Episode 246 - Swordfish: LIVE!

[AlmostAGhost 2718]

9 hours ago, Elektra Boogaloo said:

Here is a disturbing video that I never got out of my head: 

 

Geezus what were we in 2001?

And I wonder that now, in 2020

[subject117 19]

A few thoughts…
To be fair, in the club bathroom, Ginger is the one who shoves Stan against the wall and starts kissing him to shut him up.  But then they're both super into it.

Talking about all of the “hacker stuff”, it’s like somebody watched the movie Hackers and said, “Hey, it’s six years later.  Let’s just do all of this, but not try at all.”

How is the woman outside the bank when she explodes?  I thought the building was the perimeter?  And why does that goon take her out of the bank in the first place?  It's never established that there's a hostage exchange or anything.

Also, “This will all be over before you can say Cat in the Hat”?!

[DrGuts1003 462]

Jackman was awfully fortunate that he got to see his daughter after school.  She has clearly been waiting awhile for her mom.  There’s no one else left at the school and she is to the point that she is contemplating calling a cab when he finally rolls up.  If her mom had been responsible or if the porn king had a driver who had picked her up on time, Jackman would have arrived to an empty school.  For someone so concerned with seeing his child, you would think he would be more prompt.

Also did anyone else think that it was going to turn out that Travolta was the porn king his ex-wife was with?

[RyanSz 3140]

5 hours ago, subject117 said:

A few thoughts…
To be fair, in the club bathroom, Ginger is the one who shoves Stan against the wall and starts kissing him to shut him up.  But then they're both super into it.

Talking about all of the “hacker stuff”, it’s like somebody watched the movie Hackers and said, “Hey, it’s six years later.  Let’s just do all of this, but not try at all.”

How is the woman outside the bank when she explodes?  I thought the building was the perimeter?  And why does that goon take her out of the bank in the first place?  It's never established that there's a hostage exchange or anything.

Also, “This will all be over before you can say Cat in the Hat”?!

The hostage was taken out to basically allow the news crews and onlookers to see that the mercs were serious and the danger that people were in. It's basically playing up to what Travolta was talking about in his opening monologue, which was in a way disingenuous as you hear Tom Cruise's cousin basically telling her not to worry and it's going to be okay, as he had no intention of hurting her and this was all for the cameras. As for the bank being the perimeter, I have to assume that there was a grace area outside the bank for them to be able to do this walkout, so maybe it went up to the property line next to the sidewalk outside the bank, but by forcing her halfway into the intersection was way past the line and then ... KABOOM.

[Blast Hardcheese 636]

This is the third hacker-based movie featured on HDTGM after Johnny Mnemonic and Hackers, and I'm noticing a trend with these films: high-adrenaline techno music. As enjoyable and absolutely timeless as these soundtracks are, maybe next time can we get a movie about hacking set against ragtime music?

"Hello my baby/Hello my darlin'/Hackin' the mainframe... !"

For a scene that netted Halle Berry an additional $500,000, the reveal of her breast (triumphant as they are) seems a bit... gratuitous? They aren't revealed during a sex scene or even when Stan stumbles in on Ginger wearing the wire, but rather while she's sitting poolside reading a book. Stan walks up to Ginger, she lowers her books and is just like, "Yep, these are my tits." And good for her. But in this scene, the director might as well have added arrows pointing to Berry's breasts and boinging noises.

Much was made about Travolta's Tarantino-esque movie trivia monologue at the beginning of the movie, but I'm surprised no one mentioned his character's obvious Vince Vega haircut à la Pulp Fiction.

After discovering his ex-wife and her husband dead in their home while looking for his daughter, how did Stan know to go to the World Banc? It seems like there's a beat missing between these scenes.

So, Travolta's plan here is to steal money to combat terrorism. Sounds simple and noble enough, I guess. But in the course of doing so, he and his mercenaries (which includes cuddly freedom fighter Vinnie Jones) excessively cause the same level of terrorism, chaos and mayhem they are supposedly fighting against. They take hostages, load them up with collar-bombs, use a lift helicopter to ferry a passenger bus over a city, have access to Stinger missiles and rocket launchers, etc. At one point during the movie, Travolta swings around a Rambo machine gun in a downtown setting, killing and maiming dozens. It would have saved time, money and especially lives if the CIA simple gave Travolta the Swordfish cash and wished him luck in his anti-terrorism endeavors.

And I have to point this out because I'm a Psyche fan: the cop taking his time telling the chief that the bus they're chasing is airborne is Timothy Omundson. Omundson, a recent stroke survivor, played Carlton Lassiter on Psyche and was even once a guest on April Richardson's podcast, Go Bayside! He's a funny dude and reportedly incredibly nice.

[DrGuts1003 462]

49 minutes ago, Blast Hardcheese said:

So, Travolta's plan here is to steal money to combat terrorism. Sounds simple and noble enough, I guess. But in the course of doing so, he and his mercenaries (which includes cuddly freedom fighter Vinnie Jones) excessively cause the same level of terrorism, chaos and mayhem they are supposedly fighting against. They take hostages, load them up with collar-bombs, use a lift helicopter to ferry a passenger bus over a city, have access to Stinger missiles and rocket launchers, etc. At one point during the movie, Travolta swings around a Rambo machine gun in a downtown setting, killing and maiming dozens. It would have saved time, money and especially lives if the CIA simple gave Travolta the Swordfish cash and wished him luck in his anti-terrorism endeavors.

Yeah, I get trying to look like you mean business in order to make sure you get the money, but why not have the suit bombs be fakes?

In fact, I briefly though that would be the case.  When everyone was making such a big deal about getting the woman back inside the bank, I thought everyone would duck and cover only for nothing to happen.  Having the bombs be real and for them to cause so much death and destruction really hurts the case that Travolta is actually the “good guy”

 

Not only is someone from Psych in this movie, but so is Tim DeKay who played the FBI agent on White Collar.  With all this representation from USA shows, we really needs Jason to make a ‘Characters Welcome’ reference in the episode.

[transfaerie 2]

I haven't seen the movie and most likely won't. But the thought I had whilst listening to the episode is, is this an attempt to make the Movie Hackers but for a straight male audience? 

 

The whole can't touch or use a computer for years is almost a direct callback (unless we want to believe that it's just a hacker movie trope) and also whilst Hackers is a surprise darling of queer audiences due to the colourful cast Swordfish sounds like the most 13 year old straight white kid movie ever made.

 

[subject117 19]

1 hour ago, DrGuts1003 said:

Yeah, I get trying to look like you mean business in order to make sure you get the money, but why not have the suit bombs be fakes?

In fact, I briefly though that would be the case.  When everyone was making such a big deal about getting the woman back inside the bank, I thought everyone would duck and cover only for nothing to happen.  Having the bombs be real and for them to cause so much death and destruction really hurts the case that Travolta is actually the “good guy”

Yeah, that's what I thought too, maybe being fake bombs.  To have 22 people with real bombs capable of each doing that amount of damage is INSANE!  And it was just to get MONEY!  Nothing done there means even one terrorist would be taken down.   Meanwhile, if you have one dog collar glitch and go off, you at minimum kill yourself and everybody in the bank?  Just such a dumb plan.

[Blast Hardcheese 636]

21 minutes ago, subject117 said:

Meanwhile, if you have one dog collar glitch and go off, you at minimum kill yourself and everybody in the bank?  Just such a dumb plan.

Or, if the collar bombs are on the same channel on the detonator and some rando stumbles upon that channel ...kaboom?

The first time I saw this movie in the Aughts (yes, I watched Swordfish of my own volition twice now -- it was part of a doubleheader that also included Resident Evil), I remember feeling kind of sick in my soul during the helicopter/bus scene when a hostage falls out the window and his collar goes off taking out the side of an office building in the process. I know this was done to dispatch Vinnie Jones, but the whole thing just seemed so callous and fuckin' gross.

This movie is like drinking Mountain Dew mixed with Drakkar Noir while someone smashes you over the head with a Zima bottle (just all the most egregious fluids).

[ErinRene 50]

The idea that Stanley does not know how to drive a stick shift, then is forced to drive a stick shift in a high stakes situation - and is IMMEDIATLY amazing at it, is ridiculous. And the idea that John Travolta would risk this with his elaborate plan now in peril - crazypants. That car should have stalled out and jerked to a start. The idea that he hits his stride mid-car chase and then is shifting like he’s on Fast and the Furious? Nope. 
 

Also I can’t figure out how these message boards work so sorry if I’m a moron and posted it in the wrong place. 

[subject117 19]

3 hours ago, transfaerie said:

I haven't seen the movie and most likely won't. But the thought I had whilst listening to the episode is, is this an attempt to make the Movie Hackers but for a straight male audience? 

 

The whole can't touch or use a computer for years is almost a direct callback (unless we want to believe that it's just a hacker movie trope) and also whilst Hackers is a surprise darling of queer audiences due to the colourful cast Swordfish sounds like the most 13 year old straight white kid movie ever made.

 

Yeah, I think the pitch for this movie was "It's like Hackers, but with guns, car chases, explosions, and boobs!"

[DrGuts1003 462]

6 minutes ago, subject117 said:

Yeah, I think the pitch for this movie was "It's like Hackers, but with guns, car chases, explosions, and boobs!"

Swordfish, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and The Fast and The Furious came out in three successive weekends in June of 2001, so that whole summer was “guns, car chases, explosions, and boobs”.

[The_Triple_Lindy 2482]

On 8/14/2020 at 5:19 PM, gigi-tastic said:

This movie was a crime against style. No one looked good. Travolta has that landing strip on his face, side highlights, AND A BERET . He goes on about how "clothes make the man" while he's out here looking like a Men's Warehouse reject. High Jackman is playing golf in a bright orange loincloth and has the shittiest earring I ever did see. Poor Halle Berry looks like THAT (IS a goddess not of this world) and they put her in the most God awful fabrics known to man. That blue blousey number?! Did the costume designer just hate everyone on set? I'm not even going to touch on the daughter's clothes

Maybe, but as someone who came of age in the 90s, everything about this morning is rather gorgeous to me. That Pac-Sun/proto-Hot Topic look is exactly what I went for ... Jackman would've been for school, Travolta would've been church.

And since we're on this: my wife can't stand Halle Berry's hair and I couldn't agree more ... that dirty pixie cut by way of weed-wacker ... schwing.

For the record, I don't claim to have good fashion sense.

3 hours ago, ErinZaborac said:

The idea that Stanley does not know how to drive a stick shift, then is forced to drive a stick shift in a high stakes situation - and is IMMEDIATLY amazing at it, is ridiculous. And the idea that John Travolta would risk this with his elaborate plan now in peril - crazypants. That car should have stalled out and jerked to a start. The idea that he hits his stride mid-car chase and then is shifting like he’s on Fast and the Furious? Nope. 

I can safely say that the fact that I drive a manual transmission has prevented my car from being stolen at least once, probably more (since I seem to be break-in prone) -- simply because most people don't know how to drive one.

But furthermore, that kind of high-performance car doesn't even work like a normal stickshift would. The car probably wouldn't have stalled and jerked as much as it would have peeled out and run straight into the nearest hydrant before Stan would've even known what happened. 

[The_Triple_Lindy 2482]

CORRECTIONS:

1. Aside from the playful chronology of the movie's storyline, I honestly don't understand why everyone thinks that Tarantino was this movie's primary inspiration. To me, it seems clear that the filmmakers are all big Guy Ritchie fans, since Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels had come out in 1998 and Snatch a couple of years later. It has all the Ritchie touches -- snappy banter, techno-jazz, a heist plot, and even Vinnie Jones with his super-cool, uber-intimidating one-liners. 

2. The gang seems baffled by why Travolta would make Jackman hack while buzzed on tequila, getting blown, with a gun to his head, but it seems obvious that the crooks are trying to prove to themselves that Jackman could perform under crazy pressure. Although, it doesn't make sense that they would need someone who could do such a thing since his primary reason for being there is to create a worm, which Jackman apparently has all day to do while drinking vintage wine. Unless they knew that he would pull some Robin Hood-type shit and they'd have to make him undo it while fake-hanging Halle Berry ... ah, to hell with trying to rationalize this.

3. Paul seems to think someone becomes good at golf just by putting in time and practice, which says to me that Paul has never actually played golf. Golf is the kind of thing that you are total dogshit at when you first pick it up, and then after years of practice and countless dollars on better clubs and balls and what-have-yous, you are lucky if you manage to become slightly less-than-shitty. And even when you do improve a little bit and you're feeling pretty good about yourself, along comes some tarted-up triple agent in a velvet jumpsuit miniskirt and heels with the most awkward-looking swing I've ever seen and completely destroys you on your own driving range. I can't even imagine where she finds the time to work on her swing in between her international dark cell anti-terrorism hacker seduction responsibilities, which means she is probably just naturally good at the game, which is just goddamned infuriating. 

If you can't tell, I love golf.

[Greg T 48]

7 hours ago, ErinZaborac said:

The idea that Stanley does not know how to drive a stick shift, then is forced to drive a stick shift in a high stakes situation - and is IMMEDIATLY amazing at it, is ridiculous. And the idea that John Travolta would risk this with his elaborate plan now in peril - crazypants. That car should have stalled out and jerked to a start. The idea that he hits his stride mid-car chase and then is shifting like he’s on Fast and the Furious? Nope. 
 

Also I can’t figure out how these message boards work so sorry if I’m a moron and posted it in the wrong place. 

Realistically the car should have already stalled when Travolta does the handbrake turn and stops.  It's not like anyone is pressing on the clutch.  It would be a surprise that Jackman could even get it into neutral to start it then find 1st gear.

[Smigg. 509]

13 hours ago, DrGuts1003 said:

Swordfish, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and The Fast and The Furious came out in three successive weekends in June of 2001, so that whole summer was “guns, car chases, explosions, and boobs”.

I'd be happy if that was every summer.

[Cam Bert 8145]

On 8/14/2020 at 11:02 PM, JimKata said:

I looked into the screenwriter, Skip woods, and he seems like a character. His other screenwriting credits include films such as X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Died Hard parts 4 & 5, The A-Team, Sabotage, and the Hitman movies. His only directing credit to date is for a 1998 movie called Thursday, which he also wrote. I legitimately stopped reading the plot after I got to this part:

During the interview, Dallas, who wants the money that she believes Nick left with Casey along with the heroin, shows up. She scares Dr. Jarvis away by telling a story about Casey's drug-dealing and murdering past. When left alone with Casey, Dallas questions him about the money's whereabouts. Angry that he cannot help her, she decides to kill him, but not before she ties him to a chair, fellates him to force an erection, strips naked, and proceeds to mount and rape him. She tells him she will not kill him until he orgasms and she plans to go on until she makes him do so. Delivering on her word, she reaches multiple orgasms, but gets no results from him. While Dallas reaches a third orgasm, Billy breaks in and shoots her, splattering her blood all over Casey, his walls, and his floor.

I remember liking the movie Thursday. I mean it is clearly a Tarantino inspired knock off but I remember it being fun. The problem is you're reading not so much the plot summary as the entire more beat by beat. The basic story is Tom Jane is a former hardcore criminal type guy. He's given up that lifestyle for a quiet suburban life. Unfortunately he upset a lot of people and they all now know where he lives. So the movie is him as his home is constantly being invaded by these former colleges and rivals who are looking to settle scores. The sex pot character is the most extreme of which.

[Cam Bert 8145]

12 hours ago, The_Triple_Lindy said:

3. Paul seems to think someone becomes good at golf just by putting in time and practice, which says to me that Paul has never actually played golf. Golf is the kind of thing that you are total dogshit at when you first pick it up, and then after years of practice and countless dollars on better clubs and balls and what-have-yous, you are lucky if you manage to become slightly less-than-shitty. And even when you do improve a little bit and you're feeling pretty good about yourself, along comes some tarted-up triple agent in a velvet jumpsuit miniskirt and heels with the most awkward-looking swing I've ever seen and completely destroys you on your own driving range. I can't even imagine where she finds the time to work on her swing in between her international dark cell anti-terrorism hacker seduction responsibilities, which means she is probably just naturally good at the game, which is just goddamned infuriating. 

If you can't tell, I love golf.

I have a golf related question then.

So it looks like he's using an iron and not a driver in the scene. His shots seem to be landing around the 150 yard mark. If you are using a higher iron, wouldn't that be about right? Maybe his form was shit, but even the highest iron is going to what, drive 200 yards or so?

[Cam Bert 8145]

Okay I want to talk a little bit about Stanley Jobson's FBI profile we see. So when The Lone Gunman are talking about him his profile pops up on screen. Here is a screen shot of it.

It's hard to read but here is what it says that I have questions about.

"PLACE OF BIRTH  DRIPPING SPRINGS

HEIGHT 6'2"

WEIGHT 185

BUILD LEAN

SCARS AND MARKS  RIGHT SHOULDER 7" CUT"

So as we all recall the opening shot is of Hugh Jackman shirtless hitting golf balls from his trailer. We all get a very good look at his upper body. Are there any note worthy scars or marks? Well he has a very bizarre tattoo that goes across his left shoulder. What about his right shoulder? Nope that looks perfectly fine and nice. So where is this 7" cut they are talking about? The tattoo he could have gotten after prison and therefore not on his file but if he had such a large cut on his shoulder that they had to make note of it why is it not visible two years later? That is unless of course we all assume this is some sort of penis reference. Yes I went there and I am sorry.

[Olive_Duster 3]

When Stanley is forced to hack into the Department of Defense’s system with a gun to his head, he is simultaneously being fellated by one of Soul Patch’s bimbos, apparently to completion. The only problem with this is that  men only achieve an erection when the parasympathetic nervous system is activated, the branch of the autonomic nervous system associated with relaxation. The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the “fight or flight” response which would be activated when the gun was put to his head. These two branches of the autonomic nervous system cannot be activated simultaneously and, therefore, I must conclude that Stanley has to be either faking an orgasm or faking his fear. I like to think he was somehow in cohoots with the blonde bimbo whom he met in the yet-to-be-made prequel, ‘Hammerhead’, which focuses on his obsessive investigation into Holly’s step-father, the porn producer.

 

Also, why did wardrobe dress Holly like she was the understudy for Rhoda?

[Fast B 7]

*obligatory "long time listener, first time caller" intro*

Well, we watched this movie last night and I had to finally create an account here to unload my thoughts. ...And wow.

I haven't listened to the whole episode yet, but right away I was 100% Team Jason: I wish I hadn't seen this movie, it is garbage. And to be fair, I unironically like Hackers, because while it is very stupid and cheesy, they at least tried to depict some of the hacker counter-culture ethos and it is kinda fun (granted it was like they machine-translated it from English to Chinese and back, but they tried). This movie, on the other hand, felt like it was just attempting to be as cruel and mean-spirited as possible at all times, not to mention criminally stupid, e.g. jumping off the cliff.

I thought I was going crazy with the volume leveling being nuts, glad that wasn't just my imagination. Also, I'm glad somebody (Paul?) mentioned The Matrix, because at some point while watching I turned to my wife and said, "THIS MOVIE IS TRYING SUPER HARD TO BE THE MATRIX, RIGHT?" (caps to depict me trying to talk over the insane noise). It's like they saw that movie and Hackers and took away all the wrong ideas.

And since I haven't been able to finish the podcast yet, I must ask: are we going to address the Halle Berry hanging scene? Was that really necessary? I (sort of) got Travolta's villainous "put the hacker in insanely stressful situations" schtick, but watching this in 2020 just feels horrible. It's even worse than the terribly aged crypto-fascist undertones of Travolta taking on terrorism By Any Means Necessary™. In a movie full of stupid and tacky ideas, those beats seem particularly gross.

I guess the soundtrack was cool though, pity it's associated with this steaming pile.

[Blast Hardcheese 636]

If we've learned anything about hackers from these movies, it's that they are ridiculously attractive people with oversized egos and sky beam plans who love nothing more than clubbing and shooting automatic weapons.

[Fast B 7]

Oh, and regarding a Finnish guy named Torvalds who is apparently "the world's greatest hacker", did somebody on the writing staff actually do a tiny bit of research? (Sure, the character didn't curse as much as Linus, but it sure felt like a shoutout.)

Though I will add, just stuffing in a reference like that, much like conveniently panning over a copy of Neuromancer in the little girl's bedroom (?), does not automatically give your shitty movie any credibility by association.

[gigi-tastic 2322]

16 hours ago, The_Triple_Lindy said:

Maybe, but as someone who came of age in the 90s, everything about this morning is rather gorgeous to me. That Pac-Sun/proto-Hot Topic look is exactly what I went for ... Jackman would've been for school, Travolta would've been church.

And since we're on this: my wife can't stand Halle Berry's hair and I couldn't agree more ... that dirty pixie cut by way of weed-wacker ... schwing.

For the record, I don't claim to have good fashion sense.

I can safely say that the fact that I drive a manual transmission has prevented my car from being stolen at least once, probably more (since I seem to be break-in prone) -- simply because most people don't know how to drive one.

But furthermore, that kind of high-performance car doesn't even work like a normal stickshift would. The car probably wouldn't have stalled and jerked as much as it would have peeled out and run straight into the nearest hydrant before Stan would've even known what happened. 

Oh that little girl was wearing an entire Limited Too and I would have loved it as a kid. The  early 2000's were a dark time

[gigi-tastic 2322]

1 hour ago, Fast B said:

*obligatory "long time listener, first time caller" intro*

Well, we watched this movie last night and I had to finally create an account here to unload my thoughts. ...And wow.

I haven't listened to the whole episode yet, but right away I was 100% Team Jason: I wish I hadn't seen this movie, it is garbage. And to be fair, I unironically like Hackers, because while it is very stupid and cheesy, they at least tried to depict some of the hacker counter-culture ethos and it is kinda fun (granted it was like they machine-translated it from English to Chinese and back, but they tried). This movie, on the other hand, felt like it was just attempting to be as cruel and mean-spirited as possible at all times, not to mention criminally stupid, e.g. jumping off the cliff.

I thought I was going crazy with the volume leveling being nuts, glad that wasn't just my imagination. Also, I'm glad somebody (Paul?) mentioned The Matrix, because at some point while watching I turned to my wife and said, "THIS MOVIE IS TRYING SUPER HARD TO BE THE MATRIX, RIGHT?" (caps to depict me trying to talk over the insane noise). It's like they saw that movie and Hackers and took away all the wrong ideas.

And since I haven't been able to finish the podcast yet, I must ask: are we going to address the Halle Berry hanging scene? Was that really necessary? I (sort of) got Travolta's villainous "put the hacker in insanely stressful situations" schtick, but watching this in 2020 just feels horrible. It's even worse than the terribly aged crypto-fascist undertones of Travolta taking on terrorism By Any Means Necessary™. In a movie full of stupid and tacky ideas, those beats seem particularly gross.

I guess the soundtrack was cool though, pity it's associated with this steaming pile.

Welcome! And I'm so sorry you had to see this movie. It personally made me feel physically unwell. Also yeah seeing a black woman be hung was awful I had to skip the who scene