Ep 29: F**k John McEnroe: In The Realm of Perfection!

Hello this is Sean and welcome to fuck your opinion a movie review podcast before we get started please make sure to like follow subscribe, write a review of this podcast wherever you are listening right now and please be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. All those are linked in the description. Enjoy the episode. Hello and welcome to fuck your opinion a movie review podcast with yours truly Sean moussaka, and yada yadi patos Oh, sorry, I was getting mood I was normally actually angry Jani. This one was to be expected one world in which God was not that angry right now. I just wanted to yell word. podcasts are doing mad. shot you didn't even know who john McEnroe was until you watch this. And then you texted me? Sorry, you didn't text me but you wrote it in the notes, saying that. Oh, you realize he's the reoccurring 30 rock guest star who was somebody that could never figure out how it was? Yeah. You wrote in the episode when he was also in a bunch of Adam Sandler movies I liked that's in my life. Oh, you like Adam Sandler movies? You like Adam Sandler? I hate Adam Sandler. You like his his guest appearance in Mr. Deeds where he and jack? jack and jill is right over an oncoming car, which he probably could have done in his prime. I watched Mr. Deeds when I was a child and even as a child, I knew that movie was a piece of garbage and that Adam Sandler sucks your posturing? There's no way you You seem like the exact sort of person. Oh, I'm waiting. I'm posturing. I didn't like it. I don't like Adam Sandler. I fucking hate Adam Sandler. I don't want to tell you why we even got him out here. shot shot. How about you tell me the truth for once. Okay, how about you just tell me the truth. What do you want to know? Tell me what we all know. Which is that you have every single Adam Sandler film ever released on VHS, DVD, blu ray and 4k Ultra HD. Here's what I'll tell you. I used to own punch drunk love, and then I threw it in the garbage. Honestly, I think it's really overrated people just they just fallen over punch drunk love. And I'm over here like it's more interesting. based on a real life story. Some guy actually did that. Listen, I'm not a fan. I don't care for that movie. The only movie that I've watched Adam Sandler in that I've liked is uncut gems in as we all know, that is not your typical Adam Sandler. So it doesn't really count. But we're not here to talk about fucking Adam Sandler. We're here to talk about every single live star and one of the last great Americans of sorry, let me back up. And one of the last great American stars of the sport john McEnroe, who for a brief time inhabited the realm of perfection. Okay, I'm going to be straight up with you. Yani right now. You this one, I'm not sure I'm not sure if this is gonna get cut or not. But just to put it out loud. You have to listen a little bit more because you're constantly trying to interject and things and because my volume is low. I don't hear what you're saying. So I can't respond to you just wait till I fucking finished my goddamn sentence. Okay, you're like, Man, you can't stop. You can't you gotta umpire His names. You gotta let the rep speak. umpire God. Is that baseball? Okay, rough. No, it's the umpire. He's the umpire the man who sits in the chair and makes the calls is the Ba ba ba ba ba I speak to the head. Okay, so yeah, we're watching john McEnroe. We watched john McEnroe in the realm of perfection. It was really good. I love it. Here's the part where I explain why I why I like it. Yeah. Why did you pick Why did you pick a documentary? Our first documentary? Yeah, you thought you would have picked it because I personally don't really like documentaries all that much. But I really like tennis and I know of a handful of tennis documentaries, and I'm a big documentary guy. You just seem like the kind of guy The schmuck who's kind of into like everything anyways good but I'm not gonna pick one because that this podcast is not necessarily for dogs because well Okay, so now with this there's a lot to talk about listeners and wanted to watch for my next pick, we wanted to watch seven days in hell and tour to pharmacy However, there's only like one one cycling movie that I can think of it it's breaking free and I haven't seen it yet. And then there I think there's like there are two tennis movies out there that I can name Wimbledon which is like from the mid 2000s and is awful and Borg vs. McEnroe, which is good, but there was a chance Shawn might not hate it. Now as far as tennis documentaries off plays him. It doesn't make any sense to me. It's not bad. He's not bad in the role. MakerBot is not crazy about the movie but his life story one with the I can't remember her name but the female tennis player that has Emma Stone and Steve grout you shouldn't pick that one. Oh, that's the third one. That's a battle of the sexes. I think I've never seen it and I heard it wasn't terribly good. But the documentaries that I knew of hate that I've seen what have been strokes of genius, which is about the 2008 Wimbledon final between Rafa Nadal and Roger Federer that I'm pretty sure you would have liked so couldn't have picked that which left me with john McEnroe. It is a French documentary, narrated by a familiar, familiar face on this podcast, Mathieu Amalric, the lead in diving bell and the butterfly. Oh, john, Dominic, Bobby. So that's kind of why I chose this hold of me that and I forgot Yes, I thought it was the director who was speaking No. Well, I was, I think he's actually a friend of the director. That's why I chose it. That's why I also I'm a big tennis fan. I grew up in a tennis family. My father is a very talented tennis player. He taught me and my siblings how to play, didn't really get into it, super into it until later in the life later in my life in the last few years. And john McEnroe was a huge he was actually like about my dad's age, maybe a little bit older, when, when his career really took off. And so he was my dad was a big fan of him. He was a big fan of like other great Americans, Pete Sampras, and Andre Agassi, all these guys. And so there was a lot of tennis talk around the house growing up. And the older I got and the more excuses I was looking forward to get out there and exercise I kept on coming back to tennis and my dad live relatively close by so I started hitting with him and I found out I kind of have a knack for it. And also, I really liked the sport. And also, I really like Grand Slams and sitting around for five hours or four hours waiting for matches to finish. Because it's a really intriguing, very complex sport. And something that we're going to get into or at least that I'll mention later on is that much like films much like like actual cinema, tennis is a sport that were in the the players will compress and extend time to achieve their their end goals in within the medium. And that's explored fair in a very intriguing way in this documentary, The documentary right now, not really well, like I said, we'll get into it later. It's a very unconventional documentary. It's a little weird, little off kilter, doesn't do things traditionally, it doesn't have like a traditional narrative structure that most the traditional narrative structure that honestly a lot of documentaries have a kind of jumps around from point to point exploring this theme of the the tennis player as a as a kind of equivalent of the on court director of a match. Like I said, we'll get into it. But that was a really interesting concept to me the first time I watched it the second time around, I got even more out of it. There's a lot of stuff I feel like I missed out on but I love it really good documentary, highly recommend it before we get into it. And my rating. I'm going to wait, can we do decimal points? I don't know, when you judge a tennis match. As far as scoring is concerned, are there decimals? You don't know there aren't decimals, but but they they're calculating now. And if you're calcutt Hold on, let me if you're calculating the percentage of wins that you can get that a player can accrue over a year, john McEnroe's a 1984 was 96.5% I believe he was like 81 and 482 and 482 and three, something like that. Then I think I'm gonna find a way to fit it in there. No, yeah, that's not how it works. I'm gonna give me assay and I'm gonna give this one you know, any point any final rating 8.2. And honestly, I like this idea of decimal points. I think we're going to do it moving forward. Do you know any professional sport? diving? Fuck, I was gonna say where they have. Yeah, die. desk gymnastics diving. That Yeah, there are. What do you actually start thinking about? how drunk are you right now? I'm not. I don't watch sports. I don't give a fuck about sports. And you know what sport I really don't give a fuck about tennis. I don't care. I do not care. Hey, you know, neither does most of America and that's why we saw on the global stage. Alright, anyways, so point of the structure Yani What do what do we do next? What do I do next? Well, normally what happens is the plot Plot summary is supplied by the disaffected, disinterested or discombobulated party. And that would be you, Shawn, how can you provide Is there any way you could summarize the plot of this because there is a plot there's a there's kind of a beginning, middle and end. So you guys, I'm a writer. I like to dabble with different ideas of different plots. Oh, yeah. So I got to plot some writer right here. Writer. The first one is this movie is an extended 30 rock flashback gag, in which Tina Fey humorously but unsuccessfully explores the history of the show's best guest star john McEnroe, who is what I judge on their parody of America's kids got sick because kids got sick. He also he's also on homophone, don't forget homophone. He's on Celebrity homophone. And he also shows up as at Gao, Gavin valores. That I heard I just lost that. Yeah, we'll get to that in a bit. Second Plot summary. I think this is the more accurate one. A New Yorker yells at people while multiple Frenchmen attempt to psychoanalyze him. Yeah, he's not wrong. More or less that what and this is a good segue into what comes next and that is, the plot is supplied or summarized by the chooser and he's not wrong this is basically this whole film is a it is compiled from footage collected by a French filmmaker who created tennis instructional videos a filmmaker by the name of Gil de Carmen deck Comedy kermadec, I think yeah, it doesn't matter. A bunch of old footage from john Mack and Rose runs at the French Open in the early in the early 80s in the first half of the 80s. And what he does, what the filmmaker did with all this extra footage was he used it to look at and cycle analyze McEnroe as an athlete and draw comparisons between the tennis player and the tennis player in the midst of their art and the filmmaker in the midst of theirs or at least draw comparisons between tennis player versus the tennis out of the tennis player, the art of tennis and the art of film. Oh, Mike, he totally did it. He wrote me cheese. Yeah, and all of that. So basically the first hour and I think like 12 minutes analyzing McEnroe as an athlete, how it's supposed to be impossible for him to be as good as he is, with the with the amount of anger he plays with and all the outbursts he has. It's supposed to be just psychologically impossible for him to perform as well as he does yet he does in spite of it, and everything else. Everyone out there, his opponent, the crowd, the umpire, literally everyone and this man himself stood in his way from getting seven Grand Slam titles, but he still did it just as if to like, spite them all. And then the last 25 minutes, I think they just don't know what people from the northeast are like, and they're just like, the last 25 minutes seductive at the same time. Wow, that's crazy. That's nuts, guys. That's crazy. Anyways, you were saying the last 25 minutes totally up end the thesis of everything that was working towards us and it's his unsuccessful final, his onset, unsuccessful 1984 final against Yvonne Lindell, where he almost defeated him in three sets, but Lendl came back and beat him to take it three, two and the fifth. I think what happened was, if you remember the movie, Wonder Woman 1984 I really liked that one day too. I think this is when I don't remember the other guy's name even though he just said it, but I think he made I think Lindell made a wish avakian Shut up. I think it was his first Grand Slam at that moment because this is when Pedro Pascal was granted all the wishes and he said, I just want to be McEnroe and he beat McEnroe and then hey, that might have been a smart joke for and if the French Open didn't take place in spring and Wonder Woman 1984 takes place in July 1984 two months after the French Open final So figure out your timeline dumb ass, but he could have read Yogi Collegium quote of the day retro actively wished it who knows you know it has the same logic as Wonder Woman 1984 which is say not anyways Yogi green tea just give it to me Give it to me Sean I need it. Okay have to have green tea quote is this podcast is incomplete without it. So Yogi green tea quote, you cannot be serious. man he didn't anybody say that? That's not this match. That's a crazy. He didn't even say documentary. Crazy. Wimbledon. It's kind of ironic because listeners if you're not a hardcore hardcore McEnroe fan, that's a McEnroe quote. So it's a bit weird that Yogi green tea has a McEnroe, quote, I kind of think, McEnroe, read the yogi green tea, quote, I think he made some yoga Yogi green tea on a day match and said, I'm gonna use this quote, I kind of think you're full of it. I can think I'm right. I kind of think you're drunk. Why are you gonna throw me under the bus like that? I've been I've been sober for a week. And now I'm drinking because I have to talk about the movies that you pick the movie. About to talk to me. I thought it was luck to me. I have to talk to you. I have to talk about French people. I have to talk about tennis. All the things okay. Tennis is a French sport. Real tennis law and tennis it was it developed in France all racquet sports come from France. I guess that's why I hate it so much. Yeah, that makes sense. That's why and that's why you know, they also it because it's a very artistic sport because it's a very intelligent sport. Therefore easy to psychoanalyze, because it's one man against another man or one person against another person, it really comes down to the Battle of the wills. Unlike a lot of other sports. You know, it's kind of like chess. It's like chess, but all the pieces are moving. While chess there's only one other piece and the other pieces moving the entire time. I don't really want to belabor the point and I don't want to forget about it. But now that you bring up the chess listeners, if you're listening to this episode, just watch the Queen's gambit instead. And as the same ideas and I enjoyed it far more than this. Yeah, but this was only an hour and a half and Queens Gambit is like what 10 episodes eight episodes still far more engaging. Oh, I doubt it You haven't even seen it. You haven't events? Yeah, but I really like this documentary. So try to convince me otherwise do you like about it favorite ask me like about it. Um, first thing I like it's the first thing that really strikes out at you and I'd be surprised if you can at least like just give me just just makes one small concession here is the opening the opening the opening title sequence where Sonic Youth's the Sprawl starts up as john McEnroe was going to make his serve and slow motion and then the song plays out as different angles of his server are showed in succession and slow motion after that, you're not going to tell me that that wasn't like a really well edited sequence in what I was making notes in my exact know when that was going on was I hate sports already watching it in slow motion like this is like double the hate for me. So so you just can't You can't be objective about this at all. You can't be objective in any way whatsoever about the editing, about the timing, about the musical choice about the cinematography about the framing about none of that you can't be objective about any of it. You just hate it unconditionally. I like how you're talking about the cinematography of sports footage. There is one moment it's an orgy. Let me say my gosh, there is one moment in the movie. Because essentially, this French guy is recording McEnroe for years and years and years in essentially collecting all all tennis players. He's collecting all this footage, a lot of tennis player and at one point, the newscasters bringing all their cameras in, they relegate him to essentially like a corner or something. And they're like, well, you don't need to be here. Why don't we just give you the photos and he gets frustrated TV footage? No, they specifically said photos though. I think TV footage but also like, we can just give you photos. And the French guy got past He's like, they don't understand. I'm making a film. And I'm like, bro, don't be so high and mighty about this. No, he totally was making he totally was making a film about the French to do that shit. But I thought it to be honest. I thought the sequence it was all right. I know I'm shitting on a bit for comedy. I thought it was Decent. I'm not going to go high up and be like, My God, the filmmaking there. But you know is interesting ish. I think it's I think it is perfect. I don't think I don't think that sequence could have been could be so funny at all. I don't think it could have been improved one bit. I just love the way the how snappy snappily it was edited I loved the slow motion, I think it was shot at 120 frames per second i think is what they said how just fluid and haunting the movement was, especially when it was underscored by I think it was the the electric guitar from the beginning of the Sprawl is just magnificent. I've actually I've only seen this documentary twice now, but I've seen that title sequence at least six times since the first time I watched it, which was back in like, I think June or July, so absolutely love that first thing right on the table. Shawn, do you like literally anything about this? So one, I'm just gonna read off the structure cuz I got a little bit more elaborate. And what I wrote, so that means you drink more. No, I didn't. I didn't drink. I don't drink. Why you gonna be criticizing me like this? Why are you such a jerk? Sean it's, it's this is how the intervention begins. Just gets kind of fucking drink a little bit. I mean, Jani. That's not where the mark is. Okay, the mark is there showing the mark. Okay, are you blind tripping, you're tripping over your tongue. That's just how emotion it he was. He was he was actor, director, choreographer all in one jacket. JOHN McEnroe was was a genius. Let me just talk about what I actually want to talk about. So the first thing that I said that you quoted me getting was the moment I realized that he's that recurring 30 rock guest star who I knew was some celebrity but never really figured out who he was. So when I saw him there, it clicked into place for me, and specifically, his voice. His face is familiar his hair a bit, but one as soon as I heard that fucking voice I went, that's him. That's the guy. And a side note to that is I rewatched, a couple 30 rock clips. And now the context of him being the angry guy who yells a lot adds a lot to all the jokes he's in. So that's, that's the thing I like about john McEnroe. Maybe not necessarily the movie, but john McEnroe. That's funny. I hate you Jani. Yes point with with your awful movies I at least find like small things to appreciate no matter how badly I read them. I still give it I still give it some. You don't give yourself too much credit I gave you I gave credit to the fight. I gave credit to the fight choreography and Bloodsport, because it's the only good part of that movie. It's great gay porno. Folks, in case you think we're not going to talk about Bloodsport, we're fucking talking about Bloodsport later. But that's an a dislike. Fuck. Next point Yani. So my next point, and I think it's like one of the major theses of this film has to do with something I was alluding to earlier on, where they talk about, they talk about the structure and the length of tennis matches. Basically, what happened, what they mentioned in the documentary is that a film critic at one point came and watched a tennis match and he reviewed it and something that he said that he liked a lot about tennis matches. And I'm really paraphrasing here is that the the structure and the length of tennis matches kind of resembled in a way the craft of filmmaking because of the way that time could be manipulated to deliver these this desired effect. Whatever effect the the the manipulator was attempting to use was attempting to gain from it to achieve either a desirous outcome which is either a victory or the conveyance of a certain theme or idea, I guess. So. Okay, what what is his own say that when they showed the picture of this film critic, and they started using the quote, that was the closest I felt to this being a parody, like seven days in hell just look at the guy. How the French person saying this, how was phrase everything about it. I'm like, this is almost a parody. And I started to laugh. It was really funny. It's no, it's not laughably funny, he's giving. He's just doing a total disservice to this film. Yeah. There are people out there I think that actually care about the sport of tennis and there are people out there who actually care about the craft of filming. Looking at I'm sure, definitely in France, possibly at other places in the world, there is overlap between those two groups. And I don't think I think it's inevitable that they would have agree that there is some comparison, some similarity between the structure of a tennis match and the structure of a film and how those two are very different from any other sport. Like the narrator says, at one point, tennis is different from soccer, it's different from Well, okay, football, American football, basketball, hockey, all these other times sports in that the length of a tennis match is decided by the two men, two people, women, I'm sorry, I don't mean to keep doing that the two people playing the match determine the length of the match. And they are in whenever you watch a match, you can discern some sense of a structure, a beginning, a middle and an end. There's an inciting incident, there are complications, and there's and then there's a resolution and it always comes through that way, no matter what unless somebody like retires early. And even then there's there are like structural parallels. Yeah, with that, too. But it's so similar. It's so similar to film in that film also doesn't have like a set amount of time films aren't supposed to be 90 minutes, two hours, two and a half hours, whatever. They're as long as the filmmaker assures they need to be or are supposed to be whatever reflects their vision. That's how they manipulate and restructure, compress and condense time or stretch it. Alternatively, I think that is just fascinating. That is absolutely fascinating to me. It's I don't know, I never made that Carter's hardcore, deflate that argument, but to say, oh, man, tennis is so significant has a beginning, middle and end. I don't know what doesn't have a beginning, middle and end when you don't examine it in a certain context. Any Yeah, what really what I'm saying is so unique about tennis, is that there was no limitation to how long a match can last, hypothetically, before certain restrictions were placed, like at Wimbledon and but the thing I think you can go, you can play forever hours. I mean, ya know, roughly two hours, but I've seen plenty of I mean, Sutton Tonga was like, what, seven or nine hours? Yeah, I don't watch that. And I've seen most of my favorite films are over three hours, I have a couple favorite four hour ones. Most tennis matches, know, most tennis matches, don't go over two hours. If we're talking about like 1800 series, and we're talking about grand slam Yeah, you're gonna see plenty of matches that reached like the two, three hour plus mark. last film, and more Netflix original series, because those episodes can be 31 minutes, those episodes can be 72, they can be all over the place. And you don't know what the season order is going to be. It can be six can be a, it could be 20 episodes, that fluctuates time, way more than movies. But in this season, it's not gonna, you're not going to give me an inch. You're not you're just not going to give me an inch with this at all. It's like, back and forth, you know, where it's like, it's like you're watching the whole thing. I'm the McEnroe. It's like you're watching the show side. And it was in French and then it only had Chinese subtitles. It's like you were watching that I'm saying the experience we had you were so prejudiced against it that you might as well have been see reading an entirely different language, hearing a completely foreign language, not English, which most of the film was not gonna say every time I hear French speaking. I definitely am. I take away some points. It's not very soothing. But to go off of that, that sequence you were talking about there was a quote that is mentioned at the beginning. I think you know what I'm gonna say, I'm not gonna do here is I can't do it. But he says when you watch a tennis match, you don't really know what you're watching and you know what i can i can agree with the movie on that regard. When I watched these tennis matches, I didn't I didn't really know what I was watching and the movie did a poor job of clarifying well you know a stress movie but I will probably get into that later in the dislikes. I have like a least I have my least favorites because no I'm going to have least favorites even with some of my movies with some of my films, I will still have least favorites. third favorite aspect let's see. I did I even say my second I just said one though. You said your you say don't your second thing your second thing is bs anyways, you're just going to my second thing is the actual The only thing I actually liked about this rofi my second thing is the only legit thing the compliment so I wrote john McEnroe yelling at referees never gets old. And then a sub point was also when he shoved it and push it the French people are just funny. Okay, I admit that is it. Something that that I can identify with that I understand this attitude. Well, is the difference between the difference with McEnroe, I'm just going to steamroll over you because I want to make a point then you say whatever, you know, poppycock, you need to afterwards. Okay? But the way that journalists the way that television cameras all of that really invades the personal space spaces of athletes, especially at their most trying or difficult times, ie when they've just lost a huge tournament, something that's monumentally important to them. And these lenses, these microphones just don't have any sense of respect for the loss. They just kind of jam themselves as closely as possible. I thought that was really interesting. And honestly, I don't understand why more athletes aren't as outraged as john McEnroe clearly was because yeah, it's it's an emotionally trying thing to come that far and not lose everything, but to come that close to victory, and just have it taken away in a split second. And I I honestly have like a little bit of respect for john McEnroe, back in the day for not holding anything back for telling people to to essentially just piss off for swinging at news crews telling them to get away from them. Because Yeah, they should be they should be keeping their distance, give the guy his space, let him accept the loss. And then you can move in when he's calm down. Listen, I'm not going to advocate for that actual behavior. But let me be honest, it was definitely fun to watch as a guy from New Jersey I and if you're a listener of your podcast and know the characters I like in movies, this is right up my alley for what I wanted to the the attitude and the content and the personality that I wanted to see in a character. So if this was any other tennis player, I probably would not give a single fuck. But john McEnroe is such a big personality that despite the film itself, he still managed to out shine it just by being him. And I dug it. And there was like a montage of him yelling at the referees, great stuff really enjoyed what he what would he say he would be like, you don't even know where the mark is. Where's the mark, you wanna show me where the mark is? What you you got to make up your mind? What are you saying? So, little fun fact. It's fun about playing on clay, which for those of you who are unfamiliar, like Sean clay, in this instance, has just powdered red brick. That's exactly what the clay is. It's just red brick. That's also like kind of watered from time to time to keep it from being dude to dry. When the bad guys like, do I really got to do this shit. When the ball makes contact with with the clay, it slides it skids a little bit. So the place of impact isn't necessarily accurate. It's not necessarily accurate. So back in the day before they had things like Hawkeye, and we're able to discern precisely where the ball landed. There's a very high likelihood that calls made out or in were very possibly actually wrong. Incorrect. So McEnroe's upset wasn't necessarily I think, unjustified. In every instance, because there's a highly there's a high likelihood that he was probably right to be angry because calls were made incorrectly. That's an iMac. I didn't start shipping until the early 2000s. I'm just saying it was fun. Yeah, it was fun to watch. He was he was a personality. He was he was a hothead. And I think this this is like kind of a good segue into my third point getting into that cycle analysis of john McEnroe as a as a player as an athlete. He was incendiary player, if you think he misbehaved here. I mean, there's plenty of other footage of him from other tournaments years before when he was younger, when he possibly had an even worse attitude before he started winning more Grand Slams. And like I was alluding to earlier, sports psychologists and this is something that they talk about in the film. Sports psychologists say that the athlete who begins to become defensive, angry, they start to have outbursts. What that means is they're revealing to the crowd and to their opponent into everyone else watching that they are not mature enough or psychologically strong enough to survive the to survive the onslaught of competition basically. And as soon as that happens, the opponent is able to start exposing their weaknesses, especially in tennis, which is you know, just a one on one sport and in singles events. So it is a lot more easy to begin manipulating your opponent if their heads not totally in the game. And you'll see that time and time again. It was a huge problem with Korea who also lost on clay, his only opportunity really to win a Grand Slam The same tournament in the early 2000s. But the thing about McEnroe what the what the film talks about. And I think they bring in like another sports, they bring in a sports psychologist to discuss it. Again you also don't. Another side note, what's really interesting about this film is that you don't like have Talking Heads of any of the people who are doing their, their, their narrations, their voiceovers, you almost never know who's like really doing it unless it's the the main narrator, the actor, and even now, it's it's unconventional. And I really like that it's only about the tennis it's only about McEnroe, really. But But, and to talk about macro, what they mentioned is that he forced himself into a corner psychologically, and this was a corner where he was being backed in by the umpire by his opponent by the crowd. And he did that himself. He made himself that angry as a means to force himself into producing a better game it to force himself into producing the best tennis possible, in a sense constructing a false opponent, who's way more talented than the one across the net, which is essentially itself he forced himself to beat himself, in every instance, which he was almost entirely successful with a 1984. I think with like three or four exceptions, this Lindell match at the French Open being one of them, but it's anomalous. It's it's anomalous, not only in tennis, but just in the world of athletics period that an athlete should be able to do that. And that the film was able to explore that concept to explore that theme. So clearly. And so intellectually is a rare thing for me. I really love it. You know, yani, I'll give you a compliment, right? Now, a compliment is you're normally pretty good at analyzing films. That's something that I don't have that strength. I'm trying to work on that but you're usually far more eloquent than me in that regard. But let me tell you, maybe because this is a documentary, and the French narrator lays it all out. But man, I just feel like you're copying pasting. You know, like, this is Middle School. And you just cheat on the kid on the right hand side. You know, you're saying, Man, let me just take whatever the movie said. And you know, like, redo it say it changed change a couple words here and there but more or less the same thing. I use the phrase backed into a corner that's that's the one thing that he said that was absolutely identical. Here's the thing. It's so you know, what I like about this video got a good phrase and the original you don't use need to carry it over? Fine. I quote the film backed into a corner and quotes. Yeah, it's an aspect of the film that I really like, if they explain it better than I ever could. They made this point. And I wondered about this before I watched the documentary about how john McEnroe as an athlete was able to perform as well as he did. And they explained it was such clarity that How could I How could I say it any more clearly? How could I put it to you? Sean's or you the listeners? I don't know. It's what you want to say that you liked about the movie? I don't know. I didn't like it. Um, anything else you want to say? Oh, can I move on? Fine. Move on to your third thing. Okay, lastly, I liked I liked geography. She's laughing at it so hard that it must be funny. I just had sex. Sex now, and and truth in truth, I like the song. What are you talking about in that song? And I just had sex. Yeah, never. What the Andy Samberg song look it up the Lonely Island saw the Lonely Island he's it it went at it for like three seconds. Okay, it's three shy Sean said four before he had sex. It says before then it cuts to after and he's smiling like this. And it says after and then later on when they're all kind of like dancing a little bit. He shakes his head. But anyways, my actual thing I liked was the song at the end credits i thought was pretty good. Also as the end credits, so it was a nice, you know, and two things because it was the end. And another legitimate and like because that's only half like I did think the actual opening was pretty interesting. So pre McEnroe pre actually know what this thing was about? Where the guy starts off where we're introduced to this instructional video from I believe the 60s in which it's an instructional video created by the filmmaker Guild. Gil jilda. Kevin deck. You say that like you're asking me like I have any idea. But anyways, it's This instructional video in black and white. That is I has a very How do I put this I don't wanna say dated, but of the time Hold to it. And it's just an interesting time capsule as to I guess how tennis was perceived at the time, as well as how instructional video structure created, how it was taught. And yeah, and I thought it was a very interesting way to open the movie and it gave me a little bit of hope. And then and then that hope continued with john McEnroe. Like I said, yelling at the referee, like it died and died a little bit after the beginning and then it came back up. I mean, to give this movie credit, even though it seems like I'm only uploading one thing about it that one thing I liked way more than say the entirety of passion of Anna or most of ianis pics so there's that the sequence is like maybe five minutes by the way No, I was talking about an hour 35 talking McEnroe as a as a whole in that the end bed I just said but maybe you just weren't paying attention. I don't know. I just sold out with a lot of the things you say. Whenever you're speaking just gibberish. It also so annoying thing about editing things podcast, what is that you drone on about a lot of shit. And you'll make oh three I draw finish your mind drone, you'll make three or four different points at once. And I'll all consistently and this is my fault. I'll always latch on to the wrong point. So I'll be like, why did you say this stupid shit. Or I'm like, oh god, it would have been funnier and smarter if I approached any of the other ones, but I went with the wrong angle. And we are neither funny nor smart. So of course you didn't do that. Of course that one just flew out the window. Thanks. I appreciate Bye. Thanks for visiting. Okay, all right, cool. I don't really have many dislikes. But what are your dislikes you start? I disliked when McEnroe put the racket between his legs and it just looked like a little dick. Oh, that's the only thing you dislike. Okay. Well, that's our show, folks. Oh, that was a joke. That was not a legitimate dislike. All right. So first dislike the influence these attempted French bastardization of a great new yorker through their bullshit analysis. The French can never really put us down because let's face it, they're French, but the pretentious narration, particularly the accent and the switching back and forth between English and French was awful. Oh, you know, I don't wanna say awful. It's just not my cup of tea. And it was not enjoyable for me. Yeah, it's it's not bad. I don't it's not awful. The the narration it's very pretentious. Oh, no, it's not. It's it's very cogently spoken, you know, it's all very coherent. There's a point it's all very succinct. It's never excessive. They don't like dwell on points for too long or if they do have to with something that's going to take some work to get there. For the for the listener, or the audience member, the viewer to understand exactly the point that they're making. Like whether we're talking about something that I brought up about McEnroe being able to perform without a bunch of a hothead he was it took a while for them to get to that but yeah, they needed to do it. Can I ask you, but I don't think it was pretentious. I don't think there was anything potential so it's it wasn't near. It wasn't as pretentious as it could have been. They were talking about tennis players being like the Paragons of athlete of athletic achievement, you know, and we're talking about them as if they were gods they were just talking about what the film tries to argue is that tennis players are artists, there is art to athletics to search for tennis statements I've ever heard. And also it's not how can there be one of the arguments and one of the things was talking about how his biggest opponent and a tennis player his opponent is not the other player but himself. And yeah, no, is this whole This is entirely a hat game. They have this whole bet where he is basically wanting to get into a fistfight with his cardboard cutout is looking at like pissed, like, Oh, fuck this. He's, he's, he's over exaggerating. He doesn't what john McEnroe didn't like, you know, he's got a clock once you know what he was, what john McEnroe didn't like doing was putting up the facade of being a tennis player of attending pointless practices of standing in for for publicity photos for for, you know, the American team photos. He didn't like being filmed. He just wanted to play the dang sport. That was when he went he felt like he was who he was when he could go out there and face himself and defeat himself on the court come out victorious, and prove to himself that what he was doing had some purpose. So yeah, he didn't like me. He didn't like being Jani. I wasn't crazy about it. He was then and my life has much less successful Yeah. Yeah, I'm, I'm less successful, I have far less purpose. You know, you know is the thing that bothered me the most about this movie shot anyone who's grant first Grand Slam before he was 20. This this is not a fault on the movie. It's just, I haven't. I know listeners. We've talked about how we're prostate Bros. And we have prostate issues for us to pose for life. Yeah, but I haven't I haven't talked a whole lot about my arm issues. Now, I'm not going to bore you with all the details, because I call Jani up pretty frequently and just complain about them just moans. Needless to say, for the past year and a half, I've had arm and tendon issues. And they've been particularly bad this past week to a point where I can barely function. Like, I find myself struggling to press the remote buttons and have to I have an Alexa. So I have to command the Alexa to do things as much as I can, as opposed to press buttons, because I really need to rest my arms. Meanwhile, this guy who is what, like two years younger than me at this time, 1984 he was I think 25 or 26. Yeah, yeah. So I'm 27. So to see that and then to also see Matt James as the bachelor who's 28 at the time in the filming, and just seeing a guy's a little bit younger guys who's a little bit older. And just Meanwhile, here's me in the middle. I can barely pick up a glass of water. Oh, you're a spider. That's it? Why you're just bitter about this. That's okay. That's why I'm just saying I'm sad. I called up Jani. I'm like, yo, bro. I'm pretty sad is depressing. Again, I'm not gonna belabor the point. But it was it was extremely ironic to watch a movie about athleticism. Why, while I am at the slowly becoming athletic point in my entire life. No, no, Sean, Sean, you were you have never even you've never even lived at an athletic point. I used to be a cross country runner. You used to be a JV cross country runner. I ran a varsity race once. Okay, well, folks, that probably tells you all you need to know. Okay, okay. Okay. You know, I fuck you. We had one of the best cross country teams in the country. So don't even fucking act like, oh, man that doesn't know you don't get to take credit. your peers. You don't get to take credit for the success. What I'm saying is that it's really hard to be on varsity. When you're in one of the like, the top 10 teams in the country. It's pretty fucking hard. I don't know what to tell you. My best 5k was 1717. Okay, and just put it out there and said I'm sorry. What's your best 5k I don't know. I didn't run. I've never run a shoe right now. Well, I could rock again right now. walk outside my door barefoot and start running on the gravel. guarantee you faster 5k that you did? Practice. Oh, Shay. No. All right. I'm doing it. Listeners he left I hope he never comes. Alright. listeners. We had a bit of a break there. Okay, back but it's the 5k 1653 pause. What even wise there is no break. 653 you edited it out. We're just gonna keep like you five minutes. Three seconds. interrupted silence. Why my writing dislike? Do I have a dislike? I don't like anything about this documentary? Um, you know, there are times where the filmmaker was a little bit too experimental. Honestly, what was the structure that the filmmaker His name is Julian for that break? Oh, at one point. Yeah, there was a point where let's take a break somebody is doing somebody is providing some voiceover. And out of the middle of nowhere. JOHN McEnroe has this big complaint about a divot in the court. And the whole film just breaks it stopped. I love that. I really liked that. That was good. It's It's funny, but it it really breaks up the flow to me it didn't necessarily fit in it made a point. And I think the point that it it made an interesting point about McEnroe being able to manipulate time and manipulate the expectations of his opponent by interrupting the flow of the match. And it functions very similarly in the film, and that one's not that bad. But there like there are other points where stuff like that kind of happens. And it just it's like okay, I want to I let's just keep moving forward. So that's one thing I possibly dislike. I can still respect it. I respect the choice. I respect the experiment, experimentation. But do I think that it improved the viewing experience? Do I think it might have like, hindered instead of helped the the film? Possibly Yeah, no, what's another dislike of yours, killing off that with the experimentation. Another dislike I had was just the overall structure of the movie just because really a structure Exactly. Unlike hypothetical tennis, there's more, and it kind of just is this essay that drones on. But here's the thing, even with an essay, you need to have an introduction and a conclusion and a body, our body paragraphs that support it. And there's an introduction, this movie kind of has that, but it just doesn't flow very well. And it doesn't have a strong structure to it. So if I was, if I wasn't pausing it frequently, I wouldn't have known where I was. And it's not that I always need to know where I am when watching a film. Sorry, sorry, movie. And also, I will just add this bit that I often feel this during most documentaries to varying degrees. So I think it's just a limitation of the genre. But particularly here, the when we got to the end match, I'm like, we're at the end already. We're Where are we spatially? contextually? I'm very lost and confused. So it was. The thing is, you know about tennis? I don't know anything about this. And I don't feel like the movie did a good job at providing context for non tennis people. Well, I think, yeah, no, I think that's like one thing I'd say. I wouldn't say it's my least favorite aspect. But I do think it is like kind of a weakness of of the of the pieces that Yeah, you kind of do need to have a familiar familiarity, a working knowledge of at least the basic rules and the basic history of of tennis, at least in the last, like 50 years to understand exactly what's going on what's at stake, what the rules are, why it matters. If a ball is just like barely on the line, or like not on the line. Yeah, you need to have you need to be able to understand the sport on a very rudimentary level. And I'm pretty sure Shawn understands nothing about the sport or what he does understand about it. He gathered from watching seven days in hell, which we will be watching next week, but is definitely not enough. Nor is it a credible source for understanding the game of tennis. Imagine if I went out to a tennis court tomorrow, and someone's like, do you know how to play tennis? And I'm just like, why watch seven days in hell? So I think I'm good. No, Shawn, you cannot have gay sex with a man on the tennis court in the middle of a match for four hours? It is not it is it is prohibited. Listeners can't do it. And in the middle of a match in case you think Jani is bringing up his homophobia once again. Now there's actually a joke from seven days and how that is quite humorous. But anyways, yeah, okay. I can I can, I can agree with you. On some level there, though. I think the whole point of the last seat but the whole structure of this if we're going if we're calling it more of an essay, which I you know, I agree, I do think it is somewhat of a more just an extended essay, discussing the art of tennis parallels between the the tennis player and the filmmaker, and then talking about the sort of volatility of the artist in in using McEnroe as an example of that. The point they arrive at, at the very end is very subversive, and it's this 20 minute extended sequence where the narrator basically just examines how McEnroe goes from winning this match to losing it and contradicts more or less everything that we were told about Matt, how and why McEnroe was successful. And while I think that that produces this really interesting effect, and it arrives at this conclusion about the art of crafts, and like the lengths we push ourselves to in the process of creation or in the pursuit of some sort of goal, and how the majority of that pursuit is this very internal, very attractive conflict, ultimately, to somebody who probably doesn't understand the sport. They might have missed that and I think Shawn, ultimately, he might have missed it too. Yep, thumbs up. He agrees. I missed whatever. He missed that point. Ultimately, I think what the I think what that last 20 minutes sequence is about is showing you that no matter how successful McEnroe's technique was, his psychological technique was ultimately it was going to tear him down. It was a self destructive process that he was. He was working against the clock on And as you know, as history shows, he never returned. He never returned to that peak that he reached in 1984. I think he like made it to definitely made it to finals and he was definitely in the top 10 I think until the 90s. But he was never in the realm of perfection again. So yeah, kind of backhanded dislike, because I still like I still value experimentation Jani can do with one of his movies. Yep. What's your last dislike Shawn? My last dislike is I'm going to read this, again from the structure 95% of this took place on the court and I just did not care for it. There was more tournament screentime than Bloodsport, but we did not get the scene where john McEnroe was being chased around Dusseldorf by Forrest Whitaker that I think this movie desperately needed. I do around Dusseldorf, because that's where that's where the match was right? I looked this up Dusseldorf. Dusseldorf, am I wrong? Yeah, the French Open is in Paris. It's called the French Open. No, but I looked it up. I looked it up that I wanted the matches at one of the matches in Dusseldorf I looked it up French Open 1984 What? What do you say? Dusseldorf. I was confused as well. I thought that I was like, how is this in Germany? I thought this was in France. Okay. I'm gonna take it back. I want to take it back. Okay, okay, cuz you realized you're wrong because yes, it definitely took place all exclusively in Paris France at the Roland Garros fucking link I don't know what to tell you. I can't tennis courts. I'm pretty sure there's a clay court. Boys in the Wikipedia picture look like the fucking tennis court throughout the hall. Like that, because their claim for color. I don't know because they're all crushed. Anyways, I'm gonna say this again. 95% in this fucking movie took place out of fucking tennis score. I didn't care for it. I it had more tournament screentime than Bloodsport and I wanted a scene where john McEnroe was being chased around Paris or wherever the fuck he was by Forrest Whitaker and some old fucking guy with tasers. That movie desperately needed that and it needed to be scored with a 1980 song like steal the night or something like Bloodsport to give you you don't want to hear off and him to be oiled up. Yeah. Did you put here in the morning song to do one of your backhanded negatives. So to give a partial compliment I wrote though that bit where he was staring at that word, john McEnroe, staring at the cardboard cutout of himself was very reminiscent of when john Claude Van Damme was on the bus in Hong Kong and saw Chong Li and a reflection. I was like, Oh, you guys are doing the same thing right there. Bloodsport. JOHN McEnroe. Think about it. That's all I have to say. Yeah, I don't know if I have a third dislike In fact, I love I love how 95% of this was on the court was just made up out of archival footage was just was in fact parts of it. Especially the last sequence. They're like whole minutes that go by where you're just shown three different angles of the same thing happening and each angle that you each angle you watch you take away something different from McEnroe's reaction, especially if the ending with him losing the last point, shaking Linda's hand and then going off to his chair and sitting down and sulking before a cameraman comes up to him and he almost bashes the guy on the head or bashes the the lens, something like that. You just you really get a sense of that. That visceral emotion that he feels it's just it dials in every time you rewatch the play from a different angle, you just get closer and closer to the truth. To the grief of lat long, sad emotion is the same emotion I feel every time we do an episode. Every time we do one of my episodes, because every time we do one of your episodes, you're just like frolicking through a field. No. Because you somehow dislike great things and you go all Bloodsport and we give it like a 3.2 or whatever the fuck you gave it. And I go, What are you talking about you high as a kite because Raiders of the last ark of the Lost Ark is overrated. It's they should have called it over Raiders of the last of the Lost Ark. I'm telling you. I am telling you right now you're working to get hate mail for that because that's the worst opinion fK podcast@gmail.com send it care of, of Yachty Ponta Scotto like and one of the episodes to rah yourself mentioned while you're listening Have mutilating me I don't care. I will say it until my dying breath. Raiders of the Lost Ark is overrated. You know I Mike drop. I was watching. I forgot what I was watching but someone was talking about Steven Soderbergh. And he said that Soderbergh once said Raiders of Lost Ark is one of the most perfectly constructed films of all time. I don't know if Soderbergh actually said that. But considering that black and white cut he did, I would imagine that he does think that which is to say, You're fucking insane and so stupid, whose cholesterol must be awful if he's eating so much anyway, so he's consuming so much soda and cheeseburgers that he decided to change his name to soda burger from Goldstein he hates and I'm surprised that man still alive. Final thoughts. Final Thoughts? You don't folks, I found plenty over this film. You don't need to hear me continue to recommend. I can't recommend it. We've already made the decision. Many episodes ago that the chooser gets the intro. So final thought, Oh, really, to you know, get final thoughts. It's my final thoughts. And my final thoughts are you know what, as much as I cry this movie, it was far more pleasant of an experience than the majority of the movies Jani has picked and that lies solely on the shoulders of john McEnroe himself. So I want to give this movie a six flat six out of 10 because I don't believe in decimals. decimals are for cowards, like Jani and gymnast's and diverse now, I'm not gonna disagree. Greg Louganis is a coward. I don't know who that is. Yeah, he's had like a pretty serious like diving head. Why we take to that joke, he Chirk, Chirk, you know, in no way marking. So show me the mark. Show me the mark. Well, folks, you know, or watching next week, we've mentioned in previous, we've mentioned it in this episode. I'll say it again. We're watching we're doing ourselves a little a little a little a little shout out. What we do every time. I know. I shot Hold on. I actually I blanked on the term. When you watch two movies together, double feature double feature. Okay, let me go back. That's right, folks. We're doing ourselves a little double feature here with seven days in hell, followed by Tour de pharmacie to hilarious mockumentaries the first one to 10 is mockumentary the second one, a cycling mockumentary? We love them to death I think Shawn actually saw the first one at South by Southwest when it premiered Is that right? talk about that more when we actually do the episode but yeah, i for i saw seven days and how when it first premiered. And let me tell you guys what a fuckin wild ride because no one expected that. But yeah, it was great. It was a fun time. I can't wait to watch these again because they're so fun and funny. Now they're gonna this is these are I always forget to mention these are some of them the movies that I watch at least once a year I think I've seen these twice this year already. I just love I don't they never got ever was like a year and a half something like that. Oh, that's too bad. It's been a while but I have different washing habits and you I like to forget it so that when I watch the jokes again, it feels fresh and new. That's that's my I'd like to I'd like to talk to you as little as possible. So at some point being around you or like communicating with you could feel fresh and new and like invigorating and I would actually enjoy it is that because we do this on a weekly basis? I hate you and I'm just slowly coming to despise you more and more with every company you're like a cancer that's growing within me except you exist external to me. However, I can't divorce myself from you, unless I'm given some sort of risky medical procedure. Well, Jani I don't know if I'm like that cancer. I think I'm more like a pinky toe. You know, I'm like this jammed in the door that you don't want. But you know, without it you just fall flat on your face. So wouldn't be able to play tennis without my pinky toe. You're not rolling not be able to play I needed to tell you I need my pinky toe. No matter how much I wish I could just cut it off and feed it to feed it to Carlisle. But listeners I do want to make a note real quick because Jani kind of got ahead of me before I can make no if you are a longtime listener to some degree, you know that hey, don't you guys choose movies that one of you likes and the other one doesn't? Well, what we do every 10 hours episodes is we do something that we both like which is why we're doing this double feature that's kind of a triple feature in a way because if the double is McEnroe and then the mockumentaries but the mockumentaries are in itself a double feature sounds like a double feature squared double feature squared yeah twinsies I said it was a twin room live you copied me like you copy the new I said it at the exact same time he's just like a second delay because no, I was saying at the same time, you know, I have the audio after show I will hear it and you know what, even if you said Oh, you sort of a gun. You did it? You definitely did it. I know. You did. Yeah, well, I can't even hear that. I do that pretty frequently all all adjust times. When we say some style of revisionist you're just a revisionist because we'll talk over each other so much that you don't always hear each other so you miss good jokes or the timing is not always right. They only want to hear me they come see like I'm for the star like tennis I am fluctuating time and I'm working with time and the space has given me so I am editing in a way that's using time to its benefit wherever where ever you want to go with this. I don't know. Fuck it. Yeah, I can't I can't argue against that because you actually made an intelligent point there Damn Damn you for learning something from this film. And damn me for an hour you at the tools to educate yourself. I are this movie except to jar. I. The only thing I learned from this movie was who the guest star on 30 Rock was which is john McEnroe. Johnny, go fuck himself.