Sneakers (1992) - Icons, Anagrams & a Black Box

I'm on the subway the other day, and this is bewilderingly never happened to me before, which is shocking because we've lived in New York now for like twenty five years or something.

One hundred and thirty years.

Yes.

Yeah, the subway pulls into my stop. The door opens. I walked to the door, and I walk through a fart cloud so toxic that I actually almost like stumbled on the way out the door, like to the point when I turnround and be like, somebody has to see a gastro enterologist. I don't know who did that, but that is not okay. Now, I'm not even concerned for me. I'm concerned for you and what is happening in your system.

I'm concerned for you now. I think you have pink eye in both eyes.

I had my sunglasses on. I think I'm okay. I always keep my sunglass down on the subway. I don't want anyone to recognize me, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, you.

Exactly. Yeah.

Yeah.

Hey, I'm Paul and I'm America. And this is that aged.

Well, yesterday's pop culture today.

And we are in we're doing Crazy Technology month. Erica. Is it's been It's been bonkers up in here. For us, it's been it's.

Been bleeps and bloops and X rays and stingrays and all the rays.

Lots of San Francisco content.

Our second film that takes place in San Francisco just this month.

Well done, Yeah, well done San Francisco.

And honestly our second the other film is also in California, So just California all around.

All right. So before we get to the movie today, though, we do have a couple of podcast reviews that we're going to read. Shall I go first?

Sure?

All right, So this is from Apple Podcasts and it is from Mouse eighteen oh nine, and they write, cool, cool Cool. I found Paul and Erica through a date with Dateline a few years ago. Thank you again, Kimberly and Katie, and I've been an avid listener ever since. Their takes on the movies and shows I grew up with delight me endlessly. And I don't care when they throw out the ranking system for a movie or show they love. I appreciate that.

You know what I like about that is subtle shade. It's like, you know what, I don't care that they don't have integrity.

Yeah, I don't care. That they will fully be like I like this movie a lot, and so I'm giving it a nine, even though there's blackface in it. I don't care.

Well, guys a birth of in Day. She is fine. It's fine.

Erica and Paul are a match made in heaven and the perfect pair to lead us through all the problematic decades of the eighties and nineties. I recommend this pod to every gen xer. I know you know what. It's important to remember, listeners that you are the best way to get this pod bigger. Recommending it to your friends. I'm saying you are all our pr agents.

Ok, You're all our Samantha Jones's that's right.

Mouse eighteen oh nine goes on. Please please please do us all a favor and cover some kind of wonderful Well, yes, Erica, I still can't believe you haven't covered it. Keep up the amazing work. No notes, Well we have.

We got fucking great news for you. Mouse eighteen oh nine.

That's right.

Check your feed.

It's your feed. It happened. It happened before we got around to reading this. It happened in February. And then we have another review, Erica. This one's from podcast Addict not from Apple podcasts.

Yes, Giovanni B. On podcast Addict writes, one of my regular searches is for podcasts discussing.

Soap dish because you are living your life.

Right, Giovanni B. Make no changes, none, make make no adjustments. Zero adjustments needed. Yeah, Giovanni continues, as kinks go. It's quite tame, but it's one I cultivate.

Fantastic, excellent, and.

The way that aged Well discussed it with a comforting ease, genuine insight and love for its subject, couple with the sense that we're on the edge of impending chaos make me download more episodes and they confirmed my impression, which in turn led me to subscribe.

All right, can't.

Wait to make a suggestion, Giovanni be you? Can you be our life coach?

Is that?

Is that a thing you do?

I will take an oath Giovanni's oath? These are great Mouse eighteen o nine. Giovanni B. Thank you so much for these reviews. If you would like a down A twelve tote bag, please just let us know this is you. I will send it off for you. Erica, Erica, we had so many movies requested this month, but we had one movie that we kind of tried to incept in and we did. We did this.

This did get the third top number of votes. I think, uh of fourth, yeah, third or fourth, and that's because Paul basically was like, guys, we're doing.

This whether you like it or you might as well give over.

We're jumping on this. This movie's bandwagon, and y'all are following us. Today's film is the I'm gonna say classic, It is not technically a classic because I don't think enough people watched it, and we're gonna fix that. Today Nay's film is the nineteen ninety two classic thriller Sneakers.

Yes, classic comic thriller. I would almost say yes, Caper.

Caper, Yes, yes, this movie walked so the Ocean's films could run. And I do realize the Ocean's films were actually remakes of the sixties Oceans films, but this is better than all those movies.

Agreed, one hundred percent. Sneakers was requested by Kay Michael, Mary Beth, Kathleen, Heather, Ariel and Nicole, Valerie, Sarah, Lana ben Kh and Michelle and as I said before, also us and Us. It was written by Lawrence Lasker, Walter Parks, and phil Alden Robinson. It was directed by Robinson and stars Robert Redford, dan Ackroyd, Ben Kingsley, Mary McDonell, River Phoenix, Sidney Potier, and David Strathairn. Each and every one of them at least an Oscar nominee.

Wow, I actually did not realize dan Ackroyd is an Oscar nominee.

Miss Daisy Best Supporting Actor.

He was nominated for driving Miss Daisy. You're absolutely right, I'd forgotten that.

Yeah.

Allegedly, during the filming of Sneakers, the director was approached by men claiming to be representatives of the Office of Naval Intelligence, who told him that, for reasons of national security, the film could not include any references to a quote unquote handheld decoder device.

What keep reading? I'm reading visiting.

The first time you guys Robinson, The director was concerned, as such a device was a key plot point. However, once he consulted with his studio lawyer, he realized that the visit had been a prank instigated by a member of the cast, and he suspected Akrooyd and Redford excellent.

Excellent, excellent joined of Sidney Ploitier was like a big prankster. He comes on set and everyone's like, everyone just checked your seats. Plotier's on set, there's gonna be whipope cushions ha ha. He loves a fart joke more than anything.

Honestly, Yes, I like there's something about him that gives off such a joy energy that I'm just like, I bet he's a he's a foot Well.

I don't know if you read this on the Wikipedia page, Like everyone apparently adored making this movie, like this was a fantastic experience for everyone involved.

What a good hang.

Yeah.

Robert Redford also has this energy of like he's gonna take care of his people. Everyone's gonna have a nice time. No one's gonna get ignored or left out. He's gonna make sure everyone's taken care of it. I just I don't know that that's true, but I get that vibe from him.

Yeah. I also just love the fact that Robert Redford aged.

Yeah, he's fifty six when he made this movie.

Yeah, and he like, look he looks great, to be clear, like no skips what dude, But he just has like the normal weathered face of a fifty six year old he just like he looks fifty six, and part of like there's a little bit of joking between him and Sidney Potier being like, we're getting too old for this, and it's like, well, at least doesn't look like he's thirty five and being like, we're getting too old for this,

Too low. Yeah, what on earth do we have to complain about?

Now?

Look, if you'd given me a cherry Picks that was slightly lower, I would understand. Because my one complaint about this movie is it is a sausage fest.

Look, I watched plenty of movies that are sausage fests. Yeah, in the privacy of my bedroom, all the movies are sausage fests.

It was that kind of sausage fest. I'd still be into this movie.

Don't peretty much. Yeah, I don't care.

All of them, all of them. It's I mean, I don't even understand where do you take twenty percent out? Even like with my one complaint that it's there's really only one female character in the entire movie.

The only thing I can think of is and and this would be fair for critics and for audience to be fair. Like I watched it and I really liked it, and then I enjoyed it so much more on the second watch, like in the first watch because they use effective red hair.

Oh that's true.

Again, totally enjoyed it, but I was I left the first viewing kind of confused. I mean like I don't actually know exactly what happened in that movie. And then on the second viewing, when I was doing the recap, I was like, Oh, this is actually super tight, and like they actually cross the t's and dot the eyes and oh that's a red herring. Oh that's a red herring. Oh that's a red herring. That's really cool and fun and like so I can see maybe if you watch

That has to be it, because you cannot ding this on the it's funny. It's over two hours, and I was like, oh, is this gonna feel too long? And but it doesn't. It runs, it moves, it moves.

So fast because it's also like two movies, there's a there's a first act, in the second act, and it's very clear.

Yeah, anyway, eighty percent is too low. I'm just gonna say I would give this movie.

I mean.

Yeah, I mean, I guess critically I would take off a couple of percentages for the sausage fest aspect, but as an audience member one hundred percent.

But in nineteen ninety two, I wouldn't like, I'd give you a fuck one hundred.

And also the one, the one flower here with us in the sausage chest is Mary fucking MacDonell, who's a goddamn garden all by herself.

Everything about her in this movie is perfection.

Do you know how much chemistry a straight couple has to have in order for me to care about them so much? Paul so much? And it is only gotten worse as I've gotten older.

I have seen you heckle at productions of Romeo and Juliet Heckel.

Heckel who cares? Who cares? And these two, I mean the first second when he rudely interrupts her piano lesson without knocking, I'm like, I'm in, I'm all in. This is kidder Reeve levels of chemistry.

Okay, I have to I have to ask, because I am now upon watching it this time, so I hadn't seen it in a while. I have slightly confused as to what she does.

No idea, absolutely no idea.

What who is this? This woman of mystery?

She understands quantum physics, but.

Her job seems to be piano teacher in an abandoned mansion, and.

She lives in San Francisco in the nineties in a duplex, gorgeous apartment.

But as we've discussed in So I Married an Next Murderer, which canonically takes place in the same era, this is the same world as So I'm married.

Robert Redford and Mike Myers drive the same car.

They drive the same car, they go, they both go to that gross butcher shop. Like, yeah, it's the same world. Yeah, that's actually Now that I'm saying it out loud, I have one other complaint about this movie. That really could have flashed that character out, just a schooschmore.

All right, Erica, So when was the first time you saw Sneakers?

I saw this when I was in high school. I did not see this in the theater. Every single member of my family, all four quadrants of varying interest in movies. Was were like, this movie's excellent, and we recorded it off the TV because we had a VCR because we're rich. Hey yeah, and we wore out that tape watching this movie on like family movie nights. We loved this movie. So every single member of my family adores this movie.

Surprising No One. Two days ago, I saw Sneakers for the first time. This is one that I like, Like we've put on the Instagram post like we wanted to watch it. I know this is one of your all time favorite movies. Another one of my favorite podcasters in the world like lists this as her favorite, like her number one movie of all time, like she loves this movie. And then I watched it, and like I said, the first time, I was like, oh, that was really fun.

It like, boy, the way things just don't change in the.

World, They only get worse. Please, Robert Redford told us what is this thirty years ago? What the issue was?

I feel like Anonymous watched this movie and we're just like.

Got it, got it, let's do it.

The good folks are Anonymous?

Yeah, all right, Erica. The tagline for this movie was a burglar, a spy, a fugitive, a delinquent, a hacker, and a piano teacher. And these are the good guys.

Terrible, that's awful, that's so bad, that's unworthy of this fucking movie. What are you doing?

Stop it?

Sit down.

Didn't write that, Lawrence Laska and Walter Parks, they didn't write it.

They didn't write it. Some intern wrote it and he fucked up. Also, just look, look, I hate to exclude the woman more, but maybe it would have been tighter if they'd been a burglar, a spy, a fugitive, a delinquent, a hacker, and these are the good guys. Don't put the piano teacher in there. It doesn't make any sense.

You can't follow the piano teacher with and these are the good guys because the piano teacher doesn't make sense with the Good Guys. Twist, Yes, the piano teacher sense is the punchline. If this is what you want to do a burglar, a spy, a fugitive, a delinquent, a hacker, dot dot dot, and a piano teacher, you're putting a hat in a hat.

It's dumb.

It's dumb.

And also, we will discuss this as we go on. She is far more than a fucking piano teacher.

She might be a superhero. We're not entirely certain.

Honestly, I'm trying to do work for the movie, and I'm like, did they make her character and bigu us on purpose so that you never know if she's if she's with the Good Guys completely or if she's maybe Like, is that in and of itself another red herring where we don't know if we can completely trust her.

I think they they drop that in the beginning as something they want you to think about, but they do not follow up on that at all.

I mean, this is a woman who probably teaches at Stanford, right, Like that that's what she really is. She's like, she teaches mathematics at Stanford, and then like for fun, on the weekends, yea an abandoned mansion Miss Havisham's House and teaches children piano.

All right, Erica, shall I read the iTunes synopsis?

Sure?

Robert Redford leads an all star cast in one of the most satisfying suspense films. Computer expert Martin Bishop Robert Redford leads a team of renegade hackers, including a former CIA employee Sidney Poitier, a gadgets wizard Dan Ackroyd, a young genius River Phoenix, and a blind sound man David straight there and who are routinely hired to test security systems. But Bishop, they're routinely hired because that's their job. Makes it sound like it's like a gang of thieves that

Paul, I'm going to be classy today.

I'm keeping we are not going to comment on the fact that we're going to say the phrase black box uh huh somewhere around four hundred times in the next hour and a half to two hours.

I don't even understand what you could make fun of that.

It's a mystery. Yeah, it remains a mystery.

I understand why it's a mystery to you. I find it less of a mystery. I don't know if I told you I've owned a black box for a while.

Okay, okay. The synopsis goes on. Along with his former girlfriend Mary McDonald, Bishop's team retrieves the box and makes a stunning discovery. The device can break into any computer system in the world. With factions from all sides willing to kill for the powerful box, Bishop and his team and bark on their most dangerous assignment ever in this exhilarating high tech caper from Phil Alden Robinson.

They don't make it sound fun. They're over explaining the movie. Stop it just be like, do you want to watch actual like cinematic icons, be fun for two hours? Here's your movie? You had me at Sidney Potier.

I'm done. Sydney Poitier says the word Motherfucker's in this movie. Done so good it is so good.

Honestly, they went almost the entire movie before someone said something racist to Sydney, and when it happened, I was like, son of a bitch, Yeah, why why? And then five and then five seconds later he says the word motherfucker, and I was like, Oh, that's why, That's why they had to get him that level of angry. This is this like character who's like a very he's a smooth operator. They had to get that guy that level of angry.

Yeah, when they get there, come up and directly afterwards, it can be really satisfying.

You get Sidney Poitier saying motherfucker later, it's great. Do you have an actual synopsis for this film?

This is a movie about crazy technology in which the most unbelievable thing is the idea that River Phoenix cannot get a date.

A poor celibate River Phoenix.

Poor ass faced River Phoenix just can't get any attention from the ladies.

I have to say, he's fighting that face. He really is, and I think it works. I think he manages to make the character awkward enough that I do understand how he would walk up to someone in a bar and just in under five seconds weird them out so much that they'd walk away.

All right, So that is our lead up. We have a couple of commercials to play here. We're going to put them in. Stick around. We will be right back. We're going to take you through sneakers. If you don't want to hear commercials, skidaddle your little petuity. Wow, different Petuiti's in the vocab today. Skadaddle that little patuity over to patreon dot com slash that age Ball podcast. Sign up at any paid level and you will get ad free episodes. If not, stick around, we will be right back.

Did you join the Little Rascals? Is that capping?

I do have a cow lick?

Hey?

Yeah?

Yeah? Are you and Alfalfa gonna go down to the watering hole later?

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By the way, the sexiest sax intro this is like a careless whisper level sax intro sweet love to your ear drums, it sure is.

I really enjoyed the anagrams and the title sequence. At turn up Cures, Elvis becomes Universal Pictures Block, the rhinos Spaniel becomes philled out. Phil Alden Robinson thought it was so fun. I thought I would try to make anagrams of our names.

Oh okay, okay, word evil is right in my name.

It is it is, and I you know on what, I didn't go for it. I didn't go for it. So I had to use my middle name because my my just my first and last name is a lot of owls. And then then just like a couple random consonants that repeat, it's not great. So okay. With Paul John Kola and I got I an alcohol.

Pooja, you are an alcohol pooja.

I am, I am. And for Erica Yalba, I got kill a variable.

Oh that's my that's my If I was a really bad rapper, which I would be yea to be clear, that would be that would be my hip hop name.

Your name also has liberal in it, and I was trying to make something happen with liberal and I just couldn't.

Oh, you know, I did not know my name had the word liberal in it. Actually, I got evil immediately because it's really it's right there.

All right. So we open on a snowy night in nineteen sixty nine. Two college students, Marty and Cosmo use their hacking skills to reroute money from sources like the Republican Party and Richard Nixon to causes they consider more worthy of the cash, like the Black Panthers and the National Association to legalize Mara Juanna real quick.

I just want to say off the bat because we're in technology months and obviously Honey, I Shrunk the Kids is like sci fi more than technology. But this is the movie thus far that gets it.

The most, right, I think.

So, yeah, this all seems entirely plausible.

Yeah, and this is also technology in nineteen sixty nine, so to call it rudimentary.

I mean they're using an abbocus.

Yeah.

I don't even know how you break into the National the Republican Party with an avocus, with these fuckings, they did it.

Yeah, so there's an easy camaraderie between them. By the way, before I go on, can I just say you know immediately who the young guy is with the red hair, because I didn't realize that Robert Redford owned feathered strawberry blonde male hair to the level of like, if you just put that on anybody, I'm like, that's Robert Redford.

Genuinely. You can put that on Viola Davis and need be like, no, no, it's Viola Davis and Robert Redford. My bad, you got me. Davis got me again. The actor too, His name is Gary Hirschberger, and I had to lie I did a deep dive on him after because I was like, who is this Robert Redford doppelganger that exists in the world? And he has literally been in every TV show ever? Yeah, for like one episode and like and then he had a bit of a run on Twin Peaks and a bit of a run

What a great fucking career.

Yeah, he's like a journeyman. He's like a journeyman actor, but also fucking looks exactly.

Like Robert Redford. Yeah.

I was like, that's incredible.

All right. So there's an easy camaraderie between Marty and Cosmo. They had gleefully decide to get some dinner while they continue there. Robin hooding. They can't decide who's going to venture out into the cold to get a pizza, So Cosmo hides a carter in his palm and he tells Marty to choose, and Marty chooses, but he's wrong. Cosmo's hand is empty, so Marty heads out, and we see that Cosmo's other hand was empty as well. So he cheated his friend. He didn't feel like going into the cold,

Marty rushes through the snow to his Volkswagen minibus.

To his mystery mobile or whatever the Scooby Doo thing was like.

To his Hippiemobile, like the hat on a hat on a hat, But fuck it, let's do it right. Then he notices flashing police sirens and he like opens the window a crack, looks out and sees rot Row. There's some men in like trench coats and hats, very official looking, like storming into their dorm, and we cut back to Cosmo. Cosmo like wanders over to the window to see his friend. He looks out and he sees Marty running back like towards the back of the building and he's like, what

YEP, I have one correction for you. He doesn't scream Marty, he screams Mighty.

Having seen the film ahead of time, Okay, I knew exactly what this younger person was doing, and the younger version of Ben Kingsley was doing. What happened was and I'm just gonna spoil some stuff right now. They clearly filmed the Ben Kingsley scenes first, and they showed the actor footage of what Ben Kingsley was doing, and they're like, can you sound like a South African pretending to do

This guy was a depot, all right. We cut to San Francisco thirty some odd years later, and we find grown up Marty now played by genuinely the icon Robert Redford, in the midst of breaking into a bank with his squad. His squad consists of the following four people. Donald Creas played by the actual icon Sidney Poitier.

Icons and icons in this goddamn movie.

A former CIA operative. He's Marty's second in command. Darren Roscoe nicknamed Mother played by Dan Ackroyd. He's an engineer and a conspiracy theorist. Irwin Emery nicknamed Whistler played by David straight aarn a blind phone freak. That's phr e ak, which is that this is what I found in Wikipedia because I was trying to figure out he's actually based on a real person. Oh cool, And I guess this is something that people were able to do in the

Yeah, you know, I went with it.

I was like, yeah, who cares.

I had no idea. This was based on a real person that is so excellent.

And finally, Cal Arbagast played by River Phoenix. He is a hacking prodigy. He's the kid of the team. He doesn't have as much do as the others. It seems like they just kind of took him in.

Well, they caught him. The local authorities hired this crew to find this teen hacker in their midst and then they caught him and then hired him because he's so good at what he does.

Hey listeners, future Paul. Here thus begins the time in this episode where I will refer to River Phoenix's character as Cal and not Carl. Let's see how long Erica allows for this to go on before or she finally corrects me. So the team is in constant contact via radio. Each member gets to show off their skills as they infiltrate the bank, never missing a chance to ras each other like family does. These These these are close. These guys are close. They have each other's backs.

Yeah, they're a proper crew. Also, there's a great moment in this scene when they break So it's River Phoenix, Robert Redford and Sydney Potier and they're breaking it. They're physically breaking into the bank. They have to go behind the counter to get to the to the vaults, and River Phoenix just like like with the elegance and grace of a Barishnakoff, just like jumps over the counter, leaps

The man is a golden god, that's right.

So he's looking him up and down in a three piece suit, noless. Robert Redford gives him a sly look, and then instead of walking out of the bank, he proceeds to walk upstairs, and then we cut to him presenting the one hundred thousand dollars to the bank's board, telling them all of the holes that they have in their security, and they gave him a check for the job well, and then he heads back to the office.

So we cut to the sneakers hanging out in their enormous loft office and Cal rushes in to announce they have a new client, and they look like they've got deep pockets. Very exciting. Marty goes. He meets the two men, and the two men are named Dick Gordon played by Timothy Bussfield and Buddy Wallace played by Eddie Jones. Short sidebar on Timothy Busfield's hair. I have never seen hair so high and so flowing. At the same time, I

This movie has more redheads than we know what to do with.

It's true. It's true.

Also, I've never seen Timothy Bussfield play a villain before.

Yeah, he's pretty good at it.

He's actually really because if you had told me ahead of time that Timothy Busfield was going to be a villain, like not just a villain, like a heavy yeah, I'd be like, are you fucking kidding me? And he manages to pull.

It off all right. So Marty takes Dick and Buddy into a private, glass enclosed meeting room that's just in the center of their office. The two start quizzing him on why he's chosen to work with the people on his team. Crease was fired from the CIA, mother did time for breaking and entering, etcetera, etcetera. They all have like these these checkered records. Marty gets a bad vibe off of them, and he's like, who are you guys? Dick tells him to relax, and Buddy holds up his

The idea that the NSSA is the like the good guys.

Yeah, yeah, really that's the way.

That does not age super well.

It doesn't.

There's a line later in the movie where like they're like, the NSSA does not do domestic surveillance. It's simply not what we do. Like cut to ten years later, the NSA is like, all we do is domestic Marty, freaked out because they know who he is, actually, takes the bait and heads to the NSA office, where he meets with Dick again and Dick tells him about doctor Gunter Yannick.

I think they say Janic Janic in the film.

Doctor Gunter Janic a mathematician who specializes in large number theory, prime numbers, and factoring. He numbers, He numbers and numbers, that's what he does. Janic recently received an enormous grant from an unknown source somewhat suspicious. The NSA traced it and it turns out that unknown source is from Russia. That's a great moment here where Marty's like, guys, you're chasing this is a dumb lead. We won, they lost. This is not a this Russia is not even a

I love how much he hates the government and is so open, like he walks in and he goes, oh, yeah, I could have worked for the NSA. But then they found out that my parents were married, and I was like, that is excellent.

That is such a good joke. The two NSA agents are like, hey, look we spill. We still spy on them. They still spy on us, So we've got to follow up on this. Right. They've discovered that Janek is working on a little black box. So Janek has a little black box, yeah, that he plays with.

He's working. He's working on the box.

You know what. You have to work on those boxes.

He works vigorously and intentively on the box.

You have to otherwise it doesn't just open. You have to work on it a little bit.

It doesn't just it doesn't just bloom in the sun like a flower.

No, you have to tap on it sometimes, Yeah, to really get I'm showing Paul the tapping.

Tapping. It's a very it's a more vigorous tapping than I would have presumed.

Yeah, sometimes you really got to tap it to get it to open up. Okay, he's working on a little black box code names astronomy. They need to know what's this all about? What's in the box?

What's it?

Marty wonders why they're coming to him, and like, why don't you do it? You're the fucking government. Just arrest the guy and get the bucks. And they're like, whoa, because what we're doing is slightly illegal, but it's not strictly speaking legal. We won't be legal until the current president's son is president, so until ten years from now

We cut back to Sneakers headquarters. Marty is pitching the team on this job and Crease is quite angry that he had not told them about his past. Right. Marty's like, look, we've all got secrets, and he says, no one knows why you had to leave the CIA, and then Crease just like walks away and doesn't say anything. Marty attempts to manipulate them with if you guys don't want to do this to keep me out of jail, I understand, and none of them fall for it. They're all like,

Yeah, We're in this for the money.

So Marty announces that they'll start with light surveillance. He's going ahead to a lecture that Janek is giving the next day, and Chris asks, Hey, do you want me or Whistler? Whistler is the blind phone freak David straight theirn do you want one of us to go with you? And Marty's like, oh, you know, I think I was thinking about it, and I just, you know, just kicking some names around, and I thought maybe I would ask

All right, So we cut to Liz Ogilvie, played by the luminous Mary McDonald.

Can I interrupt you immediately to do five minutes on Mary McDonald's outfit. You may have a tight five on this outfit. This outfit is it is like a suede or velvet or Moleskin's business suit dress in like this deep emerald green. She's got a choker on that's styled to look like a thick belt, which exactly matches the belt on her suit. Her eyeshadow is the same green. She looks incredible, She looks she looks like she's she's dressing up for like the model uns Halloween party and

Like like, yes, she's got the carry fisher.

Yeah, this is witchcraft. This should not look good, and it looks so good.

She is so good at being sexy while also exuding like intelligence, charisma, elegance. Class, yes, class, she's truly magnificent. Role agreed, all right, So she's giving a piano lesson to a like the most adorable ten year old girl Marty walks in. She's again they're in a fucking mansion, a giant is it a music conservatory? Like and also like the kids were taken there on a bus like it's like it's an after school program.

Yeah, what is this woman's job?

Marty walks in. Liz dismisses her student very kindly, and Marty says hi, and Liz says, we're not getting back together. A delightful sparring match ensues, where Liz insists that she's very happy tending to actual children rather than man children. Excellent.

So this tells us that she once was involved with the sneakers, like she was a sneaker herself and like was like, I'm doone with this. I don't want to do this anymore.

She's like, yeah, I'd rather teach kids piano and castle Dracua. Marty finally admits to her that the governments found him yep, and she gets serious. She stops flirting. She turns around and she says, you and I are not getting back together, and he says, hey, don't flatter yourself, as she smiles and says pick me up at three.

Yeah, because remember he wants her to go to this lecture with him, right.

She leaves and Marty clenches his fist with a self satisfied yes.

I'm so invested already. I make it my business to not care about straight couples. I make it my life goal to not give a shit, and I care.

You throw a rotten eggs at weddings. I've seen it.

Yeah, yeah, I do, because I want them to know what I think. All right, So we cut to Janek's lecture. Janek is played by Donald Logue in the most un Donald Logue like part you could possibly imagine.

This got a laugh out of me.

Yes, last night.

I haven't seen this movie in a long time, and I'm like, I have such other associations with Donald last now, and I just this made me laugh out loud. Also, I just gotta keep pointing out ginger watch.

Ginger.

Got another fucking ginger in this movie.

And he's got longer hair than Mary McDonald.

This is Ginger number four already in this film.

Yeah, this is this film is a ginger snap. It's a gingerbread cookie wife.

I forgot about Gary Hirschberger at the beginning.

Oh there you go, Gingers.

We've got a ginger quintet.

All right. So Liz is trying to pay attention and Marty is like, hey, so are you seeing anybody? She says, this is about unbreakable codes and then she says, are you seeing anyone? And he shushes her. I mean, just oh god, this is a firework factory. At the reception after the lecture, they run into Gregor Ivanovitch, played by Broadway legend George Hern.

Amazing.

This is not the original Sweeney Todd, but this is the Sweeney Todd that many people know because he is the one who did the film performance with Angela Lansberry. That is George Hern.

That's right.

He also was briefly married to Dixie Carter. I love a straight man who is known for his musical theater, who has five wives. That's George Turn.

I had no idea. Now I'm going to do a deep dive on George Hern. When we're down with this.

George Hern comma, knee deep in poon. That is George Turns. George Turn's life.

Just cleaning up backstage snatch like it's.

So.

Gregor is a Russian spy who has now been designated a cultural attache. Because remember, everything's good. Now they're allies.

We're buds again.

Yep. He's thrilled to see that Liz and Marty are back together. Liz says, we're not back together. He invites them to see the Kiev String Quartet at the Russian Embassy a few nights later, and then he leaves and Liz insists that she doesn't trust him. So I left this in here just because this is I think one of the first like big red Herrings. Yeah, they have a person that we like, be like that person is

He's a Russian spy, for God's sake. Yeah, I totally agree, great Red hearing.

So she and Marty spot doctor Elena Riskov played by Lee Garlington, who is genuinely we already talked about Gary Heirschberger. Lee Garlington is the Gary Herschberger of the feminine side of the of the business. She has been in everything on one.

Episode of every single television show in the eighties and nineties.

We didn't even talk about her. But she's in some kind of wonderful She's the gym teacher in some kind of wonderful she she's on The Golden Girls, she plays Vince's mother on Will and Grace. This woman has been in everything. A journey woman actress is she also a redhead.

I can't remember if she a blonde in this she's a redhead. Sometimes she's a blonde. I think she's a dirty blonde.

So I'm not going to put her think she's a dirty blonde in the red.

Head in the redhead choir I'm building in this film. Okay, I just need to talk about this scene because again, I just mean, I just want to bring this up. Liz again is technically a piano teacher.

According to the poster, she's a piano teacher but also.

Knows quantum physics. Also understood Yannick's lecture ostensibly like the real reason Marty brought her to this lecture is to have an excuse to hang out with her and to get her back in his life. But ostensibly the reason he brought her there is because she is an expert in mathematics.

Women in stem Who is she?

What is she doing?

What is her?

Whole thing?

That? I'm going to ding the movie hard on this because it's the one thing I have, honestly to think about. Liz is such a like a wisp of a character. A lot of them are, to be fair, we don't know anything about any of these. But I have no idea what mother who mother is, But because Liz is such a main character, I need her, I need her to have more.

Yeah, I was expecting this movie to be a real ensemble piece and I and I will say it's it's not. It's a Robert Redford movie, which is great. I'm not complaining. I was just going in expecting like a lot of different character studies. And you really only get to know Marty yeah as a real person because they don't need to because the actors are so good.

That's the thing. Yeah, you're absolutely right. Like once you put like David Strathairon in the role, I'm like, well, okay, I'm invested because I love this guy. Like yeah, sure. So we cut to the sneakers in full surveillance mode. On Janek. Carl describes the office as Janet enters, so he's describing it to Whistler, so that Whistler is sort of red in on the situation as it's happening, but

Sometimes the box a little hitten.

Honestly, only one part of the box is hidden.

It's pretty out there, pretty out there.

It's only the play button that's his got to dig for it, a little play button.

Excellent.

So Janek enters his office. He readies himself to log onto his computer, and they're like, yes, this is it. We're gonna be able to see his password, learn his password, then we can break into his office, et cetera. The whole plan is coming into place. But then unfortunately, Elena comes in, the woman we saw whispering in his ear earlier, the other great character actress in the film, and the two of them in immediately enter into a passionate embrace.

Uh huh, and we hear ah.

Like like we get it that, Like these two are getting it on, and we now we don't get to see that. We get to see it through Sydney Poitier's reaction to seeing that, which makes the whole thing ten times funnier.

It's also great because Cal's like, can I can I look and they're like no, And then then I think Marty's like, let me, let me get a look.

Look, let me look at it. I want to see it.

I want to see it will turn out by the way, they are not having sex. They're just kissing, which means Janek is the greatest kisser.

I have a theory, okay, because this movie is keeping it classy, right, so it's not going to show us this, but I think it implies that he went under her skirt and gave her a little woodsie do, tried to hit play. Yeah, he was hitting play. He was he was playing you know what they were doing. He was playing Marionette and and uh.

That's what you're saying is he was playing in the shadow box.

Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah. He had his hand all the way up the scooch. That's I think that's what was happening. That's that's my in my mind, that's what happened, because you're right, Otherwise it doesn't make sense because it's just just kissing, and the sound effect is like she is seconds away from orgasming.

Agreed, agreed, So okay, these two.

Are are immediately in this passionate embrace. Janet pushes Elena away, he tries to get He's like, no, no, no, I must do my work. I must, I must, I must focus on the on the other black box in the room. He sits at his computer and they're like, okay, good again, we're going to get his password. But unfortunately Elena gets in the way. She's she covers their field of vision and she is horned. But she is not going to take no for an answer. She's not going down without

Yeah.

I don't know if the audience knows this, but I studied for many years in Saint Petersburg.

Yeah, yeah, I have a I mean, perfect.

Lawless yeah, Russian accent. I think the government has tried to hire me, yeah, as a spy. But I was like, no, no, no, I'm good.

I've asked you. I've asked you to stop doing it, because every time you do it I want to shout ruskie at you. So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you just.

You just throw vodka in my face every time. Verry so Elena leans down and she whispers with sexual heat and desire burning through her cossack body. I leave message here on service.

But you do not call. It's more sexual. I leave message here on service but you do not call.

It's not sorry. I needed to warm up into it. Let me do it, Let me do it perfect now again. I leave message care on service, but you do not call.

That's it.

I know a lot of people are like, is Vladimir Putin?

Yeah?

Did you joined this?

Call? No?

No, it's me, you guys, It's Erica. Surprised me. Yeah, she also has to say. She rips open her shirt, revealing just an A plus rack. Good for you, Lee Arlington A plus rack? Yeah, good call ball. I mean wow, even I was like hello, hello. I mean she has a bra on, to be clear, but like she looks great.

It's an amazing black lacy bra on. She looks in I just want to put my head in there and just go like, it's that good. It's that good.

She rips open her shirt and she says, I give you something to work, baby. She I think they are intentionally doing this because they want the audience to think that she is a spy. This is another red herring.

Yeah she's another Russian.

YEA, well she's check. You find out she's check, all right, Yeah.

So she is, Oh shit, I should have been doing my check.

Accident was the problem, that's what you got. Yeah. But like the dialogue here is so over the top and silly. Yeah that when I first watched it, I was like, the rest of this movie is written so well, And I was like, oh, but they want it to sound

So again these two start getting it on, and she blocks the view of the computer so they could they are never yet able to get a good view.

We cut back to the Sneakers headquarters and they are reviewing the video they took in an attempt to get Jenek's password. They just keep hearing I leave message here on service, but you do not call. Again and again, Crete announces that Elena is a Czech astrophysicist. They immediately assume between a connection between her and Sea Tech Astronomy because remember Sea Tech Astronomy was paid for by the Russians. They're like, oh, this woman is here work in Janek.

Done? Dun doune.

Honestly, the sneakers would get nothing done if it wasn't for Whistler. He does the lion's share of the work. He really does.

He is easily the best one.

So we cut to the sneakers back in infiltration mode. They are trying to get into Janic's office to get that answering machine to hopefully find Jane's little black box. Marty makes his way to Janick's office with relative ease. He finds the black box secreted inside the answering machine. Unfortunately, at that moment, Elena walks in looking for a little more afternoon delight, and she is shocked to find Marty there.

Jannick is not married. She's like, he doesn't have a wife, and he's like, yes, yes, he does, yep.

And then they convince her to stay with Janek and not tell him what she knows because the fictitious wife is a real shrew.

He's like giving her advice and he's like, you know, you should, you should take care of your man and love him, and you know, because his home life is terrible. And then then I can't remember which one.

I think it's it's Whistler.

It's Whistler goes and give him head whenever he wants, and he's just saying the lines they're feeding him, and he's like, and give him help, help whenever whenever he wants.

Have you heard this new phrase for giving head throwing neck no ouch, No, it sounds both more descriptive and grosser.

Like honestly, my next started hurting as soon as you said that.

It's like out nothing, but throwing makes it set like like maybe like bobbing neck.

Yeah, bobbing neck. That sounds right, that sounds right. At least, throwing just sounds like it's gonna hurt.

It sounds to hurt you.

It shouldn't hurt.

Yeah, it shouldn't hurt either of you.

Yeah, sometimes you get a little sore job, but other than that, hurt either of you.

Correct.

Smash cut to the Sneakers having a celebratory office party because they got the black Box. It's a fun little montage set to Chain of Fools where Liz dances with all of the men and like all of them are terrible dancers, except for mother, is played by one of the Blues Brothers, So yeah, of course he can fucking dance.

Sydney Poitier is not a terrible dancer. He's just a cool dancer. He doesn't do much. He stands there. It is Sidney Poitier the way Carl future Paul here again. So the final col count is three, but I edited out like four instances in me calling Carl cal So. Erica was really letting me run with this one. I don't know what she was thinking. Anyway, from here on out, everyone will be referred to by their proper character name. The way Carl River Phoenix throws himself into the bad dancing.

Is he's doing a mash pit?

Did he get that?

Like he's doing the nineteen ninety two mash pit? And it made me so happy.

The way Whistler dances implies that he doesn't have rhythm at all, And I'm like, all he does is feel music all the time. I don't I think you'd be a great dancer.

Actually, yeah, you're right, he should be a better Maybe this is maybe that is the best David straight.

Hair, maybe just legitimately, how's David straight there and dances?

They're like, just do your best dance because I think Whistler is a great dancer, right yeah, okay cool? And then he did that and they were like, okay.

Okay, great, let's take it again.

Let's take it again less arm flapping?

Perhaps perhaps is this one? Uh, you're not actually a blind David straight air? And have you seen one of those little hula girls on the dashboard of a car. That's kind of what you're doing.

And David straight's airand's like, yeah, that's my move.

We love that.

Yeah, right Mary, and Mary's like, I uh huh sure, sure, sure, absolutely, buddy.

And she's wearing this like oversized business suit with these shoulder pads.

Oh my god, A billion fucking dollars in this scene.

Yeah, with the exception of the monster who did her hair, the cockatoo on top of her head.

I want charges brought up. I want I demand charges be brought against because of the rest of the movie. Her hair looks basically fine. It's not the most flattering hairstyle, but it's nineteen ninety two. There's not much we can do about that.

And she can carry it off, and she can carry it off, but.

They tease her bangs to like a peg Bundy level. It's hideous, unforgivably hideous. But you're right, the outfit slaps.

Yeah.

So she's dancing. They you know, they've decorated the loft that they all work. Increase's wife and daughter are there, right, we find out he has a wife. Cool, that's maybe one line.

Yeah, I know she at least one, just one line.

The daughter gets no lines, but she still gets one of my biggest last that's coming up in a moment. And there's cake, there's food, there's champagne. They are celebrating. They they have got one hundred and seventy five thousand dollars pay day. Carl gets up the courage to ask Marty about his past with Cosmo, like what happened to your friend? And Marty tells them all that his friend died in prison. Then they start to they change the subject to something a little bit more happy. They talk

To Heiti confidence, confidence in these scriptwriters. This joke comes back an hour and a half later and lands so hard, so hard, because I was like, oh my god, they're just saying Tahiti's in Europe.

They're supposed to know things in the CIA.

If I know Tahiti's not in Europe. These guys should definitely know Tahiti's not in Europe. They all are claiming to be smarter than me, and I'm willing to accept that, but I know that in Europe.

So okay, So Chris and his wife are going to have a whirldwind vacation. Mother wants a winnebig o and the way dan Ackroid just uses all his dan acrodiness to say, winn a big o with a waterbed and and a soup up kitchen. And I'm like, dream big buddy, dream big Carl with like a deep relationship with a beautiful woman, someone like Liz. And he then kind of shyly looks over at Liz because he's very sweet and insecure. And again I know he looks like River Phoenix, but

I don't like it. Later, the party has quieted, a game of scrabble has started. This is my kind of party, A party that ends in board games. I'm in.

There is sheet cake, there is dancing, and there is scrabble.

I am.

There is talk of travel.

I am.

This is this is my dream party.

It's beautiful, it's perfect. Marty's in the process of spelling the word scrunchy, because he says, your face can get scrunchy, and know I was like, were They're not scrunchies.

They're worst crunching that. Liz is the one who's like, that's not a word, and I'm like, girl, you and I both know that's a word. He might not know that's a word, but you and I both know that's a word exactly.

Whistler starts to poke around on the black box and he and Carl start to wonder what Sea tech Astronomy means. They're kind of talking out loud, like away from the scrabble game, and that jog something in Marty's brain and he remembers that, well, that's right, no one knows what that code name was referring to ce tech astronomy. What

That's Matthew Lilard's handle.

In Meanwhile, Whistler continues to explore the capabilities of the black Box.

You know what, Whistler, you do the work.

The mysteries of life are contained within the black box.

You put the work in, and the black box will return the favor.

He discovers an enormous cash of information. Just as the tiles form the phrase too many secrets.

Whistler realizes that the black Box is capable of so much more than he ever thought it was.

It can do anything.

It makes noise.

Sometimes it creeps out information.

He ceps out. You know what, I wasn't going to use the Q word, but you're since you're doing it, you're bumming it up. Hey, this black box is just scorting information at me.

Remember we weren't going to be make the double entendres. Remember for that thirty seconds, you know.

We were gonna be fucking classy about this. We were gonna be Liz, and instead we're mother We're mothering. Yeah, we're mothering, which is our version of mothering. Okay, so the is capable of decrypting and hacking into any network, including financial and government systems.

So for those of you keeping up, this is the exact same mcguffin that is in the net, the exact same, exact.

Same one, except this is interesting in this film, it only like like decrypts American things. That is kind of us come back later and I'm like, okay, that's super interesting.

Okay.

Crease is getting really freaked out. He's like, stop what you're doing right now, and then he sends his wife and daughter home immediately, and he turns to the rest of them and he says, do you realize that this code breaking capability is something that any government on Earth would kill us for. He goes to his desk because remember they're in their office, and he takes out his gun and Liz is like, well, this is where I get off, and she tries to leave, and he's like,

Yeah.

She kind of looks at Marty. Marty puts his head down and she's like, thanks for the trust, fellas, and she sits back down.

We cut to the next morning, Marty Increase head to the handoff. Marty is walking to the drop. He has got the answering machine in this case that has the black box inside of it. It's like a Turducan case. Answering machine, black box in the center right, it's a nesting doll. He has just given the package to Dick and Buddy when Chrease notices a headline on the paper in the back seat. So Chrise is like maybe thirty yards away by the car. Marty has walked up to

Back at Sneakers headquarters, the team realizes how badly they've been had so the NSA has never had a San Francisco office. Their office is based out of Los Angeles. In fact, they find out that the building where he met these two was already like condemned, so like this was all some elaborate setup. Not only are these two guys not the NSA, but they then they discovered that the NSA, the actual NSSA, was the source of Jane's

He heads to the concert. It's funny how this is stage, because Gregor is like sitting there smoking a cigarette with this beautiful woman on his arm. Marty just like leans over. They're people everywhere. He pulls out a gun from his trench coat.

There is a line of waiters standing behind him. The no fucking way the waiters don't see. Hey, is that not holding that? Or the guy by gunpoint? You know what, I don't get paid enough to care.

I don't care.

I don't care. Yeah, straight enough, don't care.

Yeah, So he pulls Gregor away. He takes Gregor to an underground indoor pool.

It seems I don't care because this is so goddamn cool. Well no, no, actually, this all does make some level of sense because it's not like the concert we're going to is like a string quartet. Right, classy people. These are all people in like tuxedos and ball gowns at this thing. Right, So they're probably at someone's mansion.

They're at the embassy.

Yeah that's an old mansion.

Oh well yeah, fair, All embassies are like old.

Like Gilded Age mansions. This is probably like the heated pool in the Russian embassy or whatever, the Ukrainian embassy.

Oh, he demands the box back. Gregor vehemently denies that he or his government acquired the box, and he says, look, I can't talk to you about this year. Let's go for a drive.

They get into a limo and Gregor takes out like photo albums, like like scrap books of old.

Back before we had electronic files, Russian assets or not Russian assets, US agents that they thought they could turn.

No, there's because there are actual Russian assets in there. We just find out that the person they have is someone who could not be turned. But anyway, he pulls out these like scrap books full of like angry looking scary men. Marty goes through the pictures of the operatives and he finally spots a picture of Buddy, the bigger guy.

The scarier of the two, the non Timothy Bussfield.

One non Timothy Busfield, who's played by Marla Hooch is dad.

Yeah, and every time I see it, he's such a.

Meani in this movie. He's such a bad guy and I'm just like, but that's Marla Hooch's dad.

Yeah, he's a delight daughter.

Gregor is like, oh, that is a loathsome man, and like when like the Russian spy is like that guy sucks, You're like, oh, no, that guy, that's a problem. Before he can further elaborate, the limo is pulled over and Gregor is like, it's like, oh, sigh, your FBI are so meddlesome. The limo is pulled over, an FBI agent shows his badge in the window and demands that Marty get out of the car. They know Bishops is with him. They're like, mister Bishop, please step out of the car.

So Gregor turns to Marty and he says, look, this limo is technically part of the consulate. I can offer you asylum. Marty decides to get out of the limo despite this warning and Gregor in tones you won't know who to trust. The agent throws Marty up against the wall. He finds the gun in Marty's pocket and he asks if it's loaded. Marty says yes. The agent deliberately puts on a pair of gloves, turns around and executes Gregor

Yeah? Yeah, commercial break here.

Well, commercial break here, we're gonna go. We're gonna use the bathroom perhaps, and then we will be right back after these messages to take you through the rest of Sneakers and we're back.

So Marty, who's been knocked out, wakes up in the back of a car and can hear the highway going by. Before long, Buddy, Marla Hooch's dad opens the trunk it's like, you're not supposed to be awake, and takes the back of his gun and knocks him out again. Bitch, have you never heard of chloroform?

Right?

There are nicer ways. You do not have to like fucking pistol whip him every time you want.

Him to go down, but he wants to.

That's the thing, Guys, find something that you love to do in life. Half as much as Buddy likes pistol whipping Marty. Yeah, as Buddy enjoys the act of pistol whipping people. If you can find your pistol whip.

You love your job, You'll never work a day in your life.

Now Marty is knocked out again. He wakes up again in a like austere looking room YEP. A shadowy figure asks him are you in pain? And he says yes, and the figure steps forward and tells him try aspirin and holds out a bottle of aspirin to him. Then the man performs the trick that we saw Cosmo do in the opening scene, and Marty says, Cosmo, this is indeed the long presumed dead Cosmo played by British actor Ben Kingsley.

I was quite surprised. I feel like Robert Redford really underreacts to the idea that Cosmo is still alive. This man that you thought basically you got killed your friend, this man that you loved died because of what you did, and then you realize he's still alive, and he's like Cosmo.

He's deeply concussed. You forget that part.

That's true, that's fair.

I'm shocked he can remember the name Cosmo. I'm sure. I'm so shocking. Was like Charlie, wait, I can't what was your name again. I'm so tired.

What's name?

Can I go to sleep? No? I shouldn't sleep right shoep.

So Cosmo sits down. Marty asks him what the hell is going on? What happened? And Cosmo gives us his backstory. He explains that while he was in prison, he used his skills to help a couple of you know, friendly Italian guys, very family minded men, make a few phone calls and they arranged for his early release in exchange for his help and managing their financial operations. All of Cosmo's work for the MOB is encrypted so the government can't read it, which means that Cosmo and his bosses

An American accent that suggests he learned how to do an American accent while underwater. Cosmo tells Marty that he thinks he can actually change the world as they planned all those years ago. So Cosmo has been radicalized. Yeah, he's been in prison for a while. Yeah, and it has changed him fundamentally. He reminds Marty of all the problems in the country, corporations with too much money, politicians bought and sold, et cetera, et cetera, time immemorial, the problems of the United States.

Right, Luckily we solved them by everything's good, you guys, everything's good here.

We nailed it. No worries. And He's like, no matter how much money we throw at problems in this country, poverty, crime, they remain because quote, money's most powerful ability is to allow bad people to continue doing bad things at the expense of those who don't have it. End quote, Marty's like, yeah, duh.

We're hurtling like a skydiver towards late stage capitalism. Yeah, yeah, no fucking parachute, right, no parachute.

And Cosmo goes on to explain that using the black box, he could cause any number of institutions to fail from banks to governments to actual countries. He could crash the whole damn system. And look, as much as I'm making fun of Ben Kingsley's performance, the accent is terrible. I'm not gonna lie. He sounds like one of the Canadians on South Park. But like the performance is so good. Yeah, he abused it with this like level of intelligence where

Marty kind of chuckles and he's like, oh, you're crazy, very very bold statement in your current situation. Marty Cosmo is not amused. He walks out of that little privacy alcove and he starts to explain to Marty that, you know what, I'm gonna start changing some police files. So tomorrow when they run the prince on the gun that killed Gregor and his driver, they will find that they match Martin Bryce. You know that that identity that you used to it, that you tried to get rid of.

So they knock Marty out, They put him in a car, they toss him on some random street in San Francisco. He makes his way to Liz's apartment. She lets him in immediately. She starts to clean him up because he looks worse for wear.

Let's just say he looks as bad as Robert Redford is capable of looking, which is better than me on my best day run over with a mac truck.

Robert Redford is so better than me with a glam squad. Yeah, she starts to clean him up. He looks at her soulfully and says he's sorry, and she immediately says it's okay.

The chemistry this is mentos and a leader of diet coke. It is exploding. A ah ah. This is the first look we get at Liz's palatial apartment.

There's a grand piano in here, and it really doesn't take up.

That much space. No, it's an aside room.

Yeah, that's how you know someone has space when they're like, where's your grand piano? I can't find it.

Marty calls the sneakers and they all convene at Liz's Crease is like, look, we got to call the authorities. Mother's like, we can't call the authorities, but we have we have nothing, blah blah blah. Marty is finally like, look, we call the authorities, but we call them our way. They phone in with as many safeguards against tracing as they can set up, like Whistler is bouncing the signal off of all these different satellites and locations whatever.

We've all seen movies we know how this works.

They get Agent Bernard Abbot on the phone. Now, I'm not going to say who plays Agent Bernard Abbot right now because it was a genuine surprise for me.

Do you know what's funny is in this scene when they're talking to Agent Bernard Abbit. I thought that Adrian Bernard Abbot was another red herring that they were not talking to anyone at the NSA. I swore to you that this person was using a voice, a disguiser.

Yeah.

I was like, Oh, this person's not that's not that's not anyone's real voice. No one sounds like that. Just a little hint, little hint, little little little easter, I guess. So what's coming?

Yeah, Bernard Abbot pretty quickly realizes they're talking about the black Box and he's like, well, do you have it? And and Marty's honestly says no. Meanwhile, while all this is going on, mother has set up this like mcgyverd polygraph to measure the tension in Bernard Abbot's voice. He's telling the truth, he's telling the truth. He's telling the truth. And then Marty s, can you guarantee our safety? Bernard

Go, go go. This is honestly the truly the dumbest scene in the entire movie for one big reason. They are on a speakerphone. Yeah, and Marty is talking to the guy at the NSA on a speakerphone.

Yeah, And all the.

Other guys are full voiced going he's lying, He's telling the truth. They found the trace, and I'm like, guys, he can hear you. There is no part of this call that that guy isn't like, well, there's at least five people in that room. One of them seems to have some kind of makeshift slide.

Detector machine, and like, what are you doing.

The sneakers realize they have to get the black Box back in order to have any chance of making a deal with the government, right they have zero leverage and

Of course.

And then Marty's like, well that's laser fencing and a hell of a lot of security for a toy company that ain't no toy company. So they have now discovered Cosmo's hideout.

Yeah, So they set up their surveillance on Playtronics, using Whistler's preach natural hearing to make a map of the building. So they figure out what office must be Cosmos, and then they figure out that the office next door is occupied by one doctor Werner Brandis, who uses a voice pass key. To get into his office. He has to say Hi, my name is Warne or Brandis my voice is my passport? Verify me? And they say, all right,

So they start to hunt for a way in with Warner like, how do we infiltrate this guy, but he is, increases words, the world's most boring human. I just want to point out he's the kind of man who has personalized license plates on his car that say one eighty IQ yep, dick H. Mother comes in with Warner's trash and they dump it out all over Liz's living room and they start to like rifle through his trash. They

That's correct.

Are you telling me this is a straight man?

They are?

This film is gaslighting me into believing that this is a straight man in nineteen ninety two San Francisco. Fuck you movie. I know what I'm I know what I know who he is.

Yeah, they needed to like.

Because there's a honeypot situation coming. And I got why they did what they did. But don't make the concert. He goes to Barry Manilow. You guys, make it anything else, make it fucking the Philharmonic. Yeah, okay, the honeypot needed to be carled, you guys. So Marty finds a receipt from comput Dat and he squints his eyes and says, aha, he's a computer dater.

He says it with some.

Level of like he's making fun of him. Yeah, disdain, And I'm like, you guys have no idea what's coming. The sneakers are like, okay, we need a honeypot to send to this guy. Because what's funny is they only know that he's a computer dater. They still don't know his orientation at all, but they all immediately assume they're talking about a straight man, and so they're like, what about that lady we worked with once? And Liz is like, guys, look at this garbage. And then mother goes, this is

Smash cut to a Chinese restaurant, a live band is rocking out to Leroy Brown in Chinese. I really enjoyed this.

I've always loved this song because of his association with this movie for me.

Liz arrives and she spots Werner played by the great Stephen Tobolowski. So good, so good. He's putting in eye drops at the table. Fantastic.

This guy's a mess.

He's a mess. And Mary McDonald walks over and she is in full it's not even sex pot it's sexy. It's like her voice is deep, it's confidence.

It's seductive.

Yes, she walks over. She introduces herself as Dora. He is deeply awkward. He immediately asks are you ready for the dim sum bar? And she says, well, I'm not in any hurry, and he says, okay, I'll be right back, and he just goes to the dim sum bar. Look, it's not a good move on the first date. But if I'm at a dim sum bar and I'm waiting

I even love those like those soup dumplings that are guaranteed to rot the inside of my mouth, So to scorch the inside of my mouth? Do it wrong with fire and brimstone? No, I know how to do it correctly too, I just refuse.

To ye, Well, that's your choice.

My five year old lizard brain takes over and it's like, cut it all in your mouth. But no, it's hot, like no, shut up, put it all in your mouth.

Oh, soup dumplings are so good. I can't get on Chinese food again. I can't. We had a whole You want to hear me talk about Chinese food, Go listen to rush hour. Okay? He heads for the food. She checks the recording device on her arm, and then she crosses the word high off of the notepad that she's written his pass god on. She needs to get him to say the words, remember hi, my name is Werner brandis my voice? Is my passport? Verify me? She needs to get all of these words on tape.

Yeah. Meanwhile, the sneakers are determining what they have to deal with in Cosmo's office, right, like, what's the level of security we have here? Turns out, think small, angry country.

That's what we got.

That's what we're working with here. It's protected by both heat and motion sensors. So they decide to raise the temperature in the office to ninety eight point six to make sure that it doesn't detect any heat when he enters the office, and Marty has to start practice moving no faster than two inches per second in order to defeat the motion sensor.

We cut back to the Chinese restaurant. Liz has almost completed her assignment, but she still needs Werner to get to say the word passport. As the workers vacuum the restaurant around them. The restaurant is closing, they are still there. She has not completed the job. She has to resort to acting as if Werner has the most beautiful voice. And Stephen Tobolowski If you if you guys don't know who Stephen Tobolowski is, just look him up. You will

And she's like, no, no, no, it's resonance.

So she has to say, oh, it's just this word. I would just I would just love to hear you say passport, and Werner goes passport and she goes mmm. She acts so turned on. She gets this guy to believe that she's into him.

It's the Day of the Sneak, y'all.

I love that they call these things sneaks, not jobs or heists. They're sneaks.

They're sneaks. So we cut to the day of the Sneak. Carl heads into the Platronics building once the workday is done. He is disguised as a gardener. He goes past the security guard by saying I need to use the john and he makes his way into the ducts from the bathroom. He hitches a ride on the elevator to Cosmo's floor and starts to heat the office to the required temperature.

Yep. We cut to a bit later on. The sun has set and Liz is on her second date with Werner. She's thrilled. He's saying things like I'll join you. As soon as I'm done pounding these breasts.

He does this thing where he's like, you know, the best part about this meal is that it's only four hundred calories.

I'm like, oh jesu.

And then he has a whole bit about like how the healthiest diet in the world is the bottom of a monkey cage.

Yeah, and I have to say, well.

That's probably technically true. It doesn't sound as appealing as the Mediterranean diet.

Agreed, let's just agree to call it the.

Mediterranean diet, because then it sounds like you're on vacation.

Grease, not that you're eating monkey scat. So Werner is making Liz dinner, says, Oh, it's so hot in here, I'm just gonna open this window. She lifts his wallet out of his jacket pocket and hands the wallet out the window to mother, who's outside. Mother takes Werner's ID card and passes it back to Liz, who replaces it in Werner's jacket.

We cut to Marty on his way to playtronics. Werner's key card gets him in and he hooks the team into the CC cameras from the From the stairwell, he heads to the office where the mocked up voice gets him in where he sneaks into the ducks in Warner's office to climb over into Cosmo's office next door, and starts his slow, hot creep across the floor.

Back at Liz's date, Werner is showing her an animatronic voice activated dog toy that he created. I mean, kids, if you've got one of these, it's a great first date, second date thing. Try to charm you with your with your animatronic voice activated dog toy that you created.

I have so many questions because Cosmo's Company quote unquote company is some dark, evil, malignant force in the world, right, and Warner is part of like the crew, but like he has to also pretend that he really does make toys, Like did he actually make that like in his spare time, because when you get into Warner's office, it's very clear he's got mockups of like some sketchy looking shit in there. Yeah, yes, this is not a toymaker.

Okay. So he shows Liz this voice activated dog toy. She is desperate for a break, so she's like, hey, can I use your phone? Presumptively, she has to stay because they're going to try to return the ID card to Werner's wallet. Yeah, I don't know. While she wouldn't have just left, so presumptibly that's her reason for still being there. He says, Okay, yeah, the phone's in the bedroom. Go ahead, So she goes. Unfortunately, the dog toy knocks

To playtronics, not answering any of her questions about where the fuck they're going. All of a sudden, right and Chrise and mother see them approaching, and they get on the horn to Marty and they're like, Marty may Day incoming. You've got to hurry up. And Robert Redford does such a beautiful job with just barely moving his face, and he goes, hurrying is the one thing I can't do.

Maybe you should try somehow stalling them.

Werner, who is now like pissed, he barges into the building. He's spouting his very correct theories to the front desk guard that Liz is facilitating a break into his office. At this very moment, you have to go to my office. There is a break in happening, And Liz, of course is just like, how dare you insinuate that I am

Marty continues his slow hot heist, finally making it back to the ducks with the answering machine containing the box. He heads back to Werner's, cleans up the evidence, and makes his way back into the ducks just in time to avoid being caught by Cosmo and company. So he makes it right by seconds. He makes it. Werner has to admit that his office is exactly as he left it. And Liz, who we should remember was a sneaker, right,

Mady mudy, because you have to remember he spent twenty years in prison in the town from our town.

Right, Yeah, now he speaks with that accent.

He's spent twenty years in prison inside of a James Cagney curton. So okay, this got the biggest laugh from my brother while we were watching the movie where he's like fat and I'm like, what's funny, and he's like, a computer could totally have maatch. These two people up.

What is he talking about? It doesn't make any sense.

I was like, you are right, it doesn't make any sense, Like, yeah, technically they both probably have similar interests, right, they're both well like everyone says the same bullshit, like I like to read, I like to go to the movies, I like restaurants, Like everyone's profile is generic and the exact. So yeah, it could have very easily matched them up, Like there's no way the computer knows what a turd Warner is, right, especially since he's good at computers, so

Hardy becomes a fine misted Yes.

At the last minute, Cosmo stops Buddy from shooting. He says, stop shooting, and he announces over the intercom. You always had to win, Marty, didn't you. You always had to be the smartest, be the best. You always had to get the girl. And at first I'm like, what the hell does that mean? And then we cut to him with Liz and he's like, well, now I've got the girl. He says, the only way to get out alive is to just to trust him. Marty, I cannot kill you, Matty.

So Marty turns himself in. So we have Dick and Buddy the two guards. We have Cosmo, we have Liz and Marty. There's this great moment where he comes in and he sees Liz and they have like this very like how you doing, Yeah, I know, like this very like chill conversation, like cool people do. He confirms the deal with Cosmo, and Cosmo smiles, and Marty senses something is off. He says, you gave me your word, and Cosmo sighs, and he says, I cannot kill my friend.

There's a great moment with Mary McDonald here where she picks up the gun and she is physically and deeply shaking, and she's like, put your gun down. I'm an excellent marchman, marchwoman.

Marty stands up and he's like Carl, I said now three times, and Carl's like, what I just did was hard. Don't judge me.

That wasn't easy. What I just did, Okay. What we have really kind of neglected to talk about is how funny this movie is. Every single scene has great, perfectly executed jokes.

Yep.

So Marty, Liz, and Carl start to flee through the building. They're heading for the roof. They call to Chrease and Mother to come and get them. There and Chrease and mother are in the van. Unfortunately, just as the getaway car is about to head for the building, two of the guards appear and take Crease and Mother hostile. So now Chrise and Mother are outside of the van. They're being held hostage, their hands are up, and the van

You've got to drive, and you gotta do it.

So he gets in the seat excellent, like David straight their and is perfect. He's so nervous. He's like, but I can do this. I can do this. And he tells him exactly, like how many times to click the gear ship down to go into reverse. Yeah, And he's like, okay, once you go into reverse, and when I say go, just gun it and he's like okay, okay, and he's like go and he just starts to drive backwards and

Can you imagine being like the the kid trying to make it? As an actor, you get a couple of lines in a movie, and your line is to throw a racist comment at Sidney fucking Poitier.

Honestly, you're part of film history when you do that.

Fair enough, that's what you have to be a character, and you're not really.

Part of film history. But when you do to Sidney Poitier, you're part of film history.

I would be shaking if I had to do that be absolutely trembling.

Mister Poitier, sir, I'm so sorry. Here we go. So Chris, you could see, has just gotten his hackles up from that, right from that moment. And while they have their hands up, he asks, mother, did you ever tell you why I had to leave the the CIA? And Mother's like nope, and he goes, well, turns out I have a really foul temper, and he takes both guards down, unarms them, calls one of them a motherfucker, and holds him at gunpoint. It's just the rated R movie or PG threeteen.

I didn't know.

I think it must be PG thirteen because it's the only it's the only course in the entire movie. And they're like, please, can we have a mother in this movie?

So everyone's safe, except, of course for Marty. He starts to climb down the fire escape that Carl and Liz climbed down before, but Cosmo appears and he holds him at gunpoint. So we were back with Cosmo and Marty just as the movie started. Cosmo demands the box. He tells him the world is run by computers now, and Marty's like, I'm not giving it to you, and he fires a shot on the gun and it bounces off the ladder, and Marty's like Jesus Christ, and He's like,

You know who I bet can really destroy a box?

Robert And.

I bet, I bet I bet. He takes a ginger battering ram right to the box just uh annihilates it.

He says. He says, destroy the box while you have the chance, and he's like, I'm leaving, and Cosmo his voice nearly breaks. He says, please don't go, and Marty says, Look, if you want to stop me, you're gonna have to pull the trigger. And he starts to climb down the ladder and Cosmo's looking at him, and he's holding the gun on him, and Marty's looking at him, and Cosmo holds his fire. So Marty escapes. Cosmo just kind of sighs.

Okay. I love this moment, like it's unexpected. Cosmo, yes, definitely a villain. Yeah, definitely weird and crazy, but like and he definitely tries to kill his friend earlier. But when push comes to shove when it's just the two of them, he changes his mind. Yeah, and he's like, let's do this together. I don't want to do this alone. I don't want to be alone in this. Like you, you and I are, You and I are friends. You see eye to eye on this, I know we do.

And it's also like this moment of like Cosmo's life did not go well, right, like he he wound up in jail.

He wound up in jail in Boston in the nineteen thirties, right.

There was Tommy Gunzo's al Capone. It was a whole thing. It was a whole thing, but he wound up in jail and they had like this this dream. He was a dreamer with this with his friend Marty, right, and Marty's life went one way and his life one another. And like there's some bitterness in the fact that he got caught and Marty didn't, that's definitely there, but it's

Yeah. So the Sneakers head back to their old HQ, that old loft they had, and who should they find there but a bunch of NSA agents holding giant guns. And they are with the agent they spoke with on the phone, agent Bernard Abbott, played by the great and good another icon.

Huh, James Earl Jones. I gasped. I genuinely did not know he was in this movie. It was almost like a jump scare.

I was like, I forgot it this part too. I haven't seen this movie and so long I forgot James Earl Jones is in this Oh my god, And now going back and listening to that other scene where he's talking to him.

It is James Jones one hundred percent.

Yeah, but he's like almost making it even like deeper than he normally does.

And it's slightly digitized too, which disguises a little bit.

You don't recognize it. It's James Earl Jones right away, and it's so so excellent. So okay, So Agent Abbott is now there waiting with the team. The sneakers are all held at gunpoint. Abbot demands the box, and Marty's like, you know Greg, remember Greg, our old Russian friend who got murdered at the beginning of the movie. You know, he told me something pretty interesting about this box, this

Ha ha ha.

That elicited a big laugh in the crew in the room that I was in.

Yeah. Abbot realizes that Marty has some advantages here, right, So he says, look, what do you want? And Marty says, look, I want my record cleaned. He says, great, give me the box. And then Mother's like, hang on, hang on, he wasn't the only person involved in this operation. I want to Winnebago and Abbot is shocked, but he's like, okay, fine, fine Winnebago for you give me the box. Crease is like, hang on, I want a European vacation. I want to

The way he says it, He's like, Heity's not in you can't demand Tahiti as well.

And Carl says, well, you can send us a geography class. Until you do that, he goes to Tahiti. Right, this is all so good.

Everyone is firing on all comic cylinders in this scene.

Including James Earl Jones.

Especially James Earl Jones as the exasperated agent who thought he had the upper hand.

Abbot is growing more and more irritated, but he agrees, fine, European vacation for Crease. How about you, he asked Carl. Carl said that female agent holding the ouzi is she single? And then I love this bit. Abbot is like, no, I'm not doing that, absolutely not. The agent steps forward. The agent, I don't notice, is crucially wearing a scrunchy. Oh yeah, exist universe. They do exist in this universe.

Uh.

Whistler steps up. He asks for peace on earth and goodwill towards men. Abbot steps were the US government, we don't do that sort of thing. Excellent, excellent. Still, he grudgingly agrees to see what he can do, and then he looks at Liz and he says, how about you what do you want and she says, oh, I'm fine. Marty gives Abbot the box and he tells him, look, it doesn't work. It never did. And Abbot says, that's not important. You just remember that this box doesn't even exist.

So the NSA leaves, and Liz asks what happens when the NSA just hooks up the box and finds out it does actually work, and then Marty shows her that he removed a core component of it and he's like, won't work without this piece.

YEP. Incredible that this movie ends with the city with the beat right out of the sound of music. Reverend Mother, I have sinned, holds out an engine part. It's just the same thing, save the von Traps from the Nazis.

We smash cut to a local news report announcing that the Republican National Committee is suddenly bankrupt.

I have never gotten erect quicker.

It was.

It was disinal how fast I became sexually aroused.

Not only as a Republican National Committee bankrupt, but suddenly a bunch of charities have seen a sudden anonymous windfall. Amnesty International green Peace, the United Negro College Fund have announced record earnings in just the last week.

YEP.

End of film.

End of film, all right, so that is the end. We stick around. We're going to play just a few more commercials that we'll come back with our random observations and final rankings, and we're back Erica. Do you have any more little little files, little bits of information that are floating through the interwebs. That's how the internet works, right, just shoots them through the air, like in Willy Wonka.

Yeah, like you know, like when when you blow on a dandelion and it just flies through the air. That's how it works. That's the Internet. Mother played by Nanacroid, is a conspiracy theorist of the of the highest degree. And so there's a runner in the film that I absolutely love where he's spouting his conspiracy theories to Crease

Right, yeah.

Then I mean a full thirty five minutes later in the movie, it's just Crease and mother in the car and they're being silent. They're watching the game, they're not doing anything, and he goes, col mutilations are rough, and Chreasus goes, do not right now.

I was tracking like kind of his his conspiracy theories because they're never made much of it's just kind of background noise. So like he has like the moon landing was faked and sure, like that's that's a common one, right, and then he has the CIA caused like the nic A Roguan earthquake, which I was like, all right, I kind of get that one.

But when cat debate on that one, which is excellent, price like, no, I have to respond, what are you talking about?

When the cattle mutilations came up, I was like, I don't know what this is about and I I'm not gonna I'm not gonna look. I don't want to know. I don't want to. All of these are real enough that I believe they probably are like actual conspiracy theories that were held by randomutles. I don't want to know what the cattle mutilation thing is. If you listening, know this, do not tell me. Do not email me and be like, hey, just FYI, I do not want to know. I'm not kidding.

I'm not kidding. Do not tell me, do not. I'll look it up later though, because I'm curious.

Now.

There's a bunch of like really funny physical comedy moments that, of course we didn't get to because it like there's one there at one point in the very beginning of the movie, when we're setting up who everyone is and like, you know, what they do and who they are, they cut to Whistler and someone's like, what's Whistler doing. He goes, oh, he's reading, And they cut to Whistler and he's reading in braille, and that's how the audience says, oh, he's blind.

So here's my question about this, Erica. Is it a better blind man reading a Playboy joke than the one in menon Tights?

Oh?

Yeah, yes, this is a smarter blind man reading Playboy joke. It's a much much smarter one. It's also just so it's slightly too stupid for this movie, but it works, like it just works.

Yeah, well because it's also like, well, he's genuinely reading Playboy for the articles. Then because it's just brail, I mean, it could be like nice round.

Breasts describing it in detail.

She likes long walks on the beach, and there's also a beam shot her beams.

Just another dumb but hilarious Whistler moment. It's dumb, but it fucking works. When Whistler is like driving that carene van through the parking lot. At the very end of it, Marty's like, Okay, Whistler, I want you to drive for five more seconds and then hits and then hit the brakes and stop. Got it? Five four three two, And then he just hits the wall, just hits the tide of the He's like, I think I'll stop here, Okay, moving moving.

On one bit of physical comedy that I loved and also just at like a testament to the power of like a movie star and the power of like a

He was so good. A couple of things about Cosmo's office tell me you're a villain without telling me you're a villain.

Yeah.

Number one, he's got a fish tank. That's never a good thing, no, And with a giant fish tank in their office and they're up to no good, they're up to something. But also, wouldn't that fish tank set off the motional detector that they're trying so hard?

Huh?

For Robert Redford not because those fish are just so women. They're best and they're big. It's like a coy pond. Yeah, in there almost and I'm like, that should set off the detector.

I wonder if they if the detector doesn't perceive it through the water. I have no idea.

The other thing I just want to point out about Cosmo's office is he has these Magreek type, yes who lithographs of faceless men, and I kind of love them, Like I actually really like the art office. But then like in the lobby of the building, the art is like dog skeletons, like dogs who have been X rayed, and it's their skeletons, And I'm like, what is this? Anyone who walks in there is like toy company huh?

An evil villain lives here, right, this is a super villain's layirer.

Just so I'm clear, Yeah, what did you think of the like tall lithographs?

Did you like that? I didn't like them, but I respected the choice. Like like Cosmo's office is, I just called it austere in the recap, like all of the all of the furniture in it is like the metal furniture you would find like in a park, right, and like these lithographs and they're gray on black and there's like a wall of like it's so like nineties minimalist beige, metallic metallic, like yeah, yeah, And we didn't even discuss Ben Ben Kingsley's tiny little ponytail.

Oh my god, ponytail, A sad little ponytail.

We mentioned Marty's car briefly. I care about cars less than I care about heterosexual couples. Like I genuinely the bar is low could not possibly care less about cars. That's a cool car. It's like burnt orange almost like that that little conver. I mean, look, it looks like a death trap. Let's be clear. It looks like you get in a fender bender and you are dead. Like so I would not want to drive it. But it's a cool car. I will say that car.

Yeah it's a convertible. I don't think we have to tell you it's a convertible.

Yeah.

I just have one more. And it's my favorite line possibly in the movie.

Okay, funny stupid.

Joke at the very end when Carl's like, I want that lady's phone number and James Earl Jones is like, absolutely not. We do not do that, Like, that's disgusting that you would even ask. Redford leans in and goes, come on, the FBI would have given him twins.

Excellent. I just want to give this movie props for one thing. It takes place in San Francisco almost entirely. While there are no major characters of Asian descent, it is populated with multiple, like small characters of Asian descent. And I know enough that I noticed it. Like the little girl playing piano with Liz is Asian, the bank teller is Asian. Like, there's a couple instances where they clearly made it look at least a little bit like

Shade, and she nails it. She hands him his meager little check in the bank and she's like, yeah, you don't make a lot of money, buddy.

Yeah, which is surprising. I would have thought this was this was highly skilled work.

It's highly skilled work, and they're working for banks. It's not like they're working for like public schools. I guess they did in Carl's case, but like, like, yeah, I would imagine it's a sliding scale and if you're a fucking bank, yeah yeah. But anyway, all right, Erica.

How are we gonna rank sneakers this movie that we both love so dearly?

How about one to ten Ginger quintets genuinely, how many times do you see a movie with five gingers in it?

I can't think of one.

I question whether that even exists anywhere else in the water.

I think if you're getting into five gingers in the movie, you're getting too fetish films. That's I'm sensing a fetish film happening. If that's if that's what's going on. How about one to ten heterosexual couples that Paul actually cares about due to their atomic chemistry.

Honestly, Mary McDonald's chemistry with everyone.

Her dancing, every single one of them.

Every single one of them like her and dan Ackroyd. I believe it. I believe it is. She's chemistry with Stephen Tobolowski, for Christ's sake, and she's not even supposed to. Yeah, how about one to ten boston Ish accents? He went to the same person who taught Jack Nicholson a Boston accent for the departed.

His time in prison was actually at the Boston Conservatory of Music. That's that's where he spent his time.

His time in prison was at the Boston Tea Party.

He actually had to do community service in Colonial Williamsburg. That's where he did his as he did his jail time.

Oh.

One to ten black boxes.

A black box being destroyed by Robert Red.

Yeah, uh huh, just you know what I like about it.

In the end, he doesn't destroy the black box. He goes in, he picks out the best part, plays with it a little.

Bit, puts it back, he leaves it in better shape than he found it.

That's key, crucial. That is crucial. When we say destroyed the black box, we mean.

That rhetorically destroy and rebuild.

Yeah, what you want to do is leave it better than when you found it. You want to leave it satisfied, just just.

Like we want to leave the earth better than to do this one.

Yeah, let's do this one.

Okay, do you want to go first or should I go first?

I'll go first on this one.

Hit me.

I love this movie, I really do. It has blind spots, though the cast is actually fairly diverse, especially for nineteen ninety two. You know, you have James Earl Jones, you have Sidney Potier, you have a character who's blind, not played by an actual blind actor, which would have been lovely, But you have a character that's blind, right, but one woman? One woman, and she's so underwritten, and like just because Mary McDonald is such a fucking icon and goddess, because

Yeah, so I think that makes sense.

Yeah, your husband's gonna hear this and throw his out there.

It's fun.

I don't recall that many movies with Robert Redford and Sidney Poitier in them when I was like a teenager, Like, I don't know that they were working that much at this time at this like like and so just to put these two like fucking megawatt superstars in a movie together, it's like totally worth the price of admission and like, it's so good just to see them firing on all

Uh Yeah, No, I agree with what you're saying. I will say I don't even know if this would have occurred to me if the NET hadn't been such an ally like two weeks ago, where the NET was so clearly wearing its politics about like the AIDS crisis and everything on its sleeve. I was kind of waiting for them to mention like act up or.

Send the Republicans money to act up as well as as.

Well as everything. Yet like I was expecting to be included in some way there. I want to be really clear, I believe that everyone involved in this movie one hundred percent agrees with us politically. Believe not everybody, but like the people involved in like the storyline and the storytelling of it, are on the side of the Angels. Here like so, so I'm not trying to like call them out or anything. It's not even something that bothered me. It was just something I noticed, and I think solely

I don't know, maybe they thought it would depress people. Yeah, the Aige crisis specifically, I'm talking about, not like just gay people.

Yeah, oh gay people, they're bad at computers and they're fucking depressing. Let's just let's just be clear.

But like, that's the one thing I can think of, is like, if you're intentionally almost leaving it out, it's because the conversation is so heavy.

I would almost expect it to be like they just picked like they have the National Organization for the Legal Legalization of Marijuana being mentioned right, like they're I think they're trying to do ones that are a little bit funny. Yeah, the Black Panthers, the Republicans, like that's obviously the Black Panthers are very serious, but it's funny to juxtapose those two things. And maybe you're right, like you put an act up and like it's just just just too fucking depressing.

It's too sad that an audience in nineteen ninety two would have it would have.

It would have been tangible to them.

Yeah, yeah, like that's in the news, you know.

Yeah. Again, I want to be clear, I'm not trying to take any points off the movie for it this movie, I'm willing to forgive it almost anything I could ding it on, which isn't much, simply because I can so clearly see the intentions are so good and I so appreciate it. Like I take your point about there only being one female character and she's basically underwritten. I think basically everybody in this movie is underwritten except for Marty,

Maybe she was though, because again I'm not even talking about like she doesn't need a whole monologue, just what does she do? What is her backstory? Like everyone else got that and she didn't. I think she's an afterthought. I think she's the girlfriend.

I mean, I don't totally agree with that, Like they didn't have to make her a mathematical genius. I get that we don't know why she is and doesn't make any sense, but like.

Her mathematical genius. She shows up to the lecture, She's like, yeah, this is about math. No, she says nothing else.

No, she says, this is about He does not understand the lecture. She tells him what the lecture is about. This is about codes, unbreakable codes, and so she does understand it, Like there's an actual reason for that.

All right, I'll give you that. I'll give you that, But I it's again, I think she's too underwritten fair enough.

Other than that, just a great fun, good time at the movies, Like, couldn't possibly come up with anything else to ding it on. If it was made today, it absolutely least one of the main sneakers would have been a woman. There would have been more ethnic diversity, although there is some. As you said, like there would have been even more ethnic diversity in it. I think I view this movie as like not perfect, but like moving in the right direction, like it's doing, it's doing good things.

Twenty out of ten enjoyment, twenty out of ten so goddamn funny.

Absolutely will not be offering a palate cleanser.

No, this is perfect, is I mean? If you want like a good caper film with all women Oceans eight, Yeah, like would be an amazing double feature almost.

With this uh Erica. That is the end of this year show. Everyone listening can follow us on the various social media platforms. We are on Blue Sky, we are on Threads, we are on Instagram. If you want to know our monthly themes in advance, you want to give us movies that are on those monthly themes, you want to get your name read on this podcast, you gotta follow us on Instagram. It's the only place we do it. We have a tea public shop where you can pick

In that Age Well is produced and edited by Paul Kaola. We would like to think Kay Michael, Mary Bess, Kathleen, Heather, Ril n Nicole, Valerie, Sarah, Lana, ben kh and Michelle for reaching out and letting us know what you want to hear. It was a foregone conclusion, but you know what, Yeah, I'm still I'm glad we had back up.

I'm glad. I'm glad we didn't have to just be like, and we're doing this one and we're doing this.

Shut up you guys. We don't care what you want to hear. I'm glad we have receipts. I hope people wanted to hear this too. If you want to have a say in the topics we discussed, you can join our patreon. Every patron gets to vote in an exclusive monthly poll to determine one of our subjects. So head on over to patreon dot com Slashed That aged Well podcast to find out more.

Speaking of finding out more, speaking of our patreon, Speaking of tears on our Patreon, some tears come with a thanks for a podcast character. And today we're hearing from Oh lordie, we're hearing from everyone. Buckle up, get your late caresses ready. We've got missus White from Clue.

Is this a flaming, flaming gun in my hand? Who put this smoking gun in my hand?

Well, missus, missus, what you did? You did walk walk in with it? So I don't know where you would have gotten it.

All I know is I I heard a shot and my my seventh husband, Carl, just died all of a sudden. I think it was a heart attack.

Oh, it's from the from the sound of the gun, the sound of the gun start? Did he have a weak heart?

I didn't kill my husband. How dare you insinuate I accidentally murdered my husband with the smoking gun.

I see what you're saying now the gun is actually on fire? Is that a Is that safe? Should you have that in here?

Is it safe? She's my security blanket. I call her Amber.

Oh, like an emotional support animal.

Thank you Amber for helping me through these difficult times. How I do adore the Amber?

Now? Can I ask? Are you allowed to take that on a plane? Is there a way to get a Is there a way to get a psychiatrist note to allow you to take that emotional support pistol on the plane.

I'm fine, nothing's happened. How dare you insinuate that I need a psychiatrist?

Oh, not that you would need one in your everyday life, just simply that you would use one for your own personal gain.

My fifth husband was a psychiatrist. He was absolutely terrible at it. Do you know a car ran him over four times?

Four times?

You'd think someone in tuned with the human nature would see that coming.

Now? Was that? Is that? Backwards? Forwards? Backwards? Forward? Is that four times? Or is it?

How should I know? Just because it was my car?

Fair? Fair, I guess, I guess that's true. I guess that's true.

If you don't mind now, Amber and I shall be taking our leave. Thank you once again, Amber for everything you've done for me.

And why not for that aged Well, she's a lot to handle.

Oh I didn't is she? Was she even in here? Why does it smell like burning embers?

She had an actual flaming pistol. The pistol was on fire.

Interesting, yeah, because she did also ask me earlier where you keep your head a key? And I told her I hope that's okay. So she's spending the night.

Yeah, that's that's fine, that's fine. Can we can we can find a new place for that. In fact, I should probably do that quickly, Erica, do you have any final thoughts on sneakers?

Change, change, change, change, chain of fools for five long Yeah? I thought you, my man, I'm just dancing like David straight Hair?

Was that a half found that out? I'm just a link in your change.

I hurt my neck. I was throwing neck like David straight Hair in this movie, and I threw it out.

Christopher, even Marco Kidder and Superman. I can't think of any other.

Sarah Paulson and Pedro Pascal honestly, the only other people with.

This much that is not a straight couple that is a is a gay ass couple.

They're both so gay and went back around chemistry for days. Yeah.

Im