Oh, God. Oh, my God.
Speaking of decisions, I will come to regret.
Welcome back to Cage Match, colon around about way of meeting Nicholas Cage.
That's how you do a segue.
It's just the intro.
Just the intro, bud.
You know, by season two, I think you'll get segues.
I finally understand what a segue is.
We can use all that sweet, sweet Patreon money to hire someone to write segues.
Just a ghostwriter for segues, just out of any kind of situation
you might imagine, it's like we're talking about like
roasting chestnuts with like behind your balls.
And that's how we get into like ghostwriter somehow. Exactly.
I want the montage, like the training montage of Sean learning how to segue, though.
Different situations and him fucking up and figuring it out.
Yeah, so like while the best writing a segue, though,
because I would pay a lot of money to see Sean write a segue.
Cage match, colon around about way of meeting Nicholas Cage,
where we take 64 of Nicholas Cage's best movies and
we'll figure out what the best is eventually.
Maybe we'll say, okay, just bestest.
You can totally take a look at the bracket on our website, though.
Cage match dot fun. Yes, we are your home. That's a fucking plug. Nice.
We're for the thing they're listening to.
Yeah, we're we're your host, Sean.
Oh, and I'm Nick and I am producer Peter.
And this week we have a special guest, my favorite person and sometimes arch nemesis.
Meredith slash mayor.
I'm Sean's ex spouse and we still like each other enough to talk.
It's true. And beyond my podcast, apparently.
To be fair, I did kind of strong arm my way onto this podcast,
because as soon as you were like me and Peter and Nick
are doing this podcast about Nick Cage movies, I literally was like,
as soon as you do the rock, I have to be on it because it's a perfect film
and I love it very much and it's very special to me.
And if you don't let me on your podcast, I do know where you live.
You actually don't now, though.
Bitch, I have access to your Amazon account.
I know exactly where the fuck you live.
Oh, damn, that's true. All right.
How do you think I got your address to send you divorce papers?
Oh, no, I'm sad.
Actually, that brings it back around and I'm feeling a lot better about this now.
Are you feeling good about this?
OK, great. You can edit all of that out, by the way.
Keep that in.
I this is going to be easier than me writing a suicide letter.
That's fair.
This suicide letter will actually just be directions for somebody to listen to this.
So we get one more listen.
Oh, no, it's going to be it's going to be a QR code motherfucker.
Yeah. You have to subscribe to the podcast to get the suicide note.
That's good. Also great.
And review. Yeah, please.
Yeah, it's important.
Meredith is still the one person who's like giving us a written review.
Yeah, much appreciated.
If anyone wants to write us another review, except for that guy,
they said Sean makes Meg Ryan look like blonde Robert Downey Jr.
That is also a review.
I do. And it was right.
It was a Reddit review, but it counts as five stars in my heart.
This week, we are discussing cinematic Masterpiece of the Rock
and cinematic cinema, Bangkok Dangerous cinematic malware.
Yeah. OK. So when we did our episode zero,
Sean sort of foisted Bangkok Dangerous
on us as a joke, and I am pretty furious at him.
I'm so mad. I was watching Bangkok Dangerous and I was just like,
you fucker, you absolute fucker.
I know this was Sean's pick.
I know it was. Fuck him.
What is wrong with you, Sean?
What is wrong with you as a human being?
I mean, you're the one who married me.
I didn't even make it through the whole movie.
Oh, man, I found out how to make it through it today.
It's just bubble bath, really big sandwitch.
And just just don't get up.
It's just I have nothing but bad things to say about this film,
so I just can't wait to get into it.
Sean, why don't you do a synopsis?
That's a segue, motherfucker.
So Bangkok Dangerous from 2008.
Joe is an assassin getting ready to hang up the old spurs, as it were.
Goes to Bangkok for one last job to kill four people along the way.
Makes a friend, meets a deaf woman or a mute woman.
Both. Oh, yeah.
And then learns a lesson and then kills himself.
That's Bangkok Dangerous.
OK, so how about The Rock?
Yeah, can we talk about The Rock now for the next hour?
Now we need to get through this.
It's a shitty movie.
It's shitty and I hated it.
Isn't it like a remake?
It's a remake of a 1999 film.
Same directors. Oh, my God.
Wait, they only waited nine years before remaking this movie.
Yeah, same directors.
It was their first film.
Not even long enough to learn their own lesson.
The Pang brothers.
I'm wondering.
Is there first and second?
I don't want to go and see if the first one's actually any good.
Probably not.
It's not.
I haven't seen it, but I'll just go ahead and say it's not.
I mean, these brothers do have a fairly long filmography.
Just because you've done something a lot of times
doesn't necessarily mean you're good at it.
Like I. Yeah, fucking Paul Schrader.
Yeah, Paul Schrader.
Like I've baked before.
I've made a lot of cookies.
Were they edible?
Absolutely not.
We've seen worse in terms of quality of movie, in terms of quality of cage.
It's slow.
It's meandering.
You don't like any of the characters, but it's not like the worst thing
that's ever been committed to film.
It's just a bad movie.
It's not good, but it's not like painful.
Three movies that are worse than Bangkok Dangerous.
Dog Eat Dog.
Yeah, in the Nick Cage universe.
The Shraders and Left Behind.
Left Behind.
Those are.
Dog Eat Dog, Left Behind.
Although I would take.
I would take Dog Eat Dog over Bangkok Dangerous for sure.
I think we established like recently, like I kind of put Bangkok Dangerous,
Left Behind and City of Angels all on the same.
Oh, yeah.
I think the whole thing for me on this one is just the movie's not interesting.
It's not well scripted.
And there's nothing for him to work with.
Give me a movie that makes me mad or frustrated or sad or joyous.
This movie was the worst because it made me feel nothing.
Yeah, it's just a waste of time.
You could literally be doing anything else.
And it's a movie that's essentially like it was like his John Wick back in 2008.
OK, well, that's the one thing I actually want to talk about,
because this is just.
I want to talk about John Wick, too.
It was a lot better.
It was.
No, this was just like this is Hong Kong, like action cinema,
hard boiled that era of film, but done by amateurs.
This one just has the fortune of having Nicolas Cage.
This one does have the best disarming sequences we've seen in a Nick Cage movie
though, where he actually takes off a dude's arm with a motorboat.
Well, that in general is the only good scene.
The slow speed chase.
Oh, every boat chase is a slow boat chase.
I don't care like how fast the boats are actually going.
There's no like exciting way to have boats just traveling on water
unless you jump it off of something or boat through something.
And we got both of those in face off.
And that was a way better movie.
I was with a way better boat chase.
This boat chase was fine, though.
Yeah.
Oh, that should be that should go on the back of the box.
This boat chase was fun.
The whole statement about face off and everything.
I also just want to point this out in terms of where we're at in Cage's career.
This was right after Book of Secrets.
So we're really getting to that era of he owes the government money.
That's what I thought the whole the whole movie.
I was like, Nick, my man, you are going through something.
It is obviously financial.
You clearly are in the middle of a breakdown just based on your hair.
Yeah, this is peak bird hair.
The zero chemistry between him and the pharmacist lady.
Oh, Charlie Young was not as distracting as his own hair that was on his head.
I got used to his hair, though.
The thing that I hate the most about his speaking of his relationship
with the the deaf mute pharmacist lady, the sign language they use for her
is so juvenile.
It's the best part.
What is like doing the like fingers thing?
Oh, the rain, which is the thing.
You can see it.
Again, this is this is a audio formatted podcast.
Okay, for everybody.
We're about to get into the dumbest hand motion portion of the podcast.
Just describe all your hand motions, please.
So I'm like pointing my fingers down and like wiggling them
as I like move them down, like from near my face to near my chest.
Nicholas Cage's character is in this woman's mother's home.
Who also seems to be her boss.
I couldn't I couldn't I couldn't figure it out,
but is like doing this weird finger waggle motion at each other.
And it's like, oh, your name means rain.
And it was just like, what the fuck is going on right now?
You don't know her name.
You've been on like what?
Like five dates with this woman and she's just sat silently smiling at you.
Perfect for the patriarchy.
Fuck all of you. I hate this movie.
My favorite sign language was definitely like when he first asked her out
and he like goes in, he's like, oh, I want to I want to ask her to dinner.
Will you ask her to dinner for me?
And the old lady just turns and she makes the stupidest like points at the girl,
points at Nick Cage, brings two fingers like together
and then mimes eating.
It's like, wow, couldn't have done that myself.
What I love in terms of their communication arc is right before things hit the fan
where they're walking through the park, she hands him a note
that's written in English that she's, you know, happy.
And then she has great handwriting, too, cursive and everything.
So you guys could have just been writing to each other the whole time.
She can write in English so she understands it.
You work at a pharmacy.
You've got a pad and pencil.
We just have it with you.
When Nick Cage went into the when Nick went into the pharmacy
the first time for like the cut on his arm and she just like goes up to him
and then he's like smiles at him, asks for something and she just sits there
and stares at him smiling like an idiot, not making any motion
to indicate that she can't hear that she can't speak his language.
Nothing just like stares at him like a dummy.
And the other lady is supposedly the mother just lets it happen
and she just looks like a fool.
Obviously, people that are like deaf and mute can definitely work
whatever job they want.
However, every person I have ever worked with who signs
has always usually had like on their badge, like I use ASL or something
and is typically someone that is factored into their job.
They are not necessarily the greeter
and the first line of customer service defense.
Like, yeah, what?
I mean, this is also Thailand and this was like an open air pharmacy
where the lady out front seemed to be grinding up crabs at one point.
She was like, just boiling them.
Yes. Smash in those fuckers.
I don't think declaring your inability to speak on your chest was a really a thing.
Perhaps not.
Perhaps everybody in the neighborhood just knew like, oh, she'll just go up
and stare at you until you vaguely and weirdly mime at her
with your weird hair looming over her because you're like six, four
and she's like five, two.
He's like six, nine with that hair, though.
Dude, it brings a whole mood to his character that I was just like,
you tall lanky bastard, like, what the fuck?
Also, just in all of the chase scenes when they're like looking for him
and he's like, I'll put on a baseball hat.
I'm like, you're a foot taller than everyone in your surroundings.
Yeah. And white and white.
Also not a great assassin because he never wears gloves.
His fingerprints are on everything.
Yeah. This movie was pointless.
It had zero redemption of anything, but there was one line in it
that I did like, which was basically anybody can kill a politician.
And I was like, that is an inspirational quote, Nick Cage.
Thank you. Also, his sidekick Kong was dumb as well.
Everybody in this movie was dumb.
So I kind of just jumped ahead to the end.
Does it actually end with Kong just dancing in a field or something?
Like what? Yeah, just standing like, yeah, like by the bank.
Cool. But right before that, like Nick Cage takes out the mob boss
who hired him and then gets in the car with him and then blows
both their brains out for reasons that are never explored.
Yeah, you decided to have a very high profile gunfight
in the vicinity of a bunch of cops and then didn't realize how that was going to go.
But there was that boat chase and that was OK.
We're hanging it all in the OK boat.
Yeah, it wasn't OK.
Boat chase. It was fine.
And again, that great disarmament scene where he uses the motor boat to like,
yeah, take off a guy's arm.
That was the best part about it.
I do. Hence why we're doing this podcast.
I'm assuming I know where this is going to go, but I have to ask
a good kid, bad cage, good movie, bad movie.
Yeah, this is bad on both sides.
Bad cage, bad movie, bad cage, bad movie, bad cage, bad cage.
I mean, your thumbs down was pretty, pretty emphatic, but no one can see.
Audio, audio format.
I was waiting for a shonda shut up so I could give my opinion.
We've all been waiting for Shonda. Shut up.
That's like half the podcast.
Everybody waiting for me to talk.
God, if we could only fast forward through this Sean stuff.
I have the power to just entirely remove him.
Yeah. Wouldn't that be weird if it was just me?
And like, I'm obviously having a conversation, but there's no Sean.
This is like Garfield minus Garfield.
This is starting to become hurtful.
And welcome back to cage match.
I'm Nick with my producer, Peter. Hello.
And that's it. This is all of us.
The full roster.
Why do I ask you guys to do things with me?
You did this to you. I know. I don't know why.
Let's just crank out like a quote real quick and get the hell off this movie.
I don't even have a quote.
Yeah, I know. It's so not quotable. I'm just going to pick one.
So on IMDb Joe narrating, you stay invisible too long.
The human race starts to look like another species.
So you venture out, you observe,
and then you return to your invisible world like a ghost.
It's just bad.
Yeah, I didn't have a quote for this one, but I will say on the hair topic,
it reminded me of Tom Hiddleston as Loki.
So then I went and I watched Loki instead, and that was a better choice.
Yeah, it was.
Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum.
Welcome to the rock.
All right, Meredith, this is your favorite movie. Go.
Oh, my God, this movie fucking rocks.
Literally, it's a pun within a pun.
That's it. That's all that needs to be said.
It is peak Michael Bay.
It is peak Nick Cage.
It is peak stupid action movie.
It is peak car chases in San Francisco that are absurd.
It is just and that's like I didn't even mention Sean Connery
in those things, and he is also a delight.
It's just the best.
So real quick, Nicholas Cage plays Stanley Goodspeed.
Good name. Good. Yeah.
Sean Connery is John Patrick Mason and Ed Harris plays General Francis X Hummel.
And then there's a bunch of other people.
There's a lot of people in this. Yeah.
Most of them good. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. It's got Dr.
Cox. Yeah. John C McGinley's in it.
This was just the best mid to late 90s
action supporting character mashup
of all of these guys that I feel like were in every single action movie
from like 1995 to 2002 as sort of tertiary characters.
And they're all fantastic.
Meredith, when did you see this?
Did you see it when you were, you know, whatever, 12?
12. This movie.
You would have been six when you came out.
A perfect movie for a six year old.
So we had the VHS of it when I was seven
the year after it came out.
And I watched this movie probably once a week for like four years.
I love this movie from the ages of seven to like 10 or 11.
That is so much like my relationship with the movies
Men in Tights and Stripes, but Stripes because there was a shower scene
and Men in Tights because it's hilarious.
Yep. Confirmed. Men in Tights is golden.
I wore those tapes out.
I'm not even kidding you.
I have a distinct memory of my parents having a dinner party
when I was like seven or eight or something.
And they were all like talking and laughing and whatever.
And I was like, can I be excused?
And they were like, yes, get out of here, child.
We're going to go continue drinking and talking. Be gone, young one.
And I asked my brother, I was like, do you want to watch The Rock?
And he was like, hell yeah.
And so we just sat in the living room and like watched the VHS of The Rock
while our parents were like having a lovely dinner party.
And I was just like, this is so cool.
Meredith, this is again your favorite film and you're our guest.
So why don't you expand on it?
Rocks break this film down for us.
OK, Ed Harris is mad about war stuff with Marines
because they're forgotten by the government.
But what's the only way that he can solve this problem?
By stealing weapons, chemical weapons from some kind of facility.
I think a chemical weapons facility, a probably chemical.
If I had to guess, Nick, I would say it's a chemical weapons facility,
but I'm not sure.
But let's go not scientists like let's go with that.
So then Ed Harris and all of his crazy ass mercenary terrorists
take over Alcatraz Island with a bunch of tourists on it
in a bid to get the government to pay money
to the Marines that were forgotten on like a secret mission.
It doesn't make like a ton of sense that this would be like the best way
to make this happen.
But Ed Harris is very convincing and he has a bunch of dudes
that he's convinced to do it.
And then what? It's Washington, D.C.
Nick Cage is in a chemical lab.
There's this VX gas, but it's crazy.
He has to go to San Francisco to because there's these chemical weapons.
Oh, my God.
But then they're like, it's Alcatraz.
We can't get into Alcatraz.
There's no way no one's ever gotten out.
And then one guy's gotten out, but he's blacklisted.
He doesn't exist. Who is it?
It's fucking Sean Connery with long hair and he's amazing.
And then Nick Cage and Sean Connery and a bunch of Marines
who all die infiltrate Alcatraz.
They get like, but what is the thing I'm doing right now with my shot?
Shot. They get shot.
So Michael Bean played the lead.
A seal.
Basically, the rest of the movie is Nick Cage and Sean Connery
interacting, being the best.
And then they like save the day and whatever.
That might be our best synopsis.
You guys make notes.
That was really fucking good. Thank you.
You know, everyone at this table knows I don't learn.
I was playing Minesweeper.
Did you win?
No, that's why my computer made noises.
Somehow, I'd never seen this film.
What? Until now?
Yes. As an adult?
Yeah. No. And I.
And you were married to Meredith.
There are reasons.
Well, wait, Sean, we never watched this together.
You never shared this this thing with me.
You're getting second divorced.
This is grounds.
I just I must have assumed you'd already seen it because again,
it's a perfect film.
Mostly, I think I've tried to watch it in the first 10 minutes.
I always bounced off of just the Michael Bay slow strokes of the
military industrial complex.
Yeah, Michael Bay, man.
This is such a like you just watch it and you're like straight out of the
Michael Bay playbook.
Everything being shot at a low angle, kind of up while spinning
around people talking.
But that's how you know it's serious.
He apparently turned down this movie six months like earlier
because he didn't think the script was serious enough.
They are talking about annihilating the entire Bay area
with a chemical weapon because 85 people didn't get recognized
because they did some shady government shit like it's unhinged.
That also dates this movie in that if that were to take place now
and the government was like, well, California is going to go away.
More than half the government be like, that's all right.
I will say this was a very pre 9 11 pre rise of visible
white nationalist military groups pre a lot of things that we could say
are currently plaguing our country.
But I will say there was a certain pure delight in that of like,
these are dudes, they're mad about a thing and they're going to do
something totally fucking insane.
And isn't that fun?
And also like collateral damage.
What is that? We're the government.
We don't care.
I guess the most collateral damage would be the car chase through San Francisco.
An entirely worthless scene like needless.
Yeah, I mean, it's a fun car chase, but it's a needless scene to the film
actually causes some issues with the character of Nick Cage,
who isn't a field agent, isn't supposed to be an action guy and kind of
that's his arc, but he can, you know, drive that Lamborghini
through San Francisco like it's nothing.
He like jumps it through a fucking shop window.
Yeah. Fun fact.
It's cool.
And that car chase scene, the Humvee that Sean Connery steals,
the guy who he steals it from, same actor that Ed Harris
steals a car from in National Treasure 2.
Interesting. Yeah.
That's a that's a Bruckheimer connection.
That's a Bruckheimer connection.
This is one of five Bruckheimer's that we'll watch for this.
It's Nick Cage's first time working with Bruckheimer.
Also, the last time Bruckheimer worked with his producing partner,
they had a falling out due to drugs.
Who was doing them, who was buying them or selling them
and who was sharing? Not Bruckheimer.
I don't know what the guy's other name was.
Yeah, it's probably the guy that didn't continue a career.
If if there's one guy that like really suffered negatively
from the drug connection, it's probably the guy we don't know the name of.
That's fair. That's fair.
This is the start of peak Nick Cage action here, though,
because his next two films were Con Air and Face Off.
So this kicked off an era for him before this.
He was like mostly still in the comedy, sometimes drama thing.
Like we had Red Rock West, which is more the comedy.
Yeah, Red Rock West was definitely it.
I mean, it wasn't comedy, but it was.
Well, it was sort of like it was a comedy.
Dark comedy, farce.
And this was the next movie after his Oscar win.
This came out right after leaving.
He was really in the pocket right here.
Yeah, this is some of his best stuff.
That's what I mean. It's Pete.
He actually gives a shit.
He's actually clearly acting and invested
and is extremely funny and charming.
Again, with the exception of the weird car chase
consistent to his character, he was the one who decided his character
didn't swear. Oh, that's right.
There was a little bit of swearing in this movie.
But he just gives like a G and a golly.
Zeus's butthole, he he grabs Sean Connery and says, hey,
hey, Paul, and I was like, just say ask the man.
Come on. What do you say we cut the chit chat?
He whole. Yes.
I like when people say fucking a once they introduce Sean Connery,
they give Connery most of the best usual cage lines.
It doesn't really tell the third act where Nick Cage really starts caging out.
Yeah, definitely.
I mean, there is the whole thing where he goes off about how LPs sound better.
Which is just the best.
And also another thing that made me be like, how has Sean not seen this movie?
This is Sean.
You also it's the Beatles.
I think it's with the Beatles.
Sure. Yes. That because he's a he's a Beatles file.
No, he's a Beatle maniac maniac.
That's kind of like a Hulkamaniac, but Hulkamania is still running wild.
Is nobody remembers the Beatles stopped. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. I tell you something, brother.
I think you'll understand.
I mean, that was like a good I give you a 73 for that.
That's pretty good.
I'll take it. Yeah. I give it a 69.
Oh, nice.
Gave you a lower score than me.
But a funnier score. Yeah.
A funny, much funnier score.
Objectively, that's my ex wife, everybody.
You guys ever listen?
Speaking of Hulk Hogan, did you guys ever listen to the Hulk Hogan
and the wrestling boot band?
No. With such.
Oh, yeah. He played bass.
He had such bangers as I want to be a Hulkamaniac
having fun with my family and friends.
And then like some other wrestling used to be whole year.
I love everything about.
Yes. Of all the celebrities to just have a band, Hulk Hogan is the best.
Like, fuck Steven Seagal.
I want to see Hulk Hogan.
So and the Hulkamania.
I would just love to hear you continue to sing some of their greatest hits
from their oh, I know I've got a voice like honey, but
that's for the patrons.
Oh, yeah, we should do a special song.
And that's how we lose all our patrons.
I mean, they don't have to listen, Sean.
They can just stop and keep giving us money.
If you start a clip, you have to play it.
Yeah, yeah.
That's how we know you listened right back to malware.
It just plays immediately at full volume and there's no way to shut it down.
They won't let you do that anymore. Google stop that lame fucking Google.
Let me force the podcast on people.
How do you think this movie would have gone if it got its original lead?
Arnold Schwarzenegger as a scientist, as yeah, and as Nick Cage's role,
he was offered it originally turned it down and then later regretted it.
I mean, he's correct on that choice.
I mean, this was also that kind of peak time where Arnold Schwarzenegger
was just plain an average guy who happened to be a giant.
Like Jingle All the Way Twins.
But like Nick Cage is such a gangly weirdo that I was like,
it's actually believable that he would be a scientist. Exactly.
And a Beatle maniac.
Also, though, if we're tracking Nick Cage's chest and body hair, my God.
Oh, we are.
There's some disagreement as to why he he has his like naked in his apartment scene.
Michael Bay says we knew Nick Cage would want to take his shirt off,
so we just got it out of the way.
And Nick Cage's reasoning was, well, I just wanted to show that my character
was like comfortable at home.
He was very comfortable.
Just another tiny plot note, because like there is one woman in this film.
There's actually a couple of women in this film.
I mean, there's like a few, but like this movie is not for the ladies.
I'll just say it so you guys don't get canceled.
I mean, again, we had thanks.
We had mostly naked Nick Cage in like the first 15 minutes.
That was for the ladies. That was for me.
That was for Peter exclusively.
OK, they live in Washington, D.C.
Nicholas Cage and his romantic paramour,
and they very casually are fucking on their roof.
And I was like, I don't know of a single part of Washington, D.C.
that is not densely populated to the point that I would feel comfortable
fucking on my roof.
Hey, they're exhibitionists. Don't yuck.
Exactly. Rude.
You didn't hear the Inuit clap at the end.
So that's how you know Nick Cage is done.
God damn it.
As the heat from their body slowly melts the ice in the igloo.
Disgusting. Oh, God.
I love memories by Nick Cage.
Yeah. That's a call back to last episode.
Go listen to that one if you want to get the reference.
I do want to talk about a little a few behind the scenes things for The Rock.
So because there's a lot of there's a lot of wacky stuff.
Wait, before we talk about the behind the scenes stuff,
let's talk about the in the scene stuff.
Yeah, we really haven't talked about the movie at all.
I want to talk about the fucking weapon.
Hold on. The green oars.
The great oars are so cool.
They're so cool. I wanted those things so bad.
And there was a store in Kansas City when I was growing up
that was for like rich old white people.
And they had something that looked like that.
And it was just supposed to sit in like a vase on your coffee table.
And I wanted them so bad that I had no money because I was 12.
Similar to you.
I had these like from like Bath and Body Works or something,
because again, it was the mid to late 90s.
The like bubble bath orb things.
And because my dad is a real jokester and knew I loved the rock,
told me that those bubble bath things were poisonous.
I love your father.
You want your skin to get all bubbly and fall off?
Yeah, exactly. That's what he told me.
And I was like, why would my father ever lie to me?
He would never do that. Those must be poison.
And so I lived in fear of these bubble bath orbs in my bathroom.
And a similar story about John.
My father.
Shortly, shortly after our separation, I got an unmarked box in the mail.
And inside was just like a rusted canister.
I called John.
I'm like, and I saw it came from where Meredith and I used to live.
And I just like, I'm going to call John and see if this was him.
And he didn't pick up.
So I called Meredith and Meredith's like,
does it say like Gotham Gas Works on it?
I'm like, I didn't touch it.
And I like turned over and it did because John liked to get me like Gotham
Batman related things like, oh, this makes sense.
Card would have been nice.
Yeah. So you lived in the Bay Area.
Yes. Did either of you ever go to Alcatraz?
Yeah. No. Once.
Does it have as many chains as they show in this movie?
I mean, not in the places that they allow you to go.
There are so many decorative chains in this film.
It is like a BDSM shoot at Kink Dotcom.
So which also used to be in the Bay Area, which also used to be in the Bay Area.
It used to be in the armory.
We're in Soma, like near our school, near our college that we went to.
No, just going back to Alcatraz real quick.
The powers that be, the producers wanted this film to be done on a soundstage
in L.A. with just a few shots of Alcatraz to kind of sell it to San Francisco.
Michael Bay was quoted as saying, I got to shoot on the island
because this island is so fucking bitching.
That's a very Michael Bay thing to have said.
Yes. Sean Connery lived on the island for the shoot.
What?
Sean Connery had them build a cabin on the island for him to live on
because he didn't want to commute to and from the city every day.
I just imagine him bathing in that gross ass cistern.
I just imagine him in Zardoz,
and that's the only thing I ever picture him in that movie's gold.
There was one day, I think it was when Sean and I were in college,
and we were talking about Sean Connery and we were on the like bus to go to school.
And I said something about Zardoz.
I was like, oh, yeah, Connery and Zardoz, the man of my dreams.
And Sean was like, what are you talking about?
And I was like, everybody on this whole bus, shut up.
We're about to talk about Zardoz.
And I pulled up the photo of like Sean Connery in his like
sexy ass bikini with his like bulge and the braid and the whole thing.
The whole thing.
And Sean was just like.
What?
Like it broke, it broke your brain, like I could see it happening.
And I was so proud.
Yeah, that's the man that my parents decided to name me after.
Yes, it is. Oh, yeah.
And what a man choice choice.
Yeah, respect. Yes.
Yes. So I grew up around the Bay Area.
Obviously, Sean and I went to school there. Sean is from there.
It was very sweet to see late 90s San Francisco again.
I was like, oh, my God, the San Francisco of my youth, not the one that is
crowded with tech bros wearing fucking Pataguchi jackets and whatever.
That chase sequence would be much different right now
with the current traffic in that city.
So the chemistry of Sean Connery and Nicholas Gage cannot be denied.
It's perfect. Oh, make this movie. It's amazing.
It's perfect. It's good.
What did you guys think of the the old Hans Zimmer score?
I don't remember it.
Yeah, none of it actually strikes me as memorable.
The only moment that is vaguely memorable score wise is when Nick Cage
like has jabbed himself in the heart with atropine at the very end of the film.
And it's like.
You mean when he jabs himself in the stomach with it?
I mean, yeah, exactly.
It was like in his diaphragm.
I was like, Brody, you know where your heart is?
You're a scientist.
And he like goes out with the two flares and it's like,
and it's amazing.
And there's like blue angels are coming in and it's like, oh, God.
And the music swells and it's just like peak testosterone.
And it's really great.
This is the era of Final Fantasy Eight was coming out.
There was a demo disc that got bundled with a game called Brave Fencer Musashi.
I don't know if any of you guys played that one.
I remember I remember this game and I remember this disc. Yeah.
And the demo has the beginning of Final Fantasy Eight.
It's like a landing scene where you're landing on an island
and it's a big military move. Yeah.
And the music on that demo disc ripped this score off so fucking bad
that they had to change it for the actual release of the game.
It's awesome. I love it.
That's my fun fact. Let's talk about Ed Harris's villain,
because he's really good in this and he's always the villain, though.
Oh, what about Apollo 13? I think that's good, Ed Harris.
He's just such a good villain, though he has intense face.
You know how some people have resting bitch face.
He just has like resting intense face.
He's like the dad you don't respect.
My problem is I always envision him wearing a Kangol hat.
I'm just thinking about Kangol.
So now I'm thinking about Kangol's.
No, not not Kangol's and Kangol's Kangol.
Like a K.
Go hat. Like, why do you have a hat on it?
You know, a K.
Goals hold the hat in place, you know, the place where you do Kangol's.
But with your head, just
know, you can actually just suck a hat off of someone's head.
Yeah. With the power of your K.
Goals, use your magic.
Can you imagine somebody zip lining over you and then just
take your hat right off?
And then they zip away.
This is what John fears every day.
And you're just like, oh, but you're really sad because you lost your hat.
I love a story, though.
No one would believe you.
Yeah, nobody would.
But no, there is like really good at this.
And also he's doing this for the right reasons.
And at the end, he even kind of, you know, oh, we bluffed and they,
you know, they called it.
So he was never going to blow up the Bay Area.
Yeah. At one point, they said he's not not a Raiders fan
because the one missile they do fire, they said to Oakland,
for the football game, they were going to the baseball game.
It was the Giants, not.
No, it was in Oakland.
It was in Oakland. So it would be the A's.
No, but they said they said they said they saw game.
We're going to fact check this shit.
Yeah. OK.
Sorry. I will just say that I know it wasn't the Coliseum
because the seats were red.
The seats were red.
And Oko does not have red seats.
They do.
Of people to know about this, you would be one of those people to know.
I've sat in those seats.
I know they're not.
Nick has just been on the Internet trying to prove his point.
I heard him tapping away.
I was curious what was going on.
I was wrong. It wasn't a baseball game, but it was Candlestick Park.
Weird, because that is not in Oakland.
No, it's not. No, it's not.
I mean, it was also all CG as well.
You mean they didn't just launch and abort
a missile filled with sarin gas. Cowards.
Cowards. Either way, those stadiums are right next to each other.
So it doesn't really matter.
Well, the other thing that I love to just like if you're from the Bay Area,
they're talking about how they're going to launch a missile at San Francisco.
It's at San Francisco, San Francisco.
And then the first missile they launched, they said that shit to Oakland.
Well, since this film Michael Beans in this film for a bit, he's fun.
The most scrawny action hero there is.
Who was he? Who is he?
He was Hicks in Aliens.
He was in Terminator.
John Connor's dad. Yeah.
Or whatever. I can't remember his name in the first Terminator.
Yeah, I can't remember either.
Kyle Reese. No, I mean, who was he in in this film that we're talking about?
He was the leader of the Seals when they came in.
He was always like, I can't give that order.
They won't give that order when they get shot in the shower.
I just love Michael Beans.
So whenever I see him in something, I'm like, hey, it's Michael Beans.
One of my random actor notes is I wrote Slick Hair Little Mustache.
That was a guy named Paxton who was played by William Forsythe,
who the last time we saw him, he was playing John Goodman's
brother in Raising Arizona. Yeah.
So I do want to just make sure we get in here.
Sean Connery got like the entire crew sick.
With what? So all herpes.
All of the so when they were doing all the water scenes, interior
water scenes, Sean Connery wanted the water to be heated to 90 degrees.
And then like everyone got the stomach flu and doctors were just like,
yeah, it's a fucking Petri dish that you made there.
If someone pooped in the water. Yeah.
So just yeah. That's just it was Sean Connery.
He's just saying they're like.
That's like a thing in.
Fuck you, woman.
Of like under 40 degrees and above whatever, like 140 degrees,
like bacteria can't survive, but anything that's between like 41 degrees
and 139 degrees like bacteria thrives.
Sean Connery, stop it.
Where do we fall on?
Is is is he James Bond or not?
100 percent. You know this theory, right?
I kind of dig this theory. Walk us through it, though.
But the whole premise is Sean Connery is or, you know,
his character, Mason, was an S.A.S.
agent caught at the Canadian border with some microfiche of all of America's,
you know, dirty secrets and then was disappeared
because he never told them where it was.
So he's just been on like a black site for 30 years with like no trial.
The British haven't claimed him because they couldn't.
And the U.S. like can't acknowledge that they have him.
And it winds up, you know, he would have been arrested
like the year after his last James Bond movie would have taken place.
And I think that is largely it.
Can we just say he is and then becomes canon in the cage verse?
I'm cool with that.
Well, especially because the NCU is a multiversal concept, as we now know.
Well, also, this movie ends at the start of National Treasure.
Yeah, right. It does tie in like the movie ends with Nick Cage
and his new newlywed wife
going to a church and stealing the leg off a pew,
which had the microfilm in it.
And like the last line of the film is Nick Cage being like, Hey, honey,
you want to know who killed JFK the best?
So, yeah, this movie just leads right into National Treasure.
Because then he's like, I don't need to be a government chemical
scientist anymore.
I need to go find this goddamn treasure that the United States has been hiding.
And I'm changing my name to Benjamin Franklin.
Yes. So Michael Bay did have an idea for a sequel to this,
where Nick Cage's character Stanley is on the run from the government
because of the microfiche, and he has to go track down Mason
to like help him get away.
I'm glad they didn't do it.
National Treasure is perfect as a sequel to this.
I just love also that this is like the quintessential 90s
one off action movie that is not concerned with the collateral damage.
It's not concerned really with the outcome.
It's just like we're going to go blow some shit up in the San Francisco Bay area.
Is everybody on board? Great. Let's go.
All right. So where do you put this on the performance review?
Then good cage, good movie, good cage, good movie.
Yeah, that's fine.
Wow. Nick, well, OK.
So this has been my favorite action film so far.
Yeah, Nick, you have.
But you've actually been kind of quiet on this one.
What what are your feelings on this flick?
I think it's it's the kind of movie where like it's great.
Nostalgic Lee.
But then when I started to like critically watch it and like
it doesn't have as much peak to me as it does just in my memory.
I'm sorry. The science doesn't hold up as well as face off.
Yeah. Penis swapping technology, swapping technology.
No, I think you're not come around on that.
I think they are actually penis twins.
I think they're dick twins.
Travolta and cage. Oh, OK.
I was thinking Sean Connery. No, I mean, maybe they had great chemistry.
Can you have dick triplets?
That's Eric. What you would know what a triptych is, right?
So would America. Yeah.
So I would know.
A triptych, a triptych of like all three like it would take the same
things or whatever.
But I mean, different size.
Dicks would all be the same, but their thighs would be different.
I kind of want to make that you can put that in the entrance and then
underneath, you can just have like the live laugh love.
I just really want to go down a line of what I think all of these actors
dicks look like.
So starting with OK, starting with Sean Connery,
feel like definitely not a shower.
But as soon as it shows, you're like, God damn, like.
I was mistaken.
Turtleneck, I was yes, like I was mistaken, sir.
I I apologize.
Feel like he's also a huge man.
So it's like you got to have some perspective there.
Yeah. But like still, like even for that, you're like, whoa, that
it was shocking.
Nick Cage feel like his dick very,
very big flaccid, which is always kind of weird
and like kind of thin and like difficult getting hard,
like difficult to get and maintain, you know.
Now, it's Oscar worthy.
Is it difficult for him to get it hard or is it difficult for an outsider
to get it hard?
Why don't we just work his sister's only he know how to work it.
One yogurt on the toes.
Yogurt. Yeah.
He he is an expert on the hardware that he operates.
Do you know what I'm saying?
Everybody else clapped enough cheeks at this point, too,
like you got to bring your a game.
Yeah, like you got to know.
And he's like, I could have this done in 10 seconds.
And like this is going to be a whole ordeal if someone else is interacting with it.
But like on the surface, though, incredibly impressive.
But then you're like ultimately disappointed.
I need you to hit John Travolta last.
But I also think that we are going to have our second podcast
be Meredith describes celebrity genitals.
And it'll just be you doing this for like 30 minutes an episode.
I would super love that because I have a lot of opinions.
OK, so Travolta.
Real coke, real coke can on that guy, I think, just like
Chody is a motherfucker, just like really.
Chody motherfucker.
Yeah, like it's not it's not long, but it's like girthy.
You know what I mean?
To the point that it's almost like like the length wasn't going to be an issue,
but like we need like a lot of lube in this situation because like this.
I appreciate the the penis evaluations.
Good predictions, prognostications.
Yeah, those are prognostications.
Those are my completely.
Completely factual, 100 percent accurate,
well researched opinions about Sean Connery, Nick Cage
and John Travolta's genitalia.
Yeah, yeah, big meaty cocks.
Do we want to do quotes and start to kind of tie this up?
Yeah, I think we unless there's other like really specific things
that anyone has about the movie.
I think we can probably go watch it.
It's amazing. Go watch it.
It's amazing.
There's no boat chase.
There is no boat, which is which is weird because it's about the.
I mean, it's like in the water.
It's about the rock.
Well, it's about the rock.
It's not about the water.
It's about the boat on rocks.
Actually, when you boat on rocks, there's usually just disaster.
Yeah, it's bad news.
Any any sea captain will tell you that.
Meredith, do you have a quote for this film as a guess?
You could go first.
I feel like everything that Sean Connery says is amazing
and everything that Cage says is amazing.
So anything that they say at any point in this film is my favorite quote.
Nick, I don't find it to be like a remarkably quotable movie.
I don't know.
Like I said, this movie's fine.
But if I had to say something,
I would just pick out the the haircutting scene where like
Sean Connery is getting his haircut and by the peak 90s, like flamboyant.
The worst gay stereotype of the mid 90s.
Yeah. And so Mason just asks, am I out of style?
And Goodspeed just says, unless you're a 20 year old,
unless you're a 20 year old guitarist from Seattle, it's a grunge thing.
And it's like, that line sucked.
Actually, every time he opened his mouth to talk about music, I resented him.
That's totally fair.
I might. I got I got a Sean Connery.
I'm a Beatle man.
I'll do a Kate. My cage first.
Well, I'm one of those fortunate people who like my job, sir.
Got my first chemistry set when I was seven.
Blew my eyebrows off.
We never saw the cat again, but into it ever since my Connery is
when they're it's just the two of them and they're about to go like raid the rock.
Sean Connery goes in your best.
Luna's losers always whine about the best
winners go home and fuck the prom queen.
That was a great one. I loved that.
Sean, I need your help on this.
OK, who am I? Who am I?
Oh, you are his fiance.
Oh, you didn't mean what you just said, did you?
When? Just right now, when you were talking about
bringing a child into the world and it being an act of cruelty.
Well, I meant it at the time.
Stanley, at the time, you said it seven and a half seconds ago.
Well, gosh, kind of a lot has happened since then.
That's a good line.
And of course, you know, when when they're actually caught
and in their cells, you broke out.
Let me see if I can get the straight down the incubator chute
on the mine car through the tunnels to the power plant under the steam engine.
That was really cool, by the way, and into the cistern, though,
the through the intake pipe.
But how in the name of Zeus's butthole, did you get out of your cell?
I only ask because in our current situation,
well, it could prove to be useful information, maybe just so many
peak cage moments.
That's why he really starts like cage out.
Yeah, he turns it on in the latter half for sure.
There's one more I needed just when he's, you know,
disarming the last missile.
Listen, I think we got off on the wrong foot.
Stan Goodspeed, FBI.
Let's talk music.
Do you like Elton John song?
Rocket Man?
I don't like soft ass shit.
Oh, you. Oh, oh, oh, oh, well, I only bring it up because it's you.
You're the rocket man.
And then launches a missile into the guy's chest. That was kind of rad.
Which didn't kill him falling out of the building
and then being impaled on a fence post kills.
Oh, yeah, I forgot that that's how that guy ended.
I think the most gruesome missile, the missile probably did the work,
but then it has to impale the fucker.
I love that the missile did the work.
Speaking of people falling out of windows.
Yeah, it was robbing the place and like they were using nonlethal
like it's bean bags and they bean bag a guy.
But then he gets thrown out a window and like down
like at least one floor.
Yeah. And it just like dies on the concrete.
I know it was good use of nonlethal weapons. Yeah.
Thanks, Michael. Good shit.
So, I mean, I think that takes us to the end.
You know, what do you guys think?
Actually, that brought us back to the beginning.
That's true. It's no, it's of course the rock. Yeah.
I know you're kind of begrudging on that one, but no, I mean, it's
they can't all be Bangkok dangerous.
I had to look to see what this was going to go up against
just in case Bangkok Dangerous would be a better matchup.
But I think it's a disservice to everybody if we just start cheating
and choosing things that way.
The Rock is fine. No, it's not a bad movie.
I'm not anti the rock. I'm just.
Yeah, I mean, the rock is definitely like of an era.
It is strongly of an era and it is very of a specific moment in time.
And I think if you can just shut your brain off
and not think about it critically, you're like, yeah, that's usually not a problem
for me. I mean, look, Nick, I wasn't going to make assumptions
and be like, you know, Nick, how you always do.
Yeah, with my sandwiches and such.
Yeah, with sandwich with all of the sandwiches you eat.
Like it's just it's a whole thing.
I will also say, though, Lindy West, who is a film critic
and a really funny writer, wrote like an essay about the rock.
And I highly recommend if you can find it, definitely read it
because it's a it's a delight.
It's just the best.
I don't do a lot of academic reading if I can avoid it.
Especially not for this.
This academic writing isn't so academic as much as basically
just everything I said about the rock she wrote down on paper.
If you could get somebody to maybe just film it
or record it on a podcast that you can listen to later.
And actually, I mean, on occasion, that would literally not work
because I don't listen to podcasts.
You listen to this podcast.
Did Lindy West describe celebrity penises?
Lindy West is not.
And you know what? That's the X factor I bring.
You know what I'm saying?
Perfect. Oh, yeah.
Do you have anything else you want to plug, Meredith? Phrasing.
Shut up.
I know my audience and current and at the moment, my audience is my ex wife.
I'm going to not take the bait on that one.
If people want to see my misadventures in owning a house,
they can check me out on Instagram at Lawn Daddy Lives Here.
Great name. Thank you.
Other than that, no, I would just encourage everybody
to listen to this great podcast called Cage Match.
Has these two great folks on it.
Sean and Nick, they're great.
Peter's there as well. It's amazing.
I love it.
You and subscribe.
Wow. Doing all our work for. Yeah, actually.
So I'm really excited for next time because we're finally watching
the unbearable weight of massive talent.
Yeah. So people can finally stop yelling at us for not having seen that movie.
Yeah. Which would be really nice.
I have limited time.
We're doing unbearable weight of massive talents.
A lot of words. And what else?
The trust, which is him and Elijah Wood.
Yeah. And they've got cool mustaches.
Oh, OK. That's right.
And I think they do a heist. I don't know.
Yeah, they're like time traveling heistians.
Heistians. Yeah.
Who are pulling off a job against.
I think it was a Christy Yamaguchi.
Yeah, I think you got it. That's perfect.
So stay tuned for that one.
Please do rate, review and subscribe.
It is very helpful.
It'd be great to have any other reviews other than Meredith,
although that was a great one. We really appreciate it.
I'll come find you at your house and make you write a review for this podcast.
Don't think I won't do it.
I have a lot of airline miles.
Laundaddy is going to come for you, but not enough to be here in person
for the podcast. Yeah. What the fuck, Meredith?
Yeah. Where are those air miles now?
Look, I use them sparingly and only for vengeance purposes.
Nick, this is for fun.
If you want to, if you want to interact with us at all,
you can find us on Reddit or Twitter or Instagram.
But Reddit is probably the best one.
That's a cage match pod.
If you are. Nick's only fans.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, it's definitely butts and dicks there. Yeah.
Not his that weirdly enough. No.
Let me finish.
Dear God, I'm trying to help you finish.
You're trying to help a lot of people finish, Nick.
That's your whole only fans thing.
That's the whole point, right?
If you are interested in supporting us, we are on Patreon at Patreon.com
slash cage match.
Special thanks to our Sparkle buddies, Josh, Sean, Josie, Rico,
Matt and Adam, and the special, special thanks to our cage dancers.
A name we totally came up with ourselves.
Ira and John Meredith, thank you for being here.
Thank you all for having me.
I'm so sorry for everything I've done and said.
That's not true.
No, it's not. I think this turned out great.
I have zero regrets.
Nick, sing us out.
Bye bye.
I don't know the rest of that song.
That's the only important part.
The part where my voice cracks like I'm still in puberty.
Yes.
All right.
So I just want to say this because I saw this and laughed.
The assistant prop master was named Skip Crank.
Man, you never skip a crank.
You can't get backed up.
Not on a Sunday.
Well.
What is going on out there?
Lightning we established.
I know, but it's weird.
I'm not used to hearing like big thunder.
You all have been away. I'm scared.
Man, you all have been away from the East Coast for too long.
Well, I just saw thunder Peter.
I don't know if either of you have ever lived in the East Coast.
Please don't call me big thunder.
I just want the listeners at home to know Sean has a tattoo on the back.
We don't need to do this.
That says tethered virtue.
That's from a poem that he wrote when I was 17.
When he was 17.
I'm back in the conversation.
Let's not.
What do you have to do with an Inuit?
And then and he has a tattooed on the back of his neck.
It's beautiful.
Like it is a beautiful script tattoo.
But when I first met Sean ages ago, I like asked him about it.
And he was like, I don't want to talk about it.
And then like several years later, I got the full story.
And I was just like, this is the best thing ever.
And I love it.
Someday I'm going to get a tattoo of Guy Fieri on my butt cheek.
And it's just going to be his face.
And it's going to say welcome to flavor town around it.
Perfect.
Fuck, yes.
It's the perfect tattoo.