The Machine strands Truman and Landen in 2018—an era of neon-soaked genre mashups, Big Swing studio projects, and the last gasp of mid-budget original thrillers—depositing them right at the doors of the El Royale. Before long, they’re knee-deep in false identities, shifting timelines, and enough stylish menace to make even the Machine a little uneasy.

Bad Times at the El Royale is a pulpy neo-noir thriller starring Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges, The Big Lebowski), motel singer Darlene Sweet (Cynthia Erivo, Harriet), and charismatic cult leader Billy Lee (Chris Hemsworth, Thor). Written and directed by Drew Goddard, the film follows seven strangers who converge on a once-glamorous, now-rotting hotel built directly on the California–Nevada state line. Over one stormy night, shifting allegiances, hidden motives, and buried secrets collide in a tense, stylish descent into moral ambiguity—echoing the era’s fascination with prestige genre experiments and retro mystery throwbacks.

Though released with pedigree talent and festival-friendly ambition, Bad Times at the El Royale struggled to find its audience, landing in that uncanny valley between mainstream thriller and auteur mystery box. It’s a fascinating, overstuffed, beautifully mounted oddity—exactly the kind of “almost-classic” the Machine loves to resurrect.

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Bad Times at the El Royale, Bad Times at the El Royale 2018, Drew Goddard, Jeff Bridges, Cynthia Erivo, Chris Hemsworth, Dakota Johnson, Jon Hamm, neo-noir thriller, mystery thriller, hotel mystery movie, ensemble thriller, 2010s thrillers, 20th Century Fox, Movie Memory Machine, movie podcast, film discussion, forgotten movies, cult films, film history, podcast episode, cinematic analysis, 2018 movies, retro noir, stylish thrillers

The Machine isn’t done tampering with reality. After dropping Truman and Landen into The Thirteenth Floor (1999), it pulls five more films from across decades that poke at the same unnerving question: what if this world isn’t the base layer? From analog paranoia to blockbuster bullet time to art-house identity crises, this week’s 5-For explores cinema’s favorite existential glitch.

The Machine has selected the following titles for further reality destabilization:

• World on a Wire (1973) – Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s proto-simulation TV epic that predates the digital age but nails the dread

• The Matrix (1999) – The cyberpunk phenomenon that redefined virtual reality on screen

• Free Guy (2021) – A self-aware NPC comedy about autonomy inside a video game

• Ghost in the Shell (1995) – Anime cyberpunk meditation on consciousness and artificial identity

• Certified Copy (2010) – An art-house reflection on authenticity, performance, and what’s “real” in relationships

Each of these films approaches simulated existence from a different angle—tech noir, anime philosophy, action spectacle, romantic ambiguity—but they all interrogate authorship and identity. The Thirteenth Floor sits squarely in that lineage: less flashy than The Matrix, less academic than World on a Wire, but fully committed to the same existential vertigo. Together, these five titles reveal how filmmakers across eras use genre to ask the same destabilizing question: if reality is constructed, who’s holding the controls?

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The Thirteenth Floor, The Thirteenth Floor 1999, World on a Wire, The Matrix, Free Guy, Ghost in the Shell, Certified Copy, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Wachowskis, Mamoru Oshii, Abbas Kiarostami, science fiction, simulation movies, virtual reality films, cyberpunk cinema, identity in film, Movie Memory Machine, movie podcast, film discussion, curated films, thematic film list, cult sci-fi, film history, cinematic analysis

Truman and Landen wrap up the lingering mysteries, theories, and stray code fragments left behind by The Thirteenth Floor (1999)—a movie that remains convinced your desktop computer is one bad day away from becoming God’s Etch A Sketch. And as always, they play The Trailer Game, trying to guess which moody shots of virtual L.A., green-screen cityscapes, and suspiciously calm Gretchen Mol the marketing team grabbed for the trailer before watching it for the first time. Next week, the Machine sends them to a new date in cinematic history with yet another cryptic clue… and inevitably a fresh opportunity for temporal chaos.

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The Machine hurls Truman and Landen back to 1999—an already glitchy year in cinema—dropping them into a neon-soaked rabbit hole of corporate intrigue, VR head trips, and the uncanny feeling that somebody else is driving. It’s a sleek, paranoid slice of late-’90s sci-fi, and the guys are here to find out why this one slipped through the cracks.

The Thirteenth Floor is a neo-noir science-fiction thriller starring Douglas Hall (Craig Bierko, Scary Movie 4), Jane Fuller (Gretchen Mol, Boardwalk Empire), and Detective Larry McBain (Dennis Haysbert, 24). Directed by Josef Rusnak, the film follows a tech mogul who uses a cutting-edge virtual reality simulation of 1937 Los Angeles—only to discover his mentor has been murdered and the digital world may be more real than he ever imagined. Blending noir mystery with turn-of-the-millennium anxiety, the film rides the era’s fascination with digital identity and simulated worlds.

Overshadowed by The Matrix and eXistenZ—released the very same year—The Thirteenth Floor became the forgotten triplet of 1999’s “simulation cinema boom.” It’s a stylish, ambitious mystery that got lost in the cultural shuffle, making it a perfect candidate for the Machine’s filing cabinet of neglected sci-fi.

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The Machine isn’t done roaming hospital corridors and city streets. After dropping Truman and Landen into The Dream Team (1989), it queues up five more films circling institutions, delusions, gentle outsiders, and what happens when “treatment” collides with humanity. The vibe? Compassion, satire, rebellion… and at least one starship.

The Machine has selected the following five films for further study:

• One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) – Rebellion inside the psychiatric system

• Titicut Follies (1967) – Unflinching documentary inside a state hospital

• Don Juan DeMarco (1994) – Romantic delusion or healing fantasy?

• Mister Lonely (2007) – Outsiders building their own fragile community

• Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) – Institutional logic meets human absurdity

Each of these films explores institutions—psychiatric, societal, or bureaucratic—and the fragile, often beautiful humanity pushing back against them. From the countercultural defiance of Cuckoo’s Nest to the vérité exposure of Titicut Follies, from romanticized identity in Don Juan DeMarco to spiritual misfits in Mister Lonely, and even to the comedic outsider logic of Star Trek IV, the thread is clear: who gets labeled “crazy,” and who gets to define normal? It’s the same tension that powers The Dream Team, just refracted through wildly different genres and decades.

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The Dream Team, The Dream Team 1989, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Titicut Follies, Don Juan DeMarco, Mister Lonely, Star Trek IV The Voyage Home, Movie Memory Machine, movie podcast, film discussion, curated films, thematic film list, psychiatric films, mental health in movies, cult films, film history, cinematic analysis, ensemble comedy, institutional critique

Truman and Landen wrap up stray thoughts, production quirks, and leftover laughs from The Dream Team (1989)—a movie that somehow combines gentle heart, New York grime, and Michael Keaton at his most unhinged. And as always, they play The Trailer Game, trying to guess what footage the marketing team thought best represented four escaped psychiatric patients wandering Manhattan before watching the trailer for the first time.

Next week, the Machine sends them to May 28, 1999 with the clue: Question Reality—and it’s already cackling like Christopher Lloyd in a stolen hospital gown.

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The Dream Team, The Dream Team 1989, Howard Zieff, Michael Keaton, Beetlejuice, Christopher Lloyd, Back to the Future, Peter Boyle, Stephen Furst, comedy, 1980s comedy, Movie Memory Machine, movie podcast, film discussion, trailer reaction, vintage trailers, forgotten movies, cult films, film history, cinematic analysis

The Machine yanks Truman and Landen straight into 1989 New York, where the pigeons are plentiful, the crime rate is questionable, and four psychiatric patients are somehow having a better day than our hosts. With a comedy tone that wobbles between screwball, satire, and “oh no they let who loose in Manhattan?”, the guys dive into a movie that’s equal parts heartwarming and wildly irresponsible.

The Dream Team is a chaotic, character-driven comedy starring Billy, a volatile former ad exec (Michael Keaton, Beetlejuice), Henry, an anxious perfectionist (Christopher Lloyd, Back to the Future), Jack, a delusional former newsman (Peter Boyle, Everybody Loves Raymond), and Albert, a childlike gentle giant who only speaks in baseball commentary (Stephen Furst, Animal House). Directed by Howard Zieff, the film follows four psychiatric patients whose group outing spirals into an unplanned odyssey through 1980s Manhattan when their doctor is attacked and hospitalized. Balancing slapstick mayhem with earnest sweetness, the movie captures a late-’80s moment when studios still greenlit high-concept ensemble comedies with surprising warmth.

Why This Film?

Once a modest box-office success and a cable-TV staple, The Dream Team has largely faded from pop-culture memory despite its stacked cast and oddball charm. It’s a time capsule of pre-Batman Michael Keaton, scrappy New York street comedy, and a tone Hollywood simply doesn’t make anymore—all perfect ingredients for the Movie Memory Machine.

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The Machine isn’t done sprinting yet. For this 5-For transmission, Truman and Landen are handed five studio comedies that orbit Tag (2018)—movies where grown adults, respectable jobs be damned, are dragged into escalating games, schemes, and misadventures that test friendship, masculinity, and the limits of insurance coverage.

The Machine’s Five Selected Films

According to the Machine, these films share a common DNA: high-concept premises, ensemble casts, and the quiet fear that adulthood might already be over.

• Game Night (2018) – Murder-mystery stakes collide with suburban friendship dynamics
• Date Night (2010) – Marriage, mistaken identity, and chaos after bedtime
• Horrible Bosses (2011) – Workplace rage filtered through cartoonish criminal logic
• Hot Tub Time Machine (2010) – Male nostalgia weaponized into a sci-fi party comedy
• The Hangover (2009) – The modern blueprint for friendship-based disaster comedies

Why These Five?

Together, these movies map out the late-2000s and 2010s studio comedy boom—where adult responsibility was repeatedly smashed into genre frameworks like action thrillers, crime capers, and sci-fi romps. Seen alongside Tag, they reveal a moment when Hollywood tried to keep the R-rated comedy alive by turning friendship itself into the central stunt.

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