Latest / Houselights: A Film Director Podcast / Unstoppable (2010) - Tony Scott | Houselights #169

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Unstoppable (2010) - Tony Scott | Houselights #169 · Houselights: A Film Director Podcast

1:48
Welcome to the ned Party. Welcome back to House Lights, our director discussion
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show here on the Nerd Party Network. Today, we're completing the House of
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Scott with the works of Tony Scott and his final film twenty tens Unstoppable.
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As Denzel is back yet again. Will this action film carry the same weight
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as his previous outings or will it derail? I'm Darren Yard master Moser.
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It's all the railroad puns today. I'm joined again by my friends, veteran
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railroader John Mills and Yellow Vest Tristan Riddell. Gentlemen, start your engines.
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I feel like that's good casting, Darren Early Jose, I think you got
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it there. Just because I'm the youngest person here doesn't mean so that's exactly
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I have to You're the yellow Vest. That's exactly why it's my haircut.
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It's why I got the Denzel role. He and I had the same haircut.
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That's true. Denzel was rocking the ball look in this in this film.
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It was a little bit better than me. He's like, you know
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what I've done? That equalizer money. He's saying, hey, you got
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it right. He's got to yes, he's got to stay an equalizer shape
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and it's you know, one thing for Chris Pine because twenty ten. So
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this is right after Star Trek, so he right after it, he is,
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this is his after Star Trek movie. Really, he's he's on a
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rise. Yeah, this is yeah, pre Wonder Woman and everything. This
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is uh, this is yeah, he's parlaying everything Guardian. I remember that
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one also was a good about Coast Guard. Uh, he's he plays a
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post guard guy. I'm mixing that. I'm mixing that up. Sorry,
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there's another thing that's Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher was in The Guardian. Sorry,
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yeah, there is another one where he's like on a boat and I
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just got the title wrong. But yeah, I don't have his whole film.
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That's okay. Now. One thing I realized we've never done like this
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is episode one sixty nine. And one thing we've never don on the history
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is is talk about the movies plot beforehand, like because we always assume,
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like if you're listening to this, like you the movie, I think so,
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No, I think it is, but I just I just want to
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say it this one time, like, okay, so Unstoppable, Tony's got
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twenty ten a runaway train carrying a cargo of toxic chemicals puts an engineer and
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its conductor in a race against time. They're chasing the runaway train in a
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separate locomotive and need to bring it under control before it derails on a curve
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and causes a toxic spill that will decimate a town. There you go,
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I don't know, I felt the need to do that. I just did.
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And this was based off of a of a real life event, and
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I looked it up and it's it was like, like, okay, everybody
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it it kind of happened, but like they connected it twenty five miles per
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hour and the guy hopped on the train when it was going eleven miles per
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hour. Yeah, yeah, just a little slower, a little little bit,
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a little bit, a little bit less dramatic in real life. But
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at the same time, though it's a movie, It's like it would have
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been so anticomagic if like he just sauntered over and hopped on. Hold.
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Was like, you're telling me that. Tony Scott, with his action sensibilities
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came in and it was like, yeah, great story, bro. Now
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let's magnify everything by a billion and see what happens with that, and it's
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like, yeah, I mean because the thing is that that that's an interesting
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premise for a movie, but is terrible movie to watch, right where it's
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like, oh, look, it's easy to solve this problem. Well,
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cool, guys, it's great. I don't know. I I'm so glad
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that you actually brought that up. And Darren, I'm totally stealing the opener
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from you, but it sure, you know, Okay, So okay,
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So obviously it's obviously it's amped up. It's a Hollywood film, and I
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really really appreciate it when films started with saying inspired by true events, it's
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not based on real events, right, there's a really important difference between based
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and inspired. This was truly inspired by real events, like the real one
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happened in Ohio and it was totally slow by comparison, and there was actually
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a curve that they had to worry about. That's actually did Seven's it's crazy
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different. But one thing that really Okay, So you know, like John
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you talked about, how you know, like would you like Darren and John
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you talked about like would that be satisfying if you had that kind of where
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you just kind of saunter over what like when I finish a movie, I
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love going on letterboxed and seeing you know what people say about it. And
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I saw a lot of five stars, and I saw a lot of one
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stars. I was like, oh wow, this is interesting, and so
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I clicked on the one stars and so many people were like, like,
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it's so predictable. There's a runaway train, there's two guys. Two guys
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stop the runaway train any questions? And I'm like, what is wrong with
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what? Did you want them both to die? And like the town to
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be destroyed? Like is that the ending you wanted? Yeah, that's actually
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the ending those people wanted. That is exactly the I will I will go
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I will die on that hill. Those people exposed themselves as the ones that
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are dissatisfied if the train doesn't like go out, and like Chris Pine has
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a tearful thing where he's like, I'm so sorry, honey, I truly
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love you, like just as the train hits because he has to strap himself
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onto the front of it to try tell him to watch Rogue one. You
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know that'll fill your cup right there. Not everything needs to be the Godfather
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part too. You could walk out with a spring in your step every so
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often. It's fine, but it's but speak speaking of Star Wars, it's
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just when I see stuff like that, it makes me think, like,
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okay, so like when you were watching Star Wars seventy seven, like did
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you were you pissed off that that Luke Skywalker made the shot at the end,
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Like yeah, like I totally called it, you know, like Luke
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Skywalker Like of course, and even in the meta thinking about it, if
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it's inspired by real events, most likely they are real events that ended up
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happy because no one's really gonna make a giant movie about Like remember when like
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that town got wiped off the map from the Runaway Train. They're not gonna
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make a movie about that. Yeah I would, I would hes it.
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Well, they'll give it some time, I think. I think there.
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I think it takes a lot longer for that story to be told because there
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are incidents where it is dramatic enough, like but it's like Silkwood dramatic enough
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where you're like, we got years after the inspired by Yeah, that's not
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enough for a track. You've got to be twenty years. You gotta be
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twenty years. Yeah, you gotta give it some time, got to give
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it some time. But yes, well let's be let me, uh take
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control, put my pin back in of this train car. But this is
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an also interesting one for us because I had seen this one before, but
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neither of you had. And Tristan you said you shared your direction plan of
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seeing what other people thought. John, what did you think before you even
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saw it? I know that I missed this movie specifically because we had two
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children by that point and an action movie about a runaway train. I'm just
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going brass tacks. Doesn't matter who was directing it, Like George Lucas would
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have gotten me out of my house to go see it. But at that
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point it was like, eh, to the point of the one star people,
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I wasn't sitting there saying, Oh, that movie's gonna suck. They're
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both going to live. I was like, you know, I'll get around
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to it eventually, and I just never got really around to it overall,
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which is kind of odd because it seems to have some pretty positive vibes from
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the critics and everything, and so I never heard bad things about the movie.
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It's just everybody knows how it is, especially nowadays with your watch list.
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Lot like if there'd been around in twenty ten, because it wasn't.
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Yeah, this probably would have caught your eye on the shelf, but it
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just slipped through. Otherwise, Yeah, yeah, this would have been like
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the oh, look they have their their their guaranteed wall is empty. Let's
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grab unstoppable. That's oh Tony Scott, Oh oh Denzel. Okay, that's
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a winning combination. I've seen that before, exactly. See. That's the
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thing though, is that, like John, I was kind of the same
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way, where like I saw the ads for it, and I was just
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like, oh, it's a runaway train, you know, It's just kind
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of like, eh, even though it has Denzel, Tony's got in Crispine,
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it still wasn't enough to draw me in. Now, this had a
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budget of sixty eight million, and it it had almost one hundred and it
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had had one hundred and sixty eight million in box office. That's one hundred
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million return, not including marketing costs. But like it more than doubled its
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budget. So I mean this, this movie made money, you know.
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And yeah, and so it was I was confused that this isn't a bigger
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thing. However, what I'll point out is twenty ten, where now the
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Marvel engine is just warn I mean, oh, you're right. And so
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this is the point where one hundred and sixty eight million dollars doesn't sound like
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as much to suits anymore. This is where we start to lose perspect two
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hundred Yeah right, where's my Iron Man money? Where where's my even Louis
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Leterrier's incredible Hulk money? Where's Chris Pine? Train movie didn't make a billion
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dollars? It's like, okay, wait, which Chris are we talking about?
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Yeah, rightly, I thought this was Heavensworth and denzil Ah. Yes,
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no, no, It's absolutely a good point of the changing trajectory of
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film at the time. And I say I've seen it. I did,
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I don't. I'm pretty sure I did not see it in theaters. I
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just happened to catch it like a couple of years later and have watched it
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several times. It's it's definitely an enjoyable rewatch, I mean, Trucker,
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he still saves the train every single time if you watch it. But h
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no, I yeah, but I'm glad you had that idea, Just that
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of of kind of talking about the plot a little bit, as we do
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assume often that our listeners wouldn't listen to a movie review show without actually but
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hey, there's some crazy people out there, who knows. But yeah,
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so this one it's interesting because I mean I kind of joked about it at
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the beginning of this episode in my intro about you know, an action film
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with Denzel it's a very different action film. It's what do they call it,
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man versus nature kind of thing. It's a different kind of uh,
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you know, unstoppable force. So there's no guns, zero guns in this
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movie. That's not true. That's not true. They're guns. They try
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to shoot the off switch. Okay, it's highly stupid, right next to
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the gas can. It's incredibly stupid. For another reason, in it's totally
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movie logic sort of thing, because my first thought, well, they're sitting
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there at it, and I'm like, not one bullet ricocheted and clipped anybody
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or hit a tire. I like the close range like that, and the
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gauge and the firing of the I'm like, somebody got one like lost inn
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ear here or something like that. So well, and then a little later
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and with the derailment, all those cops are like, all the cars are
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like right there, I'm like, man, you deserve to have your car
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total. Why would you park next to a derailing train? There should be
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like a five block radius of nobody. But hey, you know, well,
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I I will also say that while everybody makes fun of the uh you
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know, save the cat trope and everything, when it hit the horse,
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when the accident happened in the horse trailer was hit by the truck and everything,
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I'm glad they spent the time to save the horse because horses are majestic
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creatures and I love them. And when the car hit it my I actually
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was watching it alone and my first words were, oh, that horse is
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dead. And I was so happy that they made sure to show me that
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the horse was okay, because I would have been so angry about that,
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like disproportionately angry, like the cop like, yeah, dummy, you park
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next to the track. But the horse didn't do anything deserve just didn't do
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anything, didn't do anything to deserve what was going on there. And you
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know, but it is interesting because even with Tony Scott's over the top action
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sensibility, he as a season director comes in and he's like, and we
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got to make sure the horse is okay. We got to make sure we
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show the horses over. I think you hit on it, though, John,
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of what I was kind of leaning into, because it's the tension in
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this movie, and really the tension is all about what is placed in front
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of the train. The train is a constant, and so we place a
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horse trailer with a horse in it. First, we place a train with
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like the proverbial you know, school bus full of kids. It's the train
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full of kids on a field trip. And the guy is like sweating,
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like tried to get in that sighting. And you're like, oh boy,
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and okay, we need to give props to that engineer because he could have
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slowed down, he could have tried to stop that. But the thing is,
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though, is that like, because he didn't slow down, because he
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stayed steady, he saved all of those kids. Now A granted this is
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of course an invention of the movie, but still like, like, this
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morning, I ran out a time to watch it, and I was like,
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I gotta watch this movie this morning. Guys like everybody leave daddy alone.
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And my young my two year old, would not leave me alone.
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And I was like, fine, screw it, You're gonna watch it with
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me, and so we're watching Unstoppable together and then we get to that scene
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where they're going where the train full of kids and the runaway train are going
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at each other, and I just I pause it. I'm like, you
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know what, I have no idea how rough this movie's gonna get it.
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You're not gonna watch this anymore? Yeah, yep, fair, fair assumption.
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If you hadn't seen it, that could have been a really bad moment.
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Uh. But yeah, so we're we're putting different things, you know,
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you and I think I saw a great job a a what's what those
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bandits called the the animals that look like bandits, raccoons. There was a
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raccoon, there was a there was one raccoon that ran across the train tracks
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while the train was coming. And you just know the editor was licking his
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lips like, well, we had we had a lot of the tropes.
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We had the uh car guy leading out of a car door doesn't see the
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poll coming and the car door gets sheered off check, you know, and
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oh, the I just want my kids back storyline. Mm hmm. Yeah,
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oh yeah, totally. That's the That's that made me. It made
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me think about some of Tony Scott's previous works, and one consistent line of
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thought that we've had is action movie tropes, but you don't mind them,
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right, This is a decent movie because it's a decent movie, and you
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have Tony Scott, you know, at the helm he knows how to take
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and use the trope without making it eye rolly, at least in my opinion.
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You know, one thing that we really talked about was in Man on
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Fire, where that easily could have been a tropy eighties style action film,
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but it had a lot of depth and its commando or something chipping in satire.
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Yeah, and this one, this one took you right up to the
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edge but then brought it back. Yes, And I think it's also his.
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The way they tell the story of Chris Pye and going through stuff is
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important, and I think it lends into Tony's. Tony Scott's style of approaching
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character and the way the actor plays it is that there isn't one big,
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clunky, expository moment. It's the way real conversations happen where somebody doesn't necessarily
18:00
want to talk about it, they get prodded a little bit to say,
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hey, it's not your business, and then Okay, fine, I'll tell
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you a little bit here and then the other person like there's a real give
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and take. And this is where I'll give Denzel Washington a lot of credit,
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especially working with Tony Scott. I think that Denzel Washington works really well
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and finds the chemistry with Chris Pine to make that conversation feel authentic as opposed
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to clunky, Just like I think that Denzel Washington's strengths as an actor make
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the discussion about his daughter's working at Hooters a charming, funny one where he's
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busting Chris Pine's chops. He's like, your blushing, that's okay, I
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know, Like you get the sense that Denzel Washington really exists, that this
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character really exists, that this is a real person because he's having real human
18:53
interaction and reaction with stuff. And that's why you don't to your point tersts
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and that's why you don't mind the tee because it's done the way that real
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people would do it if it were not a trope, you know. And
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also like to piggyback off of that, like when he calls his daughters when
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he when like when they after those returns, that felt like a very real
19:15
moment because he didn't he didn't say like, I'm so sorry that you know
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we haven't been in contact, you know, like we haven't have we haven't
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been right since your mother died, and I like I vowed that I would
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do x Y got to work close the Yeah, that's it. It's all.
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It is, just saying like just you know, like you can tell
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that something's wrong. She knows something's wrong. He's like, just tell your
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sister I love her too. Then boom, click phone. A lot of
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flip phones, a lot of flip phones in this movie, Like everybody had
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a flip phone. But speaking of it, the contact photos in the flip
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phones were the worst examples. What they were clearly headshots or taken at a
19:52
scene of the movie. Yeah, because you know how you got a headshot
19:55
into your phone back then, Guys you took a picture with your phone on
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your two megapixel if you were lucky. It just looked like trash. Why
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why didn't they just have them take selfies. I don't understand, but that's
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what they should have done. Even because the workers sent the train off.
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His like headshot on the news looked like immaculate. It was like the nicest
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you know headshot that we'd never seen. Uh okay, little little quibbles,
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but little equibble, little quibble. Uh yeah. So so you have the
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train going on, but yeah, like you said, Tristan, a lot
20:30
of real moments and it does get a little more dialoguey as it goes,
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but that's not bad because they've earned it, because they've had all those little
20:38
conversations about hey, get off your phone, Hey, we got to do
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our job, like and he so. Yeah. Obviously in the last third
20:48
there is that kind of not exposition dump, but they're kind of he he
20:52
he swings around. It's like, oh, hey, well we have time
20:55
now. Wanted to tell me, you know what what that was all about.
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And that feels earned. If they had had that conversation within five minutes
21:02
of meeting each other, we would have been like, why are you info
21:06
dumping on us? And it wouldn't have felt good. Yeah, And like
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you feel like you feel the urge from a writer's perspective or from a director's
21:15
perspective, for Chris Pine's character to just unload on him, saying like,
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ah, I'm sorry, I'm on the phone so much. I got this
21:22
thing with my wife and the you know, like the restract very people are
21:26
fairly private in their real lives. Like not everybody like loves to dump on
21:30
other people that they've just met. Yeah, that's a movie thing or a
21:33
weirdo thing. Well, I need a character to give exposition in a movie
21:38
because you can't go inside their head. So it's it's just a nature of
21:42
the beast. I appreciated this exposition. I didn't mean to cut you off
21:47
there, Darren. I appreciated this exposition, but at the same time felt
21:49
a little weird about it because in the opening, like we see chris Pine
21:55
and he's sleeping on a couch, but then like we like we don't quite
21:59
know where he's but then he looks through the crack on a door and you
22:03
see someone and then but they don't establish how he's looking at him, and
22:07
so like they don't establish the geography of the space, and so it kind
22:11
of is like, okay, is that his husband is he crashing? The
22:15
geography of the face is Crispine is barely wearing anything, and that is what
22:21
that is what that shot is for. And they cut on the cross boom,
22:26
cut on the crutch. But it regardless, You're right, but like
22:30
on top of that, like it was just kind of weird. And also,
22:33
why is the guy that he's staying with, who's a friend. Why
22:36
is he taking the calls from the lawyer. Why isn't the lawyer talking to
22:40
Chrispine. If Crispine can take a call from his friend, why isn't he
22:44
taking a call from his lawyer. That's a great question, and I will
22:48
defer to the legal experts in the audience to know if there's a reason why
22:53
that would happen outside of possibly that there's like I was trying to work with
23:00
that to your point, to be like maybe the friend has a relationship with
23:04
the lawyer, like the lawyers like, you know, like he's involved in
23:11
Yeah, I've been there, I've been there, I've been there. Yeah,
23:15
it's it's possible. It's one of those things where I think that,
23:19
you know, just like the internal geography of a space, you know,
23:26
you go back to true romance. We have the same sort of complaint with
23:30
with Tony Scott with that I don't know that it's always been his his I
23:34
don't know that it's always been his achilles heel. I don't I won't go
23:38
far as to say that, but obviously it's something that you know, it
23:41
comes up every so often. But in terms of that personal relationship, I
23:47
think it was just because it was a way to deliver exposition without it being
23:51
clunkier or having him take more phone calls and stuff like that, because I
23:56
think that if we go to a certain point where he's taking more hidden phone
24:02
call, you know, like I don't know, I'm trying to explain it
24:04
away here. I concede it as a flaw, but it's one where it
24:08
moves quickly enough that it's like, eh, yeah, you know, no,
24:11
sure it's not for me. It's oh no, no, no,
24:15
you know. The exposition because the plot, guys, is the giant train
24:19
that's running away that growled like a tiger every time we saw it on screen.
24:25
It sure was ferocious. Well, I'm also I love that trope.
24:29
I love the trope of adding an animal noise to a how well, I'm
24:36
also willing to bet that there were enough rewrites along the way that they,
24:41
you know, probably that guy was there for a certain thing, and then
24:44
like they like the part or the plot line wins up getting trimmed down.
24:48
Because this is only ninety six, ninety six ninety eight minutes or something like
24:51
that. Really short. That's really really short for a Tony Scott movie.
24:56
But if it was I feel like two minutes to her, it would have
25:00
been too long. Oh. Absolutely, Yeah, this was a ninety eight
25:04
minute story, and I'm glad it was a ninety eight minute movie. Yes,
25:08
ninety eight at most. I would say that maybe you could have even
25:11
shaved a couple of minutes off of this where specifically just truncate a couple of
25:18
you to establish a lot of people, like you have to establish Connie,
25:22
like she gets a fair amount of screen time as well. She's not a
25:26
bit player. She's having an you know, Sam with Wicki's dad. I
25:32
know what. I know him as fighting tr Kevin done for the little guy,
25:37
Okay, Kevin done? You you philistine, you person person, Kevin
25:45
done. Slotting into a role that he's played a billion other times, like
25:52
this is, this is and I'm not taking anything away from him, but
25:56
like this type of role, if I'm casting it, I'm like, yeah,
25:59
I get Kevin done. He knows, he knows how to shout this
26:02
line. Just just get Kevin done on the phone. Just have him show
26:04
up. Okay, he doesn't need any prep time. Yeah. And also
26:08
speaking of trup I mean I keep saying, I keep saying speaking of tropes.
26:12
But again the CEO on the golf course, Oh god, well,
26:18
what's that gonna packed our bottom line? Bob? Well, let me tell
26:21
you he's gonna be thirty down home from from Vestor's Bottom Night, Rob from
26:26
from from golf game. Yeah. Perfect, No, you're right, Uh
26:32
yeah, well, I mean maybe, Gosh, I'm looking right now.
26:33
There's like three Kevin actors in this movie. There's Kevin Dunn as Oscar,
26:38
There's Kevin uh Corrigan as the inspector Guy, and then Kevin Chapman as Bunny,
26:44
a railroad operations dispatcher man. A lot of Kevin's, but I think
26:49
the unsung hero. Gosh, this guy was chewing the scenery, but so
26:53
much fun. Lou Temple as ned ponytail giant red truck that looks like just
27:00
a fun I don't know if he really existed in real life. I don't
27:04
need to know. I don't want to know. I want to imagine that
27:07
this guy exists and just loves peeling out in his giant outrigged bread truck every
27:14
chance he gets. Is so fun. Well, and he had worked with
27:18
Tony Scott on Domino, so you know, Tony Scott bringing back somebody that
27:22
he's worked with before again. But he was a he was I think he
27:27
was like an E. M. T or something like that and Man on
27:30
Fire I can't remember, so like he's he's been in smaller roles before.
27:33
Okay, yeah, it was the lack of ponytail. I didn't catch him
27:37
in the when he shows up at the end and he says he's like,
27:41
hey, you know, like I need a police escort or even at the
27:45
at the very end, like a I thought he was going rogue, like
27:49
I thought he was trying to be a hero. And you know, like
27:53
it was really because they didn't stup with the train, right because they kind
27:56
of don't and they don't reveal what it was until the very very end,
28:02
right, and he says that Connie sent him, and then that comp was
28:04
just like wait, you know Connie and everything like that, and so it
28:07
was it was weird because we didn't see that conversation between Rosario Dawson and lou
28:12
Temple. So it was one of those it wasn't a DOSX mockin up,
28:17
but at the same time, like they could have had like five seconds of
28:21
Connie saying get down there, right right, Yeah, it's yeah. And
28:27
then there's some interesting characters, like again you have the inspector who knows a
28:33
lot about explosives. It's like very handy to have. Again, I don't
28:37
know if this character or a person existed in real life or if they're just
28:41
for the plot to move it along. But yeah, but overall, now
28:49
on a little bit of a negative, there are definitely some shots where the
28:52
train's rolling through and you're like, it's not going sixty miles an hour,
28:57
Like I know what a sixty mile an hour like call our vehicle looks like,
29:00
and that's like twenty You know, it's obviously not going that fast.
29:06
But I don't really care because it's like they got to work with what footage
29:10
they're shooting and and you don't want to not be safe with an actual train.
29:15
So it wasn't a huge deal, but you could notice it at times.
29:18
Yeah, it's it's true. It's true. When you have that many
29:22
train shots in a movie, Uh, you gotta get some variety, and
29:26
you gotta it can all be raccoon shots. Yeah, what what's what?
29:30
What is actually interesting is because you're especially twenty ten, you're in the era
29:37
where you easily could have had a CG train going down the tracks, or
29:41
somebody would have said, you know what, we can control this. We
29:44
just get a shot of a clean tra was a shot, but I didn't
29:47
notice anything NOG train. No. But but but That's what I'm saying is
29:52
you have that choice, or you have what I would say is the Tony
29:56
Scott choice, which is we're gonna shoot this and we're going to swoop in
29:59
with with helicopters and we're going to edit the crap out of this so that
30:03
you get the sense of the train like we're going to disorient you. I
30:07
will actually offer that there are a couple of moments that fall flat as a
30:11
result, because it's so obviously manipulated what you were just saying, like you
30:15
can tell. But then there are certain shots where like it cuts to like
30:19
over side, front side, front, over under right, it's like like
30:25
it's one point at that point, it's like the magician getting a little too
30:30
showy, and you're like, listen, I was playing along, Okay,
30:32
I know you're not really sawing anybody in half here. You don't need to
30:34
like have the screaming. Okay, let's let's just let's just agree that I
30:38
know how this trick works. There's a there's one shot where the camera is
30:42
right above the right wheel of the train, and I think it's a key
30:47
moment where it's not going to get diverted, and so it follows and stays
30:52
on the main line. And I'm like, that's a really nice shot because
30:55
it's literally where I would be following as an It's true, like, how
31:00
many ways can you shoot a trade Like there's a lot of times where I'm
31:03
pretty sure. I mean, I don't know exactly how they did it,
31:06
but it's almost like they had an arm, like they mounted it on the
31:08
roof of the train, had an arm coming out so they could swing it
31:11
around looking through all the glass. Because every shot of Denzel and Chris talking,
31:19
it was moving around the cab outside the cab, looking through the glass
31:23
constantly, over and over and over. I'm like, okay, you got
31:26
that rig use it. That was one criticism that I saw online was this
31:32
was I saw more than a few people say they want to take the Dolly
31:37
cam away from Tony Scott in this movie Fair It's fair, I would say
31:42
that fair, but noticeable. I'll just say that bad. Those times where
31:48
it crossed. There were times where it sort of got a little excessive.
31:52
But but the thing is excessive is is Tony Scott's calling card. All of
31:57
these movies that we've talked about right there, there is always something excessive about
32:04
it. It's just different levels of excessive in whether we think it works particularly
32:07
well. I look at this and I can see the same guy that did
32:13
Man on Fire calming down a little bit, just like you know, we
32:16
hit Man on Fire, and then we move forward and we sit and we
32:21
can clearly say I can see the same director working here. The interesting thing
32:25
to me is we can't. Like I think, if you look at Man
32:30
on Fire and then you look backward towards Beverly Hills Cop two, you can
32:35
see the director evolving to that point, and then you move from Man on
32:39
Fire forward, you can see a director refining and trying to control. And
32:46
Darren, as you mentioned at the beginning, this is his last film,
32:50
and I would have given anything to see where he went next, because I
32:54
think that unstoppable. You see him getting full. You know, it's the
33:01
worst word, right, You see him refining it like Man on Fire is
33:07
his big magnum opus over the top, look at everything I can do.
33:10
And then you see him move forward, and it's and it's that guy learning
33:15
how to contain it, learning how not to go all the way up to
33:20
eleven and still make it really visually interesting. And I would have given anything
33:24
to see his next project after this, because I think, I think you
33:29
get you get somebody who's completely comfortable with all of the tools at that point,
33:32
and you know, that's just where I go with it mentally. You
33:37
even had a little bit of a dash of the low shutter speed in the
33:40
very very beginning as they're kind of establishing the train, but it was just
33:44
enough to be like, oh, that's the train I need to focus on,
33:47
you know. And obviously it's smart that they it's the one with all
33:51
the seven's, like, and it's the giant red one, like they make
33:53
it really clear, you know, all the other trains we see are like
33:57
blue and gray, and it's like, no, it's the hot rod red
34:01
one is the one that caught away. And let me offer that that goes
34:05
back to a criticism that a lot of people leveled at the original top gun
34:09
where the tail numbers would get mixed up in the editing, and we know
34:14
all the different technical reasons for that, and people would be like, oh,
34:15
this plane is here and this plane is there and that sort of thing
34:19
making that chu Chuo train red and a seven seven seven That is somebody who's
34:24
like who got burned by that criticism. It was like, fine, I'm
34:29
gonna make it super clear which train we're looking at. Guys. I think
34:32
that's such a great pulls. It's so true even though it was you know
34:37
at that time, it would have been twenty four years ago of twenty four
34:42
years prior. You know that like people who are creators or artists, they're
34:45
just they don't let go of those kind of criticisms. Noop new they do
34:51
not want should days like we have the CG technology to like paint over those
34:55
tail fins and fix it if we really want it easily. But that you
35:01
know now or now you even see where I mean. I remember on television
35:07
a lot you would have all the screens would just be green, like they
35:12
would replace all the monitors so that countdown timers and everything would always hit its
35:17
mark because it was done in post and you know we know, we know
35:21
how it is, but yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, seven
35:23
seven seven, it's an unlucky number. You know. I absolutely love love
35:30
that The two dipshits that caused this to happen were played by Ethan Suple and
35:37
TJ. Miller. Yeah, oh great, Cass see them and you're like,
35:42
well, this isn't gonna go well for you boys. You just know
35:46
they're like the way they're yawn on the on the radio, and he's like
35:51
watching them with his binoculars, like, I see you guys sitting right here.
35:53
You're not doing your job, and do your job. And this was
35:59
this was before Ethan Supple got jacked slipping down. It's kind of as in
36:05
his middle of his transformation. Yeah, yeah, I agree. It's it's
36:10
good to have these characters because of the fact, because the thing is that
36:15
this is another thing that makes this an atypical action er sort of thing like
36:22
this, where other directors they focus on Chris Pine's family life and and Denzel
36:27
Washington's family life and those sorts of things, and that's where we really get
36:31
our drama. But there is a very conscious, you know, criticism of
36:38
corporate culture and class culture and no, and nor should it be. I
36:45
love the fact that they really lean into it and they're like, they throw
36:52
these actual things that would be real factors in the real world for these real
36:57
people and up to and including you know, you talk about, oh,
37:02
the CEO on the golf course sort of thing, but the guy sitting there
37:07
and the only threat he has is you're fired. You're all fired if you
37:10
don't get this done. And I love the moment where Denzel Washington says,
37:15
yeah, you already fired me, what do I care? Yeah, and
37:20
you have no power here. You know. It's you know, honestly,
37:24
the most liberating thing in the world is if you work at a dysfunctional place,
37:29
being able to say to somebody, you know, if they walked in
37:31
the door today and they said leave, my reaction would be okay, you
37:37
know, Like that's that's the ultimate power. And that's what I love that
37:40
they give that to Denzel Washington's character, for him to play that moment to
37:45
say, I don't care, fine, fight, what are you gonna do?
37:49
Fire me? Twice? Go to hell. I love that moment when
37:52
he says like, it's like, I'm not doing it for you, you
37:54
know, it's there's there's so many There's there's a reason why Denzel is such
38:00
a freaking movie. He's so good at what he does. And I know
38:06
that he's gotten some criticism in his career for being like a self insert like
38:10
he only accepts movies where he can be Denzel, and to them, I
38:14
say, screw yeah. But in this, in this movie, like he's
38:20
he's sitting in a he's sitting in a cab just talking with Chris Pine like
38:25
ninety percent of the time, or talking on the radio. But he plays
38:30
these lines so well. He makes it interesting. His face makes it interesting,
38:37
the way that he delivers the line. I know that I'm just explaining
38:39
acting to you, guys, but it's just as in Lesser Hands, this
38:45
this movie is nowhere near as interesting. Well, I think there's also an
38:50
interesting thing that Tony Scott does this, and then you can sort of contrast
38:53
it with Crimson Tide, where he's smart enough to know I can't ever let
38:57
the audience off of this submarine. But he knows here, I have to
39:00
let the audience off of this train because of what you're talking about. You
39:05
can get away with not letting anybody off the submarine because there are so many
39:07
characters on the submarine. You cannot trap the audience with these two guys for
39:13
ninety eight minutes. You have to go out and see Rosario Dawson, and
39:17
see Kevin Dunn, and see all of these people outside working toward this common
39:23
goal. And I think it's it would be really interesting to do one of
39:29
those cheesy double features, to say, Crimson Tide Unstoppable, same director,
39:35
and look at how he uses his same toolbox to build tension in two completely
39:39
different environments but to the same effect. I think it'd be an interesting experiment.
39:44
And the train it's really like a shark. It surfaces occasionally because but
39:52
he uses it to his advantage that we don't know where it is, Like
39:55
it'd be so easy to be like, oh, yeah, there's a we
39:59
have all of our train with GPS trackers. We know exactly where it's Like,
40:01
do you don't know exactly where it is? You don't know what school
40:05
it's flying by at seventy miles an hour right now? Or you know what's
40:09
going on? And so yeah, I mean so if you obviously we spend
40:15
more time in remember the number, but twelve, oh yeah, twelve or
40:19
six there we spend more time with that train than we do with the speeding
40:22
train. Obviously, because nobody's on that train. That'd be very boring.
40:25
It's like we're the cab. Just here we go right, another intersection.
40:31
But yeah, I think again, like you've said, both of you,
40:36
he's really Tony Scott is really in his craft right now. Of amount of
40:40
time given to characters, drawing another great performance out of Denzel Peppering in a
40:46
lot of great background, even the very very ending the curtain call credits with
40:52
the three what happened later is like, I feel like that was necessary to
40:58
kind of just pin it. Yes, like you could have done it without
41:00
that. It was like, hey, he got his job back and then
41:04
retired with benefits. You know. It doesn't say if Chris Pine kept his
41:08
job or did something else, but it just focuses on his he's still buried
41:14
and having kid. Uh. And then he's like and then this, you
41:17
know, Connie got the bad executive job, which you get. I don't
41:22
know if that's true, but we'd like to think it is. And you
41:25
know, Dewey and Dewey Is start working in fast food, which is just
41:30
the perfect name, just enough to say and and to your to your point
41:37
where you're talking about with that, with the you know that, that ending
41:39
and everything. It would be so easy for somebody, especially of Tony Scott's
41:45
stature, to approach this as a paint by numbers. I'm just gonna get
41:49
my paycheck and walk away, I don't care whatever. But what you were
41:52
saying, Darren, where this is somebody accessing his entire toolbox. This shows
41:59
I think a real professionalism and a real love of craft on the part of
42:05
a director who refuses to phone it in. Even on the movies where I
42:09
didn't love Deja Vu, but he wasn't phoning it in. He was doing
42:14
the best he could. Or you look at the last Boy Scout. You
42:17
guys liked it even less than I did. That's not a guy phoning it
42:22
in. That's a guy in a very difficult circumstance, but he still gives
42:25
what he can. And I think that this is another movie where there are
42:30
a lot of directors where they would have shown up, they wouldn't have cared
42:36
about anything except look, let's just shoot it. Let's get it done in
42:38
eighty days and then we'll put it in post. I'm gonna go to my
42:42
next project to be done. I get the sense of a director who actually
42:45
showed up and did what he can't he can't not care about what's being done
42:52
on set. It would have been an HBO film, right, No,
42:55
like it would have been something it would have been something of that helper if
43:00
they just showed up and did it. And also like a different director would
43:04
have made this two hours and ten minutes and filled it with their backstories.
43:08
Before they even got to the train yards, there would have been another family
43:13
in right near the curve, and we're constantly cutting to them trying to evacuate
43:17
and getting away. We didn't see any of them like like it, you
43:22
know, because it was kind of a there's no point, like it's gonna
43:24
be such a bad disaster if that thing tips that there's just you're it's all
43:30
gone. Although I'll give Tony Scott credit for having the the the herd of
43:37
dumbasses on top of the building that the cops are like, we're asking you
43:40
to leave for your own safety, and it's like, yeah, no,
43:44
those guys would be there. They would be yeah, and they're all flipping
43:46
off the cops or you can't do anything about them. Well, I love
43:52
in the newscast when they say that, Like when they show a display of
43:55
the curve and they're like, and then there's the fuel depot right here at
44:00
the curve, and like, not did we build it there? Not for
44:05
a single moment did I ever think that that was unbelievable? Like I'm like,
44:09
of course, I mean that, I want to know if that's real
44:13
life, because I totally believed that some city planner would have done that.
44:16
You know, it's just h yes, one hundred percent some city planner did
44:22
that. I don't know what Stanton, Pennsylvania looks like, but I'm willing
44:27
to bet that if I go, and I'm willing to bet that I'm going
44:30
to read an article where the real life story that this is based on is
44:35
that quietly afterward they moved where the curve was, or they moved where the
44:38
tanks were or something like that, where it is like they didn't call attention
44:43
to it, but they realized that this was an idiot mistake back then.
44:46
I you know, I think that I just looked it up and that Stanton
44:53
is not a real place at Pennsylvania U Scranton is. Yeah, maybe there's
45:00
nice paper company there, so I kept thinking they were saying, but yeah,
45:04
sorry, I just needed to. I googled it right now. I
45:06
was like, is that real? Well, and it's also interesting because you
45:09
know, like, as we're talking about Tony, I get the vibe in
45:14
this movie and it's good that And I don't know, maybe the statement isn't
45:22
necessary, but he's not making this movie to make the next franchise series of
45:28
runaway train movies, you know what I mean. Like it's he's not going
45:32
into it being like this is gonna put me on the map for that sweet
45:36
sweet Marvel money or something like that. And I know we're just getting into
45:39
that Marvel era in this time. But I kind of missed when movies were
45:44
like this. It's like, it's just inspired by events. It's fun,
45:49
but you're not trying to create a cinematic universe out of it. You're not
45:53
trying to you know, crossover with Crimson Tide because the same builder built the
46:00
train, who built the sub or something crazy like that. The sad thing
46:04
is is this movie would have been on Netflix today. Oh this totally would
46:07
have been a Netflix movie. And I to say that out loud, Well,
46:10
I you know, but but I do like I'm constructing it the way
46:15
you're talking about Darren, where like there's a stinger at the end of the
46:17
credits, mister Barnes, I'd like to talk to you about the Amtrak initiative,
46:22
right, and it's like it's like he becomes a roving train fixer or
46:28
something like who can stop this train? Captain Malcolm x H. That's right,
46:34
a Soka over the phone. Yep, pretty much, yes, yes,
46:39
indeed, all right, Well, as this train is heading towards the
46:45
curve, I want to say one thing before we go, is that we
46:49
keep talking about like a we're you know, Marvel era and everything like that.
46:52
Like Iron Man came out in two thousand and eight. Another film came
46:54
out in two thousand and eight, and that's The Dark Night. And I
46:59
do believe that Gregson Williams was heavily influenced by Hans Zimmer's work in the Dark
47:07
Night in two thousand and eight when he made this film. Only crap I
47:13
could have sworn that Zimmer made this. Like Like as I was as I
47:16
was watching the movie and I was listening to the music, I was like,
47:20
man Zimmers really repeating himself here. I'd say that's that's that's a fair
47:25
assessment of the score. Yeah, but you know, the the funny thing
47:31
is we haven't really talked about how I mean, you talked about in one
47:35
of the one of our episodes about how you know the production company there was
47:39
a stable of people and it's like Gregson Williams's name comes up so much,
47:45
and honestly, it's a little disappointing how to your point, how derivative some
47:51
of this sounds. But at the same time, your spot music sometimes really
47:58
influences how things sound, and it's like, okay, you know, but
48:02
there's nothing about this score that's really gonna light it up. I mean,
48:07
the most memorable thing was the sound effect that the train made us like,
48:10
that's all. I think. The sound design of this movie was. Sound
48:15
design is fantastic, fantastic. Did it not win an award? I think
48:20
it won an awards for sound I hope so oh. It was nominated for
48:25
an Oscar for Best Sound Editing at the Academy Awards, but it lost to
48:30
Inception. That's that's fair. I mean, if you're gonna lose, you
48:35
know, okay, fair enough. And yeah, I mean again, and
48:40
there's some crazy stuff going on this like the helicopter stuff, the guy repelling
48:45
down, you know, and it's they he's again. He does such a
48:49
good job of like it feels like the train's like right there, like if
48:52
I could just grab, But then I kind of put myself in that person's
48:57
position and I'm like, yeah, but if you jump and you miss,
49:00
you're dead because you're being run over by this giant. It's not a maybe,
49:06
it's you're you're dead. So not just dead, I'm not gonna do
49:09
it. Not just dead, but probably spending sixty seconds in excruciating torment as
49:15
your body taps out. All right, Well, as I said, as
49:16
we're rounding the final curve, yeah, we've been saying a lot, a
49:21
lot of positives. Definitely not a perfect film, but an enjoyable movie that
49:27
we finally came across our plates. So Tristan, why don't you start us
49:31
off with any final thoughts or your rating for Unstoppable. I'm gonna be ridiculous
49:40
here and I'm given this movie five stars. I genuinely love, same as
49:46
Man on Fire movie. It's it's a completely different animal. See that's the
49:52
thing like Godfather I talked about that. Yes, well, no, it's
49:59
like Godfather is is five stars, Toy Story three is five stars. True,
50:02
very different movies, but very different movies exactly unstoppable. When I was
50:07
watching this, I was so enraptured by it, Like I watched it by
50:12
myself, like in the basement, and I'm glad that I did, because
50:15
there were so many times when I reacted to it physically, where I like
50:20
one time, like I grabbed my mouth like ah, or like or like
50:23
I went set out loud to like what it's There's so many times you reacted
50:29
to it. And I caught myself grinning like an idiot. And I know
50:32
that this sounds ridiculous, but while I was watching it, I was just
50:36
like, I was like, man, this is this is cinema, like
50:39
this is this is man versus nature, this is this is just in your
50:45
face storytelling of spectacle. It's so much fun. It's so great, there's
50:52
so much Is it a perfect movie? No, But enjoyment level is straight
50:54
up there with five. And apparently this is one of us as we you
50:59
know, we just talked about in Step, but this is one of Kris
51:00
Nolan's favorite films and if it's good enough for him, it's good enough for
51:05
me. Well, by that rationale, that means that my love of the
51:07
Fast and Furious franchise is completely justified. So thank you very much for that,
51:12
Tristian Verdell. I appreciate you can have that one. Okay, you
51:14
can have that. Oh I'm gonna say that Tiff is unstoppable. John how
51:20
any final thoughts? Did this again? Enjoying for the first time, obviously,
51:24
But where does this rank in as we round out Tony Scott, Well,
51:30
I have to say that I love the idea of the John Henry Mann
51:36
versus machine. I'm gonna I'm stronger than the locomotive sort of thing. Cool.
51:42
I think that there are some real, real craft, real art on
51:45
display here. I think that everybody understood the assignment. If this were in
51:52
the old Channel surfing days and I was going through and I was like,
51:54
I need something on while I'm doing something, I would stop here. I'd
51:58
be like, yeah, unstoppable, that's good, But I'm not landing on
52:00
a five. I am going to land at a three and a half.
52:05
What Because I enjoyed it, I thought everybody understood the assignment, but there
52:12
was not the substance that I would normally enjoy. I'm not in the comparison
52:21
game. I'm not in a justifying my rating because I liked another thing this
52:25
much sort of game. I understand what you're saying with the five, Tristan,
52:30
but in the scale of how drawn am I to experience this again,
52:37
A five means I'm drawn to it and I know I'm going to experience it
52:40
again. A three and a half is that's fair. Rewatchability is a you
52:45
know, I'd watch this again. Like if you threw this same slate of
52:50
films against me and you're like, Deja Vous were unstoppable, unsoppable wins,
52:54
Last Boy Scouter, unstoppable, unstoppable wins, Beverly Hills Cop two. Yeah,
53:00
unsoppable wins. But you know, just for comparison, say you throw
53:05
True Romance or Crimson Tied Up against it, and I'm like, yeah,
53:07
that's a no brainer for me. So three and a half from me,
53:13
which is a I think a decent rating, And I just I wish I
53:17
could have gotten one or two more films from Tony Scott selfishly, because I
53:24
just think that this is a guy that, you know, like I was
53:29
saying earlier, he was incapable of phoning it in. This was just something
53:34
he was always going to get it right, and so three and a half
53:37
for me and God rest him. Well, yeah, I this movie,
53:44
Like I said, I watch it. I've watched it several times. It
53:47
is definitely rewatchable. Not that the ending changes or anything like that, but
53:52
it just tells a good story. It builds. Uh, you know,
53:57
you got fun characters. I love Ned He's so every time he's unscreened,
54:00
I'm just crack it up because it's just so funny. I will say,
54:06
I don't know which makes me squirm more, the the astronaut that has the
54:14
chunk of space degree will go right through his head in gravity or Chris Pine
54:17
getting his foot like whole punched by a train. Uh, it's a bit,
54:24
but no, I think I'm also going to give this a five.
54:29
It's just a lot of fun. It's well done. It does a good
54:36
job of you can tell it's being embellished like it. But that's not a
54:39
bad thing, because we all know real life can be interesting, but it
54:45
also can be really boring, and we have interesting characters like honestly, yeah,
54:50
made us all want to look up the actual story, which I think
54:52
is a great tribute to anything that's inspired by that makes you want to look
54:58
it up and be like, oh, what actually happened? And you know,
55:00
oh the numbers are all eights on the look about instead of sevens.
55:02
I see what you did there, you changed it. But yeah, so
55:08
but no, it's been a it's been a great ride with Tony Scott.
55:12
I think we're all sad that this was his last film and we don't get
55:15
to continue this house anymore. But maybe we'll circle around someday and pick up
55:22
some of the other ones we skipped this time through. There's always there's always
55:24
more. I think I'd like to do that, Yeah, little pick up,
55:29
Yeah, if we need some filler. All right, Well, as
55:32
I said, we've just been ending the long House of Tony Scott. We've
55:37
been doing this for several episodes since nineteen eighty seven Bevery Hills Cop two.
55:40
But next week we're going to go into the House of Zwick with Edwardswick as
55:47
we do another decade by decade play, starting with nineteen eighty nine Glory also
55:54
storrying Denzel Washington, join the Revolution, join the net Party, m