0:00

Welcome to Movie Crush, a production

0:02

of I Heart Radio. Hey,

0:29

everybody, Welcome to Movie Crush. Charles W. Chuck

0:31

Bryant Here Home Studio, Pot City Market, Atlanta,

0:33

Georgia. Friday Interview addition, Colleague

0:37

Edition Colleague colleague

0:39

for a long time, for a long

0:42

time, dude, like sucking twelve years?

0:44

Yeah, twelve years. You can curse on the show,

0:46

you know, I can? And that exciting. I

0:49

don't even know if I'll be able to do it. I

0:51

know, right it had It took getting

0:53

you sup for me, But now I like have the

0:55

worst mouth on the show. I've

0:57

heard a couple of episodes that are a little a

1:00

little blue, but in the best way. So

1:03

some of you might recognize this voice. I'm sitting

1:05

down with Matt Frederick, one of

1:07

my old pals, an old

1:09

colleague. We've been working together for like twelve years,

1:11

like I just said, And Matt, you

1:13

know we all started out here. Uh. I

1:16

was a writer and you were in the video department.

1:18

Yes, along, you were kind of one of the first

1:20

ones, you and Tyler. Is that right, that's correct?

1:22

Yeah. I came on as an intern in two thousand

1:24

and six. Wow, Yeah, thirteen

1:27

years ago. You're an intern. I was an intern.

1:29

It's adorable, straight out of college from

1:32

what Georgia statee or just state Film

1:34

and Video department, right, So you got a job.

1:36

And that's when we were doing videos, and we were

1:38

making videos for the web site

1:41

into the Web and then we got

1:43

bought by Discovery and did like YouTube

1:45

stuff and everyone was

1:47

like, no one wants to see anybody anymore,

1:50

dude. Back in the day, we were trying to make podcasts

1:52

that were videos to go on iTunes

1:54

because there was a whole section on iTunes for

1:57

video podcasts. That's how

1:59

stuff I don't want you to know I got started. It was

2:01

video. Yeah, it was iTunes video

2:04

podcast. Well that was the next thing

2:06

coming out of my mouth. As you're the one of the co

2:08

host of stuff they don't want you to know. You

2:10

are now a what's your official title?

2:12

Executive producer. I'm lead executive

2:14

producer or ep I.

2:17

I don't know, it's not I'm not taking credit for anything.

2:19

But I remember when all these big transitions were

2:21

happening, I met with all you guys who

2:24

always thought of as like, you know, little brothers,

2:26

and said, listen, dudes, which

2:28

thing changes in the air and my advice

2:31

is get on the audio wagon. I

2:33

remember this clearly because I think that's where

2:35

it's headed. And unless you want to go

2:38

work at another company and do video, then

2:41

be an audio producer. And you all did.

2:44

Yeah, like everybody. Well, that's the thing about

2:46

this place, how stuff works. You know, no

2:48

matter who owns it or you know what entity

2:51

is at the top of that name, the people

2:54

have largely unchanged. And I think it's

2:56

because of the people that are here. I think

2:59

you're right. Yeah, I mean, no

3:01

one was like screw this, I'm out of here. Everyone

3:04

adapted and changed. Casey you

3:06

Tyler, Paul, I

3:09

guess Paul was. I mean he's he's quote unquote

3:11

new. Paul is newer. Annie has been here.

3:13

I didn't realize how long any had been here, which he's

3:15

been here, what like eight or ten years? I think

3:17

nine or ten. Yeah, yeah, that's

3:20

great man, All

3:22

of you like what we're doing here. For everybody

3:24

out there who even cares at all, the

3:27

house Stuff Works team is pretty cool.

3:29

I think people do care. I think they like to know

3:31

that. You know, we've all been working together a long time

3:33

and we're all like invested in each other's lives

3:36

and like, you've grown up now. I saw you

3:38

get married, well, not in person. I wasn't invited.

3:40

That's okay. Hey, hey

3:43

in South Florida, so I didn't invite you to my wedding here.

3:46

Uh, but we've all seen each other get married

3:48

and have children, and our kids are about the same

3:50

age and just kind of this really neat

3:52

thing to see everyone grow up. You're a grown

3:54

man now. You were just a child. Yeah,

3:57

thirty six as of just a

4:00

couple of days. It's crazy. You guys are always going to

4:02

be twenty two and twenty three years old to me,

4:04

me too, And that means hopefully I'm always

4:06

going to be thirty six. Well, yeah, hopefully

4:09

we can all keep our I forget

4:11

the actual title of this or the term

4:13

for this within the movie we're gonna talk about today,

4:16

but our ourselves, our matrix

4:19

selves representations. I was your age

4:21

actually when I started roughly

4:24

wow, because I'm forty eight,

4:26

yeah, twelve thirteen years ago. Well

4:28

sir, you do not look a day over

4:31

thirty eight. Please.

4:33

I didn't have gray hair when I started on my beard,

4:36

Yeah, I remember that. Yeah, now it's it's

4:38

there's a lot of it there had

4:41

ale my hair when I started. So you're

4:43

a lead EP now and you work, you've still got

4:45

out of your hair. What are you talking about? You get great hair? Uh?

4:48

Are you playing drums these days? By the way, I am not,

4:50

man, I want to so badly. So if you're

4:52

listening and you're in the Atlanta area and

4:55

you need a drummer, give me a shout. Do

4:57

you still have a drum set? I do what it's

4:59

set up. It is set up. It's

5:01

in my parents basement. Oh well,

5:04

so you have to cover there. Yeah, so you literally

5:06

haven't touched drumsticks? And how long?

5:09

And I every time I go, like we'd take

5:12

my son to go see

5:14

I go in the basement for a while. Like I just say,

5:16

honey, everybody, just give me, give me thirty

5:18

he'll be back. See. That makes me feel good. That's what I

5:20

wanted to hear. It would have really disappointed

5:22

me if you're like, yeah, I don't even have any interest anymore.

5:25

Oh no, man, No, that you

5:27

know that blew my mind. I don't know how many people

5:29

know who Connell is the number

5:31

one important, most important powerful person

5:34

in podcasting. Uh

5:36

yeah, Connall's our boss who literally

5:38

commissioned all these podcasts many many

5:40

years ago. When I first met him,

5:42

I was in a meeting in a place called the

5:44

fish Bowl, Uh, in our old office.

5:47

He came in to talk to us in Roxanne

5:50

and everybody who was there, and he

5:53

somebody casually mentions or somehow

5:55

it it's brought up that he was a touring musician

5:57

and he used to be and her touring as

5:59

a singer and guitars. And I was

6:01

like, true, sorry, Oh. I was

6:03

like, dude, do you still play You know, I

6:06

got my sticks, I got my kids. Let's go man. And

6:08

he was just like, I don't play music

6:10

anymore. That's

6:12

very conal. He's like,

6:14

yeah, I was. We were signed to a major label

6:17

and I was touring through Europe. But like, no, I don't

6:19

do that ymore. Don't worry about that. He's a very talented

6:21

guy. Seriously. So, now

6:23

you were a lead EP of some of the biggest shows

6:25

in podcasting. Uh. You were leadp on

6:27

Atlanta Monster and voice

6:30

that as well. Right, So I don't

6:32

mean to correct you. On Atlanta Monster,

6:34

I was supervising producer, okay,

6:37

And then we'll set the record straight. And

6:39

then on the second season, I

6:41

was host and then became executive

6:44

producer on that show too. Okay, and

6:47

uh, you're now working with Aaron

6:49

Manky, one of the biggest names in podcasting.

6:52

On his stuff, he were assigned his slate because

6:54

you're killer and they knew you do a great job

6:57

what you're doing. You know, I

6:59

think I'm doing a Hey, I'm still here. That's that's

7:01

what I'm like basing everything on. I

7:03

still have an office. What's new? What's going coming

7:05

up? Is there anything can talk about that you want to tease?

7:08

H? Yeah, I can tease a couple of things. If

7:10

you haven't listened to Noble Blood yet, I

7:13

certainly would. And that is about the

7:15

royalty. Yeah, it's relatively

7:18

unknown stories of royalty, but told

7:20

in a very narrative way, even

7:23

though their true stories. It's Dana Schwartz who's

7:25

the host, and she just does a great job telling

7:27

you the story in a way that flows,

7:30

similar to the way Aaron Manky tells stories on Lore

7:32

and some of the other shows Um and

7:34

also Unobscured, which the first season

7:37

was all about the Salem witch Trials. The

7:39

second season is coming out later this year

7:41

around October. Can you say what it's about yet or

7:43

is it a secret? Maybe

7:46

Aaron keeps a lot of that close to his chest, so

7:48

I would rather not speak to it. But it's really it's

7:50

really cool, awesome. I can't wait. You'll

7:52

tell me off, Mike, right, yeah, okay, sorry

7:55

everyone perks of working here. Uh

7:57

yeah, So man has become one of like the best leadps

8:00

we have. You're assigned some of the

8:03

most high profile stuff, and it's

8:05

a testament to the work you do, my friend. Now

8:07

stop it and thank you. So let's talk the Matrix.

8:11

I'm glad you picked this one, and you picked this one a while

8:13

ago. I've sort of been well, I'm holding it

8:15

for you. No one else asked to do it. But uh,

8:19

it's fucking twenty years old, which is crazy to think

8:21

about, and I have not seen

8:23

it. Um. I was trying to remember

8:25

the last time I saw the Matrix, and I saw

8:27

it quite a few times back then, but

8:30

it's probably been at least fifteen

8:32

years since i've seen it. Oh yeah,

8:34

I haven't seen it in a long, long, long, long

8:36

time. I realized when I was watching it and

8:39

the short answer you stopped by my desk yesterday

8:41

kind of like a little nervous, like did it

8:43

hold up or not? And boy, it held

8:46

up for me. I'll tell you. Last

8:48

time I watched it was two

8:50

thousand three, okay, wow, yeah,

8:53

yeah. And I know specifically because my wife

8:55

had never seen it and I

8:58

at the time she was just my girlfriend. But

9:00

I was like, you have never seen the Matrix.

9:03

That's pretty unusual. I think. Yeah,

9:06

So we had a young American. It's

9:08

not like she was eight years old or like

9:11

fifty. She was in that wheelhouse. Yeah,

9:13

when she was an actor too, and she was plugged into

9:16

you know, pop culture and everything, and I figured

9:18

it would be you know, up for her. It

9:21

wasn't. And I forget sometimes that it

9:24

is a serious action

9:26

sci fi like movie.

9:29

Diana not into that stuff. That is the

9:31

opposite of what she's looking for. If

9:34

it's got Judd Apatow involved

9:36

or a hilarious person, then that's

9:38

that is her wheelhouse. So that makes

9:40

sense. Did she like it though when she saw it? I

9:43

think so. It

9:46

doesn't sound like that we had We had some we

9:48

had some cool discussion, but you know a lot of times

9:51

that's me harping on something

9:53

like we're probably gonna talk about it later, and

9:55

then her just going Okay, I guess

9:57

I can see that said, that's a cool discussion in

10:00

your house generally,

10:02

like me, come on, Emily, watch the Hangover.

10:05

We'll have a cool discussion about it. Uh.

10:07

It really held up for me, man, it was and

10:11

I think in context now, especially to

10:13

see something that was twenty years old

10:16

but so revolutionary at the time. And it's

10:19

very easy to forget how

10:21

revolutionary it was when so

10:23

many imitators came after um

10:26

and and And it's not like the

10:28

Matrix was the most original thing ever, like they

10:30

borrowed installed. We might as well

10:32

talk about all that stuff from manga and

10:34

and any sci fi movie ever. So

10:36

it's not like it was the most original thing ever. Tons

10:39

of tons of comic book

10:41

yeah, like you said, manga and comic book shots,

10:44

like you can just see it. You can see the pages

10:46

turning on the on the screen. And

10:48

also the story, the overall

10:51

story, if you take out the sci fi

10:53

stuff, is a very old

10:55

story. It's biblical exactly,

10:57

you know, it's Jesus in some ways. In

11:00

a lot of ways, it's uh, it's

11:02

almost a superhero origin story

11:04

in a lot of ways. I

11:07

think it was just at the time and

11:09

the way they skinned the movie, it

11:12

just felt like something we had never seen before.

11:14

It's a bit of a magic trick they played to

11:17

seem totally fresh and original and new, and

11:19

all these other people in the know at the time, we're like, dude,

11:21

they're totally ripping off this, this and this' Think

11:24

about the first thing you see when you

11:26

start this movie. You know, it's just showing

11:28

you the production companies and everything. That green

11:30

logo overlay with

11:32

all that, God, I mean, for

11:34

me, that became so iconic. Yeah, just

11:37

that even that tone, that color. Yep,

11:40

I loved it. I felt all the green like,

11:42

uh, I mean the whole movie is green.

11:45

Every I'm sure they just had a green filter over

11:48

every single shot of the movie, but that there's

11:50

something about them going with that, like

11:53

pushing all their chips in on

11:56

a color, which is pretty

11:58

crazy, you know, man, it's like,

12:00

let's make a green movie. Yeah,

12:02

but it's so iconic now. Well and then, oh

12:05

man, my wife was pulling up trivia

12:07

because we watched it last night for the second time. Did

12:09

she like anybody? She liked it better? She really

12:11

did. We were more into it. But again, I'm sitting

12:13

next to her like clacking away on my computer

12:16

taking notes. I'm transcribing most

12:18

of the quote I want to talk to you about.

12:20

I'm just like, oh, I forgot about that one.

12:22

Just feel free to throw out a quote whatever you come by.

12:25

Oh yeah, we're gonna we're gonna do some monologueing.

12:27

I think there's some soliloquies we gotta get into.

12:31

But um, yeah, I even forgot

12:33

where I was because it was just so that

12:36

opening scene. We're looking at the trivia and

12:39

she was telling me that it took four days to shoot, just

12:41

that opening scene from the moment

12:43

where uh, spoiler alert do you give

12:45

spoiler alerts? Everybody here knows where this

12:48

is spoiled away? Okay, cool, So

12:52

it turns out you didn't look like it for a

12:54

minute. But it turns out so

12:57

when Trinity is sitting there alone in

13:00

that abandoned building that all the

13:02

police show up, they opened the door, she's sitting there,

13:04

and that fight scene that occurs. One of the first

13:07

things we see is her

13:10

doing a jump kick. She jumps

13:12

into the air, spreads her arms like a sucking

13:14

spider or something or crane, and

13:17

we get that slow motion pan yeah,

13:19

bullet time. Yeah. Well, well, it wasn't called that

13:21

until later, but sure, yeah, we get that shot

13:23

almost off the bat. Yeah,

13:25

and I forgot that that. I mean, I

13:27

I knew it. I guess it's just I forgot that they

13:29

were giving you that much in

13:32

the beginning to ramp up the

13:34

tension, the jumps from the buildings

13:36

that you get almost immediately, and just

13:38

the badass fighting kinetic

13:41

and there's so much energy to it and the

13:43

black leather and it was so stylish

13:45

and like cool and

13:48

that jump and the bullet time. Like I

13:51

remember sitting in the theater and seeing that

13:53

happen and feeling like

13:55

my brain exploded because it was

13:57

it's so many people copied

13:59

it. It's so old hat now no one was

14:02

saying. His daughter they watched it together

14:04

and she was like, oh, that's kind of cheesy, and like I've seen that

14:06

a million times, Like to see

14:08

it on screen the very first time and

14:10

not knowing you know, I'm a film guy, you're a film

14:12

guy, Like, how did they do that? I

14:14

had to stop myself from trying to figure

14:16

out how the funk they did that shot. It felt

14:18

like seeing a magic trick and

14:21

and really, yea, so cool.

14:24

My brain exploded in the movie theater. Um,

14:27

yeah, I mean right off the bat, they and the other thing

14:29

that I kind of forgot. I

14:32

did voice to text too. That's some funny. It's like

14:34

so many of these words are misspelled, but the

14:36

steaks are set and it's spelled like the cut

14:38

of meat, the steaks, but

14:41

the stakes are set right away with that voice over. And

14:44

I don't even remember that

14:46

voice over at the beginning, with um

14:51

Trinity talking to Morpheus.

14:53

Yeah, we're going to kill him, but Morphias

14:55

says he or no way is it Joey pants?

14:59

Yeah, I think it's Joey Hants talking

15:01

to two uh yeah,

15:04

Cipher and Trinity. Cipher always forget all the names.

15:06

Well and so okay, Morpheus says

15:09

he's the one, like they say it right at the beginning,

15:11

but the first time you see the movie, you don't even know what they're talking

15:13

about, dude. And for

15:16

me, that has such interesting

15:18

biblical uh

15:21

meaning there with the betrayer

15:24

and the savior essentially of the guy,

15:27

like having this conversation at the top. It's

15:29

all over the place in this movie, like the story is

15:31

as old as time. Like you said, well,

15:33

the movie is so smart to do that because you don't

15:35

even know the significance at that moment, but it

15:37

is truly significant. Well, and it was

15:39

one of these where repeated viewings back

15:42

in the day where like you saw so much

15:44

more, you understood so much more, even

15:46

though it's not a complex movie, like all these

15:48

little like teasers along the way, so

15:51

great. Can I tell you a little bit about why this

15:53

movie meant so much to me, why I wanted to cover it with you?

15:55

Absolutely? Okay, So

15:57

picture Matt Frederick. You

15:59

don't know what I look like, I'm assuming, but just

16:02

picture of this thing, but in corporeal

16:04

form. He's living in for scythe

16:06

County, Georgia, coming Georgia. That's where

16:08

is where you growing up? That's me, this guy. Yeah,

16:11

that's where I grew up. And yet you became a

16:13

good liberal. Well, well,

16:15

I'm pretty sure everything

16:18

happens for a reason and

16:20

and what not. Really

16:22

I don't truly believe that. But in this way, it's

16:24

the the idea that I had a

16:27

reaction to my environment, right,

16:29

and a lot of times it's a rubber banding

16:31

effect kind of thing. I think that's what occurred. And

16:33

also had an incredible appearance growing

16:36

up there who were not from for Scyth County. Um.

16:40

Not to look, I'm not poo pooing

16:42

you for Sath. It's just you

16:44

know, there's some stuff going on up there. Y'all know

16:46

what it is the way the way it is,

16:49

um. But I was living there. I had

16:51

grown up in the church, the Methodist Church

16:53

specifically, and I

16:56

internalized that heavily as

16:58

I was becoming teenager, you know,

17:01

middle school, high school, and my

17:03

philosophy was so rooted in

17:06

the Bible and taking it literally

17:08

and reading the stories as though

17:11

Moses really did these things,

17:13

as though you're talking about me too, my child

17:15

as well. Yeah, yeah, except I was Baptist.

17:17

Oh there you go even worse. Well,

17:20

I don't know there there's a there's

17:23

a certain boring quality to Methodist

17:26

services, um

17:29

that I don't see again a lot of Baptist services.

17:31

But in anyway, that's just no again, no offense

17:33

to you Methodists out there first

17:35

United Methodist Church, Shambly,

17:37

Georgia and uh coming

17:40

okay, So um, that that's

17:43

my worldview. It's very solidified.

17:45

So because

17:48

this came out March, I think March thirty

17:50

one or March, um,

17:54

my worldview is so solidified that when

17:57

I walk into that theater to go see a cool

17:59

action movie that I'm excited about. The trailers

18:01

look great. The taglines have been so crazy

18:03

cool, like free your mind? Oh

18:06

what you only to free my mind? What is

18:08

the matrix? I don't know. Let's go find out what the matrix

18:10

is? George Clinton Ship seriously, the

18:13

matrix has you? Um?

18:15

So walk into that theater. I

18:17

watched the movie and I couldn't

18:20

tell you that I truly remember watching

18:22

it for the first time. It

18:25

felt more like the movie happened to me, um

18:28

because it was the first major

18:31

crack in the armor of my established

18:34

word. You where I And

18:36

again, it's just a movie. I know it's fiction. I'm

18:38

in there. I understand all of that. But it

18:40

caused me to think,

18:42

well, maybe I don't know everything, because

18:44

I think what religion a lot of times will do to us

18:47

is cause us to believe that we have the answer,

18:49

we understand, like what humans are,

18:51

what we're meant to do on this planet,

18:54

and all these things, and don't don't explore any further

18:56

because it's all right here. Yeah you got the answers already.

18:59

Uh. This this movie really did

19:02

move things in a direction of discovery

19:04

for me. Wow, that's great. Yeah.

19:07

Yeah, for me, it was a religion class in college.

19:10

Dude, I wasn't there yet, but as soon

19:12

as I took a religion class in college, that's

19:15

when things took a bit of a one eighty. Yeah,

19:18

that's interesting. We studied Judaism, Hinduism,

19:20

and uh jeez,

19:22

what was the third one? I can't remember.

19:25

Judaism and Buddhism. Maybe Buddhism, dude.

19:27

I remember thinking, oh, wait

19:29

a minute. First of all, they're all sort of the same.

19:32

How is that possible? Yeah, and

19:35

yeah, I learned a lot. It really opened my mind. Oh

19:37

man, me too. Yeah. For me, it was a lot of

19:39

the um kind

19:41

of the old old more

19:43

what would be considered pagan or like Wicca

19:46

and some of these religions that

19:48

that focus on nature above

19:50

a lot of other things that really like

19:53

just broke me out of everything

19:55

because I because I could connect with all the things

19:58

that that we're being worshiped in venerated,

20:01

and I was like, oh, okay, that kind of

20:03

makes sense. So

20:11

you were sixteen then roughly

20:13

when this came out. Wow. And

20:16

then on my seventeenth birthday, I

20:18

had a birthday party at my parents basement.

20:21

Hopefully there's one person listening that was at

20:23

that party. Um, it was

20:26

my sister probably listening. She

20:28

was there. It was a combination

20:31

Matrix Steve Irwin party, so

20:34

you could either come. You could either

20:36

come as dresses your matrix

20:38

self, bring your leather, or bring your

20:40

short cargo pants. That's

20:44

adorable. It was amazing. Wow,

20:46

I just I want to put you in my pocket right now. Well,

20:49

you'll The other funny thing to remember about this film

20:52

too, in context of when it came out, is

20:55

a few months before a movie

20:57

called Episode one, The Phantom Menace.

21:00

But yeah, not a good look for George

21:02

Lucas to be bested

21:04

at his own game and preemptively,

21:07

you know, when these two directors that I

21:09

had never heard of came through and

21:12

created this thing, and

21:14

then it

21:16

feels like it's old and dated

21:19

and like this seems so fresh and like cyberpunk

21:22

and kinetic and like cutting edge. And

21:25

it's like I said, it's easy now to some

21:27

people like Noel thought it was a little dated now

21:30

to look. But in the context of it

21:32

was right there of the

21:35

millennium. Oh yeah, you know it was

21:37

everyone was thinking about this like stuff. Yes,

21:40

it was on everybody's mind. Y t K was was

21:42

like that their fear was real. It's

21:45

crazy to think about. But so

21:48

there are a couple of dated things I want to hit right here, just because

21:50

we pushed on that, um the cell

21:52

phone that Neo opens that

21:54

the first time. Yeah, yeah,

21:57

that's great, and my wife was like, oh my god, that's

21:59

the cheese. This there's a terrible They couldn't

22:01

think of a cooler phone. That's because

22:03

that's the coolest phone. It was so the

22:05

coolest phone. Well at the time,

22:07

you know, if you're gonna have a phone, it was a flippy maybe,

22:10

but usually it's a brick and or

22:13

if you had a lot of money, you had that razor flip phone,

22:15

the razor into a thin fish.

22:17

But again, like this thing, they just

22:19

like, look cool. The kinetic

22:21

movement of it. It was bad ass.

22:23

So that one my wife thought was hilariously

22:26

bad. But then the other one is

22:29

Morpheus's sunglasses. They're

22:31

great. Do you remember these? Yeah, man, there's no

22:34

uh whatever these are called what

22:36

are these called? The thing that sits on your ears the arms,

22:38

yeah, the arms, the legs. You just pinch it

22:40

and you watch him do it and come puts him on. He

22:42

just like Hinch I forgot he put

22:44

him on in that one scene he said something

22:46

and then just like tenches him on his nose because

22:49

they look cool when they're sitting on his face. Cool

22:51

for Morpheus. Yeah, I wouldn't wear that shed

22:54

Yeah, but they look good on Laurence Fishburne.

22:56

They did that. Morpheus is so

22:58

great. So they had the open fight and

23:00

you get one of already out of the gate. You get one

23:02

of the best lines of the film.

23:05

Oh, I know what it is. You are you gonna say to you?

23:07

Well, you say it because I want to see if it's got to be the same

23:10

one, Are you sure? Yeah, go ahead, you give

23:12

me that jurism addiction crap and

23:14

you can cram it up your ass.

23:17

Okay, all right, that was mine. Uh

23:19

my line is your men are

23:21

already dead. Yep. That was literally

23:23

the next one that I have here. All Right, I figured, because

23:27

well we should talk about um,

23:29

we should talk about him in that character one

23:31

of the great villains of all time Smith, Yes,

23:35

like one of the great movie villains ever, one

23:37

of the great bad guys. And the decision

23:39

by the wikowskis too um.

23:42

I think it was a smart decision to make the agents

23:45

so fucking scary

23:47

and intimidating, yet put them

23:50

in these black suits with glasses and mysterious

23:52

and you don't know even what they are, and they're

23:54

never up or down like he's always steady.

23:57

But you know, is bad

24:00

uses all of them? Are they fucking

24:02

run from agents? Yeah? And no

24:04

one's ever beaten one up? Yeah, exactly,

24:06

everyone has died. It's interesting to

24:08

me how they represent um,

24:12

both like a you know, representations

24:15

of an FBI agent or a corporate

24:18

boss, or the way that suit

24:20

lands on them, the way it sits on them, the way

24:22

their sunglasses are, the earwigs,

24:25

Yeah, the secret service style. They

24:27

represent a whole lot of power structure

24:30

really really in a sleek

24:32

way, would say, and that

24:35

the cold calculated,

24:37

like the way their eyes function,

24:39

the way they move, the way they look and they function

24:42

together. It's just it's representative

24:44

of a lot of the negative

24:47

things that this movie, or this movie takes to be negative

24:49

things. Yeah, there are some larger

24:51

statements going on I think in this film.

24:54

Yeah, behind the scenes, and they

24:56

distill a lot of things into a symbol

24:59

in this movie. Yeah. Absolutely. Um.

25:02

Also in the opening scene, aside from the

25:04

great jump in the bullet time. I have to say

25:06

when when she runs on the wall, that

25:10

was another scene that blew that part that

25:12

blew me away because immediately

25:14

you're just like, these people have some

25:16

kind of superpower. But this is before

25:18

MCU and all that stuff, so we didn't

25:20

know what that meant or look like. Like we hadn't been

25:23

over inundated with superhero

25:25

movies. Yeah, it

25:27

wouldn't play as well now. And

25:29

it was so odd because they didn't feel

25:32

like superheroes, but they were doing

25:34

superhero things. They look really

25:36

interesting on screen, you know, with

25:38

the latex of leather and all those things,

25:40

especially Trinity in that opening scene. But

25:42

Carrie and Moss was so hot. My

25:46

my wife and I were bonding a little bit about that.

25:48

She was like, oh my god. It was on that first scene.

25:51

Actually, no, it was the scene the next

25:53

scene, right

25:56

after Neo wakes up at his computer. Then

25:58

he follows the White Rabbit. They're in that

26:00

club. Since she gets in his ear, she's talking

26:02

to him right in the nape of his essensual I

26:05

remember like feeling as though I was falling

26:07

alow with her. You were sixteen, dude. In

26:10

the Methodist point you probably didn't know the feelings. You would

26:12

be like, I didn't understand that that would never happen

26:14

to me. I was like, I

26:16

like that. Well,

26:19

she was so sexy and cool and

26:21

like strong and like she was

26:23

a badass. She was like everything you wanted

26:26

and like, uh in a movie like this, and

26:29

I can't imagine being like I'm remembering

26:31

sixteen year old Baptist Chuck like mine

26:33

would have been blown. The movies were not the school or

26:36

sexy back then. It's the kind of thing where everything

26:38

in my body wants to cover my eyes

26:41

and not look and then just peep through my

26:43

fingers because I really want to look.

26:45

But everything is tough, perfect, and especially

26:47

like the outfits and all, like you said that, the latex

26:50

and the leather and like that stuff there. It's

26:52

like, you know, you didn't see

26:54

girls in high school wearing that stuff, so

26:56

you see it on screen and it's just like, oh my god,

26:59

I know I like her. Yeah.

27:01

Well, in the costuming in this

27:03

movie is so interesting, and it

27:06

was again that methodist

27:08

kid living in a conservative county in

27:10

Georgia has never seen anybody

27:12

where any of the clothes that are happening in

27:15

the matrix, um, for at least when

27:17

they're in their matrix selves or their insidual

27:20

whatever self. And

27:23

that was also very strange for me. Um

27:25

oh, and that was the other thing with the Agents that I totally forgot.

27:29

We get introduced to the agents in Pitch

27:31

Black at night in a city by

27:33

an abandoned building. We've got police officers

27:35

out there, siren or flights going off

27:37

everywhere. They roll up all

27:40

wearing sunglasses. Yeah you think they're Feds.

27:43

Yeah, yeah, but they're wearing the shades. And

27:45

it also seems like their robots. It's

27:48

like what are they? Yeah, exactly that you immediately

27:50

get that, um, this is these

27:53

guys are off. But yeah,

27:55

because the cops defer to them.

27:56

Yeah. Um.

27:59

And and you it takes you don't fully

28:01

understand the relationship. And

28:03

like the movie, like, uh, the

28:06

movie reveals itself very smartly as it

28:08

goes, I think, as far as the world and

28:10

what's going on. Obviously the big reveal

28:12

later, but I like a movie

28:15

where you're you're trying to piece together because

28:17

you know they're not regular cops or detectives.

28:19

Yeah, like there's something else going on, but they

28:21

do. I mean, you that line you

28:23

give me that jurism addiction crap. You can cram it up

28:25

your ask. That's the that's the thing we've

28:28

heard in a lot of other movies. You think about Beverly

28:30

Hills Cop or maybe not that one, but there's a

28:32

lot of older cop movies where the

28:34

FBI agent, Yeah, THEYD

28:37

taking over now, yeah exactly, Well

28:39

come on, O cme scene. That's

28:42

just about to say it. That's the line.

28:45

This is our crime scene, now exactly, take

28:47

your local boys and get out of here. And they

28:49

just set it up in the beginning, and then it makes

28:51

you that's what it does. This movie

28:54

makes you start to question things before

28:56

it reveals things, and then as

28:58

it reveals things, your mind

29:00

continues to get blown. So think

29:03

about if you don't mind, can just take us to we

29:06

We talked a little bit about Neo running away.

29:09

He's in his office building. He's he's symbolically

29:11

escaping his corporate which is a great

29:14

sequence. Yeah, oh so awesome. Yeah.

29:16

Um, then you know he goes

29:18

out on that ledge which by the way, Kano

29:20

Reeves apparently actually went out on

29:23

that ledge. Really no stunt man and

29:25

shot that scene. Yeah, I

29:27

mean, probably not necessary, but yeah,

29:29

but he wanted to and it. I mean it's really

29:31

cool. Yeah. Then

29:33

we he gets taken away by

29:35

the agents, right, and you have them sitting down

29:38

being interrogated, um

29:41

talking, I've totally forgot his name was

29:43

Thomas. Yeah. You don't hear his

29:45

name much because it's always Mr.

29:47

Anderson. Yeah, when it's Thomas

29:50

A. Anderson, I think Thomas Anderson and uh,

29:53

I forget if they actually mentioned his age. I was looking

29:55

it up last night. He's supposed to be around around

29:59

that time. Yeah, that's about right. Um, so

30:01

you know, a fairly young professional

30:04

guy working. He's being interrogated. We

30:06

know already from the movies established

30:08

that he's a hacker of some sort. He at least

30:10

he sells that guy some

30:12

kind of data disc Yeah. I

30:15

don't think it's explained fully. Maybe I'm wrong, correct

30:18

us if we're wrong, But I don't think they fully explain what

30:20

it is. But he gets a lot of money for it.

30:22

It's some sort of black market thing. And

30:25

then all of a sudden,

30:27

you know what was it. I've got the line

30:29

in here. I'm talking about clubbing

30:31

to White Zombie, which was so weird. Hang

30:34

out in the club and Dragula is playing. Okay,

30:37

So you mean when he's being interrogated what he says,

30:39

Yeah, he's being interrogated. Let's see,

30:41

um agents I put agents

30:44

Smith putting in work. I don't know what

30:46

that means. As

30:49

you can see, we've had our eyes on you for some

30:51

time now, Mr Anderson, Yeah,

30:53

he does. It's sort of the trope where he uh you,

30:57

it's a great way to get information out there is when you

30:59

read the case five to the person about the person.

31:02

It's an old movie bit, but it works.

31:04

It totally works. And he just says, you're

31:06

you're guilty of virtually every computer

31:09

crime out there. And he says,

31:11

we're gonna wipe the sleep slate clean. We

31:13

just need you to give us Morpheus, the man who calls

31:15

himself Morpheus. Right, And

31:17

that's when you get another awesome line from Kanu

31:20

when uh he says, how

31:22

about I give you the finger? And he

31:25

flips them off and you give me my

31:27

phone call? Yeah, he knows his

31:29

rights, but they respond

31:32

by blowing your mind. The movie responsible

31:34

blowing your effing mind, Yeah, because it's I

31:36

mean, you get it gets teased out.

31:38

You see the bullet time in her run on the wall and

31:41

otherwise it's a pretty straightforward. Like,

31:44

you know, Hacker gets caught by detectives.

31:46

Do you think they're detectives. Yeah, he's being interrogated,

31:49

and then they fucking seal his mouth shut, yeah,

31:52

somehow without touching him ever. Yeah,

31:55

and that's when you know you're in a different kind of movie. And

31:57

then they get out this weird little

31:59

metal thing, this glass vial, and break the

32:01

glass vial and then it turns

32:03

into this weird like shrimp e squid

32:07

and then robo shrimp squid, and

32:10

then it crawls into his belly button. My

32:13

my wife was cringing like on the

32:15

couch, like, Yeah. One of my

32:17

favorite things about this movie is all of that stuff,

32:20

and all of it seems within the realm of

32:22

possibility. None of it is so far

32:25

out there that you're like, come on,

32:27

Like when you see that thing like literally planting

32:29

a bug on someone, you think, all

32:31

right, this is the near future. Maybe

32:34

that ship will happen exactly exactly

32:37

well in the that you know. That's another

32:39

weird thing about this movie. It plants

32:42

itself. Yeah,

32:44

there's a part where that's where

32:46

Morpheus is talking to to

32:48

Neo and he's

32:51

saying, you know you believe it's and

32:54

in fact it's closer to Oh that's

32:56

right, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.

32:59

Um. But to think that

33:01

it's trying to be our real world

33:03

essentially, yeah, just

33:06

adding in these elements to

33:08

that world, because like you said, it's not so

33:11

so out there. They're

33:13

not flying around spaceships. You know, you're still

33:15

in the Lincoln Continental in that in

33:17

the scene, you're you're absolutely right

33:19

there in Lincoln Continental. And there's no m ib

33:22

like men in black button that makes it

33:25

um. But they get that contraption

33:28

out after the bug has been planted,

33:30

the team comes to help him. Trinity gets out

33:32

this weird looking contraption. That's

33:34

a great sequence rain Oh dude,

33:36

in the rain. It kind of looks like a red camera rig

33:39

that's been fully set up that has

33:41

a little tube on it, and then

33:43

watching them do that. But that technology

33:45

is not It looks and

33:48

feels like something you could construct with

33:50

things, and it locates it's inside

33:52

you, it shocks it and then sucks it

33:54

out, like all of those things could

33:56

probably happen if

33:59

you could make it weird sentient squid

34:01

drone. But

34:04

again, it's like the style

34:08

of that sequence with that rain, and

34:11

you know, just everything was so intense.

34:13

It wasn't just like let's get a rain tower.

34:16

They were like, let's get four rain towers and

34:19

make it rain more than you've ever seen in any

34:21

movie. And then the great shots

34:23

from above of the rain coming down, and

34:25

the rain on the window looks like

34:27

the matrix, you know, because it has

34:29

that green hue and it's tickling down. There was something

34:31

about the screen of the matrix going

34:34

vertically instead of horizontally

34:36

that was different, and like, I hadn't seen that before,

34:39

dude, we haven't even talked about this. The

34:42

first shot of the movie is

34:44

that flashing green like

34:47

doss. Yeah, the icon, the little uh

34:49

prompt or whatever. That's the first thing we see.

34:52

So we know, we understand as viewers

34:55

this is a computer. We're looking at the screen of

34:57

a computer, output of a computer. And

34:59

then you know, there's a little bit of I

35:01

think type a

35:04

cursor, a little bit typing or something, and then we go

35:06

immediately as the movie begins, we go into

35:08

that monitor and into the

35:10

computer itself. Right, that

35:13

is exactly

35:15

what the movie is doing, and that's what exactly

35:17

what the world is doing. That's what the humans within the world

35:19

are doing. It's um, it's so self

35:21

reflexive and so intentional.

35:25

Yeah. This uh like we're all

35:27

going into the matrix. Yes, yes,

35:30

and what does it mean? And we're going to explore figure

35:32

out what that means as we continue along. Man,

35:35

I would break this entire movie down. I feel like this would

35:37

be a four hour episode of movie crush.

35:39

Chuck, let's we gotta hit some

35:41

big things. No, no, no, this is great. Um.

35:45

So they plant the bug, he goes on the ride, they get

35:47

the bug out, and um,

35:50

there's just so much atmosphere in that scene. Uh.

35:54

And it's like so much

35:56

of this movie became pop culture canon, like

36:00

some of the lines and red pill

36:02

blue pill, Yeah, and all these

36:04

things became part of um

36:07

bullet time obviously, Like but

36:10

that some of the dialogue became part of

36:12

pop culture history. Oh my god,

36:15

people still say red pill blue pill as

36:17

a joke. I mean that became a meme obviously. So

36:19

many memes came out of this, like in the early

36:21

days of memes. Probably, Yeah,

36:25

this should just be most of the memes and

36:27

just take the returns and they just apply it to most memes

36:29

and you're done. But that's sort of the question

36:31

like uh, the

36:33

red pillar, blue pill. That is that's

36:36

the big question that it's asking all of us

36:39

is what would you do? Yeah, would

36:41

you want to know? Or is

36:43

ignorance bless Well, I'll tell you

36:45

what if we're going

36:47

to be serious here, Yeah,

36:49

if you think about the show stuff, they

36:51

don't want you to know that Ben and I created in

36:55

roughly two thousand and eight, like working on

36:57

It'll maybe a little bit in two thousand seven, but mostly

36:59

twousan eight. Um.

37:01

It is highly influenced

37:03

by this because Ben and I were

37:06

into you know, X Files and Mysteries

37:09

and all of the amazing

37:11

shows that came before those, everything

37:14

to the Twilight Zone, all of the mysterious

37:17

things in our world. We were obsessed

37:19

with, both of us. Even when I was a little

37:21

good Christian boy, my dad and I were watching

37:24

X Files when whenever a new episode

37:26

was coming out, I was watching reruns

37:30

of Oh God, there's another show that now

37:32

I'm blanking on the name of it. But it was like the

37:34

Twilight Zone, like a lot of those

37:36

the Outer Limits. I

37:38

was obsessed with that, remember Out Limits.

37:41

It was great this movie, that

37:43

concept of going down the rabbit hole

37:46

far enough to where you have to decide

37:48

to take a pill, like do you want the answers

37:50

or not? Yeah, the stuff they don't want

37:52

you to know is is literally that for us, it

37:54

is offering people a

37:56

red pillar a blue pill. It's offering ourselves

37:59

every episode or red pillar a bluepill, but

38:02

never taking it. Does that make

38:04

sense? Sure? So it's basically putting

38:06

it in front of you if you're a listener

38:09

and just saying you you decide, what do you what do you think they

38:11

are? You take that one and keep going down that rabbit

38:13

hole because you can, yeah, or you can

38:15

stay here and you know, keep

38:17

working your nine to five and keep imagining

38:20

that all of this is fine and we're gonna be okay.

38:22

Yeah. I think that's how the movie works so well

38:25

though, is because you do sort of think about

38:27

this stuff afterwards, like what I want to know? Or

38:30

you know, you saw Cipher, Yeah,

38:32

Joey pants later on, he he regrets

38:35

it so much. He's a turncoat and

38:37

he even has that great line. You know, I know you're

38:39

thinking what I've been thinking. Why why

38:41

didn't I take the blue bill? Exactly? It

38:44

was a blue pill? Right, Why? Yeah? I didn't I take the blue

38:46

polos. Keep you, yeah, keeps

38:48

you in the matrix because then you get that shot

38:50

cutting that steak and he has a great

38:52

monologue. What does he say, do you have it? Yeah? He says,

38:55

I know this steak doesn't exist. I

38:58

know that one I put it in my mouth. The matrix

39:00

is telling my brain that's juicy and

39:03

delicious. After nine

39:05

years, you know what, I realized. Ignorance

39:08

is bliss. That's right. And he eats

39:10

the steaks. Man. He's

39:13

so good at this movie. Um,

39:15

I think because it asked those big questions though,

39:18

and listen, I'm not gonna sit here and say, like you

39:22

know, man in the Matrix, like all

39:24

the big questions of life, they're there,

39:25

and I'm not doing the college

39:28

you know, Stoner dissertation. But

39:30

it is a bit of a heady question that lobs out there

39:33

and it doesn't hammer at home. It just sort of

39:35

lets you sit with it as an audience member. It's

39:37

like, you got a choice. There's the truth

39:39

out there and uh,

39:41

someone like Neo wants to know and

39:44

they knew that because he's the one.

39:46

Well Morpheus really had a hunch. Uh,

39:49

he really felt it in his bones. But

39:51

this is where the movie goes off the rails. Right

39:54

after that, he wakes up

39:56

in the matrix pods or I guess

39:58

not matrix pods the real world. Yeah,

40:00

but they are No, they are matrix pods because

40:03

each one of those is a connection

40:05

to the matrix. That's you know, yeah,

40:08

making the human believe they're in there.

40:10

But that whole part with him bald

40:13

and shaved, no eyebrows

40:15

and getting that thing comes out and all

40:18

the plugs come out of his body and he sucked

40:20

down, it was just like fucking

40:22

mind blowing. The first time I saw it,

40:25

dude, it was it still holds up. Oh, it's

40:27

completely yeah. I was like, ah

40:29

last night. It looks amazing on screen,

40:32

It really does, and the the effects

40:35

are so convincing. Except for maybe

40:37

that the robot um

40:40

I call it what I called it, the extractor robot

40:42

or whatever it was. It

40:44

looks okay, it looks all right. It looks better

40:47

again than a lot of the episode one stuff

40:49

when it came out. But but you know, it's

40:51

a little odd and there's a lot going on with it.

40:54

But it took me away

40:56

a little bit. But the shots of the pods

40:58

and the towers and him, like the

41:00

actual physical pod that they created

41:03

with all that stuff in the score. Yeah,

41:06

my life. That reveal of how big those towers

41:08

are and how many people

41:10

there are, and that little baby hooked

41:13

up to those tubes. Now that you have kids,

41:16

much different deal. It really is, you know,

41:19

it really is. But he says, you

41:21

know, uh, he comes, he comes

41:23

out of it and well, he says,

41:25

to turn you into a and he holds up the battery and

41:28

that's when it's all you finally understand what's going

41:30

on. That's when he has his freak out and

41:32

you can't handle that. He can't. I

41:35

couldn't handle that ship. What you want me to

41:37

be a dr cell? That's what that's what I

41:39

am. I'm equal to a nine volte

41:41

or whatever. It was great

41:44

fucking shot where it shows, uh,

41:46

you know, welcome to the world of the real Yeah.

41:51

So it goes all the way down and they're

41:53

just sitting in those chairs in the waste land.

41:55

Yeah, but he more of you is it's the

41:58

old well again, Hey, it's a little core the

42:00

only cornyline I remember when it,

42:02

you know, it cranes down to him

42:05

and he goes, welcome to the desert.

42:07

Yeah, welcome to the Desert.

42:10

All right, Hey,

42:13

I'm not saying this as the best acting in it ever

42:15

or it's not like kind of corny at times,

42:17

but that's I think this movie exists as

42:20

a Saturday afternoon B movie in some ways.

42:22

It's just gussied up, definitely, you

42:25

know, you have to take it for what it is. But it is so much

42:27

smarter. The movie itself is so much smarter there. I

42:31

really think there's so much time spent

42:34

thinking about the writing

42:37

and then going into the direct our direction

42:39

and all the everything. It's uh,

42:41

it's a vision. It's not just something that was cobbled

42:43

together by different people with a script

42:45

that they're trying to make come to life.

42:48

You know. Well, here's the question, Matt,

42:50

is this the only good movie that they've ever made? Because

42:56

I really did not like the

42:58

second in the third Matrix movie these and

43:00

in fact I don't remember them at

43:02

all. They had such little impact on me that

43:05

this sort of exists in

43:07

my mind like it should have. Which is one

43:10

great movie that ends in

43:12

the most badass why you could imagine. But

43:14

how it's done? How do

43:16

you only have one Matrix?

43:19

When we think the budget, at least

43:21

according to IMDb, is around sixty three

43:23

million dollars, not a lot for the time, not

43:25

a ton, and they achieved what they did, and

43:28

the worldwide gross at least according to

43:30

IMDb is four hundred and sixty four hundred

43:33

and sixty three smash smash

43:35

hit. So I

43:37

mean Bound that they did before this was a good movie.

43:40

Did you see that one? I have not seen. Bound Found

43:42

was good and they and they made their name on

43:44

that film, but then they went off to they obviously

43:47

got more money and could do stuff they really wanted to do,

43:49

like sci fi, but like the Matrix

43:51

two and three weren't very good. Speed racer I know has

43:54

it's like a cult classic now and they're people

43:56

that will be like, no, it was genius, but it

43:58

was a bomb Jupiter

44:00

sending my buddy Scotty and I think you know Scotty,

44:03

we went and saw that together as a joke and

44:06

had a ball laughing at it. But it was bad.

44:09

I've never seen it on purpose, because I you

44:11

should because it's funny. I was terrified

44:13

when I watched the trailer because I

44:15

want to believe. I want to believe in

44:18

in the Wood how skis, But

44:21

well, Cloud Outlets was the other one. And I didn't

44:23

see it, but that got panned too. So

44:25

what do you say about these two people that,

44:28

um, I don't know, did

44:30

they have one in them? What's the fourth one going to be? Like?

44:33

I don't know, man, I don't know what happens? What happens

44:35

in Hollywood? When you make a movie like this, what

44:38

happens to you? You know what I mean? Like person at

44:40

a on a personal level and

44:42

you hit that success off almost

44:44

off the bat? Yeah, sure, second film like

44:47

what what happens to you? Can you go

44:49

from there? Yeah? What happens to your circle? What happens

44:51

to your creative process?

44:53

Like, I don't know. All I know

44:56

is that the next two Matrix movies

44:58

were attempting to build on a war world

45:00

that people really liked, that resonated

45:03

with a lot of people and with

45:05

characters that we wanted to spend more

45:07

time with. And they

45:10

had some they expanded on some ideas,

45:12

Like the things I remember from the

45:14

second and third movies the

45:16

most are this place called Eden that's

45:20

referenced in the first movie several times, the last

45:22

human city is underground, Zion,

45:24

your right not eating apologies Zion,

45:27

And when we actually get to

45:29

go to Zion in the movies. It's

45:31

better left than the mind. Yeah, it's just

45:33

not it doesn't. It's

45:36

not the same. Yeah. That's the deal I think is

45:38

that Zion as it sets

45:40

up the concept in this film works

45:42

well because you never see it and it exists

45:45

in your brain and there's

45:47

sometimes you don't want to go there and

45:49

see that stuff. And you definitely don't want to go see

45:51

a giant, sweaty orgy. That's

45:54

super slow motion that part.

45:57

And and you're especially for me, So

46:00

okay, get back to a little Christian

46:02

boy kid. You know, just

46:04

because I took my religion classes and I you

46:06

know, changed my mind about my own personal beliefs,

46:08

didn't mean that a lot of those bed

46:11

rock feelings

46:13

changed. Like I wasn't like, oh

46:15

man, sex is now the best thing

46:17

ever because that was this little it's not an overnight

46:20

thing. We're both still unpacking all that

46:22

stuff. Yeah, and um,

46:24

when the second movie comes out a little later, you

46:27

have this thing happened. And for

46:29

me, it was such a curl

46:32

up and you know, and get away from

46:34

this movie because I could

46:36

For me, I couldn't handle and this just me personally, But

46:39

um, for a kid whose mind was

46:41

so blown and altered and changed,

46:43

and from the first movie, that

46:46

single thing stuck in my mind so deeply

46:49

that I don't even remember the

46:51

big robot fightings. I think there's a giant

46:53

robot fight scene at some point in this um

46:56

where the squids are coming, but the

46:59

humans in Zion have these

47:01

giant mix but I can't remember if that's

47:03

real or not. I feel like that happened,

47:05

but I don't even know. Man, they had such a little impact

47:07

on me. I was living in l A by the time

47:10

those came out, and I was excited to go see him, and

47:12

I remember the feeling of disappointment when I left.

47:15

I was just like, oh, man, they just

47:17

fucking dropped the ball. Oh I remember

47:19

what the scene was. All of the agents Smiths.

47:23

They had

47:25

a bunch of them, right, and then Neo became

47:27

c G I for fight scenes, and

47:29

because they got a bigger budget or something, or maybe

47:33

Kiano couldn't do the things

47:35

that intimidating the one agent Smith. Oh

47:37

you know what I remember about those movies, dude, I

47:40

can pinpoint why I had a They didn't

47:42

engage me. Is a

47:46

person that can't be beat fighting, A

47:48

person that can't be beat isn't dramatic.

47:51

There were no steaks. I remember feeling

47:53

that, like they're both so powerful

47:56

and there's so many of them that it's like it's boring.

47:59

Yeah, this wasn't boring because you

48:02

ran from the agents. They were superior,

48:05

and the drama is Neo in

48:07

the end, which we'll get to achieving

48:10

uh power over them. Yeah,

48:13

exactly, that was the drama. Like without that,

48:16

like, it's no fun to watch Superman fight Superman.

48:18

Dude, you're still right because the

48:20

the stakes ramp up so well in this movie,

48:23

with the Oracle telling Neo that

48:26

he's not the one, well he's not the one, but also

48:28

that he's either going to have to let

48:31

Morpheus die or sacrifice himself,

48:34

so we know that death is

48:36

going to occur. Then when the

48:38

betrayal occurs and

48:41

we watch all of the characters

48:43

that we've been falling around dying off, like they're all

48:45

they all just started dying off, and we realize,

48:47

oh my god, oh my god, like maybe Neo

48:50

really could die. And again

48:53

we know that because he's a we know

48:55

that he can't die because he's our protagonist

48:57

in this movie. If he dies, then the

49:00

twenty minutes that's left in the movie, Like what is that

49:02

going to be from a storytelling perspective,

49:04

But at the same time, you get that feeling

49:07

when you if you're truly lost in the moment, like Okay,

49:09

maybe he really could die. Yeah, um,

49:11

yeah, it's it's it's a it's they're

49:14

legitimate threats in this movie, and those

49:16

were not I didn't feel like present in the

49:18

other ones. Yeah. So

49:21

Neo boards the Nebuchadnezzar. Um.

49:25

One of the great lines to me that

49:28

kind of blew my mind. Why did my eyes hurt? Yes,

49:31

you've never used them before. It's just like

49:34

and he's you know, he's never used his muscles, and

49:36

he's all loaded with the the

49:38

pins sending electric signals like I guess

49:40

to just stimulate his muscles. Yeah, so he can

49:42

fucking move and he

49:44

has that. There's a great first person

49:46

point of view shot when he's walking

49:48

around the Nebuchadnezzar. Yes. Um.

49:50

And the only thing that bugs me about this movie and

49:53

even bug me at the time, or all the dumb little nicknames,

49:55

it's like this is tank and dozer and mouse

49:58

and Skippy and and Sharky

50:01

and Electro what

50:04

was her name? Switch. I think Switch, Yeah,

50:09

I want to ask you something. When

50:11

they go back into the Matrix, at some point

50:14

they it's when they get betrayed,

50:17

so they're going to go see the oracle and everything.

50:20

When they first enter the Matrix again, they've got

50:22

this panning shot or it's a it's

50:24

not at wow. I don't know why

50:26

I'm not. They're

50:29

circling around. So they're on a track

50:31

and they're circling around a telephone that's ringing

50:34

yes. And as they're they go around and they

50:36

get to the other side, and then the our

50:38

whole Matrix team is just there inside

50:40

the matrix. Everybody has on

50:43

either a black suit or black

50:45

leather or black latex

50:48

or black everything, but Switch is

50:50

wearing an all white outfit, the

50:53

only character wearing the only white hair.

50:55

Yeah, And I think it's

50:57

this really interesting thing where they didn't

50:59

have to do that, right, but

51:02

within the Matrix, you're represented

51:04

as your you know, the your

51:06

vision of your best self, you know, your

51:09

ideal you, and since

51:12

you know, I don't know who made that character decision, if it

51:14

was written or something, but I just remember

51:16

thinking it was really interesting and I wondered

51:18

if there were something more to it, but I

51:20

don't think there was. I think it was just existing

51:23

in the rules of the movie and the

51:25

world. And she was literally a switch.

51:27

Yeah, she switched to white and

51:30

blond. Just really cool. Um.

51:34

The the Construct, let's talk about that sequence

51:37

because that's one of the best parts

51:39

of the movie to me, is when they set up the Construct that

51:41

became so iconic and copied

51:43

in fucking TV commercials, Like

51:45

how many TV commercials did you see rip off

51:48

the white room with the stuff

51:50

flying in? I mean it was like sucking

51:52

car commercials and ship It was so

51:54

annoying, but at

51:57

the time it was so iconic, and

51:59

that whole set up is

52:01

just so great. With the with

52:04

the learn well, first of all, we learned all about

52:06

the matrix that we set up. Ai Ai destroyed

52:08

the human race, wed what black

52:11

in the sky or scorched the sky because

52:14

of solar power. It's such a such a great

52:16

set up, very simple but like believable

52:18

and cool. Um.

52:20

But then you have the Construct and that whole training sequence

52:23

that's like one of the best parts of the movie. I

52:25

just learned kunk fo, I

52:28

know, kung fu. Yeah, whatever, it's

52:33

such a jitsu. I'm gonna learn jujit

52:36

jujitsu,

52:38

dude, and uh is it tank? He's like,

52:41

hey, Mikey, I think he likes it. Yeah,

52:43

I gotta throw that in there. I guess very

52:46

corny. But the fight scene,

52:49

you know, it's just it's just two guys in

52:51

a room fighting. Um,

52:53

but it's so badass because the

52:56

wire work is stuff that you like. I guess

52:58

you'd seen like Crouching Tige or

53:01

um then you knew it, or if you were a fan

53:03

of Japanese martial

53:05

arts. But if you weren't, you had never seen anything

53:07

like that. Oh yeah, it was brand new, like they totally ripped

53:10

it off, but only if you had seen that. So but I'll

53:12

tell you what, none of that would have matter, no

53:14

matter how cool it looks moving

53:16

on the screen and everything. Can you imagine,

53:19

um, if it was silent or just

53:21

room tone or just the music

53:24

without the the impact of

53:26

the sound effects. Yeah. Yeah, there's

53:28

a moment where I think it's

53:31

Neo's No, it's Morpheus.

53:33

Is like throwing a knee. He's like jumping

53:35

and throwing a knee and it

53:37

lands and hits the floor. But

53:41

I mean it's not just a little or a Yeah,

53:43

it's so powerful Yeah, the sound

53:46

design was so great and

53:48

the we we need to shout out

53:50

Young Whooping, who was the choreographer

53:53

for these fight scenes. And there was

53:55

there was something you know, I hadn't seen. I don't

53:57

know which martial arts were involved. I suppose it was

53:59

probably a lot of him combined, but I

54:01

had never seen those those moves

54:03

with like the straight arm chops and

54:05

the backhand chops, and I've never

54:08

seen ship like that before, so it just seemed totally original

54:10

to me. In those fight scenes, they are switching

54:12

styles, yeah, right the entire

54:14

time, and they do it on purpose to show that he's

54:17

learned all that. Yeah, they just learned everything. Yeah,

54:19

And I remember what Diana

54:22

exclaimed something when he's

54:24

going through the training program before

54:26

they actually get into the fight scene, and you

54:29

know, he's just it's right before he says, I

54:31

know kung fu. Yeah, he's kind of scrolling through the

54:33

options. One of them that he's teaching

54:35

him is drunken boxing, and

54:38

Diana's like, drunken boxing bar fighting

54:40

basically. Well, I mean but no, it's

54:42

a it's a style. It's a crazy

54:44

style of throwing your opponent off because

54:47

of the way you move. Oh, I thought. It

54:49

just meant like in every scenario

54:51

you're covered. If you're drunk and you're in a bar fight,

54:53

then you know how to do that too. You know how to smash

54:55

a picture on a guy's head

54:59

style. Okay, yeah, uh, school, I

55:01

learned something. Um. But at the

55:03

end of the training session, you know that, we get to the

55:05

jump scene, which is fun

55:07

and great, but it's also like a big

55:09

pivotal point in the film

55:12

because there's so much tension. They do such a

55:14

good job of the tension in that room

55:17

when everyone's you know, and you see Trinity

55:19

like come on, come on, like

55:21

she wants him to do it because he's

55:23

the one. Nobody makes their first jump

55:26

and he didn't make his first job. No, he didn't.

55:28

They tease it out just right, like the

55:30

fact that he's not the one. Yeah,

55:32

you have enough doubt. You've

55:34

got to have that doubt for it to have impact at

55:36

the end. And again that's playing with

55:40

It's playing on so many levels, just that

55:42

concept of doubt, doubting

55:44

that Neo is the one, doubting that you

55:46

know personally you are the one, and whatever your struggles

55:49

are, and whenever you're going through doubting that

55:51

you know, if you take it biblically, that Jesus

55:54

or whoever, whoever we're going to choose

55:57

as the one is the one. Um.

56:00

It's again, it feels

56:02

to me like this movie really is

56:06

going into some

56:09

other world, some other thing for me. When

56:11

I'm watching this movie, they were after something deeper

56:13

for sure. Yeah, and I'm not saying it's like

56:15

some deep philosophical statement about everything,

56:18

but like they were trying

56:20

for something a little bit more than

56:22

your standard sci fi stuff. You know. Laurence Fishburne

56:24

when he read the script this is again from my

56:27

wife's trivia lookings. Uh,

56:29

he didn't believe this movie would get made because

56:31

he thought he was too smart. He said, it's

56:34

too smart. There's like, it's

56:36

just too much going on here. It's

56:38

not gonna get made. But they combine it with these

56:41

great, great, great action

56:43

sequences, some of the best ever. Yeah.

56:46

I don't know how you talk some of

56:48

that stuff. You know, there's

56:51

another thing we could talk about here, which is the

56:55

possible the influences

56:57

that this movie has had on people throughout

57:01

some of the more negative things that have occurred.

57:03

There are some of the big negative things that image

57:06

of walking into that building carrying

57:08

all those guns and their trench coats

57:11

and all that stuff. That image that we

57:14

saw repeated that

57:17

kind of thought about that. Well, yeah,

57:19

I mean it's true that it seems to have influence.

57:22

I'm working on a show, speaking of

57:24

other shows about

57:26

a kid that got

57:28

heavily influenced by this movie and

57:31

he's true story. Send it

57:33

in court, um after a

57:36

lot of people lost their lives. Yeah,

57:39

and he talked about the matrix was big for him.

57:41

And again it's that idea that

57:44

the world you think you live in right

57:46

now is not the real world.

57:48

There's a deeper level to this and

57:51

if you can access to that, none of these

57:53

people matter because there's a there's a

57:56

part where they're in the

57:58

remember the Lady Red or the woman

58:00

in Red. They're in that training

58:03

simulation and Morpheus

58:05

is teaching Neo that all

58:07

of these people everyone here. If they're

58:09

not awake, essentially,

58:12

if they're not a part of our team, they are

58:14

an agent. They are a potential agent because

58:16

the agents can switch between any person that's

58:18

there. That concept

58:22

is pretty dangerous to somebody who maybe

58:25

is a little less stable or their

58:27

worldview is straight up mentally ill.

58:29

Yeah, that everyone else is the enemy? Yeah

58:32

wow, yeah, I never thought about that. Well,

58:34

it's not. Again, it's not like this is the only

58:36

movie that has that concept. It's

58:39

just at the time for what it was

58:41

for the other themes that is

58:43

dealing with it seemed to resonate with

58:45

kids, uh and people

58:47

my age, people a little younger. Um.

58:50

For me it was a positive thing, but

58:52

for others maybe not so much. It doesn't mean the movie

58:55

is bad or is do anything wrong, right, it's just

58:57

something that you need to talk about though. Interesting.

59:01

Sorry to go there, man, that's that's

59:04

that's fucking legit. Um.

59:06

But I'm gonna move on to another favorite

59:08

line. Awesome, awesome, awesome. Are

59:11

you saying I can dodge bullets? No,

59:14

neo, I'm saying, when you are ready,

59:16

you won't have to. There's

59:19

so many great lines like that. Some of

59:21

them are a little cornball, but they're

59:23

just fucking movie lines, man, they

59:25

are. They're now such good lines.

59:35

All right, we haven't hit it yet. I know we're running

59:37

out of time. I haven't even how long. I mean how

59:39

long? What's you're what? You're out? What do you have to do? Uh?

59:42

Nothing? We have a big meeting with

59:44

that that guy that what most

59:46

powerful person in podcasting? We're

59:50

looking good then, Okay, so

59:52

I really want to do the

59:54

Agent Smith monologues because

59:58

this or we don't have to do a whole thing.

1:00:00

I don't know, maybe it's worth it. Well we get sued.

1:00:02

Is Warner Brothers gonna come in so that we

1:00:04

can't play it, but we can certainly reenact.

1:00:06

I wish we could play it. Oh, Warner

1:00:09

Brothers, why don't you let us play some of the amazing

1:00:11

things that you've created. We could probably get away with that,

1:00:13

but i'd rather hear you say it. Okay. Well,

1:00:16

there were two of them in particular, and this is

1:00:18

at the point in the movie where Morpheus has been

1:00:21

captured. Uh. Morpheus

1:00:23

sacrificed himself to save Neo because

1:00:25

he truly believes he's the one. It's a rough part

1:00:27

of the movie because you don't want to see Morphias of getting

1:00:29

his ass kick. Yeah, yeah, hard,

1:00:31

but just it's bad in that bathroom.

1:00:34

Then we come back to Morpheus.

1:00:36

He's in that chair he's

1:00:39

strapped in and the

1:00:41

agents are all there with him, and

1:00:43

Agent Smith is just talking directly

1:00:46

to him. They're on a high level high

1:00:49

rise right there on one of the top levels,

1:00:52

and it gives you a view of the city, the

1:00:54

human constructed city,

1:00:57

And he starts talking to you two more

1:01:00

vious. Yeah, I know,

1:01:02

I know where you're going here, he says. Have you ever stood

1:01:05

and stared at it? Marveled

1:01:07

at its beauty? It's genius? Billions

1:01:10

of people just living out their lives

1:01:12

oblivious. Did

1:01:15

you know that the first Matrix was designed to

1:01:17

be a perfect human world where none

1:01:19

suffered, where everyone would be happy.

1:01:22

It was a disaster. No one

1:01:24

would accept the program. Entire crops

1:01:27

were lost. Some believed

1:01:29

that we lacked the programming language to describe

1:01:32

your perfect world. But I believe

1:01:34

that as a species, human

1:01:36

beings define their reality through

1:01:38

misery and suffering. Now,

1:01:41

just if we stop right there, like I

1:01:43

think we kind of do, I think there might be hitting

1:01:45

on something like like right there, Um,

1:01:48

it's feeling like now remember kid

1:01:51

Matt Boy listening

1:01:53

to that, going oh yeah, I I totally

1:01:55

do, like dying on the cross, bearing

1:01:58

your cross like guil for

1:02:00

everything. Everything's this

1:02:03

has hit me so hard. And the way he's delivering

1:02:06

it too, Um, it's Hugo weaving

1:02:08

right, Oh my god, just amazing.

1:02:10

So then he goes so

1:02:13

the perfect world was a dream that

1:02:15

your primitive cerebrum kept trying

1:02:17

to wake up from, which is why

1:02:19

the matrix was redesigned to this

1:02:22

the peak of your civilization. I

1:02:25

say your civilization, because

1:02:27

as soon as we started thinking for

1:02:29

you, it really became our

1:02:31

civilization, which is of

1:02:33

course what this is all

1:02:36

about. Evolution, Morpheus,

1:02:39

evolution like the dinosaur.

1:02:43

And he points to the window that we've been We've seen this

1:02:45

window the whole time, unless we've gotten the reaction. Shot

1:02:47

to Morpheus, this giant window with all

1:02:50

of the humanities, glory,

1:02:52

look out that window. You

1:02:54

had your time. The future

1:02:57

is our world, Morpheus. The

1:02:59

future is our Time's

1:03:03

good. It's great,

1:03:05

man, and and you get us, and that you finally get

1:03:07

a sense in that scene, like he

1:03:09

gets angry. He's so angry

1:03:11

that he has to live among these humans.

1:03:15

And it's like that's when he lets down

1:03:17

the veneer, the only time

1:03:19

he lets down that cool veneer, and

1:03:21

he's by himself. The other agents aren't with him,

1:03:24

and that's sort of like he's breaking bad a little

1:03:26

bit, and he'ms vulnerable. You can

1:03:28

it's vulnerable, and you can tell the ray. You can

1:03:30

see the rage and that's when I think

1:03:32

you get the you know, the human beings or a disease,

1:03:35

a cancer of this planet. Dude did hit

1:03:37

me too, Yeah, that you know when

1:03:39

that hit me hardest, though, um

1:03:42

much later, because this is always

1:03:44

in the back of my mind. I didn't. I

1:03:46

never thought about that too hard

1:03:48

of humans as a cancer until

1:03:50

I was listening to the Joe Rogan experience

1:03:53

a long time ago and

1:03:56

he was discussing his

1:03:58

his vision I guess

1:04:01

they had while he was on a

1:04:03

plane flight I believe, out to California,

1:04:05

heading heading west out to California,

1:04:08

flying over certain parts

1:04:10

of that area before you get to

1:04:13

a lot of civilization out there, and

1:04:15

he's just talking about them, the magnificent

1:04:18

beauty. Even this even in the areas where

1:04:21

there's not a lot of foliage, there's not a lot

1:04:23

of like there's not a lot of trees

1:04:25

or anything, but it's just all natural. It's all nature.

1:04:27

You're just watching all this stuff. And then

1:04:30

you start getting into civilization,

1:04:33

and especially as you start getting into l A, you

1:04:36

start to see the metal constructs

1:04:39

which that shoot out of the ground

1:04:41

and the black gray

1:04:44

stuff that covers everything. The

1:04:47

just the lack of nature and

1:04:50

he's he's talking about how if

1:04:53

you look at our pole planet and everything, it

1:04:56

seems like a living, natural being

1:04:59

the planet itself. But then there's these

1:05:01

cancers that are growing. There

1:05:03

are these cities that are just like these malignant

1:05:06

tumors that are just growing and growing.

1:05:09

Sometimes. Well, and I'm thinking back

1:05:11

to his

1:05:13

his whole thing about equilibrium. He's talking

1:05:15

about humans. He

1:05:18

doesn't believe that humans are a mammal, because

1:05:20

all mammals adapt to equilibrium

1:05:22

within their environment. Humans are the only ones

1:05:24

they continue to produce, to continue

1:05:27

to spread outwards and eventually, yeah,

1:05:29

consume and want to spread to the

1:05:31

other planets, the way a virus

1:05:34

wants to spread to the next cell. Whether

1:05:37

it wants to do that or not, it is compelled

1:05:39

to do so through some natural mechanism. Yeah.

1:05:41

Yeah, dude, those

1:05:44

are some great, great, very well

1:05:46

written monologues. Yeah. I

1:05:48

mean it's saying a lot, you know,

1:05:50

he they have the Waikowski has had a lot to say.

1:05:52

I think. Yeah, like they had

1:05:54

a they had a perspective in a point of view. They weren't

1:05:56

just making a movie exactly. You

1:05:59

know. Well, the problem

1:06:01

for me is, what's the counter argument, you

1:06:03

know, to agent Smith like, what is

1:06:07

well, I mean, fucking love my microwave

1:06:09

and my beamer. What are you talking about? Well? I know,

1:06:11

but is that really I'm honestly

1:06:13

asking, because in the movie, the

1:06:15

counter argument to that is no, every

1:06:18

human life is precious. Every

1:06:20

point of consciousness that we have

1:06:23

is unique and yet the same, you

1:06:26

know. So it's like, I think

1:06:28

that's what it's saying, and

1:06:30

and there's value in having an

1:06:32

intelligence like that,

1:06:35

that is that is, can both

1:06:37

analyze but can also truly

1:06:39

feel, right um

1:06:42

the way the machines perhaps

1:06:44

cannot or seem to not be able

1:06:46

to. But again, we don't see a lot

1:06:48

of the world of the machines

1:06:51

and what they're doing, Like what

1:06:53

what once the machines have

1:06:56

all this energy they've created with the humans

1:06:58

on their batteries. We know they've

1:07:00

got sentinels. We know

1:07:03

that there's a part of them that exists within

1:07:05

the matrix because it's a part of their

1:07:07

or the machine consciousness is in there with

1:07:09

the agents and with the program

1:07:11

itself. But we don't see what

1:07:14

the machines are doing, like what

1:07:17

what is the what

1:07:19

is their life like? Right? We

1:07:21

don't know is their meaning

1:07:23

to that life? Maybe there is some bigger

1:07:26

meaning, even though you know, perhaps

1:07:29

art and culture aren't a part of it, or maybe it's a

1:07:31

different art in culture. I don't know. I'm just

1:07:33

saying if I didn't know anything about the larger

1:07:35

matrix universe, I would

1:07:37

want to know, right, like, why

1:07:39

is that more important than the

1:07:42

human life? Right? Which is where they should

1:07:44

have left this film. That's why you don't need sequels,

1:07:47

like leave so many things unanswered? Better

1:07:49

move I think so, you know,

1:07:52

not like they answered everything, but I feel

1:07:54

like they went way down the road of tidying

1:07:57

things up. Well, should we get to the end?

1:08:00

End? Yeah? I mean, uh,

1:08:02

you know, quickly he goes and sees the oracle, uh,

1:08:04

which is a great sequence. Um, she's

1:08:07

she did such a wonderful job in the Uh.

1:08:10

I know it's so good. There is no spoon,

1:08:12

it's so corny, but like it's such a great line.

1:08:15

Um, Joey Pants, you know

1:08:17

has sold out more if us at this point, there

1:08:19

were these little cool bits along the way that I love,

1:08:22

just as far as just having cool ideas.

1:08:24

When like you sit down with your buddy to write

1:08:26

a script and you're thinking about this future

1:08:28

world, like what, you know, what are things that happen and like,

1:08:30

how about this, Like deja vu

1:08:33

is a glitch in the matrix? Awesome,

1:08:35

it's a black hat was the same black

1:08:37

hat. It's so great. It's like I remember

1:08:40

like in the theater thinking that was such a cool little touch

1:08:42

to add that, you know, like because

1:08:45

no one can explain deja vu in

1:08:47

real life, so they're like, how about this, that's the

1:08:49

fucking glitch in the matrix. So they changed something.

1:08:51

That's what deja vu is. So there's

1:08:54

the scene when Cipher breaks breaks

1:08:57

bad, and that is really a brutal scene

1:09:00

where people are getting unplugged, the people are dying,

1:09:02

and uh that that was like I've

1:09:05

seen this movie a bunch of times and that was like tough for

1:09:07

me to watch last night. Yeah, man, two

1:09:09

nights ago. When he hits tank with that

1:09:12

crazy electric or the electricity

1:09:14

gun. Then his brother Dozer

1:09:17

sees him and he's just running over to stop him

1:09:19

and gets him too. And then

1:09:21

he's sitting on top of well

1:09:23

he see on top of Trinity, and

1:09:26

then he sits on I don't know if he sits on Morpheus.

1:09:28

I think he like straddles Morpheus. He's just like talking about

1:09:30

like come on, man, Yeah, there's so much disrespect

1:09:33

and like Morpheus has earned this place in the

1:09:35

film of respect, and so

1:09:37

it's really impactful when he's like destroying

1:09:40

everything they've worked for. Uh. He

1:09:42

gets his of course, which is great. But

1:09:44

this tension is building throughout over the central

1:09:47

question of the whole film. Is

1:09:49

Neo the one? And that's

1:09:51

that's the question, and that's why it sets up that third

1:09:53

act so perfectly. Um

1:09:55

is you've got And it's one

1:09:57

of my favorite things in movies if you can get like,

1:10:01

hey, it's great in the Karate Kid when they have this

1:10:03

one central thing at the end. But

1:10:05

what's even better in a movie is when you've got two

1:10:07

or three things all converging

1:10:09

and playing out. That's the ship

1:10:11

I love, and they're connected enough to

1:10:14

where it matters all the outcome

1:10:16

of that one that's right, and

1:10:18

the sentinels are deployed and Neo

1:10:20

is doing his thing, and like all of these things

1:10:22

are happening at once, and it's that's

1:10:24

such a great way to like ratchet up tension, is

1:10:27

to have converging storylines of tension

1:10:29

all happening that also that you

1:10:32

understand and they're in a physical place

1:10:34

that when you're cutting back and forth, it feels

1:10:36

different enough, and the style

1:10:38

of editing and shots are different

1:10:40

enough to where you can it

1:10:42

doesn't feel jarring or confusing.

1:10:45

Yeah, yeah, for sure. We should cover

1:10:47

really quickly though. Now you mentioned it a little bit earlier

1:10:49

about the lobby shootout, but

1:10:51

the lobby shootout sequence to

1:10:54

the rooftop battle and the

1:10:56

helicopter crash are all sort of you

1:10:58

know, back to back. Yeah, and it's

1:11:01

just a mind blowing set like that.

1:11:03

There's so many bullets going in that lobby

1:11:05

sequence and so much shit

1:11:08

breaking and flying around and slow motion.

1:11:11

Again, it was like I hadn't seen that in movies

1:11:13

quite like this before, Like they took

1:11:15

it to eleven. This is what I wrote, entering

1:11:18

building, black leather, black trench coat,

1:11:20

so many guns, Holy sh it, back

1:11:22

up, send, back up, slow motion flips,

1:11:24

slow motion, exploding stone, slow motion,

1:11:26

cartwheel, gun grab, damn soundtrack,

1:11:29

elevator up. Dan Well

1:11:32

even says that's one of the other iconic lines is

1:11:35

guns We're going to need lots of And

1:11:37

then you get the shot you were talking about in the construct.

1:11:41

Yeah, of the of all the guns rushing by.

1:11:43

But that is a great part when he initially goes in and he

1:11:45

has open your coat. He's goings

1:11:49

and that long duster, that black duster jacket,

1:11:51

back up, send back up. Oh my

1:11:53

god, it's so good. Um.

1:11:56

And then the rooftop battle, you know when he dodges the

1:11:58

bullets and he does that very again

1:12:01

that keeps saying the word iconic, but it is. Yeah,

1:12:03

when he when he bends over backwards and does the

1:12:05

matrix do man so

1:12:07

good? And Trees is like how

1:12:09

did or no? Trinity comes up and

1:12:12

she says dodge this and just like

1:12:15

another period. But

1:12:17

then you know, we have the great helicopter sequence because

1:12:19

Morpheus has been up there, you know, getting uh,

1:12:23

getting talking to. Yeah,

1:12:26

but the helicopter sequence is so great. Can

1:12:28

we talk about that mini gun, the little

1:12:30

mini gun he uses and how he doesn't hit Morpheus?

1:12:33

Okay, last night was going like wait a

1:12:35

minute, because he just

1:12:39

doesn't stop spring and he's all around

1:12:42

Come on, yeah,

1:12:45

I guess Morpheus was just dodging in

1:12:47

there or whatever. So you

1:12:49

think Neo is going to leave and

1:12:52

um, the phone gets shot

1:12:54

though and broken, which, by the way, we should

1:12:56

say that that's a really cool way

1:12:58

that they did this. In the movie that you have to get

1:13:00

a phone to get sucked into

1:13:03

because you know there's the great shot earlier, or maybe

1:13:05

it's now with Trinity and the

1:13:07

truck coming put her hand on the

1:13:09

glass. Yeah. Like, there's so many times where they're

1:13:11

running away from an agent toward a phone

1:13:14

and there's just so much tension going on, so

1:13:16

well done. But in this the

1:13:18

phone gets shot and then the

1:13:21

stage is set. It's like it's

1:13:23

it's one of the best setups

1:13:25

for one of the best final battles

1:13:27

in movie history between he and Anderson

1:13:29

in that subway station. Man, do you know what my favorite

1:13:32

part of it is. Let's see if you can guess favorite part.

1:13:34

Let me let me get the best the best fight

1:13:36

move, my favorite fight move, and

1:13:38

that best in that last Yes,

1:13:42

okay, nobody saw that throat

1:13:44

poke. Yeah, it's

1:13:47

so great. He stops his his fists

1:13:49

right in front of his face and he

1:13:52

jams his little fingers out into the throat.

1:13:55

It's like I remember like almost

1:13:57

cheering when I saw that in the movie. I thought it was so

1:13:59

cool. Well, and this is really important

1:14:01

because this is the part in the movie where Neo

1:14:05

Thomas Anderson himself truly

1:14:07

begins to believe that he could be the one. I

1:14:09

think this is the moment when he's

1:14:12

fighting and he's getting beat up, but he's deciding

1:14:14

to fight back, and he's seeing and getting

1:14:16

that confidence within the matrix

1:14:18

that he has only experienced a little bit of in the Construct

1:14:21

with Morpheus. And it

1:14:23

turns on that one line here

1:14:25

that Mr Anderson, that's the

1:14:28

sound of inevitability, the

1:14:30

sound of your death. And then what does he say

1:14:32

back? Um does

1:14:34

he say good? He says goodbye?

1:14:37

Mr Anderson. Well, no, that's that's

1:14:39

Uh Smith talking to him. And then

1:14:41

Neo answers back, my name is

1:14:44

Neo. And that's when he makes

1:14:46

that that that switch to like

1:14:49

the well, he's not quite the one

1:14:51

yet as far as realizing it, but

1:14:54

that's when he gets that confidence because he still

1:14:56

runs away after that. Yeah, which

1:14:58

is key to the movie, I think, because he holds

1:15:00

his own in the battle in the subway,

1:15:03

but then he gets the funk out of there because

1:15:05

he can't beat him. In that moment, he well, he

1:15:07

knows that he's just going to transfer to the next guy. The

1:15:09

agent got there because there there was

1:15:11

a homeless man sleeping down in the subway

1:15:13

watching them and you know

1:15:15

the agent got there. He just reappears

1:15:17

again. That's again, that's a terrifying

1:15:20

thing about the agent. No matter how many times you kill the

1:15:22

agent, it's coming back unless

1:15:25

you dive into his body. Yeah, all

1:15:28

right, let's get there. The final man, I

1:15:31

mean, the hallway sequence is

1:15:33

so amazing because he

1:15:35

stands his ground. They're all

1:15:37

three down there shooting at him. Well,

1:15:40

the first thing, he's running down that

1:15:42

hallway, thinks he's escaping. He opens

1:15:44

the door and immediately him

1:15:48

in his chest. Of course, I could I forget well.

1:15:50

And and this is the thing you're talking about

1:15:52

with the converging storylines, because it immediately

1:15:54

cuts to Neo in real

1:15:56

life bleeding out of his mouth.

1:15:58

He like spits blood out of his mouth. Sentinels are coming

1:16:00

in. Trinity is thereby a side super

1:16:03

upset. Then we're getting these cuts in. He

1:16:05

gets shot like a bunch more times,

1:16:08

and it appears that he's dead.

1:16:11

Flatlines. But think about this, uh,

1:16:14

in the in the real world and

1:16:17

also the symbolic world of their storytelling.

1:16:20

Trinity. He

1:16:22

just did Scare quotes Trinity. The

1:16:25

that name that what that means? The

1:16:27

Trinity, Yes, saves merings

1:16:29

him back to life through love

1:16:32

yeah, and a kiss, but mostly

1:16:35

love. But it works and it totally works.

1:16:37

Yeah. I mean it should have been the corniest thing

1:16:39

ever, like literally kissing the

1:16:41

dead prince to come back to life,

1:16:43

but it fucking works. Man. It worked two nights ago

1:16:45

when I saw it. It did that great

1:16:48

Like it's partially due

1:16:50

the writing, partially due to her acting. She acted that ship

1:16:53

out of that scene when she's

1:16:55

like so upset and she tells

1:16:58

him like the oracle told me I would fall in love with

1:17:00

the one, so you can't be dead well,

1:17:02

and that is all happening that tender moment, that

1:17:04

real you can feel it as

1:17:06

these machines are tearing their environment

1:17:09

parts and lasers are going

1:17:11

off everywhere there in the whole breach like

1:17:14

they're in that ship. Yeah, and

1:17:16

you know you also get the agents kind of

1:17:19

gloating over their trophy

1:17:21

thing and then just leaving and

1:17:23

all of that's happening at the same time. And

1:17:26

you know, talking about the cross cutting, the editing is

1:17:28

so great. Culminating storylines

1:17:30

and emotions and just all

1:17:33

the fields makes me so happy.

1:17:36

But yeah, I mean, as corny as it is, it

1:17:39

works, man. She tells them she loves them because

1:17:41

I love you, and she kisses him, and he fucking

1:17:43

stands up so great,

1:17:45

and he sees the matrix and he sees

1:17:48

the matrix and that is well, first of all

1:17:51

the bullets, he stops the bullets first. I

1:17:54

think that you're right, that's what he just says.

1:17:56

No, yeah, he says no, the bullets stop

1:17:58

him. Adair. He picks up one, looks at it, drops it.

1:18:00

They all fall and that's when, Yeah,

1:18:04

that's when I believe. You see that long fucking

1:18:06

Hallway shot of

1:18:09

him seeing inside the matrix, and

1:18:11

it's just like it blew

1:18:13

me away two nights ago, all over again. You

1:18:16

know, it totally stands up. I

1:18:18

feel it, man, because then the agents run at him and he's

1:18:20

he's turns to his side with one arm

1:18:22

is just blocked. And I remember

1:18:25

the first time I saw that man when he was doing that

1:18:27

slow mo battling and the way they shot

1:18:29

that, I was just like, oh, dude, it

1:18:31

is all over for you. You're fucking

1:18:33

done. And that sidekick down

1:18:36

there and he holds his leg up and puts it down

1:18:38

so slowly, like everything about that sequence

1:18:40

is perfect because calls back to Van damn

1:18:42

for me like they're all these things that it's just like

1:18:45

it's just hitting nostalgia, it's hitting

1:18:48

badass factor. You want to hear how I wrote

1:18:50

this up. And my yea, the end is perfect.

1:18:52

She tells him she loves him and he's the one. He can't

1:18:54

be dead. He gets up, he stops

1:18:56

the bullets. He looks down the hall and

1:18:58

he's so fucking gray. Slow

1:19:01

motion leg kick, leg, put down, body

1:19:03

explosion, Yes, that

1:19:06

jumping in him. Yeah, and

1:19:08

then the other uh well, one

1:19:11

of my my two favorite moments of that are

1:19:13

when he sees the matrix down the hallway

1:19:16

and then after he dives into his body

1:19:18

and explodes. Agent Smith he

1:19:20

does that flex and the

1:19:22

walls flex with him and he does

1:19:25

that deep breathe that's like the

1:19:27

Buddhist monks like composure

1:19:30

and I'm and that's when the guy the other two

1:19:32

are just sucking out of there, you know.

1:19:34

Yeah, he's literally rewriting

1:19:37

the code. Yeah that they are in real

1:19:39

time and they know it. Yeah, so

1:19:41

great. That flecks with the wall. Like again,

1:19:44

like the imagination to do that, like

1:19:46

when you're sitting around and writing a movie and

1:19:49

like how about this. At the end, he like

1:19:51

just sort of flexes and the walls move

1:19:53

with him, Like, how do you think of that? I

1:19:57

don't know, I don't know. And

1:19:59

it's so impact full. It feels

1:20:01

like some Dragon ball Z stuff,

1:20:04

like mixed with a lot of the other

1:20:07

comics and concepts

1:20:09

of um manipulating

1:20:12

energy in that way, like tea and a lot of these

1:20:14

you know, we're Eastern things. Um,

1:20:17

I just realized, and I forgot about this, that

1:20:19

is one of the most important moments

1:20:21

in all of the Matrix trilogy when he jumps

1:20:24

inside Agent Smith. Because

1:20:26

I forgot. I think it's in

1:20:29

the second one. I

1:20:31

think it's the second one. That

1:20:33

concept that Neo and Agent

1:20:36

Smith became one for a moment, so

1:20:38

Agent Smith was imbued

1:20:40

somehow with some of the powers

1:20:43

or something with Neo. They became

1:20:45

interconnected and inseparably

1:20:47

connected. Um see, I

1:20:49

don't remember anything about this one, dude. I'm

1:20:51

just kind of recalling because I only saw it once in the

1:20:53

theater. But I

1:20:56

think that's important to arc.

1:21:00

Oh, well, don't quote you don't quote

1:21:02

me. Well, then, then the last

1:21:04

thing we really get here after all that is

1:21:07

the voiceover. The voiceover,

1:21:09

yeah, is it zooms into

1:21:12

the words system failure? Yeah,

1:21:14

on the screen, and then Rage against

1:21:17

the Machine is like, oh was this movie pretty

1:21:19

badass? Well guess what? Yeah,

1:21:22

let me here's your cherry, let me slam it on top.

1:21:27

So great, And then that

1:21:30

final voice over like who's he talking to? I

1:21:32

think that's the one thing I couldn't figure out, because he's on a

1:21:34

phone. That's the thing. Is

1:21:37

he talking to other

1:21:39

ships out there that we

1:21:41

know are like the Nebuchadnezzard. It seems like a

1:21:43

beacon, like he's sending out a call, right

1:21:46

yeah? Is it to the other humans that

1:21:48

are in Zion? Is it too?

1:21:51

Um, you know, anyone other people like

1:21:53

him, anyone that's awake. It's still inside

1:21:56

the matrix that's woke. Yeah,

1:21:59

it woke back, or at least they know they know that they're

1:22:01

the matrix is out there, but they don't know what it is, you know,

1:22:03

just like Neo did in the very beginning. Yeah. Yeah,

1:22:06

I mean maybe it's that, but ultimately it's

1:22:08

a message to us the viewer, right yeah,

1:22:11

I think, especially if you talk about these talking

1:22:13

to you the audience member, I think yeah, yeah.

1:22:16

And then I mean I distinctly remember sitting

1:22:18

in that theater hearing

1:22:20

that final like after my mind had just been

1:22:22

blown at what I've just seen, and then that

1:22:24

last shot of him flying just

1:22:28

like the perfect

1:22:30

way to end that movie. He has the power

1:22:32

of flight now just

1:22:34

because he thinks he can. There is no spoon. He

1:22:37

knows it is. He's bending himself, not the spoon.

1:22:40

The spoon isn't even there. God, so

1:22:42

good. I'm so glad I got to watch this

1:22:44

again and talk about it with you, like and

1:22:47

then that neither of the star cynical about it.

1:22:51

No, dude, I that would have been a sad

1:22:53

conversation. It

1:22:55

means a lot that I got to do this one, because you

1:22:58

know, I've studied a lot of film in my life.

1:23:00

But if you want to talk about a movie

1:23:02

crush like what this show is about

1:23:04

exactly. This was perfect for me, and I

1:23:07

cannot believe no one else had picked it yet. Yeah.

1:23:09

I like getting Casey in here for film studies

1:23:12

stuff. Those are great conversations.

1:23:14

But there's nothing better than sitting

1:23:17

down with Paul Schneider and talking about Back to the Future

1:23:19

or you and talking about the Matrix and

1:23:21

these, or Kyle Kanane and talking about

1:23:23

Big Trouble in Little China and these

1:23:26

just these are movies. You know, they're not

1:23:28

films. That's exactly what they are,

1:23:30

the treads on films, but movies in the best sense

1:23:32

of the word. Totally entertaining

1:23:34

fun. This one's a little heady, gives

1:23:37

you something else to chew on um,

1:23:39

but it's also a B movie, B sci fi flick

1:23:41

in a lot of ways. Yeah, it means all the

1:23:43

things and their

1:23:46

dreams, right, the your favorite movie kind

1:23:48

of invade your dreams a lot,

1:23:51

at least it has in my experience, where it

1:23:53

does kind of shape the way you see

1:23:56

things a little bit. Just after

1:23:58

seeing this movie, I remember walking around on occasionally

1:24:00

afterwards being like, is

1:24:02

this all real? I know? Was

1:24:05

that deja vu? Oh? Am I being duped?

1:24:08

Is there a new brick wall in here somewhere? Those are good

1:24:10

questions to ask yourself though, Right,

1:24:12

it's good stuff. You know, all things have a little

1:24:14

healthy skepticism. Awesome, Matt,

1:24:16

This is a lot of fun, brother hey Man,

1:24:18

thanks for doing it. Thank you for

1:24:35

more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the

1:24:37

I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or

1:24:39

wherever you listen to your favorite shows.