Blank Check with Griffin & David - Silence of the Lambs with Emily St. James

Episode Date: January 12, 2020

The two friends are joined by prolific writer Emily St. James  to talk about the most influential movie that BC has covered  - except for Fletch of course. It's so influential there are TOO MANY BITS!  What's Emily's take on what all Demme movies are about? What could Hannibal lector have looked like if it was a different actor? And a special shoutout to all our cannibal psychologist listeners! 

A census taker once tried to podcast me. I ate his pod with some cast beans and a nice podcasty. Started bad, got worse. 40 Fs. That's the Pete Holmes joke. You just sounded like you were a snake. I mean. Are you trying to hypnotize Mowgli right now? I don't know how to do it.

I just, I was. Pretty good. It's the first, it's the top quote. I said, I'm going to do the impression poorly. Let's just get it over with. Sure. Because it'll happen more over the course of the episode. I was trying to maybe pull off, as we said, the rare move of the Clarice into Hannibal.

You look like a rogue. The reverse Tomahawk. Right. I mean. Dr. Lecter. Dr. I mean. Dr. Lecter. Dr. Lecter. Dr. Lecter. Is she a lot, doctor?

I can say this because it's not trans erasure for me to say this. Sure. But it puts the podcast on its skin. Yes. You know? Or else it gets the pod again. I don't know. I was thinking about that.

I feel like that's an even harder voice to do. Very fun to try and nail, but incredibly specific. Right. It's so. Yes. Very unusual. try and nail, but incredibly specific. Very unusual. Oh, yeah. Right. It's sort of like edging into D'Onofrio in Men in Black. Sugar, water.

A pet cat. Dear friend of mine. A pet cat. I just remember how he delivers a pet cat in Men in Black. Isn't it weird that that performance didn't win all four acting categories that year? Should have won all four. And also best director.

Best bug. Yeah. There should be a best supporting bug, and then Vincent D'Onofrio would have won that. It is crazy how that movie comes out, and everyone's like, D'Onofrio's great in it. I mean, it's not a real performance, but he's great in it. Do people even say that at the time? I feel like they're like, D'Onofrio gives a fun turn, a committed performance. People were like really hung up on how gross he was.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I feel like 20 years later, everyone kind of agrees like, oh, no, that's one of the best pieces of acting in the history of American cinema. That is one of the most committed full body performances ever. And then did you read the, there was the big oral history with Barry Sonnenfeld. Yes. It's incredible. And he talks so much

about the performance. And Rick Baker. Well, Rick Baker is like releasing his, by the time this episode comes out, because we're recording this 18 months in advance,

but is doing the like multi-volume hardcover book of his entire career. And he's doing a panel at New York Comic Con tomorrow when we're recording this, if you want a timestamp when this is being recorded, hardcover book of his entire career. And he's doing a panel at New York Comic Con tomorrow when we're recording this, if you want a timestamp when this is being recorded,

that is, like, he's doing his big career retrospective and D'Onofrio is moderating it. That sounds... And I was like, that's very telling to me that, like, Rick Baker is, like, that's one of my great collaborations. As Sonnenfeld, to put this to sleep, in that thing, he said, like, he's doing Jack Houston.

That's what Jack said in Chinatown. That's what Sonnenfeld to put this to sleep in that thing he said like he's doing Jack Houston that's what Jack said in Chinatown that's what Sonnenfeld realized when they filmed the pet cat scene that's what he said he literally I left something here a pet cat a pet cat I found out Jay Leno host of CNBC's Jay Leno's Garage whatever the fuck it's called

follows me on Twitter Jay Leno follows you on Twitter? What? He DM'd me and was like, hey. He DM'd you? It must have been like, I think it may have been a person who worked in his office. I can't imagine he runs his own Twitter.

Yeah, he probably does. There's no way. Did the message open with, meh, here's something. Yeah. That's the first. Hey, Emily, what do you think about this? Emily, what do you think about this?

What do you think about this? He kept calling you Kevin Eubanks for reasons unknown. He was like, can I come on? I think you're interesting. My podcast, I haven't recorded an episode of in like a year. So this was after I'd come out because he also dead named me. And I was like, I'm sorry, we haven't done an episode in a while. By the way, I go by Emily now.

And whoever runs the Jay Leno Twitter account is like, I'm sorry. I'm like, keep up with my life, Jay Leno. What the fuck? But you are going to restart. I think you're interesting now, right? You have to. You have to. I gotta.

And then I found out he did a bunch of podcasts. I think he was trying to do guerrilla marketing or whatever for his CNBC show. For Garage? Yeah. For JLG? He was doing guerrilla for JLG? He was on one of the Jesse Thorne shows. He was on some of the other LA-based interview podcasts.

He was on WTF, and he did a very, very normal, psychologically balanced interview in which he explained that he has never been competitive and only did what anyone else would do in that position. Wait a minute. Come on. Jobs open, you're not going to hide in a closet? You drop on me? Come on. I did the same thing anyone else would do. I'm not competitive.

He hasn't tweeted since August 28th so he's not a big tweeter I guess whoever I think you gotta get him on I'm sure it's not

like Jay Leno like sitting in his bathroom like I'll see what Emily's up to but his account slid like Giffield into your DMs

remember when the Jay Leno show premiered on NBC oh yeah it's about time it was about time it was about time. It was about time. It was about time. And Kanye was, I believe, the first guest.

Yeah. And he got Kanye to basically cry over yelling at Taylor Swift and his mother. Right. Did I make you cover week one of that? I made somebody cover week one of that. I am almost certain that you made me cover week one of that. Now I have to look it up. Now I have to look it up.

Let's find out. Talk about trauma. Either I covered it or you asked and I couldn't do it. Because now I can't find it. That is a thing. I mean, I don't know if you folks watch the deleted scenes because the Criterion DVD now has like 45 minutes of deleted scenes for this movie. And one of them them Hannibal Lecter

explains to Clarice Starling that the trauma that Buffalo Bill experienced as a child that turned him into a psychopath was having to recap the Jay Leno show for the AV Club I actually I was the one who reviewed the first week

it was you! That feels like the kind of thing you'd just be like, let me put this on my back. That was my first, well, I mean, you know, I was avoiding a bunch of shit, but that was my first fall as TV editor there. And I was like, I'm going to review every new show. And I was like, shit, that includes the Jay Leno show.

Five nights a week. I watched the first week of that. And my lead is like, I really thought this could be interesting. I'm like, what? Yeah, I mean, that was, I mean, everyone was maybe, had the blinders on there. Well, he was selling like,

oh, we're going to rethink it because it's not late night anymore. It's going to be prime time. We're going to do more sketches. We're going to do more comedy bits. No desk. Just the Tonight Show. Right.

It was just the Tonight Show, except there was no desk and there was like some cars on stage. Right. There was at least two cars on stage. Right. They had more field reporters. Yeah.

Like they had like six Ross the interns. There was no desk. And he ended it with five big ones. Do you remember that? Of course. The final segment was. Yeah, because that was when Kimmel messed with him was on the five big ones. Five big ones.

And you know, they had the field reporters. They broke the Edward Snowden thing, like in the last few months of the show. They broke Edward Snowden and then like, yeah, it was their contribution. NBC was like, good work. You get the Tonight Show back. That's what Citizen 4 is about. Yeah, that's why Jay Leno has the Pulitzer.

Here's something. Edward, you hear about this? Alright. Laura, turn the camera on. Say whistleblower, I hardly know. Alright, alright, alright. Laura, turn the camera on. She said whistleblower. I hardly know her. Alright, alright, alright. And Jane Whannell. Well, ringing the bell. Wow.

Is that the bit bell? It was the bit bell and it's now closed. Too many bits. Too many bits. The market is closed. Hello, everybody. My name's Griffin Newman.

My name is David Sims. It's Blank Check with Griffin and David, of course. That's true. It's a podcast about filmographies. Directors who have

massive success early on in their careers given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce. Baby. Sometimes they look like a rube. That's true. We're doing a series on the films of Jonathan Demme.

It is called Stop Making Podcasts. Rude. And today we are discussing the movie. The movie. The movie.

The movie. I mean, I was thinking, I was like, this is one of the best movies we will ever cover on the podcast. We could do this podcast for 20 more years. That is correct.

And we will never cover above single digits movies greater than this. Right? I think this is the most influential movie you've ever covered. Say maybe The Matrix. Maybe The Matrix or Star Wars. Fletch or Fletch.

Right. In terms of things maybe you don't even realize are influential and then when you watch it you're like, oh of course. This is all of television. It is all of television. It's everything. It's all of podcasting. Yeah all true kind of podcasting. I was watching this last night and getting stressed out

of being like oh fuck I'm like now reckoning with how big an episode this is. How big it is that we're going to cover this movie. It's also a movie that I've seen many times and for a movie about a couple serial killers who like to eat and or tear the flesh off of people

it's extremely rewatchable and kind of comforting at times. This whole movie is fascinating. Anytime I throw it out I'm like oh this is great. I can't wait for Clarice to have another very charged and emotional conversation with the psychopath. I was like worried I wasn't going to like it as much this time.

For reasons we'll probably delve into. But also because I've seen it so many times that I was like, oh, this is so too familiar to me. Because thrillers often you need that element of newness. But no, this movie is fucking great. I had seen this movie once before. What? I saw it when I was in high school. Sorry for yelling.

Yeah. But I saw this movie like 15 years ago, loved it, remembered it almost shot for shot. It's a very memorable movie. It was one of those things where I was like, I have not watched this in 15 years, and every bit of this is like totally stuck vividly in my brain.

But it also was one of those movies where when I watched it when I was 15, and I watched it probably cable fucking full screen or whatever, right? I was like, well, I mean, it's going to be diminished because I've grown up in a post-Sounds of the Lambs climate. I had seen it only after Red Dragon and Hannibal and Hannibal Rising had come out. Superior films, all three, of course.

Right, but I was like, this is going to be- They perfected the Hannibal movie. This is going to be one of those, of course. Right, but I was like, this is gonna be... They perfected the animal movie. This is gonna be one of those things where I see the movie and I appreciate it, but obviously it's lost some of its power because it's been parodied so much, and you've had diminishing returns in the sequels and whatever. And then I watched it, and I was like, this is fucking terrifying. It feels like it was made an hour ago.

Right. This is like searing, and it's stuck in my brain for 15 years, and I watched it last night, and I was like, why don't I watch this every week? Aside from the fact that it is heavy, I have the blue. I have the Criterion blue. The blue is fantastic. Retired bit.

The Criterion. Yes. Yes. Yes. I bought the blue the last time there was a Criterion sale, knowing that Demi was coming up. It is a movie that benefits from extremely high-quality pictures. Cool. I was sort of like watching after this. Not watching. I was going through Blu-ray review sites that were comparing every home video version of the movie. Is that something you would do?

The jump in quality on this blue is like – It's huge. It looks fucking incredible and you realize that the previous like MGM releases were kind of crummy. It is staggering that this movie did not get an Oscar nomination for cinematography, despite being a huge Oscar success. I know. One of the most insane Oscar snubs, considering that The Prince of Tides was nominated for Best Cinematography.

No offense to The Prince of Tides. It is a fine-looking movie. It's stunning when you go, this is one of only three movies in history to win, quote unquote, the big five. Correct. To win picture, director, actor, actress, screenplay. Sure. And then it only had two additional nominations beyond that?

Yeah. That sounds right. And you watch this movie and you're like every single element of this film is so perfect and is so like film school in a box for that respect of craft that you're like how did not get cinematography how did not get score incredible score how did not win editing how did not win sound but the story of the sounds of the lambs is an oscar movie is is like an it will never be replicated it's very strange and you called like two years ago you thought get out was gonna have the sounds of the lambs i don't think it was didn't think it was. Did I think it was going to win, though? You thought it was going to win.

You predicted that and you predicted it on microphone and you were like, I think it's going to be the thing that happened with Sons of the Lambs. Right, right, right, right, right. It came close. It came close. I mean, it won an Oscar and it was nominated for stuff. But it was the same thing of like. But also that was like an unprecedented, incredible year for movies.

It turned out. Like 2017. I will say, I think it lost editing to JFK. I might give JFK that win that is fair JFK has famous editing right

that is fair and JFK was the assumed best picture juggernaut of that year yeah it was

I think the most nominated it was a huge success Oliver Stone had already directed a best picture and had won two best directors correct

and it had come out a Best Picture and had won two Best Directors. Correct. And it had come out in Christmastime. And, you know, it had a zillion famous people in it. And John Williams did the score. America's favorite movie star, The Cause. America's favorite movie star, John F. Kennedy. And, yeah, I know it had The Cause. And then I think that, so that movie was like barreling towards expected success. And The Silence of the Lambs came out February.

It came out on Valentine's Day of that year. Almost exactly the same as Get Out. Right. And did really well or whatever, but it was like a sleeper film that was, you know, a trashy genre movie like to write like on paper. Right. Based on like a best-selling paper the genre they respect the least 100 yeah and so there's all that sort of counting against it and i think what happened was the jfk kind of got hobbled by the backlash of like is this for real oliver stone

is a crackpot like all that zero dark 30 effect started bubbling up and then also oliver stone had like won oscars already so it's not like there's some right yeah and and then also Oliver Stone had like won Oscars already so it's not like there's some right yeah and then I think yeah it just like silence became everyone was just like you know what

it's really good it was kind of like once JFK got hobbled this is Emily Vanderwerf by the way I was going to build to it because I was going to

build a bridge to it a point I wanted to make but then we started talking Oscars cut me back no no no you're in it you're in it

Emily Vanderwerf from Vox, from the Munich episode, from the Alice in Wonderland episode. Thank you for recovering from Futterwack and exposure. Oh, my God. And rallying enough. It usually takes people about six to eight months. Yeah, it's like mono. Post-Futterwack. I went through a thing where I had to watch it once a day.

Of course. Then it was down to once a week a day, then it was down to once a week, and now I'm down to once a month, I think. You can't go cold turkey. You have to go to Methadone. Then you have to watch the mouse through the looking glass clips. You can sort of start to... You have to fuck with time a little bit. But I do think that when the Oscars,

when JFK got sort of hobbled, they weren't going to go for... I think the other nominees were Bugsy and Prince of Tides. They weren't going to go for, I think the other nominees were Bugsy and Prince of Tides. They weren't going to go for those because those didn't have the reviews. So it was between Silence of the Lambs and Beauty and the Beast, and weirdly, Silence of the Lambs is the more Oscar-y movie of those two.

What a fucking five. It's a great five. That is insane. It's a good five because Bugsy is fun. Bugsy's kind of down the middle. Right. And you know what? I stand corrected.

It's not a genre, but animation is the only type of film they respect less than horror. A hundred percent. I mean, I believe the concept at the time was that its nomination was its reward. Here is a breakthrough nomination for an animated film.

Right. Two director nominees were non-picture directors. Yeah. Even though both those films probably should have been nominated for Best Picture. Can you tell me? So Beauty and the Beast doesn't get a picture nomination. No, it doesn't get a director. Iure directors. Yeah. Even though both those films probably should have been nominated for Best Picture. Can you tell me? So Beauty and the Beast

doesn't get a picture nomination. No, it doesn't get a director nomination. I'm sorry, right, correct. And Streisand doesn't get a director nomination, which was a big deal at the time. People made a fuss about, correctly. Right, the movie direct itself.

Okay, so it's Demi, Stone. But the reason Streisand didn't get a Best Director nomination is because of the two people who came in. So the year's 1991. 1991. The year's 1991. 1991. The year's 1991. Two people

come in. One is the youngest Best Director nominee. John Singleton. A phenomenon. Right. And the first African-American nominee and Best Director. Correct. He was 26? I think he was 24. God. The other, RIP John Singleton. The other is a guy

who is a very established director who's a big deal, who made a gigantic hit that was a cultural phenomenon, and I can't believe it wasn't nominated for Best Picture. But he did get the Best Director nomination. Interesting. And has he had other director nominations or wins, or is this like his one?

Plenty of nominations. He's never won. Plenty of nominations. Oh, fuck. Thelma and Louise? Ridley Scott. Like, Thelma and Louise? Ridley Scott. Oh. Like, Thelma and Louise

wasn't nominated is bizarre. Very weird. Very weird. Like, they had to get the Prince of Tides in there? Like, Thelma and Louise was like a sensation. Two lead actress noms,

which is insane. Right. A thing that is so difficult to pull off two actors in one shared lead category. Yeah. So daring that people fuck with category placement to avoid that.

Yeah, they're like, ah, Geena Davis is really supportive. Right, right. Well, like, Prince of Tides and Bugsy and JFK, to some extent, were the movies everyone was like, they're going to be the big Oscar players. Sure. That thing that happens where it's, like, months in advance. Right, right. And then they kind of slid in and like Silence of the Lambs was the movie people actually loved.

It was the movie, I think at the end of the day, everyone was like, you know what? Right. I remember that movie. It was a year ago now and I still remember it.

But it also, it is that thing where like, you know, we'll get into all the nitty gritty of the movie and we'll talk about the controversies and all of that. But just taken as a piece of narrative visual storytelling, it is pretty

unimpeachable. It is dark and profound and full of really interesting themes, some of which are from the book, some of which are original to the movie, but it's also like great popcorn filmmaking. It's so watchable. It's so thoroughly watchable. I'm just going to restate. You can take any single element from this film and use it as a teaching tool. Like this is how you do this.

This is screen acting. This is screen writing. This is cinematography. This is editing. This is sound mixing. You know? This is set design. All of it.

Yeah. The costume. Like everything is just like – I mean and I forgot just fucking how stacked is where it's like – right. Like Demi like discovers like Colleen Atwood you know pretty much like makes her Casey Lemons is in it right right yeah right Christy Zia

is the production designer like everyone on this is just like people who are like just fully coming into their power that thing that is so exciting to watch where like everyone involved in this movie is just figuring out how to do the first perfect job of their career. It's pretty like,

it does just feel like that lightning in a bottle thing. Sure. And the way that we've been like going through Demi and Order like this, it is so exciting to watch like, oh, he's just built it all up. Sure. And look,

this movie could have been directed by Ridley Scott or someone, and it would be a different movie. It'd probably be more of a hard boil movie and it would not have that like empathy and attention to character. The Demi, like this is like Demi's got all these tools that I feel like a director, another director would not have been able to use.

Ridley Scott made his Hannibal movie. I have, I have this, like, I'd love to hear you weigh in on this, Griffin. I have this sort of pet theory that people who are really good at comedy are usually really good at horror. I agree 100%. And vice versa.

Yes. I agree 100%. Jordan Peele. Yes, Jordan Peele. But I also think it is one of the reasons why, by and large, many of the best superhero movies have come from horror directors. I think it is that very specific sort of tonal balancing act. You mean like Shazam?

Shazam, the Raimi Spider-Man films. Sure. James Wan has acquitted himself well in superhero films. He made Aquaman. Yes. About the man of Aqua. Yes. Yes.

But I think superhero films are this very tricky balancing act of tone and control and, you know, a mix of humor and tension, action, all of that. Sure. But that's, yes, comedy and horror are the two genres where the director needs to have complete control of the dial and know how to sort of turn it on the audience. control of the dial and know how to sort of turn it on the audience because you're asking the audience to have a very specific emotional involuntary reaction on a scene by scene basis so it's about that build and release and that sort of like god the fucking camera work in this movie i mean not just like ben and i were talking about the photography itself but you just go like this is just mute this film right you know yeah you could just teach an entire semester at a film school that is this film muted every week.

You just watch it. And it's like his camera is so medium shots, but also all the camera movements are so expressive without being overly showy. The look of the film. I mean, I feel like this is the fundamental mistake that Ridley Scott made where he's like, oh, we should make it look terrifying, because Hannibal Lecter's terrifying. And the thing that's incredible about this movie is it looks kind of banal.

Sure. It's about real people. But it's not very stylized. It's not picturesque. Yes, 100%. I do think the problem with Hannibal is, one, that book is so gothic. It's terrible. He's garbage. Like, purple, right? And Demi famously, of course, reads that book and is like,. It's terrible. It's garbage. Yes, right. Like purple, right?

Yeah. And Demi famously, of course, reads that book and is like, oh, I'm not into this. And Jodie Foster says the same. Yes. And Anthony Hopkins is like, so $25 million? And it's in the bank account already, right? Cool. Gotcha.

So the book is sort of already nudging things in that direction. But yeah, and also the book has the problem of like Hannibal is very effective when he's in prison. Yes. And it's a little less effective when he just is like roaming the Italian countryside. What if I ate another person? Right. What if I wore a fedora? Obviously the TV show eventually figured out how to, but that's, that's a caged Hannibal

in a way too. Cause he's like trying to operate. Yeah. Like that's that show when they finally had him, uh, it's he's three when he was finally on the loose and everyone knew his secret and all of that. Yes. That was that section of the show when it's at its least interest. Yeah.

And it's also when they were like, I don't know, every shot should look like a kaleidoscope. Like when they start being like, let's make the show just look so crazy that that'll sort of, you know, sustain the mood. Do you know what's the thing I feel like I've never acknowledged on the podcast that I feel like better late than never? You're a psychiatrist who eats people? Well, yes. That, of course, is true. And for that reason, this movie is— Should I keep that in?

Keep it in trouble. Representation matters. Exactly. Thank you. You get it. Cannibal psychiatrist. Go on. Sorry.

What's the thing you want to say? Emily, this was the bridge I was going to make in order to introduce you but it took me 30 minutes to talk about it but I was last night while watching the movie curious to see because as you said since the last time you were on this podcast

you have come out and transitioned and you very early on said to us you would like to talk about this movie because that is the sort of messy part of this film's legacy. Yeah. Is its relationship to the trans community. Yeah. So I was curious going into it to see if you had tweeted about this film prior to your coming out because you have written so well in the last year about sort of the years of you living sort of in denial with it.

Right. Suppressing the voice inside of you, the part of you that knew to some degree always who you were. Sure. And that in the last year, it's sort of been, you know, letting yourself actually be the person. Yeah. It's just spewing everything all over the place.

Right. Yeah. Right. And your writing on the subject has been incredible. Thank you. But I was interested to try to find, you know,

if you had public statements about this film on Twitter before, you know, this year. And a lot of them are the things like,

I can't believe this didn't get a cinematography nomination. Fair point. When Demi passed, you're sort of tweeting about him. He's one of my favorite filmmakers. Right, so that's what I was finding.

More and more, just you talk about him being one of your favorite filmmakers, but also I'd forgotten that you were one of the loudest drum bangers during March Madness. Hell yeah. You were a huge fucking Are you always on the Demi train? I was always on the Demi train. I was like, he's never going to win, and then he kept going.

Do the search, David, because there are literally like 80 tweets. There are four separate threads that are Emily just like hardcore campaigning, making the argument, watching it like vote by vote, saying like, I know he's not going to make it past this. I like this one, though. I think Jonathan Demi should direct the halftime show next year. It's a good tweet. That's a great one. I was just thinking about, you know, how they kept trying to make that Gambit movie for years and years and years? Uh-huh. Jonathan

Demme would have directed the hell out of a Gambit movie. Oh, sure. Would have had a lot of like Louisiana color. You know what I mean? A lot of local Cajun kind of like. Right. Yeah. It would have been like his last film. It would have been his last film. Wouldn't it have been great if you guys went from Ricky and the Flash to Gambit. Right, and then he passed. Yeah.

If Gambit had met its original release date, and they had hired Jonathan Demme, it would have been his last film. He would have gotten it made under the wire. Yeah. But I am curious, I mean, you know, you saying you were a little bit worried going into your viewing

of this movie, how you were going to view it through a new lens. How did it sort of change for you or did it not as much as you feared or thought it might? I will admit that some of the some of the it's not even like trans representation

because it's a different idea of what gender transition could mean. And the movie makes that very clear which I had forgotten. The movie has dialogue mostly from Dr. Hannibal Lecter, who has a PhD in psychiatry.

Mm-hmm, yeah. And a PhD in eating people. Right, I forgot that the film- You got that from an underground university. The film has the most intelligent character, even if he is a- Pure psychopath. Cannibal psychopath, right?

Whatever that means. Clearly say he is not a transsexual. Right, yes. Right. Yes. Right. That it's more like he thinks that's what's going on with him, but it's more he's crazy and wants to – It's a sort of misplacement of trauma. He wants to sort of be out of his own skin.

But at the same time – and I'm going to have more to say about this I'm sure throughout the episode. Sure. more to say about this, I'm sure, throughout the episode. At the same time, it flirts with all this iconography of trans people, of transition, in ways that made me uncomfortable. But here's where I think this succeeds in the way that a lot of other trans murderers, this is a trope, have not succeeded,

which is, Jonathan Demme is such a humane director. He gives Buffalo Bill his humanity. It's a diseased and horrible humanity, but he is a person. He is not a twisted freak. He's not gives Buffalo Bill his humanity. It's a diseased and horrible humanity but he is a person. He is not a twisted freak. He's not a boogeyman. It's actually kind of

I think the thing that got the movie in trouble in a way is that he has those segments that are just Buffalo Bill. Yeah. And those are the segments

that I feel like people obviously glommed on to the most. And if he had just kind of like you know excised that Yeah.

And whatever Bill's just not really a character except something that people talk about, then maybe the movie would be worse, I think. But also regarded differently, I don't know. Well, I don't want to be flippant about it, but the thing that was striking me watching it, especially because I had forgotten that they outline a language

so clearly, and sort of consistently trying to define, like, this is not transsexual. We're not saying – I mean there's even that line where she says like transsexuals are docile. They're passive. They're passive. Passive. Yeah.

You know, but like they very clearly say like that does not fit a behavioral pattern. Sure. Yeah. So the movie goes to lengths to try to make that distinction clear. But the thing that is sort of out of the movie's control is the fact that it became such a phenomenon. That's the thing. Right. I mean, it's sort of right.

I mean, it's like I don't think the movie would have had that amount of blowback had it been like a 40 million dollar sort of like, you know, on the level of like Manhunter in terms of like critical recognition. But the fact that it became like this big blockbuster phenomenon and then a Best Picture winner means that like, well, now you have like a lot of dumb people watching the movie. Sure, there's a different responsibility to that. Right, right. I mean, it's like the whole thing that like comes into play with like the destroying culture once and for all

is that like you're in a very different position if you're making a movie for $60 million that you know is going to be released like a blockbuster versus a movie like this where clearly no one involved thought that this was going to be some four quadrants. To the point that De Laurentiis, who owned

the rights, and had made Manhunter was like, yeah, I don't care. Let me give you some advice. Don't make Hannibal Lecter movies. There's no money there. De Laurentiis was like, yeah, I don't care. He's like, let me give you some advice. Don't make Hannibal Lecter movies. Right, right. And then this is a hit and De Laurentiis was like, I've always owned all the Hannibal rights and they're mine. Yeah. And we want to be clear, we're recording this before **** comes out.

It's coming out long after **** Nation has taken form. That's the thing. This is the day of ****, like Thursday night previews or whatever. The last day before New York City burns to the ground. It's also like around the impeachment and the fact that Trump is like tweeting about how like militias are going to rise up. And it's just like it's truly a terrifying time.

And also militias are being installed at theaters playing. I also feel like every other president you'll hear that they like, you know, asked, requested a film print, wanted to watch movies. Trump seems so disinterested in everything. I don't think he's watched a single film. Well, he famously has a short attention span, and his favorite movie is Bloodsport with the dialogue cut out or whatever. There was that weird anecdote that it was like, it's Bloodsport, but Eric fast-forwards through the non-fighting speeds.

No, his favorite movie is Citizen Kane because it's about a very, very wealthy man who marries beautiful women and succeeds wildly. Had a great life and lived a long life. You've seen that interview where he says that, right? He's just like, it's incredible, the things that guy accomplished. I wrote about it for Vox in the summer of 2015.

He was still like a curiosity. And I was like, oh, look at this. Isn't this weird? And they were like, oh, fuck. He was a fully unironic person. I mean, this sort of gets into the Silence of the Lambs thing where it's like someone that dumb can watch Citizen Kane and go like this is an aspirational story of the American dream of a man ascending to power, success, and love and adoration. When it's very clear that the film presents him as a villain and is about how he died feeling totally empty inside. And so in the same way, Sans the Lambs comes out and it doesn't matter if you have characters

go like, this character is not trans, trans people do not behave this way, this is not a pattern. Sure. Because it's still like the dumbest people will view it how they want to. And then as you said, so much of it is that the iconography of this character gets reappropriated into other things. Yeah. Like you think about how many homophobic 90s studio comedies make

Buffalo Bill jokes to some extent or another. It's also just wild that this film, which has Clarice Starling, incredibly iconic character, Hannibal Lecter, also has Buffalo Bill, who becomes an incredibly iconic character in his own right. Right, three characters that, like, you can dress up like them.

Sure. You can, like, put down— They have a voice that you can do. All of it. All of it. Yeah. It is so bizarre. Well, so here's a question for you.

Okay. When you saw this movie, when it came out, when you saw this movie in the years since, as you rewatched it, how did those elements play to you in a point in your life where you were sort of fighting your own transness? Interesting. So the first time I saw this was probably high school. And the controversy around this movie had filtered down to me as like gay people are mad at it. Yes.

It became more of just a general LGBT community. So you saw it knowing there was an argument. I knew because I knew – I think the first Demi movie I ever saw was Philadelphia. OK. And I knew that he had made that because people – he was like, I want to make a movie that has positive gay representation. Right. So you saw it post-Philadelphia. Yeah.

I saw it probably 96, 97 with a girlfriend or whatever. post-Philadelphia. Yeah, I saw it probably 96, 97 with a girlfriend or whatever. And like that was at a time when I was like not aware of these things within myself, but I was also like, anytime I read a thing where like somebody magically transformed

into a woman, I was like, let's see how does that work? Do you have like a how-to somewhere? So I watched this and like, but I just, I think I really just thought of him as a gay man. I really do because those two things got conflated because I remember in high school I spent a lot of time being like, I think I'm gay.

I think I'm gay. But I was like, but just men, I don't think they're very attractive. And that seems like a prerequisite. Right. Hot David. 2019. I don't know. The Hot David train is like stalled. I gotta get some coal and put it back in. But. 2019. I don't know. Yeah. I mean, the hot David train is like stalled. I got to get some coal and put it back in.

Yeah. But yeah. So I was like, I didn't understand what it meant to be gay. And like, there was this idea that like gayness and transness were kind of the same. It's right. Just like a general otherness.

And yeah. Right. Yeah. So like the fact that I was primarily attracted to women was just like a thing that got in the way of me figuring a lot of this out so i think i when i first saw it i really didn't know it and i re-watched it maybe four or five years ago and i was like oh yeah okay but i also was like less offended by it than i thought i was going to be every time i watch it i'm like right this guy is not the worst example of this trope this guy's one of the better examples of this trope. And like,

because Demi is such an empathetic filmmaker, like you said, you know, that really is part of it. Trans people can be murderers. Like we can be murderers if we want to. We can do anything. Put that knife away.

You don't have to prove anything. Emily! Emily! Why did you take out a box of malts? No, but it is I mean you know I think that comes into play obviously with the Buffalo Bill character he could not control the way the movie

sort of got taken away from him and you know given to the culture at large I think a lot of the negative impressions I think about how many fucking like Buffalo Bill impressions are like problematic you know or like scenes where people do the talk or whatever it is. Like the elements from this have been stripped and sort of repurposed in a way that does

feel negative. Like the really bad version of this is the Danish girl. Literally. Right. That is a movie that reappropriates a lot of this image in a way it thinks is supportive and is horribly, horribly transphobic. I could not stop thinking about the Danish girl while watching this movie. Interesting.

I have not thought about the Danish girl again because I took a serious psychological action to bar it from my memory. You genuinely like re-closeted me. Because like I saw it right around when it came out and I was like – I was at Vox. So I was finally like – I had a little security and I was like, I could start thinking about this gender stuff. And I saw the Danish girl. I was like, no, no. Was it just because you were just like, well, no, it's not this. Whatever this is is not what I'm after.

Yeah, because it was so unrepresentative. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's such a terrible movie on most levels. like sort of consciously Oscar Beatty sort of movie and a movie that is going to such great pains to tell itself that it's being empathetic and humanist and sort of thoughtful and caring about it

and is a movie that just seems to have no insight into its characters no understanding, feels genuinely very exploitative and very unrepresentative of everything I've heard from any trans person I've ever spoken to or read word from or anything. Right.

And also his performance is terrible. It is really. His performance is so fucking bad. It is really hard. His performance is very bad. It is really hard to be cis and understand what it is to be trans. Yes. It's just like a gap.

And I wrote a lot. I wrote about the trans finale. I just read it. Yes. I wrote a lot about Jeffrey Tamron. I think he got close. Yeah. For what a monster person he is.

I think he got close. But he still was like there was an element of I am copying a thing I've seen other people do, which is acting. Which is acting, sure, or an element of acting. The problem is that acting is so close to what society thinks trans people are doing that then it becomes like, oh, you're just – you're Jared Leto in Dallas Buyers Club. Another terrible performance. Here's the thing I was thinking of. Dallas Buyers Club. Another terrible performance. I was like, here's the thing I was thinking of.

When I first dropped out of college and was auditioning for stuff, I had Law & Order SVU audition that was to play a trans girl where they were only seeing cis men to play the role. And there was like 15 sentences

in the email devoted to we want to be clear clear the character is not gay it is not a cross-dresser okay like they were like people are like reading the sides and not getting it because the concept was sort of like in the media up until that point so often just as you said presented as oh this is someone playing a woman. You know? Yeah. That there wasn't really empathetic.

No. Sort of well-rounded trans characters in media. And that people, I guess, were coming in for the audition and going like, oh, it's like a drag queen. Right? Like that's what it is. Right. Right. Yeah.

Even when you see like Felicity Huffman in Transamerica who's okay. Okay. There's still like a real focus on like, oh, she's got a penis. Like it's, you know, it's a fetishistic gawker-y thing that Demi just because of the nature of the kind of filmmaker he is. I don't think he had special insight into transgender people or gay people or anything. I think that he just like understood that Buffalo Bill was in pain. Buffalo Bill wanted something other than what he was. Buffalo Bill could not transcend himself.

Yeah. And like he depicted that and he got – I don't want to say he got close to depicting the trans experience because he didn't. But he got like – he got an element of it in a really weird and twisted way. I think, yeah. I think, you know, as you're saying, the baseline empathy from which he always operates gives him a major leg up, you know? And that's something you can't really, like, develop in the way you can develop your skills as a visual filmmaker.

He was born with, you know, by all accounts, a greater sort of pool, a greater depth of emotional sort of understanding than most people. So that's, you know, really his special sauce as a director is that he comes into it with that strength as a person. But I think the other element is when you read interviews with Demi, as I've been reading more and more stuff for this podcast and watching interviews with him and stuff. I want to listen to the commentary.

I forgot to. I was going to try and pull that out. And it's him. It's him and Tally and Foster and the FBI guy. And Hopkins. It's like five of them. Yeah. But he is for, you know, the people who are viewed as like major kind of like a tourist

filmmakers, certainly the people who have won the Oscar, most of the people we've covered on this podcast, he might have the least ego of all of them or had. And he talks so openly about like, I hire people who know what they're doing better than I do. I give them a lot of free reign. You know, if I hire a cinematographer, it's because I know I'm not a cinematographer. I'm not trying to impose my thoughts on them. I'm collaborative.

But like if someone's doing something good, I want them to take all the credit for it. And I think, you know, by an extension of that, he is very good or was very good at knowing what he didn't know and understanding what he could not inherently understand so that he could hand those elements over to other people and not just try to sort of, you know, impress his perception of things over the entire film. One of the complaints against Demi in the March Madness in the Reddit, and I think Alex Ross Perry made this argument, is that he doesn't have a big footprint. Right, right, right. Yes. And I think that he doesn't have a signature shot.

He doesn't have a signature shooting style. I would say he has a signature shot. The close-ups. I think the first person. I think he have a signature like shot. He doesn't have a signature shooting style. I would say he has a signature shot. The closeups. I think that, but I think he has a signature. I think the closeups feed into his signature approach, which is all of his movies are about the transactional nature of human relationships. And every,

he understands that every scene is between two people and it's about who's giving and who's taking and who's getting and who's, you know, I mean, this is his masterpiece in that regard. And like that, like he realizes this is a horror movie, but it's a horror movie about the banality of like horror and like how it's just horror is always just two people

and one is stabbing somebody. If I can quote you to you and read a couple of your tweets from earlier this year when you were banging the Demi drum. And this was directly in response to this, right? I mean, you were pointing out like, you know, people saying he doesn't fit in as a blank check director.

He feels so terribly about the LGBT pushback to Tom Salam's. He convinces the studio to fund the first major studio film about the AIDS crisis and it wins Tom Hanks an Oscar and it's a hit.

Philadelphia Imperfect, but it's a blank check that clears. Airtight argument there, right? Yes. But then, as you sort of said here, what is Demi's signature? What makes him interesting? Demi is one of the most radically humane and empathetic directors who have ever lived. He loves humans and the shit we do and all our strength and all our weaknesses.

Demi is a director who, whatever he tried, he could do it. Music videos, documentaries, features, TV pilots, live TV. He just thought people were fascinating and made great art accordingly. It is very appropriate PTA, the DNA splice of Demi and Altman loves him so. Now, I think that's a really other strong point when people talk about like, why doesn't he have a signature style, which I disagree with a little bit, not disagreeing with you, but the people who say that. It's not, it's not a Scorsese style. No, it's not showy. Well, I think that's the big point is that it's not that he was a chameleon who adapted to whatever he was doing, but he tried to engage with the material first as a human and then figured out the style that best benefited the story being told in the most sort of emotionally intelligent way possible. intelligent way possible.

Right. So you look at Silence of the Lambs which is very stylish in a lot of ways but also compared to most crime thrillers most movies of this ilk feels so stripped down

and almost neorealist. Yes. When in fact there is a lot of crazy heightened elements in terms of the actual filmmaking of what he's doing.

Yeah. But it's like you know That's me eating something. He never has a camera movement that isn't entirely motivated. I love his camera movements, though. You know, and it's like he's just like this really fucking elegant magician where it's like,

I'm just going to bring your eyes right over to the thing that you need to pay attention to right at this moment. His camera movements in this movie are always, I don't want to look at this thing, but I have to look at this thing. It hangs back and it goes. I don't want to look at this thing, but I have to look at this thing. It hangs back and then it goes. And you even feel the tension in the sort of, I mean, it's a lot of handheld movements, you know? And they're fairly smooth, but you can feel the actual physical presence of a person reluctantly lurching towards swinging around to. I mean, it's also has like one of the most iconic, like five of the most iconic, the shot of her in the elevator, that opening, you know, very right at the opening. Right.

Surrounded by the boys. And she's very, she's a short person, Jodie Foster. Very little. The like, you know, the shot of any shot of like Hannibal leaning in. Yeah. When you see him in the like reflected in the glass and everything like. But that's like another thing that's kind of stunning about this movie that I was like,

am I going to like roll my eyes a little bit watching it now, which is, it has now become such a big thing for, uh, you know, straight white male directors to make movies about the way that women are impressed, oppressed within society.

Sure. To be like, look, I get it. And very often, even if their intentions are correct, it's like they put their foot on the gas way too hard. Yeah.

You know? And this is a movie where like every single scene is affected by the fact that she's a woman. But it's almost always affected in terms of body language or in terms of blocking. It is very rarely directly stated in the text of the script. This whole movie, its theme is again, transactional relationships between men and women. And it never says anything about it. It's just like,

this is a movie about what it is to be a woman in this world, which I love in her relationship with the Scott Glenn character, which in the book is sexual in the book. They have more of like an affair and he takes that out of the movie. Or I don't know if him or Ted Talley decided to do that but like that's not in this movie but like no they neither of them ever acknowledge where he I mean there's that one

scene where he kind of acknowledges like yes I'm using you to excite Lecter because I know you will and like most of my guys he would just shut down he says that you're pretty in a way where he will at least give you the time of day but she never like has a speech where she's like you used me which like know, like so many movies would have that moment where she sort of like wags her finger in his face. And he's like, what are you going to do?

The only other moment that makes it explicit is the moment when they're in the car driving back after they do the autopsy. And Scott Glenn's like taking a nap. And then he wakes up and is like, I really upset you back there when I said the thing about us not discussing in front of women, right? And she was like, yeah, and he's like, you understand, I just had to throw these guys off my scent. And she was like, it matters what you say. He's great.

I mean, she's amazing, obviously. Yeah, but like what a perfect scene and what a great encapsulation of Demi, which is like, it matters what you say. Like in an era where, you know, people get so defensive when their work is criticized, Demi took the sort of – the complaints about Sons of the Lambs and was like, I'm going to make an entire movie to try to positively counter the effects of what this might have done in terms of LGBT perception. His conclusion from this was he wasn't ashamed of Buffalo Bill. He didn't think of Buffalo Bill as like a gay, trans,

bisexual, whatever. But he was like, I didn't realize how few positive representations of gay people there are. I'm going to make one. What a dude. What a guy. I did want to like, you talking. So I watched this movie a lot when after I first saw it.

And like I when I sort of when I was coming out, I was like, I used to watch The Matrix a lot. I wonder if that was anything. So when I was watching this last night and it was, as a matter of fact, when I was watching this last night, I was like, I watched this a lot. Did I feel something for Buffalo? I was like, no, I was for Clarice. When I saw Clarice, I was like, oh, this is how I perceive the world. But of course, I didn't fucking know that. I was like, I watch this a lot. Did I feel something for Buffalo? I was like, no. It was for Clarice. When I saw Clarice, I was like, oh, this is how I perceive the world. But of course, I didn't fucking know that. I was like 15. But it was just like, oh, I get this.

Yeah. I get how she sees the world, how she interacts with it. Yeah. And how the world interacts with her. I mean, the movie is so good at like anytime she walks into a room without overstating it, without cutting to a bunch of close-ups, without having dialogue and making too much of a meal out of it, really

showing the way the temperature of the room changes. Whether it's because these guys are sexually attracted to her, whether it's because they can't believe that she's in this room, she seems unqualified, they think she's at risk. They're intimidated by her.

Whatever it is, every scene is people in some way being affected by the fact that she seems so outside of the person who is usually doing this job. Have you guys talked about Foster on this show at all? Because this is like she goes hard after this role. I don't think we've covered a Foster before. Is that possible? Is that possible? We've never covered a Foster? I feel like we haven role. I don't think we've covered a Foster before. Is that possible? Is that possible we've never covered a Foster? I feel like we haven't talked about her. Let's take

a quick look at her filmography. No. We've not. I mean, and it's crazy because this is her second Oscar. It is, yes. You know, and someone where like the first Oscar was like, oh, that's nice. She graduated. She's not a child star anymore. Right, right. But also it was somewhat of a surprise.

She was a pretty young winner. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then just three years later, she wins a second Oscar because it's kind of like. Undeniable. Yeah. I mean, like, I don't like Hanks's performance in Forrest Gump.

Yeah. But he won the Oscar and I think he won the Oscar because people were like, well, I mean, that movie is him. He has to win. Right. You know, even though he just won. Sometimes those multiple winners, I mean, Kevin Spacey being another one, where you're kind of

like, why the fuck did he win? He just won. And it was just at the time people were like, well, he has to win. It was just some weird overriding thing. If you think this is the best picture of the year, it is entirely based around his performance. The Green Book thing, kind of. Like, yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, that's why Mahershala, because everyone who voted for Best Picture

then has to, by extension, think that's the best performance of the year. Right. And it's not a showy performance. It is not the kind of performance that usually, no, Jodie's. Oh, Jodie. It's not like,

it is not the kind of performance that usually wins Best Actress. No. Because usually Best Actress is screaming and plate-throwing. So 100%. Yeah. Yes, because most of the movie is

her in extreme close-up, trying to show as little emotion as possible. Right. Trying to sell Steely to whoever she's talking to. 100%. And it's those close-ups that are her friend because she can do the flicker of an eye. The little trembles in her voice and in her face and all that. I mean, obviously she has like one of the great oscar monologues or exchange you know the silence of the lambs model you know like that is anyone would remember that coming

out of the movie but it's not a big yelling performance right but also yes that that's uh it's a big monologue on paper that is like oh man, man, this is a home run Oscar nomination slam dunk. Sure. But 99 out of 100 people would have gone much bigger with that monologue. Yes. And 99 out of 100 actors, directors would have demanded. Demanded big. Right. Covered it a different way.

Cry, something, right? Right. Like, I don't know. Right. I mean, she's really recounting it as sort of like absolute trauma. Yes. You know, I mean, she's. And also he's found this thing. Right.

Very quickly, which is his skill. Right. Because Crawford's immediate warning is like, don't let him in your head. Yeah. And he's like, yeah, I found the box. Let's open the box. And she's like, no, I don't want to open that box. I want to do this thing.

And she's like, we're going to open this box. Right. Oh, Hannibal Lecter would have had a field day with old me. I mean, well, that's the thing. I mean, he's like, obviously, Hannibal Lecter would have had a field day with old me. I mean well that's the thing I mean he's like obviously Hannibal Lecter. Spoiler alert does like to eat people.

He eats them up. No good. Don't do it. But he is also there's the thing right. And then the cop is talking about Buffalo Bill when he talks

about like is he a vampire. Right. But like that's what Hannibal is. He's like a vampire. He like wants to eat your feelings too.

He loves it. Like it's his favorite thing. If he thinks you're like a gauche, you know, idiot like Chilton or whatever, he has like no use for you. He just wants to like eat your body. Right. But like if you're like Clarice, he's like I want to like open up your brain and like eat your emotions. Well, they also like everyone warns her like, you know, this is the thing he's going to do. Don't give him an inch.

If he gets inside your head, you're fucked. Right. And they sell it as like he will weaponize it in some way. He will use it to destroy you or get himself out of prison or whatever it is. Right. Weirdly, though, he's a mentor. Well, that's the thing.

That's what this relationship is. Duality is what makes it so great. That's what this relationship is. Duality is what makes it so great. But I also think the thing is he misses getting to do his job. Sure. Like, you know, he wants to get into people's head. Could have been a chef. That's the biggest thing.

Yeah. Good cut. Yeah. Or a butcher even. Yeah. Because the books make this clear and then the show made it very clear. It's like he eats people he thinks are rude. He doesn't like rudeness and then he's going to eat you up. Yeah. Because the books make this clear and then the show made it very clear. He eats people he thinks are rude. He doesn't like rudeness

and then he'll eat you up. Or he eats people to sort of gain their power. He'll eat other killers, things like that. But the cannibalism got in the way of his psychiatry career. But with Will Graham or whoever, he's not necessarily like, I want to eat you up. Yeah, he wants to

utterly dismantle Will Graham. And like in the show, it's very explicit. It's a homoerotic thing where he's like, if I can get you to fall in love with me, then you will just totally like fall apart. That's why Tumblr exploded when that show came out. But that's like, you know, I guess what I'm trying to say is psychiatry for him isn't a cover. It's not means to an end. I think he genuinely gets off on the fact that he is

this fucking good at it. And the worst punishment for him in terms of being in prison is that he doesn't have access to people he can pull apart that way. And the thing with Buffalo Bill is like, he's like, yeah, I know that guy.

He's lame. Like, you know, he thinks he's this, but I immediately figured him out and like that he was no fun. Right. Anthony Held is boring to him. Well, Anthony Held, right, is just, he's just, I want to eat you up because you're awful. Right.

So Clarice is like. He is a gauche, crass man. Right. Which he hates. Right. Clarice is, for the first time in a long time, him having someone who he can really chew on. Right. No pun intended like this

is an interesting psychological you intended that pun intended baby I was kidding that pun was intended you intended it I intended it no but it's like for him I mean I think the quid pro quo thing is literally like I need to get something out of this

and what I want to get out of it is like let me play my favorite sport again. Right. Like let me do a couple rounds in the batting cage. I can't figure you out and you're interesting. The elements don't line up. You're 4'11". You sound like Holly Hunter.

You're still in training. Right. They sent you here and you seem to be a lockbox of emotions. Right. Yeah. Right. But you're also not playing hard ass with me. You're not trying to be a man. You're not trying to be a lockbox of emotions. Right, yeah. But you're also not playing hard ass with me. You're not trying to be a man.

You're not trying to be a ball buster. What's your fucking deal? How did you end up here? In Red Dragon slash Manhunter, we're at the tail end of his relationship with a law enforcement guy. And so when Will goes to see him, it's almost like like old boyfriends right

like it's he's like that's the same awful cologne and will is clearly like uncomfortable because it's like yeah we did we did the whole thing we like sucked each other dry and will is like and clarice is like new you know yeah will is like the tv show that he's been watching for years and years and still watches out of obligation but but he's pretty much gotten all the narrative juice he's going to get out of that thing. Clarice is, like you imagine, the first interesting person he's been able to have extended conversations with.

We all love Frankie Faison. He's great. He's very charming in this movie. But there's only so much conversation they're having, I guess. You know what's a thing I love that this movie does? Almost every actor with more than three lines is billed in the opening credits. Yes.

Oh, great opening credits, too. That font. Can I get a t-shirt with that font on it? You know, the black letters with the white borders? Super Yaki, pay attention. I saw Chris Isaac there

and I was like, wait, Chris Isaac's in this? And his character name is literally like FBI team leader or something. I believe it is. SWAT commander.

And Daniel Van Bargen. Daniel Van Bargen. Roger Corman is in this movie. He plays the FBI director. Yes, he does. Yeah. Obviously, you have like classic demiguise like Charles Napier and. Tracy Walter.

And what's the guy? You know, Dick Miller, the guy who's in everything. Who's the funeral director? What's that guy? The funeral. I think that's Tracy Walter. Who's the guy who's Bob the Goon in Batman? No. Well, I

get faces mixed up. Okay. It is. Dick Miller is in this, right? I don't know if Dick Miller's in it. I think he made that up. He's in something else I just watched. I take it back. A different Demi? Not a different. Not a Demi. Okay. Yeah, I just love that. I love a movie that loves its actors enough that it's like, these people deserve opening credit.

And he's an actor director. Oh, yeah. Actors love to work with him. And, like, he gets great fucking casts. From 1980 to 1991, he only has one film that does not get an acting nomination. Hmm. And he gets four wins? Four wins if you're including this?

He gets four acting wins. It's Tom Hanks, Steve Bergen. Oh, you mean over his career, yes. Yeah, I'm saying, right, so that's pretty crazy that it's like for a decade, he only makes one film that doesn't get an acting nomination. And it should've. Right, it should've gotten fucking three acting nominations.

That's your favorite film, I believe, right? That's your favorite Demi, is something you want. That's your number one, yeah. It is crazy that, like, Leota didn't get nominated for that,

Griffith didn't get nominated for that, Daniels didn't get nominated for that. We'll dive into that. We'll have already Dove. Flash. We will have Diven. Yes, but yes,

he was such an actor's director and was such an actor's director and was such an actor's friend. And I feel like the Demi close-up thing is like when people see movies that have close-ups this good, I think they first think, wow, this movie is well shot. And then they think, oh, wow, these actors are good that they can hold a close-up this while. Yeah. And the thing they don't think about is, especially if it's like first-person POV, that is a very, very vulnerable thing to ask an actor to do. It is incredibly unnatural to do a scene where you are staring at the camera rather than your scene partner. Or even staring at your scene partner but the camera is right next to their face. It is super fucking uncomfortable. And unnatural. It kills the is super fucking uncomfortable. Yes. And unnatural.

It kills the reality of what you're doing. So often you're trying to be aware of where the camera is, but kind of ignore it and not look at it. And in order to get that down, which like, you know, Barry Jenkins is the heir apparent who has nailed that in the modern day. Yes.

There's a reason why those two guys are known for their sense of empathy and their love of actors and their protection of actors and of the process and all of that because in order to make those shots work you need to create a very specific kind of environment and a level of trust I asked Barry about it when I interviewed him and he talked about how like

the for Beale Street Kiki had never been in a movie before basically Kiki Lane and so she no but she was less disturbed by it. Oh, interesting. Because she was not really used to movie acting. She didn't have to untrain herself. Right, whereas like Stefan James, the other

actors were more like, it's unsettled by that, like look right into the camera. Which like, both of those directors use those shots to convey very specific emotions and place you in those moments. So like in Sansa Lambs, it's almost always someone feeling terror at what they're watching

and they're having to play it against a lens. You know, that's a tough thing to do. I think what this movie understands is that to be in Clarice's point of view, you can never literally be in her point of view. Yes. Like the famous, of course, the famous shot in the last sequence when Buffalo Bill is like reaching out

for her. And it's just like, you become her in that moment because you understand her as like an object of what he wants. Yeah. Similarly to how, when we see her from Hannibal's point of view, um,

this is the thing I read. He, like he said, he never had her look at the camera because then she's always like five degrees off. Yeah. Yeah. Whereas when you look at it, Hannibal, he her look at the camera because then – She's always like five degrees off. Yeah. Whereas when you look at Hannibal, he's looking at the camera because that orients you in what she's seeing. Totally.

So it's a fascinating way of tricking you into having her point of view without really doing her point of view. He was a very, very intuitive filmmaker because you look like – the sort of like visual language on display in this movie is insane and so fucking complicated and so risky and you're like this should not work you should not be able to cover scenes in this way but you get the sense that he just sort of grappled onto every scene every line of dialogue every shot and went what's the best way to convey this sure and he always had a really good understanding of what this was. His analysis of what he was trying to get at was really good. And this is like the movie where it just

totally coalesces and he just figures out, like, when do you need to be in her shoes? When do you need to be seeing her through someone else's eyes? You know? It's always the right decision and it's always to the right degree. And I think it speaks to another one of his strengths, the idea of

collaboration, is he saw how much Jodie Foster wanted to be in this movie. She was not his first choice. She was like his fifth choice. If she wants to do it this badly, she's probably got something. Let's do some context. Thank you for queuing that up. Thank you, Emily. This book, the book came out in 88.

And it was a big hit. Good book. It's a great book. David Foster Wallace called it basically the best American novel of the decade. Does the book- He was obsessed with it and would read it constantly. Come out after Manhunter is released. Yes, it does. The movie.

Comes a couple years after Manhunter. Manhunter, obviously, we covered it on this podcast and it kind of went nowhere. Was not a big hit. Yeah. Orion Pictures, which by the time this movie came out was basically defunct right or getting close to defunct right

but they optioned the film with Gene Hackman who was going to direct it that's crazy you didn't know that no Hackman I think

wanted to play Jack Crawford and direct it that was the take that's so telling for like a movie star at that point in his career to go like, well Jack Crawford's the hero of the movie.

I'm not going to play Hannibal Lecter because that's the monster. Maybe he just thought he could. I don't know. But also, when you read the book, and of course people point out, Hannibal's not in a ton of the movie, even though he is totally a lead and it's indisputable. I will get into this. Please remind me to get into this later.

Okay. Do you disagree with me? No, I agree with you but I came with fucking stats. Good, thank you. I did the fucking work last night. Yeah, because the stat is wrong. The stat is wrong. It's hellishly wrong

and it's been repeated endlessly. The stat is wrong. We will circle back around to it but I brought my fucking numbers. I did the fucking work. Everyone's wrong. Everyone is wrong. Well, it's one of those

screen time things is people clicking whenever they're actually on screen. Thank you. We'll get to it. Hackman wants to make the movie. Did Hackman ever direct a movie? I don't think so. That's so weird. He is a legend and we do stan. He's a legend, Mr. Wayne. Right, exactly.

Do we stan? Have you seen his Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives performance? No. Sounds good. Guy Fieri. Sounds good. Guy Fieri, one season, it's like 2008 or something. One season, he goes to a place in Santa Fe. He's like sitting down talking to the customers.

One of them is Gene Hackman. It is not entirely clear that Guy Fieri knows it's Gene Hackman. Obviously, they figured out once he signed a release or whatever. He just thinks like, oh, it's an old man getting brunch. And like Gene Hackman's like, yeah, I like the breakfast here. And like it's his, I believe on IMDb it's his last credited. That would be. That would be his most recent.

He might go to his grave with that being his last. I'm always surprised when people don't know about that. Like, yeah, there's a, if you look on YouTube, Gene Hackman, Diners, Drive-Ins and Drives. Yeah. That is incredible. Okay. They bring in Ted Talley to write the adaptation ted tally was not a big screenwriter at the time but whatever i don't know um he wrote like white palace i don't

know um and he writes the script and hackman is like this is too violent i don't want to make this yeah and withdraws sure which love Gene, but what the fuck? Right. You didn't see this coming? Whatever. It doesn't matter. The funding falls through. Orion, instead of giving up, is like, no, this is interesting.

This script is interesting. Let's find another director. They get Demi. Demi reads it and is like, this is great. I'll do it. And after that, it's like, wrap it. They just go. Because you'll read interviews with Demi collaborators. And by and large, in the Demi camp at that time, people were like, Jonathan, why the fuck are you making this movie?

Right, right. Not because the script doesn't go, but they were like, this seems completely out of whack with everything you've been building in your career. You don't seem like someone who wants to spend this much time in darkness. Right. You know? He goes to... His two least successful movies from a creative standpoint up until that point in time are the two that are

thrillers. Last Embrace and... What? Fighting Mad. Yeah. Right? Yeah. So he goes to Michelle Pfeiffer who he just worked with. Jodie Foster's like, I want to do it. And he's like, I'm going to talk to Michelle who he just did Married to the Mob with. Married to the Mob. She turns it down.

She didn't like the subject matter. She does say it was a difficult decision. He went to Meg Ryan, who turned it down. Too violent. Went to Laura Dern, who the studio said, no thank you. Because I guess Laura Dern's pretty young at that point. Laura Dern's kind of like...

And she was so dewy at that point. I saw Blue Velvet the other day, revival screening, and you forget how much of the Laura Dern like thing for so long was just like innocence encapsulated. Sure, sure. That was Lynch's original like use of her. Right, but even through like Jurassic Park is just like this is someone who's just like a ball of light and excitement for dinosaurs. God, I fucking love her in Jurassic Park. She's so good in Jurassic Park. I will say though, I think

those other three people all probably would have won the Oscar playing this part. I think so, yeah. As long as it all gelled, I would agree with you. Pfeiffer for sure. Pfeiffer would have won the Oscar. But that's the thing about Pfeiffer is it's just outrageous that she doesn't have an Oscar. Yeah, it's outrageous. Was she one of the ones who lost to Foster the first time?

If so. She might have been in Supporting. No, I think you're right. But if so, what a fuck up. Because that first Foster Oscar, you can give that to one of the other. Foster should not have won that Oscar. Yeah. No offense to her.

No, but that's one of. Glenn Close lost that one. And Michelle Pfeiffer was in Supporting, I think. I need to find this one of... Glenn Close lost that one. And Michelle Pfeiffer wasn't supporting, I think. I need to find this. Okay, Glenn Close, you're right. It's when Michelle is for... Because Michelle should have won for Fabulous Baker Boys. That's her greatest performance.

It's a great movie. Your mom's favorite movie of all time? Along with I Know Where I'm Going. For sure. Those are the top two. Foster, Glenn Close for Dangerous Liaisons. Melanie Griffith for Working Girl, which was a big one at the time Meryl Streep for A Dingo Ate My Baby

and Sigourney for Gorillas in the Mist that weird two nomination year of hers that's a weird year of a bunch of people who seemed like an inevitable Oscar win in the next decade and then still have not won like Sigourney was just like oh Sigourney's gonna win any day now Michelle Pfeiffer's gonna win any day now

they will continue dominating, Glenn Close is gonna win any day now she Michelle Pfeiffer's gonna win any day now. They will continue dominating. Glenn Close is gonna win any day now. She's gonna, right? I think the wife will pull it out this year. I think this year. What if they just resubmit it

every year? They're like, the wife? She's still a wife? Yeah. So, still a wife. She's still a wife.

Still the wife. What if they, what if they re-release it? What if she remarried? The wife too. What if they re-release it and just call it The Wife Too, Still Wifin'? What if Clint Eastwood And otherwise the film is unchanged, just different title cards. What if they re-release it? What if she remarried? The wife two. What if they re-release it and just call it The Wife Two Still Wifin'?

What if Clint Eastwood... And otherwise the film is unchanged. There's a different title card. What if Clint Eastwood made The Wife Two? Like, that would be a great fucking movie. That would be... I would love to see that movie. He would get it.

They railroaded her. Nobel Prize jerks. They wouldn't let her be a wife. All she wanted was to be a wife. This is the thing. It's like, he made Changeling. Changeling is the same thing with it. It's not like it's only the Richard Jules of the world that Clint Eastwood wants to be like, they railroaded him.

You know, like as long as they've been railroaded, Clint is intrigued. Clint distrusts everyone. But his sweet spot is when the person who's being railroaded is someone who should ostensibly be hailed as a hero. Right. Yes, 100%. Which is true as a hero. Right. Yes. A hundred percent. Otherwise. Which is true of the wife.

Right. From the wife. Totally. She should be hailed as a hero and given a Nobel Prize. Fuck. Clint Eastwood should have directed the wife. There could have been like a Nobel Prize scene like in Sully. Yeah. Where the board is like, well, I don't think you wrote these books.

And she's like, let's get serious now. I thought you were saying that Sully won the Nobel Prize, which is true. He won the Nobel Prize. He swept the board that year. Sully's so serious now. I thought you were saying that Sully won the Nobel Prize, which is true. He did. He won the Nobel Prize. Yeah. He swept the board that year. Sully's so fucking good. He won the MacArthur, Venus Grant. I hope Sully wins best picture. Did he get a Googfell?

Yeah. He got a Googfell. This is Ben's new thing. Ben's new thing is he's going to get a Googfell. Yeah. 2020. And he plans to get it in the field of calling it a Googfell. What were you going to say?

Do you think Sully's going to win Best Picture this year? I feel like this might finally be its year. It's overdue because you go four years in a row without it winning Best Picture. It's pretty embarrassing. It's a blanket on the academy. It would win Best Picture if they had the Oscars in July. They should have put it in July.

Fleabag won the Emmy. It's time for Sully. I think that is what the universe is telling us. 100%. Tony Rich, I lied! Fleabag won the Emmy. Toto had so richly deserved. It's time for Sully. I think that that is what the universe is telling us. 100%. Yes. For the role of Dr. Hannibal Lecter, Jonathan Demme wanted one man and one man only.

I gotta guess this. Do you know? I think I know. Go on. I'm forgetting. It's funny, right? I guess so. It's obvious.

It is the obvious choice at the time. It is the obvious choice at the time. It is the obvious choice at the time? I would say so. Do you know who I'm talking about? Yeah. I mean, it's very much a guy who got approached for a zillion of these kinds of roles. Who was it? Sean Connery.

Oh, of course. You know, like, and instead of Scotland, he found a Welshman. But like, you know what I mean? But that. Big gravitas actor. Yeah. Older. You know, will command the camera.

Right. That would not have worked, though. No. Because you're like, well, it's a very different movie. But you're like, of course, Brian Cox, another Scotsman had already played him. But you're like, Foster's perfect. But the Pfeiffer movie would have worked. The Meg Ryan movie would have worked. Who was the other one you said?

Laura Dern. Who knows about that? Was there one other non-Laura Dern one? She would have worked. Anyway. I mean, she's the one? She would have worked. Anyway. She would have been great. But it would have set her career on a whole different trajectory. Very much so. Yes. Connery though, the movie would have

folded in on itself. It would have been Finding Forrester. It would have. Literally. Right. You just would have been like, you're the cop now, dog. Or even in the best case scenario. Eyes open, boy. What if he'd said that? Keep your eyes open for Buffalo Bill He's out there Best case scenario is it would have become

The Hunt for Red October The game is on He is good in that But that's my point It would have been like Sterling Popcorn Entertainment That suffers a little bit from having to fold into his movie star magnitude Instead it was Starling Popcorn Entertainment. I let myself out.

This is outrageous. I've made like 18 terrible jokes. Perfect joke. Perfect joke. Perfect 10 comedy points. I mean, and then there's this thing where it's like other actors considered for the role, which I feel like is probably just like, I don't know, some studio list they found. Yeah.

Al Pacino, who in 1991 or whatever would have gone ham. He would have been crazy. Robert De Niro, who probably would have gone the other way, really locked in. Dustin Hoffman. I mean, what the fuck? This is a stupid list. Derek Jacoby, that's his curveball. A little more

of like a theatrical presence type guy. And Daniel Day-Lewis. I don't think any of those work. I think Jacoby would have Day-Lewis. Uh-huh. But. I don't think any of those work. I think Jacoby would have been too close to what Brian Cox had already done. Yeah. Not that anybody knew Manhunter, but like. That is fair.

Now, Anthony Hopkins was a guy who was nowhere. Right. He had had this young career that was promising. Right. Where he's in, you know, a lot of theater. Magic and the Dresser. Magic and Bridge Too Far. And then he's in The Elephant Man, Where he's in, you know, a lot of theater. Magic and the Dresser. Magic and Bridge Too Far. And then he's in The Elephant Man,

which he's fantastic in. But that's 81? 80. 80, jeez. So, you know, that's like a decade ago. And, you know, then it's like,

I don't know, fucking, I mean, The Bounty, which was kind of a famous flop, but then like The Dawning, a chorus of disapproval. I've never heard of this shit.

Yeah, he's kind of just in the margins he's a nobody yeah like he's a nobody that's right right but he was like in that position of like this is someone that everyone agrees is a good actor

but he's not a movie star and doesn't have any clout which is probably one reason that you get him because I guess a lot of these bigger actors probably like either like too

gross or not he's a supporting character anyone who's too established I think would be afraid to take on this role and have it fight with their star persona. That list that you read and knowing that Hannibal is supposed to be European,

just vaguely European. Right, he's supposed to be right. Would Pacino have done a Euro trash accent? Oh boy. Did we get deprived of that? He would have been so good. Pacino, come on. He would have killed it. Yeah.

Come on, do it. But it's the same. I eat his liver. Bala beans and an ice chianti, baby. Closer. Come closer. But like Baldwin talks about Hunt for Red October and he was like it was such a big deal like Clancy was huge

Baldwin's a real baby face when he's making that right right Jack Ryan was so huge he was like I remember getting on a plane and seeing that every other person was reading a Jack Ryan novel and going like holy shit I'm about to be the next massive iconic character and he was like and then all

of that went out the window when they hired Connery because the movie became Connery's show. The entire thing became in service of Connery. Not because he was a diva, but because he is this like supernova. You know, all powerful, commanding. 100%.

He's only a couple years removed from an Oscar win himself. He has become like grand old man Connery. Right. But also that he's just like, yeah, I'm going to use my voice. And the character is Russian. Everyone talks about him being Russian and everyone is like, we're not even going to pretend. It's Connery.

You know what you pay him to do. That's the whole thing. Same with – he's like, I'm from Chicago. I'm a Chicago gangster. That was the wonderful era of just actors being like, Kevin Costner, yeah, you're Robin Hood, whatever. You can just do your Kevin Costner. He sounds like he's from Oklahoma. I do want to note that producer Ben has left the room, and

I am now producer M. You are producer M. Wow. That is true. The divine producer M. But yes, I think Connery would have done Connery, and it would have been very appealing. But he would not have submitted himself to a character.

Sure. It would have looked like Sean Connery and sounded like Sean Connery. Most likely. And he probably would have gone like, well, audiences won't accept me going this far. I think it could have worked. It wouldn't have been as good of a movie. It would be a different movie. It would be for October.

You'd be like, this is like a perfect piece of like, this is a really fucking solid thriller. It would not have been the transcendent film that it is, I would argue. Also, Connery is like a big burly guy. He's like 6'2 and he's burly. Yeah. Which is probably, which is more how, I mean, Cox is a big burly guy. I don't know if he's that tall. He's pretty tall.

He's pretty tall. Whereas like, Anthony Hopkins is quite small. Yeah. He's short. Yeah. And the movie does not present him as sort of like a physical specimen

exactly. No and he has like these very delicate blue eyes. The eyes are incredible. Yeah. But like you know like he's more commanding

as a result. Right. Like you're scared of him because of the way he uses his voice his sort of stillness in the room you know what I mean?

I mean like the opening shot where she's going down the hallway and he's just like standing there it's like literally there's like a red carpet that she's walking down and he's like at the end of it like it's so theatrical and he's so theatrical without it being theatrical that he's like waiting for you that it's like the Mona Lisa like following it's the greatest scene in a movie I uh I've been right I don't know yeah I mean there are like five

scenes in this movie that are arguably the greatest scene in the movie I know but like the movie is like Jack Crawford's like clearly if she's running I love the running you know and but like he's like Clarice hey go talk to Hannibal Lecter but be careful she's like okay she goes see him and we're like what's this movie gonna be about like it's like a thing I don't know something's

going there's like serial killer on the loose and like she meets with Chilton you're like yeah and then like once that scene starts, you're like, am I watching the greatest movie ever made? What the fuck is this? It's structured like a rom-com, but it's a horror movie. That's the reason people were like, I want to see Clarice and Hannibal.

It's one of those things that people thought they wanted to see. Thomas Harris is like, this is what you wanted. It's the same thing that happened with the TV show where the relationship is so intimate. And it's all in the tension though. And like, I talked enough to Brian Fuller to know that he wanted to do

a Science of the Lambs season. Yes, of course, he was desperate. He wanted to do a Clarice on the show. And like, he was interested in desexualizing that relationship. Yeah. And like making it about mentorship. I think would be the smart way to go.

I don't remember if this was his casting or if it was fan casting, but I thought it was fucking great. And like now it would be perfect. You tweeted Saoirse Ronan. It was Saoirse Ronan. Okay. You had tweeted that.

Yeah. And like now she's exactly the right age. I hope they can work that out. Yeah, that would be incredible. It would because they still kind of talk about it as like a thing that they could maybe pull off, right? Yeah. Because now De Laurentiis is dead, right? No offense. He's dead.

No offense to being excited that he's dead, but like he was part of the problem, right? Like he was sort of like closely guarding Silence of the Wild. The problem was they had sold the rights to Lifetime to do a show called Starling, which was about Clarice. Of course. I forgot about that. And then like those rights were tied up at the same time

Hannibal was on. They've since expired so like theoretically the deal could be done. It requires somebody to want to make more Hannibal which is sort of a tricky proposition because after Hannibal which was such a huge hit, no Hannibal thing has ever really like lit the box office or the ratings on fire. Yeah, nobody's

wanted to like touch that sacred ground because Hannibal of course ran 17 seasons and was you know a massive success and we still like you still have people outside who are probably just chanting Hannibal. They're just eating people outside the NBC studios. The Fannibles. Hanheads.

Was Hannibal produced by NBC Universal? No it was produced by Gaumont International in association with the De Laurentiis Company. Which is why NBC aired three seasons, because they got it for like $5. And at the end of

the day, weren't they ending, it wasn't airing like Saturday nights or whatever, like they had weird time slots. NBC was like, we are literally literally any ad money we make from this, we make money off. And they keep yelling us about it, so I guess we'll make it. It was like burning off a Canadian drama in the summer, and NBC's like, it's a new

show. Yes, it was basically their Rookie Blue. And the first... The first season of it... I love a Rookie Blue name check. The first season of it was basically a crime procedural. It's a fantastic season. Yeah, that's terrific. I've never watched any of it.

And that season actually had okay ratings, like decent for a show that you got for $5 that is, you know, in which people's throat strings are turned into cello strings. Yeah. And then season two is much more serialized. People start to drop off. And then season three is just one of the fucking weirdest things that's ever aired on American television and, like, nobody watched.

It is truly quite odd. I do want to ask this. Is there a role that has as high a track record of great performances as Hannibal Lecter? We talked about this on the Manhunter episode. But it's so wild that lots of people have taken a shot at it. Most of them have done a really

good, almost career-defining stuff with it. And nonetheless, Anthony Hopkins is so associated with the role to the extent that you forget other people did, right? It's a weird thing that Hopkins both dominates it and there have been great other interpretations. There are four actors who have played him,

right? In filmed media. Gaspar UL, non-starter. The other three are all viewed as exemplary performances that are totally different from one another and aren't diminished by each other in any way. Yeah. And it doesn't feel like there's even any sort of like, well, who's your favorite Batman? Like, you know, there are people who sometimes make the argument that Cox is better, that Mads got to do more with it or whatever.

But everyone's just like, no, it was just like three perfect performances. Hopkins, not ruined, but he kind of, you know, he leans on it in the sequels in a way that gets a little frustrating. And the thing that's interesting is Brian Cox is playing a human. Yes.

And Anthony Hopkins is playing Dracula. Right. And especially he gets campier and campier with it. And Mads Mikkelsen is playing Satan. And they are three wildly different – He's playing a demon. Right, right. A hot demon.

Right. Like who you want to maybe have you cook your dinner. So that's the other thing is like talking about all these other people who could have played Hannibal. I feel like this is the kind of performance where people would have been scared in terms of how it would affect the audience's view of them. Sure. If you're coming into this already as an established actor, Hopkins essentially had nothing to lose at this point. He has nothing to lose, 100%.

Because he was coming off of like two moments when he should have had his breakthrough and it failed to really maintain. So he just rips into this with the ferocity of someone going like, how do I make this the most interesting character I can? Yeah. That's all I have to do here. And in a way, it makes his career, but it also feels like a performance that would have doomed most other people's careers.

And that it became so iconic that he could never get out of the shadow of being Hannibal. And the fact that he then successfully has like a 20-year run where he's like doing Merchant Ivory movies and he's playing presidents and all this shit this guy who has become this sort of like you know footnote british theater actor right to the next year to 92 he has howard's end he has dracula yeah he's in chaplin right like you know right by 93 he has the remainder of the day in shadowland like he just hollywood's like let's make you a movie star what fucking old guy guy can you play? They're like, well, you're an old British person, so we're going to shove you in some costume dramas. I'm like, it works. It was what he wanted to do, I think. He wanted to do it, and obviously he's a talent.

You talking about that, the closest thing I can think of is Captain Jack Sparrow. Yes. Where Johnny Depp got buried by that. Somehow Hopkins doesn't until he goes back to do Hannibal again. Once he goes back is when he starts to become a bit of a lazy actor, I would say. Now I actually quite enjoy current Hopkins where he's just an old guy and he's sort of leaning into it again. The gravitas.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But my favorite Hopkins performance outside of this is, it's time to guess. Nixon? Nixon! Where he's like doing an impression, but he's also like, I am Anthony Hopkins. I'm not going to try and like sit on a big nose. He's doing the Connery thing. He's doing the Connery thing.

You're never going to get over. And he's nailing it where you're like, this guy is like a maniac, but also I do sort of love him. Like, you know, there's that weird like tension that he's so good at finding. I kind of love Nixon. Nixon rules. Yeah.

Nixon is better than JFK. Yeah. I still prefer JFK, but I do love Nixon. That's my hot take. I think that Nixon is— Nixon is like Oliver Stone at his best, like, piles of conspiratorial papers around him being like, Don't you see? It was all happening in the Bahamas!

And he, like, throws another thing at you, and you're like, My God, Oliver, relax! There was a time when I had to spend a lot of time thinking seriously about the show House of Cards, which is a terrible television show. But, like, if I now try to think about House of Cards, which is a terrible television show, but if I now try to think about House of Cards... Great set, though. Very fun, light set to work on. I have a friend who was on

House of Cards and just like... I've actually talked to several people who were on House of Cards and just like it was a nightmare. Just like the whole time. Yeah. But... I wonder why. It's almost as if there was like one person who has a notorious track record of horrible behavior to everyone.

Let me be frank. Carry on, please. But when I think about House of Cards for five minutes, it just drifts into Nixon. It just becomes like... Interesting. I think those two are connected. Nixon is doing everything House of Cards tried to do in two and a half hours and is fantastic.

It is fantastic. I think also, yeah, Stone is and a half hours and is fantastic. It is fantastic. I think also, yeah, it's just like Stone is such a great, like that is Stone. He's a paranoiac and like a self-important person. That's his perfect subject. Right, yeah. Whereas like the JFK, you know, the JFK, he's making it about a person who's obsessed with the assassin. But like Nixon is just a great portrayal of power from a maniac about a maniac. It's great. After Nixon, right, he starts flipping.

He keeps the old man roles. Amistad, you know, classical where he does that big speech. You know, he flutters his pants. What's wrong where he fights a bear? That's what I'm saying. The edge. Then he's like, give me some action movies. Instinct.

You have the edge. You have the Mask of Zorro, which people forget. He has a whole opening set piece where he is Zorro, and then the rest of the movie, he's in it. You recently tweeted a perfect movie. It is a perfect film.

It's the greatest film of all time. Then Instinct, right? He's in Mission. Bad Company. Yeah, Bad Company. I saw that in theaters. That thing is a stinker. Joel Schumacher film.

I'm trying to remember now. The movie is terrible. Bad Company was written as a sequel to something. That sounds right. And I forget what it was, and it makes a lot of sense and is really funny. For a second, I thought we were talking about the movie Big Trouble, which was based on a Dave Barry novel. Correct. Yes, it was.

Correct. I've been thinking about Dave Barry a lot lately. You ever think about Dave Barry? Yes, and I think about him and I just, I give a mild chuckle. Just a little wry sort of, a skew smile wipes across my face when I think about Dave's world.

I've been feeling like if I read all of Dave Barry, I could understand our current political crisis. I saw you tweeting about that. I'm just like, I'm trying to sell my editor on it. She's not convinced. Bad Company was written as a sequel to Blue Street. Right. Which is wild stuff. And I guess it was just like, what if this time there was an old

guy with Martin Lawrence? It's like a buddy movie. I think the other problem was the first one is he pretends to be a cop, but he's actually a robber and they were like how do we heighten it and they were like what if he ends up having to pretend to be an FBI agent

and they were like through what series of events it's like his twin brother I believe it's a CIA agent but you know what I'm saying the idea is you heighten it and the plot of Bad Company is Chris Rocks dead identical twin Correct

It's Dave with CIA agents They need someone who looks like Chris Rock Chris Rock is dead He has an identical twin also played by Chris Rock who's a funny guy, not a CIA agent And Anthony Hopkins is a guy who's like Oh brother I remember them announcing that movie and me being amped

So here's a movie. It's called Bad Company. It's reworked from a script that was meant to be Blue Streak 2. It's Chris Rock and Anthony Hopkins. I was like, what a great oil and vinegar, odd couple, buddy cop action comedy, I presume. And then you see the movie. I remember even just seeing the trailer and going, wow, this looks so fucking dour. Yeah, it's kind of just a thriller.

It's a thriller. Yeah, and then Chris Rock like... Starring two people who should not be playing those roles. Who have no chemistry together. Speaking of the Anthony Hopkins role, as you're reading off these roles, I'm picturing in my head, I've seen a lot of them. I'm even picturing the later Hannibal movies and I'm like, he feels like a different person from the person in Silence of the Lost.

Yeah, he does. Even when he's great, you know? He becomes more of a movie star after this where then he's doing the Connery thing where he's like character's gotta come towards me this he's fully giving himself to also I feel like in the later Hannibal movies cause Hannibal film Hannibal brackets film does not come out for what 10 years

it's 2000 2001 yeah cause it's right after Gladiator 2001 so it's 10 years after Silence of the Lambs and it just sort of feels like Hopkins is straining a little too hard to play similar age. He's trying to be young and there's a little too much physicality. And then in Red Dragon, which is a prequel to Silence, he's trying way harder and it feels very strained. I remember when Hannibal came out, that was February, 2001.

They were trying to replicate the signs, the lambs release date. And Jeff Wells, R rated opening of all time. I seem to talk about every time I'm on this fucking podcast. Well, he's the best of us. He is the best of us.

He was like, he saw an early screening. It was like, they should release that on Christmas day. And Ridley Scott can get two best picture nominations. And like, I pretty sure it was him. That makes Poland.

But yeah. Well, either one of them. I mean, Poland is the Oscar cursor. Yeah. Anytime. Yeah, okay. Like he was like fucking Phantom of the Opera, get ready, across the board is winning the big five. Poland is not a total shitball of a human being.

But yeah, he curses everything that he talks about. He's bad at predicting the Oscars. He is not a shitball. Jeff Wells is the combination of all three Hannibal Lecters as you discussed he is a vampire he is Satan

he is but he is also a man he is also unfortunately a constant reminder I hope he now listens to our podcast

so let's let's throttle off the Wells he does I hope if he does listen I hope he makes the banner on Hollywood Elsewhere

say a vampire Satan a, a man. A man. It would be beautiful. 100%. He did email and say that. I said throttle off the Wells talk. Talked about Hopkins a couple times.

But do you folks know the Hopkins acting process? Because I find it kind of fascinating. No. Go ahead. And everyone's like he's the most professional actor. He's the most prepared. He just fucking nails it. A, he reads the entire

script like 200 times. Just obsessively reads, re-reads, re-reads, re-reads a month or two before filming, knows his lines backwards and forwards, has it so thoroughly in his head, records himself doing all the dialogue every night so by the time he's gotten on set

he's said it so many times that it's like second nature. So that's part one. Kind of crucial for this movie where he's monologuing a lot. A lot of very sort of like complicated lines come out of his mouth. Totally. But in terms of the actual language he kind of puts in the work at a scale that almost no one else does. Of just like everyone's like obsessively

no one reads the lines, practices, memorizes harder, earlier, stronger than Hopkins. The second thing is, which is reported on less, but I have heard other actors who have worked with him say this in interviews and go like, I don't know if I should be saying this or not. What he does to get in the character is like he's like really big on like building the visuals of the character and the costume fitting and the hair and whatever and then

he has them take the Polaroid I think it's still to this day a Polaroid it needs to be an analog process takes the Polaroid from when they nail the look of the character that first time and he has all the dialogue backwards and forwards you know in his head and he looks at the Polaroids and they're like it looks

like a possession where he just starts staring very looks at the Polaroids, and they're like, it looks like a possession where he just starts staring very deeply at the Polaroid, and then he, like, leans into it, and then, like, his eyes roll back into his head, and he, like, inhales and, like, stands straight up, and he's the character. Cool. And not like he's method acting,

like now you have to call him Dr. Lecter, but it's like he looks at the image of what they finally have nailed the look of the character to be, and he stares at it until he feels like he is embodying that. And then he's just like, okay, go. Cool. That's how I came out as trans. He stared at a Polaroid. Of like myself, and like, oh.

Right. And then like brought it to my forehead, and everyone's like, what are you doing? It's like a magic so the plot of science we gotta talk Jodie Foster you wanna talk about her career now

I think we gotta yeah we were saying we've never gone in yeah I was I was trying to cue you up I really wanna talk about Jodie Foster

producer M Jodie Foster as we all know was a child actress a copper tone kid 100% she's the one getting pants by the dog Jodie Foster, as we all know, was a child actress. The Coppertone Kid. 100%. She's the one getting pants by the dog. That's, sure, absolutely. Right, and then, you know, she's in Freaky Friday,

and she is the Paper Moon TV show, and the Bad News Bears, was she in one of the sequels? Am I wrong about that? I feel like she replaced Tate O'Moniel two times, but maybe I'm wrong. I don't think so. I mean, she was in things. Yeah, she was in a lot of TV shows.

Bugsy Malone. Yes. People forget that Bugsy Malone and Freaky Friday come out the same year as Taxi Driver. Yeah. Like, it's not like Taxi Driver was late in her child acting career. It was pretty quickly. Because obviously she's only 14 years old when she does Taxi Driver. And so she did kind of after that, after that whole big year, starts transitioning more to, you know, whatever, grown-up movies.

Right. But Taxi Driver I think was like, oh, shit, she can actually act but also was seen as something of a like, you know, Selena Gomez doing Spring Breakers. you know, Selena Gomez doing Spring Breakers. It's like someone trying to lay the groundwork for an adult career by establishing early that she's not going to be in Disneyland for her entire life. Because when she's in The Accused, it's kind of like, oh, Jodie Foster's back kind of vibe. Like, oh, here's like a serious performance from the famed child actor who was in Taxi Driver.

And then in between The Accused and Silence of the Lambs, it's just one movie, Catch Fire slash Backtrack. Not a big movie. And then after this, much like with Hopkins, Hollywood is like, okay, you're a movie star. You're the number one. You won an Oscar. You have two.

Yeah. Right. You're sensibly the biggest female star in Hollywood. She starts directing a lot too. She starts directing early. That's true. But she will always say she prefers to acting and that she wanted to become more of a director and act even less.

She makes Little Man Tate, I believe it comes out the same year. That was a big part of their Oscar campaign for Silence of the Lambs. They were like, we're going to put Little Man Tate out there. It's going to be a sort of phantom Oscar campaign. Because she's going to get all this press around. Cute movie!

It's a very nice little movie. In 95, she made Home for the Holidays, which I think is a good movie. I love that movie. That's a very good movie. And then in 2011, she made The Beaver. Yeah. More of a mixed bag, that one.

She kind of discovered Jennifer Lawrence, though. She did? Not she did. Didn't they make that before Winter's Bell? I believe they did. I am all but certain they did. That's also one of those movies where that was the hot script. I read it as a script.

I wanted to play the Anton Yelkin part so fucking badly. And on paper, you were just like slam dunk of all slam dunks. And even when they cast Mel Gibson, I was like, that's an interesting casting choice. And then you watch the movie and you're like, oh, it is a script that is impossible to actually put on its feet. This is the thing that I think a lot about blacklist scripts. Yeah. There are so many of them that are like, oh, this is a fucking amazing on-page premise.

The ones that read the best often are unactable. Yeah. Passengers was a movie where like the script is like very good. It's a pretty perfect script. And then the movie you're like, oh, what the fuck? And Beaver is the same thing as Passengers where it's like it is – Creepypasta. It's Creepypasta.

No, both of them are so difficult to pull off tonally. Where reading the script, the writer is literally describing how you're viewing scenes and letting you know the tone it's supposed to have. And you're putting it in your mind's eye the way that like hits your palate the best. Yeah. And those two films like put up on their feet are just like impossible to do. I did it. I did a Twitter thread about this around the movie Life Itself, the Dan Fogelman movie, which is like, sure, you read that on the page.

You're probably like, oh, yeah, great. I get it. And like you hear the famous story like Warren Beatty wept reading that script. And like then you see it on screen. It's just stupid. Right. Very stupid. I'm friends with Kyle Killen, the guy who wrote The Beaver. Now he's showrunning

Halo, I think, which is like a weird choice. Halo like the video game? No, the Showtime TV series Halo based on the video game. I'm excited. He's an excellent writer. It's just like great screenwriting, which The Sons of the Lambs has to, but great screenwriting

is so often about just like economics of character. And anytime you're giving yourself something super flashy, it becomes dangerous Lambs has to, but great screenwriting is so often about just like economics of character. Yeah. And anytime you're giving yourself something super flashy, it becomes dangerous. And then actually depicting it on screen is too much. Right. And it was like, there was almost the Jay Roach,

Jim Carrey beaver, which would have gone like totally comedy. And then it was sort of surprising that it was like Jodie Foster, Mel Gibson could do it. And it's more of a drama. And in reality reality like neither one was the right approach. I kind of want to see the J. Roach, Jim Carrey one because he would just be like

Yeah. It would have been cable guy. Complete Foster's career. One, her last directorial effort was famously a biopic of David Sims called Money Monster. It's the film about you starting the Patreon. And then there was also,

but like we should all see, in the 90s she had a somewhat robust movie star career. There's Maverick, there's Nell, there's Contact, there's Anna and the King. That's her sort of like 90s run. She gets an Oscar nomination for Nell. Contact, as people forget, was a pretty big hit and is a great movie.

Was disliked at the time but it was a mecha my god yeah I know it's a lot of movies it's long that's the biggest holdout

and The King is kind of like a big Oscar-y movie that flops like you know and it's also just a stupid idea like King and I

people should sing songs like I don't know that I want to just hear the story of The King her 2000s are fascinating because she'll take like three years in between each movie

to the extent that people are like oh I guess maybe Jodie Foster's like done and then she comes back and has another like third base hit. She has a couple. Panic Room. Panic Room and Inside Man. Flight Plan. You're calling that a base hit? Box Office? Oh Box Office.

I'm talking Box Office. Flight Plan is she has made two films that I would call outright offensive in the 2000s. Flight Plan and The she has made two films that I would call outright offensive in the 2000s. Flight Plan and The Brave One. Two films that are like, when you watch them now, you're like,

hmm, this is problematic. This is a tricky movie. Have not seen either. Yeah. Flight Plan is basically a movie that's like, what if you suspected

the brown person on your plane was a terrorist and you were right? Like, that's what Flight Plan is. But Flight Plan did 85 domestic yeah Flight Plan was definitely a hit

can you tell me the director Robert Schwenke Robert Schwenke yeah made 89 domestic director of Red pretty watchable movie

I find almost any movie set on a plane watchable because I am so tense during a movie set on a plane also just like Jodie Foster in a thriller

is like so so effective Brave One is not a movie I like but she did get that she got that Globe nomination you know

that was like Neil Jordan that was Neil Jordan people thought that was going to be a big Oscar play for her and a big sort of like

revenge thriller Death Wish we just did Death Wish is still like a template I know once in a while people are like I don't know

let's do a Death Wish with X actor. Now she's like directing television. She did some Oranges and New Black episodes. She did a bunch. Yeah. And then after that,

I mean, well, NIMS Island. Right, of course. I don't want to give it up for NIMS Island. But like, Carnage,

the Polanski movie, Elysium. Uh-huh. A movie that hangs her out to dry. I mean, she had sort of said like, I was pretty much retired from acting. A movie that hangs her out to dry. I mean, she had sort of said, like, I was pretty much retired from acting. I didn't really want to act anymore.

And I love District 9 so much I called them up and said, I'll do anything. And she kind of has the inside man role, but it's like the bad version of that role, right? Like, she's sort of

the evil rich lady. Right, and I forget which way it is because the movie's forgettable, but either she filmed it with a French accent and they made her dub it to American later or vice versa.

Oh dear. Her whole performance is ADR'd because they wanted her to do a different voice than what she did on set. And then last year, Hotel Artemis. Yes. You forget?

Which she is really fucking good in. It's not a movie I love. It's one of those movies where I'm like, I'm ready to love this movie. Me too. Love the concept, love the cast. The cast is unbelievable. It's sort of like John Wick I'm like, I'm ready to love this movie. Me too. Love the concept. Love the cast. Love it.

It's sort of like John Wick, except John Wick I love. That's another screenplay movie, though. It's another screenplay movie 100%. Totally. And it's not like it flops it, but it doesn't really get past cool ideas. She is pretty phenomenal in it. She's great. And she's giving a really funny performance.

It's a full body performance. It's wild that she's in it. Why is she in it? It's so wild. I don't know. She must have just liked the script. I think she just liked the script. So, as you're right. So it's like basically people are like, oh, I guess she just directs now and kind of chills out. And then once in a while she'll do a Hotel Artemis. Right. Or she'll show up at the Golden

Globes to speak up for Mel Gibson. She loves Mel. This is the thing. This is the thing when you look at it. Polanski, Gibson. There's a lot of people in her filmography. Wow, she really works with the – The famous thing about her was like she was the one child star who didn't fall apart. Like that for a long time. People – she was like she's the exception that proves the rule.

And yet in the middle of it, she has the John Wayne Hinckley thing where – Right. And like where like it's this huge burden on her life and she like somehow overcomes that psychologically. And I think that in some way made her more predisposed to be like these guys are damaged. But like I see the good in them or something like that. I think she had to get past this element of, oh, this terrible thing happened and I can't think it was about me. She also was like a massive star, had won two Oscars, was like an A-list box office leading lady and was-

Who was often afraid or not interested in being one. Sure. I think Hollywood was always ready to put her at the top. But the other fascinating thing about her was she was at her peak living in a total glass closet in terms of her sexuality with a total like don't ask, don't tell attitude of there was never any denial. There were no beards. You know, like, 97 or 98, she, like, has a child through in vitro fertilization with

a partner. And everyone, like, reports on it but just doesn't, like, directly say, like, she is married to a woman. Is she out now? She is. She gave a speech at some award show. Golden Globes. At the Globes. But, but this was like fairly recently, right? Like 2012?

Yeah, she won like a Lifetime Achievement Award and she gave this sort of odd speech. And she said like my wife, who she's now divorced from, but she like when she finally came out, she just sort of said like, you know, that person I've been married to for like 15 years and we just don't directly acknowledge it. I had the memory that she gave that speech and everyone was like, did Jodie Foster just come out? And then in the press room they were like, did you just come out? And she's like, no. I think she doesn't like the press that much. I mean, fair.

I read it at the time as her saying like, that wasn't me coming out. Everyone knows I'm gay. You know? Sure. Because there was never any sort of like diversion with her. Which like, you know, because there was never any sort of like diversion with her which like you know

it wasn't even like oh rumors have dogged it was like oh yeah Jodie Foster's gay she's gay everyone knows that I want to point out

she also directed the Black Mirror episode interesting people forget yeah she directed Archangel oh right which is not my favorite

episode of Black Mirror it's not the worst episode she gets good performances she does I just find it very interesting that even if she didn't like publicly come out at her peak Oh, right. Which is not my favorite episode of Black Mirror. It's not the worst episode. She gets good performances. I just find it very interesting that even if she didn't like publicly come out at her peak, she was essentially the first like major, major gay movie star. Sure. You know, there was no alternate narrative being thrown around about her.

I guess so. You ever think about how the narrative more became like, why hasn't she come she come out like why hasn't she done the formal right yeah if you think about how in Home for the Holidays she cast as the hot guy who might tempt Holly Hunter to move home

as David Strathairn like good taste what a call what a call did Karen Hahn direct this movie silence of the lands

I'm trying to think of like are there scenes or sequences we haven't talked about obviously we have talked about some of the Lambs I'm trying to think of like are there scenes or sequences we haven't talked about obviously we have talked about some of the major sequences I'm gonna do this you have your running time gripe

I understand that this will get us into the transition one thing I wanna shout out this movie was a legendary scary VHS cover

correct movie for me yep my parents rented it because I think even though they it was like I'm a young kid when this comes out

so it's probably a period where they're probably seeing not a lot of movies, but I'm sure this thing was such a big thing that they were like, alright, let's rent Silence of the Lambs. The poster, iconic poster, Jodie Foster's face in like extreme contrast. It weirdly doesn't even look like her. It feels like it's own piece of

iconography. Yes. With the moth over her face. Yeah. I mean, you guys know the poster. Yeah. Greatest poster. I was like, what is this movie? It's about lambs? Yeah. What is it? And my parents were like, no, we can't explain this one to you. You're too young.

I don't know where to begin. I had the exact same relationship with it. I knew it was scary. I knew that. The image is upsetting, but you can't put your finger on why. Right. And the weird, the skull on the back of the moth. What's up with that? Is that just how it happens to look, or is that them making a movie about a monster moth?

Like, is that a real species? Is this movie about a mothman and prophecies that might be about the mothman? Mothman prophecies. Great fucking movie. I have not seen it. Never seen it. It's actually a really, it's a really nice little movie.

I haven't heard it. Like it's, yeah. No, I, we have talked about so much of this movie and we haven't talked about two of the most famous sequences, like at all.

I just want to point out also, there is the iconic Hopkins poster that is never used. Yes. They had the reverse essentially. Right. Carry on. That's gross. That's a gross poster.

I don't like that poster. I think there's a reason they were like, you know what, the Foster one is the good balance of light and dark. There was something. Looks like you're going to get eaten by Darth Maul.

His face is totally red. Yes. There's something about the blankness of Foster's face that makes the poster really eerie. I was also thinking it's a rare example of like a poster that totally works on its own as just a striking piece of iconography.

I don't get what this poster is saying. I don't understand what's going on in this movie, but it catches my eye and it makes me curious. And also, after you have seen the movie, the poster is more impressive. 100%. You're like, that's an incredible visual encapsulation. Of what's going on here.

Totally. But it's something that like doesn't sell those things to you and spoil it for you going into the theater and then the poster becomes its own

individual work of art great movie great fucking movie now what did you want to talk about we barely talked about the second hour of this movie we've barely we haven't talked about

Lecter's Escape we mostly talk about the setup yeah and we have to talk about Lecter's Escape you're right and we haven't talked about

the Buffalo Bills house. The oubliette. Can I do my scene rundown because I think this will serve as a transition to get into the bits we haven't done. Okay? Hopkins has nine scenes in the movie. Sounds great. I can't say I was 100% accurate He's nine for nine.

He's nine for nine. But my rule was, if he is in a scene, my stopwatch is going. And if the scene ends, my stopwatch stops. That is what the rule should be. 100%. And I feel like this weird screen time thing became more about when do we see them on screen, as I already said. Right.

And so, like, what is it, 12 minutes? There's some, like, number out there. Right, where they're like, he's actually only in the movie for 16 minutes. No, he's only – his face is only directly on screen for 16 minutes. But that's mostly because of the fucking cinematic language of this movie. Yes. Which is separating Clarice and Hopkins. Right.

His dialogue is over those shots. There's no disputing this. Right. You count the scenes he's in, not the – Right, so I counted any scene in which he was working. Yes. Where he is affecting the scene. Right, where he's a character in the scene.

So even when he escapes and he's wearing the fake face and all of that, that is a scene he is in. That is true, though. Right. Hannibal does have a whole scene where he's just pretending to be a dead body. Yeah, but that's a scene- I agree, I agree. He showed up, he was number two on the call sheet. They said, Mr. Hopkins, do you want a coffee?

And he was like, yes, thank you. You want a pillow in between takes? Hopkins in that scene, okay? Do you think anyone got to eat those lamb chops? It's a classic example of great-looking food not getting eaten. The thing that drives you the craziest. Drives me crazy. They're rare.

Okay, the first meeting scene, six minutes and 40 seconds. The second meeting scene after the rain where he gives her the towel 4.20 right do you want me to add these times together or have you already done it I've added together okay

then it's 5.30 I think it's the third meeting where they start the quid pro quo thing right then scene 4

1.30 is Anthony held with him with a cage on his face talking about the transfer then scene 5 I believe is him meeting with the senator. Yeah, with the senator. Yeah.

That's 3.30. Scene six is the big one. Sure. That's the Sons of the Lambs monologue. That's seven. Yeah. Okay. And him in the weird cell and all that stuff.

Yeah. Right. Then him escaping from the cell. The attack is four. His screen time in terms of... And then also escaping from the cell the attack is for his screen time in terms of and then also the phone call at the end please oh i'm sorry then it's the two minutes of him wearing the other guy's face getting out sure right ending with him waking up in the ambulance and then scene nine is one minute which is the phone call at the end he's got 36 minutes and 30 seconds of screen time in this movie by my count.

Right. In like a two hour movie. In a two hour movie. Regular. Now, the thing that shifts is He's not in much of the latter half.

That's the thing. You know, because then it becomes gotta get Buffalo Bell. Because the first hour of the movie I was pretty much up to 30 minutes

and I was like The first hour of the movie is about the two of them. Right. That's mostly what it's about. Right. And then there's a large chunk for about half an hour plus where he doesn't appear until the phone call at the end. Right, because he's getting to the Caribbean. Right. That's mostly what it's about. Right. And then there's a large chunk for about half an hour plus where he doesn't appear until the phone call at the end.

Because he's getting to the Caribbean. Right. Getting a wig. He's getting a hat. Here's the thing I think that throws this conversation is if you gender flip this, if this was somehow a movie about like, I don't know, Eddie Redmayne and Sandra Bullock. And Sandra Bullock was like a serial killer. Like people would be like, oh, yeah, she's the lead. Of course.

Because we don't expect a man to play a supporting lead role to a woman in a movie like this. But that's what this is. It's a lead role that supports the other lead. Or there's a weird version of it wherein like the cursed movie, the Danish girl, fucking Elisa Vikander

is 100% the main character in that film. She is indisputably the main character of that film. She's the Danish girl. She is the Danish girl in that film has the most screen time. She is indisputably the main character of that film. She is the Danish girl. She is the Danish girl in that film. Yeah. And they put her in supporting because it was like a cakewalk.

She won an Oscar. It is so weird that she has that Oscar. It's so weird that she won and that she beat another lead performance that should have won, Rooney Mara.

Yes. In Carol. Yes. The other thing was, I feel like- In that case as well, Rooney Mara was the actual Carol in that movie.

She is Carol. She plays Carol. Right. It also is incredibly strange that I feel like right up until the nominations, everyone was like, yeah, Elisa Vikander is going to get nominated for Ex Machina. And she's probably going to win the Oscar because it feels like a big year for her. And that will be a cool Oscar win. And then the surprise was – We were predicting Danish Girl.

No, we were predicting the Danish Girl. Yeah. You're reading the weird blogs. No, duh, duh, no. Danish Girl was... Ex Machina had its own lovely surprise win. Yeah. People were kind of predicting Danish Girl actress. No. Ex Machina supporting. No, they weren't. They ran it as supporting. There were a couple places that said

that, but they ran. No, but no. Once the precursors... Once the precursors started, she was nominated as a supporting actress because that was the move they made. Who had that movie? That was Focus. Right, right, right. You know, Golden Globes, Golden

Schmoes. Oh, no, you're right. The Globes, they did that trick. Thank you. That was the problem. She got the double nomination and people were like, is she going to repeat it? But then, at the SAGs, she went supporting, because at the SAGs, you put someone in a category, and they can't be excluded, and she won. And that was the moment when Rooney Mars' agent called me and said she wasn't going

to do an interview with me. Oh, boy. Wow. That's sad. I was going to talk to her, because she was getting ready for an Oscar campaign, and then the SAGs happened, and I think that everyone else was like, okay, forget it. Save your money. Alicia's sad. I was going to talk to her because she was getting ready for an Oscar campaign and the SAGs happened and I think that everyone else was like, okay, forget it. Save your money. Alicia's winning.

You doomed Rooney Morrow, David. It's not my fault. It's your fault. It's your fault. Take responsibility. You're right. There was the ex machina globe nom. Thank you.

So, yes, we've talked a lot about the major interrogation scenes. We've talked about the Hannibal Clarice scenes. I love all the stuff with Cassie Lemons is so good too.

And such a good example of them not putting too fine a point on it but just like such a lived in relationship. It's just like

this is what a female friendship is like. Right. Yeah. I just was like oh. And especially

in this incredibly male dominated field. Right. Where they they are having to prove themselves twice as hard at every single turn and also dealing with such heavy, awful shit all the time. Where it's like having a friendship of someone else who gets that scene where they're going over the case file and figuring him out. And it's all in the demi first person close ups and Cassie Lemon's lips are trembling just a little bit. It's this like incredible like repeating micro expression she keeps on making

and it is like they're excited because they're solving it but the heaviness of what they're talking about is so disturbing that it's still affecting her psychologically. I also just like that that scene is Clarice being like, hey, friend, figure this out with me.

Yeah. Like it's not like just her with like Hannibal in her head, like pouring over notes by herself. Well, another scene I love is when they watch the press conference of the senator. And she's like, she's really smart. She knows what she's doing. She's really smart and explains to what she's doing. She's really smart. And explains to everyone, like, she understands that Buffalo Bill is going to have a harder time killing her if she has a name, which then transitions into it puts the lotion on

its skin and then it gets the hose again. Right. Which is like Ted Levine's best scene as an actor where he's fully playing, talking about like the demi, like, this is a human being. It's a guy working as hard as he can to play the monster and to totally depersonalize her. That scene is insanely

upsetting. So deeply upsetting. Because this movie is not that violent. No. Even though it's, you know, about a guy who eats people and there's some eating. And there's nothing viscerally graphic in that scene. Not in that scene. And really the most graphic thing in this movie is a severed head in a jar, which is creepy.

And the autopsy. And, and, and, but then all, and you know, the, the skin, the face skin. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's gross. There are some gross things in this movie. Right. Right.

But, uh, I think. He a cannibal. Yeah. But the scenes with her in the, in the pit and the pit, and her seeing the nail and all that, that's the stuff where you're kind of like, I might have to turn this off. I'm upset. That's sort of the most chilling stuff in the movie. And him doing the weird shrieking.

One touch I love, this is skipping ahead to the end, is that it's scored with that fucking dog barking. Which is just like, this dog is in pain. Very anxiety-inducing. And it's such a weird little touch that you can hear throughout the house. dog barking. Yeah. Which is just like this dog is in pain. Very anxiety inducing. Yeah. Yes. And it's such a weird little touch that you can hear throughout the house

at different times. It's so panicky. All that stuff. She's so good too. Brooke Smith. I mean every performance in this film is incredible. Every two line performance

is incredible. But her in the car. I forget that this movie has like four really strong needle drops. But her in the car listening to American Girl. Yes. You get such a sense of who she is in temperament. But it's beautiful that it's devoid of the context of her parents, right?

That it's just – it could be any random person. You don't understand the weight she's going to hold culturally. Right. Part of Buffalo Bill's problem was that he accidentally abducted a senator's daughter. Like he doesn't he's not doing it for that reason. But that's like what awakens national interest. But it's also just like such a beautiful like story decision on Thomas Harris's part, which is like that's how you explain why they're willing to deal with fucking Hannibal Lecter. Right. Because suddenly this becomes a thing that the president's weighed in on.

Every time anyone goes anywhere in this movie, they go like, oh, that Buffalo Bill case? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like everyone knows this fucking guy. He's equivalent to the Zodiac Killer in that like the mythologizing is getting out of hand. The president is weighing in on this. It's become such an emotional story that it's like we can clean up any mess after the fact with Hannibal Lecter. We just need to find her now. Which is great. And watching her do all the math of

like, you know, how she can figure it out, but also how she can use this case to her career. Career's benefit. To be able to sort of firmly get her foot in so that she can be inarguable. Right. Within the FBI. She's ambitious, like

in a normal way. Right. She gets it. She's a tiny woman. There's a version of this movie where she is more cutthroat because like that's often how women who are careerists are presented in these movies.

Or she gives a fucking speech to Casey Lemons about oh we don't get to do it. Sure. Exactly. Or she gives that speech to Hannibal Lecter and he's like

you don't understand how hard my life's been. Right. Right. Right. And Hannibal Lecter is an ally and you know

he's like I agree and he busts out my life's been. Right. Right, right. And Hannibal Lecter is an ally. Yeah. And, you know, he's like, I agree. And he busts out some stats about payment gap. He is woke. I mean, there is like every scene he's in the movie, he walks in and he just is like, hey, the ally has arrived. Yes. It's weird that he on his jumpsuit wrote the future is female. And then if you turn around on the other side, it says, nevertheless, she persisted. Right. And both are written in blood. No. Okay. and then if you turn around on the other side it says nevertheless she persisted right and both

are written in blood no okay so i other i also think like you know uh red dragon the first um harris novel uh which is about like a man who he's the version of the cop who's like i have a disease and my disease is that i understand criminals and i'll never be cured right like i understand killers. That's like what Will Graham type is. Yeah. Whereas like this movie is all about Hannibal trying to understand Clarice. Right.

And her disease is like I just feel like if I save this person then finally the ocean inside me will be calm. Right. Even though she knows it won't. The beauty of the title is that the title is aspirational. What she is striving for in life is to get to the silence of the title. Even though she knows it won't. The beauty of the title is that the title is aspirational. What she is striving for in life is to get to the silence of the lambs. She wants to be in a place where she feels like she's been able to personally stop the crying because the idea that people are in that much pain and suffering flips her the fuck out. And like it is wild that this movie, the crux of this movie is that story. Right.

Because it's not like that story. She's then like lambs. But an anagram of lambs is this, and that's where he lives. It's not like Lecter is trying to get her to realize something about the case when they're talking about her. But it is, it's such a key thing because, as you said, like viewing Will Graham as this sort

of shadow of Hannibal or vice versa, right? Sure. They're both people who have spent their lives studying the psychology of incredibly broken, dangerous people, right? And it has kind of destroyed both of them. Which is like what behavioral science of the FBI and when Mindhunter eventually is going to be – like in this movie is based on the Mindhunter. Jack Crawford is the Mindhunter guy, right?

Like that's the classic thing, right? If you spend all this time with serial killers, maybe you'll sort of start to go mad yourself. And Hannibal's sort of superpower is he understands that mind so well that it gives him such a clear vision of how fucked up humanity is and the human brain can be

that it makes him into this total fucking nihilist who wants to eat people's brains and shit. It's also really smart about making Buffalo Bill someone that only Clarice could catch. That's the thing. Her magic power is understanding him as a person and that's what eventually unlocks it for her and that's why that conversation is so pivotal.

She has not given up on humanity yet. Yeah, 100%. Which Will Graham is only so successful in being able to stop Hannibal Lecter because he's already gotten to him. The soul has already started getting eaten away at. And the fact that Clarice is so much still in the aspirational phase of maybe I can stop it all. Maybe I can let the lambs go free and they'll stop screaming.

It's kind of about the ways that men fail to understand women and the ways that women always understand men and like are able to navigate within that space. Cause like if you accept the Buffalo bill is not trans, which Demi certainly wants us to think, then he is a man who is like not comprehending that womanhood is more than this costume he wants to put on, which is true. He thinks that'll fix it if he just can find the right size and the right person. Right. And the Thomas Harris thing, like Brian Fuller was big into this, is like every killer wants to transform themselves in some way. Like he's trying to wash away his pain by becoming what he thinks of as the opposite of himself

without realizing that like it's within him at the same time. Right. It's not that he feels that he is a woman. It's that he wishes he were a different person. Yeah. So the most drastic way he can think of making that happen. Which is why he's like applied for sex reassignment surgery but rejected as like Hannibal points out. Because back then like the way to become like legally trans was like you had to like go essentially full time, which means dressing as the gender that you are.

You had to do that for like two years. And then you could start on hormones and then you could do – and like it was this – and like clearly he's not doing that. Like he doesn't want to take the social risk of like going out dressed in women's clothing or whatever. Which tells you everything because you sense that he would not feel any freedom from doing that. Yeah. feel any freedom from doing that. Yeah. He is looking for some sort of magic solved to how much he hates being in his own skin,

which is because of the life he's lived. That said, I do think that one of the areas in which it kind of gets at the trans experience in a way that is like damaging is it's talking about someone who desperately does not want to be himself. And that is often like, I remember for many years, I just was like, I just, I don't want to be a woman. I just don't want to be me. And like this, the body I'm in feels wrong to me, but that doesn't mean I want to be a woman.

Cause it's like a huge conceptual leap to make. It's like breaking apart society on some level. And like, I do wonder, you know, for all the movies, protests to the contrary, it does capture that element of the experience with Buffalo Bill. And I'm like I wonder to what degree you could do a sympathetic trans reading of this character. I think you could. I'm not going to try it, but I think you could. Yeah. Yeah.

It would be tough. But, I mean, yeah, you go, like, it takes 20-plus years after this movie for us to start getting, like, trans characters played by trans actors. There has to be a Danish girl. Directed by trans. Right. Right. Like, that's, what, five years ago. And even that is an offensive and misguided project. Right.

Essentially. Once Eddie Redmayne did it, then Hollywood was like, okay, everybody who's had to do it. You know what? Yes. We finally are a little sick of this. And that's why when Scarlett Johansson tried to do it, I was like, nope.

Eddie Redmayne did it. Yeah. That was the end of the road. You missed your window. Um, the, this is, but like the other thing I,

that I noticed this and I don't know is, is like whenever Hannibal's talking to Clarice, his mind immediately goes to the worst thing. So like when she went to her dad dies, she goes to live with her dad's cousin. He's like, and did he do all terrible things? He always goes there. And I think it's partly that he just can't resist like pushing a button,

but also like he just assumes the world is like completely overflowing with evil. And when she shows up, he's like, oh, so they sent you because they think I'll want to fuck you right and then he's like does Jack Crawford want to fuck you and she you know she's good at sort of deflecting all that stuff but he's always just like yeah no it has to be

the worst thing right because he spent his life studying right the worst psychological mechanisms a person can have and then you know where's Clarice is more like even though she took the lamb and it was too heavy and she couldn't save the lamb, she's still like, you know what, I'm going to keep

trying to save the lamb. The smart thing about the end of this movie is it understands that you can defeat minor demons but you can never defeat the devil. Hannibal Lecter is always going to escape. Hannibal Lecter is always going to be out there in the world. But Clarice's approach can work for a time. You can save one woman, you can stop one villain. It's why Lecter is always going to be out there in the world. But Clarice's approach can work for a time.

You can save one woman. You can stop one villain. It's why Lecter is so compelling. You're kind of like, oh, yeah, this guy doesn't belong in jail. He's like a caged animal. You're like, I know. He just has that feeling where you're like he should be out there even though that's scary. You know what I mean?

The idea of him operating at full power is kind of thrilling. The scene with the senator is incredible. I mean aside from the fact that obviously you have like the most iconic – Get this thing back to Baltimore. Look. But him with the straight jacket, the orange jumpsuit on the stretcher. Yeah, and of course – With the mask, which is just – another thing where watching this movie for the first time as a 15-year-old, I was like, OK, but I've seen like a thousand fucking parodies of the mask.

Sure. And parodies of the mask. Sure. And parodies of Jim Carrey's The Mask. That's right. No, but I've seen so many people wearing the mask as a joke and fucking putting it on a guardrail kid card or whatever. Billy goddamn Crystal. Right. Of course. Brought it out on the Oscars stage.

That I was like, this is going to have no power for me. And the first time they wheel him out and you go, that is fucking terrifying. no power for me and the first time they wheel him out and you go that is fucking terrifying and watching it again last night there's something about it like his just wide open piercing blue eyes and his blank expression underneath and his mouth looking like

it's in its own jail cell the fact that it's like little metal bars in front of his teeth he's too bitey the thing that the impersonations of it the thing that the impersonations of it don't get is that his eyes are darting. His eyes are incredible. He's like looking for an escape, even though he knows there isn't one.

And then, of course, they will match the senator and he like starts giving the information he wants. But also it's like he can't help himself. This is his only joy in life. And this is like he just can't help himself. Anthony Held like sucks. He's basic. There's no fun there. Sure, sure, sure.

You know? And then like he hates all the. Anthony Held is so good in this movie though. Like his whole preening like he's the best specimen I've got. You know, he's like a weird little. Sorry, carry on. I'm sorry. No, and like he hates everyone else like in his like wing.

Yeah. You know? I mean the fact that he kills the other guy for throwing the semen on Clarice. Yes. Is just like, please, there's a difference between me and guys like this. Basically, Clarice lost Hannibal, but then when that happened, Hannibal's like, I owe you a solid.

Come over, I'll make dinner. That would be his usual approach. Yeah, I'll draw you. Yeah, and then it's just like, this movie just has a couple straight-up set pieces where like – The whole prison. I mean not prison.

The whole escape. Escape thing is incredible. Sequence, right. It's just like stunning edge of your seat. That set is amazing. I don't know what – That mustache is amazing on that one officer. Yes.

It's the craziest mustache. He's got like the very thin but very long – It's like a crazy variation on a Fu Man. Yeah. By the way, Ben's back. Ben's back. Ben is back. Ben is back.

Beautiful Ben is back. Should I just throw up some thoughts of stuff earlier that you guys have already talked about? Yeah, probably. I'll just read a quick note here. Shady storage units across America. Love that. I would not help anyone with a street couch into a van, let alone at night.

I do like that in the scene she has the agency of this is clearly a bad idea, right? That they don't play her as a total naive sort of moron. It's like she knows, like, fuck, this is the kind of thing that usually ends up with you being put in a

pit, right? And it's that basic human thing of, like, in the moment you're like, I should give him benefit of the doubt. Sure. Right. And then it's too late. The second because he just backs her in. Yeah. Yeah. We didn't talk about the storage locker.

That move of Hannibal being like, go visit a friend of mine. Transfer her to the storage locker. Be real chill. Weird old cowboy man in the rain who's like, oh, something could go tomorrow. And she's like sliding under the door.

And then that fucking setup of like the carriage with the plush interior and the headless mannequin and then the head in a jar. How long are we supposed to believe that Hannibal has been in jail? That he just set up this little display and paid long enough for it to remain in the storage locker? That's a great question.

It's been at least 10 years. Right? Right. I mean, that's incredible. What an artist this guy is. Good for him. He's a big picture thinker. It's made storage unit, like when I drive those on the highway late at night, like it's so creepy.

They are creepy. There is something about that now. There's things in those buildings. It's a true mystery. What were you going to say, Emily? I just was going to say, fuck, I don't remember. Amy Taubman, the great Amy Taubman, film critic, wrote the Criterion essay. I don't know if you've read it.

I've not. It's worth reading. It's very good. And she points out that scene, there's flags everywhere. Yeah. reading it's very good uh and she points out like that scene there's flags everywhere yeah uh the scene obviously in the um prison the the escape the weird cell i don't know how do you describe it the weird cell in a gymnasium yeah thing it has the weird american flag like and like when again yeah makes a weird little display for everyone of charles napier hanging with his

skin ripped right like you know right hannibal could have just gotten out of there. But he's like, no, no, there needs to be some pomp and circumstance. He needs people to respect him. Like he needs people to recognize that he's a genius. Yes, exactly. And an artist. It's like she's like all these tattered flags, all these relics of America. Like this is all very intentional.

Yeah. Yeah. I really advise you to read it. It's really good. I'll read it. The TV show went a little – like it did great stuff with like the death tableaus. Yes. But like what I like about this movie is that you can sort of – you can bend your brain in a way where you're like, okay, yeah, I get like how he did this even though he had like 10 minutes to like strip that guy from the ceiling.

Yeah. You know. Yeah. You know. Yeah. But it is like it's a pretty like even knowing where it goes, it is such a beautifully constructed extended set piece. Yeah. From like I mean they've set up the pen like 15, 20 minutes earlier. So you see him look at it. Then a full scene later, you see Anthony Held not be able to find his pen. Yeah.

And then they sit on it for like another 10 minutes before he takes the thing out of his mouth. It's after he's had the whole Clarice conversation after he's been transferred then he takes it out

and then it's just like how is he fucking going to get out of this? Then to switch over to the SWAT guy perspective. That's what I love. That's the beauty. That takes a while.

You really stick with those guys. One of them is an actor I know. Who is it? It's Chris Isaac. It's Chris Isaac. There's someone else in there whose face I recognize. I can't remember. The thing I love about Demi is he lets things breathe. Yes. And I feel like so many other movies like this would just be like bang, bang, bang. Here's some face biting.

And like this is it takes its time. The tension of the elevator thing of all of them realizing like, oh, fuck, guns out, call the battalion, seeing it stop on three. And then going like, wait, what the fuck is going on? I also like that you don't see him, you know, rip the guy's skin off. Just the shot of him taking the skin mask off is enough for you to process like, oh, he did all of that. Oh, that's so, you know, like that's all you need. Like your brain does all the work for you. But it's such a fine

balance of like, and that the body on top, that he switched the clothes, that they think that that's what's going on. Yeah, yeah, of course. Right, like all the sort of misdirection stuff. They think he did some regular escape stuff, not some skin removal, new face escape stuff. Right think he did some regular escape stuff, not some skin removal, new face

escape stuff. He also basically is putting Buffalo Bill to shame. He like jury rigged a human face in like five seconds. When I was talking about how this show is television now, like the X-Files rips off this movie's visual palette and then every show on CBS

rips off the X-Files. So like that's why now we live in silence of the lamb's world yeah like the thing about television now is it's so graphic and you see so much of the violence yeah i'm like that's fine whatever but csi and criminal minds and svu and all these shows zoom into the wound right even like x-files a show i love did a lot of that and this movie i always forget how non-gory it is that That's what I was going to say. It's crazy because he doesn't sanitize it. Like he deals with it with the proper weight of like these are horrific things happening.

And you can't sugarcoat them. But it is a rare movie of this ilk that does not kind of glamorize and ask you to get some perverse thrill from like how fucked up it is. One of the most horrifying shots in the movie is when he grabs the guy and you have that shot of Hannibal like biting the camera essentially and then you see him kind of like biting the guy. But in another movie such as

Red Dragon, he would then like tear away and like blow away some chunk of flesh. And the guy's face would be so fucked up and when they cut back to the guy he's got like a bite wound. Yeah, he's got a bite wound. He's got one small wound he's got one small bite a little it's a little less i mean it's the classic car thing it's like your mind is what much more fucked up what's scary about is you don't understand it it's just like this is not normal human interaction and like that's also right charles napier is just watching it being like jesus christ like even the way he

strikes the physicality i mean he's not like a big boy. But also he's like dead. He just goes into total robot mode when he's doing the repeated, you know, coshing. The look on his face. Yeah, the banality of evil thing. Like as much as he then likes to like put it in a nice package and like put on a show for them, it is the fact that like, you know, you watch something like Mindhunter and it makes it a lot more glamorous than it actually is. I fucking love Mindhunter. I'm not saying that in a negative way.

Good show. I'm not saying that in a negative way. Great show. I'm just saying it's a different approach. Yeah. Because one of the things that this movie does is kind of at times feel like a documentary. I actually think that Mindhunter is like kind of breaking the Silence of the Lambs thing because it is deliberately saying we don't show stuff. Yeah, right.

We don't show stuff at all. Sure, sure. That is the show that realizes that what was scary about Silence of the Lambs was that conversation is terrifying. Yes, 100%. Conversation is terrifying. Being in the room with a person like this is terrifying.

And also Mindhunter, I think, is just about me reading a Wikipedia entry late at night of some serial killer and you're just sort of slowly reading it and you're like, that's it. about like me reading a Wikipedia entry late at night of some serial killer. And like, you're just sort of like slowly reading it and you're like, like, that's it.

Why am I interested in this? Right. Why do I want to know more? Yeah. And why am I suddenly like so frightened even though I'm only reading a thing? Right. Just so that weird fascination we have with like, I want to understand why a person would do this or what they did. It is,

it is so beautiful that Clarice ends up being the one to catch him because she is trying to just finish off all the loose ends. And the fucking fake out. Yeah. The thing that should not work. Every time I watch it, it works. And I'm just like everybody's ripped it off. Once you know what's happening, you're like, it's not going to – it gets me every time. Yeah, every single time.

And then one of the greatest action sequences of all time is is the night vision sequence yeah even though it's very brief like you think of it as this very long tense thing it's not that long because the jet the concept is so terrifying so the second he turns on the night vision yeah and and demi switches to his perspective which we've never been in before yes really right i mean i guess i guess a little bit looking down at the uv but you know like it's sort of like a jarring switch. I also love that thing where you're like, I thought I was with my hero.

Now I'm watching my poor hero be, like, stalked in the night. And the questioning is great leading up to it. The moment where Buffalo Bill realizes that she might catch him and he, like, stifles a laugh. Yeah. Like a really sad laugh. Yeah, their interaction is really interesting. Right.

Then goes for the gun and then she goes down to the basement and you have that amazing Brooke Smith scene of her being like, don't worry, I've saved you. And her just being like, fuck you, get me out of here now. A-S-A-P. No, I gotta catch the guy first. And she's like, fuck you, eat shit.

Like, she's like, there's no, like, oh my god. You fucking bitch. Get me out of here. She calls her every bad name. She's like, oh, thank you. There's none Get me out of here! She calls her every bad name. Oh, thank you. There's none of that. Of course. I love that a female cop is rescuing me. That feels great.

But she's like, you don't get this fucking guy. You're going to join me in this pit in five seconds. Get me! And of course, we forgot there's the whole thing where she lures the dog down, which is, you know, for being very innovative. That's the thing. Everybody in this movie

gets to be smart. Even Buffalo Bill gets to be smart. And it's just like, that makes it so much better. Yes. A hundred percent. Doesn't the sequence,

because we know the space kind of what he lives in, what the basement is like, but when you're actually exploring it and the perspective of the handheld shots, it is the moths

flying around the industry, playing in the background. I love that moth sequence. That's another classic Demi like let me I want to look at these guys faces for a second.

I want to understand these people beyond just like exposition people. It's like when you'd go to your grandparents house and they go in the basement

and have a bunch of weird shit and they'd be like don't get too close to the pit. You'll fall into the pit. And the fact that it's someone else's weird house that he took over and put like half of his shit into it

but it's also like half stuff he just hasn't gotten rid of yeah and it's like you see yeah the elements are like there's a map of the u.s and it's like there's no it's just somebody else hung that's another life that we we don't get any part of right um some of the house i feel like are some of the design and i might be be wrong, it's Gein. Ed Gein, yes. They kind of did a little bit of touch to Buffalo Bill with incorporating that real serial killer. Buffalo Bill is like Ted Bundy and Ed Gein. It's some weird combo of those things.

He has the Ted Bundy luring the lady with the cast and all that. But it is nice that Clarice solves it independently. Yes. Calls Glenn and he's like, we figured it out, but good job. Right, right. Now just finish it up. You know? Do the follow-up interview. Right. But she goes in having accomplished everything on her own, so she is fully loaded

to be able to handle the situation. Right. She's herpy. Hypothetically. And then it's just some of the most terrifying shit in the history of cinema. She's herpy. I'm sorry, what? She's herpy hypothetically and then it's just some of the most terrifying shit in the history of cinema she's herpy she's I'm sorry what she's herpy she's fully loaded

oh she's fully loaded some of the most horrifying shit in the history of cinema I'm so proud of that I just needed to get it out yeah congratulations it is just like

the level of like restraint and sort of like the precision of the timing and the blocking on the Billills POV through the night vision goggles, reaching out to her face, constantly almost touching

her, but missing. And Foster just is like killing that scene. I mean, playing the complete as I don't know how they actually shot that. Yeah, no. I don't know what she could or couldn't see. Right. know how they actually shot that yeah no i don't know what she could or couldn't see right but she is perfectly playing someone who does not think that the killer is that close to her but understands that she is at immediate risk his hands are out and he's coveting i know i mean buffle bill's kind of a turf if you think about it it can be a hundred percent you get your happy ending she

says then of course i'm having a friend for dinner. Great, great closing line. Pretty good. I feel like Hannibal thought of that like six years ago. He was like, man, if I ever get out and I get to do an ominous phone call, I'll say that. But that is the thing that doomed... Hannibal had a rec... Lecter wrote this movie. Yes. It is the thing that doomed the public

into thinking they wanted to see five more Hannibal movies. That's true. Because the ending is such a tee-up, but it's a tee-up for a thing you actually don't want to see him follow through on. That story doesn't really matter. Not really. You don't want to see him eat Anthony Held. That long walk away.

You don't want to see them hit on the weird romantic undertones. You don't want to see any of that stuff. Back to Lecter. Yeah. That long walk away to me is always just like, I take it as, because he disappears into the crowd and it's just like there are monsters

among us. Exactly. It's so effective. The fact that he never fades to black the fact that it just stays on and on and on and on and it's just like somewhere now Hannibal Lecter is existing outside of this frame Yes. Getting ready to chow down on people. And he's got a jaunty little Bahamian hat

And his wig! And a wig. He's got like long hair people. And he's got a jaunty little Bahamian hat. And his wig. And a wig. He's got like long hair now. And sunglasses. Yeah. I feel like Hopkins put that costume on. I was like, yeah, I'm doing this. This is me for the next 30 years.

This is my look. It's like his Twitter account now. It's just him. His Twitter account is incredible. Okay, box office game? Let's do it. February 14th, 1991. I just want to say this is the era when I was paying a lot of attention to the box office game? Let's do it. February 14th, 1991.

I just want to say this is the era when I was paying a lot of attention to the box office. So I might- Let's see how we do. Yeah. This film premiered at the Berlin Film Festival where it won Best Director and then came into theaters. February, it opens number one. 13 million. Pretty strong opening. Adjusted for inflation, that would be 30.

Wow. You know, so like a good opening. It's President's Day weekend, so it's a four-day weekend. And the domestic total is 113? 130. 130. Which adjusted is 279. It was a huge hit.

And worldwide, I think it was 279. Like it also did crazy well overseas. 100%. Yeah. Just a big old hit colossal fucking hit okay so number one 13 Silence of the Lambs

number two number two is it was number one the previous week when it came out was a huge hit of the year that I feel like is now forgotten

and it was like big movie star going serious has no idea what it is it's a big movie star but he had not gone serious before she she had not gone serious before I She. She had not gone serious before?

I mean, not in a leading role. She was seen as more of a comedy actress, I feel like, and this is her being like. This is an Oscar player? I can be in a thriller. No. Okay. Okay, she was seen as a comedy actress, and now she's going to be in a thriller. Oh, you know what?

It's not whoopee. No. I didn't realize this movie was serious, but is it a bird on a wire? It is not. Fuck. But is it Goldie? No. Huh.

But is it someone of a Goldie ilk? Is it that kind of comedy actress? I mean, in terms of that she'd been in some rom-coms, yes. Is it Meg Ryan? No. Is it Julia? Julia Rogers? Sleeping with the Enemy?

Correct. Final total on Sleeping with the Enemy, please. 90? 101. Wow. Huge hit. Wow. A movie really forgotten.

People do not remember Sleeping with the Enemy. I genuinely thought that came out later that year. Eighth biggest film of the year. Wow. Huge hit. Yeah, huge. Time for a Sleeping with the Enemy remake. And, you know, the other...

Yeah. It's going to be on Queeby, I'm sure. You can only watch it at night. Like the other big hits of the year, Terminator 2, Robin Hood, Beauty and the Beast,

Silence of the Lambs, City Slickers, Hook, The Addams Family. Weird. Right? But like all of those movies have at least some cultural tale,

right? Right. Sleeping with the Enemy is number eight and it's sort of like, oh, okay, yeah, I guess I remember that that movie year. Sleeping with the Enemy is number eight and it's sort of like, oh, okay. Yeah, I guess I remember that that movie existed. You talk about things being cyclical and culture always being this way. This is a perfect example of

a year where almost everything is some sort of reboot or sequel. Adaptation or something. Adaptation. Because then you have Father of the Bride, Naked Gun two and a half. The big hits of the year. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2. God, I saw all these fucking movies. Cape Fear, which is a remake. Like, you know, the big hits of the year. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2. Right. God, I saw all these fucking movies. Cape Fear, which is a remake.

Yeah. You know, that's like a hoity-toity remake. Right. Star Trek 6. Right. Crazy. The Prince of Tides, which of course was based on a DC comic. That was based on Sega Genesis.

Yeah. It's actually weirdly an adaptation of Golden Axe. Just no one ever talks about that. It's based on the Trading Card series by Toms. Now, number three. Okay. Is a new entry this week.

It is a film we have long discussed doing on this podcast. Ben is a King Ralph? It is King Ralph. Ben was pumping his fist. I knew it had to be

Ralph. John Goodman was the King of England. I was literally going to make a King Ralph reference earlier in this podcast. I was like, I don't want to take that from Ben. I was literally going to make a King Ralph reference earlier in this podcast. I was like, I don't want to take that from Ben.

I was like, that's King Ralph. It's such a good movie. It's my aesthetic because I don't like snooty people. You hate them. Uh-oh. Yeah, I don't like them. I don't like aristocrats. I don't like people who are bullies because, you know, you're not as smart as them.

King Ralph, he goes in there and he's like, I like rock and roll and I like sandwiches and y'all are weird. You like big guys named Ralph. That's your favorite movie genre. That's true. Ben, Queeby's calling me right now. They want to know if you want to be King Ralph in the King Ralph series. As long as it's a documentary and I go and I kick the queen out of her chair. Get out of here.

and I go and I kick the queen out of her chair. Get out of here. Here's the thing I want to say about King Ralph's poster. A lot of things I love. Okay. One, the billing. John Goodman, Peter O'Toole. Great billing.

He said O'Toole made it to the poster, but he has to be below Goodman. It's only two though, right. Two, it's a classic double tagline. One tagline explaining and two is a proper tagline. You know what I mean? Where it's like, this is too complicated. We need a tagline that explains. Those taglines are like,

two weeks ago, John Lawrence was a normal lawyer. Exactly. So, the regular tagline is the tagline you'd expect. A comedy of majestic proportion. Not a good tagline, but at least like'd expect. A comedy of majestic proportions. Not a good tagline, but at least like, okay. It's like a king comedy. Wash your fucking mouth.

It's a great tagline. Very good. Promotions. But now here's the top tagline. Okay. Not so funny. Here it is. Yeah. A great tragedy has befallen the royal family, leaving only one heir to the throne.

Not so funny. I'm not laughing. You don't think it's a smart business practice to sell your comedy by saying a great tragedy? But no, so here, if you're following, as I believe these posters, people sort of figure out how your eyes would move across. So first you're like Goodman and O'Toole. You're like, huh. Then great tragedy. You're like, uh-oh.

But then your eye scans across. Now here's the queen's crown. Yeah. But it's at huh. Then, great tragedy. You're like, uh-oh. But then your eye scans across. Now, here's the queen's crown, but it's atop the head of Goodman, and he's wearing a shirt that says, and I quote, Las Vegas. And it has a couple of dice on it. I hate,

I hate, I hate what I'm about to do, but David, you seemed kind of broken up about the thought of the royal family dying. Oh, Jesus. What's up with that? You seem weirdly invested in a thing just because you've seen it in a movie. A tragedy has befallen the royal family. Like, what if I had, like, a sort of inadvertent gasp? This is true.

It would be sad. We'd be sad. We'd be sad. Look, we all would be sad. Wow, you can get it real big. Yeah, I grew up in ones. I was going to draw it out longer. You mean, I didn up in New Orleans. I was going to draw it out longer. I didn't want you to.

Okay, number four of the box office? Numbers four and five of the box office are two of the giant hits of 1990. Okay. One won Best Picture, and one I think was probably the biggest movie of 1990. It's got to be Dancers with Wolves and Home Alone. That's correct. There we go. In that order?

No, Home Alone, then Dances with Wolves and Home Alone. That's correct. There we go. In that order? No, Home Alone, then Dances with Wolves, which are respectively 14 and 15 weeks into their runs. Home Alone, can you tell me the final total? The final total of Home Alone was 220? 285. That makes no sense. Which adjusted for inflation is $600 million. It's a lot of money. It's Infinity War. Right, right. Adjusted for inflation is 600 million dollars it's a lot of money it's it's infinity war yeah right right you know adjusted

for inflation home alone what if the wet bandits were in the new avengers disney owns that movie now kevin feige kevin feige should make it he should get pesci's back clearly loves working all the time definitely isn't uh like baffled by questions such as like what's it like

to not have been in a movie for 10 years I was gonna say the only thing he loves more than being in movies again is talking about those movies they're Disney plussing

Home Alone they are they're bringing it back and they are Disney plussing 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag yeah some of the other movies

no you're David I'm sorry that's going on Pesci Plus Pesci Plus Gone Fishing Again 9 Heads in a Duffel Bag my aunt Pesci Plus. Pesci Plus. Gone fishing again. Nine heads in a duffel bag. My aunt

Vinny. I don't know. Shit. I could have had a third good dumb Pesci sequel. My Aunt Sheila. Hey.

It's another Pesci movie. My Aunt Vinny is trans culture. Please don't jump the line. Maybe that's what Pesci wants to go for. That is true. Pesci Plus. Pesci's the only cis man still allowed to play a trans woman.

I have decreed it. You'll allow it? I speak for the community. Just because it's like, well, Pesci's in a movie? Let's just give him some room. It just so rarely works. You're like, whatever it takes. We've got to get him back up on that screen.

Some other big movies. You've got L.A. Story. You've got Never Ending Story 2, so two stories. L.A. Story's a good movie. Yeah. I've never seen it. Yeah, very good movie. You have Nothing But Trouble opening this week.

The Chevy Chase, Dan Aykroyd bomb. You have White Fang, which I remember watching on video as a kid and being kind of freaked out by. Yeah. And Awakenings, another Oscar holdover. Yes, a weird film. Emily, thank you for being here. Thank you so much for having me. You're the best in the biz.

Primetime? Primetime, I can't say right now. We're working on, we have a season two. We're pitching out to get sponsors and stuff. So there is a season two in the works. You cannot say what it is or when it will be coming out. My hope is that I will be able to say what it is when this episode drops and I'll do that on Twitter at TVOTI.

Fantastic. One of the best follows on the internet and also this is a great place to plug that I think you're interesting as coming back as a series exclusively made up of Jay Leno. Just talking to Jay Leno. Right. No, I also have a book about the X-Files, a show that I talked about earlier.

Monsters of the Week. Monsters of the Week. also have a book about the X-Files, a show that I talked about earlier. Monsters of the Week. Monsters of the Week, the complete critical companion to the X-Files. Uh, and the real reason I'm here, uh, my, uh, scripted show Arden is started season two,

December 30th. We hope we haven't recorded anything yet. And this is early October. So yeah, but it's, it's a podcast. Arden. Yeah.

Arden. Uh, it was, uh, in season two right now. So please go listen to that. Check it out. a podcast. Yeah. Arden, it was in season two right now. So please go listen to that. Check it out. True crime, fun. Best in the best.

Absolutely. Yes. Thank you. You're talking about yourself, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. And the divine producer, Amp. You won several potty awards, right?

For best podcaster? I'd rather not talk about it. I made the mistake of campaigning as supporting it's like a but if if we missed anything listeners sure it's that time of year we need some ratings some reviews oh so wanna instead of tweeting at us, and of course you can still do it if you prefer, but as a fun bit, perhaps maybe leaving a little rating of what we missed. Can I make one last pitch to the listeners? Please. I know March Madness is coming up.

This is coming on January. I know you guys are thinking about what that lineup is. I don't know what's going to be in it. My wife Libby Hill, TV Awards editor, IndieWire, has made it a goal of her life to be on every movie podcast talking about Bicentennial Man. So Columbus wins. He was in our bracket last year. Please vote Chris Columbus listeners. I want to make my life's wife hell because she will have to watch Bicentennial Man dozens of times.

One of the most unpleasant movies to watch. Yeah. Truly. dozens of times. One of the most unpleasant movies to watch. Yeah. Truly. Just one of those movies where like your eye just kind of slips off the screen where you're like, this is still going on.

But also you constantly feel like there are ants crawling on your skin. Somehow watching it makes you feel like physically like jittery. So if you want my wife Libby Hill to be on this podcast to talk it to just be like Griffin, why are you talking about this right now? I want that more than anything. Vote Columbus. Bicentennial man, baby. Next week, Philadelphia.

That's right. We're heading to the—I don't know. Whatever. Thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, subscribe. I was going to try to say something funny and my brain just fizzled out. It happens. Thanks to Andrew Gooder for our, and my brain just fizzled out. It happens. Thanks to Ant for Goodo for social media.

Lane Montgomery for a theme song. Joe Bunn and Pat Browns for artwork. Go to blankies.red.com for some real nerdy shit. Say something about like a cheese steak. I was thinking, but I couldn't put the math together fast enough. I'm no good while hunting. Go to buy shirts and Patreon around this time. Maybe right before or after this, we'll be

releasing our official performance review of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not since the Star Wars days. Gethard is coming on with us, and we're going to review every credited character in Endgame. And I'm sure

talk about Kit Fisto. Probably a ton. So, yeah, check that out. And as always, Jay Leno slides into DMs like Gifiel. Can I do something very unexpected? Yeah, sure. A little merchandise spotlight?

Sure. Sure, go ahead. Okay, so in the late 1990s, Todd McFarlane, he of the comic books, first Marvel, but then eventually creates Bond, founds Image, becomes Crater. He like owns the Edmonton Oilers maybe or something like that. Huge fan of hockey. Also at one point in time owned both Sammy Sosa and Mark McGuire's record-breaking home run balls.

Weird. He bought the balls. Yeah. He lost them. He had to sell them because he named a pedophile mobster character in a Spawn comic after a hockey player because he's such a big hockey fan. He's like, oh, fun Easter egg. And then the guy sued him for defamation. And he had to pay the guy like tens of millions

of dollars so he had to sell his baseballs. Carry on. He was very obsessed with Todd McFarlane as a young man, largely because at the peak of Spawn's cultural relevance, all the toy companies wanted to get the rights to Spawn. And he was like, fuck you.

You guys suck. I'm starting my own toy company. And everyone was like, this is stupid. You're going to fail. And it succeeded wildly. And the Spawn toys sold really well. But the thing that pushed him out of the edge was he started a line called Movie Maniacs. That was, what if you took all the interesting characters in adult films

who toy companies have been afraid to touch, but also who are the only visually interesting character in a movie. So you couldn't make an entire toy line off of that movie, but you can put them all in as a grab bag. Okay. So he did a series that was like Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Leatherface. Sure. When Michael Myers, I think, was maybe in the first batch.

Whatever. That then became one of the 10 greatest selling toy lines of the year, along with Hot Wheels and Barbie and shit. Yes. So immediately people were like, Hannibal. Hannibal. Right. And for years and years, everyone was trying to get Hannibal, and no one could because Hopkins was like, I don't want to be a toy. Hopkins was always shutting it down.

It was like 10 plus years of wind up until someone was able to make not McFarlane, but people who had left McFarlane and started their own company. Two Hannibal Lecter figures, one on the stretcher, one which is really unsettling of Hannibal with the Billy

Club being able to attack the guy. Being able to attack the guy. Jesus Christ. But the thing I want to show you folks This is that one. That's that one. Comes with the little cell. The thing I want to show you folks that I find very funny is the series of mini-mates which are Lego-esque

figures of the Sons of the Lambs crew. Hannibal Lecter gotta get a Funko Pop. I mean, you talk about the iconography. He doesn't have one? Mads Mikkelsen does. Mads Mikkelsen does.

Yeah. Oh, sure. But these are the Sons of the Lambs. Oh, wow. Yeah, so there's Clarice. Okay. It does speak to how sort of iconic every character in the movie is, that they can be recognized even in this form.

Here's Buffalo Bill holding a moth with a painted on nipple ring. And then Hannibal. These are bizarre. I don't like these. Hannibal looks a lot

like Nixon. It does. He does look like Nixon. David. Yeah, he looks like your best friend. I like to add to the merchandise spotlight.

There is now a Funko Ham. Okay, it's him on the gurney with the mask. Makes sense. I've always wanted Buffalo Bill's necklace. If everyone knows where I could get that necklace, I think it looks cool. That's it. Great.