on the final product.

[Ben Hosley]

It is I pictured as the young man who I believe kind of opens Gummo. It's the rabbit ear wearing young man.

[David Sims]

It is a painting of Ben.

[Ben Hosley]

Painting of me, the kid from Gumo, sitting on an highway overpass smoking a Sig.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[Ben Hosley]

This is a really cherished thing. This is awesome.

[John Hodgman]

Thank you. Beautiful, beautiful.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[John Hodgman]

Happy birthday.

[Ben Hosley]

Thank you.

[John Hodgman]

Yeah. Glad you're alive.

[David Sims]

Thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review and subscribe. Tune in next week for Miller's Crossing. Absolutely.

[John Hodgman]

Another movie that I love.

[Griffin Newman]

Pretty good one.

[David Sims]

Ben, anything you want to say to end the episode?

[Ben Hosley]

Oh, yeah. And as always.

[John Hodgman]

That guy.

[Ben Hosley]

Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hosley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas, and our Associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithee. Research by JJ Burke Church. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in the Great American Novel with additional music by Alex Mitchell, artwork by Joe Bowen, Ollie Moss, and Pat Reynolds. Our production assistant is Minick. Special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish and Nate Patterson for their production help. Head over to blankcheckpod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit. Join our Patreon Blank Check special features for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes notes. Follow us on social at blankcheckpod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter Checkbook on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.