"Smoke & Mirrors"

[00:00:00] Speaker A: La historia del hombre que engano atoro un pais somo los chicos de espionage y esto el hombre de las mircadas. [00:00:14] Speaker B: Welcome to the spy Fi guys. So I apologize to the universe for that. [00:00:20] Speaker A: Yes. Wow. [00:00:22] Speaker B: Just as for Denison. Is it though I laughed and then I heated myself for laughing. [00:00:35] Speaker A: Hello and welcome to the spy fi guys, where we cover spy facts, spy fiction, and everything in between. I'm Christian. [00:00:42] Speaker B: And I'm Zach. And don't worry, the rest of the podcast will be in English. [00:00:46] Speaker A: Also, please, any of our Spanish, you know, speaking listeners forgive my terrible pronunciation there. I tried my best, but I'm very basic on duolingo for a Spanish better than me. [00:00:58] Speaker B: But yes, here we like to mix things up a little bit. And today we'll be mixing things up a little bit. We're going to with our first Spanish language movie. [00:01:06] Speaker A: Good. Really? Oh. [00:01:09] Speaker B: Today we are covering El hombre de las mil carras, which translates to the man with a thousand faces. Right. Or is the man with a million Faces. [00:01:17] Speaker A: Thousand faces. [00:01:18] Speaker B: Only a thousand faces, which translated in English to smoke and nerves. [00:01:22] Speaker A: Yeah, that's the English title. It's not as cool of a title. [00:01:25] Speaker B: It's an extremely generic title is what it is. Today is also special because we're recording. [00:01:30] Speaker A: In person, which is only the second time we've ever done this. I think the first and only time we did it was for Spy who Dumped Me. [00:01:36] Speaker B: Oh, wow. This is an extremely early one. [00:01:38] Speaker A: That was really early. Yeah. So this is supposed to be fun. [00:01:41] Speaker B: So how did this movie come across our radar? Because I just found it in our list and I definitely didn't put it there. [00:01:47] Speaker A: I didn't. [00:01:47] Speaker B: Or maybe I did. [00:01:48] Speaker A: I think you must have because it's not something that. [00:01:50] Speaker B: Oh, I definitely don't remember putting it. But the premise that I saw on IMDb made me feel like it was enough of a spy movie that we could cover it. [00:01:58] Speaker A: Sure. [00:01:59] Speaker B: Having seen it, I guess we'll discuss. [00:02:01] Speaker A: I had never heard of this before until you. You mentioned. I was like, oh. But my daughters are in a Spanish immersion daycare. And because of that, and also my wife speaks conversational Spanish, so I figured I should actually be learning some Spanish. So I know if they're talking about me, that's a good idea. So I'm on duolingo. I've got a decent streak. I'm in. I don't remember which level I'm in now, but we're getting into different verb tenses and past participles. And I Was like. I was like, oh, did not help me let, you know, understand this because I, you know, they're really mostly speaking, like, Spain, right? Yeah, well, yes, and we'll get to that. But, like, well, he. They're from Mexico though, right? Is that what. [00:02:38] Speaker B: No, no. [00:02:39] Speaker A: Is it. It's Spain, right? [00:02:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:02:40] Speaker A: He hides in Mexico for a while or something like that. Yeah, that's right. Oh, it's like Spain Spanish versus, like, South American Spanish. [00:02:46] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. [00:02:47] Speaker A: So it's a little different. [00:02:48] Speaker B: Well, yeah. Americans tend to be exposed to more Mexican Spanish. [00:02:51] Speaker A: Right. [00:02:51] Speaker B: And I say it's interesting because Spain is a major country in Europe, and I feel like we never talk about. [00:02:58] Speaker A: No, not really. Unless people are going to Spain for, like, vacation or something. Yeah, Spain. Yeah. I don't know. [00:03:04] Speaker B: I mean, not compared to its neighbors, like the uk, France, Italy. [00:03:07] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, that's a very good point. [00:03:11] Speaker B: Plot synopsis. All right, so with that in mind, shall we jump right into this movie? [00:03:19] Speaker A: Sure, let's. Let's hear it. [00:03:20] Speaker B: Okay, so as always, we have our poetry, plot synopses, and as always, the spoilers begin right here. So if you're gonna see this 2016 movie, here's your chance to tap out. So first we have our haiku for. I'm just gonna call it Smoke and Mirrors. [00:03:34] Speaker A: Okay, sure. [00:03:35] Speaker B: A very loyal niece. Fooling a country's not hard, nor is faking death. [00:03:42] Speaker A: Okay, all right. [00:03:44] Speaker B: That was my feeling after seeing it. [00:03:45] Speaker A: That's nice. [00:03:46] Speaker B: And then here is the limerick. Luis is hunted by Spain, but in Paris he chose to remain. He first lost his honey and then all his money. He trusted old Paco in vain. [00:04:00] Speaker A: All right, all right. I feel like that covers the movie. That's good. [00:04:02] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:04:03] Speaker A: Okay. [00:04:03] Speaker B: But then finally, Here is the IMDb semi official plot summary. The story of a man who fooled an entire country. A tale of cheats and imposters, taking its inspiration from true facts and from one of the most intriguing characters of recent decades, the spy, Francisco Pesa. [00:04:19] Speaker A: Is he so intriguing that we've never heard of him before? [00:04:22] Speaker B: Maybe. I had certainly never heard of him, but maybe he's a good spy. [00:04:26] Speaker A: Good point. So we get into this. We start with your favorite, how they say that this is based on a true story and this was a new one. This is. This is a film inspired by real characters and events. [00:04:36] Speaker B: Say fiction inspired by real characters. [00:04:39] Speaker A: That's right. You say fiction. Yes. [00:04:41] Speaker B: Which totally sells the movie. Short, I'm going to give away a little bit of spy fact versus fiction. What happened in real life is pretty much what happens in the movie. [00:04:48] Speaker A: Oh, okay. [00:04:49] Speaker B: Give or take a few details. [00:04:51] Speaker A: I think one of the details I found. And this is not big enough for Spy Fact versus spy Fiction, but Louise's wife's name is completely different. I don't know why that's. I was like. Because I was trying. And we'll talk about this later. But I was trying to find her name because I just kept referring to her as the wife. I'm like, what is her name? And like, I. On his Wikipedia page, there's no mention of his wife. I had to do some more searching what his wife's name. And it's completely different than the one that's in the movie. [00:05:17] Speaker B: But he did actually have a wife. [00:05:18] Speaker A: He did have a wife. Yeah. Okay. [00:05:20] Speaker B: Yeah. That's not mentioned on his Wikipedia page either. So the movie starts with the voiceover and immediately. Christian. I felt like I had made a mistake because they talk so quickly in Spanish and you have to read the subtitles. If you look down at your notes to write something, it's over. You're gonna miss it. So I was like, this is gonna be vlogs. [00:05:41] Speaker A: That's why I type. I feel like. And I have it stacked so I have a movie on top and my notes on the bottom. So if I'm loot, I can read, watch, look at what I'm typing. And also read the captions on the bottom. [00:05:51] Speaker B: So you, like, sit at your computer while you're watching? [00:05:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:53] Speaker B: Oh, I just sit on the couch and always on ta. So, yeah. We meet our main character, Jesus. Spelled Jesus, which I appreciate. [00:06:01] Speaker A: Who's a pilot. [00:06:02] Speaker B: Yeah. And they're talking. He has a conversation with a guy, and I'm already confused, but I realize I'm supposed to be confused. I'm not supposed to understand what's happening right away. [00:06:13] Speaker A: Before that. It starts with a voiceover from Jesus. And there's like a quote. And this is not in my favorite quotes, but it starts off and it gave me a different feel of what I thought the movie would be about. Okay, let me pull it up. [00:06:29] Speaker B: You almost might say it's a story of lies. [00:06:33] Speaker A: It took place at a time when the sky belonged to a select few. Were there no low cost airlines? It wasn't like today a plane was a plane, not a bus. [00:06:42] Speaker B: Yes, that's correct. [00:06:44] Speaker A: I was getting the vibe of what's the Tom Cruise one? American Made. I was expecting something like that or maybe like a car. Something really to do with flying in planes. Or Catch Me if youf Can Something like that. [00:06:56] Speaker B: Yeah. We're just like a sky pilot factor. [00:06:58] Speaker A: So little into this movie that I was already disappointed, like, halfway through, like, wait, what happened to all the bits about, oh, this is really about the days when flying was. Belonged to us elite few. It was like, this has barely anything to do with the planes except for the fact he's a pilot. [00:07:12] Speaker B: It almost makes me wonder if the director wanted to make some kind of political statement about airlines, maybe. So before we started recording, I was telling Christian about a book I read for our Spy museum book Book Club by Dean Kunz. And there's a whole tangent where the guy talks about asset forfeiture. The bad guy's shady organization uses acid forfeiture to destroy somebody's life, take all of his property. And there's multiple pages where they explain how it works. And it felt like the author just wanted to say he doesn't like asset forfeiture and put it into his story, even though it doesn't fit at all. [00:07:45] Speaker A: That's funny. [00:07:46] Speaker B: But, yeah, you think it's going to be about airplanes, which I was on board for. [00:07:50] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, what's the. That got me more interested than I was gonna. Than I was or initially already. But then. And you even start with, like, a shot of a Runway and that. Oh, and you know. [00:08:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Plane landing on a Runway. [00:08:03] Speaker A: That was like, oh, that's cool. And then none of that plays out, really. [00:08:07] Speaker B: The initial conversation, even though it confused me, I did like it because they said good, mysterious things. They said something like, we have plenty of time until he gets out of prison. What are you gonna do with all that money? What do you think I'm gonna do? [00:08:22] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. So the other main character, who is actually really the main character I like, I would say Paco Francisco Paisa is your. Our main character. Even though Jesus is our point of view character. [00:08:33] Speaker B: That's right. [00:08:34] Speaker A: They were involved in handing over the most wanted fugitive in the history of Spanish democracy. [00:08:39] Speaker B: Wow. That's a good start, too. [00:08:41] Speaker A: But this is also the last time that Paco and Jesus see each other and that he would be dead in a few months. So that was in 1995. We go back in time to Varsovia, 1986, where there was an arms deal going on with the ETA terrorist group. Have you ever heard of them? [00:08:56] Speaker B: Nope. I had never heard of them. But I was like, okay, again, we're off to a good start. Got weapons, we got a police raid. We got terrorism. This feels like a spy movie. Okay, keep going. [00:09:07] Speaker A: Yeah. So Paco is Like buying arms to sort of infiltrate the group. And there was a big raid and part of the arsenal and the blackmail material was found. But because of that, Paco became one of the ETA's biggest targets. [00:09:20] Speaker B: That's right. And he never got paid for what he did to help the government. So it's almost like he's going to have a grievance which we're going to have later. [00:09:28] Speaker A: And then we go next to Madrid in October of 1990, 1989, where Paco has another job. He was sent to blackmail a gal witness. Gal being the Spanish anti terrorist death squad. And he was supposed to convince her not to testify against her boyfriend who was in the gal. [00:09:46] Speaker B: What the hell, they just say death squad. We're not even supposed to react to that. [00:09:51] Speaker A: But when he was doing the blackmail, he got photographed and his identity was out there, so he had to flee to flee Spain for five years. [00:09:59] Speaker B: So the most interesting parts of this movie is right in the beginning, it's all with voiceover you don't actually get to see. We just get told. Then we get told that Paco has no possessions. Everything that he owns, I guess legally belongs to somebody else is the idea. [00:10:14] Speaker A: Well, yeah. And he. When he returned to Spain after five years, nothing was the same. We see him in this meeting where like he's got, you know, sent bottles of rare wine. And the people he's meeting with, who he's supposed to do a deal with, say that there's a file on him and they know all about him and as well as about Jesus Komodes. His pilot friend. [00:10:31] Speaker B: Yeah, pilot friend. And also like I described him as his sidekick. Yeah, you could also say fixer if you want to be more sinister about it. [00:10:38] Speaker A: Sure. But yeah, so he lost everything and his wife. The only thing he had left that he actually owned was his painting. [00:10:46] Speaker B: Yeah, I want to talk about the painting. Maybe we could talk about it at the end. The painting keeps appearing and if this were like literature or some kind of advanced avant garde film, I would say the painting represents something. But instead it's just a dangling plot thread. [00:11:00] Speaker A: Yeah. So next we go to the biggest deal of his career, which is Luis Roldan, who was a Spanish police commissioner. [00:11:09] Speaker B: I guess, of the whole country. [00:11:11] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:11] Speaker B: Not just one city. [00:11:12] Speaker A: Yeah. And so he's meeting with Paco because he's got a problem with a Swiss bank, which Paco can help with. For 1 million. What was their currency? [00:11:21] Speaker B: It was like pesitasis or something. If it's anywhere close to a dollar, it's a lot of money. [00:11:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:25] Speaker B: And I have a dad joke here. They hired him to save him some money. Get it? [00:11:33] Speaker A: But, yeah. So some information is about to come out about Louise. And so Paco can help him and get. Also help him keep all of his properties. But. And Paco says that he should. That he, Louise and his wife, whose name I talked about earlier. Neve, I think. No, N I E V E, maybe. Where'd it go? Naive, naive. Paco says that they should leave the country because the Minister of the Interior is going to want them to testify. So they leave to France and stay in one of Paco's apartments in Paris. [00:12:09] Speaker B: Little do we realize that this is going to be the whole movie right here. [00:12:14] Speaker A: But I like Paco is very good at what he does, though. He even organizes an anniversary dinner for them because they happen to be believing on their anniversary. And even gets the wife a gift on behalf of Louise. [00:12:25] Speaker B: Yeah, he's totally on it. But again, it makes me wonder, like, what's the deal with this guy? Where did he come from? How does he know all these people? [00:12:34] Speaker A: Well, we're told that he's like a former secret or a spy for Spain. So that's. So presumably throughout all his career he's developed all these contacts and all this we never really told about. We just still have to assume. [00:12:48] Speaker B: This reminds me of the group from Munich, do you remember? The French group? [00:12:52] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah. [00:12:53] Speaker B: Where they can do everything. They know everybody, even though they're not actually backed by any government and they just do what's best for them. [00:13:02] Speaker A: That was the family that was headed up by Drax from Moonraker, right? [00:13:05] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. Yeah. [00:13:07] Speaker A: All right, so then we go, we see them and Luis and his wife on their anniversary dinner. Luis's wife reveals that she's pregnant. And then we see that Paco's plan to save Luis's homes involves another guy, Americo Castorelli, who's a shady investor, almost lawyer, alcoholic. [00:13:27] Speaker B: Did you really try to keep track of all this stuff? [00:13:29] Speaker A: Kind of. [00:13:30] Speaker B: The Moose is where the movie turns into like the Big Short or one of these other financial movies that. [00:13:35] Speaker A: Well, okay, no, I didn't keep track of this move system. No, I was like, all right, the main thing we want to take away is that he's involved in moving all this money around. [00:13:43] Speaker B: Yeah. With a bunch of shell corporations, people move money. And I did like how he talks about there's this. The guy, and then he has a slave, and then the slave as a slave and the slave of the slave also has a slave. That was interesting. [00:13:55] Speaker A: So it's all buried in loads of transactions, but essentially they still have, you know, own the property. They still have access to the property in the end. Now Luis is in hiding and he wants to do an interview with El Mundo, who's one of the national papers of Spain, to try to clear his name, but also make clear that he has intel on everyone. [00:14:14] Speaker B: Yeah, this is getting interesting too. [00:14:17] Speaker A: We see these news reports talking about that Luis's deal. And Luis has this interview and while he's being interviewed, his wife is in the other room and like Paco's talking about, she's drinking a lot of wine for a pregnant woman. That's what I was like. [00:14:33] Speaker B: Could she be drinking? Yeah, I did not even occur to me about that. So, yes, Paco talks about how he has all this dirt and he's accused of embezzlement. And I didn't realize it until right this second while we were talking about it, but the movie doesn't follow up on this. Spoiler alert for the end of the movie. He did the crime and he goes to prison and that's the end of it. This is like. So I guess he was in fact a criminal. What did he know about the other people? Did the rest of the government? Was it in on it? I was expecting some big conspiracy, but no, it's just this one criminal guy. [00:15:07] Speaker A: Well, yes and no. We'll put a pin in that until later. Yeah. So the. There's a female judge who's apparently going to call on Luis to testify. But Paco says he can help his wife or he can help them disappear for a while. But she wants to testify. But Paco also says that there's a new police commissioner who'll be appointed soon who will be able to access all of their Swiss bank accounts. So they will lose access to those. So they need to trust Paco so that. Yeah, so he'll take the money. [00:15:35] Speaker B: Did you see this coming, by the way? [00:15:37] Speaker A: What? [00:15:37] Speaker B: That Paco was just going to take it? [00:15:40] Speaker A: Not really, no. [00:15:41] Speaker B: Oh, really? [00:15:43] Speaker A: I don't know. I wasn't sure. I was never sure of his loyalties. [00:15:46] Speaker B: Towards the end of the movie, I became more sure that he was going to stab them in the back in the early part of the movie. He does seem more trustworthy. [00:15:54] Speaker A: Yeah, over here, I think he seems very trustworthy. Not at this point. Not at this time, but yeah, so. So Luis is starting to have doubts and also the wife figures out that Paco is the one who got her the earrings and not Luis. So she agrees to transfer the stolen funds to another account. And then they'll keep the suitcase with the blackmail material safe. [00:16:13] Speaker B: Right. Paco wants it as well. Yeah, for his own reasons, but they're not going to give it to him. [00:16:19] Speaker A: Luis and Nieves won't see each other for a year. She's sent to prison in Rieva that was crazy. With prisoners that her husband had sent there when he was a police commissioner. [00:16:29] Speaker B: That's really interesting. But again, nothing happens. [00:16:32] Speaker A: Oh. They specifically say that she was not affect. That didn't affect her at all. [00:16:35] Speaker B: Yeah. Come on. I feel like later you see her and she has what looks like a black eye. Was I just imagining things? [00:16:41] Speaker A: I don't remember that. I'm like, I remember that scene, but I don't remember her having a black eye. Whis is sent to another safe house. Americo goes to one of the other houses and steals a passport from the person who. The. Who legally owns it at this point. And he's doing some sort of deal, transferring money all over the world back and forth to help launder it. It ends up in Singapore, where it. [00:17:04] Speaker B: Stays for most of the movie. [00:17:06] Speaker A: And so Luis and Paco talk about where the money is. Louise doesn't entirely trust Paco, so he, like, wants to set his lawyer to check it out, but I don't know if he ever actually does. But he asks about his wife. She says, do it. And Paco says she's doing okay. And then I like this part. He says, I need. I want tv, a vcr, and this list of movies. And I'm disappointed we never find out what the list of movies is. [00:17:31] Speaker B: Something we seem to have a lot with this movie. Yeah, they keep on teasing us with something more interesting than we get. But I like that he was thinking ahead. And I must say, he doesn't seem especially concerned about his wife who is in prison, because he really seems to care about her. Yeah, they say that a few times. [00:17:49] Speaker A: Yeah. So we get some more news reports that are spread throughout this movie. So these ones are all about his disappearance. And is this the part where there's all the people who look like him that are. Keep getting arrested? [00:18:02] Speaker B: Yeah, there's that. But they also talk about how I didn't understand this. I need you to explain it to. [00:18:07] Speaker A: Me, if I can. [00:18:09] Speaker B: His embezzlement was going to, like, bring down the whole Spanish government. [00:18:12] Speaker A: Yes. [00:18:13] Speaker B: They say something like someone's political career was getting upended, destroyed because of them. [00:18:19] Speaker A: There was, like, one specific guy who, before he disappeared. Minister in the Interior. Yeah, like, was on the phone with him and he said he guaranteed to him that he could help testify and all that stuff. And then he disappeared. So he. That's because of that, his whole career went down. [00:18:32] Speaker B: Okay, so, yeah, so this is getting good. The beginning of the movie. All right, we're moving, stuff's going on. [00:18:37] Speaker A: And then we see two months later, Paco is visited by some investigators who've been looking to Luis's disappearance. There's reports of him being cited all over the world. And then the investigators know that Luis visited Paco's office right before he disappeared because Jesus Camorra, who's our point of view character, saw Luis coming out of the office and told someone at a family wedding, but didn't realize that the person he told to was a police officer's wife. And so that's how they know about that. And then we also find out that Luis, even though he was told not to use the phone in the Paris department, used it three times. Once to call his mother. We don't know what the other two times were. [00:19:18] Speaker B: Yes, that's right. [00:19:18] Speaker A: The investigators also know about America. Well, during one of his many trips, he had a delayed flight that was delayed for five hours and starts drinking. [00:19:29] Speaker B: This part is so strange. It feels like an advertisement for Jagermeister, which it may be. It could be. [00:19:36] Speaker A: When was the last time you had Jaeger? [00:19:38] Speaker B: So funny story. Story time. When I graduated from college, I only had a temporary job lined up, which was working for three months. I think I might have told you about this. At a residential treatment facility for emotionally disturbed children and teenagers. [00:19:55] Speaker A: I vaguely recall this. [00:19:56] Speaker B: Yeah. So picture more like a summer camp, actually. It reminded me of the village from the Prisoner, where it was nice, but you couldn't leave. And if you tried to escape, there's nowhere to go. And no big bouncy balloon, though. [00:20:08] Speaker A: Oh, wow, that's. What if there isn't that? What's the point? [00:20:11] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. But one of my co workers there loved Jaeger bombs. That's what he would have whenever he had the opportunity. So I think that really was the first and only time that I ever had Jaeger. And then later on, at some point, I acquired a bunch of small bottles. One of them was of Jagermeister. I don't think I ever tried it. I think I just gave it away to somebody. [00:20:33] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. No, it's probably been about as around the same time period. Well, like during college, the last time probably I had a Jaeger bomb, I. [00:20:40] Speaker B: Was like, oh, yeah, but so this part, they name drop it, you see the label and then the guy can even see the deer. Remember the deer? [00:20:48] Speaker A: Is that what that was? [00:20:50] Speaker B: Yep. [00:20:50] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness. Yeah, he sees like there's a literal three dimensional deer image in front of him that he's seeing. [00:20:56] Speaker B: Yeah, it's very strange. [00:20:58] Speaker A: I didn't realize what that's what that was. Oh, but you're right. That is their logo. But yeah. So he gets wasted and then he. [00:21:04] Speaker B: Gets caught with the money. [00:21:05] Speaker A: Yeah, he gets caught. Well, not all of the money. Just 300,000. [00:21:08] Speaker B: Correct. [00:21:09] Speaker A: In a briefcase. And he's given five years prison, but it would have gotten 15 if he didn't report about the deal he did for Louis for Luis and Paco. [00:21:18] Speaker B: See, I'm already confused. But like the deals and the money and who knows what and where. Come on, guys. [00:21:24] Speaker A: Well, okay, at this point it's really just America's word that he did a deal for them. So that's how. So they still need to investigate it. But yeah, the investigators say that they're going to try to freeze Paco's account. So Jesus is helping Paco move out. And Paco doesn't say anything about, you know, the mistake that Jesus made about telling someone. Luis meets with them and suggested that Paco suggests that he brings in outside help. An international association that could help him. [00:21:52] Speaker B: Yeah, kind of like the group again. [00:21:54] Speaker A: Yeah. But Luis doesn't like it, so. And then they drive away. But they're being followed. [00:22:02] Speaker B: So this is some good. Some good spy stuff. They get followed. Someone tries to break into his house. He looks through the people while they're leaving into a different apartment, which turns out to have an old lady in it. So what's up with that? Maybe he just imagined that people are paranoid. He wants bodyguards or Paco wants bodyguards. [00:22:18] Speaker A: Well, yeah, he decides to bring in the hired guns. The international organization. Yeah. So they're transporting Paco or not Paco, Louis, to somewhere else. [00:22:29] Speaker B: Right. [00:22:30] Speaker A: And they have a stop and Paco gets out and grabs like a gun from the glove compartment. And then for whatever. What godly reason, Louis. Louis starts, decides to get out of the car too. [00:22:41] Speaker B: He almost gets shot for doing this. [00:22:44] Speaker A: And like Jesus grabs like a second gun from the Gulf glove compartment. Well, but they all get them to stand down. [00:22:49] Speaker B: I mean, I think it's pretty clear that Luis isn't really the best decision maker in the world. [00:22:56] Speaker A: People they're meeting with are the international organization, the. The hired guns. And they said they will take Louis, Luis, and only they will Know where he's going. He'll have. They'll have no more contact with Paco. [00:23:07] Speaker B: Right. [00:23:07] Speaker A: And so he says, tell my wife I'll wait for her. And then Jesus, as they're driving away, asks PACO about the 1.5 billion. And PACO is just structured off. Doesn't matter, whatever happens, that we already have our money and like, Luis is a time bomb, so we want to be very far away when he goes off. [00:23:23] Speaker B: Yeah, well, he probably knew that eventually the police would find that money. [00:23:27] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:23:28] Speaker B: He's always one step ahead of everybody. So the next we get a title card here for Dracula's coach. And I'm like, oh, my God, don't add more characters, especially not supernatural ones. Yeah, that's who. Well, I was like, okay, it's going to be Jesus, because Jesus drives people. He's a pilot. No, it's someone else. [00:23:49] Speaker A: Three months later, Jesus is flying a plane. He seems to be a commercial pilot. [00:23:54] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, it's probably his day job. [00:23:58] Speaker A: So Paco calls and says, we need to be. So in Madrid, the Minister of justice meets with Paco's lawyer and he says, I can help you, but I want the charges dropped about Gal Eta if I'm going to cooperate. And he can get Louise back to spade for 300 million. Whatever. [00:24:15] Speaker B: Whatever. Yeah, Denaris or whatever. [00:24:19] Speaker A: So Paco sends Jesus to do a drop in Germany to make contact files in a copy of the. Of the Financial Times, which. I like that. [00:24:29] Speaker B: So did you like the coach revealed to be Belloc? [00:24:33] Speaker A: Was that Belloc? [00:24:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Was that his name? B, E, L, L, O, C, H, Bel. [00:24:37] Speaker A: I thought he was like, actually the actor. [00:24:38] Speaker B: No, not the actor. His name. The character's name was Belloc. [00:24:41] Speaker A: I didn't catch that. [00:24:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I think so. Yeah. So we get some spy stuff with the newspapers. Yeah, I like the quote where the guy was like, if you value your life, you won't follow me, or something like that. [00:24:51] Speaker A: He's going to give it like a code. He says code phrase and they're like, sit next to each other, don't look at each other. He puts the newspaper down and he puts the other newspaper down like, all right, this is. That's some classic, you know, dead drop stuff. [00:25:03] Speaker B: Yeah, you can't say it's not a spy movie. [00:25:05] Speaker A: Down. Yeah. So the minister receives details of Luis's return. And then Paco, in the Back in Paris, is walking down the street. He notices a moving van. And he also notices a man in a red car across the street. [00:25:18] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm Sorry. Yeah, they're pretty hard to miss. And he meets with a rational spy this time. [00:25:24] Speaker A: Yeah, one of his old spy friends. [00:25:25] Speaker B: Yeah, but he doesn't get any. Neither of them gives anything to the other one. [00:25:29] Speaker A: Well, what he's most important part? Well, his old friend wants to know where Luis is. But the information we do get is that the people with a moving truck and with the red car are not with Spanish spies. [00:25:43] Speaker B: Well, which if he's telling the truth, how many people are following Paco? [00:25:46] Speaker A: Right. That was like. Has the red car and the moving van working together or are they even two separate people following Paco? [00:25:53] Speaker B: Yeah, or maybe they're not following him at all and it's just because it's a movie, it shows them and it feels like it's important. Again, it's like Munich, where the guy, he might be paranoid. [00:26:02] Speaker A: Well, Paco does reach out to some of his other contacts and find out the guy in the red car was a bounty hunter. [00:26:08] Speaker B: No. Well, there you go. [00:26:09] Speaker A: So at least one of them was actually looking for him. [00:26:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:26:12] Speaker A: And his contact says, you can't help him. So he says, all right, let me double the money. I'll talk to a friend in Mossad. He says to move to somewhere across from the Israeli embassy. That's the safest place. [00:26:23] Speaker B: But again, they never do anything with it. It never goes anywhere. Also, I have an observation where somewhere in here there is a staircase that just hangs in space. Do you know what I mean? No. So. So picture a room and there are stairs that go around the exterior of the room, but there's no holes holding it up. [00:26:42] Speaker A: Huh. [00:26:42] Speaker B: So it looks like it's just hanging. In my college, there was a staircase like that and it freaked me out because I felt like it was just gonna fall as soon as you walked on it. [00:26:50] Speaker A: Yeah. So we see Jesus, you know, watching some TV and falling asleep to a documentary about the orchid mantis, which, you know, mimics the, you know, the appearance of the orchid, but then captures its prey. And as he's watching it, he starts to realize a trap sprung around him, Right? So he goes to visit his son in his ex wife's house and goes looking for some old photographs from the wedding, which was mentioned before. [00:27:16] Speaker B: Suddenly. I long for the American movies where they constantly reiterate what's happening after literally years of complaining about it and me. [00:27:25] Speaker A: Reminding you that, you know, audiences at Goldfish and need to be reminded stuff. [00:27:30] Speaker B: Now I'm. [00:27:30] Speaker A: My point. [00:27:31] Speaker B: I'm the gold. As it turns out. [00:27:34] Speaker A: To be fair, I also. I had it took me a while to figure this out. He sees someone in the photograph who he recognizes and who he recognizes was someone who worked for supposedly the international organization. [00:27:45] Speaker B: Oh, okay. [00:27:47] Speaker A: But he saw him at the wedding that they were both at. And so he goes to find the guy, tails him, and then like, gets taken, like, as he's trying to tail him, gets surprised with a knife to his throat and then like reveals who he is. And so Paco is in his new place across from the Israeli embassy in Paris and Jesus visits him and shows him the photo and confronts him and he says, oh, let's go outside. I'm sorry, what? Go outside? Is that it? Like, says there are microphones in here. [00:28:15] Speaker B: That's right, yeah. [00:28:16] Speaker A: So they go to the roof and says, there's no international organization. It's just been you this whole time. Where is Luis? And then Paco says, I can't tell you. You talk. [00:28:25] Speaker B: Yep, that's right. Like the IMDb entry said, it's all about people betraying each other. Yeah. [00:28:31] Speaker A: So Luis's minder sees that Luis isn't in a safe house, that he's not responding. There's an open window and out on the balcony we see this is a well done reveal. You just see his feet out there. So I definitely thought he was dead. [00:28:44] Speaker B: Oh, really? [00:28:45] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:28:45] Speaker B: Okay. [00:28:46] Speaker A: I thought like he killed himself and was lying out on the balcony, but nope, he's still alive. And he says that he was going to do it, but he couldn't go through with it. [00:28:54] Speaker B: Yeah, he's so sad throughout most of the movie because a couple of emotional scenes with him where he's like, I can't do it. But he's like, am I a bad person? Yes, he is. [00:29:04] Speaker A: So Paco is told that this happened and Jesus comes with him to see where Paco to where Luis is. We find out that Luis, even though it was an international manhunt for him and his sightings of him all over the world, he never left Paris. [00:29:17] Speaker B: That's right. [00:29:18] Speaker A: That's a pretty good job on Paco's part. I would say that give him credit for that. But yeah. So he's pretty depressed, he won't turn himself in. But Paco needs to move the money again. And this time to make sure there's no paper trail, or at least a less easy to find paper trail, he needs to physically withdraw the money in cash. [00:29:38] Speaker B: So this part is interesting because we have a time lock where they have to move before the Spanish government finds it, which is good as opposed to just people walking around and talking to each other. And there's all the wheeling and dealing. But then also, the most interesting part is Luis gets a choice. I think this is the most interesting part of the movie. Do you disappear or not? I don't know what Luis's plan was. Was it just wait until they gave up? [00:30:06] Speaker A: Probably. [00:30:06] Speaker B: They're not gonna give up. I know. Just wait until something happens. But anyway, if you disappear, I will be able to do it so that they won't be able to find you. But you'll never see your family again. [00:30:20] Speaker A: Because I never see his wife. Get her also. So his wife, did she give birth in prison? [00:30:26] Speaker B: Presumably, yes. The whole wife in prison thing, they. [00:30:29] Speaker A: Don'T follow up on again, again, they do right here. Right where we see her in prison. And she goes to get a phone and calls Luis. And after that, that's when Luis decides to turn himself in because he can't live without his family. [00:30:43] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't know how exactly Paco was going to fake his death. That would have been pretty interesting. [00:30:49] Speaker A: Well, we'll cut to the end of the story later and see that he had a plan to do that for himself. [00:30:55] Speaker B: But we don't see how he did it. [00:30:56] Speaker A: That's true. [00:30:57] Speaker B: Yeah. So, yeah. Then we also get a reveal that there's scandalous pictures of Luis as well as other people. [00:31:04] Speaker A: And so Paco calls his wife because after hearing all that, and he's having regrets about his lifestyle choice too. And then enter Beatrice. [00:31:13] Speaker B: Right. Who, I gotta say, maybe this is me being some sort of prejudiced. I guess he did not feel trustworthy. Why? I just got a not trustworthy vibe off of her. [00:31:23] Speaker A: Well, it's probably because we were told that she's Paco's niece, but also she's exactly like him. And we already know that Paco, at this, by this point, there's something untrustworthy about him. So maybe that's because you're told that you're giving that vibe. So maybe it's probably intentional that she's supposed to be giving off that vibe. [00:31:41] Speaker B: I think also she smiles too much. He's like, will you get me this money? She's like, sure, Uncle, I'll get you your money. Right. Am I exaggerating a little bit? Also, it's just a lot of money. It would tempt anybody. [00:31:54] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:31:55] Speaker B: And in niece, it's like, come on. It's not like she's his daughter. [00:31:59] Speaker A: Well, what they say. Well, he has no children. I think Paco. And also, she's like his daughter. They Call that out. So I don't. [00:32:06] Speaker B: Yeah, this movie does a lot of telling to say. [00:32:09] Speaker A: All right. Yeah, I know. Obviously she was suspicious to me, but I never thought she'd betray Paco. I thought she would be in it with Paco for something like. [00:32:17] Speaker B: Yeah. So at this point, did you see it coming? That Paco was just going to keep the money? [00:32:23] Speaker A: I had an inkling. I wasn't. It wasn't sure. And now, for once, I was not trying. Maybe it's because it's, you know, it's an unfamiliar story to me and it's in a foreign language. So I was. My brain was not on trying to out think the movie. It's trying to follow the movie. [00:32:37] Speaker B: Well, usually I don't try to out think the movie, too, but this time. [00:32:40] Speaker A: I was like, yeah, that's funny. [00:32:42] Speaker B: He seems so sketchy. [00:32:44] Speaker A: So. Yeah. So she's gonna do the withdrawals in Singapore and she'll deposit them into another account in the same bank two floors up. Now, that is like, okay. Why? [00:32:54] Speaker B: Yeah. How would this even work? [00:32:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:32:56] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:32:57] Speaker A: Jesus gets sent to get some stamps, and he runs into someone who works as. Someone who works for the Minister of Justice. And he wants the route that Luis will be taking to go back to Spain and offers him 100 million for that. [00:33:12] Speaker B: Yeah. That's enough money to betray your friend over. So at this point, Paco is coughing, which in most movies is a death flag. Nobody coughs unless they're mortally ill or something. Especially a movie like this. [00:33:23] Speaker A: Yeah. And so we find out that Luis is going to be flown to some neutral ground to be turned in. In Laos. [00:33:29] Speaker B: This confused me, too. [00:33:32] Speaker A: Not this part. [00:33:33] Speaker B: Well, I guess we can talk about it. When do we happen? But the big betrayal. Were you able to figure it out? [00:33:38] Speaker A: Not initially. [00:33:39] Speaker B: How they fooled the entire country. [00:33:41] Speaker A: No. I didn't realize that until they spell it out for you. [00:33:43] Speaker B: Okay. [00:33:44] Speaker A: But yeah, so he's gonna be turned into neutral ground. So it won't be an arrest. It'll be. I forget what it. What they say, I guess. [00:33:50] Speaker B: Like him turning himself. [00:33:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:33:52] Speaker B: So it's not him being caught. [00:33:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:33:54] Speaker B: So. And then we get a thing. Singapore says, okay, we'll freeze the accounts, which is great. Hurry up, Beatrice. [00:34:01] Speaker A: Yeah. And then Jesus is going to fly the private plane. Jesus looks at the routes that they're supposed to take and calls the guy from the minister's office and then says no. Wow. All right. And he says he never actually knew if it was real or if it was a test from Paco. And then Luis is given a fake passport. Paco tells him the whole plan and then specifies that it won't be an arrest. And then Jesus transports him to the airport. They're all very nervous. They arrive at the airport. This is interesting to me that their cover is their private. A private plane. And that Luis is the co pilot and that the other guy, Hans, is the person being transported. [00:34:45] Speaker B: And I love how they didn't even try to disguise Luis at all. He doesn't even shave his facial hair. My goodness. It's ridiculous. Also, there's a brief thing where they have a fight over the briefcase, where they. Paco's like, come on, man, give me the briefcase. They're gonna take it with. Take it from you. Yeah, if you don't. And then he gives him the briefcase, but he doesn't give him the contents of the briefcase. [00:35:11] Speaker A: But yeah. So Beatrice is doing another transaction and she's told she has to wait. [00:35:15] Speaker B: So it's a close call. More tension. [00:35:17] Speaker A: Yeah. But we're told in voiceover again, you're right, a lot of telling that Paco never told her that if they decided not to do it, she could potentially be arrested. [00:35:28] Speaker B: Right. [00:35:28] Speaker A: But turns out, okay, Luis and Jesus arrive in Bangkok on one of their stopovers. And then Jesus hands over Luis and calls Paco, tells him it's done. And Paco goes back to his wife. [00:35:47] Speaker B: He gets paid too. [00:35:48] Speaker A: Yeah, it gets paid. [00:35:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Beatrice gets the money successfully. [00:35:52] Speaker A: And he turns on the TV to see a press conference by the Minister of Defense where we find out that Luis lands in Spain. And rather than being, you know, very peaceful thing, let's just go. There's a ton of police and military there to arrest him. His deal seemingly got ignored. And also Paco's involvement is broadcast all over the news. But Paco did get everything back. [00:36:13] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. So he's charged with all the crimes. No deals, no, like, agreements. So, yeah, it seems like the agreement is off. [00:36:20] Speaker A: And yeah, so Paco now is on top. And he could have stopped there, but he went further. And so here. So turns out that Paco could actually show that the Laotian extradition documents they. That were given were forged because they didn't have the right stamp. It was a fake stamp. [00:36:37] Speaker B: Right. And then the two guys, the Laotian policemen, were not policemen. They were random people that he hired to pretend to be policemen. So correct me if I didn't understand it. So because the Laotians never arrested him, that means the deals with the Spanish government is off. They Just caught him and they charge him with everything. And that's how Paco is able to keep all of his money, because otherwise he'd be out in five years. He would want his money back. [00:37:04] Speaker A: Yes, I think. [00:37:05] Speaker B: But I feel like even if he gets out in five years, there's still nothing he could do to make Paco give him his money. I don't know. [00:37:15] Speaker A: Maybe. I don't know. The other thing he did is that because the fact that everything was faked, the minister now is in trouble. [00:37:22] Speaker B: Belloc. Yes, that's the minister's name. He's in trouble, I said, for some reason. And he said it was the end of his presidential run. [00:37:28] Speaker A: Yeah. And the end of his political career, basically. [00:37:30] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. [00:37:31] Speaker A: And there were calls for his resignation. So Paco meets with his old spy buddy again and we find out Paco's in trouble. But Paco still has the leverage in the documents. But his friend's like, no, you need to disappear something with no ties to your old life. [00:37:47] Speaker B: Including me. That's right. [00:37:49] Speaker A: Yeah. And your wife. And now we go back to the very beginning of that scene in the airport. [00:37:53] Speaker B: And now the conversation makes a lot more sense. We know who they're talking about. We know about the money because they got paid too. [00:38:00] Speaker A: And Jesus leave, gives Paco the briefcase. They say goodbye, and then Jesus sees him leave and then realize, so what is this? There was something that he left on the table. What was that? Do you have any idea what that was? [00:38:11] Speaker B: Can you describe it? [00:38:12] Speaker A: It was like a little square or something. Like he's in the movie, he's looking at the cash and then sees that Paco left something on table. Looks at, like, looks back at as he's going away. And like, looks at. I have no idea what that was supposed to do. [00:38:24] Speaker B: It wasn't the key ring for the lock in North Paris Station, maybe. I think that might have been what it was. [00:38:31] Speaker A: Okay. [00:38:31] Speaker B: That contains the blackmail material. [00:38:33] Speaker A: Okay. All right. Maybe. No. Well, I don't know. The key looked different. No, it was like, just like a square shape. It wasn't like the key I have. No way. That's why I'm like, what is that? I rewound it three times. Like, try to figure out what was going on. [00:38:46] Speaker B: Maybe it's a going away present. [00:38:47] Speaker A: I don't know. [00:38:48] Speaker B: Maybe Reddit has that info. But yeah, so they said that he died in three months. And did you think he was actually dead? [00:38:55] Speaker A: No. [00:38:55] Speaker B: Yeah, I even put Paco dead. For real. Question mark. [00:38:58] Speaker A: I don't think so, well, at first I was like, oh, interesting. Okay, he died. That's. That's very quick. So, I mean, it seems like there's. [00:39:07] Speaker B: A lot of people who would want to kill him. [00:39:08] Speaker A: Yeah. And flowers were delivered to, you know, Paco's wife. We find out Luis was sentenced to 30 years only, but served 15. And Americo died a week once people started dying. He's definitely still alive. [00:39:23] Speaker B: Yeah. Start dying for real. For real. [00:39:24] Speaker A: Yeah. So Mariko died a week after it was released. And then one of the other guys who they're working with, Pirard, apparently calls up Jesus and says that he accidentally called up Paco's phone and got a voicemail. Why would a dead man's voicemail still be working? [00:39:39] Speaker B: I don't know. Nobody bothered to turn it off. The Space Jam website is still working. I feel like that's a pretty good comparison. [00:39:49] Speaker A: Gerard was found dead not long after. [00:39:51] Speaker B: That, so let me rewrite the movie. It's been a long time since I rewrote the movie. How do you feel if it ended with Luis dying? He's like, I'm the last one left. He's in the room with the shotgun. No, Paco's coming to kill me. It's like Edgar Allan Poe. [00:40:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:40:09] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:40:10] Speaker A: I don't know. I like how it actually ended better, I think. [00:40:12] Speaker B: Yes. [00:40:13] Speaker A: So we find out that Jesus, curious about that, calls Paco's phone and gets the voicemail as well, and actually tries to track down Paco for a while. And we find out that Paco was found alive in 2004 after the statue of limitations on all his crimes had passed. [00:40:31] Speaker B: Yeah. How could that be? It seems like he committed a lot of crimes and it wasn't that long. [00:40:35] Speaker A: Right. But he never did call Jesus again. [00:40:40] Speaker B: That's right. [00:40:41] Speaker A: And with that, our movie ends. [00:40:43] Speaker B: Right. But what's the deal with the painting? [00:40:45] Speaker A: Oh, I don't know. [00:40:46] Speaker B: They never explain it anyway. Okay. [00:40:50] Speaker A: I think it's just supposed to show how much he had lost, that he had basically nothing except for that painting. [00:40:55] Speaker B: Yeah. I felt like the painting must have meant something to him that he kept it around for so long. But why? Yeah, again, if this were like, literature, the painting would represent something like his soul. Marcellus Wallace's soul. Spy Fact versus Spy Fiction. Anyway, so now it is time. Now it's time for Spy Fact versus Fiction. Would you like to go first? Sure. [00:41:19] Speaker A: Since I've only got one thing, I didn't end up having a time. A lot of time to do a lot of research. But the part in Aleman, which is Germany, they say Aleman in. In the captions. But that's Germany. [00:41:31] Speaker B: Yeah, like they say that like they're expecting us to know what it is. [00:41:35] Speaker A: Yeah, well, mainly because. Well, in Duolingo, whether. Talking about different places, I learned what, you know, Germany is in Spanish. So that's why. [00:41:44] Speaker B: There you go. Nice. [00:41:45] Speaker A: But the part with a newspaper reminded me of a book that I've had for a very long time. Gosh, I think that's probably around 24, 2004 or 5. It's called a Handbook for Spies by Wolfgang Lotz, who is a former Watts. [00:42:01] Speaker B: You mean the man without a face? [00:42:02] Speaker A: Maybe. [00:42:03] Speaker B: Isn't he in the spy museum? The name sounds familiar. [00:42:06] Speaker A: No, I think you're thinking of something else. Yeah, something else. Marcus Wolf. [00:42:11] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. Yeah, Wolf was in there somewhere. [00:42:14] Speaker A: Well, he wrote this book called Handbook for Spies that I like got from like my. The Hawaii State Library. And I read a bunch of times and I got a copy of myself. But the. There's a quote here, he says, I've always wondered why they make a signal with newspapers. The opposition might get many a pointer by just observing people who fitter with their paper, but they use this more or less same signals. And I soon fell into the habit of suspecting anyone who's. Who was using his newspaper for anything but reading. [00:42:43] Speaker B: Like swatting a fly. [00:42:44] Speaker A: Well, putting it down somewhere and all that sort of stuff. Because it has a lot of movies too. You have that thing where I'll put the newspaper down and grab a different newspaper. Stuff like that. [00:42:52] Speaker B: Have you seen that? A million times. [00:42:54] Speaker A: So but like that just reminds me. Oh yeah. And this book was written in what? 19. 1980. Yeah. [00:43:00] Speaker B: So I'm sure we've talked about this before, but I wonder what Wolfgang did when people stopped reading newspapers. [00:43:07] Speaker A: Well, it's the spy. Yeah. What spies do now. Now digital. It's rather than real dead drops. You have like a WI fi signal built into a fake rock or something. So you do it as dead drop or something like that. [00:43:19] Speaker B: Yeah. I'll draft. Do we ever talk about that? The draft. So there was a book. What book was it? I can't remember what it was, but there was some spy group. They all had a login to an email account. So they would write an email as a draft and then not send it. [00:43:34] Speaker A: I know that from a comic book. [00:43:36] Speaker B: Okay. [00:43:37] Speaker A: Invincible Iron Man. [00:43:39] Speaker B: No, that's not the one I'm. [00:43:40] Speaker A: They do that when like Tony Stark's on the Run. Because Norman Osborne has taken over SHIELD and so it's him, Pepper Potts, and Maria Hill. There's your, you know, former director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and so that's how they communicate is doing that. [00:43:53] Speaker B: Okay. But it's from something a little bit more legit than that. But anyway. [00:43:57] Speaker A: Hey, Iron man, that. That comic run is a very good run. It was one of the first runs after Iron Man 1 and 2 came out. So Tony Stark was a huge character now. But anyways. Yes, but that is in there. And now I want to reread that comic run. [00:44:09] Speaker B: Do you know who wrote it? Do you remember? The reason why I ask is because Orson Scott Card we were talking about earlier. [00:44:17] Speaker A: No, it was not that. He wrote Ultimate Iron Man. [00:44:20] Speaker B: Ultimate Iron Man. Okay. [00:44:21] Speaker A: Okay. Let's see. Invincible Iron Man. Oh, Matt Fraction. [00:44:25] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:44:27] Speaker A: That was a good one. Oh, I didn't realize Matt Fraction, who did the Hawkeye run, didn't he? [00:44:31] Speaker B: Yeah, he's done a bunch of stuff. [00:44:32] Speaker A: Yeah. All right, so that whole thing about the newspapers, that. That's what I got for spy faction. [00:44:37] Speaker B: Okay, So I just went to the Francisco Paisa Wikipedia page. Okay, so, born in 1936 and died for real in May 2020. Says he was a Spanish spy and businessman best known for his implication in corruption scandals and for faking his own death in the 90s. So the movie is basically true, except for all the lies, like they say in the beginning, but it's mostly true. So he poses an arms dealer to sell missiles to the eta, but they didn't know that the missiles had a location signal on them. The police followed them, found a major hideout. There was an arrest warrant for Francisco Paisa. In collaboration with that, he was named a permanent representative to the UN from SAO toME and Principe. So he was an ambassador. They talked about that, Right? [00:45:24] Speaker A: They mentioned that. [00:45:25] Speaker B: Yeah. He got involved with Luis Roldan, known for being the Director General of the Spanish Civil Guard, during a massive corruption scandal in 1993. He said that Pesa tricked him into stealing all the money that Luis had stolen. In 1998, he faked a fatal cardiac arrest in Thailand. Some people say he had been shot rather than had a cardiac arrest. His family commissioned 30 Gregorian masses for his soul. Yeah. So. But then he reappears again, then supposedly died for real in Paris in May 2023. [00:45:56] Speaker A: Interesting. [00:45:57] Speaker B: So a couple of other things. The ETA. [00:46:00] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:46:00] Speaker B: Stands for Isktadi Ta Asca Suna. [00:46:05] Speaker A: Okay. [00:46:06] Speaker B: So do you know the Basques? Are you familiar with the Basque nationalism? I Had heard of vaguely. So basically, they're in Spain, they want their own country, they want to be separatist. Not so different from the Catalonians. So the ETA was the main organization in the movement and played a central role in the Basque armed conflict in which more than 850 people were killed, 2,600 were wounded, and nearly 90 were kidnapped. And they formally dissolved in 2018. Now, the Gall Groupos Antiterroristas da Liberacion. Wikipedia straight up says that they were death squads. [00:46:40] Speaker A: Okay. [00:46:41] Speaker B: And it says they were legally established by the Spanish government to fight the eta, what was known as their dirty war. Kind of reminds me of the Troubles where they went after ETA members, but also just people who they thought were sympathetic to the eta. And it's all very not cool. And they also acted in French territory because Basques were in France. Obviously, the Spanish government can't just send people into France. [00:47:04] Speaker A: Yeah, not really. [00:47:06] Speaker B: Okay, so that's what I got for Spy Fact versus fiction. Favorite quotes. [00:47:16] Speaker A: All right, shall we move into our favorite quotes? [00:47:18] Speaker B: Yeah, I only have a few. [00:47:19] Speaker A: Same here. [00:47:20] Speaker B: Okay. I. I. Do you want me to go first? [00:47:22] Speaker A: Sure, sure. [00:47:22] Speaker B: I like at the end when the guy taps him on the shoulder, just turns and says, I'm not Paco. And then. Then the. The credit starts. [00:47:32] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:47:33] Speaker B: I like in the beginning. Like all true stories, it contains a few lies. Sorry. [00:47:37] Speaker A: That's okay. [00:47:38] Speaker B: And then finally somebody says, how many coincidences does it take to be a lot? [00:47:44] Speaker A: That's a good one. All right, so I also had the. Like all true stories, it contains a few lies. I also like when he finds his old spy buddy and he's like. Tells him to show he's not armed. Have you ever seen me with a gun? Spanish spies only carry checkbooks. [00:47:57] Speaker B: Nice. All right, well, actually. And then one more that I thought you might steal that I wanted to mention. He asked Paco, how's my wife? And Paco says, she's fine, except for being in prison. I guess that's not a big deal. Ratings. [00:48:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:48:18] Speaker B: All right, so now it is time for our ratings. On a scale of 1 to 10, martinis, 1 being Avengers 1998 level bad, and 10 being even better than Mission Impossible. Ghost Protocol. How would we rate? Let's stick with smoke and mirrors. [00:48:31] Speaker A: Okay. [00:48:32] Speaker B: I'm curious what you're gonna say. [00:48:33] Speaker A: Well, I'm also curious what you're gonna say. [00:48:36] Speaker B: Well, there you go. I guess I can go first. So I realized pros and cons is a good way to have me think through. [00:48:42] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:48:43] Speaker B: So the pros is it started off pretty well with an interesting story and it's something different. Yes, it's definitely different, which I appreciate, but the cons are not a whole lot happened in the movie. You're basically just watching people talk about their feelings, move money around and wait for Luis to leave his hiding spot. It was kind of confusing. The characters weren't especially likable and it was too long. There wasn't enough story for the two hour length. Halfway through, I was like, when is this movie going to be over? And then the twist at the end also wasn't that good. So even though it's foreign and even though it's new and different, there wasn't enough to save it. I do consider it to be below average. I'm going to give it a three out of ten. [00:49:28] Speaker A: Wow. [00:49:29] Speaker B: Yeah, sorry. No, I mean, it didn't do that much for me. [00:49:32] Speaker A: Fair enough. I was expecting low. I wasn't expecting that low. That's why I was surprised. Like you said, there is interesting stuff, but it's not enough interesting stuff. And also, I already talked about this at the top. The fact that you start off with an intro about when planes were not buses, there were planes, and the sky belonged to a select few. You make me think it's gonna be an entirely different movie. And it has barely anything to do with flying, except for that the guy happens to be a pilot. Except we only really see that come into play once at the very end. [00:50:05] Speaker B: Yeah. And what's frustrating about this, it would be one thing if it was like a From Dusk Till dawn situation where it's something that's okay that turns into something better instead. They promise something very cool and interesting and then you don't get that. [00:50:16] Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah, five out of ten martinis, that's fine. It is a story that we've never heard before. So that was interesting. But I don't know if I would actively go out of my way to find this. [00:50:27] Speaker B: I certainly wouldn't recommend it to other people. And also something I wanted to mention is the meat of the story is, like I said, the Big Short. Like people moving money around. And that really does nothing for me. [00:50:38] Speaker A: Have you actually ever seen the Big Short? [00:50:40] Speaker B: No, I really probably shouldn't name drop it if I'm going to reference it. [00:50:43] Speaker A: I think that would actually be interesting. And I know that one of the ways that they try to make it interesting is they have celebrity cameos who. [00:50:51] Speaker B: Come in, like naked women in hot tubs. Right. [00:50:54] Speaker A: Specifically Margot Robbie. [00:50:55] Speaker B: Yeah, there you go. [00:50:57] Speaker A: I'M sure that's the one that everyone knows about, but I'm sure I believe that there are other like interstitials like that too, just to keep, you know, to keep people's interest. So I was like, all right, I feel like didn't win Oscars. Yeah, so let's not compare it to something like that. But just. But yes, I get what your point is. [00:51:15] Speaker B: Well, also, speaking of this will be over promising, but the whole premise and tagline being a man who fooled an entire country. Yeah, that's a big promise. [00:51:24] Speaker A: Also, maybe this is why they changed the title. He doesn't have a million faces. There's no disguises period here. What's so left? [00:51:31] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I'm not exactly knocking my socks off the bat. [00:51:34] Speaker A: I mean, I will say that inventing an entire international organization and yet having him never leave Paris was pretty clever. That one I'll give him credit for. [00:51:44] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, Paco is a cool character and I would wanted to see more of him. He simply doesn't do that much. [00:51:48] Speaker A: Except why not make Paco our point of view character instead of Jesus? [00:51:52] Speaker B: Oh, that's like the Sherlock Holmes thing. They love doing that. [00:51:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Anyway, so. Yeah, so five out of 10. It's fine. It's not. I mean, it probably gets some bonus points for being a foreign film and being a story we've never heard, but the meat of it is just. [00:52:06] Speaker B: Yeah, it certainly does in my mind. I do try to not judge them by American standards, but there's only so far I can go. [00:52:14] Speaker A: Well, thank you all for joining us. You can find us on social media at the Spy Fi Guys on Facebook, Blue Sky, YouTube and Instagram and our Merch Stub and our merch [email protected] until next time. I'm Christian. [00:52:26] Speaker B: And I'm Zach. [00:52:27] Speaker A: And we are the Spy Fi Guys signing off. Thank you for listening to the Spy Fi Guys. If you enjoyed our podcast, please be sure to give us a five star rating on itunes. The theme song from this podcast is Mistake the getaway by Kevin McLeod from Incompetech.com licensed under Creative Commons by Attribution 3.0. Films, books and television shows reviewed by our podcast are the intellectual property of their respective copyright holders and no infringement is intended. [00:53:00] Speaker B: This is a personal podcast. Any views, statements or opinions. Opinions expressed in this podcast are personal and belong solely to the participants. They do not represent those of people, institutions, or organizations that the participants may or may not be associated with in a professional or personal capacity. Unless explicitly stated. Any views or opinions are not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club organization, company or individual. [00:53:24] Speaker A: You can find our podcast on social media at the Spy Fi Guys or Facebook, Facebook, Blue Sky, YouTube and Instagram.