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The art of turning plot holes into pure entertainment
Joe and Greg are not surprised to discover that this movie was made specifically for them. Liam Neeson is a retired CIA agent with a very particular set of skills, including the ability to track down bad guys in minutes, no matter where they are on the planet.
An incredible actor + relentless action + over-the-top absurdity = a classic Great Bad Movie. It’s basically a fast food meal: Greasy, messy, and embarassing. But because of Neeson’s talent and its short runtime, it’s basically perfect. But do yourself a favor… Don’t pause it and try to explain the plot to someone. You will probably lose their respect forever.
Also: Drinking Games, Important Questions, Joe’s Back of the Box, and more.
Joe’s Back of the Box
When Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) daughter is kidnapped by eastern European human trafficers, he must rely on “a certain set of skills” acquired from his former life with the CIA. Bryan will stop at nothing while using these skills to save his daughter and make the bad guys pay. This is an explosive thrill ride which takes us to the depths of the underworld to find out where his daughter was taken.
The REAL Back of the Box
Ok. What is a parents greatest fear? That something will happen to your child outside of your control. That your child will be kidnapped and sold into life time of suffering and abuse. Now, what if you could do something about it? What if you could wreak havoc on those who did this? What would you do? Well Taken is that movie. This movie is what every parent would do if something happened to their child and they had a certain type of skill. They would kill everyone to get their child back and that is what Liam Neeson does. And I’m here for it.
Note: This transcript has been auto-generated, so… You know… It’s not our fault.
Greg: Hey everybody, it’s Greg. Quick announcement before we get into today’s episode on taken, which is one of the greatest bad movies in history. The first is in-between each episode, we’re going to announce what the next movie will be on Instagram. Were Great Bad Movies show on Instagram. If you want to reach out, you can reach out through there.
Greg: You can email us at Great Bad Movies show at gmail.com. There are a few other ways you can connect with the show. They’re all at our website. Great bad movies.com. The second thing is, if you’ve been enjoying the show, would you go to where you listen to your podcasts and rate and review it? That’ll help the algorithm know that we’re a thing that people are into, and it’ll help us get the word out.
Greg: We have so many good episodes planned. Anytime Joe and I look at the list of movies we need to get to with authentically like giggle every time we look at it. So thank you so much for checking out the show, and if you would rate and review it wherever you listen to podcasts, that would really help us out.
Greg: All right, let’s get into episode six. Taken. Joe, the movie we watch this week, features Liam Neeson with a very specific set of skills. My question to you is, Joe, what is your very specific set of skills?
Joe: I have two that I came up with. One now when I’m speaking in front of a crowd, I can get at least one laugh. And I also can create really detailed conversations in my head that never happen. And I’m really eloquent in them. And then when I try to have those conversations in person, my vocabulary completely disintegrates. So those are my two specific set of skills.
Greg: It’s mostly a non-verbal conversation, and that’s what I hear you say. Yeah. When you describe to somebody that you have that skill, how do you do it?
Joe: But then do you remember when we worked at Baskin Robbins that I would do the thing right? And it was all coordination at one time, and I basically just all over and.
Greg: Yes.
Joe: That’s what happened.
Greg: And now that’s great. I love that you’ve kept that going. That’s what real leaders do.
Joe: Exactly. What about you? What are your specific set of skills?
Greg: Well, it’s funny you mentioned that because my very specific set of skills has to do with ice cream, and it’s if someone was stealing my high school age daughter, I would probably just rant about the lack of good coffee flavored ice cream in today’s market. It would then go into day two, which would just be called hey, what Happened to Almonds?
Greg: And that’s honestly probably more than one day that that would probably extend to the day three of it. And then we would get to the business of finding my daughter, my fictitious daughter in high school.
Joe: That’s awesome.
Greg: I could talk endlessly about ice cream. I could be opinionated about it.
Joe: Needlessly opinionated, properly opinionated.
Greg: Okay. You ready?
Joe: I’m ready.
Greg: All right, let’s get to the show.
Joe: All right, let’s do it.
Clip: Dad. Oh, my darling, happy birthday. Dad.
Clip: Guess what? You know, my friend Amanda, her cousins asked us to spend vacation with them in Paris.
Greg: So if you come in.
Clip: Go to the next bedroom under the bed. Tell me when you’re there. They’re going to take you. I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want, but what I do have are a very particular set of skills. If you let my daughter go now, that’ll be the end of it. You have a 96 outward to never finding her.
Clip: But if you don’t, I will look for you. I will find you.
Clip: I will kill you.
Greg: In January of 2009, director Pierre Morel and writers Luc Besson and Robert Markman decided it was time for a movie called taken with Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Famke Janssen. I don’t think we need to go through the list any more than that. Other people that you would recognize from other movies, but it’s full of that, guys. Greg from White Lotus was in this movie.
Greg: I had no idea. Joe Sky Tucker, today we are talking about taken why is taken a great bad movie.
Joe: It’s a great bad movie because a lot of the things that make it great are the same things that make it so bad, but you kind of look at them. Yeah. First of all, and this is not, why it’s bad. You have Liam Neeson kicking ass. So I’m in the tank for Liam Neeson. I think he’s great.
Joe: Great and everything. I read a statistic about his movie. Is that so? Sean Bean, if you know who that actor is, sure dies in the highest percentage of his movies of any actor, really. And Liam Neeson lives the most of any actor in his movies. So you have Liam Neeson kicking ass. Awesome. Love Liam Neeson. It’s been doing this forever.
Joe: You have so many tropes, so it’s like they put a action movie trope machine together. You have someone saving his family, a kidnaped daughter. It makes zero sense. There’s a lot of illogical jumps. I feel like they made this, like they made Gladiator where they did all the action scenes beforehand, and then they kind of wrote the plot around that.
Joe: Because how we get to the certain places in this movie are quite often ridiculous and require extreme leaps of faith. Yeah, but if you just turn your brain off, you sit back and you go, it’s going to be a tight hour and a half, which I love. It’s glorious going to watch this. It’s going to move really fast.
Joe: We’re going to get into the action real quick. Doesn’t matter how we get there. Liam Neeson is going to kick the bad guys ass. That’s all you need to know. So that’s why I think this is a great movie. Greg Steinhardt, why do you think this is a great movie?
Greg: I’m so excited about this. This is like, do you remember when we started this show? We pitched the idea of taken, and you were like, it’s too soon. We’re not there yet. We can’t do it. Yeah. And I just fully, confidently watched this movie. For this episode, we are ready for take in, which I want to take a step back and just recognize how far we’ve come in great movies.
Greg: But this movie came out in January of 2009, two months before Fast and Furious four and Fast and Furious four. In 2009 was, as I’ve said before, a real moment where I had hope for civilization because they were making movies for me again, just big, dumb, kind of cheap action movies. This movie was much cheaper than Fast and Furious four.
Greg: Also, we have to talk about how this is the beginning of what’s this genre called the old man who was the best there ever was, who’s now retired and then comes out of retirement because they force him to.
Joe: I don’t know that we can say that it starts this because isn’t this like the classic trope of the best at something coming out of retirement? One last job.
Greg: Where they old though Liam Neeson, seemed really old when this movie came out.
Joe: There’s a lot of Bruce Willis movies like this I feel like as well.
Greg: Okay, that’s fair, so that’s fair. But what’s the last good one?
Joe: That’s a different question. I need to look on the list right now. I can’t think of it off the top of my head. I mean, is this a good one? So it comes out in January, a new yeah, really dead zone for movies. So it’s the only thing out there. It kind of just catches the moment. It’s one of those movies where if you put this in the summer of pick a year and it comes out, it’s it’s going to fail miserably.
Joe: But since there’s nothing else to watch, right, it comes out. It’s good at what it does, and it just kind of catches that momentum and people love it. And so it just blows up and it’s got that iconic speed that everybody knows who’s seen this movie or even a trailer. I’m yeah, I’m a man with a specific set of skills or a certain set of whatever it is.
Joe: Right. And you know exactly what movie I’m talking about. You can see Liam Neeson on the phone with it. And that’s the beautiful thing. So those are the things that like, it just hits at the right time. It’s totally like fast for they’re like, you’re not going to remember this. It’s not going to stick with you. But it’s a great hour and a half.
Joe: You’re in, you’re out. It’s fun. Don’t even worry about it. Like it’s just enjoy the ride kind of movie.
Greg: It’s like somebody through one of the best actors on the planet in a stupid movie. For me, that’s what happened in this movie entirely works because of him and maybe some of the other cast, but barely. It’s mostly him who’s carrying the whole thing, and he’s giving it, I don’t know, 30% more than I’ve ever seen in a movie like this where it’s like, oh, he’s like doing the tearing up but not full here, which is like, what the best actors do.
Greg: It looks like they’re about to start crying, but they just let it kind of sit right there. He had been in action movies before, like he was in Next of Kin with Patrick Swayze, a movie we will for sure be getting to in our history of this podcast. And he was in Darkman after that, which was kind of like Roy, the Rob Roy, but still it seemed entirely unexpected.
Greg: And so this is a great bad movie because the credits roll it like an hour 25.5. So if you skip those opening studio credits, it’s just incredible how fast it gets there. And I’m hesitant to say it doesn’t waste any time because the opening is kind of dumb.
Joe: How dare you?
Greg: Yeah, but after I had written the note, this opening is kind of stupid. I think I cared more throughout the movie because of the opening, so I can’t. I can’t fault it. Yeah, because of what he showed. This is a great bad movie because the second he finds out somebody is on the other side of the planet, we cut to him walking in the front door of that thing on the other side of the planet.
Greg: Yeah, there’s just no point in showing the traveling from anywhere. And so I would love to talk about how you discovered this movie, because in 2009, when I saw it, it was really a revelation alongside Fast Furious four for me. What was the circumstance where you watch this movie? Do you think.
Joe: I didn’t want it in the theater? It was definitely like a there’s nothing else on kind of Saturday. It’s a Saturday afternoon movie for me. Yeah, sure. I’m like you flipping through. You find it and you’re, you know, no matter where you are in this movie, you’re going to watch it to the end.
Greg: Yep.
Joe: So I think I watched it maybe a year or two later. Oh, really? Kind of blown up. Yeah. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: But I think we talked about it like in 2010 or something like that. So we I had watched it. I don’t remember where I watched it, but I know I had seen it. So it was one of those it just one of those movie that I watched and I loved it. It was one of those I didn’t have high expectations because usually I’m one of those people that like, if everyone loves something, I’m just that the people in the room that’s coming up, I’ll be the judge of that.
Joe: I had the same thing with John Wick and both of these movies. I was completely wrong about.
Greg: And the opposite if everybody hates it, you’re like, I’m interested.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: I’m in.
Joe: I, I love it now. This is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen. So, like.
Greg: A third Hitman’s Bodyguard is amazing.
Joe: So yeah, I had seen it with pretty low expectations. But also, I mean, this is before we knew, like, Luc Besson was a terrible person. So, sure, I had loved his movies before that. So knowing that he was attached to it, that all that put it at a certain level for me, I loved like everyone. The trailer was.
Joe: It’s one of those movies where like, it has a really amazing trailer.
Greg: Yeah, it’s.
Joe: Almost got like the marketing around. It was really clever because there’s a lot of trailers out there that feel. I feel like they just show you the whole movie and like, well, why am I watching this movie? Yeah, I’ve seen it. Yeah. And this really kind of keeps it in the first, first act if you. Well yeah. What’s going to happen.
Joe: And so I always appreciate that because you know why. You know kind of what’s going to happen. The set up of it was so good to me. Liam Neeson really committed. I think that it reminds me of like, Julianne Moore’s performance in next of like you need it.
Greg: Like, that’s like his only. Yeah, he had to be.
Joe: You have to be a really great actor to deliver a performance that I’m really terrible script. He he has to carry the movie. But I think of another actor that could do it the same way. And I don’t know that there is right that, like, he was the perfect actor, the perfect point in his career where he was kind of beloved but kind of fallen off as a rebound for him.
Joe: So it’s like a comeback movie for him. So there’s so many pieces that kind of come into this and unexpected, unexpected time of year, and then it just explodes. Spawning two other movies.
Greg: It says in the IMDb trivia that Neeson at first thought the film would be no more than a little side road for his career, expecting it to be released directly to video instead. The film went on to define Neeson’s career and established him as a big time actor. This movie made $145 million in America. That’s crazy in 81 international for a total of 226.
Joe: And what was that made for?
Greg: Is made for $25 million.
Joe: Yeah. And you feel I mean, it was 20 million for Liam Neeson.
Greg: Yeah, exactly. No, I think he made some maybe like a million for this. And then he made 15 million for the second one or something.
Joe: Of course.
Greg: Yeah. So good job, Liam Neeson. He is the reason this movie made money. No, not the editor.
Greg: The director isn’t bad. So I watched this a little while ago because we were going to record this episode a little while ago, and so I decided to rewatch it. And when I watched this a couple months ago, I thought, and Famke Janssen is pretty bad in this film. And then when I watched it again last night, I really by that they were married and there’s still a relationship there, but not a married relationship.
Greg: But they’re both parents. For Maggie Grace, I buy it. There’s something about the way that they act in this movie that I. I might be just the most forgiving audience on the planet, but I was really into it last night like, man, that’s. Yeah, divorce is real. They’re co-parenting. They’re doing it.
Joe: I think she’s one of those sneaky good supporting cast actors. And I totally agree. I think she’s great in this. I really feel like, well, I mean, there’s her Maggie, Grace and Liam Neeson and there’s nobody else. There’s a few other folks that you’ve seen.
Greg: Right.
Joe: And then when it gets to Europe and maybe they’re more famous in Europe than they are here, but there’s nobody that you’ve known or seen. Once he gets over there and starts kicking faceless Albanians asses across, you know, across does it France? Is that where it is?
Greg: Yeah, yeah.
Joe: You know, the underworld of France. And so, yeah, the rest of it is just kind of ridiculous. And I’m sure Famke Janssen was on the on set for three days for.
Greg: Yeah, I wonder, I wonder.
Joe: So yeah, it was that’s really where it is. And and I buy it too. I like you know all those scenes kind of between them and the family, the broken home, the new stepdad, the.
Greg: Yeah. Who seems like a good dude. It’s doing the best he can.
Joe: So yeah, I did.
Greg: So I was in that same boat with you I did not see in the theater, but had heard the kind of movie it was, and it had just been a while since I’d seen a great bad movie. To be honest, I didn’t really believe that they existed anymore and that I could enjoy them as much as I had.
Greg: Maybe a few years before. And so my wife goes out with a friend that night right after this movie’s come out on video. So I pick it up and I watched it and was increasingly more interested as it went, and was really surprised at the places it goes with him just being kind of brutal throughout the movie. And in the last the four minutes, three minutes, my wife comes home with her friend.
Greg: And so I kind of press pause, turn off the TV, and we hang out for, I don’t know, 45 minutes or whatever. And then her friend leaves and I said, hey, I was watching a movie. It’s I has like five more minutes. Do you mind if I finish it? And she said, oh no, I’ll watch it with you.
Greg: So great. So we sit down and I realized I have I should probably tell her what’s happening so that this last couple of minutes makes sense. And as I was describing the plot of this film and to my amazing wife, her brows kind of furrowed, like, what on earth? And then it she went the other way, like, this is the funniest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.
Greg: And I started being super embarrassed. Like, why was I even into this is the worst plot of any film that’s ever happened? And by the time I got to, I was about to press play and I was like, oh, hold on, there’s like a human trafficking element. And she was like, you can watch this movie. I’m not going to watch this movie.
Greg: It is so ridiculous. And so I guess we can thank Luc Besson for that. And I can’t stop saying his name in probably like an offensive French accent. So yeah. Anyways, so then I finished it and I was like, perfect in every way. Hey. Plus that was a movie for me. And then a couple months later I saw a Fast and Furious four and I was like, we’re back.
Greg: It’s happening. Looks like we can’t have it all.
Joe: Can’t live the dream. Yeah, this is the movie that if you try to, I can imagine trying to explain the plot of how you got to the different points. And it’s, it takes such leaps of incoherence that you’re just like, just don’t even worry about it.
Greg: Yeah. How about we tell people what what this movie’s about? Let’s pretend that people are walking down the aisles of a virtual video store, and they’re checking out the back of Blu-ray boxes, DVD boxes, VHS boxes. Joe, what does it say on the back of the taken box?
Greg: Yes, the.
Joe: Back of the box. When Brian Mills, Liam Neeson’s daughter, is kidnaped by Eastern European human traffickers, he must rely upon a certain set of skills acquired from his former life with the CIA. Brian will stop at nothing while using these skills to save his daughter and make the bad guys pay. This is an explosive thrill ride, which takes us to the depths of the underworld to find out where his daughter was taken.
Joe: Wow, that that that.
Greg: Working in the title, the amazing. Yeah. Okay, so that’s the back of the box. What’s the what’s the honest? What’s the real back of the box here?
Joe: The real back of the box. It’s like this. So what is a parent’s greatest fear? That something will happen to your child outside of your control? That your child will be kidnaped and sold into a lifetime of suffering and abuse? Now, what if you could do something about it? What if you could wreak havoc with those who did this?
Joe: What would you do? Well taken is that movie. This movie is what every parent would do if something happened to their child and they had a certain type of skill or skills, they would kill everyone to get their child back. And that is what Liam Neeson does, and I’m here for it.
Greg: He really just starts killing people. Yeah. And I mean, it’s been a while since the movies came out. I was shocked to find out it was PG 13. I did not remember this as a PG 13 movie. It is a very intense, nearly R-rated movie. This is the kind of movie where if they added like Digital Blood, it would be rated R.
Greg: I mean, but this movie, I don’t know if it started this old retired dude goes on vengeance. Probably not. I’m sure a million Westerns were like this, but it seems like in kind of the modern age, this movie came out and then a few years later, John Wick came out. This movie has defined almost every movie Liam Neeson has made, and there’s like three of them a year, and they’re all great.
Greg: We will for sure get to more of them. And John Wick, a film will also for sure get to nobody with Bob Odenkirk very similar. Used to be the greatest at something shooter with Mark Wahlberg, although he was like 12 when the movie was made, so it doesn’t really count. But it is kind of the same thing, I guess Rambo Rambo was the best and I think that was a lifetime ago.
Greg: I can’t get over that line.
Joe: I mean, there’s Hathaway. I mean, I feel like this is a common trope, but it’s like.
Greg: It’s a resurgence. Maybe. Is that what this is?
Joe: I think.
Greg: So a new generation.
Joe: Or just hit right with the right, the right actor at the right time. So it’s almost like the actor is the parallel process of coming out of retirement. You know, Liam Neeson is kind of fading into obscurity. Does this movie and he’s back. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, this is a common trope. And then a common kind of theme of, you know, the the kidnaped, somebody has to save somebody.
Greg: Yeah. What am I saying? Why does this movie make it feel fresh to me?
Joe: I mean, that’s the beauty of this movie.
Greg: That is the beauty of this movie. It gave me no time to think about it. This is the answer. But when it comes to the amount of killing that he does, he, like, electrocute a dude. He just starts shooting people. One guy, he chases and the guy jumps off an overpass onto a truck and then gets hit by another truck.
Greg: People kind of just start dying, and he seemed like a very sympathetic character, but then it was like, oh, this guy really is. At some point, I believed that he really wanted to get his daughter back, rather than we were just going through the motions in a movie. And I think that’s something this film does, is it at some point you start believing it and it’s because it’s Liam Neeson and it’s a little bit because of the script.
Greg: You know? He really is kind of doing some crazy things to people. So his daughter goes to Europe in the film. It’s 2008 and she’s following you around Europe, something no teenager has ever done since the 1990s. It was just.
Joe: Hilarious that the zoo TV tour in 92, right?
Greg: It’s a short movie and he has 96 hours to find his daughter. So there’s there’s a clock ticking. Beautiful. I need a clock ticking at all times. Oh, Jack Reacher, I also wanted to mention Jack Reacher kind of came out in this time period. A movie that is great. Jack Reacher is a great movie. Jack Reacher two is embarrassing.
Joe: Not a great movie.
Greg: Not a great movie.
Joe: The first time. The first time I read.
Greg: Yeah. So it really just kind of became a thing where everybody was is doing it again. Should we get to, some drinking games for this film?
Joe: Yeah, let’s do it. Okay, so we have our star drinking game, so it’s kind of like, not as many of them as I would like in a movie like this, but yeah, a fair amount. So silent helicopter.
Greg: Nope.
Joe: Push in and then hands.
Greg: Oh, there’s.
Joe: Many.
Greg: Great push it enhance.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: But it’s actually zoom in and process. Did you notice it wasn’t it. Maybe that’s just what they call it in Paris. It was like a vending machine that you could put a USB drive in. Is this the thing that really happens on the planet? Maybe for travelers?
Joe: Yeah. So he’s Liam Neeson?
Greg: Yeah, but it was like he put her SIM card, actually, from her phone in this machine.
Joe: It’s even better because it’s like reflected in the window or something like that of like, right, who the person is. So it’s even more ridiculous that he’s able to on this.
Greg: You can’t enhance that, but you can process it. That’s what I learned in this film.
Joe: Do two people share a slow motion look in the middle of chaos?
Greg: No. When were there ever two people? Yeah.
Joe: No explosion with silent suffering either.
Greg: No.
Joe: Does the opening scene or credit open and the title lock in with a sound? I don’t remember, honestly.
Greg: I don’t remember. I don’t think so, because I think the title played over and the manipulative fifth birthday party.
Joe: So no. Any flashback to dialog two minutes ago or further?
Greg: Oh yeah, she gets taken and then a couple minutes later in the movie, he’s in the room and like climbing out of the bed, which made no sense. Yeah, really. Putting himself in her shoes and listening to the recording that he had of the phone call. And we see the whole scene again.
Joe: Yeah. That’s so good.
Greg: I’ll allow it. That’s perfect. Yeah. What were we doing in that scene, by the way? What was. Yeah. So pointless.
Joe: I get it. I mean, if my daughter was taken.
Greg: Sure, I’m out of the bed.
Joe: I would want to feel close to her. Yeah, I get it.
Greg: Does he ever do anything with the hair sample? Does he send it to Sam?
Joe: I don’t feel like that has anything to do with anything. But it could be I could I could have missed it.
Greg: So Sam is his colleague, which there’s a strong argument for. He should have brought the gang, the guys that he has the barbecue with. Those guys all should have come. And maybe that happens in taken two. I don’t think I’ve ever seen taken two. We’ll get to take I.
Joe: Haven’t seen taken 2 or 3 because I was like, you have made a perfect movie.
Greg: I saw three in the theater and regretted it. That was awful. So if you want to know the difference between a great bad movie and a bad, bad movie, I think it’s taken one and taken three. I think that is the gamut right there. So yeah, it does flash back to two minutes ago and it’s one of the best of all time.
Greg: This is like an all timer. Yeah.
Joe: Crazy CGI car flipping or just bad. CGI in this.
Greg: Not really. Not really, was there?
Joe: I don’t feel like there was like the classic bad CGI that we’re thinking about.
Greg: Yeah, they weren’t in vehicles very much.
Joe: Yeah, there’s a car chase, but it’s not on the streets. It’s kind of through a mining operation. Yeah, I feel like they did the they did the stunt, which I appreciate.
Greg: Yeah, it’s very reminiscent of the construction site and, Jack Reacher.
Joe: It may have been the same set. I feel like they were filming the same movie or that their movies the same time.
Greg: Robert Duvall was like, what are you guys doing? I’m making this stuff right here.
Joe: Great. Bad shot all over this movie.
Greg: Infinite amount.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: If someone comes over and you’re drinking alcohol during the drinking game. Doesn’t have to be alcohol. You could be watching this at work and drinking coffee. That’s perfectly acceptable, but feel bad for that person. There’s so many great bad shots.
Joe: Are the streaks inextricably wet? Yes. Yes they are.
Greg: Yeah. They were a few times. Right.
Joe: There’s a scene, I think when he’s just even saying this it I’m he hires the translator and they’re sitting in the car and they’re listening to the prostitute talk to the Albanian whatever. And yeah, there’s no reason for the streets to be white. And yet they are so.
Greg: Because let’s make this movie look like a million bucks. Just takes a little water. Richard Donner doesn’t tell us that.
Joe: They, give us the room. We do not have that. And this movie could have had it had multiple points.
Greg: But I wonder if they cut out a whole subplot of the operation room or whatever you call that, where people are standing by watching things happen. But he really was out on his own, so.
Joe: Where they, kill all the henchmen but they let the bad guy live. It doesn’t happen in this right. Is there a timer tracking phone conversations, trying to get like location. There is, there is.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: Yeah. Best at something 100%. He’s the best.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: So and that’s all of our stock drinking games. What are some drinking games that you came up with for this game?
Greg: I think you need to invite a lot of people over to watch this movie, because yeah, it is going to be a great hangout. My drinking games are if there’s ever a scene where Liam Neeson seems a little down and out and he’s had some Chinese food, there’s Chinese food on the table, you have to take a drink.
Greg: I don’t know why it’s always Chinese food. I really want to read some sort of article in depth on what Chinese food is supposed to intuitively represent for us.
Joe: I’m having flashbacks to the 355 where like the opening scenes is bad. Yeah.
Greg: Yeah, totally. Any time somebody says, Brian, try not to make a mess or something like that because he’s he’s out of retirement. Anytime he gets the smallest clue and the movie cuts to him finding that person or place immediately take a drink.
Joe: That is the plot of this movie in a nutshell.
Greg: Yeah. You know what? I’m going to take that one. I’m gonna I’m going to be a good host. I’m going to take that one anytime he fights someone and they fall to the ground not to be a problem again from like a single punch. That happens a lot in this film. Anytime someone mentions how meticulous he is, that happens quite a bit.
Greg: Any time his friends seem interested in his relationship with his daughter, which is not a thing that happens in life. Yeah, not to the degree. It’s like there’s a single plot point we need to get across in this scene at this barbecue.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: And there’s a scene where he sits down and instantly falls asleep in a chair 8 to 10 times faster than anyone has ever sat down in a chair and fallen asleep. And it’s the same scene where he’s crying. So he’s a he’s like about to cry. Then he sits down, then he falls asleep in point three seconds, and then his phone rings and wakes him up.
Greg: It’s a beautiful scene. So if that ever happens, drank a drink? Yeah. How about you?
Joe: I have a lot. And a lot of them are like that where they only happen once in the movie, but they’re so specific to this movie that you just have to drink. I have tense conversations with Famke Janssen. There’s like, every scene with them is like tense. I have an old technology alert. So, you know, this isn’t from 2008, right?
Joe: So there’s like a map, like literally a paper man and he have there’s a karaoke machine. Yeah. The cell phones are from that era. So just kind of drink when you see that. Yeah. You drink when he has the famous beats that everyone has seen. Yeah. You just have to.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: And I wish I if I had seen this movie more recently I remember this. But he has several moments where he has phone calls on his cell phone where he just has an incredible amount of information from the phone call that propels the plot forward. Like somehow, magically, the person like, gives him all that he needs. It’s a beautiful thing.
Joe: Anytime they say 96 hours, they say that a lot. Oh that’s good.
Greg: Like, yeah.
Joe: The beginning. Just a drink for the short life of Peter, who takes the girls to the the apartment and then falls off the overpass to then be hit by the truck. Yeah. When he finds the Albanians. Finally, you got to take a drink.
Greg: Sure. I’m sorry. Can I correct you when he finds the Albanians instantly? Is that what you meant to say? Yes.
Joe: Yes. When he gets lucky that they are the exact same Albanians that he talked to on the phone.
Greg: What are the odds there? Yeah. What are the odds?
Joe: Miraculously has what he needs to be like hasn’t. Again, when I say these words out loud at the movie sound ridiculous, I embrace it. There is a moment where he rescues a prostitute and, like, nurses her back to life and he happens to have an IV and drugs, right?
Greg: Yep.
Joe: And there’s a torture scene where he has, like, the stuff all ready to go. So like, he miraculously has all the things that he needs just instantly. Yeah. Anytime they say Marco from Triple-A.
Greg: Glory, that was a that’s a really good.
Joe: One. Every time he slams someone’s head into a wall or a car. So similar to the punch, he just like there’s a lot of like slamming people’s heads down. And yeah, they just they die. I have two more. One is they have this weird this is an action movie trope, but like purity being good. So his daughter survives because she is a virgin.
Greg: Oh, interesting.
Joe: Whereas her friend isn’t. And they make that very clear in their talking when they get to the apartment in Paris. And so the friend dies and she doesn’t because she is pure. So there’s like this purity in movies being good, right? And then my favorite one, and I don’t know if there was a direction around that. I don’t know if it’s just an actress that has choice, but his daughter to get mad at him a couple different times and runs away and she runs with her arm.
Joe: That doesn’t move her like you run like she’s like an eight year old out of like a restaurant.
Greg: So oh my gosh, we’re not going through our like, all of our notes. But I totally have that. Like, what is the deal with her arms when she runs is she’s six. What’s happening?
Joe: It’s so I didn’t catch it the first time I watch the movie, but this time when I was watching it, yeah, that’s the most read. Like, it’s got to be a direction because it’s like showing how young she is and she’s running like a little girl.
Greg: She’s still her little girl.
Joe: Yeah, but it’s so obvious and like, silly and stupid. Same.
Greg: Oh my gosh, I love that you caught that. That’s a perfect one.
Joe: So basically you’re drunk halfway through this movie no matter what you have.
Greg: I mean, you could be taking very little sips this movie. Yeah. It’s just fun. Every time somebody has to take a drink, it doesn’t. They don’t have to get drunk.
Joe: That’s true.
Greg: They don’t have to hydrate.
Joe: Promoting the alcoholism here.
Greg: No. Yeah. No, no. It’s just fun when it’s like, Brad, you got to take a drink. I feel like we’ve addressed a lot about this film, but are there maybe some more important questions we should ask about it?
Joe: Absolutely.
Greg: Joe, did this movie hold up then.
Joe: I think, yes, absolutely.
Greg: Okay. Does it hold up now?
Joe: It’s still kind of that.
Greg: It’s still kind of does. Yeah. I mean, there’s been a million movies like this since. And yet it’s still and it’s basically Liam Neeson.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: Like the John Wick movies are probably better than this movie.
Joe: Yeah. But I mean that’s I don’t feel like that’s even like, they’re definitely better from like an action, Sam.
Greg: Like, but sure.
Joe: I could totally do see a mash up.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: Of taken in John Wick. If you take the action sequences from John Wick and put it in this movie. Yeah, it’s ready for today. Right now. Yeah. But it’s still hold I mean, it still holds up. It’s still a fun where I feel like the John Wick movies, surprisingly take themselves even more seriously than everyone and take in does.
Joe: Yeah, yeah, that’s a it’s a fun movie. And I feel like it still holds up now. Yeah, it’s a little bit of like, kind of silly, but it’s still good. You’re still into it. You still want him to kill the bad guy at the end?
Greg: Yeah. Do they sell the good guy?
Joe: Oh, it’s so hard. At the beginning of this movie. The first 20 minutes of this movie is. He’s the nicest guy in the world, but he’s got all of these skills and.
Greg: He’s a preventer. You know? Isn’t that what he says? He’s a preventer.
Joe: Something like that. Yeah, that might sound better in French than it does in English.
Greg: He sells himself. How often do we see that?
Joe: Yeah, that is new. I think that’s why people like the movies. I was like, I’m going to come for you. I’m going to kill you. You know, I’m really good at this. Yeah. And then he does it. So I think.
Greg: This episode could be titled why was This good?
Joe: If you play it off of John Wick, like, there’s a great scene in the first John Wick where they sell him, but it’s the bad guy talking about him. Yeah. Baba Yaga, he’s the guy you send to kill Baba Yaga. And this is him saying, I am Baba. I’m coming for you.
Greg: Yeah, I.
Joe: Will kill you. Sure. I think that’s a piece of it too. I think that definitely goes into it.
Greg: It’s better. Do they sell the bad guy?
Joe: Who is the bad guy in this?
Greg: Yeah, I guess the bad guy is just the Albanians.
Joe: The entire country of Albania.
Greg: Yeah, it’s a little loose. It’s not. They’re not really. Joe, does this movie deserve a sequel? I think you’ve already answered this.
Joe: I mean, deserve yes, it deserves a sequel. Are they at the quality we want them to be? No.
Greg: Although neither of us have seen one of those sequels.
Joe: Yeah, I feel like it deserves, based on this movie. It deserves a sequel.
Greg: Yeah, okay. And we’ll take it for the team and watch the sequel to taking some of that still around here. Does it deserve a prequel?
Joe: This is one of those rare occasions. It could totally have a prequel where it is Liam Neeson’s character when he was in the CIA, and he’s becoming the best at what he is to now.
Greg: It’s called the preventer. Yeah, the man who makes sure the bad things don’t happen.
Joe: That’s a.
Greg: Great show. The preventer.
Joe: Yeah, I’m in.
Greg: Okay Joe how could this movie be fixed. And that will lead us into our conversation of who should be in the remake to fix it.
Joe: I rarely say this, but I feel like you could make this movie a little bit longer and add in like one more action scene, and probably do a little bit more character development. There’s like zero in this movie. Liam Neeson is the good guy.
Greg: He’s been going.
Joe: To kill everybody when.
Greg: It comes to karaoke machines. That tells us everything we know.
Joe: So maybe a little bit of development, maybe like a sidekick thrown in there. Maybe it is the team comes together and here, because what we don’t have from a trope perspective is there’s usually like the sidekick or the friend or part of it that dies has to die early. That also, like raises the stakes for us. So really, the raise the stakes moment is finding the friend that his daughter travels with, and she dies.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: So I can see that. Yeah. How would you fix this movie?
Greg: I was trying to think about this last night. I think this is a perfect two hour and 25 minute movie. I don’t know if it needs to be fixed, other than there is something gross about the, human trafficking element, especially with what we now know about Luc Besson. And so I would probably do a pass without him in the room.
Greg: If this movie could have been fixed, it would have been, let’s have, like, some level headed people influenced the script a little bit.
Joe: Yeah. We don’t have the bad guy like in this. It’s like he just kind of kills everybody who’s in front of him. But we get to the final scene and as people we’ve never seen before.
Greg: Yeah. On that boat. Sure. Yeah.
Joe: And so I think if I’m fixing it, I keep it at the same length or maybe, you know, five, ten minutes longer. But we have a charismatic bad guy that he has to kill is the kind of classic action movie piece that we’re missing. Sure. That’s his the antagonist in this movie, really? He’s just the antagonist. And this is time that he’s trying to save his daughter and find where she is, but he find the original people who kidnaped her, and he kills them all, like halfway through the movie, right?
Greg: Yeah, but.
Joe: They don’t have her anymore. So now. Right. So I think that that I would add in that piece of like, you know, if we think about another movie that uses this exact same trope, The Gray Man, we have Chris Evans’s character. As the great, I would say, put him in the top ten of bad guys of just like totally the perfect actor enjoying every second of being a bad guy has great lines.
Joe: You kind of like, but you, you hate him at the same time. Like, that’s what this movie’s missing. It’s missing a great bad guy.
Greg: And yet I might argue that it’s better because of it. It’s just him in the fog of. It’s just an American in a different place and not even sure where anything is, although he gets every place immediately.
Joe: Yeah. And minimal information.
Greg: I think I would have thought less of this movie if there was a big bad guy actually. But if it had been a two hour movie they probably could have been, I don’t know who’s the bad guy that his best friend from back in the CIA is that, is that who it is? Is it,
Joe: It’s his best friend or. It’s it’s the, his, his wife says this new husband. Yeah. It’s like, because there’s in the in the transporter two.
Greg: Good.
Joe: Another movie will for sure. Yeah. Get to. Yeah. That’s the whole the husband sets up the kidnaping, which also can go on this list of movie. It’s a right kidnap kid. Right. Sets up the kidnaping. But to get money or whatever the reason is, it’s also the man on fire.
Greg: Sure. So I have to say that this movie was co-written by the writer of The Transporter.
Joe: Okay.
Greg: Robert Markman.
Joe: There we go.
Greg: Yeah, he wrote Columbiana, another movie.
Joe: We will for sure. Again, yes, we have. I don’t think I’ve seen that, but we’ve talked about it about a thousand times.
Greg: We’ll get to it. Yeah. I think the simplicity of this movie is part of one of my favorite things about it. So, you know, if I’m in the brainstorming writers room, if that comes up, I’m like, we’re going to need like an hour 45 to really make you care for all the people and really hit the bad guy.
Greg: And a movie that’s an hour 45 is like a blessing this year.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: So they could have taken 25 more minutes or 20 more minutes.
Joe: Well I’m also thinking of like different director like if Michael Mann or her Tony Scott directs this.
Greg: Yeah. Like it’s two and a half.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: So many just like jump cuts and like right. I feel like that’s the mash up I need. I need John Wick action Tony Scott direction. Yeah. Taken script I’m like.
Greg: I meant to ask you this. Was there a moment when you were watching this film where you realized, this is awesome?
Joe: Yeah. It’s when he gives his speech.
Greg:
Joe: And you’re like, I’m in.
Greg: Yeah. Yeah.
Joe: And then you see him click into his like he’s the best at this. Right. So like he goes to Fabrica Jensen’s house and he’s like you have a private jet under this shell corporation right. This. And so he’s like we have 96 hours so you can get and it’s like I’m in.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: And then it may even also be the I can’t remember process it when he’s like he finds out the airport.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: And then that guy also just happens to be at the airport when he gets there. Right. You know it’s just it’s glorious. Those are the moments. And then when that that guy gets hit by the car because I’m like, how are they going? How are they going to get out of this. And of course they find a really easy way.
Joe: But yeah, that was the moment. And I was like, I’m in this movie. It’s perfect.
Greg: So both of those things, you know, this was definitely a movie for me during all of those moments. But the moment for me when I went, oh my gosh, this is a great movie is when Liam Neeson shoots his friend’s wife at the dinner table.
Joe: I forgot about that scene.
Greg: What on earth? I was kind of like, oh my gosh, Liam Neeson just started that guy’s wife, who’s like the most joyful, nice person on the planet, mother of two young kids. And had he already killed, like electrocuted the dude, he might have already electrocuted the dude. And so at that point, I was kind of like, oh, I don’t know what’s happening here.
Greg: And then he when he shot, I was like, oh, okay. No, this is this is like next level stuff happening here. This is Liam Neeson really giving it that.
Joe: They have a line about like shooting her in a spot that won’t. Yeah.
Greg: Like yeah.
Joe: Internal organs.
Greg: Right. Yeah. It’s like it’s just a flesh wound or something like that.
Joe: Yeah. That’s got to be a trope now, because L and I were watching the third John Wick, and there’s a scene in there where he does that, or you shoot somebody that helps them. Yeah, and it’s done well because it’s like he does it so quick or he’s like, it’s the doctor that helps them. He’s like, well, you got to shoot me up here.
Joe: And they just like shoot them instantly. And it’s it’s beautiful. And then he’s like, oh, they won’t trust me. So they shoot me here, but don’t hit any arteries or something like that. That’s like, of course he knows exactly where to shoot. There’s been a few others in the Gray Man Ray’s like, oh, I miss the internal organs.
Joe: One thing inside, like, you’ve got to add that in there, like just a flesh wound basically.
Greg: And if you put that in there, there has to you have to balance it out with another scene where somebody says you have blood on your coat and they say, don’t, it’s not mine. One of my favorite things that happens in movies of all time.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: Okay. So we’ve talked about ways that we thought this could be fixed. So if we’re going to fix it, we might as well for those fixes into a remake of taken, Joe, who should be in the remake of taken.
Joe: It’s hard for me to to feel like I can say this, like there are movies on what I ended up doing when I was trying to think of this was I ended up thinking about movies that use this trope of the kidnaped kid. Yeah, so we have transporter two, we have the Gray Man, Commando man on Fire, gone baby gone.
Joe: Well, who does it the best versus this movie? I don’t know that I feel like I could recast this movie. I feel like this is a genre unto itself. If I’m doing it today, I would say, and you want to watch a great movie right now, watch The Gray Man. Kind of with today’s action.
Greg: Sure.
Joe: At the Great at the funny movie. Yeah. It’s got a little bit more personality than taken have. Yeah. It’s longer. So you’re kind of in for it. Yeah. If you want to watch Tony Scott direct taken watch Man on Fire. If you want to watch this movie made in the 80s, watch Commando. So I don’t know that there’s a way that I would recast this.
Joe: I feel like you’ve probably had the perfect casting for me though.
Greg: So when I saw this movie, first of all, I’m very mixed on whether, when I grow old, I should call Liam Neeson’s hair guy because his hair dye job in this movie is either amazing or embarrassing, and I couldn’t decide throughout the entire film. But when this movie came out, I was like, oh my gosh, Liam Neeson, like 180 years old.
Greg: It’s amazing that he’s like doing these action scenes. And by the time taken three happens, the camera is three blocks away when he jumps over a fence like it’s so obviously not him. And when he’s running down the street, he’s running very, very slowly. It’s kind of amazing. When this movie came out, he was 56 years old. So all this man on the planet in my mind.
Greg: So who has turned 56 recently? Let me give you a list of some actors who have turned 56 and see if any of these could be the lead in the next taken. Okay. Don Cheadle.
Joe: Yeah. Yep.
Greg: Adam Sandler, Billy Zane.
Joe: All right. I mean, with Billy Zane.
Greg: Jeffrey Dean Morgan of the losers fame.
Joe: Yeah. He’s back.
Greg: He’s probably been in a taken remake, and we didn’t realize it. Yeah.
Joe: Patrick Dempsey I would watch the hell out of that movie.
Greg: David Schwimmer from friends. I mean, yeah, Rainn Wilson from The Office one. I could see that percent, by the way. I’m like seven names in. There’s something about the Age. John Cusack.
Joe: Yeah I’d watch that.
Greg: H John Benjamin, the voice of Archer. It’d be so great. Sean Harris, the bad guy in Mission Impossible five and six. More actor than I’d watch that. Yeah, he’s basically the next Liam Neeson. He’s way more action than he needs. Dude. Jason Patrick oh.
Joe: Yeah, 100%.
Greg: Yeah. Wendell Pierce of The Wire and Jack Ryan, you know who I’m talking about? I would buy eight tickets for that movie.
Joe: Fred Armisen I would watch that movie and I would be a whole different movie.
Greg: But J.J. Abrams recently turned 56 years old. He stars in the taken remake. Of course he does. He’d be he’s good at everything. Yeah, yeah. Mike Tyson.
Joe: Yeah, yeah, for that.
Greg: Jim Gaffigan.
Joe: I could totally see him. Like, he’s kind of got a little bit of, Philip Seymour Hoffman to it. Yeah. So, yeah.
Greg: And my personal favorite, Rick Astley. I’ve never going to give you up fame.
Joe: Let’s do.
Greg: This. And then I was obviously just all men. Let’s get into female protagonists. Let’s remake this from the other side. Helena Bonham Carter. Yeah, get out of here. That’s better than anything I’ve said so far. Right.
Joe: Janet Jackson yeah I don’t watch that.
Greg: Cindy Crawford I don’t know man. I don’t even know if Fair Game is something we can talk about on the show that I don’t think that’s not a great bad movie.
Joe: That’s a Billy Baldwin not a. Yeah I’m an I like but yeah yeah yeah.
Greg: So Halle Berry.
Joe: Oh.
Greg: Get out of here. Yeah. Salma Hayek.
Joe: Yeah.
Greg: Talion.
Joe: Yep. I’d want that too.
Greg: So what’s happening right now, Joe?
Joe: 56. It’s a magic.
Greg: If anyone in their mid 50s can make an amazing movie about their kid being taken.
Joe: And Keanu Reeves is in his mid 50s as well for the John Wick.
Greg: Yeah, exactly.
Joe: I think this is the perfect age.
Greg: I was floored when I started making this list. This. I would watch every single one of these movies except maybe Cindy Crawford. Oh, I forgot to say Jon Favreau from swingers, director of Iron Man. I would do that.
Joe: Me too.
Greg: What is the deal with people in their mid 50s?
Joe: I don’t know, we’ll find out.
Greg: They need to be making more great bad movies. Okay, let’s keep going with these questions. Important questions that need to be asked. Joe, why is there romance in this movie?
Joe: This is the beautiful thing about this movie. There is zero romance in this movie. He’s not getting back together with his ex. Nothing’s happening.
Greg: No, but they learned something along the way. At the end, she was a little tearful. They looked at each other knowingly, appreciative. Yeah, yeah. I love the ambiguity of that. Are we bad people for loving this movie?
Joe: No, this is one of the few exceptions. How can you hate this movie?
Greg: And hey, there.
Joe: You.
Greg: I think probably, I think we’re probably bad people for loving this movie, but I mean, but I mean, that’s what I’m saying is everybody is probably a bad person. Okay. What album is this?
Joe: This I spent a lot of time on. And I struggle because I ended up just picking an album that did really well in 2008, when this movie came out, and I realize it was 2009 when it actually came out, but made in 2008, an album by an artist that I have zero love for. So this is not like an endorsement of them as an artist.
Joe: Button Rock n Roll Jesus by Kid Rock came out in 2008 as one of the like, the third or fourth highest grossing albums of the year. Wow. Yeah, exactly. It’s like a surprise. Like, who the hell? How many? I didn’t know there was that many people that were buying a kid Rock album. Yeah, in 2008. Yeah, kind of like I didn’t expect there would be this many people watching a Liam Neeson action movie right into that thing.
Joe: Yeah, that’s really what I came.
Greg: Okay. Surprise hit.
Joe: What did you come up with?
Greg: I leaned into the fact that he was older, and you wouldn’t expect Liam Neeson to be a relevant action star. It was surprising to me. And so I’m going to like in this movie. And honestly, what happened afterwards with Liam Neeson’s career and many other people’s careers. So I think this album is Johnny Cash, American Recordings, Johnny Cash have been gone for a long time, and then Rick Rubin just said, do you want to make an album together and really lean into the Man in Black character?
Greg: And I think they made four albums together and they’re incredible. They’re really incredible, and it’s all Johnny Cash, it’s all Johnny Cash just bringing himself to it. So I think the album that this movie is the first American Recordings record that Johnny Cash made with Rick Rubin.
Joe: I’m in on that. Rick Rubin is sneakily one of the best producers. I mean, I don’t know if it’s within the music genre, and I’m saying this is but he I think he is one of the best producers out there.
Greg: Yeah. Do you have any albums that come to mind that you didn’t know what that band had until Rick Rubin came and worked with them?
Joe: I feel like I have a couple songs I have, like, you know, some that has worked with the Beastie Boys from the 80s and 90s. Yeah. And I feel like 99 problems with Jay-Z. There’s just something about that guitar riff, that kind of rock riff to that. And that song to me is just like, it’s him in a nutshell.
Joe: If I can. Here’s a surprise little hook to it. You have an amazing artist and Jay-Z coming together. To me, it’s almost just like a song, like that song I think is one of my favorite songs of all time. Yeah, it’s like, I’m gonna have to listen to it after that. After we’re done with this podcast, it’s because it’s like now stuck in my head type of moment for me.
Joe: But you probably know his catalog a little bit better than I do.
Greg: You know, he did the early, Def Jam records. So the original Beastie Boys, Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J. I don’t think he worked on the Public Enemy records, but he might have brought them in. And that was all in the 80s. And then he started American Recordings and had like the Black Crowes. He signed Slayer, who I think was the band on some of those early Beastie Boys songs.
Greg: Like The Fight for Your Right to Party, the guitar stuff like the guitar you’re talking about. That might have been Slayer doing that just like a session musicians.
Joe: I think you’re.
Greg: Right, because they were friends. But as far as like a band not working with Rick Rubin and then making an album with him, I guess the Red Hot Chili Peppers comes to mind for Blood Sugar Sex Magic. If you’re trying to figure out, like, what does Rick Rubin bring to a record you could listen to, like his record with the Dixie chicks.
Greg: He didn’t do the the hits before that, but then he made one with them. And you can definitely tell. Oh, yeah, I guess there’s something about this. He made a Weezer record.
Joe: The one with hash pipe.
Greg: No, that was Rick Kasich, the singer from The Cars. I love that record. I really like the green.
Joe: Maybe my I mean.
Greg: The green album.
Joe: I’m not. I’m a pretty down on Weezer, but that album and some of those songs are just rock forward. Like we’re just going to like, let’s just hit it. I appreciate that.
Greg: So Weezer fans were heartbroken that they kind of stepped back and just kind of made what they thought people wanted, but oh my gosh, I love that album. It is so good. And you know, people wanted them to continue down the the road that they went down with Pinkerton. But I think they they really kind of do something interesting like every other album.
Greg: I think they have kind of stayed creative. They’re a band that I did not care about at all. And then a friend asked if I wanted to go see them and there were songs that they played that I had never heard before, but I knew how they went. That’s how popular Weezer is. There were songs that I didn’t know I had heard, but I go to a produce section and buy some carrots in the store.
Greg: I’m sure I’ve heard it there, you know? Yeah, it really shocked me. It how infused they are in our culture, because I had no idea that I knew that many songs by Weezer, Tom petty, you could listen to wildflowers to new record wildflowers.
Joe: I think. So talk about like, a breadth of artists that he’s worked with. Yeah. Can’t really pin him down. I mean, he’s worked in kind of what would be the 120 minutes world. Yeah, a lot for sure. But also.
Greg: Is that a VH1 reference?
Joe: Dixie Chicks. So yeah, that’s that’s a for anyone who is like doesn’t take ibuprofen before they go to bed. That was a show about alternative music on MTV back in the day. But yeah, it shows the breadth of his like who he works with. Yeah. There are producers you work with. You listen to this like like a Doctor Dre or Timberland.
Joe: Like they sound the same. Yeah. To me. Yeah. Like, you know, a Doctor Dre beat, you know, a Timberland beat, Lil Jon, or like, some of those that, like you hear a Doctor Dre beat em. And it doesn’t matter what album, what who they’re working with. It’s like, got a, like a sound to Timberland has the same thing I feel like from that era.
Joe: Yeah. Of like his sound. So he’s a little bit more a stripped down and kind of like simpler sound. As I think about the some of the albums that you’re talking about. Yeah, it’s almost as simple as, like what you hear the instruments, it’s really clean. So it’s, I was trying to think of you have like a signature sound or style that if like, oh, you hear that song you are Rick Rubin produced that, whereas like, it’s like a Doctor Dre beat from like the early 2000.
Joe: It’s just like there’s nobody else that sounds like that. Yeah.
Greg: I think if you listen to enough Rick Rubin records, there is a slickness to his production that is consistent, kind of no matter what band he’s working with, or at least a lot of them you could listen to and go, oh, I can see how this is the same guy.
Joe: I feel like that with like flood from like the late 90s, because he worked with a lot of folks that I listen to and there’s there’s a polish to his work. Yeah, that I don’t know that I would always recognize, but like when I think about like, his work with like, PJ Harvey, he starts working with her. I think it’s on to Bring You my love.
Joe: So she works with like Steve Albini, who’s like completely different. And then like, there’s a polish to her sound and like a fullness that isn’t there in some of her earlier work.
Greg:
Joe: And I think he works with her on a couple albums and then he works on the U2, I think, as well.
Greg: And yeah.
Joe: I think if he worked with that, he work with Radiohead on anything or do I have. I don’t.
Greg: Think.
Joe: So. I don’t think he does feel like there was another band that I used to listen to that he was a producer on. He may have worked with Nine Inch Nails as well.
Greg: That could be.
Joe: Whatever happened to him, I don’t.
Greg: Later years are smashing Pumpkins adore PJ Harvey is desire. It’s more U2. There’s some killers. Placebo.
Joe: I can see that in The Killer that he does Sam’s Town yeah.
Greg: Sigur Ros. So, Radiohead adjacent foals. It’s interesting.
Joe: What the album.
Greg: Holy Fire 2013.
Joe: Oh, interesting. I can see that.
Greg: More PJ Harvey, more Ed Harcourt, Interpol, Jesus and Mary Chain. That’s amazing. Nine Inch Nails, broken producer. Wow, some New Order. So he definitely comes from. He did New Order in 1981. Assistant engineer. Wow.
Joe: Seems like royalty and.
Greg: Yeah, yeah.
Joe: Especially kind of Brit British royalty, at.
Greg: Least. Nick cave in the Bad Seeds. There’s much more in here than I thought, actually. Wow, he did the Bowmans call. Listen, the boatmen call by Nick cave.
Joe: It’s been a really long time. It’s an album that I feel like I will listen to too early into. It’s a Nick cave is one of those artists that keeps popping up.
Greg: That seems like a good one for you.
Joe: All right, I’ll check it out. I need a new album I haven’t watched on anybody newer in a little while.
Greg: It’s my favorite album I’ve ever heard by Nick cave in The Bad Seeds, The Boat Call. It’s really good, but a lot of people mention I think it’s the one before that. I think it’s called Murder Ballads, which also seems like something you’d, you know, listen.
Joe: To sounds on Miami.
Greg: On brand for you. Yeah. All right. So it’s time for us to rate this movie as a great bad movie. Good bad movie. Okay. Bad movie, bad bad movie or awful bad movie.
Greg: Joe, what do you think.
Joe: I have this as a good, bad movie. Good. Okay, it’s not great because I feel like there’s a few things that I could see. Yeah, that I want a little bit more on, but it’s right on the edge. Okay. Like, I could be pushed and reminded of a couple different things and be like, oh, this is a great bad movie.
Joe: So it’s a really good, bad movie.
Greg: Is this the best good, bad movie?
Joe: I think so, yeah. Oh, it’s like 4.8. If we’re being a five point scale. You know.
Greg: Rotten Tomatoes gives this, 59%. What do you what do you think of that?
Joe: I mean, that feels a little low.
Greg: It’s a little low. I think it’s I’d bump it up to like a, like a 70.
Joe: Easily a 70, 69, 70 somewhere in that one. Whatever it takes. Yeah. We averaged out.
Greg: Absolutely. All right. Joe.
Joe: Oh what do you rate this movie as.
Greg: I think this is a great bad movie. I think this is one of the greatest bad movies of the modern era. And the ripple effects from this one have brought me many great bad movies. There’s at least two more after this with Liam Neeson, where I immediately went to the theater. And I don’t mean taken movies, I mean like Unknown and Nonstop in particular.
Greg: Both those movies I remember really enjoying. But it was because I’ve taken and he’s oh, he’s made another take in like at least every 18 months since 2009. So I love it. The great. Did you ever see The Gray? I think it’s a Joe Carnahan movie.
Joe: I don’t think I did. He should add, it’s so good.
Greg: Yeah, I don’t remember. Even if it’s even bad enough to be one of our movies, it’s really good. So it really solidified Liam Neeson. It anchored Liam Neeson, for sure, as this amazing melodramatic action star. And whenever he veers away from that to be funny or romantic, it’s like, oh, I forgot he could do this too. Like he really has.
Greg: He’s like a male Rose Byrne. He can do anything. He can be in any kind of movie and be amazing.
Joe: Yeah, he’s he’s a really good actor. Yeah. And if you look at his career, the last little bit has been all has been action movie heavy, but he has been in every kind of movie, and I feel like he’s been in some movies or even kind of pokes fun at himself.
Greg: Yeah.
Joe: He’s a little, little self-referential, a little silly, yeah, which I appreciate. But, you know, he’s definitely built his his kind of resume on being a good actor and being in period pieces, too. Next of kin to, you know, all of these movies. So I think he’s unimpeachable in some sense. And who here? Yes. I mean, I’ve always been a fan of his.
Joe: So and this this movie is no different for me. This is just like kind of the cherry on top of like, his later career.
Greg: Yeah, 100%. All right, Joe, we did it. We made it. Yeah.
Joe: We had the conversation that needed to be had about taken.
Greg: At this point, I don’t think there’s anything to be said other than see it taken two. Really.
Joe: We nailed it.
Greg: All right, well, listen, this has been great, but, I need to. I need to head out. Actually, I’m gonna do some research about a karaoke machine.
Joe: Yeah, I got to go. I got to meet, Marco from Tripoli. So.
Greg: I need to go have dinner with a friend and, probably shoot his wife.
Joe: Of extreme. I have to go open a shell corporation.
Greg: So you absolutely should, because I’m about to go follow you around Europe like no teenager does on the planet.
Joe: I’m going to share a cab with Peter, so I’ll see where that ends up.
Greg: Maybe I can hop in that, too. Can you give me a can you drop me off? I’m going to do some security at a concert in town tonight.
Joe: Oh, awesome. Sounds good. I have to go figure out where Albania is.
Greg: Hey, while you’re doing that, I think I’m going to go figure out what to do with this horse my stepdad just gave me for my birthday.
Joe: That’s a that’s where I’m going to go stay at my cousin’s flat in Paris. So, you know, no big deal.
Greg: Ironically, total coincidence. I’m going to be hanging out with your cousin in Spain.
Joe: Good, good. I have to go for a run, but I’m not going to move my arms at all.
Greg: All right, I think we’re done.
Joe: See? See you soon.
Greg: See you soon.