Verdict with Ted Cruz - July 04, 2025


America's Birthday： The 30 Best Movies of the 21st Century


Episode Stats


Length

33 minutes

Words per minute

170.13506

Word count

5,652

Sentence count

541

Harmful content

Misogyny

7

sentences flagged

Toxicity

14

sentences flagged

Hate speech

5

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Ted Cruz and Ben Ferguson debate the New York Times' list of the top 30 films of the 21st century, and debate whether or not they should have been on the list at all. (Spoiler: They don't.)

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.560 Guaranteed human.
00:00:05.400 Welcome.
00:00:06.220 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you.
00:00:09.500 It's so nice to have you listening today on this 4th of July weekend.
00:00:14.920 And we're going to have a little fun with today's show because it is, look, 4th of July.
00:00:21.080 A lot of families hanging out, having fun, watching movies.
00:00:24.260 And there was a list that came out and it irritated Senator Ted Cruz, the point where we're now doing a show over it, which makes me laugh.
00:00:33.520 I love this.
00:00:34.300 We're going to you're going to get to see the real Senator Ted Cruz in this show, which makes me very happy.
00:00:39.540 Senator, this list came out.
00:00:40.880 You were a little cranky about it, and I love it.
00:00:43.340 Well, let me say to everyone, I hope you're having a fantastic 4th of July weekend.
00:00:46.840 I hope you're celebrating America's birthday.
00:00:49.440 I hope you're you're grilling hot dogs and burgers in the backyard.
00:00:54.260 And playing with your kids, by the way, if you are grilling burgers, I hope you're doing a better job of it than Chuck Schumer does.
00:01:00.460 Do not put the cheese on the burger while the burger is still raw.
00:01:03.920 That that is that that's a rookie mistake.
00:01:07.400 But but if you're anything like me, holiday weekends, what I love to do is go to the movies.
00:01:13.540 When I was a kid, I went to the movies with my mom, my dad all the time.
00:01:17.180 And I love movies.
00:01:18.400 And it happened this past week that The New York Times put out this list of the top 30 best films of the 21st century, according to over 500 actors, directors and other names in Hollywood.
00:01:31.860 And I got to say, this is the worst list I have ever seen.
00:01:36.180 This is a list of a bunch of politicized, woke, effete, out of touch Hollywood types.
00:01:43.560 And no wonder the movie business is in trouble, because most of these movies nobody's seen.
00:01:49.660 And the movies that people go to don't make the list.
00:01:52.220 So I'm just going to read you their top 30.
00:01:53.740 Starting with number 30.
00:02:23.740 Mad Max Fury Road, The Social Network, Spirited Away, Get Out, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, No Country for Old Men, Moonlight, In the Mood for Love, There Will Be Blood, Mulholland Drive.
00:02:40.340 And the number one movie of the last 25 years, according to The New York Times, is Parasite.
00:02:46.480 Now, I got to say, there are some good movies on that list.
00:02:49.400 They're not they're not all dogs.
00:02:51.680 But number one, I'd be willing to bet of that list.
00:02:55.560 Have you seen more than five of those movies, Ben?
00:02:58.540 I have seen maybe five.
00:03:00.900 There's a couple like Inglorious Bastards that I've watched.
00:03:03.700 That was pretty good.
00:03:04.500 I'll throw that one in there.
00:03:05.960 But overall, I would have to Google the majority of the list you just read.
00:03:09.460 Right.
00:03:09.640 Like the majority, I'd have to Google them.
00:03:11.040 Like, what is this?
00:03:11.700 They were not on my top list at all.
00:03:13.400 Well, it is a pretentious list and it's a list with an agenda.
00:03:18.700 And I actually liked.
00:03:20.140 So Twitter was going back and forth about it.
00:03:22.780 And there was this fellow named Mike Henry who asked ChatGPT to analyze that list of film,
00:03:28.540 look for similarities and rank the films by how woke they are.
00:03:32.580 And it came up with tier one.
00:03:36.200 These are straight up ideological vehicles.
00:03:38.600 Message is greater than story.
00:03:40.820 And according to ChatGPT, number five, Moonlight, is about black, queer identity, poverty, masculinity, 0.67
00:03:47.060 deconstruction.
00:03:48.600 Get Out, number eight, is about white liberal racism, body autonomy and performative allyship.
00:03:54.380 Number one, Parasite, is about anti-capitalism, class warfare, rich equals evil symbolism.
00:03:59.520 Number 12, The Zone of Interest, Holocaust, reimagined via ambient horror, villainy through banality.
00:04:06.340 Number 17, Brokeback Mountain, least surprising movie on the list if Hollywood was putting it together.
00:04:12.980 And that is, according to ChatGPT, about queer repression, masculinity and rural stigma.
00:04:18.860 Number 18, Itabama Tambieng, sexual liberation, political awakening, class divide.
00:04:23.920 And number 13, Children of Men, anti-fascist, immigration, dystopian surveillance society.
00:04:31.760 That's what they went with, politics, instead of good movies, instead of movies people like,
00:04:39.020 instead of movies that inspire you, instead of movies that make you laugh,
00:04:43.100 instead of movies that make you hug your kids.
00:04:45.500 And so I decided to come up with my own list.
00:04:48.820 I will say, a number of reporters called and said,
00:04:51.380 all right, all right, you don't like this one, what's your alternative?
00:04:55.160 And listen, we're going to put out a list of 30,
00:04:58.280 and I'm not going to claim it is the definitive list of the 30 greatest films of the last 25 years,
00:05:03.640 but these are 30 excellent movies that came out in the last 25 years.
00:05:08.660 And I tried to think about how to do it,
00:05:11.000 because, you know, I do actually have a daydric job, and I'm not a film critic.
00:05:14.320 So what I did is I went and printed out a list of all of the nominees for the Academy Awards for Best Picture,
00:05:20.740 each of the last 25 years.
00:05:22.280 I figured, okay, that's a good place to start.
00:05:24.880 And starting in 2001 for the 2000 movies, the winner of Best Picture in 2001, any idea, Ben?
00:05:31.480 No clue.
00:05:33.300 Gladiator.
00:05:34.360 One of the best movies ever made.
00:05:36.760 It is in my top 10 all-time, if not top 5. 0.99
00:05:40.420 And these idiots didn't put Gladiator on the list. 0.99
00:05:42.780 That doesn't surprise me, though. 0.99
00:05:44.980 Like, I feel like if it's a movie that just makes you smile or makes you excited or happy,
00:05:49.620 you're like, no, no, no, can't have that movie on the list, right?
00:05:52.140 Because that would just be too normal and sane.
00:05:55.320 Gladiator was an extraordinary, a fantastic movie.
00:05:58.100 I can't watch it enough times.
00:06:00.040 It's perfectly done.
00:06:01.000 You know what also came out in 2000?
00:06:02.400 It didn't get nominated to the Academy Awards, but it came out the same year.
00:06:05.700 You know what movie?
00:06:06.900 The Patriot.
00:06:08.320 What's that?
00:06:08.720 Which is another fantastic movie.
00:06:10.780 Amazing movie.
00:06:11.480 It is an amazing movie.
00:06:13.220 It also makes my top 10.
00:06:15.340 It's not on their list.
00:06:16.500 Both of them.
00:06:17.020 So 2000 was a good year for movies.
00:06:18.880 You had both The Patriot and Gladiator come out that year.
00:06:22.500 Fantastic.
00:06:23.880 Uplifting.
00:06:24.980 Nowhere on their list.
00:06:26.740 How about 2001?
00:06:28.920 2001, just from the list of Academy Award nominees, the winner was A Beautiful Mind,
00:06:33.900 which is a great, powerful, touching movie, doesn't make their list.
00:06:40.180 Also that year, and the Academy Award didn't win it, but came out that year, was Moulin Rouge,
00:06:46.000 which was a musical.
00:06:46.980 It was fun.
00:06:47.660 It was interesting.
00:06:49.220 I laughed.
00:06:50.400 Good, good.
00:06:51.400 It's a good movie.
00:06:52.900 All right.
00:06:53.300 Doesn't make their list.
00:06:55.080 How about 2002?
00:06:57.220 2002, there are two of the movies that the winner for Best Picture was Chicago.
00:07:02.740 Chicago is a great musical.
00:07:06.520 You've got Richard Gere.
00:07:08.880 I still like when he is trying to get out of trouble and goes, and now, a tap dance.
00:07:15.400 And I will say more than once when I have been in trouble at home with Heidi, I sort
00:07:19.440 of think of Richard Gere going, and now, a tap dance.
00:07:22.860 Also that year, 2002.
00:07:25.920 Hold on.
00:07:26.180 We got to hit pause here.
00:07:27.440 I'm noticing a trend.
00:07:29.140 Hold on.
00:07:29.440 You're not getting out of jail on this one.
00:07:31.000 All right.
00:07:31.240 I got it.
00:07:31.600 There's a trend here.
00:07:32.500 Are you a Broadway musical guy?
00:07:35.600 I'm not making fun.
00:07:36.840 I just have never asked you this question before.
00:07:38.760 I've gone to, I don't know, maybe four or five, you know, plays.
00:07:43.940 Hamilton's one of them, for example, that I've seen.
00:07:46.280 Wicked was another one.
00:07:47.320 Most of the time, it's go to New York with my wife, and we'll go see a play because that's
00:07:51.640 on her list.
00:07:52.640 But I'm noticing a trend here.
00:07:54.440 Do you, like, will you go to the Kennedy Center this year for some of the plays?
00:07:58.080 Absolutely.
00:07:58.740 Hell yes.
00:07:59.220 And in fact, I have already.
00:08:00.400 I saw Les Mis just a couple of weeks ago in the Kennedy Center.
00:08:03.800 It was fantastic.
00:08:04.760 Les Mis.
00:08:06.200 Les Mis or Hamilton are, I think, the two greatest musicals I've ever done.
00:08:10.140 I love Les Mis.
00:08:11.100 In fact, I'll tell you a story in just a minute about Les Mis.
00:08:16.260 Back when I was living for the summer in New York after my first year of law school, I'm
00:08:23.500 living there, and I send my mother an airplane ticket via FedEx, fly her to New York, take
00:08:30.240 her to Les Mis, take her to see Camelot, and take her out to a fancy dinner.
00:08:35.980 We had a great weekend, just my mom and me.
00:08:38.760 Also in 2002 was Gangs of New York.
00:08:41.320 It didn't win Best Picture, but great film.
00:08:43.680 Daniel Day-Lewis, rough, rugged, really well done.
00:08:47.180 The next year, 2003, the Best Picture winner was Lord of the Rings, Return of the King.
00:08:52.140 All three of the Lord of the Rings movies came out in the 2000s.
00:08:55.240 All three were nominated for Best Picture.
00:08:57.140 Only number three won.
00:08:58.760 None of them make the list.
00:08:59.960 All three of them are great movies, fantastic adaptations of probably the greatest fantasy
00:09:06.360 book ever written.
00:09:08.640 All right, let's move forward to 2006.
00:09:12.220 2006, a movie that came out that is not on this list and should be, is a movie called Amazing
00:09:16.600 Grace.
00:09:18.020 Amazing Grace, if you haven't seen it, I would recommend you go see it.
00:09:21.100 I'd recommend you take your kids to it.
00:09:23.200 Amazing Grace is the true story of William Wilberforce.
00:09:27.020 William Wilberforce was a member of Parliament in the United Kingdom, and he led the fight
00:09:34.160 to end the slave trade in Britain.
00:09:36.840 And Britain at the time, the slave trade was the leading industry in the UK.
00:09:43.880 And Wilberforce, as a young MP, he leads the fight, and it is inspirational.
00:09:48.400 It is powerful.
00:09:50.300 And at the end of his life, he succeeds in getting the slave trade abolished.
00:09:55.500 And do you know where the title comes from, Ben?
00:09:58.520 Where's that?
00:09:59.520 The title of the movie, Amazing Grace, comes from, of course, the great gospel hymn, Amazing
00:10:04.800 Grace.
00:10:06.160 The person who wrote it, who was a friar, was friends with Wilberforce.
00:10:11.460 And before he became a friar, he had been the captain of a slave ship.
00:10:18.040 And you think of the words of Amazing Grace, amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved
00:10:24.160 a wretch like me.
00:10:25.420 I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see. 0.76
00:10:30.220 And you think, like, it is hard to think of a more evil profession than being the captain
00:10:35.600 of a slave ship.
00:10:36.900 He had murdered people. 0.72
00:10:38.120 He had whipped people. 0.87
00:10:39.000 He had obviously enslaved people.
00:10:41.180 And yet he repented and became a friar and gave his life to Christ.
00:10:46.920 And that, you think of the guilt and horror and evil that man had committed to write maybe
00:10:53.640 the greatest, greatest hymn ever written.
00:10:57.460 That's where the title comes from.
00:10:59.320 It's from a book by Eric Bataxas.
00:11:01.400 Fantastic movie.
00:11:02.480 Of course, not on the New York Times list.
00:11:04.220 You look at these movies that are left off, and I'm a true story guy.
00:11:09.640 I love true stories.
00:11:11.620 There are some movies that I just, I think of instantly, if someone said, hey, give me
00:11:16.120 10 movies that you got to see.
00:11:18.440 One of those, I don't know if you ever watched it, Man on Fire with Denzel Washington.
00:11:22.560 True story, actually.
00:11:23.740 Great movie.
00:11:24.380 Incredible movie.
00:11:26.520 And I go to those and Saving Private Ryan.
00:11:29.600 And I go, you know, these are the types of movies that I watch over and over again.
00:11:35.900 And it's like Hollywood hates them, and they were successful.
00:11:39.440 Well, and Saving Private Ryan is another phenomenal movie.
00:11:43.480 And I went last year to Normandy for the 80th anniversary of D-Day and actually got to meet
00:11:48.500 Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg.
00:11:50.920 And look, both of their politics are left.
00:11:53.740 But I said to both of them, thank you.
00:11:55.200 Thank you for bringing World War II alive to so many people.
00:12:00.760 And I will say the first 30 minutes of Saving Private Ryan, when they're landing on that
00:12:06.080 beach and the war, I will tell you that genuinely changed my view about war.
00:12:12.320 Listen, I've never served in the military.
00:12:14.280 I've never been in combat.
00:12:15.940 And, you know, look, when you're growing up as a kid, as a young boy, you're like, okay,
00:12:19.220 if I was in war, I'd be tough and I'd try to survive.
00:12:21.520 And one of the things that opening 30 minutes for me, like, made me see in a way I never
00:12:29.560 had before was how utterly random it can be.
00:12:32.960 One guy is dead because his head was in the wrong place.
00:12:36.920 And if his head had been six inches to the left or right, he'd still be alive.
00:12:40.360 And just the utter randomness and brutality of it.
00:12:44.100 And I'll tell you something interesting, Ben.
00:12:45.640 And my uncle was a Vietnam vet, and he spent about 40 years as a counselor at the VA.
00:12:52.080 And he said when the movie Saving Private Ryan came out, it was the first movie that had
00:12:57.700 gotten the sound of warfare right, the sound of gunshots and ricochet.
00:13:02.800 And my uncle said he had vets who'd been at Vietnam, and the movie triggered their PTSD.
00:13:08.400 They were back in combat, and they would come in and seek counseling because it brought them
00:13:13.860 back.
00:13:14.300 And, I mean, that's the power of cinema, to transport you to a different life, a different
00:13:19.580 time, a different world.
00:13:20.840 And it's powerful and beautiful if it's not just an agenda for left-wing propagandizing.
00:13:30.160 Yeah, and you go back to, as you mentioned, propagandizing, and that's one of the core
00:13:35.000 things here.
00:13:35.960 I also look at some of these movies that are on this list, and they do have just a disdain
00:13:41.720 also for family.
00:13:43.400 Did you notice that?
00:13:44.340 Like, it's the extreme of Hollywood that they're promoting as, quote, the best.
00:13:49.740 No, I think that's exactly right.
00:13:51.660 And it's, there is, look, the fact that people don't go see these movies, people like to see
00:14:00.200 movies.
00:14:00.780 There are a lot of big blockbusters.
00:14:03.020 It's just the folks running Hollywood don't actually like anything that moviegoers go see.
00:14:10.840 You know, if you move on to 2007, 2008, 2009, a couple that were on the list, No Country for
00:14:18.300 Old Men, great movie.
00:14:19.560 I agree with them on that.
00:14:20.560 There Will Be Blood, another excellent movie.
00:14:23.380 One of the movies they left off was The Departed.
00:14:25.680 Departed is a great, great story and fighting organized crime, and it's really well done.
00:14:33.880 And then another one they included that I agree with is The Dark Knight.
00:14:38.000 And The Dark Knight, I got to say, was a fantastic superhero movie, yes, but Heath Ledger's Joker
00:14:45.420 was twisted.
00:14:47.200 I think it will go down as one of the greatest villain portrayals in cinema.
00:14:53.200 It's right up there with Hannibal Lecter.
00:14:55.600 It's right up there with Darth Vader of, like, classic all times.
00:15:00.440 The creepy nonchalance of the evil of Heath Ledger in Dark Knight was truly spectacular.
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00:15:37.420 All right, Senator, let's get back into it.
00:15:41.440 I do want to ask real quick, if you were on a desert island, this is when I love doing
00:15:46.600 shows like this, you're on a desert island, you can only take five DVDs with you.
00:15:52.720 I'm not even giving you Blu-ray, but I'm giving you above VHS quality, only five.
00:15:57.000 What five movies are you taking with you and why?
00:16:00.280 Oh, look, my number one favorite movie is The Princess Bride.
00:16:03.340 I've probably seen it a hundred times or more.
00:16:05.480 I would take The Godfather Trilogy, and I would take Scarface.
00:16:10.080 Those are my top three.
00:16:12.600 I might well throw Fletch onto that list.
00:16:15.760 Fletch is pretty fabulous.
00:16:18.500 Great, great movie.
00:16:20.580 Funny as all get out.
00:16:25.320 Early Eddie Murphy, I love just about everything.
00:16:29.080 But Beverly Hills Cop or Trading Places are probably two of the very best early Eddie Murphy that
00:16:33.980 are just hysterical.
00:16:35.480 So that and Gladiator might well make the list.
00:16:40.380 So I'm sort of rejecting your hypo and taking more than five, but that would be the bag from
00:16:46.280 which I was pulling.
00:16:48.060 And you?
00:16:48.960 All right, I'm going to tell you, there's a difference between you and I, by the way,
00:16:53.280 in age.
00:16:54.180 This is when it shows.
00:16:55.680 Senator, I have never seen the movie Fletch.
00:16:58.600 I just Googled it, as you said it.
00:17:00.420 It came out in 1985.
00:17:02.060 I was four years old.
00:17:03.260 You were obviously older than I am.
00:17:05.560 And we're able to see it.
00:17:06.760 So I don't even know what Fletch is about.
00:17:09.280 Okay.
00:17:10.060 Ben, I love you, but you're a communist. 0.96
00:17:11.980 You're a philistine. 1.00
00:17:13.580 You have been raised by wolves in a cave. 1.00
00:17:18.740 Go watch Fletch.
00:17:20.460 It's Chevy Chase.
00:17:21.840 It is hysterical.
00:17:22.740 I've probably seen Fletch 50 times.
00:17:25.460 And Ben, you know well Grant, who heads up my security detail.
00:17:28.900 Grant and I are about the same age.
00:17:30.900 And I think the only way Grant and I communicate is in movie quotes, most of which are from
00:17:35.080 Fletch.
00:17:35.680 Like it's every line of it, much like The Princess Bride, every line of Fletch is exquisite.
00:17:41.980 So it's Chevy Chase, but what's the premise of the movie?
00:17:44.840 So Fletch, Erwin Fletcher is an investigative reporter for the LA Times.
00:17:50.780 But it's a comedy.
00:17:51.660 And so he goes undercover, but he wears all sorts of different outfits on the beach.
00:17:57.520 And he's investigating drug dealing on the beach.
00:18:00.200 But it's just, it's funny as hell.
00:18:04.280 There are all sorts of lines.
00:18:06.300 Love your body, Larry.
00:18:07.560 It's all ball bearings these days.
00:18:09.000 None of this will make sense without, I will say one scene that everyone who knows the movie
00:18:14.900 knows is Moon River.
00:18:18.140 I will say that that would be when Fletch was getting an exam.
00:18:23.520 And he does say to the doctor, ever do time, Doc?
00:18:31.620 At the end of the day, he said, I'm sorry.
00:18:33.100 I couldn't find anything.
00:18:34.200 Well, it's not for a lack of looking.
00:18:37.680 All right.
00:18:38.280 You convinced me now.
00:18:39.460 I need to watch this movie.
00:18:40.520 I just hope they still have it out there.
00:18:42.620 I may have to borrow it.
00:18:43.440 Do you have it on VHS?
00:18:44.800 Or is it like beta cam?
00:18:46.600 That's probably beta max.
00:18:47.980 Like there's a point where Fletch falls asleep and he's sleeping and dreaming and he's watching
00:18:52.800 a Lakers game.
00:18:53.820 And he, Erwin Fletcher, the star of the Lakers, 6'5", 6'9", with the afro. 0.99
00:18:59.440 And it has him flying through the air and like biting people's arms and defense.
00:19:03.400 It is one of the best comedies ever written.
00:19:08.460 But it is not in the last quarter of the century.
00:19:10.900 All right, back to the Hollywood list.
00:19:11.860 Back to the Hollywood list.
00:19:13.040 Let's get to 2008. 0.91
00:19:14.440 Inglourious Bastards.
00:19:15.420 They put it on their list. 0.97
00:19:16.440 They're right.
00:19:17.060 Terrific movie.
00:19:18.020 Quentin Tarantino.
00:19:19.360 Just about everything Tarantino does is great.
00:19:22.200 He's a fabulous writer.
00:19:24.020 But Inglourious Bastards is a great pro-America film about killing Nazis or Nazis, as Brad Pitt 0.99
00:19:31.040 and Brad Pitt puts it, Nazis, killing me some Nazis. 0.98
00:19:35.040 I mean, it's exquisite and powerful. 0.94
00:19:40.020 All right, go to 2011.
00:19:41.600 Another movie that came out in 2011 with Brad Pitt in it, Moneyball.
00:19:45.160 You're a big sports guy.
00:19:46.480 Moneyball, both the book and the movie.
00:19:48.100 Such a good movie.
00:19:49.420 Changed, true story, but changed how everyone thought about baseball and putting a baseball
00:19:53.840 team together.
00:19:55.080 All right, so you're going to laugh.
00:19:56.100 So Moneyball came out and I love, again, true stories.
00:20:01.040 Like, if it says true story, there's a 99% chance I'm going to go see it.
00:20:04.460 I love sports.
00:20:05.520 The movie comes out and I was so excited to see it.
00:20:09.560 I kid you not, my wife fell asleep in the movie and I was like rivet.
00:20:16.540 She's like, that was one of the most boring movies I've ever seen in my entire life. 0.83
00:20:19.420 And I was like, how did you fall asleep?
00:20:21.180 Like, this kid figured it out and then like he got traded for him and it's Brad Pitt.
00:20:25.780 Like, you should have just stayed awake because it's Brad Pitt, for goodness sakes.
00:20:29.140 And she, so to this day, I don't think she's ever watched the entire movie.
00:20:32.460 I've probably watched that movie every time I'm on United.
00:20:35.220 You and I fly a ton.
00:20:36.300 You're on United probably 99% of the time.
00:20:38.720 And Moneyball's on there right now on their flights.
00:20:41.700 And so I literally watched it like five days ago.
00:20:44.360 And I'll tell you, by the way, Heidi falls asleep in just about every movie. 1.00
00:20:48.580 I mean, she doesn't do movies and she can't sit still for two hours. 1.00
00:20:52.740 And if you put her in a dark room with the lights out, she'll be asleep within 10 minutes. 0.72
00:20:57.680 Now, you like going to movies, by the way.
00:21:00.000 I like being in the theater.
00:21:01.500 I like the big screen, the sound, the popcorn, every bit of it.
00:21:04.860 I like the real experience.
00:21:06.740 All right.
00:21:06.940 Now, Senator, this is a make it or break a question.
00:21:08.780 It's going to show how true you are to the theater experience.
00:21:12.580 Are you a must-get-there-for-the-previews moviegoer?
00:21:16.860 Or do you say, the movie says it starts at 8.15, so I'm going to get there at 8.28?
00:21:23.080 I usually sit through the previews.
00:21:24.940 But I don't cry if I'm a few minutes late and miss a preview or two.
00:21:28.060 But I'm usually there pretty close to on time.
00:21:30.600 On the back end, I stay till the very end of the credits.
00:21:34.280 I will not leave.
00:21:35.240 I view it as like there's a complete experience that the artists have put this together.
00:21:39.980 And so many of the movies have like a tiny bit of content at the end of the credits anyway.
00:21:44.980 And I learn something.
00:21:46.200 I read the credits, and I learn something.
00:21:48.120 I bet you half the movies I see, I learn, oh, that was so-and-so.
00:21:51.460 Or you just find interesting things in the credits.
00:21:54.960 Hey, I love that.
00:21:56.060 You're giving credit to those that made the movie.
00:21:58.380 Well played on that one.
00:21:59.600 All right.
00:21:59.800 Let's get back to the list and where they got another one maybe right.
00:22:03.620 All right.
00:22:04.240 2012, Zero Dark Thirty.
00:22:06.140 That did not make their list.
00:22:07.660 Of course not.
00:22:08.280 Because it's a true story of taking out Osama bin Laden.
00:22:10.860 It makes you cheer for America.
00:22:12.500 That could never make their list of the best movies.
00:22:15.280 Because America's got to be the bad guy. 0.97
00:22:17.320 One of my top five, by the way, on my list is Zero Dark Thirty.
00:22:20.320 I bought the Blu-ray right when it came out.
00:22:24.280 Paid full price because that's how much I want to support movies like that being made.
00:22:28.520 Amen.
00:22:29.480 All right.
00:22:29.900 Let's go to 2013.
00:22:30.940 The winner of Best Picture that year was 12 Years a Slave.
00:22:34.100 Great story.
00:22:35.320 True story about an African-American man who was kidnapped and sold into slavery and spent 12 years as a slave and escaped.
00:22:45.440 It's an amazing story and it's a true story.
00:22:47.680 Didn't make their list.
00:22:49.520 The Wolf of Wall Street.
00:22:50.900 That made their list and I agree.
00:22:52.300 Wolf of Wall Street was terrific.
00:22:54.040 It was fun.
00:22:55.040 Great acting.
00:22:56.200 That's on their list and belongs there.
00:22:58.140 But I'll tell you what didn't make their list.
00:22:59.600 Same year.
00:23:00.980 Dallas Buyers Club.
00:23:02.840 Fantastic movie.
00:23:04.800 Another true story.
00:23:06.220 And Dallas Buyers Club.
00:23:08.260 Matthew McConaughey is the lead there.
00:23:09.620 And the weight loss.
00:23:10.180 Just the weight loss.
00:23:11.340 Yeah.
00:23:12.340 So you've heard this story.
00:23:14.240 I spent several years ago, got to hang out with Matthew McConaughey and spend a weekend with him and his wife and his kids and another couple of their kids and our kids.
00:23:24.800 And great guy.
00:23:26.700 Really enjoyed getting to know him, hanging out with him.
00:23:29.280 But we talked a lot.
00:23:30.620 We talked about Dallas Buyers Club.
00:23:31.940 And it's a true story about a guy in the rodeo in Fort Worth who gets injured and has a blood transfusion and he ends up getting HIV AIDS.
00:23:43.600 And this is early on in the AIDS crisis.
00:23:47.520 And so he's dying.
00:23:49.140 There are not a lot of treatments.
00:23:51.080 And you're right.
00:23:52.160 For the movie, McConaughey lost, I don't know, like 40, 50 pounds.
00:23:55.080 He was emaciated by the end of the movie.
00:23:56.680 But he began driving down to Mexico and buying AIDS medicines on the black market in Mexico and bringing them back to Dallas and Fort Worth and selling them to AIDS patients, mostly gay men who had contracted AIDS in the 80s.
00:24:14.380 And I was telling Matthew, I said, you know, that is a profoundly conservative movie.
00:24:19.140 And he didn't quite see it through that lens.
00:24:22.460 But, you know, he asked me, well, what do you mean?
00:24:23.780 I say, look, it's all about government regulations, ridiculous regulations from Washington that made it illegal for people to get life saving medicines, medicines they needed to have.
00:24:34.940 They had a right to have.
00:24:36.180 I'm a big believer in right to try.
00:24:38.740 I think the FDA puts huge barriers to getting medicines we ought to be able to have.
00:24:44.320 And it's a true story of in the face of that oppressive regulation, this guy just went down to Mexico and saved countless people's lives.
00:24:54.580 It's just a fantastic movie.
00:24:56.680 All right.
00:24:56.900 So what's next on the list?
00:24:58.000 All right.
00:24:59.340 In 2014, American Sniper, another true story, the story of Chris Kyle, someone actually I got to know, the Navy's deadliest sniper that we ever had.
00:25:09.260 Sadly, was killed by a fellow veteran with PTSD.
00:25:13.760 Terrific movie.
00:25:14.840 Another movie that same year was The Imitation Game.
00:25:17.400 Another true story of Alan Turing, the scientist who cracked the Nazis' code and helped us win World War II.
00:25:26.720 Great movie.
00:25:28.260 Neither of those make their lists.
00:25:31.320 Instead, they go with movies where America's the bad guy and anyone fighting to defend America is especially the bad guy.
00:25:39.220 All right.
00:25:39.600 So we've done 20.
00:25:40.680 We have 10 more to do of movies that came out in the 21st century.
00:25:44.640 In 2016, two movies in particular.
00:25:47.960 Number one, Hidden Figures, great movie, terrific movie.
00:25:51.320 I took my wife, my daughters, my mom to see.
00:25:54.900 True story of the African-American women mathematician who were foundational to NASA going to the moon.
00:26:01.900 It's an amazing story.
00:26:03.900 And, Ben, as you know, my mom was also a mathematician at the dawn of the computer age.
00:26:09.000 Hidden Figures begins with Sputnik being launched and the space race being started.
00:26:15.240 My mom, in the 1950s, worked at the Smithsonian.
00:26:18.600 One of her first projects was helping to compute the orbit of Sputnik.
00:26:22.760 And actually, in honor of this movie, I introduced legislation that resulted in the street where the NASA headquarters is in D.C.
00:26:32.440 being changed to Hidden Figures Way to honor those African-American women mathematician who were foundational in our going to the moon. 1.00
00:26:41.760 And it's not on Hollywood's list either, but it's a great movie, and it's a fabulous family movie.
00:26:46.700 Another great family movie, La La Land.
00:26:49.200 Same year.
00:26:50.220 It's a musical.
00:26:51.020 It's fun.
00:26:51.700 It's light.
00:26:52.720 It's about Hollywood.
00:26:54.280 It is.
00:26:55.360 It's a terrific movie, and yet it's nowhere on their list.
00:26:59.220 2017.
00:27:00.180 2017, a great movie, The Darkest Hour.
00:27:04.080 Winston Churchill in the middle of World War II.
00:27:07.160 Powerful.
00:27:07.720 Gary Oldham does a terrific portrayal of Churchill.
00:27:10.640 He'll highly recommend it.
00:27:12.780 2018, Black Panther.
00:27:14.860 Black Panther was a terrific movie.
00:27:16.560 It's a comic book movie, but there's a reason so many people go see them, because they're really good.
00:27:22.860 2019, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
00:27:25.920 Another Quentin Tarantino.
00:27:27.340 I thought it was terrific.
00:27:28.740 Loved it.
00:27:29.900 Brad Pitt was in it as well.
00:27:31.140 Brad Pitt, when Tarantino is directing him, is really, really good.
00:27:36.860 You then get on to 2022.
00:27:38.520 Top Gun Maverick.
00:27:40.780 Just a great, fun movie, action film.
00:27:44.820 Fun to go to the theater and see the jets rocketing through the sky, fighting the bad guys.
00:27:49.720 I will note that no Hollywood theater will now make Communist China the bad guys, because they all want to sell movies in China.
00:27:56.620 So the bad guys are always some made-up fictional place.
00:28:02.820 On to 2023.
00:28:05.180 Two movies in 2023 on the list.
00:28:08.040 Oppenheimer.
00:28:08.720 Oppenheimer was terrific.
00:28:10.220 True story.
00:28:11.760 Powerful.
00:28:12.540 Interesting.
00:28:13.340 Really well done.
00:28:15.080 Same year, Killers of the Flower Moon.
00:28:17.220 Another true story.
00:28:19.200 Really powerful.
00:28:20.520 Well done.
00:28:21.100 All right, full disclosure, I missed that movie, apparently, when it came out.
00:28:25.600 What's it about?
00:28:26.300 Because now I'm interested.
00:28:27.840 So Martin Scorsese did it, and it's based on a true story.
00:28:31.740 So it's set in Oklahoma in the 1920s, and it focuses on a series of murders of Osage Indians after oil is discovered on their tribal lands.
00:28:42.500 And it's got a fabulous cast.
00:28:46.260 Leonardo DiCaprio's in it.
00:28:47.580 Robert De Niro is in it.
00:28:49.380 And look, it's brutal.
00:28:51.160 It doesn't paint a pretty insanitized picture of history, but it is.
00:28:57.080 Our history has moments of brutality, moments of evil and oppression, and Scorsese can tell a story as well as anyone in the business.
00:29:08.380 Awesome.
00:29:09.080 I'm going to have to grab that movie and check it out.
00:29:10.780 Keep going.
00:29:11.220 Well, that takes us to 28.
00:29:14.480 And for the last two, I figured, all right, who ought to decide what are really good movies?
00:29:21.280 And I came up with a crazy idea.
00:29:23.000 How about the ticket buyers?
00:29:26.020 And so I just pulled what are the top 10 highest grossing films from 2000 to 2025?
00:29:32.500 Any idea what the number one film of the last 25 years has been in terms of box office dollars?
00:29:38.840 And that's a hard one.
00:29:40.180 I have no clue.
00:29:40.920 Go for it.
00:29:41.480 I'm ready.
00:29:42.420 So number one is Avatar 2009.
00:29:45.460 And it brought in $2.9 billion.
00:29:50.040 And Avatar, I'm going to put Avatar on my list because it's a great film.
00:29:53.300 It really was novel how it sort of stretched, but brought you into an entirely different world.
00:29:59.540 And the effects were fantastic.
00:30:02.080 It was a well-done story.
00:30:04.080 The number two grossing film of the last 25 years was Avengers Endgame, and that brought in $2.8 billion.
00:30:12.000 I'm going to include both of those as the final two on my list.
00:30:16.380 They're the top two grossing films.
00:30:17.960 They're fantastic.
00:30:18.740 I like most comic book movies, but I do think Avengers Endgame was really, really good.
00:30:25.380 And it says something.
00:30:27.720 If you look at the list of top 10, none of the top 10 grossing films are on Hollywood's list.
00:30:34.860 You have number three is Avatar The Way of the Water.
00:30:37.520 Number four is Star Wars Episode VII, The Force Awakens.
00:30:40.880 Number five is Avengers Affinity War.
00:30:42.680 Number six is Spider-Man No Way Home, which I thought was the best of the Spider-Man movies.
00:30:47.800 Number seven was Nijia 2. 0.92
00:30:50.200 I don't know that movie.
00:30:51.480 Maybe Chinese. 0.98
00:30:52.520 I just don't know that movie.
00:30:54.800 Number eight was Inside Out 2.
00:30:57.660 Number nine was Jurassic World.
00:30:59.420 And number 10 was The Lion King in 2019.
00:31:02.120 It says something.
00:31:03.520 When you have a product, and the people making the product don't like the product that people like and are buying, there's a real disconnect there.
00:31:14.780 You know, you go back to that New York Times list.
00:31:17.380 Most of the movies on the list, nobody has seen and nobody wants to see.
00:31:23.760 And that really is sad.
00:31:25.460 There used to be a time.
00:31:27.560 Look, what's fun about going to the movies, you'll notice themes.
00:31:31.540 So I like true stories.
00:31:33.640 I like war movies.
00:31:35.480 I like gangster movies, things like Godfather and Scarface.
00:31:39.900 I like westerns.
00:31:41.700 I like comedies.
00:31:43.480 I like some musicals.
00:31:45.380 But I like a story.
00:31:48.340 When I go to the movies, I want to tell me a story.
00:31:52.560 It can be a sad story.
00:31:54.700 It can be a funny story.
00:31:55.980 It can bring me in on an adventure.
00:31:57.820 You know, classic movies I grew up with, like Indiana Jones.
00:32:01.680 Like, it can be, you know, Star Wars, the whole Star Wars series.
00:32:07.300 The hero's journey.
00:32:08.840 Actually, Ben, I'm going to tell you something really funny.
00:32:10.580 A really good buddy of mine that I went to high school with, you bet him, Joel's his name, great friend of mine, came to our place in DC last weekend.
00:32:23.680 He and his family were in town and he said, hey, can I crash at your place?
00:32:26.200 I said, sure.
00:32:27.440 And he and I have gone to a lot of movies together and he's a huge Star Wars buff.
00:32:32.320 And so he went to the Star Wars, I guess, museum.
00:32:36.620 And when I get back to my DC apartment, he's replaced my sheets with Star Wars sheets and a Star Wars comforter and Star Wars pillowcases.
00:32:48.420 And it looks like a nine-year-old boy's room.
00:32:50.820 And I just cracked up laughing.
00:32:53.460 And then actually it was right after I had the Tucker Carlson interview that was a lot of fireworks.
00:32:58.580 So he bought Tucker Carlson's book and he rested it on the pillowcase.
00:33:02.200 So I was doubled over laughing when I walked in Monday morning to the apartment and saw my bedroom.
00:33:09.520 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:33:12.400 Guaranteed human.