Apex Mountain on The Rewatchables
40:26 – 49:58… So James Elroy, never one to hide his opinions. In harmony with Andy Greenwald's opinion on Gyllenhaal. Let's talk about these performances. Let's talk about Apex Mountain. Okay. You talked a little bit about how this begins the Jake-a-sance. Mm-hmm. Apex Mountain for Jake Gyllenhaal. It's definitely not Apex Mountain. What would you say is Apex Mountain? I'm very partial to the movie Enemy. Yes! That movie, one, I think twin movies, doubling movies, are usually bad or overly complex. That movie is probably triply complex. But still, his performance is incredible. Yeah. So I'm really fond of that. I'm going to …
The whole segment, as transcribed
It's great cinematic work with that center stage three inadequate and unconvincing performances. I don't believe a word that they say. And it's still a great movie. So James Elroy, never one to hide his opinions. In harmony with Andy Greenwald's opinion on Gyllenhaal. Let's talk about these performances. Let's talk about Apex Mountain. Okay. You talked a little bit about how this begins the Jake-a-sance. Mm-hmm. Apex Mountain for Jake Gyllenhaal. It's definitely not Apex Mountain. What would you say is Apex Mountain? I'm very partial to the movie Enemy. Yes! That movie, one, I think twin movies, doubling movies, are usually bad or overly complex. That movie is probably triply complex. But still, his performance is incredible. Yeah. So I'm really fond of that. I'm going to go... Go ahead. Same director. I'm going to go Prisoners. Okay. Detective Loki. What a choice. What a series of choices by Jake Gyllenhaal in that movie. I mean, one of the things that's interesting is that I think a lot of the things that I've disliked about Gyllenhaal's early performances have become sort of... He steered into the skid a little bit. Yeah. Infectations. Yeah. He works hard. Yeah. He is a hard worker. And he made himself a better actor and a much more interesting actor. There are some actors where you don't see the scenes and some where you do. And both can be good. And I think he went from trying to hide them to embracing them. And that made him a better performer. And maybe we can see this movie as the bridge. Do you see this as Apex Mountain for him? Definitely not. What is Apex Mountain for Jake Gyllenhaal? Big source code head here. Yeah. No. I mean, I think you guys are right. But interestingly, I find everything going forward to be better. I am now interested in seeing Jake Gyllenhaal. Yeah. I'm interested in his movies now. He's great and stronger. Which is kind of a movie that came and went this year. But it's a really, really difficult performance. And I think it's a story that we've kind of seen before. So it didn't get the praise that it may be due. But he's just consistently excellent. And even though he has all these affectations that you're talking about, Andy, it's a great turning point for him. Apex Mountain for Downey? I think you're right about this. I gave this some thought. He is almost always pleasant and exciting to see. But I think people who know him only in the last decade and know him as a global superstar and a brand and a thing don't know him the way that those of us who remember him before knew him, which was he was always – he was the golden child that couldn't get it done. He was always spoken of in these hushed tones as the most talented actor of his generation, the most exciting actor of his generation. And yet, due to his own personal demons and addictions, it just never quite came together for him. Whatever happened to him in 04, 05, 06 was a turning point clearly in his personal life. And then on the road up to Iron Man and everything that came after, Fincher caught him. He caught him exactly as you were saying. He caught him off of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, which is another one in the conversation. Yeah, which is – Exactly, right. Pretty high on my list. Another one high on the list. Yeah. But this one, I think, marries everything that people who saw the sort of the comet in the sky aspect of him in it. Like he just – he's electric on the screen, but there's a gravity to it that would be sort of sluiced away as he became more of a comic book hero. You could say it was coming. I mean, I think his performance in Good Night and Good Luck is very solid. And it was a real – More controlled. Andrew Miller kind of coming in, eating some innings. Yeah. It was good. He was a fireman. But nothing around this suggests he was capable of putting together this kind of mannered, but also in a lot of scenes, in a lot of the film. I think that his run in the 80s is a little underrated at this point, though. I'm a big fan of Less Than Zero and The Pickup Artist. And he's really – he really was great out of the shoot. And I think part of the reason why his career was considered such a tragedy, basically, in the late 90s, early aughts when he slid into some of his addiction is because he had done a lot of stuff that was really good. Maybe he wasn't in a world-conquering franchise like Iron Man. Yeah. But he was consistently a fascinating performer. You would always be excited to see him when he was used correctly, like Soap Dish. Sure. A movie not often Soap Dish. He's great in Soap Dish. But he's great in that. And Loki Wonder Boys, which is a movie ready to be rediscovered. Excellent. He is really wonderful in that. But again, I feel like – I don't know how – in terms of Apex Mountain, how much you want to consider the larger story in terms of the success arc. I feel like this fits perfectly in there for me. Obviously, Apex, in terms of a global head of a franchise, came a year later. Sure. What about Ruffalo? What about Ruffalo, though? God, he's good. He was my biggest takeaway on this rewatch. I was like, this guy is an incredible actor. Yep. He is so perfectly cast in this role. And I was talking to my wife about the movie last night. And I was describing the Dave Tosky myth and legend and the fact that he was bullet and that Dirty Harry is sort of based on his pursuit of the Zodiac, even though they changed the character quite a bit. Plus, his character is portrayed in the other Zodiac movies. He might be the most recreated real-life cop ever. And this performance is way more subtle, way more controlled than any of those other movies. He's really cool. The choice that he uses for his voice and the accent is right on. The way he looks, the floppy bow tie. Like, he just carries himself. Yeah, the pants, the trench coat. There is a softness to this performance that is, in many ways, a radical choice. Definitely. Because he is a superstar murder police who doesn't need to prove anything to anyone, apparently. And that character is supposed to, I mean, in the popular imagination, is supposed to leave with his gun and ask questions later. I mean, this guy literally says, what about due process? Yeah, he's, he's, I think he's, he's, it's, you're exactly right. It's like that idea that all of police, 99.9% of police work is done on the phone or asking stupid questions over and over and over again. And that comes across that even this all-star, you know, popular figure is, is, is actually just a grunt, you know? Yeah, I love that vulnerable moment when he's accused of writing the last Zodiac letter and Graysmith calls his house to talk to him about this and his wife is explaining to Graysmith on the phone his relationship to Armistead Maugham. Comedy star June Diane Raphael, by the way. Yeah. Exactly. And I noticed that last night too, which I hadn't realized before. But so at one point she's explaining and she's outraged that Graysmith calling at this hour about this thing while Dave is experiencing kind of the biggest tragedy of his career. And Ruffalo very delicately, gently wanders over to his wife, grabs the phone from her and hangs it up and walks away solemnly. No words. Yeah. Very calm. It's like, it's an amazing little moment in the movie. Jazz playing in a bathrobe. That's right. All the details. That's when he and Fincher really, I don't think it's Apex Mountain. I think it's hard to say. It's hard to, it's hard to top. You can count on me. It's hard to top. And that's when many people first saw him. It's hard to top. You can count on me. You guys also know in terms of Ruffalo cop performances. This is the thing. Collateral. And that's, did you know. It's still kind of a thing for me. And I know it's a thing for Chris. Ruffalo were recommended to Fincher by Jennifer Aniston. And Fincher was like, yeah, I really liked him in Collateral. And he is right. But do you know what Jennifer Aniston liked him in? What? Rumor has it. The quasi-sequel to The Graduate. That's right. Oh my God. Is this Fincher's Apex Mountain? Boy, that's the first time. You just took a step off the rubber and thought about it for a second. I think this movie is his greatest accomplishment, but not his best movie. What's his best movie? And I think that both Fight Club and Seven are iconic movies that people are, have like stitched into their lives in a very specific way. I think The Social Network is his best movie and the movie that I like of his the most. But Zodiac is clearly the movie that took the most to achieve. And there's something to be said for that because he's an achiever. It's the most personal movie, which means a lot of different things for someone as meticulously controlled as Fincher as it might for others. So to me, that makes it the most interesting film. But yeah, it's never going to be as as beloved as a Fight Club or a Seven or certainly Social Network. Unintentional comedy. Wait, what is it for you? It's Zodiac. I think Social Network actually does is the pop version of Zodiac. It does a lot of the things that Zodiac does about obsession and greed, but but goes there in a way that's palatable. And I don't know if that's Sorkin or what. You know, I don't I don't know whether Sorkin's pop instincts make. Like and the fact that it's basically framed as a courtroom drama with a macro story of a coming of age and college campus drama comedy is it's sort of Animal House meets, you know, a courtroom drama in a lot of ways. Social Network is whereas Zodiac is just sort of lost inside of itself. It doesn't have any cool framing devices. At one point, it jumps ahead for years and you're just like, OK, here we are. Yeah, these guys just got older. Side question. Would Andrew Garfield have been a better Graysmith had the movie been made five years later? He's a little bit more of a Boy Scout and Boy Scout is definitely the watch word here. Why not Eisenberg? Yeah, I don't see it. OK, I think the only thing I don't know, I don't actually know what Robert Graysmith looks like in real life. But Jake Gyllenhaal is alarmingly handsome, even though he has that blinker, wide eye look. He's just a very handsome guy. And Andrew Garfield is very handsome. Eisenberg, you know. Let's talk about some of the supporting actors. OK, yeah. Can I say something about this? Best Heat Check Performance by a Role Player, a.k.a. the Dion Waiters Award. Do you want me to give the nominees or do you just want to run them? I just want to say before, I know you're going to name these names. Yeah. I just want to say that there is a moment in the beginning of this film that in some ways I think is the best moment of the film and nothing is happening. There's just a series of names on the screen. There is a moment as you are on the runway to this movie and we've already seen the names
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