CINEMISSES! JoJo Rabbit

On today's show, Tug and Matt indoctrinate themselves into the film Jojo Rabbit, exploring its themes of friendship, conflict, and the horrors and absurdities of war. They discuss the character development of Jojo as he navigates his indoctrination as a Nazi youth and his growing feeelings towards Elsa, a Jewish girl hiding in his home. The conversation highlights key scenes, including family dynamics, the impact of war on personal relationships, and how Taika Waititi's script, performance and direction take the piss out of Nazi ideology. They also address critics' perspectives on the film, emphasizing the importance of nuance and interpretation in storytelling. Their conclusion? Tug and Matt RIGHT, Critics WRONG.

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Transcript

Tug McTighe (00:00)
Well, hello, Matt.

Matt Loehrer (00:02)
Hey, Tuck, how are you?

Tug McTighe (00:03)
I'm well! Alright, Matt, I'm excited to be back here talking about this movie. Now, I want to just let everybody know what we're getting into. Now, look, Matt, you've seen movies about World War II, and you've seen movies about Nazis. You've probably even seen movies about World War II that, guess what, feature Nazis. But outside of Mel Brooks' overlooked 1983 film, To Be or Not To Be, it's unlikely

you've ever seen a comedy about World War II and Nazis until that is today. Welcome to Cinemisses. I'm Tug, he's Matt, and we're about to go down the JoJo rabbit hole on all these topics and more because this is Cinemisses, JoJo Rabbit.

Matt Loehrer (00:38)
I'm out.

Tug McTighe (00:47)
All right, Matt, as we are want to do on this podcast,

One of us has seen the film and one of us hasn't. Today that hasn't seen it person is Matt, who's never seen Jojo Rabbit. But what we, always do when we start here, we ask the person who hasn't seen the film, what did you think you knew about this movie going into this podcast recording session?

Matt Loehrer (01:07)
Okay, I knew almost nothing about this movie. And actually, to refer to your earlier thing, I did watch a lot of Hogan's heroes. So I have seen some World of Wars of Nomadies. But never in a...

Tug McTighe (01:16)
Yes! man, you know what,

frankly I forgot about Hogan's Heroes, what a run.

Matt Loehrer (01:23)
So I knew it was directed by Taika Waititi, who I like quite a bit, especially enjoyed his, you know, Thor, Ragnarok, that's one of my family's favorite shows. I knew it somehow involved Hitler, yet at the same time, I assumed it was a comedy or had some comedic elements, because it's Taika Waititi, right?

Tug McTighe (01:40)
Yeah,

you're not gonna do, he's not gonna do something if it doesn't have some comedic slant or bent or angle. Right.

Matt Loehrer (01:45)
Right, it's not gonna be Schindler's List. And

I knew that there was some controversy to it, but I wasn't sure what, but I presumed it might've had something to do with the fact that it was a comedy involving Hitler. That's all I knew, that's everything.

Tug McTighe (01:57)
Yes, right. Right away that

that'll lead you down a road, right? So here's the logline. Jojo was a lonely German boy who discovers that his single mother is hiding a Jewish girl in their attic. Aided only by his imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler, Jojo must confront his blind nationalism as World War II continues to rage on. So right away, had you read the logline, you would have known you were right. And we'll get to this a little bit later, but there's sort of a modern

Matt Loehrer (02:01)
Eric.

Tug McTighe (02:25)
occurrence in cinema and television and art really where people suggest there are things you can't do or shouldn't do. And they're very vocal about them not wanting you to do it. And I think that playing Adolf Hitler in a comedy is, one of those things that, that is, is on a lot of people's no, no list. Luckily it's on Taika Waititi's and Matt's and Tug's yes yes list. So, so that's why we're here. So.

Jojo Rabbit is a 2019 satirical drama written and directed by Taika Waititi, adapted from Christine Lunen's 2008 book, Caging Skies, which I'm sort of interested to read. Notable cast includes Roman Griffin Davis as Johannes Jojo Betzler, a 10 year old German boy who was a member of the Deutsches Jungvolk. I'm going to do my best on these German Pernovsky-Eschkens, because they're...

Matt Loehrer (03:19)
I think that was pretty good.

Tug McTighe (03:20)
They're fun words to say. young folk literally means young people, if I'm not mistaken, because Volkswagen means people's car.

Matt Loehrer (03:31)
If you, when people talk about the Hitler youth, I think that's who they're talking about.

Tug McTighe (03:34)
That's

exactly right. So Roman Griffin Davis, this kid's great. I mean, he must've been 10 years, he must've been 10. He was a young man. He won a lot of stuff for this Critics Choice Award, nominated for Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild Award as well. His dad is a cinematographer, was a director of photography on a ton of Marvel movies. including Guardians of the Galaxy and Age of Ultron. And Roman's mother is Camille Griffin, who is also a writer and director. So yeah, this is, he's a...

Born for the biz. Again, another Marvel connection, Scarlett Johansson, heretofore referred to as ScarJo, as JoJo's mom, She is secretly anti-Nazi and working against the Nazis. Sorry, spoiler alert, everyone. We're gonna tell the story here. Tomasin Makenzie is Elsa Kor, 16 year old Jewish girl who Rosie is hiding in her attic. She was in last night at SoHo and old.

by Night Shyamalanma Ding Dong. I never saw that movie, but I know she was in it. Taika Waititi as Adolf Hitler, Jojo's imaginary friend. And I was sort of sold, I had seen this in the theater. I was sort of sold on like, Taika Waititi is playing Adolf Hitler as a Hitler Youth's imaginary friend. Well, I gotta see what that's like.

Matt Loehrer (04:43)
He actually, the studio said he had to do it. They wouldn't have anybody else do it. So he was contractually required to play the role of Hitler in this movie, if they were gonna make

Tug McTighe (04:47)
Got it.

Gotcha, they weren't gonna

do a large casting call. Well good. And hey everyone, you know we can't go podcast without bringing up Sam Rockwell. Big role in this as Captain Klenzendorf, an army officer who runs a Jungvulk camp. Rebel Wilson, who I always like, is Fraulein Rahm. She's an instructor of the League of German Girls in the Jungvulk camp. I believe at one point she says,

Matt Loehrer (04:54)
No, if they were going to make it, he was going to be it.

Tug McTighe (05:16)
You'll do womenly duties like giving birth to lots of Nazi babies. Alfie Allen, who is Ontario officer, Freddy Finkel, the second in command to Captain K. Alfie Allen, widely known as Theon Greyjoy from Game of Thrones, And our second cameo by Stephen Merchant, very tall British actor. plays Hermann Dirz, a Gestapo agent.

Matt Loehrer (05:20)
You

Worth noting Edgar Wright tie-ins, Thomas McKenzie was in Last Night in Soho, which was directed by Edgar Wright. And of course, Stephen Merchant was in a number of Edgar Wright shows, but Hot Fuzz, which we reviewed last time.

Tug McTighe (05:46)
Yeah.

which we

just reviewed last time. So Taika Waititi, born Taika David Cohen, is a New Zealand Kiwi filmmaker, actor and comedian. He's directed a lot of funny stuff that you and I both have a sort of love for his kind of humor. lots of accolades, including academies, BAFTAs, Grammys.

Matt Loehrer (06:07)
Mm-hmm.

Tug McTighe (06:11)
Time Magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022. If you haven't seen his first film, Eagle versus Shark, I recommend it. It's really funny. It's Jermaine Clement is a frequent collaborator of Tyka and Jermaine Clement is one half of Flight of the Concords, which years ago, if you went to Flight of the Concords on their website, it said New Zealand's second favorite comedy, acoustic music duo, which is a funny bit.

Matt Loehrer (06:39)
Faulty OEM.

Tug McTighe (06:41)
And he did, boy, what we do in the shadows, another Jermaine Clement collab, hunt for the wilder people, which is an interesting sort of Australian slash Kiwi movie. I think has made recent hay when he did for Ragnarok in the Marvel-o-verse. I think took what could have been sort of just another minor character at that time.

Cause Thor had just come off of Dark World, which was kinda panned. But Ragnarok was really good and quite funny. And Taika Waititi plays Korag the Rockman in it. And so in Ragnarok, Taika Waititi's sensibility is sort of let Chris Hemsworth show his comedy chops, which I'm not sure we had seen before that.

Matt Loehrer (07:24)
it's interesting, we talked last time about Edgar Wright and his involvement in Ant-Man and how he thought Marvel wanted to make an Ant-Man movie. They didn't necessarily want to make an Edgar Wright movie. I would argue that Marvel maybe didn't even want to make a Taika Waititi movie until he made it. And they said, hang on, this is gold. So yeah.

Tug McTighe (07:39)
And then he made it. Yeah. A hundred percent

agree. and then success like Thor Ragnarok leads into Tyka's ability to get a movie that he wanted green lit green lit, which was a Jojo rabbit. Right after this, he then went on and made love and thunder. Our flag means death, which is love and thunder is okay.

Our flag means death is quite funny. He's an actor and a producer on it. There's pirates and then next coal wins, which I have not seen. And then Clara and the son, which is to be announced. So he seems to be working. Taika does. The tomato meter for Jojo is 80. That's critics, the popcorn 94. Often our gap there is the critics think one thing and the crowd thinks another, but

Matt Loehrer (08:13)
Great.

Tug McTighe (08:28)
I like this movie. That's why we're here talking about it. So I can't wait to see what you think. so let's get right into it. Johannes Jojo Betzler, 10 year old boy living in Nazi Germany in the city of Falkenhayn during the latter stages of world war II with his mother, Rosie, Scar Jo. Jojo is a member of the Jungvolk, the Deutsche Jungvolk, the junior section of the Hitler youth. and

Matt Loehrer (08:33)
Dive in.

Tug McTighe (08:51)
and you have some thoughts about just how this movie sort of opens first five or ten minutes.

Matt Loehrer (08:55)
Right,

yes, it does open with him putting on his uniform and getting ready. It's almost like first day of school. And it's, you know, I think about reasons that I like this movie, same reasons I like Edgar Wright movies. He used some of those same directorial flourishes, the quick cuts, the zooms. He uses throughout the movie, slow motion a lot, which I think is really useful in kind of isolating a moment, right?

Like, let's slow this down and let's revel in what's happening right now. So there's a lot of kind of running, kind of triumphant slow motion stuff. So a lot of the stuff we talked about in Hot Fuzz, you see similar approaches here. And I think that's why it appealed to me.

Tug McTighe (09:38)
really there's there's quite a use of color in this as well. Which reminded me of Wes Anderson, who like with Wes Anderson man, every fucking scene is like a storyboard, a work of art. It's like a painting. And there was quite a bit of this too. There was really saturated colors.

And it was green was green and black was black and the brown of the uniform was brown. And I thought that was, was interesting. I also really liked the title sequence, red, white, and black. And the text and the typography and the design was reminiscent of all these old propaganda posters of that time. I thought that was really quite interesting.

Matt Loehrer (10:14)
And it's funny to me, maybe because you and I are so much alike, but I thought the same thing. I was like, this reminds me of a Wes Anderson movie. And the color was a lot of it, the saturation and.

Tug McTighe (10:20)
Right? that funny? Just like, you're look...

Yeah, really fun. It's really fun when you shoot, for those of you who haven't done a lot of filmmaking, Matt and I are advertising guys who made a bunch of commercials. You can, you go in and you shoot what you shoot, but you go in and you work with a colorist to turn it into what you have in your mind or what the director had in their mind. And clearly this was storyboarded and thought through because there's a moment in the film where it goes, it looks different.

purposefully and we'll get to that in a bit. So Jojo's mom is raising him. His father's absent, supposedly serving on the Italian front, but they've lost contact with him. His older sister Inga has recently died of influenza. Jojo is a jingoistic full-on member of Hitler Youth.

And you learn this quickly because he's having lots of conversations with his imaginary friend, a supportive, but infantile childish version of Adolf Hitler. And that's Tycho YTT.

Matt Loehrer (11:21)
It was really funny. I mean, that opening scene was hilarious when he's, know, wolf body, panther mind. It was good.

Tug McTighe (11:29)
Right, right, he's testing him.

What are you going to do today? Fight for the Nazi party! What's your mind? Hile, give me a hile, that's not a hile, give me a better hile. All right, get on your way. Right, so.

Matt Loehrer (11:38)
It's great. Hi, man. I love

that. They did say Tycho, I did. did say, as we mentioned, he was a precondition of him. Searchlight Studios making this movie that he had to be Hitler. But whenever he could shed that uniform, he did. He was embarrassed to wear it. He didn't want kids to see him wearing it. He didn't want to normalize it, which is interesting because he clearly has some even as he's making this movie, he has some conflicting.

Tug McTighe (12:03)
some reservations. Right, because this is fucking, it's Hitler. You don't even need to say he's a bad dude, so you say the word Hitler, right? As Ricky Gervais said, boy, after World War II, the name Adolf really fell out of favor in Germany. Right? So, Jojo is indoctrinated. He's trained to think by the party and by his imaginary friend Adolf Hitler, right? Like you said, he's got a snake mind, a wolf body, panther courage.

Matt Loehrer (12:03)
feelings about how to do it. Sure.

Right, absolutely.

You're right.

Tug McTighe (12:30)
and a German soul, right?

Matt Loehrer (12:32)
But

we also know from the beginning, what does Adolf tell him? And Adolf, is him talking to himself, right? He's a part of his subconscious. So he's saying, you're kind of weird and Awkward and not very popular.

Tug McTighe (12:39)
100%. You up, that's right.

You're kind of

weird. You're not very popular. So yeah, it is the, it's the subconscious, right? He's talking to himself and it actually starts before we see Hitler. He's looking into a mirror and he's talking to himself. Jojo is right. Trying to puff himself up. Cause he's got to go on this weekend retreat. So can we talk about Yorgi for a minute?

Matt Loehrer (12:48)
So it was all right.

I loved your game.

Tug McTighe (13:05)
Archie Yates, this fucking kid is

Matt Loehrer (13:06)
It was so great.

Tug McTighe (13:08)
his best friend and he's kind of ruddy and he has round glasses and he's got a little bit of a lisp, sort of a, looks like a very young Nick Frost, if you could extrapolate Nick Frost down. They're getting ready to go to this Jungvulk Hitler Youth Training Camp and they're just, they're best friends. They're hiling each other, then hugging. There's a lot of hugging between the two of them.

Matt Loehrer (13:19)
Yeah, he does.

Tug McTighe (13:34)
and he's just, this kid is going to come back and steal every scene he's in, for the next 90 minutes. so they're going to go to this youth training camp over the weekend, run by one-eyed vermarked captain Clensendorf. This is Sam Rockwell. He's got, Freddie Finkel, his, his under officer. and then that's where Froline, Froline, Rom, Rebel Wilson shows up.

Matt Loehrer (13:39)
Yeah, York is amazing.

Tug McTighe (13:56)
She's League of German Goals. Boys are told all the cool stuff they'll get to do, like blow stuff up, shoot guns, stab each other. And she says girls are taught how to do female things like dress wounds and makeup beds and get pregnant.

Matt Loehrer (14:11)
So it's kind of a montage scene, right? We're watching them in their camp. There's a scene where a kid throws a knife at a tree. everybody gets a dagger. That's important.

Tug McTighe (14:12)
Yeah, yes,

Everybody

gets a dagger at great expense to the war effort. It's your best friend. Right.

Matt Loehrer (14:24)
Right, yeah, the boys do. The boys

all get a dagger, they're supposed to hang onto it. So there's a kid throwing his dagger at a tree and it bounces back and sticks in another kid's leg.

Tug McTighe (14:33)
It's

such a cheap bit and every time I've seen it, I burst out laughing, even though I know it's coming.

Matt Loehrer (14:37)
it was.

Okay, so my favorite directors are the ones that can use physical comedy. And the one, two, three swastika I thought was hilarious. Swastika! And they crouched down and they spread their arms and legs out to perform a swastika. thought that was hilarious.

Tug McTighe (14:46)
Right.

One, two, three, swastika, right? Right.

So just

like you said, you get this montage of this just abhorrent Nazi shit happening, it's ludicrous. It's absurd. And this is sort of, see, like you said, you see them running and screaming and slow motion and there's all this stuff happening. And this is when Rebel Wilson, Fraulein Rahm says she's given birth 18 times to help the war effort. So great.

Matt Loehrer (15:03)
And also ludicrous stuff, really kind of ridiculous. Yeah.

for Germany.

Tug McTighe (15:22)
so the kids are talking about, you ready to kill? Are you willing to kill? There's some older kids are probably 15 or 16 and they're sort of making fun of Jojo. he, this is again, you see really nice performance by this kid because you can see that he's in. Except when the rubber starts to meet the road, he, he is visibly anxious about this whole situation and they catch, you know, bullies.

bullies pick up on that shit right away and they start bullying Jojo and they pick up this rabbit and everybody calls him Jojo because his name is Johannes. Right, they give him this rabbit say, if you're such a tough Nazi, kill the rabbit, just snap its neck, it's easy. And he can't do it and he tries to shoo it away. And of course, the bully kid picks it up and breaks the head off the rabbit. And then that's where he gets the name Jojo Rabbit. Run like a rabbit, right? He's crying.

Matt Loehrer (15:58)
They want him to kill it. They say if you...

He runs away.

Tug McTighe (16:18)
runs away and hides. Okay, this is one of my favorite parts of the movie coming up. So he's hiding and he doesn't know if he wants to be here anymore. So who shows up to give him a pep talk but his old buddy Hitler?

Matt Loehrer (16:31)
Right. He's pretty supportive.

Tug McTighe (16:34)
He's very supportive. He tells them, you're tough, don't worry about those guys, they don't know anything. I know that you're, when you really need to do it, you'll do it. So he goes, get in there and give them hell.

Matt Loehrer (16:43)
Right. Well, and also that a

rabbit is like it's not shameful to be a rabbit. The rabbit is cunning and fast. Right. So.

Tug McTighe (16:49)
That's right. Cutting it fast and he's

able to escape its enemies. He pumps him up and so he he starts screaming and he runs and you see Sam Rockwell holding this grenade, which is like a torch on a stick. And he's talking to all the other kids and they're holding grenades and he just sprint. And again, there's a slow motion. He sprints through and he jumps over this, the kids and he grabs the grenade and he runs off into the woods and Sam Rockwell is trying to get him to stop and

Matt Loehrer (16:53)
So he pumps up and pumps them up a bit.

Tug McTighe (17:18)
He in a second instance of this bounce back, he throws this grenade. It hits a tree. It bounces right back next to him. And he goes, no. And then they cut wide and you see poof and it blows up and you see his little body just fly out of the fly out of the explosion, which, which you and I talked about before he started recording. This is definitely a payoff to this knife in the tree. You saw that.

Matt Loehrer (17:33)
you

Tug McTighe (17:46)
sort of foreshadowing. also I think, so if I didn't mention it, Captain K Sam Rockle is only teaching the young Volk and he's not on the front lines because he got, he lost his eye. So he's, can't be on the front lines. So he's got a physical deformity and then Jojo, you see a scene of his mom, you see he's kind of blinking. It's his POV from the gurney. He's going in the hospital and now Jojo wakes up and he's got, his gut up sort of

A little bit mangled leg, not enough to, you know, need to be amputated or anything, but it's just sort of messed up now and he has a limp the rest of the movie. And then he's got facial scars on his face. So, so he's got a physical imperfection. Sam Rockwell has a physical imperfection. And as we all know from our history books, right, part of the Aryan race and part of Hitler's beliefs were that we were the perfect, not we, I am Irish. The Germans were the perfect race, beautiful blonde hair, blue eyed. So we see this.

Matt Loehrer (18:37)
I'm

Tug McTighe (18:42)
Dichotomy of ideas.

Matt Loehrer (18:44)
I tell you, Taika Waititi does that a lot in this movie, establishing parallels and also callbacks. So the parallel between Sam Rockwell, who is physically imperfect, and Jojo, who is then also physically imperfect, it's a connection, right? It's a way for them to relate to each other, I think. And also, you know, we talked about the knife, we talked about the stick.

There are other things that we're going to talk about where there's some foreshadowing and repetition and that sort of thing. So it's really, I love that.

Tug McTighe (19:13)
And I think

it, yeah, it's repeating too. From the very first episode, we went off on this tangent about showing and not telling. There's a lot of showing in this and he's got great actors. Sam Rockwell in every scene he's in when the kids are doing something, he's either taking a nip off of his flask. He's rolling his eyes with disdain quite a bit. You can see that he has been disenfranchised.

by his injury, right? We don't know what his feelings are about anything yet, but he's definitely disenfranchised about what's gone on in his place in this war effort. And you can see that they don't have to, you don't have to say it. He just, can tell he's frustrated by this whole situation that he's in.

Matt Loehrer (20:00)
Another theme that they bring up a lot is how successful or unsuccessful they think Germany is in this war.

Tug McTighe (20:08)
great, great tie back to propaganda and populism where it doesn't fucking matter what the truth is. The truth is that the Germans are winning this war and everybody thinks they're gonna prevail in the end and there's gonna be a, you know, worldwide Third Reich and there's just no, no one knows the truth here. It doesn't matter. So,

Matt Loehrer (20:27)
And it doesn't matter to you.

Tug McTighe (20:31)
Jojo's recovering. We see some hospital scenes. He recovers at home with Rosie. He's got his messed up leg. He's got his scars on his face. She storms in to Clemson Dorf, punches him in the nuts. He's been demoted even further to work in a desk job because he fucked up and got Jojo hurt. She says you have to make him feel included despite his injuries. So he gives Jojo jobs like spreading propaganda leaflets throughout the town.

collecting scrap metal and we see some again back to the subtlety of not talking about it but showing it we see some interaction between Captain K and Freddy that that they're friends they're clearly close and again

Matt Loehrer (21:13)
I think closer than close.

Tug McTighe (21:13)
there's,

well, I'm trying to not spoil it. They're definitely closer than close. If you think I missed it, I didn't. Yeah, they're clearly lovers by the end of the movie. But you can tell that there's a hand, he puts his hand on his shoulder at one point, there's a, I apologize, I shouldn't have called you that. There's some of that there. Yeah, yeah. And I think there's an interesting part of the character that I think Sam Rockwell mentioned in some interviews that he thought was interesting and cool.

Matt Loehrer (21:19)
You can cut that out.

tender.

Yes, he said he drew inspiration from Bill Murray and Walter Mathau. If you can picture those, that kind of world weary approach to acting, that's where he took his inspiration. Right. Yeah.

Tug McTighe (21:46)
Yeah

It's a lot of sighing, a

lot of sighing and eye rolling again. So this is a really important part. we see as Joe, Joe and Rosie are walking through the town square, they come upon, the legs of people that have been hanged. And then we show these people that have been hanged because they are fighting against the Nazis in their own way. So they have been pegged as traitors and just executed.

and hung for all to see in the town square. And he looks away and in a quiet moment, she just takes him by the chin and turns his head back to the bodies. And he says, what did they do? Why were they murdered? What did they do? And she says, what they could. And that we'll come back to several times in this film. But we won't come back to it until we take a break and hear about our great sponsor, Little Bear Graphics.

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Matt Loehrer (23:02)
Okay, so alone at home one day, Jojo discovers Elsa Korr, played by Thomas and Mackenzie, who is a teenage Hebrew girl and his late sister's former classmate hiding upstairs in a kind of a hidey hole.

Tug McTighe (23:15)
Yeah,

he finds a hidden panel and she's back there and he crawls back and he's looking around and you can see there's a little plate and a candle and a pillow and then he sees a pair of bare feet and he looks up and she just goes, boo! And he just scrambles away not knowing what the hell to think.

Matt Loehrer (23:33)
and even when her hand

comes out around the doorframe. So it's very, almost like a horror film, right? And he's terrified. So he runs like hell, has a little conversation with Hitler about what he should do, and decides to go back and engage her, you know, which is funny. You, you, you.

Tug McTighe (23:39)
Almost like a horror film, right? Right? He's terrified.

Right. Right.

You who do right? He's

like, buddy, you got a Jew living here. Like he's just like, so so flabbergasted. And remember that Hitler has said it in this. They said it in the Young Volk camp. They've got fangs and they hang upside down from the rafters like bats and they breathe fire and they can. There's all these just horrifying stories that just just these asinine fucking lies that these poor kids are ridiculous that are being taught.

Matt Loehrer (24:01)
Wow.

But ridiculous, right? Yeah.

Tug McTighe (24:25)
Again indoctrination is a bad thing. They're being taught these things and they believe them because they're kids So so Jojo threatens to turn her over to the Gestapo. Of course. She says hey, bro You got problems if you turn me out if you turn me in You're getting busted. Your mom's getting busted. The whole thing goes to hell in a handbasket She says that we'll all be kaput and I like to use the German word kaput So again, I thought his terror at meeting her Was poignant

Matt Loehrer (24:49)
upload.

Tug McTighe (24:55)
because of all the things he's been taught, know, getting the drinking blood. And she just lays it on. Cause she's what 16 probably, right? Yeah. I think she says she's 17 actually maybe, but yeah, she, she's knows he's a scared kid and, she lays it on pretty thick, which I thought was really clever. Um, he, he, yeah. And this is when Hitler first offers Joe Joe's cigarette, took the cigarettes to calm him down. keeps up with the cigarette case. He never smokes.

Matt Loehrer (25:04)
Maybe a little older, but yeah.

Yeah

Tug McTighe (25:24)
which is weird. Hitler was a former smoker who then became one of the world's first anti-smoking advocates. The Najat regime implemented the first and most broadly reaching anti-smoking campaign in modern times after Hitler quit smoking. He banned smoking in public places, restricted tobacco advertising. So again, I thought that was interesting that he keeps offering him cigarettes, which again, it's a little fuck you to Hitler, right? The real Hitler. Yeah.

Matt Loehrer (25:48)
Right. But it was a great running gag though,

Tug McTighe (25:52)
If so, he's like, right,

Matt Loehrer (25:53)
because he does it multiple times. He's like, I don't smoke.

Tug McTighe (25:57)
you get ScarJo has not had a lot to do here yet. And her scenes with Elsa are really quiet and poignant. Her scenes with JoJo are quiet and poignant. She'd never sort of, she doesn't talk a ton, but everything she says.

Matters and is meaningful to what Jojo's going through or what else is going through. just I really liked her I really liked her in this

Matt Loehrer (26:24)
I agree. And there was a really quiet desperation in her performance in that she came out and said it, you know, I want to do what I can for you, but I love my son. I can't choose, but if I have to choose, choose myself. Which is also tough because her son's a Nazi or thinks he is, and she's clearly not. So she's got a lot going on.

Tug McTighe (26:29)
Absolutely.

That's exactly right.

So,

so Hitler talks Jojo down off the ledge. He agrees to keep Elsa safe on the condition. She reveals her Hebrew secrets so he can write a book for Klenzendorf, which amuses Klenzendorf that he's going to write this book. There's a great pool scene where they're at an old indoor pool and they're bathing a tire and they're bathing costumes, as they say in England.

What are you doing? He goes over teaching them water warfare. What and like 20 kids just jump in the water in full fucking uniforms with gear and they're just all Floundering very very funny So he Clemson Dorff says maybe should write a book and then anybody can easily recognize her kind

Matt Loehrer (27:26)
That was great.

Right.

So that's where he gets the idea. And this is the first time that we see Rosie's, there are kind of a tiered levels to the pool. So, right. So Jojo sitting and kind of at eye level are her feet. And she has these really distinctive shoes, which the costumer had custom made, but they're kind of a red and white Oxford type shoe, very recognizable.

Tug McTighe (27:43)
Right.

Yep, yep, like a saddle shoe almost,

little bit of a heel. And we see.

Matt Loehrer (28:00)
Right. So that is the motif

that we see again and again.

Tug McTighe (28:03)
We see

his eye level, because he's 10. We see that a lot. And it comes back, like you said, many times. Yeah.

Matt Loehrer (28:07)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, multiple times that juxtaposition

of, of per feet at eye level. And that's going to play heavily later. it's not, none of this is accidental. He sets this up.

Tug McTighe (28:19)
Yes.

And once again, if he puts it in there, it's coming back, which is beautifully written, beautifully directed. So he makes a deal with Elsa, Jojo does. She'll tell him everything about the Jewish race. This is when she reveals that she and Inga were classmates and she was sorry she's gone. But she keeps like blowing him off like, fuck you kid, get out of here. Right. And then Jojo's like, how am I going to get this book written? She doesn't want to talk to me. And Hitler goes, well, you are a Nazi.

Matt Loehrer (28:49)
Right.

Tug McTighe (28:50)
I don't blame her. You

are a Nazi. And of course, Matt, despite this, despite he being a Nazi and she being Jewish, he's 10 and she's 17. So they've started to form a friendship. She feels sorry for him. He starts to like her. He's now starting to have his beliefs and his indoctrination questioned.

and he's becoming conflicted. Right. But then he continues to tell her about, you're just like a monster from a cave. that's everybody knows it to be true. And she plays along and says all this stuff like, did you know we can read minds too? And he goes, even even mine. She goes, no, German people are too thick headed for it to get through. So it's funny, right.

Matt Loehrer (29:32)
She had

some great points about, like, we hate food. Like, don't give us meat and bread and cheese because it's poison to us. And he's like, yeah, nice try. And I think she mentions her fiance.

Tug McTighe (29:41)
Right,

She does, Nathan, where he is away in Paris and she's gonna find a way to get him there. She accuses, she accuses, sorry, he accuses her of being unpatriotic. You're gonna turn your back on Germany? She's like, Germany turned its back on me, right? He laments that his father is away. Jojo, Jojo is so mad now that mom's hiding a Jewish girl. There's a dinner scene, really great performance by Scarlett Johansson.

Matt Loehrer (29:50)
Peace.

Tug McTighe (30:15)
Um, where she, says, I wish dad were here. He wouldn't put it. He put a stop to this and she puts the ashes on her face and turns it into a beard. Um, and she plays the part of Rosie and the father and he, Jojo really believes it, right? It's like a really great bit. You know, it was reminiscent of when Gollum and Schmiegel went, when circus is Gollum and Schmiegel, she's doing these two parts.

Matt Loehrer (30:43)
Yes.

Tug McTighe (30:44)
And you're

watching it going, man, that's the husband, that's the wife, it's really well done. And I just, again, I think she's fucking great in this movie.

Matt Loehrer (30:52)
I thought she was great. I agree. There was I was talking about critics, how I think a lot of them miss the point on this. A lot of them that were critical anyway. One of them, and I can't remember who it was, said how this scene showed how the father was abusive. And I didn't see that at all. He's she spoke roughly.

Tug McTighe (31:17)
Not at all. I am... No.

Matt Loehrer (31:21)
as the husband because you don't talk to your mother that way. Yeah, okay, so that wasn't just me.

Tug McTighe (31:25)
Yes And then he says but but no no, no i'm with fuck that i'm with you. No, he's like, sorry kid,

but you know, blah blah, right? Yeah. No, it's great That's a great. No, not at all. I never would have got that in 100 years so So yeah, full stop, right? that's for you maline. So rosy wants peace. She wants the war to end and jojo's like I want germany to win. She goes I want the war to end because the war is stupid

Matt Loehrer (31:34)
Alright. Okay. So critics are full of shit, is what we're saying.

Ha ha!

Tug McTighe (31:53)
He's mad at her. He stands she stands up for herself. We see the pain she's in And again, we see this part where the dad's name is Paula just occurred to me he played she plays but it's really well done really poignant and She says at this point She's doing what she can so we hear that come back So then we we see some scenes of Jojo helping Captain K talking to Elsa

Matt Loehrer (32:09)
Again.

Tug McTighe (32:17)
interrogating her, writing it all down in his book. We learned she has Nathan, the boyfriend, she wants to reunite with him. He's just a little piss aunt and he writes this shitty letter from Nathan, which, oh, I found this letter from Nathan. Nope, I want to break up with you. You're a terrible person, by the way. I found someone else and I don't want to be together. And then he says, what does he say? By the way, I'm also quite fat and ugly.

Matt Loehrer (32:41)
He's a...

PS, I'm very fat now, I'm also unemployed. Like a big loser.

Tug McTighe (32:47)
Right? So he's doing

the 10 year old version of this, right? So then she's crying. He retracts the, he writes another letter from Nathan retracting immediately after. Um, yeah. He says, God you're being taken care of by that kid. Um, then she, uh, I really liked when she lists all the famous Jews, Gertrude Stein.

Matt Loehrer (32:51)
Right.

immediately after. By the way, I found this one too.

You

was like a point counterpoint.

Tug McTighe (33:17)
point counterpoint that yeah right

Matt Loehrer (33:17)
Like he was doing German, Jew, German, Jew,

Tug McTighe (33:20)
right this really pisses him off then you know again he's super conflicted because he's starting to like her and empathize with her but he's still going and hanging around the Nazis doesn't know what to do Hitler's in his ear every other scene and he and his mom mom says let's get out of the house they go down to the river and they're hanging around by the bridge right their bikes down there some second scene

where we see Rosie's again. Yeah. Yeah. So we see these shoes again. Um, we also see then they're riding their bikes. We see the truck of injured soldiers, just these German kids in the back of a truck. And she says, you know, Hey guys, you're home. Go, go see your mothers. Right. She's empathetic.

Matt Loehrer (33:46)
Yeah, she's walking on kind of a wall and he's eye level, he's sitting down below, yeah.

So this is a callback

to an earlier scene where one of the boys, the one that snapped the rabbit's neck and threw it into the woods at the Yungvold camp, were heading off to war. And were like, hey, Jojo Rabbit, hey sucker, we'll see you later. We're gonna be glorious. We're gonna be glorious warriors. And now we see kind of the flip side of that where they're coming back and they're.

Tug McTighe (34:23)
That's right, exactly.

Yeah, that's the point

counterpoint of that. I love that. I didn't notice that this time. Again,

Elsa continues to tell him the stories about where the Jews came from. He's really starting to like her now. And when he started to like her, Jojo's like, maybe she's all right. And Adolf is like, are you kidding? She's the monster. She's an enemy. You have to get all this information on her. She's terrible. She's bad, right? And he does not like that they're getting on so well. Another nice scene with Rosie and Elsa where Rosie's drinking.

and Elsa, she's talking about Inga and I would have liked to, Rosie says, I would have liked to see my daughter at your age becoming a woman. And it's just a really tender, you know, it's that sort of mad, it's that sort of, there's humanity. This, I'm gonna say, I'm not sounding like fucking walking cliche. In the midst of life, we are in death and in the midst of death, we are in life. There is humanity and life here.

and love and Rosie talks about that and there's dancing and music because there has to be which again is really important to show. So here's where the plot thickens and the stakes get raised. I didn't look but it's probably the midpoint. We see that Rosie is now revealed to be a part of the German resistance to the Nazis.

Matt Loehrer (35:32)
Mm-hmm. I think that's important.

Tug McTighe (35:47)
She's spreading, pamphlets and leaflets free Germany around town. We see, we see, how do we know this, Matt?

Matt Loehrer (35:55)
Because Jojo's dressed. It's so great. Jojo's dressed as a robot. He's in a metal robot suit and pulling a wagon saying, bring out your scrap metal.

Tug McTighe (35:56)
I'd like you to describe, like you to describe this scene at length.

crap metal for the war effort but he's in a fucking

like 1940s style beep beep block robot yes right

Matt Loehrer (36:14)
Yeah, oh yeah, was great. Bring it up pots and pans for

the metal man. So he's walking around.

Tug McTighe (36:21)
And he sees his mother put down one of these pamphlets so he opens this thing and then who shows up we haven't seen in a while but Yeah,

Matt Loehrer (36:28)
He showed Yorkie shows up. So

this was really cute. So Yorkie who's adorable, this kid's great, but he runs over to him and they hug the way children's do. He's in his robot suit and Yorkie's working.

Tug McTighe (36:33)
Here's the crap.

in the suit. Right. Yes. And by the way, the only thing you

can see is Jojo's eyes in York. He goes, Jojo, is that you in the in the metal suit?

Matt Loehrer (36:46)
From across the street. So that was great. But also Yorkie. So this was I thought really interesting. He's wearing this paper uniform. and Georgia says, that paper? And he says, it's some new material that the German scientists have created.

Tug McTighe (36:54)
Right.

That's right, right. it's, you're

starting, now you're starting, they've started to tick off a list of like, hey, maybe shit isn't going so well for the Nazis. Because, right? It's just a great scene. The hug, the hug is so charming. And they're talking and Yorkies, they're just a kid. They're just, they're talking the way kids do. And he goes, you know, I saw a couple of the Jews. I didn't see what the fuss was all about. They seem normal to me, right? He's just like, like a kid just cutting through the.

Matt Loehrer (37:11)
Right. Your uniform's made of paper. That's not good.

It's like pretty normal.

Tug McTighe (37:32)
Cutting through the bullshit, which is just really glorious Okay, so again the stakes get raised again Jojo's At home and the knock on the door the Gestapo led by Captain Deerts a very tall and menacing Stephen Merchant

Matt Loehrer (37:34)
Right. Yep.

Tug McTighe (37:48)
visit the house and Klenzendorf happens to arrive at the house while it being searched is what I wrote. I don't think it was accidental. I think Klenzendorf is keeping an eye on Jojo and Rosie. And so the Gestapo's show up and you mentioned this to me via email. You're like, man, I've never seen Stephen Merchant that menacing.

Matt Loehrer (38:08)
Right, his mouth, like when he smiled, went all the way around his face. It was crazy.

Tug McTighe (38:15)
Yeah, and he's got like nine attendants and they walk in.

Matt Loehrer (38:19)
Right, and when he's talking

to Captain K, he towers over him, like he's leaning over. And they're a foot difference, and so don't know, maybe that's realistic. Maybe he had platform shoes, I don't know.

Tug McTighe (38:25)
Yes, yes.

Merchant is sick.

But either way, let me yes and. Doesn't matter how tall he really is, because he's really tall. They framed it. They certainly framed it. it was like, he was almost like coming down, you know? And I thought this was great. I love this fucking, there's probably 112 Heil Hitler's, because there's like nine of them.

Matt Loehrer (38:46)
for sure.

Right.

Tug McTighe (38:59)
They say Jojo give us a how Hitler how Hitler and then he how Hitler's all of them and then Commander K comes in he how everybody how Hitler's how Hitler how Hitler Hitler and then she's how Hitler it's so this is again this like asinine idiotic. Pageantry that they're Performative crap right and he says Jojo says something while I was out collecting.

Matt Loehrer (39:05)
Captain K

Performative, performative, agreed.

Tug McTighe (39:22)
What have you been doing today? I collecting scrap metal for the war effort. He goes, I just wish I wish more boys had your blind fanaticism. So there's this great, great scenes where this is all happening. and then somebody says something about Joe Joe's face. goes, there's no need to, there's no need to attack his hideous physical deformity. Just a beautiful piece of copy. so this is so client, client, client Schmidt, clients in door.

Matt Loehrer (39:30)
Ha ha ha ha!

Great.

Tug McTighe (39:46)
Is he is here to protect Jojo. This is sort of a turning point for him where he's he's actively helping Jojo stay safe and in a terrifying moment Elsa comes Out down the stairs and and she pretends to be Inga Because they want to know where her sister is and then they say

Alright, well you just give us your papers and we'll be on our way and Klenzendorf intercepts it so it's going into the Gestapo's hands and he takes the passport He says what's your name and she tells him and he says when's your birthday and she says May 1st and He in a pause Sam Rockwell goes, yep, May 1st it checks out so

Jojo's relieved the Gestapo suspicious have been quelled But when Jojo when they've all left and Jojo goes upstairs, she's shivering. She's freaking out because she goes it's May 7th I I fucked it up and that's when you realize that that Clemson Dorf is in fact on Jojo side and on her side And I think you know, I think at this point you're like, I think he pretty much knows that what Rosie's doing

I just think there's a lot about Klenzendorf that hasn't been said that you're now, you've now figured out who he is and what his, what his truth is.

Matt Loehrer (41:04)
And meanwhile, Stephen Merchant's character, how do you say that? Captain Diertz, has found the book that Jojo was creating that has the Jewish people with horns coming out of their head and they think it's amazing. And Elsa says that she created it and they think it's amazing. So they tell her, on it. Who is this? No, and who is this Nathan?

Tug McTighe (41:05)
Ahem.

Yes!

They fucking love it.

All right. Yeah, good job.

Matt Loehrer (41:29)
There's Nathan being roasted on a spit. Here's Nathan being stabbed. Here's Nathan being shot out of a cannon.

Tug McTighe (41:35)
That's right,

because Jojo hates Nathan so much. Right, so great. So when you realize all that, right, this is when you realize that Jojo's in love with her. And then the Nazi or the Gestapo go, we better get back. Remember we left that guy hanging up? And you're just like, they just toss that aside. This is now Jojo decides to tell Elsa everything. She says, we're not friends.

Matt Loehrer (41:38)
Right, because he's jealous. That was cute.

Tug McTighe (42:01)
he says to Hitler, she, she's not so bad. And he gets really mad. Taika as Hitler has a great line here where he says, get your shit together and sort out your priorities. Like he's, he's been childish before. Now he's like a really angry adult, which is pretty scary.

So.

All this has happened. No one knows where Rosie is. So Jojo goes out into the town square. he's following a butterfly and she talked about butterflies. When you find out you're in love with someone, you get butterflies in your stomach. and we see the fucking shoes hanging and it's at his eye level and it's Rosie's shoes. The little leaflet is stuck to her leg and it's a really, really hard.

Matt Loehrer (42:30)
He's following a butterfly, if you remember.

Remember the butterflies in the stomach comes back again.

Tug McTighe (42:52)
emotional scene. He hugs her legs and he's crying and they never show her it's very tastefully done but it's horror and then you'll see him they cut away. He's just sitting there below the legs just sitting there you know he's been there the sun has moved you know it's been a long time and it's really just terrible.

Matt Loehrer (43:09)
I thought it was pretty amazing to create that framework, that this is her shoes, him eye level, this is something we've seen, and now we see it in this context. And it really is striking and sad and terrifying when you make that shift, right? It goes from comforting to awful. So I thought that was great.

Tug McTighe (43:26)
Yeah.

Yeah, really incredible.

So devastated. He returns home. He pulls out his knife. He starts to, he wants to kill Elsa. He's so upset. He stabs her and draws a little blood, but she takes it away from him. He's conflicted. And then he just breaks down. She, she comforts him. They're, they're friends. They're like brother and sister now. And she reveals that not only was your mom fighting against the Nazis, your father is away fighting against the Nazis also.

And then you get a scene where she just says, my, did you get away? He asked her and she says, my parents were getting on a train. I broke free and I ran away. So then she says, she goes, well, why didn't you go find them? And she goes, well, they got on a train that nobody ever comes back from. So you realize she was sent to a concentration camp. Joe Joe's out his, his beliefs on Nazism have, have changed. he sees the regimes in humanity with no money. He's scavenging food in trash cans.

and waste bins and why don't you talk about what happens with the color saturation.

Matt Loehrer (44:28)
Right, as bright and vivid as it was when we started, now they've really shifted this to be drab and muted. They're in kind of a bombed out part of the city that the allies have come in. So it reflects the tone, right.

Tug McTighe (44:43)
Yeah, it's just rubble everywhere.

So he's out in the city looking for food and who shows up, Matt Yorkie now a soldier who says, haven't you heard Hitler committed suicide? The allies are closing in. And when he's there, he's on the back end of the rocket launcher.

Matt Loehrer (44:50)
Yorkie.

He's carrying a rocket launcher.

Tug McTighe (45:01)
And he goes, your key and he goes, Joe, Joe, and he drops it and he just shoots eight feet away and blows up a little shop. Um, his, his paper, uh, uniform is all torn now and beat up, right. It's just shredded. Right.

Matt Loehrer (45:15)
I love that. It's just shredded. It was so great. And another

reflection of how poorly things are going for the Germans at this point, a 10-year-old is carrying a rocket launcher around town.

Tug McTighe (45:24)
Right.

That's exactly right,

exactly right. And he has a great line here too where he says, he says, haven't you heard they're closing in? He goes, no, our only friends now are the Japanese and between you and me, they don't look very Aryan. So just this out of the mouths, out of the mouths of babes, right? they hug, they hug again, that sweet gesture that's, that's repeated. the, the young Volk, the, the, the civilians are fighting and they're getting mowed down. Cause now the

Matt Loehrer (45:39)
Right? It was so great.

Tug McTighe (45:52)
Yorkie says the Russians are on one side, the Americans are on the other. This is really a terrible scene too, where everybody's being pressed into service and getting shot. And so bad that Froline Rom is just telling, a kid and saying, hug an American soldier. And she puts one of those fucking grenades in his back. So she's just sacrificing children. She gives him a soldier's coat. She gives Jojo a soldier's coat. And then she picks up a machine gun and runs in and then there's a gigantic explosion. So she's been.

Matt Loehrer (46:09)
They're right.

Yeah, she's killed out scene. Yorkie had said he needed to go home for it.

Tug McTighe (46:21)
She's been killed off scene.

Yeah, Yorkie said, need, what are you going to do now? I'm going to go home and see my mother. I need a cuddle. Right. He's got his glasses on. Um, yeah, yeah, he's a kid. Um, and there's a scene where Jojo was flabbergasted again, your slow motion cameras here. Jojo's coming to camera and all the Nazi youth. And he's just like, what is happening? And a bunch of the kids, the young folk are running by him and they're all fanatic. And you just see this dichotomy of that fanaticism and that indoctrination. And when someone's come.

Matt Loehrer (46:31)
Right. He's just a 10 year old. He's a kid. I love that.

Tug McTighe (46:56)
come to a different realization, to their senses. And then quickly facing the American and Soviet forces, the cities garrisoned and surrendered, so it's officially over in their town. This is a great time to take a break and...

hear from our sponsor. This podcast is brought to you by Little Bear Graphics, who remind you that choosing freedom over Nazism is always the right choice. Just like choosing Little Bear is also always the right choice for your business. Whether you need advertising, t-shirts, hats, or any other sort of marketing stuff, Little Bear has you covered. And if Sam Rockwell would ever use Little Bear, he'd tell you the same. Check out littlebear.graphics today.

Matt Loehrer (47:40)
Love Sam Rockwell. I enjoyed him in that last scene. Earlier in the movie, he had been telling Jojo how he was going to redo his uniform to make it more flamboyant. So then...

Tug McTighe (47:41)
Alright.

Yes, yes, yes, he, he, yeah,

this is when you, he, he'd drawn these, see the feathers and the red boots, he's the red, the red boots are just for aesthetic. And you, right, and it's, and you see them, and when he sees him, he looks like he's smoking a joint to me, and he's got a gun and he's fighting, and he and Alfie, he and his second in command have the uniforms on, he's got eyeliner on and lipstick, so then that's when you're like, gosh, now I see.

Matt Loehrer (47:58)
It's very Liberace-like if he were a German soldier.

Tug McTighe (48:17)
what the truth is here. So the Soviets have a bunch of captured Germans into a backyard, including Jojo. He hides until it ends. And then he sees, cause he's a part of the Young Volk. They bring him in and Klenzendorf's there. Klenzendorf says, hey man, your mom was a great woman.

She had to do what she had to do.

He saves Jojo. He takes the jacket off of him and he goes get out of here Jew and he spits on him and they're like Who's this kid? He goes this kid's a Jew get him out of here and he they and then the the they give him take him to the Americans I believe They get rid of Jojo and then and then as Jojo's running away you hear the firing squad So Klenzendorf and and Freddy Finkel are murdered or not murdered are killed for being Nazis, I guess

And that's when Yorkies are like you said, I'm gonna repeat it. I'm just gonna go see my mother. I think I need a cuddle. So then...

Matt Loehrer (49:11)
He's been going around like shooting people and carrying rocket launchers, but now he's just going to go.

Tug McTighe (49:15)
Right, right. This

kid's had straight enough. So now we see Adolf confronting Jojo. He's disheveled and he actually has a bullet hole, bloody wound in his head, which is 100 % a nod to the fact that he, when the war was ending and he realized he'd lost, he shot himself.

Matt Loehrer (49:37)
But also important

to know that at this point, Yorkie has told Jojo that Hitler's dead. Right.

Tug McTighe (49:42)
Hitler off himself. That's right.

That's right. So then we see it. Right. So Jojo, so Jojo knows it. It's only on Hitler's head because Jojo knows it's true. Right. So great scene where Jojo tells Hitler to fuck off and kicks him and like a fucking comic book, he flies out the window to disappear. Really, really great. Really great bit there. Jojo

Matt Loehrer (50:03)
That

Tug McTighe (50:05)
goes inside and Elsa says what happened Jojo did we win and he says no the Germans won because he doesn't want it to end he doesn't want their relationship he doesn't want to be lonely he doesn't want the relationship to end and then they go outside she sees the allies she sees the American soldiers with the flag she walks up to Jojo slaps him in the face for lying

Matt Loehrer (50:13)
and he doesn't want to be alone.

Tug McTighe (50:27)
and then music starts and they both start dancing. Because earlier in the movie, she said, he says, what are you going to do when this war is over? She says, first thing I'm going to do is dance.

Matt Loehrer (50:37)
So it's heroes, I think with German lyrics.

Tug McTighe (50:39)
It's German,

David Boisong Heroes in German, Which is fantastic.

Matt Loehrer (50:42)
Yeah. So

I thought that was, it was really cool and that was a great ending. And just beautifully photographed. thought it was.

Tug McTighe (50:49)
Yeah, for sure. So, I'm sensing you liked it, but we'll get to that later because I have a couple thoughts. I don't know you do too. You wrote to me and you said, I got a couple thoughts about critics and this movie. So lay it on me. Lay it down clown.

Matt Loehrer (50:51)
All right.

Okay, so I felt like, and obviously this was largely positive, right? As far as tomato meter can tell us, most critics liked it, but the ones I paid attention to were the ones that didn't like it. And I felt like they really missed the point. They said, this makes Hitler seem harmless or funny, but I don't think that was, I wouldn't say that was Hitler.

a kid's imagination creating Hitler as a friend that supports his idea of what he thinks Nazism is, doesn't make that Hitler. That wasn't the screaming, ranting, spittle-flect lunatic that killed himself in a bunker and murdered millions and millions of people. That was his idea of it, right? It made me think of

And this is a weird tangent, but it made me think of the usual suspects where you watch the movie, and you think that's what happened. And then you realize the end of the movie, nothing in that movie happened that you just watched. None of that happened. That was all imaginary or some of it or 10 % of it or 80 % of it was manufactured. That's what I feel like this is. That's not Hitler. It's don't think it's Hitler.

even though it looks like Hitler and it sounds like Hitler. It's JoJo. 100%. That's who it is. That's him talking to himself.

Tug McTighe (52:21)
It's JoJo.

Right, right, it's JoJo. And

it's JoJo, right, it's JoJo.

And again, it's Hitler, it's Nazis, it's World War II, but it's a satire, right? It's taking the piss out of Hitler as this kind of comedy does, right? It's clearly joke. He's an imaginary friend. He's not real. Yeah. But it reminds me of an article I came across recently called the new literalism plaguing today's biggest movies. A guy named Nirmali Sirpelli. You said, I don't think they get it. And I, they don't get it.

Right? Because it's not fucking on the nose enough for them. It doesn't say Hitler bad guy, Hitler murderer. We know, by the way. So what's this? Let's do a different angle that makes you think, that makes you wonder, that makes you try to understand. We talked over and over about you don't get to see, they don't just tell you Sam Rockwell and Freddie are gay. They give you little, little clues that you're supposed to figure out for yourself by being a fucking person who's got media literacy, right?

And this, I wrote down this quote, Sir Pelly says, it's hard to say which came first. Our so-called media illiteracy or the dumbing down of the media. Complaints about our inability to read, interpret or discern irony, subtlety and nuance are as old as art. What feels new is this expectation on the part of both makers and audiences that there's such a thing as knowing definitively what a work of art means or stands for aesthetically or politically. And it says, he talks about,

That every movies today and tell it just it just says what it means Where you just mentioned years of suspects It didn't mean anything it Fight Club. It didn't mean anything. It said it was the opposite Right, and you're supposed to you're supposed to stick with it and not be sort of spoon-fed the fucking sugar Like every law and order ends with the bad guy getting caught You know what the bad guy didn't get caught sometimes in real life So look

Matt Loehrer (54:09)
Right?

Tug McTighe (54:27)
This I think some of the blowback to this falls into that category, but it wasn't on the nose enough It didn't show Hitler as a bad guy. We know Hitler's a bad guy, right? Again, that's a little bit of that media Illiteracy is not the right phrase may just look real life is complicated Movies should be complicated, too Right. There's there's a time and a place for all this

Matt Loehrer (54:47)
I agree.

Schindler's List was a great movie, but not every movie has to be Schindler's List.

Tug McTighe (54:53)
as I was thinking about this sort of on the nose thing, I was thinking about the first 30 minutes of Saving Private Ryan, which is incredibly on the nose. It shows exactly what went on when those poor guys were storming the beach at Normandy. And that's great. But you can do this too. That's what I'm trying to get at. And I like it when we do this kind of thing. And I don't know the answer at the end.

and have to think about it. And then I maybe go read something online about it and do it right, try to create some knowledge for myself. And I just really like this movie. So I'm assuming I know the answer, Matt, but was this a sin of hit or a sin of miss?

Matt Loehrer (55:32)
it was a sin hit. I thought it was really great. I think it did a couple things. It warns us about indoctrination and the seductive nature of it. There's a scene in the movie where Elsa says to him, you're not a Nazi. You just wanted to play dress up and be in a club. And I think you can see that right now. And I would not recommend anybody ever be on Twitter, but if you are, you'll know what I'm talking about.

Tug McTighe (55:52)
Right?

Right.

Matt Loehrer (56:01)
And the other thing is I think it's a movie that encourages us as decent human beings to choose to do what we can. That was a repeated theme. They did what they could. They do what they can. Rosie does what she can. It ends up getting her killed, but she does it. Her husband does. Captain K does. He can't, he's not going to win the war and I think he wishes he could, but he can save that kid and he does. And ultimately JoJo does the same thing.

Tug McTighe (56:09)
I agree. Clearly.

That's exactly right, yeah.

Matt Loehrer (56:27)
I thought this movie was great. And the last thing I would say is that it was unexpected and not formulaic. And I think there's nothing worse that a movie can be right now than a formulaic movie. if I were...

Tug McTighe (56:42)
Yeah, for you, for

you, that's your, that's your, your most hated, you're like, know, man, when it, when it surprises me, I'm super pumped. Cause not a lot of things surprise you anymore. Yeah. All right. So I knew you'd like it. I'm glad you did. you can find Jojo rabbit pretty easily on Hulu, Disney plus YouTube TV premium, or you can rent it for three bucks on Amazon or Apple TV. So I urge you guys do that. And please don't forget.

Matt Loehrer (56:46)
I hate it.

Yeah, make it different, make it interesting. For sure.

Tug McTighe (57:08)
to email us ideas, feedback, et cetera, at cinemissas at gmail.com. You can also find us on Instagram and the aforementioned Twitter, cesspool. I also want to give a shout out to listener Tyler Burns, the first and only person to email us so far with some interesting suggestions, including Be Kind Rewind featuring Jack Black and Mostef, Kid Detective Adam Brody, and Snowpiercer, which Snowpiercer will be a good one. I have seen it, I believe you haven't.

Matt Loehrer (57:32)
I have

not. Awesome. So, what are we going to do next?

Tug McTighe (57:37)
Alright, we're gonna watch a true fan favorite horror slash thriller film from 1982 that has been a terrible blind spot for me my entire life. We're gonna watch John Carpenter's The Thing starring the inimitable Kurt Russell. I have seen the 1950s Thing starring James Arness, but despite my love of 80s horror, slasher films, practical effects, etc etc, I've never seen The Thing, so I'm looking very forward to that.

I can't wait for that sort of John Carpenter groove and style that's just, again, it seems like, we've picked a lot of directors that have a distinct vibe about them, which maybe our strategy is showing accidentally. We just like the guys that make these things and the women that make these things. And we like when they have a vibe and an eye and an idea. So yeah, I can't wait. All right, I'm Tug.

Matt Loehrer (58:23)
Well, this one's gonna be awesome.

All right,

I'm back.

Tug McTighe (58:29)
We'll see you guys next time.