‘Highest 2 Lowest’ Is a N.Y. Movie State of Mind, With Spike Lee!

Summary

The Big Picture
Episode: ‘Highest 2 Lowest’ Is a N.Y. Movie State of Mind, With Spike Lee!
Air Date: September 5, 2025
Hosts: Sean Fennessey & Amanda Dobbins, The Ringer
Special Guest: Spike Lee

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Overview

This episode is a celebration of New York movies and filmmakers, spotlighting Spike Lee’s return with the Apple TV+ film “Highest to Lowest” starring Denzel Washington. Hosts Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins review Lee’s reinvention of Kurosawa’s “High and Low” and also discuss Darren Aronofsky’s new NYC-set crime film “Caught Stealing.” Discussions range from current movie news and future releases to in-depth reflections on legacy, class, and creativity in cinema—with the highlight being an extensive, energetic interview with Spike Lee.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

News & Notes: Movie Releases, Trailers, Industry Buzz

[02:02–16:38]

• Recent releases & festival activity: The hosts return from Telluride and Venice, catching up on summer movie news and noting “Weapons” as an unexpected box office winner.
• Upcoming films & trailers:
  • Wuthering Heights (Emerald Fennell) – Both hosts note the film’s modern, arch tone, hip casting (Margot Robbie, Jacob Elordi), and original Charli XCX songs as likely to give the gothic romance a commercial boost.
  • 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple – Discussion on the continuity of style from the previous installment, anticipation for new villain roles, and overall visual language.
  • Is This Thing On? (Bradley Cooper) – A December release in which Will Arnett stars as a troubled standup; hosts muse on Cooper’s repeated exploration of tortured male performers on film.
  • Die My Love (Lynne Ramsay) – Lynne Ramsay directs Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson in a stylized, postpartum psychodrama with festival buzz despite a limited release plan.

“Everything was as you said. It's just Will Arnett telling some, like, not unfunny, but pretty basic standup jokes…” – Amanda, [11:15]

“It looks like…maybe less soulful. Maybe more just like, slash some zombies. Which I guess that's what they would put in the trailer.” – Amanda on 28 Years Later, [10:03]

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Review: Spike Lee’s “Highest to Lowest”

[17:09–39:54]

• Film details: Spike Lee’s 24th scripted feature, adapted from Kurosawa’s “High and Low” (and Ed McBain’s novel). Denzel Washington leads as David King, a powerful NYC music mogul confronted by a kidnapping crisis, class dilemmas, and family legacy.
• Performance & character:
  • Denzel delivers a frenetic, mannered performance that intentionally breaks from his “stately” norm, reflecting a character who’s “all over the place,” echoing NYC mogul types.
  • Jeffrey Wright plays King’s childhood friend and driver; their scenes together deliver the film’s emotional core.
• NYC as character:
  • Spike’s intimate, kinetic vision of New York—contrasting gentrified penthouses and working class life—grounds the moral stakes.
  • References to the city’s changing face: “He lives in a giant high rise… It's a new kind of Brooklyn than the one you might see in ‘Do the Right Thing.’” —Sean, [25:10]
• Structure and style:
  • The first 40 minutes bear a melodramatic, almost “Law & Order”-esque flatness, but as the action leaves the apartment, classic Spike Lee energy animates the second half.
  • Key set pieces: a tense ransom exchange, a dynamic Midtown chase, and a standout “rap battle” showdown between Denzel and A$AP Rocky.

“I should be fired for saying it's a movie with high highs and low lows, but it is.” – Sean, [19:15]

“You put Denzel Washington in a Spike Lee New York movie, and I'm gonna have a good time.” – Amanda, [18:34]

Memorable Moments / Quotes:

• Denzel’s dynamism:

  • “He's always making a choice… you always know they're in the room…” – Sean, [23:41]
  • “I was laughing. I was really fixated on it. They have a connection.” – Amanda on Denzel and A$AP Rocky’s rap showdown, [33:56]

• New York references:

  • “To the strains of Oh, What a Beautiful Morning from the opening song of Oklahoma… All drone shots… of ‘new Brooklyn.’ And I was like, oh, Spike, you still got it.” – Amanda, [26:25]
  • “As soon as he goes outside…the movie just takes off. You see his interest in the people of New York, the way that commuter travel works in the city…” – Sean, [32:14]

• Cultural resonance & critique:

  • Discussion of “boomer anxieties” about social media, generational conflict, and wealth.
  • “That would be absurd…” – Sean, on tension about whether Denzel’s character would pay the ransom, [36:48]
  • “That's a real thing that is working in our society right now.” —Amanda, [37:15]

• Distribution gripes:

  • “Never, ever, ever put a Denzel Washington movie straight to streaming. I do not understand it.” —Sean, [39:37]

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Review: Darren Aronofsky’s “Caught Stealing”

[39:55–54:46]

• Film details: Aronofsky's 9th feature, a Lower East Side crime caper starring Austin Butler and Zoe Kravitz, with a sprawling, eccentric NYC supporting cast.
• Critical assessment:
  • Both hosts were lukewarm; Amanda found it “implausible” and forced, Sean felt Aronofsky was “trying on someone else’s clothes.”
  • The film leans on genre tropes (mismatched criminals, action-chases, a Guy Ritchie-vibe), but with bland execution; attempts at winking cultural stereotypes and meta-humor mostly fall flat.
• Austin Butler’s presence:
  • Amanda: “I think he's Brad Pitt… he’s better when he's not like Meet Joe Black.”
• NYC & Mets energy:
  • Discussion on whether the overt baseball nostalgia adds anything, with Sean calling Shea Stadium “our shithole.” [52:02]
• Placement in Aronofsky’s career:
  • Noted as a potential “never happened” movie for both director and studio; dumped late summer, quickly headed to streaming.

“It just all felt… forced.” – Amanda, [41:53]

“He felt like he was trying on somebody else’s clothes.” – Sean, [42:11]

“I want to be Christy Turlington… do you?” – Amanda (after a tangent on aspirations and missed opportunities), [48:01]

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Interview: Spike Lee on “Highest to Lowest”

[67:20–99:06]

Major Themes & Highlights

• On adapting “High and Low”:

  • Spike stresses it’s not a remake but a “reinterpretation”—akin to jazz variation on a standard, with overt nods to Prince (title stylization) and classic artists.
  • Approached the story with a mind to “morality, what is good, what is bad,” and wanting the audience to put themselves in Denzel’s shoes.
  • “I approached this like a great jazz musician who takes American Standard…” – Spike, [70:18]

• On Denzel Washington & the Characters:

  • Praises Denzel as the greatest living actor; describes his process as rigorous and spiritual.
  • Spike says the Denzel of “Mo’ Better Blues” could not do the Denzel of “Highest to Lowest,” citing his evolution and relentless work ethic.
  • “You cannot fake the funk.” – Spike, [85:39]

• On collaboration and legacy:

  • Details his decades-long partnership with cinematographer Matthew Libatique (“We love each other and we're dedicated to this art form…”) and how the entire team is built like a championship sports team.
  • “With a team comes togetherness… and the team calls love. I know it might sound corny, but… it's love.” – Spike, [76:10]

• On NYC & cultural context:

  • Views the film as a reflection of today’s world—a “year of living dangerously” where age-old generational conflict, class divides, and parasociality are amped up by technology and social media.
  • “If you watch this film… in a lot of ways, this film is a reflection of the world we live today.” – Spike, [78:08]

• Music & improvisation:

  • Spontaneous moments—like Denzel’s character’s rap battle with Rocky—weren’t scripted, but emerged on set because, “You have to have a thing on set, established where people feel free.”
  • “Denzel is a master using props… he uses everything… to make his performance come alive.” – Spike, [90:15]

• On Apple TV+ & Distribution:

  • “I'm not mad about streaming… without Apple+, this film would not have been made.” – Spike, [94:23]

• Self-reflection:

  • Sees parts of himself in David King—“we both have beautiful wives”—but demurs on specifics.
  • Calls “25th Hour” his own most underrated film: “I think it's a living document of New York City after 9/11…”

• Looking Ahead:

  • Hints at a forthcoming film (“Save Us, Joe Louis”) he’s vowed to make, honoring the late Budd Schulberg.

Notable Quotes & Moments

• [71:06] “All money ain’t good money. The biggest thing I got from the Kurosawa film is about morality, what is good, what is bad…”
• [81:44] “That showdown… was not scripted, my brother, to turn to a rap battle. I look at a script and start dropping bars from Nas’s ‘Illmatic’ and… A$AP [Rocky] rolled with it.”
• [91:03] “25th Hour… that film is very special to me. I think it’s a living document of New York City after 9/11.”
• [85:39] “You cannot fake the funk.”
• [90:15] “Denzel is a master using props… he uses everything that’s said, props, to make his performance come alive.”

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Other Segments & Timestamps

• Industry chatter & sports detour: [56:38–66:57]

  • Fluctuating fortunes for the Mets & Knicks, salary cap shenanigans in the NBA, humorous sports updates with tangential links to NYC culture.
  • “That's a real thing that is working in our society right now.” – Amanda, [37:15]

• Upcoming features & fall movie preview: [64:05–66:57]

  • Mentions of “One Battle After Another,” “The Strangers Chapter Two,” “Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale,” and upcoming Stephen King adaptation “The Long Walk.”
  • Discussion of children’s movie trailers shown before animated features, and Amanda’s plans for “The Nutcracker.”

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Conclusion

This episode is a New York movie state of mind from start to finish—witty, lively, and saturated in film and music history. Spike Lee’s infectious passion, Denzel’s layered performance, and the ever-changing city itself are all celebrated through nuanced, at times irreverent conversation. The hosts and their guest dive into film craft, the moral dilemmas of power, and the enduring draw of NYC on screen—and off.

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Key Segment Timestamps

• Movie news, trailers & analysis: [02:02–16:38]
• Highest to Lowest full review/discussion: [17:09–39:54]
• Caught Stealing review: [39:55–54:46]
• Spike Lee Interview: [67:20–99:06]

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Quotes attributed to segment speaker, timestamped in MM:SS format as requested.

Transcript

[Jack]

This episode is presented by State Farm. Life's full of decisions, big and small. And sometimes you make movie ones you can really stand behind. For example, I was wise enough to stick around through the mid credits during Ryan Coogler's Sinners. And unlike my co host Amanda, I got to see a very special sequence with a great buddy guy, among other things. State Farm gets it. Making confident choices can make all the difference. That's why with the State Farm personal price plan, you can choose the right amount of coverage to help create an affordable price for you. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with the personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts, and savings and eligibility vary by state. I'm Sean Fennesee.

[Amanda]

I'm Amanda Davins and this is the.

[Jack]

Big Picture, a conversation show about New York. We're not in New York. We're in Los Angeles together. Hello.

[Amanda]

Hello.

[Jack]

We made it. Big show. Big show. We made it. We made it. Back from Telluride, back from Venice. Amanda traveled by ship for seven consecutive days from Europe to this beautiful country. And we are here to talk to you about Spike Lee. There's a new Spike Lee movie that is now available on Apple tv. It is called Highest to Lowest. It stars one of our very favorite actors, Denzel Washington. And guess what? Spike Lee is on the podcast today.

[Amanda]

It's a real why am I here?

[Spike Lee]

But you know what I mean?

[Amanda]

It's like no one cares. Let's just. I don't care. Let's just go straight to Spike Lee.

[Jack]

It's very exciting. Spike was at the very top of the wish list for this show when we first started doing it eight years ago and very happily happy to have him on it to talk about this movie, which is very fun. We're also talking about another New Yorker, another New York movie, sort of. Well, it is. Darren Aronofsky has a new film that came out last week called Caught Stealing, a crime thriller starring Austin Butler. We'll get into that a little bit after we talk about Highest to lowest. What else?

[Amanda]

News and notes.

[Jack]

News and notes.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

I mean, some stuff happened while we were gone.

[Amanda]

I didn't follow all of it.

[Jack]

It didn't seem like a lot.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

I felt like our timing was really good this year. Would you agree? I want to say thank you to Brian Raftery, of course, for the incredible work that he and Devin and Everybody who worked on that show, yourself included on Mission Accomplished, while we were out traveling the world this summer. And while we were gone, I was like kind of keeping up. I took some time off for real, which was nice, but I never really felt that tingling feeling of like, I wish we had an episode today.

[Amanda]

Right. The, the only news that hooked me in was weapons making 40 million plus on its first weekend. And I was like, whoa, that is, I, I, I didn't see that coming. I didn't see that coming partially because I was like, I will be on vacation. That was a, it was a wrap for me. But I realized I need to see this. And you know, it seemed like that had a real moment and then otherwise people just took some time.

[Jack]

Yeah, I mean, there were, there were plenty of movies, some of which I'm still catching up on in August. At some point this month we'll get into the Freakier Fridays and the Roses and all these other movies that we didn't get a chance to see.

[Amanda]

I gotta tell you, there were so many ads for the roses in Paris when I was there. It was like every other block. There was, it was Freakier Friday. Paris like Freakier Friday and then the Roses.

[Jack]

Those were the two big movies.

[Amanda]

Yeah. I don't know how it's doing in France so far.

[Jack]

I'm thinking about seeing the Roses today.

[Amanda]

Oh, that's exciting.

[Jack]

Yeah. Because I think it's gonna be out of theaters pretty soon, so I gotta get after that one. There were a lot of trailers in the time when we were gone. A few that are quite notable to this show. I feel like the noisiest this week by far is Wuthering Heights.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Which is Emerald Fennels new feature film or third feature film with Warner Brothers coming out I believe in February.

[Amanda]

February 14th. Happy Valentine's Day. What's.

[Jack]

Are you big on this book? Is this a classic for you soon?

[Amanda]

Listen, I'm not going to dump on Wuthering Heights. I've always been an Austin instead of a Bronte girl.

[Jack]

Okay.

[Amanda]

That's just, just like I'm a Nora Ephron instead of a Didion. One is more in the. I mean there are time periods. Austin is Regency, I think. Sorry. It's like late 1700s, early 1800s and is a little more. They are class and straight laced and funnier social satire. They are kind of more like tightly written. And the Brontes are more like gothic Victorian longing. Weird shit happening. There's a crazy woman in the attic type and I think like slightly bit, a little bit later time period, though, again, I don't have a PhD.

[Jack]

It appears that Weathering Heights is set in 1801.

[Amanda]

Oh, okay, so I'm wrong. So they're overlapping, but unclear if that.

[Jack]

Will be the case for the film.

[Amanda]

Yeah, yeah. Well, they're doing something period wise. But anyway, I don't know whether I'm, like, more uptight or what. It's really the difference between romantic comedy and, like, pining. Dramatic romance, sort of. And we know I go for romantic comedy.

[Jack]

There have been a great many adaptations of Wuthering Heights over the years, and this one is being pitched as, I guess, the brat version relative to the trailer.

[Amanda]

Well, original songs by Charli xcx.

[Jack]

Yes.

[Amanda]

Which I'm open to. Original music by Charli XCX in any context.

[Jack]

Yeah. And I think Fennell obviously likes that tonal clash that she's brought to her previous two films. This movie stars Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi as Catherine and Heathcliff. Looks very dangerous and sexy.

[Amanda]

Yeah, but does it look that sexy?

[Jack]

I don't know.

[Amanda]

It looks like there's a lot of sex that they are trying to gesture towards or like, you know, half portray. Which is different than sexy. See Saltburn.

[Jack]

Do you think Elordi will unsheath his manhood?

[Amanda]

I don't actually, but that, I guess it's exciting. Yeah. Jack is laughing. We're back. Yes. It's no laughing matter. Jacob Lordy's manhood.

[Jack]

Okay, we'll see about that.

[Amanda]

But, you know, everyone's already mad at this movie because they're mad at Emerald Fennel. Like, the whitewashing of the original text. Which, again, I like. I'm not a PhD. I don't even know the correct time periods of these books. So I'm not really. Maybe I'll reread Wuthering Heights before.

[Jack]

That sounds really fun.

[Amanda]

February. They're good books. Jane Eyre's pretty good, too. I mean, you know, it's messed up.

[Jack]

Jane Eyre is boring as hell, but okay.

[Amanda]

What's wrong with you?

[Jack]

Jane Eyre is Charlotte Bronte.

[Amanda]

Yes.

[Jack]

Okay, Isn't Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte's only novel?

[Amanda]

Yes. And then Charlotte is Jane Eyre. They're pretty good. Okay, listen. I mean, it's like a crazy lady in the ad.

[Jack]

I would be more likely to go back to Jane Austen. I think I similarly share stylistically.

[Amanda]

I do think it's McCartney, not Lennon. You know, it's like it's a you and I. But here's the thing, is that it looks like. I mean, and this is a trailer cut to Charlie cx. But this looks a little too, like Emerald. Fennel is funny or tries to be funny. And this looks a little too arch and a little like, ooh, look at us. Being provocative to fit into what I understand to be the tone of Wuthering Heights now. You know, it's. Everybody's allowed to reinvent, but that was what I hiccuped on in the trailer, like just knowing I was being poked a lot. And the whole vibe of these books is that you're supposed to give yourself over to the romance and the tragedy and the swoon or the just like, oh, wow, everything's really messed up of it all. But not a lot of humor, not a lot of room for winking in the Brontes.

[Jack]

In my opinion, that's an opportunity to adapt in a new way, which could be cool. I'm incredibly mixed on Fennel's previous two films. Mixed negative. But I must say, watching the trailer, I thought, at least to myself, I feel like this movie is going to work commercially. Oh, yeah, that like, audience wise. This is the kind of thing that we've been talking about where this is like a very familiar text, but someone putting a spin on it. And we're not entering the cinematic universe of Emily Bronte. We're just entering this story and looking for someone to adapt it in a new way. So seems like it could potentially be very successful. Seems like pretty smart casting in terms of the two leads. Although Margot Robbie, I think is a little old for this part. Not to age shame her. But isn't this person supposed to be like 20 years old?

[Amanda]

Yeah, but like a lot happens to her, if I understand who she's playing.

[Jack]

Like what?

[Amanda]

Well, there are a couple. There's a Cathy. I don't know. It's. It's. It's complicated.

[Jack]

Did you watch the trailer for 28 Years later the Bone Temple?

[Amanda]

Yes, I watched all of the trailers on this list. I even added one.

[Jack]

I see that. And we're getting to that one. The Bone Temple. Are you ready to go back to the Bone Temple?

[Amanda]

So we.

[Jack]

Speaking of Jacob Elordi's manhood. Jeez Louise.

[Amanda]

The Bone Temple is. It was. The Ralph finds structure in question.

[Jack]

We think so. There were certainly a lot of bones. And it was.

[Amanda]

And he is featured in the trailer as well.

[Jack]

He seems to play a prominent part in this movie.

[Spike Lee]

Right.

[Amanda]

And he is. So we at least know where we are. I thought this looked fine.

[Jack]

I agree. This is the immediate follow up to 28 years later, which came out in June, Directed by Nia DaCosta, not Danny Boyle, this time, bringing back much of the cast, including Jack o', Connell, who we saw at the end of that film, has featured prominently in this trailer. Having quite a year as a villain. And it looked cool. Looked cool. Didn't have that same ecstatic sensation that the 28 years later first trailer did where Chris and I in particular were like, vibrating a little when we saw that. But I'm interested.

[Amanda]

It looks like, you know, the visual language, everything was set up in the original. And so there's like a continuity kind of built in, which is good.

[Jack]

And it seems like it's holding that it's not a dramatic departure from what we saw.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

Okay.

[Amanda]

Yeah. It's maybe more, just. Maybe less soulful. Maybe more just like, slash some zombies, which I guess that's what they would put in the trailer, but, you know, like, I don't know what kind of spiritual showdown Ralph Fiennes and Jack o' Connell are going to have.

[Jack]

Did we see the little boy in the trailer? Yeah, we did. Okay.

[Amanda]

Briefly at the end. And then also maybe he's wearing a wig just like Jack o' Connell at some point. But that could have been another child.

[Jack]

I see. Okay. Well, those are arguably the two biggest new movies of January and February heading into next year. So. Okay, now we know what they're going to be like.

[Amanda]

Keeps marching on.

[Jack]

You know, it's not going to go the other way. You know, much as I would love for my back to be repaired and for my hair to be a little.

[Amanda]

Bit less gray, but it's already. It's already September. I know. Like, I was ready for back to school. But, you know, January and February, we have a whole fall to talk about.

[Jack]

My favorite time of the year. I know I could not be.

[Amanda]

So don't fast forward.

[Jack]

Is this thing on? Is coming out in this calendar year. It's coming out in December. The new movie from Bradley Cooper starring Will Arnett and Laura Dern. Will Arnett plays a standup comedian who's at a difficult stage of his life. Just sounds funny to say it so earnestly.

[Amanda]

Well, this did seem pretty earnest and straight. Right? Like, and not. Not in a bad way. But everything was as you said. It's just Will Arnett telling some, like, not unfunny, but pretty basic standup jokes about being divorced or going through a divorce.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Amanda]

What is it with Bradley Cooper and just making movies about troubled relationships of male performers? I just. Is there anything going on?

[Jack]

What do you think it is? I don't know. We'll have to revisit his work, get into the text a little bit, think about what fascinates him as a filmmaker.

[Amanda]

Also, is he gonna come out and be like, yeah, no. I always wanted to be a standup performer since I was 5. I built my own brick wall in my room.

[Jack]

I'm so glad that release the tapes. I'm really glad that WTF with Marc Maron is not ending before this movie comes out because I do really need his episode about the film. Hopefully including a discussion with Bradley Cooper, of course.

[Amanda]

Although with Will Armet would be fun too.

[Jack]

That's true. Yeah, he's a. But he's a seasoned podcaster, you know, we know he's very comfortable in that space.

[Amanda]

You know.

[Jack]

Is this thing on? I think it's the closing night film at the New York Film Festival. We will be there. I think I will be there for that screening. You may not be. I don't know. I hope it's good. I really like his previous two films. I love A Star is Born. I think Maestro is very interesting.

[Amanda]

Yes.

[Jack]

And quite strange. This looks like the most generic is an unkind word. But the most traditional, the least risky.

[Amanda]

Right. It seems like he heard our response to Maestro and took the just play it safe lesson, which is a bummer. That's not actually just because I had a lot of questions about Maestro that I want to pose to Bradley Cooper in a psychoanalytic space. That doesn't mean that I like. I like that he went for it.

[Jack]

Uh huh. I do too. I admire the swing on Maestro.

[Amanda]

Yeah. And this. But we don't know. It's just a trailer.

[Jack]

Nothing risky about Die My Love. It appears the new film from Lynne Ramsey, which premiered at Cannes to mixed reception and a large acquisition from Mubi. This movie stars Jennifer Lawrence and Robert Pattinson. It has been communicated to us that it is a postpartum. Yeah, Psychophantasia.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

Thoughts?

[Amanda]

If only I had looked like Jennifer Lawrence postpartum, you know, I mean, I guess not too late.

[Jack]

It's not too late.

[Amanda]

When does one stop being postpartum?

[Jack]

I'm still, you know, I think in perpetuity. That's where you'll be.

[Amanda]

Okay. There we go.

[Jack]

You have given birth. Did you just look at yourself to just think about how.

[Amanda]

I was just sort of like gathering it and I was like, well, I don't know. I don't know whether that's gonna happen. She looks great. I mean, this. It's just. It's a stylistic trailer of Them just either dancing or fighting each other. There's two really hot people who I like seeming to go for it. I noted that one of the. With Jennifer Lawrence, Robert Pattinson and the studio behind the substance were the. Which I thought was fascinating and is, I guess, a way to sell movies and maybe this movie in particular, it's like Women on the Edge because of a. Like a challenging phase of life. You know, I'm. I'm excited for this. It does feel like it's already a little bit to the side.

[Jack]

Awards, they chose not to bring it to any fall festivals. It's not at. It wasn't a Telluride. It's not going to be at New York. Mubi paid a tidy sum for it, well over $20 million, which is a lot in this economy for a complicated, eccentric film from Lynne Ramsey, who's not exactly Michael Bay, but she's a great filmmaker. And I'm usually more on board with psychotic explorations of broken down people. That's kind of my bag.

[Amanda]

But when it's a woman.

[Jack]

No, I mean, I just saw if I had legs, I'd kick you. And I loved it. So I think that it's been written off by some people, but for me, I'm really looking forward to it.

[Spike Lee]

Okay.

[Jack]

And I did look like Jennifer Lawrence after I gave birth, so I feel like I can really relate to this story. Anything else in the aftermath of your travels before we get into Spike's new movie?

[Amanda]

No, I'm really.

[Jack]

You ready to do like 19 episodes a month every month for the rest of the year?

[Amanda]

Really? Really.

[Jack]

We have a lot of work to do.

[Amanda]

Really intense. And I did. I got home at midnight and then woke up. Did school drop off? And then I just like started firing up movies and I was like, I'm back, baby.

[Jack]

You're back.

[Amanda]

Been sending a lot of emails going to a lot of screenings, but it's nice to have some good movies.

[Jack]

I agree. That was on the horizon. That was the thing that was clear in the couple weeks before I went to Telluride. Going to the pre screenings, I was like, oh, yeah, well.

[Amanda]

And we know that.

[Jack]

He was like, actually like, we know that.

[Amanda]

And that always happens.

[Jack]

It does.

[Amanda]

And you know, next year it will be the odyssey is what, July 21st? And then we're going to take some time and I'm going to make you take some time because no one wants to hear from us. And then. And, and then fall begins anew.

[Jack]

I don't have. This is. I'm not reporting any information because I don't know anything. But I do think there's a possibility that the Continuing Adventures of Cliff Booth is also at the end of July next year. Oh, that seems plausible, right? They're shooting it right now, so maybe we could have a better summer than the one we had this year.

[Amanda]

Maybe.

[Jack]

There was some cool stuff, but it was ultimately not great.

[Amanda]

But you don't think they would save that for festivals?

[Jack]

I don't think it's going to be an awards movie. I could be wrong. Could be wrong.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

But I don't think it is. Okay, we'll see. Okay, let's talk about highest to lowest.

[Amanda]

I got to open the water bottle. Sorry?

[Jack]

Open it up.

[Amanda]

Reunited after a month. I was a month away from this water bottle.

[Jack]

Wow. You didn't bring that with you?

[Amanda]

No, it's too large.

[Jack]

How did you survive?

[Amanda]

Well, I had a smaller water bottle.

[Jack]

Did you have a more passionate embrace with the water bottle than your husband when you returned?

[Amanda]

No, but I had forgotten about it. And I had not forgotten about my husband or my children.

[Jack]

It's a relief.

[Amanda]

But then I found it on my bedside table, where I left it, literally, because I had been away from home for a month. And I'm really, really happy to see it.

[Jack]

Old reliable.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Okay, let's talk about Highest, Lowest, Directed by Spike Lee. This is Spike's 24th scripted feature. It's interesting. This is his first movie in five years, and that's the longest period of time that has transpired between movies since Spike started making movies in the early 80s, which I thought was kind of interesting. We can talk about maybe why that is and what that means relative to the movie business. The screenplay is by Alan Fox, and it's based on High and Low, the Akira Kurosawa masterpiece from 1963. And also King's Ransom, which is an Ed McBain story from 59 that Kurosawa based his movie on. It stars, as I mentioned, Denzel Washington, Jeffrey Wright, Il Finesh Hedera, and A$AP Rocky. As always, it's cut by Barry Alexander Brown and Allison C. Johnson. A reunion with Mattie Libatique, one of the great cinematographers out there. It's about a movie where a powerful music mogul is targeted by a ransom plot. He's forced to fight for his family and his legacy while he's jammed up in a life or death moral dilemma. The threading of this story is very much the same as the Kurosawa film, in which the very successful person, we think at first that his child has been abducted when in fact, it is someone who is close to him in his life who does not have as much power in the world. And so he is left to decide whether or not he will attempt to help and save this person in his life's child. So, highest to lowest, what did you think of the movie?

[Amanda]

You put Denzel Washington in a Spike Lee New York movie, and I'm gonna have a good time, I'm gonna love it, and I'm gonna respond to everything that's good about it. So I. I really liked this movie in spite of some quite noticeable flaws that we can discuss. But I do think that they have a magical alchemy, and Spike obviously has a magical alchemy with the city of New York, which is a city I love and miss living in. So it had several moments where, like, oh, they're all back together. Where it kind of transcends what is otherwise a slightly puzzling assemblage of actors and material.

[Jack]

Yes, this is a. I should be fired for saying it's a movie with high highs and low lows, but it is. I mean, it really is in some ways. It's a tale of two movies and its heights. Leave you left me Loving the movie ultimately, because the first half of the movie, I think, is much more. Is it much tighter and much more artificial feeling than the thrilling and kind of like emotionally bracing second half of the movie. And we can talk about the choices that are made in the first half versus the second half and why the movie is that way, but there's a lot of things about it that I find really interesting. Spike's been very pointed about the fact that he sees this as like a reimagining and not a remake. That it's not meant to be specifically high and low. And that's a lot to live up to because High and Low is, you know, it's one of Kurosawa's late period movies, considered one of his very best movies. This is unusual territory for Spike Lee. Not New York City, but the character David King that Denzel plays, because David King is an extremely wealthy, successful older man. There's never really been a protagonist in a Spike movie like that before, right? And Spike Lee is a very successful older man. And this is a movie like it's a class fable, right? It's about haves and have nots and what the have nots will do to an attempt to disrupt the haves. And it's also this moral quagmire that is also in the original film. And, you know, most of Spike's movies are about working class people.

[Amanda]

Absolutely. Yeah.

[Jack]

You know, they're about regular people who live in the city and sometimes outside of the city and sometimes in the midst of war and sometimes in other situations. But the movie is really interesting because it's dotted with all these ideas about cancel culture and, you know, online celebrity and how wealth and power really operates and what it means to have a legacy versus what it means for your family to inherit a legacy. That is all pretty new terrain for him. And I can. You can kind of feel him feeling around.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Because Spike is not an inherently conservative filmmaker, but he's had so much success that some of these ideas, like, they feel a little bit like your dad talking to you, which I find I found to be really fascinating and ultimately made the movie actually more exciting for me personally.

[Amanda]

Yeah. And they are also paired with, I think, like, a Denzel performance. And one wonder is like, a little bit of Denzel's own influence. Another, you know, older, very successful wealthy.

[Jack]

Man should state that he also brought this script to Spike to direct.

[Amanda]

Right. So then you start to wonder how much of that character is and the portrayal is them working together. How much of it is what Denzel wants to do. Because obviously, he's one of our great actors and someone with his own ideas of how to play stuff. And so, yeah, it feels maybe not as if you're watching a double autobiography, but to a filmmaker, an actor and an actor working through some of their thoughts about their phase in life and their phase in their careers in one movie.

[Jack]

It's so fascinating, too, because, you know, Denzel, of course, played a musician in a Spike movie many years ago. He's a music executive in this movie. He's not. Not only is he not a working stiff, he's not an artist.

[Spike Lee]

Yeah.

[Jack]

And this is a movie about what powerful people who are proximate to artists do and what's asked of them, which is really interesting. It's also another movie about a.

[Amanda]

A manager. Yeah. Which I was thinking after our conversation on whatever night that was.

[Jack]

It's really fascinating. The King character reminded me of a lot of people in the music business when I was a music journalist. I encountered a few of these people over time. The person who it really reminded me of was Elliot Reed, who I had the chance to spend a little bit of time with when I was in New York and had that kind of like, smooth, charismatic, hyper attentive, but also idiosyncratic way of being in the world, which David King, the Denzel character, really has. This is Kind of a funky Denzel performance. I'm curious what you thought about it. Cause it's very mannered. He's doing a lot. You know, he's very gestural, his deliveries. This goes back to Gladiator 2 as well, which I thought was very gestural and kind of all over the place in a way that is, like, he holds the screen so well. Right. He's the most magnetic dude ever, but he's doing a lot. And you can hear Spike, even in our conversation, talk about how Denzel is kind of constantly just, like, making a choice, which I thought worked overall. And also because I think for a person like this, these are kind of people who, like, you always know they're in the room when you're in the room with them.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

But there's not that stillness that you find in, like, the Equalizer. This is a guy who's kind of all over the place.

[Amanda]

Right. Which I don't. I didn't mind. I think if you play this character with this moral, you know, Quagmire as Denzel as, like, you know, the great, like, stately Denzel, who is confident and who we know, even when he plays villains, there is some sort of righteousness. And you want to believe in Denzel, then it doesn't. If that Denzel is in this movie, then you're like, we know what you're gonna do. You know, there's no tension here, and maybe there's not a huge amount of tension in the first half itself of what he should or shouldn't do. I don't know whether the stakes of the movie are really set up in the way that we might, like, not realized completely, but it does feel. It's interesting. You are kind of scratching your head throughout. And then I do also think that, at least from Denzel's perspective, it's all laid up to the final scene of the movie and when the performance kind of clicks into place for me and what he wants to be doing as someone who both has an idea of, like, a very confident, successful person who is maybe not facing a crisis of confidence, but it, like, the world is doubting him. And then he gets to a point where he can then be the kingmaker again, and you kind of see what it means to him. And I guess, like, because the. Sorry, spoilers. The final scene. The final scene is in the trailer, which is sort of confusing, but it's him watching someone else perform. So some of it was also like, oh, you're gonna have to be gestural in order to communicate anything, how much.

[Jack]

I'm loving something clearly important to you.

[Amanda]

So I understood it in that way. But, yeah, I don't know. It's Denzel. I'm always happy with it.

[Jack]

No, I thought it was appropriate for the character. It's a very interesting character. So, like I said, he reminded me a little bit of Ellie Reid. There's definitely some Quincy Jones in there. There's some Russell Simmons in there. There's maybe a little Jay Z in there. This is somebody who lives in a giant high rise with multiple balconies on Front Street. And Dumbo. It's a new kind of Brooklyn than the one that you might see and do the right thing. And I like the idea of Spike returning to this space and portraying how the city has changed. He has a lot of access to that world.

[Amanda]

To the strains of oh, what a Beautiful Morning from the opening song of Oklahoma.

[Jack]

That's right.

[Amanda]

Which as soon as that kicked off and there's like, this beautiful. All drone shots. Drone shots, but of quote, unquote, new Brooklyn. And I was like, oh, Spike, you still got it.

[Jack]

Yeah. And also reckoning with, like, the passage of time, you know? Exactly. And that's a big part of the movie. And the movie. And the way that King fits into this world is super cool because throughout the film, you know, Spike is always showing these kind of signifiers for what is going on in their character's lives or how their conflicts represent something that has happened in the past. But in David King's house, you know, it's like Kehinde Wiley paintings, Basquiats, that famous portrait of Toni Morrison. You've got all these photographs of great musicians. Miles Davis, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Jimi Hendrix, like, all of these kind of signposts of greatness. And King is at this place where he sold a record label that he started, what, some decades ago, five years earlier. And he's kind of lost control of his own company. He stayed at the company during that time. And so before the events really kick off, we learned that he's trying to buy the company back. He's trying to buy back his creative integrity in addition to his legacy. And so he's at this vulnerable moment, and you have to get on board with this for the movie to make sense. Because in theory, someone like this would have $100 million or $300 million.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

And he is in a much more compacted financial state. And because of that, when this kidnapping happens, he has to make a really hard choice once we realize that it's not his son who's taken, but someone else's son. And in this case, his best friend. Longtime childhood friend and also personal driver.

[Amanda]

Played by Jeffrey Wright.

[Jack]

Played by Jeffrey Wright. To me, the movie is at its very best all the way up until the end when Denzel and Jeffrey Wright are talking to each other. Jeffrey Wright, I thought, was, like, magical in this movie. It's such a different part than the last four or five parts that he's played. And he's a guy who's had more personal struggles and is a faithful person and has accepted this role inside of David King's elaborate life and has to be obsequious to him at all times, but also clearly has a lot of rage. Really complicated character who doesn't have a lot of dialogue, but I thought was really cool. And I like watching them together. I love the scene where it's like, these are two of the best.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

And they're bouncing on each other really, really well. But there is something a little bit flat about the first 40 or so minutes of explicating the plot and what's happening and creating the world of King's family. I thought the two actors who played his wife and his son were just, like, not up to Paris with Denzel and Jeffrey Ryan.

[Amanda]

It was. It was confounding.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Amanda]

And that's tough. And then also when the. The police and the investigators come in, there are you. And it's. There is a healthy skepticism for the. The police throughout the movie. But also, it's just many bad actors, which is. And it's very, very confusing.

[Jack]

It feels very Law and Order.

[Amanda]

It's. I mean, it's almost like this scene in Megalopolis when the. Forgive me, the Saturday Night Live actress Chloe Feynman. When Chloe Feynman just botches a line reading, and it's just still in the movie. There are a few line readings in this one from people who are like. So he didn't have one other take.

[Jack]

Yeah, yeah.

[Amanda]

So that is a little confusing. And especially like when next to Denzel and Jeffrey Wright. That's really.

[Jack]

The issue is if this were a lesser movie with lesser talents, you'd be like, well, this is just a mediocre movie. But you've got kind of mediocre movie stuff happening in the first hour alongside, you know, a couple of really, really gifted people. And the movie also, it's attempting to do something kind of interesting that doesn't ultimately work, which is. It's attempting to be this, like, classical, melodramatic 50s chamber piece where people are Kind of storming in and out of rooms. And you've got this Howard Drossen scores, like, really loud and distracting to me, moving over the dialogue. And I gotta be honest, in the first 40 minutes, I was like, ooh, gosh. I'm not sure if this is really clicking in exactly the way that I wanted it to. Now, I'm not clear how intentional a lot of this is, but there's a sort of a break where the film moves from this chamber piece into more or less like an action detective movie.

[Amanda]

Yes. And they leave the apartment. It's going in and out of nice rooms for 40 minutes. I just want to note the apartment's number is a 24.

[Jack]

Yes. The one. He's very funny. Yes.

[Amanda]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then. Oh, I thought also his penthouse.

[Jack]

Oh, it's his penthouse as well. Okay. Well, the one that he knocks on the door of later in the film is also a 25.

[Amanda]

I mean, I could be wrong, but I was pretty sure that it was both.

[Jack]

Okay.

[Amanda]

Anyway. No, but it's. So they finally leave the house, and you also get the dolly shot, like, all at once. And then suddenly the move comes alive. And it is that, you know, that moment signaling to you, like, okay, now we're actually. Now this movie is. Is going to be doing.

[Jack]

Yeah. There's a couple of the classic Spike double dolly shots. One with the cop. Right. Where the cop is sort of narrating what's about to transform.

[Amanda]

But that is like. That is when they leave the apartment.

[Jack]

And that's kind of when the movie takes off.

[Amanda]

Exactly. Because it's the. It's. And it's setting up like the great set piece of the movie where they're going to try to do the money drop in exchange. But it's. It's on the balcony and then. And then things take flight.

[Jack]

Yes. And it almost feels like Spike shaking you and being like, it's my time now. Like, I've gotten through this stage of the movie now it's a little challenging. And the reason it pops out to me as much is because you could make the case that the first half of High and Low is the best stuff because it's famed for its incredible blocking. And the way that we see the inside of the apartment for the, you know, the King character in that film, it's so clever and gorgeous, and it feels like he's in conversation with Alfred Hitchcock at that time, who also was kind of a master of that kind of work in this case. Spike is incredible about being outside in New York, the exteriors, the emotionality, the music, the sounds of the city. That's something he's so talented at. And as soon as he goes outside and King goes on this journey to drop this bag, $17.5 million in Swiss francs, the movie just takes off. You see his interest in the people of New York, the way that commuter travel works in the city, the way the Yankee fandom operates, the way that the Puerto Rican Day parade works. And using Eddie Palmieri as this musical centerpiece of the movie. After having listened to 40 minutes of the Drossen score, it's such a great change up. And the movie takes flight. And it's basically pretty much an hour of excitement and intrigue. And it reminds me a lot of Inside man, you know, with Inside man, where you're just like, I'm just locked in on this movie. So I ultimately came out really, really liking it quite a bit.

[Amanda]

I mean, I did as well. There's a. There is a second set piece in the second half that I don't totally want to spoil, except, you know, asap. Rocky is in this movie.

[Jack]

Yeah. What did you think of Rocky?

[Amanda]

I thought he was great. He's really good. He's. He's really good. And he's also used really well. And they have like a rap battle of sorts that is like imagined and filmed very creatively. And I just, like, I was laughing. I was really fixated on it. They have a connection. So, yeah, it is 40 minutes of head scratching and then a very exciting New York movie.

[Jack]

Yeah, I agree. Rocky was really, really great. And that scene is the best scene in the movie, their confrontation. And I was impressed by Denzel's ability to sit.

[Spike Lee]

Sure.

[Amanda]

But hang on, it's Denzel.

[Jack]

They are really going toe to toe with one another. And it was very exciting and very fun to watch them together in that way. And Rocky, as opposed to some of the other actors in the movie, really holds his own opposite Denzel. I mean, he looks like he belongs. I just saw him in if I had legs, I'd kick you as well. And I was like, oh, he's a real actor. This is not a sideline for him at all. Yeah, I think this is quite good and quite different from what Spike and Denzel have done before. It's definitely late period stuff. Right. Where it's like, you gotta have a few familiar Hallmark moves. You've gotta make a movie that is a little bit more about the stage of life that they're in right now. This is not Malcolm X. You know what I mean, like, their personal interests are very divergent. And I think the movie resolves itself pretty well. The final sequence, not the singing sequence, but the sequence before that is kind of fascinating because you can see that Spike has a little anxiety about gangster rap. And he always has. He loves hip hop. He's always loved hip hop. Public Enemy prominently featured in his, you know, second feature and one of the most important needle drops in music history. But Young Felon, Rocky's character.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

Kind of what Young Felon represents and someone who call themselves Young Felon is interesting. And him looking at a generation that is, you know, way behind him, 30 years, 35 years younger than him, you can sense some of his concern. The ways in which David and his son talk about what it would mean or not mean to pay the ransom and how that would come down on his son.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

And there's that critical conversation that they have where King is saying something to his son that is very funny, where he's like, dad, social media is all over me. They're killing me because of this, because they say it's my fault that my friend got kidnapped when they wanted to kidnap me. And he's like, you got to ignore that. You got to just turn that off. And his son looks at him and he's like, I can't. And that's a very resonant concern. You know, like, that's something that obviously young people are just like, I can't not look at Instagram and not feel bad about my station in life. So it's cool that I think he was able to wend some of that stuff into the story and what might have been in different hands, like a more rote examination of the generation gap.

[Amanda]

Yeah. I mean, it feels like a part of the story as opposed to now. I will insert several scenes where I'm mad at the youth about their social media usage. So it does make sense. It is also, when you were watching this first 40 minutes, you are thinking, you know, they are natural thoughts that came to my head at least. I was like, okay, come on. But, like, we know this, that and.

[Jack]

The other meaning in terms of how the choices are going to be made. Yeah, yeah. He has to do what he ends up doing. There's no way he's going to be able to not pay the ransom. Yeah, that would be absurd. But the idea that, like, somebody also older who's like, I worked so hard for this wealth.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

I will not have someone take it away from me because they say I have to, because it is my responsibility. Yeah, that's a very boomer concern. You know, that's.

[Amanda]

It is really boomer.

[Jack]

That's a. That's a real thing that is. Is working in our society right now.

[Amanda]

Even the. The lack of exploration of all the other ways that this money could have been gotten, because I don't have $17.5 million in. In any currency. But your point about. It's like he's surrounded by Basquiats and all of this art. He lives in this penthouse. You know, it's kind of like, where's our cash flow? Like, what's our allocation here? What are we willing to give up and not give up.

[Jack]

Yep.

[Amanda]

Which is. But the movie doesn't even really go there, which is extremely boomer.

[Jack]

But that all. I don't know how purposeful that is, you know, because you can see all of the accoutrements in his house. These are all production decisions made by Spike and his team. You know what I mean? I don't think that that was in the script that there were three Basquiats sitting in David King's living room, but there are Basquiats sitting in Spike Lee's living room. And in fact, most of the art that's in the film are replicas of art in his collection. So, yeah, it is a little bit of a portal into the mind of a 60 or 70 something, very successful black American artist or executive or however you want to define them. And I'm grateful for that. You know, like, he's not really made a movie that is about this, even though he's lived in this atmosphere for a while. So it's a lot of fun. It's pretty successful. There's a moment when he's riding in the Rolls Royce in the front seat alongside Jeffrey Wright when they've decided that they have to go find young felon. The cops are not helping them. And the movie is very funny about the fact that the cops are always there but not helping. They're always present. They're incompetent or they're just rude. But he's driving and James Brown's. The payback hits and Denzel puts his head down and he just starts shadow boxing to himself and back and forth.

[Amanda]

It's really good.

[Jack]

And I was like, this is movie magic. This is what we want.

[Amanda]

Exactly.

[Jack]

This is how we want to feel.

[Amanda]

How do you not give yourself a.

[Jack]

It's pretty special.

[Amanda]

Yeah. Why was this only in theaters for two weeks before? You know, it's available on Apple now.

[Jack]

It'S available on Apple tv where the Majority of its audience will find it.

[Amanda]

Watch it.

[Jack]

I think people should watch it. I think it's fun. I think it's a good time with some nice subterranean ideas. And to Apple, I'd like to say never again. Don't ever do this again. Please. Never, ever, ever put a Denzel Washington movie straight to streaming. I do not understand it and I do not appreciate it. Yeah, okay. Caught Stealing.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Directed by Darren Aronofsky. This is his ninth feature film. There's Austin Butler right there. It's written by Charlie Houston. It's based on his novel. I heard from our pal David Shoemaker that he was stunned that this was even being adapted and that Huston was able to adapt it himself, which is fairly uncommon these days. Usually what happens is the novelist gets a first pass at the script, and then they say, thanks for your efforts, and then they get somebody to rewrite it. I don't know if that happened in this case, but Houston is solely credited. The movie stars Austin Butler, Regina King, Zoe Kravitz, Matt Smith, Liev Schreiber, Vincent d', Onofrio, Benito Martinez Ocasio, who you may know as Bad Bunny Griffin Dunn. We'll come back to that. Carol Kane. It's a movie about a guy living in an apartment on the Lower east side, and one day his neighbor knocks on his door and asks him to take care of his cat. He's going on a trip for a couple of days, and this guy, a bartender named Hank and a former baseball prospect, gets into some hijinks because of this cat care that he is forced to take. What you think of Caught Stealing.

[Amanda]

I found this movie implausible on several levels, on a story level and, you know, but really more on a movie, on a tonal movie level. It wants to be outrageous and funny, and I guess it's a little gross, but I didn't think it was that funny. I found it. Aronofsky doing a lot of action set pieces, especially driving cars. And they weren't bad, but they definitely felt like someone put on their action hat and was like, okay, now I'm gonna race a car. It just all felt a little. It felt forced. Um. And, I mean, that didn't mean that I had a bad time, but it did not. I didn't. I didn't buy it, you know?

[Jack]

Yeah. I think we're more or less in the same place. It's weird to see one of the defining disagreements of this show is.

[Amanda]

Is Aronofsky.

[Jack]

Is Aronofsky good? And.

[Amanda]

Yeah. And I Think this was he. I don't know if he's bad, but I just thought this was, like, kind of fake, you know?

[Jack]

I agree. He felt like he was trying on somebody else's clothes.

[Amanda]

Yeah. In the way that, like, a lot of his movies just kind of feel a little like, I know you'd like to be this guy, but, like, you don't got it.

[Jack]

I think he comes to the insane psychology of all of his protagonists very honestly. I don't think he's ever taken on a movie where I didn't think that he believed that this was the most important story to be told ever. From Pie to Requiem for a Dream to the Fountain to.

[Amanda]

Okay, but what about, like, the Whale?

[Jack]

But I think he completely believed in that movie. And that movie has a lot in common with Mother. And this is the extremity of expression. Right. That's the thing that he is so interested in is, like, the pain and the inability to connect with the world around him. Like, that's true of all of his characters. Black Swan, you know, this idea of delusion and disassociation in the wrestler. People who are outsiders, who feel lost, who feel fucked up. These are the people that he is usually making movies about.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

And if you watch Pie, you can really see, like, the. The. The. The grounding for that. We're talking about Robert Altman next week. Robert Altman's style of filmmaking could not be more different from Darren Aronofsky's, but their interest in people is kind of similar. Robert Altman made a ballet movie. You know, Robert Altman made movies about a lot of artists. Like, there's something in common. Caught Stealing is like a movie about a hot bartender who got into some trouble.

[Amanda]

Well, right.

[Jack]

There's nothing else to it.

[Amanda]

Well, that's also a little bit the Whale. And the further he's gone in his career, I think he's run out of scripts or people who legitimately have that separation from the world, that disillusionment. And so he's trying to graft whatever that feeling is onto situations that he doesn't have any sort of connection to.

[Jack]

Yeah, yeah.

[Amanda]

And so, like, you know, that was.

[Jack]

Your take on Mother. Sure.

[Amanda]

And the Whale, and a little bit.

[Jack]

I didn't like the Whale, but it felt at least consistent to me with what he was going after. This, to me, is like, this is an Austin Butler movie. I mean, he's one of the most handsome dudes in the world.

[Amanda]

Yeah, exactly.

[Jack]

There's not a lot that he's alienated.

[Amanda]

Because of his Injury carpet photos of Aronofsky with his cast are just absolutely priceless.

[Jack]

I haven't seen them.

[Amanda]

They're just a priceless.

[Jack]

Was he wearing a scarf?

[Amanda]

Yeah, sometimes, but it's. I have been. There have been so many photo calls for this. And also it worked because many of my friends were like, so why is Zoe Kravitz dating Harry Styles? I thought she was dating Austin Butler. And I was like, no, no, no. They were just promoting a movie. And I don't think it worked to get you to see the movie, but at least. So it worked. But Aronofsky just like trying to hang with all of these beautiful, hot people, I feel a little for. You know, it's hard to. It's hard to age. These are the travails demonstrate every day.

[Jack]

Yeah, I. Let's have an Austin Butler conversation.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

I believe that he's good, right? In so far as his cast in this. Is he a leading man?

[Amanda]

Oh, rude one.

[Jack]

I'm just asking.

[Amanda]

No, I think that. I think that he's.

[Jack]

I think he's a talented actor.

[Amanda]

I think he's Brad Pitt.

[Jack]

That's a high compliment, sure.

[Amanda]

But I. But we often say that Brad Pitt is, you know, a character actor in a leading man's body. That our favorite performances are either when he's on the side being goofy or, you know, the serendipity of like, you know, your. Your one perfect shining moneyball moment. But otherwise he's better when he's not like, meet Jill Black is not the. The pinnacle of Brad Pitt's career.

[Jack]

It's not.

[Amanda]

So I.

[Jack]

News flash.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Me, Joe Blackheads. Sorry, Amanda has decreed. No, I know what you're saying to me, you know, it's more like. Is like A River Runs through it is a movie that captures.

[Amanda]

He could absolutely nail A River Runs Through It.

[Jack]

Well, that's what I was gonna say. That's a movie where he is the co. Lead of that movie.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

He does not have a lot of dialogue. He has a storm inside of him in the film. He's the more complex brother opposite Craig Scheffer. And that quietness helped him a lot.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

Butler's asked to do a lot here. He has to carry a lot. And the movie, I think, does him a little bit of a disservice with a choice that it makes in the story about halfway through, which I understand why the choice is made. And I think it seems like it's true to the novel.

[Amanda]

Right. And it sets up the thing.

[Jack]

But, yes, it creates the action. But it kind of ruins the movie. And so if you don't want to know what this is, don't listen anymore. But spoiler alert. About 45 minutes an hour into the movie, Zoe Kravitz's character, who is his girlfriend, is murdered. He discovers her dead body. You know, Zoe Kravitz, obviously a very special living human, but is the vibe the heartbeat of the film? And their relationship is, like, the only nice thing in the movie. Everything else sucks. It's just, like grimy and gross and angry and bleeding.

[Amanda]

I mean, even that she has to super glue his cut together.

[Jack]

She does, she does. But she's a healer.

[Amanda]

She's a paramedic, which is really funny. Yeah, okay. She's a paramedic wearing orange lingerie to resuscitate someone on duty.

[Jack]

God bless her.

[Amanda]

You know, life contains multitudes.

[Jack]

Yes. You're saying you have never done that before. But she's killed in the movie, and then the movie becomes a chase movie where he's got to find the money and escape and elude his captors. But the movie just kind of just died for me when she left the movie.

[Amanda]

Right. I mean, I wonder if that's a little bit of, like, who's responding to who. I know what you're saying about Austin Butler.

[Jack]

I am who I am.

[Amanda]

I know what you're saying about Austin Butler. And. And the Brad Pitt thing really looms large for me because this. This movie, like, kind of wants to be a guy Ritchie movie or is. Or like. Or is signaling that it's confused. Right. But you can't watch it without thinking of guy rich movies.

[Jack]

I think the trailer kind of. Kind of forced that on us just because there was so much Matt Smith doing, like, oi, oi, oi.

[Amanda]

Right. And that's because I thought he was good in this movie.

[Jack]

Um, you always think he's good.

[Amanda]

Well, you know, but it's also a little bit of, like, let people be what they're good at. And so watching Austin Butler try to be like, a corn fed, you know, baseball loving, just like Normie in the midst of all of this is a little confusing. Like, you. You want Brad Pitt in Snatch. Like, just let. Let him be weird like everybody else.

[Jack]

Yeah, he's definitely not weird enough. I won. I think it's just because the character is not written to be all that weird. Griffin Dunn's role in this movie is obviously a callback to After Hours. And that's another movie that I think this movie wants to kind of be.

[Amanda]

Sure. It wants to be A lot of things, yes.

[Jack]

It wants to be a late night, 90s new year.

[Amanda]

I want to be Christy Turlington. You know, it's like, do you. Yeah, she seems pretty.

[Jack]

Would you want to spend all that time with Edward Burns?

[Amanda]

You don't think Zack looks like Edward Burns? I think that they look a lot alike.

[Jack]

So no comment on that.

[Amanda]

Oh, you don't. He doesn't like it, but I think Edward Burns is handsome.

[Jack]

And the pride of Long Island, Edward Burns.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

He made it out.

[Amanda]

So I would love to look like Christy Turlington. She's doing important work, philanthropic work.

[Jack]

Is that true?

[Amanda]

Yeah. She has, like, a whole foundation for moms and childbirth across the world.

[Jack]

That's great. I like teen Griffin Dunn. I wish this was more like After Hours. Yeah, it's not really there.

[Amanda]

I wish it were more like a Guy Ritchie movie. I wish it were more like a.

[Jack]

Did you think. Talk to me about the cultural stereotyping of the movie. Right. You've got Bad Bunny as a seemingly tough, but maybe not so tough, Latino club owner. You've got Regina King as a tough, talking, maybe corrupt New York City cop. Some Shades of Southland, the cop show that she was on some years ago. You've got Matt Smith as a mohawked British faux punk.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

You've got Vincent d' Onofrio and Lieb Schreiber as two Hasidic Jews who are up to no good in Los Angeles or in New York, rather. And you've got. Who am I forgetting any other cultural stereotypes that are being. You've got Action Bronson doing absurd stuff in the bar.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

Not really a stereotype, more of a.

[Amanda]

Oh, the Russian mobsters.

[Jack]

Oh, of course, yeah. Yes.

[Amanda]

Who were also funny.

[Jack]

The baldies who are Ukrainian. Right. Are they Ukrainian?

[Amanda]

Well, there's some discussion about whether they are, because they're near Little Ukraine. But then Regina King is like, no, they're part of the. And then she's like, no, they're in the mob. And then Asmodel is like, yeah, but they weren't speaking Italian. And she was like, no, Russian mob. I mean, which is. Listen, this is the level that we're working on.

[Jack]

Is, is this meant to be, like, funny? Like a metatextual comment on these kinds of characters?

[Amanda]

I think so. It's, like, supposed to be winking, but.

[Jack]

Again, doesn't really come across.

[Amanda]

No. Right.

[Jack]

Yeah. And obviously there is legitimately, you know, the Dennis Farina, Benicio Del Toro characters in Snatch who are doing the Hassan criminals thing is very funny, very memorable. It's some of the best stuff in that movie. So I'm like, is this a wink at that? What is that meant to be?

[Amanda]

Right. Like, it's. I think it's trying to do a lot of things, but like I said, none of it really comes together. How do you feel about the Mets energy in this?

[Jack]

Well, let's talk about it. So there's a scene that takes place at Shea Stadium, which is, of course, no longer where the New York Mets play.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

It is, in part, digitally recreated. It's, like, dismantled. They didn't blow it up. What did they do with it, Jack? I think they knocked it down. Did they knock it down?

[Amanda]

The German Citi Field is there now.

[Jack]

It's not in the same spot. They didn't build it on the same land. It's on a different.

[Amanda]

I don't think we said that. This is set in, like, 1998. Yes, we can say it now.

[Jack]

Well, there's a lot of baseball in the movie, in part because Butler's character is a baseball prospect who gets into a car accident when he's drinking and driving, kills his friend and badly injures his leg. And so he's not able to continue playing. But he remains a huge baseball fan and is following the Giants. That's his team. The Giants and the Mets are in a playoff race, and so there's a lot of checking in. Christopher Mad Dog Russo famously makes an appearance via radio in this film. A voice I grew up listening to in 1998. I was no doubt listening to Mad Dog talk about baseball. There's a scene that takes place at this reimagined Shay. We get on the subway, the 7 line, headed to Shea. It was okay. It was nice to see.

[Amanda]

Headed to or headed from?

[Jack]

Headed on the way back.

[Amanda]

Yeah, they're on the way back.

[Jack]

How does he get there in the first place? Does he drive there? Or maybe they just drive to Flushing.

[Amanda]

Meadow and then he walks, because that's where they're going to meet the other people. And then there's. I don't really know.

[Jack]

Yeah, I mean, look, I've definitely spent a lot of time at shea in the 90s. And, you know, it was a shithole. It was our shithole. Yeah, but it was a shithole. It was not a nice stadium. There's a reason they don't play there anymore. So it's weird to be like, ah, the good old days.

[Amanda]

It's awesome.

[Jack]

The Mets sucked and we hoped they would be good, you know, but they were certainly the little brothers of the New York Yankees, who are about to enter the greatest glory period in the last 25 years in baseball.

[Amanda]

And I guess he's a Giants fan because this is like Barry Bond's era.

[Jack]

I think he grew up in San Francisco is the impression that I got. Oh, his mom is in San Francisco.

[Amanda]

No, I mean, I know that, but yes, you could put them anywhere.

[Jack]

Bonds is in the film.

[Spike Lee]

Right.

[Amanda]

He has at the very end. Right. Which. The ending also sucks. Sorry.

[Jack]

Yeah, I didn't like that either.

[Amanda]

That's so stupid.

[Jack]

It's weird. There's plenty of stuff in this movie that I kind of enjoyed. I didn't have. I didn't have. I wasn't bored.

[Amanda]

I'm not mad.

[Jack]

Yeah, I'm not mad. Don't put in the paper that Amanda is mad.

[Amanda]

I. But I, I really do want us to get a prop that's just a newspaper that says I'm mad, that I can hold up from time to time.

[Jack]

But you should call the Sulzberger family.

[Amanda]

I was a little bored, but that's okay. But I was not mad. I was just kinda like, this isn't really gelling, but I like enough of these people that I'll keep watching.

[Jack]

Yeah, I think I'm more or less.

[Amanda]

Also, I was in a movie theater, so I didn't fall asleep and I was incredibly jet lagged. So.

[Jack]

Good sign.

[Amanda]

Is it.

[Jack]

I mean, it's not bad. This movie got dumped. Why did it open on August 29? There's famous people in it. It's propulsive enough. I think for a general audience it will be more or less satisfying. You know, it's just the crime thriller. It's a New York crime thriller. It's really no more, no less. With the exception of the occasional the gore that Aronofsky is usually in.

[Amanda]

Right. It was quite gross.

[Jack]

It is. There's a lot of blood and there's a lot of.

[Amanda]

There's more poop than I needed. I'm dealing with enough in my day to day life.

[Jack]

Understandable. We get the. Even the cockroach in the opening title sequence.

[Amanda]

The bugs are fine.

[Jack]

Okay. But it's kind of a strange film. I mean, I noted here Aronofsky, every single movie that he's directed has either been recognized by bafta, the Golden Globes, the Oscars, or won a prize at Sundance. He's had a pretty hallowed career. He's got some films that I think are masterpieces. He's got films I think are failures but are really interesting. I know you're a lot less connected to him and find him a little annoying at times. But he's very, very talented and is a cinema artist. Right. You'd say he's in a class of guys from the 90s that for sure defined a period of time at the movies.

[Amanda]

Absolutely.

[Jack]

And Black Swan, obviously was a massive hit, too. So he's got that under his belt as well. And this movie is very quickly going to be a movie that never happened. It's not going to be part of some legacy. And I don't mean to demean him, but you just know. You know, it's like Sony kind of dumped this movie and made $9 million, and then it's going to be on. It's going to be on Netflix. Everybody's going to watch it on Netflix because of the output deal that Sony has with Netflix. And maybe that's where its life will be. It'll be just another studio programmer that people won't even realize it's Aronofsky. But I'm just kind of. I'm fascinated by the decision to even make the movie.

[Amanda]

The movie does feel like he thought he was doing something else or he thought that he had it more nailed down than he did. And that doesn't mean that it's bad, but it's not very good.

[Jack]

This episode is presented by State Farm. You know what's even more impressive than being an expert at movie trivia? Being smart about saving money. And a great way to do that is by choosing to bundle home and auto insurance with State Farm. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with the personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts, and savings and eligibility vary by state. Do you think there's something telling about the fact that this is a Mets movie and highest to lowest is a Yankees movie?

[Amanda]

You tell me. How are the Mets doing right now? Dare I ask? It's late. It's early September.

[Jack]

It's okay.

[Amanda]

Things are getting tense.

[Jack]

It's okay.

[Amanda]

Okay. I have not really checked in. So what's up with baseball right now?

[Jack]

The Phillies are almost certainly going to win the division.

[Amanda]

Okay. That's great news for my house.

[Jack]

The Cubs and Brewers are firmly in the playoffs.

[Amanda]

Oh, all right. Congratulations.

[Jack]

The Dodgers and the Padres are also almost certainly in the playoffs.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

Which means that the Mets are right now in the third wild card spot.

[Amanda]

How many wild card spots are there?

[Jack]

Three.

[Amanda]

Oh, okay.

[Jack]

They're four games ahead of the San Francisco Giants, Austin Butler's favorite team and they should make the playoffs with 20 some odd games to go. If they don't, it's going to be a tough September on the big picture.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

Just want you to know.

[Amanda]

Okay. Yeah. I mean, I'm used to that at this point. That's why I was temp checking it.

[Jack]

Well, but last year was a total change of pace.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

Last year was a wonderful time this time of year. They actually struggled in September last year and then turned it on at the end of the season.

[Amanda]

They didn't. You got. Because I remember I was about to give birth and you guys were just like fucking melting down every single day. And I was like, I have some other issues to deal with right now.

[Jack]

I. Jack Sanders was not melting.

[Amanda]

Yeah, you held it together and got me coffee cake, which was really nice. So, Jack, you're number one forever. I. And then October, I mean, I remember Si was like five days old and we were watching playoff games and those were excruciating. Glorious moment from the perspective of a Phillies fan. It was a great time, which I am for about two weeks every year.

[Jack]

It's a great time. I mean, the Phillies, I don't. I'm not sure that they have the juice either this year, so.

[Amanda]

No, I don't think so. I mean, they need to. Have they learned how to hit the ball?

[Jack]

Because when they hit they don't pitch and when they pitch, they don't hit. But that's true of the Mets as well. It's like two, two good but not great franchises right now.

[Amanda]

Braves are done.

[Jack]

Braves are done. Unless they're playing the Mets, in which case they are annihilating the Mets. Yeah, it's been a complicated season. So the thing that has happened that you actually may hear Jack and I nattering about both on and off Mike, is that they've now called up two of their three big pitching prospects and the first of which has been probably the most important new person to come into my life in a long time.

[Amanda]

What's his name?

[Jack]

Nolan McClain.

[Amanda]

Nolan.

[Jack]

His nickname, which I don't think is going to stick, is Cowboy Ohtani because he was formerly a two way player. He was a hitter and a pitcher and now he has just put his time into pitching.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

And he's nasty.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

He's really excited. And he shut down the Phillies a week, week and a half ago. And then the other kid is Jonah Tong. Jonah tong is a 22 year old boy wonder, A wee little man with an ex.

[Amanda]

Is that younger than you, Jack?

[Jack]

That is younger than me.

[Amanda]

How does it feel?

[Jack]

It feels completely fine.

[Amanda]

Okay. Life comes for you fast.

[Jack]

I know. I think you'll enjoy Jonah Tong. A very happy kid.

[Amanda]

Oh, that's nice.

[Jack]

With a very. The kids are saying he's whimsical. He embraces whimsy.

[Amanda]

That's cute. That's nice. What's his walk up song?

[Jack]

I don't know. Actually, there was some noise about this on Twitter, but I can't remember exactly what it was.

[Amanda]

And you guys call yourself Mets fans.

[Jack]

I couldn't watch his star because I was at the Telluride Film Festival. So I was literally just watching clips, sitting beside Chris Rosen, fellow Mets fan. Just being, I think, did Bruce Springsteen end and we were like, what happened with the Mets? I should tell you how I feel about the Springsteen movie.

[Amanda]

Jets bad.

[Jack]

We'll see Sunday.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Showdown with former quarterback Aaron Rodgers and the Pittsburgh Steelers, week one. Yeah.

[Amanda]

I have one more sports question for you. So what's going on with Quiet Leonard? Well, I saw a headline. I didn't click through anything. I don't. This is like explain Fortnite to me. But instead, quiet, Let her go.

[Jack]

The, you know, acquaintance of ours, friend Pablo Torre reported on his podcast that a sort of shell company slash scam company that is apparently organized around tree maintenance. Okay, They've. They frame themselves as pro, basically making your carbon emissions negative. Yes. So they. But the reason why they're so sketchy is they broker the deals of planting trees. So the average tree cost to plant is like 10 to 20 cents.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

They charge all these high level people a dollar and then broker that deal.

[Amanda]

Okay?

[Jack]

This company, which is called Aspiration, was sponsored by the Los Angeles Clippers. And this company also had an individual marketing and sponsorship deal with Kawhi Leonard.

[Amanda]

Okay?

[Jack]

The suspicion is that the money that the Clippers gave to Aspiration was then laundered to directly to Kawhi Leonard to account for additional payment. Oh, on top of his salary. Now you might think, oh, how much? 50,000. Maybe a million. No, 28 million. And now maybe reportedly possibly 48 million.

[Amanda]

$48 million through a tree company.

[Jack]

So again, this is all alleged. They have also now gone bankrupt. By the way, the reason this came out is because the company went bankrupt. And so the documents were made public and the relationship to a subsidiary that Kawhi Leonard's team built showed this relationship. So this was not. It was also a no show job. So the sponsorship, it's not like he was In a commercial for this company.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

He didn't do anything.

[Amanda]

Wow.

[Jack]

So bad.

[Amanda]

That does look bad. It's also, when you get stories like this, I am often disappointed. But like, as you said, it's like, for $50,000, someone, you know, gave their life away. 40 million is. That's Iris. So. And this. They would do it because of, like, salary cap or whatever. Yeah.

[Jack]

Okay. It would be a way to.

[Amanda]

That's a great story. Thank you for explaining that to me.

[Jack]

You know, there's this. There's suggestion. Look, this has been true for many years, but there's a suggestion that there are a lot of organizations and professional sports that do similar things. This is just at a very high level. And because there's a. Zach Lowe on his show talked about this really interestingly, actually, that Kawhi Leonard's team in particular has been very open about their demands around things like this in previous negotiations for contracts.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

So, like, when they. When he was a free agent in 2019, he was. His representation, who was. His uncle was openly saying, like, we need this, this, and this.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

And none of that stuff was considered standard to the bylaws of the NBA. Listeners of the show. If you're here for the movies, I'm very sorry.

[Amanda]

Yeah, no, but this is.

[Jack]

Listen to the Zach Lowe Show. You can check out Pablo's episode where he explains it. I'm sure he's going to continue to report on it, but that was very helpful.

[Amanda]

Thank you for explaining that to me.

[Jack]

You're welcome. Yeah. It's not just movies that I follow closely.

[Amanda]

No, I know that, but, you know, I was on vacation. I stopped opening a couple newsletters that I regularly read, and I feel really free.

[Jack]

Like, what?

[Amanda]

Feed me?

[Jack]

What's that?

[Amanda]

Okay, we don't have time for that. Do you know about Feed me? Okay. Oh, okay, boys. It's like the. It's written by Emily Sundberg. It's.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah, yeah, I know her. You stopped reading it as a declaration of.

[Amanda]

No, I just didn't open on vacation because I was like, on vacation, and then I was like, oh, maybe like, I don't care what's going on. Like, where bankers in New York are eating, you know, and I. And I don't. And so I feel free. But then it does mean that I miss things. So thank you for catching up.

[Jack]

That's like, how I feel about television.

[Amanda]

Oh, yeah. I have no idea what's going on.

[Jack]

I'm like, I don't know. I haven't seen it. I'm not sure Couldn't tell you.

[Amanda]

I did start season three of the Gilded Age on the way on my eternal fight back and it was really good. But yeah, I have to watch movies, so good luck to them.

[Jack]

Movies are back. What movies are we talking about this month?

[Amanda]

One Battle after another.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Amanda]

Are we going to see that? When are we going to see it?

[Jack]

Yeah, I think I'm gonna see it on Monday.

[Amanda]

What the fuck are they. I need to see it too. Okay, well, can you.

[Jack]

Welcome back to the United States.

[Amanda]

Put me on the email.

[Jack]

Okay. You know, I'll put you on the email.

[Amanda]

Okay. Thank you.

[Jack]

One battle after another. That's one. What else is coming out? The Strangers, Chapter two.

[Amanda]

Sure.

[Jack]

Him.

[Amanda]

Yeah. Downton Abbey, the grand finale.

[Jack]

We're going. We got tickets.

[Amanda]

Michelle Dackery expecting a baby.

[Jack]

Did you see by me.

[Amanda]

Okay, well, that would be nice. For you, I guess.

[Jack]

Not for my family. That wouldn't be good. No, she's wonderful. What else is coming out? Big, bold, beautiful journey. Big, bold, beautiful journey.

[Amanda]

Oh, yeah. Have you seen that yet?

[Jack]

I have not seen it.

[Amanda]

I saw the trailer yesterday before Caught Stealing and I just.

[Jack]

You were surprised.

[Amanda]

No, I mean, I've seen the trailer. I just. Once again, what's going on there? I guess we'll find out.

[Jack]

I don't know. Spinal Tap 2?

[Amanda]

Sure.

[Jack]

I just saw the Conjuring Last Rites yesterday.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

It was okay. We'll re Weapons. Yes, we'll re. Weapons. With CR in the middle of the month. That's actually going to VOD on Tuesday.

[Amanda]

I know.

[Jack]

So you'll be able to see it then. Not the same at home, I would imagine.

[Amanda]

You know, we all. We have to cope in our own way. And me watching it at home is how I'll feel safe.

[Jack]

There's one other movie that I need to check out. What is it? I mentioned the Roses. Oh, the Long Walk. The Stephen King adaptation with Cooper Hoffman and David Johnson. So that's kind of the month. Not the. October is jam packed because it is the combination of awards season. That first week of October is always a very big box office moment where you've got the new Tron movie and Roofman and a bunch of other stuff opening. And then November, Wicked for Good. We'll do six straight episodes on Wicked for Good. You excited?

[Amanda]

Yeah, I'm excited for you to perform all the songs standing on top of this table.

[Jack]

Thanks to my daughter. I'll have them committed to memory. No doubt. We went to go see a movie. I can't even remember what movie it was. Maybe it was The Bad Guys two at some point in August. And they've. Have you noticed, I don't know if you take Knocks to the movies even. But at the new movies now, they're just showing adult movie trailers.

[Amanda]

We're not in this phase ahead of.

[Jack]

Kids movies, like animated movies.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

So like one. The one battle trailer played before it. You know, Freakier Friday played before it, which was interesting.

[Amanda]

Oh. Because there was a.

[Jack]

Like. What's that? Curiosity.

[Amanda]

Right.

[Jack]

And having seen the movie, I don't know that she totally would have gotten some of the humor.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Didn't hate Freaky or Friday, by the way.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

And then what was the other. And then they showed Wicked for good. And she was like, I will turn my life over to this. She was like, this is probably the most important film ever made.

[Amanda]

Okay.

[Jack]

So that's exciting. I have that coming for me.

[Amanda]

We gotta get Nutcracker tickets. But that's separate. I was just, you know, I'm already thinking to the holiday and I don't really want to go see Wicked for good with Alice, but I do want to. It's not an Alice thing. That's a movie thing. But I do want to see the Nutcracker with her.

[Jack]

Okay, we'll make that happen for sure. Okay, we're back.

[Amanda]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Happy to be back. Let's now go to my conversation with the great Spike Lee. It is the great honor of this show to have the great Spike Lee on the pod for the first time. Spike, want to start by asking why is it the first time, man? I asked for Defy Bloods and you know what they told me? Spike is not available.

[Spike Lee]

All right, well, we got. You got to take my direct thing. So we have to go to nobody else from now on.

[Jack]

Okay. I'll hit you up direct next time. It's important that you're here. I love the new film. I want to ask you about the 87 essential films list you made for your NYU students. So only a handful of filmmakers on that list got more than two films. Kurosawa got three movies. Do you remember the first time you saw a Kurosawa movie?

[Spike Lee]

Yes. When I was a mere kid. Older friend of mine of the family would take me to see samurai films. At that time. I must be 89 years old. You know, just love the swords cutting heads off. But that was about. Wasn't until I was in graduate film school. NYU graduate film school where Ang Lee, Ernest Dickerson being a deeper in my films. We're all same class. Jim Dramas was two years ahead of us. That I saw Rashomon and Rashamon gave me. I use basically Rashamon for the structure of she's gotta have my first feature film. So I got to meet Mr. Kurosawa, one of the great moments of my cinematic life. And he knew I was. And you see some of my films. That was great. Denzel Washington. This script was sent around for many, many years and Denzel got it and he called me up and says, spike, I got a script. I'm gonna send you FedEx. And when he hung up the phone, I knew I was going to do it before I read the script. Now, I did not know that inside man. The 1890 years elapsed between that film and this film. But it was great to bring back the band, the dynamic duo, Dean Lee. And here's the thing I think is very important. I stressed this more than once on this tour that I approached. I approached this like a great jazz musician who takes American Standard, for example, Roger Homicides. My, you know, the Sound of Music. My favorite things. Look what John Coltrane did with that. So you know that that was my approach that we're gonna put the jazz reincarnation. Not reincarnation, but just a different version of a standard. We were not. There's not a remake. It's a reinterpretation. And that, that was the way that I went this whole film. You know, we, we know what Kurosawa did. One of the great cinematic giants. But people forget a Ryan. Ed McBain wrote the novel first. It's called King's Ransom. But we would never go off the rails and not disrespect the original film. But we want to be different. That's why it's not highest and lowest is highest to lowest. And the two is not tw. No to is it's the number two. And that's a shout out to my brother Prince who always use numbers, you know, sometimes instead of writing the words out.

[Jack]

One of the things that differentiates your film from the Kurosawa movie is that David King is a public person. He's a well known figure as opposed to the Mifune character.

[Spike Lee]

I think he's known for the best ears in the business.

[Jack]

That's right. Not just the best shoes in the business like in Mifune, but you must have encountered a lot of David Kings in your life. Successful, entrepreneurial, creative, but kind of consumed by the business. What do you, what do you think motivates people like that?

[Spike Lee]

I don't want to have any blanket statements on your. On my first time appearing on your show.

[Jack]

Okay, okay, okay.

[Spike Lee]

But what I see, what I've. Over the years, you know, I've been around the block a couple times, is that I can tell who's doing it for the love and who's strictly for doing it for the money. When you're at that level, you're not hiding it. You're not hiding that it comes out what you're about. And I think one of the most important lines in this film, my brother was on the poster too. The one sheet, all money and good money. So there. And what. The biggest thing I got from the Curacao film is about morality, what is good, what is bad. And with Denzel's performance, and not forgetting Mr. Tisha Muffoon and his depiction role directly by Kurosawa, when, When the thing comes down and Denzel has to make this choice, he is such a great actor. Everybody in the theater or at home coming up will put themselves in that exact place, Derek. The exact place Denzel's playing. And what would they do? What would they do? And that's. That makes the whole movie like. Because you're engaged in the theater, you're engaging the people in the audience. Engaging people to see it later on, you know, Apple plus. And when you have people watching, I mean, it could be a show, TV show, movie, whatever, concert. When they're engaged, you won't.

[Jack]

I love what you and Matthew Libatique do together. I feel like bad a. I always.

[Spike Lee]

Say bad a get on this set. I just call out his name. He.

[Jack]

He is a genius. I feel like Chiraq is one of your best looking movies, especially in the last 20 years. A beautiful movie. If you.

[Spike Lee]

Since you bring up Chirac. They hate that movie in Chicago.

[Jack]

I know, but it, look, it's a, it's an awesome looking movie, but they.

[Spike Lee]

Hate that movie in Chicago. So I, I get. And also even before that, I'm a Nick fan, you know, the Bulls. So I never got love in Chicago, period.

[Jack]

Yeah, we share that too.

[Spike Lee]

Even though Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn. You know.

[Jack]

What? Did, did you and Maddie watch anything together before?

[Spike Lee]

Oh, yeah, we always watch. We always watch films before. We always watch films to see what are things that similar or to the, to the film we're doing, what new things we might look at. So Maddie and I love cinema. We love each other and we're dedicated to this art form we were in. And so there's several references, references in this film. We reference the French Connection.

[Jack]

On the train.

[Spike Lee]

Yeah, on the train. The defied ones. Tony Curtis and, and the great late, great Sidney Portier, Gene Hackman and from Connect French Connection. So we're cinephiles and here's the thing I like to say And I'm, I'm a 10 professor of film at NYU, the graduate film school. I've been teaching it 30 years. Ang Lee was my classmate, earn stickers and shot all my early films. My classmate Jim John was two years ahead of us. Nyu. I say to my students the first day of the year that, that if you're able to make a living doing what you love, you've won. Majority of people on this God's earth go to the grave, have hated a job they hate, haven't had a job they hated and they could do it. They don't want their children starved roof over the their heads and clothes on the back of food on the table. But when you make a living and doing what you love more than anything else, you won. And that's the approach that Maddie and I, and not just Maddie, but the people that work with me in front of and behind the camera, you know, Spike Lee joints or teams people work for me for, for many, many, many, many years. It's not just like I want to hook them up because they're great at what they do and I, you know, I'm a sports freak and so as many times the, the writer, producer, director of my films, I'm like a general manager in sports. You're gonna, we see many teams where I just had a, you know, a great player or and film a great story but people surrounding him but you know he's out there alone and that's, that doesn't turn out well. Many times you have to have a team and with the team come to togetherness and with a team called, with a team calls love. You watch any of these, these, these teams championship teams when they win, they talk about how they love each one of their teammates and the staff, even the ball boy spit on the court, whatever, you know, it's, it's love. And I know my sound corny, but I don't give a you know what it's love because it's too hard to do not loving what you're doing, you know you don't want it. When you love what you do, it's not a job. So even though we might have a 6, we have 6am calls people get their 5, 5:30 because they're loving what they do and they can have fun and we're going to do mate and we're going to work Together.

[Jack]

One of the things that's so interesting about that, though, in the movie, and I felt this watching it a little bit, is that there might be a little bit of you in David King, too.

[Spike Lee]

And what is that? Well, we both have beautiful wives.

[Jack]

I mean, maybe a few other things as well. But the movie is really smart about Stan culture and about what we call parasocial relationships now. You know, people who are out there who think that they know you and who want to be like you, emulate you, maybe even want to be you. I was wondering if that. How much that interested you in this story and the way that the, you know, this story's been updated.

[Spike Lee]

Well, it's not. I'm glad you used that word, updated. But this thing, you know, where you talking about is not new, but with technology, it's like, I mean, stalkers. So I read an article the other day about professional athletes are being stalked. No, I mean, like, it is this. This. We live in a crazy, insane world now. I'm even leaving out Trump. Even without him. I'm sweet without him. This world is bananas. And I know I might sound like old Fuddy Duddy when it was. It was so calm and Mayberry RFD stuff was happening back then, too. So if you watch this film, everybody, hopefully in theaters or not. I mean, I want to see an Apple plus, but hopefully see in the theaters first. That in a lot of ways, this film is reflection of the world we live today. The world we live today. And there's some scenes I feel very strong about when Denzel's talking about the music. AI is going to write music. These machines don't have any heart, any soul. And that's the principle that desert character is. He's a purist. And his rig company is failing because these young heads don't want to hear what he's doing, you know, and he's a purist. We say it in the film. He has the best ears in the business. And we even have a reference to Quick, who said he's like the hair apparent to Quincy Jones, who died while we were. Who died later while making this film. And not even talk about the great Eddie Palmieri, you know, who passed away a couple days before we had to. We're in New York. So you always have this conflict. This is not new about the old heads. And the youth would really, you could say, came to head during the Vietnam War, you know, and these beatniks and rebels have long hair and they don't take it whatever you want to say. And it's There's a great film by Peter Weir called the Day of Living Dangerously, the year of living Dangerously. And Mel Gibson, I'm not talking about politics, but great actor. Anyway, that's. That's where I'm calling this year 2025, the year of living dangerously. Because things going off the rails and Gaza and this, I mean, it's just. That's not the only thing. But it's crazy now. It is absolute crazy.

[Jack]

Well, it's interesting that you point out this kind of conflict between the youth and an older generation. For me, the best scene in the film is this showdown between Denzel and Rocky in the scene.

[Spike Lee]

You know what that is? That's High Noon and Denzel's Gary Cooper. I know who the other guy was.

[Jack]

That's the man in the black hat. You know, that's Rocky. So what Tell me about kind of conceiving that scene, especially visually, because, you know, on paper that could go badly and it's so brilliant.

[Spike Lee]

Well, it's from the original, which is great, but the fact that we're not talking about shoes and his music. It was not scripted, my brother, to turn to a rap battle. I look at a script and then start dropping bars from Nas's Illmatic. And then to ASAPS credit, he rolled with it. In fact, he has a line during that show down. He says, what is the rap battle? And that's example how that was not scripted. But here's the thing, though. You have to have a thing on set, establish where people feel free. Like is if you're pounding. You missed this line. You missed the line. What are you doing? What are you doing? I don't direct like that. I want to give people. Not everybody, because everybody can't improv. We got to know that from the jump. I know who could do what. Same thing as a baseball man, a football quarterback. You got to know what your players can do. You're not gonna ask this guy to kick 80 yard field goal or, you know, he. He doesn't hit from 40 outside 4. He can't do it. So you have to know what the people's. This is what I tell my class. What are the individuals who are in front of the camp? What are their strengths and weaknesses? And when Denzel, my brother, and Rocky, my brother, they were just. That stuff was all scribbled.

[Jack]

It works so well, it made it lit.

[Spike Lee]

Another thing is that when you lift up a scene at the same time, you lift up the whole film and this is the end of the film. This is like the finale that Goes.

[Jack]

Before the finale when you're. When you're on set and that's happening and they're, you know, riffing on the script and they're building out this battle and you guys are all working on it together. Do you know that day that you're like, we've just lifted this movie? Or is that something that you don't see until you're looking at it in post? What's your feel for that?

[Spike Lee]

You know, I also. I can only speak for myself, but what I'm trying to do is not bust out yelling and screaming. And as soon as I say cussing and I run it around the room. So I know I'm seeing crazy. If you ever see me at a Nick game courtside, I'm like that. But also, I gotta wait till I call cut.

[Jack]

Let me ask you about Denzel. You know, you've made a number of films together now, and you just talked.

[Spike Lee]

This is our fifth film together.

[Jack]

Fifth film is the Denzel who is in mo Better Blues. Can he do the things that the highest to lowest Denzel can do? Have you seen him add tools to his toolkit over time?

[Spike Lee]

Yes. Here's the thing. I normally keep repeating that phrase, here's the thing, but here's the thing. Great. Whether you're great musician, great artists, what makes you great is that you get greater. You don't. You just don't show up great. I mean, you. But you gotta. It's. It's building over your greatness built over years. Now, some people, you know, that might be great, and then they hit a plateau other than like. But the goal. And you really have to have God given gifts and determination. And more important, maybe put the work in. You cannot shuck and jive. I mean, you can't fake it. You can't fake the funk.

[Jack]

What does that mean, though, for Denzel? What does it mean for him to be putting the work in?

[Spike Lee]

He's a purist. He's a hard worker. He's deeply believed in God, a greater being. And in a lot of ways, he might not agree with us, but a lot of ways I think his. The way he approaches his craft is. Is religious. I'm gonna tell him that one day. I just thought of that. But the way he carries himself, it's. It's religion and doesn't want to cheat. Is God his maker? I feel he's the greatest living actor today. Now my brother Marty is going to say his brother.

[Jack]

Of course.

[Spike Lee]

They seen and the great seat live met was alive. He would say Al Pacino and Francis would say Branda all. They're all great. But I don't work with any of those guys. I can only go by my five films with my brother, Denzel Washington. Every time we work together, he does stuff that just amazes me. I mean, his range. I mean, it gets kind of tiresome. Just describing greatness for me, I know, is too easy, too cheap. Users were great, but I'm running out of silver bullets.

[Jack]

Well, the one other thing that I think really stood out to me about this one is that he and Jeffrey Wright. I just bought it.

[Spike Lee]

Let me hear it. Let me hear it.

[Jack]

Well, I just really, really bought it. You know what I mean? You know when you're watching a movie and you're like, these are real people. They have this relationship is deep and long, and there's something between them that is not said but that we understand. And it had me wondering in a situation like that. And I don't think Jeffrey and Denzel had worked together before.

[Spike Lee]

Jonathan Demi film. I forgot the name.

[Jack]

Oh, you write the Manchurian Candidate.

[Spike Lee]

Yes. That was the first only song.

[Jack]

That's right. Are they rehearsing, though? Like, are they building their bond on that?

[Spike Lee]

We all rehearsed, but it wasn't. It wasn't like rehearsal for a play. But great actors, you're on that level, it's a different thing. And they feed off each other. And one of. One of my favorite scenes in the film, Hope not giving too much away, when Jeffrey, Jeffrey Wright's character, knocks on his door and literally gets on his knees and begs him to pay the 17.5 million ransom. And that scene, you feel the hurt, but also the embarrassment he has of asking for that amount of money, knowing that character says, man, you can't even count this $17 million. It was. It was. When you get two actors like that and they're in a room, just them, just roll the camera.

[Jack]

They're pretty special together.

[Spike Lee]

I get the hell out the way and let them do their thing.

[Jack]

You are renowned for using music in films. This is a really interesting cocktail. In this one, you mentioned Eddie Palmieri, who plays a big part in a centerpiece sequence. But then you've got Howard Drossen's score, you've got this Scottish trio, you've got Rocky's music, you've got Iyanna Lee. Is that something that. Is something you know before production begins, that these are the pieces that you want? Is it something that develops as you're making the movie? Is it in post? Like, what that stew is Gonna be.

[Spike Lee]

Well, it was a combination of the both and. And my father Billy, great musician, composer. I can't play a lick any instrument, but I got my father's ears. And so that's always been one of my strong points. Music. My father discourse that she's gonna have at school days. Do the right thing and moan better blues. Then it was Terence Bletcher known as Howard Drossen. And I just know. I know music. How it works, how it doesn't work is a tool that's in my toolbox. Along with cinematography, the writing, the script, production design, costumes. On props, that's another thing. Denzel is a master using props. The scene where he picks up the grenade and says I'm gonna bolus. And then. Oh, that's not in the script. The scene was getting this guy where he picks up the radio mic he's put in his mouth. That's not the script. He uses everything that said props to make his performance come alive. He's you sport. Have you sports. Are you sports guy?

[Jack]

Yes. Major.

[Spike Lee]

You know that term five tools.

[Jack]

Of course. Well, a tento ball player 11 if you put a grenade in his hand. Yeah. I want to ask you a little bit about your career.

[Spike Lee]

Right.

[Jack]

Some of your films are acclaimed as like the greatest works in movie history. Right. There's do the Right Thing and Malcolm X and on down the Line. And then there's some that I feel like are a little bit forgotten or a little slept on. Is there one of yours that you feel like maybe deserves a little bit of shine that isn't in the same conversation as some of the best known stuff?

[Spike Lee]

25Th hour.

[Jack]

My favorite. Hell yes. Spike. Yes. Why do you think that's important?

[Spike Lee]

I think it's a living document of New York City after 9 11. Great book by David Benioff. And I don't think New York City World was ready for that film was too close after 9 11. But it's going to be. It's almost like a documentary, I would say of New York City. The hard Sol Nuke City on the microscope after the that terrific day.

[Jack]

I wanted to ask you about the making of that quickly too, because did you feel like when you set out to do that film, was that a way for you to cope with some of the aftermath of what had happened in the city?

[Spike Lee]

Great question. I was not in New York that the day before I flew to LA for meeting with Arnold Schwarzenegger. I was trying at that time, still trying. Do a film called Save Us. Joe Lewis, who I wrote with the Great.

[Jack]

Bo Schoberg, right?

[Spike Lee]

And Buzz Schulberg. And my wife called me up that morning, said, turn on tv. And I saw the second plane go in the tower. And Arnold called me. So she still wanted me. I said, let's meet. So we sat in this restaurant, not even talking about the film, but looking up at the TV screen. And that day I had to get back to New York and there was no. I don't. At that time, I didn't have my license, my driver, New York. I had my driver's license and I want to get home. And I went down to Union Station here in la and all the last train was sold out. And this beautiful black woman, I begged her back to back, said, let me speak to the porter. And they said, come on, Spike. So they alternated living spaces, but left a space, a bump for me. So I went back to New York from it goes la, Chicago, Chicago to New York. So I got back to New York three days later and, you know, I. I think that film will one day get the, you know, the love issue yet. But that did not. 20th hour late. Great. Phyllis, Steven Hoffman, Barry Pepper, Edward Norton, Rosario. I mean, that's a very. That film is very special to me.

[Jack]

I love to hear you say that, Anthony.

[Spike Lee]

Yorkers too.

[Jack]

Absolutely. I am a New Yorker as well, so, yeah, I'm very touched by that movie.

[Spike Lee]

Great score by Terence Blanche on that too.

[Jack]

Broadly speaking. What do you think is missing from Hollywood right now?

[Spike Lee]

It's just hard and hard to get stuff made and I've been blessed be able to do that for some films. You guys streaming too? I'm not. I'm not mad about streaming this, you know, for us from Apple plus, this film would not have been made. I think that the executives here, not. I think they're. There's so much writing stuff there, they'll. They're not so eager to take risk on. On new faces, new new. New people, new ideals, new stories. But you guys, anybody might say that was. That's the beginning of the Louis B. The Mayor and you know, all them old cats. So I had to come through. And I'm not the only one through independent cinema. So that's. That's where we are now.

[Jack]

Do you know what your next film's gonna be?

[Spike Lee]

I know, but I don't like the jinx stuff, so I don't really talk about stuff till it happens.

[Jack]

Why is the Schulberg script. Why has it been so hard to get that made over the years?

[Spike Lee]

I wish you could tell me. This is Bud And I, I got to meet Bud through Kazan. You know, Bud won an Oscar for On the Waterfront. Bud is in the Boxing hall of Fame. Bud will make Sammy run. And Bud was at both Joe Lewis maximum fights at Yankee Stadium. So this feels about the relation between Joe Lewis and Max melon and his FDR, Ellen DeRosa, Hitler, Gerbils, Lena Horn, sugary robbers. I mean everybody's in this film. It's. And I said this many times on this, this tour for this film, but I literally. Bud made me promise on his dying bed to get this filmmaker. And I'm, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna be a liar. I'm getting it made. Oh, it's called Save us Joe Lewis. That second smell. Joe didn't train for the first fight. Hitler and Gerber sent the, the Hindenburg from to New York to bring them back to the joyous Germans. Second fight, Joe knocked him out. No, before the second fight, FDR summoned Joe Lewis to the White House. Wheeled next. I mean, you know, he's a wheelchair. Said these muscles make us beat the Nazis. And it was well believed, Bud Thomas well believed around the world that the winner of the second fight was determined to Victor World War II. So it's a great, great epic story.

[Jack]

Can't wait to see it.

[Spike Lee]

Me too. I can't wait to make it.

[Jack]

Two last quick ones for you. First one, before we got on, you said this is the Knicks year. You really, you really believe it.

[Spike Lee]

Go to your, go to New York.

[Jack]

Go. Your optimism is inspiring. I'm not that kind of Knicks fan. I have a hard time, man. It's been a long time.

[Spike Lee]

Is it? Look, I don't wish injuries on anybody. Halliburton and Tatum, they're not playing this year. I'm not scared of Cleveland. So just give us a chance to go against OKC in the NBA finals. I'll take that.

[Jack]

I'll take it too. Spike. We end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers what is the last great thing they have seen. Have you seen any great movies?

[Spike Lee]

Sinners, Sinners, Sinners by Brian Ryan, his co produce, his wife, his partner Zinzi. That's the film, that's the film.

[Jack]

What is it about that film that you loved?

[Spike Lee]

The originality. I'm telling you, that scene, you know, the music scene, that's the best filmmaking I've seen in years. That's just out the park. I mean that, that. Here's the thing, Ryan called me out of nowhere and say, are you, Are you and where are you at? I'M in la. He said, you're in la. Can you get to the IMAX theater? Because this is the final thing we're doing with goals of theater. It said, can you get how that just happened being la, that phone call? So I rushed to the IMAX theater where, you know, making sure it goes straight for goes to theater. So the technicians there, but in the middle of theater, is me, Ryan and Zinzi. And they're never going to invite me to another screen alone because acting like I was courtside, the guard, I was double down. Ryan, that, that film, that's a cinematic masterpiece. I need to cinema to another level. You know, people hate if they want to, but the proof's in the pudding. That's the joint right there. That's the joint. You like it?

[Jack]

I loved it. It's my favorite movie of the year. And you know, you know, from joints, that's what you do. So thank you so much for the time. Congrats on highest to lowest. Go Nicks.

[Spike Lee]

And also, let's have your people, my people. Don't let this be another 39. How long you been doing this?

[Jack]

Eight years.

[Spike Lee]

Don't be another eight years on another. When we're together. Okay.

[Jack]

When you. When Joe Louis comes out, you're coming back. That's it.

[Spike Lee]

Whoever the next film is.

[Jack]

Okay. Okay. Whatever the next film is. Spike, thank you. Appreciate you.

[Amanda]

Bye.

[Spike Lee]

Bye.

[Jack]

Thank you, Spike Lee. Thanks to our producer, Jack Sanders for his work on this episode. Next week, we build the Robert Altman hall of Fame. How are you feeling?

[Amanda]

Like I have a lot of homework to do, but it's okay. I started early. I'm committed.

[Jack]

Yep.

[Amanda]

You know, and this is. This is one of your faves, so a real time for you to shine.

[Jack]

If you would like to prep for this episode and you're not Amanda, on the Criterion Channel right now, there are a number of Altman films as well as my introduction to those films. So if you want to watch that stuff before we talk, I'll try not to repeat myself too much when we do our episode. We'll see you then.