Schindler's List with David Ehrlich

Summary

Blank Check with Griffin & David: Episode on Schindler's List Featuring David Ehrlich

Release Date: April 20, 2025
Producer: Ben Hosley
Hosts: Griffin Newman and David Sims
Special Guest: David Ehrlich

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Introduction

In this compelling episode of Blank Check with Griffin & David, hosts Griffin Newman and David Sims delve deep into Steven Spielberg's seminal work, Schindler's List, with special insights from film critic David Ehrlich. Produced by Ben Hosley, the episode navigates the intricate layers of Spielberg's filmmaking journey, the historical significance of the film, and its enduring impact on both cinema and collective memory.

---

Spielberg's Cinematic Evolution and the Birth of Schindler's List

Griffin Newman opens the discussion by contextualizing Schindler's List within Spielberg's broader filmography. David Sims emphasizes the film's role as a pivotal moment in Spielberg's career, marking his transition from blockbuster favorites like Jurassic Park and E.T. to more profound, historically grounded narratives.

"Schindler's List reviews directors' complete filmographies episode to episode," Griffin Newman notes, highlighting the podcast's focus on auteurs granted a 'blank check' from Hollywood to pursue passion projects. (01:16)

The conversation underscores how Schindler's List stands as a testament to Spielberg's versatility and commitment to storytelling that transcends mere entertainment, venturing into the realm of historical consciousness.

---

Character Analysis: Oskar Schindler and Amon Goeth

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to dissecting the complex characters portrayed in Schindler's List. Liam Neeson's portrayal of Oskar Schindler is lauded for its depth and nuance, capturing the gradual moral awakening of a man initially driven by profit to one who recognizes the value of human life.

"Glad you really like Schindler," Ehrlich comments, appreciating Neeson's ability to embody the multifaceted nature of Schindler. (03:50)

Ben Kingsley's Amon Goeth serves as the antithesis to Schindler, embodying the unrelenting cruelty of the Nazi regime. The hosts discuss how Goeth's character is instrumental in catalyzing Schindler's transformation, pushing him towards acts of profound humanity.

"Amon Goeth is coded as deeply evil," David Sims observes, pointing out the sharp contrast between his character and Schindler's evolving conscience. (07:46)

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Spielberg's Filmmaking Approach: Balancing Art and Responsibility

The trio explores Spielberg's meticulous approach to crafting Schindler's List, emphasizing the director's balance between creating a visually arresting film and responsibly portraying the horrors of the Holocaust.

"Spielberg's magic is just like you're so locked into every scene," Sims reflects, praising the director's ability to maintain audience engagement without sacrificing the film's gravity. (09:06)

Ehrlich shares personal anecdotes, revealing how Spielberg interacted with survivors and immersed himself in the historical context to ensure authenticity. This dedication is evident in Spielberg's collaboration with Janusz Kamiński, whose cinematography brings a haunting realism to the film.

"We listen to Kingsley on Marin," Ehrlich mentions, highlighting the behind-the-scenes efforts to capture genuine emotions and historical accuracy. (12:31)

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Impact and Legacy: Shaping Collective Memory

A central theme of the episode is the enduring legacy of Schindler's List in shaping collective memory and its role in Holocaust education. The hosts discuss how the film has become a cultural touchstone, often referenced as a benchmark for historical cinema.

"Schindler's List has become synonymous with the Holocaust in our visual memory," Griffin Newman asserts, underscoring the film's pervasive influence. (07:23)

However, the discussion also touches upon the challenges of such a monumental film, including the risk of it becoming the sole reference point for Holocaust narratives, potentially overshadowing other important stories and academic discourses.

"There is a danger about one thing becoming the focal point for our memory of the Holocaust," Ehrlich warns, advocating for a diversified approach to historical representation. (08:46)

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Personal Reflections: Navigating History and Memory

David Ehrlich brings a personal dimension to the conversation by sharing his family's history, as his grandfather was a Holocaust survivor. This narrative layer adds depth to the discussion, highlighting the personal responsibilities artists like Spielberg bear in portraying such sensitive topics.

"I am the grandson of a Holocaust survivor," Ehrlich reveals, connecting his personal heritage to the broader themes of the film. (27:14)

The hosts grapple with the emotional weight of the film, debating its accessibility to younger generations and its place in contemporary discourse amidst rising Holocaust denial and the resurgence of extremist ideologies.

"Schindler's List is a movie that cannot be made in a world with cell phones anymore," Sims muses, reflecting on the film's immersive nature that demands undivided attention. (21:36)

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Notable Quotes

• "All you need to know is that the name of the shadow is Blackjack." - Griffin Newman (00:13)

• "Schindler's List is the most successful movie that is this difficult ever." - David Sims (07:46)

• "The legacy of the Holocaust lies in how it straddles the difference between those two parts of himself as an artist." - Erlich (08:46)

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Conclusion

The episode wraps up with the hosts reaffirming the profound significance of Schindler's List both as a cinematic masterpiece and as an essential educational tool. They acknowledge the film's ability to evoke deep emotional responses and its role in preserving the memory of the Holocaust for future generations.

"This is why Schindler's List is bigger than the sum of its parts," David Sims concludes, emphasizing the film's unparalleled impact on culture and history. (76:50)

As they sign off, Griffin Newman and David Sims invite listeners to engage with the film critically and reflect on its enduring messages in today's global landscape.

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Note: Advertisements and non-content segments have been excluded to maintain focus on the core discussion surrounding Schindler's List.

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.

[David Sims]

All around its bits lie the golf.

[Ben Hosley]

Wait, is Nosferatu in the room?

[David Sims]

How do you do, Ben?

[Griffin Newman]

I do podcast his life.

[David Sims]

Do the podcast.

[Griffin Newman]

I can't stop doing Nosferatu. It is a problem. Yeah, no, I think that was a very good Ben Kingsley in Schindler's.

[Erlich]

Oh, that was supposed to be Kingsley?

[Griffin Newman]

Well, who else was it supposed to be?

[David Sims]

I was, like, debating whether to put the word bits in the quote. Because I was like. Well, no, because I was like, look, this might be a more serious episode. No bits. And then within 15 seconds, we're doing nosfer.

[Erlich]

Yeah, we're going to keep the Becker talk let limited to, like, a tight 20 for this episode.

[Griffin Newman]

I am also a fan of Becker.

[David Sims]

If we're doing Decade of Dreams, Becker talk is in the top 10 most hated sections of any episode ever that people will not stop bringing up.

[Griffin Newman]

But then there's the Teners, who are like, wish they do more Becker talk.

[David Sims]

Yeah, I like the Becker run.

[Griffin Newman]

Come to my castle and watch Becker with me for an entire night.

[David Sims]

I think they should have talked about the movie less.

[Erlich]

We could get into all the ways that Count Orlok is coded as Jewish. And the legacy of those characters.

[Griffin Newman]

Isn'T coded in, like, the original Nosferatu. It's pretty plainly painted on.

[Erlich]

I'd say Germany.

[Griffin Newman]

Wait, what's this country?

[David Sims]

Which decade, though?

[Griffin Newman]

Don't worry. It must have been after the World War II stuff, right? Oh, no. Way before. Cool.

[David Sims]

Would you mind turning on the light switch for me? It is the Sabbath.

[Griffin Newman]

Cut all of this out. This is a terrible way to introduce. What if Spielberg listened to this episode?

[Erlich]

Oh, he's definitely bailed by now. He's. He's already ready.

[Griffin Newman]

He didn't even get to hear me meta acknowledge him listening.

[David Sims]

We've done two series on his career, not to mention all the new release episodes. And he was like, I just want to see how they handle Schindler.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, he's like, I've heard a lot about this guy. They have a lot of swings.

[David Sims]

Yeah, and I haven't bothered to listen until now.

[Erlich]

Is this the first time that somebody has been on two episodes about the same filmmaker?

[Griffin Newman]

Good point.

[David Sims]

Oh, no, no. Let's go through. Let's go through. But this is a good. This is a good list.

[Griffin Newman]

This is a good list. Sorry, I'll stop. Lawson was on both Lawson did Saving Private Ryan and always.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Erlich]

That guy. Well, always has not aired yet. I'm at the time of recording. I think you guys have only gone up through ET Correct.

[David Sims]

Erlich has done. Now will have done Kingdom of the.

[Griffin Newman]

Crystal Skull and an inferior film in Schindler's List.

[Erlich]

Yeah, well, we'll determine its inferiority at the end of this episode.

[David Sims]

Here's my question though. Has anyone. Are those. Are you two the only two to have been on both parts? And if so, if not, has anyone done two masterpieces? Because I think both of you guys have gotten one uncontested masterpiece and one kind of left handed oddball movie. Is that fair to say?

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, you mean within this Spielberg.

[David Sims]

Within the two parts of Spielberg.

[Griffin Newman]

I believe those are the only two, Griffin.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[Erlich]

I think left handed oddball is too generous to always and rude to Indiana Jones Kingdom.

[David Sims]

Okay, well, that's what I thought you were gonna say.

[Griffin Newman]

Hello.

[David Sims]

Our energy today is normal. I don't.

[Griffin Newman]

Look, I'm excited to talk about this wonderful film with you, my friends. I just had a big bowl of noodle soup and a couple peanut butter cups, which is not two foods that matched up. But that's how it went today for me. And here we are. Introduce the show, please.

[David Sims]

Look, this is Blank Strike with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin and I am David. Great. We're not. We're certainly not nervous about how to talk about this.

[Erlich]

No, I haven't been like sweating bullets for eight months since Sims texted me when I was on the treadmill. You were like, put this like across the bear on my shoulder.

[Griffin Newman]

There's no question you were doing.

[Erlich]

I have had so many speaking to the legacy of all the Jewish people.

[David Sims]

Because so many Sims. I was like, how are we gonna handle Schindler? Do we just do that without a guess? And he was like, no. Erlich really wants to do it.

[Griffin Newman]

To say Erlich and I have had. Please finish that I'm David podcast about.

[David Sims]

Filmography is directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion products they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce. Baby, baby. It's a pretty wild. Clear. This is.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, but obviously one of his more passiony projects.

[David Sims]

Yeah, but a passionate project that makes $96 million domestic wins many Academy Awards, including finally his only best picture win, his first best director win. It is the movie that in terms of this half arc we have done podrasic cast the early films of Steven Spielberg. This is. We're zoom out. The narrative has been a man trying to figure out how to grow up. Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Of course.

[Erlich]

And I think that you guys chose a pretty natural point to split the filmography. But I also don't think it's possible that in the history of Hollywood filmmaking there has never been a more distinct inflection point in a filmmaker's career.

[David Sims]

Your. Your lovely wife's birthday was last weekend. And I was. We were talking.

[Griffin Newman]

This is who he is.

[David Sims]

David Ehrlich.

[Griffin Newman]

Thank you.

[Erlich]

Decade of David's Mindy Wire fighting in the war room.

[David Sims]

Decade of David's David. And we were talking about this exact idea and just saying like man, I know why we justified starting where we seven years ago but man, has that paid off beautifully.

[Griffin Newman]

Paid off beautifully. Because imagine if we were had one more episode to go and it was the Lost World. Like that doesn't make sense as an end point.

[David Sims]

And he has the four year break and he has the dream works like. But the inflation point is in those four years jacked it set up like a llc. Like he was starting to.

[Griffin Newman]

He finally set up that llc. He was like. He called his account. He's like I think I should set up.

[Erlich]

But I also want to clarify that we were not talking about Chinless List just because we were about to record this episode. But that's just always what I'm talking.

[Griffin Newman]

About at any birthday party. Had a lot of drunken conversations about Schindler's List over the years. And that is why I immediately thought of you for this episode. Also. You've been on the show before.

[Erlich]

It's my go to subject whenever there's a lull in any conversation really.

[Griffin Newman]

Exactly.

[David Sims]

It is kind of the Schindler's list of movies.

[Erlich]

I would say it's one of them.

[David Sims]

Look up. I was thinking this while watching it. It is one of those films where it's like used as shorthand almost in a like monolithic way to represent like a larger idea of a type of movie. Not just the film itself but like the cultural reputation of the movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Like a prestige sort of gotta see it the way historically people will say.

[David Sims]

Like look, it's no Citizens Cane, Citizens Kane, Citizen Kane. Why am I fucking Schindler's listing the way people will say it's no Citizen Kane or going like look, they're not trying to make Citizen Kane here. I feel like Schindler's List has a similar kind of shorthand for like serious well made movie. But I deeply serious.

[Erlich]

It has as much to do with the film's Quality as it does with the fact that it's become synonymous with the historical event that it depicts. You know, in a way that it will get into it, but it's sort of, like, inextricable. Now, from our visual idea of a portion of World War II, specifically the.

[David Sims]

Holocaust, throwing out, like, come and see is like. No, that's a deeper cut, letterbox nerd joke. For a movie that is, like, purposefully kind of challenging to watch versus Schindler maybe being the most successful movie that is this difficult ever. Like, the most mainstream movie that is this challenging and upsetting, I can't begin.

[Griffin Newman]

To reckon with what that list is. Sorry. I mean, I guess I sort of know what you mean. I'm trying to think of, like, what. Yeah. What are other mega upsetting films that became somewhat appointment.

[Erlich]

Bohemian Rhapsody.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. So true.

[Erlich]

Wicked.

[Griffin Newman]

Now, wait a second.

[David Sims]

I know I can't back up that statement, but you get what I'm saying.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, I know what you're saying.

[David Sims]

Where it's like, you can make the reference of, like, look, it's like Schindler's List or whatever, and everyone knows what you're saying. Which I do think perhaps in the last 15 years has started to become an albatross around this movie's neck.

[Erlich]

I would actually. I mean, again, we'll get deep into it, but I. I think we're on an interesting part in the arc of Schindler's List reputation and esteem and place in the culture right now. Because I think it was freighted with a lot more baggage immediately after its release and now is reclaimed is way too strong a word for a movie that already occupies the place that it does in the public imagination. But I think it is easier with distance to appreciate.

[Griffin Newman]

People watch it and they're like, oh, this is fucking good.

[David Sims]

I feel like it had 15 years of basically being, like, homework well. But also just, like, undeniable, kind of, like, largely uncontested. This is one of the great movies. Spielberg, like, proved himself, shut down all the haters.

[Erlich]

I think about it is one of the great. Shut down all the haters movies.

[David Sims]

It is. Sure.

[Griffin Newman]

Shut down.

[Erlich]

I mean, he created a lot of new haters in the process.

[David Sims]

Sure.

[Erlich]

Among, like, the Jewish intelligentsia in particular.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

But he shut down a lot of them.

[David Sims]

Yes. I think about the. The original AFI top 100 list, which I want to say came out in, like, 98 or 97, and Schindler made the top 10. Going over that list with my parents and being like, whoa. They put a movie that Recent in the top 10. And my parents, who are noted Spielberg skeptics, were like, yeah, but it's Schindler's List. There was this feeling of this just.

[Griffin Newman]

Very interesting to see Griffin's relationship with this movie so far.

[David Sims]

But that's stuck in my head basically.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, you know, it's the word you use for a serious movie. And it really crushed the AFI top 100.

[David Sims]

This, I'm talking about this immediate canonization which I then think turned into it being like, homework, which then turned into a notion of like, well, like, Spielberg doing the Holocaust is that thing.

[Erlich]

Like, I like how in Griffin's head, Shin, Spielberg's relationship to Schindler's List, how it's somehow separate from him, is kind of similar to Griffin's relationship to his own lateness in that, like, it's like.

[Griffin Newman]

We'Re going right there.

[David Sims]

We are going.

[Griffin Newman]

We are going right to these.

[Erlich]

Before you came here, you guys talk.

[David Sims]

You guys say stuff.

[Griffin Newman]

I will say the first Oscars I really remember watching is the 94 Oscars for the 93 films of 93. And I remember, you know, you're like, seven. Yeah, it would have been almost eight. And like, a lot of those 90s Oscars are defined by movies that sort of sweep. So Schindler, English Patient. Right. Titanic, where you're watching a three plus hour ceremony where it's like, okay, time for another award. Schindler's List again, obviously. Let's keep it going, you know. And I do remember being like, what? You know, because it's like, I'm watching the Oscars. People are laughing and dancing and, you know, and then occasionally they'll play, like, very somber black and white footage. And someone will come up and be like, this is a very important thing. And I'll say to my parents, like, so what's this movie? And they're like, we'll get to it later. They're not mad about it, but they're just like, we can't start to explain the whole thing.

[David Sims]

Let's add another wrinkle to that too. Which like, by 1994, if you're a child, right. And you're interested in movies in any way, not only are you like, oh, right, Steven Spielberg, Jurassic park guy, ET Guy.

[Griffin Newman]

I guess I sort of knew. I was pretty young. Yeah, I might have known who Spielberg was.

[David Sims]

But there are also, like four cartoon shows that all have Steven Spielberg presents on them that are, like, dominating 90s pop culture.

[Erlich]

This is the Animaniacs guy.

[Griffin Newman]

This is. But no, I don't think that was true for me yet. I don't think I knew about Spielberg. The. The whatever, like, what you're talking about.

[David Sims]

Had him baked into the top.

[Griffin Newman]

I know. I just wasn't watching them yet.

[Erlich]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, when is Animaniacs?

[Erlich]

I think it's like. I think it's actually. But there's a bit in the. In the book that I have in front of me because I always like to bring a prop. I'm also clutching the.

[Griffin Newman]

Clutching the paranoia ancient symbol, horror and despair.

[Erlich]

The giant. Yeah. Pink puppy. It's my comfort animal during this record. But there's a bit in. In this book by Francesek Palowski, the making of Schindler's List, which was written before the movie came out, before the author had seen it, where he talks about how some of the young extras couldn't will themselves to be afraid in some of the background scenes because they couldn't imagine a Steven Spielberg movie. Those who are familiar with him, like the guy who made ET like how. Scaring them. Right? Exactly. I mean, sure.

[Griffin Newman]

And I was like, well, clearly you never saw 1941.

[Erlich]

But in terms of the. Terms of the sweetness of it all, though, I mean, it's so hard to parse Clint Eastwood's delivery when he's giving Spielberg the Best Director trophy because he says he's, like, trying to make a joke about it.

[Griffin Newman]

First he tries to give it to a chair and everyone's like, clint, Clint, Clint.

[Erlich]

But he's like, oh, big surprise. And he looks at it, but his delivery is so stilted that it sounds out of context, like it was a huge surprise because Spielberg had never actually won the award before this.

[Griffin Newman]

Fuck. I mean, surely Clint Eastwood was happy for. I've never really thought about, like, what is Clint Eastwood's relationship with Stevenberg? Have they ever interacted when.

[Erlich]

When Spielberg. When they wins Best Direct, Best Picture. About five minutes later, he's standing backstage waiting in the wings, and he hands his Best direct Oscar to Clint Eastwood to hold. And Clint Eastwood just fucking throws it at his head. No, he seems fine. Smiles.

[David Sims]

Animaniacs premiered September 1993. So was in between Jurassic and Schindler. It was the new hotness. And Tiny Toons had actually finished its main room, its storied room. It's story run.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm. I'm looking at the Oscars of this year, trying to think if there was, like, any movie I had seen that was nominated. Because I remember those early Oscar years when, like, the mask had, like, a makeup nom. I would be like, the mask better fudgeing win. And then they'd be like, english Patient. I'd be like, what is this crap?

[Erlich]

Children, Children across the world these days are like, this year are going to be thinking the same thing about a better man.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't.

[Erlich]

Raging at their televisions.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't think I'd see, you know, I, I, I don't think I'd made it to the cinema to see the Remains of the Day or the Fugitive.

[David Sims]

Have you seen Jurassic in theaters? So that's in the tack categories.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't think I saw Jurassic.

[Erlich]

Wow.

[Griffin Newman]

And did I. I don't. I can't remember.

[Erlich]

Also up that they had Harrison Ford, star of best Picture, nominated the Fugitive, handing out the best picture award that year.

[Griffin Newman]

They do that all the time.

[Erlich]

They do that all a movie.

[Griffin Newman]

That's why. Who is it? There's one year that it kind of does. It's a Shakespeare love year because they have Harrison Ford do it again, thinking that Saving Private Ryan's about to win best Picture. And he goes, shakespeare in love. And everyone's like, huh? Like, you know, like that was them. Assuming Spielberg was about to get his, you know, second crown.

[David Sims]

He takes three red Hulk pills from Hulking.

[Griffin Newman]

He's grabbing one of the big Oscars, like, and then he crushes the big Oscar statue with a big red hand.

[David Sims]

I was late, quote, unquote, to seeing Brave New World to entering.

[Griffin Newman]

Really wanted it to, you know, to matriculate. To stew in our culture for a week or too. Exactly. You wanted those tannins to mellow.

[David Sims]

I was astounded that that movie is explicitly about a prescription pill refill. That is what that movie is about.

[Griffin Newman]

Need my pills, Leader. And Leader's like, I won't be giving.

[Erlich]

Those Legacy of the Born Legacy.

[David Sims]

Right. There truly is a monologue where it's like, Harrison Ford, how did you allow this bad guy to rise to power? And he's like, I needed the pills.

[Griffin Newman]

They were so good. He read Hulk me by mistake.

[Erlich]

I guess no one was right under the impression that the Fugitive is going to win best Picture. It seemed like a safe bet. It wasn't like the piano was the big level second.

[David Sims]

How many times has Harrison Ford handed out or that that was Best Director, right?

[Griffin Newman]

No, no, he does picture.

[David Sims]

I'm saying the Pianist Year.

[Griffin Newman]

He does the Pianist Year.

[David Sims]

He is the one who announces Roman Polanski.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, is he? Oh, okay, you're switching.

[David Sims]

I was switching that. Okay. I was trying.

[Griffin Newman]

All right, well, I. You. Harrison Ford has announced Best Picture three times To Schindler's List, Shakespeare in Love, and of course, Everything Everywhere, all at once.

[Erlich]

More words than he said in a row in several on screen performances.

[Griffin Newman]

And also coming to you. Everything Everywhere, all at once. Me on streaming television. I'm in Everything Everywhere, all at once, all at once.

[David Sims]

Give me my pals.

[Griffin Newman]

Who's done it the most. You ask Nicholson eight times.

[Erlich]

Do you think they might get him back this year? Post 50th SNL appearance?

[Griffin Newman]

I. Look, I'm really happy. It was lovely to see Jack for a moment. Didn't strike me as a guy who's ready to, like, say more than a couple words.

[David Sims]

What if he came out and announced that Best Picture was going to Adam Sandler, that they were like, oh, there's only. There's only one thing now.

[Griffin Newman]

I hate to. You know, I hope he's doing well. Nicholson announced Best Picture two, the French Connection, Rocky. Wow.

[David Sims]

Starting that early?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, I mean, that's how fucking major he was, I guess, already. And also, he was just always there. They were like, come up. Hey, you're in your. In the front row. Rocky, Annie Hall, Driving Miss Daisy, which he did with Warren Beatty. Beatty was probably trying to, like, say it was do the right thing or something. Like reading from the back of the envelope, oh, no, I'm sorry. It was Faye Dunaway who fucked up that thing. Okay. Unforgiven, then a long, long rest. Then he comes back to say crash, which I'll crash.

[David Sims]

He holds up the two fingers.

[Griffin Newman]

And then the next year, he did announce the Departed with Diane Keaton.

[David Sims]

Conflict of interest.

[Griffin Newman]

How dare he.

[David Sims]

Back, we're back in this zone, but.

[Griffin Newman]

He doesn't remember being in the Departed. If you've seen that performance, then I have no memory of this. He gave it to Argo with Michelle Obama. Oh, was Michelle Obama, like, teleconferencing in or something?

[David Sims]

Yes. He comes out on stage and presents Michelle Obama live surrounded by military vets. I want to. Active military.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, sure, yeah. No memory of that. The thing about Best Picture is you're really tired by that point and the show is kind of rushing it at that point. And usually Best Picture is actually kind of a forgotten award because it's some producer who comes up and is like, oh, I'm so proud of all the money I spent on. You know, like, it's not always the director.

[David Sims]

Look, we're obviously not avoiding talking about Schindler's List, but you pointing out that Nicholson had presented Best Picture twice already by the 70s, pretty crazy. What is the last Time. Someone under the age of 50 presented best picture.

[Griffin Newman]

Rita Moreno's under 50. Right.

[David Sims]

I just feel like that award is exclusive for living legend Lady Gaga, who.

[Griffin Newman]

Is only 38 years old. Lady Gaga, who's almost exactly my age, presented Best Picture Dakota with Liza Minnelli.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

If you remember, she was kind of helping.

[Erlich]

They balance out to be about 73.

[Griffin Newman]

But if you want to go solo.

[David Sims]

Yeah, let's go solo, because Liza fits into the living legend category.

[Griffin Newman]

Julia Roberts presented Best Picture to Green Book, which we all remember so well.

[David Sims]

She would have.

[Griffin Newman]

She would have been about 50.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

Like 50. 50.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

So kind of on the cusp there. Sean Penn, we all remember, gave it to Birdman and was, like, making jokes about him being an immigrant or whatever. And everyone was like, it's his ribald sense of humor, Right?

[David Sims]

He said, like, check his green card.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay?

[David Sims]

People were like, don't, please.

[Griffin Newman]

He would have been like.

[David Sims]

He didn't mean it rudely. They're friends. They love joking. Like they did on the set of 21 grams.

[Griffin Newman]

Tom Cruise presented to the artist. I remember none of these.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And he was about 50. So it's like. I feel like it's.

[David Sims]

When you hit 50, I think so, too.

[Griffin Newman]

You're sort of like. It's kind of like, all right, you know, welcome.

[David Sims]

It's like you're 50, and you've been a movie star for three decades. Congratulations. You're officially part of the tap.

[Griffin Newman]

Denzel gave it to no country for Old Men right around the age of 50. Kirk Douglas, when he gave it to Chicago, I remember he was like, 22 or 23 years old. Right. He's the one who goes, and the Oscar, like. And the winner is like, he. He. He says the old way of saying, oh, rather than end the Oscar, right?

[David Sims]

And then he said, merry Christmas.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Famous Jew. I don't know what that joke is. Yeah. Or like, I feel like you have things to say.

[Erlich]

I mean, I. I was just hoping that we'd still have some time for some Becker talks. I have some thoughts. I've really gone done a deep dive since.

[David Sims]

And here's a Promise episode. We're ranking every single Steven Spielberg, and.

[Griffin Newman]

We'Re ranking every season of Back.

[Erlich]

I was basically just lost in thought, imagining if on the set of 21 grams, Alejandro Gonzalez Nu needed a phone call from Adam Sandler or Robin Williams every night just to cheer him up. Similar to Spielberg on you.

[Griffin Newman]

Like a. A soul vampire, though he probably was making 21 grams of me. Like, this is making me stronger, more Misery. Just put the camera pointed at Claire Duvall for a minute. She's gonna cry. I don't know. I'll fit it into the movie somewhere.

[David Sims]

It is funny that that is quietly maybe, like, one of the biggest parts of Schindler's List. Schindler's List, lasting legacy.

[Griffin Newman]

The lore around it of, like, he was editing Jurassic Park. He needed phone calls from Robin Williams to cheer.

[David Sims]

Robin Williams would just do a jazz over the phone for an hour every night to. Yeah. Keep him above water.

[Erlich]

I mean, that's. That's some serious, heavily heavy Jew work. Like, having to get on the phone every night and talk to Steven Spielberg and, like, do a tight five just to keep him off the brink, you know?

[Griffin Newman]

But it's also the Spielberg thing where he's like, yeah, I called my friend to kind of cheer myself up. My friend Robin Williams, circa 1993. Like, he's like. He's. I'm friends with the most funny person of the moment. Right.

[David Sims]

Okay, can I throw out a big take? And this ties into this that I had watching it again last night. This feels to me like the kind of movie that fundamentally cannot be made in a world with cell phones anymore.

[Erlich]

Wait, wait, explain.

[David Sims]

Even that anecdote is pointing to something which is, like, the level of, like, immersive concentration around this movie. Right. Like, not that they were, like, method living the Holocaust. Right. But the way he talks about it, like, we were really trying to, like, evoke something, and there is, like, a disciplined, sober focus to the idea of, like, bringing this thing, like, back in front of lenses that I feel like the second anyone is able to, like, after cut. Check their cell phone.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

I mean, there is a mood and a tone that is sustained in this film.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

That I think speaks to him being like, I need to call Robin Williams at midnight, because I've been living in this for 12 hours without breaking versus.

[Griffin Newman]

Being like, look, I'm not accusing Spielberg being performative at all. I also just think that there is a whole, like, how do you do press for a Holocaust movie?

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

You have to kind of acknowledge whatever. Like, oh, it's so hard and serious. And, like, you don't want to be like, oh, we were cutting it up on set.

[Erlich]

And I don't want to be disingenuous or, you know, or unkind towards Spielberg, but I do think he's also happily performing the act of making the. The great film that is. He's really catapulted everything.

[Griffin Newman]

But I also really sold how serious and how grown up he was making this movie, which think he was.

[David Sims]

I agree with you.

[Erlich]

But I also want to say, like, to Griffin's point, I think it's more. It feels more pressing to me that there would be less of a need to make this movie in the age of cell phones. Because so much of what is galvanizing this production is the act of sort of concentrating, collecting memory and serving as much of an arc in the production.

[Griffin Newman]

We actually had an incredible movie about the Holocaust that kind of felt like it was made without cell phones.

[Erlich]

The boy in the striped pajamas? No. But I sort of interest. We'll get there.

[David Sims]

I'm not saying you can't make a movie about the Holocaust in a world with cell phones.

[Griffin Newman]

Say that.

[David Sims]

I'm saying that I feel like there is a type of like. And it's less about how much Spielberg was suffering and living in this world, which I do agree he like, not overstates. But that is part of the narrative behind this film, which he's very good at selling his own, like, mythology.

[Erlich]

And the book makes the set sound positively buoyant. So I, I think a lot of this feels like there was a one.

[Griffin Newman]

For all, all for one vibe on this set too, right? Of like, you know, this isn't an ego thing, right. Like, there's not really any stars in this movie. Neeson is, you know, a little famous. Ralph Fiennes is not at all right.

[Erlich]

Like Ben Kingsley is, is the biggest.

[Griffin Newman]

Which is crazy that he's in the movie in a way, although he had quickly become a character supporting guy.

[Erlich]

But what you pick up when you're reading about, you know, day to day life on the set of this movie is that every day there would be another one of the Schindler Juden who would come to set and it would. They would be. These are people. These will be people who may have been thought dead or have been off the radar, who were summoned like Moss to the flame, to the production of this movie that sort of reconstituted the collective identity of this people and this group and of what Schindler was able to do.

[Griffin Newman]

Jojo Rabbit. There's a movie that feels like there's no sort of cell phone influence on set.

[David Sims]

Here is what I'm trying to say. I think more than anything is the level of, like, sustained concentration this movie has. That more than anything is like holding on to a feeling without overstating it that feels like it very much makes sense with what you're just saying of like daily reminders of this is what we're doing that is less about Spielberg because that's his job to stay in it, and more about, like, you feel like the entire crew was on the same wavelength. You know that, like, the hundreds and thousands of background actors were all on the same wavelength in a way that I just like, as someone who now works on shitty modern productions. And you just feel that sense of, like, they call cut and everyone goes off and they're like, I got to check other shit, you know?

[Erlich]

Yeah, there was definitely a sense of purpose that was very cohesive.

[David Sims]

Feels like a movie where people are checking their cell phones. And I don't say that out of disrespect. All movies feel like that.

[Griffin Newman]

Once again, I just wish the sets I was on these days were run with a professionalism.

[Erlich]

Yes.

[David Sims]

No, I'm not complaining about it. I'm just like, this is what it is. This is how we all live our lives now. When did you first of Just, like, shipping. Like, we're all just gonna focus on making Schindler's List for 70.

[Erlich]

I'm so happy that there wasn't, like, a Universal Studios marketing intern who had to come up with tick tocks from the sunshine, torpedo their own life.

[David Sims]

Respect to Reese Feldman, the king of tick tock. He was not sent to Schindler's List.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm closing the book content.

[David Sims]

When did I first.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, when did you first see.

[David Sims]

I think I first saw it when I was, like, 14.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And it was in it. You haven't seen Schindler's List? Aren't you supposed to be the movie guy?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, I think Crowley was similar for me.

[Erlich]

My friend Hood, it's like the Jewish equivalent of Hot Fuzz. But you ain't seen Schindler's List.

[David Sims]

Basically, yes.

[Griffin Newman]

The five novelties for best drag. I'm watching this now. The Oscar clip are Jim Sheridan, Jane Campion, who I think was only the second woman ever nominated.

[David Sims]

Correct. After.

[Griffin Newman]

James Ivory.

[Erlich]

Robert Altman, who did not bother to show up.

[David Sims]

Robert. For shortcuts.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, for shortcuts. Who never bothered to show up and.

[David Sims]

Shut up for the Gospel Year.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, he did. And he looked great. And he hugged Lynchy.

[Erlich]

I mean, it's. I. We. We definitely were feeling that we were doing everything in our power to delay actually confronting this movie and what it is. But I also wanted to preface this episode, at least personally, if only by way of, like, as a disclaimer for any sort of future glibness that I hope to avoid of talking a little bit about, like, how I've lived with this film. And maybe that's true of how, you know, other people on this record have internalized this movie over the years. But, like, I am the grandson of a Holocaust survivor. My grandfather was two of nine siblings who survived. He left Poland in 1939 as a member of the Polish Cavalry Cavalry on what he described as sort of the last boat out of Poland. It was going to the World's Fair, which was his only ticket out of there. And the rest of his family, like so many in the characters in Schindler's List, did not believe the severity of the crisis that was coming towards them, and so they elected to stay. And my grandfather, who ended up owning movie theaters, and unfortunately, I don't have any memory of talking about Schindler's List itself with him, which I'm sure he played Die. He died in, I don't know, early 2000, after. He lived just long enough to tell me that he was thinking about voting for George W. Bush, which was really difficult. But anyway, people are so complicated. I mean, it was all about Israel, and again, we'll get to it. But he. He was always the funniest person that I knew. And he would always talk about his memories of growing up in Poland and, like, of the early years of the Holocaust with. Not with, like, you know, not as if it were a comic event, but with, like, a certain levity that. He always made it very clear to me that it was important to confront these things honestly and with a hint of, you know, humor, albeit gallows humor, in order to be able to reckon with them and not make it so sacrosanct that became impenetrable and therefore something that would be allowed to repeat itself. And I don't know, I think that sort of seeped into my relationship with the movie Schindler's List, which I've always talked about, you know, despite what the first 30 minutes of this episode may have sounded like, with a certain, like, casualness, just because it. It didn't. It didn't feel right to hold it in this. In the sacrosanct, verified space.

[David Sims]

It does no favors to the movie itself. I think that's the case with basically all movies, you know, and there are other, like, serious, important movies that have kind of, like, things like the Godfather are always framed around. It's so watchable. Yeah, the Godfather is undeniable, despite it being like this, like, totemic best picture winner and blockbuster.

[Erlich]

And that's uniquely problematic for Schindler's List, in a way. It isn't for The Godfather.

[David Sims]

Right, right. But Schindler's List did play in a similar way. And part of the accomplishment of this movie is without belittling its subject matter or the import of the messages trying to communicate, the Spielberg X Factor is. It is so fucking watchable. It is watchable in a way that somehow skirts around being like, exploitative, in my opinion. Some certain old European filmmakers disagree. But like, you watch Color Purple and that's the first strike of him trying to do something like this. And it's like he can't stop making it. Like it's a popcorn movie.

[Erlich]

Right.

[David Sims]

But I also think he's not doing that. And yet it's got the Spielberg kind of magic of just like you're so locked into every scene.

[Erlich]

I think it's power, it's lasting power. And its value to me and to the culture at large and to the memory of the Holocaust lies in how it straddles the difference between those two parts of himself as an artist and also the parts of his career. But I also had very humble beginnings at the start of this movie and that I watched it on a 13 inch TV with a built in VCR in the break room at the school where I taught wood shop one summer. And there has never been a human being less qualified to do that. And so, like, while Timmy was sitting behind me, like sanding his arm off, I was like locked into Schindler's List on TV and just like watching it over the course of a day. And that was just. I don't know. And when that movie ended, I popped it out and put in like Rambo too.

[David Sims]

Right? You're just like, it's a very well made movie.

[Erlich]

Yeah, but I've seen it. I've seen it, I think an unconscionable amount of times since then.

[Griffin Newman]

I've seen it so many times. It's weirdly a movie that would be on tv and there's a sort of aspect that we're like, this almost shouldn't be just on TV in between Rambos 1 and 2 or whatever. But I would watch like chunks of it all the time. I've seen it. So I. But the first time I saw it, I had the opposite. I was like, I need to know a lot more about that. I was. I guess I knew plenty about the Holocaust in a sort of vague history sense. But when you're watching that, you're just like, I don't understand. Where was this? Where's everyone else? Why don't people know? Or why do people, you know, like I immediately sought much more.

[David Sims]

More context seeking, you're saying, the context of the actual historical events. Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Erlich]

Well, I mean, that's. That was a big, you know, Holocaust. There's a big part of the motivation for. For making it was just the idea that the Holocaust. It was sort of this, you know, twinfold thing that was happening where I think among Jews, the Holocaust was starting to assume a more central role in the collective identity of the Diaspora. Because for decades there had been, and again, I'm talking sweeping generalizations, a feeling of trying to sort of minimize and move beyond it amongst our people.

[Griffin Newman]

Like the Holocaust survivors in my family, it was like, never spoken. And I do feel like that's a bit of a stereotype.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, it was part of the, you know, idea of founding the nation of Israel and was just sort of like, you know, this idea of. Of trying to move beyond that. And I think its power to be, you know, galvanizing for the Diaspora was coming into focus at the same time as a decreasing awareness of the Holocaust on the whole in. Among the goy population of the world and a rise in people not believing that it happened. I mean, there's a poll that's something or statistic that I read that something said in the early 90s, something like 22% of people had expressed sentiments doubting that the Holocaust ever happened.

[David Sims]

It's crazy to me when you get to the end of this film and you have the real survivors appear on camera. Right. In this very profound, affecting way. And my immediate thought is, God, I can't believe how young they all are. Right, sure.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. Whereas now it's like there are very few living.

[David Sims]

How many are still alive?

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, this is the same, like, how many World War II veterans are still alive? It's a number that dwindled. I remember when, like, the Last World War I veteran died when I was a teenager or whatever. It was like some ancient man.

[David Sims]

I remember being in, like, eighth grade in the early 2000s, about 245,000, close to a decade after this movie comes out. And at my school, they were like, a Holocaust survivor is coming to speak. And like everyone from every grade above, you know, third is. This is like required, mandatory, whatever. And it was at that time, an old woman who talked about having been a child.

[Griffin Newman]

That's the thing. The one Holocaust survivor I know very well is a child was right. She's not currently a child. She's currently a very old woman.

[David Sims]

But. But it's like the fact that Spielberg options this right. Gets Universal to option. It spends a decade being too afraid to touch it says that kind of the inciting thing in the early 90s was like, I am seeing this level of, like, denialism starting to grow along with a kind of like, edgelord, neo Nazi kind of normalization. Had no idea how bad things were going to get over the next couple of decades. Yes, weirdly, that it was like, I have a cultural responsibility from my vantage point. My power to get stuff made and communicated.

[Erlich]

My.

[David Sims]

My, like, megaphone, basically, to make something to make this feel vivid and present and understandable to people. And then to see the survivors at the end of the movie. And you're like, these people still, like, have colored hair, you know, like, a lot of them haven't gotten gray yet. This is like, such, like, these people.

[Griffin Newman]

Are kind of hot.

[David Sims]

You don't have anything. You watch this and you're like, it's crazy how much more recent this history was to feel that disconnect from it. Feel versus now.

[Erlich]

He should have shot the scenes at the end there in his real, like, Coralie Farjay shot the substance, you know, just like, really slow motion.

[David Sims]

I think it is very interesting to watch this movie now as there are like, four or five huge tracks of what is happening in the world around us that echo this movie and the events that this film is representing in different ways that are terrifying, that feel like going back to this question we have of, like, how does this happen? What do you mean? How does this just happen overnight? And this movie is really trying to break down, like, the steps of understanding psychologically, like through a certain prism. I think that's what's smart about it.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. This is not a history of.

[David Sims]

No, I don't think it's its main goal. And I think through picking one specific story, it does find a way to dramatize in certain ways, the gradual shifts of how these things happen. But now what's scary is you're just sort of like, this feels far enough away from our present that people are losing their connection with it in the classic those who forget history are doomed to repeat it kind of way. And the fact that it felt so urgent to make schindler in the 90s is wild to me. When it's like, this is still kind of fairly new.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, Spielberg's own trepidation in approaching the subject matter again very metatextually reflected in our own approach to the start of this episode. Very good job, boys.

[David Sims]

I think so.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Can we just make Jurassic park part quickly before we have to go off and do this.

[Erlich]

And also, I think, you know, the distance between the 90s and the Holocaust has been compounded in interesting ways between the distance between the release of Schindler's List and today in a way that we'll talk about, especially in relation when you look at some of the reaction to Schindler's List at the time. And I think also all those things you're saying about it being the right time to make it, it does. And again, I, I, I don't mean to be a cynic about it, but I do think he was sort of at a point of his career after Hook, after always, you know, these movies that weren't really connecting. I mean, Hook is the ultimate it's time to grow up movie. And, you know, whatever it's, it's Charms and, and I, well, I haven't listened to that episode yet. I have to say, this series, this miniseries has been revelatory in so many ways. Like, like, Dan Candyman is from Montreal.

[David Sims]

That's big.

[Erlich]

I never, I never would have known.

[David Sims]

I told him people were going to like the lore drops, and he was pushing back. He said, cut it down. And I said, they need to know he's Canadian and part of a polit.

[Griffin Newman]

One thing Dan Candyman is always saying is, oh, cut that down. You should cut that down.

[Erlich]

That really, that really blew my codec.

[Griffin Newman]

Ferberberg. I'm cutting off, and we're going to the dossier.

[David Sims]

Can I say something off of what Erlich just said? Then you can crack open the dossier. Talking about this inflection point. A a anecdote I found very interesting is that Sid Sheinberg, when he was negotiating to do Schindler and Jurassic was like, you have to do Jurassic first.

[Griffin Newman]

I feel like that is also a huge part of Spielberg selling this movie, is that that's something I've known my whole life. Like this lore of, like, you had to do Jurassic first because he never could have done it after making Schindler's List, he had to call Robin Williams. He was editing Jurassic park on like, like a video.

[Erlich]

I think it was a lot more than that. I think he was mostly just doing the mix.

[Griffin Newman]

He was doing the final stuff.

[David Sims]

George Lucas was quiet. George, a lot of the special effects.

[Griffin Newman]

Was overseeing of the mixing. Right, right. All this stuff where you're just like, right. This is all Janousz Kaminsky, you know, in my head became. It's like, yeah, there was like a newsboy on the streets of Krakow and Spielberg sort of discovered him. You know, like all this stuff.

[Erlich]

It'd be funny if George Lucas was like, can I just pitch in on Schindler's on the crack control there and someone else can do.

[David Sims]

But the subtext of what Scheinberg was saying was not just like look after Schindler it's going to be hard for you to mood pivot back to Jurassic. I think there was this notion of if you pull this off, it's going to fundamentally change you as a filmmaker in a way where it's going to be harder for you to ever go back to that.

[Griffin Newman]

Which I think he made was a Jurassic Park.

[Erlich]

But I think it was the rationale there was the same as artistically motivated as much as it was do the thing that's going to make us $1 billion, get that done and then you can go do your fancy black and white little art project.

[Griffin Newman]

Do the thing that comes out in the summer before the thing that comes.

[David Sims]

Out that I think part one is, if you pull off Schindler, it's going to change you forever. Two is please just give us the safety movie before you. You cash in the blank check. Right. And the third part of it is if you up Schindler, it's really gonna stick to you. I think if you, if you.

[Griffin Newman]

There was no way he was gonna. I agree with this movie. But there was a possibility, I think Spielberg thought that it would be a less seen movie.

[David Sims]

That it was Empire of the Sun.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, that it would be, you know, it's a three hour drama with a lot of polish.

[Erlich]

I do think there are ways. I mean, I do think. I think there could have fucked this movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Obviously he could have it up like in my opinion, but I don't think people like f. What a stinker.

[David Sims]

I think if he fucked it up though, it would have been like conclusively. He is not a grown up film.

[Erlich]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

The ego handle it.

[Erlich]

I mean I admire him for having the chutzpah to. To make this movie to take on so transparently the weight of what this project entailed and. But the ego required to be like, I can do this, I'm going to do this. It's extraordinary. And I think that if the movie had disappointed the people that it was meant to represent, you know, en masse, it would have been a really difficult.

[Griffin Newman]

Blow for I had already made Empire of the sun, which people didn't like.

[Erlich]

I don't know if Empire of the.

[Griffin Newman]

Sun got good reviews, made okay. Money got some Oscar like Empire of the sun did okay.

[David Sims]

If Schindler had gone over the way Empire of the sun did, I think it would have been.

[Griffin Newman]

It would have been a big blow.

[Erlich]

If Empire of the sun had been a disaster, he could have gone home for the holidays without having to, like, hide in the closet. I think that. Guys, guys, I think that we're getting.

[Griffin Newman]

Into a very similar argument here. I'm just trying to say, like, he had made grown up movies. They had gone over okay. Like, it's not like he'd never made a grown up movie before. I'm just worried we're narrativizing this a little too much.

[David Sims]

I'm going to stand by this. I think if Schindler had gone over the exact same way as Empire of the sun, the response would have been, okay, for every five blockbusters you deliver us, you can make one of these, versus this being the time where the.

[Erlich]

Schindler's List every six months from now.

[David Sims]

On, anything Spielberg makes becomes this important, whether it's a dinosaur movie or a Holocaust drama.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure. I mean, there's nothing like what happens after you make Jurassic park and Shamelessness in the same year. That's.

[David Sims]

There's. It's one of them.

[Griffin Newman]

We'll ever do anything like that again, probably.

[Erlich]

I mean, have you guys, have you guys gone deep on his predilection for making two movies a year?

[Griffin Newman]

We've talked about it so much, but mostly on the other miniseries because that's.

[Erlich]

When more and more it feels like this rhythm. That must work for him. I mean, for whatever reason, he's done it like four times. Obviously it's over now.

[David Sims]

Now we slow down. But yeah, I think, I think it's a. It's a tonal balance thing. And it's a.

[Griffin Newman]

And it worked. So why not try it again? Right? Like, it worked here. So, like, why not do. Well, I'm a stud in Lost World. That didn't work out perfect. But then Catch Me if youf Can, Minority Port. That works out pretty good.

[Erlich]

I mean, the ending of the making of Schindler's List book is just like. And it's just been announced he's about to make Amistad and it's going to be Schindler's just all over again. And they were just like waiting for the next great American epic, Munich and.

[Griffin Newman]

War of the World. You know, sort of like a on base, single version of him working out.

[David Sims]

And then Tintin and Warhorse, which is sort of like, okay, he just did it five times. I think part of it is in the same way that the Making of this movie is Spielberg being like, I need to tie my arms behind my back a little bit to like, limit myself and challenge myself and like, put some restrictions on my filmmaking language and all of that. The way Soderbergh talks about, like, the compression of. Of time, of crew, of Sodrig wants is right.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, faster, faster, faster.

[David Sims]

Part of that is he's like, in order to stay sharp, I have to make this challenging for myself. I have to put restrictions on it. Because both Spielberg and Soderbergh, I think, are so fast in their kind of brain processing of these things that I think for Spielberg, it helps him to be like, I need the challenge of the other movie to feed in.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, sure.

[Erlich]

I'm so happy Soderbergh didn't make Schindler's List. Would have, like, edited it on the train ride home. And it would have just been like musty colored frames of it all actually.

[Griffin Newman]

Just takes place in like an office. Like one office.

[David Sims]

But I do think it is a. It is a self challenge. Right. It's like sort of like this feeds for silver. Say one movie ends up informing the other movie. In a way I'm surprised by.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, he was working in a radically different way than he'd ever worked before. I was working with, first of all, with a predominantly Polish crew. I mean, his first movie, storyboarding, Storyboarding, handheld camera, which he's often carrying himself.

[Griffin Newman]

And he's like, literally biggest dick star ever.

[Erlich]

Oh, yeah.

[David Sims]

Heavy on bottle.

[Griffin Newman]

Just having to deal with that.

[David Sims]

The kind of dogmatic, like, I'm not allowed to use steady cam. I'm not storyboarding, like all these things where he's just like, I'm banning pieces of equipment. I'm banning the approach of how I conceive of scenes.

[Ben Hosley]

Griffin, David, can I read you guys a poem?

[Griffin Newman]

What's going on?

[David Sims]

A poem title.

[Ben Hosley]

My cat Pig.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay.

[Ben Hosley]

My cat Pig. Elegant, good, deserves the world.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

We all agree.

[Ben Hosley]

So why am I bringing up my cat pig?

[Griffin Newman]

Apart from that. You love your cat.

[David Sims]

Bring her up a lot.

[Ben Hosley]

We just started recently using pretty litter at our home.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, tell me all about it.

[Ben Hosley]

I don't know if you guys have ever noticed if you go over someone's house who has a cat.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Ben Hosley]

And they've got that litter box stink.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, sure. It can be. I know. I try not to judge, but it can be a little gross.

[Ben Hosley]

There's just something about that odor that can just really ruin your day.

[David Sims]

Agreed.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, heart.

[David Sims]

Agree.

[Ben Hosley]

Spring is in the air, but, you know, it's not part of the air of my house. Litter box stick. That's because we use Pretty Litter. The odor is nothing but wonderful scents of spring.

[David Sims]

It smells like flowers in there.

[Ben Hosley]

It's got a non clumping formula that traps odor and moisture. It's ultra absorbent. It's lightweight, low dust and 16 pound bag works for up to a month.

[David Sims]

Don't tell Eddie Murphy. No clumps.

[Ben Hosley]

And Pretty Litter gives me a peace of mind. It changes color to indicate early signs of potential illnesses in my cat like urinary tract infections, kidney issues and more. That's huge for me because I want to be able to monitor pig's health.

[David Sims]

Yeah, and you might have won back Eddie Murphy now that you've outlined some of the other pros of the product. Just the anti clump stance is hard.

[Ben Hosley]

For him now since Pretty Litter ships free right to my door. I never run out. I don't have a huge kitty litter bag taking up space in my small New York City apartment.

[Griffin Newman]

Hem's the fact, Hercules.

[Ben Hosley]

I don't have to go out in the cold and lug those huge tubs from a store to my car. Yeah, that actually to my house does.

[Griffin Newman]

Seem like a big winner. I mean that all sounds very annoying to me. I've never had a cat.

[David Sims]

I mean that, that process what you just outlined, I don't buddy love the sound of that.

[Ben Hosley]

My past experiences using other kitty litter, the scents were always really artificial smelling and were really ineffective. Making the switch to Pretty Litter has been a huge upgrade and again, pig deserves the world. So for anyone out there who might be interested in trying this product out, Pretty Litter helps keep my house smelling fresh and clean. So try it today.

[David Sims]

You'll love it.

[Ben Hosley]

Go to PrettyLitter.com check to save 20% on your first order and get a free cat toy. That's PrettyLitter.com check to Save 20% on your first order and Get a free cat toy. Ooh, Pretty Litter. Dot terms and conditions apply.

[Griffin Newman]

C site for details Poldek Pfefferberg Polish born Jewish man who survived the Holocaust thanks to the efforts of Oscar Schindler met well this is where his story begins. He immigrates to the United States in 1948. Becomes temporarily changes his name to Leopold Page. Starts a leather goods store in Beverly Hills. Continues to know Oskar Schindler as people who know about this probably know. Like Oscar Schindler sort of survived on the goodwill of the Schindler Juden. Like later in life when he was.

[Erlich]

A broke they were venuing him every month.

[Griffin Newman]

Truly.

[David Sims]

It was like the Little Caesar CEO paying for Rosa Parks's apartment.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, exactly.

[David Sims]

That's real. It sounds like me just making a dumb joke.

[Griffin Newman]

I was like, did Griffin just tell a joke? But then I was like, no, that can't be turning in the 50s. He's like, someone should make a movie of this. Like, this is a good idea for a movie. What happened to me, like, what Oskar.

[David Sims]

Schindler did, I think also was like, how do I repay this man?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, sure.

[David Sims]

Perhaps he needs to find, like, a vehicle to forever pin him in the annals of history.

[Griffin Newman]

A deal is reached to make a film called to the Last Hour, possibly starring Sean Connery as Oskar Schindler at mgm, written by Howard Koch, writer of Casablanca, one of the writers. And it almost happened since even, like, Schindler got a check for 37 grand. Like, you know, to sort of get the rights or something dies. You know, it doesn't make it. At one point, Pfefferberg approaches Fritz Lang, who must've been quite old at that point, to try and get something off the ground. He goes over to, like, you know, MCA of Germany. He's like, maybe I can make it in Europe. Like, doesn't happen. He dies at the age of 1974.

[David Sims]

He dies at the age of. Sorry, 1900.

[Griffin Newman]

At the age of 66 in 1974.

[David Sims]

Slightly more sense, but a few years later.

[Griffin Newman]

Thomas Kennelly Canali, I think, Australian journalist Keneally walks into his leather goods store.

[Erlich]

After he's died and after Schindler has died. And Pfefferberg is telling everyone who comes in.

[David Sims]

David's looking at the dossier like, land ballot.

[Erlich]

Schindler's dead. Ferberberg's alive.

[Griffin Newman]

Schindler is the one who died in 1970. Correct. Ferberg's still alive there.

[David Sims]

I was like, what?

[Griffin Newman]

Sorry, I misread this.

[Erlich]

He's a disembodied spirit running a store.

[Griffin Newman]

Thomas Canal Caneli walks into this other good store and Ferberberg tells him the story. Like, I was saved by this Nazi called Oscar Schindler.

[Erlich]

I mean, you get the sense that anytime anyone came into the store who was even, like, tangentially related to Hollywood, he was like, sit the down. I'm about to tell you my life story for an hour.

[Griffin Newman]

Where I disagree point how to put some, you know, spit on the ball, right? Where he's like, you don't get it. It's not just that this guy was a Nazi. It's not just that he was this kind of like, Good looking, charming guy. He was like fucking his way through Germany. He was carousing and drinking.

[David Sims]

Lush and a party animal.

[Griffin Newman]

He was like interesting guy.

[David Sims]

Labor.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. He starts out with this kind of amoral sort of like, hey, sure, like.

[David Sims]

You know, you know, not. Not to be crass. It is like a perfect Hollywood hook to making a Holocaust, which is just like, guy slowly gains a conscience in the Holocaust and does a great mitzvah.

[Griffin Newman]

And connealy initially is like, look, I'm a Catholic. I'm no expert on the Holocaust. Like, I don't know if I should write this book. But he can't drop the idea. So he writes Schindler's Arc, which. Have you read it?

[Erlich]

I have not. I've never had any desire to, weirdly.

[Griffin Newman]

It's good. It's a novel. It's like a sort of like fiction, you know, a historical novel. Right. So it's sort of written in this way that has, you know, he's using documents, but he's also sort of filling in gaps with kind of. And it's good. And it's about, you know, the paradox of this man.

[Erlich]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, you know, it's about this person more than anything. It wins the Booker Prize. Spielberg sees the book, had never heard the story before and is very interesting and so Universal, very interested. So Universal buys the rights in 1982.

[David Sims]

And his first response is, is this real? Like, yes. Kind of like sounds fake.

[Griffin Newman]

It sounds Hollywood.

[David Sims]

Feels like Hollywood bullshit. If this is real, it's incredible. Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

So Spielberg, of course, as we all know from watching that movie, grew up Jewish.

[David Sims]

The movie you're talking about is Jurassic Park.

[Griffin Newman]

Papelman's okay. And new Holocaust survivors. When he was three years old, his parent, he has a story about like someone coming to the, you know, to family dinner and telling stories. His grandmother and, you know, whatever. Like he has a vivid memory of someone like rolling up their sleeve to show the tattoo to him with the numbers and. But nonetheless, kind of like you were saying or like, generally it's sort of like that's not dinner table conversation. Like, we don't talk about Nazis in this house. Right. We don't. We don't like dwell on it too much. We're. We're happy Michelle Williams playing the piano and buying monkeys. Dano's getting all over town.

[David Sims]

I mean, like three, four kind of.

[Griffin Newman]

Move states to avoid getting cucked.

[David Sims]

Three fourths of my family are Eastern European Jews who immigrated to New York State before the Holocaust.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. And like, and I think 1800s probably right. That's when my family mostly immigrated.

[David Sims]

Right. All of my grandparents were first generation, but were born here. Right. And it did. I. I feel like whenever any of them would invoke this era, it was obviously a great tragedy thing. But it did feel like there was this feeling of, we don't even want to touch that. Like, this is too profound and serious, and we're lucky that none of us had to live through that. And there was the kind of, like, general Holocaust museum, like, nod. Seriously, of course, a great tragedy kind of thing.

[Erlich]

I think it must also start to seem unreal at a certain point. I think when you're, like, living in.

[Griffin Newman]

America because you, like, things are okay.

[Erlich]

It's like this dream that happened to someone else.

[David Sims]

It is very bizarre for me to think about, like, my grandparents being, like, children and teenagers and whatever, and just hearing that this was happening. And I think, right. You, like, needed to apply a certain degree of cognitive dissonance to not go insane, especially when you're, like, a powerless American child.

[Griffin Newman]

One thing I wanted to understand when. When I start learning more, like, where I was just like. Like, when did people know in America say, right. You know, like, they didn't know during the war. They knew the war was happening. Right. But, like, they didn't really know the extent of this until after the war. Like, and then how quickly, obviously, the Nuremberg Trials start to have, you know, like, how quickly does this start to come out? Like, is this information widespread? You know, I was just fascinated by the development of all that.

[Erlich]

I mean, you can see that chronology take place on screen over the decades.

[David Sims]

I mean, one of the things.

[Erlich]

Yeah, it's what. One of the things that's so interesting about Holocaust cinema. I mean, it starts. I mean, it starts. I'm saying this is the first Holocaust movie. But, like, I think in terms of just the weight and the gravity of what's happened and sharing that raw imagery. I mean, I think of Alain Rene's Night and Fog, and that's. That's right in the middle.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, exactly.

[Erlich]

It's pretty soon after World War II, obviously. You know, in historical terms, we think of soon it'd be like, instant information. It's a decade right later.

[Griffin Newman]

What's hard to think about now that you had to wait years to really start to get the gravity.

[Erlich]

But we started getting Holocaust movies in a relatively modern sense not long thereafter. And great ones. But, you know, we'll talk about in terms of Schindler's List, like, none of the ones, none of them had really penetrated mass culture in A way that any of Spielberg's which was movies ever had. I mean, like, you know, I could wax poetic all day long about Lena Vertmuller Seven Beauties or about the Boxer in Death or about Capo, you know, and. And these are great films that have had a lasting impression on me, but only because I sought them out.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

The Boxer Death is a Slovak film. I don't think that one was burned.

[Erlich]

It was the Boxer screened to me in the Holocaust cinema I took with Annette's Dorf in college. And not something that someone was just going to catch casually on tnt.

[Griffin Newman]

No. And then there's movie. But there's movies like the Pawnbroker or whatever, where it's like, this is about a Holocaust survivor. It's about the legacy of this, but it's not about, like, the history of what happened.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Great movie.

[David Sims]

Right. There are a lot of movies about the kind of. The ripple effects and the aftermath and. Yeah, right. Sort of psychological studies.

[Griffin Newman]

Universal buys Schindler's Arc. But literally, Spielberg says to Feffenberg, apparently, it's going to take me about 10 years to make this. Like, he basically knows even then.

[Erlich]

And he tried to shop it the whole while. That was like someone.

[Griffin Newman]

Right, right.

[Erlich]

For some years he was talking about.

[Griffin Newman]

That because he says, I needed more films to make more films. I wasn't about to go from Temple of Doom to Schindler's List. It would have been possible. Right. In my burning desire to entertain, I kept pushing it back. He hadn't had children yet. Talks a lot about how having children kind of changed everything for him.

[Erlich]

It is hard to imagine he was.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, make those guns like flashlights.

[Erlich]

It is hard to imagine someone making this movie before they have children. In a way, I mean, it's an unfair. I think I. Parent brains, I could say.

[Griffin Newman]

But, you know, you could just. You're like, Ben getting the simple plan money. You're like, I can make Schindler's List. Point the camera over there.

[David Sims]

I could roll out of bed kid list and make this movie.

[Erlich]

I haven't seen A Simple Plan in a while. Does one of the characters decide to spend all their money on making a Holocaust movie?

[David Sims]

I. No, I. I agree with you that this feels like a fundamental. You are not the most important person in the world kind of movie. In a way that Spielberg wasn't always making autobiographical films, but they always felt very tied to his kind of experience and world outlook, if that makes sense.

[Erlich]

I mean, I think. And what you're seeing in this movie is him and I don't know if the right moment to go too big picture. But you're seeing the defining interest of his films philosophically go from being about the family stemming from divorce and things of that nature to in the process of this movie. And literally you can see it in the span of a single scene becoming about the value of a single human life, which becomes the defining theme of his career. You see it obviously front and center in Saving Private Ryan, then again in AI and of course in the bfg. So I think that like there's. These are. These are things that I mean of a single jar. But yeah, I mean this is. This is him entering a new phase of his existence as a person really beyond. That's just sort of reflected through the art.

[Griffin Newman]

Spielberg presumably talking about hook. LOL. Says J.J. burch, our researcher. I was seduced by my own success. I'd always played the. To the adult audience who were able to remember their childhood and enjoy the movies along with their own children. But when I began playing to kids directly, I found I stumbled on my own shoelaces. I realized when you're making movies, you can't do things consciously. It's interesting to hear him say that because Hook is indeed him being like, I'm making like essentially a film for seven year olds. And like, sure, he's made E.T. or whatever, but E.T. is sort of indefinable magic. But it's like, yeah, he mostly made movies for like everybody, teenagers.

[Erlich]

Hook for the seven year old in all of us.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, sure, seven year olds. And all of us are always like, I gotta put my cell phone down and stop working so much.

[David Sims]

I think it's almost always a problem when filmmakers this talented try to put those kinds of limitations on themselves. Like not filmmaking challenge limitations, but are like, this is just a movie for kids. And I'm like, well, now you're not playing exactly.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, I mean, that's what George Lucas, where he's just like, I don't know, it's for kids. And I'm like, this is about senates and shit. Like, take yourself seriously.

[David Sims]

It used to be about everything, right? And it used to work for kids as well, which was your magic. The second you're like, well, if adults don't like this, they're not. They're. They're up their own ass.

[Griffin Newman]

But then again, if I made some fucking movie that made $1 billion and children around the world enjoyed, and adults were like, you're war criminal for making. I'm talking about like the Phantom Menace. I would be like, well, the, the warmth of children's love sustains me. I don't need, need you grown ups.

[Erlich]

We were talking about this a little bit before we started recording, but there is, you know, I, I literally just last night sat down with my son and watched the first 30 minutes of Star Wars A New Hope, which is the fourth film. And I don't know, you guys know.

[Griffin Newman]

We never got to that one.

[Erlich]

He every, whenever Saul's not on screen.

[Griffin Newman]

Asa saying those voices aren't that far.

[Erlich]

Similar during Sundance when I checked my phone between movies and saw that Watto had died, I immediately texted Griffin with horror in my heart and got nothing back.

[David Sims]

And then I got 400 texts. We were in the middle of recording. You will not believe how many texts I got. It was more than my birthday. But also, I, I didn't, I went texting you today. Do you want coffee? For the episode record. Only then realized I hadn't responded to your water.

[Erlich]

I mean, I was. Not that you expect something back when you send someone a condolence call really, but like, I just needed information. I was like, what's happening? You know, okay, that makes, But I.

[David Sims]

I, no, I was gonna say I.

[Erlich]

Saw, I showed it to the first 30 stars we had. I've never in my life fielded more questions about Jawa. I don't think anybody ever has. Or really just the same question over and over and over again, which is, are they bad guys? Which is usually the best, is they're.

[Griffin Newman]

In the right in the gray area, which, and hey, that's one of the first things you meet in Star Wars. Kind of example of what a Star.

[Erlich]

Wars is ultimately, you know, one of the reasons that it appeals to children so much is it's this man, however you want to pronounce it, story of good versus evil, of course.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, obviously there's a black clad sadist who appears before the jaw.

[Erlich]

I thought made some good points, but your what's not mine? But I think that like, you know, you, you have that good versus evil thing that kids whose only question at this age is are they a bad guy? Can understand and that, you know, I'm not saying that I'm showing my 5 year old Schindler's List anytime soon, but I'm saying that, you know, it's an interesting parallel when you're looking at, you know, Spielberg maturing and making movie for adults. Here he is making the most black and white, you know, morally black and white movie he's ever made is the closest thing to the spirit of Lucas in some Ways that, you know, aside from maybe Indiana Jones, the.

[David Sims]

Yes. But also building it around, like a weirdly gray character in a lot of ways. Quick sidebar, because you guys were starting to get into this before the record, and I was like, we gotta fucking get this out on Mike. At your wife's birthday last weekend, both of you, we were talking, and the question came up, what is the first Spielberg movie we will show our son? Right. You were like, when will he be? Because it was like, is he ready for E. T? Will ET Be the first one we show him? What is the right age for you?

[Griffin Newman]

In theory, ET should be the first one. But then you kind of get into, like, do I want to traumatize my child?

[David Sims]

Your wife was like, I'm imagining. Imagining his response. We maybe have to wait until he's stronger. And I was like, I think part of the rite of passage of E. T. Is seeing it a little bit before you're ready.

[Griffin Newman]

Sort of true.

[David Sims]

You have to time it out.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm saying it's also just better than any other movie that you could show your kid. It has someone dying or getting sick where it's like, they might be upset by that too. But ET really, you know, avoiding the.

[Erlich]

Risk for trauma is sort of a futile endeavor because we're talking about a kid who is currently so scared of everything. We were watching Wreck It Ralph, and when someone just.

[Griffin Newman]

Great movie. What's your daughter calls Angry man?

[Erlich]

What's the name of that actress from Jane Lynch. Jane Lynch's character shows up.

[David Sims]

Sergeant Calhoun. Yeah.

[Erlich]

Asa decided that she was absolutely terrifying.

[Griffin Newman]

Wait, wait. He didn't even see her shooting bugs. He was. He was out on the Jane Lynch.

[Erlich]

How do you have to pause the movie now? And shrieking at me?

[David Sims]

And so you continue to tell me that your son, more than anything, reacts negatively to authority figures in film threatening to discipline characters.

[Erlich]

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, well, that would paint a picture for your listenership. That's.

[David Sims]

That's what's funny is you're like, if a character comes on screen and feels like they might get angry at the kid, your son freaks out. I mean, when I try to tell my son to do anything, he laughs. Yeah.

[Erlich]

Maybe the problem is that, like, I've done such a bad job of disciplining my kid that the idea of having any sort of disability become this very alien, traumatizing.

[Griffin Newman]

Asa was at my daughter's birthday. Yes, he was, and he was very well behaved.

[Erlich]

He.

[Griffin Newman]

He was throwing himself from the tops of.

[Erlich]

I will send you a video where he is Having, like, a demonic possession over the side of one of the booths and talking about Venom. And I thought he was talking about Venom, the cartoon. I was like, how did you hear about Venom? And then it came out to me. He was just talking about, like, being venomized. Asa, which is like Asa, but poisonous, which is, I guess, poison spider. I was like, okay. Or poison spider.

[David Sims]

Venomized is a big initiative in the.

[Griffin Newman]

Marvel universe, but going Venom.

[David Sims]

All the characters have been venomized.

[Erlich]

Listen, who knows what they're. Eric Adams administration is teaching these kids at school these days. But I do think that I, you know, fucking him up with ET Is fine. What was I gonna say? The. Yeah. Griffin threw a great pick into the mix. Was the Adventures of Tin.

[David Sims]

I was like, tintin's a. Tintin's good.

[Griffin Newman]

Because even though it has, like, guns or whatever, Tintin's pretty. Like, the stakes are silly.

[David Sims]

I also said in the. Is that a bad guy? Kind of fear that they're all bad guys Ace is living with. But also with Tintin, you're like. You can tell the bad guys are because of the way their faces look.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, everyone looks normal.

[David Sims]

So caricature.

[Griffin Newman]

What about. I mean, I get. BFG is also obviously pretty. Yeah. I mean, it's just.

[Erlich]

That would be Losers.

[Griffin Newman]

A movie for people who want to go.

[Erlich]

But Ace and I sleepy bedtime. When he was like, two and three, we would do. I don't think this is going to translate at all. And I don't know why I'm just gonna keep going with it because there's no mechanism in my mind that can stop these things. But we do this game when he was young where I'd say, like, E.T. and I'd stick out my finger, and he would stick out his finger touch. And I go, hook. And I'd hook his little arm with my finger. I go Jurassic Park. And he'd laugh, and I'd claw at his stomach. And then I would always, like, throw in a curveball just to make myself laugh. Or I'd be like, always. And I try to, like, do something.

[Griffin Newman]

Express Dustin Sugar on that bed voice.

[Erlich]

Yeah. Be like, war horse.

[Griffin Newman]

Don't show him war horse.

[Erlich]

Not happening. Want to that horse. Too bad. But recommend it to all the parents.

[Griffin Newman]

Thomas. I heard Canelli, Kenelli, Canel, I'm guessing, writes the first script. They didn't like it. It was too sprawling. He couldn't figure out how to, you know, whatever. He's a novelist. He's not, you know. So then, Kurt, I'm not sure how you say his on the same way Ludetka, who wrote the screenplay for out of Africa, so obviously a recent Oscar winner. He is a journalist. Like, he makes a lot of sense in a way, even though out of Africa is boring, but says that interestingly, he couldn't find his way into believing what he was writing. He was like, as a journalist, like, this almost feels surreal. Like that someone would behave this way. So that's when Spielberg turns to. Well, maybe. Does Sidney Pollack want to do it? Does Brian De Palma want to do it? No. Steve. I love him, but no. Take it back. Take it back.

[Erlich]

I mean, there are sequences. Go back to Brian's house and take it. You could easily strap away the split screen.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Does Roman Polanski want to do it? Roman Polanski, a literal Holocaust survivor who survived the Krakow ghetto. Krakow. And Polanski, I think, did take the offer somewhat seriously.

[David Sims]

But here's the guy who want to open this box.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. And makes the Pianist years later.

[David Sims]

Right. If you are a writer being hired by Steven Spielberg to adapt this book and this story, and in your mind's eye, you're like, and then this will go through Steven Spielberg's camera. I think it is tough to figure out how to write it because even looking at things like Color Purple and Empire of the sun and this story feeling so kind of, like, unbelievable on its face, you're like, how do you prevent this from feeling like a magical fairy tale?

[Erlich]

Yeah. You can't get in the mindset of writing a Steven Spielberg movie.

[David Sims]

Right. How could this fit into his world? Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Now Scorsese is the person who really did almost make Schindler's List. Marty Scorsese. You've heard of this guy. Spielberg thought, like, he's not going to back down from, like, the truth. The violence, you know, the sort of.

[Erlich]

Horror playing Sympathy for the Devil over the scene when shows up.

[David Sims]

Here's a more serious, bracing, bold filmmaker.

[Griffin Newman]

And, like, it's a part. You know, I'm going to guess that this was in sort of like the late 80s, right. When. When Marty's taking it on. So it's like. Like right around when he's doing the Last Temptation of Christ. Right. He's making, you know, strides to whatever, like, serious.

[David Sims]

He got a lot of blowback on King of Comedy. He got a lot of blowback on Last Temptation of Christ. Spielberg coming to him and being like, here's a project that everything that's challenging about it is, like, challenged because of history in a certain way. You could sort of see him like, going like, look, it's something being delivered to me, handed on a plate, okay? Supported by the best people.

[Griffin Newman]

Here I have Scorsese for you. Okay, I'm being Marty, but Schindler's List, I hired Steve Zaley.

[Erlich]

So he's in the room.

[Griffin Newman]

He hires Zelian, which I didn't know. Steve Zelin, who wrote the script, he says it's around 1990. So it's right after he did Last Temptation of Christ. And I guess it's probably after he has filmed Goodfellas, which comes out in 1990, which is a good movie, but a better pizza brand.

[Erlich]

And as long as I can remember, I always wanted to be a Nazi.

[Griffin Newman]

The whole point of the movie to me was to start a dialogue about something which is still important to me, which is the nature. The true nature of love, which could be.

[David Sims]

This is what Scorsese says.

[Griffin Newman]

It could be Jesus. I'm not being culturally ambivalent here. It's what's in us. He says it could be the force. No, he doesn't say that. Is God in us? I really am that way. I can't help it. I like to explore that. I want a dialogue on that. So I did Last Temptation. I did it a certain way. And, you know, I did the best I could. I went around the world. Any arguments, I took him on. But, like, in the case of Schindler's List, the trauma I had just gone through was such that I felt like I had to take tackle this subject matter, like, so seriously. And he's worried that he's. He's a gentile and he's not, like, gonna be up for it. Like, he mentions that Jewish people have been upset that the writer of the Diary Van Frank movie, I guess, was a gentile. I don't know. Like, it's, you know, funny, like, controversies long past at this point.

[David Sims]

It is one of those infamous historic sliding doors that Spielberg is seriously considering remaking Cape Fear, which is a real, like. Steve, come on. You're avoiding.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, that is. It's so funny, right? Like, you're totally avoiding this at this point. We were like, should I just, like, remake some of my favorite movies? Like. Because that's what always is as well. Like, it's just like, I'm just going to remake these movies. I like.

[Erlich]

I mean, there was. There were rumors that Spielberg has. Has said are not true, that he and Scorsese effectively traded correct projects.

[David Sims]

I mean, the part of it that fear, for sure, that simplified in a way that is kind of incorrect, is People missing the context that Spielberg was the one who hired Scorsese to do Schindler in the first place. I feel like the story kind of gets repeated as if, like, they were just doing separate things in separate silos. And then he called one day and was like, what if we Yankee swap?

[Griffin Newman]

Well, supposedly, according to jj, they did swap.

[David Sims]

No, of course they swapped. I'm just saying that it was Spielberg being like, I know I offered you this.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

But I'm kind of thinking I should make it.

[Erlich]

And.

[Griffin Newman]

Of course.

[David Sims]

And as repayment, do you want to do Cape Fear, which produces Ambla. Produces. Becomes Scorsese's first kind of, like, mainstream hit.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Makes money, obviously.

[David Sims]

He talks about it being a huge transition in his career to, like, figuring out how to work within the studio system and all of that. It's a big, big movie for him. Everyone kind of wins in this scenario.

[Erlich]

Yes, but I think that the. The legacy of English language films about the Holocaust, especially American films about the Holocaust, was really working against Spielberg in that it was all the more reason to make the movie. But it was also, you know, part of what made it so daunting. I mean, you have, like, Theodore Adorno's, you know, declaration that poetry is impossible after the. After Auschwitz. That's resonating in your head. And then you're seeing the Diary of Anne Frank movie and some other things that are really sort of trivializing or. Or kit making into kitsch the Holocaust in some ways that are played with commercial interruptions from Hallmark or whatever.

[David Sims]

And Frank feels like the main vehicle for telling stories about the Holocaust in America. One time she was For a long, long time.

[Erlich]

And.

[David Sims]

And then you have, like, Hitler comedies, like you have, like, To Be or Not to Be and A Great Dictator and these movies that are made, like, in progress, that are sort of like, poking fun at the idea of this guy without really understanding what's going on.

[Erlich]

There's an animated movie about Anne Frank where it was like Anne Frank but modern in a way. It was, like, set in the Anne Frank house. And she escapes into modern, into the modern world that would play it Cannes a few years ago. And I saw and reviewed and has never seen the light of day.

[David Sims]

What's it called?

[Erlich]

Something, something Anne Frank.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Erlich]

But then the other huge monolith that you have, I think, in recent cultural memory around this time is Shoah as Claude Lansman's film, which is, in a way, you know, it definitely wasn't a sort of last word and testament, you know, about the. About the Holocaust or Shoah. But it was a definitive in a way, and also an opportunity for someone like Schindler or for Spielberg, rather, because it doesn't contain a single frame of archival footage. It's all interview testimony. It is a. Like, the filmmaking in that is fascinating and alive and like. It is another movie that, despite its epic length, does not at all feel like homework. And I highly recommend everyone who has been afraid of it sit down and watch it because it is really fascinating and incredible document. But. But yeah, I mean, so that's the other sort of thing where it's just like, it's been kitschy. It's also the most totemic and serious version of this has been done. How do I thread the needle between these two things?

[David Sims]

Right, right. Which is like, there's something tonally he's getting from Shoah that is, you don't have to make the stately Hollywood kind of like. And Frank is like a very traditional movie. It is like the conventional mechanism for how for decades, Hollywood would turn important stories into accessible dramas.

[Griffin Newman]

The 59 film was.

[David Sims]

Yes, yes. You know, and. And like Showa is sort of like, obviously this eight hour, kind of like monolithic art house sensation, kind of like historically important text. But you can see him going like, is there a way to kind of like bridge the gap between these two? Have the unbracing, like, specificity and feeling of Showa and put it in a vehicle that audiences can, like, go and see?

[Erlich]

Yeah. And I think that's exactly what Spielberg recognized to his great credit, in my eye, is that part of the value of. Of him making Schindler's List is that people would see it more than anything.

[Griffin Newman]

Exactly.

[David Sims]

I think the things that certain people like to ding this movie for are all part of the strategy of what the intended impact of this movie was, which you can't really argue with because it fucking worked.

[Erlich]

And yeah, I mean, it's hard to think of any other movie, aside from maybe Saving Private Ryan, that so definitively created a visual language for a historical event that is almost dangerous because it becomes so ubiquitous and, and limiting in that way. Because people think of the Holocaust as being sort of visually synonymous as one thing. Just like now you can't think about D day or, or just like the nature of these ground battles in World War II without thinking of how Spielberg transformed them in our visual memory with. With Saving Private Ryan. And so, like, you can't think about huge opportunities, but also the danger. Thank you. Sorry. Yeah, talked over that important, important point.

[David Sims]

No, I talked over your important Point.

[Griffin Newman]

Scorsese gives up the project. He says, I guarantee you it would have been good, but it wouldn't have been the hit it became. Had some ideas. Most of it's there. It had a very different ending. I admire the film greatly. You know, I would. I. It's fascinating to consider. It'd be one thing if it was like, oh, yeah, he took the movie back from Turtle Top. It's like, Marcus Scorsese almost made this. What does that look like?

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

We've had so many chances to see the Turtle top Schindler's List over the last few. No, but I just like so many.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm gonna remake it now. He's like, even though anyway. No, he's Steven Zalien. Spielberg likes the script because he doesn't tell the story from the survivor's point of view, but from Schindler's. And as Salien puts it, I wanted it clear he didn't do what he did out of friendship. He didn't feel sorry for them. He eventually does it because it's the right thing to do. But Spielberg's like, we do need to longer. We need to broaden out. We, you know, like, yes, it should be from his perspective, but. But we can, you know, leave his perspective to take in what's happening in Krakow and like happening in the Holocaust around him. Right.

[David Sims]

He would had like a sub two hour script where he was like, I mean, this is another Spielberg thing of him being like, I can get away with this movie being over three hours long. Don't feel the need to rush this and compress this.

[Erlich]

He doesn't need to play in 2025. Doesn't have to be a tight 82 minutes. Right?

[Griffin Newman]

@ first, he resists. They went to Poland together. They meet with survivors. I think, you know, they talk about, what do we put in there. Zelien initially had this sort of hard rule of like, no. Schindler has to have been in the room essentially to have a scene take place in this movie.

[David Sims]

And Spielberg's like, no, I think an incredibly smart decision. But Shoa comes out of the same soup, which is just this feeling, getting back to what we were saying earlier, of these people are still alive. There are people who live through this, who are still young enough and cogent enough that we need to get all of these stories on record and do something with them and preserve them and archive them because they're gonna start disappearing.

[Erlich]

Which is part of the reason why making something like Schindler's List is so dangerous. And I think was greeted by a lot of skepticism among certain critics because it has the potential to malform the collective memory of the Holocaust in. In a way that, as we've seen, based on the movie's influence, you know, is a real power that it had to shape our understanding of it.

[Griffin Newman]

So the biggest thing that they have to figure out now, Spielberg talks a lot about going to Poland, transforming his relationship with his religion, understanding the Holocaust completely differently if you go there. But what they also don't really know is what is the motivation behind Schindler's sort of transformation? Because I feel like the survivors are basically just like, well, he did this thing for us. But it's like. But they don't know. Like, you know, what. Why. Why did this seemingly fairly amoral businessman suddenly. Not suddenly, maybe, but like, you know.

[David Sims]

Fairly quickly, start to behave gradually in steps? And it always. I think the thing that makes him so interesting as a character is it feels like for the first two thirds, if not three fourths of the movie, he is fighting against the idea of any responsibility where every time he does something that help, like, it's good business. Well. And then also, it's just like, never make me do that again. Oh, yeah, that's an aberration.

[Erlich]

I think one of the reasons that this movie is a masterpiece is because it does this very controlled sense of winnowing over the course of the movie in a number of different regards where, you know, this habitable space that the Jews of Krakov have comes smaller and smaller and smaller in very understandable ways. You feel Schindler's sort of moral compass. This is a mixed metaphor, but, like, getting smaller as well as. As the movie goes on. And there is a geometry to how he is reaching the sort of moral epiphany that is reflected in the scope of the movie. And every time I watch the movie, I'm surprised all over again by how narrow its confines are.

[David Sims]

Yeah. I also think all those. The huge shifts and the revelations. And part of it is. And it seems like this is just the way the accounts supported the. I'm backing myself into a sentence I can't construct properly here. It feels like part of what was fascinating about Schindler was there was a certain degree of inscrutability into what caused these shifts and when and how, what was going on in his mind. And these sort of blurry lines of, like, as you're saying, the moments where he's like, it's good for business, and denying that there's any altruistic motives versus the Moments where he does an altruistic thing and then feels angry about it. That the moments of big psychological shifts and catharsis are, like, in between the scenes of this movie. And even the thing that is closest to a moment in the film of him until the end, which we'll talk about, the closest to a moment of him being like, oh, my God, my understanding has changed. Is obviously the little girl in the red coat. But yet in that moment, the person who's having the bigger emotional reaction is the mistress on the horse next to him.

[Erlich]

Like, but there's.

[David Sims]

It's the wife at the moment. Not.

[Erlich]

Yeah. There is nothing that would have cheapened, I think, this story more than acting as though Schindler's mortal awakening was schematic enough to, like, be done. Like a save the cat, like this sort of like.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm shocked to learn that because the.

[David Sims]

Red coat happened so much earlier than I remembered. And then, even then, he's, like, going back and forth and fighting it. And when you get to, like, the last chunk of the film where he's. Where Ben Kingsley has to pull out of him, that he's purposefully making bad shell casings.

[Erlich]

Mine worked, damn it.

[David Sims]

And you're like, oh, a huge shift has happened here where not only has he saved people, but now he's, like, trying to undermine the war and everything. And those scenes happen in between the. The margins.

[Erlich]

Right. I mean, it's because, again, with the girl in the red coat, you are seeing someone sort of awaken to this idea of the value of a single human life. He's witnessing a crime that would have gone. Would have been obliviated into history if not for him having eyes on it because no one else is watching this girl. I mean, and. Right. But it's. You know, I. I think also what is so powerful about the movie, again, going back to the good and evil of it all, is that I don't think Schindler's moral awakening happens if not for his relationship with Amon Goethe, who is an evil that is so profound that he has to distance himself from it. That it's like, only by virtue of being exposed to that degree of sociopathic cruelty, is he able to sort of recognize his own morality and step back and find his own humanity.

[David Sims]

Most of the other Nazis you're seeing up until that point in the film, even the ones who seem to get some degree of perverse pleasure from it, are primarily the, like, just following orders guys, which I don't think Spielberg views as any less evil. But the level of sadism and perversion in the Ralph Fiennes character is. You're right. It's the thing of. Just like, I am fundamentally a different person than this guy.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, and there's. I mean, I think the interplay between the two characters is so brilliant. You know, there's that great scene. I mean, there are several great scenes between them, but especially when he is, you know, talking to him. He's about to bargain for Helen Hirsch's life at the end. And he's talking. But like Goethe, even after everything that's happened and their various negotiations, cannot fathom why. Why Schindler would want these Jews to work for him. He assumes it has to be some sort of financial trick that he's missing. And I think in. In Schindler's awareness of that sort of moral bankruptcy, it unlocks something in him that dealing with a slightly less, you know, profoundly evil, but still obviously evil Nazi commandant would not have maybe precipitated the same reaction.

[David Sims]

Well, right. The difference is the guys he has to fight with to get Kingsley off the train.

[Erlich]

I mean, okay, so that is. That is the scene of. I think this is the most important scene in the movie, in a way, because this is the scene where you're seeing one Spielberg collide with another and sort of knock themselves together in a way that I think makes this movie what it is and makes him eventually the artist he would become, which is that, you know, it's a very suspenseful scene of him trying to rescue Itzhak Stern from being sent away to one of the camps. And he tells the guys in this very fun movie that has. Owes as much. It's very fun moment that owes as much to something like Casablanca and classic 50s film, 40s and 50s films as it does to Holocaust narratives. He was telling them he's going to send them to Eastern Russia by the end of the month. And then the cut is to Liam Neeson walking along the train saying, stern, Stern. And then who enters the frame are the two Germans who, you see, have now bowed to his will and are working in his bidding. And it's a completely slick cut that is foregrounding the entertainment in what is ostensibly the most consequential dramatic moment of the movie so far. And it's a perfect marriage between the entertainment value and a choice that almost no other filmmaker would make to, like, really squeeze the fun out of that moment.

[David Sims]

It's almost a joke.

[Erlich]

And then it's.

[David Sims]

It's kind of a comedy edit.

[Erlich]

It's a very funny It's a very funny edit. And then it pivots again in the span of a single shot to what is the most horrifying moment of the movie so far, which is when they exit frame after Liam Neeson says, you know, if I had been here five minutes later, then where would I be?

[David Sims]

It's like scolding him.

[Erlich]

Exactly. And saying, like, where would I be? I don't give a about you. Like, where would would my business be? And the camera lingers on the luggage that's being taken from the Jews who were promised that it would go with them to the camps. And we follow that into a back room where it's unpacked and sorted and obviously, you know, organized so that it can be sold and they're never going to see their own belongings again. And all of this is happening with a fluidity that no other filmmaker would think to approach it. And it's really. It's. It's just so fluidly blending the Hollywood of it all with the sobriety of what the story is and the gravity of it. And I think from that moment on, you know, he's just so in the pocket, as Griffin Newman talks about.

[Griffin Newman]

That's also when the movie has a mission, when it doesn't really before then, you know, like, it's sort of. It takes half the movie, everything, for this sort of plot to come to coalesce. Like, his plot. I don't mean the. Well, you.

[David Sims]

You guys have seen this movie far more than I have, so correct me if I'm wrong here. I feel like up until that moment, anything that he ostensibly does to help another person is profit motive. No, I was gonna say is facilitated by Kingsley. It's like Kingsley going like this guy. And Neeson is stamping it.

[Griffin Newman]

Kingsley is essentially using him as a vehicle for stuff. That's true. Right.

[David Sims]

Which. Kingsley's incredible. And it's.

[Griffin Newman]

But Kingsley's also playing to his desire to save money, you know.

[David Sims]

Right. I mean, it's part of the magic of the performance. And then. Right. That Kingsley is quietly. The one who's. He's so good is like running the miracles.

[Erlich]

You listen to Kingsley on Marin.

[David Sims]

Oh, my God, it is.

[Erlich]

Listens I've ever endured.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't like. I love Ben Kingsley. He's given, like, many performances that I.

[David Sims]

Love to this episode.

[Griffin Newman]

I might. I mean, but, like, he has such a rep now for being, you know, pretty. Pretty tough. So I'm not surprised to hear that he and Marin didn't exactly vie.

[David Sims]

Here's what's incredible. About it. He's really tough in the exact way you expect him to be. And he just, like, immediately clams up at Marin being way too casual and conversational about stuff. And him reading Marin is kind of glib. And then also clearly, like, oh, this is one of those things where this guy wants me to, like, break down and, like, get emotional or start sharing intimate details. And that's not what Kingsley wants to do, I think.

[Griffin Newman]

Think Kingsley wants to be treated with, like, a lot of correct reverence. Correct.

[David Sims]

Right. He wants every interview to be like a career retrospective, like a war lifetime achievement award.

[Griffin Newman]

You're here to tell us about, you.

[Erlich]

Know, whatever he talks about, like, the Ryan Reynolds. What was that, like, awful movie. He made so many awful movies in the last 10 years. But there's one thing with, like, Ryan Reynolds and, like, technology. I don't. I mean, I saw.

[David Sims]

I know the one you're talking about.

[Erlich]

Was Ryan Reynolds in it. I don't even.

[David Sims]

It's not called Limitless, but it's got a title.

[Erlich]

Like, it's like, Limitless. It's, like, along those lines, Right?

[Griffin Newman]

What movie is this?

[David Sims]

It's a movie where, like, he. Ryan Reynolds consciousness is in his body or vice versa.

[Erlich]

Yes.

[David Sims]

It's a weird thing.

[Erlich]

The worst part of Ryan Reynolds to have in your body, one would argue. But I think that, like, the. The thing about Kingsley, he talks about that in the same sort of terms that he would talk about Gandhi or Schindler's List. And anyway, that the thing I was.

[David Sims]

Going to say about that interview is as much as he is, like, putting up walls and being like, I'm not gonna play your game, and if this is what your show is like, then I'm gonna give you, like, monosyllabic answers by the end of the episode, even though he's doing it, like, with a very tight grip, he basically admits that his entire life is driven by the fact that his father never gave him an ounce of approval, and then gets him to admit that he's too critical of his sons, who have also followed him into acting. And he disapproves.

[Erlich]

Marin refuses to end any interview until someone makes the same kind of incredible.

[Griffin Newman]

The movie is selfless.

[Erlich]

Thank you.

[David Sims]

I knew.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a Tarsom movie.

[David Sims]

Right?

[Griffin Newman]

But like, his most anonymous, you know.

[Erlich]

That if you go up to Tarsem and tell him that you saw the Fallen theaters, he will give you a huge hug. Physical hug.

[Griffin Newman]

That's great.

[Erlich]

On the spot. Anyway, two to three people can guarantee.

[David Sims]

I saw in theaters.

[Griffin Newman]

Good for you.

[David Sims]

Here's. Let me finish my point I want to make here. Right? So, like, this is the first moment in which Neeson does something not aided by Kingsley. It is provoked by Kingsley. He is saving Kingsley, but he's not just, like, signing off on something that guy put into motion. And Kingsley, the whole first hour of the movie is walking on eggshells. It is this incredible unspoken performance of him just being like, how much can I get away with before I get a little too loud and a little too sloppy and this guy clamps down on me.

[Erlich]

It's sort of like a reverse assimilation that he's performing that's just, like, obviously deeply embedded in the Jewish experience that would follow the Holocaust in particular. But there's that amazing scene right after the one armed worker has come to him and just to thank Schindler for employing him, which obviously never let that happen, ever. Right? And. But the way that Kingsley handles that scene where the driver comes out and Kingsley's like, fuck off. Like, off. Go away. Get in the car. Like, we need to heed this off. This has to have never happened. It's. It's a brilliant negotiation, real time.

[David Sims]

The effort he puts into saving Kingsley, which part of the magic is he doesn't do it with a sense of stakes or immediacy? In a way, he's doing his, like, Schindler bullshitter, I need that guy, right? Freaking out the two officers kind of thing. And then you think that it's like, he's not gonna say anything and he's not gonna show emotion. But this is an acknowledgment that he started to care about Kingsley a little too much, or at the very least, has started to see him as a person a little too much to let him get away. That there's some emotional calculation. Kingsley gets off. Off the train. In. In a one broke, one unbroken long. Spielberg oner, right? He gets off the train. It's like, door open, train stopped abruptly. Kingsley gets off. He is playing the emotion of a guy who was 30 seconds ago convinced he was about to die.

[Griffin Newman]

This was it.

[David Sims]

Even though Schindler's running after the chain, it's like, well, he's missed it by five seconds.

[Erlich]

It's compounded by the understanding that. That Stern has a greater awareness of the consequences of that train than anyone else.

[David Sims]

This guy has just to some degree, accepted his fate. Right? Is now like being saved by a. A hair. Steps off the train. They close the door so quickly behind the train starts moving. He glances back for half a second at, like, holy Shit, all of those people are about to die. Just gets behind Schindler and walking. Starts apologizing profusely.

[Griffin Newman]

He's apologizing while he's still in the car. He's, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

[David Sims]

I'm sorry. I fucked up. I fucked up. And you're expecting that Schindler's gonna be stoic and Schindler's like, no, you're right. You did fuck up. Fuck you. Never let that happen ever again.

[Erlich]

It's also one of so many different moments in this movie that hinge on a kind of divine providence, which, you know, there were some criticisms when the movie came out about how the Jews were seen as having, you know, just being this. This faceless mob in the background and.

[Griffin Newman]

Not having, well, but guess who took away all of their agency? Yeah, but it's not so Germany.

[Erlich]

It's also saying that, like, you know, the flip side of that argument, which is there's this famous Village Voice symposium that came out right around the time of the movie where someone was arguing that, you know, the Jews don't. It's. It makes it seem as if they didn't do anything to save their own skin. And I think that is countered just by, like, you know, and only the people who survive deserve to survive. And I think it's counted by, like, just the role that we see luck play in this movie time and time and time again. One person, you know, he lines up 50 people, choose 25 by going to every other one. You know, one person hides here, one person hides there. It's all complete happenstance.

[David Sims]

I think this movie does an incredibly good job, I want to say, better than maybe any other Holocaust film I have seen, of really dramatizing the drawn out psychological warfare aspect of the dehumanization, where I feel like people who struggle to wrestle with the enormity of the Holocaust are like, I don't get it. How did they just show up one day, tell the Jews to get in cages, and no one fought back? Right? Like, how did they just accept this sort of victimization and not fight back against it? And the movie is showing that it's like their strategy was so complicated, so drawn out, so gradual, that there are these constant steps of just like, we just have to, like, accept this thing and then find our moment to fight back against it or to slip away or to get our exit. And people did get away and people did survive. Right. But it all felt so kind of random and chaotic that there was this gaming of even the women on the train being like, I've heard this rumor about the showers. They're like, the fuck are you talking about? That's crazy. What you're describing is crazy. That couldn't be real.

[Erlich]

Yeah, I mean you feel it's again going back to the idea of how Spielberg, you know, the gradients by which he introduces different elements. You feel the noose tightening as the circle where the Jews are allowed to live grow smaller. And you feel Schindler expanding in that space. And there's that great scene that could potentially have been too on the nose. I mean this is not an overwhelmingly subtle movie, but I, I think, you know, it is very effective in doing this where we see the Jews being kicked out of their apartment in Krakow and then who takes up the apartment is Schindler. And he says it couldn't be any better. Which is kind of a ham fisted and clunky line, but only exists so that it can be mirrored by the Jewish woman then saying, I can't get any word. Like, you know, it's. And you have that scene where they're talking in the ghetto about like the get they said one guy says the ghetto is liberty. They're talking. No one stole my business today. Nobody threw me on a truck. The constant rationalizations of like, at least I have this, at least I have that. And you know, like frogs in boiling water, you know, it's. They had never, they had never been witness to a holocaust before.

[David Sims]

No. And also like you get to a point where people have just so fully lost their sense of selves. You're attacking them from so many strange, unprecedented angles and moving the goalposts so constantly while also constantly maintaining this looming threat of severe violence, tragedy, nightmarish experience that people just like don't even know what to fucking do anymore.

[Griffin Newman]

People also just didn't understand how you could kill people on mass. Because that's not something that, you know, they industrialize.

[Erlich]

Something people struggle to wrap their heads around today.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

One of the things that makes this movie very tough to watch also like we go.

[Griffin Newman]

We would also have to delve into like pre war European, like Poland. These countries are nascent. You know, they like, they've been sort of like overrun by empires many times over the last hundred, two hundred years. Like, you know, this isn't a country with a sort of like completely fixed, you know, structured government. You know, I mean obviously it's been, you know, invaded at this point by both countries, by both Russia and Germany. We can't. I need to go back to the compelling fact that, of course, Mel Gibson was one of the people considered to play Oscar Schindler, along with Harrison Ford, who certainly makes sense both for Spielberg and for age, you know, and like time. And the name you want me to.

[David Sims]

Name, which is Kevin Costner, talked about it recently.

[Erlich]

Probably Kevin Costner is kind of lobbying for it.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. And as well, Beatty was. Warren Beatty famously was as well.

[David Sims]

The period where Costner where. Where Spielberg was reluctant to direct it, Costner also took a stab at like, I think I could direct this.

[Erlich]

Schindler's List, Part one.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, look, obviously Costner is what, two, two, three years removed from Dances Wolves. The man is.

[David Sims]

He's feeling confident.

[Erlich]

What if he ran out of funding halfway through Schindler's List had to go.

[Griffin Newman]

To Santa Barbara, four or more en route. Spielberg instead goes for Liam Neeson. One wants someone who looks like the guy in his head. At least two, not an unknown actor at this point, but not a star. Won't bring baggage for the character. Won't overwhelm the film. Obviously, if Warren Beatty was playing Oskar Schindler, it probably would. Would he rock it? Possibly. Would he do great in all the scenes where he's fucking his way around town? Yeah, he can go to that.

[David Sims]

Can we talk about Neeson for a bit?

[Griffin Newman]

It's an incredible performance.

[David Sims]

It's an incredible performance, and I love when this kind of thing comes up on our show. An incredible performance. One of his most important performances. And yet when you step back, you're.

[Griffin Newman]

Like.

[Erlich]

Complete neck and neck.

[David Sims]

Well, this is like, first off, the movie starts, he starts speaking. Not immediately, Right. But when his first dialogue kicks in, the movie starts.

[Griffin Newman]

They like the candles. And he's like, I'm here too, by the way.

[David Sims]

It's not 100 unrecognizable.

[Griffin Newman]

He's doing an accent.

[David Sims]

It is the only time I think he has successfully changed his voice to. To any degree.

[Griffin Newman]

But he still has a hint of the broke. And it works.

[Erlich]

He does this. Some of the best accent work of any movie I've ever seen. And that of all these movies that immediately caused me to roll my eyes at English and various other.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, I didn't want to do subtitles. Subtitles. You're reading the movie, not watching it. You're not looking at what's happening.

[Erlich]

There's something about just. Maybe they're just getting the tones right. Not that I am all that well versed in what the right accent should sound like beyond my own. Like family. There are a lot of accents in this film. You Know, it. It all feels right. I don't know. I don't question the reality.

[David Sims]

I feel like every other time Neeson tries to do an accent, he is putting a little something on top of his Irish brogue and you just kind of accept he sounds like Liam Neeson. He's making some effort to get away from pure Irish, but he's got his own voice and no one else sounds like that.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. When he played Qui Gon. Hey, Sebulba, give me that kid.

[David Sims]

This is what I'm saying. He never fully sounds American. He never fully sounds British. This is the best, I think, he's done at finding a voice that is different from him while also retaining some of the core, like, movie star qualities.

[Griffin Newman]

It is also Ponyo's dad, did he.

[Erlich]

Bust out his Schindler's voice for that?

[Griffin Newman]

He's incredible.

[Erlich]

I mean, I think it helps that part so much about the character that he's playing here is a performance in and of itself. It allows for a theatricality that he can play up and sort of disappear into. And there's that incredible, you know, first sequence where he's, you know. You know, trivia. The. The maitre d at the nightclub where you see it is Branco Lustig, who is the. Not only the producer of the film, but a survivor of Auschwitz. And. And, yeah, and he goes in there and he's putting on a show, like, one by one in. In this nightclub and bending everyone to his will. And the charisma off the screen looks.

[Griffin Newman]

Like he just walked out of Casablanca. He's like, you know, got the cigarette smoke hanging over him like it's the. This is the best black and white photograph. This makes this movie is like taking a shit on the idea that, like, just putting a movie in black and white makes it look good. It's like, no, no, no, no. You can fuck it up or you can do what Janous did here.

[David Sims]

This movie looks.

[Erlich]

This movie, I mean, has the eyeshadows in that first scene alone are also.

[David Sims]

He's got an incredible face for black and white.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, of course, because he's got a brow and crags so the shadows can fall on his face.

[Erlich]

The movie also feels like a. Starts the day after Oskar Schindler has realized that his businesses fail because he doesn't make it. Take advantage of the fact that he is hot as shit. Like, he. He's finally figured out that the fact that I am, like, the most charismatic and beautiful man alive is going to be my greatest asset as a businessman, because I am not A great businessman.

[David Sims]

David, two anecdotes, not an ad read. I apologize for everyone who got triggered by that. Sims, if you can find either of these in the dossier, there's a, there's the, like, entertainment executive who Spielberg recommended Neeson study, where he was like, this is the kind of charisma I want you to have.

[Griffin Newman]

Ross, he was the CEO of Time.

[David Sims]

Warner in a way where Neeson's obviously a very charismatic guy, right? And can get away with the sort of like, qui gon as Lonnie. Just like, this is the most important man in the world speaking like the word of God.

[Griffin Newman]

Loved Steve Ross. Steve Ross was the head of Time Warner. I am not aware of Steve Ross actually being the greatest human alive. Spielberg seemed to think he was, I guess he was like a philanthropist and he, maybe he was like, by CEO.

[Erlich]

You remind me of Austin Lurk. It could be a loaded compliment. I don't know.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, but no, but he's saying like, no, no, no, study Steve Ross. Like, we're saying, like, study how he walks. Study. Like I, Spielberg seems like, very entranced by Steve Ross as a kind of like, good businessman.

[David Sims]

I also think he's like, acknowledging that this guy needs to have a certain kind of businessman charisma and not a movie star charisma sense, right? Or I'm like, if it's, if it's Gibson, if it's Costner, if it's Beatty, you're too far on the other line of that. Neeson obviously has movie star charisma, but there is also the deep well of Irish sadness in him that is always his superpower. And also knowing that he's like, not a guy who's going to be protective of his leading man image, that he's a guy who's going to view this as an acting assignment and he's like, watch the way that people who are good at fucking winning negotiations behind closed doors have charisma, not the people who are good at, like, getting on camera and charming up.

[Erlich]

What if Charles Foster Kane enjoyed being Charles Foster Kane, right? Like, that's sort of the vibe, but.

[David Sims]

That'S these guys who like, fucking love making deals, you know, I, I, the other anecdote I want to say, I can't remember if it's Kingsley, who's the one who gave him this advice, but that he, like a week or two into filming was like, I don't know if I have any handle on this thing. Spielberg is like, not giving me direction. He's not explaining it to me. I feel like I'm floundering. And I think it was Kingsley who was like, you need to just trust him.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure. I can find that probably right.

[David Sims]

Like, you. You are a color on his palette. He hired you because he knows you can do what you want to do. He's going to make you look good. He's adjusting around your performance. Don't get freaked out by the lack of hand holding. But I think there is a little bit of panic in the.

[Griffin Newman]

I'd be pretty panicked if I was Liam Nisa making this movie.

[David Sims]

I'm saying there's a little bit of panic that I think helps. Helps the performance maybe.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, of course. Because Schindler is kind of skating the whole time.

[Erlich]

Yeah. He's got enough money to fall back on. I mean, that's the first thing he says to Stern is like, I don't have the money for the kind of business that I like. I need you to trade enamel wear with other Jews.

[David Sims]

Part of this is Spielberg being like, I want to approach this like a documentary. I want to just let the actors do their thing and then figure out how to shoot it, rather than doing, like, perfect dollhouse arrangements, which to Neeson, he's like, why is no one giving me direction? I've never really been the lead of a big Hollywood movie like this before.

[Griffin Newman]

Dark Man Dead in a Ditch.

[David Sims]

I'm sorry, I forgot.

[Griffin Newman]

That is Wild Darkman's film.

[David Sims]

The Darkman is so shortly before this.

[Griffin Newman]

It would be funny if Spielberg was like, I just loved the way he did Darkman.

[Erlich]

I love Darkman died.

[David Sims]

Well, also, let's, let's call out. This is only the second movie for Mbeth Davitz. Her first film is army of Darkness. Sam Ray, Main Universal. Is Spielberg quietly plucking the Raimi cast?

[Griffin Newman]

Maybe he is, but you know who. It's also only the second movie for. Rafe finds Voldemort himself. Which, you know, it's one of those, like, Spielberg things where, or like, casting things where Spielberg's like, look, the man screamed evil to me. What can I tell you? Like, and Spielberg lays on so much praise of, like, I really think this guy could be like Alec Innis or Lawrence Olivier. Like, you know, like, he's the, he's the talent behind the Pope.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Which he kind of is. Yes. Right.

[David Sims]

I, I, I can.

[Griffin Newman]

Excuse me. He doesn't want to be the Pope. Stop voting for him.

[David Sims]

Can I close the loop on my niece and thoughts and then bridge to the fine thought?

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. It's just the way you say these things sometimes it's like you're building another skyscraper. I'm like, we barely talked about the movie. Carry on. Yes.

[David Sims]

I think the lack of guidance he's giving him is because he doesn't want to feel like he's controlling the performances. And he's trying to let this movie develop more organically, which is freaking out Nissan a little bit. Because this is a little out of his wheelhouse. And working on Darkman, Raimi is notoriously like, here's the shot and I'm going to do this in a two seconds. Tilt your head this degree. Like so. Hands on.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Right. Which to me cartoon I think does subconsciously. And I don't think this was Spielberg's intent. Create a certain energy of am I getting away with this? That helps the performance.

[Erlich]

It's part of the negotiation that we see in the movie. Because the first sequence of this movie, the first real sequence of Schindler at the nightclub is shot like the shadow. I mean, like it is hyper precise. And that gives way almost immediately when we cut to, you know, the footage of, you know, foot soldiers running down the street to the docudrama, like handheld.

[David Sims]

But he is almost sort of like finding his way into doing that around what the actors are doing rather than collaborating them to get to that point. Which I think is mostly what he had done with his movies up until this film. Whereas Ralph Fiennes feels like he just is like incredibly studious and self sufficient and just showed up and was like, I figured it out. Here's this guy and spoke was like, great, you're ready to go. Like, fuck it. I don't know how you found this. He talks about it like he had like a voodoo dollar. Where Ray Finds was like, I just like lived with this horrible creation that I like understood and poked and prodded.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. I mean, finds talks about, you know, he like people who play villains all the time, like understood some sympathy for this like broken evil man or whatever.

[Erlich]

But I love that he. He shows up in the ghetto with the cold from Bridge of Spies. I mean, some of the, like the two great cold acting, I think films.

[Griffin Newman]

You watch this movie now and you're like, there's Ray Fines. And I joke loads. Lord Voldemort. That's literally, you know, like, that's why him being cast as Voldemort would to me at the time, I was like, can we try again? Like, that's too obvious.

[David Sims]

But guess what? He rocked the house as Lord.

[Griffin Newman]

He's great.

[David Sims]

That performance is unbelievable.

[Griffin Newman]

I have no. To be clear, he's. He's very good in the role.

[David Sims]

He's one of my favorite screen actors of all time.

[Erlich]

Mickelson as a villain or something crazy like that.

[Griffin Newman]

Imagine. Oh, that'd be crazy.

[David Sims]

I joked the other day on Texas gonna be Danny Houston.

[Griffin Newman]

I swear to the Lithgow thing. I'm in this state where I'm like, well, I shouldn't even care about this stupid Harry Potter TV show. We need less replications of these books over and over again. There's plenty done already and we don't need to be feeding that beast.

[David Sims]

I feel a relief.

[Griffin Newman]

And then they're not gonna go as Dumbledore. And I'm like, fuck that, God damn it.

[David Sims]

But also I feel the relief that it's like, thank God we're not tying down Mark Rylance for a decade. Which was the rumor.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

David.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes?

[David Sims]

Quick question.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay.

[David Sims]

And I've been remiss.

[Griffin Newman]

Actually, this question doesn't feel quick.

[David Sims]

In our 10 years of doing the podcast, we've never asked you this directly before. Do you love movies?

[Griffin Newman]

I love movies.

[David Sims]

Okay, well, there we go. Have you ever heard of an Eye of the Duck scene?

[Griffin Newman]

Can you explain that to me?

[David Sims]

The late, great David lynch, who we covered on this podcast recently. Yes, the Best said every movie has a scene that defines the whole.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay.

[David Sims]

He basically said the way to understand a duck is to look into its eye. This is a very David Lynchian philosophy.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a sort of a left field way of talking about it. But okay.

[David Sims]

And movies have a same thing, one scene that sort of defines the heart of what the.

[Griffin Newman]

You're talking about the essential scene in a film. That. Right. Explains everything.

[David Sims]

It doesn't mean it's the big plot scene. In some ways it's the scene that defines why the movie was birthed into existence in the first place. It's also the name of a great movie podcast. On each episode of the Eye of the Duck, podcast host Dom Nero and Adam Volrich, friends of mine, explore movie by finding its most essential scene. And right now Dom and Adam are going deep on Batman movies. From Keaton to Kilmer, Clooney, Bale, Pattinson, all the Batman in between. I was on recently. I've been on the show many times. I was on recently talk about Batman Returns, My Beloved, which we've covered on this show. But it'd been many years and I have many new to what was the scene, though, that you focused in Batman Returns? It was the scene that we all three agreed on to give you a spoiler for the episode was the Susie and the Banshees ballroom dance scene between Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle where they finally crack who each other really is, Right? And she starts crying and says, are we going to have to fight now? A beautiful scene in a phenomenal film, but it's a miniseries that they're calling Eye of the Duck Night's a very clever title and you better believe they're talking about Mask of the Phantasm, baby.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

And speaking of Batman the Animated Series, if you want even more from Eye of the Duck, Dom and Adam just kicked off a new Patreon supported show called Eye of the Duck After Hours. Check them out on Patreon for industry news, weekly recommendations and the occasional deep dive like their recent episode on Bruce Timm's legendary run of Batman animated shows and films. But Batman isn't the only pop culture icon Dom and Adam have unmasked on their show. I the Duck has explored franchises like Alien, Toy Story. I did a Lightyear episode for people who have asked why we never covered what was the big on this podcast.

[Griffin Newman]

Big scene in Lightyear.

[David Sims]

Well, my take was that the Eye of the Duck scene in Lightyear is a scene that doesn't work as a great Eye of the Duck explanation for why the whole movie doesn't work, which is the conversation about juicy meaty fingers in their their universe where they have inside out sandwiches. You know what I'm talking about.

[Griffin Newman]

I do, yes.

[David Sims]

That movie is many times so bizarre. Mission Impossible, Evil Dead, Indiana Jones. I did the Dial Destiny episode with them.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure.

[David Sims]

Connor Ratliff, Jurassic Park. They've even cataloged major movements of film history like 80s dark fantasy, David's beloved cyberpunk space film, the best and movies about UFOs. Their next miniseries will kick off later this summer and if you join their Discord community, you can decide what it will be. Voting will begin May 1 for their latest installment of miniseries May Ham Head over to Eye of the Discord to make your case for the future. Eye of the Duck Explore the scenes at the heart of your favorite movies and follow Eye of the Duck wherever you get your podcast. New episodes drop every Monday and you can listen early and ad free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app.

[Erlich]

At.

[Griffin Newman]

New Balance we believe if you run, you're a runner, however you choose to do it.

[David Sims]

Because when you're not worried about doing things the right way, you're free to.

[Griffin Newman]

Discover your way.

[Erlich]

And not.

[Griffin Newman]

That's what running's all about.

[David Sims]

Run your [e-mail] Running Ray Fines Ray.

[Griffin Newman]

Fines Imagine seeing this film in 1993, 99.9% of people do not know who. Ray. No, 100%.

[David Sims]

Nobody knows who.

[Griffin Newman]

Unless you've been going to the National Theater in Britain or whatever, you know, like. And, like, this guy shows up. And I do feel like people were just like, they got a Nazi from, like, the 40s, right? They just found one, like, in a time tunnel. Like, that's what it feels like. When you're watching him, those first scenes.

[David Sims]

I find talking to people, very often people just assume he won for this. I will hear people constantly refer to Academy Award winner Ralph Fiennes and be like, he won for Schindler, right? And then he has that immediate, like. It's very similar to the Edward Norton arc, which is, like, out of nowhere. Who the fuck is this supporting performance then? Like, immediate elevation, A leading man.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't know if he should have won. I still. I wrestle with it to this. I wrestle with it.

[Erlich]

Doesn't matter who else is in that category. He should have won. But I also completely understand him.

[Griffin Newman]

Tommy Lee Jones, which is basically the greatest supporting performance.

[Erlich]

It's a great performance, but there is no performance in this movie that should not have won an Oscar.

[Griffin Newman]

But, well, wait a second. That Ben Kingsley's losing. Ray Fines. You've defeated yourself.

[Erlich]

They should have both won, split the trophy. Or he could have pulled a ving Rhames. One of them could have won and given it to the other.

[David Sims]

I watched that again the other day. It's a really good moment.

[Erlich]

But I, you know, it's like your.

[Griffin Newman]

Favorite moment because that was bad for you as a kid because you were like, this. Allowed do this.

[David Sims]

When. When Michael Kane won the Oscar for Cider House Rules, I was like, said.

[Griffin Newman]

This on our show, right?

[David Sims]

Sit back.

[Griffin Newman]

He's gonna do it.

[David Sims]

He's gonna do the right thing, Joel. He's gonna give it to him.

[Griffin Newman]

The torso.

[David Sims]

I was so sure he was gonna do it. I was like, it's not over yet.

[Griffin Newman]

I. I'm always like, it's crazy. Finds it when, right? Tommy Lee Jones. Nobody has delivered a line better in a movie ever than Tommy Lee Jones in the Fugitive. I'm not joking. I'm deadly serious.

[David Sims]

I don't care.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't care. Is the greatest line reading in the history of movies. Prove me wrong.

[David Sims]

At me.

[Griffin Newman]

David L. Sims on Twitter, which I don't use.

[Erlich]

Which you will never be reading.

[Griffin Newman]

You could just send replies into the void.

[Erlich]

I do think.

[Griffin Newman]

And plus, he was Tommy Lee Jones. It was like, hey, man, you've been in this industry for 20 years. You're a legend. Like, it's time for you to win your Oscar, Ralph. Fine. I think it's partly like, well, he's young. He'll be back. Maybe in a Conclave 2. It's like, maybe he's just a fucking crazy person they found for this role who's so incredible and maybe it's like some magic trick.

[Erlich]

No, he had to do the English patience to be like, I actually am that hot. And not an odds.

[David Sims]

This is what's nuts to me is like within three years, it's like, oh, now you were like matinee idol in a huge sweeping epic that like ran the fucking gauntlet on at the Oscars and was a hit.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, but he had to lose to Shiny McShine.

[David Sims]

And then they don't nominate again for 30 fucking years.

[Griffin Newman]

Obviously I think they should have nominated him for Grand Budapest.

[David Sims]

Correct.

[Erlich]

He should have won.

[Griffin Newman]

One should have won. But there was at the time category confusion, in my opinion, stupidly. Are there other Ralph Fiennes movies though, that he should have gotten an Oscar nomination for? I love a bigger splash and he's on my ballot that year. But obviously that wasn't a big splash with.

[David Sims]

I feel like there was the Duchess Reader in Bruges year where people were like, he's so good at. He kind of should get a supporting. But no one could figure out which movie to put him in for.

[Griffin Newman]

The answer is in Bruges, but that movie kind of broke late and obviously.

[Erlich]

Is the silliest David Cronenberg. Spider. He's amazing. What about.

[Griffin Newman]

He's. That's. That is an incredible performance.

[Erlich]

It sure is.

[David Sims]

I would have given mostly moment. I give him a supporting actor nom for Goblet of Fire, a movie that I think is otherwise trash.

[Griffin Newman]

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Goblet of Fire.

[David Sims]

Cuz that's the first one he's introducing, right?

[Griffin Newman]

He's in it for like five minutes. That's the one.

[David Sims]

It's the whole final set piece.

[Erlich]

You know what I mean?

[Griffin Newman]

I'm aware that it's the whole final candles.

[Erlich]

I'm just saying in a movie that I think has its fair share of flaws as the Constant Gardener.

[David Sims]

He's very good in that movie, which Rachel Vice wins.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. The Oscars just seem to make one rule where they were like, it gets one win and nothing else.

[Erlich]

I think that's enough for the company.

[David Sims]

It's crazy how quickly he becomes enough. He becomes a take it for granted.

[Griffin Newman]

No, Griff, I disagree with you. It's. That's not true.

[David Sims]

Okay.

[Griffin Newman]

You're wrong. The whole thing with him is he makes Schindler's List list.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

This is a star making moment.

[Erlich]

Of course.

[Griffin Newman]

You played a villain. A Nazi. A very. The most scary Nazi.

[David Sims]

I will say. I do think it is also a case of he doesn't win because the character is almost too evil.

[Griffin Newman]

I think that's part of it.

[David Sims]

It is so upsetting that people are like, we have to nominate it. But it feels gross to give him.

[Erlich]

Unless you're going full clown mode. Christoph Waltz. They do not want.

[Griffin Newman]

It's why Fastbender didn't win.

[Erlich]

They don't want to reward people for finding.

[David Sims]

It's why DiCaprio didn't get nominated for Django.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, that's a bit of a over the top performance too, in my opinion. I don't know if you guys noticed this, but he's kind of like dialing it up slightly in that movie. So next year he makes Quiz show, which he's wonderful.

[Erlich]

Oh, my God. So good in Quiz.

[Griffin Newman]

But that's a movie where clearly the Oscars, like that movie, got best picture nomination. Did not know what to do because that movie's filled with good performances. Turturro weirdly, doesn't get a nomination.

[David Sims]

Right. Gets the precursor nominations. And then Armin Mueller Stall gets the surprise. I'm sorry, I always make this mistake between Shine and Quid show and Pasco Field is.

[Griffin Newman]

Is awesome in Quiz show, but it's kind of like a right old legend giving a couple great scenes. So. So he misses out on Quiz Show. Also in Quiz show, he's kind of playing a dweeb. Like, you know, guess what?

[David Sims]

He fucking.

[Griffin Newman]

He's so good in It Rolls in Quiz Show. Okay. The next year. This is his career so far he's made. These are the only two movies he's made so far since, you know, Strange Days. Amazing performance. Quite a curveball from him.

[David Sims]

People are like, who is man?

[Griffin Newman]

I need my mini discs. You know, like. Like, this is very fine. Okay. The next year after that, English Patient. Holy. Here he is as a romantic lead. He's taken a bath with kst.

[Ben Hosley]

Is that movie good?

[David Sims]

Should I. I think it's good.

[Griffin Newman]

I think it's good.

[Erlich]

Yeah, it's. It's very sweeping. It's why they invented the word sweeping.

[Griffin Newman]

Sweeping as hell.

[David Sims]

But here's like romantic. Ray finds.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, he's hot in it.

[David Sims]

He's such a handsome.

[Griffin Newman]

And he's really good. He loses to Shiny McShine if he hadn't lost to him, he. He possibly would have lost to Tom Cruise and Jeremy Maguire with Greatest performance Ever. But he's really good in it. Okay. So the next year he does Oscar and Lucinda. Not a bad movie. Young Cate Blanchett. But that doesn't really.

[David Sims]

He gets into some failed Oscar bait stuff. Sunshine.

[Griffin Newman]

This is what I'm trying to tell you. He kind of goes down a bit of a tricky road.

[Erlich]

Sunshine kind of fucks, though.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, the next year, he does the Avengers. Oh, the Avengers. That movie made a billion dollars. No, no, no, no, the other one.

[David Sims]

Right, right.

[Griffin Newman]

Hold on.

[David Sims]

There's a sort of like, okay, this guy doesn't cross over. He. He's. He's a.

[Griffin Newman]

The Avengers, where it's like 89 minutes, but, like, the closing credits are like 20 minutes.

[Erlich]

That one only made $500 million, right?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, of course. The voice of Ramses and Prince of Egypt does a great job. 1999. Right. You have the sort of sunshine. You know, the. The Russian novel adaptation. End of the Affair, where you're like, has he become history's greatest homework actor? Right. Where it's like, the man does movies based on books you read in.

[David Sims]

But here's another thing that's turned out.

[Erlich]

Davies to cast him in something.

[Griffin Newman]

I think he's great in the End of the Affair. Kind of a forgotten movie. I was gonna say.

[David Sims]

It's the kind of thing where it's similar to Rachel Vice. It's like, oh, and look, the actress gets the nomination. Like, you're taking fines for granted. Being like, oh, this is that thing he does.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, so he takes a. He literally takes three years off. Doesn't make a movie. This is. I'm having fun with. Finds his career because it's really interesting.

[David Sims]

We're having a fine time in 2002.

[Griffin Newman]

Spider. An amazing movie, but small.

[David Sims]

Sure. Obviously challenging.

[Griffin Newman]

The good thief. Uncredited. Okay, that doesn't count. That's a Neil Jordan movie.

[David Sims]

That's a remake.

[Griffin Newman]

No, it's a remake of Bob Flambour. It's a fun movie. It's Nolte. Very, very normal voice in it and everything.

[David Sims]

I'm a Flamboar.

[Griffin Newman]

Truly. That's the movie. I saw it in theaters.

[David Sims]

Let me Flomb.

[Griffin Newman]

Red Dragon. Lazy casting in a way, but he's not bad.

[David Sims]

Do you see?

[Griffin Newman]

As $ Hyde.

[Erlich]

Do you see?

[Griffin Newman]

Do you see? And his most unnerving and strangest performance, maybe in his entire career. Made in Manhattan, where you're like, why is Lopez in love with this vampire?

[David Sims]

This Republican vampire?

[Griffin Newman]

Like that movie is unhinged simply because of him. Everything else in that movie, like, I get it. She's a maid of Manhattan. She takes the train. She's got a kid.

[Erlich]

She's falling in love with a rich guy. Oh, no, it's spelled made.

[Griffin Newman]

No, it's spelled, but like, that's where it's like, well, hey, could Ray Fines do this? And everyone's like, not really. It was a hit. Yeah, it made money. But like, again, does walk away from that being like, you know who I loved him. Then.

[Erlich]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

And then yet another three years off in 2005. He's in a zillion things. He's in Harry Potter. He's in the White Countess, which is a late Merchant Ivory movie that doesn't really play. He's in Constant Gardner, which is good. He's in the Chum Scrubber, Remember that?

[David Sims]

Go Fish.

[Griffin Newman]

And then he's kind of, because of Voldemort, become supporting villain guy in Bruges. The Reader is a supporting role very heavily. Hurt Locker rocks. In it, you know, he's playing the Reader. He plays.

[Erlich]

Not another Nazi.

[Griffin Newman]

He plays old. Old. Have you seen the Young Man?

[Erlich]

Not in theaters. He plays enough.

[David Sims]

He's the older version, the grown up version of.

[Erlich]

Have you seen the Reader more than once?

[David Sims]

No.

[Erlich]

In your life, has anyone?

[David Sims]

No, but not even as hard to imagine rewatching. I don't think Daldry watched it more than once. Beginning to end. He is the grown up version of the kid who has to testify that she read the book to him or he read the book to her. Whatever.

[Griffin Newman]

Interesting.

[David Sims]

It's all building, obviously to the apex of his career.

[Griffin Newman]

Grand Budapest.

[David Sims]

Oh, I was going to say the re team of him and Neeson in the Titans films.

[Griffin Newman]

Of course, he played Hades.

[David Sims]

Hades and Zeus.

[Erlich]

Well, never one of the greatest taglines of our time for Clash of the Titans. Titans will clash.

[Griffin Newman]

He never got bad, but, like, at all.

[David Sims]

No, no, you're right.

[Griffin Newman]

It is a weird career when Skyfall comes around. They're like, yeah, you're. You can play M. James Bond's boss. And it's like. Like, he's like not that much older than Daniel Craig, you know? And it's like, no, no, no, Rafe, hey, hey, you're. You're m. Now you're not. You don't get to run around.

[David Sims]

There is perhaps a weird lack of strategy to his career that I respect. Now stepping back and looking at and knowing that he's got a lot left.

[Griffin Newman]

To do in the 90s, the strategy kind of seems to be like, you know, prestige movies. Right? And then it's. Yes, it starts to get more diffused.

[David Sims]

Obviously, he done Strange Days is a weird swing. Avengers is a weird, weird swing. Made Manhattan's a weird swing, you guys. Anytime he went studio, it was an odd choice.

[Erlich]

You guys are forgetting his most unnerving performance, though, which was, of course, the videotaped introduction he sent into the Toronto premiere of his recent film version of the Odyssey Return.

[Griffin Newman]

Another movie that in my. As I went straight to homework, which.

[Erlich]

Unfortunately does not exist on. I mean, Christopher Nolan kind of announced, I think waited, like, right until after the movie at theaters. But he. He, like, did a video from a hotel room somewhere in Europe where his eyeball was, like, against the camera.

[Griffin Newman]

He's probably in the boat where he currently is.

[David Sims]

I love him so much.

[Griffin Newman]

I love him, too. I love him.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And no, no, you're.

[David Sims]

This is. I'm glad we took the time to outline this because it does make more sense.

[Griffin Newman]

A weird career.

[David Sims]

It is a weird career.

[Griffin Newman]

The Grand Budapest snub is outrageous. That movie is the best movie ever made. I recently watched it and I was just like, I should watch this once a week.

[David Sims]

I think he and Nissan are the same and that the career is so diffuse and so spread out and has so weird eras to it that sometimes you're like, who is this guy again? If you were to sort of like, hall of Fame project, just be like, pick the 10 most representative projects and try to hit the different phases or modes of their career. If you reduce either of those guys to just 10 movies, you're like, that's insane. Right? And they still got gas in the tank and are going to keep making stuff, but they're both sort of fines.

[Erlich]

Has a lot more range than.

[David Sims]

I agree with you.

[Erlich]

Although 100%.

[Griffin Newman]

Hollywood really sees Neeson as, like, one of two fans things, right? Like either the sort of.

[Erlich]

Especially now. But Nissan is, to his credit, a much bigger New York Rangers fan than Ray finds is.

[Griffin Newman]

How do you know?

[Erlich]

Because you asked. I haven't. I haven't asked. Ray. Fine.

[Griffin Newman]

Do you see? I have also fine according to the Stanley Cup.

[Erlich]

Oh, God, it's so far in the distance now. But I have not seen Ray Finds at every hockey game I have ever gone to, unlike Liam Neeson. And I'm just, like, looking over there, there as I watch the Rangers, like, Panarin get the puck up the ice. And there's Oscar Schindler on the sidelines being, like, with ladies.

[Griffin Newman]

To see a bunch of ladies with him.

[Erlich]

He's there with Margot Robbie. Another classic Rangers, then good for that.

[Griffin Newman]

That all Y Kaminsky. Of course. Famously, Spielberg calls up, you know, Zigmund Cundy, Alan Davio, Douglas Slocombe and is like, no, thank you. No, thank you. No, no. He watches a film on TV called Wildflower, a TV movie, thinks it's beautifully photographed and is like, who shot this? And Janus says, like, Steven watches a lot of television. Wildflower was directed by Diane Keaton on Lifetime. Crazy to imagine Spielberg being like flipping over to Lifetime. But maybe, or maybe he was like, hey, Diane made a TV movie, I'll watch it. And he got offered an Amblin produced TV movie called Class of 61. And I guess Spielberg at this point learns that he's Polish and is kind of like, well, I'm making this movie in Poland and starts to look at him more seriously. It's still crazy though, because I do feel like Spielberg mostly worked with really established names as his DPs.

[David Sims]

Yes. And had his.

[Griffin Newman]

Janusz is basically a nobody, had his regular guys.

[David Sims]

But also until this point, isn't married to one dp.

[Griffin Newman]

But the other thing is with this movie, he's basically, do what you want, want. Like, he's not like, hey, this is exactly what I need to do. And like, I have storyboarded this. He's kind of like, you should take whatever approach you need. We're not going to do dollies, we're not going to do steady cam.

[David Sims]

It's all part of him being like, I need to throw myself out of my comfort zone.

[Erlich]

A little part of like, him being inspired by Andre Waja, whose name I just lectured even from my Polish background, who he was looking at as like the guy in his mind's eye, who he needed to be to make this movie and was never going to be. And thinking about the cinematography in those films, films and looking for someone who had an understanding of how, you know, a Polish crew would work and what shooting in Poland look like and could approximate that aesthetic. And that's exactly what he liked.

[David Sims]

All of that does make sense. It is fascinating though that it's just like it's this late at the like inflection point of his career that he finds the second most important collaborator of his entire life.

[Griffin Newman]

Absolutely. Yeah. Nush is the king, to be clear.

[Erlich]

Is it God is the first E.T.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, E.T. that mother crazy motherfucker who is a runner on this one. He was the best boy.

[Erlich]

Slow runner. Get someone else.

[Griffin Newman]

I love this from Yanush. I know why JJ put This in. Because he knew I would like it. The problem with doing black and white is there's silver, obviously, in the emulsion, as we all know, because we've all seen Inglourious Basterds. And that creates a negative discharge of electricity. So it makes these little, like, spots on the film. So you have to avoid static being in the room. And so you have to. You would, like, spray the room before you shoot because there's all this static electricity. And weather is a problem. Like, weird production is a problem for all of this. So that was the biggest challenge for shooting in black and white.

[Erlich]

And this movie almost fell apart because of Spielberg's insistence of shooting in a black and white. Because he wanted to. In his. His quote is that the Holocaust was light with. It was life without light. And he wanted to reflect that in, you know, shooting without color, which he saw as sort of symbolic of light. But, like, the movie almost didn't go because Universal was so stubborn about the idea that black and white movies don't make money.

[David Sims]

There's also a thing, and this is an axiom that is, like, still held to this day, that black and white films do even worse overseas, even worse on, like, home video and television. And so almost all cases where a Hollywood studio has made a black and white film the last 35, 40 years, they insist that they shoot it in color and convert it later so that there is a color version of the film that they can at least, like, play on foreign television. Where, like, I. I know Nebraska did that, where they were, like, on the Epics channel playing the color version of.

[Erlich]

Nebraska, and every American was glued to their television for the premiere of the color version on Epics. I remember that well.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

There's like. Like that. And Spielberg was just like. Like, I refuse. I am shooting this in black and white.

[Erlich]

But it's also a case of perpetuating the cinematic memory of an event because he. One of the. Another. One of the reasons why he wanted to shoot in black and white is because every Holocaust film he had seen was shot in black and white. And the footage from the Holocaust, the archival footage, was shot in black and white. And he was, you know, continuing that idea, which is a fraught concept in and of itself, but he was trying to make sort of the ultimate version of the Holocaust films that he had seen. Scene.

[Griffin Newman]

Interesting. Schindler's List. Where do we want to say it's funny?

[Erlich]

It's funny. I was just looking at my little notes on my phone, and I was just the. It's like, The. The thing I see is it's funny. It's like, again, we talk so much about him trying to find the right tone, negotiating these different energies. And you see that come to a head with the scene where they're hiring secretaries, which is a great comic little sequence.

[Griffin Newman]

It's like the classic, like, Steve, you can't make this not fun, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Erlich]

He has to do it. And. And it's an inherently funny idea that Schindler was only interested in having a hot secretary. And then this woman comes in who is not a young hottie, and she can type three times as fast as anyone. He's like, motherfucker, like, I'm gonna have to hire her.

[David Sims]

Well, like, what is one of the moments that changes Schindler the most as a character? It is the reaction he gets to kissing the Jewish woman delivering the cake with the daughter.

[Griffin Newman]

Right? Which to Schindler, just like, what, I'm a horny devil who kisses everything he sees?

[David Sims]

Right. It almost is the thing that makes him understand the severity of the situation in a personal way for the first time is I love kissing women. You're telling me that some women are unkissable by law?

[Erlich]

Well, yeah, but it also shows that.

[David Sims]

He fundamentally doesn't think of them with the same level of disdain that, like, the. The pure Nazis do, right?

[Erlich]

No, not at all.

[David Sims]

As much as he's like, I refuse.

[Erlich]

To care, he doesn't think about them at all.

[David Sims]

Exactly.

[Erlich]

You know, more of a Don Draper thing. But. And like, Don Draper, I guess, was also, I guess, admitting in that statement he's obsessed with him.

[David Sims]

But another, by the way, another Spielberg comedy edit moment is, if I'm going to stay here, you have to promise me that no one will ever mistake me for anyone but Mrs. Schindler. And then hard cut to her waiting to buy on the plane, on the train.

[Erlich]

It's a really funny cut. But I'd say the other moment, that is a real awakening for him. In addition, when we talk to. Is when somebody calls him a good man. I really feel like. Like nobody. You know, you have the one armed worker come in. You have, you know, much later in the film, you have the. The daughter of the. The married couple who he reluctantly pulls out of the camp. But you get the sense that nobody has ever called him a good man before. And that was something he wasn't necessarily looking for. And he tries it like he. It's a weird fit for him, but.

[David Sims]

It almost feels like he's the responsibility where it's like, if I Crack the door open to people thinking I can help them or save them. Then suddenly the obligation is going to become so great on me, a thing I cannot handle. Which is what makes the end sort of like implosion so emotionally devastating of him doing the math of like, I didn't save enough. And here's a guy who spent the entire movie being like, don't make me do anything.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

Because he talks so often about how the Holocaust and World War II in the Hole is just bigger than he is. He just like, he's like, okay, so they're going to kill everyone. They're going to kill everyone. Like, what? What does that have to do with me? What can I do about that?

[David Sims]

Which is part of how the Holocaust.

[Erlich]

Happily abstains from any sort of obligations.

[David Sims]

So extreme that it is abstract. It is hard for people to get their heads around regardless of what side they're on.

[Ben Hosley]

Isn't it also self preservation? Because he doesn't really know exactly the terms or the rules of how this is all working. Like, he doesn't want to be perceived by the Nazis to be supportive.

[Griffin Newman]

To be clear, he is a Nazi. Oscar Schindler was a Nazi party member. And he is very much in like the German, you know, whatever high class, you know, the head years prior been like, we're signing up. Like, even if I'm not a true believer or whatever, like, I will happily join the party now that they run the country. Right. Like there are some people who didn't join the party. Right. And like, there you go. Like, and like, you know, still existed in Japan. Like where. I'm not sure he joined the party. Like he was a. Probably not a, you know, deeply idealistic person, clearly. But he was a Nazi.

[Erlich]

Yeah. He joined the party out of convenience because.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, exactly. If you weren't, this is what all these Germans did.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, and I don't like him. And you know, there's too bad there's no historical parallel for that or else, you know, we might have something on our hands here.

[David Sims]

But that's the thing that keeps happening in the movie is I feel like, like Ralph Lienes has the line later where he's like, we're going to be making so much money we won't care. Right. That like, much like certain present day situations, there are people who are just like, if you're saying it's going to help the economy this much, that I will personally benefit this much, then maybe I like sort of blindly sign off on whatever this other stuff you're doing on the side is. Whereas other people were signing up explicitly in support of that stuff on the side.

[Erlich]

But I think to Ben's point, it's true that he did not. And so many people would, you know, claim not to. To know where this was going. I mean, I think that was the.

[Griffin Newman]

Nazi putting such a blind eye to like what's happening over there. Part of what's going on with Schindler is he's actually in Poland. He's German, but because of his industry and all that, he's coming to Krakow. He's seeing what's going on where it's like a little harder to ignore. Whereas in Germany a lot of Jews had already left. All the Jews had already.

[Erlich]

And there was also, you know, he's like Hamilton talking about like how he was waiting for a war his whole life to rise up. I mean, like, I know you guys, there was a play called Hamilton. You may scratching my chin at this one. No, cuz I mean there's literally a line in the movie where he talks about how the one thing that he's always been missing in addition to realizing that he's hot as hell and needs to work that angle is a war to cause economic. To cause economic instability that he can use dis.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, he wants to.

[Erlich]

And you know, I'm not liking Oscar Sher Hamilton in any other respect, but there is that. That idea of these circumstances as being uniquely profitable for him and taking advantage of that. And I think the speed at which Poland falls to the Germans, it happens in a span of two weeks, is hugely dispute to Schindler's advantage because everything is so up in the air. He can capitalize.

[David Sims]

This is a guy who loves to find an angle. He can work the scene where he meets Kingsley and is Kingsley's like, so wait, what do you do? And he's like, I'm not good at working, I'm not good at running things. I'm good at just being like, like, all of you should do this and then give me all the money. Right? And it's he capitalism. It's part of what he's voted for.

[Griffin Newman]

Again, really funny that Spielberg was like my idol, the guy who runs Time Warner. You're really. You're right.

[Erlich]

It is very funny because like the moral arc of this movie is completely contrary to merger and acquisition capitalism. It's all about what he did that.

[Griffin Newman]

Was so good is gave up on capitalism and was like, I will just spend 2 0. That's the thing.

[David Sims]

It's like. It's not like he's the world's smartest businessman. It's just that he recognizes, oh, there is a uniquely bad set of circumstances here that I could maybe benefit from. And part of it is that he's like, other people don't want to touch the Jews. I view them as a cheap labor force. I can take advantage of that. Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

It's. It's right. They're. They're a product to him and they're a balanced book, you know, equation to him.

[Erlich]

Yeah. And as you said, he's annoyed by any reminder of their humanity because it's morally inconvenienced. And he's like, what do you think about this?

[Griffin Newman]

Also not obvious.

[David Sims]

Obviously, viewing them as vermin.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. In the same way that many Nazis are. And like, then when Eamon arrives, you're like, right, this is a psychopath who's been enabled by this.

[David Sims]

But don't you think.

[Griffin Newman]

Whereas of course, like, there are other Nazis, you know, high, high ranking Nazis who after the war were put on trial and they were like, I don't know. I did what I was told. I mean, I'm the millionth person to point this out, but I don't use.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

How this character in. How Schindler is characterized in the movie is that he's just the kind of like, look, I don't let any attachment or relationship get in the way of smart business decisions. Right. Like him not viewing the Jewish people with disdain.

[Erlich]

I don't invest in any enamel factory that I can't in 30 seconds or less.

[David Sims]

He keeps his hot ass wife at arm's length. Like, he keeps everyone at arm's length. He's just like, these are just numbers.

[Griffin Newman]

Should we shout out Caroline Goodall, fourth build in this movie? And obviously she's in Hook, I will say, an English rose. Very beautiful.

[David Sims]

I think it is the best thing about Hook as a movie is that it at least led to her getting cast in this film. Sure.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay. I mean, she's good. I mean, I would say the point.

[David Sims]

About how little I like about Hook.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. I was right.

[David Sims]

I was gonna say that's what I was getting.

[Griffin Newman]

But she's. She's good in this, but it's not a huge role. Just interesting that the way that works. Right. Where it's like, what's that actress famous for? Well, Spielberg really liked her for a minute there.

[Erlich]

But what's amazing about this movie is that, you know, it is one of the great ensembles, truly, like, one of the true ensembles ever put together in that. There are so many fucking faces in this movie. And every one of those faces has its own story to tell that becomes absolutely, you know, critical to the mega narrative that's happening around them. And you track these characters without even knowing it the first or second time you watch.

[Griffin Newman]

And the movie does such an incredible job not making it, like, not holding your hand about that. Like, maybe you don't clock, like, oh, this is the person I saw 15 minutes. You know, like, maybe it doesn't matter. You're always involved. And then as you rewatch the movie, you realize, like, oh, I see.

[Erlich]

You know, you, like, very ambiently recognize that, okay, this guy is here. And now I see him in this one shot, walking out of the ghetto. And then it turns out to be the guy who, you know, Goethe's gun misfires on when he shoots him outside of the hinge factory.

[David Sims]

She's the biggest example of it. But it is so skillful, the way he uses the Ambed Devitts character where. Especially in the latter half, where she's on the train, you know, the wrong train or the train going the wrong way and whatever. And now, like, you could see most filmmakers saying to themselves, the reason I've set up this character is now I have a POV character who the audience is invested in, who we can show these terrors through. And she remains in the frame for most of those 15 minutes or so. And yet she is not the focus where she's constantly sort of around. Sometimes she's going out of focus, sometimes she's moving out of the frame in moments like the fear of the shower and things like that, where what he's trying to do is remind you, like, yes, this is a character you have pinned in your mind who, of course you're going to keep track of. But also, she's not more important than any of them. Part of the mass, like, sort of terror of what's going on here is that everyone in this space is her.

[Erlich]

The. The characters that should have the greatest burden in that sense are the children. It's the. The two kids, the boy and the girl with the glasses, who we see in so many different stages in so many different places and, you know, have such. I mean, the moment where the little kid is blowing his whistle to alert the Nazis during the liquid, the liquidation of the ghetto to her mother. And then he stops himself when he recognizes. You know, he recognizes her and she. Him. And he hides her. And you can't tell if he's, like, being extra sinister in that moment or good. And then we see him. I mean, like, these things all Track so viscerally because they're children and because they're so instantly recognizable. And also a factoid that I only learned yesterday that will be mind blowing for exactly three people out there is that one of the most memorable scenes in this movie for me is the one where Amon kills the Jewish engineer when after she's building his house. We can't be arguing with these people. She is like her performance. 15 seconds of this movie, people.

[Griffin Newman]

His accent is so.

[Erlich]

It's amazing. She is played by Elena Loewensone who plays the clairvoyant in the Beast that came out last year.

[Griffin Newman]

An actress with a bajillion credits.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

These people are so tied to this movie in my mind that the idea that they exist in other realities is very.

[Griffin Newman]

A little bit to paraphrase again, I think is undone by that a little.

[David Sims]

Bit to paraphrase an Erlich tweet that I think about a lot in. In the year of Spotlight, you had a tweet to the effect of There are like 10 actors with 5 minutes of screen time and spotlight who give the best supporting performance I've ever seen in a movie. You were sort of like you could like beyond the argument of like, oh, who do you put in supporting actor of the Spotlight cast? You were like basically every like survivor. They interview for five minutes. The victim is giving the most indelible. Where the did they find this guy performance. And some of them are actors who were just unknown and then have gotten bigger like Michael Cyril Crack. Right. Some of them are like kind of like the guy who's like the former boxer, you know, like some of them are like non professional actors. And this is another movie like that where anyone who shows up for like 15 seconds.

[Erlich]

I mean I've remembered these people my entire adult life, full and serious. They were on screen for 45 seconds in this movie.

[David Sims]

What is the energy being captured here? Yeah, it's.

[Erlich]

It's a remarkable testament to casting directors.

[David Sims]

And also like six credited cast because.

[Griffin Newman]

It was like the Polish casting as well. Right. That I want to shout out the blood because I feel like Spielberg had done lots of violence in movies before, but it's always more cartoonish or in like the case of the Color Purple or whatever. It's. It's realistic ish.

[David Sims]

But you know, also a little bit avoided.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, exactly. I feel like he takes. He does such a good job to make like when people get shot, like blood spurts out of their head and it's gross and it's like disturbing and.

[David Sims]

But also is now this jet black like goo.

[Griffin Newman]

It looks like very like. Right visceral and real in a way that like kind of gets me.

[David Sims]

Every time there's something kind of. You're not dealing with Rambo squibs. You know, there's something about watching in the deep background of a shot a person just get like gunned in the head. And then you see the splurt and they fall the ground, the blood continues to trickle and it's like, like, oh, the. The. The commonality of this violence.

[Erlich]

There's a ban. I mean the banality is the word. But it is banality to just the executions to just like. And the movie is always. It always has less executions and. And murders than I remember. I think often I conflated all of those things are so. But I think like the Pianist, I feel like in my mind in the first hour, it's like every time you turn the camera, you're seeing someone is the same.

[Griffin Newman]

If you rewatch it where. Right. You're like, no, I've actually just kind of been thinking of like three or four moments that are so shocking and you know, distressing.

[Erlich]

Yeah, I mean, yeah, it does. You know, obviously the horror is meant to be sort of muffled and muted in the background and sort of interpolated into daily life. But they do a good job of not, I don't know, not making it. You numb to it.

[Griffin Newman]

The Pianist, which I think is a very good film is also about from the perspective of someone who this is happening to. And you're.

[David Sims]

Which a lot of the Holocaust movies are.

[Griffin Newman]

You're watching the Warsaw ghetto shrink around him and then he gets shipped to Trinka.

[David Sims]

Especially the post movies are primarily these stories of the people trying to survive.

[Griffin Newman]

What are you thinking? Of course, life is beautiful.

[David Sims]

Life is beautiful.

[Griffin Newman]

Of course, Jacob.

[David Sims]

I was going to say like Jacob the liar.

[Griffin Newman]

But wait, what are other. I'm trying to think of like other canonical sort of holocaust films.

[David Sims]

Like concentration camp camp movies.

[Erlich]

Did they. I mean, maybe you guys weren't old enough, but they took me at school. They like got us all on buses and took us to see Life is Beautiful.

[Griffin Newman]

That makes sense to me that like they're like sort of like, is this important? Right?

[David Sims]

Yeah, they weirdly didn't do that, but did take us to Shakespeare in Love.

[Griffin Newman]

I want to say, well, hey man, they wanted you guys a great time.

[David Sims]

I just remember being like, I can't believe I'm getting to see boobs during a school day.

[Griffin Newman]

Hell yeah. Well, that's. That's St. Anne's for you.

[David Sims]

Well, hey, I was not there yet.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, for. Fair enough. That's wherever you were for you.

[Erlich]

This is Joseph finds he'll be our nation's most important actor in the 2000s.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. There are plenty of films that, you know, involve either directly or glancingly, the Holocaust. There's movies like the Gray Zone, Tim Blake Nelson's movie, which never went anywhere, which is.

[Erlich]

I mean, it's pretty horrifying.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes. Other films like, you know, Costa Gavras's Amen, but, like, none of these movies really hit. And was there sort of a lot.

[Erlich]

Of money in the Holocaust, despite what Schindler's List may have?

[Griffin Newman]

I think the closest you have is the Pianist, which is, you know, a genuinely big movie, but is made European and all, and the Reader, which, you know, nobody actually like. I guess it made like a hundred million worldwide, which is insane to consider.

[Erlich]

But there was a wild proliferation of Holocaust. Holocaust movies.

[Griffin Newman]

There's a lot of Holocaust movies, but they're not, whatever, resonating in the culture.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

It becomes retroactive homework. Right. Yeah.

[David Sims]

And also kind of like failed Oscar bait, like, movie.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And Right. Is it some easy path to an.

[David Sims]

Oscar becomes cynical even just in a way, Defiance. Right. Which I know is not quite the same thing, but you. Where you just be like, oh, here's a serious director announces a movie with three serious actors that's about the Holocaust. In some way, Defiance is kind of.

[Griffin Newman]

A movie people were asking for with like, well, show me a movie I.

[Erlich]

Want to show directed by Edwards Nazis.

[Griffin Newman]

And it's like, well, that's a story of that. And everyone was like, well, it's okay.

[Erlich]

You know, there was a lot of concern at the time of Shin Lose this Schindler's List release that because of the shadow that Spielberg cast, it would be treated as the last word on the Holocaust. And I think you see that in a lot of the hesitations around academics around the time it came out. And I think the opposite. Well, maybe not the. Again, it's complicated because the movie is so seared into our visual memory, but it opened the floodgates in a way.

[Griffin Newman]

You had to get to the Zookeeper's Wife, where it's suddenly like, okay, but tell me about the zoos at the time.

[David Sims]

I mean, boy at the Striped Pajamas, which. Or, like, has already references a movie I find basically abhorrent.

[Griffin Newman]

It's quite abhorrent. I mean, I would say the sort of major Holocaust films post Schindler's List, that had a big impact on the culture Are Life is Beautiful.

[David Sims]

Does not make sense.

[Griffin Newman]

Extent. Although somewhat of a forgotten movie now. You know, we're kind of.

[David Sims]

But at the time was at the time very big.

[Griffin Newman]

The Pianist for sure. The. The reader sort of Son of Saul for sure. And obviously Son of Saul is trying to take a different approach into telling that story. And it's very polarizing movie. I feel like some people are so moved by it. Others were right. We're kind of not into it at all. Zookeeper's Wife. Absolutely. Jojo Rabbit. That doesn't count. It's not even really a hard buddy.

[David Sims]

Chris Weitz, who made Operation Finale and Zone of Interest.

[Griffin Newman]

Operation Finale I think is a really good movie that's not really a. Directly a Holocaust.

[David Sims]

This is what I'm saying. When we had him on the podcast.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Talking about Allied.

[Erlich]

Yes.

[David Sims]

Zemeckis secret Monster Prince Zemeckis secret.

[Griffin Newman]

Pretty good secret.

[Erlich]

Three out of five. Yeah.

[David Sims]

But he was saying like, I feel like I didn't get the memo that no one liked World War II movies anymore. That he felt like this is one of those sturdy like Hollywood genres from the 90s on where this is like a proven area where you can make a serious grownup movie with movie stars and legitimate production values. And then the movie kind of got like monuments then. Right. But I.

[Griffin Newman]

What happened to those moments I would put forward.

[David Sims]

Does something kind of shift in Inglourious Basterds a little bit, but.

[Erlich]

Right.

[David Sims]

With like the. The having such a wildly different like genre based tone and the revisionist history and everything where from like that moment on, people don't want to watch Hollywood make a serious version of.

[Griffin Newman]

But then they did. The Zone of Interest did break through. I feel like it's like Son of Saul's Own of Interest. Like if you are going to mess with.

[David Sims]

I'm saying Hollywood would. Yeah, that's my point. Both of those movies are doing unconventional things with the form. They're happening in foreign countries with like smaller budgets. I think you can't do the big shiny studio version of it anymore.

[Erlich]

No, but. But you also can't get to the Zone of Interest without Schindler's List. I think that like, you know, Schindler's List is a film that, you know, its detractors may disagree, but let's put.

[Griffin Newman]

The stuff doll down. It's crazy. Look at you making these points while you have it.

[Erlich]

No, I've been clutching it too much.

[David Sims]

It didn't totally connect. But I would put A Hidden Life in a similar vein to.

[Erlich]

Yeah, but I Think that, like, you know, obviously, this is the ultimate question. At the root of any conversation about Holocaust cinema is how to depict an atrocity to what extent you are minimizing it by. Through recreation, by visualizing it. Schindler's List takes it to one sort of maximalist extreme. But it's in very. Into my mind. And one of the reasons I have such reverence for this movie is that it's in a very real and nuanced conversation with the right to do that. And the zone of interest is, I think, similarly nuanced, but obviously on the opposite end of the spectrum where it is, you know, taking away any sort of visual evidence and operating solely through absence. And I think it's not one or the other. I mean, these things have to be in conversation with each other. And I think they're both valuable in their own terms. But I also think, you know, for me, one of the reasons why Schindler's List is bigger than, you know, it, the sum of its parts or its role as a movie is because, you know, there is a danger, as I've said, about one thing becoming the focal point for our memory of the Holocaust. But I think the work that it did to enshrine the memory of the Holocaust in the abstract, even only a one version of one telling of it in the collective unconscious, is inestimably important. And it seeded the path for all these other conversations. And you see now how even now, you know, the Holocaust is in jeopardy of being. It's questioned all the time. We see Nazism on the rise and what and whatnot. You know, I think it's my mind's eye. All the stories my grandfather would tell did not coalesce into something I could picture until I saw this movie. I seen other Holocaust movies, and I.

[Griffin Newman]

Do think Night and Fog, which you mentioned before, that's something where it's like, watch that.

[Erlich]

Right?

[Griffin Newman]

You'll see. Right? You know, but, like, again, that's through absence.

[Erlich]

I mean, you're seeing just the hair pile and the shoes. And that is more in conversation with the zone of interest. But I think that, like, I needed, like, a. And I think a lot of people who are thinking about the Holocaust less than the descendants of survivors needed a baseline understanding of what this is to. They needed to see it through the lens of Hollywood spectacle in order to wrap their minds around it, to let their imagination sort of touch the horror. That was sort of always a little bit beyond the pale, as you're saying.

[David Sims]

The undeniable effect of the conversation that Schindler's List was able to force, like, everyone to have being such a culturally important movie and a movie that even like, you know, when they air it on broadcast television for the first time four or five years after, they're like, it will air in its entirety without commercial breaks and no edits.

[Erlich]

And the ratings are even higher than the color premiere of Nebraska.

[David Sims]

It was at the time, like, I think 20 million people watched Schindler's List play as a Sunday night network TV movie. It was the highest ratings any TV broadcast of a theatrical film had gotten since Jurassic Park. And they played it without cuts, without commercial interruption, with nudity, with no censoring. And there was the sense of just like, this is so important.

[Griffin Newman]

Tom Coburn, who was a senator, I think he was a congressman at the time, who back then was like one of the most psychotic Republicans around now would probably be like a pillar of decency party, but was like, what if.

[David Sims]

A child changes the channel? He's a nipple.

[Griffin Newman]

No, it was beyond that. He was like, this is an all time low, like nudity, violence, profanity. I do love the idea that he's like, this Schindler's got a body mouth. And it's even worse than the Simpson for it that he had to like publicly apologize. Of course, now he would become secretary of Commerce for behaving that way.

[David Sims]

But, like, that speaks to how active the conversation was around this movie for years. Beyond it just being a film that basically immediately went into like, like school rotation. A thing that is shown, a thing that does start to transform it into homework. Then you have all these shitty prestige, you know, World War II movies. And then you have the good films that come out of it are like art house intellectual exercises that are critically very respected, but are not engaging in a mainstream conversation.

[Griffin Newman]

As a teenager, though, this movie, look, Saving Private Ryan was the serious Spielberg movie that all teen boys were like, oh, like, have you seen that?

[Erlich]

Like, you know, Pepper shot that guy through.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, like talking about it like they watched a awesome action movie, which it is, but it's also very serious. But people would talk like about the most visceral scenes in this movie. Kind of like you had seen a horror movie. Like, I remember that kind of like, you know, teen boy.

[David Sims]

The impact of having spiel, like, and.

[Griffin Newman]

Like the scene of fines trying to shoot the guy and the gun won't work. You know, these scenes that are like drawn out torture.

[Erlich]

Right. I mean, there is a lot of consternation about the suspense fence of, you know, showing the Jewish women going into the showers.

[David Sims]

That's something that Hanukkah always focuses on.

[Erlich]

Right. And. And, you know, one, that actually happened. And two, I mean, I think that suspense is one of the film's tools to engaging viewers in participating and acknowledging history. I. You know, I think, again, this Village Voice symposium that came out, you have someone like Art Spiegelman, who, other than Brian Michael Bendis, who, by the way, set sounds exactly like Paul, is the only other graphic novelist whose name I recognize. So you guys got to get Spiegelman on the show. Mouse, a classic. But Spiegelman hated this movie.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

And I. I think a lot of.

[Griffin Newman]

People who, like, are very involved in.

[David Sims]

Telling stories about the Holocaust didn't like this movie.

[Erlich]

I'm aware he thought that it was.

[Griffin Newman]

A bit of a grump. I will say.

[Erlich]

Sure.

[David Sims]

But I. I think, look, this is such sensitive, complicated subject matter that I think anyone who has spent so much time digging in and trying to figure out the responsible way to depict it is going to then butt against what other people landed on. Yes.

[Erlich]

But I also. I think that what. And this isn't to take anything away from Archbieman, who, again, Mouse is a formative text for me, and he was the, you know, son directly of a Holocaust survivor. You know, garbage.

[David Sims]

Pelkans.

[Erlich]

I didn't know that. And also. But he did have a huge beef with Spielberg going into this movie because of American Tales, which he thought was a ripoff, but he just felt like it was.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, points were made.

[David Sims]

I mean, he's not.

[Erlich]

Listen. But we all also, in this house, respect Fievel Maskowitz. There's room in my heart for both. But, yeah, he was just like. It's just too. I. I just think that they were. This isn't any.

[Griffin Newman]

I just looked it up. Sorry.

[Erlich]

He's gonna be cast in the new Harry Potter, though.

[Griffin Newman]

That's good. And he's said some I don't like.

[David Sims]

He's selling weird brain pills.

[Erlich]

Is he still out west? Did he ever come east?

[Griffin Newman]

He went west. He never came back.

[David Sims]

He bought a compound in Austin, Texas. He's yolked now.

[Griffin Newman]

Turns out there were cats in America. You know, streets are not ca. Would.

[Erlich]

But I think that they didn't recognize the extent to which our conception, our generation's conception of history would be formed by. By popular culture, by movies. The role, like they. What they looked as a negative in Spielberg's and his power over the public consciousness and could have been a negative. I think they underestimated one. The conversation this movie would create. And two, just the good that it would do to have it on those terms.

[David Sims]

I agree. Now this is what I, I think I'm trying to get at here, which is like the weird, I don't want to say double edged sword, but like that this film inspires a bunch of movies that are not as good, that do not hold up as well. Ones that were dead on arrival and ones that were lauded at the time and now feel kind of embarrassing. Right. And then the conversation, how we talk about the Holocaust narrative becomes a much headier, more intellectual thing rather than like a mainstream conversation. We're getting far enough away from it. The survivors are dying. It is becoming abstracted, as you said. A lot of the like collective memory or notion of this is kind of in a language, a tone, a look that this film kind of codifies for better or worse. Obviously you make a film about any large historical event, it should exist in a dialectic with all other works in that space. Right. Like, I always find it frustrating when people critique a movie for being like, but it didn't touch on this if it is not the first movie to ever cover that area. Because the responsibility isn't to do all of it in one film, but this film has lasted in a way that others haven't, while also sort of getting flattened a little bit into like, like a notion of it being a homework movie, which I don't think it is in practice, if you're watching it, which then allows for. In like decades since there has been any work that has touched on this in a way that actually reached this widely, we start to now be far enough away that we're losing sight of what is going on. Which leads to a present moment where you have like three or four different terrifying misinterpretations of what should we take away from the Holocaust that are happening on a colossal scale on our planet.

[Erlich]

But I do think like that, you know, that plays into the entertainment value of it, which I think the movie needs to be as compelling as it is for new generations to be able to see it and come in and, and recognize the urgency of what the movie's saying. Whereas if it were totally, you know, in this rarefied space where we can't really talk about it, you know, we, we have to talk in hush tones about the Holocaust, it becomes that much easier, easier to allow something that is, you know, perpetuating the same crimes but in a different guise to happen again. And you know, I, I have to say, you know, we can get to the. I don't know if we were jumping out to the end of the movie, but it is now. The end of this movie crushes me. It always has. You know, we can talk. Well, we will talk, I'm sure.

[David Sims]

The epilogue.

[Erlich]

Yeah, I'm talking about the epilogue. You know, I, I was emotionally overcome the other night, as I always am by all of these people, by the collapse of history of the actors and the people they're playing is such an.

[David Sims]

Incredible touch, you know, putting the rose.

[Erlich]

On Schindler's grave and whatnot, the stones. But I think it has an extra dimension, a regrettably extra dimension of tragedy to me now in that Israel, you know, representing what Israel has become, which is like, you know, it's this point, you see in the movie. We can't go east, they hate you there. You can't go west. You have to find a homeland of your own. And you know, I, it, I think it's a dark irony in much the same way as like Jonathan Glaser's Academy Award speech called attention to about, you know, the subject matter people very normal.

[David Sims]

About, which does kind of prove the point. I feel like we're dancing around here where it's like for that movie to be so lauded by the Academy while being a very small movie in the grand scheme of things and yet have that percentage of the people in the audience who had voted for the film get angry at the speech where he is just stating what the movie is about.

[Erlich]

Yeah, but. But what? Like the never again of it all just doesn't hold water when you see the end of Schindler's List and they're now in a country that is perpetuating similar crimes on another. And it's just it, you know, it's the unbearable. It's the idea that this is going to happen and happen and happen throughout history. And why I think in this moment in particular, I find it more resonant rather than less that we're focusing on someone who is in power in the movie, you know, a character with agency who found some sort of moral center and awakening, who used his capital for good. Because these are the people that we are most reliant upon right now.

[David Sims]

And these situations feel powerless.

[Griffin Newman]

We're like reliant on or like being crushed by like, you know, sort of.

[David Sims]

I mean the never again of it all is the thing I, I have been stewing on so much for the last, whatever, 18 months of our hellscape, right. In a larger 10 year hellscape, in a large. The centuries long Hellscape but there is this sense of muddling of what this movie is. Not just this movie is about, but the sentiment that this movie is born out of, that I feel like is very similar. Not to take too big of a swing here, but the kind of, like, perversion of the abstract idea of the teachings of Christ to then, like, alienate persecuted groups. Right, right.

[Griffin Newman]

You're saying that Christianity has participated in the oppression.

[Erlich]

This is the first time hearing about this, but I'm going to hear him out.

[David Sims]

I'm saying that, like, all of this shit keeps happening where we're like, great, I got it. You're giving me the one sentence that's the thing I never forget.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Never again. And then people lose sight of when they're, like, doing the thing again, when they are actually acting the exact opposite of the mantra that they have now abstracted into a way where it can be twisted to their own means or just fucking lose sight of it.

[Erlich]

And while, you know, the ending of Schindler's List is obviously laudatory towards the existence of Israel, in that sense, it is that. That, you know, threading the needle, collapsing the space, whatever you want to call it, between the past and the present is something that's so instrumental to what this movie is doing. I think you need. That's why those bookends work so well. Why we start in sort of this, like, you know, liminal present state and then fade into the past. Right. You know, I think it's saying that this is a part of our world. This cannot be separated or compartmentalized. And when we do that, we invite it to happen again. And I, you know, I.

[David Sims]

And the perversion of the never again doesn't mean we can't let this happen to the Jews ever again. It is a larger responsibility to make sure this doesn't happen in our world again. And that twisting has led to, like, such horrors.

[Erlich]

And I was afraid that I. I hadn't really dug too much into it because I'm very clear on where I stand. And I don't know. I don't need to parse what certain celebrities have to say. But with Spielberg, it's different because in my mind, and maybe you can understand this, like, Spielberg is sort of like the great Jew of my life.

[David Sims]

He has become like a weird kind of cultural ambassador.

[Erlich]

And I don't mean that morally. I just sort of mean that in.

[Griffin Newman]

A statue, like a very famous Jewish person who, like. Right. Speaks on and, you know, and I think already was.

[David Sims]

But then this movie makes it like, okay, great, so he's like prominent Jew in America, American pop culture.

[Erlich]

Right. And that pop culture was sort of my lingua franca, you know, my whole life.

[David Sims]

This is how I, this is where.

[Erlich]

I wanted to interact with Jewishness. You know, it was always more interesting to me that Superman was Jewish than I'm reading the tall. You know, you don't read the Talmud, but you know what I mean? But the, and so his comments in the wake of October 7th, I was always very afraid of, of what they might say. And I was reading them over last night and I, I just couldn't imagine that someone who made Schindler's List would look at this and be like, Would see it, you know, in the worst possible light. It's like totally disconnected from what had happened. And I, you know, maybe he said some things that I didn't see when, when searching the Internet, but at best.

[Griffin Newman]

I could tell he really only made public comments.

[Erlich]

Yeah. He was saying, you know, as someone who then founded the Shoah Institute and is going to be asked to for comment on something like this, he made mention of the Palestinian people and was talking about, you know, they're suffering in the same breath as lamenting the deaths of, of the Israelis on October 7th. And it seemed like, you know, he's not going to be the guy who is coming out with Free Palestine, you know, hashtag.

[Griffin Newman]

But maybe he could, though.

[Erlich]

I would love that for him. I mean, that would really surpass my experience.

[David Sims]

So incredibly impactful. I don't know.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, he's obviously, you know, he's a fairly, I think long been like a fairly sort of straightforwardly supportive of the state of Israel person.

[David Sims]

Like.

[Griffin Newman]

But yes, I. He was not. He's not. Not. I'm just saying, you know, like, there's a certain sort of streak of celebrity who became in, you know, very, very polemical in a way that was kind of disturbing. He's certainly.

[Erlich]

Sure. Yeah, no, he's not.

[Griffin Newman]

He's not released kind of measured statements on the facts of like, you know.

[Erlich]

But I, I would have. Rather than saying that, like, I, I, you know, I didn't have any realistic hope for him to be like a leading voice in this issue. But I would have been heartbroken, Token, had he come out and said something unequivocally.

[Griffin Newman]

The IDF rocks.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Killing women like Gaza.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, you know, Jerry Seinfeld's like a really normal dude.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Normal behavior.

[David Sims]

But I, I mean, this is part of you.

[Erlich]

A great director, though unfrosted for days.

[Griffin Newman]

I laughed a Couple times.

[David Sims]

That movie is well shot, baby.

[Erlich]

A couple.

[Griffin Newman]

I know, I know. I didn't mind on Frost.

[David Sims]

I didn't hate it.

[Erlich]

I mean, one of the great trials of my life was watching and writing about that movie. But teach their own what I would toughest.

[Griffin Newman]

93 minutes. Yeah. Okay.

[David Sims]

G, go ahead. No, I. I think watching this movie in, like, 2003, right, when there were not as clear, like, sort of screamed underlined parallels in the current situation in.

[Griffin Newman]

The world, you're thinking about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers recent triumph at the Super Bowl.

[David Sims]

That was top of my mind 24. 7 in 2003.

[Griffin Newman]

You're excited for the release of the Return of the K. I'm trying to think of 2003 stuff.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[Erlich]

Radio heads on tour. You got to MSG.

[Griffin Newman]

I saw radio Head. That's the Hill of the Thief.

[Erlich]

It sure was. Radicalized me. That's.

[Griffin Newman]

They open with the gloaming.

[Erlich]

Gloaming live rocks. Anyway, real loud.

[David Sims]

I'm trying to remember what my point was.

[Griffin Newman]

It's 2003. You're watching Schindler's List, right?

[David Sims]

You know this feeling that I think it sounds like all three of us have had watching the film as young men being like, how the. Does this happen? Like, looking to this movie for answers of. Of how. How could such a thing happen? Because I feel like if you are a Jewish child, a certain. A couple generations away, like we were, you learn about this in a very large 100. Sort of like, it's not like I.

[Griffin Newman]

Was like, wait, what's this now?

[David Sims]

Right?

[Griffin Newman]

I certainly. Right, had been educated.

[David Sims]

Start pulling its strings and going like, wait, what do you mean? How is that possible? Like, how much of the terror am I allowed to dig into at this point, right? How do I understand the steps of something escalating to this kind of point? And you watch a movie like this and you're just like, how were there not like thousands of Oskar Schindler's. How were there not more people standing up and, like, objecting and all this sort of shit?

[Griffin Newman]

I think an amazing and sort of forgotten scene in the movies where he's talking to the other businessman, trying to get him on board, and the guy's like, I already did a lot. And you're kind of like, you haven't fucking done anything. Like. But to him, even the slightest, you.

[David Sims]

Know, if we're, like, policing, like, why hasn't Spielberg, like, taken more of a stance, right? Why hasn't he used his power more, like, deliberately? All this. This is my point. I. A Lot of what I've struggled to deal with in the last year is like, I don't know if any of this works anymore. Like, I don't know if any of this happens has any impact anymore. It is like, really kind of overwhelming to be like, there has been such a loud conversation going on for so long in what feels like kind of.

[Erlich]

An immovable issue, as I do, unfortunately, think that it does. Or maybe not unfortunately. I don't know. I mean, I. The fallout of Jonathan Glazer's officer speech was really. It was. Blew my mind.

[David Sims]

So sobering and in a horrible way.

[Griffin Newman]

I felt for Glazer because I feel like he was incredibly nervous.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And.

[Erlich]

But it's also like, this is what the Griffin's saying.

[David Sims]

This is what the movie's about.

[Griffin Newman]

You don't have to fucking tell me. Sorry.

[Erlich]

Threw his wallet at me and I'm keeping it.

[David Sims]

Yeah, you're taking anything you want from that.

[Griffin Newman]

No, I threw my wallet at early because I already threw something else at him. I know, but, like, I felt like he. It's not like he bobbled the speech at all, but like, you could. Felt he was so nervous. And the speech has kind of like a rhetorical. In my memory, kind of like. Like, you know, device to it, right. Where he's like. And like, people misinterpreted the language right away in. In bad. Exactly. But I felt so frustrated because I was like, I know what he was trying to say, and I think you do too. And you're like, you know, putting a comma somewhere essentially to kind of make it work for you. And it was really, really infuriating.

[David Sims]

Let me throw this out.

[Griffin Newman]

Unlike with Michael Moore getting up there and yelling, where I'm like, well, some people are just not going to enjoy my Michael Moore yelling at them and.

[David Sims]

Then being shoved in a trunk.

[Erlich]

And people applaud the cognitive dissonance to do this.

[Griffin Newman]

It was a pretty good job.

[Erlich]

Like, blows my mind, you're right. But some people did watch Zone of Interest and did not pick up on any of that. They were just like, oh, wow, this is really about the Holocaust and they should have known.

[David Sims]

Right. This is why we have to make sure that Jewish people are never persecuted against again. That was their entire writing.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, maybe we should.

[David Sims]

We have to.

[Griffin Newman]

The bad faith interpreted by.

[Erlich]

Or triple it. Because, I mean, we.

[Griffin Newman]

I really don't think we should, because that would really take a long time.

[Erlich]

Just put like a deep reverb on it that makes it sound like everything we said is heard three times. But I think that like what we went through for the past and I say this as someone who's writing about movies, writing about zone of interest, writing about other, you know, Holocaust and Israel adjacent movies and you have not avoided talking about. I have, I have been very clear throated. I mean I feel like I have mortally fortified as been on any subject I've ever spoken about about the enormity of the wrong that Israel has pers and people perpetrated.

[Griffin Newman]

I was wrong. People over here said I was wrong to book Dave.

[David Sims]

I wrong I said that you were framing it as he's desperate to come on and he was framing it as I'm being hounded by Sims.

[Griffin Newman]

Well he's always framing it that way.

[Erlich]

Continue your point. Mr. No, it's just that like there was a time and, and only and this feels only slightly diminished recently where to even name the crime that Israel has been perpetuating was verboten to really mix my German and modern politics. But like it it, you know, I would have to go through rounds of legalese to use the word genocide and make sure that I, you know, there were governing bodies in the world that I could link to to back up my decision to use such a word. And I would be accused I'm not going to name names or go into specifics but like, like there were, there were heated incidents some of which I definitely went out of my way to invite upon myself that you know, whatever but yeah, I know but and some of which took me by surprise where the language I was using was, was policed and seen as being aggressive and it did not feel safe for a person employed by anyone other than themselves or by a large company to even a Jew the grandson of Holocaust survivors to say that what was going on and like, and I was like I can speak to this issue more in a more full throated way than I can to almost any other of the world's great atrocities of my lifetime and even so was still getting blowback for it and, and, and from mostly from other members ostensibly of my community. And that you know it's, it's, it really has, it's really soured me on a lot of different things over the last last 18 months or so. It's been look, I think it is.

[David Sims]

It is an incredible microcosm through which to underline all of the kind of social evils of social media of like the actual damage it is wrecking upon like our brains and our society and all that sort of when I say like I don't know if any of this matters anymore. I'm working hard to not fall into a level of despondency that is so why even bother doing any of it? But I think what I spin on is like, let's say Glazer had somehow done the impossible and like perfectly worded the speech in a way that could.

[Griffin Newman]

Have given some speech that everyone was like, wow, he's really thrown things into context.

[David Sims]

Within 30 seconds, people are doing jerk off motions going, oh, liberal Hollywood elites in their bubble. Because even the idea of that happening at the Oscars doesn't mean the same thing it used to mean anymore. You know, like everything is so blown up and so like endlessly expansive in a way and is so loud and just this constant pit of screaming.

[Erlich]

And of course, I think to someone like Laser, and I sympathize with this greatly, it shouldn't be that controversial to say, hey, remember that, you know, people defining thing that they did to us less than 100 years ago. Maybe we shouldn't do something similar to that to someone else. Maybe we should actually learn from that and behave differently. I mean, it would seem to be, be, yes, a benign statement, but it.

[David Sims]

Is part of the, in certain ways it is a danger of the death of the monoculture, right? Of just people being like, well, I'm, I'm going to my own sources, I'm existing in my own bubble. I'm looking at what my social media feed is and what I watch, which outlets I pay attention to and whatever. And in other ways, the scary part is like the control of those outlets in certain ways, you know, and the bents things are taking. It's a nightmare situation.

[Erlich]

You know, he, Stephen, Stephen, he and I are very close. He, Stevie, he says that, you know, he wants to accept this on behalf of the 1 billion people watching, on behalf of the 6 million who perished. Six million Jews in Poland, but like a billion. I mean really, you have the feeling watching that ceremony that really this was the center of the universe.

[Griffin Newman]

The Oscars always used to say that a billion people watched the Oscars and you're like, no, they don't. What are you talking about?

[Erlich]

But the Jonathan Gleason speech was one of the few moments where it did suddenly feel like the Oscars were back at the center of the universe to some limited extent for, to some a half second.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, it was also just one of those things where it was like, I wonder if he'll like, you know, make a speech versus like going up there and being like, well, thank you. This film was hard to make. And I'm glad.

[Erlich]

It's going to be very interesting in like four days from when we're recording this to see if. And hopefully when no Other Land wins best documentary.

[Griffin Newman]

That will be interesting. What I imagine it's going to win. It seems like.

[Erlich]

Like, which is so. I mean, it's so wild. That Glazer speech would trigger that reaction a year ago among so many people in Hollywood. Obviously, maybe not a majority, but enough. And then you would have that same body award. Such an outspoken, you know, film has.

[Griffin Newman]

The narrative of like, who made it? And look, we're getting very deep in the weed. Have you guys. I've shouted this movie out before. I'm moving us to a slightly different tack here.

[David Sims]

By the way, you're never getting your wall of.

[Erlich]

No, it's mine now.

[Griffin Newman]

It's fine.

[Erlich]

He threw a wallet at a Jewish. It felt like an anti Semitic attack.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't know so much. Have you ever seen I've shouted out before? The HBO TV movie directed by Frank Pearson, Conspiracy.

[Erlich]

No.

[Griffin Newman]

It was acclaimed at the time one Emmys. Like, you know, it was not like a forgotten movie or any. But it's a TV movie. I've seen it kind of a disturbing amount of times considering it's a movie about Nazis planning the final solution. It is incredible and I feel like it gets no recognition. 2001.

[David Sims]

It's called conspiracy.

[Griffin Newman]

It's called Conspiracy. It stars Kenneth Branagh.

[Erlich]

Oh, I remember K Street where somebody goes to see Schindler's List.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't know. I can answer that question for you.

[David Sims]

And if I had my image. Oh, I feel like I saw this poster.

[Griffin Newman]

You saw a poster of Is there a case treatment?

[Erlich]

This episode is brought to you by Corona.

[David Sims]

When you're on a beach with an.

[Erlich]

Ice cold Corona in hand, how can you not feel centered?

[David Sims]

But did you know you can get that vibe anywhere?

[Erlich]

That's because whether after work, at barbecues or at a bar with just a squeeze of lime, Corona brings you La Playa mentality. Because while we all want the beach life, paradise doesn't always have palm trees. Corona La Playa awaits. Get [e-mail] Relax responsibly. Corona Extra beer imported by Crown Import.

[Griffin Newman]

Chicago, Illinois is a conspiracy. K Street is an HBO show.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Erlich]

Okay. Yes. Okay.

[David Sims]

That's the Soderbergh sort of.

[Griffin Newman]

It's about lobbyists. Weirdly, people were not that interested. I don't know why.

[David Sims]

Even though it's charred. America's favorite TV star, James Carville.

[Griffin Newman]

The whole Thing it was a classic Soderbergh where he's like, well, what if I just like point cameras at lobbyists? HBO will be interested. Right? Like nobody. Anyway way. I highly recommend it as a sort of flip side because it's an incredibly simple film. It's basically set at a big table. There's basically nothing to it. It's about the real Vanassi. I. I'm probably pronouncing that Wrong. Conference in 1942 where Heydrich, who was a high ranking Nazi at the time, basically like gathered a bunch of people.

[Erlich]

And was thinking of the corner. Not K Street, the corner.

[David Sims]

What was the corner?

[Griffin Newman]

Now we got the corner is David Simon's miniseries.

[Erlich]

Basically James Carville. It's like, there's no fucking way.

[Griffin Newman]

I wish so that I had the wallet back. Well now you deserve it to. Don't.

[Erlich]

And you can't.

[David Sims]

You only get one wallet. That's the problem.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, he gathers the high ranking Nazis and is like Hitler has ordered us to exterminate the Jews in like an. You know, beyond what we've been doing in a. In a uniform way. And we're going to. And we're here to figure out exactly how to do it. And it's amazingly acted because it's so procedural and like there's nothing more chilling than watching people discuss this stuff as sort of a matter of fact. Like, you know, just. And there are moments obviously where like things get more, you know, bigoted and intense or whatever. And there's also moments where it's just like fucking German army, you know, big shots arguing like having little turf wars with each other. It. It fucking rocks.

[Ben Hosley]

I have a question about it. I'm interested.

[Griffin Newman]

Does America get a shout out in conspiracy?

[Ben Hosley]

Wait, because of course it's been found.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, then America like kind of knew what was going on.

[Ben Hosley]

But okay, it was found in. And I'm pretty sure it was during the. The specific meetings that you're shouting out that they were looking to America in the way that we suppressed African Americans.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

I do think some of them that.

[Ben Hosley]

They could then incorporate into what they were doing to the Jews.

[Griffin Newman]

I think they. They do you briefly mentioned something like that. I can't remember but I know what you're talking about.

[Erlich]

Species we have here.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Lovely series of government.

[Ben Hosley]

Just a nice reminder. Yeah. Sorry to.

[Griffin Newman]

No, but it's. That's what's so interesting is that you watch an interesting, whatever fascinating, disturbing, distressing. Like you watch Schindler's list and you're 15 years old. You're David, Me or Ehrlich? And you're like, I have so many questions. Or Ben.

[Erlich]

I would choose Sims.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, get out of here. Come on. You must have been cool.

[Erlich]

No, your. Your entire audience, just you giving the biggest laugh this whole episode, what a.

[Griffin Newman]

Cutie pie, at least recently sent me a picture of you in college. And we were both like, what a cutie pie he was. You're watching and you're like, but how could this not just, like, happen? It's just like, you're telling me there was, like, sort of, you know what I'm talking about. Like, people writing things down and making plans and being like, yeah, yeah, use that railroad. That one's good. Like, going through rounds. Approved. Auschwitz is really good because it's kind of in the middle of nowhere, so no one will see what's going on. So they know. They don't want anyone to see what's going. You know what I mean? Like, all of those thoughts, it's just like, every time you think about the thought process or the conversations people had, you're like, how did this, you know, continue? Like, how did it not stop there or there?

[Erlich]

Something that think allows Schindler's List to not spin into the maudlin or really get overly or any sentimental toward until the very end is. It's focused on bureaucracy from the start. I mean, this is a story about paperwork. The first line in the movie, other than the prayer in the prologue, is someone being like, name. And then you see them just taking down names throughout the paper, throughout the movie. It's all just a drama of, you know, trying not to create more paperwork or less paperwork. And everyone just, you know. And then, of course, the miracle of it all is solved by paper, paperwork, effectively, at the end.

[David Sims]

It is interesting that, like, that the.

[Griffin Newman]

Most thrilling thing they do is Kingsley burning up that typewriter. Like, at the end.

[David Sims]

It is interesting that Amistad is so transparently him trying to make his Schindler's List for slavery. And the actual successful version is Lincoln, which once again takes the approach of bureaucracy, where it's like, the way this gets settled is through, like, an absolute, like, kingship working of our fucked system.

[Griffin Newman]

But, like, I think Amistad, he thought he had it, too, where it's like, well, well, oh. What's interesting is they put on trial the notion of, like, you know, were they allowed to do this? Like, were they allowed to overthrow their masters on this boat?

[Erlich]

I think this speaks to. Oh, sorry.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, he just thought, like, that's another way to get at that question. Right in. In like a non. And like, it's not like Amistad's a bad movie. I mean, we. We've put out like 53 great minutes on it. You can go listen to anytime.

[Erlich]

And then a four hour episode.

[Griffin Newman]

Maybe we should read Amistad.

[David Sims]

Our ad reads are 53 minutes long, though. I will say this. I mean, working on my, like, ultimate Spielberg ranking that we'll do at the end of this episode, I was just like, man, like 10 of these I need to rewatch.

[Erlich]

But I. I do think that.

[David Sims]

And Amistad is one of them where I'm like, I would like to watch it again. But I think Amistad does then rely on like magic movie stars giving the great monologues to sell it versus, like the biggest Lincoln. Monologues in Lincoln happen behind closed doors for two people, and then the real action is him sending out like fucking.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, Vader and Hawk to like.

[David Sims]

Work it and massage it and all this sort of stuff in the same way as Schindler, where it's like you have to kind of just like wheel and deal to trick people into doing the right thing.

[Erlich]

Speaks to another one of the prevailing interests of Spoeg's career, which is his fascination with how history is told, how it's written. And you see it even in a film like the Post, which I think is underrated from the one time that.

[David Sims]

I saw it, which he also knows that he is one of the people who now, now is writing history. That anything. Yes, there is that part of that double.

[Erlich]

That twinned awareness which I think, you know, he was aware to. To some degree in Schindler's List. And then his fame grew, I think became even more pronounced. But like, you know, he is aware that he is Hollywoodizing everything he touches and perverting the historical record, trying to.

[David Sims]

Do it responsibly rather than denying it.

[Erlich]

And I think, yeah, he is. Films have a very sort of textual emphasis on what the different. What it means to create history, to write these stories, what the decisions are that go into that. And really the. The documents and the paperwork that form the lives of the people that they. They touch. You see it across history.

[Griffin Newman]

In Lincoln, what we're watching is the Civil War is about to end. You know, they've essentially quote, unquote, won. And Lincoln is like, well, we still need to put. We need to write this shit down. Like, we need to put it in the Constitution before the Southern states rejoin. Before, like, you know, there's, you know, no chance of it ever happening happening. And everyone around him Is like, do we have to. You know, like, we won? Like, it's fine.

[David Sims]

Take the W. Right? Walk away.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, like, that's a lot of work. It's hard. You have to use all your political capital on this, like, yada, yada, yada, right? And he's like, no, no, no. I understand that this is going to be pivotal. And the movie has hindsight, so it knows it's pivotal. But nonetheless, like, he also is like.

[David Sims]

I have theater tickets, like, six months from now, so we could get it done within that window. I want to be able to see a play and not have this on my mind. You got six months.

[Erlich]

A little bit more paperwork would have.

[Griffin Newman]

Saved him in Schindler's List. What's so crazy is that there's an awful thing happens in front of Oskar Schindler every five minutes, and he's laughing it off. Now he's trying to survive, like, Ben saying, like, and just escape by or, you know. Right. Just like, hey, win. Like, this is. This is the way it is. But, like, he's in the middle of insanity. Like, where is he on Amistad? And Lincoln, it's kind of like, well, we know about the insanity, but we're over here in Washington and we're kind of like, trying to untangle it.

[David Sims]

Like, this guy has been right. Unlike Lincoln. Schindler.

[Erlich]

Let's also call out Nissan.

[David Sims]

Could have for, like, 10 years.

[Griffin Newman]

I know we talk about it.

[David Sims]

I just want to say it in this episode for, like, 10 years, Lincoln was Spielberg's Schindler Part 2, where he was like, I'm not yet ready, but I know I want to make it.

[Griffin Newman]

Man was a tall drink of water.

[David Sims]

That whole decade. It was Neeson supposed to do it. And then when he finally got the script and was like, liam, I'm ready to go. Liam's like, I'm not the right guy. And it was the right guy. It was a correct decision. Like, it was.

[Erlich]

Anyone going to take Lincoln's daughter?

[Griffin Newman]

I have to shoot a whole movie in a parked car.

[David Sims]

I was so excited about the idea of Neeson playing.

[Griffin Newman]

There was some Photoshop that went around. You probably remember it, like, in those early days of the Internet where, like, someone had Photoshopped the beard on him and it was like, this is going to rock.

[David Sims]

It's going to rock. Right, right. But it. Beyond the fact that it's just like, you're never going to get a better performance than you got from. From Danny Day playing Lincoln, I gotta say, I think.

[Griffin Newman]

Wait, your buddy Dan.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Big D yeah, A coming out one year after Taken would have been a swing.

[Erlich]

Would be real pivot.

[Griffin Newman]

It's fun to him.

[David Sims]

Timing it would have flipped people's brains.

[Erlich]

I am going all in on the hope, hope that the Naked Gun remake this summer brings Neeson all the way around.

[Griffin Newman]

We will have our eggs in that basket. I would say. If you looked at the eggs in that basket, they have the blank check logo on them.

[David Sims]

Crazy. There's so many things at stake on that movie, which I'm just asking.

[Erlich]

The future of theatrical comedy.

[David Sims]

Silly and consistently funny.

[Griffin Newman]

Nissan, not just making movies set in park cars.

[David Sims]

I'm like this. It potentially opens up the final last golden phase of Neeson's career because, like.

[Griffin Newman]

The other movie he's making is called Cold Storage. And I don't know what it's about, but here's my guess. He's, like, shooting movie with cold in.

[David Sims]

The title in the last four months.

[Erlich]

I do just want to, you know, talking about Nissan in, like, a funny vein.

[David Sims]

He's got Cold Pursuit and, like, cold trucks.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, dude, he's the ice Road.

[Erlich]

But, yeah, the Ice Road blows. Cold Pursuit is a really solid movie that had the misfortune of being the movie that he was on the press.

[David Sims]

Press.

[Erlich]

But.

[Griffin Newman]

And one more thing. Robin is just like, not one more thing.

[Erlich]

Turn his mic off there.

[Griffin Newman]

If I can add further context.

[Erlich]

But there is. I mean, Liam Neeson's not in this sequence, although he precipitates it. But like I do every time I watch this movie, I am blown away by what has to be the most darkly comic sequence in maybe all of the last 30 some odd years of American film.

[David Sims]

Until 2025, of course, which is the I part.

[Erlich]

A new sequence in Schindler's List where, you know, Schindler prevails on Goethe to show mercy's power. Power is not control. Power is that we have the, you know, ability to kill these people, and we don't. And then in what is, you know, uncomfortably a comic sequence, you know, I'm on pardons. It follows the rule of three. It's like an SNL sketch. I mean, like, he pardons one person and another, and he's, like, working against his demons and looking at himself in the. In the men in the window, in the mirror, rather. And then it ultimately thing where he.

[Griffin Newman]

Like, moves his hand hair across his face. Yeah.

[Erlich]

And he's sort of studying himself. And then in, you know, typically spoken fashion, the way the information comes out, I mean, he cannot commit to having any sort of redeeming qualities and he ends up murdering Lichek. But it. It is a. I mean, again, when I think of the sequences that sort of define Schindler's List and are able to thread the needle between these very contrasting energies, having that sort of like gallows humor is an understatement. Like the incredibly morbid humor here and making it like. You don't laugh when you're watching that, but it is inherently comic. It's not the day the clown cried, but like, it's. It's funny in its way.

[Griffin Newman]

Can we watch that yet? Or you have to, like, go to West Virginia. You have to, like, go to Fort Knox.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Here's like a thing in this movie that is so risky that I think pays off so beautifully, which is Schindler basically has no ideology. Right. He is so defined.

[Griffin Newman]

We can tell apart from money talks. Right.

[Erlich]

But.

[Griffin Newman]

But that's really sort of Chris Tucker's idea.

[David Sims]

He is defined by this sort of sense of like, I haven't quite been able to make a business work. Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. Like I never will, really.

[David Sims]

I'm sort of a disappointment. My father thinks I'm kind of like a up.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

He's sort of the ultimate large adult son.

[Erlich]

Very large.

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, he's good at.

[David Sims]

He's good at. He's like good at charming people. But you're like, this guy is sort of like. Like kind of just a dilettante to a certain extent. He's like the kind of like grindset mindset, quote, unquote, entrepreneur who. You're like, who does this guy like?

[Griffin Newman]

Pardon me. Okay, carry on.

[David Sims]

No, but I'm like, he is the.

[Erlich]

The Schindler's tweets about this were fired.

[David Sims]

He is the version. He is like the LinkedIn lunatic of his time in a certain way.

[Erlich]

He's all in on crypto.

[Griffin Newman]

We're about to hit the three hour mark and I can tell it's getting good by the kind of.

[David Sims]

We have any. You know, you can tell because I'm getting. Getting war.

[Erlich]

We haven't even talked about the liquidation of the ghetto sequence, really, which is like maybe the marquee sequence in Spielberg's career.

[Griffin Newman]

It's really hard to talk about.

[David Sims]

To me, the most important scene in this film or the scene I'm kind of most impressed by the dramatic execution of, because it's not a complicated sequence in terms of the moving pieces as a filmmaker is the negotiation for Hirsch. Right. With the. The notion of the game of 21. And that you're kind of surprised that Schindler is willing to put his neck out to try to overplay his hand to get this right. He's had this moment of relation to her in the basement when he's talking to her. A move that astounds me is that you can see. And a lot of this is Janusz. And a lot of this is. Is Devitt's visible goosebumps on her skin as he's sort of circling her and trying to get his head around her. And then has that moment of the last, like, can I kiss you? But not in that way where you're starting to see these gears turning in this dude. And it's also coming after, like, the negative response he got to the kiss upstairs and all that sort of. Then he goes to King's.

[Erlich]

The kiss, the kiss where he kisses later. Then he kisses the Jewish woman at the party. Like, a sustained kiss on the lips is such an interesting moment because there's no clear indication as to why he is doing this.

[David Sims]

It.

[Erlich]

And that you have to sort of.

[David Sims]

Once again, to his lack of ideology, which is just like, you know what I like doing? Kissing women. Why would I judge any set of lips as not worth kissing?

[Erlich]

My interpretation for that moment where he's surrounded by Nazis who are looking at each other, being like, what the. Knowing that he's breaking the law is at that point, it is sort of a you. I think he's saying, like.

[David Sims]

Like, interesting.

[Erlich]

I. I think it's a you. I think he doesn't need to kiss that woman. I think he's doing that when he gets arrested. That's towards the end.

[David Sims]

My. My read on the movie is like, he's sort of taken aback by their response where he's sort of like, you actually are this disgusted by these people. Like, he's sort of like, I thought this was sort of like, let's keep the trains running. Let's all like, prosper and wealth kind of thing.

[Erlich]

That's really what he shows his cards when he's pouring water on the train car. And he's like. It's completely like that point. It's unambiguous, right? That he is trying to respect their humanity and the Nazis are just laughing at him.

[David Sims]

You get there, right? Him saying to kinglessly, like, leave one extra slot blank. You don't quite understand why he's doing it. Then it gets to the negotiation where he knows Fines is going to pick up on that and makes the play to try to win her. Get Hirsch on the list and finds. Starts short circuiting, right? Like this guy is so unequivocally evil, but in a way where he hates himself for being attracted to her and keeps kind of like tying himself into knots, where he's just like, like, if I want to her then I must be vermin too. And he's trying to square this circle. And Neeson knows that that's what he can do to make him shut down where it's like challenge him on all of this.

[Erlich]

He can't push his, her like the value that she has to him because.

[David Sims]

He will overriding like biological sort of like drive towards this woman is being defeated by his notion of like country and what he represents, which is the exact, exact thing that Schindler lacks that allows him to gradually go like, wait, this is just a person, right?

[Erlich]

Why am I treating this as any sort of ideology would be too confining for him to navigate the Holocaust the way that he does.

[David Sims]

And the more these people make money for him, the more he's like, well, I'm kind of endeared to these people, they've helped make me a millionaire. Why would I view them as less than? That's so like small minded to just like categorically group A a whole like section of people as less.

[Erlich]

Less.

[David Sims]

And you just watch like Fines is doing these insane quick turns as he's like pacing back and forth as Nissan is putting him through the paces, being like, yeah, but you're not going to take her to Vienna. Let's be honest here, that's not possible. You know, there's another moment in the movie, I'm trying to remember where it is, but it's earlier. Oh, it's in the conversation, the first conversation in the wine cellar with Helen where Spielberg deliberately has a cut that fucks continuity where he goes from one angle to a slightly different angle on a two shot of both of them. And in the first one finds his hands on his hips and he cuts continuous dialogue and finds his arms are straight down by his side. And it is such a perfect like for a movie that is so tight and is so controlled and so disciplined, most people would go like, fuck, you can't do that. That fucks with the austerity of the film. And Spielberg clearly was just like, this is the best combination of performances. I don't fucking care. If that throws people off of the movie, then we have bigger problems, you know. But it's a similar thing of like this scene where Fiennes is just like wanting to punch himself in the face for wanting to kiss her. That I think is such an interesting counterpoint to, like, here's this guy who is so dogmatic and what he thinks he needs to do, do, and has certain psychological and biological drives that he cannot override that are tearing him up inside versus Oscar Schindler being like, well.

[Erlich]

It'S one character who's at war with his humanity, what little of it is left. And another who is coming to embrace his humanity as the film goes on.

[David Sims]

Because as he's starting out, he's just sort of like, I go over the money.

[Erlich]

Right.

[David Sims]

I don't care about anything.

[Erlich]

The advantage that Schindler has over Goethe is that he knows who Amon Goethe is. And the reverse is not True. True.

[Griffin Newman]

And that Eamon pronounce it is not very capable of judging other people's emotions because he has clearly, like, a mental disorder which he was diagnosed with by the Nazi party. When they finally kicked him out, he was so bad at his job, he was actually fired, which is so crazy to think about that they were like, you know, you're not producing an enough work, I guess. You know, like. Or he was stealing, you know, quote unquote, stealing money.

[David Sims]

The reveal of the naked woman lying in bed alone. And then you're like, what's she doing? And then cut to him on the balcony with the sniper rifle. And you're like, this guy doesn't want to.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, that scene is, yeah, obviously very chilling. And also it's right how she's like, come on. You know, while he's doing this, like, unbearable psychotic thing.

[David Sims]

And he's, like, barely taken the time to put his suspenders back on. He's half naked. Right.

[Griffin Newman]

Great.

[David Sims]

Like, the drive in this guy is so frightening.

[Erlich]

The kiss.

[Griffin Newman]

Just.

[Erlich]

The one weird factoid about the kiss scene earlier was when he kisses the little girl before he kisses the older one on the lips. The woman who that character really is was on set that day. And ne is at the end of the movie.

[David Sims]

Yeah, yeah.

[Erlich]

And N goes up to her. Yeah. And kisses her dressed as Schindler in the same way as the real Schindler kissed her on the cheek. Weeks at that party. And it's just like that, for me, sort of epitomizes how the production of this movie was sort of as much.

[David Sims]

And people could be playing Angry Birds in between.

[Griffin Newman]

I know. It's so crazy to imagine how many.

[Erlich]

Cell phones I would have played so many games.

[Griffin Newman]

What if it turns out like that Spielberg had, like, a big brick cell phone that he did play, like Snake.

[David Sims]

He was snaking all the time and.

[Griffin Newman]

He'S actually, like, completely zoning out the entire thing.

[Erlich]

I just need this for my sanity.

[David Sims]

Two ways I'm getting through this. Nighttime rifts from Robin and Snake during the day.

[Erlich]

But the. The ghetto sequence is, you know, I think, problematic for some because it's so electrifying. And I think, you know, watching it in a vacuum, if I was an alien coming to Earth, putting the.

[David Sims]

Burying the jewelry and the bread.

[Erlich]

I mean, it's as electric as anything. In Raiders of the Lost Ark, it also just starts. I mean, it's. Yeah, well, you got a speech about how today is history and how he's going to make the history of Jews in Poland starts.

[David Sims]

You're like, holy. The movie is up to that point.

[Griffin Newman]

That's the thing.

[David Sims]

And it's happening this abruptly.

[Griffin Newman]

The time of this movie is kind of elastic. You don't, again, have the political background. You know, the title. You know, you have some titles that come up occasionally to be like, okay, now this is what's going on. But you're not understanding the progression of the war and you're not understanding later. I mean, like, that much until you sort of realize, like, oh, the war's kind of over, like. Or is whatever. Germany is now on its back foot versus is.

[David Sims]

It's a much later film. But I was reminded in rewatching this of Tar, which I think, similarly, you're watching. You're like, I know where this movie is going. When's it going to happen? And it does the trick of being like, this has gotten further along in the background of the story that you're focused on than you realized.

[Griffin Newman]

Tar is so good at that, where you're like, oh, are we about to methodically watch her get canceled? And then we've actually cut to, like, now. It's actually.

[David Sims]

This has been like, he doesn't realize.

[Griffin Newman]

Over.

[David Sims]

Right.

[Erlich]

But what do you guys think of the. Like, the. The way that it's shot?

[David Sims]

The lady. I'm saying Lydia, of course.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. Her behavior.

[David Sims]

Yeah, yeah.

[Erlich]

I don't know. The liquidation of the ghetto sequence, I think, is as. I think sort of the. The fulcrum of where people think the movie's problematic meet, where people think the movie is more successful. I don't know. It's just like. It's such an electrifyingly staged sequence, but it's also so horrifying in what it's depicting. And there's like the. The. The rush and suspense of people fleeing for their lives at the same time they're hurted. Are they going to escape? Can they Hide. Who is making the right choices here? I mean, I don't know. I don't really. I don't know. I'm throwing it open to the table. I don't really know how to.

[Griffin Newman]

I don't have a problem with this. I understand the academic. You know, I don't have. I mean, I don't have a objection of, like. Right. Can you dramatize any of this? Can you put any mustard on it? As I would say, it's just the.

[Erlich]

Slightest piece of filmmaking.

[Griffin Newman]

The thinnest spread of mustard. Yes, you absolutely can. The scene where the women, the scene that upsets me the most, realize their kids are on the trucks and start running. It's an incredibly devastating scene. It's also, once again, incredibly well staged by Spielberg. Like, the shot of them all suddenly moving and like, you know, that means. It means you have an indelible memory of something that's like, you know, like, you need to know and remember.

[David Sims]

For reminding me of a point I wanted to make, it's one of the most effective parts of the film to me. There are no cell phones. There were no cell phones on set during the making of this film. Or at least let me say smartphones. No. A thought I had while watching this is as much as he is sort of like, I'm approaching this like a documentary. Let the actors figure it out. I'll sort of, like, adjust around them. I'm not gonna, like, push them into place. There are obviously larger blocking maneuvers that. That needs be worked out.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

And this is such Spielberg.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah. He's not just like, hey, everyone, run around. I'll figure it out.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

This is such an incredible, like, hundreds, thousands of extras movie in a way that is, like, textually important. And you'll have these Spielberg oners that, like, start with, you know, two characters talking in a train in the background, and then it follows them off somewhere else. But you can tell that in the background now out of frame, there are still those hundreds of extras who are existing just outside the perimeters because there wasn't a cut. The camera just moved. They're not just running back off to their trailers or whatever. You know, the crafty table. And it is like a constant reminder of the. The sheer numbers of people who were involved in this on both sides. And when. When you see those masses of just like, right as you're saying, the women running towards the train and they don't stop coming, and you're like, there's more of them. There's more of them. He hasn't run out the resources to be able to like, put that many people on set and to let them exist is the kind of. Like every one of these people is equally important. Even if the scene is now focused on Liam Neeson's face, you're never forgetting that those people are right there.

[Erlich]

Yeah. I mean, there's the feeling that every character you see, both the Jews and the Nazis, are sort of in their own movie over the course of this. And you feel that in the, in the liquidation sequence where I think things that might feel glib, like the Nazi playing Bach on the piano after somebody steps on and alerts them to their presence. I think that symphonic feeling of it, the triumph sort of over being played, over the sorrow and the horror of what's happening. Like people being executed summarily at point blank range, you know, in front of people who are sort of like giddily doing their job. I mean, I think it's, it's. It speaks to how well the movie and the energy the movie gets from the confluence of all these different energies that are happening at once. Where it was. It's never just the unimaginable horror of what's happening, or it is, but the horror is compounded by the fact that so many other human emotions and. And experiences are happening at the same time.

[David Sims]

It's like the shit that Spielberg has always been great at is. Is like having exposition that sets Brody into action in Jaws, happening in the background of a oner, while in the foreground there's like a small, like domestic comedy scene playing out with his wife and child. You know, this sort of like his capturing of energy of never letting a scene be only one thing. It is just like. Yeah. The amount of sort of like parallel action he is able to stage in a way that isn't canceling itself out is astonishing because it is part of what needs to be reckoned with of just like how much was going on at every single moment.

[Erlich]

Which is also what pressurizes the ending so much when all of this expansive, you know, far reaching energy collapses on this one moment of, you know, moral recognition. And I, with this ring, I could have done more, you know, I could have saved more lives. I think it's, it's a real shift in the density of what we're seeing.

[David Sims]

There's the moment where they send the boy out and they're pointing the guns at him and you're like, fuck, I'm about to watch this kid get shot in the back of the head at point blank. And then it cuts to Kingsley Walking, sort of just like trying not to rock the boat. And you're like, oh, I guess the kid survived. And then as the camera is following Kingsley, you see the dead kid lying, right? And it's just this sort of like, oh, at the exact moment that someone's surviving, someone else has been executed in a meaningless way. And the scene with the rabbi where they test him on the hinges, which, let's just say another great thing about this movie. Anytime they show you the way the operations work, the way the pot gets made, that shit is so good. But them, like, stop watching the hinge. He feels like he's passed the test. And then finds. Is like, well, but if you can make them that fast, then why are there only this many in the bucket he's taken out? You're like, I'm about to watch another fucking horrible scene for a guy I've now fallen in love with in 30 seconds. And then the guns won't work. They're jamming up. They're going through multiple guns. It's sustained in the background. People are escaping. People are getting shot. You're focused in on this one thing. And then only after there have been like, three false starts with the gun does he say, like, I hesitate to even bring this up, but the reason I didn't have the hinge is they had to reset the machinery or whatever. Where you're understanding the psychology of this guy in this moment who's, like, processing. I could die at any second way.

[Griffin Newman]

He flinches every time.

[Erlich]

Totally.

[Griffin Newman]

Gun clicks.

[David Sims]

But also that he's thinking, like, should I even say this? If I start to speak, to explain myself, do they shoot me even faster? Like, what is the thing that helps me survive this? When the chaos of what's going on is so extreme and so all over the place and feels kind of randomized.

[Erlich]

I mean, the random is. I mean, we talked about it earlier that, like, so many accounts of people who survive the Holocaust come down to. To weird flukes of luck or just.

[David Sims]

Literally, I stepped out of line and was like, if I step out of line, will anyone catch me? And they don't.

[Griffin Newman]

Eamon would. Oh, sorry, go ahead.

[Ben Hosley]

I was gonna say the women, when they're pricking their fingers and trying to.

[Griffin Newman]

Up their cheeks to give themselves, like, to look more.

[Ben Hosley]

More alive, good at working, essentially, stronger, more healthy.

[Griffin Newman]

That's one of those details.

[David Sims]

I mean, the kid jumping in the toilet and you're like, I can't believe anyone had to do this. And then they're four other kids already in there.

[Erlich]

A Lot of these details came from accounts that Spielberg learned on set. I mean, like, the idea of them eating the. Putting the diamonds in bread and then swallowing them. That. That was something that someone mentioned him on set, and he was like, we have to work this into the movie.

[David Sims]

It's also so fascinating as Schindler starts to, like, buy off German officers. Things like the. The lighter and the. The bag of diamonds later, you know, and him having the breakdown of not selling the car or the pin or whatever. It's like he's selling them on the notion of, like, we all know this is going to crash and burn at some point, which makes it all the more terrifying that people are just like, well, I'll just continue carrying out orders until the last possible moment. And then he knows the morality test of that final moment, inviting them into the warehouse and being like, if you really care about this shit, fucking execute them right now. And everyone backs off.

[Erlich]

I mean, which is a big swing. It's a huge swing.

[David Sims]

But part of it is really gambling.

[Erlich]

With a lot of lives there.

[David Sims]

But what is this guy's, like, superpower at the end of the day? He actually really knows how to read people.

[Griffin Newman]

And he's brash. And so much of this, right, is like, put your money where your mouth is. And some people, like Eamon Coke, are happy to be psychos all day, and others are just like, I'm just doing my job, you know, which their job is, you know, the world's most unimaginable evil.

[David Sims]

But.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[Erlich]

I can understand why some people would. Would be allergic to the end where he's saying. He's breaking down and saying, this ring. I could have done more because it's.

[Griffin Newman]

The most Hollywood moment.

[Erlich]

Right. But at the same time, I don't know what other catharsis you could have.

[David Sims]

At the end of Emotions all.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

The entire film.

[Griffin Newman]

But it's also the first question I would have of him where I'm like, yeah, why didn't. You know? Like, why did it end up being this many? And why did it take you this long to figure it out? Good for you figuring it out. Weird that More didn't, but.

[Erlich]

And also the enormity of what Ben Kingsley says to him, which is that, like, generation. There'll be generations because of what you did. And you just think about my own life.

[Griffin Newman]

But, like, it feels like something a movie shouldn't do, which is have a character kind of be like, what you did is a big deal and will be a big deal. And Neeson being like, are you sure and he's like, yes. You know, like, it's like movies should like historical movies about true stories.

[David Sims]

I think that is part of what helps that movie exist in a dialectic with other stories is that he doesn't present it as like, and this is how the Holocaust cost was 1. This is how we solve the problem. Like, the movie then acknowledges, like, this is kind of a drop in the bucket, is a deeply impactful drop.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, but it's like, then. Right. That's why Showa exists. Right.

[Erlich]

I mean, this. The statistics are mind blowing. I mean, you see in the movie that there are more people alive because of Oscar Schindler. There are Jews in Poland.

[David Sims]

Yeah, it's right.

[Griffin Newman]

If you were Jewish, you live in Poland.

[Erlich]

I've never, I've never done my real pain trip. I've been, you know, I've been back and forth on the idea for so long, and that movie did not really move the needle for me one way or the other. But especially if Kieran Culkin's gonna come with me. I'm.

[Griffin Newman]

I liked that movie, but, you know.

[Erlich]

Like, like, yeah, but I'm just saying it didn't make me want to go, like, buy my plane tickets to Poland and. And go on the history tour.

[David Sims]

I. I went once and did not do any of the historical things and felt a kind of profound connection to, like, this is where my people are from. Without needing to really dig into all of that. Maybe I was also like fucking 20 and afraid of doing emotionally overwhelming.

[Erlich]

What I like about that movie is it's him sort of narrativizing his own conversation, negotiation with the pain that he's inherited with other people's pain. To what degree is it healthy to take this on? To what degree do I need to create some space from it? And I know that if I were to go on that tour, maybe one day I will. I like Jesse Eisenberg in real life and like, his character in the movie would be so in my own head about how I should be feeling in this moment and like, the solemnity I should be expressing and internalizing and how wrong am I to have my thoughts wander about whatever while I'm here that it would be sort of self defeating and hopefully I can reach a point where I could go more pure. But anyway.

[David Sims]

Hey, congratulations, guys. We just passed the runtime of Schindler's.

[Erlich]

List and we didn't even talk about John Williams. Williams. You know what I think is the single most iconic film score ever written.

[Ben Hosley]

I think we did it. I think we did A lot. And especially because we need to do the rankings. Yeah, I think we should.

[Erlich]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm gonna challenge you on that, though.

[Erlich]

I know. I mean, just the theme.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a great theme. It is not.

[Erlich]

I mean, it's been stuck in my head for 30 years.

[Griffin Newman]

Make the argument there are other more iconic.

[Erlich]

Oh, there. There are more iconic.

[Griffin Newman]

Sean Williams's Schindler's Discord.

[Erlich]

John Williams wrote more iconic film scores.

[Griffin Newman]

Exactly.

[Erlich]

I'm just saying.

[Griffin Newman]

Five more.

[Erlich]

I meant to say most iconic film theme. Just that one piece of music that doesn't come up in full until 2 hours, 51 minutes of the movie has literally been in my head on a loop for over 30 years.

[Griffin Newman]

That's weird.

[Erlich]

It is weird. I've seen several. None of them can figure it out. But it is.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a lovely thing. The part in the documentary, though, where they're all like, the most beautiful thing he'd ever done. And we cried when we heard it. And it's like Pearl, you know, cosine. And you're just kind of like. It would be funnier if they were saying that about his terminal score.

[Erlich]

Well, it's.

[Griffin Newman]

They were like, you know, the movie's silly, but, like, his terminal score. I just started hugging him and was moved to tears.

[Erlich]

All right, I got therapy in 25 minutes. Let's go.

[Griffin Newman]

We've been talking for so long.

[David Sims]

Did this movie win any Oscars?

[Griffin Newman]

This film won seven Academy Awards. I'm shocked it didn't win more.

[Erlich]

In a way, I could have won more.

[Griffin Newman]

No, I. I liked that. I'm gonna be honest with you.

[David Sims]

That was good. Who wins best actor this year in.

[Griffin Newman]

Tom Hanks wins for Philadelphia, which I, you know, is a performance I like, but I would certainly give it to. Of the five nominees, I would give it to Liam Neeson. I personally who. And I think Neeson's just amazing.

[David Sims]

It's his second best performance.

[Griffin Newman]

I personally, behind Ted, too.

[David Sims]

Yeah. And I am allowed to buy this cereal.

[Griffin Newman]

Silly rabbit. I personally give it to David Thewless for Naked, which is like. Kind of like one of the most insane performances ever put on screen.

[Erlich]

But you can give it. The Oscars. Used to have some real heavyweights.

[David Sims]

Well, thou was.

[Griffin Newman]

But also that year, Anthony Hopkins is nominated for Remains of the Day, which is an amazing performance. Larry Fishburne for what's Love Got to Do with It. Like, they're amazing nominations anyway. You know, the weirder thing is that lose a supporting actor, sure. Like we said. But, like, I'm kind of surprised that it lost, you know, like makeup or whatever.

[David Sims]

What one makeup?

[Griffin Newman]

Hello. Well, I guess you can argue with Madame Doubtfire.

[Ben Hosley]

I, I think that my assessment of the movie being quotable is right.

[Erlich]

Helloire. Schindler's List. I think they're both quotable in their own ways.

[David Sims]

Both, yeah, for sure. I think you have helped make Hello. A quote in a way that solidifies your argument. So wait, it wins picture. Director.

[Griffin Newman]

Correct. Screenplay.

[David Sims]

Score. Screenplay, yes. Cinematography, yes. Editing.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes.

[David Sims]

So that's six. What's the one I'm forgetting? Does it win production design?

[Griffin Newman]

Let's see. No, it lost costumes to I think remain to the day, which, you know, great costumes, beautiful costume. No, sorry. It lost costumes to the Age of Innocence. But it did win. Indeed. Art direction, production.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

And of course Jurassic park that year also wins three Oscars or whatever. It's a, you know, it's a hot year for old Steve.

[David Sims]

Win. Sound and visual effects.

[Griffin Newman]

And yeah, it wins both sound and visual effects. Jurassic park in my opinion, also a good movie. The film opens well, it's not an opening. It's opening number 14 because it opened in limited release, but it did make close to $100 million, as you said. Griff 96.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

More importantly, 322 worldwide. It was kind of a global hit, I think, in a way that Spielberg might not have expected.

[David Sims]

Banned in about 10 countries.

[Griffin Newman]

No titties. No. I don't know why it was banned. I assume for incredibly anti Semitic reasons.

[Erlich]

Yeah. But they, they would. In some countries, I believe it was the Philippines. They.

[Griffin Newman]

I think it's Indonesia.

[Erlich]

Indonesia. They overruled the ban.

[David Sims]

Oh, sure.

[Erlich]

And in some countries they didn't.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, it's banned in Indonesia because it's sympathetic to the Jewish cause. Doesn't seem like a great reason to me.

[David Sims]

Also, look, we live in a very complicated world.

[Griffin Newman]

So it won Spielberg his Oscar, his long desired Oscar. Of course. He looks great at the ceremony. Hair's kind of long, gives lovely speeches, but speeches that are very much like I'm indebted to, you know, it's like he can't just get up there and be like, take that. Spielberg's on top. You know, which would be interesting if he had done that.

[David Sims]

Which it's interesting to think that this is also the Philadelphia year where Hanks gives the famous like president of Hollywood speech.

[Griffin Newman]

It's definitely a bit of a self important.

[David Sims]

This is a real deal telling you. Yeah, yeah, it is. This is like peak serious speeches of like, it's not about me, it's about the the story. Yeah. And to think that it's like Spielberg wins all these Oscars, presumably, like goes out parties, wakes up the next morning and then has to review story reels for Freakazoid.

[Griffin Newman]

It is funny.

[Erlich]

You think they made him do that at 8am Monday morning?

[David Sims]

I think he did it. He would. I don't want to disrespect freak because in his struggle.

[Griffin Newman]

It opens number 14.

[David Sims]

It is funny. What?

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, just to imagine him just how.

[David Sims]

Many plates he had spinning at this time.

[Griffin Newman]

Even if he doesn't make a movie, the Warner brothers. But the Warner sister Dot is there as well. He's like, uhhuh. Will there be a pigeon sort of Goodfellas thing happening in this old lady squirrel? God.

[Erlich]

I.

[Griffin Newman]

Everything I learned about the Godfather initially came through good feathers. December 17th, 1993. Griffin. So it's opening a limited release. Number one at the box office. It's a fun movie. It's based on a bestseller, legal bestseller.

[David Sims]

Is it the Pelican Brief?

[Griffin Newman]

It's Denzel Washington and Julia Robertson.

[Erlich]

The Pelican Brief.

[David Sims]

The Pelican Brief.

[Griffin Newman]

One of those movies that has sort of gotten reclaimed because I think it kind of slipped through the cracks.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

If that makes sense.

[David Sims]

Well, it was a hit, but it wasn't.

[Griffin Newman]

And then people kind of forgot about it.

[David Sims]

Who usually was a little more serious minded.

[Griffin Newman]

It's him and his dotage a little bit. Famously Robertson. Denzel don't kiss.

[David Sims]

Sure.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. Like there's a little bit of like Hollywood cowardice there.

[Erlich]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Anyway, Pelican Brief opening to a solid $16 million on its way to a very solid hundred.

[David Sims]

I don't know.

[Griffin Newman]

It's a fun movie.

[David Sims]

I like it a lot.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, it's fun.

[David Sims]

It's Pelican Long. It's not that brief.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, Pelican kind of long.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Erlich]

I just canceled my therapy session. Did you really not? Yeah, I mean, this is more important.

[Griffin Newman]

You can get out of here.

[Erlich]

No, no, no.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, he already.

[Erlich]

The people. The people need to know. Know where on my Spielberg list, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull falls three days ago.

[David Sims]

Erlich was like, no matter what, you have to promise me I make it out of here for the therapy session.

[Erlich]

But you know what? Griffin wasn't even that late. You were like five minutes late.

[David Sims]

Thank you.

[Erlich]

That's really not making or breaking this. Right?

[Griffin Newman]

15 minutes.

[David Sims]

I was not Mrs. Doubtfire. I think I was 10. I was the exact midpoint between the two numbers. You guys guessed.

[Griffin Newman]

I just said what number two was. Hello?

[David Sims]

Hello.

[Griffin Newman]

Ms. Doubtfire crushed it. Number three. It's a comedy sequel.

[David Sims]

It's a comedy sequel. David's eating a ring pot gummy worm. What the.

[Griffin Newman]

Like licorice.

[David Sims]

Great.

[Griffin Newman]

It's great for Home Alone in my opinion. Good guess, but no. And not a good movie. In fact, here's what's crazy. The next three movies are all comedy sequels.

[David Sims]

Wow.

[Griffin Newman]

Possibly a bad idea to have these.

[David Sims]

World 2.

[Griffin Newman]

This one is Wayne's World 2.

[David Sims]

Yeah, they rushed it.

[Griffin Newman]

A bad movie.

[Erlich]

I was going to say that would have to be 94, but I guess.

[David Sims]

Yeah, but you know, they finally have explained what happened with. With that movie. That Mike Myers wrote an entire sequel. He was like, I want to. I have. I want to take inspiration from Passport to Plimco.

[Griffin Newman]

Pimlico.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Funny Elon Brothers movie.

[David Sims]

And it's a movie about Wayne starting his own country. And Paramount was like great, we love it. And he wrote the script and they put it into like active pre production. And then like two weeks before filming they were like, we fucked up. We didn't get the rights for that movie.

[Griffin Newman]

And I forgot about this. I've read this article that you're like.

[David Sims]

They made him rewrite the movie from scratch.

[Griffin Newman]

Beyond that, they had to like dynamite the.

[David Sims]

The.

[Griffin Newman]

The sets.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

No. What's weird about Wayne's World too is that right, the rewrite is should we just kind of like parody the Doors like. And you're like, should we.

[David Sims]

But that feels like a we have two weeks to go concept. And the one thing they knew was that they had to build to the concert because they had built the stage for the performance.

[Erlich]

Seeing that movie in theaters as a 9 year old who had never even heard of the Doors was the confusing.

[David Sims]

There's funny stuff in it, but one is a stone cold masterpiece.

[Griffin Newman]

You know, there's funny stuff in it, but one is. One is so good. Good one. Do it on this show.

[David Sims]

Can I make a pitch?

[Griffin Newman]

Because I know we thought about Spherious, but we've got a really long com. Complicated.

[David Sims]

You know how we folded Love Guru and Toss and Powers?

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

I think we fold Ax Murderer into Wayne's World. Do those three.

[Griffin Newman]

So do another Myers trilogy.

[David Sims]

Yeah. I'm not saying we do it immediately, but I'm saying I want to pin it on the board as an idea.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah.

[David Sims]

Then we basically covered all the Myers otur films.

[Erlich]

You guys have to do Ax Murderer one way or another.

[David Sims]

Yeah. It's too important thing. Shrek's its own thing. The ones that he is. The driving force is the three powers. The two ways Worlds and ax murder. That's it. It's six. So I'm like, we could.

[Griffin Newman]

We do important work here. We do important work here. It's three hours, 30 minutes. Number two.

[Erlich]

There actually is a clock above my head. I'm just noticing that.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, it's, it's just sort of like, like the. Anyway, number four, it's another sequel. It's new this week. Family movie about a pet.

[David Sims]

Oh, it's Beethoven's Second.

[Griffin Newman]

That's right.

[David Sims]

Is that the funniest title of all time?

[Griffin Newman]

I mean, it's a good title. It's up there in my memory. They, they, they left work for the day after coming up with the title.

[Erlich]

I mean, Sister Act 2, back in the Habit is very good up there as well.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, you've just guessed number five, my friend.

[Erlich]

I figured I was in the neighborhood.

[David Sims]

That NY Wayne's World are both like, we got a sequel out in under.

[Griffin Newman]

A year, but it feels like a mistake. Like, don't rush it. And then don't have them all up against each other. Sister Act 2 is the one of those three movies where I'm like, that movie's not bad. That movie has juice.

[David Sims]

The great Bill Duke.

[Griffin Newman]

The great Bill Duke. The great Lauren Hill. Like, you know, there's stuff going on in Sister Act 2, Beethoven second. I'm pretty sure they were just like, I don't know, there'll be a girl Beethoven too. Great. Can we go?

[David Sims]

Can I make the case for Beethoven's Second as a perfect title? Title?

[Griffin Newman]

No. We already agreed with you. This isn't something you need to argue about.

[David Sims]

I don't think they greenlit Beethoven one being like, and obviously it's a franchise. And then later we can play on the great works of Beethoven.

[Griffin Newman]

I remember my dad trying to explain it to me.

[David Sims]

I have the same memory. Right. I remember your dad trying to seriously.

[Griffin Newman]

Where I was like, why isn't it called Beethoven too? And he's like, well, so symphony writing, you know, like it was a pain in the ass turn to explain it.

[Erlich]

To a 7 year old.

[David Sims]

Imagine the moment where they were like, wow, I'm, I'm checking the books here. Pretty good return investment. Beethoven. Should we maybe do a Beethoven sequel? And then some guy stands up for his desk at Universal. Sorry, I know it's only my second day at the job.

[Erlich]

This is the role that you would have played.

[David Sims]

Remiss if I didn't point out there's an incredible opportunity here.

[Erlich]

People in Hollywood do not understand or care about how much of a pain in the Ass. It is for parents to explain things to their kids. Like when six minutes into the Incredibles, you have to explain to your kid how insurance companies work. Brad Bird is not spending a thought about this.

[David Sims]

My whole problem with Mr. San didn't ask to be saved. Mr. Sans, we didn't want to be saved.

[Erlich]

I mean I put cars. I finally gave into cars in mistaken thinking that this one would at least explain itself.

[Griffin Newman]

No, cars is the most we have to explain endorsements.

[David Sims]

Or like you thought cars is the one that would explain Cars is inexplicable.

[Griffin Newman]

The world's greatest minds like ZH is like still like watching cosmic.

[David Sims]

I don't know where is the brain.

[Erlich]

I didn't think that my kid would work. Or like wait, so they fly on other vehicles who are also.

[David Sims]

They go inside Sidley the spy jet's butt and they have a conversation with him inside of him.

[Griffin Newman]

So in the top 10, you've got.

[David Sims]

A vehicle location and a character.

[Griffin Newman]

You've got drawn American legend Walter Hill film. You've got a perfect world. Great film. You've got the three musketeers. Lots of fun. Saw it in theaters. You have Adams family values. Ditto. And you've got a little masterpiece called the Piano. A piano. Now, Steven Spielberg Griffin has made by my count, 34 films. If you count Jewel.

[David Sims]

Yep.

[Griffin Newman]

So yeah, give me your top 34 for Steven Spielberg.

[David Sims]

I'm just gonna.

[Griffin Newman]

We're doing it all the yes we talked about. Here he goes.

[Erlich]

I prepared and I have a list.

[David Sims]

Yep. Okay. I'm just gonna try to do this fast. And some of it I bump on when I say it, but I'm just locking in the order I have right here. Okay. And I. I'm shooting from the hip. 34. Hook 33. 1941. 32. Terminal 31. The BFG 30. Ready Player One. 29. Warhorse 28. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 27. I don't like that movie. 27. Indiana Jones, Kingdom of the Crystals Call. Come at me, bro. 26. The Lost World Jurassic Park 25. Always that high. Basically on the strength of Holly Hunter alone. 24. The Color Purple 23. The Post 22. Amistad we're now in a territory where every movie is basically incredibly good at best, at worst. Right? 21. More of the Worlds 20. Munich 19. Westside Story 18. Minority Report 17. Sugar Land Express 16. Duel 15. Tintin 14. Lincoln 13. Indiana Jones in The Last Crusade 12. Jurassic Park 11. Jaws 10. Fablemans 9. Raiders of the Lost Ark 8. Close Encounters of the Third Kind 7. Saving Private Ryan. 6. Bridge of Spies. Face the bridge. 5. The Biggest Jump up for me in doing this series, Empire of the Sword on number four, Catch me if you can. Number three, Schindler's List. Number two, AI Artificial intelligence. Number one. ET the extra Terrestrial.

[Griffin Newman]

I'm surprised you have Ryan so high. I wouldn't have thought that.

[David Sims]

Look, it's a film I find very difficult to watch. I think it is just kind of undeniable in terms of craft. I mean that's one where maybe I'm like, do I. Do I flip Close Encounters?

[Griffin Newman]

You do what you want. You did what you did.

[David Sims]

That's what I listen did Griff Erlich.

[Griffin Newman]

You did this.

[Erlich]

I did this on the fly. Okay, I already have great issue with my picks, but I did. 34. BFG 33. Always. 32. Warhorse. 31. Ready. Player One should have been lawyer. 30. 1941. 29. Movie I skipped school to go see at 11 in the morning. The day came out has not aged well or was good at the time. The lost world. Number 28, the terminal. Number 27, Amistad. Number 26, Sugarland Express. 25. Duel. 24. Hook. 23.

[David Sims]

High for hook.

[Erlich]

Lincoln. 22 the color purple. 21.

[Griffin Newman]

23 Lincoln.

[Erlich]

I said what? I said can't have a pe. 24 hook. 21. I need to see Lincoln again. But is not. I don't know. Never really did much for me. 21. Indiana Jones, the Temple of Doom. 20. Westside Story. 19. The Post. 18 Empire of the Sun. 17. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

[David Sims]

I mean the most Uric move of all time.

[Erlich]

Number 16, Minority Report. Number 15, Tom Hanks has a cold in the Bridge of spies. Number 14, Ace's next favorite movie, the Adventures of Tintin. Should still be a sequel. Holding out hope. Number 13, Indiana Jones. I think just Indiana Jones. The way you call it. The Raiders of the Lost Ark. No, we don't.

[Griffin Newman]

We call this.

[Erlich]

Nope, we don't. We call this the Last Crusade. Number 12, War of the Worlds. Number 11, Sammy Fabelman and the Fabelmans. Number 10, Saving Private Rye. Number 90T. Number 8, Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Number 7. Another movie that would have complicated my relationship is Steelberg is Munich. You know what I'm talking about. That in context too. Number six, Raiders, the Lost Ark. Number five, Jaws. Number four, masterpiece called Catch me if you can. Number three, Jurassic Park. Number two, Schindler's List. And number one, AI Artificial Intelligence.

[Griffin Newman]

Okay, you guys ready for a third one of those?

[David Sims]

Now like, do I put sh. Do I put. Same Private Ryan. Do I flip Same per Ryan and Jaws. I don't know. Go on.

[Griffin Newman]

Number 34. 1941. Number 33, the terminal. Number 32. Always number 31, hook. Number 30, the BFG. We're exiting. Bad movies two. Okay, movies.

[David Sims]

Yeah. That's like his only bad tier to me, right?

[Griffin Newman]

Number 29, Lost World. Number 28, War Horse. Number 27, Crystal Skull.

[David Sims]

Bad adjacent.

[Griffin Newman]

Right. Number 26, Amistad. Number 25, Temple of Dune. Number 24, Color Purple. Okay, now we're getting into good movies. Number 23, Sugarland Express. Number 22, Duel. Number 21, Empire. The Sun. I might put that up higher on rewatch, but number 20, the. Not that high. Number 20, the post. Number 19, tintin. Number 18, last crusade. Number 17. Ready. Player one. Number 16, Munich. Number 15, war of the Worlds. Now we're in. I fucking love this movie territory. Number 14. Catch me if you can. Number 13, Bridge of Spies. Number 12. West Side Stories. Number 11, Cuck Brigade. Number 10. Calling it Rogan's Cuck Brigade. Number 10, Lincoln. Number 9. Close Encounters. Number 8. Saving Private Ryan. Number 6. 7. Jurassic Park. Number 6, Raiders. Number 4. 5. Jaws. 4. Schindler's 3. Colin Farrell Kissed Me. Number 2. E.T. number 1, AI Artificial Intelligence.

[Erlich]

Colin Farrell Kiss you is number 3.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, minority part. That's one of the best movies ever made.

[David Sims]

I'm officially flipping Satan, Private Ryan and Jaws in the order.

[Griffin Newman]

Take note, people who listen to that.

[David Sims]

Drivel, otherwise staying the same.

[Griffin Newman]

But yes, I think it's interesting that we all have AI right near the top. I think it's interesting that you fools don't understand. Ready? Player one is good. I don't think it's that interesting.

[David Sims]

Look, I bought the 3D Blu Ray and someday I will fire it up and give it another.

[Griffin Newman]

I have a steel.

[David Sims]

Well, they didn't put the 3D out on steel, so I bought the 4K steel and then I bought the 3D Blu Ray and I put that in.

[Griffin Newman]

People who do that are on a government watch list.

[David Sims]

I created my own combo pack.

[Erlich]

It's catch me if you can generally accept it as being one of his top tier films.

[Griffin Newman]

I think it has of late become generally.

[David Sims]

But I think. I think all three of us put it a touch higher than most would.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, I have it lower than you guys, but I also like, once we're in that top 15. Yeah, we're in five star territory.

[David Sims]

I'm like. I mean, everything I feel like in my top 20 is 4 stars and above.

[Griffin Newman]

Oh, absolutely.

[David Sims]

Yeah.

[Griffin Newman]

Yes, yes, yes.

[David Sims]

If not even more than that.

[Griffin Newman]

Stevie, you've made me some nice movies.

[David Sims]

This is the thing.

[Griffin Newman]

For that, I say thank you.

[David Sims]

Any of our rankings that seem rude. It's like, the guy made too many great movies. And even the ones I don't like all have some of the best things I've ever seen in a movie.

[Griffin Newman]

Early, because the last episode you were on Eyes Wide Shut. No, you did vengeance after that. Because Eyes Wide Shut went. Went this long. Not quite.

[Erlich]

This should have gone longer.

[Griffin Newman]

Sure. This one went really long.

[David Sims]

I had to pee very badly. Erlich, thank you so much for being here.

[Erlich]

Oh, my pleasure.

[David Sims]

You know, may your memory be a blessing.

[Erlich]

I feel safe in saying that I have now done the single least funny episode of Blank Check, A badge that I wear with honor.

[David Sims]

That's not true.

[Griffin Newman]

We had a lot of fun.

[David Sims]

Yeah, we had. We had a good time. I think they're less funny episodes. Once again, I'm a odd 53 minutes soaking wet. I was just being like, what do we say?

[Griffin Newman]

We could do a better job.

[David Sims]

Yeah, let's go back and do the second half of Spielberg again. Let's run it back.

[Erlich]

You could do like a how to train your dragon where just, like, one element remains CG and throw it everywhere. It's psychotic that they are just at this point now just keeping the same CGI elements of the original movie and now just putting human beings around them. It's. And that's.

[David Sims]

The other dragons, at least, are a little more redesigned. But toothless looks 98% exactly the same with the same director and Gerard Butler. I saw an interview with Dean Dubois yesterday, got fed to me on YouTube of him in 2020 saying how morally bankrupt he thinks it is that the animation studios are remaking their own movies and live action.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, you know what helps you be less physically bankrupt is making movies like that.

[Erlich]

And like pigs to the slop, I will be taking my kid opening weekend, of course.

[David Sims]

Anything you want to plug?

[Erlich]

No.

[David Sims]

Great.

[Griffin Newman]

Fighting in the war room. Your podcast, Terrible podcast.

[David Sims]

Don't listen good podcast for smart people.

[Erlich]

It's even more of me if you can stand it. And you probably can't. I don't know. I write on Indiewire, write about movies. I think a lot of the people listen the show are aware of that and wish they weren't.

[Griffin Newman]

No one has ever had a weird opinion about your movie writing ever.

[Erlich]

They never will. What do I want to plug my deck on? Marvel. Snap is crushing it right now.

[David Sims]

You just inherited a New wallet full of different payment methods.

[Erlich]

I have new credit cards. What can I spend before Sims cancels?

[David Sims]

Look, if the first name's the same.

[Griffin Newman]

It'S all who's going to check?

[Erlich]

I have two kids.

[David Sims]

Your kids rule.

[Erlich]

Can follow their progress on Instagram.

[David Sims]

Two of the best kids in the game.

[Erlich]

Yeah, I don't know.

[Ben Hosley]

You should shout out that best of.

[Erlich]

The year a while. I mean, I did, I did. I did have a fundraiser that is related to this episode in support for the second year in a row of people of Gaza. This year is for the Palestine requesting society. The amount of shit that GoFundMe has given every step of the way in vetting this account to make sure that I'm not abetting their definition of terrorism, whatever has been insane. They I've even able to get all the money out and to Palestine, but they have currently shut down the page for it anyway. Internet is bad fucking nightmare. But I've been very proud and happy to have been able to raise money for the people of Palestine and that has brought me joy. Related to it is the video I put together, but is seemingly inconsequential in comparison. But yes, I do that and this episode is not. Well, time for me to promote that, but maybe I can come on in the fall.

[David Sims]

Ehrlich, do you know what which filmmaker we're doing next?

[Erlich]

Somewhere in my brain I know, but.

[Griffin Newman]

How do you announce it?

[Erlich]

What am I looking at? Oh, sure, yeah, great.

[David Sims]

How about this? How about a killer 3 DVD box set?

[Erlich]

That's episode.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, we're announcing right now, of course, that next we are doing Amy Hackerling. Nobody has guessed this or seen it coming. As usual, the films of Amy Heckerling.

[David Sims]

Guys, next week we're straight into Fast Times Original High.

[Griffin Newman]

I believe so.

[David Sims]

With returning guest Lola Kirk.

[Griffin Newman]

That's right.

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Ben Hosley]

Now, some of these movies, are they going to be kind of hard for people to get access to or is it all more or less streamable?

[Griffin Newman]

Johnny Dangerously, I think is the only one where it's like quite a pickle, right?

[David Sims]

Yes.

[Griffin Newman]

Some of them are maybe not as like rentable on itunes. I don't know.

[David Sims]

Look, I'll say this is a great time to fire up a vpn, if you have one, and start scanning the Internet.

[Griffin Newman]

Right.

[David Sims]

Giant Dangerously is the one that's like pretty out of circulation, but maybe that magically changes soon.

[Griffin Newman]

Like I'm, you know, like loser. That's rentable. I could never be your woman either way.

[Ben Hosley]

I just wanted to give it rentable as hell.

[Erlich]

Oh my God, you guys are gonna finally canonically rentable. Had the fact that Josh. That she's butt crazy in love with Josh.

[Griffin Newman]

That's a movie where we're gonna need to go four hours.

[David Sims]

It seems it's gonna go hog wild.

[Ben Hosley]

For the Clueless episode. Could we have multiple changes looks? Yeah, I think we have to.

[Griffin Newman]

Yeah, I don't know that we have to, because we don't. Maybe you're only the producer of the show, so you might have forgotten that this is an audio show.

[Ben Hosley]

It's important to the authenticity.

[Erlich]

Sound of Polaroid snapping between.

[David Sims]

I agree.

[Ben Hosley]

You'll feel that we're wearing a sportier look.

[David Sims]

I'm so tired that I just said Ben's agree.

[Erlich]

Can you stop? Brain is like puttering radio heads just in the background. Or is it fake? What? No, it's not the coolest sound just over, over and over again over the background of that episode.

[Ben Hosley]

Yeah, no, we'll license that.

[Griffin Newman]

No problem.

[David Sims]

Anyway, normal swing from Schindler's List to Fast Times at Richmond High. Check back in for that next week. And on our Patreon, we're doing the Superman films.

[Ben Hosley]

No, we haven't actually kicked that off.

[Griffin Newman]

Really?

[Ben Hosley]

No.

[David Sims]

Timing is weird.

[Griffin Newman]

This episode, of course, is dropping April 20th. Okay, 420. It's also Hitler's birthday.

[Erlich]

Good job, guys.

[Griffin Newman]

But we are about to drop a Galaxy Quest episode.

[David Sims]

Okay, well, we'll tell you what's happening next after Galaxy Quest. Superman.

[Griffin Newman]

Superman is following that, beginning with the Richard Donner film. I'm seeing here that its title is Superman.

[David Sims]

That's not what it's called. It's called Superman. Colon, The Motion Picture. That is the official title. That is why the James Gunn movie is called simply Superman, because no film has ever had that title before.

[Griffin Newman]

Well, you're. I think wrong.

[David Sims]

I think I'm wrong.

[Griffin Newman]

It was marketed as Superman. Cullen, the movie.

[Erlich]

Do you have any strong thoughts about the aesthetic of the trailer for Superman? Superman?

[Griffin Newman]

I'm not sure why he's chosen that particular color correction, and I hope he, like, you know, tweaks it a little bit. Otherwise, I'm looking excited for it.

[Ben Hosley]

I want to push the stop button.

[Griffin Newman]

Why is that?

[Ben Hosley]

I don't know. Because this has been going on.

[Griffin Newman]

Ben, are you excited for me to talk so much about Superman, though? A guy I really like and a guy you probably think is a bit of a square.

[David Sims]

I think that movie is called Superman the Motion Picture. Are we going off of what it says in the opening of the film?

[Griffin Newman]

No, the film is called Superman.

[David Sims]

Oh, right. Well, first of all, it's Superman the movie.

[Griffin Newman]

As I told you two minutes ago. You weren't listening.

[David Sims]

It's going to be thrilling conversation. It was only marked that way leading up to the release of the new James Gun.

[Erlich]

Ben, when we're done here, I'm going to be my therapist for the afternoon.

[Griffin Newman]

So that the new James Gun was not called like Superman Lie this year.

[David Sims]

Back Legacy. That's what it almost called.

[Griffin Newman]

I know, but, like, I'm. I was trying to think of a funnier version. Like Superman checks things out, you know, just. Just this whole thing where they're like Superman toddles forward. Superman begins something.

[David Sims]

Well, first steps is one of the worst. I think that trailer rules, and I'm very cautiously optimistic for that movie. But I. Here's my pitch. No subtitle necessary.

[Griffin Newman]

Fantastic force. First steps. What happens in the movie? Galactus tries to eat Earth. Oh, is that what happens when you take your first step? What are you talking.

[David Sims]

What are you talking about?

[Erlich]

MCU's bulletproof right now. Can't go wrong.

[David Sims]

Yeah, let's all just quickly take our Ro Pills. We've gotten tense.

[Griffin Newman]

Let.

[David Sims]

No.

[Griffin Newman]

I must negotiate a treaty.

[David Sims]

Did the pills stop him from being rogue or they make him Rol?

[Griffin Newman]

They stop him from being Rol? Yeah, and keep him as the great politician he is. Freedom. You've elected an 80 billion year old man.

[David Sims]

The episode's over. Basta. Basta, Basta. Thank you all for listening. And as always, podcast is life.

[Griffin Newman]

Foreign.

[Ben Hosley]

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 Burch. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery and the great American novel. 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. Follow us on social at Blank checkpop. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter Checkbook on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.