The Big Picture - The Aggressive Majesty of ‘May December’ and Beyoncé’s ‘Renaissance’

Episode Date: December 1, 2023

Sean and Amanda are joined by Wesley Morris to unpack their feelings about Todd Haynes's ‘May December.’ They discuss the complicated nature of the performances, hypothesize its potential for awards season, and much more (1:19). Later, they talk about their shared love for the newest concert film, ‘Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé,’ and highlight their appreciation for its impressive technical feats (55:13). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Wesley Morris Producers: Jack Sanders and Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do if everyone said they heard your trailer a hundred times? You'd probably make a new one. I'm Justin Sales, the host of The Wedding Scammer, The Ringer's first ever true crime pod. We've been hunting a con man for a few weeks now, and our hunt is coming to an end. Schemes, heartbreak, how to put on a wire. We've covered all this and more, but there are still a few surprises left. Binge The Wedding Scammer wherever you get your podcasts. Get groceries delivered across the GTA

from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about May, December, and the Renaissance in between. Joining us today, a very special guest, the critic at large for The New York Times, the co-host of Still Processing, one of our best pals, Wesley Morris. Hi, Wesley. Hello. Hello, hello, hello. It's nice to see you guys and hear you as well.

It's a very exciting movie release weekend. Happy Friday. Yeah, happy Friday to you. Happy World AIDS Day. That's right. And to celebrate, we're talking about two of the best movies being released today. You know, I haven't seen the Godzilla movie yet. I'm excited about that one. But we're talking about a different kind of monster to start the show.

Or monsters, as it were. Let's start with May-December. Because this is the new film from Todd Haynes. It's available on the Netflix streaming service right now. As of today. That's right. It stars Julianne Moore, Natalie Portman, and Charles Melton, a man of some interest of late.

And it's a chewy little item. One of my favorite movies of the year, full stop. Hold on. Let's back up the chewy little item. Yeah, don't you think? When's that Olivia Rodrigo album coming out? Maybe after she sees this movie because there's

there's a lot in the text of this film it's you know very roughly based on the experience of Mary Kay Letourneau the

school teacher who had an illicit affair with her then I believe 11 year old 11 year old school boy And she then later on went on to continue that affair with this young boy and then eventually marry him when he became of age after she served a prison stint. And this movie is about characters who had somewhat similar

circumstances many years into the future when an actress comes to visit the Mary Kay figure to do some research to portray her in a movie. That's the framework. In the movie, Julianne Moore is the woman. Natalie Portman is the actress. Amanda, I'll start with you. What'd you think of May, December? I've been thinking about it since I saw it. So I don't know that I have one concrete thought. I enjoyed it. I think it's very interesting, provocative, funny. Is it okay to say it's funny? Yes. I was the only person in the theater laughing, but I found it funny. It is really funny. And I think even intentionally funny until it is not. And I think that is part of the power of the filmmaking and the screenwriting and the performances that you're never quite sure where you are in this world and

who you're supposed to be identifying with or who is the, well, who's in control, which is an obvious one, but like also just where it's going and is it going to handle things the way that it quote unquote like should be handled. And so it's funny. And then, and I think part of the reason that I was laughing is because like the humor did feel like something to grab onto and obviousness as everything else just kind of gets pretty murky in fascinating ways. So it's also, I mean, what a strange setup for a movie, right? It's a movie about an actor preparing to play a tabloid star based on a real life, tabloid star is a tabloid fixture,

I should say, based on a real life, what have you. I mean, how random, but also kind of how fascinating in terms of both tabloid coverage and for me, the pursuit of acting and whether or not, what acting is and how people perform. It's actually really rich source material. I thought of you a couple of times, Amanda, because you've often been a skeptic on the art of acting. And this is a movie that spends a lot of time exploring whether or not you should be skeptical or not

about what it means to research as an actor. Wesley, I thought of you immediately when I saw this movie. I was immediately like, I desperately want to know what he thinks about this movie. So what did you think? Wait, why did you want to know that? Well, just like two absolutely hilarious going forward performances from Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore. And I feel like you are the best at talking about going forward performances from actresses. I had...

It's funny because, you know, I have a kind of complicated relationship with metaness in movies. And when at some... I mean, the metaness of this movie is not as bad as many other films, right? I think that the thing about Todd Haynes, the thing that sort of makes him always, um, interesting to watch is basically he isn't making a movie about the making of his movie. He's making a movie about movie-ness, right? And sometimes

it's the sort of aesthetic properties and subtext of movies. And then, you know, at other, or, you know, I mean, if we want to sort of go wider here, American popular culture, right? Because I'm thinking about I'm not there. And sometimes I'm with him and sometimes I'm not. And this was one of those cases where I was trying to figure out not so much who to identify with, but what really are the stakes here? And I mean, there are all these questions that this is truly honestly, and nobody wants to hear this, but this is a twicer. This is a movie that you actually have to see a second time because it's a different movie the second time you watch it. And I think the first time you watch it, I mean, I definitely laughed. And again, I was the only person in the theater. There was one just blatantly obvious

thing to laugh at at some point, but like nobody laughed at the hot dog line. You know, in the opening scene, Julia, well, like in the opening scene, in the opening minutes, Julianne Moore opens, she steps in front of her giant, you know, chrome refrigerator. And this, and the music that we're stuck with for the entire film, this like, the closest, I mean, it's, it's, I can't tell. I mean, it's by a composer. It's like portentous Max Steiner, like 1940s noir music, you know? It's pounding and insistent. And melodrama and very knowing, to Wesley's point. Like, it is like purposefully drawing attention to the quote-unquote joke.

Absolutely. Right. And all she does is step in front of this fridge, and the music just, it kind of zooms in ever so slightly on her opening the fridge. And then she looks inside. Well, she stares at it for a second is what she does. Right. And you're like,

Oh, this, this icy, another Julianne Moore, you know, refrigerator meets an actual refrigerator and the music starts. And it, it just, it just cracked me up and she's the line but the but the kicker of course is i don't think we have enough hot dogs and then there's a cut

to a grill loaded with hot dogs and so throughout this movie the real tension here is how much, what is knowledge here, right? Like what is self-knowledge and what is presentational performance knowledge? And who is giving a better performance as this woman, the actress who's come to town to play her or the person who is her? And I just, and the impossibility of knowing everything. I mean, I don't know. It's such a joke on acting in a way and the going for it-ness of the two of them. It's so, I mean, it's happening in the basement, not on the roof deck. Do you know what I mean? I was expecting, well, no, I wasn't expecting that.

It's a Todd Haynes movie. This never happens in a Todd Haynes movie. But I did think that there'd be a little more blatancy either between the two of them or on their own, but there really is a, like if there's a level of restraint here that is, I mean, I see, I, yes,

Amanda, you're nodding your head. Sort of on the part of one of the actresses and on the other, there is a lack of restraint that is part of the text i think and part of the performance but you're talking about julianne moore no i'm talking about no see i think that this is an amanda thing i've thought of this too because to me julianne moore is going for it she makes a very bold choice by giving this character a lisp. And so every scene that she's in,

you're like, wow, Julianne Moore is doing a lisp. You cannot not think that while watching the movie. As much as she transforms into the character. But your relationship

to Natalie Portman, I thought about Amanda. And Natalie Portman, let me just say, is in an interesting phase right now. Her phase right now is, I am like the dark, still death doll of cinema. Like Vox Lux and Jackie and Black Swan and these characters of like...

This is a long phase. Beautiful porcelain doom. Like that's what she does now. And she's so good at it. But I think that you are a little... Are you skeptical of it? are you like confused by it like what's your what's your read on this version of madeline portman i guess skeptical a little bit my read on this version is best summarized by uh peter sarsgaard in an interview about the film jackie which i quote every single time but he

describes showing up on set for the first day of shooting for Jackie, and she starts doing her Quaaludes Jackie performance. And he's like, oh, so this is what we're doing. And this is a real... I mean, from the minute she walks in to this movie, I'm like, oh, so this is what we're doing. And every time she's like angling her head into a mirror, just so, and obviously what she is telegraphing and what like, it's like clearly a part of the story is that she is an actor, but maybe not as good as an actor as Julianne Moore, who is acting as the, you know, who is playing this woman, like this central character.

And she's trying to do it, but the person living it is giving a better performance. So she's not supposed to be good, but it's like, to me, it's very funny the ways in which she communicates that Elizabeth, this actor she's's playing is not that good um so so it's in it's it's a good performance but it's a lot like it's a lot and i also julianne moore is like julianne moore and a todd haynes movie you know she only like actually cries twice so i thought yeah but it's julianne moore crying like i know i know but she's this is the author of don't you call me lady you know she's really she knows how to turn it up

right i mean she's the her crying she cries the way tom cruise runs right like there's no movie where julianne moore is not contractually obligated in her soul to dry heave. It's just not happening. I see the movie. It's not not happening. I see the movie in like three different ways. And I think that they're all intentional. I think that certainly there's like psychodrama

about performance that you're talking about. And Amanda, I think you nailed it. I think Gracie, the character, is a much better actor than Natalie Portman's character. Yeah. And that that is what, you know, they're kind of circling each other throughout the film and trying to unpack who the other is and give some information but not enough. And the exchange of information makes the movie, I think, the second thing that it is,

which is kind of like a mystery thriller, you know? And the first time that you watch it, it is about this slow dispersal of information about what really happened here in this case. And, you know, at the risk of spoiling the movie, it's actually more or less what you think it is. It's more or less what we've read about and what we imagine happened here. And in fact, like the conclusion a little bit to me- You mean procedurally? Yes, not psychologically. Okay, okay, okay.

But just like the events are not that mysterious. No. But then the third part of the movie is this like spicy, funny melodrama, which, you know, Todd Haynes really understands. Like this is a person who knows how to get laughs out of intense circumstances and knows how to make us like skeptical of our characters, but also start to care about them. And then once you care about them too much, you're like, wait, is this person crazy? Like he's so good at having us circling our feelings about

who we're supposed to be aligning with. And I can think of very many filmmakers who can kind of consistently do that for me. Usually we have these big telegraphing bright lights that are like, here's our hero. Even, and you know, maybe this is a way to kind of talk a little bit about Charles Mountain's character, Joe, who I think is the most sympathetically drawn. Who is the hero of them. I mean, I mean, if we're talking about, if we're thinking in these terms, I mean, he is the third protagonist. Very much.

He might have more screen time than the two of them. But is he a hero though? I mean, he's really portrayed as a victim. He's a tragic figure. This movie is also a tragedy that you never really think about. I mean, to sort of, I don't know, the power of this movie for me

is that it I mean, you know, it's funny. I'm going to put all my we're not playing poker, but let's pretend we are. Here are all my cards. Nobody asked for them. But I am strongly mixed not playing poker, but let's pretend we are here. All my cards, nobody asked for them, but I am strongly mixed about this movie. Actually.

Um, there's a part of me that is just so tired of this. Like I'm so tired of this Todd Haynes mode, right? Where, you know, he has, he's been doing this, this like, I mean, I'm calling calling Julianne Moore the refrigerator, but really,

Todd Haynes is the fridge. And I think that his interest in manner and mannerism and formalism, but mostly mannerism, right? It's all about the way in which he can position his dolls in the house that he's given them essentially. And sometimes that exasperates me. And I found it occasionally exasperating here because he's operating at the same time in a very specific place. And the other actors who aren't as good as the two of them and who aren't as like naturally good as Charles Melton. I just, there's like,

there's a way in which they're almost not average enough actors in some way. So there isn't a harder line between what, what the two stars are doing and what the, the, like the, you know, there's a guy playing her, her son.

Who's that? I don't know that actor's name. She's got, we should be clear about this other thing, right? Like in terms of the plot, which is that she has two families. When this affair started,

she was the mother of, is it three kids with her, with her first husband. And then she becomes the mother of three other kids with the new husband, Joe. And I think the thing that got me here and the thing that I love one level of this movie and I don't like another level of this movie. And the level that I do love is the attempt to raise these questions about the ethics of depiction. Right? And the fact that this movie that is not about anybody dying feels like a murder mystery. Right?

It feels like a murder mystery. Right? It feels like a film noir. And I don't know how he achieves that because none of the formal properties of that genre are operating in this movie. Except the music, probably. Amanda, tell me what you think about this. Because one, I radically disagree and think this is like a borderline masterpiece. This is one of my favorite movies of the year.

I think that this is- One of my best friends, Eric Hines, also feels this way. I was so knocked out. I watched it a second time to your twicer point this morning and it held for me. I think one of the things that- It's better the second time. Yeah. And it is because it dispenses with a lot of that mystery thriller aspect, which is not really what the movie is. It's just like a framework and the movie is much more psychological slash funny.

But the thing that I thought was really fascinating about that was this didn't originate with Todd Haynes. He didn't write it. It was brought to him. It's also the first time really basically ever that he's made a movie set in contemporary times. Most of the time when he's doing the dollhouse thing

that you're describing, he's going to the 70s, he's going to the 20s, he's going to 1998. This is, certainly there are elements that take place in the past but the movie is primarily located right now and people on cell phones and doing things that they don't do in todd haynes movies i think that's true but it is like remarkable the ways in which it is like a contemporary period piece and costume drama. And like the way that Natalie Portman is dressed, I mean, she's got the Cartier Panther and the love bracelet, you know, like,

which the, the, the, the mirror scene, I mean, there were like eight mirrors, so many mirrors, the, the, the makeup scene, which perhaps you've seen it still from Julianne Moore is wearing like several well-known Instagram brands that like I clocked, you know, and I was like, oh, that's a, you know, an Iliad. It's like he is so observant of detail and treating these people and this world as like a close as a place at a distance and at like a closed system. Like I don't, which I just say to point out, it's very well observed. And also I don't think we're, are we meant to relate to it as like a contemporary story?

I do feel the distance, even though it is set right now. I agree with Amanda on that. It's literally set in the present, but I don't believe anything that's present about it. I feel like it's 1987 or's reference to, you know, the nickname of Slow Vanna. If you've ever been to Savannah, I have, of course, I'm an idiot from Georgia. It is like a little bit of a, like a time machine place to visit. It does seem like the world is operating at a different speed there. That being said, the like interactions between Joe and his kids and everybody's going to college and we're going out to dinner tonight. And there's just a kind of like functional everyday aspect to the movie

that you don't really feel in a lot of Todd Haynes movies. It is being scored like it is something much more severe, but there's not usually this level of like calm daily life that is happening around this story that I find fascinating.

Nevertheless, I assume he was drawn to it in part because it is a movie about how we remember things and how we remember the Mary Kay Letourneau affair and how Gracie remembers it or refuses to and how Joe comes to these kind of thunderous realizations later in life. What a commercial for casual drug use. Absolutely. I mean, as someone who came to marijuana late, let me tell you, that shit worked. I've never on a rooftop, but I enjoyed that scene. But wait, can we talk about that for a second? Wait, I want to talk about that.

Yeah, let's talk about it. There's some great... I would love to see the original script for this movie because there's this... okay. So basically the other family that Joe and Gracie start, this new family, I mean, for Joe, it's his family. And all of the family members live in Savannah. They're all still in each other's lives. It's complicated because now Joe and Gracie's kids are the same age as Gracie's grandchildren. And at some point, you know, we don't really have a sense because of the way Charles Melton plays this part, which is very good. We don't have a sense of, we never think about what this looks like.

Well, also, is there a precedent for this, right? Is there a precedent for,, right? Is there a precedent for, like, if the genders were, well, I don't know, like, let's just, we'll think about this. But like, I can't think in my sort of relationship to national tabloid scandal of an incident like this happening where the two players are still together and have started a family. The closest I can get is Ryan and Trista from The Bachelor. And that's not a similar situation. Not nearly as scandalous, yeah.

What about the president of France? Which one? Macron? Macron? What did Macron do? Oh, wait, I thought you were talking about the actual people. Yeah. He started dating his wife, his still wife, when she's much older than him, and they were young. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. That's true. Oh, I didn't know if that was your, yeah. No, that's a great example, or it's a good example because it's extant and also,

I don't know, if France, that was a scandal. Imagine a Todd Haynes movie about Macron. That would be really something. I'd sign up for that. Again, I don't, we can talk about what Todd Haynes should be doing later. I think that the thing that's so fascinating to me that I had never bothered to think about in these scenarios is what it must be like to, okay,

I'm going to tell a personal story real quick. Please do. When I was Joe's age, when this affair happens between Joe and Gracie, because Gracie was his teacher. And, you know, I'm assuming that you just develop these affinities for these people in your life. And you probably don't think of them. He did not have a mother. I believe when she was his teacher, the mother was, did the mother die? Mother died, right? I think the mother dies when he's like 20. A little later. Okay.

Yeah. So they quote unquote never got a chance to look back on things, which is a tough piece of dialogue. Okay. So either way, there's some void that she's satisfying, but also this is the beginning of your hormonal life. And whether this person is maternal at all in any way, you just sort of start to develop feelings for these. Sometimes a kid can develop feelings for an adult in his or her life. I can relate to Joe and his assertion,

his defensive assertion that he was doing what he wanted in this and he was as much an agent in this decision as she was. I had a crush on a teacher who I will not name. And I, to this day, think about how uncomfortable it must have made him for me to be as affectionate with him as I was. I wouldn't call it sexual because I was 11 or 12, but I was definitely developing feelings for this grown man who probably, you know, I don't know how old he would have been. I don't know what our age difference was, but meaningful, right? He would have been at least 22 or 23.

And if something had happened, I swear, you know, I would have said something like, I wanted it to happen. My dreams came true. But I don't know what I would be saying today as a person in his 40s about a thing that happened when I was 11 or 12 with a grown man. And this movie is about, I mean, to the extent that it's about real human feelings, which I personally honestly think is, I mean, well, whatever. We can talk about how humanity functions in Todd Haynes. But I was thinking about this in a way that was sort of extra cinematic in a sense. And I think that is an achievement of this film because it actually

is concerned and it's sort of emotional turning point happens in this scene. The seeds are planted for it in this scene on the roof. Well, the seeds aren't planted, but it sort of blooms in his mind in this scene on the roof where he has what I can only describe as an incestuous drug experience with his son, right? The first time he smokes weed is with his like weed smoking son. And the son is clearly uncomfortable with this, but the father is so much more, he's transformed by it essentially. So yes, but I think what that scene represents to me

is his 17 year old son who is maturing through life in a more normal way it's probably pretty difficult to have a normal life given your parents circumstances nobody's gonna have a normal life under but in a more normal trajectory of adolescence and joe has just never had the chance to do that since he was 11 years old he's been in a state of arrested development because of what happened the movie in many ways is about the untangling the unch a state of arrested development because of what happened. The movie, in many ways, is about the untangling, the unchaining of his arrested development. And he obviously has these big, bold revelations as the movie goes on and has these realizations. The arrival of Elizabeth compounded by smoking weed, compounded by having these strong feelings for other people. We see not just his feelings towards Elizabeth evolving, but also this woman that he's in a butterfly care group chat, which is like one of those.

There's a series of details in the movie. It's not a group chat. That's a one-on-one. Okay. They've taken it off the group chat to an individual text. He does describe it as like a group, but maybe it is just one gal that he's connected to. Yeah. But the movie.

Okay. gal that he's that's how they met yeah um but the the movie okay so in the movie um Gracie is a baker and she's a character who in theory is putting all of her love and warmth into these beautiful confection confectionery items Joe is an x-ray technician and what does he do he looks inside to see what's broken inside of you you know and also he has a serious interest in the chrysalis and the larva and the evolution of the beautiful butterfly like these big bold obvious kind of dumb metaphorical character details which feel very knowing to me which feel very purposefully melodramatic which feel very much in line with like far from heaven far from heaven you know like these are like strokes of

storytelling that he does so knowingly that really worked for me. Like a, a, I smoked weed for the first time and now my whole life makes sense to me moment. It's so stupid. It's so good.

Like I, but he almost falls off the roof. I mean, I don't know. There's just, it's so, it's all sideways, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I don't know. I feel like I love, I, I mean,

just talking to the two of you, I feel like I do love talking about this movie. And I do, I don't know. It's, it is, it is richer. I mean,

for all that is sort of not flagrantly cinematic about it, it has the richness of, I think it's his least attractive movie in some ways. It's his flattest movie cinematically. But I think that the trade there is that he actually truly does want you to pay attention, not to his formal ideas, but to his arrangement of these people. And I think that succeeds to me. That works. Amanda, what did you think of Melton? Did you ever watch Riverdale? Were you familiar with him at all? I didn't, but he has been sort of on awards buzz for so long that I knew going in that this was a performance to watch. And my honest thought was about 30 minutes in,

Wesley, Sean and I did a thing about a month ago where we made Oscar predictions, like even before all the short lists came out. And we did like full category. We picked all five nominees and a winner. And I had Charles Melton on my long list for supporting actor. Didn't include him. And two scenes into this movie, I was just like, damn it.

I should have put him on my list. And I felt the loss because I could see. And then, obviously, he won, I believe, at the Gotham Awards and New York Film Critics Circle. So it's really starting for him. I thought he was great. He obviously is performing in a more naturalistic way than the two women, which I mean, imagine having to go up against Julianne Moore and not having to, but that's your job is just either Natalie Portman is going to be throwing her like weird head shaking at you or Julianne Moore is just going to be crying at you every day. I admire him. That takes a lot of courage. And yeah, I think he's wonderful. He's the clear

breakout of this. And to the extent that I think this movie communicates any emotion which I'm I'm kind of with Wesley I don't know how much emotional takeaway there is from what is a tragedy but it's obviously located in him um to the extent that you get it well I mean I want to go back to this idea to this idea of whether or not the movie is basically functioning the way a murder mystery functions. Because, I mean, it's true that nobody literally dies, but there is, to keep with the blatancy of the butterfly metaphors, but I also, I want to bring in the cakes, right? The baking, the baking, she's baking for nobody. Nobody wants what she's baking basically. And you know, the cakes do look good. I mean, in the opening, we only see her really baking. We only see the finished result of like maybe two cakes. Um, and I got to say the one she serves Joe is, does look look delicious but can you imagine how

cake is functioned in that marriage like he's really doughy and I can only imagine it's partially because she's been feeding him cake for 23 years and I think the the thing about Charles Melton's performance relative to the other two is that there's no place else for him to go. Right? And he's playing... I mean, I don't know what his mission was or what Todd Haynes wanted him to do. But what we're getting is a kid who stopped developing at 13. Right? is a kid who stopped developing at 13 right whatever happened at 13 you know his life changed and it never it never evolved and so the thing that's really uncomfortable about the scene

on the roof for instance or anytime you hear the the teenage kids his own teenage kids call Joe dad, you're just kind of like, wait, what? I don't, this is not, that doesn't feel good to me. That like these kids, these, you know, 16 and 17 year olds have been raised by a person who looks like he could be their older brother. Yeah, this is an actor who until very recently was playing a high school kid on a network television show. Yeah.

It's like a... I think it's like a brilliant stroke of casting for a variety of reasons. I think he's a really, really impressive actor, especially given the circumstances that Amanda was describing,

like who he's posed against. But there's something really clever about taking a TV actor and putting him in a role like this and effectively asking him to give a naturalistic performance while Natalie Portman, who is a revered Academy Award-winning

actress, is playing a TV actress. She's somebody who in her career aspires to greatness and a kind of respectable intellectualism, but is really just seemingly on Law & Order SVU. You know, she's not really like a gifted performer. My, you know, Amanda mentioned that scene where they're, she's learning how to apply Gracie's makeup and they're looking into the mirror. And it's a very like Bergman's persona after reading the National Enquirer for a week. Like it's such a genius little sequence. But in that sequence, that's where she tells Gracie that her mother who is an academic wrote a book about

epistemic relativism which is just like the study of how the truth is not real the truth is constantly changing and redefinable and again it's like a very obvious dumb line that is so good as soon as you're confronted

with it you're like there is no there is no subtext in this movie like the the metaphors are so obvious joe's emotional fragility and frozenness is so obvious to us that we're constantly like is this really all they're trying to tell us but then i i had the experience that i think a lot of people are having once they've seen the movie and i wonder if you guys did this as well I just went back and read everything I could

about Mary-Kay Letourneau and her relationship and where that relationship went and how it evolved she recently died and it's

it's actually crazier than the movie that's the thing that is so wild about it is that the movie is not ridiculous at all when you read the story and so our relationship to tabloid stories or at least the way than the movie. That's the thing that is so wild about it is that the movie is not ridiculous at all when you read the story. And so our relationship to tabloid stories, or at least the way that

they're framed, I think the movie is kind of asking us to look at the way that we understand these people that we've been shown in these circumstances, in these formats and figure out like, well, is this really crazy? Like, did they get a fair shake? Are they actual human beings who deserve our respect and empathy and understanding? Or are they just characters in the soap opera that we remain so far removed from? I don't have an answer to those questions, but I like thinking about them. I thought of you again, Amanda, because it's like you think about celebrity and gossip and those concepts all the time. This is a little, you know, further to the left of those things, but it's related. Yeah, and I would say the tabloid aspect of it, and really the meta aspect of it.

I'm sorry, Wesley, I think I just like meta movies more than you do. And so... Oh, I like them. I just, you know... Yeah. They come in different flavors and some are better than others, but go on. But I think the examination, and for me, it's a little less about celebrity and i saw this a little bit more as an examination of tabloid and also true crime um and that's how i feel yeah and this examination of

this phenomenon where we all just become you know rubber, rubberneckers. And not only are we inserting ourselves and having, you know, and having it play out for us as a soap opera all the time, but like it keeps happening. You know, there's that scene pretty early on at the, at the end of the barbecue with some random friend who's like, things had finally calmed down and now you guys are like making a movie about it that I did find to be, you know, that's pretty much flashing a red light, if not at Todd Haynes himself, then like at people who make movies. And it's, you know, it's a fairly simple, this is the other side of what we're all doing

here. And you feel that. Yeah, you do feel it. I mean, I think it is like a pretty apt examination of something that, like, as we all know from working in the media, is just very popular. People are just really interested in true crime, or if not in true crime, then, to my case, murder mysteries, which we are comparing it, this film constantly to a lot of different seedy, very popular genres for a reason.

But it itself is not inherently trashy, which I think is an interesting, it's a very Todd Haynes choice. He does not make trash. He will show you a photograph of actual trash or garbage, but he himself will not stoop to that level, which is why I kind of liked his Mildred Pierce, which we can put a pin in and come back to later. But this is Mildred Pierce with no gun, although there is a gun. Wait, there is a gun, but there's no murder, right? There is the implication. There are these things that are meant to just complicate who these people are, right? I do think that this is a film about interpersonal ethics. Sort of. Sort of. Isn't it though?

Well, I think it's, if by ethics you mean like vampirism, that's really the thing that I think it's most interested in is like who's sucking the blood from who in this movie? Well, I guess, I mean, to your question, like I'm thinking about what Amanda just said. And I mean, I think that the only person who's really down to do this is Gracie. And she starts to think like, you know what? I'm, and I can't tell, this is a sort of, this is one of the great psychological mysteries of the movie, or maybe, well, yes, it's one of them. And the question, the mystery is, is she afraid that Natalie Portman's character is going, like, that performance is going to supplant the reality of Gracie herself, right? And is this woman's portrayal of me going to erase me?

Which then leads me to question, why let your narcissism do this to you, Grace? Why? Because she's damaged. Of course, yes. She too Because she's damaged. Of course. Yes. She too is a girl in some way, right?

Well, there's an air of mystery around that too. You know, around what has or has not happened to her and whether she is in control or not in control in ways that I find

like fascinating. There's like obviousness and ambiguity operating simultaneously in this movie that I love. Yes. Movies don't let you do that.

Like, they don't let you get away with, like, I'm not really sure how I'm supposed to feel about this person who clearly committed a crime and went to prison. You know? Like, that's, I don't know. I found it to be very rich. But I guess, I don't know. Like, I don't know. Like, I don't know. I mean, I'm, I, I, again, I'm now litigating the, the sort of extra narrative information that I did not really know a lot about ever, even when I was alive, when it was happening and didn't really, wasn't paying attention to it. talk about what crime is. Let's talk about what agency is. There's this whole other aspect of this movie, which is cultural, right? I mean, I don't know if the kid in the real story was Korean, but in the film, we now have these Korean-American kids who are simultaneously, I mean, Joe and Gracie's kids aren't really necessarily

struggling with this, but there's a way in which she, there's a third daughter who comes home from college who clearly is bringing some level of like, I don't want to displace identitarian resentment onto the family. But there's something about her harshness that seems aimed specifically at the mother. They all seem to sort of

hate the mother a little bit. Well, they kind of, they illustrate why a little bit. My favorite scene in the movie is a different- The dress. It's the dress different mirror scene. It's the dress.

Amazing scene. Of course. It's incredible. I mean, obviously, you know, the actual frame where the mirror

is such that Natalie Portman is sitting between two Julianne Moores and one of the daughters is trying on, I know, it's great.

So smart. It's great. It's the best kind of obviousness. Yes. It's so great. And then one of the daughters is trying on a dress for graduation.

And Gracie gives some feedback that will be very familiar to women of a certain generation dealing with their mothers. Wow. In Georgia, perhaps? In Georgia, perhaps. It feels updated, but true. And it's about the child's weight, but also about, quote unquote, body standards and expectation and what you present to the world and what the world thinks of you. And so she is clearly very visually focused and surface focused. And Gracie is like aware not only of what she's putting out into the world,

but like what all of her kids are putting. You know, there's another line where it's like she gave the elder daughter a scale for her 18th or for going to college. And they're pissed off about that. But what I take away from that is that they're- Wrapped it up as a gift. Yeah.

And then the script is like, well, that's what my mom did for me, which is just, you know, it's a just great little bit about how mothers just ruin their daughters generation upon generation. Do I have to return Alice's Christmas present scale that I got her?

Is that a mistake? Is it too soon for that? Okay, Gracie. But, you know, I think it's interesting the way I do feel like I understand why the kids, or at least the daughters, really don't like their mother. And it is, it comes from a controlling, narcissistic place that probably also did feed into this crime that she committed that started their family. But like, they're just pissed because she's being a bad mom, you know, being like, being a controlling mom. And I'm sure it's all tied into it, but I actually like that, I guess that complexity and the fact that

there are a lot of different ways to be a shitty person in this movie. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I don't want to spoil the ending per se, but I also like how the power just shifts like dramatically at the end of the movie again.

And it is like, again, like this kind of resonance of who is really in control here and the way that we're constantly battling with like,

oh, okay, so that's why this happened. Oh, wait, no, is it because of this? Or like, do these people have a relationship in this way because of this?

And then when it ends, we're sort of like, but maybe it'll shift again tomorrow. And that feels like a very honest reflection of how a lot of interpersonal relationships among insanely narcissistic people play out. You know, I say this as a podcast host, like this is the nature of our being. Like you have to, like, I really had to like doff my cap at the end of the movie. I was like, damn, you just people might hate this but you went for it

you mean the the the end in ball that final conversation between Elizabeth and Gracie

that specifically not the not the the sort of the recreation thing yeah and even even that conversation

that scene I mean it is again it's just Julianne Moore in a Todd Haynes movie, I know. But the way it's shot, there's like, the light comes on in her eyes as like the power is transferred back to her. Or it was always there and she's like, aha. But, you know, there is like a real melodrama even in that that I was delighted by. I thought that part was very funny. Okay. This conversation is really doing something for me. And it's like, because I haven't written about this movie, I haven't really had a chance to sit down and work through it. And this work is really affirming in some way because I will tell you, I will walk you through my experience of leaving the theater when this movie is over.

I saw it with the public. And I heard two women leaving the bathroom being like, oh my God, that's so made Decembercore already. It was so made Decembercore when she did XYZ. So, you know, hats off to the 22-year-old women who were leaving the bathroom as I was leaving the bathroom. And I think one thing I was thinking as I was departing the theater was like, I kept saying to myself, God, I didn't like that. That didn't work. He is really just doing the same thing he was doing in 1995. I think I'm done. I mean, I didn't like Carol. I mean, I'm not a, yeah through it, and thinking about what I... Because I'm always about what I wish Todd Haynes would do. And sometimes I think my wishes for him completely work at cross-purposes with what is none of my business and what he actually did do.

And I think this movie really is an achievement, you know, in the ways that I recognized when I was leaving the theater. I think I wanted something that was a lot less heady and a lot juicier. And I think that that was me not, I think I wanted, this movie isn't actually literal at all in some ways. Do you know what I mean? It doesn't want to go head on into the thing. It does not want to be a Lee Daniels movie of the Mary Kay Letourneau movie, which is our story, which listen, if Lee Daniels wanted to do that, I would eat it up with a spoon 7,000 times, but I don't know if there'd be a lot to talk about, right? Like I love Lee Daniels. We'd be talking about a completely different set of,

of, of psychological and cinematic functions. And I don't know. I just, I, I, I have my appreciation of this has ripened. I will probably watch it a third time, um, you know, in the next couple of weeks. I, um, I, I do think that a lot of general consumers of Netflix will watch the movie and have a similar feeling to the one that you did, Wesley, which is sort of like, why did you not actually give me the Mary Kay Letourneau movie that I want to watch? Um, why am I watching this heady psychodrama about frankly, just two narcissistic psychopaths

and the poor boys caught between them. But I personally don't care about that and I don't care about those people who didn't like it. I was... Thank God my feelings got more complicated. I'd have to go. Well, I care about you individually, but that opinion you know

it doesn't really matter ultimately but I may have mentioned that we talked about the Oscars a lot already and we've been kind of blindly doing some predicting and I've been trying to figure out

whether this is going to be a best picture nominee it's clear Charles Melton will be in the running I think whether Julianne why is he a supporting actor

what is that like he truly if you add up the screen time, he's in more of the movie than they are because he's got scenes with more people. I think it's just the star power equation, ultimately, that like he's the least notable of the three. Julianne Moore is considered like a, you know,

a longtime collaborator of Haynes. But they're doing the same thing to Ryan Gosling, who has, you know what I mean? Like, it's just, I quit. Yeah, but- This is so dumb. Best actor is has, you know what I mean? Like, it's just, I quit. Yeah, but best actor is stacked, you know? But that's not how it works. Like, if you're good, you're good. Don't try to hide another category to, like, ensure a nomination.

I just, I hate that so much. Like, the idea that, who is Ryan Gosling supporting? Like, that's a political choice, Stephen. That's the literal point of the movie. I think that the actual accident of the movie is that he's the best person in it. The ironic thing about that though, is that best supporting actor has just as loaded as best actor. This is like a lot of the jokes in the last couple of days have been like, holy shit,

our DJs like Robert Downey Jr.'s Oscars are going to get stolen by Charles Milton. Like that's just ridiculous. But is that, it's not Robert Downey Jr.'s Oscars are going to get stolen by Charles Milton. That's just ridiculous. It's not Robert Downey Jr.'s best performance. That's category fraud. It's insane. Like Robert Downey Jr., that's an actual supporting performance in a movie that has nothing to do with Robert Downey Jr. Right. I agree with you.

But Ryan Gosling will be running in that category. Willem Dafoe and Mark Ruffalo will be running in that category. A lot of heavyweight actors are going to be there and there's a world in which charles milton does something that you'd see more often on the actress and supporting actress side but the sort of like ingenue who has taken our breath away with his spirited naturalism he could very well win the lupita niango of exactly no exactly yeah um and but i do think screenplay feels very likely. Best picture, I don't know.

I wonder if Hollywood will respect a movie like this or feel like they've just had bullets shot through their head. It's too close to home. Yeah. It's going to, neither one of those women is going to get nominated. I'm telling you, neither one of them. What do you think, Amanda? I didn't put them on our list

and you have Julianne Moore and I was really going back and forth because Sean has Julianne Moore and supporting Wesley. How do you feel about that? That's insane. I hadn't seen the movie when I said that for the record. Oh, okay. You know, so we're just relying on what I think that's what she's competing in. Yeah. I will say I didn't make it up. This is insane. This is, this is, this is the kind of thing that makes me not want to care about the Oscars because they're lying to people. We saw these movies.

We know how much screen time they had and what character, like what function the character had in the larger scheme of the movie. This is, I'm outraged. It's a movie with three leads, but there's politics at play here that may or may not work against them. Anyway, Amanda, keep going. I have no idea how this is going to shake out in Best Picture. I think that there are, there's probably six or seven locks, and then there are those three spots that about 10 movies are competing for, and I just, I really can't tell. I do wonder whether a lot of people will know, or at least a lot of awards voters, I should say, will know very little about this, know the name Mary Kayla Turno, turn it on, and like not commit to the tone, you know,

and not commit to the process and be like, no, thank you. I can see that i also am glad i watched it in a theater too but i think it actually this but the second time well i mean i'm one i'm curious about how it it probably plays even better weirdly at home it worked at home i watched it this morning it did as well i also watched it probably yeah it probably really works at home because the other thing about my two viewing experiences is that they both looked, they didn't look great. And, you know, I watched the opening scene

before I started talking to you guys today on Netflix. And it just looked so much better. And I think that one of the, I mean, whatever, this is a whole other conversation about movie exhibition and our 30-year projector crisis. But I think – I don't know. I predict that there's something about the depiction of performance and acting in this movie and our obsession with biopics, which is where we live now as people, right? Like adapting people's lives into films, which is one of the film's critiques.

Mm-hmm. And the sort of inherent, like, moral and maybe even artistic corruption of that sort of the tyranny of that. It's definitely interesting in that from the guy who gave you I'm Not There and the definitive glam rock movie and a movie about silent cinema

and all of his movies are like- Karen Carpenter. Yeah, Karen Carpenter. We're obsessed with our own popular culture and whenever we try to recreate it, we kind of fuck it up and it lied the truth. That's a core theme of all of his movies or most of his movies. I think I'm starting to agree with you though, Amanda, that I think that this may be received,

I guess both of you, this may be received a bit oddly by the Academy that they're going to be like, wait, what? Todd Haynes has one career Oscar nomination for his screenplay for Far From Heaven, a movie that I think tricked people into thinking that they liked it in the Academy, you know, because they were like, oh, this looks like a movie from 1956 that I think tricked people into thinking that they liked it in the Academy, you know, because they were like, oh, this looks like a movie from 1956 that I enjoyed

without really thinking about its themes. It's also just got a great, I mean, it just, it had, it was winning

every non-Hollywood award. Yes. Right? It was one of the most acclaimed movies of that year. It had that. Well, I hope, I hope we

drew a new light on the movie before we draw some light on Beyonce. Let's take a quick break. Okay, we're back. We are talking about Renaissance, a film by Beyonce, which is the latest in this stunning new trend of extraordinarily successful and powerful artists taking their concert films directly to AMC. I saw this movie last night in an AMC. I was surrounded by black women. My screening was 80% black women. And honestly, it was one of the most fun movie experiences I've had this year. I'm really jealous.

I mean, yes. This was an interesting reverie. Of course, Taylor Swift had the Heiress Tour film earlier this year that we talked about, which has been insanely successful. This movie is similar and different. It's similar insofar as it is a portrait of a 2023 concert tour by a legendary artist. But it is much more of a documentary than a pure concert movie. It's a real blend of those two concepts. And it's made by someone who is a more inherently visual artist in Beyonce.

I feel like I'm repeating myself from the last discussion, but this is also one of my favorite movies of the year. I was fucking knocked out by this movie. Amanda, what'd you think? It's unreal. I almost texted you guys an hour and a half and i love beyonce so much but i've just you know i didn't want to spoil the um the moment on this podcast so i saw it in slightly different circumstances i am uh currently in santa fe new mexico and i went with my friend molly um who is like a true Beyonce superfan, to the Regal Santa Fe on opening night. But there had been a snowstorm here in Santa Fe. So there were only like 10 other people in the theater, which, you know, is not like the full energetic concert experience that you would want.

Now, I will say for those 10 people, they were singing along, including my friend Molly. There was a lot of clapping. They all wore silver. And I did get to take some photos for a group of five young members of the Beehives. So that made me feel old but also happy at the same time. But it was still mean it was still just absolutely amazing i did not get to see renaissance in person so this like really did feel like fill that oh i missed out on something and i i don't think that we should like spend too much time comparing or contrasting with a taylor swift thing just because i did think to myself i I would be so embarrassed if I were Taylor Swift watching this, but I thought, oh, go on, go on, go on. But, you know, I did not feel that that recreated the experience of being at the Heiress Tour as I understand it from every other person I know who went to it. I did not. Yes, it did. Okay. All right. Well, that's literally all it does that's its only function well then the

era's tour seemed boring i was not bored during this you know the era's tour didn't have bad filmmaking is the problem right like it kind of underserves what was great about that concert okay i mean it's just also like people like dancing around with like jack-o'-lanterns i was like what the hell is happening? You know, throughout many, the worst part of the show and of eras, the movie. Yes,

for sure. Right. I, I did not stretch at one point. Think what the hell is happening. I was just like vibrating at being in the presence of beyond Beyonce. One of our great living artists. I just,

she's amazing. Wesley, you're a bit of, you're a Beyonce scholar. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if I would apply that term. I mean, there are actual Beyonce scholars who are like- That's true. That's a good point. You don't have your PhD in Beyonce, but you've studied closely. I'm hanging up the phone right now. yeah i mean i i'm conversant um i am it's funny like i always sort of feel like i have to um what does it mean to give yourself fully over to this person um for whom you know you know whom so many other people have given themselves over. And I think part of my resisting the tractor beam sometimes is just like, I don't want to lose sight

of what is actually happening here. And I feel like what I want to bear witness to are the granular details of the extraordinary. And in that sense, I feel like my, like I'll go up the tractor beam, but I really, I have my notepad the whole time. Like you guys can't see this because the light, it just got dark in my apartment. I realize I'm talking to you in the dark.

I did notice that. It was really, it just happened. It's very dramatic. I took like, I used a quarter of a notebook to, to, to keep track of this thing. Mostly because I don't want to get anything wrong. Yeah. But also I wanted to remember everything. This movie is two hours and what, 48 minutes, I think? 50 minutes, yeah. Two hours and 50 minutes. It doesn't feel that way. And I think that, you know, I knew it would be more than what the Errors Tour is, right? Which is the movie about the Errors Tour, which is basically what I've been describing as a point-and-shoot movie,

right? Like, this thing happened, we recorded it. Here you go. If you couldn't make it, you're welcome. This, I saw the show in St. Louis and you know, I mean, I'm glad I did. It was a one, it was like, it was a great community experience, right? People showing up in their outfits, people like traipsing around in their outfits, um, being there on display for the rest of us to be like, you go, let me crack my fan for you, sir. Um, the movie is all 56 dates, more or less. Like you don't know where any, at any point in the movie, I mean, except for twice, when you know you're in Houston and you know you're in Los Angeles. Those are the only two

times really that you know exactly where you are and the movie stays there in a meaningful way. The rest of it is a real, just a technical feat. I thought it was amazing the way they did that. The editing, yeah. The editing is, you know, I looked at the closing credits. There are, I think, nine credited editors, somewhere in the range of nine people. And there are, you know, an army of camera people. There are like, you know, remote operated cameras. There are different film stocks

or I don't know what we call film stock in the age of digital camera work, but you know, the way the images are presented, they don't all look the same. Yeah, there's handheld camera. There's eight millimeter. There's like filtered

to make it look like 16 millimeter. There's fish eye lenses. Like it is a visual feast that is like constantly millimeter. There's fish eye lenses. It is a visual feast that is constantly changing. It's amazing. And it's just so intensely cinematic. And then there's this other thing, right? Because if she had just given us the straight, hey, everybody, sorry you missed the show.

I know the tickets were expensive. Sorry. But here's a gift. For 20 bucks, you can come see all 56 shows in three hours. But instead, she goes the truth or dare route, more or less, right? Yeah. She doesn't have truth or dare in her because what you learn in this movie, in these behind-the-scenes,, backstage moments is that she actually, and I believe this because the proof is in the movie.

She is different people when she, you know, the person on stage is not the person building the show. They're just different people. And to quote her, I think she says something like, I can't be responsible for the person on stage i love that i thought this was a very well-written movie you know her narration moves through a closely and let's just say up front one i also have no interest in really comparing it to taylor swift the heiress tour they're very different propositions um but we have we have culturally conjoined them it's impossible yeah and and they even even, Beyonce came to the Aries premiere and Taylor went to London for the,

you know, they're- They're correlated but not related. You know? This is an order of magnitude. As a work of filmmaking and movie experience, I found it to be magnitudes better. Like I was so impressed

by all of the things that you just described, Wesley. But the other thing about it is, I can accept, because I have followed Beyonce's career pretty closely, I would not describe myself as a member of the Beehive, but I, you know, have really, I really love Destiny's Child.

I really liked the early stages of her solo career. I'm one of a world-class Jay-Z fan, so I am very in tune with everything she's been doing. Renaissance is actually the first album that I feel like I kind of missed. I just didn't spend a lot of time with. So this was helpful for me to kind of get really acquainted with it deeply. But, you know, she does make commercials for herself. You know, like this is a commercial for Beyonce and it is very tightly managed. And so everything that we see, a lot of which I thought was kind of revelatory as somebody who hasn't been as close contact with her, I still can feel a very discreet

control being exhibited here. You know, this movie is written, directed, and produced by Beyonce as it very proudly announces at its conclusion. So I accept that with a grain of salt and that we, you know, if we want to be kind of critical about the way that she frames herself and those different personas that she's presenting to us i think that's all within bounds i just think that the movie does both of the things that you guys just described it shows us how amazing beyonce is and it also shows us that beyonce is a very interesting filmmaker and a very interesting orchestrator of her own creativity celebrity power um and obviously also just as a performer you're just like god damn like, like 80% of the songs.

I was like, I'm riveted to my seat right now. It's amazing. I don't know. How do you balance the, like Beyonce is very powerful versus Beyonce is a great auteur. Basically, Amanda.

I, I think I get swept away honestly. And, and the power. And I agree with everything that you're saying about the quality of the filmmaking and the power. And I agree with everything that you're saying about the quality of the filmmaking and the choices visually, but also narratively. There is a through line now through Homecoming and this film of Beyonce just including clips of people not taking her notes seriously and Beyonce getting to what, which is just hugely important. Obviously there's that famous moment in homecoming,

but there's this person where she's just like, well, actually I Googled the lens and it does exist. A tremendous number of her reaction shots of her just making a face of like, am I going to, like, I'm not going to accept this answer and I'm just going to stand here until like you get another answer, which is to me, like quite possibly the most powerful thing that could ever be captured on film and put in a movie. It's very inspiring.

But it is also, as you said, a part of her narrative. The interstitials are each attuned to a theme. And there is one about Uncle Johnny. There is one about Houston. There is one about her knee, which I want to come back to. There is one about Blue Ivy and Blue Ivy performing. And, you know, the outside of the movie story is that Blue Ivy was featured on the tour. She was not received very well.

People said some pretty rude things about a teenager on the internet. And so this is clearly Beyonce's way of managing that and putting it in a new context. But also admitting that it hurt her, right? Yes. I love that. I love that she was willing to talk about that. Totally. And so I think that there's like a really interesting celebrity, you know, narrative management of that. I think there's a really interesting like parent version of that.

And I also just like started crying as soon as they were performing on stage together because I was, like, very touched. But, like, so that's an intellectual response. You know, I'm not watching, to your point, as, like, Beyonce, the auteur in Beyonce. I was just so moved by the final product of what she put out there that I, like, I just get swept up in it. And I don't get swept up in a lot of things. So I think that is yet another credit to her as a performer, as an artist, as an auteur, as all of the above. I can't have the reaction that I'm having

if it's respectfully era's level bullshit. You know, like there is a lot of work that goes into this in addition to like her power. Yeah, I think one of the reasons why it's hard to compare them to is this is like the fifth thing that Beyonce has directed. Many of her films are documentary-esque and performance-esque and she's got a lot of experience at this. So if there's a depth to it or a more control over how to work this medium, you can tell because she's had time to work on it. But, you know, I was thinking about this with us

too. I think it's funny that the three of us can talk about this movie because this feels like a movie about being in your 40s in a lot of ways. Certainly about being Beyonce in your 40s is different than being any of us. And Amanda, I know you're not, so I'm not trying to, you know, but...

Thank you so much. Yeah, please give space to these next nine months. But still, I... As I spent more time with the album renaissance i came away so impressed by someone who i think has often been like at the center of popular music kind of continuing to push herself in a more progressive and a more defiant like i thought more of like bjork you know than i did like diana ross or En Vogue or, you know, artists like, you know, R&B artists evolving over time and like trying to maintain a relevance. Like she's actually going to places musically, creatively that are weirder, that are more profound, that are bolder.

And to do that in your forties is, is hard as a pop star and unlikely. And she's been willing to sacrifice, I think, some like kind of quote unquote success, you know, like album sales success in order to do that. And so I thought it made it even richer as a movie. I don't know, Wesley, you're in your 40s. I'm sorry to put that on Front Street too. Like, what did you think about this stage of her life as the framework for the movie? Oh, I mean, when Renaissance came out, that was the story for me, right? I mean, because the album,

the reason the album works is because the person who made it was free. And this person was free in a new way. If you're familiar, if you've been with Beyonce, if you've been listening to Beyonce, if you've been, you know, somewhat, you know, engagedly familiar with Beyonce, you would hear this and you would hear something that sounded new. And part of the newness is like a comfort with vulgarity, the understanding of like how to actually convey sexual pleasure, like true satisfaction,

um, what it means to own the power that you have. I mean, I'm that girl, the first song on the album, you know, she's saying, I didn't want this power.

I didn't want this power. I didn't want this power. I didn want this power i didn't want this power i didn't want it um you know but she's got it and she is using it and the album is about the use of this power it is about the the sort of various ways to display utilize share transfer the power of others to her um it is a complete power station in some way. And what that looks like on stage, I mean, the gayness of it is a huge part of it as well, the alignment and reclamation of her woman-ness from a culture that has used female identity to find itself, right? To amplify itself.

Her alignment, her realignment with that culture while also asserting her cis-ness in some way. Might I suggest you don't fuck with my cis is, it goes two ways, as she says on Cozy. And I just feel like this is somebody who just feels so free. And part of the freedom, to come back to your inciting question, Sean, is that there's a thing that when you're 37, 38, 39, 36, even depend. I mean, everybody's journey to 40 is different and nobody knows what's, what is wrong with them until they turn 40 and they like, they get a set of wings, they get a set of wings and you just don't know, wait, what am I flying for? I just feel like a weight's been lifted. And I mean, that was my experience. And I had speculated about this with Beyonce, because you can hear it on this album. It's in the music. This music is fun. It is not

interested in contemporary. It doesn't feel left behind. And that was the thing about Four, which is not in this movie, by the way, but at the concert, the four, you know, she, at least in St. Louis, I don't know how it did, how it went in other, in other cities. Um, but I've talked to other people about, um, this particular thing I'm about to tell you. And they, it also happened when they, when they saw it in their city, but four is the album that comes out in 2011, I want to say, 2012. And it's the one that's got Run the World and Party and I Care.

And it's my favorite. It's one of my favorite Beyonce albums. It's very lightly represented in this film. Yeah, well, she only does, she just Run the World. I think it's just run the world. I think it's just girls. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. That's it. So, but at the shows she does a moment, she's, she's does love on top and part of doing love on top entails her turning the chorus over to us. And I'm getting chills just remembering this moment. I imagine it's not in the movie because it doesn't quite play as well. And I

don't know why it wouldn't, but it's not in the movie. It doesn't matter. But what was beautiful about it was that people would go six rounds of chorus, seven rounds of chorus. And when I saw it in St. Louis, she turned to one of her dancers and you could see her mouthing, oh my God, they know everything. And the dancer was like,

she just did the mind blown emoji with her hands. I think that she had stopped chasing things. And then the point, the reason to bring up four is that it seemed like she had like been left behind by pop music and that she didn't understand how to make a thing that sounded contemporary. And, you know, there was a song, there's a song on, you know, Kanye and Andre 3000 are on one song, but then Diane Warren writes another song, right? The worst song on the album, honestly. This was my issue with her albums for years, was that there was a real unevenness to them tonally and in shifting genre in ways that didn't often feel natural.

So I agree with where you're going with this. But I think four means a lot to people because it is old fashioned in a way that is also timeless, right? I mean, it's as close to Barbara Streisand as Beyonce's ever going to get in terms of a thing that sounds like it could have been made at any particular moment in time after like 1977. And I think the thing about Renaissance and, you know, people were saying, oh, it's so sad for her. Like, listen to Love on Top. It's like an old Diana Ross song. Nobody

wants to hear that now. But now we all know the words of that song. We all treasure it. That is, I mean, I think it's a lot of people who love Beyonce. It's probably one of their top two favorite Beyonce albums. And I think the thing about 40 is you just don't give a fuck anymore. And she says this in the movie, actually, what it meant to turn 40. And I just think that this show, the album, it really is her letting go of all the self-consciousness. Becoming a mother is a part of this too, but it really is turning 40 of her pushing past whatever it means to be a quote-unquote contemporary pop star. She's always been preternaturally poised and super heroic in her presentation. But you mentioned her knee, Amanda, which is a, there's a, there's a facet of this that is fascinating. Yeah. So I don't know, like, Wesley, I'm sure was up on this, but Sean, like, I don't know if you were up on, as soon as the show, as soon as the tour started in Europe, there, there was a lot of like, is Beyonce injured?

Because the way that she is dancing, or I think the amount of movement is different and, you know, respectfully to the greatest living artists, I was watching this and I was like, well, you're, I knew a little bit about those rumors. And it's like, okay, she is not, she's not moving as much, just like actually physically. And, you know, she is, she is 42. And also the movement that she does have is still like one of the wonders of the world, in my opinion. Like, yes, she is, like, gifted musically, but I do think, like, the dance and the choreography and her movement, and also the clothes, by the way. I do want to talk about the, like, incredible clothes and the incorporation of fashion into this show. And, like, there's not a repeat outfit. I mean, there are, but it's like brand new looks by like every designer under the moon

every single night. It's incredible. At the halfway point, we're still getting new clothes because of the way this movie is cut. They sometimes do the rapid fire cut where we see 10 consecutive outfits changes in the same song. I mean, that was so, so exhilarating. But anyway, she's not like, she's not jumping up and up and down everywhere across the stage.

It's different from Homecoming. In Homecoming, you see her like at her, at her power. Yeah. And so I was like surprised and glad and also conscious of the inclusion of the fact that she does a segment about a knee injury that she had recently. Well, I guess she had it a long time ago on the Sasha Fierce tour. Right, and then had surgery on it, and they're talking about how she was rehabbing the, up until the tour started. And it's funny because then, you know, for the rest of the movie, it, you know, I thought it was a managed acknowledgement of Beyonce's fallibility and humanness and age, but, you know, she is also like, you can, you can see the, the communications expert at work there as well in, in putting it out there. And it was so affecting that the rest of the time I just found myself watching the knee being like, protect the knee,

like Beyonce, is your knee, like, is it going to be okay? Which was fascinating. And I guess like a new way in which age and the passing of time and imperfection inserted itself into my viewing experience and is a part of this text. But you don't see her acknowledge stuff like that very often. So for me, it was just notable in the narrative. Can I ask a question? Yes. Because I, I don't spend very much time with people, you know, I don't spend very much time with, with, with famous people, big, you know, artists. That's all I do. So I, and I don't really spend a lot of time even talking about them as anything

other talking about them as beyond the work they make. But I also feel like, I mean, cause I'm hearing you guys talk about there's, I feel like there is a, there is a bit of, um, I'm talking about not getting fully sucked into the tractor beam. I hear you guys sort of, I mean, I don't think you're necessarily wrestling with this. I think it's kind of baked into your like appreciation of the film and your admiration of, of, of the achievement of this thing. But I also sort of, I struggle with, and I actually, I'm not struggling with it really. I mean, we're calling her an auteur,

but we're also sort of thinking about this as a kind of like brand management. Yeah, it's commercial. But I don't feel that way. I mean, what would be the difference? Why is this different than the way she expresses herself in song? I will tell you. I will tell you. Okay.

I mean, now this is complicated, but, you know, I used to work in rap and R&B magazines. I worked on issues that Beyoncé was photographed for the cover. I've met her publicist many times. At least at a certain period in history, I understood, in a somewhat intimate way, the machine of Beyoncé. And when I was doing that, it was at a time when she was arresting control

of the way that she was portrayed in the media in a way that very few famous people ever have been able to. And in many ways, she is responsible for this era that we live in of the holy Brit, like artist managed presentation. We live in a moment in artist documentary in which they are often the executive producers of films, have final cuts. In Beyonce's case, she is the director. And so, because of that,

I do think that- The writer and producer and star. And I think when you do that, you know, but I don't really have a problem with it the same way I don't have a problem when Warren Beatty does it.

Like, I like the person who's like, I will fully conceive my persona and share it with you for 40 years and have you wondering about things. But there is a natural suspicion that I think any journalist should have about what that means to fully take control away from what could be perceived as an objective party or a subjective party with a different point of view. And she does everything. Now, this movie is great to me for two reasons. One is that there's filmmaking brilliance in it.

And two is just that there's an overwhelming creativity of expression in Beyonce. But I do think it's worthwhile to be a little skeptical. The same way when I look at Taylor Swift, I'm like, what are we trying to learn here? I noted with interest when we watched that movie who we got to see in the crowd during that film, which was often 11-year-old girls.

And this movie, there's a version of that. What we see is a lot of gay men. We see a lot of queer-coded imagery. We see a lot of black women. We see... These are all very purposeful choices. Of course, all those people were at the show. But who we see as representative of the Beyoncé fan

is Beyoncé's vision of the Beyonce fan. It's her right to show that, but it's interesting to think about it. Yeah, sure. But I mean, I will say as a black person who was at these shows, I was amazed looking into these reaction shots to see all the white people, right?

And like, you know, there's one shot where she holds on this white woman who isn't even singing, but is like clearly been like affected by what she has seen. She's like 50, 50 years old, like, like sweaty ass,

red hair glasses. Clearly. I don't know what her deal is, but she's at this show standing in front of one of those guardrails. And I don't know, it's just, there's such a wealth of generosity in terms of the way the crowd functions in this film. I think that, you know, it's really smart versus the way a typical concert movie works, which is, well, I don't need to see the audience. It's not important. But if I'm going to see them, they have to be there for a reason.

And it's not like I'm thinking specifically really of comedy specials where the audience is there to verify or corroborate that a joke was indeed funny. This here is a community project with these cutaways, right? Like people are finishing this or like singing the songs along with her. And the editing is so good that the precision between from, you know, in the cut from her to the person in the audience, it just creates, it extends the space. It gives new life to the music and it affirms the degree to which, at least in Beyonce's mind, you know, we in the audience or the, you know, at least, you know, her biggest fans are extensions of her vision of her art. You know, she would say she's making it for us,

but she doesn't need to say that because I can see who she made it for. I can see the effect it's having on people. And the one thing I would say about this in terms of this question of why distrust the written, directed, produced, starring Beyonce thing, I mean, not to distrust it, but I don't distrust it for the record. I'm, I think it's just a good idea to always be skeptical of this presentation.

Okay. But I, I, I just feel like there's a way in which the art is doing the thing that some of the things she is saying, we don't, I mean, it's nice to hear them, but it's in the music, right? It's in, it's in the stagecraft, but it also is in the same way that it felt. I liked hearing her talk about what it meant to turn 40, right? Like it's very human experience that every single person who makes it that far feels this person also felt, which means it also then explains what came before 40, which was lemonade. Right. And,

you know, all of the, and what it, you know, thinking about how to rethink her life. This is the thing that I'd like to talk about with, you know, the difference between eras and,

and Renaissance, which is Beyonce's understanding of her music as an elastic source of art, right? Taylor Swift is fixed in time, right? She is, these songs cannot change because they were perfect the way they were. There's not one song in that movie that she is reinterpreting, right? The entire, do you have, is there, did I miss one? Well, I mean, there is, and I was really angry about it. I mean, she is at the same time that they are fixed in time. She is also in the process of reinterpreting or re-recording every single

song for reasons of financial revenge, which I mean, honestly, go with God. One of the great events in popular culture is Taylor Swift remaking this music. It's fantastic. Unfortunately, she expanded her best song, All Too Well, into a 10-minute version that was presented in full on the Eros tour, and I was very angry. I do not think that the new version is good. I believe in editing. I believe in making choices. And Sean had to sit next to me during the whole 10 minutes of that song. But I see what you're saying, is that they're specific to Taylor Swift and to where she was when she wrote them and who she wrote them about and what they meant.

And it's, I get it. I'm just mad about All Too Well. I'm just thinking about what she's doing in this movie to a song like Break My Soul, right? Yeah. movie to a song like break my soul right yeah um the biggest hit on the album at least chart wise and she turns that song into an occasion because she did the songs from renaissance that are in the film um and she does most of them she even includes two songs that i didn't see in saint louis which are thick and all up all in my mind all up in my mind um are all up in your mind um which is one of my favorite

songs in the album. And people are gonna be like, you didn't even get the title, right? I could be one of your favorite songs, but it doesn't matter. It is. Um, she takes break my soul and she turns that song into an event, right? Like that song becomes something even bigger than the song itself is. Um, and she takes the different movements of the song and she elongates and stretches and plays with them. And then there are songs she just completely like reinvents. And I just think she's so open to rejiggering, you know,

cross-referencing, historicizing, archiving, which is in the base of the music itself too i wouldn't put it past taylor swift to eventually evolve to a place where she wants to put on a show like this i think you know she is younger than her i think it's notable that renaissance the way that the album is produced is this kind of continuous mix that there is a kind of like breathless the music goes on no stopping no intermission approach which is part of what makes it kind of like a breathtaking album that as i listened to it this week i was like you know obviously there's there

are a lot of records that sound like this but they're not a lot of records by huge pop stars that sound like that and the taylor swift movie and tour is the exact opposite it's like here is a of time, and then here is another period of time next to it, and another period of time next to it. It is like literally chopping things into a chronological moments. And this movie is like a big stew. It's like, as she says in the movie, it's a gumbo. Everything's kind of stewing together. Songs are one minute long or they're nine minutes long. You know, we're getting a song from 2001 and we're getting a song from 2022 and everything is kind of flowing. And I find that fascinating. Like I think her willingness to do what you're describing, Wesley, it requires like a kind of boldness because sometimes when you come out to a show,

you're like, there are people who come out who know every word to every song from Renaissance, but there are also people who are like, gosh, I really hope she does Love on top and if she doesn't i'm gonna be heartbroken and there probably are people who are gonna see the movie who are gonna be like why isn't love on top in this movie and they're gonna be mad and she doesn't care she seemingly doesn't care you know she was like serving the audience but it's still an artist it's an impressive thing she's no longer beholden to i mean i don't to the extent that she was ever beholden to what people think, I think she is completely liberated from the trammels of, of public perception.

And it's what's so touching about the blue Ivy moment is that the moment in which the internet says the blue Ivy can't dance basically is that that is you reconnecting that, that awareness for your child. Um, and you know, your child is 13 and I did the other sort of amazing thing that's in the movie though, is that,

and I can't believe this, there's things in this movie that I can't, I mean, given, I mean, this is why I think it's, it is really risky, not risky. Like there's a, there's information got to her or something. Um, and it was like, here's the thing that was beyond my control. Like I couldn't, I could not save my daughter from seeing these comments about herself. Um, and I just thought that was really, you know, in, in, in the, in the world of a famous mother. Um, that was very touching. Of course I thought of my own family when I saw that. I was

like, oh my God, one day my child will have social media and see someone say something about her on social media and it will destroy her. It destroys me. I'm 40 years old, 41 years old. It's a remarkable thing that she was willing to show that. And it's obviously just tremendously relatable for one of the least relatable people on earth. i really liked the way that she phrased it to wesley's point though it was like it was definitely not beyonce who let it happen you know and the way that she phrased it was like someone got fired you know which like didn't you get she was like getting well i mean i don't know because actually she seems like a really like lovely and supportive employer. So and I like the the the pregnant trumpeter was just like, I'm sorry, I can't remember her real name. But that was just like a very moving thing.

But no, she said it in a way that was like, I don't know how it happened that she was. But it was like passive voice. It was like there is someone who is not me who did not meet the standards um and i i thought that was hilarious i mean again trumpeter by the way okay she was wonderful um i wonder i you know when they were like we all love that you know that we all feel connected to that baby that baby must be here by now i wonder how they're doing um but it's interesting that she doesn't have a i mean beyonce is not somebody who has defectors right there's no michael cohen of beyonce land do you know what i mean like there's nobody who's out here like trying to truth who's truthering or birthering or you know

um she's engendered a lot of loyalty. People seem to like working for her. Like, I mean, truly. And I just feel like, I don't know. There's something about, there's something so, again, I'm just coming back to this question that I guess I'm injecting into this conversation about trust in self-depiction or self-portraiture. But there is something so incongruous between the person on stage and the person off it that I just love the person off stage so much more because I didn't know her, right? I truly

didn't know her. I mean, I'm sure the people who really pay very close attention were like, oh, we knew this on this date, this date, this date. But I didn't know. And I didn't need to know because the work stands for itself. But there is something so... Just looking at her face in that hoodie, just think. Just have a moment to think. Eat a turkey sandwich.

You know what I noticed? Her wearing the hoodie with no makeup on and just seeing birth marks on her face. I was like, I don't think I realized that she has birthmarks because she's always maximalized

in the Beyonce experience. And so I'm the same as you. Like I have not, I don't know, especially in the last three or four years really, the beats of her life very closely.

I haven't followed it very closely, especially post Lemonade. I was almost like, wow, this got closer than I ever thought it would. This seems like really raw. So I really like seeing her in that way.

And yet that's probably 10%. And that is the one thing that I thought was interesting about this movie, which is that Jay-Z is the passionate but quiet cheerleader of this film. And he has been very purposefully and amusingly sidelined as dad. And I also really liked that. I thought it was a good idea. He went to every show, every single show. He was there, often leading people in the electric side.

So it's, you know, again, I think it is true to life. And, you know, I think the film closes with Jay conducting an interview on the plane, as one does, where he does get, I think, like a different side of Beyonce than you have seen at any point in the three hours, which is, you know, neat and I thought moving to see and there's like something it's like a peek behind the curtain you know and you're only allowed to see this much but like he brings out a different side of her than the stage does or than her

her co-workers do or than her children do but yeah he really I don't think he ever is in like a full shot right he's like sometimes

in the side you see him flash in the crowd occasionally yeah he's got his own but like for like half a second as a participant

but as a participant he does he's not he's on the side he does ask her a question or it's not really it's more of a prompt at the end of the movie

in that scene you're talking about where he just says go deeper to her when she says something which is something that you imagine very few people are able to say to Beyonce.

Well, it's, you know, as a corollary, there's that amazing moment. There's two amazing Blue Ivy moments too, right? I forgot about the moment with him and Blue Ivy on the plane and her smile was at the end of it. She reached the end of her smile, which is an incredible turn of phrase.

One of the great writers of all time Jay-Z of course he has the facility with a moment like that but then there's also the moment when she is talking she's observing the set list I meant these Amanda yeah and then she's like

you have to do Diva right okay as we get to the end of this I wanted to ask you guys two things one what was your favorite song performance from the movie and two what was your favorite kind of interstitial revelatory sequence or moment from the movie?

Wesley, I'll start with you. Definitely toward the end, it was, well, I will say that one of my favorite things about the actual show were the six songs, the six ballads that she does at the beginning, which have now been paired back to two. And I think the balladry had a real, maybe she didn't think it worked and it definitely would have slowed the movie down in a way that I don't think would have benefited. We're already there. I don't know. But the four songs, the six songs she does at the beginning of the show, I thought were just some of the best singing I have ever heard her do.

And this was in the middle of the tour by the time I saw it. She sounded so good. It was toward the end, actually. But I mean, toward the end of the tour. Because in the movie, she's talking about all her vocal, all her colds and sinus infections. And she didn't have one in St. Louis. But in the movie itself, I would say definitely America has a problem. Because this comes at the second to last sequence in the show, in the concert part of the movie. And didn't she come out in a bee costume and then put the bee costume on and then do that song just, the song, I love that song. I think the song is, is a work of genius. Um, a work of genius who knows everything about what we expect from her

and is like, not today. You came for sloppy Joe. I'm giving you a hot dog. Um, and it just, oh man, I, I love that sequence and I just love the nerve and camp of it. Um, the whole show is camp. Um,

I mean, in the way that Beyonce can't quite control. Um, but that moment is real. Just, you know, that's that show. That moment is the epitome of i can't be responsible for what the person on stage does um and then uh the the behind the scenes moment

that i loved i think we probably talked about it it's probably it's probably blue ivy telling her mother in a really in a way that I found too, too lifelike to feel comfortable with, but it's so real between mothers and daughters where Blue Ivy is, her mom is doing work, by the way. I mean, because Beyonce is conducting herself as a, as a mother at work and Blue Ivy is like, mom, why are you stressing out about these stupid, about one finger? And Beyonce is like, she just looks like she can't believe this human comment section is her daughter. That was so good. I'm glad you cited that.

I had forgotten about that moment. That was really funny. Amanda, what about you? Favorite song, favorite moment? So my favorite song, Church Girl was too short. So yeah, I was just waving. And then, you know, and there was like an extended setup with various like ecclesiastical costume choices.

So I was like, I know it's Church Girl. And then it was like only like a minute because it became a medley. So I'll go with break my soul because of what wesley was talking about you know it just becomes so expansive and at the end they're you know moving to like all the dancers are up in front and it just feels very you feel like the the communal energy like palpably there uh and then great moment yeah and i think that was when i started clapping. You know, people were clapping throughout the thing, but I led that round of applause.

And then... I wish I had been at your screening. I mean, I think... Mine was packed and full of life. I mean, it was amazing. More people would have been fun. But if anyone from the Santa Fe Regal 7 p.m. showing is listening,

I thank you for your energy. My favorite behind-the-scenes moment was, I guess it's what we already talked about, which was the segments of Beyonce responding to people telling her

things that were not true. Yes. Or not possible. Not possible, right? Right, but it turns out telling her things that were not true, you know? Or not possible, not possible, right? Right, but it turns out like they were possible, you know? And she is just responding. And I say that as like, one of the things that I love about Beyonce is that I think that she is a real genius of an artist, but she also shows the work.

And she's like, she but she also shows the work and she's like, she puts, she shows the work and she shows that hard work and ambition. But we've never seen the process. So this is the other thing about this movie. And giving it to Blue Ivy too and being like, you better fucking work or you're not allowed on stage. That was awesome.

And, and so like being on your shit and being like type A hyper in control is part of the process of making this truly astonishing art. So I say that, you know, I thought those clips were like funny and I, you know, shame on those, you know, people who didn't research the cameras. But also like I genuinely find that inspiring and it's one of the many reasons I love her um my favorite song moment is probably formation which I think is like the kind of the beginning of the new Beyonce like the like I don't I'm gonna get as weird as I want to get and it doesn't matter what you think of me and I'm gonna be extremely idiosyncratic in my lyric writing and my singing style the moment she figures out who sasha fierce is i would say right like yeah yeah sasha fierce sasha fierce was turned out to be a dud not that

crazy but the like i'm gonna do the nasal got hot sauce in my bag thing is like that that that was when i was like oh you actually are in the lineage of janet jackson you know i mean like you actually are not this like porcelain princess who has been presented as perfect all the time. So, and, and of course I love that formation video and the head bobbing and the way that it's choreographed in the film is so cool.

And it also, I think kicks off like a kind of weirder stretch of songs in the film, which is really what more of my taste is with her stuff now. But the moments are tough. Cause I thought that the, you guys cited a couple of the really good ones. is really what more my taste is with her stuff now but um the moments are tough because i thought that the um you guys cited a couple of the really good ones i really like her talking about going back to houston and the houston section in particular i found interesting but especially get watching her eating fried fish and talking about how she needs to get out of the south as

quickly as possible was another moment where like beyonce wouldn't have given us that 10 years ago and and she now is willing to give us that it It's not the Klan I'm afraid of, it's fried fish, motherfuckers. So I really enjoyed that. I really enjoyed this movie. I mean, I think it is very long. It doesn't feel as long as three hours, but it is, you really have to be engaged in what she does and care about what she does for it to feel like that. But it also is more than almost any artist gives you when it comes to these kinds of movies in terms of personal revelation and performance.

So I highly recommend it. It sounds like you guys do as well. Oh, yes. I mean, you're not... I mean, we're in a moment of... We're in a tiny little concert movie moment. And, you know, that errors comes out the same week as the,

as a stop making sense re-release. Um, and you know, that also didn't serve Taylor Swift. Well, if you were aware of both movies, um, and then you've got something like this where it is just,

you know, it is, it is a filmmaker making a movie about what happens to be herself and her art and her family and her process. And I just, I really, I'm astonished by how full and satisfying it is. Because I just didn't,

it didn't need to be all this. But of course it's Beyonce, so it's more. We're grateful it's more. We're grateful for you, Wesley. We can read you in the New York Times on Renaissance, a film by Beyonce,

among many other things, right? That is true. That is true. Amanda, we can hear you on the big picture, jam session, prestige TV. Sounds like House of R. You're everywhere these days. I hope that recording worked. true that is true Amanda we can hear you on the big picture jam session prestige tv sounds like house of r you're everywhere these days I hope that recording worked you know I'm doing my best I'm just just contributing where I'm asked um thanks to Bobby thanks to Jack for their production

work today shout out to them uh next week we will be talking about our favorite films of 2023 we hope you already yeah it's that time. First week of December. This is what we do, man. Yeah, you guys have seen everything. I'm still like six behind. Okay. Thanks, Wesley.