Some Movies That Changed Filmmaking

Welcome to you Stuff you should know from how Stuffworks dot com.

Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant aka Ciskel.

And Ebert save it's the I'll see.

And Jerry's over there. I guess she's Gene Shallett. That's the stuff you should know, triumph for.

I don't know why that took on me so much because Jeane Salat's a funny looking I guess, yeah, Jerry's not. I'm just picturing her with a big afro and a mustache and like a tweet jacket and bad opinions about movies.

Geene Shllett had a look for sure.

Still thought he's around right, Oh yeah, I think so. Yeah, Rip both Ciskel and Ebert, so sad. I know, have you seen the Roger Ebert documentary?

No, I've heard nothing but good things.

Really really good, very touching.

Yeah. Is it a something life?

Life? Uh like mine, Life with Me, Life on top, Life itself, Life with thumbs, Life itself, Life itself, Life with thumbs.

It was really great and I watched it on made the mistake of watching on a plane, and I was just like.

My allergies were acting up. Oh yeah, oh yeah I was.

I was watering because of your allergies. No, because it was sad. I was crying. Do you want me to say it?

Oh? Yeah, crying on a plane. I was confused there for a second.

That's better than when I watch other movies that are on my laptop that are like like bad violence or nudity or something. I'm always just like oh, and I kind of lower the laptop and it's like I.

Didn't realize this was in here, and the lady next to me is just.

Like, ugh, you disgust me?

Yeah, because I don't. I want to be sensitive people around me. You know, I'm not one of those jerks. It's like just lives in my own bubble.

It's like watching some sex scene on a plane, You're like elbowing the lady.

So yeah, no, I hate it. It was so embarras happened to me a couple of times. I'm like I needed to start going PG on movies airplanes.

Judd Apatow huh am, I right, he's unpredictable.

Yeah all right, So Chuck, this is your episode to shine man, is it? Yes, you're a movie guy too, though, I like movies.

But I've I almost consciously don't let myself watch movies on a like a film aficionado.

Level, your pure enjoyment.

Yeah, I don't ever want to see the individual shots and just be like, oh, well that could have been better whatever. Yeah, and just missed the movie as a whole.

Yeah. I fall somewhere in the middle of that. I try to let go.

But like our our video producer director Casey is is pretty bad about that. And our buddy Scotty who shot our TV show, Oh he's the worst. Yeah, he's just the camera working that lighting in that scene.

Scott's awesome. Hey Scott, Hey Casey.

They're all in here with this in spirit. And hey, this is the last show in the studio. Yeah, last episode in the old office.

Yep, Murder Room.

Couldn't feel more neutral about it.

I actually feel less than neutral, less than zero. It's it's weird. That was a good movie. Thank you, great shots. I say thank you as if I directed it.

I not only directed it, I also played Andrew McCarthy. Uh.

Yeah, I'm ready to get the heck out of here. Man.

I can't wait to get in that new office and that Yeah, it's gonna be good, tiny little dedicated studio.

Whole new world. All right, let's do this.

Okay, So, Chuck films, you've seen one or two of them in your time? Sure, have you seen any of the ones in this list? I know you've seen a few of them, but have you seen like some of the early ones I've seen.

Well, we'll just go piece by piece because I have not seen Battleship Patankn.

Okay, but I do love Mandy Patankin.

It's a little different, yes, in spelling pronunciation meaning the whole thing.

Uh huh.

But it's close, I guess.

But we're talking, of course, about films that change filmmaking somewhere or another. And the first one on the list is from nineteen twenty five, Battleship Patinkin.

That's hard for me to say, which is.

Not the first movie, by the way. The first screen movie was Workers Leaving the Lumieer Factory, which is forty seven seconds long and the most boring piece of celluloid anyone's ever picked together. But it was the first, that's right. This was many years. That was a full thirty years before Battleship Potempkin. By the time thirty years had passed, like we were doing like narratives, and there was banning and all sorts of great stuff. Yeah, and Battleship Patinkin

Yeah, it tells a story of a nineteen oh five uprising in where there were Russian sailors. Basically, there was a mutiny aboard a ship and then the bad guys, the Cossacks, came in looking for.

Yeah, nineteen oh five, that would have been rising up against tyranny, would have been rising up against the Romanov monarchy. I guess nice. But it was made in nineteen twenty five, so this is a time when you know, Lenin and Trotsky and all those dudes were running around trying to do the great experiment. Yeah, and it ends up it turns out that the Battleship Petempkin was banned in some countries.

Was that the deal? Yeah, okay, he knew.

This could be a metaphor for rising up against my dictatorship. So I'm going to just ban the uh yeah, even though it's Russian propaganda.

Well, filmatically, I need to bring the history, by the way. Filmatically speaking, it was a landmark film because of the montage and most notably the Russi or Soviet theory of montage, which is basically that your impact is going to come from juxtaposition of shots and not necessarily a smooth sequence of shots, right, and it should be rhythmic instead of necessarily being tied to the story. It was like a

Well, yeah, the montage it's like a go to editing technique, right.

Oh yeah, well the montage in general, but specifically the Odessa Steps.

Oh, there are two notable parts in that sequence.

One is the you know, it's basically a big charge on these these grand steps leading up to a building in a big battle.

Odessa, Texas.

And there's a part of it where there's the old the old baby carriage going down the steps. You know what's gonna happen to the baby? And it sounds tired because we've seen that in uh, you know, The Untouchables.

Yeah, notably, I did not find it tiresome.

Naked Gun thirty three and the third Yeah, everything is illuminated, the great movie by Leeb Schreiber. That was from directly from the Odessa step sequence in Battleship Patinkin the baby carriage. Yeah, and the old shot through the shot in the eye through the glasses, Oh cool, that comes from this movie too.

They were the first ones to do it.

Yeah, and you've seen that in Woody Allen's Love and Death and Bananas and.

Of course The Godfather.

The great sequence where Moe Green's getting the massage and he looks up and puts on.

His glasses during a montage. Yeah, that's exactly the whole sequence montage.

Yeah, because there was an assassination on the steps as well.

Oh yes, that was definitely was a double.

Who was that? That was Francis Ford Coppola.

Oh yeah, he was clearly aware of Battleship Pat Tempkin, clearly. I was trying to think of other examples of montages and the only thing I could come up with was the eighteen building something. But that counts as a montage, right, Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like some related in some way related shots that are kind of put together that a little bit transcend like.

Story in itself. Yeah, like Rocky training for a fight.

Yeah, that's another good A lot of times just.

Set to music. Yeah, I love it. That's the only one you can think of.

Yeah, and the great movie Brazil too has the shot through the glasses bit, as I like to call it.

So that's Battleship of Dinkin, doesn't it. One of the Nazis and Raiders of the Lost Dark gets shot through the glasses.

Maybe that wouldn't surprise me. It's been it's been off homaged, you know.

Yeah, So Battleship Pat Tempkin was a It made a pretty big splash in nineteen twenty five. In nineteen twenty six, the following year, the next movie on the list. It wasn't his first, but it really solidified I think his stardom Buster Keaton stardom.

Yeah, the general rightfully so too. Yeah, he was one of the.

Great Well, some people call him the greatest stuntman to ever live.

He's done some stuff that I think earns him that, Yeah, because I mean this is.

Back in the day too, where he was legitimately risking his life, right, you know, like.

That the very famously where he's standing on the street in front of a house and then the whole front of the house falls over him and the window just goes right around him.

Yeah.

I watch that again today.

Yeah, it is.

I can't believe he did that. And there's actually a half of a second where his arm jerks up because he's startled as the house finally makes its way like into his peripheral vision. Yeah, and it has to be one of the most dangerous things that human beings ever done on film.

Yeah, I'm sure the whole time before that was like we did the math, right, he did the math.

Do the math again, Do.

The math again, Show me the math, Show me the math, because that's all it was. It was math in measurements, right. But yeah, he could have been squashed and killed very easily, and.

He had a lot of faith in everybody who was pulling off this stunt with him. You know, he had to just stand there. That was his whole thing is he had to just stand there, and his bit was that he was he played it straight constantly. He was a stonefaced actor.

Yeah, deadpan.

Yeah, he kind of started that whole thing because his big I was about to say rival, but I guess just contemporary Charlie Chaplin, while similar in some ways, was completely different because Chaplin was constantly mugging for the camera and like asking for the audience sympathy.

Right, raising his eyebrows or yeah.

Like look, what's happening to me? Come on, come on? Where his Buster Keaton would just he had that dead pan look the whole time.

Yeah, he would go from like a house falling around him to jumping on a train or something like that with just the same blank facial expression.

Yeah.

And the reason this is a highly influential film the generals because it kind of showcases the best of both the amazing stunts that would be mimicked and throughout the years and built upon, and then the deadpan style that influenced everyone from obviously Bill Murray is one of the great.

Deadpan actors of all time.

Yeah, Like you can count the number of times Bill Murray even smiles in a movie on like two hands, sure much less like apes or laughs or anything.

Michael Sarah's mentioned in here, and I'm like, he, I think he might have Bill Murray beat as far as the dead pan pan actor goes.

Yeah, well, Zach galafan Actus is on the list, he's super deadpan.

Leslie Nielsen, of course. Amy Poehler, I think is a woman that's a very dead pan has a deadpan style. Jason Schwartzman.

Yes, but people say, is this all is a direct descendant of Buster Keaton's work.

Yeah, And if you think we're overstating this, go watch any Buster Keaton movie. Yeah, you will be thrilled and delighted. And if your attention span has been shredded to ribbons by the Internet, just go on onto YouTube and type in Buster Keaton and it'll bring up all sorts of clips of his awesome stunts.

Pretty great.

He will be thrilled in as I promise.

Yeah, and I think I made a note here, by the way, that we have a fatty arbuckle retraction to make Remember when we called him out as the rapist.

Murderer, I didn't say murderer. Well we said rapist at least, right, but we were taking the task by fan he was, he had, he was acquitted of all that stuff, and apparently he didn't do either act and his career in life and family name were ruined forever. So he was evidently done a grave miss justice, and we sort of cavalierly just still called him that today. Yeah, I need to look into it more, all right. So next up we have the Jazz Singer, the nineteen twenty seven edition.

Not the Neil diamond one.

No, and there was one in between two with Danny Thomas. I believe I like Neil Diamonds. It's good. I never saw you ever see it? No, No, it's not bad.

But this is the original from Alan Crossland, and it is notable because it was.

The first feature length.

Movie that was at least twenty five spoken dialogue.

Right, does that make sense? Yeah, it's totally new.

Yeah, it wasn't the first talkie because they had short films that were talkies, and there was a movie the next year I'm sorry, yeah, in nineteen twenty eight called Lights of New York that had one hundred percent full spoken dialogue. But the Jazz singer had a mix of music and spoken dialogue. Right, the first big, big daddy feature length film to.

Do so right with substantial dialogue, right. Yeah. And they.

Did it in the most roundabout difficult way that you could possibly do it, which is to record the audio and the soundtrack, both the dialogue and the music, onto vinyl records.

Yeah, probably wax records.

Really, and then the projectionists had to sync the record up with the film strip so everything was in sync.

Yeah.

It was a device called a vitaphone that Warner Brothers sunk about half a million into this company called Western Electric who invented it, and it was actually physically connected to the projector's motor, so they did while they did have to sink it was it was a physical connection between the phonograph player and the projection.

Real, I guess, yeah.

And it went on to gross three and a half million bucks for nineteen twenty seven.

That's man, a lot of dough. That's a ton of dough. That's like five six million dollars today, at least, yeah, at least, but was ineligible for the Best Picture because they were just like, you can't compete with the rest, it's not fair. Oh wow, because everything else is silent and everyone's going to vote for you. Yeah, so that changed the whole game for sure.

We will continue on with our awesome and engrossing list right after this. So, Chuck, if you'll notice, the first three movies in our list, the first three films that changed everything happened in nineteen twenty five, twenty six, and twenty seven.

Things were changing fast.

They really were. I mean, like we by leaps and bounds. Sure, but you can also make the case that there was a lot of new ground to cover. So just about anybody who did anything new that was noteworthy of the innovation. Yeah, it was a big innovation. Yeah.

Harder to innovate these days, it is.

And if you'll notice on the list, so the earliest ones were like technical editing innovations. Now, starting with Citizen Kane from nineteen forty one, we started to get into innovations in storytelling, which is a lot more nuanced than you know, doing your own stunts or using a montage or something. It's figuring out how to tell a story in a much less linear narrative fashion. And Citizen Kme was one of the early ones to pioneer a non linear narrative.

Yeah, did you you saw this? Yeah?

Yeah, I didn't see it untill I mean it was probably like probably about fifteen years ago, but like way later than you would think I would have seen.

This is a big film, buff.

I saw it in college at a in a film class.

Yeah. Sure. Often. Yeah, if you sign up for a film class, you're going to study Citizen exactly pretty much. And I finally found out what Rosebud was. Don't ruin it. I won't.

But it is a landmark film in every way, and it has often been top of best Films of All Time lists for great reasons, one of which, like you said, the non linear narrative was a really unique thing at the time. Although flashback wasn't brand new, it was the first time it had been this extensive and effective in the story.

Yeah, because, I mean it's substantial enough that it really cuts up the flow. Oh yeah, you know, it's not like a quick flashback and then come back and the actors like staring off into space to transition back into the present again. I mean like it was all over the place.

Yeah. Yeah.

Some of the more concrete cinematic landmarks, one was using deep focus.

Director of photography.

Greg Toland legend used he had used deep focus before on a movie called Long Voyage Home, but it's all over the place in Citizen Kane. And that basically means if you see a shot where something very far away is in focus in the shot, basically where everything's in focus with.

The background in the foreground or yeah, and focus so you can press pause and look around like you're sticking your head into a box.

Yeah, that's called deep focus.

And it was brand new as far as Citizen Gain goes, is how extensive it used it.

One of the other things was off center framing.

It was a big, you know, pretty common thing to just center whatever the main action was, either the character or the object, And Citizen Kaine had a lot of things where the main focus of the scene the character, maybe even off screen, which was really weird at the time. People didn't know what to think of it. Expressionistic lighting back then, everything they just lit it. They're like, make sure everything's well lit.

But it was an autopremeter. Also like a big pioneer with that.

Yeah, I think so.

With Dalm for Murder, I think he.

Directed that was it Hitchcock.

I think that was Hitchcock was it okay, Well, autopremmeter directed stuff like that, though, right he was. He used moody lighting and shot yeah and stuff a lot.

I probably messed that up. People are gonna be for murder. I think it was preventy okay.

But orson Welles, of course, I don't think we even mentioned. That's who wrote, directed, and starred and produced. And I think he even edited a Citizen Kane.

Yeah, I just assumed everybody knew that, you know.

Yeah, he came from the theater where you create mood with lighting only.

Certain parts of the stage.

So he brought that into the movies and it was very evocative and set the mood well, and people are like, man, why we lighten everything all bright all the time?

Look at Citizen Kane. It really worked a couple of other things, One of which.

I know you will appreciate, sir, is that he pretty much invented the wipe.

Oh the star white, not the star white, but it followed.

Yeah, the star wipe followed, which I know is your favorite transition in cinema.

Oh, it's all Star.

Wars star because it almost makes a sound, you know. And one of the way I want to say, you're right, Dallen for Murder it was Hitchcock.

Oh was it? Yeah? Okay, what was premature? Did you look that up?

He did one called Laura the Man with the Golden Arm. It's not who I'm thinking of. I'm thinking of a director named Auto who directed in like the twenties or thirties, and he directed like moody, like like moody movies, like yeah, murder movies. Yeah, like fil noir, Yes, film noir. That's exactly what I was going for. And I don't remember who it was.

Maybe his name was Auto film Moore. He's French.

And then one final thing, of course, that you could study Citizen Kane for a week in the film class. So this is an overview. But the low angle shots. People didn't use a lot of lower high angle shots back then. It was kind of just shot from straight on and Orson Welles even dug out cut out the floor a lot of times to get the camera lower.

Wow.

And for the first time we saw ceilings in view in a movie, because quite often things were shot on a sound stage where you don't have ceilings, and he wanted those low angle shots. So they used fabric most times to act as a ceiling, but very effective shots

But he was the first. He did the first, and that's why it was innovative.

Exactly.

It's Fritz Lang.

Yeah, there you go, Fritz Lang, Metropolis and Am just them. That's okay, Yeah, it's all making sense now.

You get confused.

Yeah, but you were right on, You were right there.

Fritz and Auto are not close. I mean they're both German, but that's about it.

Yeah, but you know the difference between and dial M just a telephone.

What's up next, Chuck Breathless one of my faves.

So I am going to rely on you mostly for this one because I looked up what the French new wave really did, what it accounted for. Yeah, and like all of the essays I found were hard to they were dense. Yeah, and I didn't really understand. I understood that the French New Wave like changed everything, and that a lot of the movies that I know and love today are the offspring of the French New Wave, but I still didn't get exactly specifically what the French New Wave did.

And you're going to allow me to summarize, says yeah, no pressure.

Well, for me, the French New Wave basically ushered in an era of what now I think most people might associate with indie filmmaking okay, okay, like handheld camera work and what some people at the time considered amateurish camera work, movies where maybe not a lot seemingly happens, you know, nothing grand happens, which was the case in Breathless. A lot of people didn't like it at the time because

Yeah, so without Breathless, who wouldn't have like Fallow Rocket.

Maybe.

Wes Anderson's definitely a big French New wave guy, Yeah for sure. But godar John lu Goodard who directed it, and Truffau and some other French New Wave forefathers were film critics at first.

Oh yeah, yeah. They decided as a.

Group, like, we want to look at cinnamon a new way and do something different.

So they went and started making their own movies.

That's like James Fenimore Cooper, Yeah, the guy who wrote Last of the Mohicans.

Oh really Yeah.

He apparently used to complain that like nobody wrote good books anymore, and so I think his wife or something said, well, why don't you do it, big shot? And he did. In the books he wrote really were so great. But he went and wrote them, and he wrote a bunch of them too.

One of my favorite foresides ever is the second to the Last of the Mohicans. It's just a line of Native Americans and the second to the last one they're online facing away. He just sort of turning around and waving camera. I guess the camera at Gary Larson's hand, So Breathless is notable for those reasons. It kind of kicked off the French New Wave. But the use of jump cut editing, which we see so much now, it was the first movie and it was very jarring at

Right, It's like you indicate the progression of time or movement or something by just cutting quickly rather than focusing on somebody walking down the street for five minutes, you cut a couple of times, and all of a sudden they're just closer to the camera, and then closer and closer, and then they're past the camera.

It's a jump cut, yeah, Or even as simple as something as simple as like you're going to leave the house, so you go and pick up your keys and you put on your coat. Instead of showing all that you come out of the bedroom, Boom, you're putting on your coat. Boom, you're putting the keys in the door.

Right exactly.

You're just showing the high highlights of this progression of stuff where that would otherwise be boring to watch the whole thing. But it also is used to create tension too, because it's it's jarring. I guess it's probably why it creates tension. And Scorsese famously used it in Good Fellow. Oh yes, at the end when Henry Hill is like, like trying to sell some guns to Nero. Yeah, he's to the gills, right, and he's like trying to sell some guns to NERO, but they don't fit the silencers,

Yeah, very effective, and for budding filmmakers it's a great way to hide mistakes of things you may not have gotten that you thought you got. Jump cutting is a really easy way to just sort of, yeah, to hide your errors. Yeah, I did it a lot. In other words, when I was making those.

Shorts, I I was I realized that in my head I was referencing the shot in Soul Taker. You know, have you ever seen that mystery signs three thousand with uh uh? It's his last name is Estevez is Martin Sheen's brother and he is the soul taker and he's next to this guy who's a soul taker.

You just have to see this.

But anyway, they're they're walking down the road in this jump cut, like has this progression of them. It's so unnecessary, but it's like a great use of jump cut. You could tell the director was like, I can't wait to use a jump cut, and this is what she did. She used it on.

But go watch the MSc three K it's a good one. Man. Did you see every single one of those episodes?

No, it's still I still run across the ones that I haven't seen.

Yeah, nice, hey in then shout out to Bill Corbett, who I know is a listener.

Oh, yeah he is, isn't he?

I don't know if he's going to hear this one, but the great Bill Corbett, so taker. Next, we're gonna move on.

To Frederico Fellini's Eight and a half. Have you ever seen this one? No?

I haven't. Now I understand why it's called that though.

Yeah.

It was one of the first, although not the first, movies about movie making and starring the great Marcelo Masteriania Masi from ladulcea vita a muse of Fellini's over the years too, And this one, this one really kicked off the surrealist filmmaking and sort of saying you can play around and shoot a dream sequence where the guy's in traffic and then he leaves his car and floats up in the air and is you know, being pulled down to the ground on the beach from a rope tight

Yeah, And successive filmmakers did go nuts, like Gondry did Eternal Center of the Spotless Mind.

Oh yeah, he's hugely influenced.

Darren Aronofsky did some weird stuff here or.

There, yeah, David Lynch and Terry Gilliam of course. Yeah.

Just basically surrealism is what I'm taking Fellini introduced into.

This, yeah, for real.

And besides the surrealism, that opening sequence of Eight and a Half where the director, he's the director in the movie, Guido is.

Stuck in traffic.

It's really claustrophobic feeling, and that's why he floats.

Away and escapes, you know that that.

Traffic jam, But that was directly mimicked in like Rams Everybody Hurts video. Oh yeah, and the beginning of the movie Falling Down. Do you remember that huh that started with the traffic jam. Yeah, Michael Douglass just left. He doesn't float, he gets like an oozy.

I saw that again the other day. Most of it it's weird.

It alternately felt way ahead of its time and also very dated because the stuff that Michael Douglas is doing felt way ahead of its time.

But then there was I just forgot about that whole weird subplots with Robert Duvall retiring and he had this wife that was hinpecking them, and like this retirement party they were trying to throw them. I forget about that too.

Yeah, it was just so unnecessary. It felt really weird and out of place. The other day when I was watching.

It, there like a jump cut montage where he's putting on his watch, his gold retirement watch.

No, but then too, the Barbara hershey know, is in venice at home with the daughter and he spends a whole day coming there to grab them basically, and the whole time she just keeps calling the cops.

Like the no, he's coming and now he's coming.

And I was watching the other day, I was like freaking leave. Oh yeah, what are you doing there?

Yeah, that's a movie character thing.

Ah.

You know that's just bad writing, bad directing. When you just walk right past the ability to leave. You missed a huge step.

Where were we falling down?

Yeah?

I think that pretty much sums up eight and a half.

I think so too. Falling down boom, so chuck. We got a little more left, we got more films. Is this making you want to watch films?

Yeah? Me too.

I feel like eating ice cream, watching a film and scratching from poison ivy lately.

Yeah, and burning this office down. You know, if that.

Happens now, suspicion's gonna fall on you for saying that.

That's all right, we'll be right back after that.

All right, So we're back with our awesome jingles, which, by the way, we have to thank John Began, John begin Begin. He even emailed with the pronunciation of his name. But he the original guy who did our jingle, the first jingle ever, Rusty Mattias or Matthias Man, I'm not good with the pronunciation. Uh well, anyway, Rusty who's banned

Can we use these. It's like totally mash it up.

Yeah, and John's been making awesome like versions of it ever since.

Yeah. They're both great and talented.

Thanks to you both.

And go check out I think that what you say. They're on tour right, yeah, the sheep Dogs. Yeah, go check out the Sheep Dogs. Yeah, and in town near you. Yeah. All right, let's finish with these two in reverse order.

Okay, Toy Story was a big one, hugely innovative, huge, and again it's one of those things where now almost everything about it seems pedestrian.

Su or what it did.

Yeah, see, it's still a great movie, I'm sure, but the innovations that it undertook are just seemed pedestrian. But at the time it was totally groundbreaking.

Yeah, game changer.

It was the first, the first CGI movie, all CGI movie ever. Yeah, that was enormous.

Well yeah, and I remember at the time seeing it and just being like, Wow, this is the future of animated films.

What's the best all CGI animated film? Seemed?

Visually, Uh, well, I haven't seen a lot of them. These days because Emily doesn't like those, So I probably wouldn't be the best person to ask Holly from uh stuff.

Or soyas in history class. She'd probably be the one to.

Ask for my money. Have you seen The Adventures of Tintin?

Oh? Yeah, that was amazing, mind blowing. Yeah. I saw that on your recommendation and really really liked it. Yeah.

The story was great, the action was great, the characters were great. But the CGI, the computer animation, is I think possibly the best ever done.

Yeah, and that's a bit of a different style than say, like UP or The Incredibles. It's not nearly as cartoons. It's like the I think it's the motion capture. Yeah, I think that's what they did for that.

Oh yeah, with UP it would strictly be totally just animation, right.

Yeah, but I mean they're both animation, right. But yeah, man, Tintin, that was really good.

It was good.

I was surprised how much I liked that.

But UP was good too, and Toy Story was good too. But all of these things came as a result of the ground that Toy Story.

Broke absolutely in nineteen ninety five, Like you said, what seems like a common thing today I mean, you don't see cell animation anymore.

It's almost I know, I kind.

Of miss it.

I totally miss it.

Well, like the new Mickey Mouse is all weird and CG like stuff from our generation should have just been discontinued. Yeah, and then you just come up with all new stuff that's CGI Starwberry Shortcake not supposed to be CGI. It just all looks weird now.

Yeah, I wish there would have people would have done the little bit of both still, because I think sell animation, Like I think The Iron Giant came out after Toy Story and they did sell animation. Yeah, and that was great. Yeah, great movie.

I haven't seen that.

Oh, it's really good. You'd like it.

Like it was a movie for grown ups, and Toy Story sort of laid the way for that because it was one of the first movies, I guess, cartoony kids movies to really have a lot of dialogue that flew over kids heads that adults.

Got a little nod in a wink.

What Toy Story.

Yeah, not like dirty humor, but it's not like Fittz the Cat No no no, but a little entendre here and there that adults might appreciate. The kids won't understand, right, those are the best jokes.

Right.

And now we have you know, best Animated Feature in the Oscars, which definitely came straight out of the original Toy Story because movies started being considered before they created its own category up and Toy Story three were actually nominated for regular Best Picture. Yeah, and I think everyone's like, oh, we need to get them in their own category because you can't have an animated movie when best Picture it came.

Well, up would have come after the Best Animated Picture category came out. Oh really, so that kind of ghost as a testament to just how amazing that movie is.

Yeah, that's right, those that it was still for Best Picture. Oh, it was both.

I don't know if it was up for it probably was up for Best Animated as well, but it was definitely also up for Best Picture while there was an animated cat category.

Yeah. I never considered that. Bam, that was a good movie. Yeah, it was sweet. So I got nothing else on Toy Story.

Well then what about the last one?

Yeah, two thousand and one in Space Odyssey. Man, quite a film.

You sent this essay on Criterion I think Criterion dot com, but you know, the Criterion collection. Yeah, it was written, I guess in nineteen eighty eight, even though it says posted in nineteen eighty eight. It's like there wasn't an internet to post it on in nineteen eighty eight.

Maybe it means posted like in the mail. Maybe.

But I realized, like I can read film essays about Stanley Kubrick's work all day long. Yeah, me too, Like I love that documentary Room two two seven. It was two three seven, two four six seven, you know, the one about the shining conspiracy theory.

Yeah, the number of the room is amazing. I can't remember, though.

I read a bunch of articles is I think two thirty seven. I read a bunch of articles around the release of that documentary, which we're basically like film essays on the Shining. I read this one amazing one from several years ago about Eyes Wide Shut, about how it's like a masterpiece of sociology. I love that movie theology.

A lot of people hate that movie.

Yeah, and then now this like two thousand and one. I'm sure there's tons out there to consume, but I can just read that stuff all day long because that guy was so just amazingly detailed as a director.

Yeah, I agree.

I can read more about his work critical essays on his work than any other director.

Right, it's just unbelievable. It's almost like it's its own genre. It is, you know, Kubrickian. Yeah, just got a word name after it, and well it should so.

Two thousand and one A Space Odyssey nineteen sixty eight blue minds back then, blows minds today one for it's just the amazing look in the technical achievement eight is really well. I mean, if you see a movie from nineteen sixty eight about outer space, it still looks like the future. Yeah, he don't expect it to hold up well, but it totally does. So much so that a lot of the you know, George Lucas and Ridley Scott were just like, it's done right, Like we might as well give up.

Yeah.

George Lucas when Star Wars came out said Star Wars is technically comparable, but for my money, two thousand and one is by far the better movie.

Yeah, everyone was sort of intimidated, I think by how talented Kubrick was.

Well.

Plus also you have to take into account that he made this movie at a time when other sci fi movies were.

Just pure schlock.

Oh yeah, so not only to make the movie in this way, this visually amazing and amazing with an audio soundtrack and just totally innovative, it also took like that mindset is just completely going a different direction that everybody else has as well.

Yeah, of course, think about Ridley Scott saying that, and then he goes on to make Alien and Blade Runner after that.

So I mean he helped Prometheus. Man.

Yeah, people don't like Prometheus. I don't care.

It's a cool movie. No. I liked it too.

I thought, Okay, one flaw, the big flaw to me was, and I'm sure it's like part of the subtext or the context or one of the texts, but the engineer coming back to life or coming out of hibernation after however long and just immediately like inflicting violence on these pe brained humans who are showing him no threat whatsoever. Yeah, I just thought it was a little It wasn't explained well enough, I think for my taste.

Yeah, I don't think I agree with you.

But when I'm watching a Ridley Scott movie, I just assume if I'm missing something, he has an explanation for it. I'm just not catching it.

Yeah, I know what you mean.

I'd like I think I read some stuff about how it tied into the alien cannon and realize I need to go see it again with all this knowledge that I wasn't really thinking about.

Yeah, and maybe i'd like it more. Yeah, but I haven't done that yet. So back to two thousand and one. Yeah.

It was also notable for being bookended basically with thirty minutes of silence on both ends of the movie. The first thirty minutes or and when I say silent, I mean no dialogue, and the last thirty minutes have no dialogue.

Yeah.

The last line comes like a full thirty minutes before the end.

Yeah, And over the one hundred and forty six minutes there are only forty minutes of dialogue and the whole thing. And that's why I just when people compare something like Interstellar, then call it Kuprickian.

I just want to smash.

Do you not like Interstellar?

Not really?

Oh, I liked it.

I was super letdown.

Despite McConaughey doing Waterson in the future, I still liked it.

I even liked him in it.

I liked a lot of the parts of it, But to me, it's anti Kubrickian because every ten minutes they're explaining everything that's going on.

Oh yeah, again, that was another thing. Just like in.

Susception, Ellen Page's entire character was written in to explain what was going on every ten minutes.

Yeah, And I feel like Interstellar was the same way. It's like Christopher Nollen needs to just trust his audience a little bit like Kubrick did and say you figure it out or don't.

Yeah. No, I'm not.

Gonna stop every ten minutes just to explain everything.

Yeah, it's just going on. I remember if you didn't get it right, here's what's going on again.

Well, I think if they are labeling something like Interstellar is Kubrickian, right, one of the ways that you can interpret that is that he was he rooted his two thousand and one in science fact Yeah right, So like the stuff that the astronauts are like dealing with and the things that are going on and the conditions of space, it was all factual. Whereas with Interstellar, same thing. They went to really great links to do what they could

That was rock Hudson, Rock Hudson, that's right. Yeah, the original.

Screening that Roger Ebert was at in La Rock Hudson just left and said, can somebody tell me what the hell that was about?

Yeah, and it wasn't even over yet. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, the reason it it has science fact and not science fiction is because Kubrick and Arthur C. Clark, who oh yeah, it wasn't actually a book that was made into a movie. It was a movie. Our book made after movie, and they collaborated on both. And they went to Carl Sagan of course of Cosmos and said.

He said, you're gonna make billions, And.

That was pretty good, was it? Yeah? That sound a lot like them.

They went to Carl Sagan said, Hey, we want to portray these extraterrestrials. Are they maybe the Star Child is or they turned Dave into the Star Child? Are they humanoids? What are they going to look like? And Sagan was like, they were very unlikely to be humanoid. So Kubrick did the smart thing and was just like, well, we just won't show him at all, instead of making a fool of myself like Signs and making some dumb looking out o man, man, let me just not show the aliens.

Very smart move. Getting back to the story of two thousand and one, although I.

Think the Village is underrated, Yeah, I can stomach that one.

What about Well, you like the sixth sense? Right? Everybody like the sixth Sense? Sure, I guess that was it for him. I loved Unbreakable.

Unbreakable, Yeah, that was one where like, yeah, I think it was maybe even better the second time.

Yeah. I still like that movie.

But then he also made that Lady in the Water movie and the the one with Marky Mark the people were jumping off four brothers, No, three kings?

Is it the one in the Elevator? No, he just produced Oh I know what you're talking about, the one where people like jumping off of buildings and stuff inexplicably. Yeah, that I didn't even I didn't see that. You couldn't get through ten minutes of that movie.

So two thousand and one Back to Good Movies was had a three acts, three part structure, but not a conventional three act structure that you might be used to in movies, which is why it confounded people like Rock Hudson.

The first they called the movements.

The first movement was the The Dawn of Man sequenced with the Apes with a monolith, and he has that great part where he throws his little bone tool up in the air and then it morphs into all lot morphs, but it maybe is a dissolve into the spinning in outer space.

It's called the match cut. Yeah, match cut.

And of the rotation of what we now know was a nuclear warhead.

Because I read.

That little article twenty Things you Didn't Know about two thousand and one, I didn't know those were nuclear warheads necessarily in outer space. They made it a little more vague, and initially it was going to be more explicit and they were going to explode it in outer space, right but he said, now it's a little too close to the ending of strange. Yeah, so let's not do that. Yeah, probably a good choice.

Yeah, But as a result, some people have taken it to mean that like it was that match cut was supposed to show how far humans have come, right from using a bone to murder somebody to satellites in space. But if you know that the satellite is actually loaded down with nuclear warheads, that match cut demonstrates how little humans have changed from using a bone to murder somebody to using satellites to murder somebody. The motif is still the same, and it's murder.

Yeah, he's going for some deep things. Oh yeah, a lot of metaphor happening. Yeah.

I mean supposedly in every single shot, because he started out as a still photographer, right, Yeah, supposedly every frame of a Kubrick movie. There is nothing that isn't unintentionally placed there by him. He did a lot of his own set decorating.

Yeah, Like the pencil holder on the desk in the office of the guy at the Shining Hotel, right was where it's supposed to be.

Right, and if it has like a picture of a goatthead inscribed on it that means something.

It's not accidental.

Yeah, although we'll say Room two thirty seven, which I think may have been the point is a little bit like these people are crazy, not like, oh man, I just see what they're saying in all this, right, I was just thinking these people are nuts.

Right, it's it was just kind of enjoyable to hear their interpretations of.

It well, and I think it had It was a comment on obsession and fandom more so than the shining.

For sure, but there I thought, there are some of their ideas were oh yeah, interesting totally. I said Room two two seven, didn't I like going out with conspiracy Theoris. It's like Mary.

Was in Room two two seven, like a sitcom. Yeah, it was just called two two seven. Okay, yeah, gotcha, remember it was Jack Kay. She'd be like Mary, Oh okay.

That's what my impression was. What'd you think I was doing?

Well? I wasn't sure what she meant being a weirdo. Yeah, yeah, okay.

The second movement was, of course the How sequence, the computer, the how uh was it?

The How nine thousand?

Yeah, really creepy and How ended up being a lot of people's favorite character, even though it was just a voice the supercomputer on the Discovery ship.

Like, what are you doing to It's so creepy.

I had the Mad Magazine spoof of two thousand and one when I was a kid.

It was great. Yeah.

And then the third movement is when Dave moves on to the next stage of human development with these extraterrestrials that you only hear, and basically it's when it comes full circle the third movement.

And the third movement is the one that has almost well it's really just the second movement that's has a dialogue.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Some of the alternate titles for two thousand and one Journey Beyond the Stars, terrible Universe not bad, Yeah, okay, Tunnel to the Stars so great.

Planet Fall that sounds bad.

It sounds like a James Pond movie.

And then How the Solar System was one as a play on how the West was won.

Yeah, which like movie geeks would find that appealing, but everybody else would say, that's you ruined everything.

Yeah, And Kubrick was this is the last thing I have. He was so obsessive with protecting his material that he allegedly I don't think allegedly, I think he did ye. Have all the sets and props and miniatures destroyed after he shot it, so they would never be reused, which is a common thing at the time.

Yeah, okay, we're doing a space movie. Go get that, Go get that space ring from Stanley set. Yeah, let's reuse it for a planet fall.

He also destroyed all of the footage that didn't make it into the original theatrical release.

Yeah, destroyed. It's gone.

Yeah, so they wouldn't one day after his death recut it, which they invariably probably would have done.

Yep, he's a smart man.

Yeah, I could. We should just do a podcast on Kubrick.

Okay he was I'm down for that challenge.

He'd be a dude. Yeah, one of my heroes.

Yeah.

Cinematically, you got anything else? I got nothing else.

If you want to know more about movies, if you like this, and you probably also love our exploitation episode, exploitation movie episode fun one. What else have we talked about movies in Cannonball Run? Oh yeah, I had a lot to do with the movie.

Yeah. Our James Bond episode. Yeah. Yeah. We've had a few of these, and people always respond to these real like, you guys should have a spin off.

Should do an all movie podcast. Sure, maybe one day.

Maybe.

Remember if you're looking for any of these press control F or Apple F in your web browser and search that way on our podcast archive page. You can also search for this article on how stuff works by typing movies in and seeing what comes up. And since I said how stuff works, is time for a listener mail. I'm gonna call this Mike A. DuPont really clear something up for us on scientific method. Okay, hey guys, it was a great Well, actually, he doesn't say it was great.

I think I just made that up.

Hey guys, your Scientific Method podcast has a consistent misuse of what a scientific law is in relation to the working of the scientific method. It appears that you believe that a law e g. Newton's law of gravity is held in higher esteem than theory, that eventually a theory matures into a law. I think I probably did think that because of politics, right, you know, Bill becomes a law right exactly, he says, when in fact, theory is considerably more robust than a law.

A law is a mathematical model.

That describes observed behavior, does not answer the why. Theory does answer why something happens.

Did we not say that.

I thought we did well, Like I knew that. I remember finding that out from the research. I just can't believe it didn't come out of my mouth.

He claims, we did not, And I feel like I'm learning this so I definitely did not.

Okay, go ahead, but you may have. For example, Newton's law.

Of gravitational attraction describes the action of two bodies that can be used for pretty much everything. It is perfect for describing what happens, but it cannot tell you why the two items are attracted or drilled down to the underlying mechanism.

Yeah, a law is like much more succinct.

It just is what it is.

Nor is the law even universal, and could not be used to explain the Parahelian procession of Mercury's orbit burn. In comparison, Einstein's theory of general relativity was eventually used to solve the Mercury issue.

Oh yeah, the mercury issue.

And the standard model, along with the recent discovery the Higgs posts on my stern can answer the why do these two masses attracted to each other?

A question?

I think what you mean is why are these two masses attracted to one another? Mike, it's pretty teleological theory is considerably more developed and richer than a scientific law, which is more of a tool that is applicable to a wide range of applications. Keep up the good work that is, Mike DuPont.

Thanks Mike, thanks for that of the Valley Forge. DuPonts, I think, so, huh have you seen fox Catching?

Oh? No, I've heard it's good. Is it good? No? Really, I don't think so.

No.

I hear it's kind of slow, it's beyond slow. Really?

Oh yeah, I can understand why the academy loved it, or sure a lot of people. I'm sure, do you like it?

I was not a fan of.

Fo I think people generally seeing like a turn by an actor like Steve Girl doing something really different.

They're knocked out by that. No, I still can't believe he didn't like Birdman. No spoiler alert for people who have not seen Birdman. The following conversation is full of spoilers.

Yes, what didn't you like about it?

So?

I thought I thought Michael Keene was good?

Okay?

Who plays his daughter Emily Blunt?

Is that? Who that is? Emma Stone?

Emma Stone? Excellent? Okay? Ed Norton even pretty good.

Okay, so the acting was fine.

Who is Naomi Watson was in it?

Yeah?

She did great? Okay, so yes, the acting. The acting was fine. Sure that the acting was fine. I thought the photography was amazing.

Yeah, the whole seemingly one take thing kind of knocked you out.

Probably I didn't even pick up on that, but yes it did. It was more the uh, the for me, the juxtaposition of the story, which was pretty boring and realistic in everyday life, even though it was about a Broadway production, it was still about the everyday life of it, sure, against the surrealism that's like threaded and embedded in throughout the whole movie. I didn't like that. Okay, it was like choose one or the other men?

Gotcha? It irked me.

And uh and then just so that one part with the critic where Michael Keaton tells off the critic. I thought Michael Keaton did a wonderful job, But just the whole point that it was in there of like the director, you know, using Michael Keaton's character to tell off all the critics he's ever wanted to tell off in his movie. Yeah, I just thought it was pretentious and I thought it was kind of clumsy in that sense too, and it was enough that it attainted it.

Yeah. And then the ending. I did not like the ending at all, Yeah, at all. That'll ruin a good movie.

Because it was it completely went contrary to all the other stuff that he went out of his way to point out was fake or fraudulent or not real. And then all of a sudden it is what Yeah, no choose one or the other. The director refused to make very important decisions, and I think that that ruined the movie.

That is a very well thought out the criticism, I think, thank you, thank you very much. Sure man, that was the end of listener mail even, wasn't it. Yeah?

Because now I'm not like, she's Jush is weird? He didn't like Birdman. Now I'm like, just didn't like Birdman. He has good reasons.

Thank you, Thank you.

I like justifying my opinion, don't we all?

So if you want to get in touch with Chuck and I or Jerry, who I apparently just spoiled Birdman for, you can contact us via Twitter, s y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff you should know. You can send us an email, this stuff podcast at how stuffworks dot com, and as always, joined us at our home on the web, Stuff you Should Know dot com.

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