The Reel Critics Network
The Reel Critics Network Podcast: With Reggie Ponder and Kathia Woods"
"Authentic Analysis. Bold and Black Opinions. Cinematic Conversations."
Get ready for movie discussions with The Reel Critics Network Podcast. We're bringing you the best (and sometimes the worst) in film and TV, from a Black perspective. Expect sharp wit, insightful commentary, and unfiltered takes.
The Reel Critics Network
The Reel Critics Network S1, E11 - Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning
This week, Reggie and Kathia recap Kathia's trip to the south of France to attend Cannes, Review Tom Cruise's farewell to Mission: Impossible with the film Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning and take a look at a very successful box office.
Welcome to another edition of The Real Critics Network. I have my co-host here who I'm actually going to treat as a guest because Katia been traveling. I guess we say this all the time that we're on here, and she been traveling, but she been traveling. But Katia, how are you?
Kathia Woods:Tired? Tired.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:So I have to ask you a couple of personal things first, and one of'em is, did the dog miss you?
Kathia Woods:Yes, he did. That's my buddy. He was ready to give me, when I tell you he was ready to give me the business. Oh, he had a lot to say. You know what I mean? But yes, he's, he is been, yeah.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:That's good. It is funny, but people who can't see her, she smiled big time. When I mentioned the dog, she was like, yes, the dog missed me. Licked me was like, Hey, I'm so happy to be with you. Probably was more Sprite than you've seen the dog in years. He
Kathia Woods:is always got, how can I say this? He's always got a lot to say, and I'm sure he was like, yeah, but yes, we're united. Everybody at Team Woods is happy to have me in the house.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:You got the gang back together again.
Kathia Woods:Yes. And even my daughter was like, oh, when did she said to me, said me, are you back in country? I said, I'm back in country and almost home.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:That's funny. All right, so I'm gonna treat you as a guest today for at least the first part of our segment, which is what's on my mind because what's on my mind is that I was excited. I'm talking about. Overjoyed to hear that you went to cons, cans, however they pronounce it.'cause they, every time I hear different people say different stuff, but you went, and I'm gonna treat you like a guest and I'm gonna ask you some questions. Try to get some rapid questions in here and see, see how the whole thing went. So the first thing is, how are you pronouncing this thing? Cans.
Kathia Woods:Cans.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:It's
Kathia Woods:cans.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Okay.
Kathia Woods:Cans. And the, but you know what? I don't think people will get so cons. I mean, we'll get cans, but it was
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:so No, no, don't answer that question yet because the first thing I want you to do is to tell people where it is because a lot of folks might not even know where this event is, what it is, and where it is.
Kathia Woods:It is a film festival that takes place at the south of France, not about 20, 30 minutes outside of Nice. Which is also on the coast of France. It's very swanky. It's very qua. As a French would say, it is expensive looking as it sounds, but you can, there's some things there for the regular people. I saw some yachts where my whole home could fit into it.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Wow. Wow. That is
Kathia Woods:humbling.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:And again, I'm just a couple of rapid ques questions. Is that, how was the flight?
Kathia Woods:The flight wasn't bad, so I was on a budget because we don't work for media that can send you business class. But a girl got creatives and shout out to kiwi.com and trip.com to help make it work. And I will, I'm working on trying to pitch the article, so I, this is what I did people, I took ACON economical flight from Atlanta. To Orlando, where then I hauled my rolling suitcase and I did everything carry on. That also helped. I self transferred, so that's how I saved money. And also my bags arrived with me. So I hauled my little self from the domestic portion of Orlando Airport to the international. I took the Norwegian airline, nor N-O-R-G-E, from Orlando to London, not London, the smaller airport right from London. I took a what the, it is a European carrier. Think of it as our frontier spirit, but a little bit more posh that from London. To Nice. And then from nice, I took a Uber, which was like$50 wasn't that bad because I landed at like nine, 10 ish at night and I was not trying to do the whole bus thing. I was tired. I was ready to take a shower and go to bed. So I took that to my studio, Airbnb, which was 15 minutes walking if I hauled, but I could do it in 10. By the last couple of days I did it in 10'cause I knew where I was going and which is a very ethnic, the neighborhood that I stayed in, this is the part they don't tell you about come is it is mainly a lot of people of Middle Eastern, I wanna say Algeria and African descent. So I was more in with the regular people, which was fine. Hey, I had my little studio spot and it was all good in the hood and it did what it, my number one concern is I wanted to be as close. Where I could just go back and forth if I needed to, and I was able to accomplish that. And yes. And going home, I took same thing, easy, except I went EasyJet to Paris. Paris. I took French B, which is a European carrier. Oh. And then to Newark York, did immigration, which by the way was easy breezy. I like everybody else, was like, Ooh, what's this looking like? But scan my passport, going through the EEU, which is the European Union. Scan my passport, did my whole facial scan and I had no issues. And when they did ask me, when I left France, what was I there for? I said, I was there for the fin festival that I'm a journalist. And they were like, okay. And off I went, but, and then from Newark, I just took a domestic carrier to back to Atlanta.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Sounds like a lot of travel, but it does sound like you were, I
Kathia Woods:did it for, and again, I, this is the key, I did it for carryon and I used some very savvy apps, so I raised$650. So I was able to book my round trip flight, being creative for five 50 and I was sitting in the middle part of the plane. I had meals on both of my flights. Both of my flights. I was, I, my seat was very comfortable. Oh, that, that is great. That's before I comfortable. I had, and I have my little blanket that I, my scarf blanket that I traveled with, but e French pea gave me a blanket and it was, everything was fine. I'm gonna
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:say that's fantastic so that when you do it next year and you do all that creative stuff, I'm gonna need to take some notes. Yeah.
Kathia Woods:I'm, I'm better equipped, and I will say this too, right? Here's the key. It was my first time I knew I was traveling on a budget. This is where asking other people, I Google mapped a lot of things. I probably could have stayed a little bit cheaper had I stayed in needs, but I didn't wanna deal with the back and forth. But the point still is that I didn't. I didn't suffer any comfort. It's, I'm also lucky I do have lounge access. So why I was waiting to take my next flight. I rolled myself into lounge access, had some lunch, did some work, got myself refreshed and all those things. But I think you have to lean on it. The key word is when you're traveling on a budget, like a lot of people do for work.'cause we don't, again, work for those outlets. You have to keep an open mind. I'm not saying you gotta sit in the back of a camel or a donkey now, but if you are willing to say, Hey, like I stayed in a studio apartment key for me is safety and cleanliness. That's right. Because you're really not spending that much time in the room because you are going eight 30 to 5, 6, 7, 8 o'clock at eight and,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:and speak. And speaking of that, so let's get to, let's get to a little bit of that. We could talk about cans all day, but answer yes or no. Did you do interviews? No. Okay. Did you see more than two movies? Yes. Did you do red carpet? No. Did you see any of our friends and hang out?
Kathia Woods:Yes.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Did you get drunk? No. And then my last question on this is, did you write more than one article? Yes. All right, so here we go. That was my first set of questions. What was the movie? Just give me the name. The movie. Oh my gosh. That you saw that you think that Reggie ponder? Absolutely. Has to see.
Kathia Woods:We can't count. I'm gonna take the Spike Lee film off because it was running out of competition, so we can't
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Oh, the spike. We can't count the spike. No, go ahead. The Spike Lee, you,
Kathia Woods:you can't count that because to me it's like. That's like a cheat code. That's like as a mission impossible there. That's a cheat code. Okay. Okay. Oh, the purpose, at least I'm gonna say for me, I can't speak for any, anybody else, is to see those art house films that are looking for distributors. So My Father's Shadow, which is, believe it or not, the first in my Nigerian film by Nigerian filmmakers, was featured at Con Cannes, excuse me. And that is a movie that I recommend, and I don't know if it got distribution, the Secret Asian, which is the Brazilian film that just got picked up by. Neon. So that is going to be making, and that is with Wagner Moore, who it many of you have now seen. He played Pablo Escobar and Narcos and he is also in Dope Thieves with Brian Tyree Henry. A movie that, when I tell you my temperature was up at 150 million degrees and holding on for Dear Life was wrapped is by a French filmmaker Oliver Lacks. When I tell you it's about, it's a combination of cultures of Middle Eastern, French, and Spanish, and it's a father who is Spanish that is looking for his daughter that has gone missing for five months and she allegedly is on this rave party circuit. But it's all the stuff that happens when he links up with some of the ravers to. Possibly try to locate her at another rave that they're going to. And there's also some military backdrop. But what really happens is when he hooks up with these ravers, and when I tell you there is stuff going on where you see, you know, you watching a movie and all of a sudden your blood pressure goes up to 350,000 degrees. You are like, what? It's happening. You'll never forget this movie.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:That's three. But I have to ask you, because you are the documentary person, were there any documentaries there?
Kathia Woods:I did not see documentaries,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:however, you mean Katya, you talking about Katya Woods? Went to a film festival and did not see a documentary.
Kathia Woods:I did not. I'm gonna tell you what it is'cause this is part of my learning curve. I had a good pass. No, I can't talk to you. I can't tell you guys how I got the color pass that I got. I got what I got. Again, I went into this very open-minded and just leaning into the blessing. That's number one. 7:00 AM excuse me, 2:00 AM r time. I had to go in every day while to get the tickets. So you have four days out to get the tickets that you want. So I did have some documentaries I wanted to see. I couldn't get tickets for it, and I couldn't make it work with the other movies where I stood in line. Okay. It just wasn't working out that way. But I'm still glad I saw what I saw because, oh, I'm
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:sure you were. I just know you
Kathia Woods:I know better.'cause my husband was like, where are you going at 2:00 AM I said, I gotta get my tickets. It's 7:00 AM in France, so I gotta log in. So it was a little bit interesting, but I was very, very lucky. That I did get to see.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:So you were gonna gimme, we're gonna take one more film because you really wanted to gimme one more film and I saw you come coming. So we're gonna take one more film and then I have to ask you about the Spike Lee film, but gimme one more film that you were about to put on the list.
Kathia Woods:Okay, the Dossier 1 37, which again is also a French movie. It's about police brutality in France. I like detective spy movies, TV shows. This was right up my alley. Leah Drucker plays Stephanie Bertran. She's an, she is an internal affairs police officer and she invest, investigate something, and she was about to dismiss it until the mother of the boy that was pled by these police officers, which are like special forces type of thing, Uhhuh, and come to realize that they lied about the deposition, what happened to this boy, and how she now is sucked into it. It's very, it's well acted well done and gives us a different perspective that police brutality, police versus community is a global issue, not just an American issue. Oh,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:okay. So I, I need a recap because you gave me four films and I like for the audience to know what those four films are. So just name those films again for us.
Kathia Woods:It is my father's Shadow,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:my father's Shadow
Kathia Woods:Sirat. And how do spell that? It doesn't look like you have an name. It's T
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:How do you spell that?
Kathia Woods:S-I-R-A-T Dossier. 1, 3, 7.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Those are three. And then, um, oh, okay. I a Excellent. All right. So now just tell us a little bit, because we need to get into our movie for the day. Tell us a little bit about the Spike Lee movie. People don't know what the I,
Kathia Woods:I did not see Spike's movie. I left that Monday. One of the reasons too, is I wanted to see the movie in the United States. Oh. You know what I mean? But here's the thing is I did have some star sightings. Okay. As I was leaning over. Tom Cruise, and I had a moment. He waved, I waved. Security was on me, so I didn't get a tick picture of it, but he waved. I was looking down and I saw Ms. Bassett and I got to have some one-on-one time with Ms. Bassett when she came to Atlanta the other day. But I was like, Tom, he waved. I waved and it was just between myself and the witnesses at that moment. All right.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:All right. Tommy, can you hear me
Kathia Woods:Right here? But Angela Bassett, and I saw Halle on the carpet and she looked gorgeous.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Oh, the
Kathia Woods:carpet is very, you don't necessarily do carpet interviews like that and can, because it's the steps. Can I just say on TV and on video, the steps look so much larger than what they are. Like I thought there were like the MET gala steps, they were like, woo, they're not, it's a depth perception type of thing. Don't get me wrong, it's still something hard to navigate. With people in high heels, but it is not what you deem what you think it is. Do you know what I mean? And so you have, the photographers are here and some people here, but it's not necessarily people on the red carpet. Do you know those interviews are taking place? There's a walk that they do and prior to the premier and photographers and then they veer off with the various outlets to do those interviews there. It's not like on the carpet per se, there isn't that much room. And when you are going to a SC gallery screening, you, they usher and you either go beforehand and it's you walk around that you're not in the carpet area with them. And then they, the stars didn't come in last, so to say.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I had to go and look up one of these pictures of Halle and so they say that she finally wore the gown that violates new cans, film festival, dress code. How could it violate the dress code?
Kathia Woods:Okay. What they wanna say is okay in when some people have been like, and this is coming from France mind, you have been like borderline. And some people do it for shocking'cause they know they'll get photography and they'll make the papers and whatever. But I don't think Halle has ever been that type of person to wear fashion, just to be like, this is not like Kanye's wife. We're we're seeing her goodies, her hoo-ha and her,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:yeah,
Kathia Woods:her breasts. I just feel like they just wanna, they wanted to curb people that are taking it too far. And mind you, this is also a region where there is a large Muslim population.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Ah.
Kathia Woods:So I do think it's a matter of, some people were just pushing the envelope just to be seen. But I thought all of what I saw of Halle, all of her fashion, was really tasteful. She looks fabulous. Like she's, no, this towards 60. I thought her and her partner looked absolutely grand. She was there to participate in the jury. And again, that's what we listen. We have been complaining that a lot of these stars dress so underwhelming and we want our movie stars to look like movie stars. We want, we don't want'em to look like you and I like, like we're gonna bosco. I
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I'm trying to look, I'm trying to look pretty good though. I'm trying. No,
Kathia Woods:I'm saying like, I've seen how you, if you and I who are Joe regular, when we go to events and we both try to put our best foot forward, I will say, we can say that about ourselves. If the thing says it's black tie, we gonna show up in black tie. If the thing says party nice, semi-formal, we adhere to the dress code. The problem is we should, our coins are not nowhere near stretch and at far we don't have no, there's no doubt we don't have a designer home, a designer coming through the house to measure us for jackets and tailoring us for sewage and all that. If our. Regular cells are looking more put together than, excuse me, some of these Hollywood stars, Houston, we got a problem. And I think that's what they're getting at. We need you to look the part. No, that
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:makes,
Kathia Woods:makes sense. And they have also speaking that they have a dress code at Con where they're like, I think what they're trying to get away from and here in America, like sometimes people do be looking like they rolled outta bed. You don't have to put on a three piece suit, but just let's look like we trying to go somewhere. That's basically what they're saying. They made it very clear for the galas, you need to be in gowns. You can't have a tote. Gentlemen, you need to be in your suiting. You don't necessarily have to be in a tuxedo black, a black suit.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Okay.
Kathia Woods:All right. That kind of thing. If you're going to the regular screening, we do expect you to get your, pull yourself together
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:to ju to dress apart. All right. That, that's it on our cons. Talk for the day. Where, where are your articles? Do you have a place for the articles that you, I have
Kathia Woods:one. One was, uh, the Chilean film was in la Latin Media Company, which is already published. But you, if you go to my social, it's, I have a link there, and the other ones on the three films I talked about po, excuse me, published today in the Philadelphia Tribune. Oh. And I'm working on a piece because they celebrated Brazilian cinema, and I had a very nice time at the Brazilian mixer. We have some, and talking about the state of Brazilian cinema. Listen, it's always nice to be in sun and drinks by the beach. I'm not gonna complain.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:All right. With that, let's move into our next segment, and our next segment is talking about your, I guess, encounter a friend. Tom Cruise. This, our movie for this week is Missing Impossible. The Final Destination. And I wanna start this off by just saying that if, if you were thinking that you are ready to go see Mission Impossible, the last, the final reckoning, then you're not ready. If you haven't seen Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One. And if you are confused because you're like, wait a minute, where's Dead Reckoning part two, the final reckoning is Dead Reckoning part two. I know they're confusing people here because they decided to change the title. In 2023, the movie Mission Impossible, dead Reckoning, part one came out and you have to go back and see it. You have to, there are too many things that happened in that film that you need to see because really all this is one continuous film. It's the same, it's in, in my opinion, it's one continuous film. They had six hours of time doing some crazy stuff, so they had to figure a way to show us six hours of time doing some crazy stuff. But my first thing, my first advice is, please go back and watch Dead Reckoning Part One. And with that, I'm gonna open it up and let you start talking about this particular movie since you saw Tom, and since Tom saw you and since you guys looked at each other. Whatever
Kathia Woods:I, okay, I'm gonna say this. I like that reckoning better, right? I felt like this wasn't as good. Having said that, it is. It's giving you all the things you want from Tom and company, right? Tom's running 18 million times. I don't know how, I just wanna know how is Tom at 62 faster than a car or how he can get from the field into the city in 2.5 minutes. But hey, that's what movie magic is. I also think that the stunts, like the scenes between Issa Morales when they got the little the planes, that is crazy, right?
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Crazy.
Kathia Woods:That was crazy. But I would've liked to see the story flush out a little bit more why that entity and what it entailed. I would've liked to have seen more screen time for Angela Bassett, who's now Madam President. Before, I believe she was the CIA director and she's madam president. I would've liked to seeing her utilized a little bit more. I like that my guy, Greg Tarzan, has a bigger part and he's now part of the MI thing. I think having said that, it is still an exciting, exhilarating movie. It's just the story to me, it's like they seemed like they ran out of time. It didn't quite joined up. It possibly left the room for a final, final reckoning, but it's still, it's what you expect from a Tom Cruise action movie. Having said all that
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:well, I actually dis, I, I agree with you on one point and disagree with you on another. Where I agree with you is that IL liked the part one a little bit better, just a little bit better, but I did like it a little bit better, but I felt that they tied the story together really well. In fact, so, well that they. Had to figure out a way how to get in the action pieces because this was really not just about saving the world, this was about saving, uh, friendships and showing how you honor those friendships. And you could see that they spent time allowing those characters, Tom Luther, Benji Grace, allowing them to have moments that had nothing to do with action, that had something to do with their relationships. And I think that's was really important if this really is Ethan Hunt's last go round and Tom Cruise's swan song. So I thought that they did that really well and was smart enough though to know that the action people probably don't want to see all that mushy stuff be like, come on man, get to the action. So they brought us that real personal relationship interaction stuff and gave us all the action things that, that we want to see. You said. Did we, did we get to see Tom run? Yes. We got to see Tom run. He ran so much that he ran a marathon. He, so if you were looking for that, that Tom Cruise run, you got to see it. Did he do those aerial stunts, the underwater miracles, the incredible car chases, dodging bullets, missiles and engaging in close hand to hand combat for you diehard action people. It was there. To me it was really like, but the action seekers should feel like a kid in the candy store because while we know what's in the candy store, we could see the candy and all that stuff. And we tasted it before it was still very tasty to me.
Kathia Woods:Now I have a question to, for you. Do you honestly believe that it highlighted the team?
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Yeah, I think it did. I think that what it I, I don't wanna say too much because I don't wanna give out a, any spoilers, but what I did say in my interview is that I think this, that what we know for sure is that we don't know for sure if Ethan Hunt is gone. But what we do know for sure is that there's a team still there. We know that IMF is not dead. We know that there's people who could step into those shoes and I think it's gonna be very interesting to see how the franchise reboots, so to speak, with Tom not being there. And I think they set it up for that. So, yeah, I with, I love Pom, well, lemme say Mentia. Oh, I love Pom Clementia. I loved her Henry Cerney. I just think Simon Peg and Haley Atwell. I just think that they've set it up to say, okay, we can continue this. Yeah, I did. Do I think anybody can take the place of Tom Cruise? Nah. However, Tom at 62 is saying, I can't do this anymore.
Kathia Woods:Do we? I think you wanna do it at a certain height. I dunno, I feel a little bit in the middle on how some of the characters, but then again, I am also a little biased'cause I was introduced to Mission Impossible where my mom, who loved, loved, loved, loved the show. And you know when a lot of people don't know that Leonard meanwhile was the main guy before he was Paris and before they, before they had Ethan Hunt. So to me it would be like, okay, do we then bring in Paris, the character of Paris also, I always felt, one of the things I did not like about the movie franchise is I don't think they ever let the women operatives shine like the TV show did. I think the TV show did a better job. That. What is the girl's name? Leslie. You talking about Haley Atwell? No, I'm, now, I'm gonna really back to the show. Barbara Va. Yeah. And I think, yes. And I feel like she did a really good job of some of the, like that you wanna talk about a TV show that stood the test of time. Like Leslie Ann Warren, she was really, really good. Barbara Bain, right? Who played Cinnamon, first of all, she just had, you wanna talk about a face card that didn't decline? Yeah, she did. But also because of the fact that she was so attractive. People always underestimated her when she was out here being really, how can we say this being really devious And I do miss the leader, the Steven, the Jim, the Peter Graves character. The Jim felt, yeah. So I think there is, listen, there is room here for. For some other people. But I think, and I get it because Tom is the drawer, but I feel like Simon's character got to shine. I am not too sure that Ving Rames, who is the Greg Norris, the Barney character, got a chance to really shine. But it, I don't think, I don't
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:think, I don't think he got a chance to shine as much as he could have in this whole series. I have to mention, since you're going back to the series, every time I think about the series, I think about Brock Peters, and so that's the name that always comes up. So you got Greg Morris, you got Brock Peters, you had David Davis Roberts, and when you look at those African American folks, you're really happy the portrayal that and inclusion that show had back then. So I agree with you, but I think this movie did everything. This second part did everything that it was supposed to do. It had to give you some type of closure. It wasn't, it's not total closure because this, I don't believe that this is done, but it had to give you some kind of closure with Tom and his people. It had to figure out some kinda way to give you to a conclusion as it relates to this, the entity. And it had to tell you that there were some other people willing to make it to the next level. I, I just think that it did it. I was on the edge of my seat. I enjoyed a number of things about this. Uh, obviously the action I, I think the way it was shot as well, maybe for us, and I think you probably might agree with this, is that for the people who are looking for action. The way this is shot is so up close and personal that I, a couple of times I was sitting on the edge of my seat and the people who were with me were like, Reggie, what's going on? I was like, I felt like I was there. I,
Kathia Woods:okay, so we, I was about to say, when you said you were at the edge of your seat, I was not, Reggie, there was nothing scary in this movie, but you Oh, no,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:no. I wasn't scared. I was like, is he gonna make it? Oh, okay. Oh, who's gonna get caught next? Oh, oh, no, no. Somebody's behind you. Somebody's, I was involved. I, I enjoyed that part. And then I liked the way in which they used the music too. Is that dun dun, dun dun. They, I mean,
Kathia Woods:you can't listen if nothing else. If nothing else, we're gonna get that theme song.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:But they used it like that is
Kathia Woods:a theme song where people are like, don't touch it.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:That's right. But they did use it with some variation. And to do that, you have to be really, really careful to your point about messing with something as iconic as that. So they had some variation to that. I, I like this a lot. I gave this one a three and a half out of four. I'm recommending that people go check it out. It was fun, it was enjoyable, and it was personal. That's what I, that's what I felt about this movie.
Kathia Woods:Oh, 100%. I think if you want a summer movie, movie, that movie, again, listen, the stuff we're talking about is itsy bitsy. Right? But if you wanna be entertained, Tom Cruise is gonna keep you. Like, this is when he makes these type of movies. He's in his element, right? This, this is
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:the one
Kathia Woods:when he tried to play the Good Nazi. This, when we go, Tom, you're right. When you're right. But sometimes you lost us. But in this particular thing is any other thing too, is, I like what Tom is saying. When people are like, oh, he's the last movie. He's, I don't wanna be the last movie star. I shouldn't be. There are other people here that can pick up the mantle. What are we doing? You know what I mean? So I like the fact that he said on this press tour, I wanna make a movie with Michael B. Jordan. I'm glad that Michael B. Jordan went to the London premiere. I think he gets more than anything. And I just got down talking to Greg to this movie, this, excuse me, this morning, not this movie this morning where he has put his arm around Craig Tarzan and put him in, took him from Maverick and put him in these other two movies when he didn't have to. So there is something, listen, I know why some people are like, but we talk movie stuff. We're not talking about, we're talking, we're
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:talk. We're just, we're talking. But
Kathia Woods:as far as a star that has this much real estate, for him to put his arm around younger people and other filmmakers is freaking. Huge. You know, how he pushed sinners forward and the fact that he, and when he says he wants to work with somebody, even, I don't care if people in Hollywood in the executive branch think Michael B. Jordan is mediocre. If Tom Cruise says he wants to do it, it's gonna happen.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Yeah, for sure. And since you're mentioning people, I want to mention Tremmel Tillman and who played Captain Lezo. And I suspect since you spoke to Angela Bassett, that you probably spoke to Tremmel too.
Kathia Woods:Yeah, we had a little Kiki. Yes. In that Trammel, when you got this gig, you were like, yeah. And then you were like, Ooh, hold up. Now let's talk about where you gonna place me. Because I think when you sign up for a Tom Cruise movie, so you might be jumping outta somebody's airplane and you might be like, Tom, I'm with you. Can the stuntman do this? And he said he was very happy. He was excited because he has scenes with Tom. He said he was very excited that his scene. Captain Bledsoe were him on Terra Firmer. I said, because you know Tom in in some of these segments with the ubo, he is out there. He goes, you know what? I was here with him mentally supporting him. And listen, I am, I'm not mad at him'cause I would be like, Tom, I'm a support from the side. You go be great. We gonna say a prayer for you. But again, I love how everybody that is including Angela Bassett said we are just in Tom's world and happy to be in it.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:This, this is Tom's world and it really, if it's done, it really does signal a end of an era. Yeah, Tom can be in some other stuff, but this was his vehicle. This is Tom's world and I understand when we say we wish some other people got a little bit more shine, but people came to see Tom, this is Tom's thing and I think he did a really, really good job here.
Kathia Woods:Again, he understands what we come to. I love a movie star, an actor that knows who they are. These people, sometimes they are like, they're like, Ooh. And I'm like, nobody's coming to see that from you. Right? Like we're coming for the stunts, the locations like we don't want Nina, we don't want Mission Impossible at the Jersey Shore. No shade to the Jersey Shore, but we like that you were in Budapest. We like that you were here in Sky. Like we want that Who spies don't go to around the corner. That's where we imagine spies people to be in luxurious things and fitted tucks and mixing with really bad guys that are millionaires and have glass eyes and whatever you have there. This is same thing we want our James Bond to. We don't want him in a JC Penney suit. This is our idea of a good time. We wanna live vicariously through you. A
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:a. Absolutely. Well, living Vicariously a apparently that's gonna help us move into our next segment. And that segment is Rant and Rave. And the thing that I wanna rant and rave about is the box office. There are people who are living vicariously at the movie or at the box office. They're going to the movie theater, seeing actual movies. And when I look at the box office, I'm pausing for a moment because when I look at the box office, I'm saying OMG, because there's some movies that are doing really, really well. And the first movie I wanna start with is a Minecraft movie. That movie. Is killing it domestically, it's almost at$420 million. Internationally it's at 400, 513 million. So we know this movie will make, we'll break 1 billion. I had, this is the film for, I was on vacation, so I hadn't seen it and I still haven't gone to see it because of the reports of what's happening in the theater. I don't want to be around some of this craziness that people are doing in theater from bringing chickens in, throwing popcorn at the screen, all that. The craziness is absolutely wild, but we have to give credit. To the filmmakers here. They made a movie that really kicked off the summer movie season almost coming up on a billion dollars. I I, I don't see how it won't make another 70,$70 million to do that. But any thoughts on my a Minecraft movie?
Kathia Woods:First of all, it's a video game that was a huge hit. My daughter played the game when she was younger, grammar school, middle school. So you are pulling in all that crowd. I said when I saw it, I said, that movie was not made for old heads like me. It was made for that generation and the kids that are still playing the game. And they tapped it exactly into that. My daughter went to see it to have that nostalgic feeling. And so I'm not surprised that there is not, everything has to be for everybody. And there is a group of people that things resonate with. And the gaming community came out and supported this film point blank period.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Absolutely. Just for Warner Brothers. Absolutely. The other movie I wanna bring in that I'm a little, not surprised from my review, but I think it's, I think it's a disappointment in what it's done in the box office, which is Thunderbolts. If you look at the domestic Gross, you, it's at about 160 million. And internationally 170 million. That means it's somewhere around 331 million for this big Marvel movie, which I think they had higher hopes for this film. I can't remember what was spent on this, but let's just say like most Marvel movies, it had to be at least a hundred million. So I think you
Kathia Woods:have a valid point.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Go ahead. So if it was at a hundred million, you're only making a 330 something million for a Marvel movie. That's not good.
Kathia Woods:Okay, it's, the budget was 180 million. Let's do the math that they like to do on our movies. So the budget was 180 million. Let's say marketing was another 20 to$30 million and it earned so far,$331.7 million. Yeah, I'm with you. You need more legroom. You, the movie has not made its money back. And now with sinners doing what it did and the word of mouth, I don't think for Thunderbolts was strong enough. I enjoyed it. I thought I did. It was, I thought it was, uh, especially considering where Marvel has been, I thought it was a good. It's getting back on track with what people want out of Marvel. I think it was really funny. I like the fact that this cast of MiFi, excuse me, misfits are here, but considering the amount of money that was poured into it and the campaign, yeah, it's not, and it's gonna lose even more esteem because Mission Impossible is coming out and it is Memorial Day weekend, so you've got an extra day for people to go to their movies. So it's going to get lost in that shovel, you know? So,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:yeah. And when you look at, I looked at this movie as a Guardians of the Galaxy Light. It really is because when you look at the domestic gain of the Guardians of the Galaxy, which came out in 2014, that movie made a 330 million or 34 million domestically alone, and then another 404 million internationally. So that movie ended up at 7 74. I just don't see the Thunderbolts even getting close to that with what you just said, that we centers came and it was out there when centers was out there. Mission Impossibles is out, and then a Minecraft is still just cruising along. So I just don't see it doing that well. With that. Go ahead. No, you go ahead.
Kathia Woods:No, no, no. And the other thing too is it is you've got Smurfs coming out, right? A lot going on in the Asop, Rocky, Rihanna household.'cause ASAP Rocky had that wonderful premier of High to Low and, and can, and you've got Rihanna who's in Smurfs and Rihanna's given us a song right in Smurfs. So Rihanna people, people want to be near and wanna absorb things adjacent to her. So it is one of those things where people are really like Woo. Yearning to be a part of stuff. So I don't, it's going to be interesting, you know what I mean? And we haven't even had F1 is gonna do Insane Numbers. Jurassic Park. You still have some of the bigger movies coming. So I just feel like. This is a shame'cause it's not a bad movie, but maybe it's, we gotta talk about it. Is it, do people have more, do people have moral fatigue?
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Yeah, I think, uh, look, a couple things, and I said this in my, in my review, is that when you don't know the characters, you're, you are hoping that those characters can catch on in some kind of way. And there, for me, there wasn't a standout character that I felt like, okay, this is my character. This is the person that if I were to go out and buy a figurine or a bobblehead or something of that nature, there's a character there that I really want to put on my mantle. I think with Guardians of the Galaxy, they had that in in, in various characters. And I also think that might be because of the Star Power with Guardians of the Galaxy as well, is that some of the folks in Guardians of the Galaxy were already na household names. So people were like, yeah, I'd love to have, I love to be this character. That's what I think about it. Hope If Thunderbolts was made to be a setup movie, to set it up for what's to happen next, then it did a, it did its job, it did its job to to be a filler in for the fact that there are no Avengers yet. We're waiting for Fantastic Four, we're waiting for some other characters to come out. It did its job. I think it was a fine movie as well, but sometimes those characters that are lesser known just don't travel as well.
Kathia Woods:I like Elena. I thought Y Elena was the heart of the film, but you're right. Does that translate into a figurine and wanting to dress up? As that come Halloween. No, but I do think that she, the scenes between her and her dad, who's, yay, we're backing in. She's no. You know what I mean? I thought those were some of the best scenes. I agree.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I agree. I,
Kathia Woods:I think she's, the heart of Florence is fantastic. I think she is the heart and soul of that movie. But you're right. I don't know if it's timing. I, again, I think it's one of those things where for once we can say the movie wasn't a problem, I just feel like people are not quite ready and Oh, we haven't even, I forgot to mention this too. You got Fantastic four coming out in July.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:You got Fantastic four coming, so this is a lot of stuff coming, but what is out at the box office still is centers and this movie has made just as much as the thunderbolts. It has made worldwide 330$23 million, 246 domestically and 76 internationally. Now, it's interesting that internationally, that it hasn't done as well, and I've looked at the markets that it is where it is internationally, and it's in most of the major markets. So it just didn't have, I guess, that same appeal that it has here. It seems like
Kathia Woods:I'm gonna, okay, that's top markets, right? I don't expect sinners to do as well in Bulgaria and Croatia and the Czech Republic, right? Because their black population is not as large in those countries. But when you go and then you jump. Start to a country like France where it did 2 million an opening and has done 7 million. Right. Which is, again, you gotta look at what is France the size of Texas. So that's pretty good. But you also look at the demographic. You have a large black population, I think that is amazing. Opening weekend it did 800,000 in Germany, which has some, but not as large as France. Yeah. And overall has done 3,251,000. Again, I don't expect it to do gangbusters in Hungary and Iceland and places like Lithuania, the Netherlands is a little bit more diverse. And if you look at, but if you come down,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:biggest market obviously is united. If you look at United Kingdom, United
Kathia Woods:Kingdom, again, you are looking at countries that have predominantly a large. Black population. Right close,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:close to 20, close to 20 million. But you look at the United Arab Emirates, that 2 million, you look at South Africa, which is a penance, which is not even a a million. What? Yeah, not even a million. South Africa, even Saudi Arabia is really low as as well. I mean, some of the bigger markets that are not there, obviously, and I don't know if it'll, if it'll go there, would be like China and Japan, those places where you have a lot of people
Kathia Woods:you can, you can make your money and China alone, you looking at even Brazil. In Brazil it did 3 million, 200,000 Columbia. Like these are places. But I do think we have to start looking at international markets and see how some of these films are being marketed there. I do think there's still that fear that they don't think black films. Perform well, so therefore they're not data and making the talent as accessible to those spaces. You know what I mean?
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:A a absolutely. Uh, and again, so I'm talking about maybe that the international market is not as strong, but the domestic market for this is out of this world. When you look at what has happened for this film, I read an article that said Sinners needs only$31 million to become one of the top 10 R-rated movies at the domestic box office.
Kathia Woods:Yeah. And I also, I would say that, again, I am not an international box office, but I will say people know in certain places, like if you, then you have anomalous, like I said, it is in Germany. Those are good numbers. And again, we gotta look at these countries that have smaller, that are like the size of a state here in the United States, right, who are like, they're going to bet on stuff that they know. So if you are competing centers with Minecraft, they're going to make more screens available for something like, and not to be nerding out. But then we gotta break down and say, compare to how many screens are available. So if you only have in a country, let's say, of 20 million people, 10 screens dedicated in. Out of those 10 screens, five are in major cities, then those numbers are pretty good. Now, if it's as accessible as it is here in the United States and that's the return, then okay. But I do think, I don't think we should look at that at discouraged, because again, I don't expect, I don't know how much black culture gets digested other than music,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:but that's the way I wanna jump. That's where I would like to jump in, is that we've heard this over and over again and we've been on, we've been on panels or with people listening to panels where they're talking about how the movie industry hasn't. Decided to market black movies the same way music is marketed across the world, is that if we're leading in trends and we're leading in culture, we're leading in all these other things. This is a trend. This is part of culture. This is one of those movies that should have those kind of legs. So I'm not, do look at it as a, as a failure. And I don't mean a failure for Ryan Coogler, I don't mean that I look at it as a failure from the movie studios because if it's doing that well, this is what normally happens someplace around the world. They'll be like, oh, people are saying, people saying, uh, they dapping people. Okay, I guess that's what I should be doing. This is the movie.
Kathia Woods:Yeah, and I agree with you. You need, what we need is, and you have a stronger marketing background than me. You need. This is why we are having a discussion right now. This is why diversity, equity, and inclusion is so important. It's not just about having a black person in the room. It's a black person who is from the region that understands how to do the marketing so that you can bring out, and also how to make it, translate it for non-black people. That's why it's important to have these different voices because how can you speak for an area that you're not from, that is not your culture, and you don't understand how those people consume information. But we all see the, what is it, the Greg Nor Show, right? The English talk show where we see the English talent, but American talent always, I don't, again, somebody clue us in, right? I don't know what that is in Germany. I don't know what that is in Litan. What the late night talk show is, what the daytime talk show is, and it's also about. Trusting some of your cast to go into those spaces. Can Michael B. Jordan go all over the globe? No, but this is a large enough cast where you can send some of these people into some of these markets to get that one-on-one time so that people,'cause again, people like to be what Will Smith did, right? Which was the Arnold Schwartzenegger, the Tom Cruise, how to promote a movie He understood, to cut through that is he had to go there himself. And then once people started seeing him consistently, they were like, I'm coming to see this'cause Will is coming to sell it to us. So I think part of that is too, I feel like Zoom, why I get it.'cause it's more cost effective, but nothing beats a movie star going to places where. Movie stars don't normally come to. We've become a little numb. What you just say. We can say, yeah, we can say, I'm not gonna catch Beyonce and Cowboy Carter'cause I caught her on Renaissance and she's gonna go on tour again. Whereas some of these other countries are like, it took 10 years for us for her to come with Renaissance. I gotta catch it now.'cause I don't know. She's gonna come over here with Cowboy Carter.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Look, Elton, John El and John coming. I gotta go see Elton John now'cause we might not see him again.
Kathia Woods:Exactly. So I do think, I think that is technology. What I do think it gives more access to more media to speak to talent. But we also have to understand is to have a, what Youma call it, a freaking, there's a center's premier promo started in Mexico and look at the numbers right. London, the list goes on and on. If you were to have a sinner's premiere in, I don't know, in Amsterdam, and maybe you can't get Michael B. Jordan, but you can get some of these other folks on there and you do the red carpet and you do all the stuff that people like, it's gonna make people be like, oh my God, you came to Amsterdam. Because those type of movie premieres don't happen in Amsterdam. There's
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:absolutely no doubt about it. To wrap this part up is that sin is doing well, it's doing well. Absolutely. Domestically. Looks like it's trying to get into that all time top 10 from a RR rated perspective, and that's extremely impressive. I saw the movie twice. I think my daughter saw the movie three times, so this is one of those movies that has legs and I just wanna say for people who are gonna try to wait and watch it at home, I. It's not gonna be the same. It's gonna be good.
Kathia Woods:You're buy it. Buy it.'cause that also goes towards I somebody, Sean, a friend Sean Edwards said something. I think that is really important because people were so intrigued when Ryan did the whole IMAX conversation on how, when he kind of nerded out a little bit. And I say there as a compliment'cause I'm right there with him. I like to know that Warner Brothers listen to the feedback from the people Package this bad boy into A DVD. Give us the behind the scenes, give us the director commentary. I am telling you, people are still buying hard bodies. They're not buying everything but this. And you put it in the Walmart, the Targets, whatever, right where we get our day to day and make it available to purchase on Amazon, wherever you get your stuff. It is going to sell. And if especially you do a 35 99 or 39 99, people are gonna buy it'cause it's going to become a collector.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I, I to, I totally agree with that. I think that packaging it that way, it's really funny because I remember when people thought vinyl was dead and now everybody's not buying records. But I'm keeping my records. I think you even see a couple of'em back here. Uh, one of them, one of them is, is one of the movies that I liked, which was, if you can see it, which is conclave. And I, I just wanna mention as we get ready to close out that, did you know that the Pope is from Chicago? I may. Maybe you didn't know that. Of course. Maybe man, since you
Kathia Woods:pulled out your vinyls.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:All right. You got Gladiator. Oh, you got us. I don't think I have that one.
Kathia Woods:Oh, oh, I got one more. And I have a record player.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I do too. So now you making me look. Try to look and see if I can find my other ones. Okay, next, next time we,
Kathia Woods:yeah, so I'm just saying you take care of yourself. We also come from the generation. We know not to check the needle on there. We going to be very careful. But I do think there is something like, listen, whoever may be listening to our podcast, Warner Brothers, give us the DVD package with the behind the scene interviews and Ryan, that whole IMAX chat and also giving us, you know, some location shots and let Ruth Carter talk about the costuming and Hannah, about the set design. I am telling you, you are going to make a butt load of money. Now the smart thing here is now Warner Brothers, if you really listen to us, have it in time for the holidays. This gonna make a great gift for the movie fan.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:In your room? Oh, if you, I think if you do some of them, some figurines too. I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I think some people will purchase a couple of those figurines and I'll be scared to do that because I do not want those, those characters that are vampires. So I can't have that in mind. You,
Kathia Woods:you don't want, what is it like when he got the blood and he's
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:No, no, no, no. Thank you. I'll pass. We're at the end of the show. Look, this was fun. I, I had a lot of fun. Oh, I did say to you, before we get to the end of the show, I did say to you, you do know that the Pope is from Chicago.
Kathia Woods:I think everybody from Chicago adjacent to outside the suburbs of Chicago has told the whole world from Chicago. And you know what? I'm not mad at you. I'm gonna let you celebrate that and enjoy that. I am glad.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:And for the record. He is a White Sox fan, south Side for Life. He's a White Sox fan, so I don't want to hear you Northsiders. The people who who don't know about Chicago saying Cubs. Cubs is, he's a White Sox fan. Like yours. Truly. I'll leave it at that. That's the end of our section Ran and Rave. And now we can just close out.
Kathia Woods:Reggie's gonna be, if you thought Reggie was unbearable before,
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:oh man,
Kathia Woods:I, he's really, really gonna be unbearable now.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:I am so happy, Katya. Tell everybody again where they can find your stuff. Yeah. And connect with you as well.
Kathia Woods:You can find it at the Philadelphia Tribune, Sacramento Observer and Cup of Soul show.com. And Reggie, where can they find you? Can South side Chicago. South.
Reggie Ponder, The Reel Critic:Yeah. Yeah. Well, my wife will say that I've been living on the west side so long that I should claim the west side. Nah, I grew up on the south side, so I'm claiming the south side as a west sider. Right. As a west, west side resident. Let me say it like that. You can find me at Indigo. That's NDIG o.com. I currently have my review up for Mission Impossible, the final reckoning. You can also find me@vlo.org. Check out my stuff there. I am writing for the Garfield Lawndale voice and doing some, oh, I'm doing some things with Ronnie DeShaw on a digital radio station, so I'll need to make sure that I give the right station number for that. But brother, working, we out here working so that we can get to KS cans. Candy, candy, whatever we trying to get there too. So that's what we're doing. With that, I wanna say thank you, my friend. You got two critics, two opinions, and it's one mission. That is where dialogue engages. It educates, it entertains, and occasionally it escalates. And if it escalates, that means that we get to connect with you. Thanks so much, and we'll see you guys next time.
Kathia Woods:Next time.
