The Big Picture - Hollywood Is Pressing Pause. So Stream These Movies. | The Big Picture

Episode Date: March 13, 2020

The coronavirus and new social distancing measures have led most major studios to delay their spring theatrical releases. With blockbuster titles like 'Fast & Furious 9,' 'Mulan,' and 'A Quiet Place: Part II' on hold and many people quarantined at home, streaming has become the movie lover's refuge. Sean and Amanda talk about the long-term ramifications of the delays and then they each pick three movies from three different streaming services to get you through a long weekend free of human contact. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys? This is Kelly, and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. Make sure to check out the latest addition to the Ringer lineup, Music Exists. Each week, Chris Ryan and Chuck Klosterman ask and answer questions about their love of music while exploring the role of concerts, locations, fandom, criticism, genre, lyrics, and much, much more. You can listen to new episodes of Music Exists and follow along every week for free on Spotify. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about being stuck at home.

The coronavirus has been declared a pandemic. The Ringer is working from home across the board and Amanda, all we have to keep us company is movies. And so we're going to talk about movies here on the podcast and we're also going to talk a little bit about what this pandemic means for movies. Earlier this morning, we learned that A Quiet Place Part 2 was being postponed indefinitely. We also learned that Fast and Furious 9

has been postponed until 2021. Fast 9 is not going to be coming for more than a year, which is just absolutely incredible. Last week, No Time to Die was pushed to November. These will not be the last of the delays. How are you feeling about the state

of the movie industry right now, Amanda? Concerned or surprised? I mean, we're going to do our best to give everyone informed analysis and thoughts. But the reality is, is that we don't know anything and nobody really knows anything. This is unprecedented and many of the dominoes are still falling. And something like Fast 9, you know, obviously it being delayed a year is unusual and a year is a really long time. But that also is an illustration of just the ripple effects of something like this, that it's going to go on for a long time and we don't really know

how. So I'm feeling how I always feel when I am unprepared and don't know everything, which is not great. So what do you think you're going to be doing over the course of the next couple of weeks? Do you think you'll just be hunkered down in your home watching movies? Will you be cooking a lot? How do you expect to, when you're not working, handle your time? Yes, there will be movies. There will be cooking for sure. My husband and I are both home cooks and I have been both trying to not panic stocking, but to responsibly have things and then also plan projects. I'm not really a crafts person. Cooking is only the hobby, the only hobby I have. I think I'm going to be reading a bit more

later on in this show. You and I are going to do some streaming recommendations. And I have also selected accompanying book recommendations to go with the movies because, you know, we have a lot of time to fill. And also I like books and nobody really talks about books at all. So I'm just going to sneak them in where I can. What else will I be doing? You know, I think maybe I'll get really into phone calls. Wow. Probably not. Who would you call? I don't know.

I mean, it's not like I will be going out to see that many people. So I don't know. I got a lot of contacts. Maybe I'll just do the random dial where, you know, phone numbers that I've had in my phone for like 10 years, but haven't spoken to the people in eight years.

Just be like, hey, checking in. Want to see what you're up to? I'm sure that won't be weird at all. During a global pandemic, people will feel like that's an absolutely normal course of action. What are you going to do? I'm going to watch a lot of movies. I'm going to use this opportunity. Maybe some TV shows. You know, Chris Ryan, our friend, pointed out to me that this is the true test of the drama series that you said you were going to watch if you had more time. And I don't know, maybe I'll really get into Narcos now. You know, I finally have my chance to do so. But really, the home of Narcos is kind of the place that is best positioned to succeed if one can succeed at a time like this because netflix is the place that is only

is really the only place that's going to be able to find people with their movies you know the hunt is opening this weekend and bloodshot is opening this weekend two pretty big mainstream studio releases but i don't expect that the audience for that for those movies is going to be very big in fact most people are that i know are staying far from movie theaters, which sucks in general and is terrible for the industry and terrible for the people who worked so hard on those movies. But there is a new movie on Netflix this weekend. It's called Lost Girls. It's a very serious drama about a serial killer on Long Island starring Amy Ryan. Interesting film. Unlike every other studio, which is kind of moving its release dates around and thinking about where the box office is going long term, Netflix just has a slew of movies

planned for the next six weeks. In fact, I mean, you can look at this schedule that you and I put together, but on March 20th, there's a horror movie called The Platform, I believe from Spain. On March 25th, Crip Camp, which you saw at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, there's a drama called Corked and an action movie called Coffee and Kareem and Alan Yang's Tiger Tail and kind of on down the line. So no matter how long this lasts, there's going to be a lot to watch on Netflix, which is fascinating. And it kind of leads us into this conversation that I feel like we've been nosing around for a couple of years on this show, which is should more studios seriously consider, if not exactly the Netflix model of giving people a film

if they have a subscription, should they possibly make their movies available at a bumped up price rate over a period of time like this? Yeah, this is a complicated question. And it does feel in a lot of ways that recent events have not, it was already bubbling, but have forced the issue in a lot of ways. And again will people have seen it? I don't really know, but that actually does feel like a movie to me that could find as much of an audience by a streaming instantly at like a medium price point than, than it will in theaters. And that's a little bit because of the online brouhaha around it. Obviously it was a movie that was originally scheduled to be released in September, I believe, and then was delayed because of some feedback. And then they have since leaned into that marketing campaign. I believe the tagline they're going with is like the movie that no one's seen and everyone's

talking about or something to that effect. And that sort of thing, you can imagine a lot of people being like, well, I'm stuck in my home. And I've heard a lot about this online where I've spent all day reading panic news alerts. I might as well click on something else. And, you know, that seems like something where you can make some money back. On the other hand, you have here written in our spreadsheet, if studios start making movies more available in the home during this time and take opportunity in the short term, do we go back to theaters? And does it undermine the long-term business model? And I don't know the answer to that again, but it sure seems like a possibility. Yeah, there was an irony that played out over the last couple of days,

which is that while movie chains like Alamo Drafthouse and the Arclight and AMC have encouraged people that they will be decontaminating their movie theaters as frequently as possible and keeping things clean and are very sensitive about the concerns around COVID-19, CinemaCon, which is essentially the movie theater lobby annual event that showcases all the films that are coming to theaters around the country, was canceled. And the fact that that event was canceled indicates just how much concern there is

for something like this. And the one thing that CinemaCon doesn't want to hear is that Netflix is best positioned to take advantage of something like this. And that could maybe even, this seems strong, but could maybe even change long-term patterns for moviegoers. Now, I think for both of us, we like to sit in a dark theater. We like to have the communal experience. We like the idea of, you know, you and I see a lot of movies in screening rooms, but honestly, my favorite experiences are seeing them with 200 people and hearing the gasps and hearing people crying and hearing people thrilled by something and i don't want to go to a place where we have to watch the hunt the hunt is the perfect kind of movie like it or hate it and it'll be interesting to hear what you think about it

next week when we discuss it it's worthy of a conversation and it's the sort of thing that you want to see with a bunch of people and then go out for a drink and talk about what you did or did not like about it, especially given the way that it's been marketed. And if I sat home at 5.48 p.m. as I start to wrap up my day during the COVID-19 crisis and I fire up the hunt and I watch it alone and then it ends and then I can do one of two things. I can stop thinking about it and move on with my day and do something else or i can probably just go on the internet and act like a shit lord and shit post about it either way right those are kind of bad those are bad outcomes that's that's kind of the opposite of what is good about movie culture so you know if i were a movie studio

i would have serious doubts about whether or not I should make these movies available. But honestly, given what's happened with the stock market and given that a lot of these companies are owned by massive conglomerations, they're going to have to seriously consider how to cut their losses. And I don't know. I mean, this might be a time to experiment, I would say. Maybe not totally shift strategy, but experiment. What would you be willing to pay for? I don't know. Let's use Mulan as an example. Next Friday, Mulan hits theaters. I mean, do you want to pick another example? Because no dollars.

Okay. What's another example? Is there a film coming out soon that you'd like to see, that you're eager to see well i do worry that everything that has not already been delayed will ultimately be delayed so no time to die would be a great example obviously it's not coming out till november but that is a movie that i am really excited about and it's also you know i know that it's a franchise and a lot of money. It's like a blue chip movie, if that makes any sense. We're talking about money. So what would I pay for No Time to Die? These are the terrible questions to ask me because I always way undersell or way oversell anything. There's never a practical thing. I guess I would pay. I absolutely would pay $20, $25. I'd be like, this seems like a little pricey,

but I guess I'll do it. And maybe 30 is my breaking point. Okay. I can assure you that under no circumstance will MGM make the James Bond movie available to you for $20. That will not happen. They've made the right decision in delaying it till November. Good job, business people.

You did a good job. I think the price point, and I recall, I can't recall the name of the company that Sean Parker was trying to start, but Sean Parker, you know, one Facebook figure of lore, was trying to start a company like this. And I believe the price point he identified was $100 on opening night. You could pay $100 and get a movie in your home. And this was, I don't know, five or six years ago, well before... I mean, television technology. I just got a new TV a couple of months ago. It just changed my life. It's just a giant screen.

And it is more than I ever could have dreamed of when I was 12 years old and all I wanted was a big screen TV. And it's not even that big. It's not extravagantly big. But the idea of being able to watch No Time to Die on my TV at home on opening night, I would probably pay 100 bucks. Now, that's really at the highest possible end of that. And also, you have to assume that I do not work in this industry at all and don't have access to these movies but if i'm a regular person and i've got a family of six and i've got popcorn here at home already i probably would have been paying a hundred bucks to take the whole family out to the bond movie i have two things to say number one i have also seen your new large screen television and it is not worth a hundred. That's not a $100 viewing experience. It's a nice TV, but like, no.

Number two, I think you can't ignore the fact that a $100 opening night movie would be competing against however many streaming services with however many more options for us and for a family of six. If you're a family of six, why would you pay $100 for a new movie when you have like the whole Netflix kids section and Disney Plus and whatever will be on HBO Max in however many coming weeks? And, you know, I like I understand that movies like No Time Today are really expensive and that you have to offset the cost somehow. But unfortunately, there's a competing marketplace and sometimes from the same studios that has set the price much lower. And I just don't think that you can expect consumer behavior to jump from $12 a month to $100 a night.

It's a fair point. point and i think what it does is it kind of underscores something we were discussing earlier this week on the show which was this really prizes movies like spencer confidential which we know are not going to be as creative or as compelling or as even kind of made with the same level of care as something like no time to die but it's good enough and movies that are good enough for ten dollars a month as opposed to one hundred dollars a night really have a chance to succeed here which is kind of fascinating i mean the movies that we'll talk about when we go to our next segment are our older movies that we love and we care about and we think will make people feel better or maybe a little bit worse depending on the movie that we're recommending um during this time when a lot of people are stuck in their homes. But new stuff is so tricky. I mean, I saw someone share this on Twitter, and this doesn't necessarily reflect what we're talking about here with No Time to Die versus Spencer Confidential. But

someone said, what if ESPN just released its 10-part Michael Jordan documentary series this weekend with all of the people that are going to be at home with no sports to watch now because NBA, MLB, NHL, and even NFL owners meetings have essentially been suspended indefinitely. So there isn't much to watch on ESPN. If we just put this Michael Jordan doc out, would it be the most watched television event of the year? Possibly. I guess so. I mean, you know, I suppose I would watch it because other people in my home would watch it. And I also do know who Michael Jordan is. 10 is a lot of parts. That's really a lot of parts. Just FYI. It should be 20. Sure. But that's another

really interesting thing, right? Of just kind of the behaviors that we've become accustomed to and what we see in a theater and what we see at home we expect everything to be 10 parts at home we're more used to this serial nature things and there is an element of the way that those types of projects are constructed where it's like now you got to watch another one and now you got to watch another one so i think it probably would be really uh watched does that like bode well for the types of movies that you and I like to talk about on this podcast? No, I'm concerned, even though, sure, I would watch the Michael Jordan documentary. I'm sure it's great. What about the smaller releases? What if Portrait of a Lady on Fire was available at home right now? Well, that's tricky, right? I think on the one hand, that is a movie that's just built for

a giant screen. I have been lucky enough to see it twice at the Dome in Los Angeles, which is like the largest possible screen. And it really is like living inside a beautiful painting. We have a colleague, Justin Verrier, who very sweetly, I think he listened to me ranting about Portrait of a Lady on Fire and he got a screener and then he watched it at home over the course of two nights. And he came to me and he was like, yeah, I wish I'd seen that in a theater. So I appreciated that he wanted to see it. And I think seeing it is better than not seeing it. But you are losing something. You know, one smaller movie that is out this week is Never Rarely Sometimes Always,

which I thought was just like a tremendously effective and heartbreaking movie that I don't think will make you feel any better about the world at large, but is definitely something that you could watch at home. And I think in situations like that, people are looking to both fill the time and have experiences that are different than just sitting in their house all the time. So maybe for smaller releases and especially kind of like non, I don't want to diminish the visual quality of Never Really, Sometimes, Always, but it's not like Portrait of a Lady, which is just about vistas the whole time. You know what I mean?

And I think those could have an opportunity. I know. And if my heart breaks for any movies or any filmmakers this weekend, it's really for people like Eliza Hittman, who made Never Rarely, Sometimes, Always, whose movies deserve to be seen in theaters and who worked hard on their films. I think the makers of The Hunt will be okay. I think the makers of Bloodshot will definitely be okay. They'll figure it out. Those studios will figure out what to do. Specialty studios and independent studios, it's just that the margins are that much thinner. It's that much harder to get movies like this made.

So that's a very tricky thing. I think that there could be some benefit, but the trick of it also is just marketing. And it's kind of hard to get people's attention about anything that isn't COVID-19 right now. I mean, really all of my news consumption over the past 24 hours has largely been oriented around this. Everything that we've been doing at work here at The Ringer has been finding ways to meaningfully contribute and or distract people from the fear, frustration and anxiety that this has provoked. And so just kind of getting the message across in the world

that a movie like Never Rarely Sometimes Always is out in the world is difficult, let alone available on iTunes or whatever service would be most appropriate. You know, with the caveat that we don't know what's going to happen, how do you think this is going to play out? Do you think that we're going to see movies

kind of canceled or postponed for a long stretch of time here? I think so, yes. I mean, the remaining shoe to drop is whether movie theaters will be able to stay open. And as you mentioned, CinemaCon, which is kind of the convention for the movie theater association and movie theaters, has been canceled. And it does seem like there is some question about whether people will be able to go to movie theaters in the United States in a week or two. Internationally, some countries have closed down movie theaters. So if that happens, then I do think everything gets moved because or maybe some things do get get shifted to streaming though I would be surprised

I kind of feel like most companies are going to be too caught off guard and not have both like the technological or the financial wherewithal to just immediately put everything on streaming that just seems unlikely to me but I could be wrong and it would be interesting it would be interesting if every studio you know tried one or two just to see what it's like. I agree with you. I think that there are some other seriously significant films coming down the pike that represent a lot. Obviously, there's an MCU movie coming out within the next six weeks, Wonder Woman 1984, Top Gun Maverick. These are films that the studios have built a large portion of their market share around and a movie like Fast 9 Moving clearly indicates that there's some really long-term ramifications

that these companies are deciding on. And I think you're right. Some are going to be able to have the financial wherewithal and some are not. Universal is a studio that is in good shape right now and made this choice because Fast 9 is such a global franchise that it has to do that we'll see we'll just have to keep our eyes out and ears open about what happens here you know i mentioned netflix and what i find most fascinating is that they're just making so many more movies than all of these other studios largely because they can but i mean they by the by may 1st which is really when I think is kind of the breaking point on how things are going to evolve here significantly and what choices the studios and moviegoers

are going to have to do, Netflix will have released 13 new English language films for the year. And the studio that has the most in the major studio system is Universal, which is only releasing five. And that's with Fast 9 having been moved. So, you know, a lot of people

are going to be turning to Netflix. Now, under normal circumstances, we could talk about Lost Girls or we could talk about Spencer Confidential. I think those movies are fine. I'd rather talk about movies that we care about and that we want to tell people to go check out if they haven't seen them.

I don't think our recommendations are necessarily going to be the first time you've ever heard of these movies, but I get necessarily going to be the first time you've ever heard of these movies, but I get the impression based on the list that you've shared and perhaps the list that you see from me that these are movies that just make us feel better. And why don't you start us off? What is your first recommendation? Yeah, that's a correct reading of my intentions with this movie.

I didn't do Contagion, though you did it on the rewatchables. Let me just say something. I have I didn't do Contagion, though you did it on the rewatchables. Let me just say something. I have not rewatched Contagion. And while I have been reading interviews with Scott Seaburns and others, I will not be rewatching it. Just that's not how I'm greeting this. So these are-

It's so good though. Listen, don't try to tell me about Steven Soderbergh. I'm in the house of Steven Soderbergh, not his house, but the house that respects Steven Soderbergh right now. This house where I'm recording this podcast, we respect Steven Soderbergh. Not his house, but the house that respects Steven Soderbergh right now. This house where I'm recording this podcast, we respect Steven Soderbergh.

Okay? So you don't tell me. I just cope differently. To that end, I picked movies that I like. And also to an extent, we're going to talk a little bit about these movies. So I picked some movies that you and I have never really spoken about on this podcast. There are a lot of movies out there available on streaming that I would recommend. Many of them we've done on rewatchables. Many of them would be my personal rewatchables that will never be considered.

And but these are I tried to pick some things that were like newish. So the first one is one that I think you and I have referenced a bunch, but never actually discussed, which is Joe Wright's Anna Karenina, the 2012 adaptation of the novel by Tolstoy. And you and I are both part of the Joe Wright hive. And I think that this movie is why. It is, you know, it's an adaptation of a thousand page Russian novel, and it does actually manage to condense all of that into two hours. And the way that it does it is with a formal conceit where it's like they're, it's set on a theater stage. And, but it's not like they're doing a play. It's not like behind the scenes that someone trying to do a play of Anna Karenina. They're just using the actual scenery and physical elements of a theater in order to

move quickly between a lot of different characters and a lot of different locations. And also, I think, to bring out some of the themes of performance and social, what we do outwardly versus what we do inwardly, which is some of the themes of performance and social, what we do outwardly versus what we do inwardly, which is some of the themes of Anna Karenina. It stars Keira Knightley, my girl. Also, Matthew McFadden is in there. That's Tom Whamsgams for everybody. An early Tom Whamsgams performance. And I think it is both extremely watchable, you can watch it on surface level, and also has ideas about making this kind of movie. Yeah, it's a very smart way to make a movie

that is the grandest possible story on a pretty modest budget. I think this movie only cost about $40 million, which, as you said, for a thousand-page novel adaptation is pretty extraordinary. It's so beautifully designed. That's really what I like about it. These kinds of stories, as you know, are not necessarily my

favorite kinds of stories. Joe Wright is really one of the only filmmakers who I've been able to kind of fully wrap my mind around Pride and Prejudice and Atonement. And there's a kind of, I don't know what's the word, a kind of stiffness, a kind of prestigiousness to these stories that I'm sometimes a little bit resistant to. And I really like the way that Joe Wright stages them, this one in particular. I'm totally with you. It's completely amazing. It's on Netflix, right? Yes, it is on Netflix. I also said at the beginning that I was going to be offering book recommendations to go with these movies as well. This is a pretty obvious one. It's a book called Anna Karenina. I just want to say, in my education, I just kind of missed the Russians. That was not a thing that I ever did or sought out, I think, to my detriment or my loss. And so a few years ago, I was just like, I'm going to read Anna Karenina. And it took me a long time. And I definitely told everyone in my life about it like every day. I was like, and another thing that happened in Anna Karenina. But I have to tell you,

it was extraordinary. And like, you get it at the end. You're like, oh, OK, so I understand why this is one of the great books and why also that the novel was like the defining form of literature for at least 100 years. It's great stuff. And if you have some time, I really recommend it. You can make it through the 100 pages about farming. You can do it. And everything else is great.

Yes. I have been told by a few sources, yourself included, that there are long passages about the grain industry in Russia. It's 100 pages. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. passages about the grain industry in in russia yeah yeah um yeah and i i am i i think donald gleason's character essentially represents that industry in the film yes um yeah they cut it out of the film that's another argument for the film right so life is very short and um i'm trying to be mindful of that and so i don't know if i will get to that book. But I admire... I am actually,

frankly, just amazed that an adult human is reading Anna Karenina, not because it's a homework assignment. So congrats to you. Thank you very much. I should say that's the only time it's ever worked. I recently tried to read Middlemarch for the first time and I quit. So Anna Karenina, it's worth it. Speaking of great literature, my recommendation is Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, which of course is based on a comic book by Brian Lee O'Malley called Scott Pilgrim. This movie is directed by Edgar Wright, co-written by Edgar Wright and Michael Bacall.

And I'm sure that most people listening to this show have heard of this movie. And I also feel like somehow it has completely slipped out of the consciousness. I think when it was being made, there was an expectation that it was going to be a very big deal it but it also is a very for lack of a better word a very indie rock movie the tonality of it the love story at the center of it the way it is sort of infected by video games and a kind of adolescent anxiety it's a little bit like if john hughes designed a nintendo video game and it's got this incredible performance maybe the

last great mich Michael Cera performance that we were ever going to see, but just a wonderful post-Superbad Michael Cera performance. The reason that I think it is fascinating to watch now is it's really one of the best cast movies of the century. And it has such incredible foresight for where so many people are going in their careers. I'll just read a few of the key names in the movie. Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who we just saw in Birds of Prey earlier

this year. Kieran Culkin, speaking of Succession Hive recommendations. Chris Evans, now international global star, essentially parodying himself in this movie as a masculine actor and star of action movies. Anna Kendrick, pre her mega fame. Brie Larson, pre her mega fame. Aubrey Plaza, right at the beginning of Parks and Recreation. Jason Schwartzman, the list goes on. It's basically like a who's who of cool kid actors who somehow transitioned into movie stardom. And Edgar Wright's style is pretty well documented abroad, although I don't think you and I have ever really spent too much time talking about him. Baby Driver precedes this show. I was a huge fan. I also am very sensitive to the people who think that Edgar Wright may be a little bit too smart for his own good. I personally don't feel that way. There are choices made in this movie that are very hyper aesthetic.

There is a lot of text on the screen. There is a lot of sound design that makes it sound like a video game. There are a lot of winking jokes. It feels very informed by stuff like The Simpsons. I think kids who grew up watching that show would feel at home with a movie like this. But mostly it's just, it's an easy sit. It's an easy watch. It's like the anxiety of the movie is such that it's just about a kid trying to defeat his girlfriend's ex-boyfriends. And I think most people who have been in relationships can identify with

the true struggle of Scott Pilgrim, who really does feel like he's battling the world, even though the people that he's battling are essentially meaningless and he's inside of his own head for most of the film. Are you an Edgar Wright person, Amanda? I feel like perhaps not. It's not that I'm not. I think I have seen,

I obviously saw Baby Driver and I've seen a couple of his movies. I was trying to remember if I had seen Scott Pilgrim and I was confusing it with the other Michael Cera movie that came out around this time that was like Nick and Nora's Excellent Adventure. Do you remember that? That was like a weird one night. Yeah. And so I think maybe I never saw it.

Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist. Yes, that's what it was. Man, the history really repeats itself huh but i don't think i ever saw it but i do remember this moment in time and i remember scott pilgrim as one of like the early i wouldn't say that there was like controversy around it at all but there was like an it was like early internet hive movie if that makes any sense um and a lot of people talking about it and excited about it and then maybe not quite a backlash to it but like an engaged discussion of it and it feels like a movie that um was predictive of a lot of both how movies were made and how we talk about movies now

and which and it was released 10 years ago so maybe i'll i'll watch it i think it's kind of worth it there's you might not like it, but there is a lot to appreciate about what they're trying to accomplish. And it's the kind of movie that if it had been a success, I think would have been super influential. And in fact, it was kind of a bomb. I mean, it lost money.

And that's kind of hard to imagine when you watch the movie and you can see how much they're doing with the story and how accessible they've made a very odd story. But I'm not sure if it's influential. It's a movie that we get asked for speaking about the rewatchables. People ask for Edgar Wright movies all the time and ask for this one in particular because I think that there is so much to kind of unpack about what's cool about the world that he built. But I thought it would be a good thing to remind people exists because if you're not an Edgar Wright super fan, you may have just completely forgotten about this movie and felt like maybe Baby Driver was the next most important thing that he did. That's Scott Pilgrim versus the world. What's next? What's service? We're going

to jump from service to service here. You got another service for us? Yes, I'm doing the Criterion channel next. Pushes glasses up nose. I'm going with A Hard Day's Night, which is a film that you and I maybe have never talked about, even though like the Beatles are one of the few things that we agree on, even though I'm still so angry about your yesterday take. I just remembered it now as I was talking and I got really angry again. I think you're wrong. Song sucks.

Yeah, okay. A Hard Day's Night. Yo, what a movie. It's so interesting because this is the type of movie that you can watch on surface level. It obviously has a lot of great Beatles songs and great Beatles performances and there it's a kind of madcap humor to it. You don't really have to think about it. I watched this movie probably as a 10-year-old and was just like, hey, the Beatles, cool stuff. Paul's really cute. And then I rewatched it maybe last year. And it is just, and this is not groundbreaking news, but such a genius, inventive filmmaking. It's obviously, so it's 1964. It's directed by Richard Lester and it kind of like invented music videos

and how we film things or film musicians. And the interesting thing about it for me now is if you compare it with like all of the basically terrible music documentaries and movies they're out now like what we expect from a pop star as famous as the Beatles were then like whether it's Gaga or Bieber or Taylor Swift or you know insert your favorite musician versus what the Beatles are doing in this movie as celebrities and at the height of their fame and what Richard Lester is doing in terms of making like a visually interesting movie. And, you know, also, I wouldn't say the plot's

complicated, but it is satirical and it's commenting on the Beatles themselves. It's just it's so it's such a higher level than than what we get now. And I think that's really interesting. And also, it's just really fun to watch. I am obviously a huge fan. I'm a huge fan of almost all of Richard Lester's movies. It's funny that we were talking about Contagion as you record from the house that Soderbergh built because Richard Lester is really one of his mentors. And there's this great book called Getting Away With It

or The Further Adventures of the Luckiest Bastard You Ever Saw that's basically an in-convers oh no it's fine yeah it's no it's good it's good that you got there i even have it go ahead do it do your thing no one can see it but you can because we're google chatting there it is yeah i was looking for bookshelves last night and i was like oh i should recommend this uh to speak on a hard day's night no i mean it's just you know there are levels to all of this. If you want it, if you want to read Richard Lester and Steven Soderbergh talking about the industry and their specific views on filmmaking and also their complaints, you can do that. And

it's great. And I recommend it. And if you also just want to watch all the Beatles crammed into a train car singing, you can also do that. That's beautiful. It's a very fun book. It's a very easy read. Also, it's like, why are there not more books like this? Why are there not more books where two people who are friends, one of whom is in a mentor role, the other is in a mentee role, just talk at length? Why can't we get the erudite conversation series in book form? Because not everybody is Steven Soderbergh or Richard Lester. Why are we always taking Steven Soderbergh for granted? Why can't we just be like, this is a special person and I appreciate everything that he's doing? I appreciate him. We appreciate him on the big picture. I promise you that.

We also appreciate Kevin Smith. And well, I don't know if... This isn't going to be my recommendation, but I'm going to pivot to't know. This isn't going to be my recommendation, but I'm going to pivot to Amazon Prime. Jay and Silent Bob reboot hits Amazon Prime March 13th. I watched it. Let me tell you, Amanda, I'm not going to make you talk about it because it's not good,

but it does feature all of your favorite characters from all of the Kevin Smith movies over the years. And one thing I also got a chance to see that people will not be seeing for a long time is a movie called Clerk, which is a documentary about Kevin Smith movies over the years. And one thing I also got a chance to see that people will not be seeing for a long time is a movie called clerk, which is a documentary about Kevin Smith and his entire life. It's a two hour film that has extraordinary features interviews with all of the people that are in this movie.

And it's it's, it's something I'm not allowed to speak about it. The movie doesn't have a distributor yet. It was supposed to play at South by Southwest. It's obviously not playing there now because the festival has been canceled. But I got a lot of Kevin Smith in my life in the last couple of weeks. I've been nosing around it, trying to incense you a little bit on this podcast. The face you're making right now indicates that you're not fired up about this micro

segment I've built inside of my own segment. Anything else you want to say? No, I think that you should build whatever segments you want and talk about whatever movies you want. I was just imagining like you immersing yourself in the world of Kevin Smith more than your life already is. And you know, that was the face I was making. Anyway, continue. I respect his journey, if not the end point of the journey. I respect where he came from. The movie I'm going to recommend is not going to make you feel any better. It's called The Descent, but I rewatched it last night, and it is an absolutely extraordinary movie. It is directed by Neil Marshall,

who many people will remember from the Blackfire episode of Game of Thrones, and who went on to make a series of kind of not-so-great action movies over the years, including last year's reboot of Hellboy, which was not strong. The Descent is a much smaller, much more narrow, and much more terrifying horror movie about five women who go into a cave to do some exploring in the aftermath of some serious trauma, and they find more trauma inside the cave. So much of the movie is shot in blackness and lit entirely by flares. It is a horror movie in a traditional sense, but it is also a horror movie in a very ecological sense. It's just absolutely terrifying and brilliantly made. And when I saw the movie,

I thought it would have meant that Neil Marshall would have had one of the most incredible careers of any filmmaker in the world. And he's gone on to some success, obviously, with things like Thrones. But I really wish he would get back down to it, like a really down and dirty, Into the Wilderness style movie. You probably won't recognize most of the actresses in the film. It really does feel like something you would have pulled out of a time capsule that was buried and forgotten. It was just added to Amazon Prime, which is why I mention it here. And I tried to watch it while not scaring my wife who was coming in and out of the room and would see it and seem disturbed by me spending my time on something like this.

I don't know what to say about that other than just to say that horror movies make me feel better and not worse. And I know that for some people they feel worse. For you, I assume they make you feel a little worse. It's not, well, they make me angry usually because I can just see how I'm being manipulated and then I just get pissed off. And so that is a form of being worse. But I think it's just not my instinct

to vent my anxieties that way. I have a lot of other ways of expressing my anxiety and I'm just always, I'm looking for escapism in this type of viewing experience. Well, if you're looking for escapism, I've got a recommendation for you. It's called Jay and Silent Bob Reboot.

Okay. Seriously consider that on Amazon Prime right now. What's your final recommendation? Yes. My final recommendation, I rigged this entire podcast to be able to put this on it. It's on HBO Now or HBO Go. And it's a little film called Working Girl, which is... We've never talked about Working Girl except for me to yell about how much

I love Working Girl. So now I will talk a little bit about it. This is a 1988 Mike Nichols film starring Melanie Griffith and Harrison Ford and Sigourney Weaver. And it is about a woman working in Staten Island. I'm sorry, a woman from Staten Island who wants to work on Wall Street and has big dreams. And it's kind of a Cinderella story of sorts, though that puts more emphasis on the guy than Working Girl does. Anyway, it's a classic. Every single time it's on, I'm happier about it. I think it's one of the great Harrison Ford performances. And it has a tremendous soundtrack by Carly Simon, including the credits song or the title song, Let the River Run, which is just in terms of ridiculous karaoke or just like blasting a song loud to feel better. You can't do better than that.

And I think I do classify this as a rom-com, even though, as I said, I think ultimately it's more about the, the test character played by Melanie Griffith than the, than the romance. The romance is just like a nice side benefit to, to her career and her dream for herself,

which is, which is how all things should be in life. But it's, I don't know. You can't go wrong with this one. Yeah. and her dream for herself, which is how all things should be in life. But it's, I don't know. You can't go wrong with this one. Yeah. This checks a lot of boxes for me too. I think it might be like the perfect fusion of our interests, you know,

in terms of how the film is made, what the script is like, what the performances are like. It really, you know, it's shot by Michael Ballhouse, who, you know, famously worked with Martin Scorsese over the years, shot films like After Hours and The Color of Money and shot broadcast news for James Brooks and really is like one of the elite cinematographers of the 1980s. also being just like a highly approachable movie that has ideas but doesn't feel like it's forcing its meaning on you which is something about it that i i like um obviously mike nichols you know one of the things we're going to talk about once we get to the end of this episode is sort of like

what the hell we're going to do on this show for the next few weeks or months and maybe one thing that we should do is seriously dive deep on a couple of directors that we both really agree on and have fun kind of analyzing a little bit mike nichols probably near the top of the list for us um and it's just him in his comfort zone working with the best possible cast and a brilliant script by kevin wade who is like not really a writer that i i think much about he's got some not ideal credits, including Made in Manhattan and Meet Joe Black on his CV. Yeah. So it's kind of shocking that this movie comes from him.

You know, I think, again, like all good movies, this movie has the surface level story, which is pretty fairytale-y and rom-com-y, and you can take it on that level. But I think Mike Nichols and some of the performances bring some nuance to it. There is that famous last shot. Sorry, spoiler alert. If you've never somehow seen Working Girl, I guess hit 30 seconds. Fast forward right now, but there's a famous final shot where Tess gets her own office. And she shot where um Tess gets her own office and she's so excited that she gets her own office and then the movie zooms out from her alone in her

office to show that it's like one of hundreds or thousands of offices in um in Manhattan and you know one interpretation of that is that like everybody has a dream and a career and something that they're working towards and the other is that this is that like everybody has a dream and a career and something that they're working towards. And the other is that this is just like one more stepping stone and we're all trapped in this system. So it's not all, it's not saccharine, if that makes any sense, even while being sentimental. And I think that has a lot to do with Nichols and with the performances. It's a great recommendation. Is there a book companion? Yeah. Well, I was going to say, and maybe we can talk about it more if we talk about Mike Nichols, but I finally did read

Life Isn't Everything, which is the oral history of Mike Nichols. It's Mike Nichols is remembered by 150 of his closest friends by Sam Kashner. It came out late last year. It was recommended to me by our boss, Bill Simmons, and it's a great read. I wish that there were more on Working Girl, to be totally honest. But it does. It puts his career in perspective. And he is one of my favorite directors. So it's worth your time. It's a great book. I've read it too. I was a big fan. Thanks to Bill for recommending it to us. My last recommendation is a slightly different in tone from any of our previous recommendations, but I thought it was a movie that since we didn't get a chance to talk about it last year at all, I should share a little bit about it here. It's called Black Mother.

It's by a filmmaker named Khali Kalah. He is a 35-year-old documentarian, photographer. He's from New York. It's a of a, it's a highly unusual impressionistic documentary that uses a lot of unorthodox styles of storytelling. It does not have a linear narrative. If you go in looking for a clear through line on a story, if you want something as fizzy and thoughtful as Working Girl, this is not that kind of movie.

It's essentially a story about Jamaica and the people who live in Jamaica and particularly women and what they mean to Jamaica and it's shot with this series of interviews and there is essentially a voiceover execution as you see a lot of stark images of the people who live in Jamaica this sounds perhaps a little bit haughty I promise you it is like a riveting, very short films, less than 75 minutes. I think Kalika is really one of the best young filmmakers in the world. And if you watch it on Criterion, there's a 15 minute introduction by him in which he talks about the meaning of the movie and the themes of the movie that I would wait to watch until after you've seen the movie.

I watched it after I had seen the film a few months ago, and I regret not advocating for it more in 2019. I think it's really just one of the best movies of the year. His other films are also currently on the Criterion channel, which is where you can watch Black Mother. So I would encourage you to check that one out if you have the time and you're looking for something just a little bit different. Have you seen this movie yet, Amanda?

I haven't, but you know, I'm going to have some time, so I'll put it on the list. It will probably go above Jay and Silent Bob, just in the interest of full disclosure. I can't say that that would be a very smart double feature. I don't think tonally they share much. One thing I did like about the movie is that Kelly said in his interview is that he'd never seen a movie about Jamaica that didn't have reggae in it. That every movie about Jamaica is about reggae. And he said, there's no reggae in my movie. And not because he doesn't like it, but just because he's trying to break down some of the walls of perception around countries like

Jamaica. So as we think about a slightly globalized world right now and the way that we are both connected and completely quarantined from each other, I thought that that would be an interesting movie for people to check out. Speaking of things to check out, what are we going to do? What are we going to do on the big picture? Help me understand what we ought to do. You want me, Amanda Dobbins, to help you understand that? Where would I be if I didn't ask for your help we're obviously gonna try to cover the movies that are being released or aren't being released as the case may be and kind of what we can understand as things are changing and you know hopefully hearing from other people who

know more and being able to to at least discuss how the industry is shifting a bit. And then I think we'll also talk about movies that you can watch in your home. Yes. We'll have to devise some sort of strategy here. We might do a movie swap soon. I think that's a possibility. I wouldn't say that this Google Hangout is the ideal environment to do a movie swap, but it feels like the right time

because we might not have new movies to talk about other than what's on Netflix and Amazon Prime in the coming weeks. Yeah, I would agree. I think, you know, it's funny. I know that you've chosen my movie

for the next movie swap. Can I share with people what it is? Certainly. Sure. So you've chosen Aliens for me. Aliens with an S, correct an s correct but you know that's a tricky one where i until recent events i was like how can i find a really giant screen on which to watch that movie because i do think that it will help me understand it a bit more

particularly like the large action sequences so i i think we will end up doing one but it's it's not the circumstances on in which we originally intended this swap I guess so do you want me to recommend this maybe a smaller film that doesn't have as much uh cinematic grandeur maybe a movie like Jay and Silent Bob reboot yeah sure that'd be great I mean if you want me to watch Jay, Bob, Silent, whatever, and then do 30 minutes on it, you don't even have to show up. I'll just monologue. It's fine. If you want that, you can get it. But just remember you asked for it.

Okay. We probably won't do that. We're going to figure out what to talk about here. As Amanda mentioned, we'll talk about The Hunt next week, a movie that we've both seen and probably have some conflicting feelings about um and i think also has brought to the surface some feelings at least for me about what happens when a movie tries to reflect something in real life when real life changes and perhaps how frivolous a movie can seem in the in light of things like that um in the meantime amanda of things like that. Um, in the meantime, Amanda, thanks for, um, stepping up in this,

in this awkward environment. And, thanks for listening to the big picture. We'll see you next week. Bye everyone. you