iTunes Exclusive Episode Snowden

ques
형
1
2
2
1
1
2
2
2
3
Greetings, Empire member and or members.
If you are hearing the sound of my voice, it means the following conditions have been met.
At least once in your life, you have listened to the Clubhouse podcast live every Sunday,
70's turn for Pacific, your one-stop shop for all things pop culture.
It also means you subscribe to the show on iTunes because it is time for another Atoms exclusive.
The 236th one of these things. Welcome. My name is Rob, I am the executive producer of the
Clubhouse podcast and I live firmly by the belief of you got nothing to hide, you got nothing to worry about.
But I'm not alone as I rarely ever these things during me across the desk as he tends to do is my co-host and a man
Who the extent of his hacking usually comes from trimming trees. He is chat. Welcome, sir
I do tend to hack people off so there's that. Oh, there is that. Also joining us is the official fact checker of this show and a man
Who lives his life covertly?
You may know I miss fondongo, but his mom and even don Ford. I'm gonna call him Don Ford. Welcome, sir.
Well, in my tenor, there's a lot of open spaces. So I just go outside put some green on or no, but it's like a nobody has it.
Just like the chick play cow and hang out with Betsy and all the other cows no one would know.
Nobody knows the needs and all the bodies are. It's all I'm saying.
Whatever we do one of these things, it is to review something and this one is no exception.
We are here now to review the latest film from director director director writer director Oliver Stone.
It is called Snowden. For we start this whole thing.
Oh, that's a lot. Hey, we got to think our best friends.
And we're in a great marketing. Let's say everybody there. Such wonderful people. They did a great job with this screen.
Yeah, that's great. We love those guys. Thank you so much, Melissa and everybody there.
So if you don't know what this song is about, we do or this song. This film is about.
You okay? I don't know. I'm out of it today. This film is about
Edward Snowden and if you don't know who he is, first of all, welcome back from the cave
He is a guy that is currently he can see Russia from his house because he lives there.
But he was basically the guy that exposed a lot of things about the government and how they were
watching people and things of that nature. Do we really need to say anything else?
Like it basically covers 2000 was 2004 to 2013.
Some around there. Yeah, maybe some people that are in the dark. They may not know though.
Yeah, he works for the CIA. It's stuff like that. And then he saw some injustices and everything.
So it decides to keep the information then he releases it to the public saying that the government
spying on you illegally and all that yaddy yaddy yaddy yaddy. Then he go for trees and then the question is
is he a patriot or is he a traitor? Yeah. Joseph Gordon Levitt plays the title role.
Also in this film, a lot of star power, Melissa Leo Zach Quinto, Parker Sawyer, who played
our future president in the recently released Southside with you. He is in this.
A res defense. Is that all you said that Chad?
Res if funds. You think it's hard to pronounce them. I'm not saying that's right. But that's
whatever. Nicholas Cage, Shaling Woodley, Tom Wilkinson, Jolie Richardson, the list goes on and on
and on because this is what Oliver Stone does. He was a lot of people in the movie and then he
makes movie. A lot of it is told. The time frame does jump a little bit because it starts as he's in
his hotel or he meets up with the journalist that are going to be end up publishing this for the Guardian.
And it kind of they tell they they talk to him and they tell some of the story then they talk
and they tell them more of the story. It kind of does one of those things. Yeah, play by Quinto.
Quinto. The exact Quinto. I'm sorry. I don't know how to talk to you. That is Mr. Spock.
Is that what Quentin Tarantino's shortening his name too? Yeah. So, Dar.
Going into this. It's Oliver Stone. Yes. Like, you know what you're getting with Oliver Stone.
No, you don't sometimes. When it comes to political films. Well, a political, you know what you
get in from. Because you're looking to get something like Potun or Nixon. Right. You're going to get crazy.
More of the July. You're going to get conspiracy theorist. Jay Everstone. Which Potun is one of my all-time
favorite films. Big fan of Potun. Yes. But there's a certain level of grain of salt that has to be involved.
Little levity has to be involved here. When it comes to Oliver Stone, especially since
he didn't really write the actual screenplay. He co-wrote the screenplay. But it was based on the
articles and a book that was written about Snowden. So, going in, I kind of had that frame of mind.
Be advised. This is two hours and 20 minutes. About battery average length. Which is average
for the first film. Absolutely. Have an empty bladder in an open mind. It's rated off, of course,
because there's a lot of things that are dull. The language alone. Yeah. It's the R rating.
I don't think he can work pages. But I will say for a movie that's two hours
and 20 minutes long, it's paced very well. Oh, good. Okay. The test. The last meter. First time
I looked at my watch, we were 35 minutes in. Whoa. That's what I'm saying. The pacing on this
is really well. I can disagree a little bit. How's that? Oh, I thought you disagreed with when
he looked at his watch. Did he look at his watch? We have different opinions. No, no, no, no.
That's when he looked at his watch. I think he's agreeing on the actual pacing. Okay. I'm the pacing.
What I saw with it was it started off kind of good, but then I think it kind of
drugged someone. When did it start though? When did you feel like a jump to show up?
They be about 20 30 minutes into it because I realized that the same thing you did. But but I wasn't
a pacing which is just when I was just curious. I mean, I mean, what I what I what I say that
flow well over overall very good. Yes, I did. I thought it had a good flow. But if you go to my
written review at www.clubhousepodcast.com, that's our website. I put on their kind of that
I thought it kind of dragged about the stuff of him finding the injustices and they put too much
time into that and being conflicted versus then they had this big push wrap up of what happened
right after the weeks became public. I will rush that into much. I think they should have spread out
more of, hey, here. I think they should have done maybe they leaked it. The stuff may be an hour
and a half into the film and you have 40 minutes to hear what's going on after the fact.
That's my personal gripe. I did learn that you can resign from the CIA and then just get back in
later. Really? Yeah. I think that's what it made it look like. Like he resigned from the CIA and
he was like, yeah, I'm going to go work for him. Yeah, I'm going to go work for him. Yeah,
I'm going to go work for him. Yeah, I'm going to go work for him. Yeah, but it was a contract.
Yeah, but you still used to work for the CIA and you quit. It should not be that easy. But
if I hear something, you already have their clearances and all that. But I mean, so I kind of
disagree a little bit on that because once you're cleared, they're going to want somebody who has
already been clear and spurses a full background checking somebody new. Well, my question to you,
though, Don, because I didn't attend this screening. I wasn't able to make it. But what what is the
chase that you really want to cut to in the saga of snow? I think it should have been at the
hour and a half. Here's that goes public. So that's what you're trying to get to is when when the
when the shoe drops, when the shoe drops here, it's right, it's probably the last 25 minutes of the
film is the is the shoe dropping and the fallout there. See, to me, that is the chase that I would be the
most looking for. Yes, it is the fallout. Not necessarily the shoe dropping, but how they dealt with the
shape. They would have done half and that's the part that most it treats me. They would have been
half or 60, 40. I would have been great with it. But it was more like 80, 20. They sent way too much
time to get you the shoe dropping. But it wasn't like the shoe dropped and all of a sudden the race is
on. Yeah. I liked the shoe dropped and he was still on the hotel for two more days. So, so
movie time wise, how long did that take? The last since. Like I said, from the final shoe drop to the
end credits, it was about 25 minutes. But for me, that was fine for me. It wasn't because it was
to me. It was more about the motivations behind what he did than the thriller aspect of him
avoiding the press and being on the run. Like there is a little bit of it of the chase of when he
checks out on the hotel and how he gets, how he's hidden out and how he gets out of Japan to get to
Russia because Hong Kong. But it's Japan. I mean, Russia wasn't his final destination. He was
trying to get to Latin America. But he got to Russia and they've walked his past. He couldn't go any further.
Yeah. So, for me, that wasn't a big deal. I thought the acting here is really, really good.
I will give that. I put what I discussed in my written review, which is at WWWW,
House podcast.com, which is our website. The chemistry between Gordon Levitt and Woodley
is a little weird. It's not because she plays his girlfriend.
It works. Okay. But here's my thing with it. Okay. When you start watching them together,
you're kind of like there's no chemistry here. That's a problem. But what you realize as the film goes
on is this is done on purpose because Snowden as a person is very guarded. Yeah, you get that
and every time everything I've seen him in. You get the sense of this, this kind of chemistry was
actually created this way because he's forced to build a wall around him. Right? Because Woodley's
character, Lindsey Mills is a, she's kind of hippie. She's kind of free spirit. There's a couple
of jokes in the film about how she's bringing out his inner liberal. True. True. That is true.
So, I think that awkwardness is done on purpose. So, once I had that established in my head,
it made the chemistry easier for me to deal with. That stands to reason. That does kind of make sense.
So, it was just one of those, I had to get to that place to understand it. Right. But I didn't
understand it right off the bat. I really, really enjoyed ethons. I can't, I can't, I can never
get his name right here. I really enjoyed him in this film. He kind of plays Snowden's mentor as
he's going through his CIA training. Great performance by him. Wilkinson. Tom Wilkinson.
Oh, I'm already a fan. With a Scottish accent. Oh, better. Okay. Because he works for the actual
Guardian UK. So, he's kind of the liaison on that side where Quintos more on the American side.
Okay. And then you've got Melissa Leo who plays Laura Poitress, who's a documentary in
who's filming everything. Melissa Leo can pretty much do anything. She did. Yeah. You got what you
expected. Yeah. So, yeah. And just like Don said, from a cast standpoint, you get what you
expected. I mean, it's, and then that's not a bad thing. It's actually a good thing because it's
people that are bringing their A game. I want to add though when it comes to the acting and one
thing that's Gordon Levitt. I didn't think of him as a guy from the Batman and all that stuff or
the rock from the sun or all that or he or the guy from the wall. I thought of him. I knew I knew
was him. But after a while, it's like, I thought of him as noting. No, I agree with you. He played the
mannerism, the character, the attitude, the whole thing about Snowden. He was spot on. There was
there were moments where he disappeared into the character. Absolutely. Great. You can do that. He
did it with the walk. Like, he has taken a really good real quick earlier is that with, with the
relationship with this girlfriend is like, she kind of accepts, but it has a hard time accepting
saying he can't talk about it. And she understands that, but doesn't like it. It's a really good
chemistry between. Yes. It's a good character study. Once you understand the nature of the association,
it makes the association easier to deal with in the film. Where it falls apart for me.
Again, we're dealing with Oliver Stone. So you know you're going to get a certain
shall we say slant on things? You think? It appeared to me that Stone's purpose in this film was
to make you feel one way or the other about this guy. This is going to be a polarizing experience.
He's going to push you more towards a side or he's going to push you away from his side. Okay.
He did neither of those things for me. Really? So he did not accomplish his mission then that was
it fell short for me because I'm still after watching the film. You should have decided anything.
He pushed me a little bit more towards the debuggy part of it because
until it was very very because and this is kind of how the film, the cookies kind of crumble.
Until it's severely personal to Snowden and I mean severely personal.
He's just kind of like, yeah, whatever. It sucks, but you know, I'm making a ton of money.
The moment it becomes severely personal. No, it's oh, I'm taking this whole thing down.
Oh, really? So to me, the way the way I saw it, it wasn't necessarily about him being patriotic. He just went to court
to earth. Pretty much. Like that's the way I saw it, but it didn't really change the way I saw the guy.
It didn't make me rattle my saber, but it didn't make me want to go adopt him either.
You know what I mean? Like he comes off as very self-serving in every interview that he gives.
And one thing that I kept giggling about in my head watching the film was
towards the end of the film, he does an interview at a college, but it's his face on a robotic screen
that moves around and all I kept thinking was, John Oliver got in the room.
I like that. That's true. My personal view of this film is it's stone. You know what you're
going to get, but it wasn't, or like you said, or do you know what you're doing? It wasn't balanced.
It wasn't trying to make him look at an unbiased light. I think some people,
there's that debate, is he a patriot or is he a traitor? And I think that this film
lead more towards the side of, he was a patriot because that's what Oliver still does.
Yeah, and so it's not going to be a nice establishment. Yeah, it's not going to be that unbiased view
here's this whole story and I did notice that in the film. I'm not going to give my personal opinion
of whether I think he's a patriot or it's just irrelevant to what you're talking about. Exactly,
but I just, I did, I have one worn empire. It is signed towards that kind of view of being a patriot.
It doesn't really clear up whether he did the right thing the wrong way or just the wrong thing
all together. Yeah, but I will say from a performance standpoint, I was impressed. Now, I'm not,
here's my concern and I wrote this in my review as well. This is the kind of film that people are
going to clamor for come award season because not because of the performances, not because of the
screen play, but because of what he did because of the pedigree of what it is. Right involved? No,
because of the subject matter. It's a line of people to say like some people tend to take films
like this and use them as a personal agenda to put them in an Oscar intention. So you think this
is Oscar-bathen based? I think it really is. That was an ex worth out of time. But if I'm in a academy
voter, I've seen better performances. I've seen better films this year. Do you think 11 it will
get the nod? I think it will get a nod. But it might still not the best performance. Here's my
question about this film. It was moved back, moved forward, moved back, the release date. If they were
really Oscar-bathening this, it would be November December. Usually when they really want an
Oscar-bathen film and they're trying to get the Oscars nominations, they do November December. In some
cases, what didn't rattle around you when Spotlight released? I was in November.
Was it? Yes. Oh, we just saw it. We got a saw in the press reading of it. So it is, but what you have,
no, it's September now. It's September. But look, but also look it from the standpoint.
We're 45 days from an election. This is going to have staying power because of what it is.
So that's why you release a film like this now and not after the election. Because after the
election, it's all over but the crying. You release a film like this now because it's going to be
in the public consciousness as we march towards November. And then you'll probably get this
film re-released at that point if it's not still in theaters, which it probably will be given
when you look at the field between now and then, you know, your your big push isn't going to
come till Thanksgiving, right? So that's why you release a film like this now.
I could see that. And I will, I agree now with you. I really do. I do. You want it to be a talking point around
the illusion. One thing, I kind of got at the end when they kind of rushed some stuff by the end
in the credits and stuff. And here, here's my point is, I wonder what the original take is versus
what we saw. What I mean by the original take is, which I found interesting, they had a lot of
comments from Sanders, Clinton, and even Trump. They showed the real debates. What do you think about
Snowden? Is he a trader? But it had both of the major candidates on this film. Because again.
Yeah, that's, that's what I like to do. He probably put that together. At the very end, that's my
question. As soon as pretty much we knew who the players were going to be. Exactly. That's when
he put that montage together. Was that during the film or during the credit? It kind of credit anything.
All right. So we ready to do final analysis. Let's go for it. All right. The way we do the final analysis
on the show, a little bit different than maybe you've heard before if you've never been with us for
one of these things. We're a little unconventional. We're not going to give you thumbs up thumbs down.
We're not going to give you letter grades, numbers, stars, whatever. Our audience, whom we have
affectionally referred to as the Empire. They want us to go a little bit deeper. So we're going to
go a little bit deeper. Two questions we will ask. Question number one is, would we see this film again?
If the answer is no, then we're done here. But if the answer is yes, the follow-up question is
going to be how far are you willing to go to see it. So the spectrum goes from best to worst.
Full price at the theater. Twilight, Matt and A. Early morning. Second run at the dollar theater.
Red box, Netflix, table, Dawn. Would you see this again? Yeah, I would. How far are you willing to go?
I'm going to do something like the Matt and A. Pussby and early Twilight because I think the
flow kind of, I think they rush the end really bad. So that's why I can't get like the coveted or
anything like that. It still be good to see the theater, seeing the Matt and A go to dinner after
discuss. That kind of thing. I am barely on the side of yes. Barely. Okay. HBO. It didn't tell me
anything that made me go. Ooh, that's a thing. Like, ooh, the government spies on us.
Welcome to the early 1800s. Like, this doesn't, this movie didn't tell me anything that I
either anything that I know or I'm feeling a few things. But I, I, are you given it to the
SP kids at the acting by love? Yeah, the performance aspect. The performance is, the performance is
carry some a script that could be better. Yeah. It's all I'm saying. Okay. It is Snowden. It is
directed by Oliver Stone. And before you sign up again, thank you so much Melissa and everybody at
all, like our best friends. We love you guys. All right. All right. Let's do the plug gentleman.
Visit our website, the aforementioned WWW dot the clubhouse podcast.com. Find out everything you
need to know and some stuff you don't. Follow us on Twitter at Clubhouse Show. Our Facebook page
and our Instagram are exactly the same. The clubhouse podcast. Use all three words in that order.
You're going to wind up somewhere else if you don't. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at yes
that Rob Irvin that has spelled ERV. I end which is also my Instagram. I am at Chad and B.C.
69 on Twitter. I'm at Fondongo and you can email me at Don at the Clubhouse podcast.com.
Email Don for information on how we can come to a live show for you. Got one coming up very
soon after it's from the date that we record this. You can email me if you'd like questions,
comments, concerns, tell me to go pound sand. I am Rob at the Clubhouse podcast.com. I am
Chad at the Clubhouse podcast.com. Charlotte Parker is on Pinterest because we are morally obligated to
say that and any interest from you and your wife was a British descendant this thing. The
story intrigues me and I'm a fan of JGL so I give it a look. Our normal show is every Sunday,
night, 70's turn for Pacific. Your one stop shop for all things pop culture or just keep
subscribed on iTunes and you get everything. So until next time, for Don, for Chad, for the Empire,
I'm Rob. Clubhouse is close. You really could put Bernie Palmer on this just because she was around
back then so you just let her play herself. I'm just saying.