#70. Layer Cake, Movie Theaters, and a Rest Stop Ranking
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JVL finally gets his turn and spends it on Layer Cake, the 2004 Matthew Vaughn debut he has been championing for sixteen years and calls, without qualification, the best movie of 2004 and one of the four best of the decade alongside The Dark Knight, Fellowship of the Ring and Lost in Translation. His case is that it works as a Brit gangster picture, a heist, a con movie and the best business movie ever made — Michael Gambon's line that the art of good business is being a good middleman explains Amazon, Facebook and Google — layered over a class structure and a generational war in which the boomers at the top would rather kill their Gen X successors than give up a seat by the band, and in which everyone loyal survives. He rhapsodizes over the tiny performances, especially Stephen Walter's Shanks laying out the provenance of the pills with a lollipop in his mouth, and over the way Vaughn shoots Sienna Miller in the club so that for one moment she looks like Helen of Troy. Sonny, who upgraded from DVD to Blu-ray for the occasion, likes it a great deal and praises how efficiently and unshowily Vaughn shoots compared with the Guy Ritchie films he produced, with one gripe: the Serbian warlord subplot is a step too many. Vic gives it a B+ — A's for duration and violence, an A+ for Sienna Miller, and an F for plot, because he has now watched it many times, this round with subtitles, and still doesn't understand it, which cues a long interrogation of JVL about whether Cody and Tiptoes are cops (they are con men, all of them, the whole raid), who is in the van at the end, and why Sidney does what he does. Before that: Tenet slides to August 12, the Zoom movie Unsubscribe becomes the number one film in America with $25,488 by buying out a single theater, and Vic delivers a five-item coronavirus-edition rest stop ranking topped by a spotless Grover Cleveland, plus a gout flare he blames on one spoonful of his daughter's leftover Quaker Oats.
From the show notes
#cdata-section -------------- In this latest episode sponsored Gabi and DoorDash, we discuss the British gangster flick Layer Cake . JVL e...
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00Hello and welcome to another edition of the Sub-Beacon, sponsored by Gabby and DoorDash.
Vic00:00:29I'm Victor Matus, along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. Just a reminder, the Sub-Beacon is available on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. Look at our podcast and search for Sub-Beacon. You'll easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, and leave a review. Gentlemen, how are we? How is your week's off? How are your week off?
JVL00:00:50How is your week's off?
Sonny00:00:54You know, it was funny. I didn't do a podcast. I haven't done a podcast for two weeks now, which is the longest I have gone without doing a podcast.
Vic00:01:04What happens when you don't do a podcast? I don't know. You get shakes?
Sonny00:01:08I get, my brain, like, freezes up. I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do with myself. The cold sweats? The night sweats? I don't know what's going on.
Vic00:01:15They gotta strap you down and put a diaper on. That's what they do at the rehab center.
JVL00:01:18Yeah, it's very weird. Do you even know what to talk about anymore? If you're not doing a podcast, when you interact with your wife and your children, do you just find yourself with no material?
Sonny00:01:28The movie release schedule being in such flux and no podcasts, I just don't understand what's happening in the world anymore. I've, like, I'm totally unmoored. Oh, that's cute. I'm floating through time, so to speak.
JVL00:01:40That's very cute. The movie schedule is in flux. What a charming euphemism.
Sonny00:01:46No, it was funny. Somebody left a review on our iTunes page saying that, you know, the show has taken a turn during the quarantine, that we're much more downbeat. Sonny in particular has become such a sad sack and hard to listen to. You know what? This person was right. I'm, like, I had a rough couple weeks at work, you know, there's this global pandemic thing, but this person is totally right. I, like, I need to, I need to be more, hold on, I'm getting a, there's a notice on my phone here that a Washington Post reporter is saying that Tenet probably isn't coming out until the middle of August now. And, uh, you know, I just, I can't, I can't do it. I, why, why do I even, how, how are we going to get through this, guys? Guys, what is, when does it end? When does the world get better? I don't think it's gonna. I don't think we're done.
JVL00:02:42I feel like we all, we're all together in February in the offices of the Washington Free Beacon, and I came in with my gloves and my goggles and my mask, and you guys made fun of me. And what I told you was. I told you everything was changed. I said, you guys don't understand. The whole world has changed, and you both laughed at me.
Vic00:03:05I do, and I continue to laugh at you because I never changed, and I'm still alive.
Sonny00:03:08Yeah, I haven't really changed that much. I'm just here in Texas.
Vic00:03:12When I go to the theater, I'm going to take that mask off and go.
Sonny00:03:15There is a, there, there is a theater near me. I'm jumping it.
Vic00:03:19I'm sorry.
Sonny00:03:19There is, there is a theater near me that has opened, the Cinemark 17, showing Blade Runner, amongst other movies. I may just, I may just go. I may go to the movies tomorrow. Who knows? Which one? The original or 2049? The original. The original. The final cut. Which cut? The final cut. I think. That's too long.
Vic00:03:35You'll probably get it. You'll get the virus. It's too long, that movie.
Sonny00:03:38Well, I looked at the seating chart. Zero tickets have been sold for that 1 p.m. showing.
Vic00:03:43What's the strategy, you think? I think the strategy is.
JVL00:03:48Sit in the back. Okay.
Vic00:03:51All right.
JVL00:03:51You know what? Last row. But doesn't that, isn't that where the air recirculates to? Yeah, exactly.
Vic00:03:55Doesn't it like rise?
Sonny00:03:56Can we, so this. This is, this is an actual thing that would be useful is having one of these like fluid dynamics people that you're so enthralled by JVL do like a story about like where the best place to sit in an airplane, in a movie theater, in a restaurant is like, where are you? Do you want to sit like near the door? But if you're near the door, people are coming through. If you're near the walls though, the air comes down onto you, right? Like I, shouldn't you be in the middle?
JVL00:04:20No, because then there are people behind you breathing on you. This is what I'm saying. All, all, all the. The exhalation is going.
Vic00:04:29No, this is. It rises, doesn't it?
JVL00:04:32These are small bits of particulate which go out and then are pulled by gravity back down to the ground, right? Unless they are caught up in the air, air flow and the recirculation, which I think in theaters is probably, well, who knows? I don't know. I mean, I assume it comes out of the MS. I mean, it's a totally enclosed space. It is a totally enclosed space, which is why if you want to be safer, you should be in the very, very. Back. Okay. With a tent over you.
Sonny00:05:00With like a little hood, like a beekeeper hood on.
Vic00:05:02And don't, don't watch, don't watch a comedy where people are like, ha, ha, you know, watch something very, watch something boring like Widows or something. Somber. Watch something somber. If they, if they put Widows back in theaters, you could watch that. Somber. That's right. Okay. Well, we'll, I wouldn't, I don't get to that later on or if we can get to it now. I do have a, well, I don't know. You want to talk about theaters now or just as a separate thing?
JVL00:05:24No, I want to talk about your Connecticut holiday.
Vic00:05:26Oh, yeah. Yes, thank you. Did you go to the Yacht Club? I did. No, he's no longer a member. Did you go yachting? We played. We actually. Up with the Connecticut Dwyers? We played. Yes, we played. I played with my father-in-law, Dr. Bob Dwyer at Fenwick, but that is a public course.
JVL00:05:43Did he save anybody's lives while you were out on the links?
Vic00:05:46No, but it was amazing because it's like this, it's like Brigadoon or something. It's this magical, you know, little world, this little town that you feel like you're being transported. You're transported in time to the 20s. In fact, the green fees were 20 bucks for nine holes and it was a public course, but it is like a time warp and it's like this little community that hasn't changed. It's probably why they looked at me very strangely in my garb, in my garb. I mean, the way I was dressed, you know, who, why is he dressed like that? Why are there so many pockets? Did somebody give you drink orders? Yeah, washes balls, washes balls. And, but it's a really interesting, fancy, fancy part of town. I even asked my father, I said, father, I said, but you grew up here. You ever go to Fenwick? He goes, no. He said there was never a reason to be allowed to go to Fenwick. Catherine Hepburn's house is there and we played right past it on one of the greens. That house is currently listed at 14 million, but it was on a public course, right on a public course on like on the other side of it.
Sonny00:06:47How are the, how are the greens, how are the greens fees only $20 on this course? Yeah.
Vic00:06:52Pandemic, I guess. But the, uh, but that's the house that the whole family lived in.
?00:06:57Like,
JVL00:06:57Do they have gates three miles out along the roads to keep the brown people out?
Vic00:07:01It's not like a golf community where you're right by there and you might accidentally hit it. Although I could the way I hit, but you know, it's along the fairway, so it's on the side and it's facing the water, which means, um, it is in constant danger of hurricane, you know, uh, peril. The whole, apparently the whole Hepburn family lived there and she like supported like the whole, you know what I mean? Like everybody was, uh, her father was urologist, so I mean there was family money and stuff, but the, uh, uh, but obviously with her career, she could, you know, the whole, it was like a giant.
JVL00:07:31So she was also the child of a doctor like you.
Vic00:07:34Yes.
JVL00:07:35And she went on to become one of the most celebrated, celebrated stars of the silver screen. And you also the child of a doc. I mean, look, it didn't go to Georgetown, did she?
Vic00:07:46No, I wonder where she went to. Probably. I don't know where she went to, but, uh, but we played right by there, which was great. And then, uh, but the, uh, the, the, the, uh, pro well, before I get to that, I was going to say, you know, how long it took me to get from Arlington to Connecticut.
JVL00:08:05Uh, hold on, hold on. Don't don't. I'm doing the math. Six hours.
Vic00:08:10On the nose, JVL on the nose.
JVL00:08:13Uh, technically that was my real time tracking, like the Google real time traffic analysis calculating, calculating your brain.
Vic00:08:20And it was five and a half hours, but there were three rest stops. The sad part is it had nothing to do with it. The kids, it was all my bladder. You know, when your kids are young, like your kids, there's always, you got to stop for this. You got to stop for that. Somebody's had a diaper changes or whatever. And now, now I'm the one with the diaper. No, no, no. I'm the one that has to be like, okay, who needs to stop? I know you got to pee. No, no, no. Oh, uh, okay. You know, and then we go a little bit further. I'm like, why are my kidneys hurt? My kidneys are hurting.
Sonny00:08:51We got, we got to get gas. We just got gas an hour ago.
Vic00:08:53Don't you, I don't, you feel that urge as a dad. Accurate says a spy is like, is it the inner wall of your bladder? Don't you feel the urge? You know? And so, uh, we had to stop three times and it's like, and once, of course, once you open the spigot, you know, then it's like, oh, we got to go again. But you know what?
JVL00:09:08Which stops did you make?
Vic00:09:09Ah, you know what that means? Great segue, Jamie.
JVL00:09:12This is what I, this is what I want to know.
Vic00:09:13Get ready for Delaware.
JVL00:09:14Did you stop at the Biden center in Delaware?
Vic00:09:16Get ready for this. I have for you today. Rest stop rankings. Coronavirus edition. Yes. Top five. Actually, the only five. I went to five different rest stops. Round back and forth. Each time is about six hours, by the way. Uh, and I have ranked them for you and for our listeners from worst to best. Or do you want best to worst? Worst to best. Okay. Worst to best. Number five, Maryland house, Maryland house. You know, the one near Harvard of grace. Yeah.
JVL00:09:46Even the rebuilt Maryland house. Don't love it. Yeah.
Vic00:09:49So you're going, if you're going down 95, that's the last one for another stretch.
JVL00:09:54So when we were kids, Victorino, I don't know if you remember. This, but the Maryland house had something I've never seen anywhere else in my life. It was a comic book vending machine. And you just, you just put three quarters in it and you chink the three quarters and it just spit a comic book out totally at random. And when I saw that, Oh man, that was the great, I used to look forward to stopping at the Maryland house just to make use of the comic book vending machine.
Vic00:10:22I actually made a joke cause I was there and I'm there with my son and, and you can get out of the restroom, but I said, Hey, you want one of those? Look, you could get free, you could get, you know, the operate, the vending machine has like the ice cream, like dots. Is it dots? What are the dots? You want some dip and dots? He goes, what? The thing is empty. But I thought it was funny to look at, like somebody like would be insane enough to actually do that. We got there around noon. It was already a bit of a mob scene. People are out and about, you know what the other thing is, you know, what's bad when there are food lines, not just for Wendy's, not just for Wendy's, but for the burrito brothers at Phillip's Seafood. You know, you want, you want seafood at the rest stop. No, you know what? No.
JVL00:11:05So, okay, hold on. The Phillip's Seafood at the rest stop. And I believe there's also one at the Delaware. If all you're getting is a crab cake, it's just a frozen crab cake. The way you would get from the grocery store that they sort of pop on a griddle.
Vic00:11:19I would. That is perfectly fine. I would get clam strips. Okay. I love clam strips. Okay. Number four. Number four. Mont Vail on the Garden State Parkway. Coming down because we took the tap with the Mario Cuomo, the Mario Cuomo Bridge, the tap at Z. And it is the first rest stop of the Garden State Parkway at the very top of the state. And it's Mont Vail. I have never stopped there. It is like two miles into the parkway. And it is Mont Vail.
JVL00:11:48So, you come off the tap, 287, and then you hit the parkway? Boom. It's right there. Sonny, are you loving this segment? Well, is that the one that's near?
Sonny00:11:56The Meadowlands?
?00:11:58No.
Sonny00:11:59You're on the turnpike. You're on a whole different side.
JVL00:12:01Oh, that's the turnpike. Sorry.
Vic00:12:03Can we mute him, Vic? Yes. This is the Garden State Parkway, which you have to take if you're coming down from the tap, or the Cuomo.
Sonny00:12:11Wait, did they rename the tap in Z Bridge? Yes, they did. The Mario Cuomo Bridge?
Vic00:12:15No, they named it the Chris Cuomo Bridge. Oh, stop. Yes, the Mario Cuomo. You know what the problem with Mont Vail was? The bathroom wet floor. You never know. Is it mopping wet floor? Why is it particularly wetter? Around the urinal, okay? That was one thing. The other weird thing, there was nobody there, which is always nice. There was nobody there, except for one old man with no mask inside, sitting on the coin-operated massage chair.
JVL00:12:40What?
Vic00:12:41I wanted to go, like, what are you doing here? Maybe he lives in Mont Vail. I just want to use the chair. I don't know. Okay. Number three is Brantford in Connecticut. It's very quaint, like all of Connecticut, and it's small. Is that on the Merritt? No, on 95. Also, it's usually the worst, 95 in Connecticut, but again, because of the situation, there was a lot of traffic, but it was flowing. And of course, there's a Dunkin' Donuts, because there's a Dunkin' Donuts in every rest stop in Connecticut.
JVL00:13:12Is this before or after Stamford?
Vic00:13:15After. After. So it's like Stamford, Bridgeport, and somewhere else.
JVL00:13:19Because the traffic around Stamford is always murder.
Vic00:13:21New Haven, too, but you never probably have to go that far.
JVL00:13:24Okay. We might actually be able to kill Sonny with this ranking.
Vic00:13:26I see. Sonny, 15 more minutes. Number two, Delaware. You are right, JVL.
JVL00:13:33The Biden censor, because I knew it. The President Biden rest stop.
Vic00:13:38It was already refurbished and new prior to the pandemic, so I figured how much more, right? Okay. And number one, Grover Cleveland on the New Jersey Turnpike, just before you enter New York. Now, there's one more rest stop on the Turnpike before Grover Cleveland, before you went to New York, and that would be Vince Lombardi. Lombardi was closed. Grover Cleveland. Yeah, Lombardi's terrible. It was closed. Grover Cleveland, because I had to go.
JVL00:14:11I had to go. Had they redone it? Because they've been redoing all of these rest stops. Maybe. Have they done Grover Cleveland yet?
Vic00:14:16I normally don't go there at all because I try to avoid North Jersey rest stops. They're not as clean as the South Jersey rest stops for whatever reason. But you know what?
JVL00:14:24Whatever reason. Because I... I have some reasons.
Vic00:14:27I'll tell you why. The great thing about... The upside. The upside to the pandemic, they were like, well, I guess we're going to have to finally clean these stalls for the first time in five years. Time to clean the urinal for the first time in five years. Okay. So it was really like expectations because I thought it was going to be bad. But not only was it not bad, it was spotless. It was spotless. So there you have it.
JVL00:14:51Can I give a little service for our listeners? I'm reluctant to share this because I don't want to let slip a little secret here. But the other great thing about the Biden, the President Biden Memorial Rest Stop, is that they have a drive-through Starbucks. Oh, yeah. Did you notice this? And it's hidden in the corner and nobody knows about it.
Vic00:15:16I got news for you, JVL. They all noticed it. The line was like miles.
JVL00:15:20Okay. But that's because the inside Starbucks is closed right now. In normal times, when the inside Starbucks is open... Everybody goes to that Starbucks and you can just skip...
Vic00:15:30It would have been in like another hour. Yeah. But it's like that at all the Starbucks now. Okay. So the only thing I will add to this is that while I was in Connecticut, I got the gout. It came back.
Sonny00:15:46Oh, no.
Vic00:15:47Flared up? Did you get a picture? I thought... No, this was really weird, too. I thought I had sprained my foot and it was like... You're like, oh, I thought I sprained my foot while I was running. Because it was a burning red sensation. Ready for this? In a whole new location. Heel? No, my genital. No, no, I'm just kidding. My left foot. It's normally my right foot right before the big toe. Instead, it was left foot right before the three middle toes, the joint knuckle, whatever it is, the metatarsal, whatever it is, metaphylangeal. It's right before... All three of them? Yes. In the middle. Heel, red, hot, and immediately, of course, my mother-in-law was like, it's all the martinis you and my father-in-law have been drinking. And I said, no, no, I don't think so. And maybe it's all the beer, because it's true, I did have a lot of beer, right? I normally don't drink beer. And he's like, hey, you want a beer in the afternoon? How am I supposed to say no to that?
Sonny00:16:47Can't say no. Can't say no, have a beer. It'd be rude. It would be rude to say no. Beer is very bad.
Vic00:16:50I had some red wine. I did have some whiskey. But no, I look back. I look back. Diagnosis? Yes, diagnosis. Prior to the trip, we're cleaning dishes, and my daughter had had a bowl of oatmeal, and she didn't finish it. And I was curious, because I hadn't had oatmeal in a long time. I took a spoonful of the oatmeal.
Sonny00:17:10It was the oatmeal. It wasn't the 17 different kinds of alcohol.
Vic00:17:16It wasn't the combination of spirits and liquors and beer. No.
Sonny00:17:20It wasn't the 300 oysters you had probably had.
Vic00:17:22It was Quaker Oats.
JVL00:17:26How bad did it get? Did you go to DEFCON 1? Did you head it off?
Sonny00:17:32Did you get some cherry liquor?
Vic00:17:34For a day, because I was working from Connecticut, and I was able to use Captain Bill Dwyer's old bedroom as an office with a computer set up there. I had to prop my foot up on the desk, and I was just hobbling around for a day and drinking a lot of water. And next day was gone. So much so that I ran while I was there. So it was really a miracle.
JVL00:18:01What does it mean as a medical matter to have had your gout move? Does this mean that you're basically going to die tomorrow?
Vic00:18:10Yeah, maybe. I've had it on the back of my heel. Some people get it like in their other joints, elbows, knees, which is really awful. This thing came, but then it left. You know, I mean, just drink water. And I mean, again, I ran four miles twice, I think. So, you know, I mean, while I was in Connecticut. And so I can't do more than that because I'm not changing my diet. This is as good as it gets. JVL, what's going on with you? Nothing. Okay. Well, I was going to say, and in that case, I was just very happy it was on my left foot. It's a good thing it was on the left foot because if it was on the right foot, then that would have been a real pain having to drive down. Even if it was only six hours, using the right foot to drive would have been impossible. So speaking of driving. We're all looking for ways to save money, especially now. When's the last time you looked at how much you're spending every month on car insurance, on homeowner's insurance? Now is the time to check out Gabby and see about getting a lower rate for the exact same coverage you already have. Gabby takes the pain out of shopping for insurance by giving you an apples-to-apples comparison of your current coverage with 40 of the top insurance providers like Progressive, Nationwide, and Travelers. Just link your current insurance account, and in about two minutes, you'll be able to see quotes for the exact same coverage you currently have. Gabby customers. Save $825 per year on average. If they can't find you savings, they'll let you know, so you can relax knowing you have the best rate out there, and they will never sell your info, so no annoying spam or robocalls. It's totally free to check your rate, and there's no obligation. Take two minutes right now to see how much you can save on your car and homeowner insurance. Go to Gabby.com slash Sub-Beacon. That's G-A-B-I dot com slash Sub-Beacon. Gabby.com slash Sub-Beacon. Box office thoughts. Box office thoughts.
Sonny00:19:58Yeah, they officially, Warner Brothers has officially delayed Tenet to August 12th, so. I got no reason to go on. That's it? That's it for you? That's it. I'm just going to crawl in a hole.
Vic00:20:15I see the box office. There's two horror movies up on Box Office Mojo.
Sonny00:20:20Well, it was funny. There was a, JVL, you sent us this story, actually, didn't you, about the guys who made the room. Zoom movie, and then bought out a theater in New York City to have the number one highest grossing movie of the week. We should do that. We should just tape. We should just record this.
Vic00:20:40You know, we could raise money for this. People would do it.
Sonny00:20:44I should just tape this screen for the next hour. We can talk, and then we'll make a 1080 rip of it, and we'll send it. We'll send it to some theater somewhere, and we'll buy all the seats, have a nice little red carpet premiere. That would give me something to do, you know. So anyway, those are my box office thoughts. Box office is depressing. Hold on one second.
Vic00:21:10The time is 20 to wait. I cannot hear JVL. Can you hear him, Sonny?
JVL00:21:14Yes. Sorry. There we are. Hello. I was muted during the ad read. For one day on June 10, 2020, the movie Unsubscribe was the number one movie in America with a gross of $25,488. Because they rented out one entire theater, and that was enough to put them into first place over The Wretched.
Sonny00:21:33The Wretched. Yes. The Wretched, which is making the drive-in circuit. That's an IFC movie that...
JVL00:21:40Would you like to know what The Wretched's per theater average is? Yeah. Go ahead, guess. Just guess.
Sonny00:21:49$500?
JVL00:21:51$227. That sounds about right. Yeah. Sure, sure. I'm positive the $10,000 is the average. And it will be in theaters on August 10th.
Vic00:21:5912th. Whatever. Theaters are reopening without masks. Wait, with masks. And the question is, are you going to go? And if so, what? JVO.
JVL00:22:14Nobody's going to go.
Vic00:22:16Sonny. Nobody's going to go.
Sonny00:22:19I'll go to a draft house on a midweek morning screening for something like Disception. I would do that. Fine. I'd do that.
Vic00:22:31Victorino. Of course you'll go, Victorino. Of course I'm going to go, but it's going to depend. Because if it's young people, I feel comfortable. If it's old people, then I am not going to go to the theater. So I'm going to, like, if they're reissuing that Hotel Marigold movie with Helen Mirren, you know, that one. You're not going to that. Or the 70-foot journey or whatever. You know, the movies that old people like, I'm not going to go to those because it would be very dangerous. For everybody involved.
Sonny00:22:57Well, I mean, not for you.
Vic00:22:59All right. For them, maybe.
Sonny00:23:01For them, maybe.
Vic00:23:02I don't know.
Sonny00:23:03Because you're probably, you're just shedding disease everywhere you go. Clearly. Just like. Clearly.
Vic00:23:08Clearly. Asymptomatic. But I might give it to other people who are asymptomatic and on and on it goes. But in the theater, you can't stop people. You know, it's dark. Right? People are going to let it slip.
Sonny00:23:19Well, this is one reason. I'm talking about the mask. This is one reason why I would go to a draft house more than ever. More, I'm more likely to go to a draft house than other theaters because draft house audiences are already conditioned to behave themselves in theaters. They don't use.
JVL00:23:35Go ahead. Say it.
Sonny00:23:36They don't use cell phones.
JVL00:23:37I dare you to say it.
Sonny00:23:38No, they, look, they have prided themselves on conditioning an audience that respects the rules of movie going, right? Like, no theater, no cell phones in theaters, no talking, no, you know, hooting and hollering at the screen.
JVL00:23:55No hooting and hollering. What would you say these audiences predominantly vote for?
Sonny00:23:59I have no idea. I mean, I don't think that Donald Trump voters are necessarily much more likely to be well behaved at the theaters than Joe Biden voters, frankly.
JVL00:24:12Bunch of affluent and college educated people who love cinema. Yeah, no, who could say who they vote for?
Sonny00:24:19But, uh, the, the, this, this being the case, I am more likely to. Uh, believe that a draft house theater audience is going to do things like wear their masks and, you know, not, uh, show up sick and coughing all over the place. I don't know. I mean, I, I like, I'm, I like, it just, it is what it is. Uh, that said, I'm also like, I'm also not terribly scared of, you know, going to a random theater at like two in the afternoon, which is when I go to movies now, like you, you know, either like two in the afternoon on a Tuesday or like 10 PM on a Thursday. Um, uh, whenever I go to the theater at those times, it is generally 95% empty anyway. I don't think it's going to be any less empty now. Um, and, uh, a theater that's, you know, 95% empty, you're probably not going to catch anything cause you know, you're not going to be close enough to anyone.
JVL00:25:19So, you know, if you get your hands on an N95 respirator, you're good to go in a, in a theater that is almost entirely empty with you, like you and two other people and you're sitting far away from them and you're wearing not a mask, but an actual respirator, which is going to filter out virus particles, uh, you're, you're basically fine.
Sonny00:25:39Yeah. So, I mean, I'm just going to, I'm just going to wear like a bandana. I'm just going to wrap a t-shirt around my mouth anyway.
Vic00:25:46If they're 20 feet away from you, I'm not scared about getting it. I'm just not. I go around everywhere here. Everybody's fine. I don't know anybody.
Sonny00:25:55Nobody actually has this.
JVL00:25:56Come on. Do you? Come on. It's all a hoax.
Vic00:25:59Nobody, nobody has this disease. You're in a nursing home, obviously. It's terrible.
Sonny00:26:03If you're, if you're above the age of 60, you've got something to worry about, frankly. You know, me, and I'm like, I, frankly, I've got less to worry about than you guys because I'm so much younger, more virile and, you know.
Vic00:26:14I'm not, I'm not going to go see Cocoon. I'll tell you that much. No, that's smart. Uh, we have a movie of the week. That's what we do here now. And this movie, uh, is. We've talked about it a lot.
JVL00:26:26JVL is your turn because we've, I don't think, I don't have access to it because my other
Vic00:26:31files are in the office, but I don't think we've actually dedicated an actual episode to this movie.
Sonny00:26:39We have talked about it in a previous episode about, I want to say either Kingsman or Kingsman
Vic00:26:45Golden Circle, possibly. Because, I mean, obviously, because this is a movie that came out before the Sub-Beacon substandard. JVL, we, this was your turn to pick a movie. And you picked one.
JVL00:26:58The year is 2004. Matthew Vaughn, an upper crust Brit with ties to royalty, is best known as the guerrilla producer of Guy Ritchie's gangster movies, including Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. Guy Ritchie acquires the J.J. Connolly book Layer Cake and is going to direct it, but then goes and does something else at the last minute. And so Matthew Vaughn makes his directorial debut with what is arguably the best movie of the 2000s, Layer Cake.
Sonny00:27:41Very arguably.
JVL00:27:42There, we have just set the table. Sonny, would you like to give a big boy review? You watched it on glorious Blu-ray last night. I did. Was it your first time?
Sonny00:27:53No, no, no. I own this movie on DVD. I didn't want to watch it on DVD on my big TV.
JVL00:27:59Well, it would have hurt your eyes.
Sonny00:28:00It just is, it's unpleasant. It's unpleasant to watch it. It had been on like Amazon Prime or Netflix for a while, which, and I had watched it relatively recently, last year, maybe on one of those services. So I didn't, I had not had reason to upgrade to the Blu-ray until this week. So thank you, JVL, for choosing this.
JVL00:28:19Did it go on your shelf?
Sonny00:28:20Oh, I don't have shelves here yet. I've just got like, it's the worst. For now, I don't really want to do a big boy review of this, JVL. I think you should do the big boy review.
JVL00:28:33Yeah, I agree. You're the one who has been.
Vic00:28:35Do one of, if this is, if we're catching you sort of off guard, I do want to also know what was it that drew you to this movie? And did you actually see this movie in the theater?
JVL00:28:47I did, believe it or not. I saw this at East Street.
Vic00:28:50Lucky you.
JVL00:28:50I saw this at the East Street, the cinema.
Vic00:28:55No, Sonny. I don't do big boy reviews very well. You didn't write about it. Did you, JVL, at the Standard?
JVL00:29:00No, I don't think so. This is one of these movies that I have just been championing for 16 years now because it is an underappreciated, absolute classic. But again, please, Sonny, would you do a big boy review for me? Don't make me do it. My thoughts about this are all too big to condense into a mere plot summary.
Sonny00:29:24Okay, so Layer Cake stars. Daniel Craig as a middleman gangster type who is into the low-level cocaine game in Great Britain. He has a small crew of thugs who he works with, including a very young Tom Hardy in this movie. I don't think this is Tom Hardy's first movie, but it is certainly, I think, his biggest experience. And it is kind of amusing to see him. The first scene in which, by the way, he's wearing a mask. It sets the stage for the whole Tom Hardy body of work. So it's Daniel Craig who is working with Tom Hardy, a couple of other guys, Morty, played by George Harris, and Morty's, I don't know, muscle guy named Terry. They are basically, let's see, I'm trying to think. There are two levels down from the head middleman. Their go-between is played by Colm Meaney, the great Colm Meaney, who most people will remember from Star Trek The Next Generation, of course, as the transporter operator. Chief O'Brien, was that Colm Meaney?
JVL00:30:49Yeah, that was Chief O'Brien.
Sonny00:30:51Anyway, I'm getting bogged down in the weeds because Layer Cake is a very fascinating, emotional movie because it's essentially a heist flick, right? And it is tricksy and turny and noir-ish in the way that very good crime heist flicks are. But the joy of this movie is not really the ins and outs and what have yous of the heist, which has to do with a million tabs of ecstasy that have been pilfered by this ridiculous person, the Duke, who, you know, just wants to be a gangster and wants to be flashy and all that. The lovely thing about this movie is just all of the little characters playing their little parts to make the whole thing tick like a clock. You know, this is Daniel Craig's first really big role. He's fantastic. Like I said, Colmini's great in it. Tom Hardy's good. But it's these little flashes of characters. Like Crazy Larry, for instance. Crazy Larry is played by... Hold on. Jason Fleming? Actually, I looked this up. Jason Fleming. Thank you.
JVL00:32:03Who has one line. One line in the whole movie.
Sonny00:32:05He has one line in the whole movie, but he has an overweight presence in the middle of it. And his very persona, his kind of garish persona in the middle distance through a bunch of the everything in this movie into into motion. And you don't realize that until like the third or fourth time you watch it. Yeah. Like what what what what exactly is the inciting incident of the whole movie? I don't know. It's just it's a it's a very clever and very compact and very complex movie that like hums along. It clocks in at a tight hundred and five. It's it's a very it's a relative. It's a relatively short movie, an hour, 45 minutes, and you see something different every time you watch it, which is basically my last remaining hallmark for a great movie is like every time I watch it, I see something new and interesting in it. I don't know. This is a terrible big boy review because I don't I don't know how to like actually talk about this movie.
JVL00:33:19You said so you you mentioned great little performances, my favorite of all the little performances. Is Stephen Walter playing Shanks? So during the course of the movie, Mr. X, who is Daniel Craig's character, has to move these pills. He's got to find a buyer for these pills. And so he goes up to Liverpool and meets with two North England drug dealers who are Trevor and Shanks. And Shanks is played by Stephen Walter. And they do this this scene. Again, this is his only work in the entire movie. His only lines is he stands there with a lollipop. And he lays out to them the provenance of the pills which they are selling, which they themselves don't know. And everything he does in that scene, he is so precise. And it's just an amazing little tour de force from a great actor.
Sonny00:34:15It's interesting that Matthew Vaughn was the producer of the Guy Ritchie movies because the Guy Ritchie gangster movies are similar in a way in the kind of like intricately plotted nature of the things, but extraordinarily different in another way, which is that visually, you know, Guy Ritchie is all flash. He's all, here are clever little visual things that I'm going to do and you are going to keep watching because it's interesting on the screen, right? And Matthew Vaughn does none of that, really. It's a very straightforward, I don't want to say...
JVL00:34:48It's beautifully shot. Even the B-unit stuff is gorgeous to look at.
Sonny00:34:52It's extremely well shot, but it's also extremely... Straightforward. It's not showy. There's nothing fancy here. There's nothing particularly, you know, special or showy or any of that stuff. It just, it is efficiently and purposefully shot in a way that, again, the Guy Ritchie movies aren't. The Guy Ritchie movies are just, are very, you know, in your face with what the style of the thing is. And this is more restrained and more... A little, a little more reserved, which I think, you know, plays into the whole Matthew Vaughn, you know, upper crust, royalty, stiff upper lip type attitude that he brings to these pictures.
JVL00:35:40Victorino, you loved it, didn't you?
Vic00:35:42I gave it a BB+. Because...
JVL00:35:46Are you fucking kidding me?
Vic00:35:47No, I'm not. Have you seen it? You'd seen it before, right?
JVL00:35:49Look at the quadrants, Victorino.
Vic00:35:51I know. Well, here's the thing. Duration is an A. Violence is an A. Sex nudity is definitely an A. See, out of Miller, that's an A+. She gets an A+.
JVL00:36:00So what, so how does it go down to...
Vic00:36:03Plot gets an F. Plot gets an F and drag down the, it weighed down the average. So it was like A, A, A and an F for plot. I've watched this movie... Too complicated? Too complicated for you? I've watched this movie so many times and I still don't understand what happened. I watched the movie this time with subtitles. I watched it with the subtitles. I have questions.
Sonny00:36:19I turned, I turned the subtitles on this time too. Because I was just, I, I, because I had to turn, I had to, I had to turn the subtitles I had to turn the volume down because I was watching, you know, with the kids.
Vic00:36:28The whole movie is, that's the whole movie.
Sonny00:36:31Can I, my one, my one complaint about the plot, I do have one complaint about the plot is that I do think that the introduction of the Serbian warlords is like one step too many.
JVL00:36:42These lot are wanted for mass murder.
Sonny00:36:45Yeah, the, the, the whole dragon subplot I find to be like...
Vic00:36:48That's the only part I think I understood, but okay. I have questions. These are real questions. This is not trolling. This is not trolling. Go ahead. But you know... These are all of them.
JVL00:36:56I've seen this movie like 60 times.
Vic00:36:58Did they ever find Michael Gambon's daughter?
Sonny00:37:01Yes, at the end of the movie. Yes, Michael Gambon has her. Yeah. He sent her to Arizona. He says this at the end of the movie. That's not Sienna Miller. No. Okay, just checking.
JVL00:37:09His, his, his daughter is Charlie and Mr. Troop is the one who picked Charlie up from Brighton and then they sent her to rehab in Arizona. Mr. Troop is the...
Vic00:37:19There's so many characters. He's one of the soldiers.
Sonny00:37:22Oh.
JVL00:37:22He is the head soldier for Michael Gambon's character.
Vic00:37:25I thought Daniel Craig's... His name was Kinky. I got confused.
JVL00:37:28No, Kinky was the boyfriend who of Charlie... Okay, never mind.
Vic00:37:32Michael Gambon, by the way, has a perfect voice. But we never see... He's great. Absolutely perfect. Extremely darkly tanned, weird. I don't know what's going on there.
JVL00:37:41And enormous, enormous hands. Yeah.
Vic00:37:45Okay, so...
JVL00:37:46The scene where he puts his hands around, when they're on the rooftop and he puts his hands around Daniel Craig's face and he almost touches his fingertips on the back. It's like an orangutan.
Vic00:37:55And even with the profanity, he's still Dumbledore to me. So Michael Gambon's daughter is found, but we don't see... That's funny.
JVL00:38:03Dumbledore is Eddie Temple to me.
Vic00:38:06Either way, two sides of the same coin. So she's found, but we don't see her. She's gone. So why did... She's not...
Sonny00:38:13Why did...
Vic00:38:14What?
Sonny00:38:16Well, I mean, we see her once briefly in a flashback.
JVL00:38:19She's never in the movie except for her doing a line of coke in a bathroom.
Vic00:38:23That was a false flag or whatever. Not a false flag was the word I'm looking for. It was like a red herring or something. It's like, you know what I'm saying? Jimmy sends them on this mission, but it was a fake mission?
JVL00:38:37No, it wasn't a fake mission. It was to put him in the path of Eddie Temple.
Vic00:38:41To get killed or to be helped? Yes. Oh.
JVL00:38:45One or the other. To either have Eddie Temple kill him or for him to... If he found Charlie so that he could then get leverage over Eddie because he wants to get the money back from Eddie. Right.
Sonny00:38:57The money that he put into the African nation. Yes, right.
JVL00:39:00Even made him a member of the tribe.
Vic00:39:06That sounded very... Amazing. That was just amazing. Okay, so there's that. Because I wasn't sure about that. And then who were the guys that they enlist to find Kinky and the girl? Cody and Tiptoes. Are they cops? Yes. Cody and Tiptoes. Or are they bad cops pretending to be... Are they undercover?
JVL00:39:29They're con men. They're con men pretending to be cops. No, they're con men. All they are is straight con men.
Sonny00:39:34Yes. They're con men, but that scene at the end is a bit of a cheat. Well, do they get killed? It's a bit of a cheat. I don't think those... In the van?
Vic00:39:42I couldn't even see their faces. No, no, no, no.
Sonny00:39:44Because what happens... So what happens is at the end, they have the British SWAT team chases Daniel Craig and the low-level gangsters out of that warehouse, just chase them away. And then they come back, and instead of leaving with the pills to these two guys, what are their names again?
JVL00:40:16Cody and Tiptoes.
Sonny00:40:17Cody and Tiptoes. They steal the pills.
JVL00:40:20No, no, no. See? So there are no cops. All of those cops, those are con men. Cody and Tiptoes and a bunch of actors that they have recruited to run this. How are you supposed to know that? There are no police there.
Sonny00:40:33Are you sure about that?
JVL00:40:35Positive.
Sonny00:40:36Are you sure about that?
JVL00:40:37Because... I am 100,000% sure. There are no cops. It is all Cody and Tiptoes the whole time. The whole thing is...
Sonny00:40:45And so they're just putting on a show so Dragon can watch in the distance?
JVL00:40:49Correct, because they believe that Dragon is watching them. Interestingly enough, Cody, played by Dexter Fletcher... who went on to become a producer and director. He produced Bohemian Rhapsody and directed Rocketman.
Vic00:41:03You know, one of them, I can't...
JVL00:41:04Again, this movie has more talent on screen than just about any movie I've made.
Vic00:41:08I can't remember which one is which, but one of them I recognize... because he was in Band of Brothers and he was a great role in Band of Brothers. And of course playing an American. But of course Tom Hardy was in Band of Brothers. There were a ton of Brits playing Americans in Band of Brothers. But that's where I recognized him from. Okay, see, there was confusion there. The guy who puts the shotgun in his mouth is not Crazy Larry.
Sonny00:41:32No.
Vic00:41:33Crazy Larry is the... Who is the guy who puts the shotgun in his mouth?
JVL00:41:37Just a random guy. He's just one of the kids in the gang who Crazy Larry was...
Vic00:41:41Oh, right. ...riding against his will. All right.
JVL00:41:46Because as Crazy Larry... Gay? No, Crazy Larry was never gay. As he would say.
Vic00:41:53Yes, that's right, that's right. Okay, does Gene... Does Gene kill the guy who puts the shotgun in his mouth or no?
JVL00:41:59No, Gene kills Crazy Larry. This is...
Vic00:42:02No, the guy who puts the shotgun in his mouth kills himself. You see him die on screen. You see him blow his brains out. Yeah, but you know how it is. You're seeing things that aren't real, like in Under the Silver Lake, things that didn't happen. Maybe it didn't happen. He's altering the story. Gene is altering the story. You know, that's what I think.
JVL00:42:17Let me interrupt your questions here for a moment, Victorino. Let me interrupt you. I'll pause your question. Sonny, did you notice in this viewing that... That when Mr. X and Colm Meaney's character Gene are sitting and he's being told all this history, Daniel Craig says to him, so one of the guys who was getting ridden killed Crazy Larry? And Gene does this little thing where there's a tiny hitch. He looks to the side and goes, yeah, probably.
Vic00:42:52And it was clearly... Yeah, that's right. It is so... Once you know...
JVL00:42:55Once you know the story. Again, there are so many little tells where it becomes odd the whole way along. Right. Everything really is set up.
Vic00:43:02How is Morty off the hook when the guy, they say, oh, he comes out of his coma? Wouldn't he get out of his coma and then he would be in trouble because he ID him or...
Sonny00:43:11Well, because now he's not on the hook for a murder charge.
JVL00:43:15So he is. And what you find out in the... So this is one place where they have elided something that is in the novel. In the novel, they put together a bunch of money.
Vic00:43:25Yeah.
JVL00:43:26They put together a bunch of money and give it to Freddy to bribe him out of paying charges.
Guest00:43:31That was an assumption for me.
Vic00:43:33Okay.
JVL00:43:33So this is a... But yes.
Vic00:43:34Can I get to the spoiler question now? Is this okay? I know the movie... For people who didn't see it. It's a 16-year-old movie.
JVL00:43:40There are no spoilers. Ben Whishaw, right?
Vic00:43:43Who is Sidney?
JVL00:43:44Q. Sidney? The Lobster. Isn't it funny? Yes. Plays Sidney.
Vic00:43:48He kills Daniel Craig. Is it his friends in the club who hired him to kill Daniel Craig?
Sonny00:43:55No, no, no. No. Here's the real question.
Vic00:43:59Does he kill him on his own?
Sonny00:44:00JVL. Here's the real question for JVL from Sonny. This is the actual... It's a good question.
Vic00:44:06Not like this dumb question. What are you saying? What are you suggesting, Sonny?
Sonny00:44:11Does Ben Whishaw kill Daniel Craig as payback for the Duke or because he has stolen his girl? Because he has stolen his girl.
Vic00:44:22He does it in such a weird way where he says, I'm sorry. And then he leaves. So I felt like he was forced to do it. Because Sidney is not a killer.
JVL00:44:29Like Sidney isn't... No. Sidney is this... So they shot the movie with three endings. They shot it with an ending where there is no killing by Sidney and Daniel Craig and Sienna Miller drive off into the sunset. They shot an ending, which they use in the movie, where he's killed. And they shot an ending where it's ambiguous, where Craig and Sienna Miller leave, but Sidney follows them. And this is still kind of ambiguous.
Vic00:44:54You don't actually... He's still alive. He's still suffering. You know? Maybe. I don't know.
JVL00:44:57But what this is, is it's part of the deeper message of the movie, which is that loyalty is the most important thing. Everybody in the movie who is loyal... Survives. Survives.
Vic00:45:08But also...
JVL00:45:09And the people who are being disloyal are the ones who die. Also... But also... And, you know, rubbing another man's rhubarb? Disloyal.
Vic00:45:14But also the classic sort of, you can't get out. They won't let you out of this business. They're not married. Godfather. You can't get out. Nobody gets out. No, no, no. You can't go legit. He wants to go legit.
Sonny00:45:23Like... He... All right. I'm going to dispute this because she is the one that is cheating on him. He... Daniel Craig's Mr. X has no obligation not to be with Sienna Miller.
JVL00:45:36He kind of does.
Sonny00:45:38They're not married. They're not engaged.
JVL00:45:41You don't screw around with somebody else's girlfriend.
Sonny00:45:43They were dancing at a club.
Vic00:45:44Did they know each other? No, they were together. Did they know each other beforehand? The way they look at each other, was it strictly... In Sydney? Sienna Miller. Daniel Craig. Sienna Miller's character. Sienna Miller's character and Daniel Craig.
JVL00:45:55No, they just meet in a club and she's... It's very suggestible. It was primal.
Vic00:45:59It was primal, the way they looked at... The way she... I remember, by the way... Yeah, okay. Go ahead.
JVL00:46:07The way she is shot in that scene in the club is one of those things where once every 10 years, a director will shoot an actress in such a way that suddenly she looks like Helen of Troy. For a moment, she is the most... The most beautiful woman on the face of the earth. And it's kind of like Emmanuel Baird does in Mission Impossible. She is shot... Brian De Palma shoots her like crazy. And I think Vaughn does the same thing with Sienna Miller here. And I mean, look, she's a lovely actress in Every Pretty Girl, but she has never... Factory girl. Factory girl.
Vic00:46:43See that movie.
JVL00:46:45And never will look like that again. And it's just because of the way he shot her there. And it's amazing.
Sonny00:46:51Yeah.
JVL00:46:52Yeah. In the club...
Sonny00:46:54Zero Pinocchios.
JVL00:46:55In the club with the cigarette. Sort of like dancing by herself.
Vic00:46:59But also when she tells him to hold your horses and I'll be right back. But I remembered that from the last episode when I'm watching it the other day. I already knew that I was going to be disappointed. And I was like, man, don't answer that door.
Sonny00:47:10But it's funny. It is a funny... It's a funny scene. It is. It's great.
JVL00:47:15Go ahead. Continue your question, Victorino.
Vic00:47:17At the very end, last question. So Gambo, they take the drugs back. He takes it, but like, you know, what did you think was going to happen, the whole thing? And then they take it and they're left with nothing. But there's a brief change of scenery and you see a couple of dead guys in the van. What was that?
JVL00:47:35That's Mr. Troop, Michael Gambon, who died. Because X's revenge on Gambon is calling Trevor and Shanks. I'm sorry, Trevor and Shanks.
Vic00:47:44Not Michael Gambon. He didn't die.
JVL00:47:47No, no, no. But his guy was... So the two guys up in Northern, in Liverpool, Trevor and Shanks. Yes. So Craig calls them to tell them, so this guy took the pills. He screwed us out of the money. This is where they're going to be. Okay. Go get them. And so they go and...
Vic00:48:06It's funny because I couldn't make out their faces or his face in that scene. Like I knew somebody was killed in blood.
JVL00:48:11I mean, Troop is dead on the hood of the car. It's very clear.
Vic00:48:14They all look the same to me.
JVL00:48:18These pasty Brits. They all look the same. I'm checking the names.
Vic00:48:22Okay. Great. But again, but it's not... I've watched it, you know, several times and even without understanding it, I still enjoy watching it. I just don't... I'm like Michael Clarke Duncan in Green Mile when he watches the dancing scene. I just like looking at it.
JVL00:48:41So here is the reason that I... The truth is it's not a very accessible movie and that is because it is so heavy on Brit slang. That to really pick up on what's going, you have to understand like how British people speak. You know, you've got to know what a daily mail reader is because there's a really funny joke in the beginning, in the very opening when he talks about daily mail readings demonizing cocaine and now they're his, you know, his best clients. You've got to understand what a self-assessment is, which is paying tax or letting... You know, so they talk about geezers, grass... Grass causers, the old firm, all of which are synonyms for police, which people here might not know.
Sonny00:49:28Yeah, you think of it as an old person. Well, grass... Grassing is specifically snitching. Right.
JVL00:49:33Right. Or Jimmy was skint, right? He talks about how Jimmy was skint as a snitch. And so the whole movie is full of that stuff and especially because the accents are so pronounced and so in keeping with regions.
Vic00:49:49Very blue-collar. Makes sense.
Sonny00:49:53Strong recommend to watch with subtitles. It's one of those movies that I think actually plays much better with subtitles.
JVL00:50:04And it is a movie which I really do believe, as you said, Sonny, it improves upon repeated viewing. The first time you watch it, it's a very good movie. But by the third time you've watched it, it's great. It's the British Goodfellas, but better. And my God. It's funny, too. Like the number of laugh out loud moments in it, which are never really jokes, but are funny jokes. You know, like when there's the scene where Gene is sitting cleaning his gun and Gene, who is like this insanely violent, psychopathic enforcer, is explaining what meditation is to Daniel Craig's character. He says, you know, meditation is when you concentrate the front of the mind on a mundane task. So the rest of your mind can find peace. And, you know, this is what I like to do to meditate. And Daniel Craig says to him, so you find peace with your guns. And it's really funny.
Vic00:51:03Like it's in these little moments. It's funny to see Daniel Craig playing a character who's not supposed to be good with guns. You know?
JVL00:51:10It's very funny, isn't it? But this is, I mean, this is what I would say. It is one of these movies that actually spans multiple genres. It's a Brit gangster movie. It's a Brit gangster movie. It's a Brit gangster movie. It's a heist movie. It's also a con movie. It is, I think, the best business movie ever made. I mean, there's a moment when Michael Gambon's character says that the art of good business is being a good middleman. And that is like the truest thing you've ever heard. This is the basis of everything in American capitalism. It is the basis of the entire tech revolution. You could sum up the success of Amazon, Facebook, and Google just in that one sentence. It's a movie about class divisions. And this is, again, the layer cake, right? So you have at the very top Jimmy versus Eddie. Below that, you have Daniel Craig's character and Morty versus Jimmy. Below that, you have Freddie versus Morty. You even have the Serbs versus the English. The level of cultural disdain that the Serbs have for the Brits is hysterical throughout it. And there's also a real undercurrent here of— The way in which the baby boom hates Gen X and hates that Gen X is growing up and coming for their place in the world. And they are so determined to hold on to it that they're willing to kill their children, essentially, which is what Jimmy Price wants to do. So we know from the very, very first moment that we meet Jimmy Price—and the movie is in many ways about Jimmy—he says to Daniel, Craig, he says, you know, what are you—what do you want in life? Do you want a shot at the title or a seat by the band? And when he says that, you know automatically that he knows the answer. He knows that Daniel Craig's character is trying to walk away from all this. And he isn't going to let him because he's the boss and he's the baby boomer. And all of—almost all the dynamic is set up by the conflict in generations. And it's amazing. I mean, the little commentaries on The Grasping Rich, one of my favorite. One of the first tiny moments of it is that—so Eddie Temple, who is the richest person in the film, he has Mr. Troop go and kill Kinky, his daughter's junkie boyfriend. Why does he have him kill Kinky? Because he paid Kinky $5,000 to leave his daughter alone. And he is outraged that this guy took $5,000 and didn't hold up his end of the deal. This guy who owns Skyscraper, which again is something the rich do. I thought, how dare the audacity of him to take my $5,000. It's, you know, Jimmy ratting out Daniel Craig's character for £10,000. It's amazing. Anyway, it's a movie about life. It's the I Ching. It's the best. Look, if you're going to rank the four best movies, first of all, it's undoubtedly the best movie of 2004. There is no dispute of that at all.
Vic00:54:17What was the big box office winner box of 2004? What was like best picture of 2004?
JVL00:54:22Hold on. Out of curiosity. Hold on. Box office 2004. Shrek 2.
Vic00:54:29Wow.
JVL00:54:30Oh, yeah.
Vic00:54:31Well, it was no Shrek 2. Layer cake was no Shrek 2.
JVL00:54:34I think I would have understood Shrek 2 better.
Vic00:54:36And what's his name was in that one? Antonio Banderas. I think he was in Shrek 2. Yes. JVL.
JVL00:54:42So best movie of 2004, hands down. The four best movies of the 2000s. And again, I just don't think there's any serious argument about this. But in some order are The Dark Knight, Fellowship of the Ring, Lost in Translation, and Layer Cake.
Vic00:54:59Are you saying that Layer Cake is better than The Dark Knight?
JVL00:55:08Don't make me choose between my two favorite children. But those are the four best movies of the 2000s. And I don't see a way that anybody, especially not anybody whose last name rhymes with Mod Moritz, could possibly disagree with those.
Sonny00:55:22What were your four again?
JVL00:55:25Darkknight, Fellowship of the Ring, Lost in Translation, Layercake.
Sonny00:55:31It's missing There Will Be Blood. Fair. Or possibly No Country for Old Men, one of the two.
JVL00:55:36I don't think it's missing No Country for Old Men. I think No Country for Old Men is the next decade.
Sonny00:55:43No.
JVL00:55:45No? What year is No Country?
Sonny00:55:47It was either 07 or 08. I'm going to effort this while you guys talk.
Vic00:55:50Okay, I'll tell you what I'll talk about. Continue supporting restaurants in your community safely. There are thousands of restaurants open for delivery on DoorDash that need your patronage now more than ever. Support your favorite restaurants on DoorDash. DoorDash is the app that brings you food you're craving right now right to your door. Ordering is easy. Open the DoorDash app. Choose what you want to eat and your food will be left safely outside your door. With new contactless delivery drop-off setting with over 300,000 partners in the U.S., Puerto Rico, Canada, Australia, and support your local go-tos or choose from your favorite national restaurants like Chipotle, Wendy's, and the Cheesecake Factory. Right now, our listeners can get $5 off at zero delivery fees on their first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and enter code SUBBEACON. That's $5 off at zero delivery fees on your first order when you download the DoorDash app in the App Store and enter code SUBBEACON. Don't forget, that's code SUBBEACON for $5 off your first order with DoorDash. The answer, JVL, is...
JVL00:56:522007, Sonny is right. Can I throw a little bit of trivia at you here? Yeah. Do you recall the highest-grossing movie of the year, 2000? Don't look it up.
Sonny00:57:05Highest-grossing movie of the year in 2000.
JVL00:57:09This will blow your mind. Armageddon.
Sonny00:57:13No, that was 98.
JVL00:57:15Mission Impossible 2.
Vic00:57:18Oh, but not a surprise because everyone loved 1 so much. And then you'll see that 3.
Sonny00:57:223 was, which didn't deserve that.
JVL00:57:24Here's the crazy thing about this, though. Looking at the top-grossing movies of each year of the 2000, Mission Impossible 2 is almost literally half of the second-lowest-grossing movie of the decade. So all the other movies are right at a billion dollars for their gross, and Mission Impossible is 540 million. Isn't that crazy?
Sonny00:57:48That's interesting.
JVL00:57:49So 2000 was a soft year.
Sonny00:57:522000 was a soft year, but, I mean, what was 99? I mean, are we just looking at, like, the explosion of the foreign market? I don't know. I mean, Titanic grossed, what, 2.1 billion in 97 slash 98, so, like, but that was just
Vic00:58:09a phenomenon. That's all. Any of the thoughts?
JVL00:58:12Anyway, people should go, anybody who hasn't seen Layer Cake should go see it. I'm really sad that you don't love it, Vic. I like it. But I'm gratified, Sonny, that you didn't try to destroy me today. My favorite movie. I was worried that you were going to come in and...
Sonny00:58:25No, no, why would I do... Why would I do that? I like the movie a great deal. I mean, it's like, I don't say things I don't mean, JVL.
JVL00:58:33What?
Sonny00:58:33That's the thing everyone needs to understand about me.
Vic00:58:35I still don't understand that.
Sonny00:58:37I never say anything I don't mean.
Vic00:58:38I still don't understand that about you. You are... On some level.
Sonny00:58:41You are an enigma.
Vic00:58:42I was going to say, it's funny because the earworm that I've had since yesterday is that Duran Duran song.
JVL00:58:51Oh, Ordinary Woman? It's a world, right?
Vic00:58:53It's a funny match. It's good. It's a great scene. It's a beat down, you know.
JVL00:58:57And nobody is, right? Isn't that a great use of... This whole score, Gimme Shelter... I always think Gimme Shelter is over.
Vic00:59:04It's been done to death. So, I mean, save yourself some money for a person who's doing a movie and pick a different song or pick a different Rolling Stones song for that matter.
Sonny00:59:14The rest of the score is very good though. Like, not the actual soundtrack, but the score. Like, the ambient music underneath it is just fantastic. There's some great scenes in the opening. Throughout.
JVL00:59:22This movie, by the way.
Sonny00:59:23Like, whatever track it is that is playing under Daniel Craig after he commits the murder is just perfect. Yeah. Like, it just like...
Vic00:59:32Okay. So, moving right along. How about some corrections and shout outs? Sonny Bunch.
Sonny00:59:38I have many shout outs. I need to... Hold on. Pull up my list of thank yous. Again, the sub-Beacon slash substandard listeners have been very, very... Generous in this, my time of crisis and need. After the flood of liquor, there was a flood of board games. Here are some of the special names to call out. I'm sorry. Hold on. I have to pull it up. Grant Addison, Tanya McKenna, Shannon. Tom Abella, who kind of spearheaded this whole thing, says he has no idea. I don't know if this was run by JVL or not, but Shannon gets a special shout-out here. Thomas Lassie, Matt Roberts, and Rick Licari. Let's see. What else? A listener named Cameron McVeigh brought a pie over to my house, a delicious, delicious apple pie.
Vic01:00:44Cameron McVeigh lives near you. That's really funny.
Sonny01:00:47Yeah.
Vic01:00:47I see him on Twitter. Oh, that's very funny.
Sonny01:00:50Jedi Mama. Sent over a package of books for the kids, which was very nice. Jen is the best. Thank you, Jen. The kids love that. Dan, a friend of the show, Dan. Yes. Hello, Dan. He sent a frozen goose, which is in my freezer right now. I'm going to have to have some folks over.
Vic01:01:12You got to make some confit, Sonny.
Sonny01:01:14I'll help you with that. Okay. I'll come over and help anyway. Okay. Friend of the show, KSA, sent a package of books for the kids, which was very nice. A cocktail kit, which is – I haven't had it yet, but looking at the recipe, it calls to mind a drink called The Smoke at –
JVL01:01:33At PX. No, no.
Sonny01:01:34At – No, at the – what's the seafood place? Joe's? Fiole Amare. Fiole Amare.
Vic01:01:41Oh, Fiole Amare.
Sonny01:01:41Oh, wow. So if you're ever at Fiole Amare, get a smoke. And Ben, who lives around here, lives near me in – In Dallas, brought over a bottle of bourbon. It was funny. I was actually on the phone with JVL. I was on a Zoom call with JVL when he came up to my – to the porch and handed it off, which was great. But yeah, anyway, thank you so much to everyone. I feel bad, Tom, because I have not actually played the board games yet, but we're going to – we're going to get around to that, I promise. I don't know. I hope – I really appreciate – again, I really appreciate everybody thinking of me and sending nice, you know, well wishes and all that as everything in Dallas kind of crashes around me. It's been fantastic. It's good to know, so to speak.
Vic01:02:44Okay. Thank you, Sonny. That's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us at SonnyBunch, at Victorino, at Victorino, Mattis. Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. Just type in Sub-Beacon at a podcast. We are there. Leave a review. Tell your friends. Until next time.
Sonny01:03:09I'm sorry.
Guest01:03:12So, what's going on?
JVL01:03:15I don't have anything. Okay, Sonny.
Vic01:03:18I – I'll just throw this out then. I'll just throw this out. You know what I watched recently? It was on Amazon with my son, Generation War. And this is like the German version of a saving – they call it German version of Band of Brothers. Not really. It's more soap opera-y. And it's called – the original is called Unsere Mutter, Unsere Vetter, Our Mothers, Our Fathers. And it's five friends, one of whom is Jewish and one of whom is an officer in the Wehrmacht. The other one is a younger brother, a girl who wants to be a nurse, and the other girl who wants to be like a singer. And the girl, the German. The German girl is dating the Jewish guy. And five friends in 1941 before they all get split up and go in different directions. Let me just say it crushes the quadrants, including plot because I know how it ends. It is really quite amazing. And if you have Amazon, watch it, Generation War. So it's like an R-rated Swing Kids? Yes, it's all Eastern front. Well, they do get in trouble for the swing music, of course, but it is crazy, unexpected. Twister is also very – And it reminded me, it reminded me, when I lived in Germany and Austria, I used to watch a lot of the German soaps because it helps with the language. And I would talk to the Germans about it later. I'd be like, oh, well, you know, when I lived there, there was one called Good Times, Bad Times. Gute Zeit, schlechte Zeit. And they're like, oh, yeah, that's a great one, popular. And then I said, yeah. And then I said, I watched this other one called Maria Hoff. That was great. And I remember they stopped and they looked at me and they said,
JVL01:04:51only ones who watch that show are like 13-year-old girls.
Vic01:04:55And I said, oh.
Sonny01:04:58I'm sure it's fun.
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