iTunes Exclusive Episode Parkland

The following is a sooner orgator production.
The following is a sooner orgator production.
The following is a sooner orgator production.
Welcome.
The clubhouse is in your ears or in your speakers right now because it is time for another iTunes exclusive.
And it is what it says it is. If you listen to the eustream show strictly you're not going to get this episode.
This is only for the members of the Empire who subscribe on iTunes because we love you.
We're not going to say you're a favorite children, but you know hey you never know.
My name is Rob and we only do these iTunes exclusive for specific reasons.
And today we're going to be bringing you our review of the movie that hits theaters this weekend.
We had a chance to see it at a lovely press screening. The movie is called Parkland.
And it is literally about it. It starts pretty much at about an hour before the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and takes you through that day and the following two days at Parkland Hospital where if you don't live in Dallas, which is where this show originates from.
It is our local hospital where historically because we're not I'm not spoiling anything here where President Kennedy and Lee Harvey Osel were both taken after they were shot.
There was a man with me for this screening and he joins me now. He is the official fact checker of this show.
You might know him in the chat room or on Twitter as fun don go, but his mama column don for it. I'm a column don for it.
Hello Rob. Hello to you sir. And hello everybody in the Empire listening.
And of course this film being very timely as we are slow. I wouldn't say slowly. I was a rapidly approaching the 50th anniversary in November of the assassination.
Of President John F. Kennedy here in Dallas in the West End around Dealy Plaza.
This film directed by Peter Landisman who really he's having a lot of smaller films. This is his first directing.
He reads written three films, but this is the first time he's directed a film.
So take that into account as we begin to talk about this film.
Star-studded cast.
Zach Efron Tom Welling James Badge Dale, Marcia Gay Harden, Mark Duplas from the league.
Jackie Earl Hayley, Colin Hanks, Paul Giamati, Ron Livingston, Billy Bob Forten,
Corey Cochrane, who you might remember from CSI Miami was also in Argo.
Gill Bellows, Matt Bar, a lot of big names in this film surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963.
So let's start visually with the film as we like to do. Donna will defer to you.
Before we begin, I want to thank Gayler Smith for inviting us to this film.
And thank Carol for inviting us all. Yes.
Carol was a pleasure to meet her at this screening for this.
Very nice lady.
God, get down. Thank you very much for this.
Very, very much. I appreciate the opportunity.
Uh, visually, I'll give you an over that.
What I, this movie shows the behind the news camera stuff.
Correct. That's what I, I think is the best thing about this film.
Visually, it was real life. That's what I liked about it.
Because it basically takes ordinary, everyday people.
It was shot very much in a documentary style.
It was, it's not real slick.
No. It, it gives you that.
There's, I mean, part of my problem is when you try to do films like this, you have that shaky camera
to us that you didn't really have that in this, which I really enjoyed about it.
But it just shows how ordinary people, how the sudden their life in a minute changes
and they have to enter extraordinary circumstances.
And it also reminds you of a, you know, this happened before I was born.
Me too.
But it reminds you even when we were younger people.
How long it took information to, to disseminate.
You know, we live in a world where you know almost before sometimes people's family members
know when stuff happens.
Because because the, the technology has become so quick with camera phones and the internet
that it's almost instantaneous.
Where has back then, I mean, we were watching the film and of course this doesn't spoil anything,
but there were people in the hospital that even as the ambulance pulled up,
weren't exactly sure what was going on.
Like Colin Hanks's character is in a meeting and they try to get a hold of because he's a doctor
and they, he plays, let me go back to that screen.
Probably should have been more prepared for that.
The place doctor Malcolm Perry.
And when they go to get a hold of him, he's like, look, I'm in a meeting.
He didn't even know the president was in the hospital at the time.
It, it just, you felt that tension of dude.
The president's right down the hall and he's got a bullet in him.
You need to get down there and save him.
Yeah.
And I like how the show that intern, how all of a sudden,
he, this was not a normal routine fix up in the ER.
All of a sudden he looks down.
He's like, they call those residents.
Residents.
Residents.
I'm sorry.
Zach Efron.
Yeah.
Yeah.
How all of a sudden he just like, uh, what do I do now?
Because he realized the gravity of the situation.
Yeah.
He just goes to normal day to work.
And I'll be saying next to you know,
there's a president of the United States in front of you with the bullet wound.
And you've got three distinct storylines.
You had the storyline that really centers on the secret service and how they were handling it.
You've got the storyline of Abraham's a pruder played by Paul Giamati and his family.
And then you have the storyline of the Oswald's because what you learned very early on.
And I kind of liked the way they did the reveal on this.
Oswald's brother was working at the time played by the very, very great James Badge Dale,
who I every time I see him, I always get him confused with like an older, uh,
cornemic.
Yeah.
But he, you know him from the departed.
He was in World War Z.
He was in Iron Man 3.
He was in Shane.
He was in the lone Ranger.
The kids got skills on the walls.
I'm just saying.
Oh, totally.
Those three storylines and how they overlap.
I would say there's four because there is the government and then also the hospital.
You know, I'm saying.
I can see the hospital.
But to me, the hospital.
So the doctor ties it all together.
But still three or four, whatever.
Okay.
I could see how you would say that.
That's a valuable one.
It shows how these doctors kept on going the day after the day after.
And that had nothing to do with Billy Bob Thornton after they left the hospital.
Yeah.
Billy Bob Thornton to me.
He was more involved in these the Pruter storyline.
There.
Anything else?
Paul Giamati plays Abraham's a pruter.
If you know about this a pruter film, this was the only guy that really had the footage
of what happened.
What I liked about that.
And I might be spoiling a little bit here.
But this might also affect a decision of somebody deciding whether or not to see the film.
You don't actually see it happen.
Let's put that out there.
Because for somebody like me, it was still a little weird for me.
But it wasn't as weird as it could be.
Like you see it the only way you see it is like the reflections of Mr.
The Pruter's glasses or something like that.
I also thought Giamati did in.
I never had a big fan of his performance in this incredible on that.
He saw the motion he put into it before during half of everything.
And how here's a guy who just goes to work and says, hey, the presence coming by.
Let's go out there and see him.
And then all of a sudden, how his life changed.
I'll give you a tibet.
That's a pruter film is the most watched peeps of film in the world.
Oh, right now.
Literally is the most watched piece of film in the world.
And to me, and you and I've talked about this at length.
The genius of Giamati to me is I didn't see Abraham's a pruter.
I just saw Giamati playing him.
But it didn't bother me.
That's the brilliance of Giamati is he can play anything.
And you know it's Giamati, but you're still engaged.
And I think that's what he brings to a table that a lot of other actors can't.
And he brought the motions without overdoing it.
He showed extreme emotion, but without going, okay, now he's loony.
Right.
Because he, this guy's a girl changed in the world of the shoulders where you got pressed.
And everybody else saying, hey, we want that film.
We'll give you anything.
What do you do with that film?
You got the, you know, piece of history.
You know, what, how do you handle that if that film your lap?
And much less.
How do you handle that with everything that's coming at you at one time?
Because on one hand, you've got the government who wants the footage to find out who did it
on the other hand.
You've got reporters in the film.
You see almost beating his door down, trying to get their hands on the, on the footage, so
they can be the first ones to show it.
Another amazing, amazing.
And this one, I'm going to say could be an Oscar nomination for performance was Jackie Weaver,
who played Margarita Oswald, Lee Harvey's mother.
She veteran actress of 52 films that span almost four decades.
She had me, like she completely had me, like I wanted, if you know anything about Lee Harvey's
mom, not the most stable individual walking the earth.
Like she sold me on the fact that I just, you know, like she made me angry and to feel that
knowing I'm watching a film and knowing I'm watching a performance, that's, that's a feat to me.
I would say I could see your point of an Oscar now for her.
I also, I see for a Giovanni, too, for a best supporting nomination.
Now, see, I'm not going to go that far with you because I look at other performances he's done.
And I think this is my piece here.
I've got that feeling.
I think the, the problem for me is towards John Adams.
He was so good, like so good in that many series.
Yeah.
I just, I don't know that I, to me, I've seen him do stronger performances, although he was very good
in this and he's still a genius and he's still wonderful.
I've seen better performances from him personally.
But you have to think, I just think this might be his year.
I could be wrong.
I'm first to admit it.
But one other point you'd buy about backwards how well, you know, how it's instantaneous
and information.
The one scene, and this is public information.
I've basically seen this.
It's an unspoilerware.
Before they get the official press release, how it shows Walter Crumman kind of going,
we hear the president's dead.
The president is dead.
Yeah.
They were still trying, they were still trying online television to get confirmation.
Which, which you don't have nowadays.
You pretty excited.
I mean, think about this show was on the air when we were still on Saturday night.
The night Whitney Houston passed.
And our chat room live, which our normal show again is live every Sunday night.
70's from four Pacific.
We are your one stop shop for all things sports and entertainment.
Our live chat room was going crazy.
That Whitney had passed.
And I wasn't willing to report it because I didn't have it confirmed.
I'm a kind of person.
I need to confirm from three sources three reputable sources before I'll report it.
Now, by the time we did report it live on the show, when it came out,
there, it was everywhere.
Back then, you're on live TV.
You're waiting on a phone call.
And you saw, they show you the park when operators that are doing the plugging thing.
The whole school operates, the 60's.
So, literally as you're live on TV, trying to be the first news agency to break this thing,
you're waiting on confirmation from reliable sources.
And I thought, like, just like you said, I thought this was portrayed very, very well in the film.
We actually ran into an associate of ours that was working another screening.
That was like, oh, that's happening tonight.
I wish I could be there because I've heard so many good things.
Not overselling this.
This was an excellent, excellent film.
Now, I don't know, but it's best picture worthy.
I think, but I don't think they don't get the recognition it may deserve.
But it's an excellent, excellent film.
It depends how much they promote it and push it.
That's, that'll be my guess on it.
Whether it's a best picture not, if they put 10 possibility.
And that's also with the caveat.
Just because we don't think it's going to be get a best picture not.
Doesn't mean it's not a great film.
Yeah, it's incredible.
It's a great film.
I would watch this again.
I think it's a good conversation starter,
especially maybe for people that don't really know enough about this.
And if you, this show is based out of Dallas, Texas.
So we, you know, we have more, I wouldn't say a person,
but we have more than a rudimentary knowledge of this thing,
especially that this, you know, we're coming up on the 50th anniversary
and all of the hoopla that that's going to bring.
I think, and the genius to me, also here with this film,
is you could, you could show it to me.
You could show this in a school.
It's PG13.
I think there's, I think there's two F bombs in the whole movie.
Yeah.
And I think on the third one, you get your R.
But the, it's not, the language isn't real salty.
There's nothing that you would like shield the kids.
Because again, the really, really bad parts,
you only see in reflection or it's out of focus.
But it doesn't seem this a pooter film though,
everybody in their dogs.
But again, for, for a history class.
Yeah.
To show this film, as well.
Now, not as, as gospel, but as a like a companion piece,
to a baby, we're, we're studying that whole period in history.
So let's show this movie as a companion piece to it.
I think it would be a great idea.
Because I like how it showed everything outside of the main news camera.
And also, what the history is not really telling, you know,
because you talk Kennedy, there's the cronkite thing at, you know,
date line dowels, all that.
There's the big stuff.
You always see the few more, everything.
But this shows the long after effect a lot of out of the camera,
stuff that happened on this event that no one really sees or talks about.
And I think that this did a good job of that.
It's just, again, it kind of gives the story more depth than you
might have had before.
I'll be honest, I learned stuff.
I learned stuff about it by watching the film.
And a lot of it's pretty historically accurate.
There's one with scene with Jackie O.
That is a very tough scene.
But that happened in real life.
She really did.
And, and plus the, you do get to see how they deal with.
Okay, we've got to get into the plane and get Air Force one off the ground.
And LBJ was there, but they had him hidden somewhere.
So they, you know, because really in modern times,
the president and the vice president are very rarely together.
And I, I would say that this episode had a lot to do with why that is.
And actually the laws they can never travel together.
Correct.
They can never be on the same plane.
Correct.
So it really gives you a good background on.
How things have changed?
Yeah.
Would you see president?
Would today, would we see president Obama in a convertible top going down Main Street today?
You'd be like in the Potemobile.
Yeah.
You know, it happened to the Potemobile versus, you know, what happened back to.
And it showed one thing, which is true.
At the time it was not against federal law to kill the president.
It was actually a state.
And they actually do address that in the film.
Because Rory Cochrane, the character he plays,
is the medical and examiner at Parkland Hospital.
And how there's a struggle between way to minute.
You don't have jurisdiction here.
I have to do the autopsy and the fight between the local authorities and the federal authorities.
And I thought that was very well played.
It wasn't overdone.
It wasn't brief.
I didn't truly understood the struggle because of the laws on the books at the time.
The story telling I thought was very, very good.
The direction, what I loved about it is you have a movie where James Newton Howard does the music.
Yeah.
Normally, and I was talking to somebody about this today,
when you have James Newton Howard.
Because it's like his music is the story.
But the way they did this film,
they made it back and off and let the story drive the music,
not the other way around.
Very minimalist.
It's not a visual effects festival.
It's a storytelling movie.
And I think a lot of people may think they're going to be turned off by that.
Don't go see this movie because I don't need.
This is the kind of movie that you just need the story to drive it.
And it does so very well.
I call it real life, gritty and true to life.
Even the secret service.
That's the first time that the secret service everyone had.
And Tom Welling, who played Clark Kent on Smallville,
is one of the secret service guys.
And I didn't realize his him until Adam said,
wait, Tom Welling is this thing.
At that point, the secret service never lost a present till that point.
And it's like, what do we do?
How do we handle this?
Even puts them in the shamp.
It's really about throwing does it very, very good.
On a lot about that.
Final analysis.
Would you see it again?
And if so, in what setting?
Be personally, I would, I would do matinee.
That's a theater.
If it were me, I would go see it again in a theater.
I don't know that I could differentiate between matinee or evening show.
I think it would be more unavailability for me.
But I would say to everybody else out there who hasn't seen it.
Pay full evening prices out of theater for me.
And in history classes like you're saying use it.
Go in a group of people.
Because I think this is a movie that we would be good for discussion after the film.
I'm sure this will get a ton of play at the end of October beginning of November.
Just as we approach the anniversary.
Because you're going to see a lot of stuff.
And we know a lot of stuff coming out.
And we know what some of the stuff coming up.
And there's we know about a couple of projects that that we are hopefully going to get an opportunity to witness as well.
Very, very much recommend this film.
You're talking about discussions.
After we saw it, we were getting into it.
Yeah, we talked about it for a good twenty twenty five minutes.
Nathan Nathan, who he said he didn't like it.
And that's his right.
No, that's what's like what Nathan is.
Because he's a fellow reviewer of mine.
I don't know for years Nathan.
He actually sat in front of us at the screen.
Yeah.
And I've seen him many times.
And he said because it didn't get in the depth of characters.
And I could see his point.
But the thing is these people were just normal people.
Why do you need to tell him?
This is about this movement again.
Don't expect flash bang.
Don't expect.
Exactly.
Your big Hollywood.
But Jillian dollar budget film because it's not it's.
It's very stripped down.
Was it estimated ten million dollar budget.
That's it.
With that cast probably two thirds of that was the cast budget.
Exactly.
Because there's a lot of big names in this.
Richard Gay Harden.
We haven't talked about her in her performance as the nurse that was there in the in the
OR when both of them came in.
Very strong performance from her.
I think she's one of the great actresses of our time.
I'm I currently saw her on this past episode as past season of the newsroom where she was
amazing as as the attorney.
Oh yeah.
She was great in this film.
So overall we highly recommend this film.
Make sure you listen to our live show.
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And again, thanks to Carol for having us out.
Thank you, Carol.
So until next time.
For Don.
My name is Rob.
The clubhouse is closed.
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The preceding was a sooner or later production.
Get it over.
Go!
Why?
Because I have to.