Blank Check with Griffin & David - The Gift with Starlee Kine

Episode Date: May 15, 2022

Katie Holmes in a lazy southern accent asks, “What’s the matter? See somethin’ bad?” and we are immediately transported back to the year 2000 when the trailers for this movie were EVERYWHERE.�� Writer and podcasting icon Starlee Kine joins us to talk about Sam Raimi’s “The Gift” - a film with an incredibly stacked cast of actors who were eager to sink their teeth into a Southern Gothic Billy Bob Thornton creation. Do we buy Keanu as a wife-beating redneck? Is Cate Blanchett actually a terrible psychic? How does Giovanni Ribisi’s performance in this rank among his most deranged screen outings? Folks - we apologize in advance for bringing up “The Other Sister”. Join our Patreon at patreon.com/blankcheck Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter and Instagram! Buy some real nerdy merch at shopblankcheckpod.myshopify.com

Somebody might come in here. You better podcast me fast. Two lines in this film are in the trailer. Uh-huh. And when I was watching this film, which I had not seen in 20 plus years. But you did see it when it came out. I saw it when it came out. Okay.

But I hadn't, you know. Yeah. But then there were two lines that when they had, and they're both early in the movie. I was like, I must have seen the trailer for this film like 50,000 times. I was going to say, I feel like this was a big rotation trailer. I remember seeing the trailer a ton of times. I remember mostly thinking-

On-demand rentals, like post-theater, right? But do you want to guess the two lines or do you want me to tell you? I want you to tell me. The first is Keanu Reeves saying, you mess with the devil, you could get burned, know that one sure the second one which is the really important one is katie holmes saying what's the matter see something bad yeah that one which and then like in the trailer because like you know or like you know something but like i must have just seen the

trailer for this film 40 billion times yeah yeah yeah it is just one of those trailers where you're just kind of like huh that, that movie that I'll never see that just exists as a trailer in my mind. And I remember the only thing that made me even consider seeing the movie at the time is like, this guy's directing Spider-Man next. Like it was the movie coming out after he was announced to direct it. And I think instead I just went, I'll watch the Evil Dead movies on video. I saw it.

That was a timeline that it was, it was like a package deal of like, this movie's coming out and the announcement of... He hired him post-filming on this movie. Mid-production. Right, pretty much while he's making this movie and paid to delay post-production on this film so he could get started on Spider-Man

and I think the research shows like, and he's been candid, like he wasn't that involved in the post-production or as involved in the post-production of this movie. So his head was in a very different place. His head was in Spider-Man. Right. Already. But that was the thing.

They wanted him so badly, and they wanted the movie to go so fast. And Spider-Man ended up getting pushed back. So the timeline was not as stressed as they originally thought. was not as stressed as they originally thought, but they were like, we will pay you Paramount a million dollars, which is one-tenth of the budget of this movie, essentially. Like, we'll pay you a million dollars to push your movie back nine months

and let Sam Raimi work on Spider-Man and just edit very slowly. Wow. And it's, yeah, like, his composer on this was Christopher Young, who's kind of his backup guy when he doesn't work with Elfman, who did Spider-Man 3. Yeah.

And Christopher Young was like, yeah, we like met once. Yeah. And he was just sort of like, I trust you. And Christopher Young was like an Elfman protege. And it was like, you know, he just handed things off to his people a little bit. But yes, this movie came out and it was like, this is the last pre-Spider-Man movie of Sam Raimi. And it also had that weird vibe i mean this career arc we've been talking about where it's like he starts out in

genre movies then he has this weird dip into like adult respectability and then he comes out into spider-man it's like you've now graduated into the highest level of genre because this is a genre it's in between right so this is i saw it it as a young Oscar watcher because I was like, Cate Blanchett leading role, Oscar potential. That is why I saw it. We've talked about this before. We had a huge fight in an episode about you being such an Oscar watch forum. Cool kid.

Very cool. Right. Just wanted to get that in as well. And how the narrative at the time was that Cate was fucking up. It was that she was was below Kidman more. Sure. I feel like there's another. Winslet.

Winslet was always in that weird territory where it's like, she's an Oscar star, but is she a movie star? Yeah. She's a movie star. Absolutely. But I more mean like, Winslet would do a lot of stuff.

She would do art movies. She would do supporting roles. She would kind of bounce around because she'd already done titanic right but titanic solidified the movie star forever so that i feel like her mantle could never be i agree with you but she it does feel like she was just if you look at the years right after titanic yeah it feels like she's pointedly swerving as far away from titanic as she can and it's almost not until because it's's like Quills, Enigma, Iris. These are all supporting roles in sort of, you know... Eternal Sunshine kind of feels like the time

where she regrabs the gauntlet and goes like, I'm a leading lady. And similarly, it's that same year, right? Where it feels like Blanchett in between Elizabeth or let's say talented mr ripley right elizabeth is certainly in between elizabeth and 2004 and 2004 is the aviator and also aquatic which she's wonderful and yes um in between those two movies she's kind of fucking up her only hits are these this series of films about like a lord of rings right you know like she is in those right and

she's good in them but that almost but i'm gonna read you her project yes it's like is she doomed to just be the lady who's giving a little bit of gravitas in one scene per lord of the rings movie is she doomed only ethereal right 100 and it was also like she is incredible and elizabeth that was the other thing i was a big fan of that movie as a young English royalty nerd or whatever I was. A little confused, but we'll let you go on. Ben and I are looking at each other's

scans. We're tilting our heads like a Gary Marshall dog reaction shot. Have you seen Elizabeth? You know I never have. I believe that because I feel like it was one of those movies where people were like, this isn't actually that good. It's not actually that good. But it's certainly better than Elizabeth the Golden Age. It's a forgotten sequel.

It is funny, though. It's mostly like powerhouse acting stuff. When that movie came out, I think I assumed Cate Blanchett is someone who's been bubbling for a while. And this is her breakthrough movie. Where in reality, it's like she pretty much came out of nowhere with that movie. She had been in Oscar and Lucinda, which was not a movie that went in, and then before that,

she was like an Australian actress of no renown. But there are few instances in the modern era of like a unknown actress getting the lead role in a movie like that, and not only it being like a big Oscar player, she's nominated for the Oscar, all that sort of shit, but everyone being like, well, meryl streep this will be a huge exactly a huge we're calling it prestige actress she is clearly decades of she's not going to be an action movie

she's going to be like you say a meryl streep type who plays right real life people right or whatever right it was just like immediate anointment from that one movie. Yeah. Well, she has the quality. When I was watching this movie, I was like, even before looking up her filmography, I was just like, where does this fall?

This could have been her first movie. Everything about the minute she starts, she has a quality of you've already felt like she's not only could be the Meryl Streep,

but she's already been the Meryl Streep in your life. It's weird. It feels like, right. You're like, did I miss the 10 years before this? Yeah. She's been around and she's been developing because she just kind of arrived ready made. Yes.

And her energy on screen is not just like, oh, this person's a confident performer. But it's like you've been we've loved you for 20 years. Right. Like an erased memory. Right. When she first entered our lives so post elizabeth yes it's a lot of supporting roles in which she's good and a lot of lead projects that don't really work that just don't exist uh so uh pushing tin kind of a classic huh everyone

in this is famous no one seems to care okay so it's blanchett uh joe lee billy bob yeah who's the other guy qsac mr john qsac who at quite a height for him a weird quartet and like but that was one of those things where it's like you say those four names i'm like i'm interested in like you know who's crazy air traffic controllers and i'm like are okay and it's like no they're crazy it's directed by mike newell it is is. Right, you're like, who's going to direct this wacky American film? And I've got a great title for you that's going to pull people in. Pushing Tin.

Yeah. What does that mean? Oh, it's like slang for airplanes. You lost me. Right. Anyway, Pushing Tin. And years later, it'll be a movie that you confuse

with like five other movies. It sounds like it would be like a golf movie or something and then you're like, oh, it's a tin cup. That's what I thought. It sounded like a golf movie. I think it mostly you're like, oh, that's what I thought. It sounded like a golf movie. I think it mostly only exists because of Jolie and Billy Bob getting married.

That's how they got together. And obviously, Billy Bob knows Cate Blanchett when she's now the star. She's essentially playing his mother in this movie. Yes. Yes. Which is interesting. I think Pushing Tin as a title would have completely evaporated from the collective consciousness. Pushing Tin.

If not for three years of like E! News saying, the couple of course met on the set of Pushing Tin. So then she's in The Talented Miss Ripley, which she's extremely good in, but everyone's good in that movie. And she's probably got the smallest of the main roles. But she is good and she's very glamorous.

But she is the one you talk about the least when you talk about it. Because everyone is so good. Jude Law, Matt Damon, Gwyneth Paltrow, Philip Seymour Hoffman. And they're like, oh yeah, Cate Blanchett's good in that. You know, but it's the one you talk about the least when you talk about because everyone is so jude law matt damon gwyneth paltrow philip seymour hoffman i'm like oh yeah kate blanchett's good in that you know like you know but it's a it's a fifth but when i'm beating red but again when you what weirdly when i think of town time mr ripley i'm like that's the first one she that must have been her very first movie when that must have been introducing kate blanchett exactly and it was like several movies in and it was a few movies in. When I watched it for the first time maybe 10 years ago, I was like, Cate Blanchett's in this?

Like, this is a weirdly small part for her at this point in time. And then you realize, like, this is her third American movie. It's just so distortive that Elizabeth was so big. Yeah. And that she was the queen in a movie that had, like, eight hugely established actors in her supporting cast. But who are all hot exciting actors yeah no one in that movie obviously gwyneth paltrow already has an oscar yeah damon has a screenwriting on oscar but like everyone in that movie is still like

young and proving themselves and yes i mean that movie rules then she's in the man who cried the forgotten sally potter wow to turo dep reachy vehicle which i have seen and it's not good okay uh this year uh that's the same year as the gift which the gift i would say is just one of those movies that becomes a footnote not really does you know not a huge hit but it's not hated no but is kind of just like oh yeah remember that movie with like katie holmes nudity and like i think truly the two lasting legacies of this movie are katie holmes nudity and this is the last thing he makes before he makes spider-man sam raimi like still right pre-blockbusters right she's in bandits which she's good in and gets some award this was a thing we fought over but yeah she got every

sag and a golden globe nomination for banditsit. She's phenomenal in that. She's good in that. The movie's kind of all over the place. I kind of like that. But it's sort of likable. Right. And Billy Bob's great in that too. She was in Charlotte Grey, which is a French Resistance World War II movie directed by Gillian Armstrong. This is a classic

Cate Blanchett pre-Oscar project where you're like, that sounds like something everyone's going to go for and no one goes for nothing she's in the shipping news where she plays the crazy uh lady who leaves him i remember her being fun in she's like a spark plug in it it's a kind of a horribly written role right but she's like i'm crazy i'm gonna cheat on you goodbye you know like it's sort of like but she is fun and that movie is so dour otherwise turk card yeah great finger work david thank you i was doing a lot of finger work yeah uh good book

have you ever read the shipping news no i was about to ask so it's no i i have not read it but it sounds like a movie that i knew was made from a book yes it's bad it definitely from the time when you when you were debating i'm not going to see the movie yet come read the book first which is not happening it's an absolute you see the poster you see the cast and you go that's a book i know that's a book i smell book i don't even need to walk closer to see based on the book based on the acclaimed novel is also a you know dour it's about a dour dude he's not a happy man and he lives in nova scotia and he writes for a newspaper that just tells you when boats are coming in but in the book you're like i like It's about a dour dude. He's not a happy man. No. And he lives in Nova Scotia and he writes for a newspaper that just tells you

when boats are coming in. But in the book, you're like, I like this mood. When Spacey's like, people love it when I'm depressed and angry about my status in life.

But Spacey is like absolutely mind-bogglingly miscast in them. He's one of the most insane, like we read that book, Spacey's like the 80th person you think of, even though he's really famous.

He just won an Oscar or whatever. Then she reunites with the gifts, Giovanni Rubisi, from heaven. Okay. Which's really famous you know he's just won an oscar or whatever then she reunites with the gifts giovanni rubisci heaven okay uh uh which was the you know the kristof kishlowski uh script that he never made before he died i always get heaven and enigma confused but enigma was winslet is winslet that's the uh british code breakers in the 40s movie that is like totally watchable but is rubisci in that as well? Why do I always get Enigma and Heaven confused? I mean, they came out at the same time.

Yeah. He's not in it. It's, you know, one of your classic Duke Gray Scott, Saffron Burroughs, Jeremy Northam vehicles. Okay. That was a movie I saw with my mom, Enigma. And we were like, that was great.

They broke the codes, you know. So Enigma's more watchable than Heaven, but they both have that vibe of like... Yeah. Heaven's what? Weird. Is Heaven at all like Enigma's more watchable than Heaven, but they both have that vibe of like... Heaven's what? Is Heaven at all like Enigma? Maybe in costuming, but like... Period peak time era?

Well, Heaven I think is... It was this whole thing where Kieślowski posts three colors, right? He died of, I want to say, cancer? He died in... He died too young. He never got to make the fourth say, cancer? Like, he died in, you know, he died too young. He never got to make the fourth color, which everyone was waiting for. No, he had done his colors.

He never got to make four. He never got to blend the colors. Right. No, he had done his colors, red, white, and blue. He did that. I'm just saying it might have been like a Kill Bill Volume 3 thing where for 20 years people went, like, any chance you go back for a fourth color? I've been dabbling with green, but I don't know if I'm going know if i'm gonna do it post colors he had a new trilogy he'd written called heaven hell purgatory oh and they all he died before any of them were made okay uh and they're

set i think in kind of well heaven is set i think in italy but in like fascist tickford directs heaven and tom tickford directed it okay and then I believe they did make Hell. Denis Danistanovich, remember him? No. The guy who made that No Man's Land movie. Okay. And then Purgatory was never made. Does Giovanni give a restrained performance as a Nazi? He's an Italian fascist, I believe.

I'm not sure. Like, he's famously restrained. Let's put a pin in Ribisi and how you can and cannot use Ribisi in a movie. That's a conversation we're going to have at length. So at this point, Cate Blanchett, she's obviously, the Lord of the Rings movies are doing great.

Sure. But nothing's really working, right? 2003, brutal. Veronica Guerin and The Missing. Two Blanchett movies that the Oscars ignore, the people ignore, no one remembers,

but they were both presented as award season, and then it was really like, fuck, Blanchett's in trouble. And I would say her being in Lord of the Rings already, the way I think of her in Lord of the Rings

is more like an actress almost at the end of her career. Yes. It's not... Oh yeah, sure, she was already so established. Like she's with the established British actors in that film.

The movie is sort of using her prestige on loan to help itself more than the movie is helping her. Yes. In that sense. Like outside of visibility. And it's like- She's so well cast. She is.

She's great in them. But it's like it's already like jumped ahead 20, it's already assumed a level of prestige that you can't have established already this early on. It's almost like she's doing like an elder statesman Helen Mirren thing where it's like you're lending credibility to this film by you, Cate Blanchett, doing this. It's really weird when she turns into a ghoul. That part rules. That part rules. But it's like weird to see her do that.

It's so good. Freak me out when I'm doing to be like lord of the rings the first lord of the rings comes out three years after elizabeth yes right and i'm like she's ian mckellen one year after the gift that level of status just at the start of her long road right the thing with the garen missing combo yeah is that it's also like you know garen she's doing an irish accent she's playing a real person the missing is the other version it's like d glam period western tommy ron howard post oscar yeah so she's like she's coming at it from both angles and both angles people are like no thank you and then of course in 2004 she's so good in the life aquatic incredible maybe my favorite performance in that movie she's so funny yeah the scene where he makes her cry is so good yeah uh and then obviously the

aviator is a good performance it was almost annoying that she won the oscar because it's just like you know you played katherine hepper sure did the voice she is good she is good but it is funny i remember going weird i don't like also i i never loved when the oscar goes to a impression me neither i mean it's yeah i never love it yeah like her bob dylan performance is not an impression is not an impression and is much more interesting and probably would have won it's only three years later right you know like but at that point she just won it was too recent for her to win a second i i remember seeing the aviator with my mom i guess maybe opening weekend and her first scene on the golf course happens and the audience at the end of the scene breaks into applause and i turn around i was like i guess

she's winning the oscar like it was one of those things where people were like you know yeah yeah people i mean you know fucking tony new york audience opening weekend aviator limited release whatever but like people were just fucking like okay you pulled it off like it really was too risky to do i actually want to see who she beat now 2004 yeah so it would have been you never saw the aviator never saw the aviator so it's actually a great movie can i see if i can name the four yeah sophia canado for hotel rwanda yeah a good performance virginia madsen for sideways yes who maybe should have won i guess so it's a good performance and she'd won like all the critics awards. Right.

But it always felt like she was never going to win the Oscar because she was Virginia Madsen. Yes. There was just that ultimate limo where they were like, nomination. Right.

You know what I mean? Okay, so wait. You've been in too many Candyman movies. Yeah. You know, or whatever. Is it supporting? Supporting actress.

She could have. You can be Virginia Madsen and win in supporting. No, I mean, I'm just saying the Oscars, I feel like, had that snobbiness with the, like, you're not a good actress in anything else. Even though she can be good.

I know. I think they were like, you have to give two good performances in a row before we give you an Oscar. You're not going to get this one out of nowhere. And also, they were right. She probably never gave a good performance again. You know, she's very good in her smell.

Alex's movie, in which she's very good in her smell. Alex's movie, which is very well cast. Yeah. I just remember seeing that and she comes on as Elizabeth Moss's mother and I was like, that makes sense. Yeah, you're right, you're right. Yeah.

But yes, no, she hasn't been used that well since Sideways. Okay, wait. Arcanado. So you've named Arcanado, Blanchett. So one of them is a young actor who has vaulted into total prestige. Oh, it's Natalie Portman Closer.

Yes, who won the Golden Globe. Yes. And was a threat. Right, this was kind of a split field in a weird way. And then the fifth person is not a Best Picture nominee, are they? No, the fifth person is a very good actress who had been on a great run getting her first Oscar nomination for a fairly bland performance in a biopic. In a biopic?

As a wife. Huh. Yeah, I mean, there's a reason you don't remember this. It's not Laura Linney and Kinsey. It is Laura Linney and Kinsey. It's not her first nomination. You can count on me. Right, obviously.

What am I talking about? David, you fool. Her second nomination. She's good, then. She's totally good, because she's Laura Linney. It's just surprising that I think that movie... You know what I'm confusing it with? It was Patricia Clarkson's first nomination for Pieces of April

where you were like, she's good in this, but she's been better in other things. That's why I got confused because it felt like you were describing Patricia Clarkson. I knew that was 2003. But of course Linney did have... Has Linney not gotten a nomination since? Savages. She's good in that.

She's good in that. Yeah. I just thought Kinsey was very good, and it seemed like a major Oscar player, and then it only got the Linny nom, and you're like, Neeson weirdly snubbed, screenplay snubbed.

Yeah, Neeson snub was weird. William Sadler has one of the great one-scene performances in history in that movie. I guess so. I don't remember that movie very well. The world's biggest sex freak. Yeah, I guess I remember that. Right well the world's biggest sex freak yeah i guess i remember that right i mean kinty anyway anyway you know once she wins the oscar the funny thing is she actually kind of muddles along for a few years after that because like she's in babel but who remembers that like that she was such a big deal it's a big movie yeah

she's in the good german which is probably the worst even soderbergh movie it's in The Good German, which is probably the worst Steven Soderbergh movie. It's in the conversation. No Time Scandal, I think she's phenomenal. She's really good in that. That's one of the ones that lingers the most. That's when it's suddenly like everyone is now just like, she is Meryl Streep type. It's so odd that it's that. Now we're in that. Because we started at that and now it took all this time to get back to that

yes because it was the initial how she began like it does make you realize how much Winslet was smart to be like

let me not have the whole movie rest on my shoulders for a couple years let me wait until let me take you know take some supporting roles

right whereas all those things the Blanchett movies that don't exist are all like Blanchett front and center her face are all like Blanchett, front and center, her face, or it's something like the shipping news where it's like it's a supporting part,

but this is the part that's supposed to win her the Oscar. Like I remember so much of the buzz of that movie being like she's got the wild part. Right, right. Well, I think Blanchett was trying, she was taking parts that she wanted to try so many different things, and that made her not

think Caitlin Winslet does not do that hmm like I'm not saying she's not different

in different films yeah but I don't think she it feels to be like a different kind of mania with Blanchett being like now I'm gonna show him funny

now I'm gonna show him the crazy one in a very content timeline this is I mean just a fascinating thing for her to do so quickly. This movie. The Gift? Yeah.

I mean, I think it was one of those things where this is her first leading role in an American film. Yeah. And I know this is going to sound silly, but I think the Billy Bob Thornton script part of it is still a major hook. Huge. To me, there's no mystery why anyone is in this film like this film to me encapsulates exactly what actors thought the future of cinema was going to be sure what they thought movie making was and the fact that it's right before spider-man means everyone predicted the future wrong yeah but then we i when you watch

the interviews of the actors talking about this film the way they they're so solemn keanu reeves talking about he got like therapists coaching him and trauma everyone discusses it as though it is a much more serious work than it is because and it's and it's right at we it really is about everything's about to change with everything's about to change yeah and so every one of them read this script and thought it was an incredible script. They thought it was saying something very important. They thought it was about trauma. It was about abuse. It was showing a part of America that you don't see.

I've never been less confused why every actor in this film is in a film. It's funny because the cast is so stacked and you realize there must have been this feeling around the movie where it's like, this is like a few good men. Like, it's better to have a small part in the gift than be a lead in something else. The high tide is going to raise all ships. And you have multiple different people, different career points, all using this movie to be like, this is the exact kind of movie you want to be a part of. Katie Holmes wants to transcend being teen star. Hilary Swank is trying to like keep the momentum going off of her oscar win this is kind of right after the matrix yeah he wants to show

that he can be a bad guy right greg kinnear similarly like i want to be like a little heavier i feel like almost everyone in this movie is like can i do something i have a thing outside of my yeah and there's a real and there's a real innocence to. Like, that's a Katie Holmes, Giovanni. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there's an innocence with just what they thought movies were. Like, I just, it is really, I'm telling you, when I watch people talk about it, it just feels so pure how they were like, we're taking this very seriously. We very much believe in filmmaking. We very much believe in the message of this.

And just knowing that no one, that they don't know what's coming. Yes. No one involved in this. It adds like a poignancy to it that I think the film would not have had if things hadn't changed. Did you introduce the podcast? No, I haven't. No, you haven't. We just got so deep in the good conversation.

I just like the Blanchett. I love to think about that. You dove right in. I'm sorry. No, it's okay. I can't help myself. I mean, we can wait till the end of the show. I love to think about that. You dove right in. I'm sorry. No, it's okay. I can't help myself. I mean, we can wait until the end of the show.

I mean, we don't... No, look, I want to say this is a podcast called Blank Check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin. And I'm David. Ben's disappointed. Ben's looking at me

with disappointment that I didn't hold off on introducing until the end. No, but you've already done that before. You can't do that. That's my point. Thank you, Starly.

This is also a No Biz podcast. I'm sorry. What was I thinking? Sorry. You can't just throw that in. There thank you this is also no podcast i'm sorry what was i thinking sorry you can't just throw that in there was a point you've done when you did it before there was a reason for it was funny it was it was different yeah it was thematic it fit in with right the episode you can't just like suddenly just willy-nilly be doing that you can't do it you can't do and ben also i'm a contrarian so you said you could wait to introduce it to the end i was like fuck you i'm introducing it right now I wouldn't have let it happen, though, because I just think it can't be repeated unless it has a reason.

Fair enough. All right. I'm glad we hashed it out on Mike. Everything happens for a reason. Look, it's a podcast about filmographies and hashing out arguments on Mike. Right. Directors who have massive success early on in their careers. Wait, are we fighting now?

No, I think we're good, right? Okay, yeah. This is Blank Check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin. It is. I'm David. It's a podcast about filmographies. It is.

Directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce, baby. Yes. This is a miniseries on the films of Sam Raimi. It's called Podcast Me to Hell. Today we are talking about his 2000 supernatural prestige thriller drama, The Gift.

Southern gothic supernatural thriller. So many weird things going on with this movie. Our guest, Starlee Kine. Hi. The great Starlee Kine returning to the show. I think this is kind of my genre on this show. I was going to say, once we picked Raimi, we were like, oh, we should ask Darlene to do that again. It just felt like in both of these cases, as with What Lies Beneath, I was like, Darlene would be a good person to have on for like a 2000 adult, sexual, supernatural, prestige thriller made by a serious director. Yeah.

I mean, I really enjoy watching these kind of movies. I told you that when I first came on. These movies, I really enjoy watching these kind of movies. I told you that when I first came on. These movies are the same year. They are the same. I mean, it's the exact same vibe going on.

Because I, I mean, that makes sense. And what I, another thing I find interesting about that is that the actors are still taking

these movies seriously, but neither of those movies were big hits with the critics or even with the box office. Well, no. What Lies Beneath was a huge hit at the box office. That's what's interesting.

But the critics panned that. They were mixed to me. Both What Lies Beneath and this one, in the reviews they say, much like Kate Benchette, you don't know where she's falling. She arrived at the biggest star in the world before she'd even become a star. the reviews they say much like kate banchette you don't know where she's falling hurt like she's arrived at the the biggest star in the world before she even become a star i'm always surprised

that this year the stuff that we are like oh i've seen that a million times had already been done a million times yes both the reviews of what lies beneath and and the gift are the critics are like it's just a bunch of scares that we've seen yeah it's this shit again and then but some of the actors are like this is so new and the filmmakers like they're behind what has been out in the world i think southern gothic movies were were had had a bit of a run uh-huh because post sling blade sure you got eves bayou you got midnight in the garden of good and evil you know you have a few kind of prestige-y, murder-y Southern, well, I don't know. I'm fanning myself. You know, like a lot of that.

And maybe by the time The Gift is coming out, people are kind of like, okay, we get it. But it's more the scares. Everyone's doing an accent. Sure. But it's the scary stuff is what the critics are like, we're not scared of this. There's like six months, right,

where between What Lies Beneath coming out in like the middle of July and being this huge fucking hit that critics are like, okay, jerk off motion, right? And then this comes out like qualifying run December for Oscars and then really comes out in January.

And What Lies Beneath is like a fucking, whatever, $90 million movie with the biggest movie star in the world and like a huge leading actress and the biggest director and whatever. And it's a big fucking hit. No one takes it seriously. It's not even whispered about for Oscars or anything.

And then this is released six months later as like Paramount doesn't even know what to do with this. It's released by, you know, it's a Paramount Classics, which is their awards arm. Which you're like, this doesn't feel like a Paramount Classics movie, but Paramount's like, this is a little too small for us to know what to do with it's stacked with movie

stars they were like this is an oscar play the oscars are like this might be a little too genre it's stacked with names i would say keanu's the only movie star in it uh-huh it's like it's stacked with you know like swank has just won an oscar but obviously it's still pretty new blanchett right she's still pretty new yeah rabisi where's well i guess we'll just have a and katie holmes obviously it's that thing of like hey the kid from tv and like crappy teen movies is trying to be in a grown-up movie god it was billy bob is also billy bob's also a name billy bob is a name although weirdly is not on any of the advertising. You'd think they might say from the writer of Sling Blade or whatever,

but the advertising is very much just Cate Blanchett on, you know, like big Cate Blanchett face, names, and then a lot of like the only witness to the crime wasn't even there. A lot of crimey murder mystery. There's an A24 version of this movie now right that gets like bought at sundance and a24 cuts together a trailer that makes it look scarier than it is and they release it wide and they somehow trick people into making like 20 million dollars and but but it's artsier than this whereas this movie is like made by a studio who

insists on releasing it through their specialty arm but the film is like surprisingly kind of i don't say broad in a negative way but it's not like like he's trying to make an accessible on releasing it through their specialty arm. But the film is like surprisingly kind of, I don't say broad in a negative way, but it's not like, like he's trying to make an accessible movie. He can't help himself. But I think the actors, and to some extent, Sam Raimi,

think this is an 824 movie. I think that's- It's in an odd in-between zone. But it's because of, but when you hear Sam Raimi talk about the punishing of the audience in this, he comes back to talking about that again like the bruce campbell quote i want to punish the audience yes which i feel like is sam raimi's driving force yeah as a filmmaker he talks about it when he interviews about this the darkness of this movie is why

he was worried that the studio was going to he I think he was really drawn to how dark, the Giovanni Ribisi darkness, and not the scary stuff, but the actual like... And the intensity of the content. And I think that, in his mind, is a 824. JJ pulled up our researcher in the dossier, this interview with him,

where he says when he read the script for the first... I mean, do you want to read the quote directly? Yeah, but let's back up and start with some context this is an early thornton script tom emerson the co-writer is his buddy right they wrote one false move together after billy wilder tells him at a party you should write scripts yeah he's like a cater waiter or whatever yes and he's like billy wilder i love your work and he's like you should write your own movies yeah so he he and emerson write like a handful of scripts together he told billy bob they write a handful of scripts together and then one false move is obviously the thing that gets them off the ground but there were a couple scripts that they sold that never got made before

that uh yeah a family thing which eventually became an mgm movie i don't know it it's uh i looked this up last night it's two big actors pretty cool it's robert duvall and james earl jones thank you love that and then sling blades the third one but gift was in that pile of like the other scripts they had written around this time that just only got bought up once they were hot post sling blade the plan is for thornton to direct this movie which seems very logical especially since it's about his mother it's a very personal project for him. Jodie Foster is going to play the leading role. Slam dunk.

Slam dunk. I'm just like, and I like this movie okay. I like it okay. But I'm like, I'll see that. Yeah. And no offense to Raimi, but I kind of want Thornton to direct the movie. I do too. I mean, it is, I will say that like all the quotes of like, you don't understand how much

this is about my mother. And Billy Bob Thornton saying that when he worked with Blanchett again on, because they work on Pushing Tin, this movie gets made, and then they work together on Bandits. Yeah. Right? And he's like, you're my, right. And when they're making Bandits, she has played his mother. And he's like, this is weird. You're my mom now.

Right, right, right. And you do feel like there's some personal element missing from this movie that Thornton probably would have brought. I think so. I mean, it's sort of what makes sling blade work right i mean i haven't seen sling blade in a billion years but like that's sort of called a sling blade yeah yeah french fried potatoes but i mean some you know that's sort of like you know he he gets this world he gets right that was what people was appealing about sling blade part right Like this feels realistic. I don't know. I think it was the French fried potatoes. I think she might have been able to.

Something that bothered me about this film was that her being a psychic did not ever matter. Like every time she keeps seeing what's going to happen and then never stops it from happening. And that's her. She isn't objectively. She's a bad crime-fighting psychic. She's an okay psychic. No, she's a great...

I would say arguably a great psychic, bad crime-fighting psychic. So maybe if Billy Bob was channeling his mom more, it would have leaned more just on her... He would have just cracked the nut of the psychic because she just... I know that she feels the guilt about not telling her husband

not to go to the mill or whatever during the explosion but then she never remedies that every time she predicts something she does not and it's not a message it doesn't seem to be saying you can't stop things from playing out it just seems to be that she's not doing the thing she did intervene though she did in the movie say that she tried to stop him that morning because she had a dream yeah so i do think that she tries but it's like at least my take was the world is not accepting of what she has to say even her own her being in danger she sees stuff that's going to happen and doesn't correct her own alter the course for it not to happen which you would think would be the advantage of having psychic powers it is just weird i i think. I think this movie is okay.

I think Blanchett's performance is solid. But something about her character just doesn't totally work. It doesn't totally make sense. And when you read the quotes from Billy Bob Thornton talking about his own childhood experience and what he's drawing from, you're like, there's a specificity there that is interesting to build a fictionalized movie around that type of person in this type of setting, that dynamic that this movie somehow never captures. Yeah. I agree with everything. It needed to be written by a son.

This movie feels too small in a certain way. Like it's one of those sort of murder mystery problems where you're like, I kind of know what this is, where this is going because it's got seven characters. You've got your six faces on the poster and I immediately go like, well, he's the red herring. Yeah, Keanu's obviously the red herring and then we're like pretty much, Katie Holmes is the murder victim, Cate Blanchett's the psychic.

You're like, Rabis is too obvious so he has to be serving some other function. Yeah, spoiler alert. I do like though that the, I do think it's interesting to have the red herring be revealed that there's a whole other hour that follows. Yeah, the red herring stuff happens very fast.

Keanu getting convicted an hour in and then another whole hour passing. There's something normally that is reserved for the last 10 minutes. So there's something structurally interesting about that to me, even if it kind of plays out in a predictable way. Yeah. And look, I think the movie probably works better if the Buddy Cole stuff is... I don't know what you're talking about starly that like torturing the audience thing all the quotes there's this one i'm sorry i'm like jumping ahead to but he said when he read the script like

he like put it down halfway through he got about halfway through it and he said this is too intense and depressing for me and then he's like why am I running from this now I guess it's obviously the joke is like the guy who made the evil dead thought this was too but it's like but obviously when he made his horror films he couched it in fantasy and silliness right and this is a movie

you know about abuse and that's what he's referring to right mostly talking I think about the child abuse yes the buddy Coles of the backstory. Because it seems like when this movie came out, people were like, oh, Sam Raimi was drawn to this movie because it's a haunted house movie. Right. And he's getting back to his roots. Sure.

And this is what he wants to do. He's combining the two halves. It's prestige Sam Raimi with the earlier genre Sam Raimi. And he's working with top tier actors and whatever. Yeah. But when he talks about it, it sounds like he's like, yeah, there's a haunted house. Sure, I have to do that. But like,

all of his heart is in the prestige and the drama of it. As he puts it, I think all the haunted house stuff works great. But he seems like

it's what he cared about. I know. He's saying that's not why I did it. I want to be clear here. This is not, I'm not, that was not the pull for me.

In the gift, he wanted to present the supernatural as something that really existed, that was real the pull for me. In The Gift, he wanted to present the supernatural as something that really existed, that was real. This is what he's saying versus The Evil Dead where he's like, I wanted the actors to draw the audience. And everything he's, you know, all my technique, I threw out the window, all my camera stuff.

I wanted to create a real world. And it is one of those things that we've been talking about in this middle of Rami's career where he keeps saying this. And I think it's successful in a simple plan. Yes. And I think it's sort of semi too unsuccessful for the this and the baseball movie agreed and but it's like he seems so intent on being like I'm not the Sam Raimi you think I am right and then with Spider-Man he's like what if I tried being the Sam Raimi you think I am again it's like oh this is triumphant it is so odd because in the arc of

his career versus all these careers we see now where someone makes like a really good personal small movie and then they get hired to make a humongous fucking marvel movie and then it's like i guess this is means to an end that now they have the cachet to make whatever they want but they maybe get stuck in this semi-anonymous blockbuster realm where 20 of their voice is coming through on any movie. And instead it feels like Raimi was kind of stuck in his own making these like programmed studio dramas with movie stars.

Good scripts, I guess. Right, good stars with big stars. And then it's like his personality was a little lost in it. And then he gets to make Spider-Man and you're like, this is the purest reflection of this man's sensibility. Like, this is so personal and handmade. me as a filmmaker who struggles with who he actually is. He is, Spider-Man is what he should be doing. And it is him fully realized. And these movies that lead up to it are him being like, I wish I was this other kind of filmmaker. Because he also has that quote about like, he

was making movies that he thought he was supposed to make not only to sell, but like, using the magic of filmmaking. Right and he's like why don't i just then make movies that i i want to watch and it's and that's not spider-man that's this movie i know that he's applying it to this so he wants to be billy bob i think and even like in the earliest pieces of research we have from our our early episodes in this series they talk about like tappert and camp Campbell and everybody that like, Sam wasn't a guy who like loved horror movies.

It was like a strategic decision of like, this is what can sell. This is a good way to show off my skills as a director or whatever. But like when we were kids and made short films,

he wanted to make like dramas and like political thrillers or whatever. And so it is this odd thing where you're like, this guy's so fucking good at what he does. When he excels at it. Right. And then he sort of treats it like yeah i'm like having fun these are like fun larks these are kind of movies i liked when i was a child but obviously i'm an

adult now i'd like to make adult movies the quotes for this movie are all like i've grown up i'm married i have kids these are the movies i want to watch i want to make these kinds of movies yeah and then he gets that little spark of like fuck what if i could direct spider-man when it feels like he has put all that shit in a box and right and then but he has the sort of like actually put me and put my name in the hat put my name in the hat and then he makes it and every like i mean just jumping ahead but all this fucking spider-man interviews i was watching every cast member is like when you talk to him about this movie his eyes are like glowing like he is the most excited I've ever seen any director. It's why he gets that job because he's so,

but that's what's so interesting. Like his journey to feel peace about that. Cause that's, he's not at peace in these middle movies. He is thinking that this is what he's not only, it's not just what he's supposed to be doing. It's not just that he thinks he's supposed to make a student movie. It's what he's telling himself.

This is what he wants to be doing. And this is what he supposed to be doing. It's not just that he thinks he's supposed to make a student movie. He's telling himself this is what he wants to be doing and this is what he wants to be watching. And there's a darkness that Sam Raimi gravitates to from evil. Because Evil Dead not only is it very scary, it is dark. He's got dark stuff inside him.

And I think he's very drawn to that. I think it's why the gift in the disturbing part to the gift, it's really disturbing. And I think that's what he's like kind of the most excited about. He's the worst at it. I know. He's not good at it. But that's the lack of peace.

It feels cartoony, all of it. And then whenever he does the haunted house stuff, you're like, this has some fucking energy to it. But he's like the filmmaker who wants to be the novelist or something. Like he wants to be, he for some reason convinced himself that who wants to be the novelist or something. He wants to be he for some reason convinced himself that he had to be this other kind of filmmaker. And again, he also predicts it wrong. No one knows that Spider-Man's about to change everything. But this should be in the 90s

that makes sense that he feels that way. He's like Soderbergh, Sundance, all these yes, I should be like them. I like to think it's movie stars in the 90s. It's Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford and their big movies are like this. I'm not saying this specifically,

but they're like taking good scripts with directors off a shelf, stacking a supporting cast and they're making like adult dramas that maybe have a slight genre element to them. Well, like what if there was a firm? What if there was a firm? You know, you buy a hit novel,

whatever the fuck it is. What if there was a firm? What if there was a firm? You know, you buy a hit novel, whatever the fuck it is. What if there was a Jerry Maguire? The Will Smith takeover has just started happening at the end of the 90s. Where it's like, I am the star. Right. Everything is about my persona as a star. That's different. Right.

The thing is, though, this is a small budget movie. Yes. You know, this cost half as much as a simple plan, which is a fairly muted small movie. Right, and it cost a fifth or a sixth as much as for Love of the Game? Correct. Love of the Game cost $50 million. This cost nine.

Yeah. It was obviously distributed by Paramount Classics because of, in Raimi's opinion, the extreme content, child molestation, patricide, whatever. This idea that they're treating it like we're making hereditary. This thing's gonna be

so painful for you to watch but then in an A24 way we're making we're making prestige trauma but like something like hereditary

or Midsommar the stuff that no one's ever made a movie about trauma though I don't know what you guys are talking about no one's done that yet I mean people are thinking

about it but no one's made a Maharmony David I'm gonna embarrass you right now they've been doing it you haven't noticed because secretly this movie is about trauma People are thinking about it, but no one's made him a harm. David, I'm going to embarrass you right now. They've been doing it. You haven't noticed because secretly this movie is about trauma. Wait, what?

What are you talking about? Secretly, it's a movie about trauma. No, but the Aster movies, I feel like part of what's so striking about them is there's just like such a psychological specificity to them. They're truly difficult to watch. Right. They're so good. The conversations, not even like the subject matter of the extreme things that have happened,

but the way people interact with each other. And then this, every time there's like a horrible thing, it sort of feels like an after school special. Sure.

In its pitch. Yeah. It's, I mean, there are many parts of this movie that are like different after school specials sewn together.

It looks weird. Yeah. I like it. Just the way he's framing school specials sewn together it looks weird yeah it like it just the way he's framing it and shooting it it looks not great oddly brightly lit yeah it is it's got that right yeah and why is that i guess it's just the time i kept on trying to figure it out but but it it's it's oddly not very atmospheric looking. Yeah. Other than the nightmare sequences. Yeah. Some of the conversations with characters are so fucking weird.

Like, I don't even know why. It's just like, it's like weird watching them talk to each other. There's a lot that's a time, because there's also a time of, it's so puritanical too. Yes. It's so Cate Blanchett not being allowed to have sex or even like get

together in any way with a guy years after her husband's died which is like it's that i feel like is also the virgin horror movie trope of being applied to this woman in this small town it's like grown woman grieving single mother of three it's so strange yeah and like everybody it's it's a movie that's really like everyone must suffer. I mean, I just, broken record about this, but it just has to be invoked yet again. I do think so much of it is about him comparing himself to where the Coens are at any given point in time. I had that thought too, yeah. I mean, it's hard not to, right?

It's hard not to. And it's just like they both started out in similar sort of like wackadoo expressive camera what have you zones and the coins have now gone through like several rotations of different like stretching themselves to different corners and growth and whatever and i do think he's just in this home where he's like i can't just be sam ramey forever right so why didn't he learn more from them i do think he's comparing but why do they start to diverge so extremely in these films these three spider-man films what they should actually be on these parallel tracks both making interesting films in and his going towards these commercial films but also trying

to hold on to something that he thinks is gritty and rot that it's like they didn't speak during that time. It's very good. Was Giovanni Ribisi the Ben Foster of 2000? Yes, 100%. It's one of those things where it's like, I don't think he's a bad actor necessarily. But you have to. But there's very specific constraints

you need to put on this guy. You need to put constraints on him. Or you need to have the movie be bananas. Yes. In which case, let him go bananas. But this is the year after the other sister the other sister which of course is obviously obviously no one came out of that one looking no you know it's not i forgot about that's a trailer i remember fucking have ruined

a bunch of people's days this is illegal you cannot do this oh my god but it was that like obviously he's you know in those early that thing you do suburbia lost highway he's like oh this guy's got an interesting face like what's and then he's so he's so good in saving i was gonna say this is where you're like and i think that's you're for it's spielberg you're gonna right work so hard and do and that's where i think people start to go is this one of the most exciting actors of his generation is this the incredible young guy yeah just such a specific look that's so interesting i love how he's been on friends he always looks a little sick he's a sick actor and i love that he's on friends friends actually i think is like the most interesting

part of his entire career it's a very interesting it's very interesting that friends had a low-key high school student marries his teacher plot just nested inside of like the usual antics but this is the thing with him he's very funny like almost any time you ask him to be funny fan of him like yeah funny and then also if you give him something like saving private ryan you're like wow he's putting a lot into this guy that other people could underplay right and then if you're like it's a big character he's like great i have here's an entire bag of tricks i've been willing waiting to put into this is the same year has gone in 60 seconds which he's also kind of a lunatic in right yeah but at least he's a lunatic he's in a cage

movie next like a ruckheimer film yeah i feel like then it's kind of a little quiet from a bc for a bit and then it's like oh he's in Translation, but it's like a small role. He's playing Spike Jonze. Because 99 is Mod Squad, other sister, and there's a third one. He's the narrator in The Virgin Suicides. That's about it, really. That's cool, though. Very cool.

2000 is the gift, Bonk on 60 Seconds. And of course uh he uh he went entered the boiler room which is good in boiler room he is a kind of again kind of a you know high intensity movie but he's one of these guys where it's like if you cast him to play a normal guy you're like oh he's doing something interesting here and if you cast him to play a weird person you're like scale it scale it all the way back. Yeah, but I can't fault only him, though, because I fault more the people who open the box and unleash it. Absolutely. I agree.

That being allowed. Yes. No. And enabled and encouraged. How many episodes of Friends do you think he's in? Seven. I looked this up last night. It's not seven.

No, I'm close. You're close-ish. 20. 10. 10 episodes of Friends pretty good he's a family member he is he's Phoebe's brother I mean that was the old Phoebe thing she's got a long lost

blah who's gonna show Balaban plays her dad I think pretty sure your wife I just went out. I know. Cool. Kind of need it. The other problem is I don't know what your wifi is called because it's one of those

garbled letters. Can't you connect it to the phone? I can if I have to. And you could connect to my phone. I'll go reset it. Yeah, go reset it. But we're going to leave this all in because this is... Absolutely. I just have to tell you. I'll go reset it. Yeah, go reset it. But we're going to leave this all in. I mean, I just have to tell you I have to shout out that he played

the sneakiest of all Pete's in Sneaky Pete. He did. For like five seasons. One of those Amazon shows where they were just like, I don't know. You want to do more? Fine. How do we feel about the nickname Jiri? Good? Love it. Good? Like, that's what you, if you saw him at a bar, you'd be like, Jiri! I don't know if he'd love it good like that's what you if you saw him at a bar you'd be like jiri

hey i don't know if he'd love it he's apparently in avatars two and three and four and five well i think with four and five we don't know because they haven't filmed any of those yeah right yes they filmed two and three yeah so like anyone who's in those that's a great example for me of like nothing part of like just shitty businessman and he makes it a little bit interesting i think he is phenomenal in avatars exactly that's what i'm saying the normal guys but i have no memory other than remembering watching and being like this is better than i thought it was gonna be he's ostensibly the main bad guy but he's a guy in an office come on well my favorite moment in avatar we i think we may have talked about on this

podcast and i like a lot of moments in Avatar Is when he's scrolling on their 3D map And it goes too far And he's like You never see anyone do that When they're doing wireframe Like ah shit I overshot it That's the thing though

This movie, this performance And once again I don't blame him as much as I blame Everyone else for allowing him to do it I'm just like this movie, this performance, and once again, I don't blame him as much as I blame everyone else for allowing him to do it. I'm just like this is the worst acting class exercise I've seen where like – I think I've said this before about certain performances. But like when I would be in acting class and someone would like go this big and then there would just sort of be the silence. Everyone's like tingling with embarrassment. Well, the other students are like is that – I guess it's impressive they went that hard. with embarrassment well the other students are like is that i guess it's impressive they went that right and then i just remember one time seeing a scene like that and my my uh teacher

acting teacher elizabeth camp rip was uh wonderful her very gentle way of saying it was she'd always go well it's good that you know you can do that and that you can go that far i don't think it's necessary you know and that's like whenever i watch something like this it's that tingly embarrassment it's like giovanni i'm impressed that you can go that far you don't need to do that don't you think they were telling him in this era though that they were saying this is how you win an oscar this is gets a fucking independent spirit award nomination for supporting actor for this a truly embarrassed most of the critics are like the movies whatever but giovanni rubisi continues to solidify himself

this is what i want to say this now if you did this in a movie today jail i i'm not sure you go to jail but i do think definitely the hague no i do think there would be an automatic kind of like this is super corny this is not what we would immediately get clipped and shipped onto twitter and it would go viral and people would go can you believe this is a scene from this movie but in 1999 what i am sam is coming up right like this is people are still like yeah this is what people want right this is what the voters are looking for that's how but that's how turned around everyone was this is that that thinking allowing giovanni rabisi to do this shows the that's why trump shows the well no but yes shows the

inevitability of trump but also but it shows the inevitability of spider-man it shows the inevitability of marvel yeah we were at that point had gone, because even knowing that he was like in Virgin Suicides and all that, like those, last translation, Virgin Suicides were out there and people watching it. But somehow the last remnant of this kind of movie is The Gift. But see, Starlee, even what you're saying about the Coppola movies being out there, there's a bifurcation happening, right? Where it's like, if this is happening, this is indie, this is artisanal, this is small scale, this is specialty art.

Small batch. This is a small batch movie. It's a small batch movie. And then it's the fucking huge stuff. Like, there's already this thing of like, what doesn't exist anymore? This movie. Yeah. What lies beneath getting made and released in the middle of the summer, you know?

Yeah. Giovanni Ribisi is like giving this much performance in a film that is expected to perform commercially. Right, because they don't understand that this is, they're betting on the wrong horse. They don't understand what's about to happen. You're only allowed to go this big today if you play the Joker.

That's the only circumstance in which they allow you to go this big. Well, right. So it's like the character from the movies that are going to actually last and be, right. So it's like the character from the movies that are going to actually last and be everything are like, it's in the wrong time. He's got to step over the line and then he'll be understated.

Yeah, he'll be understated. Here's what I want to say, though, and maybe you agree with me, maybe you don't. I think Cate Blanchett is good in this movie. I think J.K. Simmons, Chelsea Ross, Rosemary Harris, Gary Cole, those small... I think everyone else is bad in this movie.

I think everyone else is not good in this movie. Hillary Swank is so bad in this movie. In that similar way of like, she's like, I kind of get what this is. Like a kind of a white trash girl and no one's talked to her, or given her

notes, or stopped her. She's just doing the most caricatured version of it, and it's super basic, and it's super bad. It's also funny that, like, where's Hilary Swank from? Hilary Swank? Isn't she Canadian? No, she's not. Oh my god, Nebraska. I just read, I was just looking at

the BuzzFeed list of who's self-made and who was born rich. Well, this is why Kim, she's not. Oh my god. Nebraska. I just read, I was just looking at the BuzzFeed list of who's self-made and who was born rich. Well, this is why Kim, she grew up in a trailer. She grew up in absolutely tough circumstances. Although she, you know, obviously she was in the next Karate Kid when she was a teenager. She was one of those kids who moves to California, starts acting. To support her family.

To support her family. It's that kind of film. That's the thing about that list, Charlie, that I also read, where it keeps being like, oh, these people are self-made. I'm like, almost all the people you're talking about were worked to death by their family's children.

Correct. They became the money horse. I mean, that list, I couldn't, I kind of wish that a list like that would come out every day because I really, it was asking my friends to guess, which it was, yeah.

I just, like, look, she did not grow up in the South, but you imagine that, like, it's not like Gwyneth Paltrow trying to play this part where you're like, Gwyneth Paltrow has never met a woman like this in her life before, you know? She's met Hilary Swank.

You're like, Hilary Swank should be able to do this. It's a really bad performance. It's a bad performance. And also, it's post Boys Don't Cry, right? You just cannot believe that this is her right after Boys Don't Cry fucking up this badly. this was they took this serious they these actors took this so seriously no one's telling them like hey too much mustard agreed i think they also i think billy bob cast a spell on hollywood sling blade confused people they all think they can say french fried

potatoes you're right and that's what all of them think they're doing here you're right he was their smartest friend because the way he acted where he was like i'm not the guy i'm not hollywood i can write circles around all of you i'm the real deal and they were also he's also seduced everybody like i just think that they could they were blinded they could not think that's a great example of just like right sling blade should be too big a performance yes and the trick there is that he makes it feel naturalistic. And when Sam Raimi talks about the script

or like, he has an ear for dialect and I'm like, he doesn't in this film at least. Or maybe he needs to massage actors to understand his ear. Like it's like,

Yeah. Someone like Tarantino where the language is very specific and you need to be on the right tonal wavelength of. Or he does his own Billy Bob because even like in

Civil Plan I love watching Billy Bob but I'm not sure I think he's a real person I don't sound like I think anyone else really talks like him but I do like what he's doing. That's the thing of him just being like plucked out of the ether. What were you going to say David? No I was going to move on to the other actors. I want to give Keanu credit because

I think he's really fucking trying but that's the thing. I think he is the fucking trying. Yes. But that's the thing. I think he is the best of the people we're talking about right now. He doesn't pull it off. He doesn't pull it off and it feels

just a little too try. It's also an impossible character though. Impossible. It's not a great character. They're trying to make us be sympathetic. Like he's got a Confederate

flag on the front. That's also an era thing. Because the character's written as a red herring where it's like he comes out of the gate like I'm gonna kill you i beat up my wife worst guy in the world right so you're like okay i mean yeah and so then you're immediately just like i guess he can't be the murderer because it's too obvious but he's just ground and it was that moment post matrix where people were like keanu's back what do we do what do we think about that and then he's in this

and people are like well he shouldn't do that. Right. I mean, he got bad reviews for this movie. Can you just quickly pull up the run of films in between The Matrix and The Matrix Reloaded? We talked about it briefly on the Patreon episode. The Replacements, Sweet November. The Replacements, The Watcher. Right.

Which I think was filmed pre-Matrix. Right. She plays a serial killer. Yes. The Gift, Sweet November, and Hardball. Yeah. It's a tough run. Wild.

I was watching the interview where he said about what are you talking about this movie and he said i hadn't played a bad guy in a while and i couldn't think of when he'd ever played a bad guy but i guess that serial killer movie because he doesn't play bad guys he doesn't usually play bad guys he is a bad guy i suppose in the watcher watcher this or the same year uh yes the watcher is one of those great like opened number one but to seven million dollars it had like three weekends at number one and all of them were under 10 million does he ever play a bad guy i mean yeah i don't know i mean he just tossed off i hadn't done that in a while

as though that was a thing that we'd ever known him to have done yeah it's it is interesting i mean like it's it's a different type of red herring because he turns out to be kind of a sweet guy, even though he seems really scary and haunted. That's the problem is, like, there's no way to make that character, the worst person in the world, a sweet guy. But what I was going to say is Private Lives of Pippa Lee, the Rebecca Miller movie. Which you bring up on Patreon. Mostly just think about how good he is in that movie. And it was the first film I maybe saw Keanu come into with like gravitas where like what he's now just he has in spades where it's just like this guy just has some weight to his presence and whatever. And he's able to just dispense naturally.

And that movie, he does end up being a sweetheart, but he ends up being a sweetheart without ever being as awful as he is in the beginning of this movie. but he ends up being a sweetheart without ever being as awful as he is in the beginning of this movie. But this thing, it's like you feel the effort of him trying to be scary. And in so many of the quotes that J.J. pulled up, Hillary Swank's like, it's tough because he's such a nice guy that he didn't want to touch me in scenes. And I said, you have to hit me. You have to at least pretend to hit me. I do think he's scary, though. His violence was believable. That's why i want to give him partial credit because i think at a

couple moments he is genuinely scary i don't think it works i think you feel the effort yeah i mean i get what you're saying i think you feel the effort more with just the character itself but when he's actually being violently scary i found that convincing partial credit i prefer his performance to Ribisi's, to Swank's. Greg Kinnear, it's just kind of the role he played often.

It's just usually it would be like, he seems like a nice boyfriend and he's a bad boyfriend. It's the same shit. It's just like, he seems like a nice teacher man, but he's a bad teacher man.

It's not a bad performance, I guess, but I don't think, I don't find him that threatening at the end when he needs to be. No, no, I agree. And then the Holmes of it is so odd. I think

she is flat out abysmal. She's bad. She's bad. She's crazy. She's bad, she's bad, and there's no excuse for her being this bad. But what is more bizarre about it is just that this movie was like, she needs to do this to prove that she can be in grown-up movies. And then her role is like

nothing, and she fucks it up. And she's so naked. She is naked. Also, for this to be the role that proves something about yourself when they actually just use her for her body, it's a miscalculation for what... It's not going to make her...

You're going to see her differently, but not in the way she hopes. There's a quote I found where she was like, I'm not uncomfortable with nudity if it's the right script, and for a reason, the gift was obviously the right film to do that. That's what I'm saying, the Billy Bob spell.

And I'm like, she was cast only to be naked or a dead body. Yes. I mean, those that... And it also is naked dead body. She says, what's the matter? See something bad? Right. You better fuck me now or whatever the fucking line I did at the beginning was. I really think it's the, you know, Anne Hathaway did this, right?

You know, a lot of actors who are, you know, perceived as teen. Havoc, you're talking about your, right, the Drew Barrymore run, certainly. Where they're like, what is the most lurid against type role I can find? Like, go get it for me. It's not just I, oh, they want me to be naked, sure. It's like, no, no, no, I need to like completely toss the WB in the garbage can right now. But in so many of those films... What's her name from Game of Thrones is doing now?

Arya. Maisie Williams. She just gave one of those interviews. It started happening in Game of Thrones where she wanted to be seen as a sexual. It's so weird when you're famous for being a cute

teen or whatever. She's like, I don't want to be cast because I'm the only. She basically just wants to constantly be doing nude scenes. Yeah. I guess what's confusing about it to me, though, is those other examples we're talking about. They are the lead or the co-lead. Yeah, no, right. It's a much more juicy role.

This just asks her to do nothing. She has like five isolated lines. Yeah, no, right. It's a much more juicy role. This just asks her to do nothing. She has like five isolated lines. All of her line readings are just like thuds. And then the rest of the movie, she's either a scary dead body covered in makeup. Which is kind of cool when she's like floating in the tree. It's the best part of the performance.

Or she's a naked body in flashbacks. It's like one or the other. Or she's a dead naked body. The ice storm, she's like kind of pops in. She's really good body in flashbacks. It's like one or the other. Or she's a dead naked body. Yes. The Ice Storm, she's like kind of pops in. She's really good in. Yes. Disturbing Behavior, which was like teen Stepford Wives with Marsden. Kind of a fun movie.

Yeah. This was a time when like every female friend I had watched Dawson's Creek and loved Dawson's Creek. Right. And so I would see any movie that any of the Dawson's Creeks were in because they wanted to, you know it's like disturbing behavior. We're going and I'll be like, okay, sure. I actually was a sporadic Dawson's Creek viewer. Sure. Even as a teen TV show fan, I never could get into Dawson's Creek. I don't want

to wait. Right, right. But I saw Varsity Blues and I saw disturbing behavior. I saw Go, which she's fun in. Yeah, she's fun. I was into her at this period. Sarah Polly's kind of the lead. The lead.

But she's fun in Go. She's fun in it. I just think- I don't think I've ever seen Teaching Mrs. Tingle. I think I have, weirdly. But that movie was sort of a misfire. And then I remember her being okay in Wonder Boys, which is the same year as this. She's very good in Wonder Boys.

Yeah. She's very good in Wonder Boys. At the wheelhouse, Michael Chabon is her. Did he not also write Ice Storm? He didn't, but it's a similar life. Ice Storm's Rick Mooney. Rick Mooney is the author. I just think she was in an interesting place

because unlike, say, Blake Lively or whatever, right? Like someone who's on the big teen show of the moment, Amisha Barton, what have you. She had that girl next door quality, which was obviously inherent to the entire premise of that show. But I do think like guys thought, boys at her age thought she was really cute.

And like girls who watched the show related to her. Yeah. She seemed personable. Sure. I agree with everything you're saying. The girl at the center of the big hot teen shows she's the girl next door in dawson's creek you know she's next door to him i think everyone was like she has to have movie star potential because she's not just i still think girls she's not jessica beal or whatever you know yes that's true well i guess i thought girls felt like boys like her in a way that they don't like jessica beale and i want to understand what that is right like you i guess you

could feel like i have more of a chance to be the girl next door than jessica that's what i think it was i think like when jennifer love hewitt was like put in movies it was like this isn't gonna work guys this isn't gonna work but katie holmes people were like this should work sure and she doesn't when she and like ice storm plays that role it is but that's pre-dawson's creed but she is that role though and she's i think that's her best yes her best yes almost by default but yes what is she looks like the most 2003 person or something. Do you know what I mean? In this? Or you just mean general Jenny Holmes?

In general. I mean, she's very iconic of a very specific, sliver in pop culture. In this way where I'm like, people don't look like that. It is funny when she shows up in Batman Begins in 2005, you're like, huh, her face. It's suddenly like the movie culture has shifted

and her face doesn't totally make sense. It is still odd that she's in Batman Begins. She's also surprisingly tall and you don't register in Dawson's Creek you're not thinking of her as a tall girl. Totally. Because Vanderbeek's really tall. Right? Yeah, and she just got this little

button nose and this little chipmunk face. She seems like a small girl. She does not seem like a towering girl. She's like 5'9". She's 5'9". Vanderbeek is a 6'4". And when people, you can tell in this movie because you see so much of her body that she's long. But I've seen other people who have spotted her and she's like,

she's a very tall woman and that's, there's a movie, what's the movie, years, there's a Jonathan Ames movie that no one saw. I saw it at Sundance. Kevin Kline's in it, and she's in it. Oh, he's got the fucking flower on the poster. It takes place in East Village. I've never heard of anyone seeing it.

It's not called The Other Man? Something like that. Something like that. John C. Reilly's in it. He plays a homeless person, I think. Probably. I remember liking it. I never heard anyone mention it ever again.

I thought of this screening at Sundance, and I was like, this is going to be Kevin Kline. This is it. He's going to be the new, he's Delmarina. This is this era of Kevin Kline. Elder Statesman comedy. Yeah, I mean, he's so good. I think Kevin Kline, just someone who, the reason he's not in stuff

is because he's choosing not to be in stuff. They call him Kevin Decline. The Extra Man? Yes, The Extra Man. Which was directed by Sherry Berman and Robert Pulcini, the American Splendor guys. Right. Jonathan Ames wrote it. Right. Have never heard of this movie. Sherry Berman and Robert Polcini, the American Splendor guys, Jonathan Ames wrote it,

have never heard of this movie. Paul Dano is in it, apparently? It's got a stacked cast. It's good. I mean, at least I remember it being good, and she's in it, right? She sure is. Ben?

I flicked you a couple comedy points. Yeah, Ben flicked me comedy points. I just want to say, I didn't create Kevin DeKline. That was a thing said the industry at the time because he turned down things so much. I'll take the points. Ben took them back. So,

Katie Holmes is not good in this film, and I would say this film, mostly unfortunately, because it is basically like a Gentleman's Six-ish movie that's alright, becomes this weird footnote joke. It's in Harold and Kumar. That's what i was trying to remember which movie it's harold and kumar where you know krumholtz and thomas

and nicholas i think yes or eddie k thomas one of the three namers are the rosenberg and gildenstein or whatever and the joke of that is like oh they have their own separate adventure that you don't see right in harold and kumar but you pop in with them and at the start they're like we're gonna watch katie holmes she's jewish and she's naked in this movie and like it's like oh horny jews who would have thought the reputation of this movie was oh katie holmes had such a girl next door persona that she seemed like an actress who would never get naked and then there's a movie where pretty much all she does is get naked and at this early stage of the internet not being as extreme as it was, it was like, I've heard. There's a rumor that if you watch this movie, you see her boobs.

Even from the vantage point of today when you have access to so much, I could understand watching this movie now why this would be a film that you'd want to see it. It's a shocking nudity in that sense. It's shocking in the way she's shown. If that's what you're there to see, you're not going to be disappointed. No, it's like, look, it's a perfect movie to like fucking slow down. Yeah. You know, because it's like, she's got these scenes where she's like on display, but they move really quickly and they're like cross fades of Raimi style.

There's unfortunate critics. The critics don't handle her nudity well the critical community of 2000 wasn't really too up on uh talking about this stuff sensitively this is a year before harry knolls writes his cunnilingus review of blade two the whole thing though with nudity in american films yeah let's do it let's unpack it well i mean it's like i i i really i really do think everyone just needs to settle down about it and not be stunned anytime they see a naked breast but then like nothing is helped by the fact that then even critics will be like and uh keep your eyes open around minute 100 of this

one or you know like that i mean it's not so much true anymore but back then it was absolutely it's difficult because there's such a now it's like oh americans are such prudes and also like americans like are fucking like it's a national news story such a now. It's like, oh, Americans are such prudes. And also like Americans like are fucking like, it's a national news story. There's this whole puritanical. She's like ID'd as like the smoking hot babe. It's like a serious. But also like Giovanni Rubisi should be given an Oscar.

Like it is. There's a puritanical wave now of like no sex scenes should ever be in movies. And people who just assume that anytime anyone's naked in a film, it is some form of emotional abuse or coercion by the production. Or like, what do they get paid for this? Right. are they why are they doing what kind of game is this their point whereas like french actors are like yeah i fucked a killer whale in my last movie who cares like

right the problem with katie holm being naked in this film is it feels like her ticket in like no one else has to do it and it is very easy to project an adult movie that's what she had to do and she's talked about it once again as i said like that that script demanded i was happy to do it but you're like it just feels like you're that's it's if i do this yeah no one looks at me the same way ever again yeah i get to like evolve to the next stage and yeah i mean talk about the overcorrection of people being like maybe all this is fucking bad is like that we had like 60 years of critics being like, Katie Holmes doesn't give a good performance in this movie. She gives two good ones. Yeah.

You know, like these fucking reviews where people have to make the joke about whatever. And this movie also with the weird stuff that Cate Blanchett's not even allowed to like kiss someone else. Like there is such a Madonna whore stuff about like just weird. There's issues in this film underneath the surface that are not being grappled with. Especially because outside of the first Evil Dead,

Sam Raimi is not a very sexual filmmaker. No, he's not great at that. This probably is only film with nudity. But I don't think he, it's not like I think

he handles the sex scenes bad in this movie. It's just, it's just how it's only on, all falls only on Katieie holmes and then and also he does like i i am interested in his like idea about punishing like i think he's like punishing the audience he also wants to punish himself i think there's a correlation in kind of giovanni rubisi's character and sam raimi the way he like when giovanni rubisi says when he's

like not grappling with his dad yet and he says like it's okay he had to hit me and i'm like that's kind of how sam ramey feels about audiences like there's something very boyish about ramey in every sense and i think the reason simple plan works so well even though it seems out of the box for him and it's the only one of these adult movies that really connects is because it is such a morality tale like there's something so biblical about Simple Plan where the lessons of it are very clear. And it's like fundamentally good people struggling to remain good and all of that. Yeah. I mean Paxton was almost played the Kinnear part in this.

And you're like Paxton could have made this work. That's the kind of tortured normal guy you want here. Kinnear is sort of just giving low energy. Well the thing with Kinnear is it's like they are just trying to pull a trick on us. But the thing is, a lot of people tried to pull that trick at the same time. I know, I've looked at the poster. I know it's going to be Kinnear. He still talk soups Greg Kinnear.

Obviously, he just got an Oscar nomination a couple years ago. It's not that he doesn't act, but I feel like he's still like, oh, Greg Kinnear with the big pearly white smile. There are three male faces on this poster, and two of them look like the scariest men in the world, and the third one looks like the guy from TalkSoup.

I'm guessing you're going to have the guy from TalkSoup be the killer. I like your take. It should have been Hilary Swank. I agree. There's a moment when she comes in and says that I'm glad she died. She's taken my man. And that's the only time they try to throw this other person in. And I guess Gary Coley tried to throw in too but you know he didn't do it but it should have been hillary's it's the better version it's work it's got at least there's complications to it here's another thing that

sucks about katie holmes in this movie though her character not to back on her performance more right but just like even as written the only things we ever see her do when she's alive essentially are fuck guys fight with guys she's fucking or has just fucked or the one moment where she comes in and it's like they're coasting off of her reputation at the time where it's like here is the most sort of like suburban looking lady in the world hugging her husband with a cup of coffee and going like what do you see say something mad right but like she has no character outside of she just can't stop fucking everybody she doesn't even make any sense. No.

Why is she marrying Greg Kinnear? Why is she – like her fucking everyone makes more sense than her getting married. You don't even see flirtations. You just see fucking and aftermath. I think a different director – It's like all the sexual energy of this town. The horror movie version of this story is that all the sexual – of this movie is all the sexual energy of this town is funneled into this one woman. And no one else is allowed to feel any – have any sexual – Right.

She's like the Ivo Shandor building. That's just like collecting all of the energy, this town is funneled into this one woman and no one else is allowed to feel any, have any sexual. Right. She's like the Ivo Shandor building. That's just like collecting all of the energy, the sexual energy. I think a different director might be able to handle this differently because obviously

it's sort of like, oh, in this small town, what darkness bundle bubbles under the surface? Katie Holmes, secretly an adulteress. Giovanni Ribisi, victim of abuse.

Right. You know. So when you watch the movie minute one you're like everyone in this town is completely fucked up this town is completely fucked up right i don't get how this psychic has not been drawn into every single goddamn insane shit you know thing that's happened already this feels like a town where every home is a cabin with an economic con in the basement like everyone in this town is going through their own evil death. But that's why, in that regard,

I do think Sam Raimi's the right one. It's just he didn't let himself go as fully into the darkness as he wanted. Because that's what he wants every house to be, that fucked up. Yes. But that's why I think he's right. He just can't handle the tone.

There's no real realism to this. And it might work if there was. And I think some Thornton maybe could give you that or whatever. That's why it's again Simple Plan Simple Plan

I went and watched Simple Plan after this because I wanted at first I wanted to be like just maybe every movie from this time that era was not good. Yeah.

I needed a constant. I needed to have something to compare this to and tonally and the location that's similar there's so many similarities and it comes before and then he manages to lose but i think with simple plan sam ramey understands that buttoned up midwestern like attitude a lot better than he understands the south which he doesn't and i think he understands the psychological dynamic of what

if i found a bag of money, how would I? All the Southern stuff in this feels like I have just gone to, where is this, Georgia, right? And I've been like, I think I know what it's like around here. Like, I just, and to be clear, I don't. Right. I know. And what I think I know about this shit is from movies. This is my thing. I'm watching this and I'm like like i feel like i'm offended by how broad these

characterizations are even though i have no right to say that as i'm sure it's not really my community but i can tell this is wrong like it all feels like princess and the frog level yeah characterization of this it's like people in the south are in each other's business but in this movie it's like to a degree that it's just it's insane right it's like there's no way that everyone knows about everything that's going on with each other in this way they also don't care about each other they're also just so mean to each other i'm like isn't that is that that doesn't seem southern like how everyone's the only bits i like are like jk simmons although i don't when she's talking to him and she's like you know saying i saw a vision of this and he's kind of he immediately knows like well that could

be half the place he's like well a pond you know like where i'm like this guy seems to actually know the town cole simmons ross are like this trifecta in this chelsea ross is really good in the scene where they drag her body out of the water what a what a guy he's the can we shut him out for a second because he's been in sure he's in a simple plan yep right he comes back and drag me to hell he does yeah two and and and different roles like he yeah the he has range he's got incredible range he is a guy so he looks a lot like my recently departed great uncle earl who was a family member i i loved dearly and so i remember seeing chelsea ross show up as a kid in movies maybe when i was a kid not when chelsea ross was like my uncle right i think he's in richie rich as like a security guard or

something and i was like oh that's the uncle oral actor but he's one of those guys where every time he fucking shows up i'm like steady ass hand i'll remember him in uh madman madman that that was such a good that was the thing run on madman. So he was this memory guy from my childhood. I felt like I hadn't seen him for a while. He has that run on Mad Men where he's so good. And now anytime I'm watching a 90s movie where Chelsea Ross shows up, I get so fucking excited.

He's got a great face. He's only got three scenes in this, right, maybe? But he is really good. His first scene, by the way, of course, is Katie Holmes seeming like she wants to fuck her dad as well. Like that's how over-sexualized this character is. But that heart attack scene, yes. Dragging her body out is incredible.

It's intense. It's well done. I think the tension of the drag. Like anytime Raimi gets to play with tension, spooks, nightmares. But it's not what he wants. Keanu's best scene is the scene where Keanu comes into her house and starts like, and he's like, I'm unbroken. It's the scene where it feels most unpredictable. Handheld camera. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anytime. Like something fucked up could happen right now.

But that's why I don't understand why he couldn't let him go. He's back in a haunted house and just he won't let himself do it. He's angst about it. He wants to not break the reality. He talks about this, right,

to make the supernatural not exciting. Yeah. This time. Look, I understand that you object to these things. No, but I feel bad for him. It's more that I wish that he... But maybe he had to do that. He didn't.

No, but it sounds like he didn't. Because the way he talks about this film is like, in the interview I read, he was like, you know, in the baseball movie, that was a very clear thing. We both wanted the same thing. We wanted it to be a commercial film that everyone wanted to watch. This one, it sounds like he pretty much was given free reign. And he put these restraints on himself.

Correct. Within a small budget, yes. But he wasn't, it just, he decided that he couldn't go for it. And that's. Yeah, yes. That feels like a misdreavus. He doesn't, he couldn't go for it. And that's. Yeah. Yes. That feels like a misdoubt. He doesn't get so many movies. But I do think so much of it is the Coens thing where if you look at the reviews of the Coens and Raimi at the beginning, it's just sort of like, wow, they have so much energy.

There's so much ingenuity. There's so much invention here. I don't know any of these characters exist or if any of this really means anything like people were dismissive to all of their early films and you look at like the raising Arizona reviews and they're like it's like a cartoon there's like no substance to this and then that Fargo moment right I mean and you have like the Miller's Crossing Barton Fink lead into that and then Fargo has this big explosion I think he just had this thing of like almost like looking around at his friends and being like why am I the only one who's not married?

You know? Isn't that Simple Plan? Isn't that what Simple Plan answered? It is Simple Plan. And that is not a hit. That's the problem is that Simple Plan doesn't blow up as much as Fargo does. It gets a couple Oscar nominations or whatever, but like it feels like it should have done better than it did. That I think he's like, I still haven't gotten the one that totally connects.

I just, I can't, does Spider-Man have it all? I know. He's about to build the bomb. We recorded Spider-Man earlier this week, so I watched these two movies in flip order, and it is bizarre to just watch them and be like, Spider-Man's the more personal film. Agreed.

And it changes everything. He's going to get his wish. He is, although then he, it doesn't pay off for him. That's the weird thing about him. But it's, but everyone else. Yeah,

like he gets to make more Spider-Man movies. Yeah. He gets to make one more horror film that feels very from the mind of Sam Raimi. And then it's like, I guess I'll see you later. And the superhero genre has sort of outrun me. But I guess in the leg, but in a way that you can look when you,

when we trace back, how did we get to the Marvel world that we live in yes we can i'm not saying it's good i mean i'm glad i'm not saying spider-man's not good i'm not saying it's good that spider-man came out and changed everything i'm saying you're going to be able to trace who built the bomb and even if he didn't pay off in that thing he did change everything it did ultimately change everything in a way that he did not he couldn't even have known what to wish if he wanted't pay off in that thing, he did change everything. It did ultimately change everything in a way that he did not, he couldn't even have known what to wish. If he wanted to make an impact,

he did. Look, I'll tell you some more context about this film. Please. They only had 44 shooting days. Now, these days, that's a lot,

but he's like, it was outrageous. He never shot for so few days. Yeah. Like 44 shooting, that's like basically two months of work, right? I mean, like to me now, like. Yeah, but everything's bad now.

That's why it's. No, but like, not to go off on a side tangent here, but this is why there are more and more stories of like horrible accidents happening on set. Well, no, that's true. A hundred percent. I'm not going off on a whole tangent about that,

but that is a fact. These are all part and parcel of the same thing, which is everyone wants to get movies made quicker and cheaper now. And they end up paying out the nose later in post-production. But that used to be the proper amount of time. You can't make a movie in less than 90 days or whatever. It was just impossible to consider doing it. A truly strange fact, in my opinion, is they had, like, more than a week of rehearsal. Yes.

Nothing about this movie screams, we honed these characters. But I guess in this rehearsal, they're all like, that's maybe Rubeese's, like, bigger? And they're like,

yeah, this is crazy. We're generating here, you know? And Keanu and Hilary Swank spent this week together talking about every detail of the character's life, including how they had sex with each other.

And they went to therapy groups to absorb abusive relationships for a tan and all this shit. And then you read the quotes where it was like Hilary Swank being like, we had to develop a rhythm where he had permission to mishandle me and all this shit. It's so bizarre. It just doesn't really translate. But you're talking about the whole Southern character of the movie being wrong, right? There's the Chelsea Ross quote there. Because there are a lot of good Chelsea Ross quotes because on top of everything else, on top of being a fucking G, Chelsea Ross is apparently best friends with Billy Bob Thornton. He's great pals with Billy Bob Thornton, which makes sense.

They do seem like they should be friends. Two men with otter faces. Exactly. Yeah. But he... Yep. Thank you. But he said that Billy Bob was really angry about the Keanu casting because he's like, I can give you a list of 75 guys who are this type of guy.

A hundred guys who would be right for this role. I grew up around these guys. I know what these guys are fucking like. Now, Chelsea Ross, to his credit, says I've worked with Keanu a number of times. He gets busted a lot. No one works harder than he does. But he does seem to also be allowing, like, but at the same time, Billy remembers growing up in Arkansas, and Keanu's not the kind of guy you would have seen down there. Right. And you never stop thinking about the fact that you're watching Keanu Reeves doing this.

No. He's the most California looking fucking guy. But the character is not exactly like the character also has no nuance whatsoever. But I understand. It's funny that he has this facial hair that at the time was like, oh, this patchy beard

he can't quite sell. And now that's like basically his John Wick facial hair. It's funny that now he actually can make that work. It is funny that the John Wick thing, they literally like took a ruler to his face and they were like, if we just make these three lines here around where your patchiness is,

suddenly it works. It looks, right. Whereas for 20 years people have been like, what's up with Keanu's embarrassing beard that he can't grow? Now he's Mr. Beard. I just think Billy Bob's point is, even if this character isn't rendered

with any great detail, it's like I could give you a list of 100 good Southern character actors, young men who will just show up and give you this vibe for free. And all this role needs to be is vibe. And now you've turned it into an experiment for Keanu Reeves to show his range. And Hilary Swank, too, I would say. The same list should have been given for Hilary Swank. Yeah.

Because that's the kind of character that if they would just had, she's so distracting. You know who should have played Hilary Swank's part? Kim Dickens. Kim Dickens is better in this movie. As Cate Blanchett's best friend.

She's putting mustard on it, but I love Kim Dickens and she obviously understands. I didn't want her to go away. I wanted that scene to be longer. But she's in the right tone. She's in the right milieu. She's fun.

And she can, she's fun, but like she could have played the, the Hillary's Mike role. Perfect. Yes. Cate Blanchett interviewed many a psychic as part of her preparation. This mother shit.

Yes. She does say that she had five readings in one week that were contradictory. So that's slightly snide or, you know, slightly disparaging of her. But then also apparently when doing press for nightmare alley, readings in one week that were contradictory so that's slightly snide or you know slightly uh disparaging of her but then also apparently when doing press for nightmare alley which is also a movie about psychics or you know whatever yeah uh mentalists um she said like years ago a psychic told me that i would have four children and other things like that that at the time i was like this

is nonsense and of course i ended up having four children yeah and now i'm afraid to see her again because what if she's like yeah it's just funny that the press tour for nightmare alley she was just recalling her uh yeah she never put it together she never she never occurred to her that she could maybe be like i have three children but the psychic told me four so now i mean that she does have that subconscious self-fulfilling playing a role it's's not like she just woke up and there were four children maybe she did you don't know actually certainly you don't know have you guys ever gone to a fortune teller

I have although not I feel like it's mostly been at like a party or something you know like someone will do that like I don't think I've ever been like I'm going to a fortune teller today and like googling the nearest one it's something I ever been like, I'm going to a fortune teller today and Googling the nearest one. It's something I love to do when I'm traveling

in a new city. Oh, interesting. I'll just go to the fortune teller. That's a very Ben thing. Can you tell the difference between the two? Can you tell, are there regional differences? Like a DC versus a Chicago. I mean, yeah, they usually are very vibe of the city.

The hot dog. Is it a good way to get to know a place? They pour out the rel mean, yeah, they usually are very like vibe of the city. The hot dog. Is it a good way to get to know a place? They pour out the relish, David, and they start like mixing it around on the table. I see roast beef in your future. Do you know what makes New York psychics better, in my opinion? What? The water. That good water.

It's that good New York water. It's that hard water. Oh, hard water. I did like one of those walk- like psychics where they have the neon sign in the window in the second story of some building once with my friend and the only thing i remember her telling me is that it's gonna take a long time before i get married that one's haunted me but now but now i'm like is that because exactly now you're doing what kate blanchett that's how you end up with four kids yeah this is why i'm never gonna get married by the way

that's gonna want to prove her wrong yeah i like that her cards are total nonsense because ramie was like i don't want this to be rooted in anything you know like tarot or anything like that she should just have weird symbols that like she clearly knows what they mean but it's isn't it a game is it not that game they're the ghostbusters cards no they are the cards that bill murray uses at the psychic test the w The wavy lines, the square, the circle. Yeah. He just calls them bland, meaningless symbols. That is, he was insistent. He was set.

It also looks like the set cards. I mean, sure. There are repetitive circles and squiggles and stuff. I like that aspect of it that Raimi was like, you develop your own internal system. I just want to be able to shoot you and go, but I don't want to have to do a close-up of a hangman

or whatever. Definitely a movie I would want to see about that psychic. It's just it keeps pulling away from it. Just to be clear, Billy Bathorn's childhood was, his parents were still together, but his mother was operating as a psychic

out of their living room and he was like there was that weird vibe of like we had magazines sitting on our table like it was a dentist's office people would wait for their reading and like the guy who says he's bleeding but doesn't want to go to a doctor is like a thing that thornton that was a real guy that she would see his mother never got roped up in a murder mystery but it's more the idea of yeah but you want more of that, too. Yes, you want more of a regular customer. Yes.

It would have helped so much to have even a sprinkling in of that. And then, look, the other thing I find kind of interesting in this movie is that we failed to talk about the other great supporting character actor performance in this movie, which is, of course, Michael Jeter

as the prosecution. When's he bad? Never. which is, of course, Michael Jeter, as the prosecution. When's he bad? Never. Obviously, we've talked about Michael Jeter on this podcast before. Weirdly, on the Polar Express episode. On Polar Express, when we dove deep into Michael Jeter. If you've ever seen him, he's in Fisher King, right?

Yes. He is so good in the Fisher King. But he's really always good. He really is. This isn't the kind of thing you'd think he'd excel at. No, and you'd almost figure him to play the cop or whatever like to play the jk simmons role right but he's so good in this and i think jk simmons song was like you the fucker has been stealing my role for 10 years i'm sorry and ramey's like i've been telling you jk grow out the mustache an additional two inches jk's looking his mustache a little thin in this one jeter's always got a

full push broom he does he's got a great stache the Jeter scene is the other thing this movie is kind of interesting with regards to that it doesn't I think explore enough or I guess maybe compellingly enough which is this like

so in order to accept this evidence you have to buy into the idea that the supernatural is real and this like question that whole sequence feels like another movie yeah it's somewhat interesting but it's not long enough no but also i literally was just like why is she on the stand right he has a reputation for violence yeah and we found a dead body in his fucking backyard. Convict. They don't need to bring in a psychic who's like, well, you're magical.

And your husband died. This is devastating for the case. Also, the fucking judge is sustaining when Keanu's saying fuck and being so fucking crude. And he's telling the lawyer to like be quiet

and then also when um she's getting cross-examined he is saying some of the most wretched horrible things he's like i do hate witches why don't you shut your whole mouth it's like fucking crazy it's like a horror h.o.r a horror mouth okay the stenographer also did you see this like the stenographer there was not quality control on that background acting because she was she's so prominently displayed in the scene and she's typing so elaborately over the key it's very distracting if you want you see her she becomes the star of the scene i do and that made me feel like sam raimi wasn't even on set that day i do wonder and look it's maybe a convenient excuse,

but I do wonder if, like, if you get Spider-Man halfway through filming this movie, I do wonder if at certain points in the production of this film, he's just starting to daydream Spider-Man more than he is paying attention to what's happening. I swear, that's the only thing to explain. You should re-watch the stenographer. Now knowing that he got Spider-Man

means that that scene now makes sense to me. Right right you're just like he's just saying there was no direct i mean so but imagine being in the mental state of that imagine having to finish this film knowing what's no i can't ron a couple other things you mentioned paxton was the first choice yeah ron eldard was the second choice who's one of those guys where it was like he was in things for a second yes Yes. I don't want to be rude about a guy who might be a nice guy. He's a horrible actor. He is

he gives one of the most movie ruining performances I've ever seen in which one the House of Sand and Fog. Yes. One of those things where when he walks in you're like oh who's this in five minutes and you're like well we'll be ruined. Well it sucks. Obviously he's part of a

bad storyline yes but he's really bad he was in er which jj abrams takes him off the bench weirdly for super eight and then like he does the old eldar shit and it kind of fucks up the movie again it's he's bad in super eight and that could be good i know he's i think that was mostly because he plays an absolutely horrible character in er. Okay. In season two of ER. He's the weird boyfriend or love interest in Drop Dead Fred. Yes, that's right. Way back when. That's like his first role.

Didn't he do a blind lawyer show? Didn't he do a show that was literally called Blind Justice? That was Rutger Hauer. That's Blind Fury. You are correct that he did a show called Blind Justice. It's like Daredevil, but what if he's not a superhero? And yes, he is a blind policeman. Oh, right.

He would go to the scene of the crime and he would see things that no one else could. Not with his eyes. It was Stephen Bochco. Because there's a lot of Stephen Bochco shows that people don't remember. And that's one of them. Yeah, it ran for 13 episodes. Had a notorious show killer, Rina Sofer, in it. And Frank Grillo.

Grillo. Love Grillo. And Michael Gaston and Saul Rubinick. Sounds like a canceled cop show from the 90s. Anyway, Kinnear, the third choice. There was the classic, can we really cast TalkSoup's Greg Kinnear?

And they did. Could Paxton not do it? Is that why he wasn't in it? I would assume he's actually busy. There was something. I think I saw whatever the specific project was. But yeah.

But yes, as we mentioned, he... It's a real leap between the two. Like from Paxton with that, what's his name?

Eldard. But Eldard was one of those guys where people were like, this is a guy, right? Right. I don't know why. He's higher than Greg Kinnear? I think it was just because Kinnear was so light at that point in time.

Like, even though he's working to cast off the talk soup thing, it's also like his legitimate movies have been Sabrina, As Good As It Gets, and You've Got Mail, which are all like a very light tone of geniality. As Good As It Gets is before this? Yeah. So he's got the Oscar nomination, but he still hasn't done a movie where he's like serious. That's what I mean. How can this be this serious? It's insane. That's what I'm saying. It's insane. Listen to what you're, the words coming out of your mouth. No, I know. That they're like

Do you hear the words coming out of your mouth? He's not yet done the level of serious that the GIF does. But I truly think that was the thought where they were like, Kinnear can be charming, sure. Yeah. But can he play like a real guy? But as good as it gets, he's serious. You've got male mystery men, Nurse Betty

and Loser, which are the four movies in between this. It's a good run, actually. Well, it's a run of interesting movies that he is always playing the same part, which is like, you think he's nice, and it actually turns out he's a jerk. Smarty asshole. Right. He's so good mystery man. He is very well cast in mystery. That fucking scene. It's a small role, but he's so...

Yeah, but the one... The scene where he just sort of lays out everything that's going to happen to him. Here's what I'm thinking. Flip the script. Is it perfect? No, but I think that's why I like it. I just...

Sorry, I have his entire performance committed to memory. After this, of course, he gets autofocus and he's like, finally, Oscar's coming for canary let me jerk yeah yeah yeah um obviously as we mentioned sam ramey found out he was directing spider-man in the middle of filming this movie yeah um hands rosemary harris a golden ticket hands jk simmons golden tickets as we haven't mentioned it i do like the rosemary harris scene it's kind of sweet kind of evocative you do understand how he on set that day watching

her deliver that dialogue straight in the camera goes little Aunt May vibe here. This works. I could carry this over. As you say composer Christopher Young was like yeah he was pretty busy while I was doing We had like one meeting where he was like look I know you can do all the supernatural scary stuff

I want you to write a score for the emotional journey of this character this woman finding peace at the end of her grieving process. Right. Which I don't think that emotional narrative tracks very well across the movie. I agree with that. And definitely not the ending note of it. It's not. The closure.

It's not a movie like The Des where i'm like oh this like supernatural movie this horror film at the end you realize has been a film about coming to terms with grief or baba duke or whatever the fuck like i just feel like i forget at certain times her internal journey because of the shaming part it just yes it's because like i just feel like i i don't like how they don't allow it seems like it's being decided not by her when her journey gets she puts her head on greg ganier's chest an hour and 15 minutes in and you're like she should have been having a developing relationship with greg can you're 30 minutes in right uh but obviously he was married

he was engaged to katie holm whatever once the body once he's his wife is dead and she's they're both single she still says i can't do it because she's not over her husband yet. And then you're like oh my god this whole movie has just been me watching a woman grieving for her husband.

That's the A storyline and everything else is incidental around it. And as much as I think Blanchett is like pretty solid in this movie the character just doesn't really exist.

It's pretty one note like that stuff and it just doesn't move on from it. She doesn't transcend it. She doesn't fuck it up. No one's really transcending anything. Can we talk about this movie's ending?

The Buddy Cole ending? Please. Buddy Cole, of course, is the character played by Giovanni Ribisi, who we've sort of talked around, who is a mentally ill person who comes to Annie for readings a lot, but is like super disturbed. He keeps on saying she's like his only friend. Right.

And you're worried, like, is this a thing where he's like in love with her and doesn't have boundaries? And of course you're like, who's going to be the bad guy? Is it going to be this guy? Right. Because he's clearly on edge and he has these sort of like breakdowns.

Or how's he going to do his Mice of Men moment? Right. It's not like I don't think he's going to be the bad guy. I think he's going to like not have impulse control and mess something up and be. It's also one of those things where like unlike Sling Blade where you're like this is such a good performance. I know exactly who this guy is and what his level of functionality is. This is a performance of such actorly like tricks that you're like what level of competency and functionality is this guy supposed to be at? Yeah.

Because I'm not concerned for him. I'm just aware of how much Giovanni Ribisi is doing. Yes. To show us that he's disturbed. Yes. This vague catch-all of disturbed. Right. And he keeps on talking about staring into the blue diamond

and how it's going to fuck him up forever. Is it, I thought it was the eye? Is it diamond? No, it's blue diamond. Blue diamond, right. It ends up being tattooed on his father. Which is a really nasty and, it's Blue Diamond. Blue Diamond, right. It ends up being tattooed on his father. Which is a really nasty and stupid twist.

It sucks. It's horrible. But there's this moment where she's kind of like, you know what, just do whatever. She's distracted and she basically blows him off.

Oh, because he has that confession where he comes to her and he's crying hysterically and he's like, I keep touching myself and masturbating when I think of my father. He shows up at the courthouse,

basically. He's basically just gotten off the stand and there's Buddy outside being like I need to talk to you right now. Quick question. Why do I do uncomfortable things when I think of my

dad? And she's like I don't know. And he's like let me make it really clear for you. I think of my father and then I masturbate. Meanwhile there's the

townspeople being like witch. Witch. Fuck you. But she does really drop the ball on that. She obviously does but she's you know we sort of we get that she's besieged with stuff

Or whatever and she blows him off And then he snaps and ties his dad To a chair and sets him on fire Outside the trailer He's duct taped his father He's whipping his father with a belt It's a really unpleasant scene It's a very unpleasant scene that does not

Just doesn't particularly feel earned It more feels like kind of this like ghastly twist yes and then he's sent to a mental institution but of course in the end of the movie he magically appears and saves her yes when she's being attacked by the vicious super strong and super intimidating greg kinnear the iconic weapon of the flashlight yes uh but no he saves her and she's like he saved me and then you got the classic like ma'am he hasn't been alive in 30 years you know he died at the mental institution yesterday you say he saved you at 9 p.m but buddy cole died at 6 p.m it really is that specific too because they say all they say is that he hung himself tonight i'm like well he

if you don't give a time stamp on that, he could have saved her and hung himself. And he had a frigging blanket. That he washed. He did have a washcloth. A little handkerchief. He didn't have time to wash the blanket. No, it's what she gave him. In the beginning.

Right, when he's crying. At the car, when she gets her car fixed. Right, he slams on the brakes and starts crying. Crying, sweating, something. I don't know why she gives it to him. Right, but it's like a baby throw-up blanket, right? And then he washes it, gives it back to her, and then the fact that she has it in her pocket

is proof that somehow something supernatural happened. I don't fucking know. I don't know. Or is it more like Cate Blanchett and the four kids? Maybe she's always had that in her pocket, then she takes it out to make herself feel like it's proof. I just wish Giovanni Ribisi's character was not in this movie at all. Do you think?

You could almost lift him out. Wait, grandma shows up and saves the day. That would have been the better movie. The thing is, because he's in his own movie, his character's always just with her. So it means nothing other than him saving her at the end. And this twist that is sort of like, okay, fucking whatever. year after six cents i don't fucking need this and it doesn't and it extra doesn't land because because they've been separated too like not only has it been done a million times truly hokey and bad ending would be her husband saving her yes they they didn't do

that i don't think they should do that no but it's almost weirder than it's like remember that guy that you kind of kind to but you also kind of weren't that helpful? At the end of the day, he came and helped you out. I'm like, why? Who cares?

And also, he kind of sucks too. He sucks. He's not a good character. This whole movie's about toxic masculinity. I know it's an overused term but it is like,

if there ever is a movie about that, these guys are bad. That's all the Magnor riddled with flaws. I mean, they're just like, they're really over the top in why they are bad.

Every man wants to fuck you and kill you. And like you say, Cate Blanchett is saintly in this kind of a way of like, well, I'm just a single mom trying to make ends meet, and I don't have time for romance, and I don't have time for, you know, and I want to be friends to, you know. To this guy who really violently tried to kill. Fuck, wait a second. David's wedding ring mysteriously.

I mean, I fiddled. No, I took it off. I fiddled with my wedding ring all the time. Mysteriously. Do we think. David, check your hoodie pocket quickly. Oh my God. There's a throw up blanket in there.

I mean, that used to be very true in my life. We're using shortly. No, just at their peak. Is Giovanni Ribisi against Ben Foster at their very best performances? Who's better? Foster. I think Foster at his best. Foster has given performances that I really, really love. I agree. Okay, no

more like this. But Foster in this mode drives me equally crazy. No more curve. We gotta do a curve. We gotta factor in the bad, the best, and the worst. What does it average out to? Who's better? I think rabisi wow but then you do have the other sister you have a couple right at the bottom really dragging the average down but foster when he's like this irritates me more oh i agree here's what i'll say

rabisi actually has a stronger middle ground i don't see in ted like funny this is the thing like when he does the seth mcane shit, he's funny. Is Foster ever funny? That guy doesn't look like someone who can be funny. I met him once and he was exactly at 10. Yes. I have had a similar interaction with him. I'm not hinting

at anything on Twitter, but you're just like walks into a bar and you're like, too much. Too much. Like him in party mode is too much. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. I think Foster has no middle ground. I think shit like Hell or High Water, you're like, he's phenomenal in this. And shit like 310 to Yuma, I'm like, take

it down. 310 to Yuma, it's too much. I do like him in The Messenger, although it's a lot. Great in that. Ben Foster, go. Like, terrible in fucking like Warcraft. But I think Ribisi has- He couldn't be on Friends either. You can't-

No, Ribisi has a middle zone that's better, but Ribisi's worse is maybe worse and his best is maybe not as good as Foster's best. It's an interesting comparison. I think Ribisi's at his worst is worse acting, but Ben Foster at his worst drives me more crazy. It bugs me more. That's true. I feel almost mean about Ribisi now because I do think

I like him in plenty of movies. And he can be quite subtle. Yes. And he was so sneaky. I've never seen Sneaky Pete. Sneaky Pete, Bryan Cranston produced. And he's in the pilot. I think that was a very in good faith show to take on. But Foster could not do Sneaky produced. Yeah. And he's in the pilot. So I think that was a very in good faith.

Absolutely. Show to take on. But like Foster could not do Sneaky Pete. No. And I think everyone watched Sneaky Pete. I mean, I've never seen Sneaky Pete. This is the point. You haven't been keeping up with Pete and his sneakiness?

It's hard to keep up with him. He keeps on sneaking away. What if that was the problem? Amazon was like, we tried to put him on the homepage, but he's so sneaky. It's not that our UI is bad. It's this piece. Hiding and family friendly, you know,

princess movies. What's he doing over there? I guess I, I don't think I'm ever upset if a Giovanni Rabisi movie comes on. No. And once again, every, I find this performance incredibly upsetting in its own way,

but I also go like, I feel bad that they let him do this. Whereas Foster, I'm like, you should have known better. Because it's post-this too. Like a world, acting like this in a post-gift world. Right. There's more points taken off. The gift was given a limited qualifying release on December 22nd, 2000. We will not be doing that box office game.

Wide release. Because that is the cast away release. We will do its wide release, which was on January 19th of 2001. Okay. It grossed $12 million against a $9 million budget. Okay. Another $32 million internationally. Not good, but not.

If they had figured out how to monetize screen grabs of nude scenes this movie would have gone into profit 10 times over but in fact they could not right they lost all that did sam raimi do his uh like submit throw his name into the hat before the gift was even made yes yes because spider-man has been gestating for so long. He pitched on that, I would imagine, in the late 90s or whatever. I think it was 99, and then they hire him in 2000 when he's filming this movie. He makes it in 2001, and when did it come out? 2002. There you go.

It was supposed to come out in 2001. And people thought it was because of 9-11. And then to Rex Reed's Fury, they released it in May of 2002. We will discuss that on the next episode. No, they thought it was because of 9-11 that I'm going to put that. And then to Rex Reed's Fury, they released it in May of 2002. I know. We will discuss that on the next episode. No, they thought it was because of 9-11, because of the weird teaser trailer, and it was that they started making the movie, and they were like, how long does CGI take? A couple days?

Come on, he swings. It truly was that foreign to them that they were like, oh, this movie's going to take a year longer to finish than we assumed. This movie, the gift probably shouldn't have come out until after Spider-Man based on Sony paying Paramount

to delay it. But Spider-Man took so long to finish, understandably, that it ended up coming out a year earlier. When you hear Tim Ramey talk about

the Paramount classics in the interviews too, I like that he says, I don't really understand it myself. It's so funny. He's like, there's,

like Paramount kind of wants it, but they know that they don't know how to market something that's this small. there's this guy lakeshore and he's willing to put up 90 of the money param puts up the 10 so then when it's on home video and cable it's paramount but then they hand it off to the smaller he's like i don't know they're gonna put it in theaters who gives a shit yeah i like that he's just like it doesn't you think it makes sense

to me it does not but it never expands beyond like 800 screens like it never really got like a super live release. It is surprising. I do think it's surprising that it wasn't a hit given how much the actors inside still thought

this kind of movie had not been made enough. It's kind of a perfect January thriller and like it should have made the Watcher money. Yeah. Right.

It should have made more like 30 to 40. Right. And it makes 12. It didn't get particularly good reviews and I think it was saddled with this had Oscar buzz particularly good reviews and I think it was saddled with

this had Oscar buzz energy, right? Like where it was given an awards-y release that didn't work. It was actually taken out of theaters for a couple of weeks. Right. Like, you know, it was only a tiny release. And then they were like,

well, here you go, the gift. And I feel like already it was just kind of like, well, we're moving on. Because what was number one at the box office that week, Griffin? You're pointing at me. He wouldn't know. January 19th, 2001. This is a film for teens.

It's a teen. It was number one the week before. It's one of those movies that was a big deal at the time. Was a hit. I feel like it's mostly forgotten these days. It's a January release. It's not a December holdover. No. It's a January release. Solidly for teens.

It's a teen film. What genre teen? It's going to give it away. Dance. Oh, it saved the last dance. It saved the last dance. A big ass hit. Yeah. Huge hit. Huge hit. Made 90 million dollars. Not forgotten. In January. That movie is not forgotten. Julia Stiles, hit yeah huge hit huge hit made 90 million dollars in january that's not for that movie

is not forgotten yeah i see julia styles is that clip is their services all the time yeah i think that movie is a little forgotten but in that clip you're talking about yes you're right people might not have not i don't think they've watched that film but they definitely know what that is and they're very familiar reference to it and it will not fall upon a single deaf ear yeah yes whether it's visual or whatever. And it made her a bigger star now than I feel like. She's lasted longer in people's memory than I would have thought. It is funny.

Because of that film. The 10 Things I Hate About You was like, we're telling you these are the next two stars. And then the movie underperforms a little bit. And then they were like, okay, Julia Stiles, make a dance movie. She makes a dance movie. That movie overperforms. Everyone's like, I guess you were right julia styles is the person and then she kind of just gets stuck into like you talk to jason bourne over the phone uh she sure does i mean i was the biggest styles fan i like her a lot still like her and like her if she pops

up in a hustlers or whatever always happy always. Silver Lion's Playbook, she's very good. Yeah, that's right. Damn. Weirdly good sister casting. Yeah. Number two at the box office is a gigantic hit film that I recently mentioned. It's in its fifth week.

No, this is 2001. Cast Away? Yes, Cast Away. Thank you. Fifth week, it's made $181 million. A huge ass. Big old hit. Now, number three at the box office is an Oscar holdover that's more in a chugging along zone. It's made $46 million in a month. It's going to make $124 million.

Wow. And it's not going to make that by suddenly exploding. It just chugs for ages. Traffic. Yeah. Wow. Here's the thing with traffic. Yeah. Is it's not going to make that by suddenly exploding. It just chugs for ages. Traffic. Yeah. Wow. Here's the thing with traffic.

Is it a good movie? I don't know. Because the whole thing with traffic is it's made by one of America's great filmmakers. Yes, it's the thing that gets him the Oscar. It's the film he won Best Director for. Yeah. It's got a transformative performance by Benicio Del Toro that I think everyone can still agree, like, what a great performance, right? Half of it feels kind of hacky and lame now right the drug stuff is really really like

it has a little perfunctory but also because like in the 20 years since there were so many movies made about the drug trade that yeah you know got into it in more detail right like but before that it was like just the way that she gets hooked on drugs, it's so after-school special. Compared to Breaking Bad or whatever. Is it the traffic has what? The Del Toro story is very good. The Cheadle story, I think, is almost underrated. I think he's amazing in that movie.

And then it's just that the Michael Douglas, Erica Christensen story is the one that's kind of glaring and clunky. I haven't seen it in a while well that's it seems like a movie to revisit it's it's it it seems like the kind it could go either way i've seen it one time i probably saw it in 2004 2005 on cable uh i didn't see it when it came out and i just remember being like this movie is so fucking bracing and real and intelligent and it's got so much fucking integrity. You won't believe how fucking good this thing is.

And everyone was just saying like, well, Soderbergh obviously should win best director for traffic, but it's never going to happen. It's too cool. It's too good. He'll split the vote. Aaron Brockovich was the bigger hit.

And it's the populist one. Ang Lee's going to get it. And when he won for traffic, it was this like, fuck. Yeah. Like, yes.

They made the right call. He won for traffic. Yeah. Right. And like he won for traffic, it was this like, fuck, yes. And now we're sort of like, huh, he won for traffic. Yeah. Right. And like that whole movie feels a little bit like hokey. And everywhere you're using to describe it is the kind of movie

that when you go back, you're like, we were so, I can't believe we thought that about this movie. The other thing is, I think at the time, people were like,

he did this thing that is so ingenious. The movie has multiple plot lines that take place in different countries. And for each one, he picks a different color filter. Which is the most overused shit in the world now.

It's now quite a trope. Right. I don't mind. But those kind of movies, I can always factor in if it's overused after. It's more like I still need it to have something going for it. Like I need it to transcend the kind, the breathless way we describe it. If it's, because I can always be like,

I've seen this many times after. I just think when I watched it in 2004, 2005, and I was like, I now finally am going to watch what is clearly Steven Soderbergh's masterpiece as everyone has presented it to me.

I was like, oh, okay. I think it's a good movie. I haven't seen it in a long time. Did you like it? I was like, this is fine. I'm a little surprised that people were this rhapsodic about it. But it is also, it's a good movie. I haven't seen it in a long time. Did you like it? I was like, this is fine. I'm a little surprised that people were this rhapsodic about it.

But it is also, it's a two and a half hour film about the drug trade that made $124 million. Huge. That's it. Won four Oscars. It is wild. And then right after that, he's like, should I make like a heist movie that like redefines the genre forever and launches a million movie stars? But that's everything Sam Raimi wants to be. Absolutely.

Sam Raimi, the fact that Soderbergh can make the most commercial films of all time and make the real ones. In an 18 month span, he did Aaron Brockovich, Traffic, Ocean's Eleven, all three films. Don't forget Full Frontal. That's in there too. Isn't that right after? Might be for 2002. That's what I'm saying. It's those three happened in a row

were all huge ass fucking hits. Yeah, no. It is a crazy, crazy thing. And getting to throw the adult movie. If Soderbergh's just like, I just feel like making an adult movie for a second and then pulling it off. Right.

That's what kept Sam Raimi up at night. Yes. Knowing that that kind of thing existed. It's hard to be Steven Soderbergh. Not a lot of people pulled that off. No. I can only think of one. Big old Sody. Yeah. Sody pop. Yeah. Can Steven Soderbergh. Not a lot of people pulled that off. No, I can only think of one. Big old Sodi.

Yeah, Sodi Pop. Yeah, can of Sodi. Okay, number four at the box office is a crime comedy that I think is expanding this week maybe or something and becomes a bit of a sleeper hit off of a prior sleepier hit. Anything I say about this movie will both invoke it's a sleeper hit off a prior sleepier hit from the same director that's the same director okay so it's him being like what if i did the thing i did in my debut film again but with a

couple movie stars this time but apart from that it's the same vibe it is a sequel or not it's just another but it really is like the next movie by this guy is gonna be the fancier version more money right the higher thread count can you tell us what genre that is crime it's a crime you know comedy but like dark comedy in january 2000 i'll tell you this yeah david simms where he lived these films were inescapably this movie's called snatch called snatch um yeah i mean the minute i bring up that he's british my uh my but i feel like lockstock in britain it was like the most important film of the year in america it was like huh some british crime movie has a little bit of juice i will say to you it didn't land as

hard but the marketing of the movie was like you need to understand this is the most important film in england it was and it was very much this sort of there was a big kind of like this is the next tarantino i remember there being a lot of ads on mtv like they were specifically trying to convince teenagers you don't know how cool this movie is and then the uk just flipped out it's truly him just being like same vibes same cast throwing brad pitt throwing del toro yeah but what's it about oh it's a bit and i'm 14 years old and i liked snatch but there were just people in my life who were like there's pre-snatch and there's post-snatch right you know like they were just like this has changed my life people have been snatched i've

never seen a man in a pork pie hat punch someone and say like lovely jubbly you know and now that's how i want to live my life that is an incredible summation of Guy Ritchie movies. Guy aboard my hat punches somebody and says, lovely jubbly. That is. Yes, correct. That is the whole vibe. And then underneath it is like some fucking Paul Oakenfeld remix of a soul song. And the camera's cutting.

Anyway, Snatch. Snatch. Have you seen Snatch? No, I never have. What? You've never seen Snatch? Have you seen Lockstock? No, I never have You've never seen Snatch? Have you seen Lockstock? I don't think I've ever seen

You never saw a Guy Ritchie movie Before he got to Hollywood, essentially Where's my pork? I'm going to punch you Snatch isn't considered him getting No, but Snatch is him getting to Hollywood If Brad Pitt's in it Brad Pitt is in it

And it was a Sony movie But, like, you know It was a bridge It was in between the two it's still a British film but he's not a good filmmaker right I mean I think that The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is like the best kind of Hollywood movie that he can make

where it's like the right level of blitz and silliness I'm not a fan of the Sherlock movies I don't love the Sherlock's and I do feel like his post Hollywood Brit movies Rock and Roll love the sherlocks uh and i do feel like his post hollywood brit movies rock and roll of the gentleman yeah always kind of feel like he's you know that same bag of tricks but it's sort of like we've been here before you know like yeah they never some people will stick

up for rock and rolla because gerard butler of it all or whatever those movies aren't what arguably is. I agree with that. And I think... And I find his Hollywood stuff mostly anonymous. King Arthur's got stuff. You always fucking stand. It's got some stuff. You stand up for King Arthur.

Yeah. What's number five at the box office? It's a film we covered on this podcast. It's a romantic comedy. It's a romantic comedy from the year 2000 that we covered on this podcast. It's a 2000 hold it's a romantic comedy from the year 2000 that we covered on this podcast it is it's a 2000 holdover it sure is and it's made 162 million dollars it's called what women want that's right nancy myers it's what women want it was up until it was what women wanted

well i was gonna say until big fat greek wedding that was the highest grossing romantic comedy of all time in the united states of America. Well, women wanted that. Do you remember when we learned what men want? Honestly, I had forgotten, but yes, we did see what men wanted. You forgot a perfect film directed by Adam Shankman, my favorite director. Some other films in the top 10.

Finding Forrester, You Are the Man Now, Doc. Miss Congenialityity a very charming film sandy bullock i can't remember the setup but i the other day i made a good you're the dog now man joke and it was it worked i'm glad for you the context worked where suddenly it was the only correct thing to say and i said it at the right time and i'm not asking for comedy points i just attention must be paid i don't have any bones on me, but I would give you a bone. There is also Crouching Tiger,

Hidden Dragon. Only made $37 million so far, so it's also got a long way to go. Oh, it's starting? It hasn't already done the run? Well, they're like, can you believe this movie has made $37 million?

Right, they're like, what a huge hit. And then it's going to make another $100 million. There's 13 Days, a very solid dad movie with Cosner about JFK. Yes, but also very much. Part of JFK kink.

That's like a post for love of game. Like, Kevin, you don't get to be the guy in a movie at that size exerting this much control again. You now have a Januaryuary cuban missile crisis that's true that's true i mean i do think 13 days got a limited awards release i will say people thought greenwood maybe had a shot greenwood's great in that movie he's a great actor uh he is a great actor feels like he should have been in the gift he would have been good the greg kaneer part sure why not hey right he's got the edge now 2001 also in number 10 of course is the well-remembered orlando jones eddie griffin double team buddy movie double take uh double take uh

that movie came out uh on a weekend that i think overlapped with my brother's birthday and my mother felt bad that she had not planned anything for my brother's birthday and she was like what do you want to do and james was like i I want to see Double Take, which I also want to see because we were both all in on Orlando Jones as the 7-Up guy. Sure. And 40 minutes into the movie, my mom was like, I cannot take this. I gotta go. Yeah, I know it's your birthday. It doesn't seem very good.

Look me in the eyes and tell me you're enjoying this. So we walked out of it and watched the second half of Emperor's New Groove, which we had already seen. But the walking out of the theater into the other theater, that's a good birthday. It was great. Double take also. One of those movies where on the poster there's a dog, and you're like, they're really they think they're in trouble. They're like, can we put a funny dog on the poster or something?

Like, I don't think we have enough here. The whole thing is they have to swap persona. One guy's buttoned up, and the other guy's kind of like Wait, you're getting that from this poster? One guy's buttoned up and the other guy's kind of like... Wait, you're getting that from this poster? One guy's buttoned up and the other one's a little bit more loosey-goosey? They have to switch personas. And I remember being like, that sounds so fucking funny with those two guys. And the movie starts and you're like, oh, this is like bad company.

This is one of those movies that should be a comedy and is not and has no jokes in it. And of course, written and directed by George Gallo of The Comeback Trail. That's the thing. The movie should be Midnight Run and instead you're like, why is this like... But I mean, every movie should be Midnight Run.

The thing about Midnight Run is why aren't there more Midnight Runs? Why is it the only one? Why is nothing as good as Midnight Run? I feel that way, but you can count on me and you Midnight Run. I'm like,

we could have a lot of these. Yeah. Instead, they're so the exception and that's confusing to me. I also just want to note that opening at number 11 is Sean Penn's excellent film, The Pledge, which was a disastrous bomb, but it's a good movie. Right.

I've never seen it, but that's considered maybe the best late period Nicholson performance. It's really good. Is it a Nicholson directing one? It's Penn directing Nicholson.? It's really good. Is it a Nicholson directing one? It's Penn directing Nicholson. Sean Penn directs. And who directed The Crossing Guard? Sean Penn. So before that.

Before. That's also a good movie. Sean Penn made The Indian Runner, Crossing Guard, The Pledge, Into the Wild, and it was like, this guy is a pretty good director

of pretty good dramas that are very dark. Yes, really good with actors, obviously. And then... And Ben Stiller. You know, he remains a really chill dude who never did anything weird.

The Last Face. The Last Face and Flag Day. Okay, it's only those two. Are his more recent, yeah. He just steadily keeps making films? Not really. He made The Last Face and Flag Day recently, but there was a long gap in between those. Especially when

Into the Wild had so much good will. The Last Face was a notorious people at the Cannes Film Festival were throwing tomatoes at the screen. People were a type thing. And it starred Charlize Theron when they were dating, and then it came out two years after they broke up because it was radioactive. And then Flag Day is him and his real-life

daughter, and he was like i want to make a movie about i've been a bad father and it came out right when theaters were reopening uh and bombed and then it was already being ignored he was doing the press despite having the sizzling title of flag day but he was like going on every late night talk show with his daughter being like i made this movie about my daughter. By the way, men today are too weak. Wearing dresses. They're too feminized. He did some crazy anti-beta male rant on like The View or whatever.

Anyway. Is it Gap because he was raising that daughter in between? Like it just, why is there a gap at all? I don't know. Why did he come back? I understand why he went away. He's an asshole. Yeah,

but he's, there's always a reason. He should make a lot more movies. I don't know why. I don't know why. If he feels that strongly that he should be making movies, then I just don't understand

why he stopped. I think he feels strongly about a lot of things. I think the problem is he keeps on shifting. He's going to smelt his Oscar, remember? He's going to smelt it.

I'm so fucking waiting. He said he would smelt his Oscar if Zelensky didn't come in. He could smelt both of them. Right, he's got to do this. He's going to smelt his Oscar, remember? He's going to smelt it. I'm so fucking waiting. Remember when he said he would smelt his Oscar if Zelensky didn't call it? He could smelt both of them. Right, he's got to do this. He's going to smelt my Oscars. Yeah. Can you imagine if Zelensky, if they had piped Zelensky into the Oscars after the slap and he had to just be like.

Right, everyone's just like, okay, hi, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, sure, sure, sure. Was that scripted? Do we think? So, right, he actually just wants to talk. So let's talk about the thing that you guys will now be talking, you guys will be talking more about the war than that, right? Right. My immediate thought after the slap was,

thank God Zelinsky isn't on this. Yeah, they had to save him for the Grammys. Right. It remains so insane that that happened at the Oscars and then they did the rest of the Oscars. Yep. And just Kajastain got up there and was like, I like to think and I'm just like, she might have just like I just like had no idea what she's

saying. Yes. Just like watching a Twitter feed be like, what is going on? Like it's the weirdest thing in the world. Yeah, no one will that will, that's exactly the movie the kind of movie too that not, that people will forget maybe it will all be kind of lost everything will be lost yeah what what did jessica chastain win her

oscar for and also what did she do during her speech yeah yeah but i mean the slap was so big that it not only eradicated the speech but the film that the people were in were also erased right like it went that far the The whole, anything that they were. It was like weird ripples. Coda is like, we're the little film that Coda. Yeah. Like it no longer exists as a film. It is funny.

I was at Marie Barty Party Barty's Oscar party along with Ben. And I was talking to a lot of people at the party where I was like, I am so flummoxed by the fact that coda has got this goodwill behind it because i think if you're looking for like the inspirational down the middle family overcoming the odds drama king richard is so much better than coda and then an hour later i was like king richard will never be watched by anyone ever again for the rest of time it's so strange for that one to settle yes no but maybe never you're right like i was on the plane i just got back on the plane you it's on there it's in the queue king richards and you just like like it's like you hover your finger over almost like an experiment i'm like

am i gonna jump from the train like you like you're you get chills at the idea look pressing i like that movie a lot i didn't i mean i'll never see it i'm like i don't know if i'll ever watch it again and beyond the fact that it's just like, oh, it's weird that that's the one he won for, the fact that he gets up and starts his speech with Richard Williams

fought for his family, I'm like, movie's ruined forever. It does hurt the movie a little bit. Inextricably. I'll say this. Yeah.

I watched Focus last week. Yeah. Ever seen Focus? Yeah, it's kind of fun. Good movie. Yeah, it's a fun movie. And guess what? Didn't feel too weird. I'm just, King Richard. King Richard's the one. It is. Yeah, it's a fun movie. And guess what? It didn't feel too weird.

I'm just, King Richard. King Richard's the one. It's not, but it's not about, it's King Richard, it's a very specific thing. I don't disagree with you.

I'm telling you, it felt like if I had hit King Richard on the plane, I was gonna like set off something. Like I mean, it was like a truly potent feeling of being like, this just isn't,

I don't even, it's not even like, it's not even like I have like, I have a lot of feelings about the slap. It's not like, it's beyond anything that's like a yes or no thing. It's just, you don't watch this. This is never. But that having been said, David, you and I texted about just announced this week 25th anniversary men in black 4k steel book i'm gonna fucking sonic the hedgehog run over to that best buy locker to put it pick it up and put it into my player it's not like i feel like will smith is forever tarnished he's not the one who was detonated it's it's that movie it's actually perfect it actually like it it's kind of tidy in that way yeah just let's leave it's like a sarcophagus around Chernobyl.

It's like when you take the bomb and you drop it in the ocean. It's like the Green Goblin's one of his balls. It's a controlled little goblin. That's a call forward. I gotta pee. You gotta take us out. We gotta wrap this up. Starly, thank you for being here. Is there anything you want to plug?

I have a podcast I wrote called Excessive with my friend Dan Roberts. It'll be coming out at some point in the future. It's on Audible. You're going to be in it. Keep your eyes open.

I'm going to be in it. This was negotiated. Hence negotiations right before recording. Some real-time negotiations. I'm going to be in it. This was negotiated. Hence negotiations right before recording. Some real-time negotiations. I'm going to be working on the show Dave. Watch that.

That is a show that I love. Great. That is an excellent show. Great. You're working on the third season? Third season. That's very cool. That is a show, I say this, I hope this doesn't come across backhanded at all, but I was like,

there's no way I like that show. Yep. And then everyone was telling me the show's really fucking good. And then I watched it. I was like, holy shit, the show's really fucking good. I had the same experience. And then a year or two later, the second season comes out and people were like, holy shit, this is a huge leap from the first season. I was like, hold your horses.

Dave isn't going to take a huge leap from season one to season two. I watched all season two. I was like, fucking holy shit, huge leap. People describe it really accurately. It's got the most accurate word of mouth hype i would say yeah because it has to have it it feels impossible and the show is aware of it i think to its credit yeah yeah my god the balancing act of it it is incredibly good i'm very excited you're writing for that uh you're you're a phenomenal writer and the show is lucky to have you as much as uh we are lucky to now get to be able to watch starly written episodes of dave yeah there'll be starly written episodes of dave his dick's really weird ben

yeah i know it's a big part of the show this and this is the last thing i'm doing before starting on day this is all i want i cared about making time for in the world we should say you literally got off an airplane a a red-eye flight, and came straight to Ben's apartment to record a thing that is bananas, but that you were very adamant to do. So adamant. In between the last time

you were on the show, I shot my tiny thing for the search party finale, and we spent a lot of time talking on set and the Charles Rogers birthday party, and you'd been telling me how into blank check you had gotten. Oh, I mean, I mean, I'm about to, so I drove from LA to New York last

June, 2021, pretty much only listen to blank check. I'm about to drive back to LA blank checks. In fact, I was so it's like, when I found out I was going to be on it, I was glad that I was going to have a bit of a lead time. Cause I was like, what if I don't have, I don't want to have my episode in there. I need to have enough Sam Raimi to get me to LA. And so then if I clog it up, I'm not, I lose an episode, but I, uh, I like now that this season, I feel like is really when we're, it's the, the people you've asked back and we're really understanding like the scarcity of slots. Oh, sure. And hearing, I hear it in every Sam Raimi guest. We're at this stage of the pandemic.

We're here again. We're all together. And we made it through and we're back on the show. We're trying. It definitely, look, I certainly enjoy making the show a lot more than I did two years ago or even a year ago. Yeah. Yeah. year ago. Yeah. Yeah. I agree.

Yeah, but I just. I just like that there's some like, that some of the, you know, the gang's all back. Yes. It's better. Yes. Yeah. And it's nice to like someone like you who we knew, but we had never gotten to record with in person.

Thank you for coming straight from the airport to record this stupid podcast and not even taking a shower. A thing that boggles my mind. No, I mean, there was no... There was no shower in between airport and bed. Oh, I'm just saying. But I wish I had... But then I'm like, knowing that there's that Delta lounge that exists and people do have the showers in there.

I don't have that access. It's wild. No. But yeah, I'm like, that would be a reason to get those miles in order to take a shower in order to be on the podcast freshly. Medallion status. Freshly ready to go. But yeah, so I'm going to do this and then I'll get dry in my car and just start listening

to Blank Check. Thank you again. Yeah. Yeah. And thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. Thank you to Marie Barty for our social media and helping put the show together in a bunch of other ways.

Thank you to AJ McKee and Alex Barron for our editing, Lane Montgomery and the Great American Novel for our theme song, Pat Reynolds and Joe Bowen for our artwork, J.J. Birch for our research. You can go to blankcheckpod.com for links to all the nerdy shit connected to this show. And you can go to patreon.com slash blankcheck

for Blank Check special features, where we do commentaries on franchises twice a month and we're doing all the Batman movies that we haven't done before. Filling in all those gaps before we get to Roger Moore who won our March Madness. He did. David's excited. I'm excited

for that. Yeah. I watched the Oscar speech where Moore, Connery, and Kane give out Best Support supporting actor to i'm forgetting whom now kevin klein oh he comes back he declined it no he accepted he aclined um tune in next week for a movie i'm just going to check my notes here that is called Spider Man a 2002 Sam Raimi film called

Spider Man with guest Matt Singer of Screen Crush not short but we got a lot to talk about the man who wrote he would say a book on Spider Man but I would say the book on Spider Man and as always he's a boxer isn't he he's a boxer isn't he but I would say the book on Spider-Man. And as always...

He's a boxer, isn't he? He's a boxer, isn't he? He's a boxer. I play job, Lee. I fuck you to job, Lee.