TDM: Total Dad Movies with Tooky, Dave, & Mike

Discussion of this magnificent film inspired Dad Mike to say: "I'm going full Harrison Butker on The Girthmaster."  I can't think of a stronger endorsement to listen to a deep Porn Dad discussion of Paul Thomas Anderson's 1997 masterpiece BOOGIE NIGHTS. 

This may no longer be your Dad's favorite movie, but it's definitely your Dad's favorite Simpsons joke. Take a peek up Charlton Heston's loincloth with us as we explore the whos, wheres, whys, and WHA?s of Franklin Schaffner's 1968 monkeypocalypse PLANET OF THE APES.

Perhaps the most Dad-spirational movie of all time, this movie features beautiful people doing cool stuff in a fantasy city.  Every Dad sees himself in a cool suit talking the racket, or tugging on our bucket hats at the track, ready for one big score. But the truth is: most of us are Julia Roberts: blissfully unaware of the danger at the edges of our  existence until it's too late. ClooneyPi...

Well, I believe in the small of a woman's back...  The hanging curveball... high fiber... good scotch. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a Constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter.  I believe in the sweet spot, soft core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve, and I believe in long, slow,...

Leslie Neilsen is your dad's favorite actor, and probably his second favorite actor as well.  Leslie Neilsen carried a handheld fart sound machine wherever he went.  Leslie Neilsen's gravestone reads "Let 'er rip". Leslie Neilsen is the Chuck Norris of Dad humor, except he actually did all the stuff that we celebrate him for.  THE NAKED GUN: FROM THE FILES OF POLICE SQUAD...

This movie needs a Dad! But I guess if it had one, it wouldn't really be a Batman, would it? Aren't most Tim Burton movies about missing grown ups in one way or another? He's got some stuff to work through, but then again, don't we all? Bruce Wayne certainly does; so does his counterpart Jack Napier/Joker in this astoundingly awkward mash-up of ideas, tones, and styles. We&apos...

Look! Up in the sky! It's our childhood! If you read comics as a kid, you read some Superman. And, love him or hate him, you knew who Superman was, and, secretly, you probably wished the people around you could be a little more like him. Granted, it's easier to have an unbendable moral code if you don't need to eat and nothing can ever hurt you, but still, you had to respect the guy...

When you're a dad/ And you want to watch/ A film/ GHOSTBUSTERS! As the Ghostbuniversters expands, we visit Ivan Reitman's ur-text, the 1984 classic that started the whole michegas.

Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear are the yin/yang of Dad Energy. Kermit: Moral. Respected. The clear leader. Perhaps a tad dorky, but effective. If you saw Kermit wearing cargo pants, you would not be surprised. A collaborator, but with a vision. He is what all Dads aspire to be. Fozzie: Relentlessly mocked, justifiably so. His laughs come from pity, not amusement. He panics when given responsibili...

Dads love cartoons. But you know what Dads really love? Horny cartoons that reference CHINATOWN. Also if you can get every classic Warner Brothers and Disney cartoon character in there as well...Dads eat that s*** up. That's why we're chowing down this week on (IMO) Robert Zemeckis' greatest achievement, 1988's WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT.

We talk a lot of Spielberg here at TDM, because Steven makes a lot of movies both for and about Dads.  BRIDGE OF SPIES might be the ultimate "only Dads will watch this movie" movie. Every Dad remembers showing their kid RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK for the first time, probably a few years too soon because WATCH THIS PART WITH THE WHIP! JURASSIC PARK - in between the screams and the biting - i...

We probably shouldn't ask more from our President than competence. Make some laws, keep the trains running on time, and be generally moral.  I might be giving away too much, but I generally like the current guy. But you put him next to President Indiana Jones, and yeah, the achievements look a little thin. But to be fair, President Indiana Jones (I mean James Marshall, but really, who are we...

Been thinking a lot this week about MADAME WEB, which (spoiler alert!) isn't a good movie, but seems to double-suffer from the background radiation of institutional misogyny. MADAME WEB isn't your enemy, fellow nerds - it's the (male-dominated) studio that serves it to us, undercooked and leaking on the plate. You know what I didn't understand in 1999? Tracy Flick is not a vill...

When your number's up, your number's up. Seems like a real Dad thing to say. But deep in our Dad Hearts, we fear the void. We fear the loss of control, the powerlessness, the inability to care for those we love.  Sam Wheat - while not a Dad - is EveryDad. Cue the Righteous Brothers: it's time for Jerry Zucker's 1990 megahit GHOST.

It's hard to make a movie. It's even harder to make a movie that accurately depicts a specific place and set of characters.  That said, if you DO make a movie in which you hope to portray a particular place and people, it's perhaps important to get actors who sound like they're from that  particular place and time. That said - this movie is extremely Dad friendly, featuring suc...

No Dads live forever, but some Dads are eternal. Carl Weathers is the Dad we never deserved but whom we were gifted nonetheless.  With the news of his passing, we had to take a loving look at the first chapter of his most identifiable character, Apollo Creed. Let's all celebrate the life and work of Carl Weathers in this deep dive into John G. Avildsen's seminal 1976 classic, ROCKY.

Hey Dads: We had some travel-related recording delays this week so we're reposting one of our first forays into the Dadlands. Strong Dad energy in this film - Peter Falk, Rob Reiner, the guy from Dire Straits, the guy who wrote Aunt Dan & Lemon , Andre the freakin' Giant? I mean, this thing practically pulses with Dad Power. Plus more swordfights than you could shake an  epee  at, if...

Tom Cruise wants to save your soul. I don't think this is an exaggeration; Ethan Hunt (his M:I alter-ego) believes he can save all the people around him, even when he can't. And Tom Cruise sees your pain, your drudgery, your humdrum lives, every day consisting of an unending string of moments where YOU ARE NOT TOM CRUISE, and therefore, are settling. It is, I believe, his (ahem) mission...

All Dads have a fear of losing control. We struggle noisily, seeking affirmation for our efforts to keep the injustices of the world at bay. Yet, sometimes the world places us in a situation from which there is no escape, no recourse, no way to purchase or bludgeon or otherwise wrangle out way out of. This is the Dad Nightmare, from which there is only one path back to the head of the table: we mu...

It hasn't even been thirty years, and yet so much about this film feels distant and almost irretrievable. Robin Williams and Elliott Smith are sadly gone, as is much of the Southie neighborhood of Boston depicted in this film. Affleck and Damon aren't kids anymore. And yet, if you squint, you can still kind of see today's world peeping through: there's Stellan Skarsgaard playin...

Another Chicago film classic! After last week's lighthearted romp through the Windy City and environs, the Dads try to close the sale on the film version of David Mamet's 1984 Pulitzer Prize-winning play. Big Dad Energy abounds in this masterclass in machismo, featuring luminaries like Ed Harris, Alan Arkin, Al Pacino, and the incandescent Jack Lemmon (as well as the "uncomfortable-...

HAPPY NEW YEAR FROM THE DADS!  This 1972 disaster flick (which takes place on New Year's Eve) has everything: tidal waves, turtle necks, charred corpses, soft rock anthems, and a spectacularly unfunny Leslie Nielsen. It's also got 5 Oscar winners, some pretty amazing practical effects, and is generally acknowledged to be the high point of the "disaster movie" craze of the 70s....

Yes, Dads, there is a Santa Claus...but is this him? The Dads use this Xmas film to dig deep into subjects as varied as: capitalism, New York real estate, balancing being honest with your kids vs. preserving a sense of wonder, and which was the hornier show - The Munsters or The Addams Family? This is a wide-ranging discussion that spans a number of divisive topics, but the Dads find consensus on:...

Merry Everything from the Dads! December is all holiday movies, and this is no exception... at least, for most of the Dads. It's the ultimate question of our time: Is DIE HARD a Christmas movie? It's got a tree. It's got a giant teddy bear. And it has real-life Santa Reginald VelJohnson.  It also has gifts that endure in the form of career-defining performances from Bruce Willis and...

Just when we thought we were out...they keep pulling us back in! (We know that's from Godfather Part III, please don't write) The Dads dive deep into the one of (as Dad Tooky observed) one of the most "Dad-absent" films pf all time. Join us for a banana daquiri, a slice of cake, a glass of water, and a stiff pour from Francis Ford Coppola's vineyards as we dig into what mi...