About this episode

The episode features an in-depth interview with John Hyams about his documentary 'The Smashing Machine' and its impact on MMA and film.

Before it was a presumed Oscar contender starring Dwayne The Rock Johnson, The Smashing Machine was a documentary about MMA pioneer Mark Kerr, directed by John Hyams. Arguably one of the most influential documentaries of the 21st century, I was so obsessed with it that the first time I tracked down John Hyams to pepper him with questions about it was 13 damned years ago. That’s right, before my retrospective about The Smashing Machine documentary was a GQ feature , it was a FilmDrunk Frotcast. I haven’t seen the upcoming scripted A24 version starring The Rock, but knowing that Benny Safdie was at least as obsessed with John Hyams’ documentary with I am, obsessed enough to recreate certain scenes right down to getting the hats and trunks right, makes me think it’s going to be pretty good. Point is, this has no spoilers for The Smashing Machine (2025), because I haven’t seen it yet. What this is is the most comprehensive behind-the-scenes interview about The Smashing Machine (2002) that I could conduct. Did you know it was originally supposed to be called “The Specimen?” That HBO considered calling it “The Bloody Punch?” That…

People in this episode

Guest: John Hyams

Topics covered

• MMA
• documentary
• film retrospective
• interview
• Mark Kerr
• John Hyams
• influential documentaries

Keywords

• The Smashing Machine
• Mark Kerr
• John Hyams
• MMA documentary
• Dwayne Johnson
• Benny Safdie
• film retrospective
• Warrior

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: HBO, GQ

Books & works: The Smashing Machine, Warrior

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