The Big Picture - Best Picture Power Rankings: An ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Surge and a Surprise No. 1

Episode Date: January 6, 2023

We’re back to power rank! With the release of Sarah Polley’s ‘Women Talking,’ Sean and Amanda are joined by Joanna Robinson to discuss the new film (1:00) and see where it stands in the Best Picture race (44:00). Then, Polley talks with Sean about her new film (1:04:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guests: Sarah Polley and Joanna Robinson Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Ryan Russillo. I'm the host of the Ryan Russillo podcast at The Ringer. We are a sports show, but we do it a little differently because we want to cut through all of the nonsense and try to figure out what's really happening and give you those bigger picture observations. Do a lot of NFL, a lot of NBA, and of course college football. Also have a great guest lineup, a lot of athletes, front office guys, and even we do some actors and writers from famous TV shows and movies, plus our life advice segment at the end of every show. So make sure you follow The Ryan Rosillo Show on Spotify.

Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit Superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessey. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about women and men talking. Later in this episode, I'll have a brief but great chat with Sarah Polley, one of my favorite filmmakers, whose new film, Women Talking, is out in limited release this weekend.

It's expanding to 10 cities. By the 20th of January, it will be all around the country. It's a thoughtful adaptation of Miriam Tebbs' 2018 novel. Some incredible performances in this movie. We'll be talking about it here on the show a bit. I hope you'll stick around for my chat with Sarah as well. I love her work.

First, we are joined by our pal, ringer podcaster extraordinaire, Joanna Robinson, to discuss the Best Picture race and Women Talking. Hi, Jo. Hi, thanks for podcasting in a hail off with me.

I appreciate it. Let's talk about Women Talking first. We don't need to talk too deeply about this film because not too many people have seen it, but it has been lingering in the Best Picture race

for a long time now. It premiered at Telluride all the way back at the beginning of September, and it was supposed to come out in early December, and then it was supposed to come out at the end of December, and then it was supposed to come out in the beginning of January, and now it's kind of sort of coming out

in the beginning of January, but more like the end of January. I don't know why this movie's date keeps moving in terms of letting the world see it, but I liked it quite a bit. It's a film that is about eight women from an isolated Mennonite colony who are grappling with a massive decision that they have to make. The film appears at first to be a period piece,

but is in fact set in 2010 and not the distant past. Spoiler. It's not though, because that revelation, which feels like a spoiler when you watch the film without any context, is actually in the trailer. And so they're not attempting to hide that information anymore and you know what this is supposed to be women talking i don't need you to well actually me with the first five minutes with your little trailer knowledge okay i see

amanda you've come to play uh amanda what'd you think of women talk i was gonna say guests first on this one we were texting about it a little bit earlier. I'd like Joanna to set the tone. Yeah, I really liked this film a lot. You know how every year during awards season, there are films that feel like medicine and sometimes you're like dragging your feet a little bit to watch them.

And I was really worried that that's what this film was going to be. I had heard the positive buzz out of the film festivals, but I was like, really how enjoyable is film was going to be. I had heard the positive buzz out of the film festivals, but I was like, really, how enjoyable is this premise going to be? And then when I finally sat down to watch it, I was riveted. Like, you know, I watched it on a screener at home, admittedly, but like often, sometimes when I watch something on a screener at home, I get distracted and I would just like put everything down and was glued to this film. I thought it was incredible performances. I think we'll talk a little about some of the visuals

and our questions around that. But in terms of like just juicy, incredible content for incredible actresses, I really had a good time with it. Okay, Amanda, what did you make of it? That's the right perspective. The performances are amazing. And it's a lineup of some of like

the big picture all-stars, Jesse Buckley, Claire Foy, Frances McDormand, Rooney Mara. I'd like to come back to that one. There is a lot of talking, you know, it is correctly advertised and it at times felt a bit, not even stagey to me. Joanna rightly anticipated yesterday that I was going to do my it's a play objection. But I don't even think it's like it would work as a play because it is based on like a lot of speeches and exchanges of ideas between these characters. But really for me, sometimes it doesn't get past that ideas building block phase. And while I think some of the questions it asks

are very compelling and very moving, and I was certainly moved by it and particularly by Claire Foy's performance, I found myself just being aware of the structure and the talkiness of it, for lack of a better word, and being like, oh, okay, and now we're going back to the debate. And that is literally what the movie is about. It is about a bunch of women debating what they should do. But it didn't always transcend that structure to me. I also, like Joanna, heard about the buzz before I saw the film and definitely had that medicine

apprehension. And I'm not sure I totally got past that, but that might be on me as well. I think there's something purposeful in that too. I mean, I think that past that, but that might be on me as well. I think there's something purposeful in that too. I mean, I think that the film, between the title of the novel and the title of the movie, and the fact that there are some signals early in the film that indicate this is something that is, you shouldn't look away and you should pay hard attention. You should think hard while watching this. This is not escapist entertainment. We see a card early in the film

that says what follows is an active female imagination, just as the story is starting to unfold. There's a kind of demand to focus on some of the specific topics. I thought what you said was interesting though, Amanda, because I watched the film for a second time with my wife last night and she said something somewhat similar. I think she responded a little bit more positively to the movie, but the film does ask a lot of questions and does not necessarily make an attempt to answer those questions. And I think how you feel about that decision in the storytelling might dictate how you feel about the movie, because the movie is this, it's this dialectic between groups of people, or at least points of view in this community. Some people have said that it strains credulity that an isolated community like this would necessarily have the variance of opinion that these people do because in a Mennonite community,

there is a kind of narrowness of thought in terms of the teachings and what's available to people because of their relationship to technology and the way that they live, you know, even at a time like 2010. I thought the movie was extraordinarily well considered as far as like a filmmaking object. Like the devices actually worked for me and worked well. But I think that they're clearly not working well for many people too. And I think that's an interesting thing

that kind of break down a little bit. It's been noted amongst many people that the movie is very gray and drab, and it looks drained of its life. This sort of desaturated cinematography that Luc Montpellier applies to the movie is the first thing I heard about when I walked out of the premiere screening. And for many people, it is not working. Now, I think when I saw the film, its intent was very clear to me, which is that this was a place that is essentially dead or dying

and that it indicates at the outset that a change has to happen and that there has to be some sort of resurrection or redefinition of the lifestyle in the community that doesn't change the fact that the movie looks like that the entire way through. And so whether or not you accept that decision, Amanda, it seemed like you just didn't really cotton to that.

Yeah, it's another thing where it is a purposeful visual choice that says something about the themes and the setting and the intent of the film. But then you still got to watch it, which is also sort of like cinema is still a visual medium. I sound like Scorsese here. I should do that more often. And that goes for the script as well. You know, like everything about it, the speechiness and the focus on the words and you know even the decision to take a waste or enhance some of the drabness and make it like a tight visual um or an unpleasant visual experience honestly and that may be taste but is is purposeful but also then you just are still watching it you know what i mean like it's still a movie so get it. And it also doesn't totally carry through for me the whole way,

if that makes any sense. What'd you think about how it looked, Jo? I think, you know, what you said is what Sarah Polly has been saying all over the place, right? That like the desaturization is supposed to be like a faded postcard. This place is already gone and dead for them, etc. That kind of works for me. But I think what works even more for me is that, you know, if I want to stretch and be charitable, I would say that the barn setting where most of the film takes place is on a soundstage with like blue, you know, green screen behind all of the cracks and crevices and windows. And that's what makes the light feel so artificial and odd in those sequences. And then everything that takes place

outside on the farm, I actually think looks kind of beautiful in some ways. And so there is this sort of dichotomy of like the stifling nature of being inside this barn. And then like, because I was like, well, why didn't they just make it inside? They're going to shoot it inside. I think part of that has to do with COVID, but if they're going to shoot it inside, like why not just make it inside? Why give us all these like weird green screen cracks in the wall? And then I was like, well, I think the reason you have this big barn hayloft window is for them to look out at a possible escape, right? It's either we stay here in this claustrophobic place, or we have this possible escape. That doesn't change the fact that I was wishing that this film looked like, you know, Sarah Polly has said that she wanted it to feel like a John Ford-esque

Western. And I was just like, no, Jane Campion made a beautiful, beautiful Western film last year. And I wish that this film looked as good as that film. But this film actually had my attention more when it came to plot and performance than Power of the Dog did. So, yeah, I wish it looked better. But it wasn't a deal breaker for me. I think you're right that that's the right movie to pair this conversation with in some ways. Because there was a sort of, you know, expectation very early on that this was a contender. That it is from a female filmmaker who is perhaps a bit under-recognized in terms of their greatness.

About a very kind of critical social issue that is using some kind of genre tropes to tell that story. They're very different movies, but they feel almost in conversation as examinations of masculinity and femininity. And they also feel like they're a little bit like, yeah, we get it right now in the culture. There's not a strong groundswell for women talking. And so it's a really interesting object in the awards race as well as being a movie that for whatever reason i personally

really responded to and i'm i find myself in a tricky situation being like i'm the man who likes women talking everyone and i feel like a little bit of a dipshit saying that but i found a couple of scenes particularly powerful especially um the sort of near to the recitation where the, all the women are sort of holding hands after what becomes a, what is a very traumatic series of traumatic conversations. And that's, to me, it was just the power of filmmaking. And there's, I think there's one other aspect of the desaturation that you're talking about, Joe, that my wife pointed out to me, which is that there's a kind of otherworldly surreality that feels like nightmarish when you watch the movie this way. That when you, if you think about what

your dreams look like or your nightmares look like, they're not in 3D Technicolor. There is something off about, or at least for me, there is something off about what you see. And so experiencing this world and these conversations visually that way, and then the intensity of those conversations, I think

just had an impact on me like worked on me but I do understand that for a lot of people there's going to feel that feeling of offness is actually going to make it a little bit more challenging to to become enveloped by to Amanda's point like I think that what Amanda is responding to in terms of that staginess which I again I don't disagree with. Like that made me then think about like, I mean, this isn't an adaptation of a book. It's not an adaptation of a play, but like what makes a play feel elevated into the space of a movie versus not when you watch it? You know what I mean? Like oftentimes it means taking it out of the setting. Like if you watch a few good

men, you wouldn't know that that's a play necessarily if you didn't already know. And so would taking us out of the hayloft make it feel even less stagey, less like a play? I don't know. But I think the visuals would have helped if this were like a dazzling visual experience, then you're like, that's a film, you know, like there's no question that's a film. And in the absence of that, I really understand some of Amanda's response to it, but I still really liked it. So what you're saying is they should have gone to Cuba. Always. Shouldn't you always go to Cuba? But also like the other movie comparison, I think I liked this film even more after I saw it and I don't want to heap insults on a film that isn't doing very well in general, but Maria Schrader, as she said, movie comparison i think i liked this film even more after i saw and i don't want to heap um

insults on a film that isn't doing very well in general but maria schrader as she said which like i really really wanted to like so much but when it comes to the we get it or what are you adding to the conversation that's those are the some of the greatest sins of she said a film that also feels like very scared to do anything that is at all button pushing. And I think that this film in leaving that converse, some of those questions open in not trying to make up your mind, but invite you into the debate and hope that when you walk out of the theater, after you stop talking about how you wish it looked better,

you would also then talk about the like debate and whether or not there are two or three sides to a debate like this or how you feel about it and um i like that about it a lot yeah joanna it's a good point the falsest notes in both movies to me are the very prescriptive moments where the characters are saying this is what i feel or this is what this is about and she said unfortunately has a lot more of those, whether that's because they have to explain how journalism works or I don't know why or because they didn't, you know, hire someone to do a dialogue polish on it. But yeah, I think you've put your finger on it, Joanna, what I am still kind of resisting, which is the parts of women talking

that come alive to me are those unresolved questions and the performances and the actors giving life to the emotions as opposed to the thesis statements. And there are still a few thesis statements and women talking where i like i guess you need them but i i wish it were a little more um a little rougher around the edges in that sense there's one pretty critical flaw in the film in my opinion and it's in large part a product of adaptation which is that in the book, the sort of narrator POV character is August, a young man who's returned to the colony after getting educated in the outside world to teach the boys and who has been conscripted to be the minutes taker of this meeting. An educated guy who in theory is sympathetic to this intense series of conversations in the movie

there's a narrator there's a sort of voiceover but it's a young girl who's a part of these conversations she's present for these conversations but august is still a huge part of the story and the necessity of the august character is kind of a head scratcher and he becomes the emotional fulcrum of like two or three big moments and it feels like wildly misplaced i i don't really know what the the solution to that problem would have been i could feel like the room like this i could feel sarah polly the screenwriter trying to figure out how to nail this because you can't have a movie called women talking in which the voiceover is coming from a man that's just like a paradoxical decision that would have i think infuriated or would have at least been confusing.

I don't know how you guys responded to that, but I actually liked Ben Whishaw's performance. I thought he was trying his best in a kind of challenging circumstance. I always like him, but it just that character just stuck out in a way that is unmistakable to me. Ben Whishaw is one of my all time favorites, so it's hard to be objective for me about him and like if you know i i believe he was their first and only choice for this role because he is like the most delicate sensitive man male actor that we have um i think but um i it's my understanding that ben whishaw recorded the narration and then they decided in the edit to switch the narration to this young woman right so um it could have been worse I suppose is is the answer but like like he works for me but it's also the one point in the story that feels a little the only

fear point in the story which is they felt maybe that they needed to have a hashtag not all men like situation where like this man is nice and and so we're not saying all men are terrible but you know um so as a point of fear i didn't love it but i liked wish i was performance a lot so and especially what it brought out in runy mara who i know that amanda wanted talk about again, but like Rooney Mara playing against type was another, a rewarding aspect of the film for me. You were out on Rooney Mara. I thought Rooney Mara was great in this Amanda. I, I have no idea what was going on with all of that. I mean, she's, you know, luminescent and I, she looked great, guess and she like I guess there is a lot of anger um on behalf of the other characters and so her character is there to just like be a shining light of of hope

almost I think and like the and to show the possibility of optimism and, or that of getting past everything that has happened to these women. I like, I suppose what that character is functioning. And then I suppose the Ben Wishaw character. And I, I also love Ben Wishaw. Let me just say that. But I,

but I suppose he's supposed to bring out some of the, the tensions in looking forward forward but what you leave behind but like from a from like a place of goodness as opposed to the just the cruelty and evil that seems to have its grasp around everybody else even though runy mara's character is pregnant as a result of one of these crimes so there's almost like a little Virgin Mary-esque thing going on there but not Virgin Mary whatever yeah I think that's the right read I think you're right I think that's the purpose of the character sure and you know the Virgin Mary herself doesn't really get a lot of character development. So anyway, just some notes for the next draft there.

So I just didn't get it. I like all of those people and I just didn't get it at all. And maybe that's also because I responded more to the angry characters and the fiery characters and the verbal characters. I mean, that's certainly true um but yeah i also just i haven't read the book but a man narrating the book version of women talking again i i would be curious as to those choices uh i think it's i mean i think it's i think it's supposed to be a literary conceit of like since he like he took the record the minutes of the meeting or whatever.

But I think, and I, to go back to something Sean said earlier, I think it's a wild, not Sean's critique, but one that he was relaying. It's a wild critique to say, would this actually happen in a Mennonite community?

Because like it didn't happen, right? The, the crimes happened, this meeting in the, in the hayloft, like didn't actually happen. And so to start the film

as an act of female imagination, to call it that, to repeat it, it's a little over-mannered, but at the same time, it's like, that's what this whole thing is, which is a what if. What if this horrible thing happened to these women who um are not conditioned to question pushback um critically examine and what if they did and and that's what we're watching i i agree it's a movie it's it is based on a book it is like it's okay for our imagine imaginations to run wild even in the most dire of circumstances so i i find that whatever if i'm strawmanning that criticism i apologize but i don't think that i am i think it's an interesting movie it's sort of like the ultimate counterpoint to what's been happening at like the american box office there's

been a lot of talk on our show in the trades in the press about the kind of slow death of the adult drama this is like the ur example in many ways of the kind of movie that they're talking about. A serious, really well-acted film from an auteur, you know, based on, you know, a celebrated work of literature that is about critical issues

to our society, and you must pay attention, and the Academy demands that you do so, and it will recognize these films even in the face of commercial failure counterpoint to that is Avatar the way of water is the biggest fucking movie

in like 15 years and it is every day there is a new data point that is like wow this movie actually made 10% more today on a Tuesday than it did on a Monday and that's fascinating because it affects what we do here on the show, you know,

and the kinds of films that are celebrated. And, you know, I certainly for the last few years have been shouting into this very microphone that I'm speaking into right now about how we should just nominate

some movies that people have seen. And it's starting to feel like some movies that people have seen are going to get nominated at the Academy Awards. So that's great. At what cost is an interesting conversation.

Amanda, since we last ranked these Best Picture contenders. Incredible segue over multiple graphs, you know, and pulling in different, you know, industries and is beautiful. Thank you. Unfortunately, this is the only thing I know anything about.

So if I can't do it for this, I can't do it for anything. Have you not gotten a new microphone? It's the same one. Same one for years since the start of the pandemic. Maybe we could get you a new microphone. How do I sound? Do I sound okay?

Yeah, but you deserve a treat. What a sad little life I lead looking forward to a new microphone. As I was saying, Avatar the Way of Water is out. Babylon, Women Talking, and Glass Onion and Knives Out Mystery had not been released when we last ranked movies. We did add some of those movies to our rankings in a highly speculative fashion. I'm happy to recap for you, Joanna, where we left the 10 previously before we start this exercise. I also am very curious about your opinion about

some of those movies we just named. So last time we spoke, it was Avatar The Way of Water was number 10. I feel like that might be moving a little bit. Glass Onion and Knives Out Mystery was nine. The Woman King was eight. Women Talking was seven. Tar was six. Top Gun Maverick was five. The Banshees of Innisharan was four.

Elvis was three. Everything Everywhere All at Once was two. And The Fablemans sat at number one. Of course, you joined us for a conversation about The Fablemans, Jo. Right. Does that seem like a deeply outmoded top 10 that i just read to you uh fableman's is number one definitely does and it's it's what we talked about when we talked about fableman's which is like fableman's has so much going for it but it needs to make some kind of pop gen pop dent and it absolutely didn't in any way whatsoever. And so like,

if it had not avatar numbers, obviously, but if it had done some numbers, I think we would be having a different conversation, but it really feels like it's vanished from the general conversation. So. May I annotate that list reading shortly? I believe that at the end, there was per usual, a lot of hand wringing and angry resignation between me and Sean about putting Fableman's at number one, instead of everything, everywhere, all at once.

And we knew in our hearts, we knew, we knew in our hearts and even we like essentially did have everything everywhere all at once at number one. And then Sean was like, no, fine. Fableman's as if he was doing me a favor, which is something we can do another time on movie therapy.

But I think we knew even then that it was not really happening because people just aren't seeing this movie. People don't want to see the films of Steven Spielberg anymore. I don't know what to say. Okay, so I have a slight rejoinder to that. Okay. Which is not necessarily in defense of the Fablemans, but something that I have noticed as the maker of this podcast, which is that the way that people are receiving movies is very different.

And the way that they are engaging with our show is very different. For example, the Banshees of Inisharen a couple of weeks ago hit hbo max and you know what i noticed more people started listening to our episode about the banshees and sharon because they can see it now yes no shit so that's but that's been happening in the past often around bigger releases and so i think a lot of the reporting and what we've been talking about about the nature of these films this year not doing well tar the fabelmans banshees all these movies barely, if hardly at all, cracking $10 million at the box office. As soon as they hit streaming,

people are checking them out right away. And that's fascinating. It means that there's still an audience for those movies. They're just receiving them in completely different ways. And that they are, I wonder how that affects the race because Fablemans is one of those movies that is not yet streaming.

It's on VOD, but it is not on a service. And I think that's something that, you know, I've heard that industry people are more and more considering. And like when you talk about the cadence, the awards season cadence, it was always like, you know, when do we drop it in the fall window? When is the smart time to drop it to make sure that the conversation is peaking

right when we need it to? And I think our conversations, some contentious, some not last year around Coda is all part of that, right? Because not everyone has Apple TV Plus, but it's still like Coda being available on your Apple TV and being on the splash page of your Apple TV every time you open it to watch something else, presuming you own an Apple TV, is a huge data point in the success of that film. And I think the swell that I've seen around Banshees is really heartening,

but I think that is calculus that everyone, you know, is becoming more and more aware of is it's like a double drop now, you know. So, Jo, have you seen everything? Are you behind on anything um i've seen everything on the list that you just read out to me um i haven't seen all quite on the western front which a lot of people have bumping around the bottom of their top 10 so that's one i haven't seen yet but it's an interesting one because i certainly had not considered it i don't

in fact i don't even did we even mention it in our last power rankings? We didn't. So we didn't mention it. And then it really overperformed, so to speak, when the Oscar shortlist came out in part, because it is this massive spectacle war film. And so there are a lot of visual effects that are being recognized. I believe the score was recognized. The score is actually my favorite part of the film.

And it's definitely a contender in the best international feature race. Right. So now there's a feeling like we've seen a lot of international films get into the best picture race or at least the conversation over the last five to 10 years. And, you know, that's a fascinating one because that's one that will tell us a lot about both the new Academy and the old Academy. You know, it's a film that obviously famously won best picture many, many years ago. Um, and it's like a legendary film in many ways based on a novel.

Um, I, so you have seen, you've seen Babylon. Yes. I texted you about Babylon. Um, did you?

What did you text me? Yes, she did about the pussy posse about the, Oh yeah, you did. Of course, of course, which we didn't even,

which we didn't even talk about on our episode, but was an astute observation that crossed my mind when I was watching it. Feel free to share your thought. Oh, I just thought it was... Well, when I was watching it, I was like, what is Lucas Haas doing here? And then I...

And then... Which with much love to Lucas Haas, who I'm always happy to see. And then I realized that Tobey Maguire was like an exec producer and he obviously has a huge part to play in the third act. then i was like wow two members of the pussy posse are here okay that's interesting i hate that phrase but i'm gonna use it thanks nancy joe sales and then uh and then i was wondering like i was listening to you guys talk about who else might be in the brad

pitt role if not brad pitt and then i was like i bet you know i bet there's a version of this that they wanted to put leo in there um do you think they went to there's a version of this that they wanted to put Leo in there. Do you think they went to him first? I do. Yeah. I think they went to Leo first. And then Leo was like, I kind of just did this for Tarantino, you know, and Brad did something slightly different for Tarantino. So why don't you have Brad do it instead?

That's what it feels like to me. Do you agree with that, Amanda? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I do also think that every single script goes to Leo first, like probably in Hollywood so it's it's I will put my money on it yes you know and like you kept talking about uh Wall Street and so like to have a you know another Leo Margo uh you know like that that that's what felt like was missed like I I liked Brad in the movie but I I think Leo would have been better suited for that role, actually. I just think he's an actor with more range.

And I think that that part demanded a lot of range. I love Brad Pitt. We talk about Brad Pitt on this show all the time in terms of what a great movie star he is. But there's just something a little... That was the one thing that was a little off for me was that performance. I had more things off for me. I'm more in the Amanda camp of Babylon than you're in camp, Sean. I liked the middle two hours quite a lot.

There's two hours of great movie in there. And that's what makes it almost worse is when a good movie is buried under layers of a not good movie. Joetta, what's your take on the ending? Give me your interpretation. Oh, did it make me feel like I felt the first time I saw Singing in the Rain? I minded that less than like the Descent into Hell sequence, which didn't work for me. But it all feels, I mean, you know, it's him kind of doing a version of the end of La La Land again. Yeah, exactly.

Yes. But like, evil. Rejecting it. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yes. And so. But like, evil. But rejecting it, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't think I believe in his rejection. I think he wants to reject it,

but he's open-hearted in the, he's a romantic, you know? He doesn't want to be, but he is. It doesn't, I think the cynicism of the film, the cynical parts of the film, when he's trying to capture the joy, which you guys mentioned in terms of like the great sequence where we're watching everyone try to make a film at the same time, everyone, everything, everywhere all at once, like that sequence, that joy, you know, which is the parts, which are the parts of La La Land that like I really responded to as well. Like that's what Chazelle is better suited for um though you know there's a lot of meanness and whiplash so that's what i'm saying to me that the critical scene in the film is the

hello college like that is yeah that's whiplash 2.0 yeah it's repetition it's mechanical engineering it's like the obsessive collision of creativity and hard work. And that's his, that's his Metier. That's his thing that he is the best at out of anybody in the world. And so a movie that is kind of constantly returning to that idea of, it's just like, man, it's a lot of fucking work to make this stuff.

And everybody treats us like disposable garbage resonated with me very strongly. But you know what? I get it. I get that. It's a divisive movie. Well, I think that a film about overindulgence in Hollywood

should not itself be so indulgent. No, no, no. Disagree. Disagree completely. You just got Alice'd. That's what they say. That's what she gets. That's what she gets

and that's what that... I could have done with... I could have gone for another... On the women talking episode. At least I didn't shush you. That's how close Babylon is to my heart, Jo. That I dare in tone. No, no, no.

Is Babylon a top 10 contender in your mind, Joanna? I mean, I think so, but towards the bottom of the list. Yeah. I've been thinking about it at number 10. Okay. I'm intrigued by that. At the moment, I think there is a lot of admiration for the accomplishment of the movie, despite its very clear flaws to the movie going public and to critics and et cetera. And they always surprise us. You know, just just they're always by they i mean the academy academy i know but like it's always slightly edgier or slightly more

forward thinking like never enough never like anywhere close to what we expect but there's just always one thing where it's like oh i guess i can't totally dismiss this entire thing because you nominated phantom thread or you didn't nominate being the ricardos or you know like they they kind of just barely get it and this seems like the kind of movie that would squeak in i don't think it'll win very much but i would put it at 10 i think that the version of that for me would be something like triangle of sadness like a triangle of sadness popped in there then i'd be like all right guys okay i was gonna put triangle of sadness at like nine or eight that's the mistake i think that we made in the last podcast and like it's almost as soon as we were done recording i

was like oh i undervalue triangle of sadness especially with like the international voters you know we know that the french love triangle of sadness um so i think i feel pretty confident that it will get a best picture nom so i i like both of those suggestions i think you're both right that's also two films that were not on our list one month ago yeah so that makes this more intriguing because i think it's pretty hard to say that avatar the way of water won't be nominated now given what's happening it will we'll move it up yeah so that will have to be moved up out of the 10 spot the one that is an interesting talking point is glass onion to me is whether or not that will make it in um i i think i can see it i think i can see ryan back in the screenwriting category and this would be an adapted because it's a sequel and i hate that loophole but like there's a big there's a there's an open space and adapted yeah it's a

soft category i could see ryan popping over there but it doesn't feel like a best picture. It doesn't feel big enough to be a best picture contender for me, nor artistically sharp enough. Do you know what I mean? It's neither big enough nor, you know, breaking through. And that might be sort of like the dulling Netflix effect or whatever. I mean, I love the film, to be clear. But in terms of like, we're going to talk about multiple commercial hits and this would be the one that i would leave off the list what do you think amanda i agree i also kind of think that the netflix slash just a 400 million dollar like bonanza of it all will be

slightly held against it you know the first one didn't come out of nowhere, but was like a genuine success and like in box office and then at home. And it felt, you know, popular, but also well-crafted. And I think that Glass Onion is also popular and well-crafted, but just because everyone watched it with their parents over Christmas, you know, I just kind of feel like it gets dumped into the crowd-pleasing holiday bucket. So if that is the case,

and I think it is possible what you're saying, I also think this is arguably the most seen non-Avatar movie of any movie, and it's only been out for two weeks. Like that's ever mattered to the Oscars. It hasn't. The movie does have pedigree it's been nominated for academy awards before there's this belief that it was number 10 when knives out was originally released but there were only nine films nominated that year i don't know there's something lingering in my mind that it might get recognized i think it's also like some of those things that you cited joanna the fact that it is not a

breakthrough in any way the fact that it that artistically it doesn't totally seem like it's not resonating as strongly maybe as the original film did or even some of Brian's other movies. I still think there's admiration for him for doing original storytelling. If it's not nominated, no streamers on the list this year, which is fascinating. Because unless...

Yeah. If No All Quiet on the Western front doesn't come in either. Right. Yeah. Yeah. If Netflix doesn't have like, what is an even is an awards race without a Netflix, like,

you know, Oh, tour contender. It's going to, there's going to be a lot of attention spent on best international feature where they'll probably have two films. I mean, that's,

that's really what it's going to be about, which is so interesting because obviously in the aftermath of the CODA victory, it felt like there was, if not a changing of the guard, an acceptance that this is the future,

that this is what movies are. And now, as I said to Amanda earlier this week on the show, I'm like, it's actually the complete opposite to me now. I'm like,

movies are in movie theaters. Like that actually is where the business is going to go more strongly in the second half of this year and into 24 once they've kind of been able to reset the table because there's just too much loose money to not pursue. And there are too many of these companies are in too much debt or their stock prices are plummeting that they need to be able to show revenue more aggressively to the street so that they can say, hey, honestly, that's what they have to do. It's because the street is like, fuck you guys. Your streaming gambit failed.

Do you know about JMO? No. Okay. It's a podcast that Chris and Sean invented and it's like a podcast within a podcast and Sean just slipped into JMOs talking about the street that's that's what you

saw is that you know it will never fully be publicly released but that's what jmo is just to be clear by the street do you mean are you saying wall street yes wall street are you dropping the wall and you're just calling it the street have you never heard anyone call it the street i need you guys to get on jim kramer asap i live and die by these bad jmo updates that show up on my phone all the time okay don't tell me to go watch jim kramer i want to talk more about revenue generation in hollywood and i don't know why you guys won't join me on this let me let me try to hop on a fantasy s segue and say talking about revenue in hollywood are you guys giving up on top gun maverick or do you think it goes higher on this list or you just think it does not do you feel like avatar way of water steals the top gun maverick slot in terms of like the massive

box office. Amanda's worst nightmare, Joanna. Yeah. Her literally in the- I'm just like, I'm having a physical reaction now. I felt my pulse just start like elevating. I'm on team. I'm, to be clear, out here in the streets, I am on team Top Gun Maverick.

You're in the streets, but I'm on the street, okay? And there is a difference. There is, yeah. I can't remember the threats I made on the last podcast like for you know my acts of protest if top were you threatening i i don't the world i don't know what i said she's gonna take to the street and uh make a difference you primarily okay me cool um yeah. I don't remember the specifics. It has to be nominated. And I also, I think that it's been such a phenomenon and there is such joy and consensus around it.

I don't think they'll be that stupid. I may live to regret it, but I think we will be seeing both Avatar and Top Gun Maverick in Best Picture. So the reason I brought this up is to go back to glass onion if you're talking about like crowd pleasers or something that feels populist or something that made a lot of money there are four big films which are like elvis which made so much money right everything everywhere all at once top gun which made less money but feels like a more populist hit because genre blah blah top gun Maverick and Avatar so I just don't feel like Glass Onion like if the Academy

is out here trying to balance the you know movies that people actually saw versus movies that only critics at film festivals

saw I think they have a lot arranged I agree with that you know that makes me wonder about Woman King I also have that

question. Yeah. Which is sad because I liked it. I liked it too. It made $300 million worldwide, which is pretty good business. I mean, two exits budget. It's, you know, real crowd pleaser obviously. I think, did it have like an A-plus cinema score? Had like a hugely positive cinema

score. And has, you know has big-time movie star performances. Gina Prince-Bythewood, there's a good story to tell there about her work and her career. It feels a little bit like there might be a Nightmare Alley moment with this movie, though, where it's like, oh, wow, they actually did

recognize it, where we maybe were not thinking of it, but it feels like a movie that's going to get cut in this top-tenning. I mean i just feel like babylon is the nightmare alley yeah you know that makes sense see also carnies that's i don't want to see carnies is my like general philosophy i'd like to see more no i'd like to see more carnies i want as many Carnies in my cinema as possible. Carnival of Souls, Freaks, Todd Browning's classic. The Carnival, the HBO series.

I'd like to see more of that. I love Carnival, by the way. Thank you, Joanna. Show me all the Carnies. I'm anti-Carney in general, but Carnival is great. The Woman King feels like a question of timing. Peaked too early, right? But also, this one is critical

because it's a Sony film and it will be on Netflix soon. I don't know when. Will it be on Netflix before January 17th when Oscar voting closes? Should have already been on Netflix if I were running this campaign. Yeah.

That's what I would say. It could have been a holiday release, but they didn't want to crowd out their own releases with a big release. See, this is the trickiness of being a distributor and a licensor. So this might be really boring people, but as I go back to the street

and I think about corporate entertainment strategy here on this podcast, would it have been better to get Woman King on the Netflix service on December 21st? I say yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

And so unfortunately, it's being cut here. What's in this McDonald's bag? The McValue Meal. For $5.79 plus tax, you can get your choice of Junior Chicken, McDouble, or Chicken Snack Wrap, plus small fries and a small fountain drink. So pick up a McValue Meal today at participating McDonald's restaurants in Canada. Prices exclude delivery. What about Women Talking, the film we were talking about on this podcast? This is like something they want to nominate, right? Like that they want to your earlier point of like, we want to support a film like Women Talking. And especially if we're stretching the allegory of this conversation to be about the me too movement

and etc and if she said is just like a nothing uh entry this year then this feels like it feels like deference to that conversation by including it but they just keep kicking it down the road i don't know why they do that like why are they doing that do you have any insight from the street no i'm not sure i will what i will do is any insight from the street? No, I'm not sure. I will. What I will do is I will visit the street today and I will report back to you about what the street is saying about women talking. Right. The street is talking about women talking.

And I am talking about what the street is saying about the men, the men of the street are talking about women talking. There are women on the street. The street is, the street is, it does not see gender. The street is, the street sees all street is it does not see gender the street is the street sees all okay i see a bit emerging here um the the thing with women talking is i think the movie that you're

describing is actually tar i think that the movie that they want to nominate is tar well yeah they're definitely nominating tar yeah but so but i wonder if like is tar enough for the sort of more high-minded branch of the academy the sort of literate and you know idea focused societally focused branch think a branch of thinkers like i i don't know if that will be enough and obviously they don't think in this very specific way because they're not a you know uh they're not a conglomerate of any kind but i i just feel like that a movie like this is actually vulnerable in part because there is a tar this year. Let me take you to a different street, which is Campaign Street, and argue that Frances McDormand as an executive producer and like huge muscle behind this film is such an Academy favorite that I see so much power in what she can push to

include this movie and make it feel like a crucial nominee. It's a good argument, but she's also barely in it. And she certainly is campaigning, but there is more power when she's the face of the thing, as opposed to when she's the, you know, the supporting cameo that I made this happen cameo, which is great. Thank you,

Francis McDormand. I, I don't know. It just doesn't seem to have a lot of juice behind it. I, I, is there another category? Like,

do you think it would be in screenplay? Probably. Probably in adapted. Yeah. I could agree taking out the list if you think it's going to be nominated in screenplay. Who will be nominated for the performances? Claire Foy is the only one who would be nominated I think.

I thought there was some movement around Jesse Buckley as well. In supporting? There's always movement in my heart. I know. I was just saying, I don't know whether I'm just being influenced by Sean there. Yeah, I think Jesse Buckley and Claire Foy are both competing. I think there's a lot of admiration for both, but I think Jesse Buckley is seen a little bit more as a movie actor. Claire Foy has a little bit of the TV tinge, unfortunately, for her.

What did you think when Claire Foy played the girl, what was it, in the hornet's nest? What did she do? Don't you love that there are two Lisbeth Salanders in this movie? Yes, I do. And Claire Foy would, I mean, excuse me, and Jessie Buckley would be a wonderful Lisbeth Salander.

Do you know what I was reminded of that I'm not using enough is you're just a bunch of boys, which is an incredible moment in a Damien Chazelle film. I was going to say, brought to you by my guy, Damien. I know.

I got it. She's wonderful. I think it'll probably be Jesse Buckley, but it could be Claire Foy. You never know. And frankly, it could be neither of them if this movie is not received in the same way

that we're expecting or ever released. Is that movie at number eight then in our conversation here or are you arguing that it's not on it at all. I mean it has like real

don't put it on on all. Well I think it might be 10 and I think Babylon might be nine and trying to sign this might be eight. OK. I just I think it's

count honestly that my face was not don't put it on at all. My face was counting. and I think Babylon might be nine and Trinidad and Tinnitus might be eight. Okay. I just lost count, honestly. My face was not, don't put it on at all, my face was counting. Because you're like, what else do we still have to put on? Yeah, I was like, I forget. My face was counting is an autobiography title

if I've ever heard one. All right, I'm going to do that if you guys are comfortable with that. I think that's good, yeah. I think I'm missing one, but I think there's six, six at least. Oh,

because we dropped, we dropped Glass Onion and Woman King and we added Babylon and Triangle of Sadness. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So we've got, I accept.

We've got seven more here to slot. Fable ones? Is it this far down? Wow. A precipitous fall. Yeah. From the frontrunner in the aftermath of Toronto the

Toronto Film Festival this was the knockdown this this gonna win prepare for four months of this now obviously that rarely comes to pass Coda at this time last year was maybe in the number four or five spot so

things change pretty pretty rapidly but I don't did it fall to seven that quickly because no one watched it it's a bold move and i respect a bold move when i'm power ranking i just can't i'm looking at the other options and i can't think anything else below put elvis i do think elvis goes above the fabelmans which is a crazy thing to say so you're right amanda fabelmans at seven and elvis at six. I think Elvis might be even higher, which is distressing

me. The Elvis surge is really distressing me to be honest with you. I agree. Which is not, it's not a movie that I hated, but I don't understand the current conversation around it. I believe it's actually Top Gun Maverick at six. I think that's right.

You just made a face, Amanda, like you were going to hit someone with a pitchfork. At some point, you need to accept your own power, Sean. You know? What do you mean? And you need to put things out into the world that you want to see come back to you. Okay?

It's what we call the secret. No. I'm a reporter for the street. I am but a vessel for the news and information. No, no, no, no, no, no. That's not true. The street does not vote for the street. I am but a vessel for the news and information. The street does not vote for the Oscars. I like that Amanda's encouraging you

to influence the street. And the big pick has a lot of muscle and if you make something a favorite, a darling of the big pick, I'm grateful you said that. I'd like to place Babylon

at number one and that is how I, and if I can assert my dominance in any way, it would be to reward that film. I think it's a question of, is Avatar the Way of Water going to stay this hot?

And it won't, but right now it is actually ahead of Maverick. Just for this period of time. Yeah, I think I accept that. And then you think Elvis is higher than both of them. I do. I think it's Top Gun Maverick and then Avatar the Way of Water at five.

We have got to have an intervention with old people. Yeah. We just have to sit them all down and say, listen. Is it the old people? Because your music is good and we still listen to it.

No, no, no. It is also, it is also the bizarre youth surge for Austin Butler that I don't understand. Oh, all the kids. I mean, I think it's both.

It's coming. It's a pincer attack. And as someone who's in the middle, I am. Are there a lot of like 24 year olds who are voting for the Academy and in the Academy for Austin Butler? Are they telling their parents? I think it's keeping it in the conversation at a certain level. Yes. Yes.

I think the acceptance of him as a movie star by us and by all. Would you vote for Elvis for best picture if Alice asked you to? No. Okay, good. Then let that be a lesson to any Academy voters. Don't let your parent kids sway you. Elvis is not good, guys. What are we even?

What is this charade around Elvis is absurd. It's absurd. It's preposterous like i would give it i would give it some i would like happily put it in costume or production design or like you know there's a number of places that i would put it but i would not put it number four best picture but this this is the reality that we are facing i think i liked it the most of anyone on this podcast. And I basically refuse to like acknowledge the reality that you're describing. Like I, it's just not number four to me, the old, you know, whatever. I, I know that you guys are talking to the people at the screenings and they're just, you know, going wild for Tom Hanks's accent, but, uh, no, I,

okay. We can put it at four four but i'm building a different world okay you know okay amanda i would i would support you in using your influence to continue to chisel away i am trying actively to chisel away at the austin butler narrative and my twitter mentions are you against i am happy for him to be nominated i'm happy for him to be nominated. I'm happy for him to be nominated. But if he wins over Colin Farrell or a number of other people, I will be very mad. That'd be a disaster.

Very mad. Of course, it's a disaster. But I did watch the movie and be like, oh, I get it. So there is power in that. I think it has

one really cool thing going for it, which is that, and I've seen, I've talked to a couple of people that's over the break, my family members who watched it. has a great ending you know the

ending of the fat elvis ending at the piano and then the comparison and like his performance in the makeup which is often kind of like lame and ghoulish in movies like this and he really sold it i think that's a big reason why people walk out and they're like, wow, it was a transformation. It was this incredible kind of tragic denouement to this story of American iconography that is very effective. But there are long stretches of the movie which are just complete musician biopic horseshit. Like just so bland, so uninteresting, very little to say about the nature of his celebrity, his artistry. Yeah, I really like I'm with you, Amanda, in that I find it frustrating that it is so popular, but it clearly is so popular.

And this is another case too where- Is this like a Bohemian Rhapsody thing though? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Where we're all just a little like, great, but it didn't win. You know, we spent a lot of time being like, oh my God, everyone's gonna vote for Bohemian Rhapsody. The world has no taste. But Rami Malek did win. Okay,, we spent a lot of time being like, oh my God, everyone's going to vote for Bohemian Rhapsody.

The world has no taste. But Rami Malek did win. Okay, well, that's true. Okay. And that's, that's the, that's the future

I do not want. I, I stand with you on that. Thank you. But it didn't win Best Pictures and these are

Best Picture Power Rankings. So, but I still think four is where it belongs. All right. Okay. All right. Elvis at four

that means we've got three films left three great films from the top three is what I think I'm a fan I'm a huge fan of all three of these films as well Amanda not so much tar we're all we're all

we're all we're all aligned on tar now tar had quite an exciting Wednesday night because the man the myth myth, the legend, Martin Scorsese, appeared at the New York Film Critics Circle Awards. And he bestowed upon Tar incredible praise

and said that he felt the clouds part as he imagined the future of cinema after seeing the film Tar. And let me just say, I will ride into the sky on a skybound chariot with Marty to the heavens to see more of Todd Field's work. Thank you to TAR. There's a 0% chance it's ever going to win Best Picture. But it's very exciting that we could say on a podcast that it will be number three.

Do you guys agree with me? I do. TAR rules. So does Martin Scorsese. All right. So now the hard part. Is the Banshees bump real? The Banshees bump

is so exciting to me. And does it not feel real to you? It does. It does. It does. I think a lot of

I think a lot of regular people seeing it and being like you got to see this movie. It was good. That feels like what the energy is around that movie right now. A movie that would have made $85 million to the box office four or five years ago,

but now can't crack 10 million, but 100 million people will watch it on HBO Max. It is a very sad film in many ways, and there's a forlorn quality to it that I think makes it a little bit more challenging in this respect, in a way that everything ever wants does not have that problem, right? There is a sadness in that movie too, but ultimately there is uplift in the storytelling and people walk out feeling good the same way they did with Coda. Um,

I don't think it can ever get to number one. Banshees. I think it's cool that we could talk about it potentially being, being at number one. What do you guys think? I was going to put it at number one. You were now. I mean,

these, but this is like a live predictor, right? This is like the needle. This is our version of the needle and not our- Don't say that. Well, but it's not our- Save it for JMO, please. Okay.

Sorry. Sorry that I dare to dream big. So I don't actually think it's going to win best picture, but I think right now the bump is very real and it and a lot of people. So I guess I don't really understand how we're doing these rankings. You know what? I'm happy to throw accuracy out the window and just say, let's put Banshees as number one. Okay. I love a toxic and dishonest list

more than anybody else in the world. So you want to put, why do we do this? Because then we put the list on Twitter without context and everyone yells. And it's, okay. So you actually think of everything everywhere all at once at number one. Make your case.

It is the film that is the least divisive thus far. Thus far. We got two months. Well, and it has the sticking power. It has proven sticking power. Yes. It's also, they've run an extraordinarily good campaign. The best campaign by far, in my opinion.

They put this movie in front of lots of people. They've told the story about Michelle Yeoh and her greatness and her career. They've told the story about Kiwi Kwan's comeback. They've told the story about the power of family. They've told the story about the immigrant experience. There's so many themes and performers and crafts, people involved in this movie that it's an, it's a big story to sell.

And a 24 is very good at this. They've done this. They did this before with Moonlight. They know how to do this. So I also, I just like this movie and I think it would be cool if the Academy gave best picture to a movie like this.

It's like it would be officially time for me to stop complaining if a movie like this wins. Because this movie, even by the realm of like Parasite, it is way weirder and way more out of step with what the Academy historically does. So I don't know if I'm rooting hardest for it per se. I likeder and way more out of step with what the academy historically does so

i don't know if i'm rooting hardest for it per se i like tar and babylon more in many ways but it would be a bold and and cool move to do they've got a bit of a fan problem they do which could lead to a bit of a discourse problem and just some kind of what do you feel like is that what what do you mean by this but by a fan fan problem a lot of reply guys a lot of toxicity um for against it no no no no uh it's fans uh are kind of out there inserting themselves and crusading in some ways that, you know, isn't always the best. So you can see that creating just some, honestly, fatigue more than anything. But that's really, I think that's the only thing standing out.

I mean, I would agree with you, except I did watch The Flash enter the Speed Force last year on the Oscars. True, it's a good point. So, you know. That's a great call i mean that's the thing is sometimes that level of toxicity does is still a movie can be impervious despite that um yeah i i like putting banshees at one even though i just do not believe that i don't think it's going to stay there but i think it should be there right now okay yeah let's just let's do the live reading you know in honor yeah in honor of the streaming bump which is you know something that people should really be thinking about

right and she's has that right now going for it so what movies are not streaming on this list let's take a look women talking of course is not babylon of course is not those are both still in theaters now triangle of sadness is not either and that theoretically i guess would go to hulu since that's a neon film right right the fablements of course is not yet there and where will that go also to hulu um avatar is not there top gun maverick is now in paramount plus elvis is on hbo max tar is not streaming Is there a tar bump? Can it go from three to two to one when it hits Peacock? No, nobody has Peacock. No. Well, people might get Peacock because of Brian Johnson's show.

Oh, Poker Face. I watched the trailer and I was like, I will definitely be watching this. Yeah, I've watched it and I loved it. Yeah. Okay. That's very encouraging to hear. I'm very excited about that. Okay.

I'm going to read the list. Number 10, Women Talking. Number 9, Babylon. Number 8, Triangle of Sadness. Number 7, The Fablemans. Number 6, Top Gun Maverick. Number 5, Avatar, The Way of Water, Big Jim. Way to go, bud. Number 4, Elvis. Number 3, Tar. Number 2, Everything Everywhere All at Once. And number 1, The Banshees have been a sharon we certainly made a list this this heals my heart because i was one of the people i love martin mcdonough and i hated three billboards and that award season really bothered me so if banshees does really well like i will feel like something has been corrected in the world according to me the one the not i shouldn't say the one thing but a thing that it has going for it is that the buzz is now very strong that Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Cary Condon, and also Barry Keoghan are all maybe nominated. Barry Keoghan and Brendan Gleeson in supporting seems like a little bit of a stretch, but if that happens, it's going to be in a very strong position. And that's the thing about the things at the top of this list is they're all Cate Blanchett is definitely getting nominated.

Michelle Yeoh is almost, you know, certainly getting nominated. Austin Butler. Like if you have an, you know, and then avatar is going to run the technical. If you have such a firm chokehold on these other big categories,

that's what keeps you towards the top of that conversation. The best picture is right. Amanda is Colin. Colin Farrell is my number one awards agenda this year. It's time. He was in four great films. You'll have to come back, Joe, and stump more aggressively for Colin Farrell. Amanda, just what's winning?

I don't. Oh, God. I honestly don't know. I don't know. I know this is my job and I just have an answer for this. I, I honestly don't know. I don't know. I know I, this is my job and I just have an answer for this and now I'm just vamping. Um,

I, that's the kind of the reason I said put Banshees at one, because I know I was like, we're doing it now and it won't eventually, but you can see it's a combo of a lot of people in the academy really do like Martin McDonough. It's a type of movie that is surprising, but still feels Oscar-y. You know, it like has the accomplished performances and the, um, it has the narrative of the it's time for Colin Farrell. Uh, it, and it, you know,

it has the great sweaters, honestly, immaculate sweaters. And I think it unites a lot of different types of voters whether you're voting for the performance or you're voting for the script I don't know I could just see it happening um I also could see everyone just deciding last minute that that tar is the way which would be a catastrophe for the Oscars and movies, but also great. That would be quite a challenge for us as podcasters to celebrate and scream at the same time. Jo, what do you think is going to win? Let's just do Banshees. Let's just say it.

Let's just manifest it. Okay. I heard Amanda invoke the secret. So I feel like we're manifesting. I think Barbarian's going to win. Thanks so much to both of you. Really enjoyed our conversation here today. Let's go now to my joined by Sarah Polley.

Sarah, thanks for doing this. Thanks so much for having me. Sarah, after I saw Stories We Tell, I was really excited about where you were going to take your film career because that was such an amazing reinvention of form. And then a long time passed. And I was wondering what your mentality was as a filmmaker immediately after Stories We Tell.

I mean, I had a child. My first child right around the time Stories We Tell came out. So I was really focused on being as present as possible with my kids, which in terms of the model that existed for making films at the time, wasn't really compatible with directing for me. I mean, I just didn't want to miss my kids waking up and going to bed every night for months on end and didn't see a way that I could just kind of create a new model where I could be present. So I ended up taking that time. I mostly have been writing. I wrote a book. I wrote a miniseries. I've written a lot of scripts for other people and really enjoyed working on that

craft of writing actually and kind of honing that. And also in that 10 years, I think gave myself a much richer film education than I'd had before. I mean, I sort of learned to make films by doing it. And so I was able to kind of fill in a lot of gaps and watch a lot of movies and think about writing a lot. So coming back to it, I felt like I'd had a different kind of training and I had different muscles. And I also had more of a sense of gratitude and joy in terms of the just magnificent joy of the job of getting to create these imaginary worlds with really talented people. So it really shifted the whole process for me to take that time off. I was curious about that writing and spending more time writing. You just published

a book this year, a collection of essays about your life. And I was wondering what that experience of excavating those memories and putting them down on paper helped you understand better or taught you as a filmmaker. Did that help you see that part of the job differently? Yeah, actually. And it sort of occurs to me now as you ask the question, something that I don't think I've had words for, which is that, you know, when you're writing a book, if you've been used to writing screenplays, which are really always in a live document, it's always in process, it's always a blueprint for something else. To have to write something that's a final document requires a kind of rigor that I hadn't been used to. And a kind of perfectionism and sense of realizing that you could rewrite something 8,000 times and still not get to the end of improving it. And so I really took that into my process as a screenwriter, where I was not nearly

as easily satisfied as I have been in the past. I wrote 100 times more drafts. I always saw something as something that could be improved upon or which I might not have found yet. I was willing to rip it apart and make bold experiments. And I think in the past, it's been a much more linear, discrete process of sort of finding the film, honing it down and kind of getting the script where I want it to be fairly quickly. And this one, I just challenged myself to be as rigorous with the script as I had been with my book. So

I think that really changed my writing process. This is jumping ahead a little bit, but you make me think of this as you say that about women talking. Did that script stay locked as you were shooting the film or was there any flexibility to kind of evolve it as you were making the movie? Yeah. I mean, so we, you know, I wrote a million drafts of it. And then in rehearsal, when we were just unpacking the text with each other on Zoom, there was a deep dive into the text and things shifted. Absolutely. And then we got the scenes on their feet in the set, in the hayloft in the week before shooting and things shifted again. And even when we were on set, we would find moments and craft things that hadn't been there. As people got more comfortable contributing

and lending their voice, I think it was really, it wasn't a live document. So did it change radically? No, but I think it got honed and shifted and important things got added as we went along. I assume in the aftermath of Stories We Tell, you were approached to direct other films, right? Yeah.

And were you just consistently just turning down those gigs? Yeah, I was. First of all, because of my kids. And secondly, because then I sustained a really serious concussion, which lasted for about, the symptoms lasted about three and a half years. So I actually didn't think I was going to be able to make a film again. In fact, I was told by medical professionals that it was unlikely that I would be able to multitask in that way or have that kind of stamina again. So at first, it was a choice to pull back from directing to be more present for my kids.

Then it became what I thought was an impossibility to be able to manage a film set. And then coming back to this film, once I had, you know, really found this kind of amazing cure in this, at the UPM, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, which really helped rehabilitate me and got me completely back to 100% after my concussion, then I was still left with this obstacle of shooting hours and wanting to have a reasonable life where I was present with my kids and met with Dee Dee Gardner and Frances McDormand about this film and express that, that, you know, as much as I know, men have written the rules of the film industry. Let's rewrite the rules. Let's work 10-hour days. Let's make sure everybody's home for bedtime. And so suddenly that kind of collective of women made it possible for me to see myself in this job again, which was such a gift.

Were you excited to be back on a feature film set? Were you trepidatious at all? Like, what was that feeling like going back to directing a film? I was really excited. I would describe every day as having at least one moment of actual euphoria. I felt like I had little to lose. I had lived quite happily making a living as a writer for 10 years and with my kids. And, I felt like I could take risks and push myself and take chances in a way that I hadn't before. And I just so reveled in the collaboration and the intensive collaboration that happens in the filmmaking process in a way that I just don't think I'd appreciated before. You've done adaptation before. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the process of taking extant material

and being faithful to it, but also putting into it what you feel you need to to make it cinematic. You know, you've done it in a feature. You did it with a TV series as well. For this, with Miriam's novel, what was it like to kind of take it apart and put it back together again? I mean, it was a really long, intensive process. I mean, her book is so beautiful and it's so searing and so efficient.

And I knew that to find it as a film would be a challenge and an exciting challenge. I really wanted to make sure that this film didn't just live in that hayloft, that there was an expansive canvas to talk about and feel the world that these women were talking about. Basically breaking apart and then remaking according to their beliefs and values. Um, but the conversation that she makes happen in the book had to be kind of rearranged and filled in and subtracted from and honed. And it just felt like this very intense, long process of sculpting that conversation into something that would work in a film while still trying to maintain the spirit of what she had

written in the book. Are you ever in touch with the author when doing this kind of work? Do you show them the work afterwards? What is that process like? I try to always be in touch with the author both before and during and after. So I always like to meet with an author as a first step. And my favorite question to ask is if there's one thing that's most important to you in the adaptation of this material, what is it it and I think you always learn a lot about that answer in terms of something you may not have noticed or seen or thought was particularly important and Miriam's answer was such a great guiding principle because her answer was the laughter just don't lose the laughter it's such an important part of these communities it's such an important part of these communities. It's such an important part of survival.

It's so characteristic of these women. As soon as the men are out of the room, there's so much laughter and physicality and warmth. And so to have that as a guiding principle really helped because this film desperately needed that. And so to make sure that we were honoring and moving towards laughter and lightness wherever we could was something that

I really thought a lot about. And then, yes, I always show the first draft that I'm happy with, and then a final draft to the writer. And I always think interesting things come out of those conversations. Did you know anything about Mennonite communities before this? Because, you know, speaking of laughter, that's not something we necessarily associate with maybe our preconceived notions. Yeah, oddly, I've had quite a lot of contact with Mennonite communities and have Mennonite friends. So it was a, it's a faith that I'm really drawn to and interested in. And there are so many things about these communities that I'm in deep admiration of the sense of community and collectivity and selflessness,

I think is so compelling and so interesting to me. And I think it was a good place to start as a base in terms of not being Mennonite myself and telling this story of pretty horrific things that happened in this Mennonite colony in Bolivia in 2010, I think it was important to me that we always be really honoring and respecting the faith itself and not approaching these women's beliefs with any judgment because we were telling the story of the horrific nature of what happens when there are these hierarchical systems of power that develop and grow up around a faith that is really genuine. So, and trying to parse those things out from each other. And I think that's what the women in this film do. They're picking apart and trying to tear apart what their faith is and what they most deeply believe and want to honor and move towards and what the world is that's grown up and sprung up in the name of that faith and define how those things are separate

from each other. So the film works as a really strong allegory for a series of ideas, but it's also this tightly woven, very focused, intimate story. And sometimes when something operates as a big allegory, it can sometimes be overwhelmed by the ideas that you're trying to communicate. I was wondering if you could talk about seeking that balance between making the audience understand something outside the walls of the hayloft without necessarily letting us look past or get disinterested in the actual narrative of the story. Yeah. I mean, one really superficial thing I knew early on was that the film couldn't run over 100 minutes.

I knew that it had to be efficient and move like a bullet and that we had to be oftentimes on the edge of our seat watching and wondering whether someone was going to change their mind and allow the group to move forward or hold it back or sabotage it. I also knew that it needed this epic canvas to live on and a sense of momentousness and gravity. I mean, the stakes could not be higher for these women. It is life or death, and they have 24 hours to make up their mind about whether or not they're going to stay and fight or leave and do nothing

after the series of terrible attacks. So I didn't want to shy away from the intensity of that and the stress of it and the excitement and also just the world-changing impact that whatever their decision would have would make. So it was about getting into the granular and their individual relationships and the philosophical ideas while also just remembering at all times that there is also a ticking clock. There's also this giant canvas we have to work on because of the size of the decision they're making and to try to keep those things in balance.

Sarah, we end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers what the last great thing that they have seen. Have you seen anything great lately? I saw an incredible movie, which is probably my favorite film of the last few years that they have seen. Have you seen anything great lately? I saw an incredible movie, which is probably my favorite film of the last few years, called Brother. It's a Canadian movie made by Clement Virgo. And I think it features two of the best performances I've seen in years, Aaron Francis and Lamar Johnson.

And I want it to have the biggest life ever. And I just, I saw it at the Toronto Film Festival. Everyone just leapt to their feet, screaming and crying and applauding. And I'm just so excited to see how that movie progresses in the world. That's a great recommendation, Sarah. Thanks so much.

Congrats on Women Talking. Appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it. Thanks to our producer, Bobby Wagner, for his work on this episode. Thanks, of course, to Sarah Polly and Joanna Robinson. Next week, we'll be coming to you immediately after the Golden Globes on Tuesday night, reporting on the first big award show of the season. We'll see you then.