One Battle After Another (2025) / Green River Wheated Full Proof Bourbon

0:00 In 2025, director Paul Thomas Anderson and star Leonardo DiCaprio gave the world an explosively dark comedy that struggles to balance drama with absurdism. Oh, in 2026 we try a whiskey that might have us asking for one bottle after another. I I like that, Bob. That's good. Thanks so much. Thank you. The film is 1 battle after another. The whiskey is Green River weeded foolproof bourbon. And we'll review them both. This is the Film and Whiskey podcast.

0:57 Welcome to the Film and Whiskey podcast, where each week we review a classic movie and a glass of whiskey. I'm Bob Book. I'm Brad Gee. Brad, do you look like you're you're still waking up here, man. It's 12:00. What are we doing? It's. It sure is. It's just itch on my eye, Bob. That's all right, it's all right. You know, we're rolling, we're going live, and we're doing something different today. Folks. Welcome into film and Whiskey. By the way, if this is your first time joining us, we typically don't talk about movies as recent as Paul Thomas Anderson's 2025 film 1 Battle After Another. We're usually looking at classic movies from bygone eras and reviewing those.

1:37 However, this season of the podcast, we've gone back and we've reviewed every movie we did way back in season #1 with the exception of two films, because we had already revisited both of those films already, and we figured that a third time might not be the charm to talk about Goodfellas and whatever the other one was, Brad. So we said, hey, we're going to have two open spots at the end of the season. It's going to be right around Oscar time. What if we take the two leading contenders for Best Picture and talk about those movies instead? And so this week we're talking about 1 battle after another, which is by all accounts the front runner for Best Picture. But next week we're talking about Ryan Coogler's record-breaking nominated film Sinners, which is by far the biggest contender with One Battle after Another. So stick around for these two weeks because we're talking about movies that are very, very fresh, that haven't really had time to marinate not just with us, but within the culture. Brad, I think you know, for the most part in the past we've tried to stick to about a five year gap between the movie's release and the time we've talked about it and other have been exceptions for Cruise misses. I know we've done Oppenheimer and the Holdovers and past lives, but for the most part we try to put a little bit of distance between US and the film chronologically. Yeah, yeah.

2:56 And and it works because we have a chance to let it sit. It sits in the cultural consciousness. And then, you know, we just come in swing right in there and and give our to be honest with you, Bob, the best opinion you'll ever find on any movie. So. Well, you know, they say the way to get the most clicks on your website and downloads on your podcast is to wait five years after the movie's released. You know, because culture doesn't like to know what a current movie is like. They want to know what that movie from 5 years ago. It's right, Brad, and that's why we're so successful, folks. That's the key, the recipe to our success. The the key would because there's that like 25 year nostalgia window that like seems like every fifth year you're jumping 25 years back. And that's like the thing they make ATV show about. So we really should be focused right now on like that early 2000s, which we kind of did.

3:48 We recently released a 25th anniversary episode about Lord of the Rings. So do you want your nostalgia fix? Go back and listen to that. Go listen to the Lord of the Rings. I do like the kind of five year rule, Brad, because it allows us to get like some things just out of the way really quickly. So like when we did Green book, especially for this revisit, it's like, look, everyone acknowledges this movie shouldn't have won best picture. Do we need to throw the baby out with the bathwater? And I feel I feel like it allowed us to deal with the movie on its own terms and to grapple with the kind of like, you know, Cinderella esque racial tension in that movie where it's like, is this really how racism gets solved or is this a Hollywood thing?

4:28 And because we didn't have to have the conversation about the best picture of it all, it actually allowed us to appreciate things about the movie and to be a little more honest about its flaws, which we're going to try to have to do that today with one battle after another. A movie that has not yet allowed the public to come all the way back around on it. Like this movie. When it was released in late 2025, it was, I think, the best reviewed movie by most metrics of this decade so far. The hype train was absolutely off the charts for this movie. I went and saw it in the theater. I'll very quickly tell you that I was not on this movie's wavelength the first time I saw it and I am, I feel very alone and very on an island about that because like I said, universal acclaim for this movie. So of course I have to be the contrarian and I never like being the guy that's like this movie sucks because if someone enjoys something like good for you. I wish I enjoyed this movie more. I go see this movie at like a 10:30 PM showing. I get out of the theater at like 1:00 in the morning. I'm driving home on this Country Rd. and there is a dead deer in the middle of this road that, like, the construction on the road has narrowed it down to one lane. I'm going around a curve and there's a deer and I have no choice but to run over this small deer that's already dead in the middle of the road.

5:47 It screwed up my whole, the whole bottom part of my car. And then, you know, within a month, I have to get a new car. So I blame this movie not just for being a let down for me, but for having, but for totalling my car, essentially. Brad. Yeah. So I mean, if that's not coming. No, I come into this rewatch with this movie's got to prove a lot to me, to improve in my estimation, 'cause now Paul Thomas Anderson owes me a vehicle. Yeah. That, that's how I I take it to be. I think, I think legally as well that, yeah. I believe the law's on my side in this one. That feels like an Old Testament, like if your bull gores your neighbors and you owe him restitution.

6:27 I think Paul Thomas Anderson owes you restitution, Bob. I agree with that. All right, Brad, you have just seen this movie for the first time. Now I know that there will be a lot of folks out there that are going to be a little bit myth that you did not go see this in the cinema but you saw it on the small screen. I will say gorgeous cinematography in this movie. And I think that one good sign of a well shot movie is that it does translate to a smaller screen, whether you're watching it on ATV at home or you probably watched it, you know, on your computer monitor. Brad, it's it's big enough, right? At least it's not a phone. It's TV sized. And I think that the movie in terms of the way it's shot, the compositions, the sound design, that all translated to this viewing where I streamed it as well. So I think points in the transferability column for this movie.

7:16 But we want to hear Brad. We're all waiting with bated breath what you thought of this movie, and in order to do that, we have to explain what the movie's about, and that means it's time for our first segment of the day, which we call Brad explains. Brad's going to give us the movie plots with only 60 seconds taken on the clock, so let's go ahead and do your take with this little segment that we call, Brad explains. Brad Explains is the part of the show where Brad breaks down the plot of the movie that he has just seen, often for the first time. I believe this is the first time this season we've been able to actually say this is a first time watch for Brad G. It absolutely is a first time watch. It's kind of nice to be back to a new movie.

7:57 I like, I've deeply enjoyed going back to season 1 movies. It's been an absolute blast. I was kind of excited I, you know, popped onto HBO Max and was like, all right, let's do this. We're watching a new movie. You know, I do feel like it has been kind of a crutch for you this season that you already knew what all these movies were about. It really improved the quality of, Brad explains. But the chaos factor has gone way down and I missed the chaotic, Brad explains. Trust me when I say this is going to be a chaotic, Brad explains. All right, Brad, I'm actually really eager to hear your thoughts on this movie because there's a lot of directions we can go. Usually you tip your hand a little bit with how you or what you decide to include in your summary of the film, so you have 60 seconds on the clock. This summary is just going to be me reading off names from the movie just as you jungle Pussycat perfidia Beverly Hills. Folks, here's the thing, Brad explains. It's going to be full of spoilers. It always is.

8:56 So if you don't want this movie spoiled for you, it is now streaming. You can rent it across a number of platforms or it's streaming, you know, for free on HBO Max. Please go watch this movie. It's likely going to win Best Picture 2 1/2 hours. It's a long movie. Come back and join us for the rest of the episode. But Brad, the task before you is to spoil this movie in 60 seconds or less and go. One Battle After Another is a film that follows the members of a revolutionary group called the French 75 who make it their goal to attack ICE customs and enforcement officers and free and allow immigrants to come in seemingly from Mexico into the US.

9:40 The 1st 45 minutes of the film follows them on a revolutionary mission where the main character Perfidia Beverly Hills comes in contact with a Colonel Lockjaw of the military forces. They have a weird sexual encounter and he gets her pregnant. Fast forward 16 years later, she has been put away and escapes from from confinement. What's witness protection? Because she sold out her crew and she's gone. You never see her again. The rest of the film follows Leonardo DiCaprio who thinks that he is the father of Perfidious child who is 16 years old and named Willa. She is captured by Stephen Lockjaw because he is trying to make his way into a racist white people club and trying to erase the reality that this was his mixed race daughter and chaos ensues.

10:38 Leonardo DiCaprio is wildly hilarious and I think, I think that's it. I think that's it. That's a good start. Brad is that is that, is that a good start? Listen, I will commend you first of all. Because that was that was pretty good. That was pretty good and it was a very neutral and and what I'm most interested to hear from you today, because Brad, you are the resident, you know, right wing Alex Jones, loving conspiracy theorist, worshipper of the rights on this podcast, right, That that's a good explanation of of where you are. That is me to a tee. I don't have any thoughts on my own. I only follow what, Alex Jones and Nick Fuentes and all that.

11:23 I'm just like. And I, I am a straight up communist who worships at the altar of people like, you know, Rachel Maddow, let's just say, you know, so that and Carl Marx and Carl, well, I mean, of course that goes without saying. So you are a little bit more right leaning than I am. And right before we pressed record, you said like, I think this might be the most left wing movie we've ever done on the podcast, which is saying something because there's a lot of them and we've done quite a few of them on the podcast as. Well, you tell me a movie that's more overtly left wing. Well, see, here's The thing is that, and I think that like, this is a good jumping off point because I want to talk about like what we think the movie's trying to do because our ability to articulate that I think will also tip our hand as to whether we think the movie works or not. So this movie is based on a novel called Vineland by Thomas Pynchon.

12:18 And Thomas Pynchon is a very lauded novelist who likes to write, you know, semi absurd, humorous novels. And this is the second time Paul Thomas Anderson has adapted Pynchon for the the screen, the first time being his movie Inherent Vice, which is probably his most divisive movie. And a lot of people would say it's his worst movie. I find it to be his worst movie. It really rambles. It's also 2 1/2 hours long. But you get kind of similar things where like there is a level of like slapstick humor, like Joaquin Phoenix is high all the time and kind of like doing pratfalls. Same thing you get with Leonardo DiCaprio here. I think that movie is pitched a little bit more absurd than this one is.

13:01 But you have all those kind of classic traits of like absurdist names like Lockjaw and Toe Jam and things like that. That's also in Inherent Vice. What I really want to try to get to the bottom of here, Brad, is that I don't think you or I has ever actually read a pension novel. So we're here only experiencing that through the lens of Paul Thomas Anderson. And the novel Vineland is set in a different time period. I think it's set in the 1970s. So he modernizes it, adapts it to what he sees going on in the country today and kind of makes it his own thing, but tries to carry over some of that satirical absurdist humor as well. Do you think that that is, have I captured what we think he's trying to do with this movie?

13:45 I would say so. It seems it seems like he's trying to capture the cultural moment in a way that uses absurdity to call out the ridiculousness of what he sees to be negative things going on in our culture. Is that fair? Yeah, I think so. And I, you know, this time around, I really did notice that while the majority of the absurdism is directed towards these kind of like hard right figures and or, you know, military structures, there definitely is also this sense of like, OK, if if Dicaprio's character Bob is Paul Thomas Anderson's muse in this movie, then there also is that sort of like, what the hell are the kids doing?

14:33 I don't understand these kids. Is that a he or a she or a they? And then also like, you know, the new revolutionaries that are coming up underneath DiCaprio. He's like, at one point he's talking to the guy on the phone and he hangs up and he's just like you liberal prick. And he hangs the phone up. So there's also this sense of like, I have a deep hatred for what the left has become as well. And I find that really fascinating. Now, again, there's a million directions we can go in. Brad, I think I want to start with just the simple question of whatever the tone of the movie that you think Paul Thomas Anderson is going for, how like what percentage did it actually succeed at that? I found myself really struggling with the 1st 45 minutes of this movie 'cause it's played dead serious like. But besides the fact that these characters have ridiculous names, which somewhat makes sense, like you can tell that these are pseudonyms.

15:32 They're not their real names, they're revolutionaries. Have that have taken on these personas? Go ahead. Can you set the stage for like what is the 1st 45 minutes? Yeah. So the first 45 minutes I struggled a little bit because they make it seem like it's set in the 1970s, but then they're also using smartphones and so it is a little bit confusing. It seems like it's set in 2008 to 2010 area where we have some early smartphones but there's still a lot of more just more analog nature to life and the whole 1st 45 minutes is the French 75 revolutionaries waging war on capitalist America.

16:18 They are freeing immigrants that are being held by American forces. They capture that. I mean, the key scene is when she captures Stephen Lockjaw, the Colonel, and like forces him into like sexual humiliation and he likes it. And then I, this was something, this is something that I struggled with throughout the movie is that there's no subtlety to this movie. This is like the the least subtle movie I've ever seen. And the first note I took on Lack of subtlety is like Stephen Lockjaw, like walks Sean Penn, played by Sean Penn. He walks funny and it almost looks like he has a stick up his butt because he likes a stick up his butt.

17:02 He sure does. He sure does. But that's the first 45 minutes, and it all ends poorly. When a bank robbery goes wrong, Perfidia gets captured. She sells out her revolutionary friends, she becomes a rat. And then as soon as she's set up with her witness protection, she pieces out. It disappears to South America, I think. Yeah, we don't know. Where is? Is that what you're looking for? Yeah, yeah. And I think that's helpful because there is such a big time jump in the movie. One thing that I struggled with is throughout the movie, they really play around with the timelines. And because like the timelines are just happening across a couple days in the back half of the movie, it's not that big of a deal. But there will be like, there's this one moment late in the movie where Dicaprio's character gets arrested, He gets tased and arrested.

17:52 And then they cut away to what's happening with his daughter, who is being taken to like a safe haven. And you kind of stay with her for a day or two. And then they cut back to DiCaprio getting put in the cruiser a couple nights before that. So you're, you're kind of constantly aware of the fact that like we're jumping around in time as it suits the story. Where I struggle with. Where I struggle with that is that in the prologue towards the end where like Sean Penn's character has like fallen madly in love with Perfidia 'cause he just attracted to her like raw whatever sex appeal. He drives his truck over to her house and he gets out of the truck and it's like a very modern truck, like it's a 2020 truck. And then they show her escaping and she puts on AT shirt and the font on it.

18:40 I can't remember. It was something that was popular a couple years ago that said like such and such club. It was a thing from like 2022. So I don't understand if they're just like not paying attention to the details of these scenes or if we're supposed to understand that she's been in witness protection for years and years and is just now escaping. I like there are things that seem a little bit sloppy and unexplained for a movie. To your point, that just does not concern itself with being subtle in any other area. Yeah, it what, what's it called? You have like a person on set that makes sure of like continuum. Is that the word? Yeah, yeah. Like continuity, Yeah. Continuity, thank you. That like, I know that that is like with a scene to make sure the person's seated the right way when you reshoot the next take, but like it feels like they needed somebody like that to be like, hey, this doesn't make sense for 2008.

19:33 Like 'cause I had the same thought and I, and that's what felt so confusing about the 16 year time jump that I was like, wait, I thought this was like 30 or 40 years ago, but maybe it wasn't because she had a smartphone and I guess that would put him in this time period. But there was just stuff that and it's, it's little things like that that, you know, a lot of people would be like, well, why do you care? It's you know, it's just artistic and he's doing his thing. It's like within the world of the movie. I do want there to be some logic to it. That is such that I don't have to worry about it, that I, the viewer, don't have to be taken out of the experience to go, wait a second. I thought this was set in this year, but now they're in that year and and it just takes you out of the movie a little bit. Yeah, so like returning to the bigger question, 'cause, you know, I said, like, what percentage does the tone that we're going for work?

20:25 And the first thing you said was like, I struggle with that first part of the movie. So that tells me that something about the second part of the movie must have worked a little bit better for you. Yeah, I think once you do the time jump and you have pothead Leo who doesn't remember all of his revolutionary stuff from there on out, I think the movie works like gangbusters. And I actually think that the movie works better if you completely cut out that first 45 minutes. I think you just, you just add like like a 5 minute Leo telling his daughter his version that he wants her to believe of what happened. And it's like a pothead flashback.

21:07 You kind of see things but you kind of don't. And it's 5 minutes And then throughout the rest of the movie you are finding out with Willa, his daughter, the truth of what happened back then. I think that makes for a way more fascinating movie about a young daughter trying to figure out her past, her inheritance, who she is and how she can connect with her father over this. It makes the revelation of Lockjaw as her. As her dad way. Different I, I, that's, that was my big take away. Just the structure of the film. I think you cut out those first 45 minutes and a, you get a much cleaner film. It's not 2 hours and 40 minutes long. And B, it gives you way more of a perspective from Willa and it makes her much more of the main character than Leo. And I think that that would actually work better. And I know better than Paul Thomas Anderson so well. Of course, I mean, you guys have won the same number of best director Oscars, so hey, you're on equal footing. Bro that was wow the dude PTA fanboys are going to be coming after you.

22:18 I mean, not if he wins this year. It's in fact he hasn't won yet. You know, what are you gonna do now? I will say I've been thinking a lot about this too, because the movie really wants to be on some level this kind of like semi absurd, semi satirical, funny, dark comedy. And I actually think that this time around, now, I saw this in the theater, dead silent. Like, I just don't think anybody in the theater was on this movie's wavelength. Watching it at home a second time and knowing what, like, what he's trying for, I think was much more successful. I laughed a lot during this movie, and I thought most of the comedy was really well done. It also is very successful at like, raising dramatic stakes and crafting, like very tense sequences of like robberies and terrorism. And, you know, the chase scene at the end of the movie, there's no jokes happening in that stretch of the movie. Like, it really is just a a really good action scene. It's the melding of those two together or the lack of melding and the sort of juxtaposition from scene to scene, from moment to moment of like, here's a guy who's a buffoon and now he has to be a concerned dad.

23:27 And we're taking him very seriously in his role as concerned dad, not as buffoon. And sometimes it just doesn't quite land those beats to me. And I've been thinking a lot about like, what's the overall theme? What what are we actually going for here because of that first 3545 minutes. And I do think that Paul Thomas Anderson is really making this movie as a 50 something dad with children who are about the age of Willa. And it's it's definitely a commentary on getting older. It's a commentary on being a parent and not understanding the world that your kids are coming up in and, and feeling helpless and like you don't have control over that world anymore. I think that all reads really, really well.

24:07 And so if you look at it through that lens, the first part of the movie, I think it's about how like when you're 25 years old, everything you're doing is very serious to you. Like we are changing the world and like what we're doing is revolutionary. And then when you're 50 years old, maybe that maybe you still think that about your 25 year old self. Maybe you've changed in how you look at your 25 year old self, but there's a self-awareness in the character in PTA by putting this into the character of Bob that like I'm kind of a loser now. Like Bob just sits around and gets high and gets drunk and he has like no meaning or purpose to his life.

24:48 He doesn't engage with society in any way. And it's kind of a question of like, what happens when you lose your purpose as a middle-aged person And that and through that lens, I think the movie is mostly successful even when it doesn't navigate the tone properly. And I think like, this is kind of jumping to my end point where I landed with this movie. I think that that right there is why this movie is a failure. I think he had such an incredible chance to show that the core of this movie is a man who finds his purpose in being a parent, in passing on his wisdom to a new generation and being active in his role in society so that he can show his daughter like, you know what?

25:39 There is something of value that we can add to this society and it doesn't have to involve us enacting violence upon the world. And you see that at the end when he when he finally finds her and she comes out from behind the sign and they're on the highway together and he holds her. It's this beautiful moment of like, this is the important thing. It's not all the destruction and mayhem and chaos that the French 75 are causing upon the world or these racist old white men are causing upon the world. It's the beauty of a familial relationship. And then he goes straight into, he's back on the couch.

26:21 He's a pothead loser that just smokes and drinks and can't figure out how to take a selfie. And she's the American girl who is fighting the revolution and continuing on what her mother did for her. And I was, I literally just sat back and was like, you just ruined your entire movie. Like absolutely ruined the entire movie for me because he had a chance to point towards something larger than the 1 battle after another narrative. He had a chance to point to something eternal and instead he pointed back to like, Nope, you just need to be in the moment and fight the battle that you see in front of you and it's never going to end as a battle.

27:02 And and it just was such a negative bull kind of ending to the movie that I was like, oh man. Like I I thought he could nail it. I thought he was going to land the plane and then it just. That's interesting. Yeah. I mean, I actually, I think that the the ending is kind of like for Paul Thomas Anderson. It's a very cheesy kind of ending, right. And even that needle drop of American Girl, I'm like, really. Like this is the most obvious thing. Like I said, it's not subtle, no subtlety. But then if you listen to what's happening in that final scene, you know, something comes over the ham radio and it's like something happened and there's going to be a protest. And they don't say like, we're gonna go blow up a bank like Perfidia did, you know?

27:44 And I think so, like, they do adapt and, and I think Leo has realized that like that revolution and even Perfidia says like, we failed at changing the world through what we did. Leo's just on the couch now. He's like, I'm done with this revolution stuff. And his daughter's like, I actually want to fight what I perceive to be the battle of society right now, and I'm gonna do that. It seems to be through nonviolent means. So I never had a problem with that in particular. But I think that we're pointing at something here, which is like, how is this movie actually handling current events? And it's hard to talk about it without linking it to another film that came out last year called Eddington, which we talked really briefly about on this podcast.

28:26 Eddington is a movie by Ari Astor who makes horror movies for the most part. And it gets even more kind of absurdist in how it views current events in the United States and slightly less funny and like less funny on the surface, I think. But they both are are trying to portray current events through this black comedy absurdist lens. I think because whether you're on the right side of the aisle or the left side of the aisle in 2026, I think we can all kind of agree that over the last 10-15 years, America has kind of just become a cartoon. And it's really hard to talk about like, what is going on without trying to portray it in the most absurd light because reality now seems more absurd than it did 20 years ago.

29:14 The problem is like, I don't know if I can blame the movies themselves or just like where we are as a society, but you almost need a more normal society and a more absurd movie because they're still too close together in terms of the tone for me to take it seriously as a satire. You know what I mean? Like, you and I were texting about Doctor Strangelove the other day. And I think that like when I think about a movie that is making satire of current events, I think about Doctor Strangelove where it's it's about nuclear weapons, but it's taking place in this alternate America. And yes, you do see like the archetypes of the the George C Scott character who's like. What's his name?

29:58 Macho meathead guy. And then you've got like the ex Nazi Kissinger guy in the like. There's definitely parallels, but it's so much more absurd and the names are even more absurd than the pension names where the president's name is Merkin Muffley. Like it's just because you get it, the president's a pussy. Brad, do you understand the reference Like? That's what we're saying here. And I feel like this movie is like just one tick less satirical and I wish that it was either not satirical at all or just slightly more satirical because the tone wobbles a little bit. Yeah, it, it does. And I, I would say for me, when the world starts to feel really absurd, I think it's because as a society, we've lost touch with what we believe collectively about like the eternal truths of the world that we as a society, even with all of our different viewpoints, are working with the same set of like rules and truths and stories that we're telling about the world.

31:05 And so when the world becomes really absurd, I think it's because you have people who believe very deeply different things about the purpose of humanity are living together in close quarters, not that America is close quarters. And so I think a movie like this just plays into that even more where it's just like, yeah, life is absurd and you just have to fight the battle in front of you. And it's going to be just one battle after another. And and like he gives, he gives away. The end Reality of that is like, Willa is going to be a 50 year old someday laying on the couch smoking pot, going, ah, man, we didn't accomplish the revolution that we thought we would.

31:49 And that like, there's this weird obsession with young people in the movie of like, well, we old people screwed up and we're just going to smoke pot now. And Perfidia has given up on her dream of revolution. And we're just going to let the young people do it. And we're going to kind of like weirdly worship the young people and be like, yeah, these young people, they're going to figure it out. And I just, I just very deeply feel like that's a bad vision of the world. That's not a healthy vision of the world to me. The healthy vision is Leo at the end of the movie, realizes the cost of his decades of pot smoking, beer drinking, abdication of responsibility. And he goes, you know what?

32:34 I'm going to take responsibility for my life. I'm going to take responsibility for my daughter's life while she's still in my home. And we're going to do something productive in the world. And instead he just continues to abdicate his responsibility because life is absurd. And we're just going to let the children figure it out. And that to me just. Yeah, no, I mean, I I do think it's funny because like I have like very major issues with this movie. This is just not one of them. And I think that like I just take a different read on the end, which is like. The funny The funny thing is, Bob, I actually really like this movie other than the first 45 minutes. The movie itself within the world it sets up, I think, I think it's a really good movie.

33:17 It's really funny at different points and he gets his point across really effectively. I think that's why I started all this by saying this is kind of my end point of like, at the end of the day, I just deeply disagree with the vision of how we as humans ought to live that Paul Thomas Anderson lands on. I think he gets there really effectively and I I think it's a really funny movie. Yeah, I agree. And and, you know, just to put a pin in this particular conversation, I just view the end more as like an acknowledgement that that life is that goes in these kind of cycles and there's seasons to life. And I, I actually was very encouraged by the fact that I think the argument he's making is like, hey, guess what, old people who missed your chance to do real change in the world.

34:03 We actually do at some point have to acknowledge that it's time for us to recede into the background and that the world that we're leaving to our kids at some point has to be turned over to those kids. And it's like, it's acknowledgement of like, the kids are going to be our rights. She has a good head on her shoulders. You can't control what happens in the world. And I don't know. And especially juxtaposing that against like, the guys in the Christmas club or whatever it's called, where it's like they're all between 50 and 95 years old. And it's like these old men trying to control the world. I don't think that we should all abdicate responsibility and smoke pot instead. But I do think it's it. It makes a point that like even its dumbest, most buffoonish character understand something that like, these powerful guys don't understand. Do you know what I mean?

34:50 I I know what you're saying. I just deeply disagree. Like it'd be what? It'd be one thing if Leonardo DiCaprio was 90 years old and he's like, all right, let's let the kids handle it. He's like 50, 45 in this movie. He's 42 according to the lie he told to the people at the jail, which I don't know, maybe he gave them the correct age. But then at the end of the movie when they flash back to the three of them in bed together when the when Will is an infant and you see all of Leo's like neck rolls that a man that's clearly 50 years old has, but he's playing 26. It's like, oh, I don't usually add like I don't advocate for CGI that often, but like, let's clean up that jowl situation a little bit. PTA.

35:33 Totally. I, I think what I'm trying to say is that I hope we don't give up on our ability to enact change in the world when we're 42 or 50 or however old he is in the movie. I personally prefer a vision of the world where people who are middle-aged and older and younger all work together to make the world a better place. And the older people share their wisdom with the younger people. And sometimes they say, yeah, like, I love your passion for the world. Maybe let's slow down a little bit and think about the consequences of our actions and think about the fact that if you get caught doing this thing and you get thrown into prison, like it will change your life in a very negative way. And how do we work within the system to enact change in a healthy way that isn't violent and and broken? And I just, like I said, it's the vision of the movie that I'm like, I'm out the the world is, the world is not run by racist people who are out to get you.

36:41 And because they're out to get you, you have a right to violently defend yourself. Like that is something I just deeply disagree with. I think that's actually a really dangerous way to view the world. So. Do you think that that that's actually what PTA thinks is happening or are we just using metaphors for like the struggle that young people have and parents have? So that's, so that's the other big frustration I have with the movie philosophically, is that when you are making a movie that like very clearly is about real life modern events, like even set 16 years ago, like for better or for worse, there were not revolutionaries in 2008 who really cared deeply about immigrant rights. Like there's some, but that wasn't the big thing we were worried about in 2008.

37:33 The big thing we were worried about in 2008 was The Big Short, right? So very clearly, even in the past, he is making it about what's going on here. In 20252026. When you are doing a movie that is very clearly about real world events and you also make it a dark comedy and a satire, I feel like you are hindering your ability to make any statements about what's going on. Because the whole time you have to ask the question like, well, is the way he makes fun of comrade Josh for needing a safe space, like is he being serious about that? Is he actually, is that an actual message he's trying to make? Or is it just a joke?

38:18 Are the, are the racist old white men, the, the, the Christmas nightclub are like, are they serious? Is he actually saying that there's a cabal of evil white men ruling the world? Or is it, oh, it's just another joke? And I feel like that's a, that's a cop out on Paul Thomas Anderson's part to be like, you know, if somebody approaches him and is like, like, do you actually think that the world is run by racist old white men? He can just be like, no, of course I don't. It was a comedy. And, and, and it just by making it a comedy, he kind of takes away any punch from his own viewpoint. And I I wish that he just made it a straight drama. I'm wondering though, like, can't you say that to some extent about every satire?

38:59 So like take Doctor Strangelove where you have, you know, like the the inciting incident of Doctor Strangelove is this general loses it. And because of the way the military is set up and the lack of fail safes in the nuclear arsenal system, the dominoes fall in a very specific way. And it happens, you know, comedically, right. But like, I do think they're getting at something in the the character of the crazed Colonel or general or whatever his name is. That's like, I think we're, you know, we're a little aggressive as a military in 1964. And we're going to pitch that up a little bit so that people will recognize the absurdity here, but also reapply that back to what we see in everyday life. That's satire.

39:43 Yeah. I'm kind of wondering, are we at a point now as a country where we're like, beyond the efficacy of satire? Like, does satire just not work on us anymore because we are so aligned with our political identities that anytime anyone tries to do something satirical about either party, we only see what we want to see and we take offense to the things we want to take offense to instead of engaging the satire on its own rights and asking like. What is like, does this actually get at something wrong with our society that needs fixed? Like I just wonder if we skip the the self reflective part sometimes and go right to like it needs to be more balanced. It needs to attack the left and the right or, or whatever it might be.

40:33 And I think, you know, to your point, this happens on both sides now. Like, you know, the identity politics is a real thing and I think it's killed our ability to be self reflective. And I, I think what I would say about satire losing its efficacy and power in our current culture, I would say that it's lost its power because we are such a cynical society. I think satire works a lot better when you have really sincere people who believe in the world that they live in, and then you satirize something that might not be great about the world they live in. And because we are sincere about the world we live in, we can recognize a satire go. He's obviously making a statement about how ridiculous this is.

41:20 But when we look at our own world, it's like, OK, maybe there is a point being made because we're so cynical. We've already thought of the points they're trying to make about the other side. Usually before he ever made the satire. And we were. Already defending them too. And we were already defending them. And so it's like, yeah, like the satire doesn't hit home because I've already thought bad things about the other side or, or not thought bad things, put bad intentions behind the other side. And I have to say, like when Paul Thomas Anderson makes this movie, he does make fun of the left and the right, but he makes fun of the left by going, you need a safe space.

42:02 You're such a, you're such a snowflake. And he makes fun of the right by saying they are racist evil cabal of monsters that are trying to control the society through racist means. Those don't feel like even satire to me. Like if you were if you had to be called a snowflake or racist monster Bob, which one would you prefer to be satirized into? I I get it, man. I also do think that, like, you know, satire usually attacks whoever's in power in the moment right now because PTA probably aligns more with the left. Like would he be making this movie in an Obama era? Probably not because he you're right about there is identity politics there.

42:48 I guess the question then is, like for my left-leaning friends, like, will you accept a satirical comedy about the left more at face value than you see right wing people taking movies like 1 Battle After Another or Eddington? And I think that, like, that's a challenge to the left, right. Like, you have to allow people to speak what they've perceived to be truth to power, whether that's through, you know, lampooning them or taking things really seriously. And Brad, I think it's about time for us to get to our break. So let me just say like 1 Battle After Another, a very funny movie that I think we need to talk about more as a movie when we return. I'm glad we got the big picture conversation out of the way because I just want to talk about like Leo and Benicio Del Toro and Sean Penn when we come back from break. But before we get there, let's try this Green River. We did foolproof.

43:43 What do you say? I noticed, Bob, that you only talked about men and that, you know those three people you named like what is there? Is there something there we don't like? The women When? You can tell me what time it is. You can call me back, Brad. Let's let's drink that whiskey, Bob. All right, so today we're checking out Green River Foolproof Weeded Bourbon. Now we have had many a whiskey from Green River in the past couple years. We have a good friend that works down there, Aaron Harris, their master distiller, and their latest offering is this Green River Foolproof Weeded Bourbon. Now, they've done their regular bourbon as a foolproof before, but then the weeded bourbon won best overall whiskey at the New York Spirits competition this year. And so they said, well, hey, it's time for us to expand this product line as well.

44:37 So now we're getting a weeded foolproof. I'll give some quick stats on it, Brad, and then I want your thoughts. It says that this is going to be a variable batch proof ranging from one O 9 to 116. So this initial batch is at one O 9.3 proof or 54.65 ABV and it ranges between 5:00 and seven years. In terms of the distillate we're getting here, 71% corn, no 70% corn, 21% wheat, 9% malted barley in the mash bill and MSRP on this, Brad, you're going to love this 14999. Dude, I, I mean, I will say, unfortunately we've hit a point where 50 bucks for like mid, mid level, mid tier whiskey is like, yeah, no, that's 50 bucks Now. It makes my, my miserly heart sad, but honestly, it's a, it's honestly a good price.

45:33 I I'm I'm being mostly facetious. Now I I will say the the best thing we've tried by far from Green River is their foolproof of their regular bourbon. So I'm really looking forward to this one because I've kind of gone back and forth on their weeded mash bill before. It seems like it's a hit among other people with all the awards it's winning, but I'm excited to dive into this one. Brad, Now, I know you've already tried it. I have not. So I'm going to be sipping it live and you're at least doing it for show here. So why don't you give us your notes on the nose here, Brad? I mean it, it might be a good indication of how I feel about it if I poured myself another DRAM. That's true. I will say on the nose, this has a really potent cherry syrup bomb It, it has a lot of cherry on it. The vanilla is there.

46:18 There's a little bit of brown sugar. I feel like I got like a little bit of a woody cinnamon, like maybe a cedar vibe going on. It's a really pleasant nose. The cherry is like tipping on the edge. Like I said, cherry syrup. It's tipping on the edge of cherry cough syrup for me. So I like, I'm holding off a little bit. It's a 7.5. I I really like the nose a lot. I'm just curious to see where it goes. Yeah, I think I'm going to land at a 7 out of 10 here, Brad. And that that might even be a little bit lower than I want to go, but it's a gut reaction. I had this poured and sitting here for about 5 minutes, I raised it to my nose and it was this very like syrupy Maple brown sugar and cherry. And then I kind of just swished it around in my glass and agitated it a little bit.

47:06 And I got some notes that are like just slightly concerning here. Like it's, it's not, it doesn't smell like it's going to be really viscous. It has like a sort of thinner, more aggressive, more alcohol forward nose. And then it has this note underneath that that's characteristic of like younger whiskey, like 2 year whiskey. It just the little bit of grassiness and like a, a lack of maturity in the grains here. So even though it's five to seven years, I'm kind of prep preparing myself for a little bit of harshness on the palate here. So I'm going to get ahead of that by giving it just a 7 on the nose. I think on the palate, I, I know that the brand's not Hostess, but, you know, like the little fruit pies in the box. Oh, yeah. In like the Hostess section of the gas station. This reminds me of a cherry pie, like one of those really cheap cherry pies that's sugary and delicious and like immediately clogs the arteries.

48:00 The taste really reminds me of that. There's a lot of vanilla on the palate and the graininess that you were talking about Bob comes through in like a very unflavored cream of wheat cereal, like hot cereal that it's it's got this creaminess, this wheatiness that isn't bad. It's not uplifting it to a super high height. I do like this a lot. I think it's a really pleasure, full, interesting whiskey that doesn't have a lot of richness or depth around it. So I am. I'm gonna stick it a 7.5 for the palate. Yeah, I'm a little surprised at how kind of herbal and bitter this stays on the palate and it kind of spreads out across my mid palate and right on the edge of my tongue.

48:44 I get like this really bitter note. And I took two sips just to make sure you do get acclimated to it. And there does become like a little bit of fattiness to it that I didn't think would be there. But overall, I do think it's a thinner, more aggressive mouthfeel than I would like it to be. It's not as it's not as fruity and it's not as sweet as some other weeded bourbons that it's now going to be competing against in the market. A much darker cherry note, a much more bitter herbal note here. Like you said, I think it's well made, but I think I'm just going to give it a 7 out of 10 again, Brad. I think the finish is where I fall to a 7 out of 10. The finish is weirdly short, like for a one O 9 proof whiskey I expected to have a little more staying power. It's a little bit short.

49:34 The weak rain really comes through now. The cherry flavor does sit with you for a little bit. So it's still it's a weeded whiskey through and through. I'll give it a 7 out of 10 on the finish. Just not enough there to push it over the finish line. Yeah, I think this is really where the barrel char becomes prominent. But then also it has notes of like a toasted barrel as well. That sort of bitter oak that we get on toasted finishes a lot. Again, like if this is your wheelhouse, if you like a a sort of tannic, unsweet black tea note on your bourbon, and this is like right up your alley. I don't know if I would peg this immediately as a weeded bourbon if you put it in front of me, Brad.

50:16 Aside from that kind of dark cherry note, it doesn't have that characteristic sweetness to it that we typically associate with weeded bourbons. And it it's not especially soft on the palate either. So like if you had told me this was a high rye bourbon that had notes of cherry in it, I'd probably believe you. Again, I think it's well made, but I also think I'm probably just going to be at A7 across the board on this whiskey. Yeah, So balance wise, I'll give it a 7.5. I think that despite the fact that I'm like a tiny bit let down, I think I was hoping for a little more. I I think this is a well balanced whiskey. They give you the flavor profile you're looking for and there's there's no surprises for me.

50:56 So 7.5 on balance. Yeah, I'll do the same. I'll come up to a 7.5. I do think this is like a three out of four-star kind of a whiskey and that takes us into value where I'm trying to balance much like Paul Thomas Anderson, the actual quality of the whiskey or like my enjoyment of the whiskey versus like is it fairly priced? Regardless of what I think, and I think it is fairly priced, $50.00 for a foolproof bourbon is like very much in line with the market and probably a little better than the market. I do not like this as much as the regular foolproof and and kind of by a considerable margin. So I'm going to give it a 7.5 on value again to kind of indicate that three out of four stars like it's it's worthwhile.

51:40 It's just not for me. That's so funny, Bob. So I gave almost everything a higher score than you, and yet I'm going to give it a 6.5 on value. Oh wow. Like I, I think this is a good whiskey. I think $50.00 is a decent price point. I just think that there's other really good options at this price point that kind of push the value down for me a little bit. So I'm, I'm at a 6.5 on value. I am coming out to a total of 36 out of 50. I am also coming out to a total of 36 out of 50, so we're at a 72 out of 100. I love how we balance each other on this podcast. Man, this is perfect, Bob. This is just over that line.

52:22 Typically around 35 is where we'll start giving like a soft recommend. The closer you get to 40, it's a pretty solid recommendation. And then over 40 is just a darn good whiskey. This is solid, and I think it's boosted, at least for me, by the fact that it's not $80.00, right? $50.00 is a fair price to charge for this. If you are in the liquor store and you see the weeded foolproof next to the regular foolproof, take the regular foolproof all day. That's one of the best values in the world of bourbon and I think they could charge way more than they are at that $50 price point. This one's like, I'm glad I tried it, it's just not for me. Yeah, I I think I'm with you. The regular foolproof Green River is one of the best bourbons on the market right now.

53:05 Go get yourself a bottle. If you really like weeded whiskies, like go give this a try. It's 50 bucks. You could maybe find a pour of it at the bar for like 8 bucks. It it would be worth a try. I think this is a recommend from me, but definitely the regular foolproof bourbon is where it's at. Now, Brad, while we're talking about alcohol, I do have to bring up a a, a major part of this film, which is the French 70 fives, yes, which are named after one of Bob Book's most favoritest cocktails in the whole world. You've you've had a French 70 fives. I have not dude. So listen, New Year's Eve is one of the few times that my wife and I will will do anything alcohol related together, especially around our children.

53:48 But we'll get a nice bubbly, right? So if 75, you essentially make like a gin sour. So it's like an ounce of gin, lemon juice and simple syrup and you top it off with sparkling wine of some sort. So it's like a champagne cocktail and you get just a little bit of that like herbaceousness and bitters from the gin. And when I tell you like my, my family all went to bed around 1:00 in the morning and I had half a bottle of Prosecco left and I was like, I'm going to make 6 French 70 fives right now and just sit here and watch, watch movies. It is phenomenal. So folks, if you're not feeling the Green River or the whiskey this week, I would highly recommend trying out a couple French 70 fives. They're a really fun drink.

54:33 Yeah, have at it, man. What say you though, Bob? Are you ready to go back to battle? Let's do it man. Let's get back into talking about 1 battle after another. All right, everybody, That was Green River weeded bourbon. Foolproof. A whiskey that just didn't quite make the grade for us. Is that fair to say? Almost made the grade like. It's like it's. Like over that mark, but it's like a very soft recommendation for me. Although we probably shouldn't start this old battle back again regarding Bob's idiotic take on the grading system, we will leave that battle in the past and we will move back into the weekly battle that is 2 facts and a falsehood, Brad.

55:24 Is going to try to stump your ball. To. Our right and what is wrong? 2 facts and a falsehood. 2 facts and a falsehood is the part of the show where Brad presents me with three items as. Fact. About the making of this movie, one of which is a complete lie and I have to figure out which one that is. Now Brad I, I started keeping tally on this season. I have not caught myself back up. I promise I will have a final record before our movie Sinners next week so we could see where I'm sitting. I have a feeling I'm below 500 on the season. You. You've done a really good job on this. I appreciate that. I think that you are at like 11:50 wins if I had to follow my gut.

56:13 Yikes. That's that's kind of rough. I will say while we're talking about games, you know, we participated again this season in a thing called the Movies Fantasy League with Vulture Magazine. And when I go to their leaderboard each week and I click through to the podcasters division, of which there are probably like 100 to 200 people in there, your boy is sitting at 3rd place among the podcasters right now. I would say. Primarily because I chose I chose 1 battle after another as part of my team, so I'm doing pretty well man. Bob, I'm not going to lie within our podcast division, which is just you and me and some fans of the Film with Whiskey podcast, guess who's in second place, Bob? That's right.

56:54 And. Overall, you're in like 30 thousandth place. That is not true. Every week I check it I'm like 5800 out of I think it's like 35,000 people signed up. So I'm just saying compared to years past in this league, I am knocking it out of the park. Do you know what I chose as my my username for this season? What's that? One barrel after another I boom, I get it. I see what you did. Somebody had already taken 1 bottle after another. I was like, oh that. Dude, that was all. Right, dude, let's get into our two I'm. Going to go all for the day. I'm going to go all perfidia Beverly Hills on your ass. All right, fact number one.

57:40 There are a number of allusions to parts of the novel Vineland that were not adapted. Early in the film, we see Willa playing in the field outside her trailer park home with a dog while Bob notices a helicopter flying high above them, which is a gag that alludes to the climactic events of the book that are otherwise excised from this from the film adaptation. Fact #2 The exterior of the mansion where the Christmas Adventurers Club meets was the home of Ronald Reagan in Sacramento when he was the governor of California. Fact #3 Paul Thomas Anderson named Perfidia Beverly Hills in part after an aunt he remembered from growing up in the San Fernando Valley. The aunt was a quote fiery smoker who lived in Beverly Hills.

58:29 I have no idea, man. This is a good one, Brad, because I don't know which falsehood is fueled by your vengeful hate for the left. I kind of feel like I love the Ronald Reagan fact because like, I don't care what side of the political aisle you're on. Like, that's kind of funny that they would make that, you know what I mean? But I also feel like, you know, that I would think that's funny, and that's why you would totally make that up. I like making up good facts. I don't know if Perfidia Beverly Hills is a made-up character though, or if or if she was part of Vineland. I'm going to go ahead and assume number one is true because as I've said, I have not read Vineland so I have no idea. So if you got me there, you got me there. But you also haven't read it, so you know. I love I love the the Internet world of like. I don't know if this is true or not. I have no experience with it, so I'll assume that it's true. Well, it's more like the only ones that I even have an inkling about.

59:31 I want to put my chips on those. And if I lose that way, I'm I'm. I feel better doing that than like you tricked me on a book I haven't read that doesn't feel totally, I'm gonna say #2 is false, but I have no idea, Brad. Bob, this was not fueled by my far right ridiculous hatred of the left. It was. It was. That was that was the truth. That is some that was real. Was it really? Yes, that's funny, dude. When I saw it, I was like, A, that's kind of funny, but B, that feels really disrespectful to a former president.

1:00:13 Like it's it's cool to disrespect presidents who are sitting or like just out. But like, you know, I'm not going to make fun of Jimmy Carter. Like, come on. That's true. That's true. I Bob, I am with you if if you are a person of left lefter leaning orientation, I am sure that that's one of the funniest jokes that you could funniest like behind the scenes little that's like wow, exactly I'm like I I recognize the humor and I'm also like that feels really wildly insulting. Wait, So what was the falsehood? The falsehood was fact #3 that he named Perfidia after his aunt. Was Perfidia a character in the book? I don't know.

1:00:59 I do know that he was indeed from San Fernando Valley. Yeah, I do. That is true. That is true. So that's, see, I knew I was like if I just put one little thing in there. OK, listen, I want to start our conversation after taking my L here about Paul Thomas Anderson, the bastard who owes me a new car and I I have been reckoning for a long time with a couple different things. Number one is my up and down relationship with his films because I think that he has made some true masterpieces and some of the best films of the century. And I also think that his miss rate is a lot higher than people admit that it is like he definitely takes swings. He definitely has a tone in mind. And especially with his comedies like you, you look at a movie like Punch Drunk Love with Adam Sandler, that is a movie that I have just never vibed with.

1:01:57 I cannot get on that movie's wavelength. It's an hour and a half long and it it feels like it's three hours long to me. And then you have a movie like Inherent Vice, which is a more absurdist comedy, which falls kind of in the camp with this one, and I think much less successfully. So you could make the argument that Licorice Pizza is a comedy. I don't even think I would say that I think Licorice Pizza is just like a hangout movie that funny and dramatic stuff happens in. But he's a guy that's like he has really spanned the transcendently great to very good to like. This did not work at all for me range. And that leads me into the second thing I struggle with with him, which is that I think he's become kind of lionized and and in a lot of ways the patron St. of the modern film bro, where he's achieved like Kubrick territory.

1:02:52 So like he starts out in the late 90s and he's making independent films. He he bursts on the scene with this movie called Hard 8, gets a little bit of funding and makes Boogie Nights. And Boogie Nights is like, it's controversial because it's about porn, but it's also like it's just Goodfellas set in the porn world and it's it's it's Scorsese RIP off. Then he makes Magnolia, which is this big messy magnum opus and he takes a couple years off. He comes back with Punch Drunk Love, which is really divisive. Then he's like, I'm out for a little while. I have overexposed myself. I've been, he's on, he's doing a ton of cocaine and he was like spouting off his mouth and he had a God complex. When you say overexposed, you mean like I? Mean, maybe, I don't know, takes five years off and comes back with there will be blood.

1:03:37 And it's like, is this the greatest movie I've ever made? I don't know. Paul Thomas Anderson immediately jumped from like talented guy with a God complex to like actual movie God in people's eyes now. And he's been atop that pedestal since then. And when you get atop that pedestal like a Kubrick, you can explore your own idiosyncrasies and get a pass for them. And I think that that happens a lot with PTA and it happens in this film bro culture we have now where it's like, it's it's cool to like be in the Criterion Collection and it's cool to know about aspect ratios and IMAX and things like this. And so PTA is like this patron St. that is like idolized in the movie bro culture now. And it just bothers me when we have film makers who have achieved a status where they they seem to be beyond not just reproach, but any criticism because I think that this is a flawed, messy movie.

1:04:37 That is, I'm still positive on In the Balance, but it's hard to talk about people like PTA when it feels like you're fighting an uphill battle just to offer any criticisms of his films. Yeah, absolutely. The the reality is a lot of times when people die is when the opinion on their work is more cemented and you know, it's, it's still a little bit wet. You still have some people who vary, but it feels like that's when we lionize people. And for that to happen when somebody's still alive and not just still alive, but still actively making films, it feels like you're not allowed to engage in healthy discourse around their work in a way that you can around all these other directors that that are making movies.

1:05:29 And so I I'm kind of with you, Bob. Now I will say I have seen there will be blood licorice pizza 1 battle after another. So like my exposure to PTA is, is very limited. You know, three of his, what, 10 films? I, I would be very curious to see the master at that. There's something about his exploration of Colts in that movie that I'm like, I don't know, I'm curious to see his take on that. I, I did see a lot of licorice pizza in this movie. There are like hangout moments when Willa is in the bathroom, just the way he shot those girls in the bathroom. I was like, oh, we're back at Licorice Pizza, like, like right back to it. But then he also the at the end of the film when he is filming the car chase, it felt very deeply like a 1960s Hitchcockian.

1:06:26 Like filming the chase from one person's point of view, then another person's point of view. The camera like rising up and down with the road felt like a bullet type of movie. There was so much about this movie that I'm like, I think he did a really good job for me. To get to your point about being able to critique PTAI think the script is what's messy and the script is what kind of keeps us back. I think PTA as a mover of the camera, as a creator of action scenes, I, I think he's a really great director in a lot of those ways, and you see that on display here.

1:07:06 I mean, I think one of the one of the criticisms I gave of There Will Be Blood, which I don't know if we've talked in the last year. Last year Regal showed a whole bunch of classic movies for like a month straight. Man, I went and saw There Will Be Blood in the theater for the first time since 2007 and I was like, OK, never mind. Like all my criticisms, pretty much gone. Gone. I do feel like as a writer, he he often writes himself into a corner with his endings. And so even There Will Be Blood, it has that sort of explosive ending and that final punchline of like, I'm finished and then it just goes to credits. I still think that's the weakest part of the movie for me. It's, it's satisfying, but it could have been more satisfying. And I feel like that with one battle after another where it's like you have achieved such a status that no one ever needs to do a second pass of your work and you're allowed to just make. It's like Tarantino.

1:07:58 Like I feel like Tarantino's last couple films have been, for me, a step down from some of his best work. And it's because it's like there's no one there. Like Sally Menke, his former editor, has died. So the movies are getting longer and like, there's no one there to kind of rein that in. And I think that you have to surround yourself as a film maker with people who are willing to give you like, really honest feedback and rein you in when you need to be reined in. Now how that it reminds? Movie. Go ahead, go ahead. It reminds me of our conversation about David Fincher and Aaron Sorkinson in The Social Network. That, like Sorkinson, needs a director that, like, keeps his writing at Bay. Yeah, dude.

1:08:39 And I'm really concerned about Aaron Sorkin's next movie, the Social Network sequel that he's working on. I don't know how that's going to turn out, but we we shall see. But getting back to this movie, I, I'm wondering, Brad, you know, you've seen three PTA movies and they are in three very different kind of buckets of types of movies he makes, which if there's one thing you can say about him, it's like, at least he doesn't limit himself to making one genre of movie. Sure. But. What are the things that you now notice about you know, in in both the pros and the cons column of him as a filmmaker? I think, I think his cinematography is incredible. Like he just has a very obvious real talent of working with his cinematographer to photograph reality in a very compelling way. Even even like small shots when they're at the 1776 compound and you see the bounty hunter, which sorry, back to the skirts being bad.

1:09:39 Like this bounty hunter is like, I don't kill kids, but I'll take kids to somebody who I know will kill them, but then I'll feel bad about it and go back and get killed for her. And you're like, huh, How like how does this make any sense? Anyways, They're like, there's a few shots in that where you have the 1776 guy sitting and you see the dude walking from behind and he just walks up and takes the keys. It's the camera's still, it's just sitting there, but it captures the human experience so incredibly well. So I, I think as a cinematographer, when I think about There Will Be Blood and when I, I was going to say Daniel Day Lewis, what's his character's name?

1:10:25 Daniel Plainview. Daniel. Yeah. That's how I was. Like Daniel. Daniel Plainview. When Daniel's Plainview's grief erupts with the fiery inferno of the oil furnace, and like you feel, that sense of this grief is a sweeping, massive Vista of pain and suffering. What does he do with the camera? He gives you one of the best camera movements, from the spouting fire to following him to Daniel Plainview screaming. And it's this incredible use of the camera that captures the feeling of grief that Daniel Plainview is feeling. Like. He does an incredible job. He does it in licorice pizza with the playfulness of the interactions between the the main 2 characters of that movie, like the flirtatiousness of young teenagers, young 20 somethings.

1:11:15 He captures that with the way he slowly moves the camera behind them as as they're standing in line to get their pictures taken. And the young boy is like following her. Like it's like, Hey, if I if I was in high school, would you date me? And like there's a playfulness to the camera movement that I'm like, I he just is so good with the camera. I wish he was better at writing in one battle after another. I out of Do you think that's fair? Absolutely. I mean, I think any criticism of any movie is fair with you sharing it as well as you just did. And I think that's a good jumping off point to talk not just about the characters but about the actors here we're, you know, an hour plus into this episode. We haven't talked about Leonardo DiCaprio, Oscar nominee. We haven't talked about Sean Penn, Oscar nominee. We have not talked about Benicio Del Toro, Oscar nominee for this movie.

1:12:05 And you know, you you said I talked about just the men, but Chase Infinity, who plays Willa. This is for all intents and purposes, her first big movie. I think she's phenomenal in this movie and she does not get a nomination. Teyana Taylor does get nominated for her role as Perfidia, which is kind of shocking to me because I think Regina Hall is better in this movie than she is. But we know we've got a good collection of folks that we can talk about. Brad, where do you want to start with our main actors here? I I do think starting with Leo makes the most sense. He takes up the most screen time. I I found I really liked Leo in this movie. I you know, as much as like I said, I don't like the character as written.

1:12:52 I love how Leo plays him because he does bring that pained sense of regret over his past that like you need Leo to play that depth. Cause clearly we know that Leo can play a tortured individual but because he's playing a character that's been a pothead for 30 years, the moments of his like forgetting the code of what time is it is hilarious and the way he plays it so serious. His anger is so sincere it it just works like gangbusters. And the moments where he gets the most angry and the most emotional are around his daughter and the love he clearly has for his daughter.

1:13:40 And that's why Leo works for me in this role. He does just such an incredible job of showcasing like I've screwed up a lot in life. I am not going to screw my daughter up, I'm not going to screw our relationship up, and I will fight to get it back, as buffoonish as I am as I try to fight to get it back. It is interesting to see the sort of phases of the types of characters Leo plays throughout his career. And we've spent a lot of time on this podcast focused on that sort of like mid 2000s departed era Blood diamond departed up through the mid 20 teens of the Revenant where he was playing like exclusively deeply tortured souls who cry a lot. Like that was like his thing.

1:14:27 And he takes a couple years off after making the Revenant and he comes back and now he's like, I want to play dumb asses. Like I want to play people who are like losers and dumb. Like that's who I am now. And so he does, you know, don't look up a couple years ago, which is probably his lowest rated movie of this era. He plays a really intelligent person in that movie, but he's a person who's like on the outside of the power structure. And so he's kind of bumbling. You know, he's in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood playing Rick Dalton, who is like this guy who is a has been and kind of pathetic. And then, you know, you have him in in a movie like Killers of the Flower Moon with Scorsese, where he's playing like a genuinely dimwitted person who gets suckered into doing horrific things and pays the price for it. And then in this movie, once again, he is like the dimmest bulb in this movie.

1:15:20 He's a genuinely good dude but like watching him try to process things happen while stressed out and high, it's a really funny performance and I don't think Leo gets enough credit for how funny he can be. He gets nominated for best actor for this film on 1st watch. I was like, this seems like a kind of a minor Leo performance to get an Academy Award nomination. But watching it back I'm with you man. I think that it's like it's not subtle. Like, nothing about this movie is subtle, but the work DiCaprio is doing, I think when you watch it with the intention of like, is this an Oscar worthy performance? It absolutely. Is it like he's giving this his all?

1:16:02 And it's a really, really good kind of, you know, addition to all the great roles he's done over the years. And, and I I'll go back to my, my gripe with the movie. I think if you end the movie with him hugging Willa on the road, Chef's kiss, like Oscar is in the bag. He has it because he provides the emotional core of the movie, which to me, the core message of this movie that I take away is the pursuit of family is a pursuit that transcends all political bounds. Like, regardless of what he believed in the past, he has recognized I'm going to protect my daughter. And I, I think that's where Leo's performance just like leaps up into Oscar territory is when you see him embracing Chase Infinity and just, oh man, it's such a great moment. Let's talk about Chase Infinity just for a moment because, you know, she's she's not getting the Oscar recognition. But like to be able to be in scenes with Leonardo DiCaprio and Sean Penn and Regina Hall, you know, for a couple minutes and hold your own against all these really, really great actors as a newcomer.

1:17:16 And to be able to play like the stress of the situation of being kidnapped and the complete like melting into Leo's arms at the end of this movie. Like, I'm kind of blown away by the talent that she is. And I'm excited to see where she's going to go after this. Absolutely like. The. Transition within scenes of when people see her and she has this shield up and she has her walls up to when she's actually alone and is curled up in a ball and crying silently on the bed. I I think she was lights out in this movie. I really, really loved her performance when, when Sean Penn is chewing scenery and like flexing his biceps and, and just being this big douche of a guy and she's just got this like, calm, powerful anger.

1:18:07 She nails it. She is absolutely incredible. I I am curious where you're at on Sean Penn, though, because I don't know if we're going to land in the same place on him. No. And just to spoil things a little bit, you texted me like, I think this is the worst performance of all time, which is really funny because I think he's doing exactly what he was asked to do and exactly what a a guy named Colonel Stephen Lockjaw is supposed to do. Yep. It is interesting to me because he's gotten the recognition of nominations throughout award season. I think when this movie came out, actor, supporting actor, when this movie came out, everybody was like Sean Penn Oscar, Write it down like it's just gonna happen. And what we've actually found to be true is that they're nominating both Sean Penn and Benicio Del Toro. And in a couple instances, Benicio has won a few supporting awards throughout awards season, you know, just from critics groups and things like that.

1:19:03 But it's funny because Benicio's giving a completely different kind of performance and it's a much more like thankless role. Like it's a it's fun to hang out with the sensei, but like he's not the thing that's top of mind. Then it kind of reminds me of like when Leo did Django Unchained and he was like the big bad villain, but he doesn't get the Oscar recognition Christoph Waltz does. And and when you know, Jack Nicholson does The departed, he doesn't even get nominated for the departed, but Mark Wahlberg does. So it's just kind of like, it's one of those things to me where Sean Penn seems to have the more Oscari, big scene chewing performance here, but they're actually like, there's more love going towards Benicio Del Toro in this movie. Yeah, I say all that good to say, I I like Sean Penn a lot, but it seems like people are kind of coming around to the idea of like, we don't really have to give this guy an Oscar just 'cause he's playing like the big bad in a big movie, you know?

1:20:01 Right. And I I think my frustration with Sean Penn probably is just more about his character is written. We talked earlier about the absurdism of the movie. He is the height of that and it clashes with the style and of the other characters of the movie. It just it's so heightened and so Doctor Strangelove levels of absurd that I I kind of just was like, I can't take this seriously. And you know, PTA and his writing fell, fell prey to the like, cynical Marvel humor of having Willa say to him like, why is your shirt so tight? I love that dude.

1:20:48 And then there's. Like the long, the long pause or that he's like, I'm not gay if that's what you're. I thought that was hilarious. Of all the comedy in this movie, that one fell completely flat for me. I'm like, really interesting, OK, Just the worst writing. I There's something about writing in the snarky. Sarcastic youth Marvel humor that I just find it is the least funny thing I've ever. Well, I think the only reason it actually worked for me though is because right before that he's like, you should put more make up on like, you know, like he's like feeding into her insecurities.

1:21:30 And then she's just like, why is your shirt so tight? And then he just immediately gets defensive. I'm with you, though. I do think that there are, like, there are definite misses. But yeah, I asked you the question earlier of like, how often does the tone of this movie actually land? And if you'd asked me four months ago, I'd have been like 50% of the time. Like, I think I gave this movie A6 when I walked out of the theater. I've come around a lot more on it. And I think that it's like 70 to 80% of the time the jokes work, which if you're writing a comedy, like if we're talking about Anchorman, I think like 80% of the jokes work in Anchorman. And that's an all time classic comedy, you know what I mean? Like. 80% of the jokes work every time.

1:22:12 Every time. Yeah, I did write down a couple a couple lines that really made me laugh and moments that made me laugh. And like, when, when they have all of the old white guys get together for the Christmas club or whatever and they're explaining the situation to the the assassin that they're gonna send out. And they say, like, you know, they conducted a raid on the chicken lickin frozen farm. And the guy goes, oh, no, I love their Nuggets. It's just the line of like, I love their Nuggets Made me laugh so hard. And there's just little moments like that, like when when DiCaprio is on the phone with with Comrade Josh and just losing his absolute shit. I wrote down every line there 'cause it made me laugh so hard and, and Comrade Josh is like, you're violating my safety. These are noise triggers.

1:23:04 And Dicaprio's like fucking noise triggers. He's like, what is your, what's your name? I want to know your name. He's like, my name is Comrade Josh. And he goes, all right, well, first of all, you need to get a better name. Comrade Josh is a fucking horrible name for a revolutionary. Says the guy who his name not This is confusing because you're Bob, please be honest. But I love when I because I'm pretty sure he answers that by going all right, Bob. It's just this perfect, like, yeah, Comrade Bob, all that much better. It's so much better. And then there's like the moment of like they cut back to DiCaprio and they've put him on hold with the the revolutionary hotline and there's like hold music on the phone. There's just so many good moments of comedy. I can't hate on this movie too much because like it, it really does work.

1:23:58 Yeah, there's there's even moments of like almost like a Wes Anderson aesthetic When it when Willa is at this nunnery of like revolutionary nuns and it just cuts to her perfectly framed in the center of the frame, like big wide stands holding a machine gun, just blasting off the same way that you saw her mother doing when she was pregnant with her. But like this specific scene, it's bright and vibrant and there's colors and she and it's she's perfectly centered in the frame and somebody else is talking off screen about her. And it just felt like this Wes Anderson comedic. Like I just, I loved the little moments like that throughout the movie. Yeah, we we should talk really quickly about Benicio Del Toro, who was in a Wes Anderson film just this year, The Phoenician Scheme.

1:24:50 He had the lead role in that movie and that is one of my favorite movies of the year. I felt like it was really slept on. I wish Benicio was nominated for that for best actor instead of for this movie. Not that he's not great in this movie, but I just felt like he was even better in the Wes Anderson film. I I am partial to Sensei though, like I really like what he's doing in this movie. It's cool to watch him be an ally to DiCaprio and just to be like the the coolest cucumber. He gets that great last line of I had a few small beers and then they just cut away and you never see him again. Like it's it's a cool character for sure. And the way he's like dancing as the cops are like having him put on his cops. I think once again, I think Benicio Del Toro's character highlights the struggle for me though of like, at first you see him and, and he's Willa's like sensei and trainer and he's helping Bob out, but he's also like organizing this like resistance to ice.

1:25:48 And he's very serious. And so I, I was struggling. I'm like, is it, is he supposed to be funny or serious or like say something about the world? What are we doing here? And then at the end of all things, he's just a very unserious, funny character that's like, you know, in the eyes in in the eyes of the film, he's doing the right thing. But he's just kind of chill and has a few beers and it's funny. And like once I landed on oh, he's an unserious character, I was able to enjoy his performance and and I he's very funny. The way he like puts his first up as the carpet, like rolls over him as he's leaving. It's just like, it's really funny and it's a great.

1:26:31 Performance. Yeah, I think that every character in the movie is an unserious character, except for, I guess you could say, except for the female characters like Perfidia is, is portrayed as like this incredibly flawed person. And one of the things I do love about the movie is like the for a, for an unsubtle movie, like she makes horrible selfish choices, but nobody in the movie has to be like she's a horrible selfish, like they call her a rat 'cause she literally ratted on them. But like, you understand as an audience member that she is both afraid of being tied down. She's afraid of being a mom. She's afraid of losing attention. She craves attention and she like gets off on danger.

1:27:13 And like, this is not a, this is not setting yourself up for success as a mother. So she abandons her kid and she just she does, and I think that like portraying it so frankly is is perhaps the most adult thing this movie does. Like sure, and in letting you actually understand, like I don't like Perfidia because she did this, but I understand her motivations, even if they are selfish. So when you see a character like Chase Infinity Willa in the movie, she's like one of the only serious people because she's still like she's looking around her at all these absurd characters and trying to figure out like, how do I make my way in a world filled with absurd people? And you kind of get that with Regina Hall because at some point someone tells her you're the only one that takes this seriously anymore. Like one of the nuns even says like, I don't like doing this revolution thing anymore.

1:28:03 You're way more involved in this than we are. So I I do think there's something to the idea that, like, the world is filled with absurd people and only a couple of us are actually serious about this. And that kind of feeds into the comedy of it, but it also kind of feeds into this disconnect you and I both feel with the tone of the movie. Yeah, absolutely. And I, I think the the disconnect for me also comes down. I'm curious how you feel about this. It's interesting to me that the most emotionally powerful part of this film is when father and daughter are reunited. It's not when the villain of the movie is defeated. Like, it feels like there should be this sense of like, like, like we got in Locklear is dead.

1:28:53 They're free from his influence. And yet, like his death kind of feels anticlimactic and just kind of like, OK, he's dead now. And I, I just, I don't know, to me, once again, the everything that happens after Willa and Bob are reunited feels like it just kind of cuts the legs out of the movie because we've already had our emotional climax. The whole thrust of the movie has been completed. And then there's all this add on stuff that makes you go, oh, maybe the movie wasn't about what I thought it was about. And it's it's maybe it's about defeating Lock Lockjaw. But when I see him defeated, I'm just kind of like, OK, that happened, I guess.

1:29:42 He was ultimately just a cog in a machine, too. Yeah. And I think that if you wanted to take a much more negative view on PTA as a film maker, then you could say that he's kind of aping other film makers and and he's kind of derivative. I don't think this about him, but like you could very clearly map Boogie Nights is a Scorsese movie. Magnolia has always been considered like a Robert Altman type movie. I think you could say that Licorice Pizza being a hangout movie is very Altman, but it's also very like French New Wave. You could say that There will be blood and the Master are very Kubricky. And I think when you look at this movie, this is him and his most like Coen brothers, both in trying to capture the dark comedy and the sort of like randomness and futility of life. And there is a ton of No Country for Old Men in the way this movie is shot and set up.

1:30:36 You know, this whole idea of like sending an assassin after the main bad guy who just ends up getting killed really quickly too, like Woody Harrelson did in No Country for Old Men. I I do think there's a ton of Cohen in this movie. I don't know if he is as successful at balancing tones as the Coens are, but I do think that there's something to the way that it's like, well, you know, this, we thought this was our big bad. And now he's been dispatched as quickly as anybody else in this movie. Kind of like when Josh Brolin gets killed in No Country and it happens off screen and you you fade back in and he's just dead and you're like, what the hell. Like, I I wanted the payoff of seeing that happen. So yeah, I mean, I think it's purposeful, but it's also a thing that you could pinpoint as a potential weakness of the movie.

1:31:25 Yeah. And I, I think, I mean, Bob, I think this is kind of wrapping us up to the point where we need to finish out with our last two segments of the day, the first of which being let's make it a double. We're near the end of the episode, so thanks listening to the film and Whiskey show. Let's have another film with this one, even if it's struggling. It's the final segment of the day. Now let's make it a double. Let's Make It a Double is the part of the show where we pick a movie to pair up with this one to make the perfect double feature. Brad, since you brought it up, I'm going to assume you have a good one on deck here for us. So I'll let you go first with Let's Make It a Double. Yeah, I, I think that if you look at this film as a man and his daughter trying to reclaim some semblance of life after a period of war, after a period of revolution of, you know, Bob living this violent life.

1:32:19 I'm actually, this is like probably a, a stretch. I'm going to pair this with the best years of our lives from 1946. I, I think that there is that sense of how do we make sense of our lives after this very big traumatic event that we participated in? And how do we, how do we reconcile with our parts and our roles in that war, in that struggle? I think that there's actually a lot of similarities there. And I think I would rather watch 1 battle after another and then the best of your years of our lives and end in this kind of better, more optimistic place. Nice.

1:32:59 Yeah. I, I think there's a couple directions I could go with this. The first of which is if you just want to keep it to 2025, there's another movie that came out this year called Marty Supreme, which is shot in this kind of hectic tension building. This guy is screwing up his life with every choice he's making. And you make reckless choices as a young person, and then you kind of learn how to figure it out when you see the eyes of your baby for the first time. And like, it's very much a movie about fatherhood. Marty Supreme would be a really good movie to pair this with. I think I'm going to stick on the Coen brothers thing. You know, there's definitely no country for old men in this. There's definitely some Fargo in this movie as well. I think I'm going to pair it with one of my favorite Coen Brothers movies which is called Burn After Reading, which is a great 90 minute movie that is all about like CIA intrigue and a bunch of really stupid people who get trapped in having documents they shouldn't. A bunch of people get killed and the end of the movie is very much just like, what did we even learn here? I don't know.

1:34:01 And then that's the end of the movie. And it feels like very much akin to 1 battle after another. I think it does the comedy just a little bit better. So I'd highly recommend pairing this up with Burn after reading Brad. We have made it. We're an hour and a half in. We should probably give this movie some final scores here. I'm a lot higher than I was the first time I saw this. I don't think it's a perfect movie. I don't think that it's like, I don't think it even approaches There Will Be Blood in terms of Paul Thomas Anderson's best films. If it wins Best Picture, I won't be mad about it. I just don't think that this was a particularly strong year for film, and I'm going to reflect that in the fact that I'm giving this movie an 8 out of 10. OK.

1:34:46 I think I just as a movie, I think that this is I'm with you. It's like an 8 out of 10. Like the cinematography is really great. The scripts kind of average. The action scenes are really well done. That there's a lot to like about this movie. I think for me, and you tell me if I'm wrong about it feels like there is a political statement being made here. Like, am I crazy? OK. No, not at all. OK, so I for me, the vision of the world, of the human experience that he is promoting, I just disagree with like on a deep fundamental level.

1:35:28 So for me that's like it's like a one out of 10 on the message it is bringing to the world. Like I just, I very deeply disagree with it. And so I, I think I'll land at like a 6.5. Like I think this is a really well made movie. I just think that the the message that the world is run by these dark, evil, racist people and they are trying to ruin and destroy people's lives. And that therefore makes violence OK. It makes it OK to enact violence and chaos on the world. I just, I can't get down with that man. It really is. And antithetical to how I view the human experience. So I I'm, I'm, I'm kind of in the middle where I recognize that this is a really well made movie. It's funny.

1:36:20 There's a lot to like about it. I just found myself a little sour at the end. I hope that you feel like you've been able to express your dissenting opinion today. And I've kind of, I've also tried not to argue with it because a, like the movie kind of does the arguing. You know, I don't agree with the idea of like, we should violently overthrow things. But I do think that, like, the course of human history kind of says that there are powerful people and people who are not in power. And like, change comes through people protesting. Now, my issues with the movie are not of the political ilk at all. It's more just like, does the tone of this movie work or not? And I think for the most part it does. And I think you and I can find common ground in the fact that, like, what the movie does as a movie, for the most part works pretty well.

1:37:09 Yeah. So totally, I'm coming out to an 8 out of 10. Brad's coming out to a 6.5, which puts us at an average of a 7.25 on this. So next week when we return with the movie Sinners, we're going to be holding it up against this 7.25 and seeing which of these two movies actually deserves to win the Oscar for Best Picture this year because of. Our vote that matters. That's right, now you can let us know what you thought of 1 Battle After Another by getting in touch with us on any of our social media accounts, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok or YouTube at film. Whiskey. Or if you want to join the conversation, you can find a link to our Discord server at the end of every single one of our show notes. All right, we'll be back next week talking about sinners, but until then, I'm Bob Book.

1:37:57 I'm Brad G. And we'll see you next time.