Name: ON CINEMA EPISODE 36: 300
Uploaded: 2012-06-04T15:49:28.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'ON CINEMA EPISODE 36: 300' from Tim Heidecker on Comedy Buff. Published 2012-06-04. Transcript available. Tim and Gregg discuss 300 with special guest Jordan Hoffman.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'ON CINEMA EPISODE 36: 300' from Tim Heidecker on Comedy Buff. Published 2012-06-04. Transcript available. Tim and Gregg discuss 300 with special guest Jordan Hoffman.

Hi, everybody. Welcome to another episode of On Cinema. My name is Tim Heidecker.
I'm
your host. It's a podcast where we talk about, I talk about, sorry, not
podcasts, talk about
movies and different new movies, old movies. Hopefully, we'll get to the point
soon where
we're seeing movies before you see them. Then we could do little previews, and
that would
be awesome. But anyways, I got a different special show today. I've got with me
my often
on the show guest, Greg Turkington. Hey, guys. Glad to be here and to talk
about cinema with
everyone and fill you in on all the details about movies that you might have
missed. And
I also would like to welcome our special guest. The computer is Jordan Hoffman.
Jordan, welcome
to the show. Hi, guys. Thanks for having me. I'm a long-time listener, and I
got to say
the audio fidelity of the podcast. Let me just give you a little explanation of
who you are. Jordan is a film writer. He used to write for UGO.com, and is a
freelance writer
who writes for MTV, About.com, IFC, Slash Film, Screen Crush, Badass Digest,
and I'm sure
many more. Thanks for coming on the show, Jordan.
Yeah, it's a pleasure to meet you both through cyberspace.
Cool. So the movie we're talking about today is 300.
Yeah, this is a great movie. I love this movie. And of course, if you've seen
Lord of the Rings
or that type of movie, this would fit in very, very well into that category. So
I just loved it. It
was a classic. You really think so? You really think it's of a piece with Lord
of the Rings? I mean,
I find them to be polar opposites in a sort of a philosophical point of view,
wouldn't you say?
Well, I mean, they're both great. They're both fantasies, and they don't take
place, you know,
in Hollywood or in New York City. So with these sorts of characters, I mean,
you can't go wrong. And
it's just a great movie. And Frank Miller is the director and did a great job.
And this was a big hit.
Yeah. Well, actually, actually, Frank Miller was the writer of the graphic
novel upon which it was
based. It was actually Zack Snyder, who was the director. All right. Well, okay.
Well,
so Jordan, tell me a little bit about this movie. I mean, I'm not super
familiar with it. I remember
seeing it. Can you tell me a little bit about? First of all, it's based on an
actual historical
event, the Battle of Thermopylae in ancient Greece, the quote, 300 Spartans
that held off the
Persians at the hot gates. And it's done in a very stylized manner. And I think
a lot of
critics don't give it its due because it was, you know, was released in 2007
when the political
culture was really very, very testy about anything to do with East versus West.
And, you know,
it's about the, you know, the Greeks symbolizing Western culture fighting off
the invasion of
the East, the Persians, you know, one could argue as a, you know, as a stand in
for Islamic culture.
And it seemed in bad taste at the time. But that's all of to the side of the
fact that it's a really
engaging, fun action film that is completely over the top, highly stylized, and
was quite
revolutionary in its use of green screen and hyper stylized violence. Yeah.
Well, I mean,
that could be true. I think it's a popcorn movie and, uh, and it became a
classic when it came out.
Well, a hundred percent a popcorn film, but I think it actually works not, not
to mix my,
my Greco metaphors, but a little bit of a Trojan horse in that it's sort of, uh,
brought in some
higher political themes, uh, subversive themes, you know, that maybe 15, 14
year old boys weren't
expecting to see. Wow. That's interesting. Yeah. Well, I didn't know anything
about that. I mean,
I, like I said, I'd seen it once on, I think stars. Well, I've seen it three
times. So, um, I mean,
some of what you're saying is right, but a lot of it's just not, I mean, it's
not that type of a
thing. This is a fun movie. It's fun. I mean, kids would like it. Adults like
it. Everyone likes it.
It's just a lot of fun. Well, no, feminists don't like it. And those who are
very, uh, you know,
hypersensitive to sort of, uh, bombastic, you know, neo-fascist, uh, imagery
don't like it,
but I think they're the ones who are being, they don't go to movies. All right.
Well, let me just,
uh, those people don't go to movies. Let me jump in. Cause I want to talk about
the lead star of this
movie, Gerald, uh, Gerard Butler. Is this, was this, uh, Jordan, was this sort
of his first big
action movie or the big movie that broke him out or certainly the first thing
that gave him any real
attention? I mean, I'd heard, I'd heard of him before. He's done a lot of, uh,
a lot of great
movies over the years. He's, um, uh, was in, um, uh, uh, tomorrow never dies.
James Bond. I'm a big
Bond guy. So, uh, I knew him from that. This was the one though that made him a
leading man. And,
uh, it's not that he does a great role. He's a sort of a, he's a sort of a cypher
for, you know, a, you know, alpha male, you know, the Spartan culture is, is
not exactly
warm and fuzzy. You know, he's, uh, you know, there's a sequence of him, you
know, just murdering
the injured, but he's, you know, takes his shirt off and he's got tremendous
muscle.
He's like a sex symbol as well.
Yeah. And he was born in, uh, November of 1969. So he's, he's getting up there
in years,
but, uh, you know, uh, give him a shot. It's, he's a great actor and it's a
great film. I would rent this,
uh, Netflix. You know, uh, it also was, um, one of the first films anybody saw
Michael Fassbender
and who now is a tremendous star. You're familiar with his work. I'm sure. Yeah.
Did, did you see, um, did you see shame the film that was a very, very popular
at festivals and
with the critics last year? I have it on my list. Um, definitely not something
I've seen yet. Um,
is that something you'd recommend? How many, how many videotapes do you own?
Do I, um, I actually don't, um, okay. Well, no, no. I mean, I used to have some
videotapes.
So you're not really committed to, um, building a library and having films for
reference. Cause
that's how you build up expertise is how that's not important. The important
thing is that this
guy knows a lot about this movie and he knows obviously a lot about, um, movies
in general.
For example, used to, you write for star trek.com, correct? Jordan. Yeah, that's
actually accurate. I
read, I write a weekly column for star trek.com, but that's not an authorized
site. That's just a fan
thing. Anyone can, I mean, that's like saying you're right for Wikipedia or
something. No,
it's star trek.com. That's official. That's an official website. Somebody just,
there's poachers.
There's people who make a living getting websites. There's guys that go on and
you know, well,
can you settle a bet for us then? Because we had this discussion about several
months ago about
star trek two and, um, Greg insisted that it was, and I've, I've pretty much
confirmed it through our
audience, but I'm convinced that the plot of star trek two was about, uh, the
wrath of Khan. It was
called the wrath of Khan. And Greg seems to think that it was about them going
back to
San Francisco, which is actually the plot of four. Can you know? Yeah. Uh, you're
right,
Tim. Uh, number two was about Khan. Um, and number four was when they go back
to San Francisco in the
1980s. They go through time. Hmm. Yeah. I'm going to have to disagree. Um, the
second, well, I mean,
it depends on how you number it. I mean, look what they did with the star Wars
movies. If you
are an expert in that, you see that they took the first one and now that's the
fourth one. So,
I mean, anything's possible, I guess. Actually, uh, you know, if you go way
back,
it was always episode four or not, are we talking about star Trek here? No, no,
this
means star Wars. Gotcha. Yeah. I don't write for star Wars.com, but I, um, you
know, I'm,
I'm, you know, I, I swing both ways in that regard. Can you tell me the, uh,
can you tell
me anything about the new star Trek movie that's coming up? Yeah. Um, it's
going to be great.
It's not going to have Leonard Nimoy. I'm actually asking Jordan here who
writes for star Trek.com.
Go ahead, Jordan. Uh, well, you know, I, uh, the, the script is, um, very much
under wraps.
There were a bit of rumors. Uh, so I, I actually don't know anything about it.
Yeah. Well, actually,
that's, that's actually a little accurate. I don't know too much about the plot
itself other than it's
the continuing adventures. Uh, there were some rumors. I mean, it's not, of
course it's the
continuing adventures. That's what they all are. That's why we love the series
and that's why it's
a successful series that and yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's right. That's
right. Um, but as
far as like who the villain is, whether it's Klingons, whether it's Khan in a
new form, whether
it's Ricardo Montalbom died about three years ago, he did die, but, um, you
know, so did the guy
who played the original Scotty and they've got a new one and the original bones
and whatnot. In fact,
none of the original cast is, is in the new Star Trek films with the exception
of Leonard Nimoy.
Yeah. Which is why fans don't care for these movies. And, uh, you know, I give
them a chance.
It actually did. It did pretty well. It not only did it do well with new fans,
but it managed to
appeal to a great number of the original fans. It was a nice handing of the baton.
I mean,
there were some ruffled feathers in the community, but, uh, by and large,
people seem to enjoy it.
All right. Well, those are, um, obviously 300 is, uh, is very different from
Star Trek,
but I was glad to be able to talk to you about that here. Uh, once again, uh,
thanks Jordan for
coming on the show. Jordan Hoffman, you can find his work at star trek.com. Uh,
until they shut,
until they shut it down. Cause it's not an authorized site. Uh, about.com IFC,
uh, slash film screen
crush. Um, and also great, you know, it's a lot of places and also great Turkington
here. Greg,
do you have any, uh, websites you want to plug or, um, well, I'm working on a,
on my first book right
now. I'm not messing around with websites. Cause that's, you know, anyone can
do that and, um,
taking, uh, you know, 30 years of film expertise and putting it in a book that
hopefully we'll be able
to, uh, give all the details about when it's published on this podcast, on our
podcast. So,
uh, thanks everyone for tuning in and, uh, stick around next week. We'll be
back with more on cinema.
Let me do the ending. Uh, thank you everybody for listening. And again, thanks
to Jordan,
uh, Hoffman for calling in. Thanks to my laptop for letting us do this with the
whole
iChat and everything is really awesome. I recommend using it. If you're doing a
podcast,
you want to talk to somebody that's not in your, in your, in your vicinity. Uh,
one other quick
question. How can people get ahold of 300? Um, netflix.com, which is a very, uh,
popular site.
And if you're not on it, uh, it's very easy to sign up for, and it's so much
easier than having to go
to your local store and get movies. You just watch them come in the mail. I
also recommend, um, uh,
checking thrift stores for old videotapes, people like Jordan,
are getting rid of their videotapes and you can find some, some great, great
titles that way.
Netflix is good. And there are other, some ways you could, you could stream it,
uh, you know,
through the various of the major platforms for streaming. If you want to watch
it on your
mobile device, your iPad, or, you know, right through your, your TV, if you
have that technology.
All right. That is 300 and some of the Star Trek movies we also hit on. And
actually we actually
kind of talked about Star Wars too, which is cool. All right. Thanks very much,
everybody.
And see you next week.
Bye.
Bye.