Sardonicast - Sardonicast 184: Emilia Pérez, Lost Highway

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

Support the Show for $2 a month and receive all future episodes early at https://sardonicast.com and https://www.patreon.com/Sardonicast. Website: https://sardonicast.com Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Sardonicast Reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/sardonicast Twitter: https://twitter.com/sardonicast Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/sardonicast.bsky.social Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/sardonicast Sardonicast Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8AhJ0bzQgs5fb9m_ZCRqkw/featured Alex's channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/IHEOfficial Adam's channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/YourMovieSucksDOTorg Jake's channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ManCarryingThing Jake's movie channel: https://www.youtube.com/@womancarryingman Alex's Twitter: https://twitter.com/IHE_OFFICIAL Adam's Twitter: https://twitter.com/2gay2lift Adam's bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/yms.bsky.social Jake's twitter: https://x.com/ManCarrying Jake's bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/mancarryingthing.bsky.social Adam's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/YMS Jake's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/mancarryingthing Intro music by: https://www.youtube.com/user/anUnkindnessvideo   Timestamps: 0:00 Emilia Pérez 1:16:46 Lost Highway 2:00:40 Questions 2:21:33 Recommendation + outro

Three, two, one. Rumpel pump. Rumple pimple pump. Tiny stump, welcome to the rump. That was a lyric from Wicked. I'm Adam from your movie sex. Sorry, that was from what? Emilio Perez, I thought.

It's the best song in Amelia Burns. I'm Adam from your movie sex. Does it start out of guess? I'm Alex from a rumple pimple pump. that's not all that's not all sorry i was trying to hand it to you like this is so like it's just like the ralph days it's just like falls apart when there's like three like we just can't do the i do my sorry great hi hi this is jake i'm from a man carrying thing and woman carrying man and i'm here today to talk movies mm-hmm oh yeah um that was pretty good go there in the end what was

this about amelia paris do you want to talk about it everybody's mad oh yeah yeah yeah i just wanted to say fuck you okay you get the box and gloves let's go okay you know it's funny one of the silliest comments on the previous video was someone saying i don't think i don't think adam is even going to talk about it

because this is his podcast and he doesn't want to be the person with the opinion that people disagree with what the fuck they haven't listened to this have they ever seen me on the internet at any point ever And also within that episode, we say, hey, we're going to have a larger discussion about this later. Yeah, no, we're trying to silence you. Yeah.

We recently brought on a third host so that we could argue more. So we can have opinions that are not the same. Right? And so far, we have argued zero amount. Well, here we go, everybody. Amelia Perez. This is a place to stop. State your thesis, state your position.

We're going to ding the bell. Each person has 30 seconds for an intro statement. No, I don't care. Just have a regular conversation. What did y'all think? I watched your video, Jake. I watched many videos on this film. Alex, I know the least about your opinion.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I guess I'm way more leaning towards Jake's opinion um then yours i think adam i to me it was a huge swing and a miss and man god where do you even start plucking out with this one uh i wrote like pages and pages for this one because it's just like nice whoo where do you even start um i think the way this conversation has gone about this film is like almost exploded to not quite on the same level but like almost like a last jedi type just yeah what are even talking about like conversation

But I do think the criticisms especially from like the communities I'm not a part of that being like the trans Mexican community the things they're saying about it. I cannot disagree with. I think there's something quite cheesy and inauthentic about the film. But honestly, my biggest issue at the end of it all is that it's this ironically confused identity movie where it like it can't settle on what it wants to be in my opinion. And it's a musical and the music is just, I just can't stand it. Like I don't think there's like a single good song in here. And that's kind of where my jumping off point is. Do you kind of feel similarly, Jake? I think you basically have it down there. Yeah, I mean, at the heart of it, it's a musical. And I personally found the music very grating and obnoxious.

But also, I think a big issue. And I've been thinking about this movie way more than I should. should. And I think a big issue here is that it started out as an opera. Jacques O'Diard wrote this as an opera. And I think that on stage, there's a level of abstraction and a lack of reality that isn't present when you film something. And it's filmed to be very like literal. It's not super like it's supposed to look like, even if it doesn't sometimes. But it's supposed to look kind of realistic. And I think that makes all of the leaps in logic and the big character changes and all these things that are supposed to be expressionistic feel very lame and off. So I think that maybe it

would work better on stage. I don't know. I personally don't think I'd like it regardless. But ultimately also, to me, it comes down to what the story is about just fundamentally, which is a Mexican drug lord who is trans and the way that character is handled feels I mean I'm not going to even get into the representation and all of that because there's other other people who are way more better equipped to talk about that and have a lot of good so Jesse Jender had a good video out about that but I thought that it's just hard to feel anything for this character knowing that she basically is like a murderer and doesn't really make any significant internal changes except for the obvious external ones. So, I mean, we'll get into the story and stuff later, but that's like, I think at the heart of why I don't like this movie.

That's very interesting. See, I, you know, I watched this at TIF before. there was any, you know, huge backlash. The audiences at festivals enjoyed the film, like more or less, generally positive. Both critic responses and audience responses. It's not just a disconnect between audiences and critics there, although now it does seem to be more like critic slash industry versus general audiences.

What I find interesting about this is my interpretive, of like the trans character. There was never any point where I thought like, oh yeah, the film wants us to think that she is redeemed. I thought that throughout the film they were presenting her as untrustworthy. That, you know, sure, they didn't like do a huge psychological deep dive and like spell it out and address like, oh yeah, I'm still such a bad person sort of thing. But, you know, she continued to use dirty money to fund her charity work.

She continued to be deceptive. She continued to lie to her family. She continued to manipulate. There are even scenes where, you know, at the end of the argument where she straight up physically assaults Selena Gomez's character, you know, zooms in on her and you hear this kind of like sinister low tone in the soundtrack. Things like that. I don't, I've heard a lot of people saying that the film is like endorsing the character and presenting things as though her transition is to absolve her of criticisms.

And, you know, even at the very end, there's characters that kind of like throw a parade in her honor. But these are characters that didn't know she was a drug lord. They didn't know she was a murderer. So in my perspective, I saw all of that is like, oh, okay, it's not like a black and white sort of telling you how to feel movie. This is just a very bizarre story with characters that are not moral and are not supposed to be taken as moral. There might be some gray areas. Like, sure, you know, she is still a person that would like to be with her family, and it's up to you as the viewer to decide whether or not that's a legitimate thing to feel for her or whether or not she deserves to have

her family and her life. But I honestly, that's one of the things I liked about the movie, is that traditionally we see this idea, this pervasive idea in any piece of media that includes something like a trans character where the expectation, especially if it's like a festival movie, especially if it's like almost a Hollywood movie, even though this technically wasn't a Hollywood movie, people are calling it that, there's the expectation. that if you have a trans character in the film, that they're supposed to be this like, oh, goody two shoes,

sort of like not even really addressing them as human beings sort of thing. And I like that this was a film that didn't feel like it had to do that. I like that this film was something where, oh, a trans person can be morally questionable, a bad person, somebody with a troubled past that doesn't absolve themselves.

A trans person can be a character where they aren't telling you how to feel about them. That's part of what I liked about it. And sure, in terms of like the representation, it's not like the best representation for trans people. There's plenty of weird misconceptions and stereotypes that exist within the character, a la it being, I don't know,

created by an 80-year-old French guy. But in terms of like, I don't know, the intent behind it, I don't think that there was anything particularly like malicious in terms of how he presented the character. And yeah, I don't think it was explicitly telling us how to feel better. And that's kind of something I enjoy. Yeah. It didn't feel intentionally mean-spirited to me, but it did read to me as sort of a shortcut for sympathy. I felt like that was kind of what the film was getting at.

And it was riding this line of like, yeah, this is like a magical realism, operatic thing on one hand, but is also like a straight melodrama on the other. And it felt like I just couldn't decide how I wanted to wield specifically that transition. And what it was what he was saying with that. What particularly got me thinking about that was I was reading interviews with the director and what inspired him and he was talking about this novel that he was partially inspired by those. And there was a chapter he was asked about, I'll read this part of the interview. What was it about the character in the novel that sparked your interest, which he said,

One chapter set in Mexico featured a very violent cartel boss who wanted to transition. What struck me was the person, representative of pure violence of the most absolute patriarchy having a desire for femininity. It was that paradox that drew me. So I think that was like the spark of what made him go down this line. But I feel like the absurdity of it being a cartel mob boss and the way it's presented in the film was it was like wielding the emotional sophistication of something like. 13 reasons why to me just did not work from that angle. Like it was really clumsy in the way it was bringing about that character in particular and the way it was using what it was saying with it.

At the end of it, the ultimate point seemed to be sort of a Godfather three situation where it's like you can't outrun your past and it's going to catch up to you at some point. And the way it wields the trans experience in there seems almost glossed over with just like the surgery part of it just kind of being glossed over and it being like one scene. And yeah, more about like the crime angle and I don't know trying to get to this half redemption sympathy angle and then what they're saying about it after the fact what this character is

supposed to resemble and how they're talking about it I just don't yeah what was it odiard said wants Amelia to be an inspiring figure of hope um which I just don't feel like that's how the film sorry he said in an interview that he wants Amelia to be an inspiring figure of hope yeah when he was collecting one of the awards one of the many awards it's already won I didn't know which down in particular. I just noted down the quote. I'm going to need a source for that one. I can find it.

I'm not saying I don't believe you. I'm saying I need a source. Unfortunately, because of the nature of how people are having these conversations, there's a lot of like uncharitable out of context, either mistranslations or misquotes or just like things that people didn't say, that people just keep repeating that it's like okay when you look up the source it's like oh they didn't

really say that so you have to you have to be careful about quotes for in this film it's funny like that that particular quote aside though um the the kind of drama that's been unfortunately attached to this movie from that lead actress um does mare that message whether it be true or not um and just how that has gone down and all of the the quotes and the tweets and the interview. It's just, it's turned into this huge controversy. Mm-hmm.

That, uh, I don't know, kind of like is ironically going against what I feel like they were trying to make the film mean. What do you mean? If they want it to be more of a, like inspiration, taking this character and have it be a inspirational, kind of more sympathetic angle,

which I feel like they were kind of going for. And they wanted this character to be inspiring, um, in some way or another. I just don't, feel like that comes across and it feels contradictory. Yeah, no, I mean, I... I didn't interpret it that way, so...

It's funny if he said that at an interview or awards ceremony, but yeah, I mean, anyone's experience can be whatever you want with a movie, as in death of the artist is a thing that exists, but... Yeah, I kind of felt the same way with Civil War. When that came out, I thought the director was making all these statements. about what the movie was about and I was like, no, I disagree. I think you don't understand your own movie. Yeah.

But yeah, with Amelia Perez, I think Alex, you make really good points about how it feels like, like the premise would be really interesting. Like this drug lord is like trans and wants to transition. What would that mean? Like, what does that mean in that culture with the patriarchy, everything like that? But I don't think the movie really is interested in that and in a lot of ways is trying to like just deify this the image of this character who And I and I think the transition and being trans is treated as just kind of like a A switch that you flip and and it's just like sudden transformation. It's almost more of like a

metaphor and treated like a metaphor for a transformation rather than a literal thing I mean she literally has like one operation and gets like every single surgery done in one single night you know it's it's very unrealistic and I believe that it's because there was little research put into the film but also because I detect a sense of a lack of curiosity about what's what's actually here and I think that to use it as a metaphor is it can be fine but I that the movie was clumsy as a result and it it wasn't enough for me to buy what the movie's trying to sell emotionally yeah yeah see I just I guess a lot of how you experience the film can come down to like what you believe the intent of the

director or you know the artists are I when I you know knowing that he essentially just took like a character from one chapter of like a different short French novel and was like, oh, that's cool. You know, like I kind of want to have a drug lord character that's the transitions. Like I'll make something interesting out of that. I don't see Jacques O'Diard's intentions as being ones where he was looking to make like a thorough deep exploration on whether it be social issues

like transness or Mexican culture and he stated in interviews plenty of times now like I've got one of the tabs open that you know he was never trying to make any sort of like deep commentary or statements about Mexico

right and so I would assume that he the same goes for the trans experience is that he was essentially just using like a scenario is like a concept to be like, oh, okay, there could be some drama that comes out of this or particularly with my experience of the movie and it being so like weird and zany and wacky and like absurdist, like clearly absurdist at so many points. I don't, I feel like for me personally, there is a bit of leeway when it comes to the concept

of realism or the concept of. authenticity when you're going for something that has, you know, the intended effect of like, oh, wow, that's happening sort of thing or, oh, wow, that's really wacky. Or like, it's kind of something where, like, you summarize the sequence of events in the film. And it's like, oh, wow, nobody could have, you just created a new sentence, basically. Like, nobody could have predicted the plot would go in this way. Like, it's, it's one of those things that I enjoy. Um, you know, like spoilers for Ralph Bakshi's wizards, you know, like that that's a movie where I enjoy the fact that this, the summary of the movie is like, okay, you have this like fantasy world animated, uh, animated, uh, two-d animated film where, uh, there's like a really large breasted fairy, but then Hitler's come back. And then the, all of the, the wizard and, uh, like hobbits and stuff have to stop Hitler,

but then when the big showdown happens, the wizard just pulls out a gun, like things like that. It's the same type of vibe for me. And sure, you could, you know, Wizards isn't a movie that is consistently throughout going for comedic sensibilities. It's just one of those like on paper. You have a very bizarre,

concept and I like things that are unique. I like things that are weird. I liked its approach to what it was doing narratively, not necessarily, you know, how groups were represented. To me, I found that not like I don't care, but in like Alex said, what did you say? You said, I can't disagree with you know the minority groups complaining about this movie yeah like their experience

I agree I can't disagree with that either I also can't agree with it because it's just not within my realm of understanding right so in the same sense like if you were to ask a color blind person to comment on the color grading of a film the guy can't agree with it

nor disagree with it because they have no perception of it right I have no perception of Mexican culture. I live in Canada. I don't even live in the states, right? So any criticisms on how the culture is portrayed or, you know, the discrepancies between accents and whether or not some sounded like Mexican accents or Dominican Mexican or American Mexican or just plain American accents or butchering the lingo, the phrasing, the, you know, all of those things. I can neither agree with it nor disagree with it because I literally don't have that perspective. And that's fine.

And part of the beauty of there being more than one person on the planet with more than one brain is that you can talk to other people and go, oh, here's these things that I have no concept for, but you do. And here's these things that you have no concept for, but I do. That's how they influenced our experience of the movie. And that's interesting, and you don't need to hate each other about it. I'm not talking to you guys, because you are reasonable. I'm talking to the audience here. There's no reason to get like so serious and vindictive and vitriolic over just the notion of different brains existing, you know, like some people are going to be perceptive to some things and some people aren't and that's totally fine. Yeah. I mean, I agree with you there, but I also think like your perspective about how like the kind of chaotic nature of it is what's appealing to you and that it isn't trying to kind of make statement.

about these communities, I disagree with that because I feel like the movie at multiple points is really trying to say something. Like, it kind of goes out of its way at certain points to feel like a didactic message, like that one part where she's talking to the surgeon and she's like, you know, changing the body, changes society, changing society, changes the soul, changing, you know, blah, blah, blah. And it just becomes like a word salad. And after that, I'm like, okay, you're trying to say something. no idea what that meant. I don't know what this is.

Depending on no. Sorry, go for it. No, no. That's just one example. And then later on in the movie, when it feels like it just becomes a different movie all of a sudden when Amelia Perez does the, you know, the organization to try to find all these bodies, these dead people, which she ostensibly had some part in their deaths, you know. Oopsie. But it becomes, yeah, yeah, it's just like becomes. a like, oh, this is a topical thing. This is about Mexico. This is a problem. And we're highlighting

this. And that's a good thing. And that's kind of what I got from it. So I kind of wish that it was more like how you described like just a crazy, like sleazy, like more stupid movie, you know, because instead I feel like it's trying to do a little bit of both. And I didn't, I don't know, I didn't buy that. Sure. Yeah, yeah, it's fair to say that it's trying to do both. But yeah, I just, I don't take the, you know, if it's making larger statements. I don't weigh that so largely in terms of the experience because I just don't feel like that was its overall goal.

You know, I literally feel like it's, it's like the equivalency of like, someone making a horror movie and they're like, okay, what if it was like, what if it was like Nazis in snow, right? They just took, they took something that exists in reality and they were like, okay, what if this dynamic existed? What could I get out of that? And sure, it's not a horror movie. You know, there is more artistry to the presentation and filmmaking. They have like legitimate actors and performances. There's like a, you know, much more professional production. You know, it's a fucking con movie. Con film festival, not C-O-N, although some people might disagree.

Sure. There are definitely elements that do imply, that kind of feel like it belongs in the category of grand statement, very serious movies. But I do think that with it riding the line of like it being both, I think that it's just one of those situations where someone's experience with the film, you can kind of get either out of it, depending on what kind of person you are, depending on how you experience the film. Yeah, I, you know, a horror movie where they decide Nazis are the villain, they're not necessarily making statements about Nazis. And sure, there could be points in the movie where

they're, like, Nazis are bad, and that's a statement. But I just, I don't think that it was trying to be, that deep. Despite it, sure, yes, having a, let's call it, intentionally progressive attitude or overall outlook. Like it wasn't, it's a movie that wasn't like going out of its way to be like, oh, trans people suck and they're bad sort of thing. And, you know, I think that the intention of the director was just, you know, let's have, let's see, let's see, let's see what comes out of this drama. And he, you know, didn't do his best in terms of what he could have researched and the authenticity in terms of portraying different cultures and different minority groups. Undoubtedly, would it have been a better movie if he did?

Yes. But I just, you know, it's a fucking 80-year-old French guy. I'm the type of person where, you know, as somebody that belongs to different minority groups myself, I don't, I, I, I, I, I don't know. Personally, if I see someone that is confused about their hearts in the right place, I don't see that as a bad thing. I just see that as like, oh, you're old. Right? So maybe that's kind of influencing my perspective. That's just kind of how I live in my day-to-day life. Doesn't that make that lack of focus or research or dedication to the concept kind of make it feel more performative though? Like it's being labeled as trans crash, for example. Like it's

That's kind of sticking. I disagree with that. Green book comparisons are coming up too. No, those movies were much more preachy. Way more preachy. Like Crash had... I don't know. This movie...

Sorry, go ahead. Comparing Crash to Amelia Perez in terms of, like, the messaging and the preachiness. Like, Crash was only about the messaging. Like, that was the entire... That was... There was nothing else about the movie that was a goal at all. Like, like, literally the movie. was like a fucking PSA.

Whereas Amelia Perez was like, okay, let's make an anti-musical, right? Let's make something weird and wacky and we'll have unexpected unexpected plot turns and twists of things that you might not anticipate. We'll do some weird subversive shit.

Yeah. What do you mean by anti-musical? I just thought it was a musical. No, this is, you can actually look at interviews with, there's an interview of what's her name from Live DiRP? Emily Blent is

interviewing Zoe Sal Danya and Zoe Seldanya talks about how Jacques O'Diard was very explicit about it being an anti-musical he said okay you know musicals exist in one very specific way we don't want it to be like overindulgent not every single we don't want musical numbers that have like this

clicheed buildup and go into this you know, like overperformative. I'm lacking the vocabulary, but I'm hoping you get what I'm going at. And this is one of a lot of people's criticisms with the film. They'll complain like, oh, the song just starts and then it ends, right? But I kind of like that it does that.

I kind of like that it is a very weird and unique approach on musicals that characters, you know, if we were to give an example, like when the drug lord is explaining their plan, and it's literally just like a rhythmic low thumping, like, dun, thump, dump, dump, and he's kind of like whisper rapping. He's like, he's rhythmically whispering what he is saying to the character, and it might as well be dialogue, but it's kind of a song, but it's kind of not really a song. it's existing in this kind of like halfway place. I like that it did that.

I like that it's kind of like melding the narrative aspects with the musical aspects and having something that isn't explicitly one or the other. And I know that that's a criticism that a lot of people have, but I look at the film and I go like, okay, that's intentional. You know, like people complain about the whisper singing. Okay, well, in the context of the scene,

the character would be whispering. There's another whisper singing scene where it's Amelia and Zoe Saldane's character at a table. In the context of that scene, they're having a private conversation. They don't want others to hear. Of course, they're going to have their voices be more held back, right? This isn't wicked. This isn't, you know, insert Broadway musical here. The performances in how people sing and how the songs are written are intentionally not trying to be that.

and it's funny because I actually realized over the course of this controversy being a thing and people being like, what the fuck Adam? There's no good songs in this movie. I realize that most of my favorite musicals are kind of anti-musicals. Like, Dancer in the Dark is like an anti-musical in a sense. Very weird.

It has wonderful music. It has wonderful music, but very atypical, right? If you, it's not the type of music that you go like, oh yeah, if you enjoyed Wicked, you'll enjoy dancer in the dark. And especially with, you know, the pacing and structure of it and how songs appear in the film. Sure, those songs are much more fleshed out. They each, in Dancer in the Dark, each song has like a three minute plus runtime or whatever. And they feel like full songs.

But I like that in Amelia Perez, they are kind of like, most of the songs are kind of like, if a character had a thought in a scene and it was excited. expressed in some sort of musical way without needing to feel like it fits in the mold of like, okay, here's verse chorus, verse chorus, bridge chorus, right? Not every song needs to have that. I like that it's just kind of like a thought of a song. And then it never appears again. I like that that's something that I find kind of cool in terms of like its approach. And I understand that's not for everybody. I understand that, you know, especially after seeing a lot of, the criticisms of

Amelia Perez. I've watched a lot of people's videos. People talk about it in the language of the expectations of musicals that they've seen. They're talking about it in terms of like, here's the I want song and here's the right, this isn't like other

musicals and it's not trying to be like other musicals. It's trying to be weird and different. And I've got a lot more to say about the choices that they made in terms of like how they recorded this as well, but I could go on forever.

So, uh, what you're saying, it's kind of read to me as more as like half baked. Because it's not really giving you anything of what you want for this story to connect. Yeah, I would, as Jake said, I'd want this to be more campy,

more over the top and insane and maybe the story would work. And you wouldn't be thinking about, wait, this is a cartel mob boss and they're starting this fun so they can go and find the bodies of the people that they're responsible for killing. And it's like, that's just so dark and so heavy. then juxtaposed against these goofy songs.

It just the tone doesn't work for me. It does feel half-baked, and it doesn't feel like it's fleshed out. I don't care about these characters. I feel like I'm not really learning anything through these songs. And I do kind of feel like it was, as a song was starting to develop and going to a place where I feel like, oh, this is like going somewhere,

then it would stop and just move on to the next thing. And this is like a two-hour, 15-long-minute film. Like an hour in, I'm like, oh, my God, I paused it and looked at the time code. It is plodding. Like the way it moves is so just random it feels. And like the focus on these characters and what it's trying to say in totality, it really just feels like a huge swing and a miss.

Like I appreciate this and it's not a hack director. It isn't. This director has made plenty of great films before, especially love sisters brothers. But yeah, this was just a huge mess as far as that approach. And I just don't think it comes across that way without like reading more about it. is like we do have a film going up against this one in this award season that is a heightened reality

directed by a French director, you know, set in a country that they're not from, with the substance. But I feel like that world, it sells it. It sells the absurdism and it creates this new world. And it's never distracting because of that. And that's more the kind of tone I'd be looking for for something like this to work for me. Because otherwise it kind of just feels cheesy and inauthentic. And like, why did you even include these elements you knew were probably going to be controversial? like he says in the interviewer

with CNN but the film was an opera and therefore not realistic adding if there are things that seem shocking in Amelia Perez then I am sorry cinema doesn't provide answers it only asks questions but maybe the questions in Amelia Perez

are incorrect which to me is kind of like an admittance like oops maybe I went a bit too far in a few places I don't know I like because you know a lot of things that people are saying are kind of his like

defenses so they almost seem like people are interpreting them as like post hoc rationalizations. The way he describes his intentions, to me, I felt that on my first watch before like anybody else was talking about it. I'm like, oh, okay, you are going for like a weird different thing that is, you know, campy and not meant to be taken like as like a literal interpretation of Mexico. Like if you watch my original review of it that I posted well before any other controversy and no point do I say like, oh yeah, what an authentic representation of Mexico or any of the minority groups. Like, I don't praise it for those things at all because I just, I didn't feel that from the movie.

Like, just literally experiencing the movie by myself, no external expectations or reviews or anything telling me how I'm supposed to feel or any criticisms or anything. That's just what I felt. And it lines up with how the director is explaining his intentions behind. the film really. So it is interesting just having these completely different experiences on the same piece of media but

you know it happens with plenty of movies it's just not that serious with most movies you know Jake you love Megalopolis right so like nobody nobody's harassing anybody over that one right now now they will no they still won't well

I think like I think a big part of it is because nobody would give a fuck about this movie if Netflix hadn't put their entire weight behind it in award season. You know, the reason why it has so many nominations, et cetera, is because they've been pushing this movie like crazy until very recently for obvious reasons. But this was like their awards movie. They're one awards movie for the season. And I think that then it hit the mainstream. And now we have like channels that would never be talking about this movie talking about it. Like it's the new

you know, the new megalopolis. The new Last Jedi. It doesn't, yeah, it doesn't help anything. It's just like the discourse is fucking horrible. Yes. And obnoxious. And to have any kind of like nuanced discussion about this is kind of impossible at this point because it's become just a meme.

So I'm happy that we're talking about it in this way. And actually, Adam, I thought like your comments about Jacques O'Diard and what he's talking about it as like an anti-musical. That is interesting, and I really respect that idea, and I would, and I love Dancer in the Dark. I think that's a great movie, but I feel like Dancer in the Dark coheres from beginning to end. Like, I never feel like, I know, it's not really a fair comparison because that's a masterpiece. But I feel like that movie coheres from beginning to end, and the musical sequences never feel unnecessary or jarring. And just from a creative perspective, like the smaller choices that are made in each musical sequence, I found it very uninteresting.

Like there's a musical sequence with Selena Gomez, who's just kind of like rolling around in bed and filming herself with her phone camera. And to me, it's like, okay, I've seen that in like the Mean Girls musical, you know, just like, okay, how do we film this? Maybe they're filming themselves, you know? Like these choices were just kind of boring. And I think that's something that also was surprising to me when watching this was that because of the pacing, because of how each scene moves into the next one, I was getting very bored of going, okay, I get where we're kind of heading with this. Like, let's move it along or see some kind of complications with the story. I didn't like these characters. Like I didn't understand them.

Zoe Saldanya's character, I was like, okay, I get it. You want money. You want success. But after that point, like, do you really care about Amelia Perez? Like this person who basically kidnapped you and attacked you and forced you to do this? Like, even though, you know, she's a trans character and changed, but it's still the same person, you know? It just felt like, I don't understand you. Like, what is your goal in this now?

And then at the end of the film, well, are we talking spoilers? Yeah, we can talk spoilers, yeah, for sure. Yeah, let's go spoilers. But, I mean, at the end of the film, when she hires a bunch of guys with guns to go after and rescue Amelia Perez, I'm like, what is this for? Like, are you guys really that close? Like, I just didn't understand the relationship dynamics. And then, yeah, the musical sequences. There are a couple that, I think every musical sequence, I just didn't really get what the purpose of it in the end was.

Like, the famous one that everyone talks about is being the really good one. For Zoe Saldaño's character. El Mal. El Mal. Yeah. I'm not fan of that. I just didn't really... Plus the Ascanan one, right?

Yeah. Yeah. The two Ascaranom ones were like my least favorite. Well, yeah. And to me that one felt like, because I had seen clips of it and I was like, okay, this doesn't look too bad. Maybe in context of the movie. It works.

But in the movie, it feels like all of a sudden, okay, we're talking about all of these rich, corrupt, you know, billionaires in Mexico and how they're overlooking, you know, this subject of the, you know, the cartes. Hell deaths. Meanwhile, Amelia Perez's person responsible for so much of the carnage is it just feels like there's something off with how the movie is viewing the subject because that whole sequence felt like a preachy, like, cringy thing of like, wow, we're calling out all these powerful people and it's contemporary and this is thoughtful and we're speaking to real problems in Mexico. And that's part of, you know, why I can't buy the narrative of, oh, well, it's a fantasy.

It's the stuff. When it feels to me so clearly in the movie, it's trying to be very literal and discuss real everyday problems in Mexico. I think that it is riding the line. I think, like for me, I can say that it like, it can be both sort of thing. and it's just like whether or not you're focusing on one or whether or not you feel one particular way more can influence your experience. Yeah, it feels like it's being more used

in a provocative way. Yes. Like a genuine, I want to tell this authentic story based in these cultures I'm not fully involved in or attached to, which I think is part of why it reads the way it does, though. because I think Jake is right that to me this is just not an awards film and that's part of where this drama comes from like it's got a historic amount of Oscar norms coming up and then when you look at like what the 2014 survey said the average academy voter is 63 years old 94% white and 75% men are these really the people that are like breaking down and seeing the subversive nature of this film and like that's why it's being lauded to such a degree I don't know I think it is frustrating when there are films like TV glow which I felt I didn't love completely, but the way it communicated the trans experience was like quite

impressive and especially that third act was really emotionally effective, I felt. And there's no real talk about that movie and all of this drama being attached to this trans character feels unfortunate and the way it's gone down. It's funny. It's a historic event. I don't know. It's like a historic event, right? It's like the first trans woman up for a big award. And it's a shame that has to be attached to this drama when I feel like if it something like TV glow was up there, there just wouldn't be the same controversy, you know? I feel like if TV glow was up there, it would be controversy, but it would be mostly like from the right wing, I guess. Yeah, in which case, yeah, who cares?

There would definitely, there would definitely be, there would definitely be controversy for TV glow appearing at the Oscars. Yeah, but there's controversy and then there's like the tweets and the interview and like Netflix like not funding her trips around for certain award shows. Yeah. Just everything. All that baggage that is now attached to this film. Yeah. I cannot speak to what the academy voters got out of the film or their motivations for

giving it 13 noms. But I mean like in terms of, I don't know, it generally, this is not an unusual thing. Generally, there's movies every year at the office. Oscars where, you know, if it's nominated for a big award and they decide, oh, we're going to give it a best picture, they're going to just toss on a bunch of other noms whether it deserves them or not, right? Like, there's plenty of examples of this. There's examples of other movies within the same year that are just kind of being handed

nombs because it's nominated in the larger categories. You know, I'll agree if we were to call one aspect of the film kind of like half-baked, I would say like the script. right, the characters I'm not like in love with. I'm not, you know, super relating to them. But in terms of like individual scenes and the intent of the emotion behind individual scenes, even though I don't love Amelia Perez as a character, even though, you know, like I, I'm not like in love with her story or invested in her narrative and like whether or not she gets her kids back, you know, still watching the scene where she's like in bed with her. child and the child is like doing this

more whisper singing about how they miss their father I do feel something from that scene within the bubble of that scene I feel almost like you know it's almost like I could experience it as like a collection of short films

I like I think that what helps that for me is that the music in terms of the way that it's written like the chord progression, the melody, and also the like fullness of the sound in many of these songs. It's not quite like an orchestra, but they use a lot of like different varied instruments and tones and sounds. Like even in the opening number,

it'll go straight from like this, you know, kind of large choreography with people like swinging around chairs in the back, background and then like in the single shot move into just a sitting down position and then you get like the soft piano and then it's like oh wow this song like really transformed and I'm into those moments because I like the music and I like the way that the music is composed. That being said, you know, there are moments in the film. Some singers are not great. the doctor at the beginning of the lady his voice is not great

but but as a person that like I don't know all of my favorite bands and artists are like people with very distinct and imperfect voices and like I can go back to early fucking Connor Ober shit that he wrote when he was 15 and it sounds like shit but as a person that has like, you know, a lot of experience with music and composition and, you know, I live and breathe music every point in my life.

That doesn't mean I'm correct, by the way. I'm just saying my experience. I'm able to view, like, songs or listen to songs that Connor Oberst wrote when he was 15 that are recorded terribly. The lyrics are just fucking juvenile, but I'm still able to get something out of them. just kind of feeling the intended emotion and in my brain going like, okay, yeah, I would change that part. I would change that part. But I still, I get the completed picture of it, even if it's, let's say, in presentation, like a jigsaw puzzle with 75% of the pieces there,

my brain's able to fill in the rest and go like, okay, these are these imperfections here. This is what doesn't work about it. But I still get what you're going for. And even with those imperfections, I still see your vision. I still see the intent. And that's how I felt about, you know, a good chunk of the songs in this film is that, you know, the dude sucks at singing at the beginning of that song, Lady. But, you know, Zoe Saldane's character comes in with her vocal performance and the musicality of that, the chord progression and melody. I think that it's a catchy song.

You know, it's something that kind of gets stuck in my. head. I ignore when I'm looping it in my head. I ignore the first part with the doctor singing and I'm stuck with the ideal parts of the song in my head. But yeah, there's so much that I love in terms of like what they went for and what they tried to do even if in execution, not all of it came together. It is an very imperfect film with a lot of flaws, very rough around the edges. But there's plenty of films that I love like that. There's plenty of directors and autos and provocateurs even. Many have called Jacques O'Diard that. I love going through old Lars von Trier films. I love going through like Harmony Carine films that like, you know,

you could just as easily call them bad or good. Like what what the hell was agro drift? I don't know, right? And like even if you look at the intent behind it, does it work? Even if you were to say it's supposed to be bad, does it work? No, maybe to many people. It really depends on what your experience with the film was. And so, yeah, like, in that sense, there's a lot of my experience with this film, kind of just appreciating what it's going for in any given scene, not necessarily, like, the full picture of how it was executed.

I am curious how would you view and justify the penis to vagina scene? It's hilarious. It's hilarious. It's funny. If every song was like that song, I would like this film. If every song was like that, I'd be into it, honestly. It was like 90 minutes and every song was like that energy and that kind of goofiness. It's funny.

It's like so over the top, then it would work. But just that scene contrasted against the rest of the rest of the. The movie is just so, so absurd. Yeah, I guess it just feels very out of place. Yeah, I've heard people say that. And, you know, it is a unique song compared to the other songs in the film in the sense that, like, okay, this one's clearly the most intentionally comedic. It's clearly, like, taken the piss, you know, throughout the song, all of the backup singers and extras within the entire sequence are giving like a shit-eating grin, staring at the camera. saying vaginoplasty you know they got like the the doctor with like a very silly

a voice in the way he sings the the cadence of it is also just intentionally comedic so I don't know I find that track funny I get what I was supposed to out of it I believe I yeah there's an absurdist nature to it that it's it's also catchy it's also an earworm I know a lot of people hate it. How do you feel about, how do you feel about the ending? Because I, I've kind of found the ending unintentionally funny. And I feel like it was going for like high melodrama, emotional. Like, it just seemed so abrupt and bizarre to me. Yeah. Unsatisfying. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, like, I'll bring back what I said earlier is like things can be both, right? So I look at that scene. I don't take it completely seriously. I'm not like glued to it and being like, oh, she died in a car. I'm going

like, oh, that's silly, right? But it's also, you know, even with my experience being like, oh, that's kind of silly in terms of like the sequence of events, I do like the shot of the, like how the wide shot of the car kind of gets like digitally blended into this like slow zoom that that finalizes in the close shot of the car headlights. And they were using the darkness of the environment to help stitch together those two different shots into one that made for a really cool seamless effect. So yeah, even within a scene where I'm like, that's kind of dumb and funny, at least, you know, it's both stimulating from a, you know, it's weird that it happened narrative sense, but also

stimulating from an, oh, there's some cool shots in here sense. And, you know, I like the presentation, the technical presentation in many of us. aspects. I haven't yet talked about the sound design in this film. And it's something that I absolutely love. It's very unique and very intentional. And so if any nom is deserved for this film, like, sure, Zoe Saldane's performance, I think she did great. But the sound design nom is one that I think is very well deserved. Now, some people, I think most people, have a very difficult time when it comes to analyzing or interpreting sound. I think a lot of people view it in like a very reductive or very surface level way, including the academy, by the way, which is why they had to merge

sound mixing and sound editing into one category is because literally they didn't know the difference. And so the same movie wound up winning both every year and people were just like, I don't know, it sounds good. You look at the nominations. It's like, okay, does a complete unknown deserve a sound nom. You can try to psychoanalyze the Academy voters and be like, okay, this one had music at it. There's sound in this movie. That's probably why Amelia Perez has a sound nom based on the Academy voters. But what I love about this film is that unlike other musicals, and that's what I was going over to check before the podcast started, I was going through some other musicals just to reaffirm my experience and memory of those other musicals.

This one is particularly unique in terms of how it creates a 3D soundscape and space. And you can see this and hear this from the opening track in the song, every single number in this song, if we want to call them that. But particularly when characters are moving across the screen or even when they're head is turning. So a musical like Wicked, basically, um, most musicals, uh, they'll record a track in a booth, um, and essentially just lip sync over the track, uh, and, you know, through us being conditioned to the experience of a musical, most people don't really see anything wrong with that in terms of like, oh, it's just as if they're lip-syncing over a song sort of thing. In this film,

you know, regardless of where the audio was recorded, the way that it's edited and the way that it was overall presented has such a keen attention to detail in terms of how the sound moves within an environment. So if you were to watch a scene like the opening scene or, you know, the one with Celina Gomez and like the most obvious examples are like, okay, she's singing into the pillow or like the when it's through the iPhone, you can hear that the audio sounds like crackly or whatever. Those are the most obvious examples. But what I love are the subtle examples in terms of like if you're wearing headphones or watching it with surround sound or in a good theater or with a good sound setup. The way that characters move throughout the environment, if you close

your eyes, you can still hear that they're moving through the environment as they're singing. And so also, you know, like certain backup vocalists will get louder when they're in the frame and quieter when they exit the frame. When a character's head is turning, that is something that is reflected in the sound design of the film. So it's not just a visual like, oh, the character's head is turning. You can hear the way that they sound when they sing that their head is turning. and which direction their head is turning. So I compare this to Wicked. I literally just opened up the film right before we started.

So in Wicked they have basically they'll add sound effects of a character's head turning. So you'll hear the like whoosh or whatever, like if they're making like a really exaggerative movement. But you don't hear it in their voice. You can maybe hear it a bit in their performance. Like maybe they'll make almost kind of like a grunting sound. But you don't hear it in the sound. scape. You don't hear it in the 3D space. And that's something that this film did super, super well. I would suggest anybody who is trying to like, you know, if this sounds like new information to

anybody listening to this, listen to, there's like the scene where Zoe Saldania kind of like runs into the door and there's like, I think, some cleaning ladies that are in the other room. Like listen listen to how it sounds as she's entering that room and how the audio changes based on the shape of the room. Like the way that the audio is heard is also dependent on like the room size they're in. Like that's something that they took into consideration, which I find really cool. Another great example is like within the scene with what's the most famous person's again whose name I already said screaming into a pillow oh goodness selina gomez

selina go yeah during that scene you know not only can you hear it like with her like head turning and which way she's facing in the room but as it goes into it kind of transitions into like this dance area right and she comes in from the left frame the left side of the frame and the audio space you can hear her voice not only coming through on the left side of the frame, but in the way that they edited it, you can tell that she's facing away just from hearing it. And then as she's doing the dance moves,

her head is like, you know, turning and spinning. That is all reflected within the sound design. I find that super cool. It's something that like, nobody fucking does. You know, and we've seen examples of like some films that have tried to do those things. Like, a great example

is Fantastic Mr. Fox by Wes Anderson. Um, they had the voice actors literally like, running around like in a field for scenes where the characters are running around in a field. They had George Clooney like crouching over and like it's as if you're getting the real life like boom mic recording with animation. I find that super cool. I don't know exactly what they did to achieve the the soundscape of this film. Like I didn't, you know, I haven't looked extensively at the behind the scenes. But it is like a very,

detailed effort that you can hear. And I absolutely love it. That's something that I think is super deserved as the sound numb. And not many people have the ear for that. I know. Like, it's something that, like, it just feels like nobody has the perception for. But hopefully now that I've mentioned that, if anybody wants to revisit any of these scenes, they can go like, oh, okay, wow, that is like an interesting technical consideration that I

didn't consider. Because if I say the sounds good, people are going to say like, oh, what, you like penis to vagina, which is like a very, like, it's a very surface level concept of what sound is and how editing works and like the different people's jobs in terms of creating sound in a film and, you know, the technical aspects to it, just how much effort goes into it. So yeah. So the, the sound on that kind of level never stood out to me, because, what it was in service of for the most part. And I was actually more distracted by some of the sound, particularly through Amelia Perez's singing herself, actually. There was some kind of auto tuning going on, or I found an article about like the AI cloning used in order for her

to reach registers that she couldn't reach. That really stood out to me. So I just, I wasn't caring about the characters. I wasn't caring about the music. I wasn't caring about the soundscape because I just wasn't caring about the framing of this and the way it was being shown to me. So how do you feel about that that AI usage? I feel like it's almost the complete inverse of our conversation around the Brutalist where I feel like that was so necessary for that film and doesn't really take anything away. Whereas this, it just makes me scratch my head and think like, well, so you don't really care about the trans experience. You have to like use AI to even make this anti-musical come together. So like, what are we doing here?

I... This is just such a strange film for me from that perspective. I don't know if it really is that different from the brutalist conversation, because when we're talking about the AI usage for audio here, we might as well just be saying auto tune, which is something that every single musical uses. You can hear it very egregiously in Wicked when Jeff Goldblum is singing, by the way. You know, it sounds equally bad like in that film and this to me. Yeah.

This is my point. Exactly. Yeah. Like, it's imperfect. it is not I'm not going to say like all of the singing sounds great I think that there's a lot of criticism to be made with the singing and vocal performances but a lot of it does work for me a lot of it does work and again

it's someone that you know I can watch this movie and you know stitch together the 70% of whatever or whatever of the end product and be like, okay, here's what it was trying to go for and I still like it. Yeah, the AI usage in terms of the vocal performance for that character,

it's just, oh, they wrote a song, they wanted the register to be higher than she was able to perform. It's not, you know, in terms of audio editing music, it's not like an egregious or even unusual thing, right? it's just a new word that people are scared of. It's not unusual, but it definitely stood out to me as like a distracting thing in those scenes where I don't like this.

I don't understand why they're doing this. I wouldn't say that that's like present throughout though. You know, I would say that that's noticeable at moments, in moments. Not every song is with certain like notes, certain vocal registers, as we said. But there were some moments that really stood out for me with that in particular. I mean, I think I'm with you on an Alex like I like you describing it out Adam is like really interesting. Oh, I didn't even know they did that like that's you know a level of detail I wasn't even aware of and probably would would never look into. Yeah, I mean just wear headphones but I

skim through some scenes. It's really interesting. Right. But like I can't subject myself to those scenes. I can't watch it. You know, it's like it's like it's like you're saying Alex like I don't like the story I can't relate to these characters and now that I have to relate to these characters, but just nothing fundamentally works on like a script level. So everything below that, I just like that. All right. Like that's cool that they did that. But yeah, what is it in service of? I tell you really say. I'm glad you said that because I say that to many films. There's so many films where it's like there's something, you know, like all not vibe with it. And then people go like, oh, but what about this technical element or this thematic element?

It's like, yeah, but if I'm not vibing with it, you know, what is there for me to get out of it? Like, I'm not going to want to re-explore it for that. If it's a movie that, you know, gets better on the second watch in terms of like what it's saying thematically or, you know, some of the technical elements. Like, yeah, I completely agree with you. If you're not feeling it, there's no reason to want to check that out. and, you know, in terms of appreciating something, it can just end at like, oh, that's a, that's a nice thing that they did, but, you know, the overall experience of the movie doesn't work. So, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's, I mean, I don't know. It's, it's so subjective.

No. These, these little, yeah. There's one correct opinion to have on this movie. Your credibility is destroyed. Yeah, yeah. And I think, you know, that maybe we're all, wrong in different ways. I mean, Adam, I think you're most wrong, but that's my opinion. Yeah, I don't know. It's really weird and unfortunate that this movie has become the lightning rod that

it has. I don't think it's the worst movie ever made, but it is definitely unpleasant for my eyes and ears. Nice. Shout out to Salina Gomez's line. My pussy hurts thinking of you. That was my

nice. Nice. And I guess I'll just address this. So apparently there's some people are saying that the singing in Wicked was recorded live. Like all of the singing was recorded live. I don't know how true that is. I would have to look into it. But either way, in terms of like how it shows in the film, there is something, there's something. There's something. There's something. There's some. something very extra with how they presented the sound design in Amelia Perez, especially with, you know, the singing and the space of the sound. That doesn't reflect much in Wicked. So it's kind of interesting. Like, if that was all recorded, literally every single line is like Dogma 95. I don't know if I believe that.

it might just be the only the only reason the only reason I would think Wicked did record all their audio in person was because of Michelle Yo's performance because why would they do that to her I don't know well here's the thing is like it might just I'll look into it more but it might be one of those things where it's like oh they actually sang it live but it's not necessarily like

oh they used the exact take of you know or there might have been some sweetening there might have been some like other recordings like you know who knows like they you can still be singing on set and that not necessarily be the audio that is in the final film like you know if you look if you just look at the scene where Jeff Goldblum is singing there's like a a close shot that cuts to a wide shot and you can you can oh it's it's such a it's such a messy edit with how they um uh basically the intent of the edit is like, okay, he's close to the camera and then we're going to have him lower in the mix

because he's further away from the camera. But you can like literally hear the like messy crossfade as that's happening. It's like a really jarring, just unprofessional sounding edit. So yeah, I'll have to look into exactly what the marketing claims are from Wicked. But yeah, in terms of, I don't know, the experience and how it's presented, I feel like Amelia Perez did really, really interesting and unique things with the sound design that I really like. Well, Amelia Perez has been vanquished from awards season. It is now Wicked Sweep.

We are ready for Wicked Sweep, every single category. Get ready. Yeah. I still think so done is probably going to win. I mean, she's the favorite. Yeah, probably. Yeah I would not be surprised by that

Yeah Who else would it be I don't even know Who else is in the conversation At the moment Felicity Jones Yeah Felicity Jones

Did you ever watch hard truths Yeah Yeah no nom for Marion Jean Baptiste Or whatever Oh that's the Mike Lee movie No I wanted to see that I love Mike Lee

Yeah Okay cool No matter how long we talk about this film There's gonna be people mad in saying that I represented something inaccurately. I don't know. Our comments saying the discourse is toxic, people will go, no. There's people talking about it rationally.

It's like, okay, well, you don't understand how they're being drowned out, and you're dishonest and you're gaslighting. Stop gaslighting. I just want to reiterate. I know we had a great conversation about this, but I want to communicate directly to our audience and say that, Adam was talking over me the whole time and disrespecting me, and he did not let me get any single point across the end.

Yeah. You're both scared to disagree with me is one that people say like. And people are scared to disagree with me. I won't let people disagree with me because I have strong opinions. The group chat is a nightmare. I had no idea coming into this podcast, but it's like, oh my God. Here's one more tiny thing. about my relationship with music that I think is kind of relevant.

If you look at, so there's, I've got like a playlist called bangers on Spotify that some people have discovered. And you should play it on shuffle. There's like a lot of songs that I'm just like kind of into in the moment. Sometimes I'll remove things. Sometimes I'll add things. There's a huge variety of like different tones and genres.

But some of the artists on there are speaking foreign. languages that I don't understand. So Stupéflip is a French rap group. Maximum the hormone Japanese band. One of the tracks from the soundtrack to Houssu is a Japanese band that I don't know what they're singing, but I listen to the music. I listen to the music and I'm still able to jam with it. I'm still able to vibe with it. I'm still able to sing along with it without it necessary, Without it even needing to have like a literal interpretation of like what are they going for? You know, music is something that you can feel. And in that sense, like, sure, are there issues with the script?

Yes. Sure. Are there issues with what the song is communicating or like does it make sense logically or is there a reason for this character to be saying this and how does this represent this? all those issues exist, but I can enjoy music independently of that. I can enjoy things with like weird, messy lyrics that don't make any sense. I can enjoy things with lyrics that I don't understand

because I don't speak the language. And that's just my relationship with music. So, yeah. And it's wrong. It's a wrong thing to experience. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Incorrect.

Yeah. It's funny. It's, I just think it's crazy. that people take something so seriously. Like we can have interesting conversations and hash things out

in a way where I don't know, my goal when I have conversations with other people that have a different perspective than me is not to win an argument. It's to understand the other person, right?

I think that people forget that that's something that some people are interested in or that you can be interested in. You know? Like... They want to see us beat you down so you change your opinion and apologize for liking something that the mob doesn't

like yeah and that's part of it is like so much of the conversation around it is like how many of you have actually seen this film because like if you've seen it then I respect your opinion but like how much of this is just like cultural slash just fiery online it's the it's the new thing right now it's not going to stop until the Oscars happen yeah like it just feels like the current thing to be mad about that's what I don't get about movie discourse in general like I don't know why it is about movies that maybe because it's so accessible for people that everybody watches opinion but everyone watches movies but it's like it is people get so so angry when you disagree with them on movies or you have a bad movie take or they have this idea about who

you are because of it um i think it has something to do with uh how powerless people feel in general in the world and we don't have much say over our political institutions so hey you know what we can do is yell at people for having the wrong movie take you know, just one of those things. And sometimes people can't separate like an emotional experience or they take it as a personal attack if they had a strong emotional, positive experience with something,

then they hear a bad review or vice versa. Yeah. And just, yeah, disconnecting those two things can be tough for some. Yeah, if you dislike the Mario movie, you're attacking someone's identity because they've built their identity around the brand. They're the Mario movie.

So you're attacking them. I'm Mario. I am the Mario. Mario movie. So yeah, ratings. Alex, what, you give it a four out of ten? Yeah, I just finished by saying, yeah, had a completely flat emotional experience.

There were a couple of things I actually did like. I did like the penis to a vagina, yes, yes, yes song. I thought that was hilarious. The like mumble song was also kind of interesting to me, and I wish there was kind of more on that level, or the songs would develop more. There was some, like, frenetic kind of fun camera work and some great shots here and there, some good lighting.

But yeah, just as a whole, the, especially that whole ending, the conclusion, I don't really understand what it's saying. The titular character has like this silly conclusion that doesn't even matter. And I'm just left thinking, like, why do we even focus on this? Why do we include these elements if we didn't really care about it outside of just the lightning rod that it is? Yeah. Also, one more thing, I want to shout out the parody short film that's been going around made by trans-Mexican. Yeah, yeah, it's really funny. They're all like doing the inverse like caricatures with the,

they're all dressed up in like sailor shirts with mustaches and baguettes and doing their own kind of clap back, which I thought was really funny. That's on YouTube. Yeah. Yeah. Four star out of ten for me. Yeah, I'm going two stars. Two stars.

At a ten? Yeah. Harsh. Yeah, well, you know, sometimes you got to, sometimes you just got to go out there and say, No, no, no, no. And I'm not trying to. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, people were so mean to my beloved Megalopolis, so no holds barred here. I just, I did not like this movie. Yeah. Yeah, I watched it twice. Yeah, I'm comfy with a seven. And perhaps on a third watch, I'll change it to a six. I don't know. Who knows?

So you did rewatch it for this discussion in your Oscar video? assume. Yeah. Yeah. And I got, you know, more or less the same experience is when I watched it in a theater with some things kind of like reaffirmed, I guess. Like, you know, there's a section in the, I don't know, 70% through the movie that I found like slow and uninteresting. And it's like, I don't know, 10 or 15 minutes long that I'm like, okay, I could do without this. I don't care about this. And that, you know, second watch reaffirmed that I felt that way and that I wasn't just tired after seeing like five movies in a day at a festival. Yeah, so we'll see how I feel on a third watch.

I'll probably watch it a third time at some point. Like there's there's things that I like about this movie. There's things that I get from the experience. And damn, you know, is a guy that every one of my controversies seems to be that I don't like a movie. Now I'm getting like a positive experience out of something people hating me for it. I can't fucking win, whatever. you should be happy that I got something out of it that you didn't right I support you I support you

Adam we stand behind you yes your seven out of 10 will be respected yeah it's okay it's okay to like something that's imperfect it's okay to like something that's flawed it's okay to like something that's offensive right there's nothing wrong with that exactly it's okay that you support Carla Sophia Gascon and all of her opinions are Twitter. That's totally fine. You know, I would have given it a five, but her tweets raised it up to a seven. All right. Nice, plans it.

Good to know. Yeah. Full support. All right, it's a time for a recommendation from Jake. Yeah. Take it away. All right, today we are discussing David Lynch's 19. 1997 film Lost Highway.

I chose this because you guys haven't seen it. And it's been a while since I've seen it. This is probably my third or fourth time watching it. I have an interesting relationship to this film. And it's certainly, even in his filmography, it stands apart a little bit. I think it was critically reviled for. for the most part when it came out. I know famously it had that like advertising poster

that was two thumbs down from Siskel and Ebert. I am really curious. Wait, wait, let me guess first. I want to guess your guys' ratings. I think, I think Adam, this is stupid. I shouldn't even be doing this. All right. Adam, your rating is going to be five Adam.

a 10. Alex, you're going to give it a seven. Interesting. We'll see. We'll see. All right. I'm just excited to hear because I myself have had like a changing relationship to this film. Did you hate it and love it? I was very confused. When I first saw it in high school, this was way before. I think it kind of has, its reputation has gotten a lot better. but at the time I was like, okay, I don't know, that's definitely not blue velvet.

It's very dark and confusing and kind of a horror film. And then over the years, I've seen it in a different light. I feel like this viewing experience definitely opened it up a lot more to me, just because of life experience. I haven't killed anybody, but, you know, I feel like I relate differently to what's going on screen, especially as it relates to the noir genre. I've read a lot of noir fiction, and I love, you know, classic noir film. So go ahead, guys. What did you think? Take it away, Alex. This was crazy. Yeah, because it takes me back to early on in the podcast

where World at Heart was recommended, and I just didn't connect with that movie. It really hasn't stuck with me. I didn't like the vibe it was going for. All I really remember is that shot. that it's that really good cut of on the bed, the feet close up. That was cool. But over the years, I've kind of indulged more in Lynch. And I love him as a person. I think he's such a character. I love watching interviews with him. And of course, it's all in the, it's in my algorithm at the moment with the sad news. I've been passing somebody recently as to recording this. I just love his approach to creativity and how unfettered and especially what I've grown to appreciate about him is how he's able to capture a dreamlike surreal atmosphere.

A lot of the best directors are able to do this, be it like a Gilliam, Bergman, Jorowski or whoever. But there's something about the way he presents his dreamlike narratives that are so like confidently weird and don't fall into that trap, a lot of films that are experimental or trying to go against the grain for me that just I can't emotionally connect with or don't. feel anything I feel like especially with this one Los Highway or a Mulholland Drive as well the way it's able to balance this fear against this

comedy with the violence and how unpredictable that is and just completely against all these like rules you've come to expect from more like formulaic cinema and just like keep it entertaining for a film as long as this man I think I thought this was great actually and quite a companion piece too, Mulholland Drive, I felt, um, felt like he was working out that style of filmmaking and where he wanted to take it and just this nonlinear kind of narrative and these dual perspectives and just like a lot of the plot making no sense, but it's still kind of emotionally working and feeling relatable from this kind of everyone understands dreams and there is something absurdist and understandable about it even though when it comes down to. So what's the plot of lost.

highway it's a bit like uh yeah you know um yeah like start there's a guy there's like you ever have a headache yeah yeah no yeah so i i really like the experience of this one mm-hmm cool uh i thought it was pronounced mohallaan doctor i'm just kidding oh shit um what the fuck you know i think mullahan drive is my favorite lynch film and I haven't seen it in so long but I currently have it as a seven I feel like if it's I feel like if I revisited it

uh you know in current current version of me um it might like bump up to an eight so I would like to see that again also blue velvet blue velvet I will be seeing on Friday because that won the

the Patreon watchalong poll for my YMS Patreon Patreon, obviously, because Lynch passed away. So doing some Lynch stuff this month. In terms of Last Highway, I had very mixed feelings

throughout different parts of the film because it goes in a lot of different places. I found myself not really into the opening section. So I felt like I was getting much more out of it. as soon as a pole man disappeared for a while.

And it started doing it. Yeah, yeah. I would like, I don't know. There's something. So when David Lynch is, David Lynch has a director. He's very strong on tone and vibe. And there's a lot of people that connect with that particular tone and vibe.

And sure, this one does stand out in a weird way in his filmography for sure. Um, but I'm just like, I found myself more observing that first section than I was like experiencing it. Um, I was reminded of other movies that I like more, you know,

movies that came after even, I'm not even saying that ripped them off like, Cache. I'm like, damn, I wish I was just going to say Cache. Yeah, I wish I was watching Cache. It's one of the first things are going to have done. Um, and yeah, like,

it's interesting in the sense that like okay everybody's like talking to each other really awkwardly and speaking quietly sometimes glad I have subtitles the sound design in Lynch films is always very intentful and very much his vibe and on brand but also like undeniably cheesy for me a lot of the sound effects and how they're used is like a very there's like an overwhelmingly cheesy sound. That being said, that being said, I did connect with this film. Um, and it is something that I would watch again, um, despite it being an experience where, I don't know. Like I, I found myself enjoying it in more of like kind of a popcorny way, um, than a, like, serious like, ooh, what's the mystery, what's going to happen, you know, investment

kind of way. There were quite a few scenes in this film that were like laugh out loud funny to me. Just very absurd moments and silly scenarios that... I agree. Yeah. But I like it for that.

Yeah. I was kind of actually with you with your experience for the first, the very first section of the movie up until the mystery man shows up with that phone scene. I love that scene. That was like, as soon as it kind of plays its hand with like how surreal it's going to get

And I guess if you didn't get that emotional experience of the fear and Mulholland Drive does similar things. It would just be the scariest scene you've ever experienced just like just randomly in a way you couldn't predict. And yeah, I really felt like the tingle down my spine and it was working for me from that angle. And yeah, it does shift kind of in the second half to almost a completely different vibe entirely and then comes back round on itself in a quite a satisfying unique way. But I was, I never found myself kind of at an arm's length with it, even though I was seeing how some of these performances are kind of stiff and cold. But it just feels like a dream to me and I really value it for that. Like it feels like being in a dream and just a filmmaker able to convert like that, that something that you can't even verbalize into an experience you can watch and then like feel the emotions of. I really love that about his best films.

Yeah, well, I'm glad you guys, like, connected with it on some level, you know. I think that I'm surprised Adam that you liked the comedy because there are funny parts in this for sure, but it also feels like it has the least amount of, like, corny, goofy comedy that you'll see in his other movies. this movie to me is like a pure nightmare. Like it is, every time I watch it, I just, I feel the sense of dread and kind of panic. And I think the movie is really trying to instill that. And I feel like it is a very serious movie about like sexual violence and jealousy. Like that's my takeaway from what it is.

And it's bent through the lens of noir cliche and fantasy. And that's something that he's dealt with in a lot of his films, but never so, never so seriously and never with such like fear and terror. I mean, it is a noir film cranked up to pure horror and some parts. And I think I agree with you, Alex, that like when it became the. Baltha Zardetti scenes, you know, once Bill Pullman transforms, it's a way less punishing movie. But that opening, that first 45 minutes are really unpleasant. And yeah, you know, the relationship, you know, trying to intuit what's going on, the videotapes, but it is just such a like suffocating environment being in that house with those two people.

that sex scene between them is just like really unpleasant and watching the jealousy kind of build and build it's very it's some of the darkest like stuff that he's done I have not seen Twin Peaks firewall with me I know that has a reputation for darkness but you know I think a big part of what Lynch was exploring in this film or what he said he's explored is how does someone commit a murder and then how does their brain process that and try to move on with their lives. And I guess he was obsessed with the O.J. Simpson trial around this time. And that plays into this movie perfectly. And you can see kind of what themes he's exploring. You know, that the whole movie is about, um, this this transformation how the brain tries to

comprehend what it's done or what it's capable of and kind of goes into fantasy mode and that whole Balthazar Getty Patricia Arquette you know Mr. Eddie Robert Logia is great in this movie that's a whole different movie that's like has some comedy you know he's like beating up a guy for tailgating him you know he's you know he's you know he's falling in love with the mob bosses, you know, girlfriend. Like, that's Pulp Fiction. It's, it's, playing with these things. But, um, in, in such a way that is really exploring like,

like, what does it, what does it mean to have a Femphital, you know, in a film? Like, what is that, like, deeply fucked up and disturbing relationship to femininity in this genre? And how are the men, in this movie abusing this character who is two characters is both femme fatal and victim. You know, it's a deeply layered movie. Like I just have so much respect for what it is attempting to do and what it achieves. But it's a hard movie for me to watch because it is so successful at just like putting up all of the twisted, like sick fantasies of David Lynch and also of the genre itself, you know? Yeah, I love how it included the kind of voyeuristic angle as well with the, the porno stuff and the

cameras and being delivered these videotapes. Speaking of cachet, obviously I was thinking about that too. But the way that the murder is kind of revealed to the audience, I thought was a very unsettling truly, deeply scary scene with the way that was unraveled and then just skipping over anything but legal, like any court system, whatever, he's just straight behind those bars. And yeah, as you're saying about this, kind of like this unreliable protagonist type figure who's constantly like victimizing himself, which, you know, you bring up the OJ thing. It feels like an apt kind of way to characterize someone who's done something so evil and, yeah, what their

psyche might look like from the inside out. and how dark and warped and non, there's no logic to follow once you've done something like that. And yeah, you probably would have to reinvent yourself in some way and the way that's communicated through the visuals, through these needle drops and these random characters coming in and out. It's really quite brilliant,

as far as capturing that, the emotion of how that would feel describing something. Yeah, I already said you can't really put to words, but I feel like it captures that feeling so well through this. And it isn't just completely, completely aimless though I feel like there is stuff you can pick up through these kind of like abstract themes and recurring symbolism but a lot of his films seem to do despite yeah that disregard for a like formulaic structure he really feels like a like a painter or something to me with the way he puts this stuff together and the main character starts off he's like a saxophone player right and it almost felt like an improv jazz type structure to the way the film was like building itself up and moving. Yeah, really creative. Yeah, I think I think what I'm coming to terms with is like the, I enjoy David Lynch's films, um, but they don't speak to me on like a really deep and personal

level. And I think part of the reason, um, why Mulholland Drive is from my memory, you know, my favorite and, or at least the one that like, I feel has resonated with me the most and that I remember the most about and want to return to is I feel like that's the one where I don't know perhaps through its presentation or the performances or maybe the characters I'm able to take that one more seriously in like a literal narrative sense and and kind of get absorbed into that movie in a way that I'm not really as able to with most of Lynch's other works. Like, um, even with this film, like, yes, there are intentional comedic elements to it.

Uh, you know, the, uh, tailgating scene has definitely some intentional, uh, comedic elements. But even, even in the opening to this, like, I don't know if it's just like the, the, the vibe of it feeling cheesy to me or just like weird and off. Um, perhaps I, I'm just not in love with, uh, like the characters or performance. But like I'm kind of watching even like the opening scene the intro scene like even with the murder I'm finding it kind of like silly, you know The the choices for like almost kind of like jump scary sound effects and like the flashes in the editing and you know you know it's an interesting choice for it to go from the black and white video recording into the color

like full frame like oh this is actually happening and he's there but you know at the same time just like the whole uh the whole vibe through the editing and then like I don't know I found it really funny that the the sort of like zoned out baby like expression

that he has on his face while he's there murdering like I found that hilarious like I found that genuinely funny um and so yeah I it is interesting hearing, you know, people being able to take Lynch films a lot more seriously in general than I'm able to.

And in that sense, I'm still appreciating them just not in like a glued into the universe kind of way more just like, oh, I'm watching a film and I'm watching a film made by a weirdo and that's fun kind of way. Yeah. No, I don't find the same thing funny as far as what you're describing. I mean more like the idiosyncrasies of these random side characters that show up and just say like just these crazy lines smooth as shit from a duck's ass there's some spooky shit we got here like that kind of thing is what i love and that's like the a bit of the levity and i keep saying it's dreamlike

but god it really does feel like the the way these random kind of things are mismatched against each other and you said you mentioned the editing but i love the editing here like these repeating shots and like reincorporating these ideas throughout that don't make sense at the beginning but do towards the end and like the timing with the music and it will like diegetically flowing together. Soundtrack is amazing in this film. I love the use of Bowie, Lou Reed, got nine-inch nails in there.

And they all complement the scenes they're used in to either enhance it to make it weird and off-putting. I think the atmosphere is such a priority, I feel like, in his movies. And that might be why it doesn't connect with you as much, Adam. Like if you're not buying into the atmosphere

and not finding creepy, it's just not going to work for you, but I find it very effective. Yeah, yeah. Whereas I'd not put off by the iciness of some of the performances. I did it first. I kind of settle into it,

and especially after what happens and the kind of scares it puts you through in that first section, even though I was almost disappointed that it stopped being as scary after that first kind of 40 minutes. I was still intrigued by what was going on and where this was going or what was it saying,

and then this femme fatale character appearing again, but it seems to be someone else. And they look different. Their hair has changed different. What does that mean? Now that they've changed their hair, like what are the implications of that? And it really gets you thinking in the same way that having a bizarre,

a horrible dream of all these ideas smashed together after you wake up and try and pick it apart, I feel like the same experience and feeling. Like, oh, I need to like pick this apart. And what did that thing mean? And what is the reverse imagery of the burning shack mean? And all this kind of stuff. I feel like it gets my head spinning. And it's just so creative.

Yeah. What's interesting is, so in terms of like, tone and imagery that I've connected with from David Lynch the most. From my memory, it's been from like his short films. There was like a really interesting oneer that he directed. I think it was like he was hired to like make a commercial or something and then it like went through like a building and then part of it went on fire. I'm like, oh wow, like what an interesting memorable image. There's there's a film from 2007 called DeEach His Own Cinema, where they got a bunch of, you know, like artistic,

auteur directors to participate and basically just make like a collection of short films presented in one movie. And, you know, some of them are good, some of them are bad. But my favorite from that entire collection was the one that Lynch directed. And I found that, you know, without fully describing it. It was like, that was like a very visceral, nightmarry, like, weird, like,

uh, I was super into what he showed there in a way that, like, I still remember it. I still feel it. I can remember the sound design choices. I can remember the visual choices. And it's very short. Um, but I, yeah, I feel like personally his style in terms of like what I am able to get out of his films. Maybe it just lends itself better to personally, you know, short snippets or, you know, shots or concepts rather than like an overarching story or, you know, like a tone and vibe or an atmosphere of like an entire piece, I guess with the exception of Mulhoan Drive that I, you know, I remember that working well overall for myself. Yeah, that's a I mean, I personally prefer Mahal and Drive as well.

I think most people do. And I think a lot of the reason why it's, I mean, it's interesting because Mahal and Drive started as like a TV show and then was kind of pieced together of different parts, whereas this was completely conceived as a film. And I think this one maybe cohere's a little better, but Mulholland Drive has a kind of, Even with all the darkness, and it's a disturbing film, you have the Yorando or whatever, the scene where, you know, in the theater, there's a kind of like beautiful quality and a transcendent theme of, you know, you kind of have that sweet and that bitterness in a lot of Lynch's movies. And for me, this movie completely gets rid of that sweetness. I find that there's nothing really sweet about this movie.

And I think that the Patricia Arquette character, Alice, Renee, is very similar, I think, to Naomi Watts's character in Mahal and Drive in that she's someone who's been abused in this industry and is kind of discarded. But unlike Mahal and drive, we aren't given access to her. We aren't told to empathize with her. She is kind of like an otherworldly creature throughout the whole film. And I think that's what is so upsetting through a lot of it. You know, there's a scene where, and I do think that's the point.

You know, I don't think the movie is, I think the movie's commenting on that for sure. But there's that scene where she explains to Balthus Argeti's character how, you know, she knows Mr. Eddie, et cetera, and we see her being forced to strip at gun point in front of him. And after that, Balthazar Getty's character simply asks, why didn't you just leave? And I was just like, oh, how did I not catch that before? Like that's such a victim blaming. Fucked up line, you know, like she's literally has a gun pointed to her head.

But her character is just like, can you forgive me, you know, or do you still want to be with me and that sort of thing? She is like a cipher, the entire film. And I think she's the key to the film because another thing that happens near the end, when he finally transforms back into Bill Pullman, it's when they're having sex in front of the car in the desert. And she whispers in his ear, you can never have me. And that's when he transforms back.

You know, that's, that's, I feel like that unlocked so much of the movie to me thematically. like, you know, this person cannot be his possession. I mean, that's ultimately probably what, you know, why the murder happened. It's about this sexual jealousy. And, you know, what brings him back or maybe transforms him into another person because I'm kind of unconvinced that Bill Pullman in the final 10 minutes of this movie is a different character from the Bill Pullman in the first half of the movie. I think that

that just says so much about what this movie is trying to communicate about the male psyche and sexual jealousy. It kind of flips back on itself, you know, at the end of the film, when he goes up to his own house and says Dick Laurent is dead.

Yeah, why do that? I don't know what that means. I don't know. And then he's chased by the cops and he kind of has a tantrum in the car and there's a lot of flashing lights. But I think that like emotionally, I feel like the movie is trying to communicate the pain of this character, Patricia Arquette's characters, you know, suffering, the abuse that they endure. I mean, I think this is a theme that Lynch goes over through a lot of his films with his

female characters. And maybe it's not as done as tactfully or with the same kind of nuance that a female director, writer would tackle it. But I think that through the lens of noir, the noir genre, it's a really bold and very very um a very incisive like exploration of the femme fatale uh archetype i think you could i think you could make an argument for like him leaving the message to himself or leaving the you know door buzzer uh voice message to himself you could interpret it as either like okay lynch is saying that like there's like a cycle of violence in the male

psyche or that like even his attempts to like you know either ignore or pretend to be redempted or just not want to face reality it doesn't excuse reality and it comes back or you could say like that the nature of him doing that is lynch trying to get at the idea that it is like self-inflicted like the mentality is his own fault that he's not like a victim in this scenario that he set these things in motion for himself absolutely Yeah. Yeah. I think you hit the nail on the head with this idea of the,

you said the word possession. And I was actually thinking about the film Possession too, which has kind of similar themes of the relationship between men and women. Great men. Especially how the male perspective and the focus on that. And kind of going back to the soundtrack, the inclusion of the song, Song to the Siren by Tim Buckley,

got me thinking with like the mythical implication of what a siren is. and how you know it was a mythical creature that would pull sailors in and you know represents this kind of like lust or some kind of a exaggerated idea of what a woman is to a man on a like base weird like primal level or something um and the way that's kind of communicated through the film and used through this music and how she is this femme fatale as you're saying yeah i really feel like that's the kind of point of the movie in it being locked to the male perspective too like you're right she's doesn't really have much agency and a lot of the conclusions and conversations are quite sick and one-sided and possessive. So yeah. Yeah. And I think that so much of his psyche maybe is trying to externalize this internal misogyny and violence, you know, because he literally, he can't remember the murder. He has to see it through videotape. He explains to the cops, you know, I like to remember things my own way, not necessarily how it happens. And, um, and, uh,

Yeah, the Robert Blake character, you know, even that phone call scene when he says, you know, I'm in your house right now. You can talk to me. You know, the, the criminal is within, you know, like I think it's a pretty simple way to put it. And later on, when his heroic, you know, noir fantasy of being the young guy, you know, going out with the boss's girlfriend, when they finally kill Mr. Eddie, it is. supposed to be some kind of catharsis of killing the real villain, the real, the bad man, you know, representing all of the evil in this world. But that doesn't do anything. It just leads to, again, the cycle of violence. Dickleron is dead. Well, the whole movie's just going to start all over again. And he's still being pursued by the cops. There's no real resolution. The cycle continues. And there's something that I also noticed new this time through is that, After that party scene where Robert Blake calls him, et cetera, and when he goes home, he tells his wife, you know, to stay in the car and he goes upstairs and looks around.

And that scene, there's, I don't know why I never noticed this before, but he's looking around and he turns and looks directly at the camera. And there's like a jump scare cue as he looks directly at the camera. And his expression is like, oh, yeah, you guys are here, you know? Like, we're the ones who are in his house filming, you know. we're the ones watching this. There's that voyeuristic feeling of like, yeah, we're also participating as, as viewers in this crime and in this perpetuation of violence on screen, I guess.

There's also the line after he yeats the guy, where he's like, we killed him. She's like, no, you did. So that could be also backing up the idea of. you know, him leaving himself the message being kind of, kind of getting at like, no, this is your responsibility. You are. You are doing this to yourself sort of thing. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Very weird movie as expected. I felt what's kind of funny is that scene, that scene with the tailgating part felt, I mean like it was funny, but it felt, it felt so weirdly out of place for like what I've seen from Lynch filmography. Like maybe you could correct me if there's other examples of this,

but it really felt like, oh, Lynch is doing Tarantino for a scene where he's just like, he's speaking through the character like, here's the, you know what really grinds my gears, people tailgating, brings up all the statistics. Like, if I could, he's clearly just like living through the guy like, I wish I could, I wish I could just pull them out of the vehicle and and smack them. Everybody needs a smack if you're tailgate. Well, yeah, that line early on about the main character, he says something about how he hates video cameras.

That's apparently just like David Lynch's opinion on those video cameras and he just like made it part of the characters. So that would feed into what you're saying. Which is so surprising that a few years later he'd make in an empire, you know, on. Yes, very video. interviews so he's like loves digital cameras by the end yeah maybe I mean it's maybe he fell in love with phones at some point yeah I don't I mean this movie it also is like all about like I guess like video and and recording and it's I guess ahead of its time in that sense you know like

now it's even more prevalent I think that yeah I guess cash is dealing with it in a similar way. I think cachet is a better movie, but they're so different in trying to do such different things. But, no, like, it, it, there's something so, there's nothing like this movie out there. I'm just, that's fair. I'm very grateful that it was made. And I think regardless of how you feel about it, I don't think you can argue that David Lynch and Barry Gifford, the, the co-writer, didn't make what they wanted to make.

And I think that it is very successful at what it did. Fun fact, I met Barry Gifford. This is so, this is so random. I met Barry Gifford, who he, I went to art school for like a year, like right after I graduated high school. Anyways, we watched Wild at Heart, not a fan of Wild at Heart, but I have only I've seen it once, so it's been a while. But he wrote the material for a while at heart, Sailor and Lula stories.

And he came in to talk to us a little bit. And I mean, I was 18. I asked him probably a stupid question about what is, how do you feel about writing surrealism? But he tore me a new asshole. I swear to God, this guy was like, you are my enemy. And it was very, it was very funny in hindsight because he kind of treated me as like, the critics. He was like, the critics like this young man will tell you a movie has to be this way. And it was funny, after the class, everyone was like, damn, what was that about?

So I feel like, yeah, I was like, that was interesting. I mean, I have no idea what that was about. And I probably, I probably did say something very stupid and deserved it. But yeah, that was my fun experience with Barry Gifford. I mean, otherwise seemed like a pleasant man, but their collaborations, Wild at Heart and Lost Highway, I think they're unique in his filmography because of his contributions there. Yeah. What do you think about the very loud, licensed music in the film?

Love it. Yeah. It enhances every time it's used. Yeah, I think it's, it never distracted me, or took me out of the scene, I only ever enhanced a scene for me, or kind of gave you some clues as to what it was going for, what it was saying if you were like listen to the lyrics and the kind of or like the juxtaposition of how it was used perhaps like the lew read one like the lyrics quite positive but like the way it was used was made it quite a unnerving atmosphere for me yeah it was for me it was definitely jarring the maryland manson and ramstein whatever it was like just very i mean like you know very intentional choices but just kind of like odd in their placement uh for

me. Yeah, the oddness is kind of exactly what I like about it there, I guess. Yeah. I would describe the film as odd and incomprehensible. It's just whether or not you vibe with it. Exactly why I love it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's not my favorite, you know, music. And I think like maybe I like Blue Velvet more just because it has the Roy Orbison music and it's a little more riffing on the 80s, or on the 50s from the 80s, but this is, it almost feels like we're trying to be, more hip and like oh we've got like this cool soundtrack and we're kind of on the edge of things I don't know yeah I think it works for me but it's not my favorite aspect of the movie Marilyn Manson literally showed up in the movie that was weird did he I didn't yeah yeah

he was um it was uh there was when he was uh it was almost kind of like uh when he was I forget if it was on the projector or on a TV but there was like a tape of like almost kind of like an orgy it was like a there was a close shot you could see his eyes where the one pupil is larger

than the other people that was his eyes and then you could see him laying down and like that's actually Marilyn Manson acting in the film so he wasn't like a major character he didn't have any lines or anything but he was just kind of like in there all right kind of funny

interesting yeah that's well Also, Richard Pryor is in this? Yeah. That was funny. Really random. A creepy bit of trivia I read about Robert Blake was that he wound up killing his wife, like a few years after this. So that kind of parallel with the mystery man, like in real life being involved.

Allegedly. He's implicated allegedly in some kind of, you can read about it on his Wikipedia or whatever. It's really fucked up and weird. I don't know. Well, Lynch hypnotization. ties him into doing it. It is a weird element now that like a weird layer to this movie now. And maybe unsurprisingly, Quentin Tarantino was a, it's like a Robert Blake truther.

Like, oh, he didn't kill his wife, you know? I don't know why. That seems like the kind of thing he'd be passionate about. I'm a Jeffrey Epstein truther. You guys innocent. Okay, that's good to know. And a Harvey Weinstein truther. We should make a movie about that.

Yeah, I should just make a YouTube video about it Just main channel like actually guys you know probably nothing happened maybe You guys should just like we need a yeah and then then you go into a psychogenic fugue after saying you like Amelia Perez and then you become a different person Yes Yeah it was um I would watch this again I think I'll probably get more out of it on a second watch. It was interesting kind of like reading the interpretations afterwards.

Most people seem to generally be on the same page about like what it's going for. And like, you know, most people seem to interpret the lightning at the end is like, oh, he's in the electric chair sort of thing. And yeah, there was some interesting stuff about like, you know, him talking about. when he's asked about the cameras, he's like, no, I prefer things as I remember them sort of thing, you know, that kind of tying into his refusal to accept the reality of a situation or take responsibility. And also, like, I don't know, perhaps another meta layer of like, okay, if you're seeing something through the lens of a film, like, which we are as audience members, like, then what is the reliability of what we're being shown? Is it literal? You know? There's cool ideas in there.

I did find it a bit long. Really? I actually, I could, I was surprised by how I wasn't distracted by that runtime and how it kind of shifts in certain ways that, like, reset the momentum. But yeah, I'd happily watch this again soon.

But, yeah, was I going to say, yeah, shout out to that scene with the, the porno producer guy getting, like, killed. Like, the underside shot him flying through the air and then him, like,

being impaled on the edge of, of the table. I loved how how great that looked and then that understated reaction. Wow. It's like a really weird off-putting scene in the way they keep returning to it and showing it off. It's like, oh, this is cool. You just don't expect

where it's going and the way it does it, especially. No. I'm still surprised watching it. Like, there are so many things I always forget just because it feels so random in the sequence of events. Like, oh yeah, that guy gets his head just like

slams it right into that table. Yeah. He tripped. Oops. Oops. I'm given this one, unless we have more to say about it. I'm fine with ratings.

No. I'm... I'm given this one. A seven at a ten. Oh. It was good. Yeah. Hell is.

I'm just... People think I hate Lynch. I don't. I just don't. I just don't connect with his films in the same way and I'm not like engrossed in them in the same way that other people are like there are most of his films I've given a seven um it's just people get mad that I don't give him a 10 and that I'm not like taking the entire thing as seriously as other people

through no fault of my own I'm just sharing my experience but yeah people he's got some fanboys for sure he's got some stands yeah I don't I think it's earned though um I love that surreal nature a bit, how sort of esoteric and mystical they feel and like they're these, you can kind of project so much onto it and unpick it and come up with your own interpretations and everyone enjoys sharing their theories on it. It's, yeah, it's so much fun and keep saying creative, but it is just so creative the way it's put together. This would be a low four star for me. Can I out ten? I thought this was excellent. Almost enjoyed it as much as Moholland Drive, actually I wasn't expecting to get as much out of it as I did.

Nice. Very cool. I'm giving it an 8 out of 10. Nice. Yeah. Nice. Nice. Is it a good.

Do you think I'm ready for inland empire? Why not? Yeah, sure. Fuck it. Yeah, I just see the three hours long. A lot of people hate it, but it does have some memorable imagery for sure. I'll be recommending all three seasons of Twin Peaks Yeah, I do learn that first season

I need to get to that I really need to get to that Twin Peaks has got a really good score I like the theme Oh yeah Yeah everyone loves that theme Yeah that's great I'd continue Twin Peaks

I'll watch I'll go through the whole thing eventually I could do that You gotta watch the return The return is Oof, there's something else Yeah Right Let's do some questions then from the Sardonicast community

if you want to head over to the suggestion thread over there and leave questions for future episodes just like sarcastodon did. Since Jake recommended some books to you too based on your taste, what video games would you two recommend Jake based on what he's into? I would, for example, strongly recommend Disco Elysium to avid readers.

Also, Jake, what is your opinion on games as a medium since you haven't really mentioned them on your channel? You're a certified gamer, Jake? Oh, man, I'm not a gamer at all. I don't know. I am open suggestions, though, but I will not play them most likely. Do you like kind of like brain puzzle type things?

No, no, no, no. I like, do you know what I like? I like to play Grand Theft Auto 5 and kill people with Biccar. You know, but anything that's too challenging, I just get bored. And then I'm like, why am I working hard at this? I could be working actually. Yeah.

What about like Red Dead? You've got some of the Western reviews, really? No, no. I like Minecraft. I like Minecraft sometimes. Yeah. I don't know. I guess I just, it's a time thing.

Like, I never got super into it, you know, and when I was like a teenager. Like, I'd play games. Like, you know, we had a PS2. and everything growing up. But at a certain point, and especially now at this point in my life, I can't imagine myself going,

okay, I need to devote a lot of time into exploring this genre and exploring all these games that I know are probably fantastic and I would really enjoy, but it's just like, what are you going to do at this point? Well,

it's definitely a time swing. One of my favorite games ever is The Witness. it is a puzzle game but it's so much more profound like it's it's in terms of how like it engages with you and how you're expected to engage with it it's basically like an exercise in in how outside the box can you think and like what what perspective should you even be approaching

how to solve things like it's it's it's it's one of the best games for like getting people to think in ways that they don't normally think and I think that it's just like one of the coolest fucking things ever like that's one of my favorite experiences like yeah one of my favorite experiences with video games ever is the witness it's just incredible the witness is harrison ford in an omish village oh yes yes it's uh yeah that's it cool Okay, I'll play that. Have you played Disco Elysium, Adam? That was mentioned in the comment.

Everybody. That is one I would highly, highly recommend. Yeah. It's one of the, a lot of like, I'm like, man, it's so impressive they put this together. But that's one where I'm like, how the, how did you make this? Everybody keeps recommending it to me. It's long. And so I haven't started it yet.

All I know is that it's really long. It's not as long as you think, though. But the way, yeah, because you can finish it quite quickly, actually. But it's more the way, uh, the options you have available. and the uh the politics and philosophy explores it's like i'm sophisticated in a way that you often don't seem from the medium um okay and it's extremely replayable in that way but uh yeah that was incredible um there was one you just mentioned uh gta five jake and there was actually coincidentally a question from worth of willingness 83 says have you heard of grand theft hamlet

if so how do you fellows feel about it my friend group and i had a bit of an argument over the absurdity of watching GTA 5 gameplay in a movie theater in the terms director and film being tossed around. I've not seen the project myself, but is receiving a bit of buzz. Yeah, it's got great reviews. You guys see the trailer for this? Yeah, I'd watch this. It sounds hilarious. Yeah, I would watch it. It's on Mooby. Right now. I think Mooby actually, it's a movie original. Like, they own the rights to it, I think. Yeah, I'm totally supportive of the idea that you can create a film out of anything. Like, there's people have made films

in VR chat, right? Like, video games have become like an animation tool in many... Red versus blue. Exactly. That's the classic. The machinima. Right?

So... Yeah. Yeah. It's... You can make anything at anything. It just depends on your presentation and your goals and, uh... Yeah, how it's executed. I totally watch that.

Yeah. It's got great critic reviews, so... Yeah, I didn't realize it was like big enough to have critic reviews, but I'm, I'm hype for that. It was at a festival. It was at a few festivals, I think. Yeah, I could check on that. Let's do another one from Tad Strange 2.

Now that Kendrick Lamar's made being a hater cool again, I have to ask this question. What are some movies that you're very happy to see fail commercially and or critically? Am I happy to see a movie fail? Yeah, the Sonyverse. I'm happy about them failing. It's funny. I put my hands together and I

When I got this question I looked at Mufasa couldn't have made money right? No, I'm wrong Like he's made like hundreds of millions So I can't even include that one Yeah there's There must be something you put your hands together and be like

Yeah I'm glad this isn't being rewarded There so even the worst films I never find myself wishing for them To not be successful It's just one of those things Well, I do wish that certain things wouldn't be rewarded in the sense that, like, okay, if we reward something like Lion King 2019, Alien Romulus, you're telling them you want more. But there's nothing that I'm like, you know, I never find myself wishing something wasn't made. I guess just maybe the residual effects of its success are bad.

The biggest example I can think of having felt that way about a movie is probably, saw spiral because they wasted precious fucking time with Tobin Bell just dicking around doing Chris Rock's nonsense so I'm I guess I'm glad that wasn't successful but at the same time I just I wish that wasn't even made

they were wasting precious fucking time you fucking idiots you assholes can't believe you isn't they reporting that Bell is he's getting up there now I struggle to put something together for his next film but yeah that's a shame I guess

I could integrate this one from Butterfield 47. Not counting Marvel or Star Wars, are there any movie franchises you'd be happy to see end? I feel that way about that Jurassic world bullshit. We just leave it alone. Oh my God. Like, but again, they make so much money. That's where they keep doing it. Yeah. I mean, you don't have to end it. Just make it better. You can make a Jurassic Park movie and just have it good. You don't have to end it. Just stop making shit. That's too hard. That's much too hard for them to do. I'd be good with Halloween

the Halloween franchise ending for a long time Let's give it like 30 years Before we touch that again Here's one, Star Wars, easy, done They said not Marvelous Star Wars Oh well fine Never mind

Too easy Oh my god Pookie Dot says You guys have said that you write notes during films Have you watched a movie so boring So dull that you begin to draw While watching No, because I don't draw really.

Alex, this might be for you. Yeah, this is more for me. Yes, like, that last planet the apes, that's like a perfect, like, drawing movie, you know? I thought you said you enjoyed it. Yeah, I did enjoy it. I can enjoy it and draw a picture at the same time. It's like a building furniture movie.

Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. Like, you'll be of furniture, I might draw a little doodle or something. Yeah, I think there's, like, a category for that. Okay. Do you ever, like, doodle or anything like that, Jake? or are you more like Adam like a. Are you a doodler or a didler? Like the new Marvel movie.

I lock in completely. I'm like, I'm not, I'm not looking at my child. I'm not listening to anything. My headphones on. And if anything happens outside of my field of vision, then that's their problem, you know. I think, I guess if a movie is really bored, then I will probably,

just start drinking alcohol, you know. That'll make it go down smooth. So there you go. Yeah, I think it's more of a me thing. Like when I was like 16 and 17, I would like play Halo while watching like a movie. Just all these like all the stimulation at the same time. So maybe that's more of a me thing.

Yeah. I respect movies too much to like have it on as like a background thing. I don't know. I respect like a certain movie. is for sure. There's some I don't respect. I'll do that. I sometimes just put like stalker on the projector and just like have it playing. Yeah. I don't necessarily sit down and watch the whole thing. Like just have it there for the atmosphere.

Yeah. I, you know, there is, it is a valid experience to say like, okay, the movie didn't suck me in enough and therefore I'm now building furniture while the movie is playing. You know? Because that does speak to your own. experience with the film. There's some things like, I don't know, maybe I have ADHD, maybe my brain is too neurospy or some shit. I have no fucking idea. But there's some movies where like, there's a good chunk of movies actually, where like watching it and giving it my complete full attention feels like abuse. Like I feel victimized from the film. I'm like, you can't fucking trick me, you piece of shit. Like, it. It's, And that's not like, oh, going into it before it starts sort of thing.

That's like, okay, it's been 20 minutes. What are you showing? I'm trying my best. And even if, you know, this is something that happens within my own brain, if I'm in a theater, there's no other distractions, you know, no phone, whatever, nothing. The same thing will happen in my mind. I'll catch myself being, oh, wait, I was just thinking about all of my plans for the week for the past 10 minutes. And not through any, like, intentional action. because I'm like, oh, I don't respect this movie enough.

I'm going to start thinking about other things. It's like, oh, wow, I catch myself doing it because the movie is just so nothing. It's showing me things I've already seen. It's just not engaging sort of thing. That, like, yeah, it doesn't really matter whether or not there's like a physical in-universe thing I'm doing or sense of distraction, I guess, in a literal sense. Like, same thing is happening in my brain. It just really depends on the movie. That's why a film being like dull or uninteresting is like just the worst thing to me,

like the most middling of middling. Like when it's, I need to be engaged through it being exceptionally good or bad in some way. Exactly. It's just when that dull is right in the middle. I can't, I can't do it. Like I do the exact same thing. My mind starts wandering and start thinking about laundry I got to do and like just

stuff that's irrelevant to the film. And then like, yeah, I do the same thing. I catch myself going like, oh shit. Like I just haven't paid attention for like the last minute because this is so like dull or whatever it might be. Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting because there's like a biological reality to that. Like that's how the human brain works. Like if you're exposed to the exact same stimuli, you get used to it, right?

Like you don't smell the inside of your nose or taste water or the air or sort of thing. Right? Like, if you're just exposed to the same thing, you get used to it. That's just how our brains work. And, you know, some people might experience it more than others when viewing media. that's just a biological thing. And yeah, it's not just like the, the length of a film or whatever, because I put on the brutalist again and rewatched it the other day.

Yes, exactly. Just flew by, and it's like a three and a half long film. And I'm like transfixed to it the entire time. And I want to like pick it apart and break it down as part of like why, like we said in the Amelia Perez conversation that you were picking apart all this stuff about the audio design and whatnot. But for me, like I just, if I'm not into it, I'm not going to be doing that to that degree unless I'm watching it again.

and again and I'm just, I'm not going to do it if I'm not, if I'm thinking about the, if I left the oven on or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. Give me something to chew on. There are certain things that, you know, I'm, I value that I want to chew on. And if I am not given those things or anything, and I'm just kind of like, detached with no moments of like, even thinking something's interesting.

Then it's like, okay, my brain's just going somewhere else. I'm sorry. Like, I can't, I can't. I literally can't help it. It's like, you know, if you're reading like a really boring book, and then all of a sudden it's like, oh, I'm three, I don't remember what I read for the past three pages. Like the words appeared in my head, but I didn't absorb any of them.

You know? It's like same thing with a film. Yeah. Well, speaking of books, I, Jake inspired me to start reading Blood Meridian. Whoa. dude I've read like one chapter and I'm already like Jesus Christ

really so yeah report back I mean that's I get on with that's cool I mean do you are you connecting with it or is it just kind of like what the fucks that you like the way he writes is just like so envious of like that control

of the English language but yeah man it's it's heavy it's dark it's real dark yeah oh man this is this is is exciting. This is an exciting development. I'm going to be, I'm going to be annoying you about this now. I hope you realize. No, please do. Yeah, and I've got like Butchers Crossing that open

in a tab. I saw this like a goofy Nick Cage movie they made based on it. I'm not going to watch that. I'm not going to watch that. Don't worry. Now you've got to play Halo, Jake. Yeah, what game should I play? Can you guys agree on one game? I mean, I'll check out the witness, the Harrison Ford game. but is there anything else Alex that I should check out if time wasn't an issue I think you would like read there too honestly but yeah I don't know if that's a game for people they don't play games though that's the thing this is like a real high barrier to entry where the

disco elysium isn't there's like no real time like you don't have to be good at anything it's just it's more like a d and d dice rolls and we might come up with some more suggestions another day. I'll think about it. I like Tetris. Hell yeah. Oh yeah. Classic. Should we do one more here? Let's do it. I really like this one from Jack the Great 98. If you could go back in time to the early decades of cinema, maybe 1900 to 1940s, what modern movie would you show people of the time? My pick would probably be enter the void, not necessarily one of my favorites, but certainly a pretty mind-blowing audiovisual experience that I would kill to see an older audience react to.

Sorry, what year? I'm just, you know, let's say 1910. 1910? Okay. Human Sandopede 2. No, I think in something like really visual effects had you like avatar.

Like they'd have like panic attacks. Okay, wait, wait, wait, wait. Here's a good idea. Amelia Perez. Mars is moms. Yeah. Oh my God. See, here's the thing.

There's, there's, I've always thought about this, like, the further you go back in time in terms of, like, the language of cinema and filmmaking and, like, what was possible, like, what people did and what, you know, certain things were valued of just being like, oh, wow, they achieved this effect or, you know, not everything had, like, a perfect, like, narrative sense or structure. You could probably, there's a, there's a point in time you could go back to where, like, the room would be the best. movie, you know? Like, if the room was the first movie ever made, it would be a masterpiece.

Right? I disagree. I disagree with that completely. If it was the first movie ever made, you don't think it would be the best movie? What are you talking about? No, no, no way. What? They're great, great early movies from the 1910s. But I said the first. No. If it was the first, people would be like, people would be like, that's it. That's cool that they, you know, have color somehow and yeah how did you do that that's that's really fascinating it would it would be like the birth of a nation you know it would be like oh wow that's technically innovative but maybe let's not see that anymore yeah if it was the first movie it would be the best movie that that's a factual statement how different would film history be

I'm thinking about you're an older you know like if you travel back in time with like an iPad with Batman v. Superman on it. Like, that would, that would create religions, you know? It would, like, change the course of everything. If you showed that... Oh, Skibbitty toilet? Greek philosopher. Yeah, the whole Skibbby Toilet series.

Change history. Oh, my God. Man. People would be preparing for a war with toilets. Yeah, exactly. People would just be praying to them. Yeah, yeah. I think everyone would just kill themselves.

Yeah. If that footage of the train coming, like, made everyone freak out, like, what are they going to do? to do if they see Avatar 2, you know? Oh, man. Yeah, I don't know. Especially if you prefaced it with like, this is real. Like, this is a message from the future.

Yeah. It'd be interesting just like using like technology in a way, just, you know, technology that didn't exist in filmmaking and then showcasing that. Because, you know, you look early computer animation, you know, heavily used in like 90s films. We can look at that retrospect. and be like, ooh, ugh, right? How do, some of these scenes, like, it's just really jarring.

It's like so obviously computer animated. But a lot of this is just dependent on like what people are used to. Like if it's something people haven't seen before, then it is more difficult to differentiate and to, with less of an understanding of how it works and with less better examples to compare things to, things are more convincing. Like, at the time, a bad effect was very, likely a good effect just because people had less of an understanding of how it worked and less to compare it to.

So you could take... I honestly, I mean, I think that people would be more jarring. It would be more jarring for people in 1910s to see the changing social attitudes and like mental, like how society in the world has changed rather than the technical stuff. I do think like that would be jarring, but I think they'd be like, oh, it's the future. Of course, they have different techniques and they can film this stuff. But it'd be like, okay, these people are existing in a world that has seen World War I and World War II. You know, all of our ideas about class and gender and race.

It's all on its head. You know, I think that would be the more. Yeah, they'd be like, what's this woke shit? What is this? Where's the Kaiser? Well, it's a coach where he is. Yeah. Yeah.

How can these people have rights? What the fuck? What the Frick? Show them Brokeback Show them a gay movie Show them short bus

I don't know There's like There's no wrong answer For this question No, it's interesting regardless Or show them a film that is like intentionally trying to look like an older film Show them just like

The Artist from 2011 Yeah. The lighthouse. That would fuck people out. All right, we did it. Thank you. We did it. Bye. And right, it's what?

It's my recommendation, right? We all believe so. We believe so. I'll take it then. I have, I don't know, I've had this film on my mind. I've been obsessed with Hell Divers lately. So I want to talk about Starship Troopers in 1990. There's some interesting kind of political implications and stuff that I want to talk about as well.

Yeah, that's go. 1997, Paul Verhoeven, Starship Troopers. Have you seen it, Jake? I didn't see a rating on that's about it. You know, I think I saw it when I was a kid. I have not seen it since, so it's going to be like a movie for me. Nice. Cool.

If you don't want to be spoiled for Starship Troopers, 1997, Paul Verhoven. How are you pronounced? that, I don't know. Watch it before the next episode comes out. These episodes come out every two weeks. You can listen to them early. Support the show. Go to patreon.com slash sardonicast or sardonicast.

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Yeah. Keep that rumple clean. Bye, everyone. Thanks for listening. Bye-bye. Bye.