Up / Barrell Vantage ft. Steve Bramucci, UPROXX

In 2009, Pixar Animation Studios and star Ed Asner gave the world the most heartwarming and tearful animated film known to mankind. And that was only the first ten minutes.

In 2024, we sit high atop our perch with a really good whiskey.

The film is up.

The whiskey is barrell Vantage.

We'll review them both.

This is the film and Whiskey podcast. 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 G. And this week, we are in the year 2009, looking at a Pixar film. And not just any Pixar film, Brad, but one of the very best we are talking about up now.

Fun fact, Bob. This is the year that I graduated high school.

So does this have, like, a sentimental value to you already?

It does a little bit, yeah. I was fond of my high school years, enjoyed graduation, that transitioned to college. It was a special time.

Yeah. And you got to go to the theater and watch a small child and an old man bond, dude. Just learning life lessons left and right, man.

I feel like my history with up, I've seen it, like, five or six times.

Wow.

That might be the record. I'm talking to a guy who has seen no movies, like, more than once.

Yeah, it's up there. Bob my journey with this movie, though, started in a place where I walked out of the theaters and was like, I think that might have been a perfect movie. And then in a few subsequent views, I kind of was like, eh, it gets a little slow at the end, and there's a few issues with the months character. And then I watched it this time.

Robert uh oh.

This is a perfect movie, Bob.

Brad no, it's not. But I'm gonna let you have your moment. Bert, for right now. We will get into the nitpicks I have with this film, but suffice it to say, this is a damn good movie. Brad Pixar is in the middle of a huge run for them. They go back to back from 2007 to 2010 with Ratatouille, WALL e up, and Toy Story three. Tell me that is not just an all timer run for a studio like Pixar.

Dude, that. Yeah, we we've talked about different runs in movie history before. You know, Tom Hanks of the of the nineties. This. That is a hell of a four.

Movie lineup, you know, and I wish that we didn't have to talk about the cars movies at all, because otherwise, from the late nineties to the mid 2010s, Pixar is kind of undefeated. But every now and then, you just get an Owen Wilson movie thrown in there. Yeah.

And I. From what I remember, I think the first cars film is, like, decent. It's still, like Pixar standard two and three. I don't think I've ever seen, and I don't feel like I've ever heard anything good about them.

Well, we'll get into talking about Pixar a little bit more, but we have somebody here that is, in fact, Brad. This is not me exaggerating. Perhaps the best possible person to help us talk about this movie.

Oh.

A man who knows some life lessons of his own and has a spirit of adventure. We're talking about Steve Bramucci, head of creative at Uproxx, first time guest on the podcast when it comes to talking to me and Brad. Steve, how are you doing today, man?

I am doing great. I'm excited to talk about this. I'm excited to talk with you, too. I've been on your show without you, obviously.

It's such a weird thing to think that our podcast has happened without us, Bob.

It's like, stayed at your houses as an Airbnb.

Yes. Yeah.

But now you're here. Now I'm staying in your guest room.

I know.

Yes.

It's like you. It does kind of feel like you slept in my bed a little bit. Now I'm trying to feel out, like, what was your intention here, man?

Totally, totally. What if later I go like, oh, that wasn't really how we did things when Zach was hosting your show.

So, you know, it's funny. Cause I edited those episodes for Zach over the course of our time off, and Brad got an actual vacation from the podcast. But today we were talking, and I said, oh, man, it's gonna be good to talk to Steve. And he was like, when did Steve come on the show? What movie did he join us for? And I was like, well, I know he's been on before. And I ran back and looked, and it was. No, it was. You were talking to Zach, so Brad had no idea who you were. I come in with only the background of what you talked about with Zack, which I believe was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid.

Yeah, my favorite movie of all time.

We've got a kind of mini South America run going here now for you. Totally. The ending of Butch Cassidy and this movie. So good reference. Yeah, man. We'll psychoanalyze the hell out of that moving forward. But, Steve, give us 30 seconds on what you do for Uproxx and how that brought you to us today.

Yeah. So I am the founding life editor of Uproxx and founded that in a really cool way in that I was probably the last person ever when media was still growing. I was, like, the last foot in the door. And I sent them a letter over the transom. The company was exploding, and I could see new writers coming on because I went there a lot. I visited a lot, the site, and I said, I think you would do really well with food and travel and drink. And we did okay. The first couple of years, we were building a brand. You know, I didn't really understand that. You know, you can't just put uprox at that time was kind of an entertainment site. You can't just give them a travel section and have it be successful overnight. Took a little while to build, and then the pandemic hit, and we exploded. And where we exploded was we had already carved some authority for drinks, and we exploded in drinks. I mean, we couldn't expand fast enough. We went from publishing two, three articles about spirits a month to two or three articles about spirits a day, and we did that, like, almost overnight and just took up an incredible amount of ownership for this topic, from craft bartending to beer to a little bit of wine, even, and a ton of bourbon, and really built our brand on that. And then recently, I was promoted to the head of creative across the company, which gives me kind of insight into everything everyone's doing and whether or not it aligns with our brand and feels cool and passes my muster. And there's certain projects I kind of hand hold, and there's other projects I'm a little more removed on. So it's a really fun role. And it came about speaking about South America. I'm a travel writer by trade, and I was a travel writer when I was reading Uproxx, full time travel writer. And I have ADHD, so I use this thing called the Pomodoro method, where you concentrate for 30 minutes. You're supposed to do, like, push ups and during the other three minutes, and instead, I just found myself going to uproxx over and over and over and seeing these new voices. And finally I was like, this company is expanding. And Bret, Michael Dykes, who was the editor in chief, you know, I sent him a cold letter, and he said, let's try it. And, you know, we interviewed for about six months, and it moved relatively slowly, but I've been there ten years, like, this week.

Wow, man. That's incredible. What a story, Brad.

Yeah, I was gonna say, it almost sounds like a moment where our boy Carl Fredrickson just looks at himself and says, I'm doing this.

Yeah, that happens. That happens.

Direct quote from the movie.

Yeah, I saw that version on Disney.

Living or getting busy dying.

That's right. Oh my gosh, Brad. Okay, this inspired something in me. And I have a question. But I will save it until we get through our first segment of the day, which we call Brad explains. Brad's gonna give us the movie plugs with only 60 seconds ticking on the clock. So let's go ahead and hear 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. Brad, I like, I have incredibly high expectations for you now. You've seen this movie six times now. You should be able to recite the most minute details.

I'm gonna. I'm gonna pull a Michael Scott and do it line by line, like when he does the law and order SVU episode.

That's exactly what you should do, man. Brad, you have 1 minute on the clock to spoil the hell out of this movie. Folks, if you have not yet watched up, it is a breezy hour and 36 minutes. Go watch the movie, come back and join us afterwards. But Brad, 60 seconds and go up.

Is a film about a soon to be old man named Carl Fredrickson, who starts off young, falls in love, cant have kids with his wife, she passes away and you cry your freaking eyes out. And it's beautiful and it's the catharsis we all need. Bob. From there on, he is encouraged by his late wife to go have an adventure of his own. He decides to take his house to South America, to Angel Falls.

Paradise Falls. Paradise Falls?

Yep.

Paradise Falls is the name of the movie. He takes his house there by filling up a bunch of balloons to escape the metropolis that is enveloping him. He kidnaps a small wilderness adventure child. Along the way, they run in with talking dogs, an old explorer, and eventually he learns the beauty of what it means to take life by the horns.

Brad, I love when you are just giving, Brad explains, off the cuff, because you give everything equal weight. And so eventually it just kind of sounds like, like either a really bad ayahuasca trip or a dying man's fever dream. Like you literally were just like, he kidnaps a small child, he runs into talking dogs. Like those two things were consecutive. Phrases out of your mouth tell me.

That they're not of equal weight.

I mean, they kind of are. You know. Okay, guys, I want to jump in and say, let's talk adventure movies. We've had a few movies, and I don't just mean, like, swashbuckling, cutting through the jungle with a machete kind of movies. But, Brad, we've had a few movies over the history of our podcast, where I think they really embraced the spirit of, to your. To your point, grabbing life by the horns, making life what you will, and making an adventure out of it. And I was thinking about Walter Mitte, a movie that you and I really, really like that, I think hit us at the right age, where Ben Stiller is just going off and having his crazy adventures. Steve, I guess I want to phrase this question to you first. It seemed like a very obvious choice for you to pick this movie because of what you do for a living. But do you feel like this movie captures that sort of traveler's spirit, the spirit of adventure that you find in yourself?

Kind of. Here's what I think, obviously, massive, seismic choice for Pixar. First time they ever have a true elderly protagonist. And the spirit of adventure is therefore kind of refracted through a different prism, rather than being like this, this 20 something, like, oh, my God, the world is expanding. There's so much out there. What else is out there? Let's see the world. It's actually, like to use that grab the bull, grab life by the horns phrase. It's saying that it's never too late to keep doing that. That's the point. And so as far as capturing that type of adventure of, like, you know, you don't have to put any limitations on yourself and your life and your life scale, right? Like, there's all these conversations in the creative community about, like, when is too late to become a novelist, to become a screenwriter? I mean, screenwriting, Twitter every day has this conversation, when is it too late? When is it too late to travel the world? How old is too old to stay in a hostel? All these conversations that are based on societal constructs that we all created because we're idiots and poorly trained by a capitalist system that is collapsing in front of us because of that. We have all these constructs that we build that aren't really real. And I think him shaking off that construct and going, let's have more adventure. I'm ready to do this again. I'm going to do something cool. When I do something big, is, like, an incredibly powerful and captivating moment.

Yeah.

You know, I think, I guess we could talk about it later. But it's also to honor you guys, I have been drinking whiskey for the first time, and I'm on my third somehow already.

I should, to be clear, for the first time ever in your life, right?

Yeah, first time ever. I mean, definitely first time. I've had alcohol in probably six months. So I do feel like I. Yeah, you know, I probably shouldn't save my ideas. I should probably just say them out loud. You know, the famous thing at the end of Ellie's adventure journal that says, like, here's. Here's where it ends. It's been. Obviously, it makes us all emotional. Here's where it ends. Now go have some more. And Carl hadn't seen that page that said, go have some more that I'm quite sure is like a pretty direct reference to the Herald. And Maude. Maude is killing herself. Harold says, I love you, Maude. And she says, good, go love some more. Right. And the idea that life can be expansive, that there are never. That there's only one ending point to life. Right. Like that there's just the one. And that everything else is a false ending point. I think I find that to be really profound and really rich thematic territory, because as we know, you know, anyone over 50 is. Is pretty much pushed out of the movie business, and we don't feature tell those stories as often. I love that moment.

You know, Steve, this actually reminds me a lot. And so Brad and I, I don't know if you know anything about our backgrounds, but we're both seminarians. Yeah, yeah. So when we were in seminary, there was.

In the catholic faith or.

No, no, Protestant.

Okay.

Yep.

My father was a catholic priest for 20 years before having kids.

Oh, wow.

And three of my uncles. Three of my uncles are. Were catholic priests. All of them left the priesthood to have families. And I was a volunteer with the brothers of Sacred Heart and did a year with the brothers of the Sacred Heart in New York. Wow.

Oh, man. We're gonna have so many good conversations. I can already feel it, man. I grew up catholic, so, you know, we can have the. The catholic guilt conversations as well as we go. But I was going to say, there was a young woman in class with me, and she felt really called to lead a church that was heavily focused on the elderly. And it was a united Methodist seminary. And so in the Methodist church, everybody's aging out. At this point, the congregations are increasingly older, but there's also this sort of americanized evangelical subculture that tries to cater to young people. And so increasingly you find that just like with other parts of society, older people are getting pushed to the margins in the church. And I've learned so much from her, just about how we tailor everything in the church towards the next generations, because that's kind of our natural bent, is to make sure that people are still learning about the faith, but we so often neglect those people who are more seasoned and wiser.

Right.

And I feel like this movie, it really hit home for me this time around that I would say 75% of the scenes, to your point, are not just about capturing the spirit of adventure, but they're about underscoring this idea that, yes, it's never too late, but that life has inherent meaning and value beyond a certain age and also beyond. Beyond certain things. That scene where he is emptying out his house so that, you know, it's a perfect little visual metaphor that even kids can grasp. But, like, my house is being weighed down by all the stuff that I can't let go of my life. Yeah, exactly. And I have to physically remove all of that stuff so that I can move forward. It's just. And, you know, they end it by. The camera tilts down, and you see the wing back chair next to his chair, sitting perfectly side by side as he floats away. I just. This movie has so much imagery that underscores that theme. Man.

No, the metaphor is incredible. And his inability to let his wife go is huge. And the fact that he does it in that way. I'll tell you a funny story. When my father passed away, he and I were incredibly close. And it was the weekend that I had moved into his home up in Portland, Oregon, when he was sick. And it was the weekend we were doing the funeral, and I was giving the eulogy. And my mom, God bless her heart, is kind of a minimalist. And she was, for some reason, I don't know what brings her peace. She wanted to start getting rid of stuff, and I just start, like, grabbing things left and right and left and right. And her sister, my aunt, comes up to me and she goes, you know, I gave away my mom's last pair of shoes last year. She's been dead for 25 years. My grandma and I listened to her. I don't know which direction she's going with it. She goes, the funny thing is, even after holding on to him for 25 years, it never did bring her back. And I think, you know, he's in that place where he's like, well, if I keep the house intact and I keep every single relic, then she's with me. And, you know, what he had to learn is that she was with him whether or not he kept the stuff. I thought that was incredibly powerful. Plus, obviously, he's choosing a living relationship for an inactive dead one. Not metaphorically dead, but a person who he can't interact with, whose stuff is around. He's choosing a living kid's life for that. And that's really cool.

I want to talk a little bit about the actual. The technical aspects of the movie. And last week, we had Indiana Jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull as our movie. Yeah, each week this season, we're doing the highest grossing films of each year. And so we're coming off of Indiana Jones, we're coming into up. And, you know, that movie is pretty much a stinker through and through, but it had some really beautiful iconography. And we talked a long time about this specific shot where Indiana Jones kind of walks over the crest of a hill and looks down on this town that's just been obliterated by an atomic bomb. And so you see Indy silhouetted against the mushroom cloud, signaling, we're bringing Indiana Jones into the nuclear age here. I think that similarly, this movie, in a lot of ways, seems reverse engineered around certain imagery. Like the image of a house flying with balloons on it is just something that if you were to sketch that out, like on the back of a placemat at a diner, you're like, I need to make a movie out of this. It's an immediately iconic image. And I think that Pixar, to their credit, they know so well how to milk that image for all it's worth. There's some great moments when Carl is first floating up through the city to get on his adventure, and you see the translucency of the balloons coming into the buildings and kind of illuminating the girl's room. And I'm curious, Steve. And then we'll throw over to Brad. I guess we have to hear from Brad every now and then. But, Steve, what if you have to, what are some of the images that stick out to you from this film?

Good question. What is the thing that they steer with that they use as a rudder? It's the fire grate, right? It's the flu handle. Yeah, yeah, I found that really good. This is how I write. For those who don't know, my side job is writing children's books. And I write with a lot of visual imagery, and I write to create movies in heads. That one's powerful, obviously, Carl, you know, the door opening scene, Carl being on the porch as the house floats away is powerful. I think, you know, you could argue in a crazy way. But like, relatively apropos that up is the most violent Pixar movie, right? Because there's the striking him striking someone on the head and it drawing blood.

I think I thought the same thing, Steve. Like seeing blood in a Pixar film, even if only for 2 seconds. That was interesting.

Which leads to, here's my lob of all lobs for Brad. Which led to your favorite image in the whole movie, right?

Yeah, I don't know if it's my favorite image. I just think it's a perfect shot. So, Steve, right after he hits the guy in the head, they call the police, and they're gathered around him and the suit that is trying to take over his house. Carl goes into the house, barely opens the curtains and looks out, and everybody else is like, panicked. And the dude in the suit is looking straight at him, and he just puts his hand, 3 seconds later, he calmly puts his hand on the fence post. And it is like the most villainous, menacing thing that any character has ever done in a Pixar film. And I was just like, oh, my God. That, like, it was, it was perfection.

I feel like that's clearly cribbed. Are we aligned on where that's cribbed from?

Oh, let's hear it.

I think that is. Okay. So a couple things. One, I have studied my kids, and I have a very strict relationship with screens. I'm that la hippie, right? But we get a movie night every week, and we have, you know, had movie nights for a couple years now, and so I want to engage with them. And also, I have a good memory. And so I've seen all these movies quite recently, and I've noticed that they often honor other movies, in fact, sometimes to a distracting degree. Right. And that, to me, is a really clear, cool hand Luke reference. That's the man in the mirrored sunglasses.

Oh, interesting. Yeah, yeah.

You know, it's the everyone moving around Luke, except for the 1 st solid villain who's, like, not underestimating him. And I thought that. I love that shot. I'm glad that you guys love it.

Steve, I was going to say that's at least two movies now that you've talked about, that this movie directly makes reference to. And I really love, especially in early to mid Pixar, you could tell that the directors of these films, whether it's Pete Docter or John Lasseter or whoever it might be, they are huge movie nerds. And I noticed a couple really obvious ones throughout this movie, too. The one that I wanted to talk about was right after he lashes out at Russell and kind of sends everybody away. Right before he has his little epiphany. At the end of the movie, he comes back into the house, and the house is essentially in black and white. And darned if it didn't look like the wizard of Oz right before Judy Garland opens the door into Technicolor. And you notice when he reads the scrapbook and sees that inspiring image, they cut back to him, and everything's back in color again. There's just such a brilliant use of color in this movie. And I think this is perhaps the most kind of over saturated, candy colored movie Pixar has ever done with those, the latex balloons and everything else. But, Brad, I want to throw over to you, you've mentioned one image here. Anything else in the imagery department or specific shots? Because I made a whole list. But I'd love to hear some more from you, man.

Yeah, I mean, there's the shots that you can tell the animators were like, we're gonna win an oscar for this. You know, like the iconic shots of it flying through the air with just the beautiful puffy clouds. Pretty much any time they use a wide angle lens to shoot the house is just gorgeous. But I'm with you, Bob. I think that the transitions of color to shift the mood of the movie are just so well done. Like, any time Carl is depressed or feeling low or feeling frustrated, everything, like the world loses its color. And that's just true about life. When somebody goes through something like finding out that you can never have children, losing your spouse, losing the dream of fulfilling what your spouse and you should have done together like he does at the end of the film, it feels like your world loses any sense of pop or zing that color could bring it. And they just do such an excellent job of mirroring Carl's emotions with the colors that you see on screen. And not just the colors, but like you said, the sharpness kind of dims and the colors fade, and they just do such an incredible job throughout the film. With that, I was going to say.

Too, I think it's even more than what you were saying. It's not just that, you know, the. The world dims, but it's. It's that the world dims as a result of Carl's own reaction to the world around him. You know, it's. And I think the movie does a really good job if you're paying attention to it, of talking about or demonstrating that the color is there in the world. You just have to kind of reframe yourself to be able to see it. You know, when they get the terrible news about not being able to get pregnant, everything drains because you could see it in. You could see it in her face, but you can see it especially in the kind of helplessness that Carl is feeling at that point. And after he pushes everybody away to the scene I was just talking about, the lack of color is a reflection of the fact that his life is colorless. His life is meaningless. It's not that the color isn't there. We were just outside with it. But he's brought this sort of bland, colorless life into this hermit like existence that he wants to live. And it's not till he opens it back up again that the color returns. I just think, you know, again, we're not talking about, like, the deepest movie and the most obtuse, hard to understand thing. This is really accessible. But I think these are, these are lessons and these are themes that, to Pixar's credit, you start to introduce kids to, a, how to read a movie, but b, how to read their own emotions. And I think this is a huge jumping off point to what they eventually approach in, uh, inside out. A few years after this, guys, I am like, what a great first half of an episode. We haven't even talked about the voice performances or anything else. Steve, Steve, you look like you want. You want any final thoughts before we throw over to our whiskey segment?

Uh, a million. No, I mean, although all of that stuff I agree with, I think, you know, it's a brave movie. It's a nuanced movie. My most recent book was a reaction to the movie Moana, which I think is one of the most brilliant epics that Disney's ever told. But Moana is a perfect character. She really does what the perfect human would do in every setting. She's been chosen by the God of the ocean, and she's perfect. And this often happens. It's often a failing in movies that are meant to be feminist, and feminist empowering is that, like, a writer may make the woman just perfect. And, you know, up is almost the exact contrast in the sense that the character's deeply flawed and everything is generated through his flaws. And I find that to be really the best part of the movie. Right. Like, up. Its amalgam at Pixar to me would be Nemo. And I think that, you know, Nemo and up are two movies that are driven by the insecurities of adult men. And I think that's like, that is obviously, as a male. That's. That's fertile ground for me, and it's stuff that I want to explore and. But it's also like, you know, it's. It's really a great motor for a story, because these people are flawed. They're flawed at the end. They don't. They don't even become perfect people, but they're, you know, Carl is a flawed person who figures out that life goes on. He. He didn't. It's not. It's not that thing. There's that toxic thing that happens when someone really doesn't know when the good stuff is happening. Right? When someone is in the good and misses it, which I find to be one of life's most heartbreaking occurrences. It's not that he did appreciate it, but he thought it was over, and he felt like it because of the scale that it happened at, that his life was still a failure, that he had failed Ellie. Right. Just not because he didn't give her a lovely life, but because he didn't give her life at the scale that she imagined. And I think, like, those themes, I hear everything you guys are saying about shots, and I admire it, and I'm sure we'll talk about voice work or whatever, but those are just monster themes to take on. It's funny. We're going to talk a little bit later because I'm going to reference it in something else I say about toy Story. But, like, I don't know, guys. Like, show me an adult movie that came out in 2000. Was it 2009? Yeah, show me adult movie that came out in 2009 that dealt this effectively with, you know, the fragility of the male ego and the idea of when life starts and stops. All these things, like, these are monster themes for an animated movie to deal with.

Well, and we're. We've been focused pretty much completely on Ed Asner's character. Like, we haven't even started to touch the dad issues that Russell is facing and what he's going through as he's searching for. What does it mean to be a man? Right? Because they place him in this. We'll just call it the boy scouts. They place him in this traditionally prototypical manly training ground. Right. Rite of passage. You need to have these badges that show you have these skills, that show you have what it takes to be a man. And yet he has every single badge except for helping the elderly. And all of us would look at him and say, what he needs more than badges is a healthy father in his life.

Man. One of the best shots in the movie. One of the best images in this whole movie is when you first start to understand what his home life is like. And I don't know what the lady's name is. Phyllis or something. And he goes, you call your own mom by her first name? And he goes, that's not my mom. And he goes. He finally is caught off guard and says, oh. And then he just kind of glances down, and they show the empty spot. Oh, man. They show the empty spot where the badge is supposed to be, and it's like, wow. That. That empty spot took on a whole new meaning here in this movie. Brad, I need to drink whiskey. Cause I'm starting to get a little misty over here.

You mean the. The dad issues are getting you going?

Bob, we will discuss dad issues when we come back from break, but right now, Brad, we need to drink some barrell vantage. What do you say?

I would say talk about rites of passage. Let's go drink some whiskey. All right, everybody, today we are drinking barrell vantage. Now, this is a 114.44 proof whiskey. It's a blend of straight bourbon whiskeys, finished in Mitsunura, French, and toasted american oak casks.

There you go. Yeah. Mizunara casks we've had on the show before, I think most prominently with that Chivas regal Mizunara finish that we really liked a couple seasons ago. Brad, big fan. Yeah. Barrell Vantage is a really cool product. It came out at the end of 2022. It kind of grew in popularity throughout 23. So we're a little bit late to the party here. But like other barrell products, it's composed of three different bourbons. So we're talking an Indiana, a Tennessee, and a Kentucky distilled bourbon. And they're finished in three separate kind of casks. Now, what I can't figure out and what I'm sure is kind of a barrell industry secret, it says on the bottom the back of the bottle that we have here, Brad, that each of the component whiskeys is finished separately from each other. But what I can't figure out is if it's like, okay, all of the Indiana goes into Mizunara, all of the Tennessee goes into french oak, or if they're finishing, if there's, like, nine barrels, do you know what I mean is each of the three getting finished in each of the three? I don't know that, but what I do know is that I trust barrell and whatever they're doing, because this is not the first of their triple finished products we've had. Uh, we've also tried seagrass we've also tried. Uh, what was the other one? Dovetail. That was really, really good.

Ugh. I was going to say, this is not a whiskey that won number three overall whiskey for most complex finish. It was rated the number three whiskey for whiskey advocate. Yeah, uh, I like. I don't really care how they finished it, to be frank, because I have drank this, folks, and let me tell you, I have seen the promised land. We are coming, my friends.

I was gonna say, I thought that this would be a cool pairing with up because so much of this movie takes place on top of that waterfall and up in the air, where you have a really good vantage point. So there you go.

I did it. That should be the Instagram post you need to post at Asner holding a bottle of this.

All right, man, let's dive into this. I am drinking it live on air. Brad, you have sampled already, so go ahead and give us your nosing notes.

Yeah, Bob. This nose is just pure deliciousness. The first overarching note that I can't get enough of is not just caramel and not just apple. It's caramel apple, baby. There are peanuts here. There's some pear that gives a little depth. There's vanilla bean. And, like, I've said this note before for some cheaper whiskeys. And usually it's a designator of, like, I don't really know what to do with this, but it's generically sweet this time. I feel like the note of simple syrup is, like, a beautiful thing. Like. Like, there's just a nice underlying soft sweetness to this that reminds me of, like, a pure, simple syrup that you just boiled on your stove. Dude, I'm blown away by this nine and a half.

Yeah, I'm gonna give it a nine and a half as well. I am in lockstep with you on these notes. The only thing I would add is there's just, like, a, like, a spritz of citrus on this as well. I would call it lime even more than lemon. It's really, really nice. It brings, like, an almost tropical kind of thing to the party. And it has a touch of that will it funk. Although it's not so much floral as it is that kind of, like, really nice dusty oak we get sometimes on will it product. It's a man, this is just beautiful. It is not, like, decadently sweet, but it's, like. It's just fruity and oaky in a really good way. I am super excited to dive into the taste here.

Yeah, the palate is just a continuation of all the beauty that you get on the nose. There's apple juice, there's caramel. For me, it gets into a nutmeg kind of spiciness. I got, like, notes of, like, hot chocolate powder. And the more I drank it, the more I. I found myself thinking of being in Wayne County, Amish country, Ohio, and having peanut butter spread. And if you not had peanut butter.

It'S different than peanut butter.

Yes. Peanut butter spread is one of the greatest inventions that humans have ever come up with, and I know Bob can confirm this for me.

Yeah. But, like, how would you describe it? It's almost like whipped peanut butter with, like, a honey flavor. Yes.

Yeah. That is a perfect description, Bob.

Thank you so much.

Your years of being the generic fat guy, number 17.

Yup.

Has paid off.

Okay, so what's your score on the taste here?

I'm coming down just a hair from my nose score, because that nose was so incredible. But I'm still at a nine out of ten, Bob.

Yeah, I can't tell if I want to come down to a nine or an 8.5. I think I'll do 8.5 just for some balance here, because there is a really kind of strong, bitter note towards the back of the palette, and it was. It was really predominant on my first sip. I took a second sip and really kind of swished it around my mouth and kind of aerated a little bit, and it wasn't there quite so much. But it is like an explosion of bright, tart fruit on the front of your palate. And as you kick it to the back, some of those more herbal notes really take over. Uh, so there's. It's not quite as consistent as I'd like it to be across the palate, but all of the flavors are incredible. So I'm going to come down to an 8.5 on the taste.

Now, Bob, I know that I just lauded you on your ability to pull out the flavors of peanut butter spread. Your math skills aren't quite as good. Balance would imply that you have the same score as me by going to an 8.5, that actually creates imbalance. I don't know if I just wanted to make sure that you understand how math works.

I think that a fair score for this taste would be somewhere between an eight and a half and a nine. So I'm going to give it an eight and a half to bring up the, you know.

Yeah, there it is.

What's the finish score, man?

I think the finish on this is delicious. I'm sticking it a nine I think that I got some salted butter notes starting to come through. The vanilla is there. There's a bit of a Graham cracker feel. And there's just a really nice pop of, like, a fresh cinnamon on the finish that gives it a bit of spiciness. Man, this is, this is a delicious whiskey barrell is knocking it out of the park.

Would you call this a long finish?

Uh, yeah, I think I would. It. It sits in, it sits on my palate for a while. And I think my definition of a long finish is when, like, four or five minutes after I'm done drinking the whiskey, I still have flavors just, like, popping around in there that I'm intrigued, intrigued by.

It reminds me of like, cinnamon red hots or those, you know, the fireball candies almost. Except without that sugary, simple syrup flavor, like, it's definitely more oak prominent. And then cinnamon candy. I really like it. I would call it a medium to long finish, but the flavors that are left behind, like I said, they're not the sweet flavors. And so I think you kind of, you know, frankly, I kind of forgot about the finish after a while. I just had to take another small sip to make sure that I had my notes correct. I like this finish. I do think it's probably the weakest part of the experience here, Brad. So I'm going to give it an eight out of ten for me.

Balance. I think that this is a perfectly balanced whiskey, Bob. I'm at a ten out of ten on the balance because for me, I didn't hit those, you know, slightly tart notes that kind of soured at the finish for you. For me, I felt like the finish gives you a beautiful, bright, salty end to a sweet experience that I just, I'm a big fan of. I think this is a ten out of ten on balance.

Yeah, man. I'm kind of struggling with my balance score here because I think whatever else I say about this whiskey, it is a delicious whiskey and it is a really well made whiskey. But I definitely went from a 9.5 to an 8.5 to an eight. So that tells me that there's something just slightly off in the balance here. I don't think I can really go any lower than an eight and a half on balance, though, Brad, because at the end of the day, I think the sum is kind of greater than its parts here. So, yeah, I'll give it an 8.5. And that takes us to value. Now, what are we dealing with, Brad, when it comes to the actual price of this thing?

Bob, this is on barrell's website. They market at $90. I did see a few places where you could get it for, like, 78 to 85 ish. So I think I'd be comfortable with putting it at, like, an $85 mark for value.

Listen, I'm kind of at the point with barrell, and it may just be that I'm so biased in favor of their brand now that as long as the product's good, I'm going to say it's worth the money. But it's also, like you said, dollar 85. And I was like, oh, yeah. Like, I would 100% pay $85 for this. This is the best whiskey I've had in a couple of months. Brad.

Yep.

Uh, I don't know. $85. That's an eight out of ten for me, man. On value.

Yeah, I'm pretty close. I'm at an eight and a half out of ten.

Like.

Like, this is approaching. If I see it, I would probably buy it territory. Like, I. I just don't know how barrell does it. Bob, they consistently make high quality product and they charge quality prices for it. Like. Like, I'm not going to pretend like $80 to $90 isn't a lot for a bottle of whiskey. But what I will say is there are other premium brands out there that are charging double to triple this for product that is of a similar quality.

Yeah.

So I like when it comes to value. I actually think that there's just very few whiskey companies out there that accurately price what they are giving you the way barrell does.

No, I totally agree. And I think my score reflects that. Brad, I'm coming out to a 42.5 out of 50. And I think you're probably even a couple points higher than me.

Yeah, I probably have the highest score for a whiskey this season at 46.5 out of 50.

All right, so we're at an 89 out of 100. Brad, this. This is just shy of that all time classic. 90 out of 100.

Yeah.

You and your balance, Bob.

We're sitting at a 44.5 overall on this. Brad, this is the first whiskey this season to achieve a 40 or higher. It's been. I don't want to say mediocre this season, but, like, yeah, pretty much every whiskey has been above average and nothing has knocked our socks off until now.

Yeah, I was going to say it feels like a lot have fallen in that 35 to 38 range. And here we are. And not just above a 40. Like, 44 and a half is a good site higher than 40 out of 50. Bob, this is far and away the best whiskey we've had, barrell.

Thank you. There's just certain brands that I wish I could just send them. Just start spamming them with all of the good things we've said about their brand. You guys need to start hire us.

Yeah, you're gonna start writing shakespearean like sonnets about the beauty of the rain.

Barrells. Shall I compare thee to a barrell vantage? All right, man, let's get back into talking about up. What do you say?

Oh, dude, I freaking love this movie.

All right, everybody.

That was barrell vantage. A whiskey that stands up to such an incredible film. Bob.

Oh, man. What a whiskey.

Oh, dude. Barrell is perfect. They just make so many great whiskeys. I. Man, I can't say enough good things.

Well, Brad, I can also say some good things because I am still absolutely killing it on the season when it comes to our next game. And, Brad, what's it called?

Two facts and a false hood.

Brad is gonna try to stumpy ball to our eyes and what is wrong?

Two facts and a falsehood.

Two facts and a falsehood is the part of the show where Brad presents me with three items about the making of this film. All of them are presented as fact. One of them is a falsehood, and I have to figure out which one that is. Now, folks, if this is your first time joining us, the way we play this game is usually one win, one loss. But if I have a guest that I can consult, and in this case, I sure do, I usually seek the advice of our guest. So, Steve, please be prepared to either go down with the ship with me or to lift me up like Carl's house. The catch is, if we get this wrong together, Steve, a, I blame you, and you never return to our podcast. B, I am awarded two losses instead of just one.

Awarded.

Awarded. I only get one win if we win, but I get two losses if we lose. So, with those stakes established, Brad, hit me with your two facts and a falsehood.

Fact number one. The animators for up took a unique approach to accurately depicting the aging process of Carl and Ellie Fredrickson by studying time lapse footage of various individuals aging over decades to capture the subtle changes in facial features, posture, and movement. Fact number two. Design wise, the animators for up based all the characters upon circles and rectangles, except for the villains, who are based on triangles. Not only are Carl and Ellie based on squares and circles, but all the objects around them based on them match their symmetry. Fact number three. This is the only best picture nominee to have just two letters in the title. The record for shortest best picture nominee title belongs to the film Z from 1969.

That is correct. I knew that Z was nominated. I also knew that this film was nominated for best picture. A bit of nerdy trivia real quick on the movie front. This 2009 was the first year that the Academy expanded back to ten films that were able to be nominated for best picture after the fiasco of 2008 in which the Dark Knight did not make the cut for the five best picture nominees. So up is kind of constantly seen as a beneficiary of this. Like, we can finally nominate an animated movie again because one had not been nominated since Beauty and the Beast in 1991. This is also a really fun year for Oscar nominees because we had the movie up and then the next nominee in alphabetical order was the George Clooney film up in the air. So up and up in the air in the same year. Also a really good movie about kind of fragile masculinity. Brad.

Yeah, great film. Love that movie.

Okay, let's get to it, man. I think number three is true, as I've said. Number one, the, the time lapse photo thing, I think is, is interesting. And then number two, the geometry thing. Are you familiar, Brad, with the, the artist Gustav Klimt? He's famous for the kiss.

I sure am.

Yeah. That's a very Klimt kind of thing.

You know, like Klimtian is what my friends called me in college.

Of course they did. Steve, I am. I'm going to seek your input here. Which one do you think is the falsehood? And am I completely steering us astray by just assuming three is true?

I don't know. I mean, by the way, is this Brad who's writing all these quests, these facts? They're fantastic. They all. I was like, that sounds good. That sounds like a smart thing that someone would do.

I don't know.

That sounds great.

I've been doing this for four seasons.

Now, Bob, you are good at it.

You should give him the disclaimer, though, Brad.

Yeah. So here's the disclaimer. So obviously, two of these are true. One of them is 100% written by me. When I say true, my definition of true for this game is I got them off the IMDb page for the.

So who knows?

I think the geometry thing is correct in that I remember how angular the villain is.

Yes.

And how angular the dog is. And so I think that's correct. I think the aging thing feels like a thing that Pixar crew and John Lasseter would do. But I also don't know if they would need to, I think they probably, you know, I thought about, you know, what's the number one sign of aging before your skin wrinkles? Is that the fat packets in your upper cheeks shift down into your face. And I just don't know that, like, that they would need to go that deep. Cause these characters are all shaped like squares and triangles.

I mean, we do know that Pixar is famous for not doing a lot of research on how to animate things.

You know, it's funny, I was reading the Wikipedia this morning, and it. It said, like, in order to understand better what Paradise Falls would look like, they took an eleven week trip to South America. It was like, okay, this is the most, like, let's see if my boss will approve this expense I've ever heard. Eleven weeks to look at a waterfall. What are we doing? Come on.

Oh, my God, that's so funny. Because one of my favorite, you know, I know it's not. Is it Pixar? Is Luca Pixar or just Disney?

It's Pixar. Yeah.

So one of my favorite Pixar movies, for that same reason that I like flawed characters, is Luca. I think it's grossly underrated. And at the end of it, there's, like, a vignette that has all of them decamped in Italy for just ages. Just eating gelato all day and going like, oh, yeah, I think maybe this could work. And, you know, I'm also in the creative fields and even in a very similar field of creating content for children. And my publisher has never been like, hey, listen, let's bankroll you. Going somewhere for six months, right?

Yeah. There's only so much gelato you can eat before you can. Just, like, you can animate the Mediterranean Sea now, like, come back.

Yeah, exactly.

Okay, I'm with you, Steve. My only hang up on number two is the other dogs that are villainous, like the pug or whatever it is. The bulldog, that's not very triangular, but I think it's more.

Pugs are way smaller than that. Bob, I don't know how much you know about dogs.

The ugly faced one is very amorphous, so I do think that it's more likely that two is true. So I'm gonna go with Steve. I will risk my two losses, and we're gonna say number one is the falsehood. Brad.

Bob, the win for me today was Steve's beautiful compliment of my writing skills. That was just meant the world to me. However, I'm going to take the l here, because you are correct.

Yes.

Nice.

You did it, Steve. You can join us again.

Yeah, I mean, I did think that a bottle of bourbon showed up when I did this show, so I appreciate. Maybe now that we got the win, the next time I come on, a bottle of bourbon comes.

Yeah. You'll get something. We'll see. We'll see. I was going to say, if you lost, I'd send you a bottle of vodka. That would just be the biggest insult we could give.

It could be that flavor vodka we tried at the world wine and spirits competition.

Oh, yeah. That was rough, man. All right, guys, let's dive back into the movie. We left off by talking about daddy issues, and I think in order to do that, we have to talk about the character of Russell. I think that this kid.

I think in order to do that, Bob, we need to bring your father on the show. So lucky for you, I have him on line three.

What's up? No, I think that this kid is a. It's a really good voice performance, but I think that Pixar does a really beautiful job here with toeing the line between making this kid just obnoxiously annoying and really endearing. And he is. He's inquisitive enough and he's vulnerable enough through the whole movie that it keeps him from entering this, like, the Jar Jar era. Brad, that we've been. We've had a lot of side characters that have been testing our patience.

You have been camped in the Jar jar era since 99. Like, that is all on you, my friend.

I mean, we've talked about Shia LaBeouf many, many weeks in a row now and how his characters are kind of Shia Labinks. So I just. I want to hear from you guys. What do we think of the kid sidekick in this movie? Is it too cutesy? Does it work? Perfectly. Where are we falling on the spectrum here?

Perfect.

Yeah.

I love it. I mean, I was just going to say I love it. I find it, like, really charming and really, it's a very patient vocal performance. He's not like, he's not rushing, he's not punching jokes. He's just, like, letting moments be. It's a really well written part, too. You know, it starts out with that thing. You know, I noticed today that the Muppets story uses the joke a lot. The funny, but, like, on the nose joke of, like, we'll never find Kermit's house. Are you sure it's not that one? Oh, it's that one. And, like, this really obvious joke. Right. Which. Which can be funny. And I think up starts out with this really obvious joke of a really boisterous kid talking to someone who's really quiet and the kid being eager and, you know, this golden retriever role and the quiet person, you know, being this, like, harsh role. And it's kind of the Ron Swanson and whoever that woman was on parks and rec, like Leslie Knope, it's kind of that relationship. But as the movie goes on, you know, it's funny enough that you stick with it. And as it goes on, it becomes incredibly nuanced. You know, like, the boy has feelings and an internal world, and he's able to call out his friend, and he's able to stand up to someone older than him. And it's really like it takes on some really nice layers.

Oh, and it illustrates perfectly this idea that we need people in our lives who aren't like us. A. I don't know if I've ever seen a movie that points out the importance of intergenerationalism, that, like, I don't know if I've ever seen a better movie of why young people need to hang out with old people and not because the old people are great. Like, you know, we clearly established earlier, Ed Asner sucks in this movie. He is meant, he is harsh. He uses sarcasm in a biting way against the child who doesn't understand what sarcasm is. There are so many flaws here, but the important elements of them hanging out is that they bring out the best in each other. And I think that that's just such an important element to human life, is that we can't isolate ourselves and expect for good things to come about. You get to see Russell start in one place and end in such a vastly different place. I mean, I'm even just realizing this now, man. So many parts of this movie are just so well written. It seems obvious, but they start in a metropolis and they end halfway across the world, and they also start emotionally in one place and end on the other side of the emotional world. There's just so much about this movie I love, man.

Yeah. I mean, you are, you led out of the gate by saying this is a perfect movie. So you kind of have to back up that statement every now and then. I get it, because it's a perfect movie. Bob, I want to talk really quickly. Go ahead, Steve.

No, I was just going to say, you know, if you look at the, at the Joseph Campbell hero cycle, you know, in the best stories, you actually have all the characters stepping through a different door and, and returning home with a different bounty. And that's what you have here, right? You have, you know, to use that thing about where they end up on the other side of the world. They do end up on the other side of the world. And, and the movie actually ends back home. And they both have come back with a much different bounty and returned from their adventure, changed in much different ways. And I think that's, that is really cool, right? They both had, had a reluctance to go for different reasons and they both, you know, went into the belly of the beast in different ways and they both came back with something else, you know, that, that added insight to their lives.

Yeah, I totally agree. And I want to talk really quickly about my favorite scene in the whole movie. And Brad, this movie. I think the, the unfair reputation of this movie is that it kind of gets the saving private Ryan treatment, that the first part of the movie is the best part and you don't need to watch the rest of it after that. I do think that the movie, the most well made part of the movie is that mini film you get for the first eleven minutes. I decided this time, because I've seen this movie like you 810 times, like, I'm not going to watch the first ten minutes. I'm going to start the movie right after he goes up, you know, alone into his house and it fades out. Because I want to see how the movie works without that montage. And it works really well. I mean, it's a great movie even without the best short film you've ever seen. But for me, the thing that worked the best about it is when they're not trying to do the Pixar manipulation, when, when there's not a lot of music, when they're not calling back to that montage. And it's the scene where Russell and him are just walking at night. And Russell starts opening up to him about the things he liked to do with his dad. And he talks about going and getting ice cream and sitting on the curb and watching the cars. And the story starts to go on and the details start to bore Carl. And you can see him roll his eyes, but there's no music. And then the camera cuts down to eye level with Russell and he's like, he has a five second pause and says, I really liked that curb. And then he says, I know it sounds boring, but I think sometimes the boring stuff is the stuff we remember the most. And that scene got me more than any other scene in the movie because they're not overdoing it. It just like that just hangs in the air for 10 seconds before we move on. I think it's the best written scene in the movie, and it earns its callback when they are sitting on the curb at the end of the film.

Yeah. I think that the reason that hits so deeply is because it speaks to a human truth that I don't think many people take seriously nowadays. And. And it's the reality that kids emotions are real. And that whether you are two or eight or 82, like, the emotions that we feel have deep, impactful meaning on who we are, on the intern, on the internal stories that we are telling about ourselves. Like, there is so much going on there. And for a film to take a child seriously, when he says, essentially, I feel sad that I don't get to have the relationship with my dad that I wish I had, that is a really honest, raw emotion that we all should take seriously, whether you are a child or a teenager or an adult.

And to Steve's point earlier, I actually think that that scene, whether you realize it as an audience member or not, it enriches the scene where Carl is looking at the scrapbook and sees that she says, go have another adventure. Because, Steve, you were saying this earlier. He feels inadequacy. He feels like he let her down by not giving her the scope of life that. That they had planned together. And it's when he looks and sees all these snapshots of them doing the most mundane things that they actually did have. Like, those things were, for her, an adventure. And I think that, like, for me, that's the emotional core of the movie. It's not even just the personal growth of Carl. It's this understanding that, like, the boring stuff of life is sometimes the most fun stuff. Like, it's the stuff that I look at my wife, and we have a laugh after we watch our kids do something, and then three weeks later, we're still talking about that thing. You never know what's gonna become, to borrow another Pixar term, like a core memory. And that's the stuff that makes life an adventure. Like, I don't know. I'm on my soapbox. I'm gonna step down for a minute.

No, that's a good soapbox to be on. You know, when I. If you really pressed me and you're like, well, why do you think you're a good travel writer? The reason that I would say is that I'm able to look at the world through new eyes over and over again. And I can look at my hometown that way. I can look at the town that I currently live in that way. And I can look at, you know, Uganda that way or Mozambique or Madagascar or anywhere else that I visit, you know, through really new and awe filled, awe inspired eyes. And I think that that's what, you know, Carl relearns throughout the story is like to shake the dust off in part, but also to kind of shake off those blinders, those like, oh, I've seen and done it all right. Like, he becomes less jaded.

Yeah, I think that's.

I think that's really, really special. You know, you're right. The small moments are the ones that matter. And obviously, that's a really well earned callback. I think it's interesting, you know, one story mechanism that I like that not all people like is what's called the clockwork universe. And, you know, the. In a Pixar movie, in all of them, you know, if a doorknob sticks on, you know, scene one, we know that that's the door that's not going to work when someone needs to get through it on scene 20. And I really enjoy that. I enjoy, you know, things getting tied up neatly with a bow at the end. I think it's really inspiring and fun, and it's a fun story construction that, that I also write with. So it's. Yeah, it's really enjoyable in this movie because it all feels really well earned. It doesn't feel slapped on. The references are really delicate. You know, there's a certain delicacy to this movie and Nemo, a certain vulnerability to them that, you know, even though they kind of star male characters, they're heavily. They're both movies are really heavily male. There's like a genteelness about them. There's like a certain femininity to them that I really like.

Yeah, no, I love that. I do want, before we move into. Let's make it a double, we've talked about Ed Asner. We've talked about the character of Russell. I do want to talk a little bit about, is it Muntz, the bad guy played by Christopher Plummer? Who?

Charles Muntz.

For all of my issues with the movie and, and it's really primarily focused on, like, all of the talking dog stuff. And how did this man get this technology? Like, the analytical side of my brain that wants to poke holes in the plot, it all has to do with the non human characters. And I was pleasantly surprised this time around because a lot of those gripes are still there, but they're not there when it's a conversation with Muntz. Himself. And I think one of the best made sequences in the movie is when they're having dinner on his blimp and the lighting gets more drastic and dark as it goes. And when he starts to piece together that these guys are hiding this bird from me, and then he flips the switch into like, hey, I'm gonna reveal to you that I murdered a bunch of people. I forgot that I was watching an animated film. It was. It was so engrossing, and the filmmaking technique was so well done. I felt legitimate suspense, and I have to give it up to Christopher Plummer as well. I think he really nailed the false hospitality into immediate threatening aura. It's just a really, really good voice performance.

Yeah, I agree. I agree. I think this is probably the first movie bold enough to take on the very idea of being an explorer and, you know, an expeditioner and then to the worst degree. Right. Like a discoverer, which then, like, the next that. What's the next stage of Discoverer? It would be conquistador. It would be like someone who, you know, there is this great conversation going around a little more now. It's like, where do museums get their stuff? And how did you know? I think the 2024 conversation is not Indiana Jones. It belongs in a museum. The 2024 Indiana Jones would be like, whose museum does it belong in?

Yeah.

And I think, you know, taking on this adventurer who will make a discovery at all costs and even, you know, lose all sense of ethics in order to be the bold explorer is, again, like a really. A really great, incisive critique of the male ego.

Well, and again, going back to a scene we mentioned earlier, the scene where Carl hauls all of his stuff out of his house so that his life can have kind of buoyancy. Again, it's a complete contrast to the villain character, who is so possessive of this one thing that he won't let anybody else share in the discovery, that he won't let anybody else threaten him to be first in the discovery. You know, it's. It's this complete contrast of possessiveness versus letting go of the stuff that. That doesn't matter. The stuff that doesn't make life worthwhile. Totally.

And where is he living?

Yeah. In a cave.

In a cave? In a cave. They did. They've, like, you know, Jung was, like, on the reading list. If that was the fake fact for the. I think it would have fooled us. Right. Man and his symbols was the key reading list for this movie. Could have maybe fooled you and me.

For me, that delineation between explorer and exploiter is what they really get at here. Because the reason Muntz is a villain isn't because he discovered parts of the world that had not been seen by western civilization before. It's because he was trying to exploit it for his own gain.

Yeah. Also the murder.

Exactly. I will do whatever it takes to prove myself right, to bring myself renown, money, fame, whatever else it is, versus, to use a real life example, I think of a John Muir. He is a world famous photographer, mountaineer, wilderness explorer, that it doesn't seem like he was out to exploit the untapped lands. He just wanted to capture it on film. He wanted to understand it for what it was and preserve it in the way it was. And it led to so many beautiful advancements in things like national parks and protecting these types of places. And so I think that there can be an explorer archetype that is interested in the beauty of the world for its own sake versus the beauty of the world for what it can bring me and for what I can exploit from it.

Totally. I mean, you know, a mutual friend of ours, Zach Johnson, and I have often debated this, because as an indigenous person, he's. He's a little bit jaded on it. And my core belief would be, you know, that old Mark Twain belief that, like, we need to travel the world, we need to see the world to, you know, turn, make our prejudices seem ridiculous. And, you know, the theme of my most recent novel was very overt, which was, like, in order to preserve the world, we have to see it in order to love it, right? Like, and to love it, will preserve it. And so I think there is a way to do all these things, but he's a great example of someone who's profiteering and gets caught up in this system that favors him and makes him larger than life and is sweet to his ego, etcetera.

Yeah, Brad, he reminds me a lot. Charles Muntz, as you describe him, of my guy, Ernesto della Cruz in the superior and much more perfect film, Coco.

False on the fact of superior.

Also perfect, though.

Hell of a movie, dude.

Also a perfect.

Coco is so good.

So these are the. These are the movies because I have a Pixar movie that. That I think is perfect.

Oh, okay. Let's hear it.

But it's not either of yours. So if those really.

These are not our. Let's make it a double. But I did tell Brad, you know, at some point, we need to do, like, the Pixar tiers. Listen, because the thing about Pixar is they've made, I think, 27 movies now. And I would say conservatively, half of them are like an eight and a half or better. Like, they're. Half of their output is legitimately great and then half of it is like, at best a six. And it's really interesting because no one ever debates the stuff that's six or lower. But I think everybody has, even among those 13 films, like, what's your ABC tier, Pixar? Before you get down into the Drex and like, so rattle off a couple.

Sixes so that I know. What's a six for you?

Oh, well, see, I don't want to step on whatever your perfect movie is, man.

No, I won't care. I won't. I know that I'm right about this. Don't worry. It's very rarely do I, am I that, like, Internet hole who goes like, I'm right. And if you don't like for tacos or something, if you don't like tacos this way, you're an idiot.

But I think most of the sequels I would put in, that's like Monsters University and finding Dory. I think both kind of go in there. I think that all of the cars movies are probably on that level for me.

What about the good dinosaur?

The good dinosaur was a disaster of a production. It's an okay movie and I actually think it's much better than it got credit for. But it certainly doesn't belong with Toy Story two or toy story three or Monsters, Inc. You know what I mean? Like, it's just. It's not there for me.

I hear that.

And now you're going to tell me that that was the one.

No. Yeah, it was. It was Monsters universe, my perfect movie. No. So. So I feel quite convinced that. That the best series movie that cinema has ever produced is the Toy Story movies. And I would make. I'm an Italian American, a proud Italian American. I have the exact same immigration story straight through Ellis island as Vito Corleone. I would quite seriously, and without being facetious, make the case. And Vince Mancini, the old uproxx film critic who's very famous and has been on this show, he and I would happily do it here on your show. But I would make the case that, you know, taken as a whole, the Toy Story movies are better than the Godfather series. I think that is an amazing, amazing series.

It is the rare trilogy where each film in succession gets better. And I would.

Have you seen the fourth one?

Oh, it's awful. No, it's fantastic. The first three. The first three are. The fourth one is completely apocryphal to the story that the first three told.

No, it's amazing. It's amazing.

Steve, I was with you. I was with you until you said the number four.

No, it's.

It is.

It is the handing over of white male authority.

Oh, oh, we're going there.

And yet the. Yeah, and yet the white male in question, like both white men who starred in that series, find really key roles. You know, Buzz decides that he's going to use his wisdom to be a support player. And, you know, Woody wants to keep being a star, but he knows that his, his time to govern things is over, and so he goes rogue. And those are both possible solution for a certain generation of white males. And those are both valid. I mean, you know, I think, oh, my God, the whole series is perfect.

I feel like two things have just happened. Number one is you need to just come back next week when we talk about Toy Story three. And number two, I feel like that third glass of whiskey finally hit, like, right as you were about to start talking right there.

It got me. These are my. These are my absolute favorite movies. And every movie night with my kids, it's so predictable that my three year old daughter wants encanto and that I want one of the Toy story movies.

Well, on that note, guys, let's. Let's pick something for this particular white male in up to be paired up with, with our final segment of the day. Let's make it a double. We're near the end of the episode, so thanks for listening to the film and whiskey show. Let's pair another film with this one. Even if it's struggle, 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, I'm going to go first because I think there's a lot of options, and we've thrown out a ton. We've thrown out pretty much every Pixar movie that you could pair this up with. We've thrown out a whole bunch of frag like, male fragility movies that you could pair this up with. I think I am going to glue this together with the secret Life of Walter Mitte, which I think is an inferior film to this, but is probably the closest in capturing the idea that, man, I wish I could remember exactly how they phrase it, but the idea of what is the. I think they call it the quintessence of life at the end of that film, and you get that great reveal of what the final cover of Life magazine actually is. And, man, that movie, it gets me every time up gets me every time. I love a good movie that reaffirms what it means to be alive. So that's my pick, dude.

Honestly, that was my pick as well. Oh, nice. I have a second choice. I just think the secret life of Walter Mitte especially captures one of the key elements of up in that life is life really starts, you know, when. What I said at the start, when you grab it by the horns and, like, Walter Mitte has that sense of inertia, that once he finally gets over it, he starts to understand what it means to be alive. And that, like, that's just so good. I'm going to pair this with another adventure movie, Bob. It's going to be a movie that we watched on this podcast before, and you are going to be so proud of me for picking this film. Are you ready?

I might. Can I take a guess?

Take a guess.

Is it the treasure of the Sierra Madre?

No.

That is a good guess.

I love me. Love me some Walter Houston.

All right.

Do I get a guess?

Yeah, go for it.

Romancing the stone.

No, we have not watched that.

We have not done that. We have done the african queen, which you didn't like. Is it that one?

No, it's not the african queen. Bob, I'm gonna pair this movie with the life of PI.

Ooh, life of PI. Good movie.

I just feel like watching these two films back to back would give you such a beautiful view of what it means to be a human and how to engage with your story. I think that's an element we didn't fully dive into in this episode, and that's okay. But, like, how important is it the story that we tell about ourselves? Right. And life of PI dives into that a little more with, did it actually happen or not? Is it all a metaphor? But I think that you see that here in up as well. Like, the story that he had been telling himself about his life since his wife passed was not the story that she had told herself about her life. And once he saw her side of the story, it changed. It gave color to how he viewed their life. And there's just so much beauty in that, in that storytelling aspect of life that I. Man, I just. I love it. I think the two of those. I think this and life of PI would be great together.

That was poetic. How do you follow that? That was like, listening to poetry, you.

Could only follow it by just completely undercutting it. You need to pair this with happy Gilmore.

Pie is terrible. That movie's awful. I don't think that's good at all. And the tigers just hang. Okay. I think I maybe misunderstood the prep work on this because I'm a little more direct. I think I spoiled. Spoiled. One of the ones that I had in mind early on, which is Harold and Maude feels like an antecedent to this movie. But I think, like, if it was a double feature, obviously, you know, with me watching this age of movies, I'm thinking about my kids a fair bit. I think that Nemo is the right pick in the sense that you're talking about. People who have lost someone and in loss have become safe, and in that safety, make themselves smaller. And eventually you just get this image of their ribs starting to pop. Right. Or the waistcoat that they're wearing starting to snap the buttons off, and their life becoming expansive again. And their life, you know, finding bigness and finding scale again, and understanding that the scale of life is, you know, to the most part, what we make it. And I think that's. That's a really powerful moment.

Yeah. All right, so three bangers, Brad, if I can add a fourth banger that I thought of as you were talking, you inspired me again.

Ooh. That's what I do.

Bob, I thought a lot about the ending scene to Fargo, where Francis McDormand.

Shoves him into that wood shop.

No, not that one. Where Frank Dormant and John Carol lynch are in bed, and he's bemoaning the fact that he didn't make the stamp that he wanted. And then she just reminds him, like, you know, we're doing pretty good, man. And they just completely reframe. Like, that is one of my favorite.

That is one of my favorite scenes in any movie ever.

So if you want to go from the violence of up to the violence of the Coen brothers, you could totally escalate things with Fargo as well.

The only way that up and Fargo could have been paired is if at the end, instead of just, like, falling off into oblivion, he actually fell into one of the blimp propellers. And you like, see?

Yeah, that's great. That's the director's cut we were talking about. All right, guys, it's time to give this movie some final scores. Once again, I'll get mine out of the way first, because I think I'm gonna be the lowest among us. Here's the thing, Brad. The stuff with the dogs really bothers me, and I think that it's the element of the movie that they really just didn't develop enough. I'm not saying I need a fully realized world built out on this island, but if you're gonna make a guy be a Bond villain, I need a little bit more explanation for, like, how did he get the technology to build talking dogs?

What is with you in backstory this season, Bob, I just, like.

You are constantly, like, sense, dude.

Just give me ten more minutes of how Obi Wan and Qui Gon became who they are.

Either listen. Either.

I'm sorry, Steve. This has been an ongoing tussle throughout the season.

Either build out the world or don't. And I feel like there's too much of it in the movie for it to be unexplained. And I think you just said, either.

Build the world or don't. They chose not to, and you're not.

They chose not to, but they're trying to have their cake and eat it, too, with all of these inventions and things. Like, it's funny.

I had. I had never thought of this issue, but I actually. Now I'm completely aligned with you. It is a narrative cheat. Right? They were like, oh, this guy's alone. He needs to have villains. The villains need to be able to communicate. Let's give them voice boxes.

Yes.

But, you know, that's. That's. That's a clear, like, lampshade narrative cheat.

He's been there since, like, the 1940s. Where in the hell is he getting. Maybe one of the people he murdered was, like, a secret tech billionaire, and he just brought all of his component parts.

He just needed the scene of him having dinner with him.

Yeah.

Learning his secret.

And a guy being like, can I show you my new dog collar? And he's like, I know what I'm gonna do now.

You will not get me to accept a loss on or accept, you know, a critique of Toy Story movies this quickly. But I. You completely sold me on this critique.

Everything with the human characters is, like, a ten out of ten. I just think they spend too much time with Doug the talking dog and Kevin the giant bird, and it takes away from what they're trying to do at the rest of the movie. I was. I came into this episode. Brad, you will be happy to hear this. I came into this episode. I was going to give it either a seven and a half or an eight. Uh, I'm between an eight and a half or a nine now. So you've talked me up that far. But I'm going to stick. This is in my b tier of Pixar films. I'm going to give it an 8.5 out of ten.

I. Yeah, right? 8.5.

Yeah.

Don't. Don't gripe. What do you.

Come on, man.

You were going to give this a seven.

No, a 7.5.

Oh, man. So much better. Bob, this is a ten out of ten movie. I have watched this enough times, and I've come up and down on it. I've always been in the nine to nine and a half range. I think that this time through, there's just an element of the character writing for each and every character, including the bird, including Doug, that all just meshed together so well to point to the things that humans need to thrive that I just think makes it one of the most beautiful films.

Yeah. I mean, I do think you have to kind of admit, though, that even if it is a ten out of ten for you, it's the kind of ten where the success rate of the movie kind of covers for any flaws that it has. It's not a flawless movie, and I think you kind of have to acknowledge.

That there's no such thing as a flawless movie.

I mean, we've watched Casablanca, so I would beg to differ.

Let me talk to you guys about this Toy Story series.

Now, I think what the fun thing with Pixar, like I said, is we can have legitimate arguments where you feel offended that I gave a movie an eight and a half and not a ten, but with that upper tier of Pixar movies, every time you watch them, you know, for a long time, I would argue that Toy story two was a ten out of ten. And the last time I watched it, I was like, all right, maybe this is a 9.5, but I was always a little bit lower on Toy Story three. I thought it tried too hard. And then I watched it this last time, and I was like, this is the greatest film ever made. Like, what? Perfect movie?

No, that's a fun thing about filmmaking in general. And I think that's, you know, I had a great talk with my son because his teacher explained to him what, like, fiction and nonfiction was. And I'm a novelist for a living. And he came. He came, and he wanted to only read nonfiction books because they happened. And we had a big talk about the Disney movies and the Pixar movies and how the emotional truths they get at are true, are completely true. And as nonfiction as it gets when it comes to emotional truths, and they really deal with heavy stuff, which this whole conversation has underscored.

Yeah. I mean, the best stories in the world will highlight truths about ourselves that we didn't know were there. And like, any story's ability to draw that out, be it a biography that we read, a nonfiction, a fiction, a movie we watch, like.

Yeah.

That ability to show us that life isn't always what we plan it to be. But there's beauty in the chaos that ensues. And it's not where you end up. It's the way in which you get to your final destination that matters. These are human truths that all of us are kind of bound by. And yet, the best stories are the ones that nail it home in our hearts.

I love it. All right, Steve, first of all, thank you so much for joining us. It's great to officially meet you. You've been mentioning a couple times that you are a novelist as kind of a side trade here. Tell us a little bit about your books and where we can find them.

Yeah, so my first novel is called the Danger Gang and the Pirates of Borneo, and it's also about adventurers, and adventurers who get lost in far off lands and a boy who sees his life as larger than life. And there's a lot of overlap, actually, with up the more I think about it, including a dirigible that's flown across the seas. So the sequel to that book is called the Danger Gang and the Isle of Feral Beasts. And my third novel just came out in October, and it's called the Race for the Ruby Turtle. And just last week, it won a couple of different awards, but it won the Green Book honor, which is, you know, the National Environmental Writing Novel selection committee. So was a cool moment for that book, and obviously one for me. So, yeah, please check those out if you like these themes. Here's some other examples.

Man, Steve, it just seems like all things are pointing up for Steve Brimucci right now. And obviously, that has all culminated the capstone in being on the film and Whiskey podcast.

That's what it is.

All right, folks, that has been Steve Bramucci. He is head of content at Uproxx. You can check us out again next week when we'll be returning to the Pixar, well, to watch a maybe perfect film, 20 ten's toy Story three. But if you want to tell us a little bit more about up your relationship to it or where it falls in your Pixar tiers ranking, Brad, where can they find us?

You can find us on Instagram X. Are we still on Facebook, Bob?

We're still on Facebook with the boomers.

We're still on Facebook with the boomers. Our handle on all of the aforementioned sites.

Isilmwhiskey or you can join us on our discord. There's a link to our discord in every single one of our show notes. Brad and I are on there pretty much every day talking to you guys, fans of the film and whiskey podcast. So check us out there. Check us out on the socials. Check out Steve and his books if you get a chance, and join us next week for Toy Story three. But until then, I'm Bob Buck. I'm Brad G. And we'll see you next time.