Hello everybody and welcome to Hold Up, the show where we dive deep inside your childhood nostalgia, pull the movies from your past out to see if they truly hold up. Today I'm hold up with two mouse hunting individuals themselves, Kyle and Andrew. Yeah, I love hunting vermin. It's my favorite thing to do.

My favorite pastime. As a vermin, how is that, hunting your own kind? You know, , very Ethically challenging in a sense. I am looked down upon by my fellow peers, but you know, I do what I love and I block out the haters. Wow. Yeah, pretty brave. , are you like into like eating your kin too? Or is it just wiping them off the face of the earth?

 Only when it's a necessity do I eat my own. You know what I think is a necessity? What? Nathan Lane.  See, I'm trying to rack up how many edits we can throw into this episode today. Uh, yeah, Nathan Lane. We're an uncensored podcast.  There's not many edits we make. Yeah, but I'm gonna say some stuff that's really gonna open your ears and eyes.

I'm so glad I do the majority of the editing. That's my favorite part of this whole experience.  Anyway, we looked at Mouse Hunt today.    Before we dive in, Kyle, tell me about your energy levels using cheese.

Since this is a mouse  themed episode. You really set him up for success. Let's hear it, Kyle. , First off, establish your knowledge of cheese. Um,  in no way comprehensive. A passing knowledge of cheese.  So, we'll go like,   when you're looking for that grilled cheese but you don't have any of the nice smoked gouda or there's no like, you know, mozzarella or anything to like put on there and make it gooey and you, all you got is that one Kraft cheese single that's slightly open and you get it out and it's kind of crusty on one part of it, it's kind of hard, but like you can't not cut that off because it takes up too much of the cheese that you put on there so you have to kind of deal with it so you make it and it just, it kind of tastes like the inside of a refrigerator.

That's kind of where my energy is today. I think so. Not bad. Yeah, we're going worth trending up. It could be moldy Kraft single Well, they can't grow mold because it's not real. Oh, they can they can grow mold. It's not real again. It's plastic Speaking of moldy we watched Mouse Hunt. So that's right there.

Let's  So Kyle, do you remember this movie when you were little? Yes, I didn't see it in the movie theaters, but this is one that me and my brother watched.  , it's fun for the kids and the adults because of the slapstick farcical element to it. But also I think  there's just some adult humor in there. That's, it's, it's layered appropriately, but it's, it's, it's a dark movie. I think I did not want to watch it too much because it was a little darker.

Kind of reminded me of like a Matilda kind of thing. It was just a, you know, a little, it was a little.  Depressing that was a good reference because I remember this movie as being  kind of darker and I didn't find it as funny as a kid  I've never been like a huge fan of slapstick 

like I do enjoy slapstick when it's done in sparing moments  I think we had this conversation I love like horror movies that are very tense and then they just go slapstick all of a sudden and  That juxtaposition of like two different feelings. 

 I'm very scared, tensed up, and then all of a sudden I'm laughing my ass off. I always enjoy that type of slapstick humor. But a movie that's slapstick from the word go. It's not usually a movie I enjoy watching as much.

, I do think that style of humor works though in this movie for children. , as a kid I knew that I,  you know, enjoyed that part of the movie. But I do think it kinda scared me a little bit because  The set pieces are very dark and very looming. They are. So Yeah, I would say they definitely help.

But as a kid I did watch it. I  Remember the VHS case   it was like red right and had the mouse on it And he was holding up the two olives and some cheese, right? I remember that he had like his little chef hat on one to eat those olives Yeah, I thought the movie was about  a ratatouille style mouse Like I thought he was just cooking the whole time when I first saw the VHS But  I was trying to remember if we saw this in theaters this would it because this was 99 97.

97. I would have been going to the movies at that time, so I don't know if my family took me to see this in theaters or not, but I do, I do remember seeing it multiple times. Andrew, what about you?  I remember it, but I don't, I didn't see it in theaters. I was only like five years old, maybe four and a half.

I do remember watching it on TV and like the,  early 2000s, , but not a strong, , memory bank there. So when I watched it, , you know, this past week or whatever, it was essentially my first time. It was a true do over. I do remember the movie poster. I remember the colors. I do remember the VHS. I'm pretty sure I had it, but it wasn't one that I, I watched multiple times or have a fond, not a fond, but a strong memory of.

You're not a slapstick comedy kind of person either, are you? I like it on stage. I love it on stage. Which that, that was gonna be what I was gonna transition to. I didn't realize until watching this as an adult,  you don't know all the, like, the actors lore, and No.

Their performances in different places, and so,  , Nathan Lane. An incredible, incredible stage actor. Nathan Lane can do no wrong. Yeah, truly. , I've been blessed to be able to see him twice on stage, like on Broadway in a play. One a comedy, the other a much more serious drama. But like, oh my god, I could watch that dude paint fences.

He is so fucking good in everything he does. And, and then you watch like a movie like this. And it's like kind of a throwaway movie  I bet 90 percent of our listeners have are like, oh mouse hunt. I do kind of vaguely remember It's a kind of a throwaway movie. It's a throwaway, but he's still fucking golden and it's kind of like a a find Yeah, like you're his performance.

I'm gonna go ahead and spoil it his performance is Incredible in this and I think you guys, , you know jumping off the Nathan Lane  bandwagon  You guys are going to fight over Lee Evans, aren't you? Yes, and no, I mean my original critique was just I was just being You know, , dramatic. For those at home, there was a text thread and it seemed like an argument was brewing between Kyle and Andrew.

So maybe we have a mini debate now about, was Lee Evans good in this movie? I mean, I'm going to come back to Center much, , more. Agreeably than, than you would, you would think, because he's not bad. It's just this goes into the whole aspect of watching a farce on, you know, the film setting as opposed to the stage.

Because I was telling you the other day, like, I much prefer to watch a farcical or a slapstick on stage, because that separation between, you know, the actors and the audience makes it more believable. When it's on a screen right in front of you, it kind of ruins that. That magic that you get and I just don't think it's like watching a movie musical.

It doesn't necessarily do it for me there's something about it that kills the authenticity and You know, there were times where Lee Evans was just a little over the top and I was like, come on, you know but He's still very talented. He's a great comedian. Like he is revered in England. He's revered all over the world.

He's not a slouch He's a he's a great stage actor, too. Yeah, he's one like I don't like there's one Tony's but what's the the West after Bafta? But what's though the West and Olivier Awards . He is  talented I just there were moments where I just thought he was a little over the top little Chris Farley esque if you will Yeah, this movie is built kind of stage like, like almost like a play, especially with its sets, which we're gonna get into all that.

It's like the play that goes wrong. Yeah. If you've seen that or you're familiar with it. It very much is, yeah. And I don't think I appreciated what they were trying to do. No. Cause you're not gonna see that as a kid and , I don't know about you guys, but at that time in my life, I wasn't seeing a lot of plays.

My brother was a stage actor. So I saw more plays later on as I got older, but as a kid,  , we just watched movies and TV shows.  My family didn't go out to, to the theater to watch, , different plays. So , this was a fun Walk through  because I think I saw the movie in a different angle for sure and I and I think most kids don't see it They don't appreciate the stage performances or this difference.

They just last laugh at the absurdity They don't they don't look at the nuances of what it takes to create that absurdity with the physical comedy and the timing and everything  they don't They're not, you know programmed to appreciate that at that juncture, which Kyle Explain to our audience too, like briefly, if you can, because I know we can have a whole podcast on this, but the difference between stage and theatrical.

Well, when you're on stage,  first of all,  stage acting and film acting are two different things. You're still acting, yes, but there's a lot of forgiveness in film in terms of like messing something up or something not hitting right. You have time to figure it out. , when you're rehearsing for Any kind of theater show there is a play or for a musical or farce or whatever   you get your mess ups out during rehearsals Maybe during a tech run maybe but at that point you should be good to go and  you really live in that moment When you're live in front of an audience, there is no messing up.

There is no Forgiveness, there's no break.  That's where the saying is so the show must go on And  this is where I think that   if you do have access to go see a show if somebody around you Is going to do a good farce  you need to go watch it and see it but finding people nowadays  Especially in like colleges or God forbid even a high school production.

You won't, you don't see that as much anymore. You're not gonna get it. It's not a lost art. But it kind of is. It's getting to that point. Because it's not, because musicals have really taken over the theater space. And even musicals today, there's nothing farcical about them. They're societal melodramas.

They are. They're pop heavy. And like, you know, Hamilton's really cool, but I think Hamilton kind of ruined a lot of theater. , I wouldn't say it ruined it, but it would change the direction. If you think that's ruining it, then I do. I think that like it brought a lot of people into theater who hadn't normally been there, which is great.

But now it's to a certain degree, kind of dumbing it down. And I think that there's a lot of, , I haven't really heard or seen anything good come up lately. I don't think they're doing anything really. Be honest with you. I don't think it was Hamilton. It was happening way before that. Honestly, there's so many shitty musicals out there You'd be surprised how many that that flop or are on, you know, Broadway for like two or three months It's so many fucking remakes or pretty woman the musical or mean girls the musical or back to the future the musical like There's no originality , when it comes to creating new musicals nowadays, I don't think it was necessarily Hamilton, but it did change the trajectory of where we were going.

There was Book of Mormon, I think, that put a, you know, has, like, And that had a throwback to the standards in the Golden Age, for sure, with everything they put in there. But there are very few talents like that and like people who are going into right music It's just it's it's kind of how we talk about like movie scores being dog shit these days.

They're not really good. There's no originality. There's no The one thing and i'll give people credit for this is there's no money in musicals So people there's no money in theater people. Yeah, people don't put their energy and effort into creating a great musical anymore because there is no money for it.

That's why Sondheim's have died out and Kander and Ebb's and Rodgers and Hammerstein's, like there's not, you're not going to get that anymore because there's no give back for them once they've created something special. You can only do Les Mis so many times. But, , my point with this is 

even if you could go find somebody who's doing a farce and then you have to understand what that is and what that means. Farce does not mean slapstick. It has an element of it, but there's a lot of like  door slamming and quick changes and i'm here and all of a sudden i'm here and like there's a lot of Lines and jokes and have to hit they have you have to have timing you have to work with your audience you have to work with the entire Crew, it's a living breathing Yeah, so that's why I understand where Andrew's coming from.

But at the same time, I don't think where you have the luxury of Living 20 or 30 years ago and being able to go see farces regularly like they're put on regularly so this is something that if I were to show this to a child and they were like, you know, Oh my god, like I love this. This is this is really funny Then I'd be like, okay Well, let's like a theater theater might be something you'd vibe with it might be something that you get with but like you're not my Point is like the action the access to that is not there Yeah, so that's why I really I defend this movie pretty heavily in terms of like it's yes There's some juvenile elements to it and some stuff that might be over the top But like you're not you don't see that kind of shit anymore and it's really it's really sad I want to say my critique of that is not It doesn't invalidate or make it not worth watching there.

I was just saying there are moments where i'm like, ah That would have hit better on stage and I get what they were going for there. I kind of lost me but like overall Yes, I i'm full of greens with you. I will say too. The reason we we talk about this  Is because this movie uses two incredibly gifted stage performers  nathan lane And lee evans and then it is  Kind of directed in a stage performance like there were there's all the huge sets huge sets.

 A lot of vignettes in there as well. Right a lot of different like  things that  Ebbs and flows  the comedic timing is very stage heavy. Mm hmm, and I was looking up the director I think his name's Verbinski. No, that's Gore Verbinski.

He directed all the Pirates of the Caribbean, right? Rango stuff like that. Like he's a very storied director. Yeah, he's he's very good in that kind of  slapstick comedy role I mean, what did people say about the original Pirates of the Caribbean? Yeah, fucking hilarious. Yeah, very fun I think this movie is a little bit more slapstick II than that but also for sure but also this movie is more stage heavy, but I think he created a setting where he's like, hey, I have these two incredible stage performers.

I'm going to let them perform in what they know best. And I think he got great work out of both. He got great work out of, I would say everybody. But let's be fair though. We could bring Nathan Lane into your apartment right now and he could probably put on a masterclass. He could do a one man show.

Right. And we would, we could hand him a page. Of just wing dings and spilt coffee stains and he would put on a performance of a lifetime with it Like I don't I don't know if that man has ever had a bad performance.   I want all the writers who are listening to this right now to understand   There doesn't have to be, like, an aspect of society or societal wrongs or something in our, in our culture.

Like, that movie stands up. You could set that movie in the 1800s, 1700s, now, and a hundred years from now, and it would still Be fine, it would stand up on its own. There doesn't have to be a fucking  overriding Message or like a, a tone, like, and we all, I love, I love Like a lot of this new stuff that's trying different things.

It's cool But like there's nothing, there is a lot to be said for the originals and a lot to be said for like Comedic writing in general and  a lot of the stuff that they had is just you can't you can't teach that you can put it in A script but for them to bring it to life like that I thought was really is one of the hidden gems I think we've watched in the last year and a half almost that we've been doing this .  Before we get into the blow by blow does anybody remember the marketing to this movie? No, I don't remember anything I think that's what I remember as a kid, but it's so fuzzy because it was so so long ago 

I  remember the one commercial It was like this is the story of a mouse and it was like a shadow of the mouse and it had big ears It was like Like a shadow of basically Mickey and then the light shines on the mouse and he's got two olives in his mouth Hmm, and it then they were mirroring it as like, oh, this is a Disney movie It's another Mickey movie and it wasn't no not at all and and they didn't they didn't give away anything about the movie It was just all focused on the mouse and then Mouse Hunt came out.

 That's what I remember vividly  From the trailers, but they didn't market this movie a lot. I don't think I guess I remember the color scheme. And I remember the movie poster. That's the one that sticks out to me. I don't remember where I saw it, whether that was the theaters. Yeah, that's a lost art too.

, that's another podcast for another day. But like, the lost art of movie posters. Cause you would go see another movie and then you would skim the posters to see what was coming. And to be fair, you still have them sometimes outside of certain theaters. They suck though. Movie posters suck these days.

People don't give a shit about posters, and that's sad because they know the people don't really look at them No, because they have access to anything So we need to bring back movie posters and cut trailers down to less than two four fucking minutes Not have it 

You know, spoil the fucking best parts of the movie, Marvel.  All right, Andrew, before we dive in, give us some numbers, right? Or make us guess at some numbers. Whatever you want. Oh, I'm make you, I'm gonna make you guess. , I'm gonna start off with, , budget. What do y'all think the budget was for this?  , they had large set pieces set, demo demolished.

They demolished it. They shot on location and studio. I'm gonna say the budget was around  35 to 45 million. That's really good. 38 million. Okay, you nailed it. Give me a guess on that. Yeah, that was pretty fucking good. , I was gonna say too, like with, , Lee Evans and probably Nathan Lane and even Christopher Walken with his little A lot of money there.

Yeah, Christopher Walken's like  But, , domestic opening, this is December 19th, 1997, domestic opening  was, , 6 million. Six million and some change. , so, you know, okay, decent, whatever, yeah, no, not really. Not a good opening. But! Domestically, , all together grossed 62 million. Internationally, 60 million.

Nice. Oh, 120. , yeah. So 122, 400 and some. Nice. , 122, 000, 000. 4. Big success. Yeah, big, huge success. With limited marketing to their marketing budget, it was probably very, very small. , and  the six million on the opening that's around christmas people are traveling people are not going to the theater and lee Evans was an international name.

I mean he is an international name. He's a he's a british comedian. He was well established , and of course nathan lane is nathan lane christopher walken. , that's a that's a solid recipe for success there. Yeah Yeah, so the the movie was a real success. Did we ever get a sequel? Did we ever look that up?

I don't think so I don't think we did either. , it's not worth looking up. We already know that that's gonna be dog shit.   They shouldn't, they shouldn't have ever created one. Leave it as is. It's fine. There's no reason. It leaves off on a plenty good note.

There's no more money to squeeze. There's no more juice to squeeze from that. Yeah, they did well there. , all right, so let's, let's start. Where does this movie open up, Kyle?  So we open up at one of the funniest parts the entire movie is the beginning and it's it's we open up on to a rainy day outside of the cathedral.

Uncle Lewis funeral. Yes, so what's it what's his name? , Hickey. , yeah, ,  I'll look it up. Ricky Hickey.  Is it William Hickey? William Hickey, yeah. Is that William Hickey? Yeah. This was one so really quick we'll just get this out of the well we'll talk about that actually we'll cut that we'll talk about that when we're in the hospital scene.

Rudolph. Schmuntz. Rudolph Schmuntz. So we, we open up to a rainy day. It looks like they're in like a pseudo New York. St. Patrick's Cathedral. Yeah. It looks, it looks New York ish. We'll call it New York. Why not? Like a, what, thirties, twenties, forties? No, no. This is, so that's, that's interesting that you say that, Chase, because it looks, it looks like that, but if you look at the cars. 

At certain points it's this is what I mean But there was a true farcical element to this was they they spanned the the decades from like the 40s through like the 90s Literally the car that pulls it. We'll get there. I do remember saying to myself. I was like, what fucking time period are we they were all over the place?

Cause like some of that is 1920s, like the factory, like gave me 20s vibes. But the cars are much older. Yeah. Cars are much, the cars were that, that time, 1997, there's a couple of Mercedes that you saw a couple. But then you saw some that were from like the 60s or 70s for sure. Well, 50s, 40s, , there, so we're all over the place in terms of, which is very, which to me is a very farcical element as well, because , if you're invested enough.

In the scene, in the character, in the actual show,   the audience will believe anything. They don't  care if it's good. , I never thought twice about it. Although I was like, yeah, that's interesting. I'm like, where, where is this? But we open up, there's a funeral happening, And we see the pallbearers carrying a coffin down These really slippery steps.

It's raining, it's raining, it's pouring. And it's, we see two men, Nathan Lane and Lee Evans, And they start arguing about  About the color of one of their suits. He's like, it's a gray suit if I ever saw one.  I said, I don't know. It's charcoal gray. No, it's black! It's black. And they start arguing and this, what a shitty casket.

It's just, he makes one wrong move and he pops off one of the handles. And all of a sudden, all hell breaks loose, the, the casket drops to the floor, slides down the steps, and he does a fucking, like, It ejects William Hickey himself out of the casket. He does, like, three flips in the air and then lands head down on a manhole across the street.

He did it perfectly, yeah.  He's catapulted, like,  30 feet easily. , easily  the construction worker eating his sandwich in the rain, that's disgusting is like who's halfway through the Hudson now.

So I guess they are in New York. Yeah. So, yeah, they, so that's, that's how we open. And , and I want to make a comment too. So this is the first scene we see William Hickey It's not the only , if you don't know who that is, he is uncle lewis  from  Christmas vacation. He's been in a lot of movies and he was Really sick during the filming of this movie.

Very sick. He had emphysema and something else with that Bronchitis. No.  . Yeah, EMI. Em, he probably died from bronchitis, but he had emphysema. He died before the movie even released. Yeah, he did. So this was, this was when he was literally on his deathbed, he died.  Actually during pre production, but they'd already shot some of his scenes because they were doing it as concept work and he died, but luckily they didn't need anything else from him so they can move on without.

He does, they have, they do a couple good things to homage him throughout this movie. The paintings being one of them, which is another farcical element that I thought. was very well done.  But , 

, it turns out , they were at their funeral of their father, if you haven't picked that up. Their brothers. Yeah, and their brothers, and they're just two different brothers.   They were modeled kind of after Laurel and Hardy.

Yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah.  One's  all about success and money and the other one's kind of more  morally bound. But underneath all of it, they're both. with Stumblebum as it says, Stumblebum and Inheritors and Brothers, like they're just idiots at the baseline of it. They are. They are.

One of them is an idiot because he's easily taken  advantage of. . . The other one's a little too over ambitious. Over ambitious. He gets in his own way. Yeah. ,  and those are, those are two really good qualities to put together. They're, they're good foils to each other, we'll say.

And , Nathan Lane is the one that's. Always, like, kind of looking at money, always gets in his own way, super ambitious, . Lee Evans is kind of like the bumbling, I don't want to say bumbling idiot, he's a very sweet dude. I'm a young dumb boy but I'm 35 years old, oh shit, what do I do? I'm, I'm too sweet for my own good, I'm gonna get taken advantage of, that kind of guy, .

But they're at the wheel reading and they're kind of arguing still  and all Nathan Lane seems to care about is what's left to them. Yes. And the money that their dad's leaving, which he leaves them the factory and it's The string factory. The string factory. Schmuntz, or Schmuntz String.

Schmuntz String. So, and what I gather, they never really go into huge detail, but the factory's failing because no one cares about string anymore. Imagine that. And that's a big like Riff between the two and they started here because he's like you used to care about string Yeah, and he's like he's like no one gives a shit about string anymore and And so he's like, oh great.

The factory's not worth anything. We can try to sell it off and and what?  William Hickey's character, has told him, is like, you know, keep the string dream alive. Never sell! Never sell the string factory. So, Lee Evans's character, the whole time, is like, I will not sell the factory. That's gonna stay in our family name, and I will run it.

And, so the fact, selling the factory is like off limits, because they,  Now they're they're split on that decision, but then they they they're left a house Yes, and he go and it was it was given to the father. Where was payment? Yes, it was  We won't we won't get into the specificities of the house yet But it's some abandoned house that has a worth of 50, 000.

It was bought for 50,  000 and he goes how much does it work now? 50, 000. Great! A worthless house! And an egg. Great. Ceramic egg. They get a porcelain egg and a box of half smoked cigars. , I think there's three left in there and the ceramic egg breaks before their meeting is even finished So Nathan Lane's pissed.

He takes the cigars He's like I have to go feed the mayor and that's what he says He said and it turns out he owns this fancy fancy ass ranch restaurant He's a head so annoying because he's he is the head chef, but he's like putting on a face fake french Accent and he's like he does it. Well, he does it.

Well does it? Okay. He's saying a couple of things But everyone's fucking taking it like they're like, yeah And I think that's part of his character is that he's doing everything he can to be over ambitious instead of just like being himself He's trying to be everything that he can't be  and this is like our first like I was dying during this scene So the mayor shows up the mayor is obese.

He is very there's a whale. Well, there's a uh  There's a a person a reporter that comes up to him. He's like mayor How do you think your triple bypass will influence your reelection campaign? And  he's like He's like, I don't care. I'll be fine. I'm here to eat. And you're like, yeah, I bet you are.  He rifles through the front door and he's just like eating up everything Nathan Lane has given to him.

And, and Nathan Lane is like, he's got like reporters everywhere. So he knows this is like a big deal for his restaurant. If the mayor loves it, then like, this is going to be a business boom.  And the merit does cause we want to make note, his kids are there. His kids are the worst. Yeah.

And his kids are just, they're just the fucking worst. So this is where this is like the darker part comes in is this point right here, because there's, he goes back into the kitchen and he's preparing everything. You see a little cockroach crawl out of like a little basket.  We got to stop. It's the cigar box.

It's the cigar box that let them some Cuban cigars from his father. That's what the cockroach that comes out of that. That is a Madagascar hissing  cockroach. Here we go again.  And  not endemic to the United States whatsoever.  , this is from Africa. Who's counting?

Honestly, that does not disgust me when I'm older. Cause I'm like, I know that, I know that that's not from there. And like, it wouldn't be attracted to the food like that. What would disgust me if it was a fucking like little German cockroach bullshit, I, I would have vomited.

But Andrew, what happens? . Well, they elegantly serve the food to the family, you know, I don't exactly know what the fuck it is. It's some sort of French, like You know, whatever, uh, and it's an extravagant Flammion, or something like that, yeah.

Extravagant showing, and they're ood and odd, and then they start to chow down, and then the mayor Bites into something crunchy and what does he say goes? Oh crunchy. Yeah. I love the almonds. That's what it was  And then there was not a single almond on that plate.  So he bites into it and then the the rest of the body of the cockroach falls on the table And the kids start freaking out.

They're like, Ew, daddy, look! Yeah, that was in your food! And he's like, No, there's only half of it! Yeah, where's the head? And then he realizes then that he has bitten half the cockroach, and the cockroach is still alive. I mean that tracks. So, so he, he like swallows the head and it starts choking on it. He starts profusely choking.

  He vomits this vile looking white bug substance onto the table.  I was eating something then and I had to take a break because it was fucking disgusting. I might have looked away, but I just remember him It was nasty.

And then he falls backwards and starts his choking fit. While choking is fiction. And then he we cut to outside in the ambulance. Oh, this is my favorite part too. So we're in the ambulance and he's getting he's trying to resuscitate and they're like, Clear! Yeah,  he is in dire straits now. He is like pretty much about to be dead on arrival.

And his kids are playing in the police tape. They're playing with police tape. I look, I, mine's better. I'm doing great. They're like pulling it off the door too because the police are trying to put the caution tape up everywhere and the kids are playing with it like it's like ribbon. And then He dies, but he doesn't, doesn't, he dies from like cardiac arrest.

Isn't that what they said? It wasn't choking. They were like cardiac arrest from the asphyxiation of the, the cockroach. So they, they, they take that and blame it on Nathan Lane. So now they're closing Nathan Lane's restaurant and he has to go work at a diner. Yeah.  Then it cuts over to Lee Evans, his miserable character, as he goes home to his wife.

Well, before that though, he had a, he had people come visit him at the string factory and they offered him, Zepco offered him lots and lots and lots of money and a, and to be like a shareholder. A salaried position. And a salaried position. And he turns it down. He's like, you got it for me. He has a little flashback of them in the hospital and his dad is dying and his dad, you know, tells him, Uncle Lewis is like, Never sell.

Never sell. So this is where, this is where you can actually see that William Hickey was definitely going to die soon. He is, I mean, how old was he? He was 69.  I want you guys to think about that. He was 69 when he died. Are you sure? He's about to turn 70. And he looked like he was 90. I guess you're right.

I thought he was 90. He had it rough. I mean, he was just like no muscle mass on him. Just like he was 69 to Share this three heavy smoker probably is and this is a tires He gives Lee Evans that string. He's like, this is the string that came over to America. Yeah Just Eddie's three  Skies like it's just a string.

He's like, okay, you can tell it like his he's moving his body's like I want you to Don't have the string. And he's like, I think they filmed that actually on his desk. I was gonna say that was his actual hospital bed. That was his hospital wing and room. What a way to go. But he, so, so we, yeah, we had  . Oh, for real.

, but I will even say this at this point, like instead of giving Lee Evans like the string, you should have gave him a, a brain. Because this was the dumbest decision in the entire movie. I was like,  you would still control. You would still have so much, and he, but he said, .

Pop said never sell. So we never, we never sold it. And he makes that stupid like quizzical face like, hmm. What should I do? I can't. It's not gonna happen. What you should do is Sell it! Like, that's what you should do. No. , and he would still have a huge control of it, so it'd still be in the family somehow.

He'd probably have, like, close to a six figure job. He'd have to do shit. In the 20s, whatever this is.  And then, so then he decides to not sell. He goes home to his wife. And tells her that. And she starts throwing dishes all over the kitchen. , she makes him leave to prove She cucks him. She cucks him out of the fucking house.

She cucks him hard. So she, she packs his shit and tells him to get out. So now he's homeless. , his factory's not making anything, and , he's like, down on his luck, and it tells me too that they weren't financially stable to begin with, that she was the breadwinner in that family. I wonder what gave it away. 

Just out of curiosity. , and she leaves him no money to even get a hotel or anything. So he goes to a diner to get some Some food and he gets a grilled cheese with some capers on it and it says what does it say? Merry Christmas on it or something. It's like he's like, excuse me I ordered the grilled cheese without capers and then what it Nathan Lane is back there because he's the cook there He's already the line chef.

He got a job really fast. He did like this like within a day. Yeah 24 hours So he's back there trying to cook his fancy French dishes in this like, 

New York diner. But like, think about, why would you put capers on a fucking grilled cheese? Have you never had capers on a grilled cheese? Come on. That sounds salty as fuck. What the fuck is wrong 

with y'all? Why would you, yeah, I don't Your taste is subpar, both of you. Andrew, describe to me what a caper tastes like. It's like a sour, like vinegar, like wrinkled pea salt. Not even, not even salty. Salty. I hope everybody listens to that. It's not even a pea, it's not vinegar. There's,  there's gotta be some vinegar for sure.

I think it's just brine and it's, that's probably vinegar in that brine water. The fact that Yout, you were talking about our taste buds. You don't even know what a caper tastes like. I just told you what a fucking caper is. You take, you don't, you're talking about vinegar and there is vinegar. Fucking I was shaking his head.

No capers. Yes. I don't yes. Yes. I'll pass. I'll take your word for it then. Well, he's wrong. So, uh,  So he obviously sends this nasty shit back and nathan lane gets  Pissed off that someone sent back his caper grilled cheese And they they they reignite together  And  Lee Evans doesn't tell Nathan Lane he got offered this money to buy the factory either during this whole thing But now They start to leave together. They're both homeless with nothing and then that's when they remember what Andrew  They have a  house. They have a house to go to. Yeah, a big old worthless house. Out in the country. And it's snowing now, it's cold . It looks dreary and it looks depressing as hell.

They're walking through the streets and they're fighting  and Hey, what is uh, Lee Evans say he's like  What's what's what's Nathan Lane's brother? What's what's the name of the character? There's Lars and Ulrich No, just move forward, but he's like it's Christmas we should be celebrating what we have not what we don't have They don't have anything.

They don't have string. They have a piece of string and capers. Ernie. Ernie and Lars. , and there's a little choir singing and it's snowing and it's Someone hands Nathan Lane a quarter. Yeah. So, and then before we, before we skip past this, but the, the choir finishes and disperses and we have to throw this in there.

You look at the, the window storefronts. And what, what is that storefront? What's the name of it, y'all? Epstein's Bakery. Epstein's Bakery. Just kind of dangling it right there in front of us. He's got an island, he's got a house, he's got a bakery. Yep. Yep. And, and for whatever reason, they can see the house through the bakery.

Yes, they can. Which I thought was very strange. Well, I thought it was a fun little transition. It's a farce, you know. Yeah. So that leads us right. to probably a very nice house, but it is absolutely dilapidated. All the windows are broken in. . 

There's no way that house is retaining heat. No, that house is rough. But, but there is a mat. There is like a cot upstairs that, you know. They fall asleep on but then they, they get woken up in the middle of night. By our main character. Mouse man. Mouse man. They don't know what it is at first. They just hear some scratching.

They hear some, some burrowing or something. They go upstairs after they wake each other up and they, they start looking and looking and And  Nathan Lane gets Lee Evans to propel him up but accidentally propels him through the actual, like, ceiling. And I will say, there's a part in this attic that I remember that scared the shit out of me was the jack in the box in the corner.

So they, they think they see a monster and it's a jack in the box and the mouse is kind of like fucking with them, basically, at this point. And then,  he catapults Nathan Lane threw up and what do they find?  They find a mouse. Oh, it's just a mouse. It's just a mouse.

Which should have been  as far as this movie went. Yeah, that should be it. Like, at this point, like  There's a little robin who lives in an old  abandoned home. Go figure.  Keep in mind folks, at this point I was like, Oh, it's a mouse. Yeah, nothing crazy.

It's not doing a whole lot. It's just running around. But , we did find  some blueprints. Yes. And this is where it takes a turn. , turns out the house is A LaRue. A forgotten LaRue, and LaRue is like, adjacent to  like, Frank Lloyd Wright, some like famous architects. From like, it's, from like the turn of the 19th century, it's like, fuckin And they take it to like, the town hall, and they verify it, and they found out, yes, it is the 43rd LaRue, and they got LaRue, yeah.

So the house is Not worthless anymore. The house is worthless probably millions. Yeah millions upon millions.  I thought it was funny because it goes really quick from there and it goes really quick from them sleeping and finding the blueprints to like Everyone being like the last little rue and like walking around the house and there's people like looking at this broken moldy banister being like Oh the art detail in this  It's classical yet.

Not modern The molding on the walls is just pristine the black mold in the bathroom is perfect It's like the house is I can't just we can't describe it enough the house is Absolutely falling apart like it's ugly as hell. Yeah, like it's the the the original layout and plan is ruined You would need to spend no telling how much money to renovate that house to make it livable Lots but continue so we we found out this the missing LaRue.

We have this weird  Eccentric billionaire man coming in. Who's like Russian? No, no, no, no. He's like French or something. Who knows? I think he's Eastern European. I think he's from Spain. And he owns like, what'd he say, like 18 LaRue's like that. He has this like, fascination. I have never paid more than six for a LaRue.

Yeah. . And he's like, oh six. You hear that? You hear that Ernie, , $600,000. They're not, they're not quantifying When he said six. Six. Yeah. And he meant 6 million. Yeah. So they're, they're under the understanding like, well, we got, we gotta get like a million dollars. And they're already talking about  an actual $6 million home.

 He's like i'll cut you a check right now for like, what did he say?  He says i've never paid over 10 for a house before and he's then So what they do is they go to like to a little sidebar and lee evans wants to just sell it immediately Which I should have done.

That would have solved everything. And Lee Evans is stupid because he's like 600, 000 and didn't think about the six and I don't think Nathan Lane's character did but he comes to the side and he's like look at how many people are here Gawking at this. Let's put it up for auction and get big time money, which is smart smart idea Yeah, so it like you're thinking.

Oh, he's in the right right here. So Nathan Lane's like Let's do that and then Lee Evans comes around. He's like, oh, yeah. Yeah. No, we'll make them bid it out and then raise the price So they go out and they deny the guy's offering it and then that's when he turns around he goes I've never paid ten million dollars for a house before and walks out and and then they're just standing there like fine Yeah, just their face is just like they're drooling a little bit.

They're like, well, see you later. Bye Come again next time because they know right now they have like Just they're sitting on a pot of gold. They're set for life if this acquisition goes through. All they have to do now is renovate the home, right? It doesn't even look like they have to renovate. They don't really have to do much.

 So  this is my main flaw with this movie.  Everybody was gawking and standing over and offering money. He's Probably going to offer them 6 million. Why just take the 6 million split it like in, in, in that time period from the 90s, it would have been a lot of money. And, ,  they don't have to renovate anything cause everyone's already like licking the banisters and like falling in love with the place.

Cause it is the missing LaRue. That's enough. You don't have to do anything. They don't have to eradicate a small. Mouse. Herman. They don't have to get rid of that fucking thing. Let the person who buys it take care of it. It's unkillable. But we're getting there. That would ruin the movie. So, so they set out after that now They're gonna try to renovate the house.

Themselves. With no money. No experience. No experience. No money. . They weren't really trying to do too much I think they were just trying to fix some of the floors and put some some some  nails in the crown molding Oh my god, that was the worst when you were watching.

I was like, why who the fuck are you? Yes, you just ruined that molding What was, what was the point? Why would you nail molding in the wall? And, and like, I don't remember if that scene came first or the other. Like I kind of lose track of what happened where chronologically. A lot of stupid shit happens in between.

I think that it's essentially what starts happening is the mouse starts. Making himself more known. Known. Yes. Yes. And he start and they start like, oh, our friends here. Well let's try to kill him. What the fucking, so, and the first thing that they do, I think because it ramps up, right? Like the first thing they do is they see this mouse, this mouse has not done anything in the house.

Not at all. Like, he's not chewing on shit. He's not just living in the walls. He's just like running around. Well, they get up in the morning and get breakfast and remember, 'cause they lay the mouse trap out for 'em and they, they, they also had a whole bunch of like fresh groceries, abandoned homes. So yeah, right.

So this mouse had eight at eaten through one of the cereal boxes, which I thought was a pretty fun little trick. And he went and Nathan Lane goes to try to get the cereal out. And this is, they're like, Oh, the, Oh, remember we had to put the mouse trap out last night. Remember, let's go check to see if it's there.

Oh, it's, it's empty. And he, look, he ate the pit. He ate the pit.  What an asshole. Yeah. He left everything to mock us. So this is where they start anthropomorphizing and now this mouse is now like  Like, like a villain. Like this mouse is now to them as something standing in the way of them and the six million 600, 000.

Yes, 600, 000 that they could sell for 10, 000, 000 that they could have sold for 6, 000, 000 early on.  We can't we're not gonna be able to get too far into a lot of these scenes because it's like physical comedy It's so I can't we can't really so we're gonna have to like  Yeah, and well in one scene I wanted to gloss over is so after they do the first because  Most of the movie now is them trying to catch this mouth.

Yes It's so there's almost exclusively and you know And I'll say this early on as we kind of hit some of the highlights as they're trying to catch the mouse they're just  Bickering further and further with each other like their their relationships kind of deteriorating It's kind of like they're more focused on taking out this animal That's just living in this environment and it's like putting a dent in their relationship, which was already dented  But in the process of them doing this though, they can they They ruin the house. 

Every single thing they try to do to kill this mouse ruins the house. And then after the first mousetrap fell, one of the ones I wanted to bring up was the one they set, they set themselves across the kitchen, and they put like 500 mousetraps down. All connected to each other, so if one goes off, you have a domino effect.

So, The fun part about this is this was a practical effect. They really set up 500 mousetraps. That's terrifying. And they had to take several takes of this. So they had to reset all these mousetraps. That is the commitment I'm talking about in these movies. Yes. That, and we talked about this on Aaron's episode. 

You just don't get the practical stuff. They would have CG'd that shit these days, and it would have looked awful. This looked real and added a when those mousetraps started going off, I got tense again. Yeah.  This is real. This is somebody really ha moves the wrong way, and their fingers snapped.

Cuz those things were very pressurized. Mm hmm. So, the mouse is able to, like, climb up around the mousetraps. They watch him do this and then he's able to just set them all off. I think he throws something onto the mousetraps. It's neither here nor there, but sets all the mousetraps off and runs away 

and  , when he sets them all off, they start rolling in them for whatever reason. I don't know what, yeah, that was just one of those dumb moments in this movie that's for the kids, clearly. That's just like, oh, now we're gonna roll through it. You could've just stayed there and let them all set off and then cleaned them all up, but whatever.

, this is where we get into this point, folks, where it's just going to be like, a lot of these moments  they're such physically comedic moments that it's not, we're not really gonna be able to describe them to you more so than like tell you what's kind of the overarching theme of each, of each one.

So we get that with the mousetraps don't work. . I want to talk about the nails in the wall. Because he for whatever reason Lee Evans is driving nails into the crown. For an electric nail gun. Yeah, from electric nail gun.

No, no, no. It's pneumatic because it's a, it's precious.  Yeah, so he's driving nails. So , right before he drives nails into the section of the The crown molding, ,  , we see the mouse, and the mouse is like running in, and he gets in this little like sardine can. It's his bed. It's his bed, and he starts to go to sleep.

So this is the first like instance we see this mouse, and that creates him as like our protagonist. Like we feel for the mouse, like oh, he's like, oh, he's just living here. This is his home. Yeah, yeah. And  I guess the metaphor here is he's made a home out of this nonsense, of this dilapidated house, and they don't see it as a home, they just see it as a way to make money.

So it's like, yeah, you find your home where you find your home, there you go, there's the theme of the movie. But,  I was impressed when I found out, they didn't, they used some CGI on the mouse? . They looked very real. They were trained mice. And this one was trained to sleep in a sardine can.

That was a real mouse that they used. Yeah, and it's like, again, We would have CGI'd that shit now. It would have looked stupid. You wouldn't have felt connected to that mouse. Thanks PETA.  But now, like, I think they used like a hundred different mice during the film. How many of them died?  Probably all a hundred of them.

I think a lot of them. I did. I think there's some life cycles happening. Thanks, PETA. Probably like generations of mice. He's gonna hear this and open up a case or something. Yeah, there. What do we do? Well, send them my address. I want them to come here so I can talk to them.  You know what they say about publicity, , , so he's driving nails through the mouse's home  his nail gun stops working. It gets stuck, it doesn't go through all the way, and it stops directly, like, Centimeters in front of the , mouse's face, it doesn't kill him. He's interrupted by something in the  living room or whatever. Cause Nathan Lane comes in with a jacuzzi tub.

A 1200 jacuzzi tub. That they threw in.  The poster cut out of the lady in it  and gave him 1, 200 and he's like, you used our last 1, 200. That's a huge part of renovation process. It's also a huge part of the plot after this as well. This 1, 200. Yeah. So they carry the tub upstairs and then what happens next, 

, they see the mouse in the, he like, he gets behind some kind of like jar of water and it magnifies his face and that. terrifies both of them. Primarily Nathan Lane. It's like he's never, he couldn't figure out what that could have been. Couldn't have been a mouse. So he flips out and moves the, , this, this probably like, I don't know, 600 pound tub and it bumps Lee Evans and it just fucking like, they both get into it.

Essentially by accident and it just shoots down the stairs through the door and break doesn't do  Does not break doesn't well this porcelain tub doesn't also break any of the wood and it has like it seems like it has zero Friction surfaces on it because it just fucking glides through down the hill into the lake They go to the center of the lake, and this is one of the, I thought, one of the funnier parts.

It's like, as soon as it lands there, it just comes to a stop in the middle of this lake, and then Lee Evans, like, tries to say something. He goes, Well, and it just, Pshhh!  Shatters. And it just, they both go down, like, You know, in this frigid water, and they're just like, Yeah, okay, cool, I guess I'll just, uh, we're down here now.

And that will come back in handy later, because we're going to see that again later on. And then, and then Andrew, I think we get the cat next, right? Yeah, I think so. Which is the Another dark comedy element that I  love. So they show up at the Pound, and the Pound is set up like it's a gas chamber.

They're wearing like hazmat suits and shit. Yeah, it's like, it is like Chernobyl inside this. It's bad. Yeah, it's And it's like, they take like, this girl's coming out, she's like, Not my fluffy, I want my It's a kitty! And there's a sweet little kitten that's in this, this little cage and the guy takes it in and puts it to the thing.

Yeah, that's the funniest part is like, cause Nathan Lane's like, look, he comes in as they go into the first counter, the cat that's left is just this sweet little cute little kitten and Nathan Lane's like What about this one? Nah, not tough enough. And then you see a guy in a hazmat suit come out, grab the cage of the kitten, and take it in the back, and you see it get gassed. 

We don't know if that's like, delousing or something, or if they're just killing that cat. No, they were just Which I don't know, I think it's delousing because the next step, the next thing we see is they go through these doors, and there's just, like,,  mountains, like just massive amounts of cats and cages.

In this next part. They're in a very dark and sterile room and like, and almost like a warehouse. Yeah. Yeah. And they're just, they're, they're looking for a cat and they come across, , cat. He's like, oh, you're gonna want cat zilla,  . And you're like, what a fucking name. Because what's the description he gives?

We want something that's just like mean, and. Yeah, he's like basically like a super soldier. Someone who's been around the block a few times. Yeah, that's like not trainable. Yeah. Boy, has this cat been around the block a few times. Oh my god. They take it out in the crate. Well, they don't even take it out of the crate.

Well, they're trying to talk to the cat in there and they're like, Well, I wonder what kind of home it has and I wonder if it and then Nathan Lane goes, You're a stupid cat, aren't you? You're an idiot, right?  And the cat just goes And he takes the zapper and like Which was a nice little jurassic park reference.

Yeah. Yeah, it was it was a fun one.  And, and it's like, because it was, , reminiscence of the raptors. In the first movie. And so, yeah, and like, so he gets the cat to calm down. And so they're like, we'll take it. And he's like, really? So they take the cat and bring it to the house  and they hand it. Like, I guess, the, a mouse cat toy?

And he's like, I don't know how this worked. And the cat, like, sniffs it once and just freaks out in his, like, wooden crate. And his arms and legs pop out of the crate. Shoot through the crate! And he walks around with this 35 pound wooden crate. that he somehow broke through. It was just, I mean, this is where I mean, when like, and it was CG, this part was CG, but like, this is the, this is what I mean when I say this is a cartoon movie.

Like, this is a live action cartoon. This is a Tom and Jerry episode. It's a very Tom and Jerry esque everything, which again, it's not pretending to be something that it's not, so we can't get mad at that. I'm not, I'm certainly not mad at it. I just thought that was kind of, that was one of the few parts I was like, I think we could have done something else there.

, but this cat. Gets out of the box, starts chasing the mouse, this whole thing, like, the mouse tricks it into the dumb waiter and it just, like, plummets to its death. He eats it to its death. Rawr! Yeah, it's still, the cat's still clearly alive, but it's probably dead.   This mouse just finds these, like, clever ways to get out of everything.

He's talented. He's a talented guy. Yeah. So. Speaking of talented, that leads us to our next, and I would say, I think everybody's favorite point of the movie. Andrew, I know you want to tackle this one. What do we get next? So, the cat fails. So, mousetraps don't work. The cat , doesn't do its job. So, what do they, which is the weird part, like, I feel like they should have done this the first.

Yeah, this should have been their first go to. Ernie and Lars call an exterminator named Caesar.  Who is played by the great Christopher Walken and it's a nice little cameo before they call the exterminator, I want to get to this plot point because it's very important They they come out to foreclose on the house.

Why do they write why they try to bank? Yeah, because because they his dad Borrowed against the house and they didn't pay the mortgage all they got to do is pay the mortgage To be able to sell the home, but they didn't and they need how much money Andrew 1, 200 Which they spent on the jacuzzi tub that's now on the bottom of the lake.

So they don't have any money to use for that So  this adds in another element that they're trying to figure out while getting rid of the mouse  , They're trying to get rid of the mouse, but the main plot point is now how do we get the 1200?

and and we'll get into a little bit more of that, but Enter christopher walken as  caesar. Yeah, great. Caesar  he comes in and he goes What is he? He goes, shh.  And then , he takes out his tape recorder, he goes,  Tuesday, oh, 800 hours,  . And he's like, must remember the kid shaving cream and whip cream from the store. 

It's like, you're like, what the fuck? He's very much a boy scout. . I do wanna mention this too. Does anybody remember, ,  I had this in my notes, I wanna go back. So before they, before the cat zilla scene, , they were talking about like. They were going over to Godzilla.

He's like, yeah, he's a monster. And if someone doesn't claim him, we'll have to gas him again, gas him again. That's good. Anyway, continue. , so he's, he's moseying around. He's like,  he, what does he say to them, Andrew? Cause he's, they're trying to like, essentially he's like, don't let the mouse listen to our conversation.

He'll know. So he starts talking about some dumb shit. And he's like, he's like, yes, we'll have to go upstairs and try to find what you're looking for. And he looks at him, he's like. He's gone now. Yeah, he's like and then like they go and they start acting like they're like, we'll go upstairs Yes,  and they walk over and he goes, what are you doing?

And they go, he's not listening now. That's what it was He's not listening now. But , we got to talk about like Caesar's getup here. Like he's all decked out in a But he almost looks like a Ghostbuster. Yeah. He's got, you know, a waist belt full of gadgets. He's got like magnifying glasses with like,  probably not infrared vision, but like he is decked out for whatever time period we're in and for an exterminator in general, in general.

, but you know, he starts doing his business. , I remember the scene. He's crawling through the the kitchen floor. He's under the table and he sees mouse poop, you know  He has like three creature levels of like magnifying glasses like on his eyes and he goes down to like the biggest one He opens up his little you know  Toolbox with like a tiny tweezer and like a vial and he picks it up and I don't remember what he says But he has uh, there's like three pieces of poop.

He's got a comment for each of them. He's like, hmm 12 13 inches and like No, he says He's like 12 cent, 12 centimeters. 12 centimeters. That's what it's, yeah. And he, and he's like whispering in this tape recorders. He is doing this. He's, , I do, and then at one point he Dirty mouse. Yeah. At one poop in the kitchen.

And at one point he eats one of them and describes the mouse's dietary Yeah. Like restraints or whatever. He eats a little mouse. Yeah. And it's, and he's like, Hmm.  Yeah, he's like whispering other stuff you some of it you can't really hear very well and and then what happens after that Andrew Well, then doesn't he get his little like? 

video  You know surveillance thing that yeah connected by a long winch, right? Yeah, it's like a A metal, you know, I don't know what you even describe, what you call that kind of, , tool. How, how would you describe that camera that he has, Kyle? It's, it's like a long metal It's, it's almost like an endoscope.

It's like, it's like something you use It's never ending. Yes. It's never ending. It's connected to his truck out front and his person and he just It's like a plumber snake, I guess. Yeah, kind of. And he feeds it through the cracks to, you know Surveil on the mouse or whatever and he's up in the attic and  , he's getting, , good feed.

He sees everything and then all of a sudden is his little, you know Screen his plasma plasma screen, which is not a it's not a plasma screen at all  Definition it's nothing. It's just you know, his monitor. We're not in the level of 4k yet. No , but it goes blank, and he's, you know, kind of befuddled, like, what's going on?

Where did it go? And he starts to freak out, and then, , you know, I don't remember exactly what happened, so if someone wants to, to take the lead here, but Because the mouse somehow puts the winch on his back. He does. Yeah. And he, and he I forgot how he reels it in. He gets reeled in, and it absolutely destroys the entire house.

So Christopher Walken is in the attic. He's in the attic up top. He looks outside, and He sees the mouse on the coil on the front of the vehicle, he's like Oh no. And then the mouse just like somehow has the, the muscle strength to flip the switch of this winch, which starts retracting, and it sends Christopher Walken for a ride, and he goes from the attic all the way to the front door, and he is hitting every step, every floorboard, and he absolutely, to Kyle's point, destroys the floor.

It's a giant, giant divot on the floor, stairwell down the front. Boom. These one of a kind fixtures. And the floor, and I remember earlier on they said that the floor was original to the LaRue and now the floor is destroyed. 

 And Christopher Walken ends up outside in front of the truck, and this is one of my favorite scenes. So the mouse jumps off the winch and onto his face, and like you get this overhead shot, and the mouse like slowly starts walking off his head, and just takes a shit on his lower He takes a poop right on his lower lip.

Yep.  So, they were out doing something. I, there's a bunch of stuff that happens in between all these mouse moments, but we're not going to be able to hit on all that, but like, they get back home, right? They come back home and they see like the ambulance going and no, no, They see a tow truck and they're like, isn't that Caesar's truck?

And , they get up to the house and see they're carting Caesar out. They were like, the cops are like, yeah, they. ,  they found him in a, locked in a trunk in the attic and he's like being carted away. He's got blood on his face. , and Ernie's like, , try to think, did you kill a mouse?

And Caesar goes, what's that? Hush, finish, I won't eat it.  He's lost his mind. He's lost his mind. He's like, this is a callback and I was waiting for this moment. So he was found in a trunk in the attic. So they said at the beginning, , about the house that the original owner was dead in the attic locked in a trunk. 

Yes  So it's kind of making waves that the mouse has been killing people that live in this house diabolical mouse Which I thought was funny, but also really ridiculous and that kind of took me out of it a little bit, but I, all right, and so just wait for the ending then, Chase, damn. 

So,  , what happens next? I think, doesn't Nathan Lane try to sell now? He finds out about Zeppers or whatever. Zepco.  So, , the lawyer comes by Lars's wife's home and talks about, he's like looking for Lars and he wants to talk about,  the auction and that gets April, his wife, excited because money excites her.

Yeah, they, she's a piece of shit. She shows up, , at the factory and like lingerie and this does not pass the Bechdel test. Does not at all. And then meanwhile, Nathan Lane is trying to meet with the Zepco people because he, you know, saw the proposal earlier from them. The money, it was ridiculous and , he wants  I don't blame him, so he's out in the town square, he tells them to meet him at, under the big clock at noon, or whatever, and he's there, he sees a couple ladies, some models, on the bench, and gets distracted, loses his hat.

Exotic hair model from Belgium, I believe. Yeah, and he loses his hat and he chases it into the street and he gets hit by a fucking bus. Yeah, and then he misses the meeting with the Zipco people. Yeah, and he's taken to the hospital and for some reason the ladies follow him  And pretend to be his sister. I thought that was one of the funnier parts of the whole movie.

They're like, they're not my sisters. The doctor's like,  He's like they come up to me like you two and he's in the doctor's like are you family and they go? Yes, we are sisters 

So funny and then Lee Evans his character shows up and he's wearing his wife's lingerie  he goes in the string factory cause he's trying to run it by himself because he had to lay off everybody because they didn't have any money to pay the people that are working at the factory.

So he tries to run everything in the loom and he gets himself caught up and his whole outfit gets torn apart because he puts it in the loom by accident. So he's naked. Yeah. Yeah. And that's when, that's when she comes in the whole thing and that's why he's wearing that. Get up. Did y'all notice the, , scrubs the doctor was wearing?

And now I did. It was very modern. It was like, literally from like, Grey's Anatomy. I mean, there was, there was modern shit everywhere. He wasn't wearing a white lab coat. It was like, you know, one of those you'd rent at like, a nurse's like, you know, scrub store nowadays. So Very out of place, I guess, but also not.

Yeah, so now they're going back to the home. Nathan Lane definitely has a concussion surprise. He didn't break anything. He should have been dead. Yeah, but he's  Alive, it's Nathan Lane like,  So they get back to the home. They're kind of coming together a little bit because lee evans is like hey april gave us the 1200 to pay the mortgage off We're good and  , nathan lane's character is like hiding the fact that he just tried to sell the factory out from under his brother  

this is where things really like  Tumbled down. It's like the last 20 minutes of the film, , , so at this point, they see the mouse running around and Nathan Lane explodes at this point and grabs a double barrel shotgun.

No, it's not, it's not just a double, that's an elephant gun. No, for real. That, that's like, that is like a extra long barrel  Big game hunting, , double barrel rifle. And he's starting to blow holes all over the house now, into this priceless home again that's been beaten to shit in back. And he's just blowing holes here and there, trying to hit the mouse and the can here, and they start literally destroying the house.

And then at one point, the mouse, like, puts one of the bombs left over by the, the Exterminator, under the floorboard and Nathan Lane shoots it and it just explodes the floorboard. Eviscerates the floorboard. And then, I think at that point, they hear the phone go off, the phone rings.  The Zepco people Are pissed off that Nathan Lane knows Shut him up.

Yeah. Even though he got hit by a fucking bus. Yeah, and  now Lee Evans is arguing and they start fighting. At this point and it boils down to like some slapstick fighting and then lee evans throws an orange apparently at 98 miles an hour And it hits the mouse and it hits the mouse behind him and like knocks him unconscious The mouse is like in dire straight.

You can see it's like belly like yeah It was actually a terrifying scene because  they go close up on this Like I think they said it was an animatronic mouse, but the mouse is like It's like twitching. It's breath is going up and down and the mouse's eyes are glazed over and you're like, God Christ.

And so  at this point now they're kind of like coming back together like, Oh, we did it. We should have just bought fruit and threw it at him the whole time. So they put the mouse in a cardboard box because neither one of them can kill it. Did you see what the note said on the box?  It said to Fidel Castro.

They send it to Cuba. They go to the US government. But they didn't weigh it. So it gets sent back. Yeah. And it gets sent back. Right when, this is like the climax of everything, and it's done really well. Well, and then too, like before you even get to that point, what was crazy is they couldn't finish off the mouse.

They couldn't kill it. They couldn't hit it with whatever, I think they were using a fire poker or something. , and then when they're taking the box to the post office, which late at night for some reason, but they were taking the box to the post office. And he's like, oh, I didn't put holes in it.

And they're both like laughing. I was like,  you couldn't finish it off, but you can suffocate it, suffocate it, in a way, worse death. , and then to Kyle's point,  it gets sent back because they didn't weigh it. Yeah, Cuba, Cuba has , a weight, , limit or not. No, they just didn't weigh it. And , in these two days, they are somehow able.

to renovate the entire house. Think about what we went through. The giant hole in the living room? They're just replacing shit, and like, nobody's gonna see it until after it's sold. It cuts to the auction night, and they're greeting their guests as they're coming in for this auction. The house is immaculate.

Clean, floors, , replaced, hole in the middle of the living room, which was the size of a fucking asteroid, is now gone. And they did this all with,  and they're not, they, they had no money to do this, though. They did it, though. , somehow, don't ask questions, they did it. Somehow they pull it off, and they think they're getting away scot free, so what happens next, Andrew?

And I will say this. This is my least favorite part of this movie is from this moment on, but it will really I thought it was I thought this was funny as hell. I thought it was fine. I thought it was really I thought it was a well done Yeah, talk about like a farcical moment like this. , they had the whole scene set up with the auction and they were in one of the living rooms and there's like 30 or 40 people in there and he sees the mouse  when he's trying to like talk about like the auction beforehand and he's like has the gavel and he's like smacking everything and then he like wrestles with it.

I did like the gavel part.  I thought that was funny because he's trying to hit it.  Lee Evans is trying to tell them, hey, the mouse is here. While he's addressing these people at the auction who are going to bid on the house and give him money. They're like, what the fuck is wrong with you? So the, the auction starts, right?

And they, so they start the auction.  And it's, it's progressing up there. I mean, a whole bunch of shit happens. They start bidding on it. It gets bid up pretty  high, but the mouse is, you know, jumping into people's, you know,  Well, no, the mouse is like The mouse, , they think that he goes into the hole in the wall, so then, Lee Evans character takes the water hose from outside, Yes.

Pumps it into the wall, and turns it on, and it breaks, the thing breaks, so it's just constantly pumping water into the house. Well, and before that, too, the mouse is just jumping around, and they're just kind of like, running around the auction room, trying to get this mouse, why this, and he tells, like, He does.

Nathan Lane tells , The auctioneer. No matter what happens, don't stop. Yeah, don't stop. Keep going.  They're trying to catch his mouse in it and he invited the  Belgium girls. Yes, they're there.  The mouse runs down one of them's like cleavage.

And he just goes, his hand right in there. Right in there.  And then it goes into Lee Evans like suit. And he's just like, convulsion fit. I thought that was fucking hilarious. Instead of just like,  Latching your suit down and running out of the house and keeping the mouse away for the bidding because that's all they have to do is get through the bidding  This is where I lost it like cuz  the premise is absurd, right? We can all say that but cuz this mouse they can it is a farce though It is a farce is farces are not supposed to be but it's like at this point It was making me mad because  they could have let the mouse go because  he hasn't done anything He has not chewed anything or broken anything.

They can't let that go. You know, they can't yeah Go and and they could have just gotten to the auction and been rich. But anyway  Well, we'll speed forward to where they put the hose in the wall for reasons So, all sorts of shit happens, like, we can't go into extreme detail, mouse running around, running into people's clothes, and into people's hair, yadda yadda yadda, they're bidding left and right, who cares, but they get to what, 25 million?

Yeah, the bidding is extreme now. 25 million! Yeah.  When that's the final bid, you start to see some water leaking out of the walls behind them. And then what happens? It just kind of caves in. The levee breaks and sends everyone out the house. Though it flooded the hell out of that house. It's a lot of water to be collected over a short, you know, period of time.

Yeah, also, that's just, you know. If we're gonna, okay. I'm going to say this one thing and then I'm going to stop because we're not, we're, it's a farce. We are not supposed to get into the weeds with this about realism or anything like that. However, this is one of the parts that I was like, I think we might've been able to do something else to get to this point because that's what I'm saying.

There was no realistic way that water could pile up in the walls like that. They're not watertight. Right? And there's also the amount of water that came out of that wall was like at least a couple hundred thousand gallons of water. At least. At least. It collapsed the entire fucking house. Yeah, and, and.

Yeah, they all get, they all get swept outside and then what happens next? The whole fucking, just like a house and, , and , I love this little section. Because I don't know if you guys caught this. So Nathan Lane stands up with his arms out. He's like, hey, don't worry. It's just some water damage This is the last larue, you know, like trying to save it.

All the auctioneers are soaking wet They're getting up and leaving, , and then Lee Evans his wife is leaving with a texan, texas oil tycoon She's just the worst  hussy ever. She's such a piece of shit And so as he's leaving he's like it's the last larue and the house just like Like collapses on itself, but , it was a nod to Buster Keaton, the house going down the way it did.

, I thought that was a fun nod, especially to someone like Buster Keaton. Yeah. We'll talk about slapstick. Talk about like physical comedy. You know, he's, he's probably the greatest. Yeah. He's, he's basically created it, , ,  anyway, so.

The house collapses and now is completely worthless,  and also, didn't the mouse eat the string? Didn't he pull out the string? Yes, during the whole, like, gavel scene where he's Ate the string, and then somehow it fell from the sky, and they got the string again when the house  Oh, see, you said they wanted to work together.

So I, you know, at this point they're, they're pretty much in shambles or whatever, but it's almost over. It's almost over. But we end the movie on a high note because there is back in the string factory, back in the string factory. But   bring the cheese with them, the mouses with them, and they somehow they and then they they also do a cape fear Thing because as they're going back to the factory the mouse rides under the car   And they're very unaware as they go back to the stream fight because they have nowhere else to go now and then  What does the mouse do?

The mouse like He turns on the factory, , And puts some cheese on some of the conveyor belts or whatever. They're just staring and watching this happen. And it makes string cheese. But like a ball of string cheese.  The last couple moments of the movie, they're like, it's Nathan laying the mouse and   they're trying out different, like, this one's, uh, mozzarella and herring, and this one, this one's curry.

Gorgonzola and peanut butter and jelly for the kids. Yeah, and it's so, and the factory is now a huge success, now that they've abandoned string and started doing They're at the forefront of the string cheese industry. Yeah, and  And as we ride off into the sunset, the mouse is on Nathan Lane's shoulder, and he's like, he's like, he's our testing division.

And that was very much I want to, I want to, this isn't testing, but I want to talk to you about marketing and strategies. , , you should be our spokesman. He's like, I know another company that used a mouse as a spokesmodel, and it worked out really well for them as he walks off.

And meanwhile, this mouse is like super CGI compared to the other actual full CG. And then that's it. That wraps up Mouse Hunt for all the kids back home. You know, , they lose the house. They don't sell the business, but hey, they turn it into something else. And I guess they make themselves a fortune.

They do. Thanks to this mouse. It all comes together very quickly at the end with really no setup, but that's okay. Cause it doesn't need it. Yeah. From the auction to the moment of them walking off, . It was pretty quick. But interspersed throughout here are parts that we never really got to go over because again, It's too we're not gonna be able to describe to you this physical comedy in here And it's something that you just need to watch and witness for yourself Because   it's  a worthy watch So kyle now that we finished it up.

Let's start with you talk about  briefly How you went in with this as a kid versus how you watched it now? Well as a kid it   it is a cartoon, a live action cartoon is what it is. And,  you know, you don't really think more about any of that, you're just kind of like, as a kid, you're like, I hope the mouse doesn't die, I want the mouse to live with a cute little mouse, I like the mouse.

As an adult, I'm like, this is actually really, really well done. The set designs were really well done. , the acting was really well done. The story itself, it doesn't need to be anything crazy. It just needs to be means to an end in order to get these funny situations to happen. So it's not like we need to delve too much into the writing.

It's not like it's bad. It's just. You know, it is very like, what you see is what you get. Point A to point B. Which is fine, because again, the physical comedy carries this movie quite a long way. There's a couple times that Lee Evans just honestly, like, his His vocal, like him and also the guy that was trying to buy the home from them was very funny.

He had a couple different lines in there. I remember that. You remember him going the, the kitchen and he doesn't say anything. He just starts eating cherries. He just like, he's just them one by one probably eating stem, all with the stem and everything. He's going in his mouth and he's like, , I have LaRue's books.

I have his notes. I have his letters. You see these shoes?  And Nathan Lane goes, are those LaRue's shoes? He goes, no, but he would have loved them.  I was like, that's really, that's really  funny. , so for me, like, this is like one of those that,  you know, as a kid, it was funny as an adult, I actually found it funnier as an adult than I did as a kid.

Okay, Andrew, , compare then to now. , again, I didn't really, you know, watch it when I was a kid. , so the first viewing was essentially, you know, when I watched it last week. , and I wish I had gone into it understanding that it was a true farce, a true slapstick. Because at the beginning, you know, I'd laugh, but I was kind of like, Alright, that's a little over the top.

You know, it took me a second to realize, oh, this is a true farcical movie. And, you know, it made me laugh a few times.  It wasn't laugh out loud. I think if I had seen it previously, I would have had more appreciation for it. But, I will say, as I watched it, as it went on, I did garner more of appreciation for it.

The acting, the set, the physical comedy, the timing, everything that went into it, the intricacies, it was, you know, as we talked about earlier, it's kind of a lost It's something you don't see anymore. There's not as much access to that kind of, , acting  or genre, , , of a play  or movie anymore.

So, you know, I enjoyed it. I think, , if I watched it again, I would probably like it even more than my initial viewing because , I know what it is. I know what it's about. And there wouldn't be as much, , what's going on here? Why, why, why are we trying to go about it this way? I would just accept it for what it is and probably would enjoy it more, but overall  Kind of a lost piece in my opinion.

So, yeah, , I remember seeing it a lot as a kid and I saw it as a leading tunes type of movie. I very much enjoyed watching it again and looking at it from a stage presence. Cause I was like, man, they don't make movies like this anymore  now as an adult, I'm like, 

here's a kid's movie that if they rewrote and took, I think taking the mouse element out of it and having the brothers trying to sell this home,  you have like a very funny, well written, staged type film that could be an instant classic.   I think the mouse element adds this like, Childlike wonder it adds this like over cartoony over the top element that you don't really need But I think if they take that out and make a different movie today, everyone would be talking about it.

Especially if you still have like people like Nathan Lane pulling this off. Yeah. But that's the point though, is that this kind of acting is lost and  there's not a lot of young stage actors out there. There's not a market for it either. I will say you'll get this kind of acting from Nathan Lane in a lot of movies, but, , Bo is afraid.

 Is a good one to watch with nathan lane doing stage acting in a modern. Well, so is birdcage Birdcage is my favorite of all time. That's that's going to be one of the best In general of nathan lane and robin williams But , when we see movies like this, we have to cherish them because they're, these do not exist anymore. And this is not like a thing of like, Oh, it's all black and white film. Like this was like not even 30 years ago. Yeah.

 That's not a long enough time for things to really shift too much you'd think. But there's been so much cultural shifting in our society in the last, even 10, 15 years that like this kind of stuff, , you're not going to see it again for a while probably.  I've watched a lot of  modern films recently that , I liked, but I will say this,  I think a lot of people get caught up in, especially in the indie market, like, oh that movie was really good and I see it and it's just a bunch of weird camera angles.  I think we're obsessed now with like these movies that do these  drastic cuts or we're watching like the camera go down like the wire cables like, you know, weird little  scenes where someone's sleeping and the camera floats up onto the ceiling and back down and like that's kind of what we're focused on now to make these amazing movies and I'm doing quotation here  instead of just like put the camera there On an actual set and let the actors work.

, you talk about the Birdcage and , I could do a whole podcast on the Birdcage. . I love that movie so much. , but  the directors with Robin Williams and Nathan Lane, the ones that work really well with them, are the ones that just put the camera on them and work around them. 

And let them have the space. I feel like we don't do that with actors a lot now. I feel like it's all about the directors. No, because they're not, I'm sorry, but they're not good enough to do that. They don't command any kind of, Timothee Chalamet is, you're never gonna do that with him.  But I disagree though on that.

I think we're getting into an age where everything's about the actors. The director's film, I was talking with some friends about films that they seen and they were talking about, I saw this person's film and this person's film and this person's film. And I remember in the nineties, it was like, Oh, Tom Hanks is in this new movie.

And it is shifted from actors to directors and more of the art pieces put on them. And I, and I get that directing is a like.  Kind of in a nuance now,  but I do want to see the actors work a little bit more  I don't want to see them exist in your world I want to see them take your world and make it better I think actors like this do exist just few and far between you know 

most of these actors  are not American actors They're gonna be British actors. Yeah.  They, I don't know. I guess. Maybe, maybe like a Michael Cera, maybe. I mean like, but he's not gonna be able to do this. Like, I was gonna say Daniel Day Lewis is one that you just let him do his thing. But he's British as well.

He's British, yes, exactly. I mean like they're, but, and he's selective on his roles too.  We probably may not see him again because he's in this. I think he retired. He said he retired. Yeah, he doesn't need it. He doesn't need to do anything else. He's done plenty Yeah, so like this is it's just it's a good thing to recognize where film has been where it's going what it could be but like If you're looking for this kind of itch to get scratched Look at movies that are 20 years old because this kind of shit is not happening now unless it has some kind of like Societal angle that we can play or a racial angle or a like, you know a gender Like it's it's got to be something like that in order for it to get made and comedies don't make money Like, they're just, they're really hard, it's really hard to make money on a comedy.

And, comedies these days are trash, dude. Like, if you go for, like, a full on comedy without, like, a drama with some elements, , they suck now. When was the last great movie comedy? I can't even remember. Exactly. I can't, I can't even recall a good one.  Ones that actually made me laugh like other than like ones that I chuckle a little bit here and there But like the plots are absurd in them and it's just like formulaic.

It's just like anything else But  let's start with you Kyle. Does this movie hold up?  Oh, yes, it does. I think it more than holds up I think this is one that like I would drop what you're doing this weekend?  And like, and watch this movie with your significant other, with your friends, with your family.

Like this is, this is an actual good one. This is one that you can play through through the holidays as well. It is, it is. It's essentially a Christmas movie because it starts, it opens up at Christmas. Yeah. Opens up at Christmas and I would say it's premiers in December. Yeah. I, this is, this is a good movie.

, it's a good family movie. It's got something for everybody in it. And, you know, actors out there, , this is going to be like one of the, not, I wouldn't say a masterclass, but it's definitely something to take note of on physical comedy, why it works, investing in your character.  If you believe in your character and the world so much.

That like there is no wrong answer. There is no like well, that's weird  the audience is going to believe that too.  I didn't for a second except for maybe the very end with the water Like second guess anything and that includes when he gets shot up out of the chimney And thrown 400 feet in the air into the lake into like, I didn't even, I didn't even second guess this, right?

I didn't second guess that, like, that's what a farce is. That's why we love those kind of plays, those kind of movies. And I think this really, yeah, it's, it really kind of brought me home. Yeah. Andrew, does this hold up? Without a doubt. Yeah. Go watch it. , you know. Go into it knowing what it is.

Don't compare it to an ordinary movie, in a sense. Know it's a farce, accept that it's a farce, and just enjoy everything that it gives you. , like we said, great acting performances, great physical comedy, lost art. Know what it is, like I said, accept it, and enjoy it. It, it for sure holds up.  Yeah, I agree. I think this holds up, and I agree with you, Kyle, that this is a movie that you'd Don't see very often these days.

 It's not flawless. It's not like the birdcage, you know, we're not i'm not even going to try to compare it to To movies like that. There are way better  stage type movies out there but it is fun when we can catch one like this and if you are out there and you're you remember that movie or you're like hey I do remember  Mouse Hunt.

 I kind of wonder if it's good. Go watch it. Like, it's a fun watch. It's a breeze to watch. There's like an hour and 30 minutes. It's easy. Easy. , it goes by quick. Yeah, it's, there's, there's, it's a good movie. I, I would say it holds up,  you know, , nine times out of ten.

Like, I, I think some people with the slapstick humor may not like, Enjoyed that as much. I'm not big into it, but I think it works here. , Andrew, what about our IMDB rankings? Do you know what this one's rated? I think I have an idea, but I'm not exactly sure. , again, idea, but I don't know the exact decimal.

Uh, but me, I'd give it, like, um,  And, and I want to recall back to our first episode. Yeah. Where we were talking about Aaron. So, , Kyle happened to not be on that episode. No, he did not. But, Aaron brought up a good point when we do the ratings. Like, he was talking about if you rate something, you're saying, if you rate it like a 5.

You're saying it's better than 50 percent of the movies out there and that really like stood with us So, thank you Aaron for if you're listening He's probably not the way that I look at it though is like I'm it's kind of like a letter grade You know what? I mean? So yeah, I guess you if I gave this one  , you know, a 60 or 6.

0 or whatever, then, you know, it's better than 60 percent of what's been made. But it's, it's completely subjective. It's based on feeling. It's more of , a look and this is what I think.  What do you give it a 6. 7? That's fair. Yeah. Kyle, what do you think? I, this is going to be a, an easy 7. 6. Damn, yeah, I was easy 7.

6. I was gonna say 6. 8 for me I think this is a really solid movie to watch. I don't again. It's it's up and down on some things , the slapstick's not for everybody so I have to  You can, you know, pull it down a little bit, but I, it's definitely a great one. And the actual, oh, the actual IMDB rating is 6.

5 out of 10, so not terribly far off. So yeah, that, that confirms it. So this one is juiced up for the right reasons, and you know the rules by now. We just reached into your childhood nostalgia, went mouse hunting,  and found out that  mouse hunt holds up.  Go watch it, find time this weekend, if you have nothing to do, and watch Mouse Hunt.

. It'll be better than, I would say, about 90 percent of shit that's come out recently that's not a TV show. It's gonna be better than that. Yeah. It's not gonna, you're gonna like it. So Andrew, do you know what we're doing next? He doesn't. Alright, so until next time everybody, we hope we see you around the corner.

Have a good night.