LAMBcast #648 Bullet Train

by Richard Kirkham · August 8, 2022 · Featured, LAMBcast · 3 Comments

Mindless action, intriguing characters, exotic locals and fast moving trains, does that sound like fun to you? It sure did to our guests this week who all had generally good things to say about the latest film from action director David Leitch. It certainly doesn’t hurt when your leading man is Brad Pitt, fresh from therapy and ready to take on gangsters with a new non-aggressive approach, let’s see how that works out.

This film is based on a Japanese novel, with only one female character, and everyone in the book is Japanese. Is this a case of “whitewashing” or is it something else? The five of us discuss whether the story loses it’s integrity by changing the characters or whether it improves representation for the audience because of the new diversity found in the film version. We get over ourselves pretty quickly since only two of us had attempted the book and only one completed it.

It feels a bit to this group that this is one of those rare instances where the movie improves on the book instead of undermining it. Our panel seems to agree that this is a hybrid of 70s films like “The Cassandra Crossing” and a Road Runner Cartoon. A big group of internationals compete with one another to see who can screw up the best laid plans with their new Acme Inc. product.

It sounds like it would be clearer if you skipped reading the book and instead caught up with some old episodes of “Thomas the Tank” , Like many films these days, you may find yourself rooting for a bad guy, simply because he or she is less reprehensible that the other bad guys. With a group of killers that have colorful sobriquets, you might think a pastoral scene will be crossing your vision, but that is not the case. Don’t let the names “Ladybug”, Lemon, and Tangerine fool you into thinking this is a picnic, it is really a nest of vipers, oh and there is a real viper in there as well.

You also get some Rants/Raves and Reviews, and a very competitive game where Lisa can’t remember how may “Twilight” books she has read.

Introduction

Spoiler Free 4:50

Spoiler Wall comes Down 31:30

LAMBscores 1:01:00

Rants/Raves/Reviews 1:04:49

The Fifth Cut Deep Dive Game 1:19:40

Plugs/Thank You/Goodbye 1:36:30

Lisa The Siblist Between the Scares

Howard Pop Art

Jeanette The Mundane Adventures of a Fangirl Does the Dog Die?

Kristen Ticklish Business

Richard KAMAD Strother Martin Film Project

The show can be found, of course, via iTunes – just do a search for “LAMBcast.” Also, I always post a link to the show on the LAMBcast’s Facebook page, and there’s a player there if you’d like to listen online. Find the show here:

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2022-08-08T12_59_03-07_00

If you’d ever like to catch up on back episodes, go there. If you’re interested, you too can be a LAMBcaster – we love new blood! For more information on the LAMBcast, check out the topic at the LAMB Forums. Music provided royalty-free by Kevin MacLeod’s Incompetech website. Big thanks to Kevin for providing this service. Closing song by Cake. The LAMBcast loves feedback, too – if you’d like yours read on a future show, leave it in the comments section at the LAMB. Please visit and like our Facebook page, and finally, we’re on iTunes, and would still love a review, even if it’s a bad one. Thanks for listening!