What’s Aged the Best?
Katarina Witt; McElhone's accent and outfits; De Niro's case-photo setup; slow-building first 40 minutes; self-operation scene; wrong-people realization; the 'any doubt' lessons; gritty French locations; shifting stakes
In the discussion (12)
Approx. transcript time · 00:41:26Read transcript
- Katarina Witt is the first pick: a host loved her and calls her the best-looking female athlete of his first 20 years, joking she could be a Bond villain.
- Witt, an iconic gold-medal skater, turns up playing a gold-medal figure skater with barely a line.
- McElhone's Irish accent is praised though she is from England, and her baggy-jeans outfits are back in style.
- De Niro handing a stranger his camera to photograph the case, then studying the photos, is a favorite setup.
- The first shootout into the first chase is only borderline, liked mainly for Sean Bean going for it, with Bean floated for the Dion Waiters or Vincent Hanna award and compared to a reality-show villain.
- The first 40 minutes build and build.
- The makeshift self-surgery to remove a bullet is a favorite action trope; other examples named are Heat, First Blood, Master and Commander (called the all-timer), Cast Away and John Wick, while The Fugitive does not count because he is a doctor.
- The realization that only the Russians could have produced the second case, 'we're following the wrong people', is a nice swerve an hour in.
- The lessons 'whenever there is any doubt, there is no doubt', 'that's the second thing they teach you' and 'no questions, no answers' are praised; a host says he should have adopted the first for Grantland.
- The grey, gritty, chilly south of France locations are praised.
- The movie changes from a guys-on-a-mission film to international intrigue to a cat-and-mouse game with De Niro, Deirdre and Mickey.
- Whether the MacGuffin aged well is left undecided, joked as a new 'what's aged the I don't know' category: it felt like a Pulp Fiction ripoff, but Sam's reveal that he was there for Seamus makes it work.