21 thoughts on “Movie Podcast Weekly Ep. 307: Mandy (2018) and White Boy Rick (2018) and The Dawn Wall (2018)”

1. Fellas, I loved the review of Mandy. I don’t know that I will ever actually see the movie, but thanks to this review I sort of feel like I already have. Random trivia note: Panos Cosmatos is the son of George P. Cosmatos, director of both Rambo: First Blood Part II and Tombstone. “Why, Red Miller, you look like somebody just walked over your grave.”

   I also enjoyed Andy’s review of The Dawn Wall. It’s always fun to hear the lepidopterist give his judgments about films and/or shows that truly engage him. I also enjoy when he really bangs his gavel on stuff that stinks, but hearing him dig into something that he really connected with is a rare treat. And I’m happy (I guess?) that Andy and I are still feuding. Maybe someday I will figure out what that’s actually about. 🙂

   I’m proud of Jay for owning up to his long-forgotten bet. My comment didn’t seem to inspire quite the level lighthearted merriment I’d envisioned. It kind of went over like a lead balloon, in fact, or perhaps an aluminum balloon. I guess we here at the Wager Crimes division will just have to be satisfied that all parties involved will eventually honor their pledges. #TourOfItaly #JusticeforGCR

   “My daughter has a Barbie movie called The 12 Dancing Princesses. I know that Cody Clark has seen it.” Uh, OK. I mean, yes, yes I have seen it. I think this should become a new feature of the podcast. Jay, whenever you are going to be mentioning an obscure film of any sort on the podcast that I may or may not have seen, please contact me in advance and I will verify whether or not I have seen it. “I was driving across Oregon last week and I though of Meek’s Cutoff. I know that Cody Clark has seen it.” “I saw some pirates at Disneyland with my boy and it reminded me of Nate and Hayes. I know that Cody Clark has seen it.” “A feral girl tied me to a bed in a backwoods cabin and threw up on me and I remembered how that also happens in The Rambler. I know that Cody Clark has seen it.”

   P.S. The Wolfmun is indeed a capital fellow. Bless him for helping Jay deal with the MPW backlog. Bless you, too, Jay. I love Move Podcast Weekly so much!

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   • Shut up Cody Clark. Just shut up! J- can we just ban Cody from the website? Someday I too hope to discover what we are feuding about. Come on the show so we can fight in person.

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     • Come on. If this were the real Mr. Dr. Butterfliegen his comment would have originated from an ISP in Lausanne. Everyone knows that.

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   • Thanks for the great comment, Cody. Great factoid about Panos Cosmatos. I had no idea! I remember Rambo II vividly because I believe that’s the one with the head-in-the-rat bag scene. That really stuck with me.

     I will definitely pay up on Ryan’s bet, once he visits SLC again.

     Not only have you seen those obscure movies, you’ve also reviewed them for the newspaper!

     -J

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     • You should make GCR’s Tour of Italy one of the group events the next time there’s an MPW Meet-Up.

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2. Allow me to explain the bad reviews for The Predator… Because while the characters were fun and enjoyable, the plot of this movie is dumb and the changes to Predator motivations reduces them to petty Invaders from Mars with the same tired tripe of all alien Invaders.

   Predators should be big game hunters. Period. Not harvesters, not trying to evolve themselves, bit a typical Star trek trope… PREDATORS!!! Hunters! They stalk, they kill, they collect skulls. It doesn’t need to be and shouldn’t vr more convoluted then that. You can have the greatest characters interacting all you want, but if the movie turns on a clearly established premise and betrays it, you will (and they did) lose the audience.

   It may be fun and I may give it a 7, but this is in no way a “good” film. If not for the presence if the loonies this film would be a 3. The lead guy had reverse charisma… The more he spoke the less I liked him, thr more I wanted anyone BUT him to survive.

   And then thr epilogue.

   Jay? Jay…. JAY! Bad Jay!

   No. Just… No.

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   • Yeah, just to sum up my good friend Red’s comments, The Predator is getting bad reviews because it sucks.

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   • Ha ha ha. Which is it, Redcap and DIno? Do I hate the cinema or don’t I? Seems like I was appreciating some escapist entertainment… I think we all acknowledged that “The Predator” (2018) is a dumb movie, but we still had fun in spite of that fact.

     Why do you guys hate the cinema? ; )
     -J

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     • Hey, I had fun with the movie for what it was. That doesn’t change the fact that it was a bad movie, so the bad reviews are definitely warranted.

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3. Mandy… there’s no denying that it’s a polarizing film. I love the movie; it’s definitely one of my favorites so far this year. There’s so much to this film. Yes, stylistically, it’s unrivaled among recent releases. Story-wise and world building, though, there is a lot to dig into. Juan and I were discussing this film recently and he made the point that it’s very similar to Mad Max: Fury Road in that regard. But there’s no denying the film is opaque and deliberately paced, so it’s very demanding of the viewer. I understand that, for most people, that probably isn’t worth the effort. Also, I can totally get just liking the film on the surface for its style and bonkers sequences, but you really need to work to understand this film. I know that, for me, the more I think about the film and uncover the different nuances to the story, the more my appreciation of and love for it grows.

   Jason, your review for Fury Road was very similar to this one. With Fury Road, you really liked the action, but didn’t get why people were praising the film so much and citing its story and world building as credits to the film. This is going to come off as pretentious, so please forgive me, but I think it’s because you were distracted by the action and didn’t bother to dig deeper. With Mandy, you praised the movie for its stylistic achievements and crazy sequences, but again, I think the style and absurd elements (along with the deliberate pacing) distracted you from digging deeper into the story and the world of the film. Your reaction to the bathroom scene is a perfect example of this. Whenever you mentioned it on the show, you only talked about it as an example of Nic Cage going absolutely bonkers. But that scene, as a whole, was incredibly poignant and wasn’t just him losing his shit (no pun intended). If you re-watch that scene, you’ll see the nuance in Cage’s performance. He goes from shock to absolute, inconsolable grief, to silent despair, to anger, to completely-fucking-crazy-I’m-going-to-fuck-shit-up. Nic Cage is an amazing actor… it’s sad that people can’t seem to get past the unhinged moments to see all that he actually puts into his performances. And, by the way, the only reason we have those unhinged moments is because he puts 100% of himself, every last bit, into his performances. I think Ryan said it on the show, but he really is a national treasure.

   Overall with Mandy, though, I’m not sure if I completely agree that it’s an indulgent film. Every aspect of the movie is in there and was done with a purpose. Even the deliberate pacing and the slow speech is done for a reason; we spend nearly an hour with Red and Mandy to get a full understanding and appreciation of their relationship and the quiet life they’ve created for themselves, which makes what happens later and Red’s “transformation” all the more potent. And the slow speech puts us in a trance (or asleep, in Jason’s case) and helps to transport us into the bad-LSD laced, alternate universe that the antagonists of the film inhabit. Even the Cheddar Goblin had a point; typically in movies, you’ll have a huge, tragic event occur and we never see the immediate aftermath. In Mandy, we see that Red, who is now all alone, goes back inside and this ridiculous commercial is on bringing the viewer back into the reality of the situation. And that then leads into the intense grieving that takes place thereafter.

   As far as the ending goes, I didn’t take any of what we see or hear to mean that this film took place somewhere other than Earth. I just interpreted it to mean that Red, himself, had ascended into a different plane of existence because of the journey he just completed. Dead, crazy, transformed… any of those could be, it doesn’t really matter. Just, different.

   Anyway, I get that Mandy is a polarizing film. I don’t fault anybody for not liking it, but it definitely isn’t a movie that should just be dismissed as an indulgent exercise in style with no substance. Because that couldn’t be further from the truth.

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   • It’s possibly my #BMOTY

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   • Just curious – Is it pronounced Dino as in Dinosaur, or Dino as in the word for the guy/gal in charge of a school of college, but Spanish with an O at the end?

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   • Dino,
     Ryan is just trying to “get points” with calling it his BMOTY. ha ha

     Nah, actually, the more I’ve thought about “Mandy,” the more I’ve come to appreciate it. I mean, before I admired its beauty and soundtrack, but I didn’t like it whatsoever. Now, I must admit that it’s growing on me.

     I like what you wrote about the bathroom scene. I’m just not sure yet if that scene and his performance has genuine verisimilitude or if it’s just over the line to where it ventures into parody territory. On one hand, I think a person might act exactly like he does, if a real person were in that situation. But because it’s Nic Cage and he strikes me funny when he goes that far, it just pops the bubble and breaks the spell for me.
     -J

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     • I get it, for sure.

       This would be a great film to discuss in person sometime… maybe at the next meet-up (hint hint)? 😉

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       • ^That came across as much creepier than intended! Haha

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         • Hey J….suck an egg

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4. J very happy to hear that you are enjoying Entourage unlike your co-hosts this is a great series and besides Season 7 all of them are are fun and easy to enjoy. I look forward to hearing more on what you think of it as you continue to watch. I think you will learn to love the 4 lovable characters as you see their journey thru the A-list star, B-list star, the manager/Best friend and Turtle the friend who you thinks is leeching off his Hollywood friend but in reality is always looking out for them.

   Have a wonderful week and keep up the good work.

   Mario

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   • Thanks, Mario. Yeah, last night I was thinking about how there are 8 seasons of “Entourage,” and I wondered if it would just be hours upon hours of “more of the same.” Not that I’m losing heart for it because I’m still enjoying the series. But I wonder if this is like when I was 14, and I sunk hours, weeks and days into conquering video games and all I really got from it was in-the-moment entertainment. Though I’m amused by Johnny Drama, I’m not sure if I’ll still feel amused after 8 seasons. : ) Have you watched “Ray Donovan,” and if so, which one is better?
     -J

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5. I’m with GCR and Dino on Mandy. I loved it, and was transfixed throughout. So many interesting and indelible moments… The laughing, the automatic window, the merging faces, the bathroom scene, the face of ashes, the porn house, the commercial, the almost totally pointless but awesome forging scene, the chainsaws…

   If I had a quibble, it’s that, while I thought Nic Cage was generally terrific, and that this movie made great use of his Nic Cage-ness, there were a couple of small moments, like with one-liners or certain aggressive rages of his, where that took me just slightly out of the movie, where I had been totally immersed, otherwise.

   SPOILERISH STUFF:
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   I expected him to turn into one of the Hellraiser type biker things, as it seemed fitting to the journey he was on. Maybe that would happen in a sequel? This did seem like a superhero origin story.

   I loved everything to do with Jeremiah and what a tool he was. Some good commentary on men who think they have power (and in some ways do), and how their biggest fear is often to be laughed at or emasculated by women. His demise was perfect, and though getting his head crushed seemed fitting, I kind of wanted him to burn like Mandy. I don’t think it was necessarily a commentary on Christianity, though, J, but specifically cultish religious leaders who use their influence to take advantage of others.

   I thought it was odd that he killed the bikers first, but it was an interesting choice, maybe to get that out of the way from our expectations that they’d be in some giant boss fight at the end, which would have been more typical.

   As I said before, I didn’t really dig some of the one-liners, like, “You ripped my favorite shirt!” But I did like some of the other dialogue, and my favorite line was after Bill Duke says, “You’re probably gonna die,” and Cage says something like, “Don’t be negative.” 😀

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   Needed to watch some puppies and bunnies videos after this one, but it was an amazing experience. I hope I can catch it in a theater sometime with a big screen and an audience. 9.5

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   • Hi Eric!
     I’m with ya on the one-liners and the uplifting “recovery fodder” afterwards…
     -J

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6. I had to comment on Ryan’s prediction about the Oscars. I understand that Ryan is the Oscar prediction guru and I completely agree with him that A Star is Born will come in with the most nominations. However, no way it wins 6 or 7 Oscars! First Man or If Beale Street Could Talk will win Best Picture (and Jenkins or Chazelle will win Best Director). And, I have a hard time seeing Gaga winning over Viola Davis and Cooper winning over Gosling. It’s also going to be a great year, probably the strongest year since 2015 (or even 2013).

   Also, when are you guys going to talk about Ozark (unless it’s included in your “lost” episodes)?

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