iTunes Exclusive Episode Are You Here

The following is a sooner orgator production. Good morning! Welcome, Empire Memor or Members.

If you are hearing my voice right now, it means a couple of things. Number one, it means at least once in your life you've listened to the clubhouse podcast. Which we greatly appreciate.

And also means it's time for another... ATTENG EXCLUSION. People that listen to our normal live shows on the 9th and 7th and 4th Pacific, they don't get these.

Let's do something extra. For the people that subscribe to this show on iTunes, because we appreciate you. So we are here for you.

Welcome, welcome, welcome. My name is Rob. And you're probably asking yourself, what in the Sam Hill is going on in the background?

Well, you're going to find out momentarily. But before we get to that, let's introduce you to the people in the room. First of all, it's in my left.

Is a man who has a crown with pins in it. Because he is the king of bowling. He is Andrew Beckham, welcome sir.

Thank you. Glad to be here. Good to have you here.

Also joining us is the official fact checker of this show. And a man who could truly care less that I'm getting to see the Braves come to town next month. You may know him as fun, don't go.

But his moment even done for it. I call him done for it. Well, I'm sorry.

I'm glad he gets to see the Braves. It's just, I'm a pirate's fan and we have that history. We do.

But I'm glad you to go. I'm happy very, very excited about them. We'll talk about that more.

Because we're here to reveal movie today. A movie that we saw the day before we taped this particular, I told him to close him. The latest film from Owen Wilson and Zach Gallifinakis as well as Amy Poler and director Matthew Weeners first film.

This is his very first film. He's not a lot of TV. Never done a feature film.

Films called Are You Here. And it was kind of weird last time when we saw it because I went with a brother friend of mine with us and he asked me the name of the film and I didn't want to say, are you here? Because then he'd be like, no, I'm on my way.

I want to turn into what we were at Abbot and Castello moment. But, uh, well, before again, we got to thank Carol Smith from Gailor Smith for absolutely. Absolutely.

So we had seats with our names on him. That was awesome. Yes.

We're going to give a shout to Carol and Gailor Smith and everybody there and thank them for inviting us to this. You're giving us the opportunity to see this film absolutely. The film basically is the story of Ben Baker and Steve Dallas.

Ben Baker played by Zach Gallifinakis is a shout we say a little left of center. But then again, that's what Zach Gallifinakis does. And Steve Dallas played by Owen Wilson is his best friend and a local weatherman in anapolis, Maryland.

And Ben finds out that his father has passed away. So they drive out into Amish Country to, uh, you know, pay their respects and they find out that in the will that Ben's been pretty much left everything. And his sister, Terry, played by Amy Poler, she got some cash and that was about it.

They also meet his widow, played by Laura Ramsey, who is significantly younger than their father was. And we go from there. So Andrew, we're going to start with you.

We're going to take this a little bit of time. What did you think of the story itself? It could have been told a little bit better.

How so? It was drug out way too long. They tried to, I guess, give a little bit of the background of just Ben Baker, the Galvanakis's character.

And I really didn't think that it was told all that well because, you know, the whole part with Amy Poler and the whole situation that she was going through and they never really addressed that in the movie. I wish they kind of would have addressed that more. Just to make it seem like it wasn't just about Galvanakis, but it seemed like a movie just based on him, just about him walking through life.

All right, Dawn? I can have to agree. Just, I mean, just really a little bit with the king of bowling there.

Um, I thought after the first 20, 25 minutes, you really got to kind of got the story down, I thought. Okay. And it's, it takes a little time, but I think within a reasonable amount of time, you really got to know the history in a nutshell, not real intense, but, you know, in a nutshell, you got to know the history of all the characters in the relationships and everything, which I thought was good.

In the first, I'd say half of the movie. I thought it flow well. I thought it had a lot of great comedy in it.

Um, because you're learning a situation you're trying to figure out what's going on and everything. But I'd say probably the last third of the movie, I thought the direction of the movie went very, very off-center where, like Andrew said, where, where I agree with him on this part, is that it did drag. And I think some questions, they didn't answer them with which they should have answered.

And it got a little complex at the end with this and that and that and this happening, if all these sort of events happening. So I think the storyline at the end, I think kind of fell flat. But the first half was very, I liked it the first for me, it meandered quite a bit.

Um, my written review that's which is featured on www dot the clubhouse.com. I talked about how it started out for me as a buddy road trip movie and then morphed into this other thing that it was like it didn't know what it wanted to be. And I will get deeper into that as we get deeper into the conversation.

But I liked the concept of the story. I just don't know that it was executed as well as I would have liked it to have been. That makes any sense.

Yeah, I agree with you a lot. It went off on several tangents and then just left them there. I would agree with you, not not kind of in the way the boyhood did because I thought that boyhood is as wonderful as the film as it was.

There was a lot of unanswered questions in that film. Where has they kind of answered some of them but they kind of didn't in this one? Let's let's talk about director Matthew Weiner.

He also wrote the film. He's directed a bunch of episodes of Mad Men and the Supranos. For me, the visual element of the film, I thought the visual story telling was good.

I think it was trying to make up for what was might have been lacking in the script. So there was a lot of really great scenery. Like Dawn said, there's some great comedic moments.

Like when a lot of Owen Wilson has to kill a chicken. And more beyond that, I thought the comedy kind of float very well through the movie. That's one part I'll say.

I thought the comedy was good throughout the movie. It's just the story. Well, let's let's talk about the director's vision of the film.

Or where were you thinking there? I saw his vision up front and I kind of saw what he was trying to do. But his just like the storyline, I thought his direction really kind of went too complicated often too many routes at the very end.

I mean, I've the last third of the movie, I probably say. Like there's one scene where they're in a restaurant and the indie polarist character in Zack's character in the Outback steak house. Yeah, now back steak house.

And they were obviously pulling up some cash for this film. Yeah, just a lot. But there was just them too talking, but they kind of say, well, this is why we want to do and they kind of answer down the road, but they really don't.

It kind of, let you know they didn't forget about it. Yeah, yeah, I, I, I, I go over this direction up front, but the last half of the movie, I thought he just kind of sprouted out too much and didn't answer enough. Andrew, this movie solely relied on star power and scenery for this film to succeed.

Okay. I feel like Matthew Weiner was a weiner was afraid to give his script out to people, you know, prefer what they may say, or people just didn't, whoever was all backstage with them, producing this movie, they were just afraid to tie up any loose ends. I don't know why.

I feel, and I want to get to that here in a minute, because I think I know where it was going. But you got to admit that this is his first directorial debut. He's a grammatically.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, directing wise, I think this is basically the first thing he's done besides bomb a madman. I think that's the premise.

Yeah, but he's he's directed a lot of TV. He's just never directed a film before. For me, he written on sopranos, but in direct.

Okay, but I mean, I agree with where Andrew's going with this. He relied heavy, it was almost style of her substance in a few different points of it, which then leads us into the performances. And for me, Gallifinacus is Gallifinacus.

You're going to get what you get with him. And we got it. And yeah, you got him in his element.

The quirky little guy who maybe has a grip on reality, but maybe doesn't polar, I think, gave what she could give and what she had to give. You know, you're not used to sitting or like that. No, I mean, she's played the antagonist before in different things, but I think she was just, she wasn't given enough to go with.

You didn't have enough time for me. You weren't given enough time in the film to not like her. You know, you know, you understood her motivations, but to me, she was never truly the antagonist of the film.

Like I thought maybe she should have been. And in the first scene, you're thinking when you see her in Zach at the funeral, they hug and glide your hair and everything. And it seems like she's a caring person, not the evil, and that's the first scene with her reality because you, but you don't see her motivations until the reading of the will.

And she disappears like in the middle third of the movie for a while. Yes, she actually does. So much so that you forget about it.

And then when she's back, she's like, oh, yeah, there's this whole thing going. It was kind of like they were right. You know, when it was writing the script and then he went, oh, yeah, I've got to go back to this thing because I have to explain it again.

Oh, and Wilson doesn't do drama well in my personal opinion. Owen Wilson is known for comedy. And try trying to see him do dramatic things in this film didn't work for me.

There's a scene where he's, he hugs Galifinakis's character and starts to cry allegedly. Like the crying, he did, the crying was not sold to me. I was just like, dude, are you, it's like you're trying to shoehorn the tears that aren't coming.

And also on the scene when he flips the table over. Yeah, I mean, to me that was coming. It rolls on the floor.

Right. To me that was, I never saw rage in that. Yeah.

You know, there's a scene where, I don't want to go do deep because I don't want to ruin anything for people that might actually see this film. But there's a scene where he has to confront a couple of the other characters in the film because of his motivations and theirs. And I just didn't buy, I bought more of the, I bought him more is just like this jerk that wants the explanation more than a guy that was genuinely hurt.

You know, all I can see, excuse me, all I can see was his character in wedding crushers. Yes. You know, and I thought he had better chemistry with Rachel McAdams than he had, you know, in this film with Laura Ramsey.

Yeah. The only serious thing you can think of with him was behind enemy lines. But that wasn't his film.

Well, he was the main star in that one, but he was a guy who shot down, you know, from the fighter jet and in Starry Avo and he has to go through the thing. Oh, you know what? I was going to completely different place.

I remember what you're saying. Yeah. That's the only serious role I can think of him in, really.

You know, before his comedy career, really sorry. Oh, no, you know, it was, but he's, he's done comedy before that, you know, but um, but that's only serious role I could think of. And you know, that was an okay movie, but it wasn't a blockbuster, but you know, him trying to like, I agree trying to do the serious stuff here.

Right. He had comedy. There was a lot of comedy in there.

You seem like the woman eyes are kind of guy up front and you're thinking with the first scene with him with the glass of wine and stuff you're kind of thinking. You know, it was this guy at woman eyes or that kind of thing. What, where was this character really going?

You know, and you never really, I don't know that we ever really understood his character, even by the end of it. Oh, no. There were certainly certain elements to his character that we're almost unnecessary for me.

There's a, there's a, there's a, there's a subplot in the film of him looking across from his apartment into another apartment that really, like, I mean, you know, when you see the film, you know why it's there, but it really brought nothing to it. Yeah, there was nothing that made me go, okay, now I understand him better. Like, he, he wasn't so, he was like, not bipolar, but quadpolar, you know, in this, as a character, a woman eyes are with nothing.

A caring guy who loved his friend, a comedy, a guy who loved the, the plant. Um, should we talk about how, like, I guess the use of drugs, like, his prescription and of earth, did that have any role in the movie? Maybe for Galifonakis, yes, but for Owen Wilson, to me, it didn't add anything to the character.

Like, you already kind of got a debaiki vibe off of him. I don't know that you needed him to be a drug user and how much we smoking did you see in this film? Well, I mean, but that was on of it.

But that's so accepted now. Yeah, but I mean, they overdue that point. Oh, yeah, I don't think they did.

I think that was, I mean, I think they kind of did said, but I think what did you say where it showed you that that was the link they had to each other in the beginning, but as the movie went on, you saw there was more layers to it. But that's just kind of the thing that people like to put in films now to, to, I don't know, give some legitimacy to a younger audience. For me, for me, I didn't really care.

I'm more about what's going on in the story than how is this going to be marketed to a mass audience. Yeah, I was kind of beat down by that because that's what it seemed like. That's all their relationship.

We got to warn the empire, though. There's a lot of drug use in this. There is a lot of nudity, too, so for the little kids, no, you know, well, this is already our film.

I know, but so, you know, just giving a warning to the parents out there. Any standout performances? When the stepmother actually started talking in the film, it, it, it almost seemed like an, like, I'll fill it first.

Once she started talking, things started actually happening. Okay. And I guess in the general store, when she actually started talking with Amy Poler's character for more than five words, and then with Gallifonakis, and then I'm actually with outside after the bar when Owen Wilson's character comes back in and they talk outside.

Okay. Don. Well, you know, like the stepmother, Laura Ramsey, correct?

Correct. Yeah. I thought she was very standout.

I didn't, would understand that when he was Amy Poler, because I'm so used to her, or these other roles of being, you know, that kind of threw me for a loop, which I thought they shouldn't have done. But a little minor role who kind of stood out for me was a Lauren Lampkiss who played the, you know, Owen's worker to help the assistant. Yeah, it's a assistant to help the TV station.

Yeah, even though she's done my, yeah, deal with Shepard. Deal with Shepard. I'm sorry.

That does help. What a five is character. Yeah, I thought she, you know, she's minor.

I select the role she had. And the guy who played this boss, too. You know, who just would not fire him.

You know, you would know her from she was in the movie Blended. She's also got a role in House of Lies. She was in Orange's The New Black.

And the, the, his supervisor work was Paul Schultz. He's the one who played this boss at work. For the role, yeah, as much as time is in there, I liked his role.

I really did. I thought standout for the amount of time that he had. He is in Nurse Jackie.

He's actually in Rambo. The 2000 for Rambo. John Rambo, I believe, was the name of that.

Was it not? No, just Rambo. Rambo, 2008 and then Panic Room, too.

And for me, really, there were no standout performances, but the guy that played the therapist who I thought was Wilson from home improvement, who wasn't, but he sounds just like him to, um, the Herman guy. Yeah, he's in the boss voice. He played the, the head vampire in the last voice.

But there's a couple of good small roles. Jennifer, she has a small role, uh, Peter Bogdanovich has a small role in this. Um, but nothing that really stood out for me.

Probably the scenery. Yeah, I mean, the best supporting. It was, yeah, it's a lot beautiful scenery in that film.

I mean, it was a beautiful land out there. You know, I'll never actually saw any stars. They kept talking about them, but they never actually showed this.

It's an excellent point. All right, well, let's get to the final analysis, Joe, and when we do the final analysis on this show, we don't give letter grades or number grades or thumbs up or thumbs down because we like to be a little more creative because our empire deserves more than that. What we do is a two prompt question.

Question one, would you see this film again? The answer is no, then we're done here. The answer is yes, then the question becomes how would you see it again?

Would you pay for price? Would you pay a matinee? Would you pay a twilight show?

Would you pay an early morning show? Would you pay for the dollar theater? Would you pay for it as a rental?

Would you wait for it on cable? Or would you wait for it on broadcast television? Donald will start with you.

Would you see this film again? Actually, I probably would if it was on something like HBO and stuff, and that's how I'd recommend it. Okay, you know, if it's on HBO Showtime or something, in it's on, I just might watch it again to try to get a lot of the storyline back again in my head and try to, you know, try to figure some of the stuff that's on the answer during the first time.

And that's how recommended to the entire fair enough. Andrew, I would only watch this again to make sure to solidify that I'm actually going to sleep. Oh, fair enough.

This is a good way to fall asleep too. I think if I did watch this film again, it would probably be either a rental or on cable, because I think you're meant to discuss this film with others. Like, what does this mean?

Where did this go? Especially the very end of the film? I think I could see where the director was going, but I don't know that he got there for what would could be a mass audience?

No, I don't think so. But I don't know that I definitely would not see it in the fear. Now, if you're a fan of these actors, and you just want to excuse to see them in a film, Matt and a price standpoint, but if you're looking for riveting cinema, probably not.

So, once again, I want to think, uh, still the one I think Carol Smith from Gailor Smith for a while. Thank you so much, Carol. We thank you so much.

All right, gentlemen, let's do the plugs. Visit our website, www.theclubhousepodcast.com. That's where you'll find our written reviews, and a bunch of other stuff you may or may want to not want to know.

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I am Rob at the Clubhouse podcast.com. My normal co-host and contributing producer to this show is Chad Wamik. You can follow him at Chad and PG69.

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You can also subscribe to iTunes, which is probably what you're doing now. So until the next time we talk, for Don, for Andrew, for the Empire, I'm Rob. Clubhouse is closed.

For any Palmer, could a user in his film? I'm just saying. The preceding was a sooner or greater production.