Four nominees: Tarantino's theory that Like a Virgin is about a John Holmes type, Madsen's line that Ladera Heights is the Black Palos Verde (as transcribed), an inside L.A. joke that slayed one host, Keitel's torture theory of pinky first then threaten the thumb, with the 'let's get a taco' clip, and Buscemi's theory on not tipping.
One pick is not tipping, because Madonna herself negated the Like a Virgin theory; she liked the film, refuted the interpretation and gave Quentin a signed copy of her erotic album (as transcribed) saying it is about love, not dick.
Another's favorite is the Madonna theory regardless, since artist intent is not interpretation and nobody cares what Tony Scott believes Top Gun is about; the finger theory is also loved, with a joke about a jewelry store manager living his hand life with three fingers.
The N word stuff was controversial even in the nineties and has gotten worse; Tarantino goes for it here and in Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown, where Spike called him out and Sam Jackson came to his defense.
It is weird that none of the six is Black or Latino, which would play differently now; but the movie is purposefully about bad, racist people, no character stands outside it, and even the cop is implicated when Tim Roth kills the woman in the car after watching Keitel gun down cops.
Tarantino is quoted at the time of release wanting the characters to say very ugly things and profound things, idiots one moment and geniuses the next, guys who did time in San Quentin; it is not palatable now but it is self-conscious.
Buscemi's theory on Black women is a tough two minutes, complicated by Tarantino's obvious adoration of Black culture and the characters' talk of Pam Grier, Honey West and the E. Lois story; in general these guys are idiot crooks.
Lawrence Tierney as Joe is called bad, with disbelief that Keitel could not call in a favor from a good old actor; one host disagrees, and the comparison is Mike Francesa if he could not act; Tierney visibly muffs a line before 'my way or the highway' in a take left in the film.
Tierney's fat Skeletor body brings a presence; a podcast interview is cited saying everyone had a hard time with him because he was distracted and forgot lines, and he was fired after the third day, so he is kept out of the third act until the last scene.
The opening diner scene is the first candidate: the Madonna 'Like a Virgin' theory leads into the tipping argument, and the clip of Mr. Pink refusing to tip because society says he has to is played.
A lot of guys came out of the movie with a new vision of the service industry; one host, who had worked as a busboy and waiter for two summers, was offended by Buscemi's character and says anyone who has worked food service knows you tip.
Mr. White is teased as woke for dropping knowledge that waitressing is the number one job for non-college-educated women; the scene is said to foreshadow the rat, since Mr. Orange snitches on Mr. Pink when Joe demands to know who did not tip.
A low-key favorite detail is the Budweiser bottles at breakfast; Tarantino scenes often happen in the morning with people behaving as if it were night, like the wolf arriving at six in the morning.
It occurs to one host that the crew, dressed in uniform right before the heist, should not be seen together in public; it is called ludicrous and parked for nitpicks, defended as pre-surveillance state, and the waitress they stiffed would remember five guys in black suits smoking like chimneys and drinking Budweisers at nine in the morning; Joe should never be seen with them.
A nerd question asks whether the roving camera around the table, shooting backs and sides of heads, was stolen from someone; Terry Gilliam loved it at Sundance, it is Scorsese-ish, and the handheld over-the-shoulder following of Madsen going for the gas can feels like a flex.
The Copacabana tracking shot in Goodfellas is the comparison, called the greatest tracking shot in movie history; a Goodfellas episode could run four hours and needs a live audience.
The shooting style is read as naturalism, putting the viewer inside the conversation, and the scene characterizes everyone at once: a beef between Blonde and White, jumpy Pink, Orange lying in the cut watching, Nice Guy Eddie showing who runs what, and Eddie Bunker as pop critic preferring the early stuff.
It is one of the hosts' favorite opening scenes; an opening-scene week bracket is floated, half of Tarantino's openings would qualify including Inglourious Bastards (as transcribed), and openings and kickers are what matter most.
Keitel versus Buscemi over the bleeding Tim Roth is the second candidate: a long, escalating, well-acted scene; it is argued as the best Buscemi performance, intense, neurotic and imposing, and the two guns pointed at each other was the first John Woo reference one host caught.
Buscemi rankings: this first, The Sopranos second, Domestic Disturbance third ahead of Fargo and Miller's Crossing; Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead, remembered for 'boat drinks', Amongst Friends and Very Bad Things are recalled as the Tarantino rip-off era.
The ear-cutting scene followed by the unexpected Tim Roth murder is the third candidate; Madsen gets the gleam in his eye once White and Eddie leave, talks to the severed ear, and the cutaway to the graffiti above the door at the perfect moment is why the scene does not gross one host out.
Tarantino, for someone so violent, often does not show things: Marvin's head in Pulp Fiction is quick and the trunk dummy is obvious, though Hitler's body and Jamie Foxx's forty kills in Django are counterexamples; he also had no money and never shows the suitcase, and Mr. Blonde's speech before the torture is recited.
The movie does not get many Fraternal Order of Police screenings; Mr. Orange's unexpected murder of Mr. Blonde is a great twist nobody saw coming the first time.
Tim Roth performing the commode story, from meeting his boss at the diner through the different settings, is a candidate, with the 'panic hits me like a bucket of water' passage recited.
He had never seen anything like it at the time: the color palette shifts to the graffiti background and the movie comes alive, Roth's energy changes completely as he learns to be the character, and it layers Tarantino's recurring themes of story within a story, seeing Freddy instead of Mr. Orange, and the former actor's process of memorizing lines in the apartment with the Silver Surfer poster; the jumps between settings were unlike anything he had seen. — Chris Ryan
Roth gets to flex his chops with some of the most anguished yelling in a movie, but his accent is called very bad even though a dialect coach was on set the whole shoot; is he supposed to be Dutch? A rare bad accent inside a great performance.
Roth delivering the monologue in the bathroom to cops who stand still while the German shepherd watches showed one host that writing could do that.
Buscemi arguing about the name selections is a shorter but iconic scene, with the trade request and Joe's 'city council meeting' refusal recited; the Joe Cabot bit is saved for later.
Chris Penn doubting Mr. Orange's story, and Vic Vega's return from prison with the Scagnetti talk and the wrestling with Chris Penn and Tierney, are thrown in as further candidates.
The final choices split three ways: the commode story; the ear-cutting scene, taken as the whole twenty-five-minute stretch from the Mr. Blonde and Mr. White showdown to learning what a psychopath he is, since the shootings are never shown; and the ending with Chris Penn figuring it out in seven minutes, which displaced the opening diner for one host after twenty years. Three-way shootouts in general are loved and are said to have influenced one host's later work.
The category is brought back for this movie and all three would have ruled: they should all be assassins trying to kill Wick, Buscemi would be a great Continental guy or bartender in the vein of his Miller's Crossing character, Trejo one of the assassins when the first call goes out, and Michael K. Williams could run the Motel 6 empire with Fishburne as the Bowery Prince to his Bowery King.
Steve Buscemi is disqualified at once for looking sixty years old, though he could have been Jesse's dad getting out of prison for one scene; Danny Trejo versus Michael K. Williams is tough, and the movie arguably needs Michael K. Williams because, other than Ja Rule, it does not have a lot of signature Black performers.
Danny Trejo feels like he should absolutely be in the movie, imagined working at Toretto's Market in a little paper hat as Dom's uncle who just got out and is rebuilding his life, joining the family by Fast Four; the vote goes to Trejo.
Buscemi maybe could have played the principal; Treo (as transcribed) would have been a great frat member, the intimidating mute guy they pulled in; Michael K. Williams does not fit and would have been weird; nobody thought the film needed any of the three, a tough category for this one.
Asked who won the movie, the answer is that there is only one: it has to be Nick. — Shea Serrano
Cage's is a legacy-defining role, the moment he announced himself as the biggest star on planet Earth, with Kid Rock's song the right one about it, Confederate flags and all, awkward twenty years later; it has to be Nicolas Cage, nobody else.
A case is made for Buscemi, the guy with four lines: he is so good that they clearly added the end scene of him playing craps, which means he tested through the roof and Bruckheimer wanted him back for one more scene, maybe eyeing a sequel; the answer is still Nick Cage.
This is one host's favorite Nick Cage performance, the one time he put all the pieces together: white tank top tucked into dad jeans, the mullet, the amazing letters, 'Dear Casey', the promise to bring a bunny, secretly kind of funny.
Only three names are on the list, with Buscemi thrown on; Nick Cage is a yes by far, though whether this or The Rock is the peak of his career is debated, with Con Air having made over 200 million bucks.
Asked whether they like this or The Rock more: this one for sure, so much better because it is not as 'serious'. Two of the hosts have discussed before that Connery is not that good in The Rock, an old man running around Alcatraz in a Scottish accent, whereas Ed Harris is incredible in it; the premise fails because Harris was going to shut it down anyway and nobody would have died if they had called his bluff. The preference is for prison movies and big, beefy Cage, who was miscast as a chemical super freak nerd in The Rock.
This is the Nick Cage movie: after the Oscar and The Rock, Con Air announced a major star going for stardom, and it seemed he would be in our lives for the long haul, which proved wrong when about five years later it was over and he started making weird movies. Today's generation gets twisted up in superhero clothing or Iron Man's metal suit, so there is no 80s-and-90s style action star anymore.
On Cage the vote is yes from one host, with another said to be a no, and the yes is allowed; Trejo is a no, his career apex being Machete, or right now as a brand with his tacos and businesses, or when the show gave him his own category.
Malkovich is a no, his apex being Dangerous Liaisons; Buscemi is a no but can be in there; one of the great things about the movie is that it caught a lot of people not at their apex but all really good at what they were doing.
