The Big Picture - ‘Leaving Neverland,’ Spielberg’s Oscar Battle with Netflix, and the Best Movies of 2019 So Far | The Big Picture

Episode Date: March 5, 2019

Steven Spielberg is waging war against Netflix—what does this mean for the Academy Awards (0:57)? Then, Rob Harvilla joins the show to discuss ‘Leaving Neverland,’ the new Michael Jackson documentary on HBO, and its potential ramifications for the future of writing about music (18:08). Finally, Sean and Amanda share the best movies they’ve seen so far in this year and preview some of ones they’re anticipating most in March (40:15). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Rob Harvilla Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of The Big Picture is brought to you by Bud Light. Did you know not all alcohol products are required to list their ingredients? That was news to me. But Bud Light is changing the game. They believe that we deserve to know our beer's ingredients, so they put an ingredients label right on their packaging. Bud Light, brewed with hops, barley, water, and rice. No corn syrup, no preservatives, and no artificial flavors.

Find out what ingredients are in your beer. Bud Light, enjoy responsibly. AB Bud Light Beer. St. Louis, Missouri. I'm Sean Fennessey. And I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the movies. On today's show, Amanda, we'll be discussing HBO's harrowing Michael Jackson documentary, Leaving Neverland, with our colleague Rob Harvilla. And we'll talk a little bit about the best movies of the young year so far, and maybe a couple of things to look forward to. But we're going to start where virtually every movie and TV debate starts, Netflix. Amanda, it takes a lot to change the Oscars.

Hell, it takes a lot to try. But that has not stopped Steven Spielberg from making an effort to change how the Oscars works. We learned on Friday, of course, via a story on IndieWire.com that Steven Spielberg does not think that Netflix movies should be able to compete in the Oscars, and he will be taking this message to the Board of Governors meeting this week in an effort to change how the Oscars are voted upon. What'd you think about this when you saw it? Because it certainly took over film Twitter for a solid 72 hours. Yeah. In the words of Julia Roberts, big mistake, huge. That's my take. And I think that, well, you know, we should talk about all aspects of this. I think it's both a philosophical mistake, which is, I think, what

rankles you and me and a lot of people who care about movies. But I think this is a strategic and financial mistake. Financial? Yeah, because you're just, you're taking yourself out of the conversation by saying that you're not going to compete where people actually watch things and consume things and talk about them. You're making yourself less important. You're making movies less important is I think the ultimate goal. That's my big picture take. That's so that's such an interesting response because obviously people who are in favor of Spielberg's idea would argue the same. They would say that the true relevance is the relevance we have communed together in a theater, which of course was an idea that we can unpack. I thought it was notable that the response many had online here, which is, I think, not always relevant to the conversations that we have, but in this case, very relevant because

Netflix is sort of an online endeavor, was fascinating. There was a lot of old man yells at clouds memes about Steven Spielberg and the fact that there is a generational shift here. And there was a lot of personal proselytizing for the Netflix brand. And then the response to that was people saying, Netflix will not save you. They are not your friend and they're not going to help you. And I think the truth is obviously, as usual, somewhere in between all of these things. But I found that to be such an interesting test case for the way that primarily young people experience culture in 2019. Do you agree with that? Yeah, I do.

Because obviously everyone is just attaching their personal experience to this at some point. And I think my point about it being a strategic and financial mistake is that if you actually take away all of our personal associations of what movies are and how we experience them and what Netflix is and, you know, people just watch things at home, like there have just been structural changes. I've been talking about this over and over again. I know. Thank you for continuing to listen to me say this, but people just don't go to the movie theaters as much. People watch things in their home. People are just consuming things differently than they were a year ago and two years ago and five years ago. And I think to put yourself on the other side of that structural change is insisting on a future that doesn't exist. But I do think that that argument is helped by a lot of people who want to romanticize certain aspects of film going, or there are a lot of people who on the flip side

want to romanticize what like Netflix can do for people who can't get to a theater and kind of the democratization of the film going experience. Now listen, Netflix is a giant corporation and is trying to be a monopoly. We have to be careful. There are so many things going on here and there is no one sweeping statement, but I do think we're all kind of talking around each other while there are just major structural changes that are inevitable. I think a lot of these things are true. I think that Netflix obviously makes it easier for creators of color, creators who have not as many opportunities to get to make films. It also has democratized the ability for people to see films. I think also this sort of desire to make good movies is borne out in a lot of the movies that they've made and a lot of movies that

they're making. We know that they actually have a really exciting slate of movies to look forward to this year. Conversely, I would say that they don't seem to have as much interest in film history. And that's primarily because it's not financially beneficial to them to license films from other companies that have spent the last hundred years making these movies. So you're kind of at cross purposes here. You know, you've got Steven Spielberg who openly admitted that he supported Green Book for best picture in this message, which I thought was a fascinating notion. I mean, I think a lot of people picture the kind of person that voted for Green Book for best picture, and they did think a privileged guy who'd been working in Hollywood

for a long time who's in his 60s or in his 70s. Certainly you and I thought that. Yeah. And I think that this really holds up. And I think that I understand what Steven Spielberg, what he is aspiring to, that there is a kind of magic in the idea of going to the movies, that it's not just this kind of false protection of a dying empire. I think that there is some realness in it, but there's inevitably something misguided because it's not just Netflix necessarily that would be affected by this. It's every streaming platform. And we're on the precipice of multiple Disney Plus, Amazon is already in action. There's been some news about Apple in the last couple of days. That's going to be happening soon. We know that companies like A24 are going to make movies

directly with Apple. So does that mean that that movie would also be ineligible for an Oscar? There are all of these tangential aspects that come with this idea. And it feels very much like trying to throw a roadblock in front of the future. And we're just, this is the direction we're moving in, right? Yes. I think also an interesting note about the Spielberg plan was that he doesn't think they should be allowed to compete for Oscars. He thinks that they should be allowed to compete for Emmys.

Yeah. And you're suddenly throwing so much star power to an awards show. Yes, it's just an award show, but it is a symbol for a whole other industry and how people think. You know, we have been arguing about TV and movies forever, and I think it is in many cases a false war. Except movies are better. I just want to say that.

I'd like to definitively say that movies are better. That's my take. To the point that we can consume all of them. Yes, we can. Like, we can. And you can, if there are more of all of them, then you can pick and choose and consume what is right for you, which is great and exciting. But to just hand over a large portion of the movies to another industry, essentially, just that seems strategically so stupid. I agree. And it's also, as many people have pointed out in recent days, I would say 97% of the great films that I've watched in my life, I've watched at home

because that is how we consume, have been consuming films since the dawn of home media, home video, like this is just how this works. So, you know, it is like a question of privilege. It is a question of like, who gets to see things when and why it's not just about ease of use with Netflix it's that it is financially reasonable to do things this way too it's true I was thinking about this I went to see Apollo 11 this weekend which we'll talk more about but I saw it in IMAX you know how much I spent for two IMAX tickets to see Apollo 11 spent $45 that's a lot of money $45 just for two you know and I wasn't trying to take a whole family and we didn't get any concessions. It was literally just two tickets.

Obviously, it's IMAX. It's a bit more expensive, but I was thinking a lot about whole families and people who would actually probably love to see more movies and consume more of this product and would be willing to pay like a certain amount, but not $45 for two tickets or $100 for a family or whatever. It is really financially prohibitively expensive. It's really asking a lot. And it makes me wonder, you know, part of Spielberg's call here has been, should Netflix quote unquote, four wall all of their films and for a specific period of time. And I thought that that was kind of an argument in bad faith because most independent films do not get that kind of

requisite three or four week pitch that he made where they have to be in theaters for that period of time. Obviously Roma was the, um, you know, sort of patient zero for a lot of this conversation. But, you know, if you look at a lot of the films, like, um, I don't know anything in the foreign film category, but there's no guarantee that any of those films are going to be in theaters for more than one or two weeks. Documentaries especially are very rarely see wide release. So trying to legislate how long and where things are shown feels like a surprisingly corporatist and, and,

and I don't, I don't even know what the word like power controlling pursuit. Yeah. I've wanted to, and we don't have to go too far down this road, but the theater owners association is kind of like a really silent but influential part of this whole discussion. And it's fascinating to me because, again, that is just another business interest. At some point, this is all business interests colliding. They are lobbyists paid by movie companies to lobby

the government and protect their interests. Exactly. But, you know, at some point, the Theater Owners Association is having a lot of undue influence over, maybe not undue, because it's their business and their business model, over these decisions. And they are, by definition, trying to keep things the old way because that was their business model. I wonder how long that's going to hold. So I want to read something that our friend Paul Schrader, my friend Paul Schrader, wrote on Facebook. I can't believe how frequently I have looked at Paul Schrader's Facebook page of late. Nevertheless, I have, there is some wisdom there from time to time.

Sometimes there's not. But here's something he wrote. I'll try to summarize it as quickly as I can. The Netflix debate. I have no animus against Netflix. Ted Sarandos is as smart about film as any studio exec I've ever met. Distribution models evolve. The notion of squeezing 200 plus people into a dark, unventilated space to see a flickering image was created by exhibition economics, not any notion of the quote unquote theatrical experience. Netflix allows many financially marginal films to have a platform, and that's a good thing. But here's my query. It involves First Reformed. He goes on to talk about how A24 gave first performed a chance that maybe a Netflix could not have given it, that maybe audiences would not have discovered that

film in the same way that they did because A24 kept it in theaters and kept it in festivals for well over a year. However, he goes on to say that relegated to film esoterica is where first performed might have lived, but a different path, my proposal for club cinemas like Alamo Drafthouse or Metrograph, Burns Center, Film Forum to form an alliance with a two-tiered streaming system. The first tier would be Criterion or Mubi. The second tier would be Netflix or Amazon. Distribution models are in flux. It's not as simple as theatrical versus streaming. The point being, should companies like Netflix be teaming up with theaters to create, you know, a sort of all-in subscription package so you can preserve the theater experience in some respects, but also let your business model thrive? I mean, they should for us, right? Because

you and I still, despite everything we just said, really like going to see movies in a theater. In fact, I cannot see a movie at home. I mean, I can, but it's a radically different experience for me. I really still enjoy the privilege of going to a theater and watching a movie. Yes, you had the privilege of seeing Captain Marvel this very morning. Yeah, I did, which is a different conversation.

But I do like doing it. I want to preserve it. But that's for me and that's for my interest and my experience. Does it make financial sense for Netflix? I don't know. I don't know, especially since they are so bound up. They started as a tech company and they are in many ways still a tech company.

And that has been their innovation. And I suspect most of their money making is in the distribution model. So should they is like a complicated question. For me, it would be great. I would love it if they would do that. And if they're looking to build goodwill, then possibly yes. Yeah, I mean, we just saw Triple Frontier in a screening room. Yes.

At Netflix. I liked it a lot. Had a great time. We had a great time. And I think that that was the right place to see it. It was, the music was so loud. It was great. And effective. And that doesn't mean that watching it at home is a problem. We've music was so loud. It was great. And effective. And

that doesn't mean that watching it at home is a problem. We've gone through this over and over again. But the number of films that they have this year that are at that level of Hollywood filmmaking, most especially, I think, Martin Scorsese's The Irishman, but also Dee Rees' new film, I believe it's called The Last Thing He Wanted. These are movies

that are true blue Hollywood awards contending movies. And so getting a chance to see them in those platforms for an extra buck or two a month on your subscription, I think would be wonderful. I also don't know how financially feasible it is. This is not an economics podcast for those of you listening. So possibly it should be, because I mean, this is the question, right? Is that it doesn't make financial sense for any of these people and at some point i do also think that the move to exclude the streaming services from the oscars is about trying to protect the finances of the movies that are still theater based and theater released

primarily an important thing to keep in mind about spielberg who's of course one of the most not just one of the most directors in hollywood but one of the most powerful producers who has relationships with many studios and who has been sort of an avatar for big top entertainment in Hollywood history for the last 30 years. You know, he is really a figure that represents the wonder of going to the movies. You know, that is literally his brand.

And I find this to be an interesting choice for him because even though you wouldn't necessarily say that he's the most progressive person in the world, he's certainly a person who has often seen the future. And his perception of where Hollywood was going and his sort of force of will to bring it there really defines, I think, a lot of the movies that you and I grew up on. And it influenced a lot of those movies to a huge extent, even if you don't love his movies. And this really does feel like the anxiety of fading influence to me. It feels like somebody who was so potent for so long and sees something slipping through his fingers and his ear to squeeze it tightly, maybe to its own detriment.

It sounds like a certain award season that we just lived through. And Green Book at the center of it, and that being steven spielberg's vote i do want to say netflix responded to this controversy where else on twitter over the weekend uh do you want to read their response oh great so i have to be the corporate shell sure um no it's understood this is coming from amanda's interpretation yes okay this is the response we love cinema Here are some things we also love. Little cheeky. Access for people who can't always afford or live in towns without theaters.

Letting everyone everywhere enjoy releases at the same time. Giving filmmakers more ways to share art. These things are not mutually exclusive. I think all of those things can be true and this can be a still unsettled debate, right? Yes. Like I'm saying, it's the philosophy of this, which is they're doing only the movies should be available to everyone and we should be

able to have more types of movies and share them with the world. 100% agree. That's great. But that's one side of this debate, which is, like I said, about a lot of existent business structures. So that's true, but it doesn't solve all the other things. There's so many different ways into this idea too. We could talk about this and I suspect we will over the months to come, but is this about getting to see movies that you find entertaining? Is it about film history preservation? Is it about shining a spotlight on new voices? Like what, what really are we talking about here? I watched this wonderful movie called the heiress that I had been meaning to watch for

many years last night. I watched it on Turner classic movies. And it's interesting because the place where I think I will find that in the future is on the criterion collection streaming service. They are of course, uh, you know, partners with TCM on film struck, which was recently shuttered by Warner media, Warner media, of course ownsstruck, which was recently shuttered by Warner Media. Warner Media, of course, owns TCM, which showed The Heiress. So you have all of these interesting arms of corporate media structure trying to show you movies or not show you movies. And no one really cares about the movie. The people that work at these companies, they try to, but ultimately it's like, these are just chess pieces and they're moving the chess pieces around. And Roma is a chess piece and Green Book is a chess piece.

And there's no sort of body. There's no film czar that says, what we have to do is we have to protect everything except for the Academy. Yes. That's what the Academy is supposed to be doing. And so by doing this, they are potentially shunting to the side the future of cinema. So we're just such amazing cross purposes with this whole debate i thought one thing that was very interesting and it was a kind of subset of

this spielberg thing and you noted in our outline but the idea that if it's on netflix it's a tv movie and that should be at the emmys which is condescending and and you know and i i think some of spielberg's problem here is just that the message didn't get out in the carefully massaged way that might actually further some of his points, which, again, is a real theme of this awards season, just for the record. And a case also where master storytellers fail to tell their stories effectively. You know, there's something ironic about that. But this idea of what is a movie has certainly prompted a lot of hand-wringing, like mostly for TV critics for the past few years of like, is this a TV show or is this a movie?

But what is a movie, I guess, is going to be a continuing source of anxiety for everybody? It is, although I feel like I am, I personally emotionally closed the book on that when I saw Roma. I was like the place where you can see this most likely is on TV. And if you think that's a TV movie, then that definition needs to evolve somewhat. And you know what? Let's use this as an opportunity to segue into our next segment because we're going to talk about a TV movie that is truly a movie. Yes. Sound good? Yes.

Amanda, let's welcome in our colleague, Rob Harvilla. Rob wrote about Leaving Neverland. Dan reads documentary about two alleged survivors of Michael Jackson's abuse, James Safechuck and Wade Robson. Rob, thanks for joining us. Hello. Rob, where do we start with this movie? It's such a crushing thing and the way that it is being rolled out to the world, I find to be fascinating because it is sustained, because it is across two nights. It's something that we're coping with over

a long period of time. Can you just talk about maybe your initial responses to seeing the movie and what are the things that really struck you when you saw it i mean it's i think it's impossible not to have a pretty visceral you know terror filled response to it honestly you know i mean i the fact that it premiered at sundance you know in january and you sort of could feel it coming you know you were sort of seeing the jackson estate putting out statements and then later suing HBO for $100 million. You were braced for the impact of the thing, but I don't think there's anything that can really prepare you for the experience of sitting down to watch it. 30 minute stretch you know where these men are are describing the abuse the interaction that's it's it's just so it's indescribable in the sense that i don't care to describe it and it's it's just it's very difficult to live with and that's the visceral reaction i had even to like all the photos of like michael jackson with a seven-year-old kid who's wearing the smooth criminal

outfit like the white suit like that was the smooth criminal was always my favorite of michael jackson's videos and i just the the full body cringe that i felt whenever i you know saw something like that it's just the the experience of this is quite remarkable and how sort of awful and indescribable it is yeah amanda i don't know if you had a similar reaction i it's a fascinating how assaultive the movie is. I felt more like a war documentary to me than it did like an entertainment-driven story. And the difference being, of course, that we all have a relationship to Michael Jackson and Michael Jackson's music.

What was your, how did you feel as you were watching it? Similar to Rob, I found it devastating. I ended up watching it, I wouldn't say in four hours straight, but pretty close together. I took a break in the middle, I think, just because anyone would have to. And I thought, you know, Sean, you saw it before I did, and you kept telling me that part of the reason that it was so affecting, because it really just is James Safechuck and Wade Robson and their family members. But there is not any of in a typical documentary. You get a lot of talking heads.

You get context. You get clips. You know, a style choice is to recreate the scene and the mood and the cultural relevance of, you know, whatever topic is being explored. And we already we as a society all know that. And so you don't need to do the context. And I think for a lot of reasons, and a lot of very smart choices to not include any of that in the documentary,

but as a result, it really just is these two men talking about their experience for four hours, which everything that they say is heartbreaking and devastating and anger-inducing and caused personally a lot of kind of reflection of how much we knew and yet chose not to know. But I think I also can't remember a time where I just sat and listened to one person speak to me for four hours straight about their experience. It's not an experience that you really have even with closest family members. Very often in your life, you just don't sit and listen to someone talk for that long. And it's very difficult, but extremely powerful.

Yeah, I feel like there is something that could be easily overlooked here. And I don't mean to sort of make light of something in the light of the story, but the filmmaking that goes into this movie to make their stories weave together, both James and Wade, and to make it coherent sort of narratively what was happening. And like you say, it's very uncommon to be met with such frank and certainly wounded conversation from people over a long stretch of time. Rob, I'm curious what you thought about the inclusion of sort of the depth of information that we got, like the idea of not just how the families arrived at Michael Jackson at that stage in his life, but also the stories of the strategies

that he employed to be with the boys. And there's the staggering detail that Reed captured in the movie. Right. I think the documentary starts from the premise that Michael Jackson needs no introduction. The level of his fame at that time in the late 80s and early 90s, especially, needs no introduction. There's no need for any context you know it's it was hard for me not to jump to compare this to surviving r kelly you know which was lifetimes series in january which had i believe it was like 50 plus you know on camera interviews and that's at least a dozen women who identify as survivors over a period of a couple decades

but also journalists cops lawyers, lawyers, like experts in psychology and criminology, like sort of cultural critics. And, you know, that too was less about breaking news, about telling you something you didn't know, than putting it all in one place and setting those women down and having them look you in the eye and tell their stories. And as Amanda says, like even across six hours with all those people, with more to tell and more people to tell it, it was still an uncommonly and uncomfortably and very effectively intimate the premise that there's no need to explain Michael Jackson or why they would find themselves under Michael Jackson's spell. You can just jump right in to the horror of it without explaining how they got there. Because in retrospect, it's obvious why they would be so taken with him, why they and their mothers especially would do almost anything that he asked yeah robin

i thought you did a really nice job in your piece of exploring the kind of tactile nature of the relationships that there are all these physical objects that they're either talking about or even showing us in real time in the film there's so many archival photographs of these people together that to hear the story over that, that bed of imagery is, is like really profoundly upsetting. I think, you know, especially the, the ring story that closes chapter one is just such a, such an upsetting and, and, and, you know, it's one of the most difficult aspects of this conversation. And I don't just mean this conversation that the three of us are having, but in general is this tension between the notion of believing people who come forward with their stories and also not necessarily legally implicating yourself in any meaningful way.

But when you hear the ring story at the end of chapter one, there feels like such a profundity to that story and such a depth of meaning that there's kind of nowhere else to go but to have empathy to try to understand what that person's feeling and you know we're met simultaneously with this very complicated story rob you mentioned the the lawsuit that the jackson estate has levied against hbo the response. And of course, fans are quite vociferously angry about this documentary. Amanda, just from your perspective as a purveyor of the internet at large, and also somebody who has a keen eye towards notions of celebrity, what do you make of the way that this movie is being projected into the world and then the way it's being received?

Yeah, it's been fascinating. So I think the most recent reaction that you're referencing that we should just talk about has kind of been the outpouring of online pushback from self-avowed fans of Michael Jackson. And one thing that watching this documentary reminded me was that there have been people for 20 years now not wanting to believe any of the stories that have come forward and who have really been like the Michael Jackson is innocent is a long running thread through our society at this point, which I had sort of blacked out along with a lot of this, which I think that we should come back to how we all think about all of this information and Michael Jackson himself. But it has certainly, as everything on the internet is, the reaction has been quite loud. It seems pretty well organized and it is not particularly thoughtful in many cases. And, you know, I think that's true of basically every single thing that's said on the internet now is that there is an organized pushback against it. This has been notable for its size and I guess possibly for the inevitability of it as well. I think I was reading some

interviews with James Safechuck and Wade Robson before the podcast, and they were talking about how their expectation was just that this would happen and that they would not be believed. And that was kind of the starting point from which they decided to go into this documentary. So in that case, it's the same as usual, but there has been a lot of attention to the hashtags and the online aspect of it just because the internet amplifies everything. Yeah, in that respect, it's been interesting too because, of course, a necessary part of this story is identifying that Wade Robson has had to significantly recant testimony that he's given, that James Safechuck has had to change certain aspects of the way that he's talked about Michael Jackson over the years. And so with that comes this sort of like, yeah, but you said back in 2007,

and it has this sort of representative example of internet dialogue, which is often can be so ugly. Rob, how does the way that this is all being discussed and not just discussed, but sort of like marketed and sold writ large strike you? Because now we know after the special, or excuse me, rather after the documentary, Oprah hosted a conversation among the three participants in the film.

There is this kind of like movement aspect that comes with a movie like this. Now it's not just a documentary. It is an entire, It is a hashtag. This movie has been trending on Twitter for well over 24 hours. And that's kind of a new phase of this kind of work, I think. Yeah. I mean, I go all the way back to 1993 when I was a teenager. And I think for a casual observer of Michael Jackson, which is to say like a fan of Michael Jackson, like the first you heard

of these kinds of allegations of this aspect of his life was the allegations made by, it was Geordie Chandler in 1993. And Michael Jackson in response did that like sort of a video statement from Neverland, you know, proclaiming his innocence and sort of describing an excruciating detail, how he was, you know, the police came to Neverland and they strip searched him. And it was the most humiliating thing that had ever happened to him. Like for a lot of people, that was your first exposure to all of this, to all of these allegations,

you know, to, to this part of the Michael Jackson story. And I think if you were a fan is again, almost everybody was I, the way, you know, he settled with the Chandlers for $23 million,

but the takeaway, I think publicly, it was like that family was just out for money. You go all the way back to Michael Jackson's infamously terrible childhood, the abuse that he suffered himself. And you look at Michael Jackson as just this incredibly naive and sensitive person who is more famous than almost anyone on earth has ever been famous and is just left now with just no sense of reality and how adults and children should interact. And it's not his fault is what you sort of try to tell yourself. It must be that these families are just taking advantage of his generosity and if there has to be in a misunderstanding based on just the absurdly charmed and terrible life that this person has had and i it's you know and then you get to the again like in both in in both men both james and wade in 1993 issued statements or told the cops, told their mothers that nothing

was wrong. And in 2004, 2005, when Michael Jackson went on trial, more charges brought against another 13-year-old Gavin Arvizo, Wade Robson testified in that trial on Michael Jackson's behalf, swearing that nothing was wrong. This's just, this has been a living story now for the better part of two decades. And it's, I think everybody started out from a position of just absolutely not wanting to believe it. As famous and as monolithic

as Michael Jackson feels to us in 2019, there's just no way in 2019 to explain what he was in 1993, what he had been for a solid decade. It's just more famous, more beloved, more revered than just any human ever. I mean, I think that's almost not hyperbole. It was impossible to believe that this could be true and that it must be based some kind of function of the absurd fame that he had. so it's this is absolutely a living thing and it's obviously the people who have been defending him and who have been insisting that anyone who

accuses him is just out for money like they have had in some cases decades of practice at making this this accusation and obviously leaving neverland itself spends a lot of time you know these men spent a lot of time grappling with the fact that they did lie you know and they did functionally they both apologize in their way to Geordie Chandler, to Gavin Arvizo. Like they say, like, I wish I could have been strong enough. I can't imagine what it would have been like to have been 13 at that time, to have nobody believe you. I mean, everybody's been living with this. The battle lines have been drawn. It's an ongoing thing that's never going to end, really.

There's no sensible way to move forward in the aftermath of a movie like this, but I was struck by something that you wrote, and there have been similar notions floated in various pieces that I've read about this and hearing people talk about it, even over dinner casually. But you wrote, just at the end of your piece, but what concrete result is even fathomable that there is no canceling Michael Jackson. That is an interesting notion that I think kind of runs counter to the all or nothing experience that we have in the world right now. And I thought it was completely rational and reasonable. I mean, I'm curious too what you think about that because of the way that Rob described Michael Jackson's extraordinary, truly extraordinary fame. The fact that when he

was alive, more people knew who he was than probably knew any other person in the history of humanity and how significant he was. And also that I think a lot of the pushback and the sort of anger and whether it is organized or not is oriented around people trying to protect something that makes them happy. And you know that a lot of this sort of pushback is often oriented around, that's a thing that means something to me. You can't take that away from me. What do you think about the way that the world will engage with Michael Jackson after they see this movie?

Yeah, it's an interesting question. When you talk about, I thought Rob's piece made a great point. There is no canceling Michael Jackson, both because of the fame, which we should talk about, but the actual music, you have to just kind of stop playing music that exists after 1988 if you want to completely erase Michael Jackson. He was so influential in the way that music sounds and our concept of pop music that I think it's literally impossible to cancel him. You can't erase the influence or the impact. And then at that point,

it'll be interesting. We talk a lot about who's online on the show and who is exposed to what parts of a conversation. And I'm curious what the ratings will be on Leaving Neverland. I think a lot of people will watch it. And I think a lot of people are taking it really seriously and talking about it like we are and I think that there is a large group of people who will it's impossible to watch this movie and not have your relationship to Michael Jackson and your concept of him change I think you know even the course of four hours I went from being like the movie starts with playing some archival footage and a lot of the Michael Jackson songs in it. You know, you know what's coming, but also the lizard brain is like, you know, it's a great song, is Thriller. And by the end, I found my lizard brain quiet.

I found that it had really changed just my associations to the music that really is hardwired in my brain as it is almost everybody else's on earth at this point. So I think it will change for some people, for people who do engage with this and think about it. I really do think that as a piece of filmmaking, it is that impactful. How many people will watch it and will want to do that work? And by the way, that's unfair. How many, because many people might actually want to do it, but may not be exposed to it. You know, I, you don't, this documentary is not as famous as Michael Jackson

and it will not reach as many people as his work and fame did. So I don't know. I think it will certainly change how a lot of people think of him and probably how history gets written from this point. But I don't think you can completely erase him from history. His influence was just too far reaching. Rob, how will your relationship to his music change? You write about music all the time. I think you're one of the most sophisticated people thinking about this stuff. Will you be adding disclaimers to pieces going forward? How will you be negotiating it just in your personal life? I'm curious how somebody who is such a titanic figure in the thing that you have committed a lot of your probably personal and certainly professional life to change the way you see them. Yeah. I mean, I can't deny that part of my visceral reaction to this was my sons are seven

and five years old, and I'm just starting to play music for them. They're just starting to become cultural citizens or however you would phrase that. When I file a piece like this, then I go and I read what everyone else has written. And in slate you know wesley morris and the new york times like everyone says some variation on there is no canceling michael jackson like he's just like oxygen like the notion of some sort of tangible reckoning where everyone piles up every vinyl copy of thriller in existence and sets it ablaze it's it's it's just not possible i i thought the ring Ringer, Lindsay Zoladz wrote a great piece for the Ringer last week on R. Kelly and on the real world ramifications, the new criminal charges that surviving R. Kelly has inspired to a large degree. And she argues really effectively,

I think, that part of the reason why this reckoning is happening is because R. Kelly is no longer a commercial force. His albums don't sell, his tours are sporadic. And part of the protests, in part because of the Mute R. Kelly movement, at the height of his power, the Ignition remix, Step in the Name of Love, he was too big to cancel. And a scathing Dave Chappelle parody was as close to justice as you could get. But R. Kelly is now diminished enough, and he no longer makes enough money for the record industry to be worthy of that protection, to be protected. And that is just simply never happening with Michael Jackson.

Because as Amanda says, his DNA musically, in terms of choreography, in terms of the iconography, is just in everything, in every one, all the music that came after him. He is as big a part of America as any one man is a part of America, from a cultural perspective, from a historical perspective. And you go all the way down to, do I play Thriller for my kids at some point? Do I offer some sort of disclaimer there? I hadn't even considered like disclaiming you know michael jackson in future work like of course i'm going to think

about him of course he's going to come up as a reference like do you have to parenthetically note this how do you even begin to do this i mean it just again the sheer size of him and you know the fact that being dead there's no reckoning possible for him as a human. There's no trial. You don't walk away from leaving Neverland thinking these men should get millions of dollars from the estate. It's absurd to even try and quantify the damage or quantify the reactions you know i you know i too am just left curious as to what's going to happen and i agree with you that like who's online versus who isn't is going to be a major factor here because you know the times has a really good piece today joe cascarelli on the michael jackson super fans who have been ready for this and like the the estate like then they put up like a vintage concert video like on youtube like 20 minutes into Leaving Neverland's premiere. Just the ways that they're going to try and flood the market, some sort of counter-programming.

It's just online, it's going to be a huge mess. But I wonder about my parents who were fans of him alongside me. We would sit there and we would watch MTV. We mourned in our way when he died. It's just, are my parents going to watch this? Are mourned in our way when he died. It's just, are my parents going to watch this? Are my parents going to grapple with this? It's just the online reaction versus the individual personal reaction that almost every human being in America on the earth is going to have to have with this. It's a really stark difference in a lot of ways. I think that's well said, Rob. I think regardless of how you ultimately feel about this, I would encourage people to watch Leaving Neverland if they haven't. And if you've gotten this far into the show, I'm surprised, candidly.

Amanda, Rob, thank you very much for doing this. Thanks, Sean. Thank you. Amanda, we're going to lighten the mood just a little bit here after that very serious conversation and talk a bit about the best movies of 2019 so far. And the reason we're going to do that is a couple of reasons. One, March is action-packed. There are a lot of good films. You and I are headed to Austin, Texas later this week for the South by Southwest Film Festival. We'll be seeing some of those films. We'll be making a podcast there. Maybe I'll talk to some filmmakers while I'm there. But before we do that, I'm curious about the movies that you've seen this month that you think are actually good because there have not been too many and the box office is in

a little bit of a perilous state. You can read something about that on the ringer.com. My old story has been writing about it. Tell me something you liked. I just get to talk about movies. I like just one thing for now. Just let's just go one at a time. It was so exciting. And then you just curtailed my ambition so quickly. It's fine. I'm ready. I saw Everybody Knows. Yeah, I haven't seen this movie. Tell me about it. Directed by Asghar Farhadi.

And so you got to see it because it fits under your theory of all good movies start with a wedding. Nice. Well, that's not the rule, but okay. Well, but like a wedding is a good way to start a movie. Correct. You nailed it. Yeah, but maybe all good movies do start with the wedding okay have you played that one out perhaps another podcast okay anyway this movie stars Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem

so I'm in smoking hot yeah and it is it is a thriller technically I'm gonna be honest it's more of like a psychological drama than a thriller by the end. If you're going in for twists and turns and, you know, having everything be a mystery that needs solving, um, I, you know, watch lost or something.

Or don't watch lost. Watch something that actually resolves itself effectively. Um, but it is tense and there is a mystery and there is Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem, who in this movie, they play exes, but, um, they are fact, together in real life. So no spoilers, but you can possibly guess what happens.

And it was just fun movie going. Javier Bardem at the wedding is just lit. He is having the time of his life. More or less fun than he was having while listening to Queen at the Oscars. I really turned to my husband when Javier Bardem came out on stage. And I was like, he is still in Paco mode from Everybody Knows. Because I think it was the same energy. He was bringing the same energy to both.

That's very interesting. Asghar Farhadi, definitely one of my favorite filmmakers. People may know his previous films, The Separation and The Past and The Salesman. He tends to make these very emotionally fraught, complex moral dilemma movies. Would you say that this kind of fits into that category? That's what it is. Okay. I look forward to checking that out.

It's also set in Spain, which, you know, it's a nice vacation baked into a movie. You love Spain. I really do. Yeah. Recommend it as a travel location and also a movie location. Should we stay international, do you think? Why not? What a cosmopolitan podcast we have.

Yeah, why not? I think it's nice to recommend foreign films. You know, I recently caught up with a film called Transit. Are you familiar with Transit? I'm familiar. I haven't seen it, but I know of it. Transit is a German film. It's directed by Christian Petzold, who people may know from Phoenix, which came out a handful of years ago.

That is just an absolutely fascinating sort of Hitchcockian drama about a relationship and the way that that relationship changes. It has kind of touches of vertigo in it. If you haven't seen that movie, it stars Nina Haas, who is Christian Petzl's partner. She does not appear in Transit. Transit is a very, very difficult movie to describe, so I will not go to great lengths to do so. However, it is theoretically a story about refugees during a significant international crisis and the way that they can get in or get out of their country and the way that we take on identities that we may not actually have the rights to. And to say more, I think would spoil it, but he does this interesting

trick in this movie. This movie could be taking place during World War II, but it looks contemporaneous. And it never says what year it is. It never officially says really what country it is. It never identifies the international crisis. There is a kind of vagueness. There is almost like a play-like structure. So the fact that you're kind of scratching your chin as you watch the movie to try to figure out who these people are and why they're doing the things they're doing, what the motivations are, and really like this urge that we have to understand what time this is happening so that we can more easily understand what the characters are meant to be doing. I thought it was like a fascinating experiment that also wasn't too like, okay, smart guy film school stuff. You know, it's very elegantly handled. So I would

definitely recommend Transit. You got another one? Yeah. I spoiled this one a bit earlier. I saw Apollo 11 this week. I also have not seen this. You know what's great? Space. I love space.

I like movies about space as long as we don't have to get into alien territory. Then I get bored. Spoiler for my Captain Marvel review. Anyway, I really enjoyed this. So Apollo 11 is just archival footage of kind of recreating the moon landing. And, you know, you're not supposed to talk about your age after a certain point as a lady, but I was not alive when the moon landing happened. Huge spoiler. Yeah.

So I thought it was very exciting. Just it was like I wasn't there. And some of it was just the real experience of kind of watching this in real time. And it pulls kind of some of the newscasters and some of the context footage. But it really is mostly from Mission Control and the Capcom, which is the radios. I love space stuff. I know the lingo. And just recreating from Liftoff until they make it back to Earth, which they do.

You just spoiled the movie. I know, sorry. And it's an IMAX, so the sound design is great in there. It's shaking. The theater was shaking when they take off and all of the fun stuff. It feels a little bit like you're there but really it just was there were all of these tidbits and things that i guess were broadcast at the time that don't really make it through 50 years of history and it was interesting to see all that can be yours for the low low price of 45 american

dollars i will say also so i have seen apollo 13 many many times many. And it's a real favorite of mine. It's in the Amanda Cannon. It is in the Amanda Cannon. The Amandan? Sure. Okay. I think Amanda Cannon is fine. We should consider a new segment called the Amandan. Think about it.

But I've seen it so many times that I both know kind of all of the beats of a journey to the moon. A 1960s, early 70s journey to the moon, but also the emotional beats that go with them. So I did want, I brought my own tension to Apollo 11. Like, you know, when they were trying to dock the LEM with the command module, which are the various parts of the space station, it's fine. Just watch Apollo 13. Okay, whatever you say. But, you know, there are all these, there are all of these sequences in a space flight that are like points of huge drama in Apollo 13 and go really wrong in Apollo 13. And I've seen them so many times that I'm wired to react emotionally a certain way.

So Apollo 11 was like a real emotional journey for me. But I don't know whether it's because I brought my own Apollo 13 baggage. I would be curious what like a normal person thinks about Apollo 11. I'm probably not the right person to check in on it then because my next choice is Alita Battle Angel. Alita Battle Angel is a movie directed by Robert Rodriguez and I'm going to spotlight him because Robert Rodriguez is going to be my guest at the live version of the Big Picture podcast at South by Southwest in Austin. So very much looking forward to that. You can find out more details about that on the internet. It'll be on Monday at 5 p.m. But Robert Rodriguez is a kind of an interesting dude

to make a movie like Elite Battle Angel, which is essentially a futuristic sci-fi cybertech movie about a cyborg warrior princess who's come to save humanity, I guess for lack of a better word. It does fulfill just kind of your general action movie tropes, but it does something very fun that I think anyone can appreciate, which is it takes incredibly gifted actors and it forces them to do ridiculous shit.

So the people in this movie include Oscar winner, two-time Oscar winner, Mahershala Ali, Oscar winner, Jennifer Connelly, two-time Oscar winner, Christoph Waltz, amongst many other people kind of slumming it in a lot of ways, reading ridiculous dialogue. The movie is produced notably by Lightstorm. Lightstorm is the company that John Landau and James Cameron formed, and they've been trying to make Alita Battle Angel for many years. And this was not an easy movie to get made. And it was, I think it was delayed twice before it was released And it was considered, uh a very difficult property to sell. It was tracking very poorly at the box office

And lo and behold it has kind of bounced back and it has kind of like become a little bit of a box office success Story internationally this year not huge in america, but doing well enough considering it was going to be a fiasco I'm gonna be honest with you amanda. I just like a big, dumb, loud movie sometimes. And if they're done well, I really like them. And I found myself really enjoying myself at Alita Battle Angel. Well, there you go. Will you see it? No, I won't. I will say, you know, this is one of these movies which I'm consuming entirely via the internet and entirely via the passion of young ringer staffers for this movie and jokes about the movie. Am I included in the young ringer staffers? Well movie and jokes about the movie. Am I included in the young ringer staffers?

Well, have you made any memes? I have actually. You made an Alita meme? Did I miss it? No, no, not about Alita. No, right. Shout out to Mose Bergman, the lord of the Alita memes. I was just going to say, I have enjoyed Mose Bergman's presentation of Alita Battle Angel.

And in many ways, I feel like I've seen my own film and I really enjoyed that. Yes. Visit Moe's on Twitter where you can find all of the memes you need. And perhaps you don't need to see the film. Do you want to make one more recommendation for films you've seen this year? Well, do I? If you don't, that says a lot. You know, I mean, the third that I was going to say, I made a mini ranking and High Flying Bird is a movie that I think really passed by a little bit quicker

than you or I would have liked. And I really enjoyed it. I am a fan of Steven Soderbergh. That's really all I have to say. Yeah, I think it's been kind of an interesting year because we have already gotten a Soderbergh movie. We've already gotten, I guess, a Robert Rodriguez, James Cameron movie. We've already got, you know, we're on the precipice of a bunch of big releases, which we'll talk about in one second. You know, we got a couple of Netflix movies, Velvet Buzzsaw kind of came and went. I think that there's, you know, that we had the Fyre Festival documentaries. Oh, yes. That was a very meaningful moment. I don't know if you could ever call those great films, but Chris Smith, who made Fyre, the Netflix version, is really one of the

more interesting documentarians working right now. Have you seen Gaspar No's Climax yet? Yeah, I'm not going to be seeing that one. I'm good. Okay. I won't say too much about it then. Okay. I've, you know, I watched the trailer. I feel like I got it. What about the Lego Movie 2 colon the second part? Maybe I'll watch it on an airplane. Wow. So here's an interesting thing. Maya Rudolph is in it. I do love Maya Rudolph. This is an interesting thing. Another movie came out this year, Isn't It Romantic?

I haven't seen this. And it came out on Valentine's Day, actually, and it's starring Rebel Wilson and I believe Liam Hemsworth, the one married to Miley Cyrus, is in it. And Alison Herman, I sent her to see it because it's her job to go see things.

And she came back. Her job is to write about the things, not to see them. But that's a whole other story. But sometimes I'm like, well, tough luck, kid. This one's for you. And this was one of those situations

because we had pretty low expectations. She came back and she was like, you know what? I really enjoyed it. And I said to her, huh, maybe I'll see it. And then pause. Maybe I'll watch it on an airplane and i really

do feel like there is a whole class of movie that now i'm really just reserving for for the airplane i don't think i'm alone in that let me can we do a little quiz yeah can you name any of the three highest grossing films of 2019 well i just googled it so oh no you spoiled my quiz well i wanted to have information. Have you seen any of them? Well, I only remember Glass. Let's give listeners the top three. Oh, of course I haven't seen any of these. So I didn't see Glass. Glass is number one. Can I just say, I support James McAvoy. Okay. You and my 15-year-old sister alike. Yes. Support James McAvoy. James McAvoy is very good in Glass. Glass, less successful, I think, than Split, which is less successful than Unbreakable. You said that it would upset me, so I didn't see it.

Well, maybe as an aperitif before your next comic book movie, it'll give you a little bit of a... I'm okay. Okay. The second is The Upside, which is the least discussed big hit in recent times. The Upside is literally the kind of movie that you and I complain about that they don't make anymore. And it made $102 million. It stars, stars of course Kevin Hart and Bryan Cranston it is a mid-budget middle brow American dramedy about two guys learning to become friends now I realize when I say they don't make it anymore they did also just make it and release in November when it was called Green Book yeah I was also gonna say is this the kind of movie we complain they don't make anymore well i just think in certain ways yes and in other ways no

okay fair enough the upside uh i don't have a lot to say about it the number three movie is how to train your dragon the hidden world which is to parents the third how to train your dragon film which is an immediate success one very small thing of interest to me about this movie as we're talking about box office, and we'll move on from this and talk about March momentarily. This is the third studio that has hosted How to Train Your Dragon. It is a property that has moved from studio to studio. Universal is releasing this one.

It had previously been, I believe, with Sony and Paramount. That never happens. That would be like Captain America being released by Warner Brothers next year. So just an intriguing little tidbit about that animated series, which many parents have told me is quite good and among the best IP, but I'm not a sophisticated dragon trainer, trainee.

Nor am I, nor are my parents. So I'm glad that the parents have something to watch with the kids. That's important. Let's briefly preview March. Yes. Well, you mentioned Captain Marvel. We'll save our thoughts for a future podcast.

We have some thoughts. In a week, less than a week, a matter of days, I'll be seeing Us. You will. Which is Jordan Peele's film. Maybe you'll see it too. I'm going to see it. We haven't talked a lot about how I'm a horror wimp, but you probably inferred it if you've listened this far in a podcast, but I am,

but I'm going to see us. I can do it. You saw Get Out. Yeah, I did. And you made it. Yeah, it was fine.

Okay. I'm very, it wasn't fine. I mean, I was very stressed out and I thought Get Out was fantastic, but I also saw the most recent Halloween and that was fine, but that was mostly because it had a tell and I could just I knew when to hide my eyes I see pretty instantly you're becoming calloused though you've seen too

many films that's the thing I always say like horror movies don't affect me anymore because I've seen I don't know 10,000 in the movie's defense I was like really looking for the tell in order to be able to hide my eyes because I would have been very upset. Otherwise I startled very easily. It's just not a genre for me, but I'm going to see us. The amount of time, how many times do you think I've disrupted you and terrified you in your office just by knocking on a door? It's like once a week and then you think it's funny. And so you try to do it more. It is very funny. Yeah. Uh, we also mentioned triple frontier. Yes. I would highly recommend triple frontier. Uh, we'll have, we'll have Rob Harvilla back on this show in a week or so. And we're going to be doing a new format to talk about our friend,

Ben Affleck. And I, Oh my God, there's so much to discuss. I'm very eager to discuss triple frontier with the world. Um, the beach bum is of course, uh,

Matthew McConaughey, his new film made by Harmony Corrine. And it is very much in keeping with the spring breakers motif that he set about five or six years ago. Neither of us have seen this, is that right? I have not seen it yet. It's off by a bit. Are you anticipating it? Oh, yeah. I mean, I'm extremely curious. More or less than Dumbo?

More. There are a number of other films, but those are kind of the top line ones. Is there anything else that's coming out that you want to put a red line under? I just really want to reiterate, like, out triple frontier so that we can discuss it you don't have to look far it's on netflix it's a rich text it's going to be there march 13th yeah and we're going to make the absolute most out of that text amanda thank you thank you sean Thanks again for listening to this week's episode of The Big Picture. Thanks to Amanda Dobbins and Rob Harvilla. As I mentioned on the show,

The Ringer will be down at South by Southwest. We'll be doing all manner of things, right Amanda? We will. We are going to be doing an episode of the show that you heard just now. We're going to be doing a live show that I mentioned with Robert Rodriguez. There's a live rewatchables with me and Shea Serrano and Chris Ryan and Jason Concepcion

we'll be talking about The Matrix a movie that has not been complicated at all by our political moment in 2019 and we'll also be

doing a Talk the Thrones live Talk the Thrones which I'm very excited about and you know we'll be capturing a lot of audio

content while we're there as well I've got five or six interviews lined up looking forward to it looking forward to it. Looking forward to seeing some movies with you, Amanda. Likewise.

Okay, see you then.