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The Entertaining Agitprop of ‘Tetris’

April 4, 2023
Notes
Transcript
On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) discuss a rumor that the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences want to broaden the theatrical exhibition requirement. Would this benefit theaters or just serve as a way for entrenched streaming powerhouses like Netflix to shut out mid-level distributors? Then the gang discusses Tetris, a movie that inspired confusing feelings in Peter and Sonny who, for one of the first times ever, felt ideologically pandered to by a major motion picture. Make sure to swing by Bulwark Plus for our bonus episode Friday on our favorite retro games. And if you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend!

A quick programming note: We are off next week, thanks to a confluence of travel and vacation schedules, but will be back the week after.

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors and omissions. Ironically, the transcription service has particular problems with the word “bulwark,” so you may see it mangled as “Bullard,” “Boulart,” or even “bull word.” Enjoy!
  • Speaker 1
    0:00:11

    Welcome back to across the movie aisle presented by Bulwark Plus. I am your host, Sunny Bunch culture editor of the Bulwark. I’m joined as always by Alyssa Rosenberg of The Washington Post and Peter Suterman, of Reason magazine. Alexa Peter, how are you today?
  • Speaker 2
    0:00:22

    I am swell.
  • Speaker 3
    0:00:23

    I am so happy to be talking about movies with friends.
  • Speaker 1
    0:00:27

    First up in controversies and controversies, the Academy of Ocean Pictures Arts and Sciences is floating a broader requirement for theatrical distribution of movies. That want to be considered for best picture. It’s a move that’s kicking up some consternation. Writing in puck Matthew Bellini suggested that the Academy might up the requirement from one week in one of the six largest American markets to one week in fifteen to twenty of the fifty largest American markets. The thinking here is that to really get the full sense of the film’s artistry, particularly with regard to things like sound design, you need to experience it in a theater and the Academy wants to increase the likelihood that voters and audiences alike will experience those movies in a theater.
  • Speaker 1
    0:01:07

    In theory, this supposed to be a sort of check on Netflix. Right? Which releases its award season stuff in a very cursory sort of way. In practice, this feels very much like a lot of things that you see in the regulatory environment. Netflix has the most money and the biggest infrastructure and already rolls out these cursory theatrical runs in more than fifteen markets anyway.
  • Speaker 1
    0:01:26

    This doesn’t really matter to them just as the minimum wage doesn’t really hurt Amazon or Walmart as much as it hurts the smaller mom and pop shops when you when you raise that. I wouldn’t be surprised if, as David Poland suggested, that Netflix itself may actually support such a requirement. However, there are other reasons to be wary of this requirement. Fan of the Bulwark Hollywood and former guest James Emmanuel Shapiro noted on Twitter that mid level studios are gonna get crushed by this requirement because it’s gonna radically increase the cost of distribution and marketing. And meanwhile, Franklin Leonard, who’s the founder of the screenplay competition slash clearance hub, the blacklist, suggested that the move would specifically disadvantage films made by minority filmmakers, highlighting a new study that showed streaming films are far more diverse than those that make it to theaters.
  • Speaker 1
    0:02:11

    The study from UCLA found that, quote, women and people of color fared far better in the streamers than in theatrical releases in every job category surveyed, which included directors, writers, lead actors, and overall cast, and, quote, The question comes back to something we discussed last month in the or maybe the month before that and the run up to the Oscars, which is when is the point of the show really? Is it is it to judge the best, quote unquote, the best movie. Right? Or is it to serve as a showcase for the industry? For Hollywood, the amorphous idea of Hollywood, which consists of, let’s be honest here, mostly, the big studio making their big studio movies and employing lots of people.
  • Speaker 1
    0:02:53

    Right? And that industry is driven in no small part by the theatrical experience and the revenue that generates, Alyssa, is is the Academy fighting a losing war here trying to put the Genie back in that bottle?
  • Speaker 2
    0:03:05

    Man, Why did I have to go first on this particular segment? I mean, look, I think it’s I think we’re still in a somewhat unsettled landscape in terms of the future of the theatrical business. In part, because we’re still in a period when what Hollywood has to offer is impacted by not just the sort of immediate pandemic era shutdowns, but by the cost of COVID mitigation efforts, which are starting to slow down, etcetera. And so what the theatrical box office offering is is currently, like, not what I think Hollywood hopes it’s going to be in the term. We’re still in a place where, you know, we’re feeling the after effects of that huge interruption and change in doing business.
  • Speaker 2
    0:03:50

    And so I mean, I’m not ready to declare the movie business dead. I mean, I think in fact, last year was good evidence for the fact that people will turn out or attractive, you know, independent movies or non franchise movies. Let me be clear, non franchise movies. And so I think you know, if I were a medical examiner, I’d be a ways away from calling it. Right?
  • Speaker 2
    0:04:12

    You know, saying, like, this thing is definitely dead. But it’s definitely I mean, I think it’s tricky. And I wonder if there is a way to do this that resolve some of the challenges that smaller distributors see with this requirement. I mean, I don’t know if there could be a way for micro budget movies to apply for you know, some screening assistance from the academy. I mean, just if there is a way to get some of these movies and theaters where it would be nice if people could see them, without making it a, you know, a sort of ruinous requirement to compete.
  • Speaker 2
    0:04:48

    And I don’t understand why I have the answers there. Well,
  • Speaker 1
    0:04:50

    let’s look at it from the perspective of exhibitors. From from the folks who who own and run AMC, Regal, etcetera. Right? They don’t wanna put movies, smaller movies from smaller distributors in their films for these runs because they’re not gonna get the sort of marketing support. Right?
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:04

    They if you have a fifty fifty split with you know, a company that’s spending zero dollars to market your movie in Kansas City, Missouri. Right? Like, why would you wanna put the the Indy there. Now maybe there’s something that the either the academy or the exhibitors can do to work with the distributors to give those groups a break, maybe, you know, help with marketing within the theaters themselves? I don’t know.
  • Speaker 1
    0:05:30

    I mean, I like, it’s it’s tricky for sure, but there is a there is a financial component on the exhibitors end here that I think should not be downplayed.
  • Speaker 2
    0:05:39

    Yeah. I mean and it’s also true that, you know, I think Disney in particular has leverage really tough revenue splits from the theaters on, you know, Marvel movies, requirements that they play in a certain number of theaters, etcetera. And certainly, you know, a smaller percentage of a big number is better than a fifty per you know, half of a much smaller number. But I do wonder if there’s some way to you know, play
  • Speaker 1
    0:06:03

    with
  • Speaker 2
    0:06:03

    that leverage a little bit. I mean, the academy has the academy has some money. You could probably afford to buy some after exercising.
  • Speaker 1
    0:06:09

    Yeah. Peter, it was funny. One of the things that Franklin Leonard had mentioned was, you know, I I think he he tweeted something like, I’ll support this when we support requirement that people see these movies in theaters. And nobody nobody wants to do that. And I was like, wait a second.
  • Speaker 1
    0:06:22

    This is a great idea. We should do that. That would be wonderful. I do think I mean, look, the point here is most people aren’t seeing these movies in theaters anyway, doesn’t really matter that much. I think that’s that’s right in some ways, but
  • Speaker 3
    0:06:33

    there’s also a kind of hypocrisy angle in the sense that on the one hand, this is a bid to emphasize the relevance of the theatrical experience. While also not requiring it of the people who are voting. Because for listeners who are not familiar with this, Academy voters get screeners for all of these films. And Academy voters for the most part are gonna be watching Academy Award nominated films on those screeners at Hope. And at least in past years, I don’t know about since the pandemic, but at least as as recently as say twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen, if you’ve ever seen a an an academy screener for a critics awards group, they’re often quite low quality.
  • Speaker 3
    0:07:11

    No. They’re not even mastered and and set up either sort of and and run either the the color timing is not done at the level that, you know, right there, like, they’re just kind of glitchy, low quality DVDs in a lot of cases. And I think now there’s a streaming server that quality may have gotten a little bit better, though I I don’t wanna vouch for any of this. The point is At best, people are seeing these at home on a nice television or maybe a home theater if they are very fancy, you know, heads of studios types. But in many cases, as recently as a decade ago, they’re just watching them on kind of crappy not yet ready for primetime DVDs.
  • Speaker 3
    0:07:47

    And so if Academy wants to emphasize the theatrical experience, then it should emphasize the theatrical experience. And I I wanna also say, I don’t have any problem with Academy members getting special treatment in the sense of, say, free screenings or private screenings only for Academy members. You know, we’re gonna we’re gonna show this movie hear, you know, at a private screening room, that sort of thing. That seems totally reasonable to me. And a
  • Speaker 2
    0:08:09

    lot of those things do happen as well. That
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:11

    that sort of thing happens. It happens for critics. Like, you wanna get your movie out to a specific audience, great. But do that in an environment that makes sense. And so to me, if they wanna emphasize the theatrical experience, then require that or at least find some way to penalize people who are watching most of the movies at home.
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:29

    Right? Something that penalizes not make me maybe. I don’t mean like and I don’t mean, like but, like, find some way to strongly encourage, to make it more difficult to watch these things at home and and make academy voters actually go out to theaters to see these things the way they’re meant to be seen. That seems like a worthy project to me. I guess the other thing that I wanna say here is I’m only drinking coffee, but I really wish that I had a big water bomb in front of me while we were doing this podcast and not just because I’m the libertarian on the show.
  • Speaker 3
    0:08:59

    But because what I really wanna do is like a a giant bomb rip and be like, the question we’re really asking is, like, what even is a movie, man? Because this is in some sense that the actual question at the heart of this is what counts as a movie? What deserves to be considered in the question of what is the best picture? Is something that is ninety minutes long and runs only on a streaming service that most people don’t have? Is that a movie?
  • Speaker 3
    0:09:32

    Compared to top gun maverick, compared to whatever Steven Spielberg comes out with next. Actually, I think Steven Spielberg is doing a television show next in it, whatever. Right? Like, this is this is in some sense a bit on the Academy’s part to make sure that these movies have more popular purchase. But more popular purchase is going to exclude many movies.
  • Speaker 3
    0:09:54

    Many things that are movies, but it will what it will end up doing is excluding niche films, Right? Just kind of by definition. And niche films mean things that are made for lower budgets. It means things that are made either that don’t sort of appeal to the masses, which is gonna mean films that are more diverse in their in terms of their casting, in terms of their stories, in terms of their plots. Right?
  • Speaker 3
    0:10:13

    Like, the more mass appeal a thing has In general, there are certainly exceptions. But in general, that’s gonna mean that stuff that is designed to appeal to a smaller niche, a smaller segment of the potential viewing audience is gonna be ruled out here. And so I I get that that’s in some ways what the academy wants to do. They want bigger films. They want films that have more mass appeal.
  • Speaker 3
    0:10:35

    But building their category around mass appeal is gonna rule out a lot of first of all, a lot of just like straightforward kind of the diversity the box checking kind of diversity, but also a lot of other types of diversity, types of films that are odd and unusual, that are cheap to make, where the producers don’t have a lot of resources. And I I think that that’s gonna rule out a lot of frankly, sort of the the future of cinema, the stuff that could provide the material that is going to build the next Hollywood and keep things going, you know, for the next thirty or fifty years.
  • Speaker 2
    0:11:08

    Can I play devil’s advocate on two levels for a second here? Couldn’t you argue, Peter, that what the academy is trying to do is build some more mass appeal for those kinds of movies. Right? By, like, getting them in, you know, providing an incentive to get some of them in front of theatrical audiences and give them the kind of release that, like, their
  • Speaker 1
    0:11:29

    filmmakers
  • Speaker 3
    0:11:30

    probably wish they could have. That’s probably true in some cases. So for medium budget Netflix films in particular, but maybe also things, you know, from Apple, Amazon to kind of big streamers that can afford a more conventional or sort of a larger theatrical release. That may be true. It may push some of those new studios that are moneyed and backed typically, with the exception of Netflix, backed by some other business.
  • Speaker 3
    0:11:57

    It may push some of those new studios to spend on distribution. But the people who are outside of that system The filmmakers, the producers, the actors, whoever it is that is anyone in the industry who is outside of a moneyed system, And to be clear, I don’t think big studios and lots of money. I’m I’m like fine with that. But if they’re outside of that money system, then they’re gonna have less access. And that means that people who are pushing the envelope, investing their own personal resources, who don’t have some sort of large corporate backing, are gonna struggle in an environment like that.
  • Speaker 3
    0:12:30

    That may be what the academy wants. That may be the self image they want to present. What we want is for people to see our our biggest production. The ones that are backed by money, not the weirdo little things. But frankly, that’s gonna mean that the next set of Steven Satterbergs people who are experimental, who start as outsiders, who are looking for alternative funding and distribution models.
  • Speaker 3
    0:12:51

    It’s not gonna mean Stephen Satterberg himself. Stephen Satterberg is gonna be fine. But the next ones, the the ones who we can’t name today because they haven’t made their their first or their second movie yet and really made a name for themselves. It’s gonna be maybe not impossible for them, but it might be harder. So I again, I I’m not even saying I think this is wrong necessarily, but it’s a choice to present a more centralized and more sort of corporate commercial version of what a movie is, that I’m not sure is the right choice in a world where filmmaking has radically expanded and become, you know, to to the masses and is now sort of part of the lingua franca of daily life just in the sense that, like, people make movies all the time on their phones.
  • Speaker 3
    0:13:34

    Little tiny movies. Right? And and, like, that’s like, the language of cinema has now been embedded into our into our lives in a way that it just wasn’t when we were growing up, you know, thirty years ago. And if you say, well, you’re gonna have to pay for theatrical distribution in a bunch of cities, not just in two, then that says, all those people who are trying new stuff, you know, out of their bedrooms and out of their garages, it’s
  • Speaker 2
    0:13:56

    gonna
  • Speaker 3
    0:13:57

    be a lot harder for them. That
  • Speaker 1
    0:13:58

    stuff’s not getting nominated for best picture anyway though. I mean, let’s be let’s be realtor. There there’s no I I don’t think that you could point to a movie that has been nominated for best picture that couldn’t credibly have been shown in fifteen cities or whatever. I don’t actually know what code is.
  • Speaker 2
    0:14:16

    Koda totally could have done it the after. But
  • Speaker 1
    0:14:18

    Koda totally
  • Speaker 2
    0:14:18

    I mean, it’s totally I mean, it’s completely in keeping with a generation of sort of prestige, nineties, weepies, like I mean, the the immediate president is, like, mister Holland’s Lopez. Right? Which, like, literally, also includes, like, a deaf character and music appreciation. Like, mister Holland’s Lopez. Goodwill hunting, like a whole I mean, that could have done a theatrical business.
  • Speaker 2
    0:14:36

    The second place I wanna play as devil’s advocate is to Franklin Leonard who I consider a friend And I think the interesting question raised by his, you know, his argument about the streamers being more diverse is that I’m really wondering if sort of an apples to oranges comparison. I mean, it would be really interesting to compare sort of all movies that got some level of sort of four year consideration campaign. That were primarily streaming versus, you know, primarily theatrical first. Because I would not be shocked if streamers are more diverse in part because they are looking to fill up the the moab content and therefore are giving some, you know, inexpensive shots to people to make movies, to be in movies, who they don’t have to pay as much, who they’re not gonna promote as much. And so I am wondering, you know, it it is not at all clear to me that the streamers are putting as much in a sort of resources and investment into diverse films that they intend to compete for sort of prestige energy.
  • Speaker 2
    0:15:43

    In a way that makes them radically different from, you know, the traditional theatrical distributors.
  • Speaker 1
    0:15:49

    I mean, to your point, I was, so let’s look at Netflix’s big FYC movies this year. Right? It was all quite on the western front, Bardo and White noise, none of which leap out to me as, like, particularly hugely diverse sort of pictures. I mean,
  • Speaker 2
    0:16:04

    BARDA, sort of, technically. But
  • Speaker 1
    0:16:06

    Yeah. I mean, I well, yeah. Again, like, it’s just I don’t know. I like, it’s an interesting argument. But again, I I just think I think it it kinda sidesteps the the real point, which is it, like, none of these movies from smaller distributors are really like I mean, what’s what’s the smallest distributor that’s going to get a a best picture nomination?
  • Speaker 1
    0:16:25

    Probably like Neon. Right? Neon has perfectly large distribution capabilities. It’s not it’s not beyond there. Ken, I don’t know.
  • Speaker 1
    0:16:33

    And
  • Speaker 2
    0:16:34

    look, I think what this speaks to is that with the rise of streaming, Hollywood undercut its own, you know, economic model in really traumatic ways. And, you know, there used to be an infrastructure by which, like, Stephen Satterberg got his start somewhere. Right? I mean, like, sex lives in videotape played in theater. And so Hollywood’s abandonment of its
  • Speaker 3
    0:16:57

    own — He had to create a lot of that infrastructure. I mean, or help create it with the help of a people in the distribution and sort of production end of things.
  • Speaker 2
    0:17:06

    Right. But that’s I mean, I think then the call is to recreate you know, some of the business models that Hollywood itself decimated. And I don’t know what the immediate way to do that is, but I I can’t necessarily fault the economy for creating something of an incentive to do that.
  • Speaker 1
    0:17:23

    Yeah. Alright. So what do we think is that controversy or controversy that the Academy of Motion Pictures Art of Sciences is considering beefing up their theatrical exhibition requirements. For movies that hope to win Oscar glory, Alyssa.
  • Speaker 2
    0:17:35

    Everything the Academy does is controversial just by nature. It’s controversy.
  • Speaker 1
    0:17:38

    I I just think it’s a controversy that Academy voters don’t have to see most of the movies in the theaters. Agreed. That should be the the real point here. We need more people going to see movies in theaters. They should there should be like a a bouncer at the door who’s checking off names every time somebody shows up at any theater in Los Angeles with a
  • Speaker 2
    0:17:58

    And then you have our acts.
  • Speaker 1
    0:18:00

    Yeah. So that that would be great. Alright. Make sure to swing by Bulwark class on Friday for a bonus episode in which we discuss some of our favorite retro video games speaking of retro games onto the main event. Tetris, streaming now on Apple TV plus a heartwarming tale of intellectual property defense and difficulty of negotiating distribution rights in totalitarian states Tetris is equal parts corporate entry, heist movie, international thriller, that that sort of movie that has no business being as good as it is, frankly, and yet it kind of zips along moment to moment in a way that is terribly pleasing.
  • Speaker 1
    0:18:35

    Tarrin Edgemini stars as Hank Rogers, He’s a Dutchman who’s raised in New York and educated in Hawaii who, when the movie begins, lives in Tokyo with his wife. And discovers the future of gaming at the Las Vegas based consumer electronic show in the form of the Soviet Union’s greatest export. It’s Tetris, the license to which is currently held by a British conglomerate. I wanted to spell all that out for two reasons. Reason the first.
  • Speaker 1
    0:19:01

    This movie is a naked tribute to the globalized economic order, to extent that I halfway imagined Kato, or yes, even possibly reasoned magazine being a silent partner on the making of it. The film is almost pure Apigand, at one point, Alexey Pajitnov, who’s the creator of Tetris, who’s played by Nikita Efremov, literally says good ideas have no borders or something to that effect. Both evil commies and corrupt businessmen are portrayed as equally bad given their distorting effect on the markets. As I joked in my review, this movie is basically triumph of the neo liberal will. I loved it.
  • Speaker 1
    0:19:33

    The second reason I highlighted that massive kind of international gobbledygook above is that it’s it’s interesting. I managed to remember all of it perfectly well. I just typed that paragraph out from memory. The script by Noah Pink and the direction by John S. Barrett conveys a ton of information.
  • Speaker 1
    0:19:47

    In that early exposition dump that would have been eye glazing in the hands of a less competent pair of filmmakers. But it’s it’s just really well done here. It’s kind of like the explainers from the big short except without the smug fourth wall breaking aside to the cameras. Just really, really well done overall. Anyway, Tetris is a work of historical fiction.
  • Speaker 1
    0:20:05

    Which means there’s some added drama to heighten attention. There’s an auto chase towards the end through the streets of Moscow that’s just kind of hilariously silly, it called the mind the manufactured tension in the final moments of Argo. These things don’t really happen in authoritarian states because if you leave a car chase through the heart of a the city like this you’re just not getting on the airplane. You’re trying to escape. That’s not gonna happen.
  • Speaker 1
    0:20:26

    That’s fine. That’s fine though. Dramatic recreations need drama And all in all, I I love this movie. I love Taren Edgerton who I think is has evolved into a very compelling leading man. I think he is doing great work here.
  • Speaker 1
    0:20:39

    Everybody is very good. I kind of loved this movie. I don’t know. Peter, what did you make of Tetris?
  • Speaker 3
    0:20:44

    I also really enjoyed it. It’s a fun movie. But as you suggested, Sunny, this movie plays very strongly to my personal biases. Right? It’s about how video games and capitalism and globalism and, like, ethical entrepreneurship are are, like, really morally good and also awesome.
  • Speaker 3
    0:21:09

    And about how, like, regular era commies are both really awful but also soul destroying and creativity like suppressing and just bad for for human flourishing and and art and creativity. And like I said, I I really enjoyed it. But it’s such a strange experience to be catered to, ideologically, so perfectly that I almost distrust my enjoyment of this movie. I don’t think it’s a bad movie to be clear. It’s obviously a pretty good movie.
  • Speaker 3
    0:21:40

    At minimum a very fun film. But I wonder, is it actually that good or is it just that it hits all of my buttons really, really, really, really perfectly. And I don’t totally know the answer to that. It seemed a little silly and a little frivolous at times in ways that I was like, oh, but I like silly and frivolous. When it’s silly and frivolous in service of stuff that I’m like kind of maniacally, you know, in favor of.
  • Speaker 3
    0:22:06

    So obviously, I enjoyed this. It’s wonderful and it’s humane and I think you were your spot on with your description of of of the the exposition and how effective it is. It’s not just that the movie does these kind of like explanatory bits really well. It’s that there’s really a lot of complicated business and international law in this movie. Stuff that could be really boring or really confusing.
  • Speaker 3
    0:22:31

    And it’s just so clearly delivered, not just clearly delivered, entertainingly delivered. The movie creates suspense And so this is why I, like, don’t think, like, oh, Peter, it’s just that you love this movie’s points and and message that you’re that you enjoy this. Like, the movie creates suspense out of. What are essentially some complex business negotiations about IP in a world of muddled international law? And somehow that’s a thriller with like a great moral sociopolitical core.
  • Speaker 3
    0:23:01

    Honestly, they’re just like, even if it’s not a great movie, a for like degree of difficulty because a movie like this shouldn’t be this entertaining.
  • Speaker 1
    0:23:10

    Alyssa, is this what it’s like to be a liberal at the movie theater all the time. Yeah. Are you are you constantly feeling panda too in this in this sort of way? I’m I’m fascinated by the — Mhmm. — by by Peter Stake here.
  • Speaker 1
    0:23:23

    Remember
  • Speaker 2
    0:23:23

    that I’m a feminist. So I often do not feel pressured to by American pop culture. I quite enjoyed this, I thought. But I will say, I felt at the beginning like I had been dropped into the movie sort of halfway. I think the beginning of the movie is the one place where the script’s clarity really kind of falters because, you know, you sort of stepping into an environment and, like, the consumer electronic show scene is not in and of itself a super clear illustration of just how satisfying Tetris is to play.
  • Speaker 2
    0:23:56

    And I actually went back and played it some this afternoon and I was like, oh, I remember what this like, this is so soothing and satisfying.
  • Speaker 1
    0:24:03

    And
  • Speaker 2
    0:24:04

    that it does not the scene does not capture that, and it drops you into the middle of a bunch of stuff that is is very confusing and that makes you feel like the action is, like, you I almost wondered if I had sort of missed an initial five minutes or something, and I think it improves a lot. From there. But it’s definitely and look, I don’t know enough about this to, you know, say what a better beginning would have been, but the first ten news, the movie, I thought I was really not gonna like it, and then I quite enjoyed it. Look, it’s just really zippy and fun. Right?
  • Speaker 2
    0:24:35

    And this is just like a huge bonus for me. You guys know right that Robert Maxwell is Gillaine Maxwell’s father. And so you’re watching like a backstory movie about just like the horrible Maxwell family who end up, of course, entwined in, you know, all of the Jeffrey Epstein craziness So as someone who’s like a fan of sort of British scandal, it was extremely enjoyable to have that sort of quasi satirical treatment of that family happening in the background of the movie. And I appreciated the extent to which the movie at times feels like it feels a little bit larger than life without tipping totally into cartoonishness. Right?
  • Speaker 2
    0:25:18

    I mean, there is the use of the sort of pixelation during the action scenes to sort of emphasize you were feeling both that you know, this is not quite real and also that it’s sort of a promise within the movie that the consequences won’t be serious. Right? I mean, you have Robert Maxwell constantly just being like, oh, it’s in the Camden Court. We’re doing some spring cleaning. Right?
  • Speaker 2
    0:25:41

    Like sort of lying in a way that is obvious and cartoonish, but that sort of serves to emphasize what a fundamentally ridiculous character he is. And so those touches of unreality are handled really definitely both in sort of the script and in the visuals of the movie in a way that I think helps it balance its sort of jazzy freshness with the stakes that, you know, are if not necessarily playing out in this particular story are sort of constantly humming in the background geopolitically. It’s just it’s very deaf. Right? And I think it’s a really nice example of what a sort of small movie and a small story can be.
  • Speaker 2
    0:26:26

    You know, some it doesn’t do as well as something like pride at, you know, developing cast of its bench of characters in sort of a really deep way, which is a bummer because there’s, you know, there’s some fun interesting stuff going on there. I mean, an interesting sort of undercurrent to what you two are sensing and experiencing in the movie is the fact that two of the sort of secondary heroes are like true believers Soviet bureaucrats who are sort of taking their last chance to stand up for Soviet ideals against a, you know, a corrupt person who has foreseen the collapse that the system is trying to profit on the way out. Right? I mean, you have these two, you know, you have this true believer KGB agent who, you know, arrests the bad guy, and then you have this, you know, this sort of old school you know, previous generation bureaucrat in Euler, who’s like, I just wanna do what’s best for the Soviet Union, and this is the best deal for the Soviet Union.
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:23

    Right? It’s like — No. I mean, this is the theme of the movie. Right? Is that, you know, the competition makes everybody better.
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:29

    You everybody profits. It’s it’s wonderful. It’s
  • Speaker 3
    0:27:31

    it’s great.
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:32

    I can I say one thing one thing about the portrayal of the Maxwells that I I liked is is the way they handle Kevin? So Kevin Maxwell is the sun. Is kind of your classic Nippo baby type reg. He, like, you know, born on third base, thinks he had a triple sort of guy. But I like the way that the the movie treats him both as a ridiculous figure, but also like almost charmingly naive about how the world works.
  • Speaker 1
    0:27:58

    Like, he is an idiot in a way, but he is at least an honest idiot. In another way, which I I think is like there’s a worse version of this movie where he is like similarly sneering and kind of evil and instead he’s just like kind of deluded, which I think is I think is a is a more realistic way to portray that character.
  • Speaker 3
    0:28:17

    I also suspect that there were some legal considerations there, given that his father is no longer in this world, and he is.
  • Speaker 1
    0:28:26

    And — That’s right. —
  • Speaker 3
    0:28:27

    also he also he he was acquitted of his financial crimes. Yeah. And so The movie presents that him in some ways as kinda as, like you said, as naive as, you know, being told these are obviously ridiculous lies like that Alyssa points out at just not being able to see that his father is a cartoon villain. And
  • Speaker 2
    0:28:49

    to be clear, in real life, Robert Maxwell was a completely bonkered figure. It’s like there is a great sort of TV mini series or something to be made about Robert Maxwell who is basically this sort of Thomas Ripley like figure in a lot of different ways. Like, there’s there’s just a great spin off to be made there that’s like both darker and, you know, sort of more biting than this IVIA’s, but that’s not their humor there.
  • Speaker 3
    0:29:16

    Yeah. What I liked about this movie, Alyssa, I think it was you who said that this movie does a great job with the stakes. And and I just wanna go back to that really quickly because this is a rare movie that basically that gets viewers to invest in the stakes of what is effectively a small business. It’s a small business that is attempting to grow into a very large one, of course. But it says, look, here’s a guy whose goal is to make a ton of money by distributing a game.
  • Speaker 3
    0:29:44

    Like, it’s not the stakes aren’t existential except in the sense of, well, there’s a backdrop of communism falling. Right? But for him, the stakes are mostly is he gonna make a lot of money or is he gonna lose his house? Right? Like, is this a lot for a person, but it actually brings yours into something that you don’t see in movies a lot, but is a really true thing in the world, which is that small business owners, people who start companies.
  • Speaker 3
    0:30:10

    Are incredibly invested in these things even when they are in some sense frivolous. And like Tetris, as wonderful as it is, is frivolous. Tetris makes the world a better place for sure, but that’s an important like insight into the world is that for quality and fun and things that in that don’t matter in a deep sense, those things can be tremendously important to people and they can they they make our world richer and more amusing and more interesting. And of course, they also build empires. Right?
  • Speaker 3
    0:30:41

    That became the predecessor to the Tetris company and you can build friendships around those things too. Right? The the guy who invented Tetris and the the founder of this company now, like, do these, like, these tours. They’re, like, they’re they’re best buds. They’ve been around for for a long time, you know, the sort of famous in the video game world.
  • Speaker 3
    0:30:57

    And it’s it’s a movie that actually sells viewers on the idea that that sort of essentially just it’s just a business proposition. But it can mean everything to one guy, to one person who owns a company to that person’s family, to the to the employees of that company. Right? There’s that great moment at the beginning where he says to all of the people who are either the the small number of people who are working for him. We’re a major publisher now or major distributor, whatever, like, the the word is.
  • Speaker 3
    0:31:26

    Right? And they’re they’re so happy Like, they’ve hit it it’s not just a big break for him. It’s also a big break for all, you know, the the dozen or so people who already Bulwark for him. And I It’s not that that story is never told, but it is rarely told in a fun popular form like this. And it’s rarely made as real and as sort of as accessible as this movie makes it.
  • Speaker 3
    0:31:46

    And so it’s a great story of, like, entrepreneurship is, like, there’s it’s actually kind of exciting and like building a business and selling something even something that isn’t world changing in the sense of like curing cancer. No.
  • Speaker 2
    0:31:58

    It’s just a video game. That’s really all it is. But at the at the same time, it makes the point that Fravoliti can drive innovation. Right? I mean, the, you know, in some ways, the crucial point in the movie is the point at which, you know, Hank explains to the folks at Nintendo that their chance of selling Game Boy’s, like, their ceiling on sales is much higher if they ship with a just a a game that has a much lower entry level.
  • Speaker 2
    0:32:25

    Right? And he’s absolutely right that if it’s perceived as a game that’s gonna be sort of difficult or for people who are already kind of invested in this, that of course there’s a cap on a number of people who are gonna buy this. But if you sell it with something that is simple and addictive, you’re much more likely to get people to make that kind of transition. And if you look at, you know, a lot of the sort of like the social Internet as we know it. Right?
  • Speaker 2
    0:32:50

    It’s like, Mark Zuckerberg invented Facebook in part to, like, debate which girls were hotter. You know, things you get a lot of drive people into you know, mobile payments with games like Farm Bill and Software. You’re, you know, you’ve got people who are wasting time But, you know, wasting time is actually quite valuable
  • Speaker 1
    0:33:09

    to
  • Speaker 2
    0:33:10

    people, that sort of low level of diversion. And the movie I mean, I think maybe even takes a slightly too light hand with that point, but it’s definitely done. Everything about this movie is deaf. I wouldn’t necessarily say anything about this movie is great, but it’s quite enjoyable.
  • Speaker 1
    0:33:26

    I think I think that’s fair. I mean, that that’s the thing is that it’s a it is a enjoyable, entertaining, little look at a interesting slice of human history. It’s finding how much more dramatic everything becomes when you put it around the Berlin Wall coming down. You know, this atomic blonde,
  • Speaker 3
    0:33:42

    I’m
  • Speaker 1
    0:33:42

    sure there are other examples. Those are the only two I can think of off off the top of
  • Speaker 3
    0:33:45

    my head, but, you know, final note that is just worth pointing out here is that this movie was co produced by Matthew Vaughn, who is the director of the Kingsman films among other things and who has is is the filmmaker who has probably most consistently exhibited a sort of libertarian, classical liberal view of the world. Right? Like, the second Kingsman film is about drug legalization. And and the the third one is about like why war is bad. He’s just like it’s kind of great to see that he’s that he’s just, like, continuing to nurture this this worldview and this way of of telling stories in other filmmakers who are also very good themselves.
  • Speaker 3
    0:34:27

    Yep.
  • Speaker 1
    0:34:28

    Alright. So what do we think? Thumbs up or thumbs down on Tetris, Alyssa. Thumbs up? Peter.
  • Speaker 1
    0:34:34

    Thumbs up with a continue to not totally trust my reaction. Thumbs up, good movie, pushing a good message for the world. That’s that’s why it’s good because I agree with it. Alright. That is it for this week’s show.
  • Speaker 1
    0:34:47

    Make sure to head over to Bulwark plus for our bonus episode on Friday. Just as a heads up, there will be no new episode next Tuesday. So we’re we’re we’re taking a week off. We we’ve got traveling to do, etcetera. So you’ll just have to suffer with that us for one week, but we we will have that bonus episode on Friday.
  • Speaker 1
    0:35:02

    Make sure to tell your friends. Strong recommendation from a friend is basically the only way to grow podcast audiences if it don’t ever will die. It did not love today’s episode. Please don’t mind me on Twitter at sunnyvale. I’ll keep in sure that it is.
  • Speaker 1
    0:35:13

    In fact, the best show in your podcast feed. See you guys next week.
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