A Few Good Men: How “You Can’t Handle the Truth” Became America’s Favorite Lie

Summary

Bulwark Takes: "A Few Good Men: How ‘You Can’t Handle the Truth’ Became America’s Favorite Lie"

Date: October 6, 2025
Host: Sonny Bunch with Sarah Longwell & Jonathan V. Last (JVL)

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Overview

This episode of the Bulwark Movie Club dives into the 1992 courtroom drama "A Few Good Men" as both an iconic American film and a touchstone for discussions about military ethics, authority, and the allure of the “strong man” mythos in politics and culture. Prompted by recent real-life political events, the hosts—Sonny Bunch, Sarah Longwell, and Jonathan V. Last—unpack the film’s enduring relevance, its memorable cast, Aaron Sorkin’s writing, gender dynamics, and what the movie can teach us about contemporary debates over power, standards, and moral codes.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Backstory and Cultural Impact of "A Few Good Men"

• Aaron Sorkin’s Career Launch: Sonny recounts Sorkin’s origin story, writing the play on cocktail napkins during his waiter shifts. The screenplay was optioned before the play was ever produced, leading to a star-studded film with Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson. [(00:30)]
• The "Walk and Talk" Origin: Jonathan and Sonny joke that this film (at Rob Reiner’s suggestion) birthed the famous Sorkin walk-and-talk scenes. [(01:44–02:56)]
• Blockbuster Status: The film grossed about $260 million—equal to $600 million today—cementing its status as a modern classic.

2. Why Discuss Now? Connecting Film to Current Events

• JVL points to the recent episode where the Secretary of Defense, echoing Colonel Jessup, gathered U.S. flag officers—citing real-world examples of "powerful men seeing themselves as law unto themselves." [(03:36–05:12)]
• The "Punisher" ethos in official circles is likened to Jessup’s brand of militaristic authority, prompting a broader reflection on the dangers of unchecked command and the breakdown of the rule of law.

3. Plot Recap and Moral Dilemma at the Heart of the Film

• Sonny summarizes the plot: At Guantanamo Bay, two Marines, following orders, kill a fellow Marine via an illegal "Code Red" hazing. Tom Cruise’s JAG lawyer character is roped into defending them, uncovering a cover-up sanctioned by Colonel Jessup (Nicholson). The crux: When law, orders, and personal codes clash, which should prevail? [(09:17–13:01)]
• JVL: "The law matters the most, and if it conflicts with your own personal code, then you leave your position. You don’t supplant your code for the law." [(13:01)]

4. Justice, Loyalty, and Gray Areas

• Sarah reflects on how she used to find Jessup appealing as a young conservative, but sees him as a more dangerous figure now—recognizing the allure and perils of the "warrior on the wall" ethos. [(06:57–08:40)]
• The panel explores the two accused Marines as exemplars of devotion to the code—even if it means refusing plea deals for acts committed under orders. Sarah notes, "There is a specific kind of person that says, I cannot say that I did this thing wrong when I don’t believe I did anything wrong. I just followed an order and that’s what I have to do." [(13:44–15:54)]

5. Sorkin’s Characters: Flaws, Daddy Issues, and Morality

• Tom Cruise’s character is discussed as callow and ambitious—more interested in career advancement than justice, a departure from Atticus Finch or Jimmy Stewart types. [(17:45–18:20)]
• JVL jokes: "All of Sorkin’s men and moral lights have these daddy issues." [(18:28)]

6. Cast Exploration and Critiquing Supporting Characters

• Stacked Cast: The film features a loaded ensemble—Noah Wyle, Cuba Gooding Jr., Kevin Bacon, Kevin Pollak, Kiefer Sutherland, Chris Guest, and the ever-unnerving J.T. Walsh as Lt. Col. Markinson. [(18:34–23:17)]
• Markinson’s Arc: Panelists find the Markinson subplot (disappearing, guilt-ridden suicide) both memorable and implausible, serving only to "move the plot two minutes forward" in an unnecessarily dramatic way. [(19:03–21:46)]

7. The Demi Moore Character: Feminist Reading and Moral Scold

• Sarah critiques the way Sorkin writes Demi Moore’s character (Lt. Commander Joanne Galloway), seeing her as sidelined, undercut, and serving primarily to push Cruise’s character into greatness. [(24:31–33:23)]
  • Sarah: "Her role in this movie is to help Tom Cruise see what a brilliant little boy he is and to sort of chastise him… but she does everything wrong in this movie and she’s diminished at every turn." [(29:37–33:23)]
  • JVL admits he likes her as a "moral scold," believing her role is to shame the other characters into acting morally.
  • Sonny argues that star power goes a long way: "Whatever problems and softness there is in the writing is kind of covered up by how good she is in it." [(27:17–28:27)]

8. The Moral Endgame: Who is Ultimately Right?

• Sarah is struck by Galloway’s climactic justification for the accused Marines—"because they stand on a wall and they tell you, no one's gonna hurt you tonight"—echoing Jessup's rhetoric and exposing the film's moral ambiguities. [(36:10–37:46)]
• The panel debates whether Jessup’s "code" insulates or exposes him to authoritarian temptations, especially in a political landscape where figures like Hegseth valorize raw power above all. [(42:27–48:53)]
• JVL: "Jessup believes that he should be a law unto himself and that the Constitution does not bind him." [(48:04–48:11)]

9. Military Standards, Hazing, and Excellence

• The trio wrestles with when the drive for excellence and unit cohesion becomes abusive ritual—comparing Code Reds to Band of Brothers, high-level sports, and recent military scandals. [(55:08–59:54)]
  • JVL: "These are sociopathic rituals which have nothing to do with actual performance… It’s just will to power." [(57:46)]
  • Sarah: Advocates high, universal standards, but is wary of how standards can be used to exclude or harm.
• They agree that Jessup’s fatal flaw is refusing to take responsibility for the unintended tragic consequences of his leadership, falsifying evidence, and acting above the law. [(53:43–54:07)]

10. Pop Culture Nostalgia and Appreciation for Craft

• The final moments are lighter: appreciation for DC location shoots, the excellence of Jack Nicholson’s later-career "third act," and a wistful look at Hollywood legends who are still with us. [(65:10–67:48)]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Sorkin’s Influence:
  "He lays at the center of my blame for why American Xennials and elder Millennials don’t have a realistic view of American government, because The West Wing just like destroyed while everyone is there to be a perfect public servant."
  —Sarah Longwell (16:02)

• On Military Codes:
  "The law matters the most, and if it conflicts with your own personal code, then you leave your position. You don’t supplant your code for the law. You say, this is against my code. I’m sorry, I can’t do this. I am retiring."
  —Jonathan V. Last (13:01)

• On Gender & Character:
  "Her role in this movie is to help Tom Cruise see what a brilliant little boy he is and to sort of chastise him… but she does everything wrong in this movie and she’s diminished at every turn."
  —Sarah Longwell (29:37)

• On Jessup and Authoritarianism:
  "We now have at the head of the American government the Colonel Jessup ethos, which boils down to might makes right. I am the commander, and so I am allowed to give the Code Red."
  —Jonathan V. Last (42:30)

• On Group Power Plays:
  "All the shit about, well, that’s how we make the best soldier… No, it isn’t… That is just looking to make excuses for people who like doing psychotic [stuff]."
  —Jonathan V. Last (57:22)

• On Current Events vs. Movie Ethics:
  "I think personally that Jessup would… resist this sort of thing from Hegseth or Trump much better than almost any other character in the movie, except for maybe Demi Moore."
  —Sonny Bunch (47:45)

• On Standards:
  "Having high standards is good… but the standards should have something to do with the actual job."
  —Sarah Longwell & Jonathan V. Last (61:28–62:12)

• On Jack Nicholson:
  "We should appreciate him as an actor while we have him, because he’s something else. He’s great."
  —Jonathan V. Last (66:05)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Aaron Sorkin Backstory / Sorkinisms: 00:30–02:56
• Connection to Current Events: 03:36–05:12
• Plot Summary: 09:11–13:01
• Debating "Code Red" and Morality: 13:44–15:54
• Discussion on Demi Moore's Character: 24:31–33:23
• Military Code vs. Rule of Law: 36:10–38:05
• Comparing Jessup to Modern Authoritarians: 42:27–48:53
• Military Standards Debate: 55:08–62:44
• Pop Culture Wrap-Up/Jack Nicholson Appreciation: 65:10–66:57

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Final Thoughts

The episode combines sharp criticism, personal reflection, and dry humor to show why "A Few Good Men" remains a resonant story—serving as a mirror for America’s evolving relationship with power, integrity, and the dangerous romance of "tough guy" leadership. The movie’s most famous line, "You can’t handle the truth," becomes a springboard for the panel’s exploration of how convenient lies and mythologizing about strength persist in American culture—from Hollywood to the halls of power.

Transcript

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[Sonny Bunch]

Back to the Bulwark Movie Club here on YouTube and Bulwark Plus. Very excited to be talking with my movie friends, Sarah Longwell and Jonathan V. Last. We're here today to discuss a classic, a classic of American cinema, A Few Good Men. Before we get started, I just want to relay some of the backstory of this movie because it's, it's, it's funny and vaguely infuriating. Aaron Sorkin, playwright, sits down in between shifts at his waiter job and writes this script down. Writes the script, the play for the play, just on cocktail napkins. Goes home, types it all up. Then he writes the movie. It's his first play before the play is even produced. It gets optioned to be a screenplay. It bounces around for a couple years. Winds up with Tom Cruise at almost the height of his movie star powers. Like, he goes into a lull a little bit after this and then comes back strong. And Jack Nicholson, very much at the height of his powers, ends up grossing, I think it was some insane. It was like $260 million worldwide or something like that, which is about $600 million in today's money. Aaron Sorkin, good for him. Good for him. That's, that's all I have to say about that.

[Jonathan V. Last]

He does it in a movie where, as far as I can tell, nobody walks while talking.

[Sonny Bunch]

No. Well, there is. There is. It's so funny that you say, and.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Tom Cruise doesn't run.

[Sarah Longwell]

There's no baseball. They play softball. While talking.

[Sonny Bunch]

There's, there's, there's batting and talking. There is some. But, but no, there's, there's, it's so funny that you mentioned this because there's a, there's a extra on the 4K Blu Ray because I bought the 4K Blu Ray. I don't know if you guys know this. Very, very hard to track down this movie at a reasonable price to rent online. You can't do it. You have to buy it. And if I'm going to buy it, I'm just going to buy the physical because that's, you know, I don't buy your. Move your copies of things. That's not what I do. But the. But on the disc there's a special feature where he talks about sending the script to Rob Reiner, who directed. And Reiner was like, all right, we've got this scene where they're just kind of sitting and talking in Tom Cruise's office and then he's outside talking in his car, first to Kevin Spacey and then to Demi Moore. What if you walked and talked to Kevin Spacey and walked out to the car and that is the birth of the Aaron Sorkin walk and talk. Can you believe it? That's. That's where it comes from.

[Sarah Longwell]

Sorry. When does he talk to Kevin Spacey?

[Sonny Bunch]

Not Kevin Spacey. I'm sorry, Not Kevin Spacey. Kevin Bacon. Wrong. Kevin Bacon.

[Sarah Longwell]

Kevin Bacon, Yes. I thought for a second you were getting your usual suspects because what's his name? The guy who plays Sam Weinberg is Kevin Powell maker.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Another Kevin.

[Sonny Bunch]

Another Kevin. Too Many Kevin.

[Jonathan V. Last]

One of the other. One of the other Hollywood Kevins.

[Sonny Bunch]

Too Many Kevin's. Jbl. Do you want to, do you want to explain why we're talking about this movie today? Because I, I suggested we do it because I feel like it's important to discuss a movie that is about the chain of command and the code of the military and the weird kind of gray areas that these things exist in.

[Jonathan V. Last]

So we're doing this movie today because last week the Secretary of Defense, not the Secretary of War, that's just his gender affirming pronoun, the Secretary of Defense, called all of the flag officers from the United States military together into one room for the first time in our nation's history and basically pretended to be Colonel Jessup. And, and so that's why we're doing this, because we have a movie in the same way that like, this is. This is the world we're living in. Earlier this week, Cash Patel, it was revealed, has been within the director of the FBI, has been giving out challenge coins, his personal challenge coins with a. His own personal logo that is like a Punisher logo. So the Punisher is a comic book character that was created by comic book writers who were concerned about criminal vigilantism and wanted to sort of take a more skeptical look at the idea of like, what if, what if the Batman was really a bad guy? Like, you know, why do we idolize these people? And now the director of the FBI takes that character to be his personal, his Personal avatar. And in the same way this movie and the play A Few Good Men have Colonel Jessup as an object lesson in the dangers of military command and the breakdown of law of order and, and the rule of law. And the Secretary of Defense clearly thinks that Colonel Jessup is the hero.

[Sonny Bunch]

We can, we can get into the, the, the right and wrong of Colonel Jessup here in a second. Let's. Sarah, when, when I mentioned the movies that we might do this weekend, you, I, I, I suggested too, I suggested the Siege and A Few Good Men because again, same, same kind of area of, of discussion here. And you're like, I've never seen the Siege, which should, it's a good, good movie. But Denzel, that's the Denzel Washington, Bruce Willis one where Denzel is trying to stop Bruce Willis from taking over New York City, becoming warlord of New York City. But you said you'd seen this movie a bunch of times. You love A Few Good Men.

[Sarah Longwell]

I remembered loving A Few Good Men and I gotta say, it hit differently. It's probably been maybe it's 20 years since I've seen it or I, I mean, so I'm 45. So like 25. Because I definitely watched it in college. I certainly watched it came out in the, the 90s, came out early 90s.

[Sonny Bunch]

Like 93, 94, something like that.

[Sarah Longwell]

All right, so this, this makes sense. This makes complete sense. Right? So I'm 12. So I certainly see this at a time when I am just being allowed to watch movies like this. I bet I don't see it in the theater. I bet I see it because my parents show it to me at 14 or. And it, I am certain at the time. Hit me with I love a code man. Boy, do I love a code. Man, do I love loyalty. And boy do I love especially I.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Mean 15 year old HR getting very nervous having the publisher of the Bulwark talking about which code. Make clear that you don't mean you love Code Red.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, just calm down a second. You calm down. Jbl.

[Sonny Bunch]

Keep rotating through video guys.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, no, no. I have had, I've had these conversations with both of you over the years and I'm actually quite interested now. I know both of you very well. We all have known each other for a super long time. I've actually known Sunny longer than I've known jbl, like since he was in college. We've been talking. I've been complaining about Sonny's movie takes for forever. I complained about JBL's movie takes, but because I know them Both. I think that they might sit on opposite sides of this movie and who its hero is. And. And I would say I'm probably somewhere in the middle of the two of them in that. I remember there was a book when I was a very young conservative, and it was like, 10 ways you might know you're a Republican. And one of them. One of them I remember was in the end of Dead Man Walking, you still want Sean Penn's character to die. And I remember me being like, yes, that's me. And one of the other ones was accurate, like 100%. One of the other ones was, you agree with Jack Nicholson's character and A Few Good Men. And I would say, if not agree at a younger age, certainly saw his point. I don't think that I had like a. I'm sure of who the good guy is, and I like, I know he's a bad guy, and I certainly knew that. But I also thought, you know, when he does the, like, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. And he does his speech, there's a part of you that's like, well, there's some truth to this.

[Sonny Bunch]

No, I want. All right, so let's. Let's. Let's. Let's explain what's going on in this movie just in case you. You. You don't remember having. You did.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Sonny, can you give us a big boy review?

[Sonny Bunch]

No, I'm not gonna do. I'm not gonna do a big boy review. I'm just gonna do a plot summary.

[Sarah Longwell]

What?

[Sonny Bunch]

It's.

[Jonathan V. Last]

It's a bit that we do in.

[Sonny Bunch]

Our other podcast, JBL. JBL's got a. It's a whole thing. The. But I just want to do a quick plot summary here because I think it's important. Again, if you haven't. If you cannot. If you don't Want to pay $15 to buy this movie, which I don't blame you. Go to your library. Maybe they have it there.

[Jonathan V. Last]

The movie is fantastic. You should be lucky to be allowed to pay $15 to live in a.

[Sonny Bunch]

Country where you can pay. Where you got a man on that wall in Cuba defending you so you can pay $15 to buy this movie. The plot of the movie is this. At Guantanamo Bay, a couple of Marines accidentally kill a problem private who was complaining about being stationed in Cuba, didn't want to be there. Was. Was a bad soldier, was a bad marine, Was. Was. Was not able to do the physical requirements. When the. The. The. The murder case gets to the JAG Corps, it is assigned To Tom Cruise, who's kind of a callow individual. He's, you know, he's, he's, he's just making deals all over the place. He's, he's glad handing. And Demi Moore is very upset about this. She wants him to really buckle down and get to the bottom of this because she thinks there's been a Code Red ordered. Code Red is very illegal now. Can't do the Code Reds. What's a Code Red, you ask? Code Red is basically hazing. The hazing of a junior member of the military to get them in shape. Remember Full Metal Jacket when Gomer Pyle gets beaten by the soap? That's a Code Red. That's basically a Code Red.

[Sarah Longwell]

And by beaten by the soap, they mean they put a bunch of. Everybody puts a soap bar in a burlap sack and Tate's turns beating him with their burlap sacks with the soap at the end.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, bag of soap.

[Jonathan V. Last]

And that works out really well because Pyle becomes a great, a great soldier who is a credit to his unit.

[Sonny Bunch]

He's a great shot.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Isn't that how that his plot arc ends?

[Sonny Bunch]

Yes.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Oh, no. He murders his commanding officer and then commits suicide before leaving basic.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, sometimes these things go wrong. You know, who's to say? But the, but the, the. So the guy dies, they're on trial. Tom Cruise wants to make a deal with Kevin Bacon, not Kevin Spacey. Kevin Bacon resists at first and then all of a sudden is like, sure, whatever. I'll give him. I'll give him two years. I'll give him 12. I'll give him 12 years. Well, no life sentence. We want to get rid of this. And it becomes very apparent that there was an order given from higher up to make this Code Red happen. The Code Red was supposedly authored by a lieutenant who's played by Kiefer Sutherland in this, who is in, in one of his great run of like creepy southern psychopaths. He's, he's got a, he's got a couple of these roles where he just, he just really crushes it. He also in Rob Reiner, Stand By Me, but it goes higher than that. It's not just, it's not just Kiefer Sutherland. It goes all the way up. Goes all the way up to Jessup. And Jessup, who's played with just absolute magnificent devilish charm by Jack Nicholson.

[Jonathan V. Last]

I believe Rob Reiner's instruction to him was be like the Joker but more evil.

[Sonny Bunch]

So I don't know about that because.

[Jonathan V. Last]

There'S a little Bit of his joker in this.

[Sonny Bunch]

There is a little bit, to be fair, there's a lot of joker in a lot of Jack Nicholson performances through this, this period. There's a continuum, like, running all the way up to the Departed. Really. There's a lot of that. So then, so the case goes to trial, and long story short, Jack Nicholson gets up on the stand and says, yeah, I did it. And I do it again. Fuck you. That's my code. They weren't living up to my code. I wanted them to live up to my code, so we're doing it. That is the very basic plot arc here. I just wanted to lay all that out because I think it's, I think it is important to understand if we want to discuss the actual moral problem at the center of this film. Which is, which is, do you do what matters more? The law? The orders from the Department of Defense, the President, or your own personal code?

[Jonathan V. Last]

Jvl I mean, the law matters the most, and if it conflicts with your own personal code, then you leave your position. You don't supplant your code for the law. You say, this is against my code. I'm sorry, I can't do this. I am retiring.

[Sonny Bunch]

What's interesting in this movie is, Sarah, what did you make of the defendants in this film who say, no, we're not going to take the deal. We're not going to take the plea deal. We're not going to plead out for six months because we did not do anything wrong. We were just following orders.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I heard that at Nuremberg. Yeah.

[Sonny Bunch]

This is what Kevin Pollock says.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's right. I, so I, I think I, I, I kept trying to watch it and remember how I felt about them the first time because I believe that I loved especially the Hal character. Right. So the, the, the two young men that are accused, one's name is Hal. One's name is Loudon Downey. Private First Class Loudon Downey. His commanding officer, just above him is this guy Hal. And Hal is the kind of person who talks about the code and, and the code that they are taught as Marines and how you live and die by that code and basically everybody. Because part of this, there were so many things that I found more interesting than I might have considered when I was, like, 20 years ago, which was this wasn't just Marines versus sort of civilian moral code. It was Marines versus the codes of other American military stripes. Right. Like the JAG Corps and, and the Navy. Right. And to which Internal Affairs. Internal affairs, right. And so I, I found the two of them I found how deeply compelling both as a figure of my honor matters here more. And you see, this is, this is a through line in lots of movies in which somebody's going to go to jail for a crime they didn't commit, someone's trying to get them to make a deal, and there's a specific kind of person that says, I cannot say that I did this thing wrong when I don't believe I did anything wrong. I just followed an order and that's what I have to do. That is what I was taught. And like that is my code as a Marine. And he hates the Tom Cruise character the same way that the Jessup character and other Marines. They are all contemptuous of the sort of Tom Cruise Navy, less Marine, serious. Like they look down on them.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Book learning.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yes, that's right. He literally, like my favorite is when he says, you stand there in your faggoty white suit trying to tell me whatever. And that like sort of your Harvard mouth and your faggoty white suit. The writing on this is so fun though I will say, because there's two things I felt the whole time through. I've now dealt with Aaron Sorkin across a lot of different years and genres. I blame him, actually. He lays at the center of my blame for why American xennials and elder millennials don't have a realistic view of American government. Because the West Wing just like destroy while everyone is there to be a perfect public servant. And they act every day with the sincerity and moral clarity to steer America right.

[Sonny Bunch]

And what about the American president, Sarah? If we just get everybody in a room and talk, it'll all, it'll all work out.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's the facile nature, to some degree of. Aaron Sorkin strikes me so much more as a grownup now. But again, I've gone through some phases of like loving the Social Network, but then having to sit through the newsroom, which is the most steaming, self righteous, smug pile of garbage like any human's ever made. And it's clearly after Aaron Sorkin's kind of lost his mind and like he's just gone too far down. He's too high on his own supply at that point. But in this, this is his early days, one of the things that I love about it is that he, you know who the good guy and the bad guy is, but he makes the bad guy, he gives the bad guy a real point and, and that gives you something real to wrestle with.

[Sonny Bunch]

He gives the bad guy a point. And he also makes the hero like kind of, kind of facile, kind of, kind of. Again, callow is the word I would use. He. He is. He is like, he just wants to. He just wants to wrap this up and go home and go on in the next case. And that is not. That is not justice. That is.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Yeah, well, he's not Jimmy Stewart, right? Tom Cruise's character is not a Jimmy Stewart character. He' not there to. He's not Atticus Finch. He is a hotshot young lawyer who just is like, kind of on the make, right. He's doing his time in JAG corps and he's going to get out. He's going to go to a white shoe firm. He's going to make partner by the.

[Sonny Bunch]

Time he's 35 and his dad was secretary of. Was the attorney general, you know. Yeah, well, all of.

[Sarah Longwell]

All of Sorkin's man men and moral lights have these daddy issues.

[Sonny Bunch]

All right, let me. Can we. Can we just jump into the cast here? Because this is the. It is. It is one of the. These casts that is surprisingly stacked. I had forgotten, for instance, that Noah Wy has a one, one, essentially a two scene. He. He shows up very briefly on the base and then he's in the courtroom with a great, great sequence with Tom Cruise or J.T. walsh, who has one of the weirdest roles in the movie. Is there. Does Martinson really need to be in this movie?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yes, I have. I really want to talk about this particular piece because this is one of the reasons this movie landed worse for me as a grownup. I think that there are two reasons that I'm going to talk about. One is the Demi Moore character, and then one is this character of the guy who is supposed to be the moral. Like he is the one that Jessup orders to do this. We see him early in the movie telling Jessup, no, right, we cannot do this. We should just transfer this kid who's begging to be transferred because he can't keep up with his platoon. He's getting, you know, harassed and beaten up on, like, let's get this kid out for his own safety. He's the good guy, right? The voice of reason that Jessup goes on to ignore and go in favor of work with Stephen, with Kiefer Sutherland's character to go ahead and. And sort of go give this go train, train the young lad by, you know, shoving a rag down his throat and taping him up in the middle of the night, which ultimately leads to his death. And I think that this idea. So this guy then. So he he, he basically leaves the military after it's clear to him that they are trying to cover up this murder. He does this jump scare scene from the back of Tom Cruise's car where he just. It's one of those scenes where Tom Cruise gets in the front seat and this guy, he looks in the mirror and the guy's in the back seat. Which stayed with me. I remember, I remember all of this guy's scenes forever. But as a. This time watching it, I sat there going, everything he's doing is not making any sense because what he ends up doing is putting on his full dress blues, putting his nickel plated pistol into his mouth and blowing his own head off while two marshals sit outside rather than testify. And right before he does that, he writes a note to the kids parents. The kid who dies parents Willy Santiago. And says I'm sorry I couldn't do more for him. Which is insane because what he could do for him is get on the stand.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah.

[Sarah Longwell]

And tell the truth about what happened.

[Jonathan V. Last]

No, Sarah, you're, you're. What he means when he says I couldn't do more for him. He doesn't mean that he wasn't able to do more. He means he wasn't capable. He was too weak to have done what he knew needed to be done.

[Sarah Longwell]

Right.

[Jonathan V. Last]

He could have done it. And that's why he takes, takes the way out. Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's because he has a second chance, this second chance to show he's, he's so demoralized with himself that he's, he's going to shoot himself in the room instead of doing the, the next. Like he could show integrity now.

[Jonathan V. Last]

He's still too weak. He's still too weak to do it.

[Sarah Longwell]

This is, I find this, I found this, I found this deeply implausible.

[Sonny Bunch]

I, I'm with, I'm totally with you, Sarah. I had actually completely forgotten about the J.T. walsh character in this movie. And like everything he does makes very little sense to me just on, just on a pure plotting level like disappearing, then showing up, then killing himself. Like it's, it's. He does about two minutes of plot work that could have been handled on a phone call and that is probably how it should have been done. But I do love seeing J.T. walsh show up because he is a great actor and he is fantastic. Again, there's so many great people in this. We've already mentioned Cuba Gooding Jr. Cuba Gooding. I was just gonna say Cuba Gooding Jr. Shows up in a preview of the Tom Cruise. Cuba Gooding Jr. Pairing a few years later in Jerry Maguire and Chris. Chris Guest. Chris Guest as the. I, I, I literally had to look him up because I was like, who is that? Who, who is like, you're that guy.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Xander Berkeley. J A Preston, again, like, all these guys, just wonderful actors. You're like, oh, I know that guy from a million. Like, you know, maybe you don't, maybe you don't know Xander Berkeley's name or J. Preston's name, but you know their faces and you know that you always love them when they show up on screen.

[Sonny Bunch]

Xander Berkeley, my favorite. My favorite. Him showing up in a thing for a minute is in Heat, where he is Al Pacino's punching bag for a minute because his, his wife, or. Yeah, his is, Is cheating on him. It just, just a, just like a perfect, like, kind of like, oh, crap, what have I gotten myself into? Moment for him.

[Sarah Longwell]

I absolutely remembered Noah Wiley from this movie, though. That is a very pivotal scene. The, the acting, the physical acting of Kevin Bacon walking back to the table and Tom Cruise grabbing the book out of his hand seamlessly as he walks to ask the same question. Is something. And this is where obviously, clearly, it's a, it's an incredibly good movie, in part just because so many of its scenes are imprinted on me. But also, Noah Wiley in that role, goes on then to be in Swing Kids. He goes on to do, like, a bunch of. Yeah, well, I'm going to make you guys do Swing Kids.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, I love Swing Kids.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Then we'll do Newsies after that, right?

[Sonny Bunch]

No, not Newsies. Not Newsies. Swing Kids. Swing Kids. Good movie. Swing Kids. Good movie. Newsies, bad movie.

[Sarah Longwell]

We're going to do all our Christian Bale. Newsies is amazing. What are you talking about? I understand they sing Sonny and you can't.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, it's not realistic singing.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay. But it was, it was. Noah Wiley is great in this movie. I just follow the crowd at chow time.

[Sonny Bunch]

And that's, and that is actually. And again, that's just a really well written sequence there. It's like. That's good courtroom melodrama writing. Right? It's, it's vaguely ridiculous, but it also hits all the points you needed to hit.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Sarah, can you talk to me about Demi War? I want to hear.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, I want to know, I want to know what your beef with Demi Moore is.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, no, it's not with Demi. It is with the character that she is playing. And I'd like to ask you guys, before I say what my problems are, I want to See if you can either anticipate them or how she strikes you. But I do think I remember always as a young person seeing this movie on the blockbuster shelf or actually we didn't have a blockbuster because I grew up in a really tiny town. So whatever the local movie store was that I would walk around for hours looking at the titles and the covers. I was always struck me that the title A Few Good Men was there and that it was. Demi Moore was on there with Tom Cruise. Right. Because I was like, well, that's not a, that's not a man. And you know, I, I don't know if someone explained to me that this, that was when it was a general neutral in a, in, in the way that it was taught what it wanted in terms of A Few Good Men. But of course it shows you who the hero czar on the COVID is. Jack Nicholson on the COVID Yes.

[Jonathan V. Last]

It's just it, what it shows you on the COVID is the people designed to have enough name id.

[Sarah Longwell]

Name ID to do it.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Yeah, get people in the seats.

[Sonny Bunch]

All right, here are three faces you recognize.

[Sarah Longwell]

You guys do, you guys do the. I want to know what you think of Demi Morris character before I tell you what I think.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Pass.

[Sarah Longwell]

This is a trap.

[Jonathan V. Last]

You. Yeah, no, you tell me what I'm supposed to think before I say something and get into trouble about this. Because I like the character.

[Sarah Longwell]

You like the character? Tell me more.

[Jonathan V. Last]

She's a hard. I, I, so I like Demi Moore a lot as a screen presence and like she's, she's a weirdly versatile actress and she's just sort of a hard ass here. And I like that. I don't know, like, I don't know what else to say. Like she's, she is the moral center of the movie in ways that I think none of the other characters really are. And she, she is sitting in the back seat for most of it. But that's also, I think, kind of by design because she doesn't, she doesn't want to be like she, she is there to, to bust Caffeine's chops on this and force him to, to start digging on it. I don't know. Like, I can see a different version of the story where she's the co counsel and not Kevin Pollock. Maybe that's what you'd rather, but I don't know. Like, again, I'm sure this is a wrong thought, but I like the character and her performance.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's not a wrong thought. I'm willing to be, I'm close as to how it hit you, because I would like to tell you how. Go ahead. Go, Sunny.

[Sonny Bunch]

Oh, I can. I can I guess what your. What your complaint is instead of saying how I felt about it, or should I. Which would you rather.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, I want to hear what you think of the character.

[Sonny Bunch]

No, my take on the character is that I. I think she is. She is kind of hamstrung in that very first opening sequence where she stammers out her reasoning for wanting to be there. It gives. It gives all the characters an out to sideline her, and it gives us, the audience and out to sideline her. And I think that. I think that kind of undercuts everything else she does in the movie. But that said, I like. This is. This is a pure star power movie. It is a movie that is dominated by Tom Cruise on one pole and Jack Nicholson on the other. And she holds her own with both of them, which is no mean feat. And as such, the character works for me just because, again, it is a pure star power. Pure star power play. I like. There's whatever problems and softness there is in the writing is kind of covered up by how good she is in it.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, interesting. I agree that she is good in that she's doing that. They need her to do a couple things. Demi Moore has a very signature thing that she does, which is that she wells up perfectly. She is a person. She is a woman who can be steely in resolve and have that shine in her eyes that shows that she cares so deeply that. That she's welling but not spilling. But here's the thing about how they use her. There's a. I was trying to think about it as an archetype that I feel like I've seen a lot of, which I guess I would call the moral scold, whose purpose in the movie is to help the dude reach his full potential. Right. And so her role in this movie is to help Tom Cruise see what a brilliant little boy he is and to sort of chastise him, not just morally, but also, you know, she is somebody who, they make it clear, has a bit of a crush on him. And, yeah, she asks him out to. To go to dinner. And she. And she stammers.

[Sonny Bunch]

That's a good.

[Jonathan V. Last]

It didn't strike me as crush.

[Sarah Longwell]

He said, are you asking me out on a date? Because people have asked me out on a date. It sounds like you're asking me out on a date. They play with the sexual tension between those two. And so the writing the whole time. And I guess this is the Part that maybe struck me as a grown up sort of differently than as a kid where I think just her presence as a woman made me feel better about it. As that's what I meant about the title cover where it's saying A Few Good Men, I'm like, see, there's a woman in this and she's in the military and she outranks him technically, but she does everything wrong in this movie and she is diminished at every turn. There is one of the ways that, and I'll tell you this, one of the reasons that I hated Jack Nicholson's character, the Jessup character, more this time than I think I did when I was younger, is that it hit me very differently this time when they are sitting in Cuba at the breakfast table and Jack Nicholson says to Tom Cruise, so she, Demi Moore's character, Joe, she speaks up about something because she is the one demanding the answer. She is the moral center of the movie. She is the one who sees clearly from the beginning what is happening and why it's wrong. And she's scoldy about it. She is scolding Tom Cruise's character into doing the right thing. She is nagging him into doing the right thing. At one point in the early part where she is trying to get him to do the right thing and she makes a bit of a speech. He turns to her and says, commander, I. I believe I'm sexually aroused. And then they go to Cuba together and, and Tom Cruise keeps being like, you can ignore her. Yeah, nobody likes her. You know, puts her down the whole time. And then Jessup says, something just occurred to me, Jack. She outranks you. Let me tell you what, you're a lucky man. I'm paraphrasing because I don't really know all the exact dialogue, but I'm pretty close. I think she outranks you and you're a lucky man because there's nothing better than a blowjob from a superior officer. And you know, this is a problem for me because I'm a four star general. And so until they elect some gal president, I'm just gonna have to keep taking cold showers. And she processes this. She actually, actually, she doesn't even process. You don't even, it doesn't touch her. She, like, continues to press on him and I, I like her resolve in that moment. But this, this movie does everything it can to diminish her, including multiple of the mistakes that get made at trial. The mistakes that when she says this, and I've remembered this my whole life as A. As an object lesson in not being too emotional, where she says, I object, your honor. And he says, overruled. And she says, no, I strenuously object. And she continues to sort of. And afterwards, the Kevin Pollock character admonishes her and makes fun of her and says, oh, well, you. If you strenuously object. Okay, great, right. They. They make fun of her for being too emotional. And then she. The way she gets on the case when they don't want her there is that she goes to another woman, the Aunt Ginny of the younger private, and gets signed on as his counsel. But he almost blows the entire case for them when it becomes clear that he didn't actually hear the code Red order. He was told by his pal Hal, which had they is like a big embarrassment for them. And the day of the court. And so Tom Cruise is yelling at her about this. He gets to be this drunk playboy, and she's got to be stern the whole time and try to keep them on track while also being the one who makes all the mistakes that Tom Cruise ultimately has to clean up with his brilliance. His. His effort. His effortless brilliance.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Sarah, this is. This is a very revealing moment about our relationship. You hate Demi Moore's character because she's a moral scold. And I really like her character because she's a moral scold. And her point is, is to embarrass the people in the movie into doing the right thing. And I think that's awesome.

[Sarah Longwell]

To shame the people in the movie into doing the right thing.

[Jonathan V. Last]

To shame them into doing the right thing.

[Sarah Longwell]

So let me just push back.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Tom Cruise is a better lawyer than she is, but he is morally bankrupt. And so it isn't that she's, like, making him into the best little boy. Like, he is the best little boy. He's the natural. But he's the one who likes. Does not understand. What use is it to be the best lawyer if you have no moral center?

[Sarah Longwell]

That's sort of the point. But let me ask you this.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Okay?

[Sarah Longwell]

Let me ask you about the bait and switch they do to her at the end. Okay, so now we can get to the way that the movie ends. The very last line, you are set up with a tension between the military code and the common moral code. And we do not like Jessup because he believes he is above the common moral code. He believes he's above the legal code for which he supplants this own Marine code. And he's able to justify it because it keeps America safe. He thinks he has a Higher messianic calling, right? And. And therefore can justify this treatment of this person because he ultimately made the core weaker with his weakness. Now, at the end of the movie, there's this great. There's actually this great scene between Demi Moore, who is the one pushing on. Pushing on, God, Tom Cruise's character, to do the right thing and see that these young men were only doing what they were ordered to do, and it's not their fault. And the Kevin Pollock character doesn't like them. And they have this exchange in the courtroom at one point after everybody else has left, and she says, why do you hate them so much? And he said, because they picked on a weaker kid. He couldn't run very fast, so they beat him up and then they killed him. And I think. And he says at an earlier point, it's a great line where he says, because I think that they are. I think that they were told to do it, and I think they should go to jail for the rest of their lives, right? He holds them morally culpable for following these orders, which were morally wrong. Then he turns to her and he says, why do you like them so much? And what does she say?

[Jonathan V. Last]

What does she say?

[Sarah Longwell]

She says. She says, because. Did you guys not just watch this movie? She says, because they stand on a wall and they tell you, no one's gonna hurt you tonight. And I said, huh, that sounds awfully close to Jessup and the justification for why he demanded that the Code Red was given. And then finally, at the end of the movie, when Hal is said, they, He. They. They get. They get off on the murder charge, they get off on the conspiracy charge. But they are. What is it called? They are.

[Sonny Bunch]

They are conduct on becoming a Marine.

[Sarah Longwell]

They get found guilty of conduct on becoming a Marine, and they are dishonorably discharged from the. The Marines and the military, which is the one thing they didn't want. The whole reason they went to court and fought it was because they didn't want to be dishonorably discharged because they don't know how to do anything but be Marines. But when the younger guy, who clearly can't do anything so young, he's like 18. And he looks to his superior officer, hal, who's probably 21 or 22, and he says, well, how can they do this? We just heard them say Jessup ordered the Code Red. How can they say to us that we're guilty? And Hal says, and this is the moral of the story that we're in, because we should have looked out for Willie. Because Our job is to protect people weaker than us. Right. And so Hal understands that they failed the moral question. She doesn't past the moral question.

[Sonny Bunch]

Well, she's just phrasing. But she is phrasing the same moral point in a different way. Right. They stand on the wall to protect us. The. The us. The general us, the weaker us. Right. I, like, I don't think that these are in their intention, but I don't think they're diametrically opposed.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay.

[Sonny Bunch]

Necessarily.

[Sarah Longwell]

I could see that. I could see that. And I think if you haven't watched the movie really recently, it may be tough for you to follow like this, this. This part of the conversation. Exactly. But I just. I guess I felt like for her character, she gets hung out to dry at every turn. And it made me annoyed for her.

[Sonny Bunch]

This is just screenwriting, though. She is the supporting character. She is there to make Tom Cruise look better. This is. This is her whole point of being. Same with Kevin Pollock's character. Kevin Pollock's character is the same exact way. He's there to make Tom Cruise look better. It's the same with Kevin Bacon's character to a certain extent.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I know. Except they explicitly give. They give Pollock's character, like, he says it. It's like it's given to him. He's like, I have no responsibilities here. He doesn't want to be there. She's the striver. She desperately wants to be there. She is fighting for her place the whole time. And so she is in doing that, sort of constantly apologizing when she puts a foot wrong. And look, I don't want to make the whole thing about this. Okay, jbl, get your eyes down. You want to know, like, you asked me what I thought. I'm just listening. You asked me what I thought, and I will just say that I found that character much less compelling. Not because of her performance, but because of the way that it is written. And this, like, it might be because I'm reading Harry Potter right now and Hermione is a little bit. Or Hermione.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Hermione.

[Sarah Longwell]

Hermione is a little bit of this character where, like, yes, she's the smartest one and she is often morally correct, but also she's always nagging them to do the right thing.

[Jonathan V. Last]

You're not far enough in. Hermione is like the true hero of the whole series.

[Sarah Longwell]

Maybe later, maybe you're.

[Sonny Bunch]

JBL has a whole Hermione thing. I want to just jump back very. This is almost beside the point, but you mentioned the relationship angle. Here, kind of. And it's really interesting to go back and read some of the reviews at the time. Both Siskel and Ebert both said this movie doesn't have a romance in it. And Siskel found it. Siskel found that refreshing. Ebert was like, where's the romance? And it is, It's. It's. It's a. Fascinatingly, it's just a very different take than you had. And this is. And so I. And I kind of split the middle again here where I like. It's very clear in that sequence where she is asks him to dinner that there is like a little bit of tension there. And it is also never followed up again in the rest of the movie. It is not that. Is they. There is never any point in the film where I'm like, those two are gonna kiss. Like that. Just never. That. That does not. That doesn't really happen, I don't think.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, there is the part where they're both in the rain. I actually thought. I thought it might happen. He's like pulling up, she's walked out where he's driving.

[Sonny Bunch]

Shit faced, by the way. He's just. He's just. He's. The rain is pouring and he's just hauling along in his car, hanging out the window like, hey, we're going, we're going. Go do the trial now. Come on.

[Sarah Longwell]

It was so funny that he shows up so drunk and then they immediately put him in his car. Although I got to say, it was fun to see DC A little bit. Right? Like, the row houses look exactly like the row houses here. Like, that really is downtown. But the part where they are both in the rain and he's chasing her down with the car and the cars. By the way, why are all the cars. This movie was supposed to be set in the late 80s, but the cars all look like they're from 1975. Like the streetscapes with the cars on them.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Okay, this looks like that in the late 80s.

[Sarah Longwell]

Did it really? His car. His car was ridiculous for an 80s car. Didn't look like the 80s at all to me.

[Sonny Bunch]

Well, he had. He had like a. He had like a vintage muscle car though, right? He had like a rich kid car is what he had.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is that what that was?

[Sonny Bunch]

I think so. Isn't it like a Mustang or something? I don't know. I'll have to look it up. I don't know.

[Sarah Longwell]

I thought that that might. They do like, get them both very drenched and he's chasing her down. And you do think there might be something there, but they do just cut it. Like, there's a hard cut there and goes to black. And so they clearly made a decision not to make it overtly romantic and just to leave it with, like, a smidge of tension.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Can we talk about Pete Hegseth and Colonel Jessup?

[Sarah Longwell]

Sure.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Because this is the thing that sticks out to me, is that we now have at the head of the American government the Colonel Jessup ethos, which boils down to might, makes right. I am the commander, and so I am allowed to give the Code Red. Right. The Code Red is only good or bad because I say it right. If I don't say the Code Red and one of my underlings does it, then the Code Red is a bad thing. But because I have the authority, I am the one who decides. And there is this puffed up. I mean, I gotta say, he. Jessup talks about, you know, all this stuff. You know, I'm on the front lines. I'm eating breakfast a thousand yards from people who want to kill me. Dude, you're in Cuba. It's sunny, and we see where you eat breakfast. It's beautiful. You have the ocean behind you. You are being served on very nice silverware, and you have a steward who brings you coffee in a silver. A silver coffee pot. You're not in the fucking trenches at Verdun. This is this. This sense that, like, you know, oh, I am uniquely on the wall, and if I don't go up there and beat this kid up, then, you know, the whole thing crumbles down because it's all on me. This is the kind of grandiose myth making that authoritarians always tell themselves. They see themselves as, like, the historical star of some gigantic apocal play. And I don't know. This is. This is what Hegseth is doing. Like, you know, we're gonna let you war fighters go out and be warlike warriors doing war stuff, and nobody's gonna second guess you because they don't understand how hard you get it. And then he's like, hey, here's a video of how somebody sat in a bunker and pressed a button on the mouse to blow up a speedboat.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's.

[Jonathan V. Last]

That the reality is far, far away from how these guys see themselves. And I think that really puts the lie to all of this code stuff is really about creating permission structures and rationalizations for them to be able to simply do whatever they want. It's just will to power.

[Sonny Bunch]

Sarah, can we get. Can we get your thought on this? Because I have a slightly controversial thought that is Going to get me yelled at here in a minute, and I don't want to.

[Sarah Longwell]

I've been waiting for this the whole time. I've been waiting for you to.

[Jonathan V. Last]

We did 50 minutes so that you could go and defend dress up.

[Sarah Longwell]

All right, because this is where I think I'm between the two of you.

[Sonny Bunch]

On this, because here I'm going to say, so what's the code that we hear over and over again from these guys? Right? It's unit, core, God, country. Right? That's what they say. You respect your unit, you respect the core, respect God, you respect country. And what is, what is interesting about all of this is the, it's, it's both respecting the chain of command, but also keeping the unit integral, keeping it safe and keeping it on mission. Right? That's the whole point of what they're, what they're, what they're arguing for here. I would argue, I would argue that this code, this code that places. There's no, there's no president in this, there's no, there's no higher command. It's unit, core, God, country. I would argue that this idea would actually insulate Jessup from the authoritarian type pressures of a hexath or a Trump in a way that, frankly, Tom Cruise's character might not resist. Tom Cruise, just a career guy just, just looking to move up the ladder. He doesn't, he doesn't care that much. These guys, they have a mission. They see themselves as out there with a sacred duty. A sacred duty. I will say. I, I, I will say. Look, the, the whole, the whole generals in front of Hegseth thing was so embarrassing for everyone involved. And Hegseth's, they're going to f a f O like, just embarrassing. Embarrassing for everyone. I was relatively heartened by the fact that the generals all just sat there like, what the fuck, man?

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, yeah.

[Sonny Bunch]

There was not, there was not, there was not clapping, there was not cheering. This was not a political rally. This was not, this was not, they were just like, okay, we're here. We're, we're, we're doing this. I, I, I think personally that Jessup would. Jessup has his problems. Jessup makes some mistakes. Jessup doesn't do all the right things. I think he would resist this sort of thing from Hegseth or Trump much better than almost any other character in the movie, except for maybe Demi Moore.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is it because of his code or is his own narcissism?

[Sonny Bunch]

But either way, I think he would.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Only resist if what Trump was telling him ran contra to what he wanted.

[Sonny Bunch]

To do, ran con. I. I don't know. I mean, we could get into a lot of different hypotheticals here.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Jessup believes that he should be a law unto himself and that the Constitution does not bind him.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. And that's what Trump is based. And that's what Trump is offering the men and women of the military.

[Jonathan V. Last]

We will allow you to be laws unto yourselves. You do not need to worry about whether or not the orders to blow up the speedboat in international waters are lawful or not.

[Sonny Bunch]

Right. Well, yeah, okay, but what does he also say? He says you serve at the pleasure of the president, which I don't think, I don't think Jessup would agree with. Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, he makes it pretty clear that the only person who could would be above him to give him sexual gratification is a. Is a president.

[Sonny Bunch]

That's my one, my one controversial thought here, is that I do think they would be slightly more insulated, but maybe not. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm just wishcasting.

[Sarah Longwell]

I mean, I think that I sort of agree with JBL here. I think that that part of what Jessup wants, right, is he's like, I just rather you said thank you and went on your way. And that's sort of what he wants. He wants to be left alone, to run things as he sees fit and not have neither the law nor the common moral code apply to him. And I think that's what's interesting about the movie is that I think that Jessup has. There's a couple things that I think he has right in the movie that make him a good complicated villain and not just a one dimensional bad guy. And one of them is, is that the speech he is giving at the very beginning is when he's being told by Markinson, well, we should transfer this kid. He keeps writing letters saying, please get me off the base. And you hear one of those letters right up top. And it is just the kid explaining all the ways in which he is failing to meet the standards of the Marines. And so, like, he should have probably been gone. He didn't either be, you know, trained up or trained out is what you do with these guys. Which, by the way, just the whole premise, the movie, watching it as a grown up, there's a little bit of me that was like, I don't know, I was like, now I'm just. I'm much more sensitive to the overwrought nature of sarcanisms. But he, when he says, maybe it's Our obligation not to just transfer him, but to train him. And I'm like, yeah, that's true. And the idea that there are sort of ways in which that are not, let's say, book authorized, but that there is a kind of social.

[Jonathan V. Last]

You're gonna go full whiplash, aren't you?

[Sarah Longwell]

No, I'm not. Well, so I was gonna. I do keep meaning to bring this up in terms of whiplash, in terms of tar. I do have a slight problem with the recognizing always that these people are supposed to be the villains when they are just trying to achieve excellence. Because I do think we should all be trying to achieve excellence, but we probably shouldn't do it by, like, what is the line between emotional torment and, you know, just trying to make somebody the best that they can be. There's. There's a. That's the whole. That's the whole thing. Be all you can be. And so that original thing where he was like, we need to train him is because the Code Reds were clearly given all the time. The only reason that this one became a problem is that when they put the rag in his mouth, this kid had an undiagnosed coronary problem, likely. There's kind of a thing around this where when the rag got pushed too far down his throat, he asphyxiated. But like, like, other people testified, like, oh, they got Code Reds. Like, everyone took turns punching the guy in the army. And so it's an accident that he died. And it is an accident that comes from this higher up order that wasn't go murder him. Right. Like, Jessup is not so evil that he's saying, go kill the kid. Like, Jessup's evilness is that he believes he has an obligation to train him, not just transfer him. And so why don't you. And then he puts it on Kiefer Sutherland's character. You get this guy up to speed. That's what we do here. And I can rock with that part. As a military leader, the idea that he goes to the person above him and says, no, your job is to make this person fit for service, to make him worthy of his comrades, to get him up to snuff. That doesn't seem crazy to me. The crazy part is that when he does die accidentally, there's two things. One, the Code Red that they give him, in particular, it's described by other people in ways that are. There are some that sound like, okay, this is the kind of thing dudes do to haze each other. And it's bad, and we don't like it, but it's not life threatening or traumatizing or, I don't know, it depends on what your tolerance for trauma is, I guess. But I guess you want it to be kind of high for people in the Marines, like, I don't know, so I could buy that part, right? Like, everyone punching the guy in the arm didn't send that. Now the one guy who wasn't showering enough, and so they scrubbed him down with steel wool and Brillo pads. That sounds psychotic. And this, and this particular Code Red also was psychotic, right? They're like taping the rag around his mouth, they're taping up his legs. And so I, I agreed with the Noah Pollock character where I was like, I both believe they were told to do it and I think they should go to jail. Like, I sort of thought that was one of the most succinct moral lines about what had happened in the movie.

[Sonny Bunch]

I question here should. If, if, if Jack Nicholson, if Colonel Jessup had just said at the beginning, yes, I ordered it. I ordered the Code Red, punish me. Is that the correct moral response, Sarah?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, right. Like if he, if he said, oh, my God, a kid died because of this. It wasn't my instinct.

[Jonathan V. Last]

He falsifies evidence.

[Sarah Longwell]

He falsifies evidence, right? That's, that's where we become. So, you know, he's, to me, you know, he's a villain when he says the thing to Demi Moore, which is grotesque and, and an attempt to humiliate and demonstrate his own power there. I also, but here's. I have a question back to you because JBL is trying to make this. And at one point, Tom Cruise does the same thing. He says, we're in, we're in peacetime. Right? So, so General Jessup is acting as though they are in, in deep, in, in fighter mode.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Cuba is about to, to send people in 57 Buicks across the fence. Come the fuck on. Sorry.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, I guess, Sonny, does it make any difference to you in how he trains people, the fact that it was peacetime versus wartime? Because you could see how a military commander says to himself, like, my job is to, to act like we're at war all the time.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah.

[Sarah Longwell]

And to train these guys to be in war.

[Sonny Bunch]

I would, I would not necessarily downplay being on an active military, you know, border there, there, there. Cuba is not Canada. It's not, it's not, it's not the same thing. I agree that it's not. You know, it's also not Hungary in, in 1956 or whatever. But the, but the look, I. I am. I, having grown up in the milit. In this world much of my life, I am a little more. I give a little more leeway to these guys to train people up the right way. Still can't break the law, obviously. Still can't do the Code Reds. You do the Code Red, you accidentally kill a guy, you got to pay the price for that. That is 100%.

[Jonathan V. Last]

So one of the things that the Russian army has done a lot on the front in Ukraine where they are involved in an act of war, is that they take soldiers who aren't performing very well and they bring them to the center of camp. They have get everybody to come around in a circle and they put their heads between two cinder blocks and then they. They slam those cinder blocks with a sledgehammer.

[Sonny Bunch]

Yeah, yeah.

[Jonathan V. Last]

To blow their heads up, to train them up and to help make sure that everybody else understands. Is that.

[Sonny Bunch]

Okay, that sounds.

[Jonathan V. Last]

These are psychotic, insane things.

[Sonny Bunch]

These are sounds like an over the top reaction. If that had happened in this movie, I don't think anybody. I don't think we'd be having this conversation. Conversation much. Different movie.

[Jonathan V. Last]

This is, what I'm saying is like, these are. These are sociopathic rituals which have nothing to do with actual performance, right? Like, oh, you want to help the guy learn to be a better runner? Have him train at altitude, right? We're going to go out and work on intervals. We're doing some extra work. That's. That's. That ain't what this is. This is. We are the people with authority. We like exercising that power over people all the time. We get Jessup doing those power games, not just with Demi Amore, when he does it to Mortensen, when they have that first meeting and he calls his secretary in, get the President on the line, and the kid's like, yes, sir. And he's like, no, delay that order, Right? He's like, yes, sir. Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

By the way, that is a. What is one scene with Joshua Molina. Josh Molina later on goes on to be on West Wing. Sorry, go ahead. And.

[Jonathan V. Last]

But this is the. You know, this is.

[Sonny Bunch]

All of.

[Jonathan V. Last]

That is. And all the shit about low. Well, that's how we make the best soldier. No, it isn't. That's not how you make the best soldier. That is just looking to make excuses for people who like doing psychotic.

[Sonny Bunch]

That's.

[Jonathan V. Last]

It has nothing to do with performance. Nothing.

[Sonny Bunch]

Okay, I, like, disagree slightly. I gotta realize.

[Sarah Longwell]

I slightly disagree. I don't totally disagree, but I think like the Code Reds, that they're Talking about. Are inhumane. But, like, have you ever watched, well, here, like, Band of Brothers, right? Like the. Or even if you're on a sports team, like, when you're failing, they make you run till you drop. Like, the. The football players that die, drop dead of heat exhaustion because they're being pushed really hard, you know, and because somebody didn't know they had, like, an underlying health condition of some kind. And I think that there's. There's a. Like, tension there between how do you pursue excellence, how do you push people to their limits so that they can be the best version of themselves? And I gotta say, if you were in any sport, you will hear coaches or you will hear military leaders or you will hear the world's best musicians or whoever it is, talking about how you devote yourself in this way. That is incredible. And so, like, Band of Brothers, I.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Did high school and college sports, too. We didn't do that shit.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's. You're not trying to be, like, at the absolute peak of your. But, like. And this, like, okay, what they should have done. So, like, this is the movie. Presents. Presents. Choices you've got to make to go along with the movie. But if you're not going along with the movie, like, the right thing to do was for Jessup, instead of having a power play, to be like, this kid doesn't want to be here. He's clearly not measuring up. Go home. Like, that's just, like, the normal way to handle this. There was a solution in there that was both humane, that did not compromise the military, and so it would make the unit better. Sure. Exactly.

[Jonathan V. Last]

If what you care about is making the unit better and not exercising your power.

[Sarah Longwell]

And I think. I think they. That. That's probably right. Right. That was just a normal thing to do. And I think that in the actual military, it is what they would do. Somebody's requesting a transfer. They wouldn't keep them there just to, you know, teach them a lesson. They'd get them out of there because this person's a liability and all kinds of issues. I don't know.

[Sonny Bunch]

I do. I. Look, I think Jessup. Jessup. The argument Jessup makes that if we just send a failure to somebody else that puts somebody else in danger is not an uncommon opinion in the military.

[Sarah Longwell]

I think, well, that kid shouldn't have stayed in the military. I mean, if you listen to the thing, like, he just needed to not be there anymore.

[Sonny Bunch]

He needed to wash it.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Got a million and a half people in the military and having one substandard private sitting in the Richmond Virginia armory, shuffling papers, putting people into, in danger. Like again, I'm sorry, this is all just self pathologizing by people who believe that everything depends on them because they're so special. Like you're not dude, Colonel Jessup, you're not special.

[Sarah Longwell]

So I agree with that. But I, I also think and like the military does run on certain standards, right? So like I'll tell you here we can, we want to just share unpopular opinions. I don't know whether this is unpopular or not, but one of the things that Hegseth keeps talking about in terms of he's like, we're gonna have one standard and everybody's gotta meet them. Men, women, whatever. I agree with that. I've never liked the idea that they lower standards for women in the military and have two different ones. I think it's a mistake and I think it creates for women a second class citizen status because they don't have to meet the same standards. I think they would be given more respect in the military even if it meant fewer women were in it because they have to meet like these as higher level of standards. I think having high standards is good.

[Jonathan V. Last]

What if the standard is height? Like you know, something like the standards have to have something to do with the actual job.

[Sonny Bunch]

And so being able to run and do push ups and pull ups is part of, part of. I, I understand that 70 of casualties.

[Jonathan V. Last]

In the Ukraine war are.

[Sonny Bunch]

You have guys who fly the drones and whatever. I understand that but like I, you still, you, you still. That's the reality of modern warfare job that.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Look, the reality of modern warfare is again 70% of casualties in the, in the Ukraine Russia war are from drones.

[Sarah Longwell]

This idea though that we don't have to train and that we shouldn't train the military to be better than everybody else like we want. That's not what I'm saying.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Argue with what I'm saying which is that like your standards should be applicable to the actual things that matter in the job, not these weird self mythologizing. Well, you need to be able to do 150 push ups or they have.

[Sarah Longwell]

To be 6ft one more in the desert. Where people had to live in the desert and walk and run in the desert in ways that like was very challenging on their bodies and that they had to be trained for.

[Jonathan V. Last]

And we're, we're never going to do that again, right? This is, we're having no more wars. We're an isolationist country now.

[Sarah Longwell]

I don't know that that's true. Jbl.

[Sonny Bunch]

I Don't think that's true at all.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Yeah, I mean, that's what the president has promised me.

[Sarah Longwell]

No.

[Sonny Bunch]

Well, how much faith do we have in the president keeping those promises?

[Sarah Longwell]

To me, the problem with Hegseth and the way that he does this is not the idea that there shouldn't be. Like, he's right, in my opinion, about there should be standards. What he is infinitely wrong about is part of it is a kind of stolen valor on his part. Right. He is so desperate, he like to. This is where the pathologizing. I do think for Hegseth, he is. You can always tell the insecurity of these people. The. The sense that he has and that he's always had that he like the inferiority complex that plagues Pete. Hegseth is just so clear. He always needs a hotter wife. And he needs to stand in front of these generals and tell them what's what and tell them he's. Because if there's one thing Hegseth has going for him, right, he doesn't have. He's not smart. These generals are probably quite smart. But he is physically fit. And so he wants to make them reflect the things that he's good at and that he values. And he wants to be able to stand up there and say, we got to get rid of woke up and we got to get rid of dei. And that is different, right? He's a buffoon. He's a cartoon. He is not earned the right to do this. He's only up there in that role because Donald Trump needed a lackey. And so for those generals to be told by this lackey what these things are, Rob's like, embarrasses the entire military. Right? So that doesn't mean that Hegseth can't ever say anything that is correct in some way. But, like, he is. Nobody should listen. He hasn't earned any of it. He hasn't earned anything to be in that role.

[Sonny Bunch]

Which again, kind of brings me back to my point that I don't think anybody listening to him on that stage cared what he said. I just don't think they. I don't think they put any stock whatsoever in him or his is nonsense, which I find heartening, frankly.

[Jonathan V. Last]

My point on standards wasn't that we shouldn't have standards, but that standards should have something meaningful to do and not be about like, narcissism and outmoded views of what jobs are. That's all.

[Sonny Bunch]

All right. Well, this is been a fun. We got. I feel like we got a little off track. Could we just say one. One more nice thing about this movie, which is that it is a great D.C. movie. Sarah, I think you mentioned this very briefly, but it is a great. It is just fun to watch them drive around on the streets of dc, Go to the Bridges of dc, Beyonce. I like a good DC movie. And this really captures nice parts of dc, which I like well, especially because they film.

[Sarah Longwell]

They do a lot of shows that are supposedly set in DC that clearly are not shot in dc, and this one was very clearly shot in dc.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Can we say one other thing? It's a little macabre. Jack Nicholson is 88 years old. We are not going to have him around for forever. We should appreciate him as an actor while we have him, because he's something else. He's great.

[Sonny Bunch]

There was this whole second wind of Jack Nicholson from, I guess, around Batman 88 to the departed about 18 years, where, like, it's like a whole second act of his career, maybe even third act.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Third act, yeah.

[Sonny Bunch]

Which is. Which is like the part that I grew up watching him in. You know, this as good as it gets. All sorts of other fun stuff.

[Sarah Longwell]

Not Terms of Endearment or.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Yeah, I'm really feeling this, like, having lost Robert Redford and, like, thinking, like, oh, God, we're gonna lose Jack Nicholson too. Like, yeah, there's a lot of great leading. Leading men.

[Sonny Bunch]

There's a lot of that coming. There's a lot of that coming in the next five or ten years here. I don't know. I. I think about this a lot. I feel like more and more people who we grew up with are dying, and I think that's just because we're getting older and the spectrum.

[Jonathan V. Last]

That can't be it.

[Sonny Bunch]

And the specter of death is looming over us.

[Jonathan V. Last]

It's just dumb luck.

[Sonny Bunch]

Perpetual basis. I don't know. I feel like we're all. We're all headed out soon when Lily.

[Sarah Longwell]

Tomlin and Jane Fonda, like, those two are still kicking still. They're like, they just made a Netflix movie. I was like. I was like, cl. Yes. I'm gonna watch Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda just talk about murdering people. Sure. Were they.

[Sonny Bunch]

Did they. Did they make 80 for Brady? Were they both in 80 for Brady?

[Jonathan V. Last]

I think so.

[Sonny Bunch]

Was that the Tom Brady movie? Did you. You didn't watch the. The Tom Brady old lady movie?

[Jonathan V. Last]

And didn't Shirley MacLaine just pass, like, a year ago?

[Sarah Longwell]

Did Shirley MacLaine die? Steel magnolias.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Think she's not just fabulous? Oh, I love Shirley. I'm going to effort that while you wrap us up.

[Sarah Longwell]

No, she's 91 years old.

[Sonny Bunch]

She's still kicking.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Thank God I'm wrong.

[Sarah Longwell]

Let's end on that happy note. Shirley MacLaine still with us at 91.

[Sonny Bunch]

All right. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Sarah, JBL. This was a lot of fun. A little bit dark. And we'll be back next week with another episode of the Bulwark Movie Club. Make sure you hit subscribe like on YouTube, etc, so we can keep doing these. It's a lot of fun. And hopefully, hopefully with slightly less dark next time. I don't know. Maybe we could do. Can we do Schindler's List or something? That would be Margin Call.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Margin Call. Another Demi Moore.

[Sarah Longwell]

Another Demi Moore. 1. I'm trying to remember her character in that, but I.

[Jonathan V. Last]

Chief compliance officer, I think, at the firm.

[Sonny Bunch]

Is she a moral school?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. Compliance.

[Jonathan V. Last]

No, she's not.

[Sonny Bunch]

No, no, no. She.

[Jonathan V. Last]

She, in fact, is one of the people who's like, we can all look the.

[Sonny Bunch]

Let's go for it. All right, we'll see you guys next week.