Pain & Gain (2013)

Matt (00:01:19):

Hello and welcome to Load Bearing Beams. The Summer of Rock. The Summer of Rock, and I’m Matt Stokes.

Laci (00:01:25):

That was an explosion. We’re watching a Michael Bay movie. I’m Laci Roth.

Matt (00:01:29):

Hey Laci.

Laci (00:01:30):

Hey, we’re

Matt (00:01:31):

Married, we’re fit, and we’re we believe in fitness.

Laci (00:01:34):

I got my pump on right

Matt (00:01:35):

Before

Laci (00:01:36):

This

Matt (00:01:37):

Situation. You actually do look kind of Jack DeLaci. I think we’ve mentioned this. You’ve gotten a movie tattoo on your other arm. You had the one movie tattoo arm and now you got the other one. What does it say?

Laci (00:01:46):

It says, come on, Yolanda, like it is a quote from my favorite character of my favorite movie and my favorite scene. Pul Fiction Jewels

Matt (00:01:58):

Di scene. And where is that? Comma,

Laci (00:02:00):

We aren’t going to talk about things that aren’t your fucking, why’d you make me make a song about it? I’m trying to be nice. Well just tell I

Matt (00:02:07):

Didn’t mean to. It’s a fun story. Tell everybody it’s

Laci (00:02:09):

Not a fun fucking story. I panic hammered my tattoo and told the man to put a comma after Yolanda and he panicked and added it after

Matt (00:02:24):

You had it in the right place. He put it in the wrong place.

Laci (00:02:27):

It wasn’t afterthought and he just did it by hand. It was literally, that’s a comma.

Matt (00:02:33):

Come on Yolanda. What’s Ponzi like?

Laci (00:02:35):

Okay, whatever. Fuck off.

Matt (00:02:37):

It’s sexy though. I didn’t think I’d like it every time. I don’t want to tell you this because now you’re going to be like, I want way more tattoos. This is it though. I

Laci (00:02:46):

Want

Matt (00:02:48):

Like this is it, right? That’s it.

Laci (00:02:51):

No, I’m getting one every year of my forties on my birthday.

Matt (00:02:54):

You think you’re going to make it another year?

Laci (00:02:57):

Is that a threat? What’s

Matt (00:02:58):

The next tattoo going to be?

Laci (00:03:00):

They’re all movie quotes.

Matt (00:03:01):

Go ahead. Is it going to be from this movie?

Laci (00:03:03):

No. It’s going to be I love Lamp.

Matt (00:03:05):

I love Lamp.

Laci (00:03:07):

What that from? Anchorman.

Matt (00:03:08):

From Anchorman. You don’t even like Anchorman.

Laci (00:03:11):

Just I do.

Matt (00:03:11):

You never watch Anchorman? I

Laci (00:03:13):

Don’t have to watch Anchorman Don’t like it. You never talk about Anchorman. I quote it constantly. Matt,

Matt (00:03:17):

What do you say? Whale’s? Vagina?

Laci (00:03:20):

No, I say I love Lamp. Like all the fucking time.

Matt (00:03:23):

I’m with you all the time. I’ve never heard you say this,

Laci (00:03:24):

Matt. No, it’s a very specific situation. It’s when everyone’s yelling something and our crowd’s cheering or whatever, and I wait for enough quiet and I just say it and it gets a laugh every time.

Matt (00:03:34):

All Maybe

Laci (00:03:35):

You don’t go with me where I’m clapping.

Matt (00:03:37):

I’ll believe you. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.

Laci (00:03:39):

It’s true. It’s at sports stuff and it’s at theater stuff. Two things we don’t do at the same time. We don’t do much at the same time. Love. You’re not with me all the time.

Matt (00:03:49):

I feel like I am.

Laci (00:03:50):

Oh good.

Matt (00:03:50):

We’re very, we’re tethered. That’s

Laci (00:03:52):

The sign.

Matt (00:03:53):

We are doing a podcast. Maybe we podcast so much

Laci (00:03:57):

Together. We’re married.

Matt (00:03:59):

This is the podcast Load. Bring beams. Talk about a movie that we love from a long time ago. We examine it except it’s the Summer of Rock Setin, our normal movies aside and talking about the films of Dwayne Johnson and why the summer of Rock? What is it about Dwayne Johnson?

Laci (00:04:18):

You look nice today, Matt. Thanks. Okay, you are. You look

Speaker 1 (00:04:24):

Nice too

Laci (00:04:24):

In Infatuate. That’s a weird word. You are intrigued by his career introductory and choices. I think he’s a fine person to Why not? You got to pick somebody.

Matt (00:04:36):

Yeah, I Mormon. What is it about the man and what do you think we’ve learned about him from this newest film? Pain and Gain, which I think a lot of people say is his finest performance and I am inclined to agree.

Laci (00:04:46):

Yeah, I think he needs to work with directors who have a vision rather than him having the vision. I think that’s what I’ve learned. He can do things when pushed, when put in an environment where everyone’s dialed up and I feel like he’s just not in the right environments

Matt (00:05:01):

Handled

Laci (00:05:02):

By the right people.

Matt (00:05:03):

I think that this movie, I think him in Fast five where he’s very much a supporting player and I think the other movie that I would say is his best performance, Southland Tales, which you haven’t seen yet, but we want to do a Patreon episode. It’s so good and he’s so good in it. That is the performance that’s most like this, where it’s like he’s not the anchor of the movie. He’s a supporting person and that weirdly seems to be where he’s best. But also I think in this movie and in that movie, he’s very vulnerable,

Laci (00:05:30):

Very,

Matt (00:05:31):

He’s very not comfortable in his skin,

Laci (00:05:34):

But he fluctuates, right? I mean, it just depends on how much Coke he’s on or at all or if he’s feeling remorseful, but he’s just a fully developed, complicated person in this movie. And maybe that’s because he’s playing a complicated person or person, just someone who lived a life and it’s a true story, so he’s got to hit these beats and have these characters. Maybe because it was already developed for him, he already understood here’s the roadmap and maybe when he’s asked to make choices in his own acting roles that are unique to him and don’t exist before he created them, he has a hard time adding that nuance. And a director would help you with that.

Matt (00:06:15):

Somebody who you’re going to let sort of craft your performance, let you get out of your comfort

Laci (00:06:20):

Zone.

Matt (00:06:21):

Whereas this guy, they’re like, okay, obviously this guy’s just an action star,

Laci (00:06:25):

Right? It’s like the directors aren’t seeing what his potential is and he’s not either. He only knows him as himself as the thing he’s done the most with wrestling, being a big macho guy, it definitely takes a confident and persuasive person, I think to get that out of him.

Matt (00:06:45):

And where I think that what the pop psychology analysis we’re getting with him is maybe the real man is not so comfortable being this looking like this and growing up in the wrestling industry where you live your false persona. And so his most interesting movie roles are where he gets to really explore that South Wind tails and this movie, and I only just realized next week’s movie, Jumanji, welcome to the Jungle, where he’s playing a person who is just wearing the rock skin.

Laci (00:07:14):

Yes. Right. So he can feign vulnerability better in that situation because he’s literally a girl character.

Matt (00:07:24):

He’s not a girl in that movie, but he’s like a Reeb.

Laci (00:07:26):

Awe, a small person

Matt (00:07:27):

Boy. He’s like, why do I look like this? Yeah,

Laci (00:07:29):

I mean we’ve learned a lot about his dad, but we know he comes from a generational wrestling family. Wrestling is, there’s not any dweebs in wrestling. There are not small people in wrestling. You physically look like that. You have leading man energy. That smile can cheer up dead puppies as they say. And you can’t help but get boxed in. Probably. You box yourself in and you’ve been told the same thing’s over and over and over about yourself. You can’t convince a tall person there that they’re short because they’ve been asked, how’s the weather up there? And can change this light bulb a hundred thousand times. His physique boxes him in.

Matt (00:08:11):

And a wrinkle in this movie is he’s a very clearly repressed person who has no, it’s not that. I mean he’s pretty stupid. He’s not a bright character.

Laci (00:08:22):

He’s the most moral of the three.

Matt (00:08:24):

Yes. But moral in, I guess he would be the most, he has the most moral sense of any of the three does.

Laci (00:08:32):

Even if he’s what screws it up. It’s the morals that screw it up. And it’s his vulnerabilities, like his addiction issues.

Matt (00:08:40):

His addiction issues, which is clearly using because to address the oppression the movie de implies he’s repressing his homosexuality, but grew up in such a way where he wasn’t even aware of that as a possibility or even have the language to describe it.

Laci (00:08:54):

No. Right.

Matt (00:08:55):

So he just feels perpetually uncomfortable

Laci (00:08:57):

And

Matt (00:08:57):

Uneasy with who he is and it’s great, it’s a great performance. But again, he’s not, mark Wahlberg is the very clear lead of the movie and it feels like maybe this was the Rock’s Destiny is to be the second banana in a movie.

Laci (00:09:11):

And I think that’s a great, I mean, yeah, I think you get to do more. You get to be the relief. You get to be the best scenes or when it’s all on your shoulders, then you’re just under more scrutiny and that’s no fun.

Speaker 1 (00:09:24):

And

Laci (00:09:25):

Yeah, he struggles with being the person who has the biggest arc or drives the narrative, I guess. I don’t know really what you would say about to drive the narrative

Matt (00:09:36):

To keep it on his shoulders, which even in Jumanji, he’s not. He’s just one of the ensemble.

Laci (00:09:42):

Oh, of course. Well, and I will say this is world-class Mark Wahlberg right here though too. It might be his best. This and Boogie Knight. I mean he’s just on his Yes, I’m believing all of it. Mark.

Matt (00:09:54):

I usually say the departed in this, I might, and now this, I think I’m going to go with this because he’s also, he’s the lead of the movie. He’s carrying everything.

Laci (00:10:00):

He has so much energy. He does not stop. The pedal is full throttle the whole time. Those nostrils, I could fit my fist in. He is flared the whole intensity. He’s completely embodying whoever this guy is and he’s just a guy that believes in fitness and I know Mark cares much about the way he looks, but this is not who he is. If anything, mark would be more like the rock character. So Catholic, he loves Catholicism.

Matt (00:10:32):

Yeah, I almost, I started to think how much is this the real Mark Wallberg? And it’s like that’s too big a rabbit hole to go down because

Laci (00:10:40):

I think he’s more, well, okay, yes, because that it’s not the summer of Wallburg, but I think he is more meek and he’s soft spoken,

Matt (00:10:51):

But he is like a fitness freak who’s like, I wake up at 3:00 AM and work out.

Laci (00:10:56):

But that’s not like a guy that’s social. That’s a way of isolating yourself. And that’s really obsessive. I think more introverts than you think are huge bodybuilding people and people with lots of insecurities and who want to protect themselves.

Matt (00:11:10):

I think on our Baywatch episode, that’s when we’re going to dive into the Rock as businessman.

Laci (00:11:14):

And

Matt (00:11:15):

I feel like Mark Wahlberg is also one of these guys who’s acting as just one revenue stream. I also want to conquer all these other worlds.

Laci (00:11:22):

Don’t tell me something. I don’t know. I already fucking look at me confident fucking well because struggling so hard not to call him Marky Marks. Of course. I did not originally meet him as the actor. He’s already showed me he can do it all.

Matt (00:11:35):

Well, but I’m talking about with Wall burgers and his Catholic app and the Rock Wall Rock, his burger chain with his brother.

Laci (00:11:43):

I mean, I hear you, but

Matt (00:11:44):

And being the producer of Entourage, someone should make a show up about my life, my entourage and that The Rock maybe got all these ideas from him and they’re also connected to Ryan Reynolds, who similarly is like, well, I just act so I can fund my investments.

Laci (00:11:58):

No, I mean Catholics drink. So I feel like the only thing they’re missing here from this mogul is his own beverage. But I guess if you do burgers, you could skip it

Matt (00:12:05):

Maybe, but beverage that’s like, that’s the highest margin thing. I don’t know. What’d you think of this movie? You liked this movie?

Laci (00:12:13):

I really liked it. It was a lot and it was much longer than I expected it to go, so I did have to take a little break. But Michael Bacon exhaust, I still can appreciate what I’m looking at, but I needed a stimuli break and I felt like I, because it’s a true story, it goes on and meanders in a way that it doesn’t feel like a scripted movie because it’s not 1, 2, 3 acts. It’s like six because you think that the torturing part or the main guy that you see the most of the time that they’re trying to get the money from, that all seems like the story. And then there’s just whole after part that’s horrible. And then you go to trial. I mean there’s just a lot to cover. I was not, it messed with the ebbs and flows of what I’m used to in a written story. So I my, I didn’t know it was daylight savings time, so I went to bed early is what I’m saying.

Matt (00:13:04):

It’s like, it’s when you read a book and it feels like I have another 70 pages left, but then you read the last chapter and you’re like, wait, the book’s over and the remaining 40 pages are like, here’s previews from other coming books. So you’re like, no, this is the thing that always would happen to me. I was like, I wasn’t ready for it to, and so I didn’t put the weight on. Yeah,

Laci (00:13:25):

It’s exactly like that. It’s just funny. You’re using a book

Matt (00:13:28):

Story, but it’s a reverse. It’s like, oh, I thought the movie was ending, but actually there’s 45 more minutes. And so okay, I have to sort of reinvest

Laci (00:13:34):

In what Im watching. I couldn’t fat. I mean they had already gotten away with it. There was already a private investigator on their heels. Clearly that was about to happen. I could not fathom that there was a whole other set of crimes that they did. It just wouldn’t have been written like this. I love that. In the movie they bothered to remind you and this is a true story. Yeah, this is fucking, yeah. And

Matt (00:14:00):

You had never seen this movie?

Laci (00:14:02):

No, I thought I had, but I think I was thinking of a Brad Pitt movie.

Matt (00:14:05):

I saw it one time in 2013, remembered nothing about it. I remember the Rock being good, but I remembered him being very different than what he actually is. I did remember him being very vulnerable and I think I just remembered that once my gift is beating people the fuck out. I thought that’s what his whole performance is. But it’s so different and so much more interesting than that. And I fucking love this movie. I couldn’t believe it. I think Michael Bay accidentally. Well, let’s talk about our Michael Bay relationships. You have a take on bay.

Laci (00:14:38):

I don’t even think I realized which movies were Michael Bay movies except for the Transformers ones. They’re not. God, I wish I had a filmography in my head right now. I wasn’t into Pearl Harbor, but I did Armageddon Titanic. So I feel like he misses the mark with me and maybe I also didn’t appreciate the artistry and what he was doing nor care about artistry more than I cared about storytelling Head

Matt (00:15:01):

Off the Vultures. He didn’t make Titanic. You were saying that as an example of

Laci (00:15:06):

When he made Pearl Harbor, it was off the heels of Titanic and Armageddon was It was his, that was his movie. Okay, sorry. I was thinking Armageddon wasn’t okay. I like Armageddon or at least I remember liking it, but I felt like he was trying to do that with Pearl Harbor and I do not remember liking it at all. So that was just me comparing the wrong things together. And I don’t like the Transformer movies, this movie I really like, but is there one I like Matt?

Matt (00:15:36):

Let’s see, the Rock The Bad Boys movies. I mean the First Two Bad Boys

Laci (00:15:38):

Movies. Oh, duh. Yeah, no, I mean I remember liking those.

Matt (00:15:41):

Yeah,

Laci (00:15:42):

I love Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, so I can’t imagine. I don’t, but I haven’t revisited them in a long time. What was my fucking point? I think he was neither here nor there for me, honestly. And now all of a sudden you had me watch some info about him and I am all in. I want to revisit.

Matt (00:16:00):

Okay, cool. So Patrick Williams has these two videos on Michael Bay and he’s part of this movement of film critics who’s like, no, you need to take Michael Bay seriously, at least as a sort of vulgar or tour. He’s one of the directors, and this is a great point he makes, he’s one of the directors who normal people know his name

Speaker 2 (00:16:16):

And

Matt (00:16:17):

They know what a Michael Bay movie looks and feels like. And that’s important. And it’s so tied into his upbringing as a commercial director, as one who makes TV commercials and then decided I’ll make movies that always look like TV commercials. And he has all these visual tricks and hallmarks.

Laci (00:16:34):

But I mean imagine the micromanaging that has to be happening. You’re talking like you’re talking Stanley Kubrick level managing of, I don’t know if it’s the camera work or the stuff. Every shot, you can freeze it anywhere and the frame is full and it’s telling a story and you can use each part like a commercial, and that’s really fucking hard. Not much time. People put in a 32nd commercial and then you apply that to a fucking two and a half hour movie. He must be intense either. I would like to know, is he putting that on the actors to be that microscopically looking at the details or is it in editing? Is it all internal that he’s, is he mean? I’m asking if he’s mean. I dunno. People seem to like him. Okay. That took me a long time. I was really Michael Bay in it there. Learned edit Laci.

Matt (00:17:27):

Yeah. Well, no

Laci (00:17:28):

Learn edit.

Matt (00:17:29):

It’s certainly in the edit, but it’s also, I mean every shot, it’s very deliberately composed and the camera moves in such a way that it’s not like something you can, when the camera swoops around two people talking, that’s not something you can do in editing. You have to literally physically move the camera

Laci (00:17:42):

Around, I guess what I’m saying with such an amazingly polished, complicated product. Someone hates him. And I’m guessing it’s the camera people. Someone is getting the brunt of this. And I would love to know, on average, how many times is he taking each shot? Both because he films it from two different angles sometimes and because he wants everyone situated just right, either it takes a really long time and he’s very nice or someone hates him. I don’t want to know who it’s,

Matt (00:18:11):

I forgot about this while we were doing our episode, but Megan Fox famously called Michael Bay Hitler and she got fired from the Transformers franchise as a result, but it seems like they later reconciled. But that is the person I would point to as someone who feuded with Michael Bay. But he’s got what you like, which his actors like working with him again and again, be people who

Laci (00:18:33):

Easy on the actors, hard on the grunts.

Matt (00:18:36):

Yeah. I think that the only time he is, he doesn’t have the reputation of a Michael Mann who’s tough on actors. He’s just probably like, okay, this is the shot where we need your sweat glistening. And that’s when he asks a lot of you, when you’re just talking, who gives a shit? Say what you’re going to say.

Laci (00:18:51):

And that’s because he doesn’t care about the heart, which is also probably why I don’t have a whole repertoire in movies where I’m like, yeah, that I think it’s because of the actors. He happens to choose that win me over and I feel heart anyway. But he does not seem to care about people. He cares about the way they look, but not so much about the, he’s a more technical person, so he’s going to have less heart in his movies just generally. And I have to be in the mood for that.

Matt (00:19:15):

But weirdly, because I think because he came in commercial, came up in commercials, he’s like, but I know the tools to manipulate people.

Laci (00:19:21):

He knows what the visual cues. That doesn’t mean he’s going to trick me,

Matt (00:19:27):

But so Armageddon, a movie that I don’t like very much. He knows all the things to do to at the end of the movie Make me Cry because Bruce Willis, who I don’t like in that movie, is saying goodbye to Ben Affleck, who I also don’t like in the movie and to live Tyler, who I also don’t like in the movie, but he knows which pleasure centers to poke to make me squeal like a pig, which is what he thinks of me. And I think that my experience was always like, yeah, Michael Bay sucks. If I had a go-to worst movie I’ve ever seen, it was always Pearl Harper, but I haven’t seen it in 20 years. I’d be interested to watch it again.

Laci (00:20:00):

It looks like shit.

Matt (00:20:02):

I’ve seen all the Transformers movies, I dislike them. I think that his thing is overwhelming in the Transformers

Laci (00:20:08):

Movies. Yes, the action. It’s hard. They’re all metal blobs fighting each other. I do not mean Pearl Harbor looks like shit visually. I was looking at a recap and that looked like shit to watch. Let me just clarify that. I’m sure it’s beautiful.

Matt (00:20:22):

Yeah, it looked like not a fun time. It was so obviously a let’s go for the Titanic thing,

Laci (00:20:30):

Right? With no love in your heart and no appreciation for the fact that you are getting off on killing these people who actually died. These are real people. You’re killing in these fantastic ways. What was the guy’s argument that of the, what is his name?

Matt (00:20:48):

Patrick? Willem.

Laci (00:20:49):

He’s really smart,

Matt (00:20:51):

But there are a few movies of his that in recent years I’ve really one his movie from three years ago, ambulance is great, starring Jake Gillian Hall. Ambulance, ambulance, ambulance, which is just an ambulance. Chase a guy guy does a heist and gets away in an ambulance and it just gets chased forever. It’s great

Laci (00:21:07):

Speed with one person.

Matt (00:21:08):

Well, yay Abdul Mat. And I don’t remember the woman that’s, I think she’s the only woman character who gets to do stuff in any of his movies. And then The Rock is great. I think The Rock is really fun. The movie The Rock.

Laci (00:21:21):

Yes, I remember liking it again, that’d be decades ago that I saw it.

Matt (00:21:25):

And then this one, and I feel like

Laci (00:21:27):

I love a heist.

Matt (00:21:28):

I feel like in pain and gain, whether he intended any of it or not, he had this preternatural understanding of America and the fundamental characteristic of the American as just being a mark for a big scheme who simultaneously loves that. He’s getting conned and also feels like I’m getting one over on everyone else because I’m so smart and so virtuous and ties it in with this prosperity Gospel Protestantism,

Laci (00:21:57):

He knows how to equally hate and shame people, but in a fun way, whatever it is. It’s fair. I’d say that he doesn’t seem to particularly love one type of person over another and at least this movie, they all look like fucking idiots. Yeah.

Matt (00:22:16):

I think that one thing that makes me this movie more than most of his movies is no military in this movie. And he sucks the dick of the military constantly. All his movies look like propaganda for the military and he often works directly with the military to make his movies,

Laci (00:22:30):

But that is to make his movies marketable the same way he pokes and prods your little buttons. He’s just doing that to make it something a lot of people are going to. He’s a blockbuster fucking phenom. He knows how to make something everyone will see.

Matt (00:22:43):

Yeah. So maybe unlike someone like a Spielberg who’s like a bleeding heart and I want to make you hear my bleeding heart, he’s like, I feel nothing. Exactly.

Laci (00:22:50):

But

Matt (00:22:50):

I know how to pose as a healer.

Laci (00:22:51):

Exactly.

Matt (00:22:52):

And this might be the movie

Laci (00:22:53):

World Class poser. This

Matt (00:22:54):

Might be the movie where he is like, let me put that to use to really try to examine something.

Laci (00:22:59):

I think it served him really well and the rock that this is real events, he had a playbook and so he didn’t mean to build heart into it, but I end up caring about all three of the main idiots and Ed Harris somehow, but never the, I don’t care so much about the victims, but it’s probably just in the performances. But I still end up rooting for people even though I’m confused a lot of the time as to who it should be.

Matt (00:23:24):

You want to talk.

Laci (00:23:25):

I don’t think he did that intentionally. I think he was just doing what was on the paper and I think I just really mark Mark and the Rock in this. And Matthew is fine too.

Matt (00:23:32):

He was good. First time I’ve really thought, oh, that Anthony Mackey,

Laci (00:23:36):

Who

Matt (00:23:36):

Up until now have been like, okay, fine.

Laci (00:23:39):

Yeah, they gave him some cool shit to do and he was against type and got to be just kind of silly. But I guess he wasn’t as fleshed out as a character as the other two. So when he would get aggressively mean, I’d be like, where’s that coming from? I thought you were a nice guy. Just got married. The switching around was a little abrupt for him.

Matt (00:24:01):

It’s not there on the page. The humanity comes out and the way he performs it, I think it’s in his relationship with Wilson, which I actually really like.

Speaker 2 (00:24:10):

I did too

Matt (00:24:10):

Because it seems like Michael Bay’s humor about like, look, it’s a fat woman. But the difference here is they actually like each other and are attracted to each other. And

Laci (00:24:17):

I think they say several nice things about people with all kinds of different body types in different parts of the movie. They certainly make fun of the big guy that’s sharing the hospital room with the guy they torture because he diarrheas all over the walls and floors hilarious. He’s a big guy that has to poop. So he’s not nice to everybody, but he does not seem to fat shame as much as you might expect someone,

Matt (00:24:46):

As much as you might

Laci (00:24:46):

Expect, who praises the military in America

Matt (00:24:48):

And just all the bodies.

Laci (00:24:49):

Oh, the bodies. Jokes.

Matt (00:24:50):

Jokes that he makes in all of his movies.

Laci (00:24:51):

Well, and the way he very much knows to give a lot of tits and ass to, is it because he loves these tits and ass? I don’t know. But you’re going to see some female cheeks and pecs if you watch his movie.

Matt (00:25:04):

Yeah. Which you get the sense. It’s not that he likes it, he’s just like you pigs like this, don’t you?

Laci (00:25:07):

Yep. Yep. Like slap for you, slap for you, slap

Matt (00:25:10):

For you. Yeah. I guess just the Anthony Mackey though has this quoted this movie that’s like Win. Mark Wahlberg is a montage where he is giving his plan and he’s pointing at a chart and this is a diagram and stuff. Anthony Mackey and voiceover is like, I knew Danny was just making this stuff up, but it didn’t matter. We were going to be rich.

Speaker 5 (00:25:31):

And

Matt (00:25:31):

I felt like that is America right there. That is the key to everything.

Laci (00:25:37):

You just need to be very confident and know how to talk your shit.

Matt (00:25:41):

I knew he was lying to me, but still I was sold.

Laci (00:25:45):

Yeah. I took that line more to mean, I knew he was making this up as he went, but I knew I still would get money from it. Not like he’s literally lying to me. I think he thinks this is true right now, but I can already tell this is not going to go the way he thinks it is. I’m still in,

Matt (00:26:02):

I took it as like it’s just a vibes based thing. Nothing he’s saying makes any sense, but it all feels, it feels good. But

Laci (00:26:10):

He’s also seems like the best kind of best friend ever. He only ever talks up his friends until they start screwing up during the heist. But all the stuff you see of them, he is a fucking sweet. He’s intense, he’s loud. He doesn’t know how to use an inside voice, but he is so adoring the things he says, and I think it’s touching. There’s two different times when someone’s like, he was my first, my second never friend. Like ouch. Oh, the rock’s character.

Matt (00:26:36):

You

Laci (00:26:36):

Deserve more than just the one friend.

Matt (00:26:38):

Yeah, I know

Laci (00:26:40):

That happens.

Matt (00:26:41):

Alright, let’s talk about the history of pain and gain. We need to start by checking in with the Rock’s wrestling career, which resumed during this time period. He returned to WWE in 2011. He

Laci (00:27:19):

Seems his biggest in this movie so far.

Matt (00:27:22):

If

Laci (00:27:22):

I’m tracking the levels of his shoulder muscles,

Matt (00:27:26):

He, let’s see, returned.

Laci (00:27:27):

They’re at third floor, right? On this movie?

Matt (00:27:29):

Yes. They’re, he returned to a live episode of RAW in February, 2011, announced as the host of that year’s WrestleMania. And they started teasing a feud with John Cena and ultimately this built to WrestleMania in 2012, like a 14 month build, the biggest wrestling match of all time, the Rock versus John Cena. He did have one match in between then in November, 2011, his first match since 2004. But then yeah, he fights John Cena in the main event of WrestleMania 2012, where he won and where they would then billed to rematch the following year.

Laci (00:28:06):

Is this right before John Cena starts doing movies?

Matt (00:28:09):

He had not started doing movies.

Laci (00:28:12):

He’s Magic Mike, right? No, that’s Chant Tanium. Channing Tatum was his first one. The cock blocking movie. Cock Blocker.

Matt (00:28:19):

No, no, no. Train Wreck I feel like was the first time people noticed him train Wreck. He did shitty, shitty direct to video action movies before

Speaker 2 (00:28:27):

This, but

Matt (00:28:27):

He was full-time WWE e. There’s this famous thing where they came out and talked shit to each other and the Rock, Dwayne Johnson had written some stuff down on his arm to refer to during his promo. And John Cena saw him do that and then used that in his own promo. So he pulls off his wristband. He is like, look, I don’t have to write stuff down on my arm for my promo. I’ve seen conflicting things about whether the Rock knew he was going to say that or if he really did do that and really did upset him. But the Rock looks genuinely offended right there.

Laci (00:29:00):

So a real feud

Matt (00:29:02):

Just in that one thing that’s a low blow. And then John Cena later said, now that I’m a movie star, I understand what he was going through and he didn’t have all the mental space to devote to this. He was doing a million things at once. But yeah, they have a match. It’s a decent, I watched it last night. It’s a decent match. And crucially, the Rock didn’t get hurt, but John is a boring wrestler and the Rock’s a boring wrestler and they do a lot of things and play it very safe. And the following year they had the rematch where John Cena won and then they hug and are all respectful at the end.

Laci (00:29:36):

I mean, you can’t shame them for being careful wrestlers when their big thing is that they’re good looking. Can’t fuck up your face when you’re

Matt (00:29:44):

Well, I mean

Laci (00:29:46):

That’s why they’re boring.

Matt (00:29:47):

Not hurting your neck or your back or

Laci (00:29:49):

Yes. And I’m saying that’s because they have lives to go lead and they have other things they get to do. But if you’re somebody like is it mankind? What is his name?

Matt (00:29:57):

Yes, mankind. Okay. But there’s plenty of really good looking wrestlers who are not boring.

Laci (00:30:01):

Oh, are there?

Matt (00:30:02):

Yeah.

Laci (00:30:03):

Who

Matt (00:30:04):

C punk, a great technical wrestler who’s also a handsome fox.

Laci (00:30:07):

But is he an actor? Are his ambitions outside of wrestling is what I’m saying?

Matt (00:30:12):

I mean all of them think they’re going to be actors.

Laci (00:30:15):

Well, he is getting past his prime. Show me seeing punk. I remember him being boring looking. Is he blonde?

Matt (00:30:23):

No.

Laci (00:30:23):

Oh, well then I’m not thinking the right person.

Matt (00:30:26):

He looks like

Laci (00:30:26):

He looks like John Ham.

Matt (00:30:28):

Your friend who when I met him I was like, you look like Sue Punk. And I kept saying that to him.

Laci (00:30:34):

Okay. Yeah, he’s handsome.

Matt (00:30:36):

Okay. It’s just

Laci (00:30:37):

He looks like John Ham.

Matt (00:30:38):

He looks like John Ham. Alright, so the meantime, the Rock after Fast five, he had movies like Journey Two, the Mysterious Island of Surprisingly Big Hit Snitch and GI Joe two. Another surprise hit or surprising that I look at it and I’m like, that movie made $400 million. Okay,

Laci (00:30:53):

I’m surprised. Alright.

Matt (00:30:55):

Michael Bay, we kind of already talked about, but he began his career in commercials, famously directed the Got Milk commercial

Laci (00:31:01):

A Burr.

Matt (00:31:02):

Yeah.

Laci (00:31:03):

Aaron Burr,

Matt (00:31:04):

Aaron Burr, shit. Did tons of car commercials. Victoria’s Secret commercials. Yes.

Laci (00:31:10):

As soon as I realized he was the reason why I wanted to buy every fucking thing that Victoria’s Secret sold. I can remember all of his commercials. There’s just iconic in my brain and I had a store card for Victoria’s Secret and it’d be like, okay, yes, go use it. I’ve paid it down $50, need a bra. I wanted be in Smoke and just, he just has a way of capturing glistening bodies,

Matt (00:31:38):

But in a very technical way. I don’t think there’s anything sexy in this movie. I don’t know, maybe I do In Pain and Gain.

Laci (00:31:47):

We’ll

Matt (00:31:48):

Talk about it

Laci (00:31:48):

Every time. I mean, can a woman who’s half naked with an amazing body ever not be kind of sexy? I don’t know.

Matt (00:31:55):

I don’t know.

Laci (00:31:56):

Can you sexless show that?

Matt (00:31:57):

But he worked with David. He and David Fincher were friends as they were commercial directors. They were like the two commercial directors. And then David Fincher went in a totally different direction when he started making feature films, whereas Michael Bay did not. He’s like, well, I’ll make feature films that look like my commercials Bad Boys was his first movie, the Rock, his second movie in 96, he made Armageddon in 1998.

Laci (00:32:18):

But my God, would you want to be in one of his movies? He is going to make you look like your most glorious self. He’s got probably the most iconic just hero moments. He uses slow mode maybe too much. But when he does it just right, it’s like, wow, that person’s never looked fucking cooler in their

Matt (00:32:34):

Life. Yeah, you’d absolutely want to do that. And Armageddon is the first movie where he works directly with the Pentagon. I’ve been talking about this on these videos I’ve been making youtube.com/at load ring me pod of the symbiotic relationship between Hollywood and the military, where Hollywood films will literally get money from the Pentagon and access to tanks and military outfits and aircraft carriers and stuff in exchange for the Pentagon having script approval. And over time you see the military depicted in more and more and more of a positive light. Michael Bay first worked with the military for Armageddon. He worked with them for all of the Transformers movies except for Transformers four when he worked with the Chinese military.

Laci (00:33:17):

Interesting. But here again, we’re pointing to the cynicalness of it all. Yeah. He just wants the budget and he wants the access to the cool shit. He doesn’t give a, I mean he’s poking the military’s buttons too, and they’re totally leaning into it, giving him more and more.

Matt (00:33:31):

I think he likes the military. I

Laci (00:33:33):

Don’t think he likes anything.

Matt (00:33:34):

Okay. I mean, yeah, maybe not. Maybe it is. Like I see Americans and I see their love their fucking troops and I’ll give ’em their troops in this

Laci (00:33:43):

Beautiful

Matt (00:33:44):

Sun drenched.

Laci (00:33:45):

And I don’t know that it’s mean that I think it’s just like, okay, you like that? I’m going to give you that. Then you give me stuff. I think it’s all just practical

Matt (00:33:52):

Maybe. Yeah, maybe every shot in Armageddon, whenever you will see civilians on the ground listening to news about the asteroid, it looks like it’s from the 1940s they’re gathering around a radio. There’s a biplane going overhead or

Laci (00:34:10):

Everyone scarves or starched and

Matt (00:34:11):

Like this. Yes. Yes. Or people look, these people in Holland, they’re by windmills with wind blowing. And to listen to the radio,

Laci (00:34:18):

These people in Italy, they’re by the leaning Tower of Peas.

Matt (00:34:22):

And it’s like the only way

Laci (00:34:23):

Everything’s a postcard

Matt (00:34:24):

And everything is just like, what’s a signifier? To make you think like, oh, that’s America. Oh, that’s Holland, that’s Italy. But a fake commercial version of it. And I think what’s interesting about pain and gain is being character. Mark Wahlberg has totally ingested the commercial version of America and been like, Hmm, I feel like I’m getting ripped off.

Laci (00:34:46):

I

Matt (00:34:46):

Haven’t gotten that commercial version of America and I need to do something about that.

Laci (00:34:50):

And he keeps saying he’s got the body of someone who deserves more and that his friends have the body of someone that doesn’t make sense that you don’t have a bunch of stuff. Look at how hard you’ve worked on your body.

Matt (00:35:00):

Right? Because he’s totally accepted the idea of the meritocracy, which is the number one myth that the cultural industry sell. You work really hard and you’ll win. You’ll succeed in America when actually you succeed by having parents who succeeded. Or there can be cases like somebody like Tony Lu in this movie who’s like two, mark Wahlberg seems like the very height of success, but he owns a Schlotzky’s Deli franchise and he has $3 million to his name, which is a lot, but that would make him the 10000th richest person in Miami.

Laci (00:35:37):

He’s also got kind of what Mark Wahlberg, what shit Daniel has in this, which is this tenacity, this he’ll be the asshole, he’ll say something. So he doesn’t care so much about what people think because he’s got a mission. He’s tough. They’re both very tough people. So I think they have more in common than what they lack.

Matt (00:36:00):

So he can wrap his head around him as a target. He seems real to him in a way that a corporate CEO would never, he would just never see a corporate CEO

Laci (00:36:10):

Or have long-term an extended conversation with him. The CEO wouldn’t have enough in common to even entertain it

Speaker 1 (00:36:17):

And

Laci (00:36:17):

They are alike. And so they did strike up a type of a professional relationship friendship thing. He was his trainer. Or not just working at the gym where he went.

Matt (00:36:31):

You’re talking about the real people.

Laci (00:36:32):

Alright,

Matt (00:36:33):

So this is all based on a real story. The Sun Jim Gang. In real life there were more than just three people. It was a larger gang, but it centered on Daniel Luga, who in the movies played by Mark Wahlberg and Noelle Adrian Al, who’s played in the movie by Anthony Mackey, the character that Joanne Johnson plays is a composite or he plays like a composite of all these other guys,

Laci (00:36:53):

Which makes sense why he goes through some stuff.

Matt (00:36:55):

Yeah. He goes through all these. Yeah, that was not actually the same guy who did all that stuff. So this story was famously told in the Miami New Times in a series of articles in 1999 and 2000, which were written by Pete Collins, they’re called Pain and Gang. And it is a fascinating story. It got tons of media attention at the time for how colorful it was. But Daniel Lugo, the ringleader of it all is kind of this Frank Abna, the real Frank Abna character who’s like, I served 15 months in federal prison for financial fraud. I pretended I was a bank officer and going to help invest in people’s businesses and then just never,

Laci (00:37:32):

Right. They kind of go by that part so fast that you don’t even really digest it. I mean, you get that he’s, he’s just looking to make money and he doesn’t care who he hurts. But I guess I didn’t totally understand what he was selling and that quick clip to say, Hey, I’m a con ex con. Yeah, I’m that.

Matt (00:37:50):

Yeah. I think what he was doing was getting people approved for fake loans and then they give him a down payment.

Laci (00:37:56):

Oh, okay. I’m sorry. You have mugshots or pictures of Noelle and Daniel and who are these other two people? So

Matt (00:38:03):

The other two people are the real Frank Grea and Christina Furton. Who

Laci (00:38:08):

Is that? The two that get killed?

Matt (00:38:09):

Yes. And so in real life they were the ones murdered. But this all started with Daniel Lugo, the Mark Wabar character targeting somebody named Mark Schiller who in the movie is Victor Kershaw told me. Do we have

Laci (00:38:23):

A picture of him please? That was pretty close. Tough some bitch.

Matt (00:38:29):

Alright, so he told his friends at the gym that this guy had stolen a hundred thousand dollars from him and they should kidnap him to get revenge. So they did really have this plan where they’d wear Halloween costumes but didn’t go through with it. They really did show up in the backyard of his house in camo and crawled on the ground and then got spooked by a car and turned around and abandoned it and ultimately just grabbed him in the parking lot of his deli, which in real life was a schlotzky’s franchise. In this movie, they make it seem like it’s just a

Laci (00:38:56):

Regular

Matt (00:38:57):

Deli. But I kind of wish it was a Schlotzky’s franchise just to hammer it home that this is just like a shitty small businessman who is upper middle class, upper upper middle class.

Laci (00:39:12):

Okay. Sorry, I make sure I understand. So in real life, no one, but Daniel knew the truth throughout the whole thing they were operating under.

Matt (00:39:20):

I don’t know that.

Laci (00:39:21):

But they began it as thinking they were helping him get his money back from a guy. Yes. Okay.

Matt (00:39:25):

And so they kept him kidnapped for weeks, transferred his assets into accounts that they controlled, and before ultimately trying to kill him in much the same way as happens in the movie, try to getting him drunk and crash his car that didn’t work, set the car on fire and that didn’t work. Run over him multiple times. That didn’t work. But another car showed up, so they fled and then they found out, oh, he’s still alive. We got to go try to get him at the hospital. But he fled the hospital before they could get to him. And so Daniel Lugo moved into his house telling neighbors, I work for the federal government, he’s been deported and we’ve now confiscated his property and we’re going to use it for a government operation.

Laci (00:40:01):

Now that’s smarter than in the movie

Matt (00:40:03):

Where he’s just like, I live here now. So then they moved on to Frank Riga. They planned to do the same thing that they did to Mark Schiller, but Adrian, the Anthony Mackey character got mad and killed him during a fight. And so they injected his girlfriend with horse tranquilizer ultimately killing her

Laci (00:40:21):

By accident.

Matt (00:40:22):

Yes. Mark Schiller, the earlier victim, hired a real private investigator named Ed dubois and he really did go to the Miami pd, say you got to take this seriously. But they blew him off until these two people ended up kidnapped. And then the only other major difference is Daniel Lugo did flee to The Bahamas, but he stayed there for five days before the Bahamian police got to him. And then these two were both sentenced to death and they remained on death row until last year when they received a re-sentencing trial and sentence was converted to life in prison. So they’re still there

Laci (00:41:00):

And as they should be, but it did mean it did end the movie in a bad spot for me, thinking of the death penalty, I figured it would say if they’d already been executed, I was hoping it’d be the case that I don’t know. I don’t know what’s more humane.

Matt (00:41:13):

No, nobody should be put to death. It’s

Laci (00:41:15):

Stupid. It seems so archaic.

Matt (00:41:16):

It’s inhumane and it’s also dumb. There’s no reason to do it. It’s more expensive than to keep them alive. And

Laci (00:41:23):

It is.

Matt (00:41:24):

Yeah, it is. Because of all the extensive legal procedures to do it. And there’s certainly been innocent people executed. So that right there means you shouldn’t do it. But also, isn’t it good to just keep ’em alive in case you ever, I don’t know, need them for something? You have a question you need to ask them.

Laci (00:41:41):

Just a permanent I a question Little Gs waiting for you to ask it something.

Matt (00:41:45):

I would even say 30 years for murders probably too. Probably too much.

Laci (00:41:50):

You got to think you’re coming out a different person.

Matt (00:41:52):

Or even if you come out the same, I don’t know.

Laci (00:41:55):

Wait, Matt, you don’t want them to re-offend.

Matt (00:41:59):

No, I know you don’t want them to re-offend, but in other countries they don’t have sentences longer than 20 years.

Laci (00:42:03):

They

Matt (00:42:04):

Think that’s barbaric to even if you murder somebody to make them stay the rest of their lives. That’s

Laci (00:42:08):

Interesting. I will give that more thought then.

Matt (00:42:10):

Alright, so that’s the history of pain and gain. And now the movie, all right, we open with Mark Wahlberg doing these intense curls or whatever on an exterior wall and some cops show up. So the movie starts in media race. I bet you wondering how I got here.

Laci (00:42:59):

Not really.

Matt (00:43:00):

Well it all started six months ago. Pain and Gain. My name is Daniel Lugo and I believe in fitness.

Laci (00:43:07):

I think maybe he sees himself in this, I’m just guessing in Bay, in that he sees himself in results and getting a blockbuster out of what he did. And so maybe he’s good at telling Mark Wahlberg what to do in this role. Like I get it. You want your focus guy. The n justifies the means you believe in fitness.

Matt (00:43:29):

He believe in fitness and he also believes it’s this very American Protestant ideal. American Protestantism is totally separate from any organized religion or church that would be a mediating force. And instead it’s all about how you personally feel about your relationship with God. But what that means in reality is any reptilian urge you have, you feel justified in having it. Like, well, God’s on my side, so anything I do is good.

Laci (00:43:58):

I’m vouched for

Matt (00:43:59):

If I do something, it’s good by definition of me doing it. And that’s how he operates this whole movie. Anything I do, I’m doing for a good reason and I’m doing it to make the world better. And God loves me for doing it.

Laci (00:44:10):

I’m righting a wrong. I deserve more. Look at me. I’ve worked so hard for this one thing. I’m just, even the scales.

Matt (00:44:18):

Yep.

Laci (00:44:18):

I’m correcting the karma problem here.

Matt (00:44:21):

So Ed Harris’s voice comes to us and says, this is a true story. It took place in Miami, Florida back then. Unfortunately this is a true story. And this is so peanut butter and chocolate. It’s two great taste together. It’s the Cohen Brothers meets Martin Scorsese this movie. I mean, it’s the story about Cohen Brothers characters, but told like it’s a Martin Scorsese movie

Laci (00:44:45):

With Ed Harris. Meow. Excuse me.

Matt (00:44:48):

Oh yes,

Laci (00:44:48):

God, his face.

Matt (00:44:50):

And I just love a movie about stupid people and stupid people who think they’re smart and stupid criminals. And their movie Burn after reading the Cohen Brothers movie, burn After Reading is also centered on people who work at a gym and have a dumb scheme who also aren’t aware of how stupid and wrong everything they’re doing is

Laci (00:45:09):

Like they’ve never seen a heist movie. And Mark, dammit Daniel says multiple times, I watch a lot of movies as an actual credential where I feel like if that were true, he’d be better at this. While they’re at the Home Depot buying all the death tools. You split that up, you pay cash. Whatcha doing?

Matt (00:45:28):

I don’t want to say too much, but I know somebody very well. Who is that? Who would legitimately say to you as a way to, I see a lot of movies, I’ve read a lot of biographies of great men and what I have to take away is they always have a plan and he feels so sincerely that he’s a brilliant thinker that is just convinced himself. He is. And I’ve known somebody like that and I felt weird to see him on screen.

Laci (00:45:59):

Okay, okay. Yes, I could see him totally fucking up a heist, but thinking he Well, but I did all the steps. I had 1, 2, 3 fingers,

Matt (00:46:07):

Well would never even be able to say, but I did all the things, would never even acknowledge that anything has been going wrong. When things go wrong, it’s like, huh, I shifted. He just going to have to roll with do something else. So yeah. Then we go six months back, mark Wahlberg starts narrating his dumb philosophy. If you’re willing to do the work, you can have anything. That’s what makes the s of a great, when it started, America was just a handful of scrawny countries colonies. Now it’s the buff pumped up the most buff, pumped up country on the planet. That’s pretty rad.

Laci (00:46:37):

It’s just so interesting for him to choose making your body big as the thing that shows you work hard. There’s a million things he could have done to show his work. Why should a physical body that is imposing be like the ultimate sign of that guy deserves stuff? Because I mean, the majority of people who are rich don’t look like that, but that doesn’t even track.

Matt (00:46:59):

He’s only seeing what’s in front of him. And if he’s in Miami and in this place with all these gorgeous people and these muscle bound guys, he assumes that’s the whole world.

Laci (00:47:06):

It’s true, especially if you’re going to go work at a gym, especially a prestigious one. You’re just meeting people with a lot of money who care about their bodies. So you’re thinking, oh, all these rich people and don’t even have what I have. I’ve got, they’re coming to me looking for my wisdom. So I’m already here transpose. I clearly need their money and yeah, it makes sense.

Matt (00:47:27):

Right? And well, again, the person, the most amount of wealth he can conceive of is the Tony Shaloub character who, again, he has $500,000 in cash in the bank and has about 3 million in assets. And that’s a lot of money. But a lawyer has that, A dentist has that much, it’s like the Tony Soprano thing. Tony Soprano, the mob boss of New Jersey, lives next door to a dentist, lives next door to a lawyer. He’s basically just upper middle class. You’re not actually at the high echelon of wealth. But that’s all he can conceive of because that’s the world. That’s the only kind of person he would encounter. Well,

Laci (00:48:02):

He’s also being brought in by a conman. I mean, the victim in his own right is sort of a, in the way that he’s talking about his life, he’s saying, how many hot pieces of ass? And look at my mouth. I’m such a, I mean, look at my muscles. I’m such a fuck. He keeps talking shit. And he’s convincing Daniel that his life is amazing,

Matt (00:48:23):

Tony,

Laci (00:48:24):

Even, that’s what I’m saying. Right. He’s a tricky victim because he also is just completely confident that because he has such a heroic, overcoming first generation survivor story that anyone that did what he did would end up with the same result. And that’s just not true. He got lucky too. So I mean, he’s believing his own hype and he’s selling it to Daniel who now just wants to take it. He just sold it to the wrong person.

Matt (00:48:50):

And he’s selling. And he’s even selling himself because he says, when I’m out on my go fast boat, I like to pretend I’m a drug smuggler or I like to pretend that I’m the DEI chasing a drug smuggler. The other thing is, if you get all the riches that you think you want from the commercials, it’s not going to make you feel any better. You’re still going to be miserable.

Laci (00:49:07):

You’re still missing whatever was driving you.

Matt (00:49:10):

You have to tell this story about yourself and you have to make something up.

Laci (00:49:13):

Or it’s like, oh, I’ve got all this money, but I must be unhappy because I don’t like my body. I’ll go to the gym.

Matt (00:49:18):

Yeah, yeah.

Laci (00:49:20):

I’ll talk to the schmo that wishes he was me. That way I feel good about what I am.

Matt (00:49:23):

Right. Exactly. So he says, all my heroes are self-made. Rocky, Scarface, all the guys from the Godfather,

Laci (00:49:30):

All the real people,

Matt (00:49:31):

They all started with nothing and built their way to perfection. Now one, yeah, all fictional people. I mean, Rocky was inspired by a real guy, but also, also

Laci (00:49:38):

Not perfection. I don’t aspire to envy anyone from the Godfather,

Matt (00:49:42):

But also in The Godfather, you could probably only say that about veto Corot. It’s mostly about his sons who very much did not start. They literally started on third base.

Laci (00:49:52):

Right. And Michael Cor did not amount to perfection. I will remind you.

Matt (00:49:56):

True. It did not end well for

Laci (00:49:57):

The one. No. So Rocky, what’s the second one?

Matt (00:50:01):

Scarface

Laci (00:50:02):

Again dies in a fucking blaze of glory. Great. Anyway. Yeah. Oh, mark,

Matt (00:50:10):

I have no sympathy for people who squander their gifts. It’s sickening. It’s worse than sickening. It’s unpatriotic. So

Laci (00:50:16):

You think the pile of Coke in Scarface was that guy really enjoying his gifts?

Matt (00:50:20):

So Scarface is still a movie I’ve never seen.

Laci (00:50:23):

Oh. It’s just a lot of Coke.

Matt (00:50:25):

And once I see it, I will have to figure out a new movie. That’s the big movie I haven’t seen.

Laci (00:50:29):

It’s not worth seeing. It’s so replicated that you won’t feel like you’re watching it. For real. It’s aggravating. I saw it way after I’d already seen it parody and it suffered from that in my mind.

Matt (00:50:41):

So his new client is Tony Shaloub as Victor Kershaw, who again talks about how he has this great boat and he likes to pretend he’s a drug smuggler owns the Schlotzky’s. I do some stock trading real estate, own a Greyhound that races. I’m a self-made man. I’ve made a lot of money. We see Mark Wahlberg in his car watching Tony Shaloub at his house and seeing the life that he leads where he just yells at the gardener and at the people who are washing his car and comments on the ladies walking by his house and on their asses. And he’s just like, I want all of that. And he goes,

Laci (00:51:15):

But he seems to want it from this guy because he doesn’t think this guy deserves it. He seems to think he’s different from this guy in some really important way. It also matters that this guy’s easy to not like, because both of the targets are very flashy. People who are super tacky and they don’t manners.

Matt (00:51:34):

I think that comes second. I think that this guy is in front of me and I will come up with reasons to justify the fact that he doesn’t deserve it. And instead I do. And he would do this with anybody, including if it was a great person. The scene where he goes to the lawn care store and gets on the riding lawnmower and the guy who works at the store is like, ah, it’s a pretty nice mower. And he’s like, yeah, well if I deserve something univers, give me something or whatever. And the guy’s just like, oh, okay. And walks away.

Laci (00:52:03):

No, the guy was pissed because you make 10% back on any lawnmower you sell if you’re in hardware.

Matt (00:52:08):

Oh, okay.

Laci (00:52:09):

And garage door openers, if it’s like Sears,

Matt (00:52:12):

But right there, mark Will. It

Laci (00:52:13):

Was Sears, wasn’t it? He

Matt (00:52:15):

Was, I don’t remember if it was the Sears.

Laci (00:52:15):

He mentioned Sears. Yeah. He got that guy’s hopes up and then that guy wasn’t even going to buy the fucking lawnmower.

Matt (00:52:21):

But he’s like, these two guys are literally the same. They have the exact same positions where they work, but Mark Wahlberg feels so superior to him based on nothing other than just the way he feels about himself. So this gym, I mean, can you tell us about this gym, Laci?

Laci (00:52:38):

I mean, I did not visit a gym in the early nineties, eighties. What year is

Matt (00:52:42):

95?

Laci (00:52:43):

Okay. But I mean, it has the energy of gyms. I’ve been in just a lot of people way too dulled up working their asses off to look as good as the person next to them. This is probably a sexier gym. I mean, are you asking me about the gym when he walked into it? Or the one, what’d he turn it into? Cause it’s two different things.

Matt (00:53:02):

Both. I mean, yeah. Starts

Laci (00:53:03):

See, it feels typical workout life and equipment looks really the same. It just used to be white and now it’s silver and black. That’s it. The outfits are different.

Matt (00:53:13):

Yeah, it is interesting. I go to the gym. I know hearing about how Gold’s Gym was a big innovation in the gym space. And then Planet Fitness was another innovation. Like don’t worry, we’re not elitist here. Do whatever workout you want to do. But in my whole life I’ve only gone to gyms like that, so I can’t imagine a gym where people are really fucking serious and will judge You

Laci (00:53:36):

Don’t think cross case is like that? I think there’s a part of every gym where there’s that guy. You’re right, you do tend to work out at smaller gyms. I feel like I’ve only ever gone to big ones. I went to Elmwood the first time I ever, and that’s a really big one. So maybe it’s the experience of being a woman at the gym, but I feel like there’s always people trying to show off

Matt (00:53:57):

And

Laci (00:53:57):

Being really, I

Matt (00:53:58):

Think that whatever the Planet Fitness model was responding to, I’ve never experienced the thing they’re responding to. I’ve only ever been in planet fitnesses in that kind of environment where it’s just other people who are just going to go on the treadmill for 40 minutes.

Laci (00:54:13):

I think you’ve also got to be a gym rat to really see it all and just like a mall rat, right? You are there all the time. So a movie about the gym, you are seeing the parts of the day that are like that, especially you’re not in the CrossFit area, so when they’re in a big garage thing, that’s when it’s really fucking, it’s all about the woo, what’s your plan? What do you do? How much you live bull. That’s because the true believers, the ones who are really trying to get big aren’t in that other area where they’re shaking fucking ropes and flipping tires and doing crazy shit. Never. I would never,

Matt (00:54:43):

But when he starts working here, it’s like it’s an old person gym, just old ladies and stuff, and this gym has a pool, but he’s like, what they say about Florida is God’s waiting room. No, I like older people. They’re generous, but he’s, he’s got to change the clientele when he gets,

Laci (00:54:59):

He’s smart

Matt (00:55:00):

When he gets hired. This Bosch John, who’s played by Rob Corddry, very funny. He explains, I read a lot of biographies. The one thing that unites great men is the reach always exceeds their grasp. I can triple your membership in however long he says,

Laci (00:55:12):

And he does it six

Matt (00:55:13):

Months or something and he does it. That’s the thing with

Laci (00:55:15):

Really smart ideas.

Matt (00:55:16):

Yes. Okay. That I think that’s so key here is he has a plan and he executes it and it’s very good

Laci (00:55:23):

And these things come natural to him. There’s something I’m telling you, there is a lot of Michael Bay in this guy. There’s this guy just naturally sees what people want and he gives it to them. If you’ve got a goal and your goal is to have hot people here, I will give discounts to strippers. You didn’t say what kind of hot people. You just want the aesthetic of hotness here. There you go. There’s a pragmatic thing in his brain where all of this makes total sense and seems really easy to him. He just needs the space to do it and he’s right. It’s just he’s biting off more than he can chew and he’s going into a plan with more than just him with the bigger stuff, and it is the weaker links that ultimately fuck him over. Honestly, if you had three of him, he might’ve gotten away with it.

Matt (00:56:08):

So in the voiceover, we’re seeing him talk about how he made the membership really change this place and we see his boss is raking in the cash and he explains, I made sitting a fitness quarter by Christmas, perks included how it works. You give and you get back. He’s almost like Hank Hill working for Mr. Strickland who’s like, oh, I’m an assistant man. Yeah, he doesn’t mind a boss. He crucially does not understand. You are getting fucked over by your boss that you think you live in a fair market, but you’ve

Laci (00:56:39):

Been given a title boss. Your

Matt (00:56:41):

Boss is the one you’re making money for, and he hasn’t adequately compensated you and you totally misdirecting your anger toward I deserve.

Laci (00:56:50):

Right. Well, he thinks he’s being given the thing he deserves in terms of what the boss can offer, completely forgetting a salary increase would probably work out better or a bonus. He’s like, yeah, he gave me the title, the Prestige I Want. It’s all about prestige, right? It’s like I am somebody here. I walk in here and I’m at the top echelon. That is what I want. It’s when he walks into a different environment and finds himself to the bottom again, that he gets all shitty about it

Speaker 1 (00:57:14):

When

Laci (00:57:14):

He is just talking to other people who work there. He feels really good about himself, but when he goes to ask out a rich woman who thinks he’s attractive and he thinks she’s gorgeous, but she laughs at him like We are not from this same world and you think that we are because you’re helping me work out. That’s when he feels it,

Matt (00:57:35):

And that’s why I feel like the reason the flags keep coming in. He keeps talking about America. It’s so important here. It’s this fundamental American characteristic of looking at how unfair this world is that we’ve built and having the wrong conclusion. The actual conclusion should be me and my friends who work here need to unionize or start our own gym or whatever. We need to have solidarity with each other and instead never even occurs to him. His boss is screwing him over

Laci (00:58:03):

Because to him, his boss is the one who gave him his big break, trusted him, let him do the thing he wanted to do, and maybe it’s because it’s Miami and Miami is a real melting pot of nationalities and stuff, but I mean, crucially, the hot woman he wants to talk to, she’s not American. The hot stripper, he pulls into the mix later, not American, the guy he’s fucking over, first generation immigrant, not American, and then the people he ends up killing, they also don’t seem like apple pie. I feel like he’s looking at people who don’t look like the All American guy and he’s getting pissed at them and either trying to make sure they like him back or getting angry at them and going, fuck you. I’m an American

Matt (00:58:48):

In real life. They were Hungarian. They don’t do that. Who is the couple who they kill?

Laci (00:58:53):

Okay, they

Matt (00:58:54):

Don’t say they’re Hungarian in the movie, but they’re coded as Italian or

Laci (00:58:58):

Yeah, they seem first gener, they seem new money.

Speaker 1 (00:59:04):

There’s

Laci (00:59:05):

Attacking us. There’s a flaunting, there’s a need to be seen as wealthy that seems to aggravate him, or at least it’s the shiny thing that distracts and can piss him off or make him happy. He’s attracted and repulsed by it.

Matt (00:59:18):

If you internalize the idea that I’ll work hard and I’ll get my reward, the meritocracy, once you find out, oh, that’s not true. It doesn’t matter because I don’t own the gym. My boss owns the gym.

Speaker 5 (00:59:30):

What

Matt (00:59:30):

Makes him entitled to the gym? I don’t know. His parents had money, so he had money so he could buy the gym. Then there’s two different conclusions you can come from that you can come from, well then I need to figure out how to get mine. Or it’s like, well, I can figure out how to make the system more fair. And most people in America are like, well, I need to figure out a way to win this rigged game myself and hoard more for myself.

Laci (00:59:54):

These people are cheating. I’ll cheat too and get away with it just like they did.

Matt (00:59:57):

So his best friend at the gym is Adrian, played by Anthony Mackey, who doesn’t work there. He just goes there and he tells him he’s frustrated. He tells him he’s frustrated. He feels like he should be further along in his muscle building project, and then Mark Wahlberg is like, no, we should be frustrated because we look so fucking great, but we should be making way more money and you are broke all the time, and that’s stupid. We need to get a plan to get out of being broke and to get out of being losers who can’t get dates, and Adrian is just kind of like, huh, okay, I guess I agree.

Laci (01:00:32):

You’re real nice about it.

Matt (01:00:34):

So there is this just wonderful sequence with Kim Jong as Johnny Wu whose TV commercial is literally him on a yacht surrounded by hot women, just one of these TV hucksters who plays a millionaire, who makes his money by going to shitty hotel ballrooms and giving lectures about how you two can be like me.

Laci (01:00:55):

It’s just a more successful Daniel. Daniel also was in a ballroom when we see him during his first con

Matt (01:01:00):

And the wisdom he gives out is like everybody in America is either a doer or a donor, a doer or a donor, and Mark Wahlberg is so good. He’s just nodding along and writing every single thing down, a doer or a donor. Here’s my message for you today. Don’t be a donor. Do be a doer.

Laci (01:01:21):

I’ve already got your money. You’re a bunch of fucking idiots. All I got to do is pump up a couple people and I’m getting out of here without anyone being mad at me.

Matt (01:01:30):

And he’s like in the voiceover, he’s like, this guy understands me. And he’s like, we only need three fingers. Get a goal, get a plan and get up off your ass.

Laci (01:01:42):

Also, America’s perfectly calibrated for these kind of hucksters because after we get duped, we are trained to feel like shit about ourselves, not about the guy. So it’s like they’re sitting there ands, probably washing over them like, oh, there’s no actual information here. Oh fuck, okay, I’ve done it again. Then you just want to scurry on home and tell no one you went to this thing. Meanwhile, Johnny Woo goes onto the next city and does it to a whole bunch of more people,

Speaker 1 (01:02:06):

And that’s

Laci (01:02:06):

How it works is the built-in shame in other cultures in other countries. The shame goes the other way. In Russia.

Matt (01:02:15):

In Russia, yes.

Laci (01:02:17):

My friend told me all about the way that it works and it sounds really harsh and sounds like drive-throughs. Drive-throughs are reversed in Russia. They give you the food and once they’ve proven they give you food, then you pay the second window is paying.

Matt (01:02:32):

Okay.

Laci (01:02:34):

I don’t know, it’s just kind of backwards here. We internalize when we get conned, not by getting mad at the conman.

Matt (01:02:41):

Yes, okay. No, that makes perfect sense. Based on the psychology we have, and if you want to explain, well, what makes America different from Western Europe, it’s like, well, there’s historical reasons, but a big part of it is geography. We have this vast open country and for about a hundred years, anybody can just be like, well, I’ll just go get some land out there and make my fortune.

Laci (01:03:04):

The whole law around America is the one determined man, the one that was willing to do the hard part, the brave man, the self-starter I came from Nothing. You literally have to come from nothing in an American story because that’s where everyone came from alone,

Matt (01:03:20):

And when the land no longer exists for you to just go claim, now you get people like Johnny Wu, Kim Jong, who’s like, but metaphorically, go get yours.

Speaker 6 (01:03:29):

But

Matt (01:03:29):

If you live in France or whatever and your family’s lived there for 700 years, you’re like, no, there’s no mobility. I’m not making my fortune. So instead, let’s figure out how to make it better for all of us. And that’s the thing that America has never been willing to do, and I think that this movie got bad reviews when it came out and everybody’s like, it was so nasty, but I feel like it’s reputation is really improved since, and they’re like, oh my God. It seemed to anticipate Trump

Laci (01:03:54):

Because

Matt (01:03:55):

This is literally a Trump guy that

Laci (01:03:58):

He’s wearing a cutoff Gene. Ken

Matt (01:03:59):

JG is playing.

Laci (01:04:01):

I was saying Daniel, he looks like a Trump guy to me,

Matt (01:04:03):

And Danny’s very much seems like a Trump guy of, I go on pure instinct, but I’m a virtuous person. Even if I don’t do things that are morally good and I deserve it and I deserve to follow my base instincts and I deserve to accumulate and screw over other people,

Laci (01:04:20):

They’re even in Florida,

Matt (01:04:21):

That is not a thing that is just limited to people who’ve over Trump. That’s also, that’s everybody. Every American is like that. If you love Trump and you think he’s raising taxes on everybody but billionaires, but he’s doing it to make my life better, you are a Rube. But if you are a Democrat who’s like, yeah, but Robert Mueller’s going to come and make everything better and come down from the mountain and Trump will be executed, or Ooh, these new Epstein files are going to make everything better. No, no, no, nothing will ever get better. Everyone is lying to you and conning you

Laci (01:04:55):

And the personal story you tell yourself, because I did start out poor me, Laci. That is part of my lore and I’m weirdly proud of it, especially not being poor now or whatever, nothing, what I grew up with, and in fact, if I were a second generation person coming from a middle class, I would find a way to convince myself, no, no, I was poor than you think I was. It doesn’t matter how much you achieve in America, we’re all pretending to still have that same origin story.

Matt (01:05:29):

Oh yeah,

Laci (01:05:29):

That’s what I mean. Trump saying that he came from nothing. It, it’s like ozempic. It doesn’t count if you’re cheating. You want everybody to be skinny. You want everybody to be rich, but you can’t take a shot and you can’t have had money to start with. It’s like, well, fuck, the whole thing feels like a con then America is just a con. You cannot win.

Matt (01:05:48):

I’m sure to trump, it does feel like he came from nothing.

Laci (01:05:51):

Yes, he’s convinced him. I’m saying that the psyche of an American person is because it is so important to have been that guy. You just tell yourself you were, and he can say, well, it’s because my mom didn’t love me, and my dad hated me too, and my brother was a drunk. So to him, he’s like, so that’s starting or

Matt (01:06:06):

From Queens, and the people in Manhattan looked down on me.

Laci (01:06:08):

It’s not prestigious. So it’s like, yeah, big feelings help make you invent a pass that’s not true about yourself. Yeah,

Matt (01:06:17):

When I went to prep school, they were snooty to me.

Laci (01:06:19):

They’re not going to understand my real story. They’re not going to get the gravity of it. I’ll just embellish because they don’t understand unless I do.

Matt (01:06:26):

Oh, what I’m saying is he doesn’t think, no one thinks they’re embellishing. They’re like, this is emotionally true. This is directionally true. This is true.

Laci (01:06:33):

That’s what I’m saying. It’s not embellishing. It literally is, but in your brain you’re going, no, I am helping them understand I’m heightening. You would’ve had to be there.

Matt (01:06:44):

So we finally meet the rock. Paul Doyle is his character,

(01:06:49):

And Adrian has decided, or Danny Mark Wahlberg has decided he’s going to rob Victor. He’s going to rob Tony Schoop, and he brings Adrian in on his plan, and he’s like, but we just need one other operative, and this is where we meet Paul Doyle, and now the rock starts doing narration, so it becomes more Scorsese, more Goodfellas. Here you’ll get multiple narrators. He went to prison and Mark Wahlberg is like, that’s okay. We all make mistakes. It doesn’t mean we don’t deserve a piece of the pie. But what he was doing was he was doing cocaine and breaking and entering into a home on Christmas and got caught, and there’s a freeze frame of him getting caught that makes him look so scared and embarrassed. It’s so good. And right away, I think that’s why, how you know that this performance is going to be so special. And whenever I see a movie about cocaine, I think, oh, I want to do that. But my experience of people on cocaine is not much in real life, but very much on podcasts. I hear them when they’re on cocaine.

Laci (01:07:47):

You do?

Matt (01:07:48):

Yeah. And what they are mostly is checked out and annoying versus I think the stereotypical like, oh fuck, I’m so fucking like,

Laci (01:07:56):

Yeah, there is a moment on cocaine where you’ve got all the answers and you’re very talkative, but most of the time you’re thinking about, am I high enough still right now? Does my head hurt? Am I still having fun? I wonder You’re distant, so

Matt (01:08:09):

You’re right. He’s playing here is aloof and distant and scared and paranoid, but he is not super twitchy like going a million miles a minute.

Laci (01:08:18):

He gets there. I mean, that’s what I’m saying. It ebbs and that cocaine is a ride, and the more you do it, the more you stay on the sad part of the ride of the, where are we going? We’re going to go.

Matt (01:08:29):

I still want to do it.

Laci (01:08:32):

I support this.

Matt (01:08:32):

Just like when I saw the brutalist and Adrian Brody and his wife do heroin and have heroin sex. I was like, oh, we should do that.

Laci (01:08:39):

No,

Matt (01:08:40):

We should do

Laci (01:08:40):

That. I draw the line,

Matt (01:08:41):

It looks fun. It saves their marriage in that movie.

Laci (01:08:45):

Well, now I know that happens. Thanks.

Matt (01:08:47):

So then the rock’s voiceover. No. Why rabbit? No. Why have rhymes with rabbit? Because your whole life disappears down a bunny hole. That’s so great.

Speaker 2 (01:08:56):

Is it?

Matt (01:08:56):

Yes. You really liked it. It’s such a great quote. But yeah, we see in prison he got saved. He beat up a bunch of tough guys, including wrestler. Kurt Engel, when he got out of prison, he went to Florida. He didn’t have any warrants there. So he goes to a priest’s place like I’m a priest and I run this place for ex-cons, and the priest is played by Larry Hankin, fake Kramer from Seinfeld and a billion other things, who welcomes him right in without asking questions. And in his voiceover, Paul’s like, it was nice when I met Danny, it was nice. I hadn’t really had a friend since Ma died.

Speaker 7 (01:09:27):

So

Matt (01:09:28):

This is an exceptionally lonely man, and he doesn’t seem to be aware of how lonely his life has, how specifically badly he’s been treated. Doesn’t realize how sad it is that Danny wants to be your friend so he can use you. And we will see what happens with the priest.

Laci (01:09:50):

I will say it doesn’t totally make sense to go to jail and get saved as a Catholic. Those aren’t the people that are saving you in fucking jail.

Matt (01:09:57):

Where does it say Catholic?

Laci (01:09:59):

He goes to a priest after. Oh, but he would go to a pastor. No, it’s very different. I feel like people, maybe it’s different in church, but I feel like people who are saved later in life, they don’t get saved and become Catholic. They become evangelicals.

Matt (01:10:11):

No, no, no. He’s an evangelical. He could go to a Catholic place though. I could see that happening. It’s like I’m a Catholic priest who welcomes in Excon. They don’t have to belong to my religion.

(01:10:26):

So they go to this strip club, they watch Serena Lumin and they tell her, Danny tells her that he and the Rock are making a music video and she should be their leading lady in it. Then she has a voiceover where she explains, she came from Romania where she was the runner up in a Mr. Romania pageant. And it’s bullshit because the woman who won only won because she showed her vagina to the judge. And then she’s like, but I knew the only place woman like me could be appreciated was United States. So then we see her, she’s getting let out of a trunk in Mexico wearing a senior frogs, and she’ll have to walk to the border, and she’s like, it was the land of opportunity. And then I met Daniel, he had that can-do spirit. My American dream was finally coming true. So she also is poisoned by this idea. She didn’t even have to live in America to get this idea of what America could do for her.

Laci (01:11:15):

And is she completely conned all the way through until the end? I mean, she’s even on the stand saying she is a CIA operative, and did no one bother to tell her that that was all bullshit, and was she not listening to the rest of the fucking trial?

Matt (01:11:30):

I’m sure in real life she was not convinced of that through the trial. But in real life, she did think that she was working with them for the CIA. Danny tries to get Paul to go along with his plan, and he’s like, no, I can’t do that. That’s illegal. So we get Adrian Anthony Mackey’s voiceover explaining how good Danny Lugo has been to him. He has such a big heart. He only ever has my best interest at heart, but his plan doesn’t make any sense to me. He says, I’d never been a crimer, ain’t never had a reason to be. But then we see he gets a reason to be he’s taking a lot of steroids and then made his dick stop working. And so he goes to a penis clinic and Rebel Wilson plays the Australian nurse working here, and she’s like, yeah, we always treat men who do steroids and then their balls shrink and their dick stop working. But she’s attracted to hunky black men and he’s attracted to larger white women. And I actually think it’s pretty nice, their little relationship.

Laci (01:12:27):

I think there’s chemistry. Yeah, I enjoy this.

Matt (01:12:29):

She says, I don’t know, something so sexy about a black man who can cry, love a little rain on the African plane. And I think in a worse Michael Bay movie, they would, they’d play that for a more straightforward joke. But Anthony Mackey just looks at her and laughs, oh, that’s a character making a joke to

Laci (01:12:50):

Me,

Matt (01:12:51):

And we shall laugh. And a sort of attraction and chemistry builds between us. It was just nice. I don’t know. I think these guys could have had something. And Peter store, Mayer plays the dick doctor. He’s often in Michael Bay movies and Cohen Brothers movies, but this Dick Madison, these shots directly into your dick, like Harvey Weinstein had to get. They’re very, very expensive. So that’s why he has to go along with the plan. I think this is one of the only things that annoys me about the movie or about the screenplay is like, we got to have a reason everybody does anything. I would’ve liked it more if it’s just like, well, my friend told me to do it, so I did it.

Laci (01:13:24):

Well, I think they lose track of the fact that Daniel is a con man. I mean, he’s even conned himself into thinking he’s having real friendships, and he’s these friends into thinking that he’s his friend. I mean, he’s, he’s an opportunist. He needs to pump people up so he can get what he wants out of them. And to him, he thinks he’s being a friend.

Matt (01:13:40):

Yeah, yeah. It would never occur to him that he’s not being

Laci (01:13:43):

No,

Matt (01:13:43):

And they

Laci (01:13:44):

Are very similar. The two guys that are in this, the guys who he would be the lead of a gang of are all going to have this need to be appreciated and admired by the big strongest person in the room.

Matt (01:14:00):

So then the screenplay is like, okay, well now the rock needs a reason to join the criminal scheme. So the reason he does it is that fake Kramer, the priest makes a sexual pass at him or just so

Laci (01:14:10):

Now he needs a place to live,

Matt (01:14:11):

And he beats him up, but he’s like, so, I mean, what was your read on this? The priest just kind of touches his arm and comments on how glistening he is in the sun and he looks so confused and then beats the shit out of him.

Laci (01:14:24):

I read it as, I mean, it looks like the movies hinting that that priest is coming onto him,

Matt (01:14:31):

But his reaction and later when he goes into the sex toy factory

Laci (01:14:37):

And

Matt (01:14:37):

He’s looking at

Laci (01:14:40):

All

Matt (01:14:40):

These penises and stuff,

Laci (01:14:41):

I didn’t read it like you did, but I mean, there’s so much to look at and so much to follow. So I mean, I could totally buy it. Sure, repress it would make sense why he stays to himself and his best friend was his mom. Honestly, the best friend to being the mom is probably the biggest key that that’s what they’re trying to do here. And to have such a huge reaction to a come on from a man, it’s usually a repressed person who does it

Matt (01:15:03):

Where it starts as confusion. I don’t even understand what you’re doing,

Laci (01:15:07):

And

Matt (01:15:08):

The only way I can respond is with violence. So he has to move out of there, and he tells Mark Wahlberg like, okay, I’ll do it. I’ll do your stupid plan.

Laci (01:15:16):

But it’s, he’s lost, and God was his way of finding himself again. And then he goes and leans on this guy because he trust in people who trust in God, and that didn’t work. So he just finds himself to going to the next strong man in his life. He’s just drifting from person to guide him. God being the biggest strong man of the mall, that’s not working out for me right now. So let me go to Mark Wahlberg. Yeah,

Matt (01:15:42):

They go to this pawn shop to get a bunch of weapons. Anthony Mackey’s, like we’re looking for merchandise to shock incapacitate and imprison our fellow man.

Speaker 1 (01:15:49):

And

Matt (01:15:50):

The shopkeeper enthusiastically helps them because they bond over their shared love of Christian Rock. And so Mark Wahlberg starts, he takes out his maps and stuff, and he’s like, here’s our plan. Delta Force could probably do this in 53 seconds, but with our superior athletic ability, we could do it in 40. So he’s like, there’s another breed of American now who’s like, I never served in the military, but I really feel like

Laci (01:16:13):

A veteran.

Matt (01:16:14):

I really feel like an operator.

Laci (01:16:16):

I could do it.

Matt (01:16:17):

And so I shop at Army surplus places and I have the soul of a troop. So it’s inaccurate to say that I’m not a veteran. I kind of am spiritually,

(01:16:28):

And this is where Adrian says, I knew Danny was making most of this shit up, but it didn’t matter. We were going to be rich. So they arrive in camo gear at Tony Sha Lu’s house, but he’s having Shabbat dinner, and they’re like, oh, fuck. And they just run away and they regroup and devise a new plan where they’re going to kidnap in the parking lot. They’re going to block his car in so he can’t escape, but they block the wrong car in, and then he just drives away. And Mark Wahlberg’s yelling at the rock and the rocks. It was an

Laci (01:16:51):

Honest mistake. Did you check the license plate? Told you, check the license plates. He’s got a mistakes.

Matt (01:16:57):

I’m

Laci (01:16:57):

Telling you, if there were three Daniels, this would’ve worked out.

Matt (01:17:00):

Yeah,

Laci (01:17:01):

He’s not wrong. He’s got something,

Matt (01:17:04):

Although, but he makes the most important mistake when they get Victor, when they get Tony Shaloub, which they get him by just Anthony, Maggie steps out and tass him wearing a ninja costume

Laci (01:17:15):

In the face,

Matt (01:17:17):

And they take him to this warehouse that the rock’s friend owns or something that is a sex toy warehouse. But when he is looking at it, he’s like, there’s a lot of homo stuff in here. He’s just looking at dildos of dicks and stuff. But then he sees one of those realistic sex dolls of a woman where it has female anatomy, and he’s squishing it, and he’s like, huh. So it’s true what they say. I

Laci (01:17:41):

Think you’re a little more hung up on this part of it than I am.

Matt (01:17:44):

Clearly, I don’t think it matters. Why? Well, none of this matters. It matters when we need to get through the mover.

Laci (01:17:53):

I see what you’re saying though. I only watch

Matt (01:17:55):

That implies he has never had sex with a woman. He doesn’t know what female anatomy is.

Laci (01:17:59):

Right.

Matt (01:17:59):

He’s marveling at a female sex doll. So I think that clinches it. Mark Wahlberg, whenever he talks to Tony Shalu, he talks in this bad Scarface accent, tells him, send your wife and kid back to Columbia. Don’t tell anyone. But once they take him into the warehouse, Tony Sha Lu’s voiceover explains like, my parents survived concentration camps. I went through some shit in Columbia. They could do anything they want to me, but I’m not fucking giving ’em what they want. They don’t know who they’re messing with. And Mark Wahlberg continues to talk to him in this Scarface monologue. They’ve put duct tape over Tony Schoop’s eyes, and then he says something that makes Tony Shalu look at him, even though his eyes are duct taped. And he’s like, you’re broke. You dumb shit because you never went to college. Thereby guaranteeing you’re going to spend the rest of your life obsessing over pectoral muscles. And they all freak out. They’re like, how does he know about my pectoral muscles? And he’s like, fucking, I can smell your cologne, your bad cologne. I knew the whole time it was you, Danny. And they’re like, fuck. But he too knows, as soon as I said it, I’d sealed my fate. Now there’s nothing they can do, but kill me. But he has the same

Laci (01:19:11):

Thing. That urge, that urge to be like, you’re not smarter than me, except for I just did the stupidest thing ever to prove I’m smart. Right?

Matt (01:19:17):

Because he too is internalized this meritocracy. I went to college, I did the right stuff,

Laci (01:19:24):

But also he wants to be thought of as the smartest guy in the room. That’s his mythology. He’s not the biggest, he’s the smartest. He’s the one with the most fucking know-how. So he had to tell this stupid person that he was stupid.

Matt (01:19:35):

And he says, killing me is not going to give you job skills, Danny. So yeah, they’re like, so what are we going to do? And he’s like, what do you mean? What are we going to do?

Laci (01:19:44):

I’m fucking relieved though. I could not stand the fucking fake accent. I’m like, okay, good. Just talk like Mark the rest of Scott.

Matt (01:19:50):

Yeah, because it is comical, but not over the top. So you’re like, is he really going to getting away with this? And right away they’re like, no, he’s not getting away with trying to sound like Scarface. No. Or wrestler Razor Ramon.

Laci (01:20:00):

He just sounds Hispanic to me.

Matt (01:20:03):

So they have him fire his employees over the phone, tell his wife to leave the country, help his staff at the house that they’re all fired, and then they need to leave Paul the Rock at the place overnight with the first shift. And he’s like, well, what do I do? He is crying and Mark Wahlberg’s like, he’ll stop.

Laci (01:20:21):

So they make best friends.

Matt (01:20:23):

The Rock is reading a magazine called Christian Camping when Victor yells, I need a drink. And Paul’s like, we don’t do spirits here. And I’m sober. And Victor’s like, oh, I’m sober too. So they start bonding over their shared sobriety. And Victor’s like, I think the reason I’m here is I was sent here to help you. You seem like you’re on the wrong path, and the rock seems really taken with this. Yeah, you’re right. But one thing, are you a Jew? And he’s like, yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:20:51):

Is that a problem?

Matt (01:20:52):

Can I save you? And he just puts his head on his hand, his hand on Tony. Tony Cha cast out the Jewish demon to cast out the Jewishness and Tony Chalos like, oh, that felt great.

Laci (01:21:01):

That felt good, because it’s just a conman working. Another guy who’s a total mark, giving him a name, I’m sure you felt some kind of affection for him because of Stockholm syndrome, but he’s working over the weak link.

Matt (01:21:14):

Yes. He gives him a name, ldo, it means beloved of God and Hebrew, and the Rock gives him a name Pepe. And he’s like, well,

Laci (01:21:21):

That’s his name.

Matt (01:21:21):

Well, but it was Victor Pepe Kershaw. And he’s like, after Danny Pepe was my second friend, and later Paul is reading to him aloud from magazines, and he’s like, do you want to hear about the human bomber now? And then Victor tries to run away, and so the rock has to punch him. And he is like, why’d you make me do that to?

Laci (01:21:40):

It’s sweet. It’s sweet. But I guess I’m never totally sure if the victim, I cannot remember his name ever, is totally conning El dad.

Matt (01:21:54):

He’s trying to do whatever he can do.

Laci (01:21:55):

I know. I guess what I’m saying is I can’t ever tell if there’s a real affection both ways. I can tell that there’s one way, but

Matt (01:22:01):

I think you just said it. He probably does have some affection for him and feels bad for him, but

Laci (01:22:05):

It’s all just survival instinct. Got to get out of

Matt (01:22:08):

Whatever’s going to work. The Serena the stripper, she finds Mark Bert’s night vision goggles. She’s like, I know I’m not movie elect. He’s like, no, I’m in the ccia A and I’m sent here to recruit you. Trust me, I’m in the ccia a one time in Hong Kong. I had to live for a week in a tree

Laci (01:22:26):

Just like ccia a guys do.

Matt (01:22:28):

And she’s excited and she’s turned on. She’s like, oh, I can’t wait to be a CIA operator. But he’s like, oh, he’s concerned that the Rock is developing too much sympathy for Tony. So he’s like, I’m going to have Serena start spending time with him. So she approaches him at the strip club, but then they get interrupted by Frank Griego, this new guy played by Michael Rispoli, who we last met in while you were sleeping, where he plays Sandra landlord’s son. Oh, shit. He was frank. He was the third richest man in Golden Beach. Okay. So three weeks go by and Victor still hasn’t broken, and we see

Laci (01:23:05):

It’s a fucking long time to be doing this. That’s incredible.

Matt (01:23:10):

But he’s maintained his little bastard attitude the whole time. They’ll wake him up on the sofa and he’ll just piss himself right there. He’s like, you guys clean it, pieces of shit. They steal his greyhound from the racetrack, and Anthony Mackey brings it to Revel Wilsons, and he’s like, look, we have a dog now.

Laci (01:23:26):

Why? I don’t understand that one. That’s fine.

Matt (01:23:28):

But they do finally break him. They get him to sign a document. And so Mark Wahlberg goes to the bank and he’s like, look, he signed off this form. So now I get all his stuff. And they’re like, absolutely. We just need to notarize this, so he will need to be here in person to sign it. And he’s like, but he’s busy. He’s in Europe trying to save elephants. It’s like, yeah, of course. It’s not that simple. You can’t just have him sign a document, but he needs a notary. Well, his boss, John at the gym is a notary. And he’s like, Hey, can I borrow your notary stamp? And he’s like, no, that’s sacred. And he’s like, bro, what even is a notary? But he wins him over by saying, Mr. Kershaw will sponsor your athletic competition. So stand, stand, stand, stand.

Laci (01:24:09):

I was going to back. He did not fire the employees. The employees think that Daniel is a very nice owner, more so than the other guy was. They end up, the people that were in Schlotzky’s end up really liking Daniel

Matt (01:24:19):

How he fire, because that is one of my favorite things in the

Laci (01:24:22):

Movie. Hes the workers at the house.

Matt (01:24:23):

Okay, that’s what I meant. Sorry. Yeah. That’s one of my favorite

Laci (01:24:26):

Things

Matt (01:24:26):

That’s lurking in the background is the new people like Mark Wahlberg better

Laci (01:24:30):

And he’s so fucking productive. He’s going to the gym, he’s making time for the neighborhood kids fucking, he’s running a schlotzky’s and he’s doing the torture and scamming. This guy’s fucking busy.

Matt (01:24:42):

It’s like that fantasy of,

Laci (01:24:43):

I guess the kids in the neighborhood doesn’t happen until after they try to kill the first whatever. This guy is just a doer. But

Matt (01:24:52):

It’s like you have that fantasy of if I had to take over your life, I’d do it better than you. I know I would. And you probably would for about six months. And then inertia would take hold and the reasons that you were living your life poorly come into, you know what I’m saying?

Laci (01:25:10):

Sure.

Matt (01:25:11):

And catch me if you can. When Frank Abna takes over as a substitute French teacher, and then you find out he’s been doing it three months. I don’t want that part. Three weeks. Why don’t you like that?

Laci (01:25:20):

Because Because the little old lady comes on the bus and it was hard for her to get a bus, and then she doesn’t even get her substitute. That’s the only part of the movie I can’t watch. That’s

Matt (01:25:29):

True. I forgot about that. I’m sorry to bring it up. Anyway, the scheme is now working. They get $500,000 in cash. They get the deeds to his house, but they don’t know what to do about Tony Shalu, about Kershaw. They have to kill him now. And Mark Wahlberg turns super evil on the rock now of like, well, you have to. He saw you. He knows what you look like, and I don’t want you going back to prison.

Laci (01:25:54):

He’s all of

Matt (01:25:55):

Us. What are you fucking talking about? But he’s always, the rock is flustered. Mark Wahlberg’s talking way too fast. He’s like, we got to get him drunk. So they feed him Kaa and then take him to a parking lot, then try to make him drive his car into a concrete barrier. But that only injures him because Anthony Mackey buckled his seatbelt. I’m like, why’d you buckle his seatbelt?

Laci (01:26:14):

It’s the law.

Matt (01:26:14):

Yeah. They pour gas on him and on the car, light it on fire, but he just gets out of the car.

Laci (01:26:19):

He’s got his arm. It’s just a little bit on fire, but he’s fine.

Matt (01:26:24):

They run him over, but it doesn’t work. He gets pinned in a curb between the curb and another curb,

Laci (01:26:31):

So it doesn’t actually kill him.

Matt (01:26:32):

And the rock is driving and Mark Wahlberg’s like, you

Laci (01:26:36):

Killed him.

Matt (01:26:37):

You did it. Back him back up. You have to put him out of his misery. Your friend is suffering.

Laci (01:26:42):

Right. He does all that. And then after he needs some reassurance. Okay, well, I fucking killed him. Right? And did you killed him? I mean, yeah, he’s being completely cruel. He talks him into it and then he leaves him alone with him, and then

Matt (01:26:55):

He’s like, yeah, you did it. You did it, Paul. You killed a man. We did it. He’s like, no, man, you did it. It’s good you killed him.

Laci (01:27:03):

But you can tell he feels completely abandoned and betrayed.

Matt (01:27:08):

He feels that, but would never be able to explain that. He feels that because like, but they’re my friends and they’re good, and they’re good to me, but

Laci (01:27:15):

I do want cocaine now.

Matt (01:27:17):

But he’s alive and he wakes up with horrible injuries in the hospital.

Laci (01:27:24):

But because of Kershaw’s past his ties to Columbia, I guess the way that he looks, his story is the main thing is his story is so crazy. They truly just don’t believe him. And he’s just put in a common room in the hospital. They don’t think he can pay his bills. He can’t produce any money. He can’t prove that he owns anything, which that is something amazing. I mean, Daniel’s robbing that theft was so thorough that he can’t call his wife. He can’t call a person. He knows to vouch for him. I don’t understand. How could he be this mistrusted and truly broke? I don’t totally understand. But they don’t believe him and he has to get a private detective to help him.

Matt (01:28:12):

I guess he just doesn’t have deep enough roots here that anyone can vouch for him

Laci (01:28:18):

That the police would take any more seriously than they take him because they think he’s been involved in some sort of organized crime. And anyone he brings in to vouch for him would just also look guilty of the organized crime.

Matt (01:28:31):

And the movie’s great at depicting just dumb, incompetent cops, which is realistic. They come in and they’re like, huh? Says here, you lived in Columbia. I hear there’s a lot of drugs in Columbia. And he’s like, but this happened to me in America.

Laci (01:28:43):

They’re

Matt (01:28:43):

Like, sure it did rummy.

Laci (01:28:45):

And it’s not as sympathetic victim. And so this’s not going to get the attention of the media. All they have to worry about are white women that go missing or get murdered.

Speaker 1 (01:28:54):

That’s

Laci (01:28:54):

Who they are beholden to. They’re in Miami-Dade County. No one gives a shit about this guy. They don’t like this guy,

Matt (01:28:59):

Crucially, because they don’t know he has money. If they knew he had money, they’d listen to him, but he doesn’t look like he has money, and there’s no way of proving that he has money. So they’re like, fuck you, buddy.

Laci (01:29:08):

All they don’t want is bad press. And that’s what anyone can say about their job. This is just difficult and weird. I don’t know. I don’t think I’ll get in trouble for ignoring this. Okay, bye. I think it’s very human to Ed. Makes sense to me.

Matt (01:29:20):

Yeah. Item to check off my list. And then they walk away. I didn’t believe, I warned that guy showed. So he looks in the Yellow pages and finds an ad for Ed Dub, ed Harris. We finally meet Ed Harris, and he talks on the phone with him and he’s like, I got to tell you, I’m having trouble believing your story. And he’s like, don’t believe my story. And he is like, but I’ll tell you this. If three bodybuilders tried to kill me, I’d be worried they’re going to come to the hospital and finish me off, which is exactly what happens. So he runs away, gets away with it. But when Mark Wahlberg and his friends get to the hospital disguised as doctors, they talked to a doctor there who’s like, oh, Tony Shaloub just checked out. I told him not to, but I think he was scared of the cops. The cops didn’t believe him anyway. And Mark Wahlberg’s like, okay, great. So to them that’s like, well, we don’t have to worry about that ever again because the cops didn’t believe him. And now a montage of us enjoying the spoils,

Laci (01:30:18):

I didn’t think we’d get to this part. I didn’t think they actually got away with it. The whole thing was a surprise to me, so that there was even enough time to go by for Anthony Mackey’s character to get married. And you guys really did it. I don’t care if it all gets taken away. You did it

Matt (01:30:33):

Right. Mark Walberg moves into Victor’s house. Anthony Mackey starts having sex with Rebel Wilson. The rock’s doing cocaine with Serena. Never see the Rock have sex with Serena. Mark Walberg just drives around happily in the boat. Anthony Mackey buys a house. The rock keeps doing cocaine. Meanwhile, ed Harris changes. His mind pays Victor a visit. Ed Harris plays Ed. Ed pays Victor a visit. He’s like, I’ve decided to take your case. And he’s staying at just the saddest motel in the world.

Laci (01:31:01):

Are you sure that they don’t see each other at the ground? They’re in a stadium

Matt (01:31:06):

That’s later.

Laci (01:31:07):

Oh, okay.

Matt (01:31:08):

Once he fleas the motel.

Laci (01:31:10):

Oh, I thought he flea the hospital and went there. Si.

Matt (01:31:13):

Danny is, he’s ingratiating himself with the neighborhood. He meets neighbor Brad. And he’s like, my name is Tom Lawn.

Laci (01:31:20):

Right. He’s just a guy that needs a gang. He needs sicker fans, he needs followers. He needs people who need him. So he pretends that there needs to be a neighborhood watch. And who better to protect you than my big beefy self? And all you kids, you need someone to look up to. So I need a gang. This guy is just a guy that needs a gang.

Matt (01:31:37):

Yeah, he does. There’s no practical purpose for him doing a neighborhood watch or anything, or for him to say, yeah, I have this really nice basketball hoop. All the kids, they can come around. I’ll cut, I’ll coach ’em, whatever. And they do start to hang around and the kids are around. He’s lecturing them, and then the Rock and Serena come in and he whispers to the kids. He’s like, you guys, you like that Russian pussy? It’s so stupid. That was mine. I gave it to him. Nothing

Speaker 1 (01:32:08):

Didn’t care.

Matt (01:32:09):

And this is where the rock’s character is so high on cocaine in that way of just being totally checked out and confused. And Mark wa confronts me. He’s like, what’s wrong with you? He’s like, well, what? He’s like, you look like shit. And he says, I feel like I look great. But later, he is on the 20th floor of his hotel and he is like, I hit rock bottom. There’s only one way to go. And it seems like he’s about to jump off his hotel at that sad motel that Tony Shalu is staying at. I just have here on screen the saddest image I think I’ve ever seen in a movie,

Laci (01:32:44):

Two feet of water in a six foot water pool

Matt (01:32:46):

Of this pool. Yeah, that’s green. That’s turning green. And we have a shitty pool that turns green. If I don’t,

Laci (01:32:52):

All pools turn green.

Matt (01:32:53):

It turns green so fast and nothing will make you feel like scum faster

Laci (01:32:57):

Than you seeing. Okay. But that’s the sad part, not the fact that there’s two feet of water. And

Matt (01:33:02):

Yes, you mentioned, and I’ve thought if I said, well, the pool’s only two feet, you’d yell at me for repeating you.

Speaker 2 (01:33:07):

I would.

Matt (01:33:09):

But nevertheless, there’s the kid floating on a raft in this tiny puddle of water. It’s so sad.

Laci (01:33:16):

How’s he get out? You don’t know.

Matt (01:33:17):

Well, the pool slopes up, so he just walks up. You can see it’s sloping down. And that’s also something that makes it

Laci (01:33:23):

Sad. I understand the whole thing is not six. Nevermind. I was making

Matt (01:33:26):

Joke. So he meets up. So Ed Harris pays Payton Sha lube a visit, and he’s like, yeah, it’s going to be hard to prove this case, but they’re living your life and they’re enjoying it.

Laci (01:33:35):

How’s it make it hard? That seems like it makes it easy. I guess what’s hard is to say that these guys, you didn’t owe them this money. That isn’t some sort of crime that you’ve committed as well. Something that

Matt (01:33:46):

Always happens to victims of cons is they take it to the police and they’re like, you gave your stuff away voluntarily

Laci (01:33:53):

Because it’s all a fucking show for The cops need a good show to see that you’re just the right victim for them to support the news. Media needs to give a shit about your tale or else it doesn’t actually count. And the biggest show of all the jury, what’s the jury going to think of this? I think they’re not going to like you, therefore you don’t get justice.

Matt (01:34:10):

And what’s the line? He says to him, you make a very unsympathetic victim,

Laci (01:34:13):

Not

Matt (01:34:14):

Unsympathetic, you’re a

Laci (01:34:15):

Shitty or something like that.

Matt (01:34:16):

You make a really shitty victim, Victor. But Ed Harrison is like, I know what to do. I’m going to sign up for a gym membership. But the Rock is getting so desperate. He has the saddest bank robbery of all time where he just steals two bags of cash from a brake truck, which

Laci (01:34:30):

Just pennies,

Matt (01:34:31):

Just coins, and one bag gets shot and it’s just coins. And he opens up the other and immediately squirts green on him, and the cops are chasing him. And the cops in this movie are always overreacting to everything. 13 cops descend on him and are just shooting at everything. For a guy who

Laci (01:34:48):

That what’s like here?

Matt (01:34:48):

Well, yeah, it’s for everywhere. He ran away with $10,000, get him destroy way more than $10,000 worth of property. And he jumps into the river, gets his toe shot off, and then in the narration, he’s like, well, this plan was just practice. I had another plan. Frank grea, it wouldn’t be as easy as robbing a bank, but as it turned out, a bank wasn’t all that easy. So he gets over to Anthony Mackey’s wedding and he’s like, guys, I want to do another job. And Anthony Mackey’s like, oh, okay. And Mark Wallberg is like, no, no,

Laci (01:35:22):

We’re all done. They went through three, four weeks of hell trying to get what they needed to get out of the first guy. And all of them only got a hundred thousand dollars each. So yeah, you’re going to go through it. If you’re in a penthouse fricking giant fricking, I guess hotel room, you’re just rocking up tens of thousands dollars a week just with that. Then your cocaine habit, then you’re buying suits in a car. Luckily it was the nineties, so it lasted, I don’t know, three weeks. There’s no timeline for this part, but it is a fucking tiny amount of money that they did all this for. In the grand scheme, they’re going to have to do another job. They need Vince. No, they need Dom, who I was trying to say,

Matt (01:36:13):

They figure out where Tony Schoop’s hotel is. So they go, but he is already because

Laci (01:36:18):

He Star 69,

Matt (01:36:19):

You want to have sex with him. And the hotel clerk is the only guy that guy I ever talked to was the guy who paid his bill, and they figure out that it’s Ed Harris. And Mark Wahlberg sees a picture of him. He’s like, that’s my client. And he gets really upset that

Laci (01:36:35):

His client would do that to him. Yes. Not the reverse.

Matt (01:36:38):

He’s so upset about that specifically.

Laci (01:36:40):

He doesn’t seem to like, oh, he just happens to also be my client. He shouldn’t be in all this.

Matt (01:36:45):

Yeah, ed Harris is having trouble getting the police to believe him or to invest resources in this. And he’s like, well, this is going to bite you in the ass. They’re going to do something again. And people are going to find out. You could have done something about it. But Danny and Adrian sneak into Ed Harris’s backyard. They see his wife making a cherry pie. I love cherry pie. And then the cops pull up and they get spooked and they’re like, oh God. Somebody called about a black guy being in the yard, but it’s just cops giving Ed Harris a ride home, and they just jump into the ocean

Laci (01:37:15):

And he can’t swim.

Matt (01:37:17):

And as Mark Wahlberg is jumping into the water from the dock, he shouts, abort mission something they were already doing.

Laci (01:37:27):

Yeah. You want someone to hear you yelling that as you’re fleeing the property.

Matt (01:37:31):

And so Ed Harris, he says, Tony Shalu needs to stay with us. He’s in trouble. So they bring him over to their house and he’s trying to eat with them, but he’s injured and he drops a roll onto the ground, and there’s a very sweet moment where he tries to bend over to get the roll back. Ed Harris kind of kicks it to him and he picks it up. And Ed Harris’ wife is like Ed Harris’s wife who I guess is supposed to represent just, just virtue, just good, just the Holman Hearth. And she’s like, every man deserves to have dignity.

Laci (01:38:01):

No, every man fights for his own dignity.

Matt (01:38:04):

And he’s tearing up and he’s like, I have a boat.

Laci (01:38:07):

Well, because finally someone got why he’s been doing this this whole time, why not accept help? Why not take a handout? He’s been force fed this damn American dream. All of this needs to be for something. Me sustaining all this torture. I was fighting for my dignity. I’m going to pick up this fucking roll,

Matt (01:38:25):

A real thing, a real thing to have dignity over. And then to build on that, he’s like, well, I have a boat. I own a boat.

Laci (01:38:31):

A boats are constantly, and they are constantly represented in Miami-Dade County as the ultimate sign that you’ve achieved something. And people rent boats all the time in Miami just to take pictures on them. So it’s no coincidence that Woo’s post or features a giant mega yacht, and his boat is his prize possession. It’s just all these, you’re not supposed to just look wealthy. You’re supposed to look like you have fuck you money,

Matt (01:38:59):

But the kind of fuck you money that a middle-class person can attain. I can buy a boat

Laci (01:39:03):

And that will the same reason and why people give shit to black people for buying a Cadillac. It’s like, well, but I can buy this. I can make payments on this and it can feel, I might be able to not be able to buy a middle class house doing what I’m doing, but there’s status symbols we can’t afford.

Speaker 1 (01:39:23):

There’s

Laci (01:39:24):

Indicators I might not be investing smartly me as this slosky businessman, or it’s good enough. He probably should not have a boat that nice. There’s no reason to have it except for that. It signals some sort of, yeah. You know what I’m saying? There’s need to podcast. You already know what I’m saying.

Matt (01:39:45):

Mark Wahlberg’s house, he feels really betrayed by Ed Harris. He starts beating the shit out of his barbecue pit and he says, fuck this Beaver cleaver shit. But I wasn’t going backwards. The three finger plan just needed a fourth finger. That was all. So he tells Paul, we’re going to do it. We’re going to go forward with your Frank Griego plan. So they go to Frank Riga’s house and he gives this presentation and his presentation,

Laci (01:40:07):

I don’t know what he’s presenting, but

Matt (01:40:09):

His presentation is like, let me tell you, click about the country, click of India, Thailand. And he’s giving a proto version of a TED Talk, but it’s so stupid. And Frank Riga is the first person who’s not that impressed with him.

Laci (01:40:22):

But why even take, why keep going with him?

Matt (01:40:27):

He’s impressed with the idea and assumes there’s somebody above Mark Wahlberg. This guy’s an idiot. But I like him personally. I just have to meet with his board of directors.

Laci (01:40:37):

But

Matt (01:40:37):

He’s like his presentation, which he delivers with so much swag and conviction, it’s stuff like, we’re going after Indians, but not a woo woo Indian. No, we’re not going for that click. We’re going for the Gandhi kind. The Gandhi. He’s like, but those are Japanese.

Laci (01:40:53):

This man needed the internet badly.

Matt (01:40:54):

He’s like, oh, that’s phase two. He

Laci (01:40:56):

Waited 10 years. He would’ve had all he needed,

Matt (01:40:59):

But he’s enthusiastic. He’s like, alright, well, when can we start? So their plan is they’re going to do the same thing again and hold this guy and his wife hostage and have them sign documents.

Laci (01:41:08):

They made a big mistake of not getting rid of the wife first. And for having a likable guy as their target,

Matt (01:41:16):

Who tells Mark Wahlberg, look, I just want to meet your board of directors. Honestly, I’m not comfortable with you having my money. A little something about business, but not as much as you think. Some of the things you say are just comical. And the thing that makes Mark Wahlberg freak out is he says, I don’t think you’re a hard worker. And Mark Wahlberg just,

Laci (01:41:39):

You couldn’t have said anything worse to Mark Walberg

Matt (01:41:41):

Goes nuts on him. He’s like, look, I’m not saying you’re a moron, but this business takes professionals and you guys, you’re a bunch of fucking morons. So Mark Wahlberg, he is and is not a hard worker. Yeah. He’s spending a lot of energy.

Laci (01:41:55):

Yes.

Matt (01:41:55):

It doesn’t mean it’s directed in any sort of productive way.

Laci (01:41:59):

It never occurred to him to get a profession based on all that energy or to go in a path that is not illegal. He’s got something, he’s not stupid. He’s just too narrowly focused and too confident.

Matt (01:42:18):

And he feels so much like a hard worker and a smart person that he must be. And sometimes I will feel like I’ve worked so hard today, and I’ll be like, but all the shit I worked really hard on was bullshit, but I still feel exhausted. And so I’m like, oh, I had a good day. I got a lot done. It’s like that feeling

Laci (01:42:34):

Your whole

Matt (01:42:34):

Life

Laci (01:42:35):

Feeling disagree.

Matt (01:42:38):

What?

Laci (01:42:39):

Feeling exhausted doesn’t make me feel like I had a good day. I’m just saying

Matt (01:42:43):

I had a productive day.

Laci (01:42:45):

But again, unless I got a bunch of shit off my to-do list, I feel frustrated at how exhausted I am. So he starts, we’re different

Matt (01:42:53):

Beating the shit out him. And then Frank’s wife hears the commotion and he accidentally kills Frank with a dumbbell. And as he throws the dumbbell at the guy’s head, he’s like, I fucking work. But he kills him. He’s like, oh shit. And then the wife comes in and she’s like, huh. And they give her horse tranquilizer. And I have this clip here of Mark Wahlberg just having a panic attack explaining what he did.

Speaker 8 (01:43:15):

Wait. He said he was going to sign the papers that he wouldn’t sign. Then he got upset, and then he said he wanted see the board. And then I said, no, he couldn’t see the board. I don’t want you to see the board. Why you call me the amateur? They got upset. Then he fucking said something else and I got him upset and he fucking fell. I think he fell or I pushed him or something. Did you?

Laci (01:43:28):

That was so good. That was good. I was up there with Leonardo DiCaprio in a Wolf of Wall Street. There’s a moment where he talks so much until he’s out of

Matt (01:43:36):

Preference in one take. Yeah. And he fucking feller. I pushed him, I don’t know.

Laci (01:43:42):

Yes, it was chaotic.

Matt (01:43:44):

Now they’ve moved on to like, okay, well horse tranquilizer and tricker into giving the combination to their safe. He’s got to have a lot of stuff in that safe and he thinks he’s getting from her, but she’s just giving him random numbers. She’s like 17, but he doesn’t write down 17. He writes down in different anyway with authority, says to his friends, he’s like, guys, it’s now a salvage operation. And the rock’s like, what does that mean? But

Laci (01:44:08):

I love that the rock’s toe injury hurts. So as soon as he gets a chance, he just takes off a shoe to just air out his stump. That’s very

Matt (01:44:17):

Believable. In all of his chaos, the Greyhound has run away. So Mark Wahlberg and the Rock go over to Frank’s house to open the safe. They find the safe. They’re like, fuck yeah, we did it. But the combination isn’t working and

Laci (01:44:30):

The blame game starts again. And there’s nothing that hurts the rock’s character more than whenever he gets blamed for not doing it. But you didn’t write it down right? I wasn’t responsible. It’s the second time that he pulls this shit with him. Yeah, so wounded.

Matt (01:44:45):

They call up Anthony Mackey and he’s like, give her fucking, tell her to give the combination right this time up at Anthony Mackey’s like, yeah, I think I fucking just killed her with another dose of horse tranquilizer. And then he has a great panic, fast talk. It’s

Speaker 6 (01:44:58):

Not fucking true now. I mean, you told me, give us some more tranquilizer. And I did. I gave her two shots and I think I gave with too much. Now she’s not in fucking breathing and we were dancing and having such a good time and I was smacking our ass and now she fucking dead. And you’re not here, bro. No, no, no. You get the code

Laci (01:45:16):

Just deep saying He keeps saying it though. Mark Wahlberg is on the ground screaming No until they get really close.

Matt (01:45:24):

Did you get the code? Just give me the code. I’ll open it.

Laci (01:45:27):

Yeah, no, I ready. I have a notepad.

Matt (01:45:29):

So they just end up stealing a bunch of shit from the house and the Rock for some reason gives his toe, his separate toe to the dog there

Laci (01:45:35):

For some reason. And they take the most beautiful Lamborghini I’ve ever seen. I don’t care about cars, but that purple color was so unique, the only one that probably exists. And they take it fucking morons. And then they go to Home Depot and buy all the things you need to dispose of a body all on one check all at one time, keep the fucking receipt for some reason. And then when a saw doesn’t work the way that they think it should, they return it with clumps of hair and blood.

Matt (01:46:03):

But it’s just like, so what are you doing? Why did they buy the cheapest shittiest chainsaw

Laci (01:46:08):

Using their own money? They’re out of money and it’s China.

Matt (01:46:12):

The Greyhound has returned to the dog track wearing a collar with Anthony Mackey’s phone number on it, and the owner of the dog truck’s like, oh shit, the dog vet was stolen. So he calls the cops, rebel Wilson comes home, finds her house destroyed in blood everywhere and gets a voicemail from the police about the stolen Greyhound. But meanwhile, they’re back at their saw trap factory and they’re going to dismember the bodies as the Rolling Stones. You hear me knock and plays completing the Scorsese illusion, illusion.

Laci (01:46:39):

The image of them windexing a body and the tits. I’m like, I’ve never seen this happen before. This is fucking weird. That had to be a real person. I mean, that is the actress they’re doing that to. It looks so real. There’s no way to fake that. She’s just getting scream

Matt (01:46:53):

And white. I don’t think I’ve seen somebody literally getting windexed either ever.

Laci (01:46:56):

But you’re right. It was baffling. I mean, well, it was chilling. I don’t know what the word is,

Matt (01:47:02):

But Anthony Mackey is like, maybe we should take out her breast implants. And

Laci (01:47:05):

He was right.

Matt (01:47:05):

And Mar all was like, you sick. Fuck. You’re obsessed with titties. But yeah, this is the

Laci (01:47:09):

Up

Matt (01:47:10):

Being thing that convicts them

Laci (01:47:11):

Up. And I did. It’s the first time in a court case where the serial number on implants is what helped convict somebody.

Matt (01:47:17):

So

Laci (01:47:17):

I’m okay.

Matt (01:47:18):

That’s right. The chainsaw gets stuck in her hair and Mark Wahlberg is like, of course. Of course. It’s cheap. Made in China Electric Crap. I told you to get a gas powered one. I fucking love Anthony Mackey’s return. He’s like, but you said we didn’t have time to stop for gas.

Laci (01:47:31):

Well, I love whenever he asked the rocks character to barbecue the hands. And very practically he goes outside to barbecue it because he is like, you’re not supposed to do that in here. It’s a lot of, I don’t know, they’re just all just, they are very convincingly, innocently responding to this macho man that they are looking up to and letting them lead them. And they’re hurt little boys. Yes,

Matt (01:47:58):

And all because

Laci (01:47:59):

They’re wounded constantly.

Matt (01:48:00):

He thinks faster than them and

Laci (01:48:02):

Talks

Matt (01:48:02):

Louder than them. And so they’re like, oh, okay.

Laci (01:48:04):

And they think that they are being practical with him and then they go getting yelled at for the thing they were trying to do to help that he didn’t think of.

Matt (01:48:12):

And

Laci (01:48:12):

It’s like, I didn’t tell you to do it, so don’t do it. It’s like, but you don’t tell me a lot of stuff. I’m all just trying to do it.

Matt (01:48:18):

When the rock is barbecuing the hands, that’s when the text comes on screen saying this is still a true story. And in the voiceover he is like in aa, they tell you to sit with your feelings, look under the bed, you’ll see there’s no monster there, but sometimes there is a monster there. And then all you can do is run away. And so he runs away and leaves a node

Speaker 1 (01:48:34):

And

Matt (01:48:34):

Now everything is closing in. The police gather an enormous SWAT team to take all three guys down simultaneously, but they managed to dump the bodies in a river. But then each of them gets arrested. And also the John, the gym owner, Rob Corddry gets arrested and the score here, I forgot to write down who did the score, but it has this really haunting, mythical quality as everything is just going to shit.

Speaker 1 (01:48:57):

Oh,

Matt (01:48:58):

Mark Wahlberg manages to escape to The Bahamas. He gets in the go fast boat and goes fast to The Bahamas. And then Ed Harris for some reason gets to go to The Bahamas too and lead a squad of Bahamian police. There he is. Get him And they get him.

Laci (01:49:12):

They get there so fast

Matt (01:49:13):

And they do get him like 90 miles away. And when Ed Harris flies Mark Wahlberg back, he looks down at how many cops are waiting for him and he’s like,

Laci (01:49:21):

Hold that for me.

Matt (01:49:22):

Hold that for me. Wow.

Laci (01:49:23):

Little Frank Ane Jr in me right now.

Matt (01:49:26):

And Ed Harris is like, the gunner want to know why you did it? He’s like, why did I do it? I’m a doer.

(01:49:31):

So Ed Harris says it’s the longest strangest trial in the history of Miami Dade County, but the state was very thorough and they bring in evidence after evidence, but they don’t have physical evidence until they find the breast implants. And all the while Mark Wahlberg is turning to Anthony back, he’s like, they got nothing on us. We’re going to walk. And he just maintains this until the very end. Well, no, never breaks because the rock who confesses, he’s given 15 years in prison and we see him in prison, so happy leading the prison choir, but they give the death sentence to Anthony Mackey and Mark Wahlberg took the jury only 14 minutes and Anthony Mackey makes the funniest face when he hears he’s going to be put disgusting. And Mark Wahlberg’s face is just, he cannot this information that he is guilty and has fucked up and is a failure, it just will never get in there. The antibodies won’t allow it still like I just need a second chance.

Laci (01:50:30):

He

Matt (01:50:30):

Gives prison regroup.

Laci (01:50:31):

Really interested in knowing what has his prison life been like for such a character? You got to think it’s abnormal in there. He might’ve spent a lot of time alone

Matt (01:50:43):

If this character actually, if the real guy was actually like this. I mean

(01:50:48):

That seems like just the way into playing a guy, this is my take on this is such a artist who believes his own shit so much that he can never actually confront what he has done and probably still to this day is like, no, I’m innocent. I didn’t do any of that. I don’t know. I didn’t look into the real guy that much, but he’s like, but I’m not giving up. When my chance comes, I’m going to be ready. Life’s going to give me another chance and I’m going to be ready. I believe in fitness.

Laci (01:51:43):

I have not rated this yet on Letter of Box, but I think I have to go five.

Matt (01:51:49):

I think I’m going to go five too. I watched it twice, gave it four and a half each time. But I fucking love this movie. I love it so much. There’s

Laci (01:51:56):

Just so much to like about it. There’s so much that’s hard to do about it. There’s so many good actors that I wouldn’t necessarily have mixed together, but it works really well. Yeah,

Matt (01:52:07):

I think there’s so much going on with, for some reason Michael Bay, as the sort of Don Draper of movies who knew could dissect the American ID and sell it to it, sell it bullshit, had this insight into

Laci (01:52:22):

He was the perfect person to sell us this movie

Matt (01:52:25):

And

Laci (01:52:26):

To see it through their eyes to see the American dream. No one else would’ve thought to show Mark Berg literally sitting on a display of a lawnmower and a Sears than Michael Bay. He just keeps feeding us back. That’s why he beats up a barbecue pit later. It’s because that’s also part of the American dream, the cookouts and being the man of the neighborhood. And it’s like this is a lie,

Matt (01:52:52):

Which like Don Draper, a man who has no identity, had to create himself selling ads and is like, well, I should get a blonde wife like the Coca-Cola ads that I make.

(01:53:02):

But no, it’s not going to fix what’s rotten in your soul and you owning a barbecue pit or a lawnmower is not going to do anything for you to make you feel sated. But that’s what America is. That’s all that we have. That’s all that there is. Matt Chrisman from Chapo Trap House says of Donald Trump. He’s like, Donald Trump is a tumor made out of America. That’s what this movie is about. It’s just the pure distilled America. And I think that America in 2013, the period of time that I say is the dumbest period of American history, which is the pre-Trump era when everything was already terrible, but nobody wanted to acknowledge it. You could acknowledge it a few years later like we elected a damn Cheeto as president, but everything was stupid and it was a big carnival game, but it’s okay. Maybe you can win the carnival, maybe you can win the ring toss game. And I don’t know, Michael Bay was the perfect man to tell this story. Mark Wahlberg’s best performance. Dwayne Johnson’s best performance. Anthony Mackey’s best performance. Love it. Harris loved Tony Shaloub. Love it all I guess. Yeah, five fucking stars

Laci (01:54:01):

I guess. Fucking, yeah, I guess she conned me into it guys.

Matt (01:54:04):

And it’s just so interesting to think of an alternate career path for The Rock where he played more character actor roles or allowed himself to be vulnerable and allowed himself to not have to be the star for somebody like Mark Wahlberg who I don’t love Mark Wahlberg, but he does have a movie star Power that the Rock doesn’t

Laci (01:54:23):

Have. Yes, he can carry a movie and the ones where the Rock is the leading man, he is just barely getting away with it. And they’re the ones where I don’t like it the most. It’s stuff like the rundown where he’s splitting the job or he’s the side piece where it’s perfect. Know your lane, know your role and do it to the best of your ability. There’s nothing wrong with that. You don’t have to end up, the top is not leading, man. It’s just one of the options

Matt (01:54:53):

Versus some of these recent movies like Rampage or Skyscraper where I watch and I think this is a pretty okay movie where you are the problem

Laci (01:55:04):

Where

Matt (01:55:04):

You, Dwayne are alone for so much of this movie and you can’t hold my attention, but

Laci (01:55:10):

You’re great at spectacle. So allow yourself to lean into that and be a sprinter, be the big side piece when we need it, and then allow the marathon person to do what he does. Maybe someone like, I don’t know, the guy that’s like a leading man in fucking everything right now for the hitman

Matt (01:55:33):

Glen Powell.

Laci (01:55:34):

Yes. Maybe he can’t be a spectacle on the side. Maybe he’s not good at the buddy part, but he’s an amazing leading man. There’s something endlessly palatable about watching him, but I’m just saying there’s huge value to both and they don’t have to be in competition with each other.

Matt (01:55:51):

I wasn’t expecting, I threw Jumanji in here as like we’re in the good period of the rock’s career and this is the height of his commercial success and a movie that everybody loved. We did a Jumanji an episode about the original Jumanji years and years ago. I listened to it. It’s good. You and I were funny back then

Matt (01:56:12):

But we were talking about it. Everybody loves the new Jumanji movie, so that’s why we did it. But I wasn’t expecting, I’m very excited to see this performance because he is playing somebody who does not have the experience of looking like the Rock. So it is this weird metaphysical Dwayne Johnson playing, not Dwayne Johnson, but looking like Dwayne Johnson or no, Dwayne Johnson playing the Rock because there’s a difference. And yeah, that’ll be next week,

Laci (01:56:41):

August 1st. I’m looking forward to it.

Matt (01:56:42):

2025 Jumanji. Tell a friend about our show, please check out our YouTube channel Load Bearing Beams Pod. Check us out on letterbox. Matt Stokes nine and Load Bearing Laci. We’re on the socials. My band is Rural Route nine. We do the music for the show, including the summer of Rock theme song. Thank you to Wade Hymel and TJ Barends for helping us produce that. Thank you everybody. We love you.

Laci (01:57:01):

I love you. Goodbye smell you. I’m tired.