‘Rollerball’ (1975) With Bill Simmons and Brian Koppelman

Summary

The Rewatchables: 'Rollerball' (1975) Episode Summary

Podcast Information:

• Title: The Rewatchables
• Host/Author: The Ringer (Bill Simmons)
• Guests: Brian Koppelman, Producer Craig
• Episode: 'Rollerball' (1975)
• Release Date: August 12, 2025

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1. Introduction

In this episode of The Rewatchables, Bill Simmons welcomes Brian Koppelman to discuss the 1975 cult classic film 'Rollerball'. Celebrating its 50th anniversary, the hosts delve deep into the movie's enduring appeal, its thematic depth, and its place in the pantheon of rewatchable films.

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2. Overview of 'Rollerball'

Rollerball is set in a dystopian future where traditional wars have been abolished and replaced by the violent sport of Rollerball, a high-stakes game broadcasted to billions of viewers. The film explores themes of corporate control, loss of individuality, and the spectacle of violence as entertainment.

Brian Koppelman introduces the setting:

“[01:37] Brian Koppelman: Imagine a world without nations, few of us making decisions on a global basis. Controlled by corporations...”

Bill Simmons adds:

“[02:14] Bill Simmons: Rollerball. Rated R. This episode of the Rewatchables is presented by Prime...”

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3. Themes and Societal Commentary

The hosts discuss how Rollerball serves as a critique of corporatocracy and the commodification of violence. The sport symbolizes the suppression of individualism, where players become disposable assets for corporate entertainment.

Brian Koppelman elaborates:

“[06:04] Brian Koppelman: ...it's a paranoid thriller in the shadow of Watergate and Vietnam.”

Bill Simmons reflects:

“[07:06] Bill Simmons: ...we have controlled television... a society that has abolished love and hate, aggression, and individuality.”

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4. James Caan's Performance

James Caan’s portrayal of Jonathan E. is a focal point of the discussion. His duality—being both a detached individual and a charismatic athlete—is examined for its complexity and ambiguity.

Bill Simmons shares his perspective:

“[13:03] Bill Simmons: ...this is my single favorite... performance anyone's given. There's entire scenes where he just seems checked out...”

Brian Koppelman responds:

“[14:32] Brian Koppelman: ...he was the most credible athlete... the look in his eye when he's playing sports...”

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5. Production and Stunts

The episode highlights the film’s groundbreaking practical effects and stunt work, especially considering its 1975 production. The Rollerball track design by Herbert Sherman, featuring a combination of roulette and pinball elements, is praised for its originality.

Brian Koppelman notes:

“[32:03] Brian Koppelman: ...the first movie ever that the stunt people were credited on individually.”

Bill Simmons adds:

“[32:09] Bill Simmons: ...half the stunts you're like, man, that looks like that guy got hurt. I don't know how they did it.”

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6. Reception and Legacy

Initially receiving mixed reviews, Rollerball has grown in stature over the decades, appreciated for its visionary themes and intense action sequences. The hosts discuss how the film anticipated future societal issues and remains relevant.

Bill Simmons reflects on its legacy:

“[60:36] Brian Koppelman: ...the movie's so good that as a whole... it got so much right.”

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7. Comparisons with Other 70s Films

Rollerball is compared to other seminal 1970s films like Parallax View, Network, and Apocalypse Now. The discussion underscores its unique blend of sports drama and political thriller elements.

Brian Koppelman compares it:

“[17:07] Brian Koppelman: ...this is like Rollerball... it's like flying cars in The Jetsons...”

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8. Favorite Scenes and Moments

The hosts share their most rewatchable scenes, highlighting the film's key moments such as the violent Rollerball games, the dystopian party scenes, and the climactic confrontations between Jonathan and the corporate executives.

Brian Koppelman praises a scene:

“[44:09] Bill Simmons: They have super weapons, like little tiny...]

Bill Simmons shares his favorite:

“[46:47] Brian Koppelman: ...the ball hitting the guy... you just feel really is so effective...”

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9. Potential Remakes and Awards

Producer Craig expresses enthusiasm for Rollerball’s potential as a television series, drawing parallels to successful remakes like Andor. The discussion also touches on hypothetical awards categories specific to the film's unique elements.

Producer Craig suggests:

“[88:27] Brian Koppelman: ...the most batshit insane. There's no other movie really that's like this...”

Bill Simmons adds humorously:

“[58:52] Producer Craig: ...the worst jerseys and helmets I've ever seen in a sport.”

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10. Conclusion

The episode wraps up with reflections on Rollerball’s place in film history, its visionary critique of society, and the enduring fascination with its intense, well-crafted narrative. The hosts advocate for the film's recognition as a cinematic classic deserving of study and appreciation.

Producer Craig concludes:

“[90:10] Producer Craig: ...this desperately needs to be a television show. Tony Gilroy...”

Bill Simmons finalizes:

“[97:04] Brian Koppelman: ...Rollerball... we'll never learn what really happened. And this movie makes you feel all that shit.”

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Notable Quotes

• Brian Koppelman ([06:04]): “...it's a paranoid thriller in the shadow of Watergate and Vietnam.”
• Bill Simmons ([13:03]): “...this is my single favorite... performance anyone's given.”
• Brian Koppelman ([14:32]): “...he was the most credible athlete...”
• Producer Craig ([90:57]): “...this desperately needs to be a television show.”
• Brian Koppelman ([97:04]): “...this movie makes you feel all that shit.”

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Highlighted Moments

• Rollerball Gameplay Design ([07:06] Bill Simmons): Discussion on the intricacies and originality of the game's design.
• James Caan’s Duality ([13:03] Bill Simmons): Exploring the complexity of Caan’s character.
• Stunt Innovations ([32:03] Brian Koppelman): Recognition of the film's pioneering stunt work.
• Climactic Endgame ([46:47] Brian Koppelman): The impactful moment of the ball hitting a player’s head.
• Dystopian Party Scenes ([39:30] Brian Koppelman): Analysis of the film’s portrayal of a controlled, superficial society.

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Final Thoughts

Rollerball stands as a multifaceted film that merges sports spectacle with deep societal critique. Through engaging discussions, Bill Simmons and Brian Koppelman illuminate the film’s strengths, from outstanding performances and innovative production to its prophetic themes that resonate even decades later. This episode not only celebrates Rollerball but also cements its status as a timeless rewatchable classic.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

This episode is brought to you by Disney. This summer, Disney is going retro with all your Disney and Hulu throwback faves. Hit endless rewind on Disney with the Princess diaries, the Lizzie McGuire Movie and Freaky Friday. Then with Hulu, Throw it back with Gilmore Girls, One Tree Hill and Full House. All of these and much more now streaming with Hulu on Disney plus with a bundle subscription available with bundle plans starting at $10.99 a month. Terms apply. Visit disneyplus.com hulu for details. The rewatchables is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast network where this guy has not been on in a long time, Brian Koppelman. He's very busy. He's making TV shows, movies. What else are you doing? You're doing a bunch of stuff.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, I'm just honestly returning your texts. That takes up some time and it's fun. You had a Knicks run.

[Bill Simmons]

You had a big Knicks run. You had to divest yourself from emotionally after they beat my team, but then fell apart next round. You had that.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, I didn't anticipate and I should have because you know what? We did this. You already gave me. You basically told me what I saw you like two days before I was at your house two days before the Knicks lost or something. And you were like, just so you know, this is ending now. And I was like, what do you mean? And you're like, it's gonna end now. So I knew, well, you'll have Giannis.

[Bill Simmons]

You'll be fine. We are still doing one word movie month. And this is a movie you and I have talked about for a long time. It's finally happening. 50 year anniversary of this movie coming out, I think two months ago. Rollerball is next. In the not too distant future, wars will no longer exist, but there will be rollerball.

[Brian Koppelman]

Imagine a world without nations, few of.

[Bill Simmons]

Us making decisions on a global basis. Controlled by corporations, sickness, no needs and many luxuries. A society that has abolished love and hate, aggression and individuality, replaced them with the most fantastic entertainment of all time. Televised to 2 billion hypnotized viewers, it is more than a game. It is rollerball.

[Brian Koppelman]

James Kong, John Houseman.

[Bill Simmons]

Rollerball. Rated R. This episode of the Rewatchables is presented by Prime. You listen to this podcast for the Movie Talk. So let's set the scene. Our lead, tall, dark, stranded at the airport, hours of delays. He's scrolled, strolled and loitered by every overpriced snack stand. But just when all hope seems lost. Plot twist. He remembers he has prime and without a whole library of free ebooks ready to read right from his device. Cue the triumphant score. Roll credits. Free ebooks library. It's on Prime.

[Brian Koppelman]

Foreign.

[Bill Simmons]

Koppelman. No player is greater than the game itself. The message of rollerball, which we've now spent a half century unwinding and completely going in the opposite direction. Not to mention all the other crazy things about this movie. Unbelievable.

[Brian Koppelman]

The individual, Bill, is not. The whole point of the game is that the individual is not better or more important and can influence the game.

[Bill Simmons]

Disposable athletes. It was the opposite of the player empowerment era. Now we live In a world 50 years after this movie was made where Devin Booker is signing a $150 million two year contract extension and Patrick Mahomes is making $500 million. And there's so many fun sports elements to this. This movie's been in my life my entire life. Much like with you, I'm sure you can't really even remember a life without rollerball. Are we going to talk later about when you saw this or.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, we can talk about it anytime you want. I mean, this is the thing. This was the first R rated movie I got my dad to take me to.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Brian Koppelman]

I was nine years old, 1975. So because the commercial, which I want to talk, I'll talk about later. And what is most watchable, most rewatchable. But I remember I like from the moment the first commercial aired. Because James Caan was Sonny and James Caan was Brian Piccolo. And it was like him. I was a pro wrestling fanatic. And this looked like every. All those things just lined up and then you're just sitting there in the movie. It was like a few years later, this other friend's dad took us to see Apocalypse now, which, terrible mistake. But this also was like a real. Holy shit. First R rated movie in the theater. I don't. I would love to tell you that the. I, I remember the, you know, the ticket taker looking at my dad like, don't do that. But they didn't. But I just remember holding my dad's hand going in to see that movie and my mind was blown by it. How'd you remember?

[Bill Simmons]

I don't remember the first. Not in the theater. Um, at some point it was on cable. Probably like a lot of other people just got drawn into the games because there's three giant games in this movie and I don't know which one sucked me in. But over the years just became the most rewatchable movie. And the games are like basically an hour apart. It's the first 10 minutes and then it's like right around the hour mark and then the last 15 minutes, obviously. And it's really one of the great first sports movies. It's. If you go through the lineage of it, it's the longest yard in 74, it's rollerball in 75, it's Rocky and Bad News Bears in 76, slap shot in 77. And we're off. Like we're, we're just ripping off sports movies and classics and there's at least one good one a year. And this is, you know, an all time sports movie for me and an all time James Caan. I can't wait to talk about. Was he good in this movie? Was he great? Was he spotty? It's all over the place.

[Brian Koppelman]

But it's also a paranoid. The movie's also a paranoid thriller.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, good. Oh, in the whole Parallax View, Three Days, the Condor, whole world.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, it's this movie. So what's so fudgeing Unbelievable to me about the movie when you. It's like, it is like Parallax View Network. It goes. It's a year before network. And if you think about what the movie's about, it's. It's as much, yes, it's totally a sports movie, but it's also a paranoid thriller in the shadow of fucking Watergate in Vietnam, man.

[Bill Simmons]

Right, well, and the, the corporations. Yes. And these shadow shadowy figures are taking over and they're just going to drum out all the individuality that we have. Listen, there's been a lot of science fiction movies over the years. This, this universe we go into. There's pieces I like. Like as I was growing up, I'm like, you know, this might not be bad if this is the future. Just get together. There's hot 70s babes every. Weird parties where we get to set pine trees on fire. And then there's a really violent sport that I could follow. I might be okay.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, they make a really fascinating choice to show. Like they only show these couple like classes of people where life doesn't. You can tell that there's in the way that you know yet at first, right. You're a kid watching, you're like, oh, look at that. He gets his pick of women. And then you realize, well, except the women have not only. They have no say in it. They just get moved around. Like not only chess pieces like checkers, but then also he doesn't even get to. He's like, I'd like To keep that one. They're like, no, an executive wants. An executive wants her. And then Shoop sucked out of his house.

[Bill Simmons]

It's basically Raya, the dating app Raya. But you don't have choice in who you end up with.

[Brian Koppelman]

Simmons.

[Bill Simmons]

Look, it's, it's trying to say a whole bunch of things and we can get into all of them. But I think ultimately the reason I love this movie so much is it invents this world, but it invents a sport. It just invents this sport. This sport, it's hockey, it's football, it's roller derby. There's some judo in there from scratch. This sport doesn't exist. There's no pieces of it. They're just kind of figuring out on the fly. And the sport becomes so convincing that after this movie came out, they actually, the producers and Norman Jewish and director got approached to be like, hey, let's do rollerball leagues. And he was like, the fuck are you talking about? The whole point of this is this sports too violent. And this is where pro sports is going. And we, we can't have sports like this. That's how realistic it was.

[Brian Koppelman]

They use a heavy steel ball that nobody can, Nobody could pick up. I mean, and that kills you if you get, if you get hit with it, you know?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

So, yeah, it would have been tough to. Would have been tough to make it happen. But of course, As a fucking 10 year old, I mean, I would. Yeah, you're like, sure, let's go, let's watch it. Because what's the difference between that and when you're watching pro wrestling? And also, I'm sure, I know you've talked about this before, but, you know, I mean, there were three channels and one of them would sometimes have roller derby on.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. Well, and then we would get. We would get all those garbage sports on the weekends. The trash sports superstars and a million version of those.

[Brian Koppelman]

Why couldn't Brian Oldfield have played? He could have played rolling ball. He would have been great at it. Right.

[Bill Simmons]

I really wish producer Craig, who, by the way, a rarity, I don't know if this has ever happened before, he declined his flex category and said, I don't want to weigh in on this film until the end of the movie. So I don't even know what that means, but I wish producer Craig had been there in the 70s as we had all these ridiculous sports that they fed us. Because we had three networks, we didn't have enough pro sports to go around. Nobody had figured out any sort of scheduling and we would just battle network stars. Every TV star in the universe was just competing against each other in these weird events. And that was just what we grew up with.

[Brian Koppelman]

But we watched him so closely, dude. And they were all recorded and cut, like probably months in advance.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

And now you'd know everything before it happened. You would know when it was happening. Someone would have leaked a piece of it. I mean, I'm sure you watched Unreal. And it's incredible how they're even planning, we're not going to put this on tv. But we know social media will catch this and put. But we were just like suckers sitting at home going, I Hope Kyle Ro Jr. Is able to beat.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, Gabe Kapla would have been like, just beat Bob Conrad and the 100 yard dash, like doing a selfie. Yeah. It would have ruined everything. But yeah, so roller derby was the sport that was on. So was pro wrestling. I remember watching the nasl and if people were competing, I was probably watching. This seemed like an insanely great version of it.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, I don't even think Craig could picture, like, what we had to eat when we were watching that. Like pizzas that were like a puck. They weren't even like, Right. That had like the pizza on the inside. I mean, we were living like animals, Bill. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

We had Stouffer's Mac and cheese. That was a big one. Or those little Swanson turkey dinners. Yeah. It was just spaghetti and meatballs. Whatever we were doing. All right, so I think this movie's set maybe 45 to 50 years in the future. What do you think? They never really say, but it's somewhere like 20 years.

[Brian Koppelman]

2018.

[Bill Simmons]

2018 is officially. Yeah, okay. Because I had that in my notes and I wasn't. I didn't feel 100% on that.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think so. And I, I, yeah, I think you might be right. I dug out so original. I dug out the short story that it was based on too.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, nice.

[Brian Koppelman]

Doesn't say 2018, but it gives some context for it. It feels like it's probably set in that.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. So that's like 40 plus years in the future. Free speech discouraged. No more schooling. Now we have conditioning. Just about everybody making meager wages, but poverty is basically gone because everybody makes the same amount. We have, I guess, controlled television. We have weird food situations where there's just like envelopes. I don't even know what's. I guess that's like pre postmates. There's no kids anywhere. There's no kid in this Entire movie. There's no babies or kids. I know they're having them, but we never see one. Right?

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. And you have to get. It's like you have to get permission to have kids. That's in the story. But you can see in all those futuristic movies like that, it's very right. Because the resources are scarce and they want to control. And so not everyone gets permission to have kids.

[Bill Simmons]

There's no dogs. There's no rescue dogs. Like now rollerball would just be like, Jonathan E. Has three dogs.

[Brian Koppelman]

There's no last names even.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, true, true. So anyway, rollerball emerges and it symbolizes the futility of individual achievement because people just die. I can't wait to talk about the stats from this later, but just people routinely die. Multiple people die in a game. And yet here's our guy, Jonathan E. Played by James Caan, who's transcended the game. What is he? He's Brady. Crossed with Michael Jordan, crossed with Ali. Is that what we're supposed to think? 10 years just winning every year.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. Tiger Jordan Brady, he's on that list.

[Bill Simmons]

Never gets mentioned with the greats, in my opinion.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think Jonathan. But I will say, as a kid, that stayed with us also, because everything James Caan brought to it. I mean, you and I have talked about James Caan when we did Misery.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

But then also when he died, you had me come on the pod and we talked about him on the pod, I think. But when you started already by asking what I. What do you think of the performance? I have. I have a lot of thoughts on it, so. But how do you. How does it hit you, man?

[Bill Simmons]

I'm going to do my hottest take right now. So this is my. CR Thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford. Hottest Take a word of all the sports movies, this is my single favorite. Great one minute terrible the next minute performance anyone's given. There's entire scenes where he just seems checked out and he's just muttering his words and I have no idea what he's going for. And then there's other scenes where he becomes Sonny Corleone as a rollerball player. He's carrying the mystique and charisma of an A plus plus list athlete perfectly. And yet I don't really understand what he's doing with some of the. He's just kind of motoring his lines like this and seems kind of vaguely drugged out. I don't really understand the performance, but I love it. I really love it.

[Brian Koppelman]

I love the performance. First of all, I think it's important. Like, if you think about it, he's the most credible over and over. When he did this, he was the most credible athlete, like in mo. In a movie, when him and Reynolds.

[Bill Simmons]

I would say him or Burt Reynolds were the two where I actually felt athletically, they could hang in any situation.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, I mean, it's. It's amazing in the Gambler when he loses the basketball game because, like, you're so used to seeing James Caan win and be amazing at sports, but also in this, just the physical condition he came in at to do this movie, he basically has, like, that V tape or he looks like Roman Gabriel or something like that. The way he's built and it. Right. I mean, it's amazing how fucking. You just don't question because that's the first. We talked about this a lot, like, in life, too. The moment you see an actor throw a ball and they can't really throw the ball or hit a tennis ball and they can't really hit it, it takes you right out of the movie. And there's not a second of this when he's doing the sports. Also, like, the look in his eye when he's playing the sports and just, you know, the entire, like, fucking capability. And then I have a slightly different take. I think he's a guy who's been kind of asleep, lulled into sleep by this world that he's been put in.

[Bill Simmons]

And that's why he's playing it that way. I think you're right.

[Brian Koppelman]

Come to life when he's playing the sport and don't ask questions and don't think about anything. You're. Your houses are delivered to you, women are delivered to you. Money is delivered. You have to get to the game, and you have to be in game shape, and that's basically all you have to do.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, what's your take on the white pill they give them? Because that seems like at least part of, like, why they. Everybody seems a little zonked out.

[Brian Koppelman]

Well, the executives take it to dream of being athletes, and the athletes take the dream of being executives. Right. And it's like MDMA before mdma probably. I. I think it kind of just makes you. Just kind of just makes you float right and. And feel good.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, this is like what we talked about after Khan died. Like, just such an alpha, just to kind of. When they. When we always talk about why don't we have, like, lead actors anymore? You know, where are they? Or we have pieces of these guys, but not 100% of them.

[Brian Koppelman]

And.

[Bill Simmons]

And I think Back to Reynolds and Longest Yard and then in Deliverance and then Khan in this movie and him as Sonny Corleone. Nobody pulled off the sleeveless white T shirt, which we called 50 years ago the wife beater. No longer allowed to say that. But the sleeveless white T shirt, he looked the best in it. He just had the best shoulders and just always looked like he was about to either bring his Gamar over or go outside and get in a fight in an alley with somebody. He just, he always had it and he had it in this movie. Just alpha all the time.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's the show. Yeah. The shoulders to hip ratio. Nobody else had that. But I also, I think, you know, it's funny, you texted me and you were like. Because I don't want to undersell this to people listening who don't know the movie. You text me and say it is like the most batshit insane. There's no other movie really that's like this because it is half a sports movie and half a paranoid thriller.

[Bill Simmons]

And it's a dystopian science fiction movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's a dystopian science fiction future that's supposed to telegraph what's going to happen in. In the world. And in the middle of it is the greatest made up sporting contest ever. And so this, I think in the times people didn't understand it. It's actually, I think it's a great movie and like a. Not just like super fun movie. Like, I think on reflection, it got so much shit right about. Yes. Who. Whether the play. Because the end. The end of the movie does introduce the player empowerment era. The whole point is they're trying to stop the player empowerment era.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

And the human empowerment era of people who are just workers. Cause it's a worker revolt movie too. And at the end, the whole point is the individual can. And it is. This movie is super fun. You could fucking get stoned and watch it or drunk and watch it. But you could also watch it with like a class of philosophy majors and pencils and pens. That's what's so incredible about it. It kind of can hit you wherever you are.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And so usually when a movie like this works, they put so much thought into everything. So I even think about this fake sport they created. There are all these little wrinkles with it that are so fucking cool. Like when the guys, when the guys are skating around in the pre game warmups and they all have their little gimmick. It's almost like the warriors in the, you know, in the gang. When each Gang has their different gimmick. Like, the Tokyo team does this, and then the Houston team, they. They have like, they, they swerve more. But they say of that you have like. I really feel like they put thought into like, we're gonna have six skaters, There's a guy who scoops the ball up, and then there's three guys on motorcycles. And you're gonna see the rosters and the lights are gonna go out if somebody got hurt, and there's gonna be subs and it's gonna move like a sporting event. And you watch and you're like, how the fuck did they come up with this? It created a sport.

[Brian Koppelman]

That's the other thing that's so amazing. The motorcycles, like when you were a kid and suddenly there were motorcycles mixing in and guys get knocked off their motorcycles. It was like one of the most first. It's so fucking dark and brutal. But they show you the bloodlust of the audience and you get caught up in it when you're in the movie theater. And yeah, I mean, you know, obviously that scene when the coach comes in, the specialist coach comes in to tell them about the Tokyo team and the players don't want to listen. I mean, that is so much like the way you hear about players now not wanting to be coached sometimes. But also totally racist. And the movie's super. Got a ton of that racist shit.

[Bill Simmons]

All through mid set. It's 50 years ago, but like that.

[Brian Koppelman]

Moment when you were a kid in the theater at home watching the commercials and yeah, when the Tokyo team does that turn that one move toward the center of the floor, you were just like that. I got to see that. Like anything I have to do to see that. And everyone walked around imitate. I mean, didn't you walk? I mean, you just walked around trying to do that thing like that they do when they go low. It's so cool.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, it combines so many things we loved as kids, right? Because even you have like, like the, the roller derby, all these stupid sports that we were watching nonstop. Then you have the, the uniforms. Then you have like an easy, easy sport to follow where it's like there's only a couple goals in every game, right? So it's like a little like soccer cross. But then it has the violence of football, which is really what I think this movie, I don't know if it's about the violence of football or the violence of sports in general. But Now, I think 50 years later, UFC is 25 years, 20 years away from being created the power slap league is 45 years from being created. Football by the time we get to the late 70s, there's that famous CBS montage of the pregame show and it's just guys getting nailed. It's on YouTube. Every once in a while it's like it's the Brett Rustberger and each thing is just a football player getting demolished. And this is what sports was kind of like. But nobody was, was putting in any perspective. So I think that's what they're trying to say.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, well, they're, I mean, they're, yeah, they're, they're, they're trying to say that the gladiator thing never went away. It's never that far away. Right. That will always show up for the gladiators. And we're always trying to find a way to kind of justify like, you know, bloodsport. And we are. Right. I watched, I mean, I'm no better. I'm no better. I watched UFC 1, literally watched USC 1, 2 and 3. I could tell you what those fights were like. Like we all locked in and that was the closest thing was really close to rollerball. I'm not sure you're going to talk about Norman Jewison, but you know, when you said, oh, they really were careful. I mean, one of the most fascinating director runs because this guy made absolute stone cold classics. And then he missed wide, you know, but was a great, in the end, a really, really important filmmaker. I mean, listen, the guy made Cincinnati Kid, which as you can imagine, real important to me.

[Bill Simmons]

That's 1965. Yeah, he is almost a four decade run because he has the Russians are coming. The Russians are Coming in the heath of the night, Thomas Crown affair. And it's like, wow, this guy's doing great. Then he has Fiddler in the Roof and Jesus Christ Superstar back to back. That's weird. Rollerball fist and justice for all. And then he just kind of keeps going as Moonstruck. He ends with the hurricane in 1999. He's had like a, he gets that.

[Brian Koppelman]

As like, you know, right there toward the end. I mean, I'm wearing, I'm wearing my expos hat as a little salute to Canadian Norman Jewison. Yeah, yeah. Important director.

[Bill Simmons]

I think it's fascinating that he thought people would be appalled by the violence in this movie. And then they were like, yo, any interest in starting a rollerball league? And he's like, what's going on? The ending in this movie is one of the better endings in a sports movie with the dead silent crowd, the ball goes in and then Jonathan Skating faster and faster. And the way they do it, the music, some of the opera stuff they use.

[Brian Koppelman]

And then the cut to the terrible, ineffective coach suddenly chanting Jonathan with everybody. Yeah, I agree with that. Jonathan. That's good, dude. Yeah, it's a really perfect. It is a perfect ending, but it leads you. Does that ending. Did it always leave you feeling good? Because the ending leaves me feeling. Not a little bit. I mean, you're so happy that Jonathan lived, but it's not like it's. Everybody else is dead.

[Bill Simmons]

I love the ending. And I'm in on Jonathan. I think he's back for year 11. Like LeBron Jonathan. He's doing Instagram things over the summer. Get ready for rollerball. Year 11. I'm going to miss all of my teammates because they're all dead. Hopefully I'll have other teammates. Can we talk about the corporate autocracy? So the population is now concentrated in six corporate global city states. Transport, food, communication, housing, luxury, and energy. And Houston's in the energy sector. And Hausman seems like he's the head of all these people, but basically we learned the executive class rules. All. All the nations are bankrupt and gone. It's just these six places. And then I think each one has a rollerball team. Was my take. I think that's right.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's not said super clearly, but it's my guess.

[Bill Simmons]

So if you. So transport, food, communication, housing, luxury, and energy. Which one do you think New York was? Because New York's the final team in the movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Maybe transportation.

[Bill Simmons]

Transportation, luxury, maybe because they also said there's a Rome, Pittsburgh game they mentioned. So maybe the league has more than. I don't know. We know of six cities. So could Pittsburgh, New York and Houston have been the three American cities? And then we have Madrid, Tokyo.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, that's a big online argument, right? That's a big online argument right now is what are the four major cities? You know, that's a huge TikTok thing right now. The four major.

[Bill Simmons]

New York for major cities.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, people are really arguing about it. So now you can introduce this into it that maybe there are just three.

[Bill Simmons]

Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, New York, Houston. We've already solved this, guys. And then Los Angeles just gets cut out completely in rollerball. Apparently we have no LA team. Housman, another guy we grew up with his eyebrows. I don't know if you got to watch this on a nice big hdtv. His eyebrows are a supporting actor in the movie. It's unlike anything I've ever seen. I watched it.

[Brian Koppelman]

I did not. I Watched it on tv Like I watched on a big TV screen Again, I've watched it on computer, too, but I just watched it on the big screen thing, that moment. Houseman's whole career, he never had a moment. Like when he enters the thing with the two girls. You've never seen Hausman. He's usually like, you know, behind a desk teaching a law class or in a commercial barking at somebody about business. And then here he gets to in that same corporate thing, but he's entering with just these, you know, these two courtesans, because that's what they are in this movie. They're cortisones. And I thought that was. I'm just picturing him doing the small. Like when they said cut, I was thinking about when they said cut. You know, has been turning to them and just whatever that conversation.

[Bill Simmons]

Hey, ladies.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, what was that? You know, because that party's one of the strangest scenes in any movie I've ever seen in my life.

[Bill Simmons]

I cannot absolutely wait to talk about it. Hausman, James Mason. James Mason. It's been disallowed. Like the. The. Just the distinct voices that. We don't have guys like that anymore either. Who's our distinct voice? English actor guy in 2025. Do we have one?

[Brian Koppelman]

I think there are a couple of them. I mean, we did. Yeah, we have a couple of them.

[Bill Simmons]

As good as Hausman, like, has been calls you and. And you're trying to convince him to be on your new TV show, and you would just be in awe. The entire zoom of every sentence he said.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, I mean, I guess Dame Judi Dench is probably like that person in a way, if you think about it. She has that, you know, it's like from. From that point of view. And yeah, most of the British actors now, they act in American accents so frequently, so it doesn't feel like that. Right. They would have had that guy.

[Bill Simmons]

Now, how did you feel about the corporatocracy that they lay out now that we're in 2025 and we're being run by a bunch of corporations? It's kind of weird. I mean, literally, we're being run by like five corporations.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, literally, there's not one person listening who wants to hear me talk about this.

[Bill Simmons]

We're going to move on then. James Kahn 1971 Brian Song 72 the Godfather 74 Freebie and the Bean 74 the Gambler 75 Funny lady with. With Barbra Streisand, 75, Rollerball. That's all in five years, the wheels come off a little bit. I think for our guy Jimmy. There's some playboy mansions, early cocaine era.

[Brian Koppelman]

He started really living like Jonathan.

[Bill Simmons]

The IMDb gets rocky. There's a brief comeback from 79 to 81 with chapter two in Thief. And then in 82, he's in Bolera with Bo Derek and some movie called Kiss Me Goodbye, disappears for five years, stops acting. And I think when people talk about who was the craziest during the cocaine era, he's always mentioned as a how is he still alive Guy. What's interesting about his movie career, he turned down the following movies. French Connection, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, Close Encounters, Superman and Kramer versus Kramer. This guy after Redford. And maybe Newman was the third call. I think maybe Reynolds. Maybe it was 3A, 3B.

[Brian Koppelman]

Jack also. But Jack turned everything down. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I think people knew not even to call Jack. Yeah, but he was in that world, though, where he's just. I mean, if he has two of those, his 70s are. Com. Are even.

[Brian Koppelman]

But then it's so great because he gets the amazing comeback then, right? He gets his own TV series. He gets Misery. I mean, it all turns around. He does get a great sort of last bunch of years, I think, where he got to be James Caan again and he got to watch his son become a television star and all that stuff. But yeah, the lost years of him and some, you know, then a bunch of unsavory guys hanging around at the Playboy Mansion, you know, trading. Getting to hang with James Caan for coke. I agree. It's a tough. It's a tough moment for the guy.

[Producer Craig]

It's tough.

[Bill Simmons]

Have you and Levine ever kicked the tires on a Playboy Mansion, late 70s scripted series or no, people.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, that's for the next time we see you. That's our one meeting with Oliver Stone. I'll tell you another time.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, that sounds.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oliver Stone wanted to make that Hugh Hefner.

[Bill Simmons]

It's one of those great ideas that'll never happen. Yeah. One other thing about rollerball, I forgot to mention. Jewison and the production designer, John Box. What a combo. They designed the track. They wanted it to be like a roulette wheel crossed with a pinball machine. And they found this guy, Herbert Sherman, who had previously designed the track at the 72 Munich Olympics. And they came up with that thing which now, like when you watch the Summer Olympics, they have those velodomes or whatever those are called. Yeah, it's a little like that. Same thing where it's like on A slanted.

[Brian Koppelman]

It was in Germany, right? They built it in Germany.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. And they filmed all this stuff. They made it seem like it was different cities. What it wasn't. It was so realistic. They would play it between takes and on off things and the stunt people and people just making the movie, they're like, hey, do you want to play a little rollerball for a half hour? Like, it was so much fun to skate around. And that was it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Today I was listening to a behind the scenes thing that Norman Jewison and a few of these other guys talked on. And one of them, they said that the production designer, he was the production designer of Lawrence of Arabia. So he. That guy had done, you know, truly like incredible shit. And this is the first movie ever that the stunt people were credited on individually.

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Brian Koppelman]

And they made sure of it because it was so hard, like. And James Kahn did a lot of his own stunts.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, when you watch it and you know, there's no cgi.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Half of the stunts you're like, man, that looks like that guy got hurt. I don't know how they did it. Half the time their head's just bouncing against the track.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. I found this thing this afternoon. I'll send it to you of behind the. Some behind the scenes footage that shows the, like, the ball getting released and where they were all standing. But yeah, they released the ball, obviously. And then, I mean, they did all that. Like. Yeah, there's no cgi. Like, a guy had to bend down and pick it up in his glove. They really did that. They really had the motorcycles and they really had the dudes behind the motorcycles.

[Bill Simmons]

Like, they were practical doing all that. There's no Steadicam back then either. So I don't know how they filmed some of the camera stuff because the Steadicam didn't come till the year later. That's the other thing with this movie that now it seems like, oh, yeah, it makes sense. They did this in 1975. They weren't making movies like this because you had the. The football scene, the Longest Yard, which we covered previous rewatchables, and you had this. And it was like, there was nothing like this in a movie theater before. It was a little like the French Connection car chase and, you know, these seminal moments in the 70s.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, you couldn't understand.

[Bill Simmons]

I can't believe that happened.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, you can't understand how the hell. You can't really understand when you're watching it how the hell they shot some of these sequences, not just the fights, but like, when, you know Moon Pie has that little tough moment. I mean, that's just incredible. The way they shot it and the way that they staged it. And you really feel it, you know?

[Bill Simmons]

Feel it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Cause we've talked. We did Close Encounters. We've done Jaws. Obviously, there were these. How the hell did they do that moment that you had in the theater? Because you. You just had never seen anything like it. Now I feel like that in 2025, I don't think those exist anymore. And we're just so conditioned to CGI and crazy stuff. I can't remember the last time I sat in the theater. That's what. What was so cool about F1. When seeing that in the theater, it was like, wow, how'd they do this? You know, like, how'd they film that crash like that. And then you felt like you were in the race. It was a rare time of having that excitement in theater.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. Have you seen that? That's what's so crazy. Have you seen that moment where Stallone is talking about how he wouldn't consider Michael B. Jordan a real member of the Rocky family?

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, until. Yeah. Michael B. Jordan told that story on my podcast, like, three years ago.

[Brian Koppelman]

Have you seen the clip? I mean, there's a clip, and I guess it was with Andrew. It wasn't Andrew Tarver. Right. It was one of the. One of the. One of the spar. Like one of the sparring partners. But they. Yeah, yeah. I can't even believe 10 years ago that they would net. I mean, there's just. There's no.

[Bill Simmons]

Nah, they would have CGI'd everything you mentioned. William Harrison wrote Rollerball Murder in September 1973, Esquire. They didn't mention the sport that much, but that's how this all got going. Jewison got excited about it. His goal was to show the sickness and insanity of contact sports. And their allure. Mission not accomplished. Football became way bigger right after this movie. Not because of the movie. There's a United Artist. Things I just wanted to mention quickly, the production company that made this, they were bought by a bigger company called Transamerica in 1967. They rolled off in the heat of the night. The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, Last Tango, Cuckoo's Nest, Rocky, Annie hall, And then in 79, Rocky 2, Manhattan, Moonraker and Black Stallion. But then Heaven's Gate happened, which was immortalized in the final cut. But they were on the cutting edge with some of these movies, including this one. I almost felt like they were a little a 24ish, like taking crazy, crazy risks. Like, I can't imagine anybody even greenlighting this movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Well, this is the 70s movies that people talk about, and once, you know, I'm sure you know this, but he said it on my podcast for the first time, and then I think he's talked about it on the thing he does with Avery. But, you know, Quentin Tarantino is still saving this movie to watch. Of all the 70s movies, this is the one that's, like, canonical that he's never seen, and he's saving it.

[Bill Simmons]

Interesting. That's like, me and the big Lebowski. Still haven't seen it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. I don't understand it with Haven. I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

I own it on 4K Blu Ray. I'm just saving it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Have your kids watched Lebowski?

[Bill Simmons]

I'm just saving it for the perfect day, and I'm gonna dive into it and get really into it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, yeah, you got. I mean, yeah, you got to watch it, but same thing. Quentin, for whatever reason, Talks about the 70s more than anybody else. Right. Written all about the one he still hasn't watched. Roll the Ball. He's still saving.

[Bill Simmons]

So weird, because this combines so many different things of movies that he loves. I know, like a great alpha star performance, like a weird sport, a weird world, a good director. Most critics were lukewarm in this movie. It was $6 million budget made, $30 million. Vincent Camby, New York Times. Rollerball isn't a satire. It's not funny at all. Not being funny, it becomes instead frivolous. He could off Jean Siskel 2 stars. A movie in love with itself. Vapid, pretentious, and arrogant. Raj could not find a review, but he did give this movie three and a half stars, but the review is not online. James Kahn in 1977 rated all his films and rated rollerball an 8 out of 10, but said he couldn't do much with the character was his scouting report on himself. So there you go. We're going to take a break, and then we're going to do most rewatchable scene. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Sure, we're called the Rewatchables. And, yeah, we usually rewatch movies obsessively, but every now and then, we trade screenplays for ebooks. Some moments just call for it, like when the credits roll and you're still in movie mode, but your watch list is empty. Or when everyone says the original story is better than the movie and you got to see what the hype's about. Prime gives you access to a whole library of free ebooks so you can swap the rewatch for a reread or try something new. Free ebooks library it's on prime. Most rewatchable scene. The opening, everything. First 10 minutes. The. The opening credits with the music. We get a little box. Takata Fugue and D minor. I was practicing this. I gotta give a shout warm ups.

[Brian Koppelman]

I gotta give a shout out because the most incredible thing. One of the most incredible things of my childhood was our friend Peter Zazo figured out how to play box the cotton fugitive D minor on electric guitar.

[Bill Simmons]

Like Eddie Van Halen.

[Brian Koppelman]

So shout out for real. It was incredible. Yep.

[Bill Simmons]

We get pregame warmups. Houston, Madrid. By the way, we forgot to mention they created the corporate national anthem for this. And it's pretty good.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's crazy though. That's a crazy thing. And it's an amazing moment. Yep, agreed.

[Bill Simmons]

And then Jonathan has three goals. We get to watch what the game is. They do a nice job. Some wide shots close up. And it's like what, in by five minutes you understand everything. And then we have Jonathan scoring over and over again. And then with Moon Pie. I love this game. Moon piece. What. What are your Moon Pie thoughts? Played by John Beck.

[Brian Koppelman]

The Swooper. Moon Pie. The Swooper.

[Bill Simmons]

Moonpie was the mustache guy.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, but he's also the swooper, right? Because he's the one who he. They call him his position. It's the only position that's stated in the movie is Swooper, which is just because he comes swooping down from the top and knocks the guy off the motorcycle.

[Bill Simmons]

Right? He's like. I don't know, is he like a left tackle? What is it?

[Brian Koppelman]

That's his move, right?

[Bill Simmons]

His move is defensive end come.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. Well then stay close to me. Stay close. You're right. He's got to stay close. Protects Jimmy Khan and then Khan.

[Bill Simmons]

A lot of charisma on Moon Pie. So I got that one. I got Jonathan's lecture to the team when Tuffy decides to make a run at him. And we had see Con in a sleeveless white T shirt. I have the. The interview with Jonathan and his latest girlfriend with the stats guy. When we find out most points in a game was 18. The guy says, I'm a big stats guy. This is 1975. Nobody like Bill James hadn't even written the baseball abstract yet. So this might have been. This guy, might have inspired Bill James for all we know. Most velocity shot out for the ball was 120 miles an hour. Most deaths, nine caused by.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, this was for Me the. If you had a category that was like, you know, the Moneyball category for the greatest stat. I mean, to me, you know, the best sort of war kind of stat was that Jonathan had nine deaths in a game.

[Bill Simmons]

So Jonathan had the record for most injuries caused by one guy. 13.

[Brian Koppelman]

13?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

13 injuries caused by one guy.

[Bill Simmons]

And then most ass was nine. Rome versus Pittsburgh, what happened in that game? Because they had penalties and they had all the old rules. The Rome, Pittsburgh, obviously a lot of bad blood.

[Brian Koppelman]

Beat twice.

[Bill Simmons]

The crazy futuristic party I wrote down, it's like Eyes Wide Shut crossed with Ice Storm crossed with the Shining. I don't know what's happening in this party. They're screening Jonathan's special retirement show, but he doesn't actually retire. They have like a prototype for a big ass plasma. It's about as big a TV as you've seen in a 70s movie. People, are they escorts or is it like a call girl party? Is this is like a prototype for Heidi fleiss in the 80s?

[Brian Koppelman]

I think it's the scene that pulls back if you're watching that movie and you just are kind of going along thinking, oh, it looks like things are all right. I think that's the scene that really shows you that you're living in one of those futures that is super fucked up and dark and that very few people have any rights at all. And like, not in the. I think the point they're trying to make in that really so fucked. First of all, everybody's on these super designer drugs that probably were barely invented. Some combination of Quaaludes and Molly and they're all taking them and passing them around and kind of drifting into this place. You described James Caan's performance as being. But each of those women and men are just kind of describing that the women were kind of shuttled to the men, kind of ordered to be with them. And nobody. Like you said, there's no kids, but I would say there's no love. It's a world that almost has prescribed love, you know, gotten rid of love. Because like, I think that's part of what you're supposed to feel in that scene. Because if you think about it, even by the. When Jonathan thinks and at first convinced himself he used to be in love, he realizes, no, that's not true either. And I think that's part of what's going on in that scene. And that one shot to the woman who's just crying, randomly crying. It's fucking insane. And it is one of the strangest scenes. It Goes on forever. And at first you're like, this is going on four minutes too long. But by the end of it, you're like, I think they might have earned it. I think it might have been okay.

[Bill Simmons]

I think they somehow, once we get outside shooting a fire gun at pine trees.

[Brian Koppelman]

I've had in my life. That's incredible.

[Bill Simmons]

Terrific.

[Brian Koppelman]

Then it suddenly becomes like this environmental movie, like, where you're supposed to understand these people don't give a shit. It's like, they say all this, but what's different than the way someone would do that movie now is someone would take a half hour to make a lecture about why these people are bad. What's so great about this movie is it lets you just watch it and decide. Watch the movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

He's not lecturing at you. You just see a cut to these, like, naked, wild, beautiful people or whatever, and suddenly they have super weapons. Like, you know, a cartoon, like a Men in Black level weapons, like the little tiny. You know, and.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, we don't have those now.

[Brian Koppelman]

No, they don't exist now. You just flick the thing and then whoosh. Yeah. Trees go up. It's crazy. Totally crazy. For me, the best scene.

[Bill Simmons]

Wait, we're not done yet.

[Brian Koppelman]

I have a couple more.

[Bill Simmons]

But for that futuristic party, I'm adding a special category we don't get to give out very often. The Mallory Rubin Award for Did this movie need a better sex scene? Or in this case, did this movie need a sex scene? You've already given me the hard R. It's a rated R in 1975. I just feel like this party could have been a little friskier.

[Brian Koppelman]

Like, who must have been on the cut?

[Bill Simmons]

Norman Jewison. We're not judging you.

[Brian Koppelman]

It must have been everyone's.

[Bill Simmons]

Everyone's drinking and they're hanging, and it's feeling very Ice Storm key party ish. And then we just, all of a sudden, we're shooting trees. Yeah. I think we met. I think we missed out. Couple more. Tokyo versus Houston. No penalties. What a monkey wrench. Can you imagine if the NFL is like, AFC Championship game, no penalties? We would be like, what?

[Brian Koppelman]

But that's.

[Bill Simmons]

No penalties.

[Brian Koppelman]

But that's also the moment that, like, that's the toughest as a. I'll just say, screenwriting wise, that's the toughest moment in the movie is all John Houseman wants. And he's the most powerful man in the world. Yes. There's these three people or four people you find out who are above him, but basically, they. He is the axe out the wishes. Right? He is. He's the most powerful man in the universe and all he wants is to get Jonathan to quit playing the game. And the whole movie is about how do I convince Jonathan to quit. I just, I'll do anything, Jonathan. There's nothing you can't have. And it's like one of those old jokes, nothing. And then Jonathan looks at him and goes, okay, but all I need is that my. I will quit. I'll do everything you want. I won't destabilize the entire world you built by proving the individual is the better. I will quit. All you have to do is put the rules back in the game. And how's it like? Well, I can't do that. Well, we've already announced it. We've already announced that. You see, if people can't have babies, the women are ripped out of houses to go to other. You can do anything you want. You don't want to disappoint the fans. It's like Bud Sellig calling that that game and whatever inning. It's like you do anything you want. What inning was that where he just decided you can't keep going.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, he just stopped. Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

They all. One of the worst moves of the history of sports.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a great one. That's a very good weak link for this movie. I had one as well. The Tokyo versus Houston I mentioned. I love the warmup. The, this game gets more and more violent, culminating in the. Jonathan just gets pissed. He starts wreaking havoc and they knock that one guy down and he drags the guy over to where the rollerball is getting released and thing just nails his head. It's like, oh my God.

[Brian Koppelman]

That was the moment that nine year old me, that very moment was the moment. Nine year old me was like, I might not belong in this movie theater. You know that moment when you're like 9 or 10 and you're watching something that's above your grade, above your. Like I just remember that guy, that ball hitting that guy's head and killing him like that. And you're just like, Jesus Christ.

[Bill Simmons]

That was me at the shining at age 10 when Scatman Crothers took the axe. I was like, what? Just what I love.

[Brian Koppelman]

I love that guy. Well, that's, that's particularly cool because he's the most lovable character in the history of cinema. If you made a list of the 10 most lovable characters in the history of cinema, Scatman Crothers and the Shining is like number four.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's Terrible moment. I agree. Horrible.

[Bill Simmons]

He has two naked lady paintings on each side of his bedroom and wherever the hell he lives. I love that guy. Well, and then Tokyo versus Houston, we get the moon Pie death, which is just an absolute gut punch. It's up there with. For me. I mean, not everyone knows this movie, but for me it's up there with Goose and Top Gun and like some of the great. Sonny getting shot at the toll booth. Like, it's. I just love Moon.

[Brian Koppelman]

I gotta be Chris. I gotta be Chris and Sean in this moment. No, it's not. It's not, it's not.

[Bill Simmons]

I love this movies moments. Oh, it's like they kill Moon Pie. Like, don't kill Moon Pie. I love Moon Pie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Hilarious.

[Bill Simmons]

You're not giving me Goose.

[Brian Koppelman]

Goose is one of. No, I mean Goose. I could. I could.

[Bill Simmons]

If you just talked a little bit more about Goose.

[Brian Koppelman]

If you talked a little bit more about Goose's death, I could cry right now at Moonpie. I can just. Moonpie's a murderer. They're all murderers. All these fucking dudes are murderers, man.

[Bill Simmons]

They have no choice. They're in a capitocracy. What's it called?

[Brian Koppelman]

No. Yeah, they are in what? Yeah. Kak. No, it's K. A K, right? Yeah. Ka.

[Producer Craig]

Ka.

[Bill Simmons]

Ka. Kap. Ka.

[Brian Koppelman]

No, you're saying kleptocracy. But no, the other one is the Kakistocracy, which is the one where it's. The entire thing is just rigged up like that. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Two more. Jonathan finally realizes Ella, the lady that he's loved forever, that the whole thing's fraudulent. She's trying to convince him come back and he erases his. Her videos that he always watches right in front of her. Good breakup. Maude Adams. Wow. Wow. Just. Just looks fantastic, but also gives you.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, that gives you a hint, though, that what James Caan is doing in the movie is what was asked of him. Because all those scenes, everybody's kind of playing those scenes that way. The only one who doesn't really is in that little world of that stuff. The only one who doesn't is his former player coach, who's now an executive. The guy he has the meeting with, he's constantly asking him to get him information, but everyone else plays the whole thing. They're just slightly under being awake. They're just not quite awake.

[Bill Simmons]

The final game, the last thing. Houston versus New York. I love. There's so many great things about this game. I love when the game's going on. There's no penalties and it's basically like there's only going to be one person alive at the end of this. And then the coaches are getting mad about cheap shots. It's like, this is a fight to the death, where you can't be upset that somebody's got clothesline. They're not going to call anything. There's no penalties.

[Brian Koppelman]

Do you. Do you have the best quote of the movie category coming up at all? Because.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, we can put it right here. Game.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, that's it. Right? That's gotta be. I mean, that's gotta.

[Bill Simmons]

Wasn't meant to be a game ever.

[Brian Koppelman]

Ain't nobody gonna win this game.

[Bill Simmons]

Game.

[Brian Koppelman]

This wasn't meant to be a game. Never. Because it's not a dialogue. Heavy film. That's the line that. To me, that's the number one line in the film.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, well, everyone goes down in the first period. One of the great first periods. Terrible game plan. We get some strategy. It's just Jonathan, he's already banged up. Got a guy and then his buddy with the motorcycle and there's a fire and they just. They basically Buffalo Bills it. This is like watching Josh Allen against the Chiefs. Like, it's like you have everything. It's fourth and one. Just get the first down. They overthink it. They do a one at a time thing and Jonathan just demolishes them. You think it's like Pete Carolo, the Malcolm Butler play. Yeah, you have it. It's two against one. This is a wrap.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. The thing is though, there's a great freeze frame in that when. When he kills the guy right up against the executives. And one of them, the younger one, has this look on his face.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, he's like bloodthirsty.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's just what Norman Jewison was going for. You can imagine he spoke that extra. Like he. He said to the assistant director, like, okay, that guy sitting next to John Houseman is very important. I need that guy to be awesome. Like, we need somebody good in that seat.

[Bill Simmons]

That was like my son, my son ringside for ufc. When Toporia knocked out. Knocked out the guy in the main event. My son would basically had that look on his face. I. This is too good for probably an answerable question. So I'm putting in here. Is this the number one craziest sports movie sporting event? You could have gone to the Houston New York Rollerball finals. No penalties. There's only going to be one live one. One. Like, where would you have wanted to sit? Would you want to have been? Would you been right on the glass or would you Be a little further back in case a motorcycle guy went in. Like, what would your move have been? Where would you have wanted to sit? Luxury box.

[Brian Koppelman]

I don't think there's any. I love this question. This is like an amazing whole pod. You should do a whole podcast on. This is an incredible question. This is a roundtable. Get eight of your good friends and this is the best. I can't believe you've never done it. It's amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

We've intermittently done pieces of it in.

[Brian Koppelman]

Rewatchables because to me, no, the Mr. T fight, you got to go to Clubber Lang. Clubber Lang is the fight. If you could see anything, the rematch. Think about what the buildup would have been to the Clubber Lang rematch. Like with me. Just think about what the, what you would have been feeling in the world to go to the, to that. To go to that fight.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, you could do the Drago fight when the Russian crowd turns. I think I honestly. Creed Balboa. The, the. The second fight.

[Brian Koppelman]

Rocky. Yeah. Rocky two.

[Bill Simmons]

It's pretty good. I was thinking, I remember doing this as a mailbag question a million years ago. I think the, the natural Roy Hobbs hitting the game pennant winning homer and then. And knocking the lights out, I think.

[Brian Koppelman]

Would have been pretty cool. But club Clubber Lane, because of what he said about Adrian and just how much he baited him in. And I think if you were a Rocky fan, which you would have been as a kid, right? And in real life, I think it would have been like ali Frazier times 10. Like you just.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, none of these is the actual answer because I think we did answer this once. It's the soccer game in victory. Sure, it's Pele bicycle kick, the moral victory of winning. But they call the goal back and then Stallone stopping the penalty kick and then everyone escaping. It's. It's a, It's a sporting event mixed with the great Escape. So you go to the game, you're under some sort of rule, you actually get to escape. I think that's the winner.

[Brian Koppelman]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

I also would have wanted to be there for shoot versus loud and swain.

[Brian Koppelman]

100%. David and I have referenced that fucking movie and thing, like everything we've ever agreed with. You couldn't agree more.

[Bill Simmons]

Major League, those guys winning Frank Ducks. I think beating Chung Lee in Bloodsport. I mean, you know, a little darker, but I think it would have been cool to see.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, and then you want to see Kareem Abdul Jabbar's fight in the Bruce Lee movie. If you're going there. That would have been pretty amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

They had no spectators for that.

[Brian Koppelman]

But I mean, I'm saying, wouldn't it have been great to be able to be there?

[Bill Simmons]

Costner, perfect game. And for love of the game, Yankee Stadium.

[Brian Koppelman]

You wish the movie was just one notch. You wish the movie was one notch.

[Bill Simmons]

I still don't mind it. Okay, what's the most 1975 thing about this movie?

[Brian Koppelman]

Sorry. We're really wrong, by the way. Obviously it's the fight in the gym between.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, the secret third Creed.

[Brian Koppelman]

Secret fight between Apollo Creed.

[Bill Simmons]

Balboa fight.

[Brian Koppelman]

I just. I just realized that, right? I mean, that's where you got. I mean, you tell your friends forever. You'd never stop talking about it.

[Bill Simmons]

Worst. Worst sporting event to go to from a movie. The million dollar baby fight. Tough.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, God. Horrible. The worst thing ever. The dad.

[Bill Simmons]

Can you imagine being like, let's just go. Let's get in our car. No, but it would have been worse than that.

[Brian Koppelman]

But you know that I'm of the generation. You were too young. But I watched the boom boom and see Dooku Kim in real time.

[Bill Simmons]

I watched it too. Cbs.

[Brian Koppelman]

I watched it in real time. I with my. I swear, like I not making it. I got.

[Bill Simmons]

Because it's CBS during the day. Yeah.

[Brian Koppelman]

Forget watching it. I'll never forget trying to track. Because we couldn't. There's another thing nobody can understand. I'm sorry that we're old. I'm old.

[Bill Simmons]

Like you didn't know what happened.

[Brian Koppelman]

So track it till the newspapers. Like you would watch the news at night and hope they would tell you. And then you had to wait to read the newspaper the next day and the next day because it took two days. I think like you had to find that out like 48 hours later.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah. Most 1970 thing about this movie, I'm either going with the 70s babes. Just the look of the women in this movie, which is very Charlie's Angels first season three's company. Or that they thought in 1975 that the future would not have cell phones or the Internet because they kind of had that computer. It's like the cloud, basically, which is what we have now. But they just didn't. They felt like it was going to be in some. In water in some sort of factory in Geneva. And it's like. No, it's actually just going to be in the air. I'm going to be talking to my friend Koppelman right now on WI Fi.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think it's that they let an actor hit A heavy bag with no. With just his bear. Nobody would let. They let an actor who's not in a boxing movie hit a heavy bag with nothing on his hand. Like everything we know now. If you saw a friend of yours hitting a heavy bag, like we all go to the wheel, but without something. It's insane. That's fully.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a great one. You know, that's a great answer. I love it. What's age the best. The conceit of rollerball as a sport. John Houseman as a villain with his crazy eyebrows. He's got his crystal thinking layer where he goes in his. Does Levine have that? Where you go to see Levine, he's just surrounded by crystals in an all white room. In general, how white and light everything is. Feels futuristic and fun to me. The huge TVs I mentioned earlier, that's about as big of a TV as you've seen a movie. Here's one. Any moment in a movie where our hero is about to kill the last guy and does the thing where he holds the rock or the knife up and then decides. And they cut to the guy, the guy on the bottom like the Bad Boys, Sean Penn, Si Morales. Cut. But the guy doesn't kill him. It's just a winner. It wins every time.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, what a movie you just referenced.

[Bill Simmons]

Thank you.

[Brian Koppelman]

The best. The exploding boombox. Come on. The exploding boombox in that movie. One of the great.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, the 70s tracksuits that they're wearing. Like, I feel like those should come back.

[Brian Koppelman]

I'd wear them. I'd wear them tomorrow.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm going to tell Craig to get one. We mentioned the white pills everyone took and whether this foreshadowed the Mushrooms Molly era that we're in now. We never see kids, we never see a downtown, we never see a restaurant. Even when they go downtown in Houston, it's just this amorphous like buildings. And I think this was just how they were able to shoot the future back then. But it also shaped my view of what the future was when I was a little kid. Did you have that where movies and TV shaped what you thought in your head the future was? And for me, it's just, of course, light and buildings and kind of emptiness.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, it was all that stuff at the Jetsons.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. And flying cars.

[Brian Koppelman]

That's what we thought. Flying cars.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, here's one. Bartholomew Hazman's character and Jonathan parallels to Goodell and Brady in the Seattle Seahawks Patriots super bowl when they. They're trying to get Brady and he won anyway. Came back. Malcolm Butler wins it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Jonathan, I mean, look, I was going to say. And honestly, you can. Craig, you can cut this out. But I mean, no, for me, the future is presaged because when Jon Houseman says to those guys, and it's great because you gotta be paying attention, but he says, listen, we've decided nothing special is gonna happen to Jonathan. They make the decision. They're not gonna kill Jonathan. They're gonna let the game take its course. And I was like, that must have been the conversation that Skipper and Iger had about you.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, my God. I should leave that in.

[Brian Koppelman]

We're not going to let anything.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't know that's what you. Where you were going.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, they're not going to. We're not going to let anything special. We're not going to have. Nothing special is going to happen to Bill. We'll just let it take its own course.

[Bill Simmons]

He'll.

[Brian Koppelman]

He'll take himself out soon enough. We don't have to take him.

[Bill Simmons]

That's amazing. Oh, man. I didn't know you were going there. The. The seventies babes in this movie. Maude Adams, Pamela Hensley and Barbara Trentham. The big three. So tell me if you agree with this for what stage? The best. Jewison said the movie could be taken as a metaphor for the creative artists struggling against the corporate mediocrity of Hollywood and the executive groupthink they're in. Thoughts?

[Brian Koppelman]

Sure. I think so much of it, it aged. I think what's so incredible is I love when you read the reviews and even like I think would age the best. And it's always the thing like the movie fucking aged the best. The movie's so good. And despite what maybe Craig's gonna say at the end, the movie's so good that as a whole. And it makes total sense to me that it wasn't in its. Like in its time. It was kind of a modest hit. As you said what it did. You said it did 30 on 6, but. But I don't think people understood like that it was actually trying to do that stuff. It was actually trying to make someone think about something. And it got so much right. And honestly the energy. Okay, so I'm not gonna again, like the politics. No one wants me. I'm not gonna talk about this. But David Foster Wallace making the years named after corporations and shit and people. The Year of Venus Williams, this movie did all this stuff. There's no doubt that all those writers who became like the huge writers in the 90s, they grew up watching movies like this and it influenced the way that they thought about the world and you just feel it. So I think it. I think the movie is what really lasted a long time.

[Bill Simmons]

Book censorship and history getting erased. Sadly. His age the best when he's watching the old Maude Adams DVDs. The music that's playing where it's like. It's just so good.

[Brian Koppelman]

Great call. I wouldn't have thought about. That's a great call. Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

The violence of football over the next 50 years. And then the last one, Dick Emberg calling a game, has always aged the best. Just great to hear his voice.

[Brian Koppelman]

Amazing.

[Bill Simmons]

Really miss that guy.

[Brian Koppelman]

Amazing. And are you. I think that. I guess we can talk about the computer. We got to give a little bit to that whole computer scene, but we can do that in the. Unfortunately, it's terrible because you named that award after Teddy kgb, but we got to do that. The actor being in his own thing. Because I have.

[Bill Simmons]

That was a. That's a compliment, though.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, yeah. But I don't want to ever reference my own thing. You know what I mean?

[Bill Simmons]

It's like, don't be a jerk.

[Brian Koppelman]

But. No, but I'll say Ralph Richardson. That guy. Sir Ralph Richardson. He's this legendary British. The first actor to be knighted in England is that guy. Lawrence Olivier got knighted second after this fucking guy. And. And it's true. Like, one was 1946, the other was 47. And because that guy is in his own movie. And it's a great movie. The movie he's in, like, he makes James Caan totally different.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, he's like in a Bond comedy. Oh, yeah. He is in a totally different.

[Brian Koppelman]

He's on a talk show with Orson Welles. Like, what is he. He's in Citizen Kane. What is he doing? And he's like. It's his own. Like, you could tell that guy was in a room. He's like, knows he's gonna be. He's playing a guy who spends a lot of time alone. Right. And just as an act, like, thinking about what that guy did as an actor, he built, like, layers and layers and layers, and then it's totally wrong for them. It's amazing. It's just amazing to me. Perfection.

[Bill Simmons]

I agree with you. Great shot. Go to awards. So many options for most cinematic shot. I really like when Jonathan scores that one goal against Tokyo and then the guys, the fans behind him through the window are yelling and he just bangs.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, yeah. With a contempt.

[Bill Simmons]

It just feels 70s hockey. You mentioned Moon pies Coma. The. The coma shot that. It. When they lift the Helmet up. I think that's the best shot in the movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think it's the one you mentioned, but I think it's the one you mentioned before. The ball hitting the guy.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think the ball hitting the guy is like, so. Because you just feel really is so effective because it stays with you for 50 years, dude.

[Bill Simmons]

Kid Cudi, Pursuit of Happiness Award, Best Needle drop. The ending, when the music kicks back in again, it's just great.

[Brian Koppelman]

You're like, someone's been watching some Stanley Kubrick for Jordan Jewison.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, Chess rock while Brock Lanterns Award, Best character name, Moon Pie is pretty great. I need to bring that back. And then Butch's Girlfriend award for the weak link of the film. You mentioned yours. Here's mine. I just think the corporation either kills Jonathan or just kidnaps him to keep him out of the final game. I don't think they go through this whole rigmarole trying to. Oh, we really don't want you to play. Now we're going to change the rules to try to kill you. Like, how about just killing him? No, they're worried about what happened with Jonathan. Oh, Jonathan had a tragic accident on a horse.

[Brian Koppelman]

He's dead, but they're worried about martyr. See, this is the thing. Why. The whole thing about the individual is they don't want to make him into a martyr, so they can't.

[Bill Simmons]

How would people know he just died? They control the news. It's like, sad news. Jonathan's dead.

[Brian Koppelman]

All right.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, no. I love that guy.

[Brian Koppelman]

All right. I can't argue with that.

[Bill Simmons]

It feels like an easier way to do it than to rig the game with no rules. And, you know, I mean, the other.

[Brian Koppelman]

Weak link is sending a terrible. In the context of the thing, like, I'm not saying the woman who played her was a terrible actress, but the one girlfriend, the blonde, the blonde. I mean, they're just. First of all, it's like the whole beginning of the Sharon Stone Schwarzenegger thing where she comes in there and he realizes she's turned. She practically is going to wheel and kick him like Sharon Stone did in Total Recall. But that was pretty weak, that scene. And then when he almost, you know, Jonathan almost really hurts her.

[Bill Simmons]

I have that in one stage. The worst. That's what I do.

[Brian Koppelman]

Not a great moment.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that's in the wood stage. The worst. You know, Longest Yard had a random domestic violence scene, too. I just think it's the 70s. I can't. I can't explain it. We mentioned the super system memory pool, which now is Just the cloud. The Tokyo team. There's some. Some pretty apparent racist stuff with that. This is what, 32. 32 years after World War II could still feel. Some of that in the 70s was still that bad.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, we're still doing very, very rough and racist.

[Bill Simmons]

The CTE issues with rollerball, I was thinking would probably hilarious. Probably not great. Like an outside the lines. The rollerball guys, 20 years later, they're.

[Brian Koppelman]

All, you know what Bob Lee looking at this.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Bob Lee's like, you know what?

[Brian Koppelman]

Bodily looking at this thing 100%.

[Bill Simmons]

But the number one would stage the worst is that they remade this movie in 2002. It's one of the worst movies ever. I wrote about it for page two. I think it was one of my better early page two pieces. I like skewered it. It's really awful. John McTiernan made it weirdly, which he.

[Brian Koppelman]

Made so many good movies.

[Bill Simmons]

It's really, really one of the worst. To me, it's like Bad News Bears go to Japan. The rollerball remake. It's on a short list of the worst ones we've ever had.

[Brian Koppelman]

Among the worst. You know, I will. I've never. I watched 30 seconds of it, maybe 40 seconds of it, and never watched more than that. Shut it off. Wouldn't go to the theater because why do the. You know why. Why?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, it also violates the rule of why are you remaking a movie that is still exceedingly awesomely. It was 27 years after they made the original. We're gonna take one more break and then we're gonna do a couple more categories. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Prime delivery is fast. How fast are we talking? We're talking a cooler for your snacks, a folding chair, a Bluetooth speaker, and a six pack of your favorite seltzer delivered by tomorrow. Fast. Oh, yeah. Extra napkins, last minute guac bowls, backup phone chargers, even a replacement remote.

[Brian Koppelman]

Fast.

[Bill Simmons]

I feel like I've ordered all of those things. We're talking everything you need for game day. Fast, fast. Free delivery. It's on Prime. This episode is brought to you by Viori. Look, I'm not a big let's hype up workout clothes guy, but Viori, I gotta say, total game changer. Been wearing a lot. If you see me power walking around Los Angeles, probably gonna see me wearing some Vuori Sunday performance joggers that they have. It's made with four way performance stretch fabric, one of the most comfortable things you own. You will wear them everywhere, I promise. All you have to do is go to viori.com Simmons and you get 20% off your first purchase with Vuori. V-U-O-R-I.com Simmons. Enjoy free shipping on all US orders over $75, plus free returns. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. This episode is brought to you by Lifelock. When you visit the doctor, you probably hand over your insurance, your ID and contact details. It's just one of the many places that has your personal info, and if any of them accidentally expose it, you could be at risk for identity theft. LifeLock monitors millions of data points a second. If you become a victim, they'll fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Save up to 40% your first [e-mail] podcast terms apply. Ruffalo Hanum Gruben Partridge Overacting Award so you. It sounds like you're leaning toward the coach on this, but I Can I offer you Jonathan's ex girlfriend shooting the fire gun with that crazy look on her face.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, look, I think maybe nobody knew who they were. They spent a lot of time on the stunts and maybe. I bet you the Norman Juson, great director, like I said, I mean, that guy made some really unbelievably important great movies. But my guess is that so much of his time was spent on making sure the gameplay was right that there wasn't a lot of energy in terms of making sure the performances were locked, you know, and that's hard. It's really hard.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you have a flex category or. We already did it.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think my. My flex category would have been the KGB actor thing, because that guy is so good. I think that guy's in his own movie, but I think he's great. Like, I think he's just in his own movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay. And do you have a CR Thinks Luke Wilson would have been Harrison Ford, how to Take a Ward or. No, because if you don't, we could move on.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, the hottest take would just literally be that. Yeah, I have a. I have such a hot take that I think it will get me.

[Bill Simmons]

I think this movie is every point of the category.

[Brian Koppelman]

I think this movie's better than Parallax View. I think it's more accurate. I think it more accurately makes you feel what a paranoid thriller is supposed to make you feel. Because there's nothing else like it. Parallax View is like a million different things. And this movie, there's nothing else like it. And it tackles. None of us are going to be in a situation where we're thought to have Shot the thing and they're pinning a giant murder on it. But all of us watch sports, all of us interact with these corporations. All of us have felt that feeling that the game was rigged and we don't quite know why or what was really going on in that game. We'll never really learn what really happened. And this movie makes you feel all that shit. And so I think rollerball and I.

[Bill Simmons]

Think it's like LJ's four point play.

[Brian Koppelman]

And yeah, that was.

[Bill Simmons]

Who ordered that?

[Brian Koppelman]

The second Knicks dig. I was at the game and it was so great.

[Bill Simmons]

Just perfect moment continuation, pal.

[Brian Koppelman]

We still haven't won a champion. I don't know if you noticed, but we still haven't won championship since I was 7.

[Bill Simmons]

It's been a while. At least the team's good again. I couldn't find any casting. What ifs the best that Guy award. So Moses Gunn plays Cleat. And Moses Gunn, who was in Shaft but had a nice run in the 70s where he'd be like in Streets of San Francisco and he just was around. He was one of those guys. So shout out to him, but to.

[Brian Koppelman]

Me, Moon Pie, because I didn't realize that Moon Pie did. I like, forgot that he's the same guy who did all those episodes of Dallas.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I. I couldn't. He might be John. I mean, for Craig, he's Moon Pie. Okay, we. We still don't know if Craig liked this movie, but he was in six. Yeah, you're right.

[Brian Koppelman]

60 episodes of Dallas.

[Bill Simmons]

Somehow I know. DM waiters. I think it's Maude Adams. Coming in hot. Yeah, coming in. Mod. We just need you to shoot for two days. We're just gonna shoot you laughing and looking really hot. And then we need you to do like three lines with Jason.

[Brian Koppelman]

But it's special shout out. I think you gotta give a special shout out to the thankless. It's like, I wish that the most thankless role, the guy who has to come in, Japanese guy that I thank because it's the Tokyo team, has to come in there and he just get interrupted. All he wants to do is share the science with them. And it must be like having a meeting with, you know, Robert Kennedy. And like, he just wants to tell them about the science and they don't want to.

[Bill Simmons]

You know what I mean?

[Brian Koppelman]

They don't want to hear about the science.

[Bill Simmons]

Recasting couch Director City. Can I offer you Gene Hackman as the Houston coach? We just go up a level with.

[Brian Koppelman]

Gene and then, yeah, he gets a lot of more Dialogue nobody else could have played. Who else could have played Jonathan?

[Bill Simmons]

Burt Reynolds. And I think James Kahn's a better.

[Brian Koppelman]

Choice because the smart. Because James Kahn was smarter. Like on screen he read as smart. You think he's smarter?

[Bill Simmons]

I think Bert could have done the athleticism and the swagger hero stuff. He probably would have enjoyed getting physical with the ladies, having love scenes.

[Brian Koppelman]

Could Redford. Could Redford have done it?

[Bill Simmons]

No.

[Brian Koppelman]

Not a good enough. Like, not credible athletically, like his violent athlete.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think he's got that dark, the snapping side. Warren Beatty would have been interesting. I don't know if he would have done it, but I think athletically, I think he could have done it.

[Brian Koppelman]

That's a good call. He's credible. In Heaven can Wait. You believe he can throw a football?

[Bill Simmons]

He could. I think he's a good athlete. Yeah. All right. Craig's flex category is here, but he's passing. Craig. Just a mystery man for this pot half ass earned research. You mentioned they shot everything in Munich. A bunch of. A bunch of opera in this movie. If you want to go check out the different songs. Some of it's online. Rollerball, the video game which I waited for for most of my video game playing life, and it finally was supposed to happen in 1998, got delayed and then the publisher went bankrupt. I don't understand why we didn't have a rollerball video game. I think it would have been amazing. And maybe there's still time. Nobody died during the filming any of the stunts, but we did have some major injuries. And then Devo saw this movie and ended up writing the Devo corporate anthem for their 1979 album.

[Brian Koppelman]

Bill Somebody, somebody, somebody at Rockstar Games should just. There should be a moment in gta and if it delays GTA by another two years, who's gonna care? But there should be a moment where you should walk into an arena, get to play rollerball. In Grand Theft Auto, you should walk into an arena and get to play rollerball. Think about. That's the most logical thing it could be in GT the next year. It could be in the one that comes out right. The month before I die. That's when they could. You know what I mean? For 30 years from now, they'll get.

[Bill Simmons]

That one in Apex Mountain. James Kahn, it's right around here for him because Godfather's been a couple years. He's in a movie with Barbra Stre in the same year when she's probably the biggest female lead. I think it's right around here. The Gambler Just come out. He's making a bunch of movies and he has. The wheels haven't come off yet. So I would say maybe yes.

[Brian Koppelman]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Plus, can't argue fake. Fake created sports in a sports movie. I'm also going to say yes, unless you want to go dodgeball.

[Brian Koppelman]

No, you're. This is it.

[Bill Simmons]

Dick Emberg. No. Dick Emberg in a movie. Also no. Because he's better in Heaven Can Wait. Because you can see him. Mod Adams. I. She was in Tattoo with Bruce Dern, which I think I might have seen when I was a teenager and don't remember that much of, but it's probably this. She's a huge model, though. This is the era where the 70s, they would just grab a famous model and just throw them in a movie. Norman Jewison. No, it's probably in the Heat of the Night.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, Cincinnati Kid, Hurricane. So, no, no, you got to say Moonstruck, because the Oscars and stuff, it's got to be Moonstruck.

[Bill Simmons]

But I mean, that Poitier movie. Yeah, it's a great movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Great, great, great, great, great movie. Not, of course, but later, I always think that the guy. Later in the. I always think like, yes, but I always think a guy that had this happen when it comes back and it's Moonstruck, like, yeah. And everyone's celebrating this guy.

[Bill Simmons]

But that's a career highlight. I'm talking more like, when did he have the most juice?

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, yeah. Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Probably late 60s.

[Brian Koppelman]

Sure. Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Houston as a sports city to go here. Or would you go Hakeem Rockets? The Jonathan era.

[Brian Koppelman]

Dan Pastorini and Earl Campbell.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, that's like, right after Jonathan E. John beck. It's clearly 60 episodes of Dallas. John Hausman. No, no. Probably paper chase. It's gotta be setting pine trees on fire. 100%. And then just roller skating. Roller skating. Maybe. Did we ever do better in a roller skating movie?

[Brian Koppelman]

No, no. This is. This is the coolest it ever looked. For sure.

[Bill Simmons]

All right, most important part of the podcast for you. Cruz or Hanks for the lead.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's Cruise in a walk. It's not even close. It's not even close.

[Bill Simmons]

This would have been an amazing Cruise movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

No, no, But Hanks, if he wanted to do the Dark turn, could play the Houseman role. He'd be amazing because you believe that he cared about Jonathan.

[Bill Simmons]

Or how about young Hanks as Moonpie? Like 19 Bosom Buddies Hanks. He was tall, gawky, skinny.

[Brian Koppelman]

He was never the enforcer.

[Bill Simmons]

Now it's definitely Cruz Scorsese. Or Spielberg.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, that says Martin Scorsese. Martin Scorsese.

[Bill Simmons]

I had that as well. What role would Philip Seymour Hoffman have played?

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh, this is great.

[Bill Simmons]

Probably a younger houseman. He's in the corporatocracy.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, but. Well, would this have been one of those. There's not really that showy, you know, young. Young Philip Seymour Hoppin, like, you know, in Heartache. There's not like that flashy little moment where a guy comes in like that in this.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know if there's a role for psa psh in this. Picking it. So I had some questions about the rollerball penalties before they got rid of penalties. Karate. Kicking the motorcycle guys seems bad. That's three minutes. Headlock punch. Okay. Headlock punch with the spike punch to the helmet seems fine. Motorcycle guy knocking the other motorcycle guy from behind, like, spinning him out. Seems legal.

[Brian Koppelman]

I looked this up. I. This was my Internet research. I looked it up. I looked up what. What rules? Penalty. So the violence. And you're right. You're so on this. It's the. You're completely on it. These penalties only existed. So all those things, you could do them all as long as it was in the course of the gameplay.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, that's what they said.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. When you. When I looked. When I looked at it.

[Bill Simmons]

Sounds like Jewison came up with that at the 11th hour. They're like, yo, what's the difference in these penalties? Like, course of gameplay.

[Brian Koppelman]

Course of the gameplay. So. So that if. Instead, if Wally, let's say right after Jonathan scores and you're resetting, the ball hasn't shot out yet, you went and Spike punched a guy in the head, then that's a penalty. But if you spike punch a guy when he's about to score, we're good. I think that's never said in the movie. And you're 100% right.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I needed a little more. It's almost. You needed the announcer to come in and like, as always, three minutes for that. I just would have eaten it up. All right, so we have gambling in 1975. We know it exists because they're putting the spreads out. We've had football players. There's been gambling scandals. It just felt like an incredible missed opportunity not to talk about lines at all during this movie. And then it sent me down a rabbit hole thinking, like, who was favored in the last game? They would, like, FanDuel would have had last man standing bets, and I think Jonathan would probably have been the favorite, but it would have been, like, 2 to 1.

[Brian Koppelman]

Would have been like those Tiger years where you could bet the field for a certain number.

[Bill Simmons]

Jonathan versus the field. I would have just banged Jonathan. But then you could also make the case like, they're just going to do everything they can to take him out. I think there was no betting lines.

[Brian Koppelman]

Dude, there's no betting lines because no one had any money. The money was only the executives. No one had money.

[Bill Simmons]

But there was probably like a. Like a stealth poker game with the executives. And maybe they had a bookie. I don't know. There's a lot of gambling stuff that should have existed in this yet. Any picket nits or do we cover everything?

[Brian Koppelman]

No, we covered them.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay. Sequel, prequel, Prestige tv. All black cast are untouchable. Can we make the prestige TV case? It's been 50 years. I think that's fair game. And I do feel like there's some cool scripted series in here that I think would take added significance in the mid-2020s.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, they're making. I'm sure you know this because it was announced and stuff. They're making, you know, the William Gibson novel Neuromancer. They're making that into a series that's an incredible futuristic thing. If that works, whoever does that show could then just come right in here and do this.

[Bill Simmons]

I think the problem is the rollerball remake was so bad that I think it scared everyone off the ip. But let's bring it back. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Danny Trejo, Doris Burke, Sam Jackson, Nell Byron Mayo, Tony Romo, Chris Collinsworth, Daniel Plainview, Long Legs, or Wilford Brimley in the Firm? Do you have. You can also throw in anyone else you want in this category.

[Brian Koppelman]

You know, you bring up Enberg a couple times, but I just kept thinking how fun it would have been to just cut to Norm MacDonald talking about this game. That's.

[Bill Simmons]

We should throw Norm in the category.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, Norm belongs in the category. He really does. Because imagine Norm talking about when Moon Pie. Like the thing you just did about. Oh, so when can you hit the Moon Pie in the head with the spice? I mean. Yeah, I just think that's a little bit. Yeah, I just think it would have been incredible. Like, Norm would be just top.

[Bill Simmons]

Too much. Too much individualism. I think they would have just killed Norm. So I had. I'm adding John Cazale to the movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Oh.

[Bill Simmons]

Because of the sunny Ties. But especially after. After when Jonathan says no to Mr. Bartholomew at the party and he comes back out. And then Cazale could come over and go, johnny you don'. Talk to a guy like Mr. Bartholomew like that.

[Brian Koppelman]

Awesome.

[Bill Simmons]

And then they do the. Don't go against the family.

[Brian Koppelman]

But he could also be his character from the conversation just fits right in.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, just. It's right in the time. It's in the Cazale. It's in the timeframe 75.

[Brian Koppelman]

Now imagine if instead of Maude Adams and I agree, what if it's Meryl walking into that room? 1975 Meryl.

[Bill Simmons]

Get both of them.

[Brian Koppelman]

Imagine if it was. How much better is that? Meryl?

[Bill Simmons]

Like our first movie.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, Right after Andy. Like 75. Meryl. Right before.

[Bill Simmons]

Before that. Yes.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Just one Oscar. Who gets it?

[Brian Koppelman]

Production design.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I would. I would have said stunts. Is stunts an Oscar? It is.

[Brian Koppelman]

Right now they're giving stunts awards and things, but they didn't for years.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, Production design's good. Probably an answerable questions. This one might be answerable. Jonathan E's last name. I think it was Evans. Because at the Eyes Wide Shut party, one guy says to the other guy, Evans is out. And I wonder if that means that Jonathan Evans was his name.

[Brian Koppelman]

What are others? I have one. I have one unanswerable question.

[Bill Simmons]

As if rollerball just keeps going over the next 50 years, how would advanced stats have changed rollerball? Would people have thought like the three point shot, like people firing from far away. It's a heavy ball, but could there have been like a Steph Curry that comes in who's like, this guy's like throwing it from basically the bottom of the track. He's completely changed.

[Brian Koppelman]

Rollerball. They would probably add up. Because the thing is, because there were very limited substitutions, if you killed somebody, it's kind of as beneficial to the team as scoring to your team as scoring a goal.

[Bill Simmons]

So the advance stat would be more maiming and murder.

[Brian Koppelman]

It would be murder plus points. It would be like points plus death. Right, because. Plus mauling someone to their off. Off the floor.

[Bill Simmons]

I think so you think the Moneyball move. Like Jonah Hill comes in and he's like, I've been looking at the motorcycle and it's just the complete inefficiency. We're spending too much time getting the motorcycle guys. And what's what we really need? What was John Beck's role? What was his thing? Swooper. Swooper, yeah. The swooper is actually the most important position. Rollerball. We got to go all in and try to find better swoopers.

[Brian Koppelman]

So sick. I think. Yeah, for sure. Then there's this little. So my unanswerable question is, there are two references in it that maybe they're robots. Like in the.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, the androids thing at the eyes. Yeah, they might all be androids.

[Brian Koppelman]

And one says, you know, they're all made in Detroit. And the other says they're robots. You hear these two lines and they're not. But, you know, you wonder if it's like the replicant thing. Like, are they replicants or are they. Is it possible? Because now I didn't remember this. This was. I listened to some wacky podcasts today and I wish I would credit them. There's some guy who did some, like, deep dive into the meanings of rollerball. It's crazy. I'll send it to you. I found it like two hours ago. But the one thing is, he was talking about this possibility of them being robots and seem to have some credible argument for that. Had to do with when Jonathan is talking to sir, the computer guy. I did not pick this up. This guy in this podcast did. I can't take any credit, but he says that when he's talking to him, the guy says, I've seen you so many times before. You've come so many times. And the guy was like, Because Jonathan doesn't know because Jon's a fucking robot. And every time he gets destroyed, they rebuild him back. And then he comes to the point where he has this question at the end of his life cycle. I have no idea if it's true, but I love it as a theory.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, how would that explain moonpie being in a coma, being kept alive with no vital signs?

[Brian Koppelman]

That is a flaw in the theory. You've poked a great hole at it. Oh, to prove to the players. Oh, you know why? So the players believe it. The player doesn't know he's a robot.

[Bill Simmons]

Maya there, answerable. Do you think the Dolan family own the New York rollerball team?

[Brian Koppelman]

That's the best. Yeah, I. I hope so, because then I hope they go, oh, and whatever.

[Bill Simmons]

We don't get to get this that often does award for what happened the next day. So Jonathan survives. I think we're probably forming a rollerball players union. There's probably a Donald Fear or whoever. Somebody's coming in and being like, we gotta get these guys some benefits maybe. Maybe some rules in place that you can't just wipe out the rules before the semifinals. Does the sport exist? Was that the last rollerball game ever?

[Brian Koppelman]

I think Jonathan maybe takes the whole society down.

[Bill Simmons]

That's it. It's just complete chaos. I think so, yeah. The easiest answer ever for what piece of memorability would you want or not want from this movie? I mean, it would have to be the jersey, right? The number six orange jersey. Like, what would be a better thing that.

[Brian Koppelman]

Plus the glove. A glove and the gloves and one of the motorcycles wouldn't be bad.

[Bill Simmons]

Like a bad.

[Brian Koppelman]

Imagine in your garage. Imagine if in your garage you had a rollerball banged up motorcycle. That'd be. I mean, come on. Pretty great.

[Bill Simmons]

The Coach Finstock award for best life lesson Corporate society is an inevitability quote from John Hazman. Let's go with that. What's your double feature choice?

[Brian Koppelman]

Some Bruce Lee movie. Enter the Dragon.

[Bill Simmons]

Interesting. Why?

[Brian Koppelman]

Because of the era. Just because I associate it with a time in my life, basically. Otherwise, it's network. So I wrote down earlier. Network's the other one that makes the most sense because one's about media, one's about sports and entertainment. Like, so network. On the highbrow, it's network. And on the less highbrow, I think it's Enter the Dragon. What's yours?

[Bill Simmons]

I like your paranoid movie thing. I think that was fun. I would have said Longest Yard just because, like, those are the first two great sports movies. But I do like the idea of doing, like, Three Days of the Condor or something and just.

[Brian Koppelman]

Is Brian's Song in your mind not a great sports movie?

[Bill Simmons]

It is. It's a TV movie, though.

[Brian Koppelman]

Okay, so it doesn't count.

[Bill Simmons]

I've seen it 20 times.

[Brian Koppelman]

No, I know, but I'm saying it doesn't count for that reason. For you.

[Bill Simmons]

I still think that's Khan's best performance in any movie. I should have done that as my hottest cake. He's unbelievable as Brian Pickle.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, of course he is. He's incredible. That movie's. I mean, again, it's for. Dudes are. I mean, that movie's just the best.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it's really old. It's 55 years old. Who won the movie? James Kahn, of course. All right, it's time. Producer Craig coming in. He's been dead silent, nervous.

[Producer Craig]

I'm excited that Brian has no idea which way I'm going. And he even thought that perhaps I was going the negative route. I am not. I can't believe this movie was just sitting here and no one told me about it. What the hell? I had heard of Rollerball. I think it's a weird title. And perhaps I had no idea what the movie was about. I was transfixed by this movie. I mean, this is a dystopian science fiction movie disguised as A sports movie?

[Brian Koppelman]

Yes.

[Producer Craig]

I think it should be considered like one of the greats. This should be shown in film schools. There is so much going on. There's so much there. You're like, it's basically gladiators fighting for public entertainment. It's like maybe it's a little heavy handed. It's so weird. Jewison's making so many weird decisions. It's aged incredibly. I think the tree burning is like fascinating. I thought, I think this desperately. I'm usually not this guy, but I think this desperately needs to be a television show. Tony Gilroy turned andor like a Star wars story about, like, turned that into like a political story about fascism and imperialism or whatever. Get him rollerball next. Like, I want something at that level for rollerball.

[Brian Koppelman]

Tony would crush it. Tony would do an incredible job with this. Yep.

[Producer Craig]

I thought this movie was unbelievable.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow. I'm so excited. I was so worried that he didn't like it, but I was like, you know, I feel like I know Craig well enough to know he probably liked this.

[Producer Craig]

I couldn't look away. It was, it was everything. I want to watch it three more times. I, I, it's almost, it was almost the first time ever. I watched it twice before we recorded just because I wanted to do it again.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Producer Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Well. So what was your most rewatchable scene?

[Producer Craig]

I think the argument between. Is it Houseman and Khan? While the tree burning is happening. That going back and forth is really electric. And that whole party. I think the whole party scene is the most interesting part of the movie. But also, I mean, the stunts are unbelievable. I can't believe that they're doing that to these actors back then, these stunt actors. It's ridiculous. Yeah. The music at the top and the bottom, the box. I mean, the whole thing is just, it's so original and unique and it's like, I love when a director just has his hands all over something. And if there's stuff that people don't like, I kind of don't care. I'm like, at least he just did whatever the fuck he wanted.

[Bill Simmons]

So are you mad? We waited seven years to do this movie.

[Producer Craig]

I mean, I couldn't have been mad because I barely knew it existed. But there's a. I have a couple nits.

[Bill Simmons]

I will say, let's hear it.

[Producer Craig]

Genuinely, the worst jerseys and helmets I've ever seen in a sport.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. That was mid-70s, though. I mean, like, if you go back to that era, every. We just lost the narrative.

[Producer Craig]

Is that. But that's what they thought. Jerseys would look like in 2008, 50 years in the future. And that's what they gave them.

[Bill Simmons]

It was just that this weird concept of Koppelman can attest. Like the font that we thought was going to be in the future was that specific, like, weird font. Like very, like simplistic. Horrible.

[Brian Koppelman]

Horrible.

[Bill Simmons]

Terrible.

[Producer Craig]

It looked like high school warmup football jerseys. It's terrible.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that's a good call. What else did you have?

[Producer Craig]

None of the actual guys look like athletes. They look like mechanics. I mean, what are we doing here? Like, these look like a bunch of normal dudes, I guess. James Connor.

[Brian Koppelman]

You're making the JJ Reddick, Bob cousy argument.

[Producer Craig]

These guys don't look like the premier athletes of the world, you know, 18.

[Bill Simmons]

I swear I had that written down. And I forgot to say it. I noticed that there's that shot in the locker room and then four guys.

[Producer Craig]

Who look like Louis CK back there. Like, I don't know what we're.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, but I wonder, did they do that because they couldn't get anybody to do rollerball or. Because then at one point they have the weight training scene and one guy is basically doing this 1984 gymnastics routine on the, on the, the parallel bars. And it was. But yet all these guys look like plumbers, electricians, as Craig said. So I don't know what they were going for with that.

[Producer Craig]

Also, man. Like, back then, men just looked different. James Kahn in this movie was four years older than I am right now.

[Bill Simmons]

Was he really?

[Producer Craig]

He's 35.

[Bill Simmons]

You could have told me he was 50, 122. You could have given me any age.

[Producer Craig]

I would have easily guessed 45.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you agree with me that nobody has ever looked better in a sleeveless white T shirt than James Kahn? Like, it's something about his shoulders.

[Producer Craig]

Men don't look like that anymore.

[Bill Simmons]

No, no. You know who looks like? Sometimes you'll get the random little boy that looks like that. You'll see like the three year old boy at a party that's built like James Kahn.

[Producer Craig]

What's that?

[Bill Simmons]

And then. But nobody ever ages into it.

[Brian Koppelman]

I didn't anticipate this going there. That's.

[Producer Craig]

I was going to say, what three year old boy at a party are you seeing?

[Bill Simmons]

No, my son, when he was like three, kind of had one of those James Kahn bodies for a little bit, but they had. You know what I mean? Like those really muscly little kids.

[Producer Craig]

Like they have like the T build, like the Michael's T build.

[Bill Simmons]

We used to joke that my son looked like a 1760s blacksmith. He would just walk around. He had this hard pot belly and was just walking around like Fred Flintstone.

[Producer Craig]

I was going to make the joke that, like, we should do the Lloyd Howell Jr. NFLPA for worse. First League League rep award for whoever.

[Brian Koppelman]

The was running rollerball.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a good one. What'd you think of the seventies babes?

[Producer Craig]

Great. Another. Women don't look at that either, man.

[Bill Simmons]

But it's like a specific look. And I don't know what it was, but I know it's a. You know, when you see it kind.

[Producer Craig]

Of look, middle part, long, feathery hair kind of like coming out. They look like Sharon Tate a little bit.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like this blue eyeshadow.

[Brian Koppelman]

It's like a version. It's a version of. Of. Of. Of. Of Michelle Pfeiffer Scarface thing, which was later.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that was like the tail end of it. Yeah, it's really Charlie's Angels. Like, if you go. You could click any mid-70s Charlie's Angels, Vegas Three's Company, all the. Every. It's just this look. And then it just disappeared. Not sure what happened. So, Craig, would you have played a rollerball video game?

[Producer Craig]

Absolutely. I still would.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. This is some of the best IP nobody's taking care of.

[Producer Craig]

It really is. I. I have not seen the remake. I won't watch it, but I. It's been long enough. I think somebody could revive this. And it's. It's so relevant now.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, man, roll above Fantasy league would have been interesting. Sure. Imagine if, like, you would add swoops. You would have had assists, you would have had goals, you would have had takeouts. Yeah.

[Producer Craig]

I mean, Derek Henry and rollerball. Unstoppable.

[Brian Koppelman]

A problem is we only know one. One player's name, really, and the other guy's name we knew he's dead.

[Bill Simmons]

So, yeah, that's like Rollerball three, where, like, the rich Paul character comes in and trying to get everybody paid for. All right, Craig, so happy you like this movie. This is produced by Craig, as always, thanks to Ronick as well. And thanks to Geha for getting us on. On the Zoom. Thanks to Koppelman. Great to see you. It's been a couple years for you in the rewatchables.

[Brian Koppelman]

So happy to be back.

[Bill Simmons]

Anything to plug? Got any plugs?

[Brian Koppelman]

No. Stuff's coming. Stuff's coming. You know, but nothing to talk about yet. But happy to be back for time. Number seven on their rewatchables. And we gotta do Quiz show someday. That's the one I'm holding out. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

You're doing it in la.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah, I'll be there for it.

[Bill Simmons]

We'll do that together. And then Rounders two. I'm just gonna be dead before it comes out.

[Brian Koppelman]

I mean, you'll be in if there is. If it ever. You know as much about it as I do. We've talked. How many hours have you and I spent talking about it with Levine?

[Bill Simmons]

Every time we do a podcast, we mention it enough.

[Brian Koppelman]

Time. Time.

[Bill Simmons]

Craig's ready for it.

[Brian Koppelman]

Yeah. Okay. We're all in.

[Bill Simmons]

All right. Great to see you guys. Thank you.

[Brian Koppelman]

Great seeing you guys.