I Have Some Notes

Cloud Atlas is an ambitious film about the ties that bind us through the passage of time. It is thoughtful and expertly edited. Does it deserve to be picked apart in the traditional I Have Some Notes fashion? Probably not. However, you suggested and voted for it, and we're not in the habit of disappointing our listeners.

While there are some obvious problematic choices the Wachowskis and company make that could be very easily cleaned up, many of our other notes are more of the picking nits variety. Still, it was a great discussion about a really interesting film.

For our 101st movie fix, Cruella, because here at I Have Some Notes we allow numerical coincidence to dictate the show. In all honesty, Cruella was a pretty good time. It wasn't the least notes we've given to a film, but it was certainly close. Still, the lore of the film was hotly contested, making this a fun episode.

We have officially fixed 100 movies, and still no calls from any Hollywood execs. This is a free service we're providing here, you'd think they'd at least reach out and say "thank you", especially on our 100th movie birthday.

One person we would like to thank is Colin MacIntyre, this show's original host, for returning for this momentous occasion. Believe me, it isn't easy watching mediocre movie after mediocre movie and to hit the century mark really feels Herculean to us, and Colin was a big part of that. 

Listen to us flex our muscles 100th time as we take on an absolute classic in BATMAN (1989). I realize I just talked a big game about watching mediocre movies being rough, and no, Batman is not one of those. Give us a break, we wanted to watch something good for our centennial.

You've heard us talk about fixing a lot of movies, how about our own movie pitches? We've got great ideas, but Hollywood isn't returning our calls, so now we're giving them away for free! Returning guest Robyn Slack of the Quantum Kickflip podcast joins us to pitch some wholly original movies, except the ones that are pitches for existing properties…then they're just mostly original.

Robot Jox spent its budget on some cutting-edge special effects for 1989, and not much else. While the giant mechs looked great, the robot choreography itself was a bit dull. But that aside we found plenty of other easy wins to punch up this B-movie classic.

A classic 80s character is stripped apart and rebuilt by the modern-day Hollywood machine. Robocop may not have been the most cynical of reboot cash grabs, but it certainly missed many of the opportunities it set up for itself.

That's where we jump in to reprogram some of the film's themes and attempt to add some contemporary pathos to a script ironically lacking humanity.

If you grew up in the 90s Adam Sandler probably had a large influence on your sense of humour. He likely did not have a large influence on you as an eventual parent, however. While Big Daddy was certainly a more "mature" turn for Sandler at the time, his childish instincts prevented it from being a really touching comedy about fatherhood.

Speaking of fatherhood, German Villegas of the Modern Manhood podcast joins us this week. The entire upcoming season of Modern Manhood is all about child development, which put Big Daddy right in German's big damn wheelhouse. Together we try to add some stronger comedic structure to the film while also analyzing Sonny Kaufax's style as a father.

Highlander II was so efficient at burning the goodwill of its fanbase George Lucas took it as a personal challenge, and that's how we got The Phantom Menace. We're not exactly Hollywood historians around here, but we're pretty sure that's how it went down.

For some reason, the minds behind Highlander thought the best way to continue the story of a 500-year-old sword-fighting immortal with a rich background, not even Forrest Gump could hold a bucket of shrimp up to by making him an alien who's charged with fixing the ozone layer. Yeah…

We're diving back into the MCU once again for Marvel's Studios The Eternals, a film rich in characters and short on development. The Note-ernals take passes at spreading the dense plot out over two films as well as dropping an entire sub-plot to make a more breathable single film. We also find an interesting twist on the main villain that would have been far more thematically relevant.

One good asteroid movie deserves another, we always say. For the second time in a row, we're tackling a planet-killing plot device, this time of the Michael Bay variety. Truly there was one simple fix to this oil-riggers-in-space fantasy, and we happened upon it quite quickly. However, we do spend a great deal of time taking shots at Michael, even as Liam is trying to get us to talk about what we liked about the movie.