When Your Kryptonite Is An Air Horn

Sound can be wallpaper in a movie, or it can be the whole engine. Tuner lands firmly in the second camp, and we had a lot to say about why it works. We talk through the film’s core hook: Nikki (Leo Woodall) is a piano tuner with hyperacusis and perfect pitch, and the same ultra-sensitive listening that makes him great at music also makes him terrifyingly good at cracking safes. That twist isn’t just clever, it sets up a crime thriller where volume, silence, and tiny mechanical clicks carry as much weight as dialogue.

We also dig into the people around him, because the character web is where the tension really tightens. Dustin Hoffman’s mentor role brings humor and heart early on, Ruthie’s concert pianist ambition raises the emotional stakes, and Uri’s criminal “security company” front turns Nikki’s skill into a trap. We unpack the medical debt trigger that pushes Nikki toward the wrong crowd, the watch gift that instantly reads as stolen and wildly inappropriate, and the escalation that comes with a crypto wallet score big enough to ruin everyone’s lives.

Then we go full nerd on the filmmaking. We talk about sound design as a character, the use of Dolby Atmos-style spatial audio, and why conduction microphones and shifting “auditory profiles” make the safe-cracking scenes feel physical. We also call out a very modern problem: AI movie reviews that sound confident while getting major facts wrong, plus a quick box office reality check on what “successful” even means now.

If you love film analysis, crime thrillers, and behind-the-scenes craft, hit play, subscribe, and share the show. After you listen, what movie do you think has the best sound design?

Transcript

Cold Open And 100th Tease

SPEAKER_00 0:03

I wish there was a way to tell how much space we have left on this card. We have probably forty episodes on this card.

SPEAKER_02 0:12

Yeah, there are a lot.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

At some point while we're recording, I'm telling you, this thing's just gonna like lock up.

SPEAKER_02 0:21

Stop, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

But at uh today, fingers crossed, that is not the case. This was your pick. It was, yeah. And it is not. I know you're all in like you're probably all at who was this? You're probably all waiting with bated breath as to what the big reveal is gonna be for 100th episode. It's gonna be silence of the lambs. Just kidding. That's gonna be 101. Because I don't know how to count. I'm not gonna tell you what a hundred is. You're gonna have to wait till next week. But this week was your pick. Sources provided in our notebook a comprehensive look at the 2026 film landscape, primarily highlighting the release of the acclaimed crime thriller Tuner. How did you find this?

SPEAKER_02 1:18

How did I find Tuner?

SPEAKER_00 1:20

Yeah. And don't say it was

Lemon Cake Detour And Local Shoutout

SPEAKER_00 1:22

just because you saw from a poster at the State Theater. You can tell the show is on the fly because she didn't have a response loaded up. You what?

SPEAKER_02 1:36

I I got distracted.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Um see this is what happens when we go to Cannell and we have one of their what did you have? A lemon tart? A delicious lemon. What was that thing?

SPEAKER_02 1:50

It was like a lemon, like an actual lemon, like a fondette lemon.

SPEAKER_00 1:54

Yeah, but inside there was like it's not pastry. What do you call that?

SPEAKER_02 1:58

Oh, um. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 2:03

It was a dessert cake in the shape of a lemon, colored like a lemon, with lemon.

SPEAKER_02 2:10

It looked just like a lemon, more like a fake fruit lemon.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

It was like a lemon made as a cake. It was a a cake of lemon.

SPEAKER_02 2:18

With no cake in it. It was more like lemon mousse and lemon. Um it was two different kinds of like lemon something delicious.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

One was mousse and the other one was cream.

SPEAKER_02 2:29

Yeah, maybe, and one was like really tart and it had like pieces of lemon.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

I swear to God, that guy can do no wrong. You know? Every time you go in there, it's a new, it's a new experience with with cake and pastries.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Yeah, but that's not why I got distracted. I shouldn't read email. Um You were reading email? Yeah, because the email came through about my apartment and I needed to know if it was anything important. I'll read it. You're getting thrown out later. No, it didn't say do I think that's a good one.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

In here?

SPEAKER_02 3:00

It didn't say that.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

It didn't say that? They didn't catch you yet, they no. Okay. Well, I I know, wait a minute. Let's not get distracted. We were talking about Fonda. You she's giving me this look. Everyone knows you don't run an orgy in this apartment. It's simply not big enough. I had, which I'm I gotta tell you, I'm a little surprised that you didn't pick this one up. I had the mango version of what you got. You being the Indian, you should have gotten that one.

SPEAKER_02 3:28

Yeah, but lemon is like, I just love, I love lemon. And I really had to try that one.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Matt Kino doesn't even know that we do this podcast. He doesn't even know who we are, but we love his pastries. So if you're in the Ann Arbor area, visit Cannell on what street is that on?

SPEAKER_02 3:48

It's on Washington Street in Ann Arbor and downtown. But there are other locations throughout Michigan.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

There's one, I think I told you in Kigo Harbor. There's probably one in Dearborn, because I believe that's where he's from. But oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

The closest one to you.

SPEAKER_00 4:07

Well, I don't know if there's one in Novae, but I know there's one in Kigo Harbor. Because I met Jackie there once for a meeting. But anyway, tuner, how'd you find out about this?

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Honestly, I think I was looking at the Michigan Theater website to see what was playing and I came across it. And it looked good and I wanted to go see it. And I I would say, I mean, obviously I think we'll talk more about it, but um the preview and the movie

How We Found Tuner

SPEAKER_02 4:40

were a little bit different to me.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Really?

SPEAKER_02 4:43

Well, I guess it makes sense actually now that I'm thinking about it. The the the movie was. Like the preview looked really good and looked quite intense, but then the movie was more intense, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Well, the We'll get into it here, but I'm wondering if did they spend more time in the trailer, do you feel talking about his tuning and his hyperacusis? Is that what it is? Hyper hyperacusis?

SPEAKER_02 5:19

No, I think they didn't actually. Like I didn't under I didn't get the headphone detail.

SPEAKER_00 5:25

So like It seemed like in the preview they were just they were pointing out that hey, this guy tunes pianos, but he can make more money cracking safes. He gets involved with the wrong crowd.

SPEAKER_02 5:36

Yeah, exactly, actually, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

And then you find out that the main- There's a lot more to the story. Yeah, the main character played by Leo Woodall, he's a piano tuner, but he suffers from a hearing condition that allows him to excel as a safe cracker. That hearing condition is known as hyperacusis, which in essence means he is allergic to loud noises. It's almost so he has to wear these ear plugs that are attached all the time because regular sounds is too much. It's too much for him, and loud sounds would be cripplingly painful.

SPEAKER_02 6:16

And he also carries around and wears most of the time, too, a set of headphones, right?

SPEAKER_00 6:20

Mm-hmm. For like just being outside. Like over-the-ar headphones, like your ear protectors, like the people wear when they go to a gun range.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 6:28

So this was directed by Daniel Rohr. And it says he was an Oscar winner. What else did he do?

SPEAKER_02 6:34

I know that's what I was looking up before we started and I didn't finish. Um, but I I'm wondering. Um let's see.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Well, you keep looking.

SPEAKER_02 6:43

Okay, I got it.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

So Leo Woodall is the key character who is his character in this is Nikki White. And again, he plays a piano tuner with this hearing condition. But when he's on a job one day and he stumbles on he's in the in these really nice houses that have a piano, and he's in there one day at or in the evening, and he hears uh somebody make a noise upstairs and he happens upon I think their cover is that of a security company. But these rich families let them come in and work on the security, but while they're in there, since they're working on the security, they know how to circumvent everything. So they're trying to crack into a safe. And they it's funny, what are they, Israeli or there's some other or Albanian or something. And the leader of this crew is a real hothead, and he gives Nikki a little bit of a hard time, but he says, you know, if he wants to be quiet, help us open this safe. We have permission from the owner, and he Nikki Nikki gradually finds out that this guy's just a crook. Yeah, he just finds out that it's this guy's a crook, but there's so much money to be made.

SPEAKER_02 8:14

And I really do think the first time, I mean maybe that's just my creativity, but I really think the first time he's like, Yeah, okay, I guess I'll help you out. We're in the same place at the same time, or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

And then it turns very quickly into like this is gonna be something they want me to do all the time, and it's this is not good. Yeah. These people are not good people.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

So Cracking Safe provides texts for critical reviews, box office data, and interviews that examine the movies, narrative use of tactile sound design. That was something that got a lot of a lot of talk in all of the sources you pulled up was how much effort was put into the actual

Hyperacusis Turns Sound Into Danger

SPEAKER_00 9:00

construction of this film around sound design. Yeah. What what you were telling me something the other day about I don't know if you remember the the sound designer, but he only he played the role that was in this particular movie was second to the director in terms of he had to create a universe for this movie that was it's a movie, so it's a visual uh art form, but so much of this movie has to do with the audience experiencing the the universe of the movie through his perspective, which is mostly it's not like he's blind, but auditory. So sounds are muted, things are turned way up at certain key. Like when he is attacked by that guy and he uses the air horn on him. You as the audience feel that because they they crank up the m the sound so much, and Leo does such a great job of portraying somebody who's in pain, who's hearing loud noises. Who else do we have in this? Dustin Hoffman plays his mentor, the guy who owns the piano tuning company. And you find out later that Leo is a wasn't he a concert pianist or something?

SPEAKER_02 10:21

He was. He was going to be a concert pianist, and he was really, really great and talented at what he did, and then he developed or got this what do you call it again?

SPEAKER_00 10:32

Hyperacusis.

SPEAKER_02 10:33

Um, and I hope I'm saying that right.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

Keep talking, I'm gonna look it up.

SPEAKER_02 10:39

Um and it affected everything because he was like they say allergic to sound, and so he couldn't play, but he'd he had a really good ear for tuning pianos and getting the right pitch. And it's a really involved job. I guess I didn't even really think about Well, he has perfect pitch.

SPEAKER_00 10:58

Thank you, yes. Which is that's such an I the thing that throws me when I meet a new person is especially when you are developing a relationship with them, when you discover out what their talents and acumen are, when you meet somebody like again, trying hard not to use the word like an um, when you meet someone who has an ability or a talent that is absolutely not something that you possess.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 11:34

For example, anyone who has perfect pitch can hear a sound or hear a note and know where that falls on a scale. Like is that A, that's B sharp, that's F sharp, that's a C, C flat. Yeah, details that I I have no idea how to reference that.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

I don't even know where to begin with.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Or how to identify that. And again, this was a movie the actor doesn't necessarily know that, but that is a talent that some people out there, I know it's exceedingly rare. Mm-hmm. But he again, he with through this ailment of hyperacusis and having very tuned in his ability to hear things is so jacked up that he uses this that ability to crack safes. And the way they portray it is he can just put his ear to the tumbler, and as he's turning the dial, let's see if I get this right. There is a inside a tumbler in a safe door, there are discs, and there is a notch in a disc that a I don't know what you call the actual lever that has to slide into it. When it goes over it, there is a slight tick because there's a gap in that disc that this hammer, for lack of a better word, has to go over. But when you stop the dial on that hammer, it has the ab it will slide into it when you change the direction. Yep. And he can hear these things, and to the average person, you got to get in there with a stethoscope. And he didn't do that, he could just put his ear to it and roll it on over. So let's go through the characters. You want to do that? Um Harry Horowitz was Dustin Hoffman. Who is he? That's not just me talking, you know.

SPEAKER_02 13:49

Oh, well, you started, so go ahead, keep going. Okay, Harry.

SPEAKER_00 13:54

This is a back and forth.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Don't forget that.

SPEAKER_02 13:57

I won't.

SPEAKER_00 13:59

Harry.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

Horowitz is he has

Characters, Romance, And A Bad Gift

SPEAKER_02 14:02

a business tuning pianos, and I would say Leo Woodall becomes like his apprentice, and he's learning from him. And I would think too that he's going to take over the business when Harry dies.

SPEAKER_00 14:15

And Harry is the first 20 minutes of the film are kind of funny, in that it's the two he's this Nikki's this, I don't know, late 20s, early 30s kid.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 14:29

And Hoffman, uh Harry is, you know, he's old, he's clearly older. He's 70s, I would say. Talks to himself, grumbles, says things that are a little socially off.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 14:47

Eats in public loudly.

SPEAKER_02 14:50

He's he just he's at the age where he doesn't care what anybody thinks, so he does and says whatever he wants, whenever he wants.

SPEAKER_00 15:02

Yeah. It was nice to see him like that. It's fun to see him like that, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:07

So he and Nikki work together, Harry and Nikki work together. And then there's his wife, um, who, if anybody watched um Nobody Wants This on Netflix. Um, that actress was the mom.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

Tova Feld Feldschu?

SPEAKER_02 15:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

Plays Marla.

SPEAKER_02 15:29

Plays Marla, thank you. Who's she's married to Dustin Hoffman's character, and she's kind of like the she's like the sensible one. She's like, this is how things are gonna be done. And like there's no argument, but of course Dustin Hoffman's character wants to argue. He's like, no, yeah, anyway, so there's that relationship, and then Leah Woodall's character falls in love with Ruthie.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

Um played by Havana Rose Lou. Yes. Um, who She's a concert pianist.

SPEAKER_02 15:58

She is, she's like studying piano at the big school there, whatever that is. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Because they're in New York.

SPEAKER_02 16:04

And um he goes, she's working on a recital piece that's coming up, and her piano's out of tune, and so he comes obviously to tune the piano, and she's like, Well, how long is this gonna take?

SPEAKER_00 16:18

And like, I think she's she goads him a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 16:21

She does, she's really skeptical about like, who are you, what are you gonna do? I need this time to practice. And I think she discovers, she kind of tests him, like, for his perfect pitch, which of course he has like excellent pitch.

SPEAKER_00 16:36

And um, so yeah, anyway, they kind of develop like her adversarial push against him, like, hey, I've my needs are important. Yeah, but what do you bring to the table, even that you're just a lowly put piano tuner, and she kind of figures out this guy's really got his he knows his stuff when it comes to so it that's where the the the romance kind of buds from is that this she develops a respect for him begrudgingly.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

Um and then let's see Uri. Uri Leader oh, they are Israeli. Okay Israeli criminal group Uri, who played by Lyor Raz. Mm-hmm. Lior Raz recruits Nikki after witnessing his skills. Unlike a stand I'm reading this from what we worked up here, unlike a standard mob psycho, Uri is a psychological manipulator who recognizes Nikki's superpower, but ultimately infects the film's most brutal violence upon him, rupturing his eardrums later in the film. And then Marceus Meisner is played by Jean Renault, which was he is the his character. Marius is a composer.

SPEAKER_02 18:11

Sorry, I say it one more time.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

He's a composer.

SPEAKER_02 18:13

Who is his character? Jean Renault.

SPEAKER_00 18:16

Yes, he's sorry, I'm sorry, yes, it wasn't Cambrai and Ruthie wants to apprentice for, but at her recital, she really has to knock her recital out of the park in order to sort of bend his ear and catch his eye.

SPEAKER_02 18:28

Every year he chooses one student from the program that Ruthie's in to be his apprentice, and she, like you said, really wants that position, but she has to work hard for it. And because everybody wants that position.

SPEAKER_00 18:40

Right. Marius is he's clearly wealthy, and I don't I guess this isn't giving away too much. There is a there is a section of the the movie where Nikki is out, you know, break cracking safes with your Yuri over and over and over a month, I believe. Him and his relationship with Ruthie develops and he gives her a really nice watch.

SPEAKER_02 19:14

A really nice watch.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Which is clearly old.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

Yes, it's like an heirloom.

SPEAKER_00 19:20

Yes, it's clearly an heirloom. But that and another watch were taken from unbeknownst at the time from Jean Renault's character's home. And when she sees it, she doesn't recognize that it would have belonged to this composer she wants to work for. But she knows was it a Rolex? Was it an old, old band? It was, yeah. With a pearl band. The pearl band is beautiful, yeah. Which was very and like you could tell it had some agedness to it. And I believe the other, I don't know, was the other watch or Rolex, but it was a vertical twin-dialed watch, which you don't see that many of.

SPEAKER_02 19:59

Honestly, I can't remember, but this they were both very rare and very.

SPEAKER_00 20:02

Yeah, like I remember on the second one, and it had a, I believe, like a green back panel. It was a it was a beautiful watch, the other one. But the one that was he gave to Ruthie, she looked at it and she's like, Where'd you get this? This is not this is not the kind of thing that you would go out and buy somebody you've been dating a month. Right. And it's I can't tell why I it seems like it could be really valuable, and like it the it starts it triggers all these little alarm bells with her.

SPEAKER_02 20:29

There's clearly an engraving on the back that's very sentimental to someone. So it's not just again something you picked up for. Right.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

And the sentiment doesn't relate to Ruthie at all. So she's confused. Which I find this funny when you see these kind of character flaws or mistakes in um in in movies with the characters who are you would think a guy, any guy who's buying a present for somebody, like if you're gonna have something sentimental behind it, it should relate to the person.

SPEAKER_02 21:05

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 21:06

Like I'm I'm looking at this, I'm like, why would you buy that? Or why would you give her a stolen property? Right. And B, if it's gonna be it's engraved on the back. I know you looked at it, or you should have. Why it's this just seems like a wildly inappropriate gift. And I know it kind of moves the story forward, but I don't know if you caught it when we were watching it. I was I really had a problem with that scene. Like, if you have a brain one in your head, you're not gonna give your woman a a watch like that after one month. Let it's clearly worth something, and it's not something you're never gonna find something like that at a garage sale.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

No, and even Ruthie, I mean, we probably already alluded to this, but was like super taken aback. She was like, I can't accept this. This is like really nice, and I appreciate it. There's something else without d directly coming out and saying, You can't give I can't accept you can't give me this kind of gift. I can't take this from you. I mean she did.

SPEAKER_00 22:14

I think that was kind of a way to build your build the respect with her as a as a character, the fact that she would say no to that.

SPEAKER_02 22:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

Let's see, what else?

SPEAKER_02 22:27

Also, a side note um the lady that plays Ruthie um was in Power Valid for a short time. She was she Nick Jonas' love interest.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

That was her?

SPEAKER_01 22:38

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 22:38

Oh yeah. And also, I was reading about her, and I find this kind of cool, but her parents um, I don't know what you call it, developed or made the not website, the wedding website.

SPEAKER_00 22:50

Oh yeah, I remember that.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

And I was like, that's kind of cool. Go eat. It feels like a way to plan your wedding it all in one place, kinda.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

Oh, I gotcha. I gotcha.

SPEAKER_02 23:06

Like they have a magazine and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_00 23:10

Let's see. Primary driver of the plot is medical debt.

SPEAKER_02 23:17

Oh, yeah, that's right. I know that's a big that was a big part of it.

SPEAKER_00 23:21

So, Harry, you can kind of feel this coming because he's an older guy. And they come across, they go out to lunch one day, and does Ruthie come into the restaurant?

Medical Debt Pushes Him To Crime

SPEAKER_00 23:37

Is that what happens? She does. And there's some there's some back and forth with go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 23:44

She might have already been sitting there. Somehow all three of them are at the same restaurant bar still.

SPEAKER_00 23:51

And Dustin Hoffman, Hoffman with his big mouth, for breakfast early in the morning, by the way, sorry. Sees that they're about the same age and he just jumps right in and he's like, You guys should spend time together. You guys should date. And they're both like, oh, stop it. And he just he really shoehorns them together and makes Nikki walk her back to class. He's like, carry your books. He's like, I don't like the implication of that. What do you mean the implication? It's just carrying books, do it. And he forces him to spend time with, which is ultimate was ultimately the best move. But when he returns from taking Ruthie to class, there's an ambulance because Harry. Harry suffered a heart attack. And when he is in the hospital, oh, Marla is the wife's name.

SPEAKER_01 24:46

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 24:48

Marla's there and they get hit with the fact that it's going to be about $30,000 worth of bills, which you know this is a movie because if somebody who's not insured suffers a heart attack, it's going to be hundreds of thousands of dollars. $30,000. They just needed something manageable for the movie. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:06

But that was $136,000, but.

SPEAKER_00 25:09

Well, no, I'll look here. I think it was. Okay, here it is. After Harry suffers a heart attack and is hospitalized, Nikki discovers that Harry and his wife, Marla, Tova Feltshu, are facing $36,000 in unpaid medical bills. Desperate to save his mentor from financial ruin, Nikki accepts an offer from Uri, the leader of the not of Nazis, pardon me, Israel. Leader of an Israeli criminal group that uses a security company as the front for robbing wealthy homes. So he gets a commission or he gets a piece of the action, and he is paying off Harry's debt. But this isn't really giving it away either. I always feel like what you don't want to tell is the ending of the movie. So Nikki is able to pay off the bulk of the or this this debt, but Harry doesn't survive. And during that exchange, Rui recruits. What's our what's our butt? I d it's hard names are hard for me. What's our kid's name?

SPEAKER_02 26:34

Recruits Nikki.

SPEAKER_00 26:35

Nikki. He won't tell him what it's for because all the time he has him come out to a job

The Crypto Wallet Safe Job

SPEAKER_00 26:42

site. These are really nice homes.

SPEAKER_02 26:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

But they go to one house which is by the airport, and this house is a dump.

SPEAKER_02 26:48

And yeah, it's not like the nice mansions they've been going to.

SPEAKER_00 26:52

And Nikki ultimately is like, what the hell's going on here? And it's made to it's set up to make you think that this is some kind of a drug den.

SPEAKER_02 27:00

Yeah. He also shows up, side note, um, usually he would go with the bad people to the job, but Yuri contacted Nikki and was like, come to this spot. And so Nikki pulls up to this spot, which, like you said, is a house by the airport, not at one of the beautiful mansions that they've been going in. Um and so then he enters the home.

SPEAKER_00 27:24

And there's a couple of other guys there, and you're you find out that these are people affiliated with the homeowner. And the few of them have weapons on them, and they're doing coke. And it's not Nikki's scene, he's uncomfortable, but Yuri is a bulldog and pushes him to open the safe. And when they he finally does, there is a stuffed animal inside, which is really disguising a crypto wallet. The owner comes home, chaos ensues, and he holds the owner holds everybody up.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

Very intense.

SPEAKER_00 28:08

And he's furious, of course. And you you makes you wonder what is first. I was wondering, is this some like super rare plushie that you can sell on eBay for a billion dollars?

SPEAKER_02 28:17

I know, I thought it was like a loboo boo doll or something.

SPEAKER_00 28:19

Right. And then you find out it's just a cover for this crypto wallet.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

Inside is something more valuable.

SPEAKER_00 28:27

So one of Uri's guys, who is a real softy and has a dog and who's very who's kind to Nikki gets the drop on the homeowner and shoots him dead.

SPEAKER_01 28:41

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 28:42

And chaos ensued. People are running around, they're freaking out the cops are coming. And oh the the at some point before the guy gets shot drops the the passcodes for the wallet.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

Oh, yeah, they fall out on a little piece of paper.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

Right. And this is the other thing that I think was kind of they glossed over this entirely. Because there's on I don't have a crypto wallet, but I think there tends to be a number of keys that you have to put in in the in the right order. And Nikki took one look at this and memorized all six or eight words. Codes, yeah. And then the this guy who ends up getting shot, the owner, tells him to tear it up and eat it.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Yeah. Right there in front of him.

SPEAKER_00 29:37

Right. So I'm like, why would you do that, man? That's your why wouldn't you just open it later, move it, and put and create new codes? Mm-hmm. But chaos ensues, and somehow Nikki escapes with the wallet.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

And aside from this ailment of hyperacusis, he has perfect recall, and he can remember all of both the both the order of the words, the uh what do you call it? Capitalization and the case of all the of all the words and the order.

SPEAKER_02 30:19

Not from just all in capital letters.

SPEAKER_00 30:21

Maybe. But he he from memory opens this thing.

SPEAKER_02 30:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:26

And there's $18 million in crypto in it.

SPEAKER_02 30:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 30:31

So I remember as we were I didn't lose you, did I? No.

SPEAKER_02 30:35

No, sorry, I just moved my mic.

SPEAKER_00 30:38

I remember thinking, I'm like, if this kid was smart, because Uri pressures him to get it back, and some people are put under the gun, shall we say. To recover the because Uri's not gonna let this go. He also just committed a murder. Right. I'm like, if this kid was smart, he'd just take a little piece of it.

SPEAKER_02 31:00

Yeah. So that no one would know.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

And they reference that later in the movie, but it's like all of those scenes it happened real quick, so you really gotta pay attention to the numbers. But that that was I think the m-th my thought is this movie got better the longer it went.

SPEAKER_01 31:20

Yeah, I think it's a lot of it.

SPEAKER_00 31:22

I liked it. I liked it start to finish.

SPEAKER_01 31:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:26

But the the pace ramped up. I want to say it around the 30-minute mark. 20-30 minute mark. Now, of course, we're not gonna give away the ending. But this kind of had, would you agree this kind of had like a two-part ending?

SPEAKER_02 31:48

Yeah, yeah, I would.

SPEAKER_00 31:50

The two parts being Rosie's Ruthie's um The issue that she ends up having with him at the very end when she she makes a certain discovery, and actually the composer makes a certain discovery. Yeah. That was the key one. That was the key second part ending. Well, yeah, that was the that and then how Nikki makes it right. Because prior to that we thought it was the end when he was rushing to her recital.

SPEAKER_02 32:23

Yes, yeah. And then there was more to it. Because after her recital, yeah. The famous composer. That thing. And then was the other part? I said multiple parts, not thinking it through.

SPEAKER_00 32:35

Well, he was he was his relationship with Yuri. He shows up to the her recital, but he gets there late, but she's still moved by it, and then she discovers this thing, which puts her job in jeopardy.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

Yeah, the watches.

SPEAKER_00 32:54

Right, the watches.

SPEAKER_02 32:56

And that they were stolen from the famous composer.

SPEAKER_00 32:59

Right. So that's where we'll just between you and I, I think that's where we'll leave people hanging so they see how things were resolved.

SPEAKER_02 33:09

That's a okay, yeah, that's good. Yeah, we don't want to give things away.

SPEAKER_00 33:16

What I would say though, was so there is there's something that happens to Nikki physically.

SPEAKER_01 33:27

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 33:28

And Yeah, you can't tell. Yeah. Well, we were listening to we were listening to reviews of this. We had an AI review made of this, of this movie, and

Two-Part Ending Talk Without Spoilers

SPEAKER_00 33:40

I think the AI reviewer got it wrong because it said that he lost his hyperacusis. And I don't I don't know if that's true. And it also sacrificed his perfect pitch, which I also don't think is true.

SPEAKER_02 33:58

I agree with what you're saying, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:02

This is kind of this is where we're at in 2026 with AI, in that it does help you organize a lot, but hallucination is definitely still a thing with with artificial intelligence. Whenever we're doing these reviews, we like to take a ton of different sources and mush them together. And as we've said before, Notebook AI will make a podcast with two AI-generated voices doing the back and forth, but we use it as reference material. And one of the things they always do on every podcast is they agree with each other in using the same verbiage and the same intonation, that being when they say things like, it really does. Or that was absolutely the case. Just to be just to form an affirmative point. That's all I had. Okay. You're looking at me like I was going somewhere. That's just kind of the thing, is that when we're listening to these, it's both to kind of snicker at AI, but also to get the facts about the story straight. I don't believe that the character lost his hypercusis or lost his ability, his perfect pitch ability. But the wrap-up was very clean. So again, we like to see movies that are narratives that wrap up pretty neatly at the end, and this one, this one did. Did you have anything else about his about the uh I was gonna look at studio, I didn't want to cut you out of.

SPEAKER_02 35:55

I would have just added um that, as we said before in the beginning, that the sound was a major part of this movie. You know how like in movies they say, like the setting is the character in this movie. You know, for example, the setting is New York, and then New York is a character in this movie. Um, in this particular in this movie, um, the sound was a character.

Sound Design, AI Reviews, And Box Office

SPEAKER_02 36:20

And the uh and like Jay said before, the sound person really um like I I don't for lack of better words, did his job well. Um, sitting in the theater, you really felt and heard what Nikki was hearing, and it was just as painful and um I don't know what the other word is I want, but um it was it was just as painful as Nikki listening to it, or um having the hypo hyper hyperacusis. Hyperacusis. Um and I mean you kind of felt like you had it too. Like the the I just th the sounds were very heightened.

SPEAKER_00 37:06

So Johnny Byrne was the sound designer.

SPEAKER_02 37:09

Oh, this is really interesting.

SPEAKER_00 37:11

Byrne's approach was deeply personal. At age 19, he suffered from acute hyperacusis himself for six months after an accident, an experience he used to explain the condition to Roar and guide the film's sonic landscape. His goal was to use the unique environment of a movie theater to directly demonstrate Nikki's disability by playing sounds at levels that became momentarily painful for the audience, mirroring mirroring Nikki's distress. So Uri uses an air horn more effectively than a knife or a gun on Nikki. It's almost like his kryptonite.

SPEAKER_02 37:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:57

When he wants Nikki to do something or he's irritated with something, he sprays him with the air horn, and even if Nikki has his plugs in or his ear protection on, the guys will rip the ear protection off and hit him with the oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:13

You can just feel like it was so bad.

SPEAKER_00 38:16

You know what this meant? I don't know. Have you ever had an earache?

SPEAKER_02 38:20

No.

SPEAKER_00 38:21

Uh, I can talk about this. So when I was probably four or five, I was prone to ear infections, particularly in my left ear. So I had I had a ear, nose, and throat doctor, Dr. Nelson, in Traverse City, and this is in the early 80s. Dr. Nelson is is no longer with us, but he advised my parents to put tubes in my ear, which was not a it was relatively a new procedure. Now they can do it with kids. They they do the surgery through the ear canal with local anesthetic. Back then, they went through the back of my ear. And they almost cut my ear completely off while they're doing the surgery, not like accidentally, but to get access, to get more space to access my eardrum. Okay. And they would they made an incision in the eardrum because I would I would hold fluid behind my eardrum and would push the eardrum out. They make a s slight incision and they put like it looks like a grommet as a tube inside that um slice and allows fluid to drain from the other from the interior of the the inner ear outwards. And then they would take it out once it everything had a few weeks had gone by. But since then, when they the surgery was all done, the scar tissue formed and it closed my ear canal.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 40:02

I sup because of the pressure in there, when I had all the when I had the tubes in there, or right beforehand, I suffered some nerve damage, which is why I have a bit of a hearing loss.

SPEAKER_01 40:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 40:12

But I'll I think I've shown this to you before. There's a clear scar on the back of my left ear. And when the scar enclosed, it closed the ear canal. So anytime an ear, nose and throat guy looks at that, he's like, I can't see all the way in there. That's why.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

That's why. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 40:29

So I would be prone after that to earaches. And I can count on maybe one hand how many times I got them, but they are debilitatingly painful. And what happens is you can, it's almost like you can feel pressure so strong that I can hear the blood coursing through the eardrum. Like I can hear the pulse. And any noise, I don't know that it becomes amplified, but it's almost like you're I'm getting hit in the side of the head.

SPEAKER_02 41:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:06

And I I had one when I was in Chicago that I don't know how I got it, but it was I was in so much pain. And actually, I talked to Frank, our our buddy Frank, and he tells me he told me to do something else, but he said, you know, if you just use vinegar, that'll kill the bacteria. And so I I used a little bit of vinegar inside my ear, and it instantly made it worse. So I went back because I was I did this when I was at home for I'm gonna say it was a Thursday. I was home for lunch. And I know we're digressing from the movie, but I can't help it. I went back and I had a client who was a doctor who I did mailing for. And I couldn't get a hold of him, so I talked to his secretary, and I'm like, hey, I got this earache. It's incredibly painful. I couldn't even walk by the end of the day. It hurt so bad.

SPEAKER_02 42:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:06

So as we're watching this movie with Nikki getting sprayed with the ear horn, I'm like, I know exactly what that feels like.

SPEAKER_01 42:12

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

I know exactly what that feels like. Like, I I had double vision. I could bait, thank God I didn't have to take the freeway home. I only lived a couple miles from the office, but his this secretary was a sweetheart. She got my message to him and he called in a prescription for the antibiotic and the painkiller. And I I went straight to Meyer, I picked it up, I went home, and I went straight to bed. And I took this stuff, and the th the thing that was funny, it's a little gross, but I don't care. When you have an ear infection, you're uh and you take the appropriate antibiotic for it, it kills the infection, which this thing did. I remember taking it and lying down, and I took the pain med too, which was strong, but did nothing. And I mean nothing. And after about an hour, the antibiotic was kicking in, and I could hear this popping in my ear. I heard like, and it slowly became like pop rocks. And that was the infection dying.

SPEAKER_02 43:18

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:19

And I had to put paper towel all over my bed because it would drain.

SPEAKER_02 43:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:24

It was a oh. But it was amazing because like it sound it was like pop rocks were inside my ear.

SPEAKER_01 43:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:31

And then the pressure slowly dropped, uh-huh, and then I passed out, and it like the gore that comes out of your ear when you have ear infection sucks. But by the next day it was gone. I I couldn't believe it. It was just it amazes me when you feel anything that intense in the body. It almost it's almost like the body is telling you there is repair for this, but you're doing something. That's so far out of whack that I have to make you feel this. But all that to say the sound design was amazing. The reason why I told that story is the sound design in this was so good. It brought back memories of because I had one at when I worked at KD Mailing. I had one when I went to Hawaii and I went scuba diving or snorkeling. I had one in, I think I had one in college and I had one in grade school. And these were these were they were all the same experience. Like not being able to stand up. I ran into walls. It was the worst. I'm like, oh my god, I know what that's like. It's so awful. So subjectively, the three ways of hearing. This I found interesting and I just want to touch on. We're almost at we're almost at time here.

SPEAKER_02 45:02

Okay. Is from the um slide deck cards.

SPEAKER_00 45:07

Is there a slide deck card?

SPEAKER_02 45:10

Sorry, I didn't mean to go go back to what you were saying, but I think I was.

SPEAKER_00 45:14

This was from hold on. Hmm. Oh, I'm all screwed up here.

SPEAKER_02 45:32

I didn't mean to say.

SPEAKER_00 45:33

What did you do to me? Good lord. Themes.

SPEAKER_02 45:43

You were what looking at what?

SPEAKER_00 45:45

Three different I was looking at the hold on. Crime filler, neonow. I don't even know if this is where I was. Look what you did. You messed up.

SPEAKER_02 45:53

I know I'm a- I did. I did. Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 45:56

All messed up. Medical dead.

SPEAKER_02 45:58

I know you said something about the studio.

SPEAKER_00 46:00

I'll have to find this here.

SPEAKER_01 46:04

Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 46:07

Tonal fluidity gene. I don't know what this is. Wait on. Creating harmony out of chaos. Oh, sounded technical. Okay, here we go. Hold on, everybody. I actually have things to say. I don't know if they're going to be earth-shatteringly important, but hyper-acute. Okay. Three auditory profiles. To achieve the consistent in-head point of view, the technical team developed three distinct ways of hearing that the audience navigates throughout the film. No ear protection. This profile is characterized by bright and intrusive sounds where normal environmental noises are weaponized, as the case with Uri and his air horn. Small ear defenders. This provides a muffled, engaged version of the world representing Nikki's typical way of navigating daily life. You can kind of feel this when the point of view, the visual point of view, changes. And large ear defenders. This profile offers a state of near silence, allowing the auditory retreat into Nikki's mental focus, particularly during high-stakes safe cracking sequences. So there's so much here that we try to limit these to 45 minutes, but there's no way that we can get into all the all the nooks and crannies of this movie. But with we have a whole section here on uh the microphones that were used to attain all of this. That's probably something that we should mention.

SPEAKER_02 47:59

Didn't they use a special microphone for they used a special kind of um yeah, I guess it was a microphone, a special kind of sound engineering or something to bring to to make this sound.

SPEAKER_00 48:13

I've got a list here. Oh, okay. So conduction microphones to record the safe mechanisms, burn used microphones that stick magnetically to the met to the metal and capture vibrations. Yeah, this was it. Conduction mics. So you get a completely different, you can't manufacture this sound. They use these conductive mics to attach to the safe to pick up the sound that that you experience when it's traveling through metal. That stick magnetically to the metal and capture vibrations rather than airborne sound. This resulted in a percussive clarity for the safe's click-clack crunch that feels physically resonant to the listener. Also use Dolby Atmos. The film utilizes spatial audio and create a directional and subtle dense sense getting old is the worst. Sense of dread. For instance, the sound of a drill used by thieves upstairs is placed specifically in the ceiling speakers, forcing the audience to coax their hearing towards the distant and strange sound. That was the amazing thing about this movie sound moved the story from scene to scene, not dialogue.

SPEAKER_02 49:45

That's true. It did, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:48

So if that sounds of interest, check it out while it's still at the oh, that was the other the other bit about the AI podcast. I pointed this out to you and you agreed was the budget versus the return.

SPEAKER_02 50:06

Oh yeah, uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 50:07

The audio said that this had around a seven million dollar budget.

SPEAKER_02 50:12

I think, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:12

And it was considered successful because it brought in a little over seven million for the box office. I'm like, that's not a success at all, that's a massive failure. It hadn't done actually while we're talking about this, look it up on box office mode.

SPEAKER_02 50:26

I am, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

Because aside from production costs, you have distribution, you have marketing, which tends to be two and a half times production budget, at least classically, it did. So this is a current movie, I'm sure it's still in theaters around, but box office mojo should give us a ri a accurate number as of this date. Are you there? Yep.

SPEAKER_02 50:55

So um for domestic take home, it was um like under is it it's not five thousand, it's five hundred thousand. What was it say in the four zero nine eight two three five? Four zero nine eight two three five.

SPEAKER_00 51:18

Four zero nine eight two three. Yeah, that that's that's four million.

SPEAKER_02 51:25

Oh, okay. Um, I have a hard time reading big numbers. Um and then internationally, yeah, um almost six million.

SPEAKER_00 51:36

So what was the four million that was the budget? Um that was a domestic uh I don't have the Oh okay so internationally is that four plus seven, that'd be ten.

SPEAKER_02 51:45

Yeah, so it's about it made about ten million dollars worldwide.

SPEAKER_00 51:48

Okay, so in the past week since you made this, it made another three million bucks.

SPEAKER_02 51:52

Yeah, when we when we started our research, it wasn't doing so well, but now it's gone a little bit up. Right?

SPEAKER_00 52:00

Still yeah, what's what's it say about the budget?

SPEAKER_02 52:04

Um, I don't know where to look for that, actually.

SPEAKER_00 52:07

Well, they said it was seven million on the the construct that you made. It doesn't have a budget section.

SPEAKER_02 52:17

Um, not that I'm seeing, no. I can I mean I can look at on um.

SPEAKER_00 52:21

Yeah, just Google what was tuner's budget.

SPEAKER_02 52:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:25

I'm betting it was around seven. Click-ady-clack, clickery clack.

SPEAKER_02 52:39

Not with my heels and my fingers on my keys. It has the same information.

SPEAKER_00 52:47

What's it say?

SPEAKER_02 52:48

It doesn't have a budget number.

SPEAKER_00 52:50

Huh. Well, one of the sources you pulled referenced the AI podcast.

SPEAKER_02 52:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:58

Said seven million bucks. So I would say it's got a ways to go. Ooh, that's me. You know what that means? That means we're at time.

SPEAKER_02 53:07

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 53:08

We're actually we're way over. So that's it for today. What's coming up now? Oh, yeah, I didn't do a uh I didn't do a recipe. Your loss. What do we got next? Disclosure day.

SPEAKER_02 53:21

Next we have disclosure day. I'm coming close, I might be at the box office.

SPEAKER_00 53:25

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

Um. No budget details. Sorry. Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 53:30

You lose people.

SPEAKER_02 53:31

Also, um, one last thing before we go. The director of this movie also directed an Oscar-winning documentary. Which was um called Naval Nye. Naval Knight. Some political thing.

SPEAKER_00 53:46

We'll have to get into that next time. Post route's gonna hit me hard for being over time. Hugs and kisses, we'll talk. Thanks for listening. Toodles.