Rewatchables Reference

• Bill: Opening credits with Wang Chung blasting over LA cityscapes.
• CR: The entire car chase – wrong way on the highway, six weeks to shoot, all of Pankow's reactions were real.
• Sean: The counterfeit money printing sequence in Bakersfield. Also the final scene where Vukovich takes over Ruth – 'you work for me now.'

• Bill: The LAX airport security scene where Chance just chases a guy through the terminal – zero post-9/11 security. The gym/weight room scene where they conduct Secret Service business while doing tricep extensions with the worst form ever.
• CR: Wang Chung scoring an entire movie. The 'Miami Vice' era parallels – Petersen and Don Johnson were basically interchangeable in 1984.

• Bill: Counterfeiting as a viewing experience – every generation discovers this movie. Calling people 'amigo.' Villains with artistic hobbies (Dafoe painting). The bungee jump – Petersen did it for real.
• CR: The Middle East conflict opening. Jane Leeves's brief hot-girl cameo.

• CR: The through-the-windshield POV during the car chase. Cars going wrong way on the highway with the landscape and horizon visible – Friedkin shot it that way because 'he just liked the landscape on the other side of the road.'
• Sean: Dafoe burning the painting. Ruth at the topless bar bathed in green and red light.
• Bill: The bungee jump off the Vincent Thomas Bridge. CR was passionate about Robby Müller's photography throughout.

• CR: Wang Chung – the entire soundtrack. Friedkin told them not to make a title song, they made one anyway, and he loved it.
• Sean: Wang Chung wasn't even nominated for the Best Original Song Oscar while Say You Say Me by Lionel Richie won. Bill: 'Fucking Wang Chung could have been at the Oscars.'

• Bill: John Pankow – 'a TV actor not good enough for movies.' Sean agreed.
• CR's counter-argument: the first 8 minutes feel like they're from a different movie – the Islamic terrorism opening doesn't connect well to the rest of the film.

• Bill: Burning an expensive painting for real instead of using CGI or a wide shot swap. Friedkin's agent fired him after this movie. The bungee jump bridge was later known as the Tony Scott bridge.
• CR: The alternative ending where Chance lives and they're exiled to an Alaska Secret Service base – Friedkin flew to Alaska and shot it. A deleted scene with Vukovich reconciling with his wife that Friedkin regrets cutting.

• CR: This is a better movie than The French Connection. Sean: 'certainly more watchable.' CR also said this movie is what Heat would feel like without the Natalie Portman and Dennis Haysbert characters – 'minus the fat.'
• Bill: Petersen and Don Johnson could have just switched careers in 1984 and it would have worked perfectly – Petersen on 'Miami Vice', Don Johnson in these movies leading to a Costner-like trajectory.

• Bill: Pankow – 'What are we going to do now?!' CR: 'It's good though. It's good shit. That's what you would feel like.'
• Sean: Robert Downey Sr. as Thomas Bateman – 'puts a little mustard on it every time he gets into a scene.'

• Bill created a tiered system after Craig's complaints: Casuals – Dean Stockwell. Real Ones – John Pankow (from this and Frasier). Deep Cut – Dwier Brown (the doctor, also Ray's dad from 'Field of Dreams').
• Sean and CR both had Gary Cole (guy Chance chases across the footbridge). CR's Dion Waiters: John Turturro in an early career role.
• Craig said William Petersen was a That Guy, which Sean called 'obscene' since he was on the #1 TV show for 10 years.

• Craig's gratuitous nudity triple axel for Friedkin's fearlessness. Sean's Of Human Bondage Criterion orgasm for the film's artistic pedigree.
• CR's Dennis Peck test for Petersen's intensity. Bill's comparison of Petersen to the mid-80s B-tier leading man class: William Hurt, Raul Julia, Jeremy Irons, Tom Berenger.

• Bill: Replace Pankow with Malkovich, Gary Sinise, or Bill Paxton. Sean added David Patrick Kelly (Warriors), young Michael Madsen, JT Walsh, or John Hurt.
• Bill: For Bianca (Dafoe's girlfriend Deborah Fuhrer): Melanie Griffith, Rosanna Arquette, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kelly McGillis, Daryl Hannah. Sean: Daryl Hannah – 'doing very similar makeup in Blade Runner.'

• Bill: The counterfeit money leaked into circulation – a crew member's son tried to buy candy with it, and the Secret Service was finding bills years later. Car chase took six weeks to shoot and was the last thing filmed.
• Bill: Friedkin conceived the wrong-way chase in 1963 after falling asleep at the wheel driving home from a wedding. All Pankow's reactions during the chase were real. Wang Chung saw a rough cut before composing the score.

• Bill: Pankow – Mad About You. Wang Chung – yes, this is it. Petersen – CSI. Dafoe – Platoon/'Spider-Man'.
• Bill: Every other actor in the movie except Turturro is probably Apex Mountain. Bungee jumping (Craig nominated GoldenEye's bungee jump too). Setting art on fire.

Bill: Scorsese. Quick, unanimous agreement.

• Sean's 'It's a book about medals' award for best quote exchange: 'I'm getting too old for this shit' – two years before 'Lethal Weapon'.
• Bill's CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford stake award. CR's Norton reverse dunk for Petersen's intensity.

• Bill: Chance noticing the room service issue that saves the president felt contrived. Jimmy pulling the terrorist down from a lower roof. Turturro openly confessing crimes on a monitored jail phone. Why does Vukovich inherit Chance's Bronco?
• Sean's full Vincent Chase award: Chance chases through LAX alerting Carl, has an affair with an informant, takes a clearly-bad deal with Thomas Ling, insults a judge, and gets shot in the face by a bodyguard. 'Chance is not good at all.'
• CR: Why not just execute Masters instead of creating all these crimes to cover up for each other? Dean Stockwell already knows how criminal their investigation is.

Bill: All-black cast – 'we haven't had an all-black cast in a while, this would be amazing.' WGN actually tried to make a prestige series with Friedkin but it didn't get off the ground.

• CR did a full Zane Lowe impression interviewing Chance: 'You just jumped off of Vincent Thomas and nobody thought you could do it. Alvarez didn't think you could do it. Your partner Jimmy Hart didn't think you could do it. But here you are.'
• Bill: Ryan Ruocco and Doris Burke calling the car chase – 'We see you, Mr. Chance, he's driving up the one way ramp.' Also Wayne Jenkins and Fergie the Florist.

CR: 'Oscar to Robby Müller, please.' Wang Chung was robbed of a Best Original Song nomination – Say You Say Me by Lionel Richie won. Power of Love from 'Back to the Future' was also nominated and could have won.

• Bill's extended counterfeiting business analysis: Is it even a good business given the expenses, risk of arrest, and the fact that your buyers are also criminals who might rat you out? Why not use the counterfeit money to buy drugs instead of selling it for real money? How much does the bodyguard make?
• CR: Can somebody really be your best friend after seven years? How did you find out who won that game in the pre-internet era?

• CR: Rick's painting before he burns it. Sean: Masters' entire art collection.
• Bill: The briefcase Petersen slams open with the counterfeit money inside, and a dollar bill from the movie with the X on it. CR: poker chips they used to beat up the money.

• Bill: Counterfeiting is a terrible business – 40 things can go wrong and the only thing that can go right is not getting caught. Don't let your agent fire you after making The French Connection and 'The Exorcist'.
• Bill: Don't get freaked out by early career success like Petersen did – if you're going to be in the arena, stay in the arena.

Bill: 'Manhunter' – Petersen's other big 80s role. Sean: Thief, or Boiling Point (Wesley Snipes counterfeiting movie with Dennis Hopper). CR: Point Blank (John Boorman – similar impressionistic crime moments).

Bill: Petersen, 100% – 'this starts his career and eventually leads to CSI and him just wandering around Larchmont in jogging pants, just throwing 20s at people to get him a Starbucks.' Sean agreed on Petersen. CR said Friedkin.

• Craig loved it from the first 5 seconds: '5 stars. Music's out of control.' Compared it to 'Body Heat', 'American Gigolo', 'Blow Out', 'Body Double' – 'fucked up 80s movies where the city plays a real role in the movie.'
• Craig: 'Every single room we're in looks cool for some reason.' Said it's both a turn-it-on-and-vibe watch and a deep, meaningful film. 'High art, low culture, that sweet spot – I really, really like. And this is as good as it can get.'