The Big Picture - The Best Movies at the Telluride Film Festival and the Triumphant Return of the Oscars Show | The Oscars Show

Episode Date: September 4, 2019

Sean has returned from Telluride bearing takes on the very best that the Colorado film festival had to offer, among them 'Marriage Story,' 'Ford v. Ferrari,' Uncut Gems,' 'Waves,' and (yes, seriously) 'The Two Popes.' Then, Sean and Amanda take a close look at where the Oscar race stands after Venice and Telluride, what to look forward to at the Toronto International Film Festival, and how a very competitive Best Actor race is shaping up. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Liz Kelley. With the NFL season a week away and the Ringer's fantasy football coverage gearing up, we have released our first ever Fantasy Football Hall of Fame. We assembled a panel of voters, including Bill Simmons, Cousin Sal, Robert Mays, Mallory Rubin, and more, to induct the 25 best fantasy football players of all time. You can find the rankings by going directly to fantasyfootball.theringer.com. And for more fantasy football coverage, check out the Danacy Football Podcast on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Sean Fennessy.

And I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the Oscars. That's right. It's been six months. September is here, and so is award season. Amanda, welcome back to The Oscar Show. Thank you. It's like I never left. I know. We really didn't leave. Anytime we got annoyed with what was happening with summer movies, we sort of inched our way back into this show. But this is the official confirmation that we're going to start talking about awards in a material way. The reason for that is because it's September, but also I just

got back from the Telluride Film Festival for my first time going. And let me tell you something. I had a grand old time. I'm so happy. It really is a magical place. The bill of goods I was sold was accurate and true. And it's just an extraordinary experience. I highly recommend it. Maybe next year we can go together because I think it is immensely valuable in figuring out how this award season is going to play out. I was doing a little bit of research before this podcast. And just to give people a sense of what happens at the festival, it's sort of famed for being

a platform for Best Picture winners. Seven of the last 10 best picture winners showed at Telluride. And it's unlike any other festival I've ever been to. It's very small. There's probably fewer than 5,000 people there. It's very intimate. It's very friendly. There is no business happening there. There are no deals being cut. I was going to say there's a difference between deals and business, but... That's a good point. Well, I certainly was doing a kind of business, a kind of handshaking and smiling and niceness emitting all over the place. Likewise, all the people who brought films there. But it is really a unique experience because it's powered in a lot of ways by the wealthy people who

are patrons of the festival. They are the people who get in to see these films before everyone else, even before the press, which is an interesting thing. And it's also a little bit older because wealthy people who give money to festivals creates a different kind of atmosphere. So say you and I went to South by Southwest in April. How would you describe the atmosphere of some of those screenings? Rowdy. Yes. Energetic, enthusiasticthusiastic. But not old.

No, it's certainly not old. It's young. And it's also a little bit, a little drunk, a little bit full of candy. There's no alcohol at Telluride. It's a much more, there is like a good energy.

There's a positive energy, but it's not. There's no alcohol like at all. It's not a dry town. It's just all the screenings. I mean, honestly, water was in short supply. You know, they have a lot of drinking fountains. In a way, I would say after seeing 12 films

in three and a half days, I felt like I was going through a gauntlet of a kind, but it is just significantly different. And it's different from Sundance where there's a lot of deals being made and there is a kind of a race through the snow to get to screenings. This is a just highly organized festival. A lot of the films show multiple times. So if you missed the first time, you don't have to be there for that opening night

screening. And every theater is imperfect in a way. There's really only one theater that's like a true blue theater, the Werner Herzog Theater. A lot of the other theaters are in converted hockey rinks and high school gymnasiums. And there is a little bit of like a handmade feel to it too. It's not very corporatized. There are some traditional sponsors, but there's no like activation for Call of Duty 7 happening at the festival. It's just kind of a lot of like happy bourgeois people sauntering around talking about their favorite Claire Denis film. You know, it's just a totally unique experience.

So I'm very happy to be back. I'm very happy to talk to you about some of my experiences there. From the outside, what did you see from this festival? Because I want to try to do a little bit of a like a true false game with you. It's interesting because Telluride is happening at the same time as Venice. And Venice is much louder. And particularly certain elements of Venice were much louder. And I have no interest in discussing those elements now or ever. But it did give a sense of, okay, the big film festivals are much louder and there are

just a lot of people talking to be heard. And so Telluride seems like it was a lot of people going to see waves and being like, wow, what a special experience. Yes. And more about people enjoying movies and also being happy to be where they were and not having to be anywhere else talking with other people. Yeah. I mean, there's a significantly smaller amount of press at Telluride. And I think that's a big factor. At Venice, there is. And with movies like Joker and The King and a lot of sort of like big, not studio movies, but movies that demand a lot of kind of international attention, there is a desperate race to not just get your opinion out, because I certainly was getting my opinion out about the stuff that I saw, but to make a declarative

statement about something's usefulness. And, you know, Venice being an international festival, it has a broader reach in that respect to Telluride being so small with so few people, there is, you know, there is a downside to that too. There's a little bit of a distortion effect because, you know, you're literally high altitude wise and you're high in a kind of emotional state and, you know, to wake up at 7.30 every day and head straight to a movie theater

and watch a movie and then go have, I don't know, a pack of Twizzlers and then go to another movie and then to go get a hot dog and then go to another movie. That's not a common human experience. And it creates like a little bit of a mania. It's a good mania. I think it was important to me to be aware of that mania every time I was seeing something so I wasn't overreacting. Yeah. And I think that's, we know that to be true of all festivals, right? That there is just people get swept up in the moment of the experience. And then the people who go see the movie two or three or six months later or a year later have a different experience.

Context is a part of it. And it was interesting to watch all of these and consume the festival knowledge, not having been to any of them. I realized kind of what movies I would need to be seeing and talking about. It kind of earmarks the to be discussed later movies. Yes. But at the same time, I was like not taking any of the reactions super seriously because I haven't seen any of them. Yeah, I mean, maybe that's a great way to transition right into the big picture's big picture.

This is a problem in the big picture. Do you know what I mean, maybe that's a great way to transition right into the big picture's big picture. This is a problem in the big picture. Do you know what I mean? So we'll talk just specifically about what Telluride can actually do for a movie. I mentioned that seven of the last 10 Best Picture winners have showed there. This festival, I think, is changed quite a bit over the years. There was a very interesting moment where, and you're very proximate to celebrities all the time at this festival, but there was a tribute to Adam Driver, who was only 35 years old, but who was celebrated at this thing. And Martin Scorsese talked about, he presented Adam Driver with the silver medallion, which is something that people

receive every year at this festival. And as he was giving him the medallion, Scorsese told this story about how he hadn't been to the festival in 41 years. And the last time that he was there, he was being driven around in a car by a filmmaker friend of his. And he was there to present Michael Powell, the great English filmmaker with the silver medallion. And at that time he was driving around the town and he saw Michael Powell in the street and Michael Powell was not supposed to know that he was there. And so he hid in the back seat of the car so that Michael Powell wouldn't see him until he saw him at the presentation. That is like a very intimate experience. One, somebody was in a car. There are no cars until you ride. It's basically like completely shut

down and people are walking. It's a very small space. But two, it revealed like how far the festival has come, even though it's still small. It was a lot of Netflix and a lot of Amazon and a lot of A24 and a lot of Sony Pictures classics. Like it is still a movie festival that is driving towards essentially award season. Yes. And there was so much conscious conversation after movies showed about how do you think this is going to do? You know, almost every company, I'm sure part of that is people who know me know that I care about this a great

deal. They know they were asked one, first of all, thank you to everybody who came up to me and said that they like the show. They're interested in the show. They like what we're doing. That was honestly fucking awesome. And everybody was very sweet and tell you, right. I appreciate that. But mostly people in the industry who are asking, they want to know like, hey, so is the two popes like actually good? Like, do you think it's actually going to have a chance in best picture? And I think that it will, but like that is the nature of the conversation. And that also, I think is a little bit confusing. Like from where, from your vantage point, were you like already kind of putting your list together about what you thought was for real and

not for real? Not quite. I don't mean to be dismissive, but I was thinking a lot about this time last year when we were all talking about how A Star Is Born could go in the top five for five. And I loved A Star Is Born and we talked about it all year. So it is useful in the sense of identifying what movies I really need to see, who I need to be emailing today. And sorry in advance if you're getting one of those emails from me and I look forward to coming to your screening shortly. But it does separate. It just marks the conversation. And we've talked so much about how the conversation does and does not inform what the Oscars do. And I think we'll talk about that again this year because it both fuels an industry itself. And also, I think the voters are sometimes in their own bubble.

So it's useful to help sort out the big names, but I wouldn't say that I have any sense of whether Ford versus Ferrari actually is going to be like the crowd pleasing, like box office success, best picture contender. I have no idea. All I know is that it's like really loud and I'm nervous about that because I don't like loud things. Well, there is there's something interesting about that, too. So the first very first screening of the festival is a quote unquote patron screening. And so the press and the patrons are invited to that screening. No one else can get in. No other pass holders can get in. And it's a secret up until the moment you arrive at the screening. And it's always something a little bit fancy. When I first got there, they said, well, you know, like seven years ago,

it was Argo. So it's always something best picture-y, something major studio, something a lot of people will want to see so it's Ford vs. Ferrari you sit down in the theater you're right it was loud I thought the film was quite good

very old-fashioned everything that we sort of expected that we've been talking about for the last couple of months here huge star turns especially from Christian Bale Matt Damon

very charming very credible Texan it's just it's a really really well-made movie it's Mangold James Mangold really in his comfort zone

but the people who saw that movie were like 38 members of the press Um, it's just, it's a really, really well-made movie. It's Mangold, James Mangold really in his comfort zone. But the people who saw that movie were like 38 members of the press and a bunch of wealthy people who are not Oscar voters more than likely. And that reception and the way that that is communicated to the world then theoretically informs a race that is voted on by all of these other people, which is weird. It is weird. I would say, though, that a group of wealthy non-academy voters probably has more in common with a group of academy voters than you and I do. You make a very good point. And maybe that's part of the calculus there. And there was a lot of conversation about, is it better to premiere a film at Telluride?

Is it better to premiere it at Toronto? Some films have international rights differences. So if you premiere a film in Toronto, then you have to use a different logo than if you premiered in America or if you premiered in Venice. So there are these all, it's a bit of a chess game where everybody is figuring out like the Irishman now is not premiering until the New York Film Festival because that is a safe space for Martin Scorsese. His friend, Kent Jones, the filmmaker and critic is the curator of that festival. The way that things were chosen here is interesting because something like Ford versus Ferrari makes a lot of sense. Something like Marriage Story, I think, makes a lot of sense. What you have is a lot of cinephiles, a lot of people who've been with No Boundback for a long time who are looking forward to this movie. Something like Uncut Gems

played interestingly. I loved it. It was exactly what I was hoping and thought it would be. And it lived up to my expectations, but that is an abrasive movie and loud and loud in a different way and propulsive and intense and a little bit terrifying. And just when you think it's going to ease up on you, it like hits you in the head with a ball peen hammer. And the old people were a little bit dismayed by that. And it was interesting. Like I overheard quite a few elderly patrons say like that movie hurt my head. I thought it was awful,

which like to me is a positive review in a way, like if it's offending that kind of a sensibility, I think it's wonderful, but it's so interesting the way that the narrative then emerges from some of these movies because the two popes is the opposite of that. It's very sweet. It's very sweet. It's very charming. It's Jonathan Pryce and Anthony Hopkins

just kind of nattering back and forth as popes. It is completely a buddy comedy. It's just them like riffing. Somebody described it as my dinner with the papacy. And like, that's what it is. You know, it's just a lot of conversations about like faith and duty and honor, but couched in a kind of like chatty, almost bro-y kind of

back and forth. And old people were like, this is phenomenal. This is exactly what I wanted is these two older folks having a grand old time. You're looking at me with a bizarre expression. You are baffled. That's a choice to make that version of the Catholic Church and those two popes at this moment but go with God literally it doesn't really reckon with it talks about some of the

controversies and complications of the Catholic Church but that is not primarily what it's about it's about the differences in their philosophies but actually about them meeting in the middle

of those philosophies it's an interesting movie you're mouth agape I just one of the two popes is Benedict, right? Yes. Yes. No. Ratzinger. Yeah. Oh, it's Ratzinger and. And Pope Francis, the current Pope. Yeah. Oh, okay. I thought that it was Benedict, which is more complicated. Pope John Paul, you're saying the second. Yes. Ratzinger who became Benedict. Sorry. I was

confused by their Pope names. Well, he was a complicated historical figure. I'm guessing they don't get into that. They do a little bit. Okay. And they sort of glance at the God's Rottweiler aspect of Pope Benedict's reputation. But I would say it's not a key focus. And also when you have a person like Anthony Hopkins portraying him, Anthony Hopkins is just so naturally likable.

You know, so naturally charming. The movie is really Jonathan Prices and that's, that's a whole other story. We'll get to that when we get to another category of this conversation. A couple of other things about being in Telluride. I told you this story over the weekend. I'm going to tell it here right now. I sat down in Uncut Gems on Friday night. I'm very excited. I got in pretty early, sitting alone. Middle-aged woman comes, sits down next to me. Very well-dressed, very polite. Snuck right by me and sat down right next to me. Chatting, having a nice conversation.

She's a very smart, very confident person. Very happy to tell me that my opinions of the things I'd already seen were bad, which I think you can appreciate. What had you seen at that point? I'd seen Ford versus Ferrari and a movie called The Assistant, which is a sort of representation of the Harvey Weinstein story as seen through the eyes of an assistant at a major movie studio. It never actually names Harvey. And so I'd seen those two movies. And then maybe I had even seen a third by that point.

So I had a lot to talk about. She was very engaged, very chatty. I might be a little too strong to say we were flirting, but we were having a very fun back and forth. Okay. And she asked me what I did. I said, oh, you know, I'm an editor. I work at the website, I make a podcast.

I asked her what she did. She said, oh, I do some work with the Academy. I said, okay, cool. Talked about 30 minutes, movie starts. I think we both enjoyed the movie, said farewell, walked out. Next morning, very briefly wandered into the Academy Awards luncheon, the Motion Picture Arts and Sciences lunch, and I saw this woman. And she was surrounded by a lot

of people. She was holding court and it dawned on me that that was Dawn Hudson, the CEO of the Academy. Incredible stuff. Who is a very powerful person. And I'm certain is not aware of this podcast, but if she is, hello, Dawn. And I'm sorry that I did not properly acknowledge your power in the world. I promise to do so next time I encounter you. I didn't ask you this.

Did you let off any Academy takes during that 30-minute conversation? I don't think so. Okay. I hope not because they would be unfiltered in a way because we were having a kind of jocular conversation.

I don't think so. Okay, that's good. Maybe if she has read some of my writing about the Academy, I think that would have been a little bit more complicated, though I doubt that she has. But that's just the kind of festival it is. I was at a party the next night. Who's at the party?

On my left is Adam Sandler. On my right is Randy Newman eating ice cream. You know what I mean? It's that kind of a place. You're walking down the street, Renee Zellweger wandering all over the place, having a grand old time. Bong Joon-ho, the director of Parasite, literally like in and out of every screening, seeing everything, chatting with people, people are stopping this Korean genius in the street and being like, I love what

you do. And he's like, what did you see? What did you like? So it's a very strange thing, but it is really, really special. Like I really was transported to a different version of life and it took me out of the frustrations and anxieties of a lot of the things that we're normally dealing with and brought us into a good place. I don't know how to answer this question, but I do actually want to know what you think, what you thought you saw the most about. What was the movie that you thought there was the most energy and kind of anticipation and praise around? Movie or performance? Well, that's a good distinction.

Because we should talk about that in terms of, I think it's a bit easier to sift out how the actor and actresses categories are going to go now. I agree. Because so much of that, and always has been the case, but that's knighting someone, right? It's their year. And you can see it in the awards that they give out at these ceremonies and who agrees to be where and who's campaigning and who's giving a very intense interview to New York Magazine, which we can talk more about Renee Zellweger. But so I saw a lot about Judy in that context because Renee Zellweger is campaigning for her Oscar. I saw a lot about Marriage Story in part because I am myself and have self-selected my feeds in order to have people give me as much about

Marriage Story and Noah Baumbach and Adam Driver as possible. But it did also see, I mean, Adam Driver was another person getting the silver medallion. And he's not someone who does a lot of press normally. So it was very notable to me how present he was. He is clearly campaigning as well or whatever the Adam Driver version of that campaign will be. No doubt. And it did also seem like people really liked Marriage Story. So I was also trying not to read anything substantive about it until I have my own experience. So I just saw Marriage Story and then my brain turned off and I would scroll to the next thing.

Yeah. I'm going to try to, how do I talk to you about this movie without telling you anything I don't want, you don't want to hear? It will be a fascinating thing. I think it's probably safe to say at the highest level of Telluride,

Marriage Story was the movie of the festival. I think it was the movie of the festival going in and going out, even though I don't think it's a perfect movie. I don't think it's even, I don't think it's Baumbach's best movie, but it's even, I don't think it's bound backs best movie, but I do think that it does maybe all of the things that bound back does well

all together at the same time. Plus it has at the center of it, like just an all time performance from driver, like a very in the pantheon of great seventies actors and actresses kind of putting it all out there. Very unvarnished, very raw. Other. And, you know, obviously Joker, I think, without question, was the movie of Venice.

And just in terms of the conversation around it. Fast forward. We'll fast forward through that. I haven't seen it. There's nothing really for us to say about it. The other ones, what else did you hear? I mean, for me, the movie that I loved the most was Waves, which hopefully we'll talk about a lot more on this show going forward.

Looking forward to you seeing that as well. And that broke through as kind of a, this is like the really emotional experience, which I'm very excited about. I was thinking, I was in Mexico City this weekend and was in Roma and was thinking a lot about how much like Roma wrecked me as like, I was thinking about the experience of seeing Roma and I was like, I'm ready again,

just for a movie to run me over. And it seems like that's what Wave is going to be. So bring it on. So that kind of bubbled through. Obviously, I'm friends with all you chuckleheads, so I know about Uncut Gems, which actually, I said this to you in private, and I'm going to say it in public. I read your tweet about Uncut Gems, which is a ridiculous sentence, but I mean this sincerely, and I was very happy for you. I was like, oh, that sounds like best case, Sean. It was good.

And I'm curious about it. It was good. I mean, I think that it's going to be divisive. It was divisive at the festival. I think if you didn't respond to Good Time, it is like Good Time times three. There is an amazing Adam Sandler performance. And it's every five years he makes a movie and he actually does transform and he does something that is not just like a shabby-do. Like he's not just doing that thing.

And he is amazing as this character, Howard Ratner. I think awards-wise, that's probably where the movie will go. It will probably go right to best actor. I find a movie like this hard to believe that could be a best picture movie.

You never know. But the Safdies are... It's not a mistake that Scorsese has executive produced their last two movies. They are in a lineage of a certain kind of heedless, furious, hilarious, violent, ridiculous kind of a movie. There's also easily the best basketball player performance ever in a movie from Kevin Garnett. Like, without question, he is so good in the movie and so important and key to the movie that even that alone and, you know, all the people that you would think, like, could be terrible. The Weeknd is in this movie. He's very good.

Mike Francesca is in the movie. He's very good. Like, all people who it's distracting when you first see them and then they disappear into their characters. So in that respect, it was just so much fun to watch. It seems like a movie that is sprung from the brain of every guy that I am friends with or married to in my real life. And I don't mean that as like a neg on the Safdie brothers or their unoriginality. It just seems like the synthesis of a lot of things that you guys are all interested in. No one can see me, but I'm gesturing at other people right now. But, you know, those are the men in my life. So I'm interested to better understand and experience,

you know, whatever's going on with you guys. We're going to talk about the best actor race later in the show, but let's just talk about Judy for a second. I did see Judy. I would, I'll just say I did not love Judy. I did love Renee Zellweger. That was definitely the takeaway. It was like not a great film, definitely a great performance. Everyone was really happy to just see Renee Zellweger. She's just wearing like a flannel shirt and the University of Texas hat the whole weekend. She's so happy, very cheery. I think you're right that there's clearly like an engineered thing going on here, but she came to it in what felt like an authentic way, which I think people are usually rewarded for.

And, you know, the movie itself is essentially, it's adapted from a stage show. It's a portrait of Judy Garland at the end of her life. She died at a very young age and she was abused alcohol and pills. And she obviously had this very complicated, difficult upbringing as a young child star in Hollywood in the thirties. And it's a, it's a showcase kind of as. And it's a showcase kind of a movie. And it's a quote-unquote transformation.

She sings a lot. She has an amazing singing voice. I had forgotten how well she can sing. She doesn't sound like Judy Garland, but it kind of doesn't matter. And people were sort of comparing it very quickly to things like My Week with Marilyn, where Michelle Williams was nominated for a great transformation in a not great movie. And I feel it feels like a pretty safe bet that she's just going right to the Oscars with this movie. Has anyone been comparing it to The Wife? I don't know. I mean, this movie opens in a month, so not even a month, three weeks. So will people be able to see it? I assume so.

I don't know. I don't think it's going to be very, she's not quite at that Glenn Close level of success either. No, but she has had a rough decade just in terms of her relationship to the public and what it means to be a star. And she was not working for a while or was not in public view. And I think this is being positioned as a comeback and a coronation of someone who we didn't take. We didn't appreciate enough when we had her and also possibly didn't treat as well as we would have liked. The New York Magazine piece that I mentioned by Jonathan Van Meter is very much it's soul searching and she's very open and seems to be having a great time. It's just like a very relaxed kind of daffy.

Yes, that was her energy at the festival, for sure. And it's just also very clear that she's running for Best Actress. She's running. Here we are. Maybe we should add a is he or she running segment to this show going forward, just in keeping with our 2020 anxieties.

You know, as far as the best movies at the festival, we've mentioned Waves. We've mentioned Marriage Story. I did finally get a chance to see Bong Joon-ho's Parasite. Just insanely good, like ridiculously good. It was also clear that that was just, yes, it's as good as you've heard. Totally. It just kind of is sweeping. And it's also very much a Bong movie.

It's not like he's toning it down to get a Best Picture nomination. It is crazy and complicated and very genre-y, but not ridiculous. And actually about, it has ideas. So I'm very excited for The World of Sardinia. That movie's out very soon, October 11th. So we're looking at a month away from that one. If you haven't seen the films of Bong Joon-ho, The Host,

Memories of Murder, Snowpiercer, Okja, highly recommend you dig into all of those. Ford versus Ferrari. We'll be talking about it a lot more soon. I would be stunned if it was not nominated for best picture. There will be a lot of very similar,

I think, conversation. The sort of Brad and Leo, Once Upon a Time, Damon and Bale, who is the best actor, who is the supporting? Is anyone supporting anyone in either of these movies? You never really can tell. Uncut Gems and the two popes we discussed. I saw Kelly Reichert's First Cow, beautiful movie that I don't think is dated right now at the moment. Also an A24 movie. Also a movie

about two men trying to find their way in an evolving and changing society. There's been a bit of a theme, I think, happening in movies in 2019. These men don't know what to do with themselves. Yes, only in 2019. It's a new theme for a new era. These movies are all specifically about men who are being pushed out of or onto the edges of their universe, you know, and how they can fight back against it. Now, maybe that is as old as time. Maybe that's as old as Quo Vadis or something like that. But that's a very nice movie. Diego Maradona played there. I didn't see any documentaries, which I feel kind of bad about. I have seen Diego Maradona. I saw it earlier.

There were seemingly a lot of great docs at this festival, but when you're trying to pack in three or four screenings a day, that it automatically feels like, wouldn't I rather see the two popes on a big screen than a three hour movie about Bill Gates, you know, and no, no,

nothing against the Bill Gates, Netflix inside Bill's brain documentary, which I'm interested in and look forward to. I think Davis Guggenheim made that movie, um, who made the Al Gore environmental, uh, saga,

but I don't, you know, it just doesn't feel like the right format. Yeah. Documentaries lend themselves to, they're more flexible in terms of situational viewing, which is probably part of the reason that we've been going through a documentary boom in the last couple of years, because you can really watch them in a lot of places besides a giant theater. That's exactly right. A couple other things that I saw,

Motherless Brooklyn, Edward Norton's adaptation of Jonathan Leitham's novel, which I thought started off a little bit rocky and then I thought had a brilliant second half. And I'll be curious to see how this movie does because this is a hard sell in 2019. It's a movie about a complicated character with a deep literary background that has been transported to a period piece and is a studio movie and has a lot of

famous actors in Alec Baldwin and Willem Dafoe and Guggenbacher and Michael K. Williams. And it's really, really well made and really, really specific. And it changes the book a lot, not just the period that it's set in, but the story and the figures. And it becomes much more of a historical document about New York and the way that New York changed in the middle of this last century. I thought it was really cool. I don't know how you convince people

that it's something that they need. And this was also an interesting festival for it because I think a lot of the older folks did also really appreciate it. They admired what Edward Norton was going for, but it does feel like a movie and he's been working on this movie for 20 years that has never been harder to make and never been harder to get people to see. Adaptations are tricky because in order to get the audience in the theater, you need to

be as faithful as possible, but to actually make a good movie adaptation, you really have to be willing to completely reinvent the text. I completely agree. And that was sort of what I admired about it. When the movie first started and it was kind of faithful to the book, I was kind of like, ah, this doesn't, I don't know if this is working. And then as soon as he starts kind of tearing away at the core text and doing what he wants to do, it's like, oh, I see why you're interested in this. I see why this works for you. I would recommend that movie for sure to people, but it is a bit of a different thing. And I wonder if even a different title would have made more sense for a movie with so many changes.

Yeah, but then you can't get anyone to go see it. I know. It's a tricky thing. I also saw The Report, which debuted at Sundance, which is another Adam Driver movie. It is very good. It's a story about essentially the composition and research and time and effort over many years that Daniel Jones put into the torture report. The CIA's sort of famous and much derided and awful program that was exposed. And this movie is, collates years and time and thousands of pages of information into a tidy two hour movie and does so very effectively. So that was interesting.

And I mentioned the assistant as well. And Judy, I missed a few things. I missed the aeronauts, which I did not hear great things about, which is the Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne. Hot air balloon survivalist. But it does turn out that it's way more survivalist movie

than a hot air balloon adventure. One of the big questions out of the festival was how do their characters go to the bathroom? It's important to ask that anytime you're making a movie, because otherwise someone will write a blog post about it. It's a good point. Maybe we should get on that right away. I still haven't seen Pain and Glory, the Pedro Almodovar film.

I did not see Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life. That's crushing for you. So I didn't do it because the movie is like three hours and 10 minutes, and there's only so much time in the day. So to spend, you know, you got to get to these screenings an hour early. And then they start 15 minutes late. And then there's a Q&A afterwards most of the time. So you're looking at like a five hour experience. Yeah. That's just not a good use of my time. I can't wait to see that movie, but just it didn't make sense at this festival. The one movie that I didn't see that I really

regret that I'm looking forward to is called The Climb. Have you heard anything about The Climb? Yes, but you'll have to remind me what I've heard. It's like a bold name that I remember reading something about it. The Climb has been described as sideways on bicycles. It's a cycling drama, I believe, set in France, starring two Americans who are also, I think, the co-writers. And one of them is the director of the film. It's being distributed by Sony Pictures Classics. It had like the one true blue, like this is kind of an indie sensation feeling around it. I haven't seen it, but every

single person, you know, when you're waiting in line for these movies, people are just like, have you seen the climb? I thought it was lovely. You know, like that is the kind of energy that that movie had. You know, my big takeaway, I think, ultimately from the festival is Marriage Story and Ford versus Ferrari are huge best picture contenders. The Two Popes is a surprising best picture contender. And we'll talk more about the best actors in a second. Let's do stock up, stock down so that we can talk about some stuff that neither of us have seen. If it goes bust, you can make 10 to 1, even 20 to 1 return. And it's already slowly going bust.

So we weren't in Venice, but we saw what was happening in Venice. And you know, I really didn't feel like I missed much. It seemed like a lot of stuff was disappointing. The Olivier Assayas movie, Wasp Network, did not get great reviews coming out of there. The King did not get great reviews coming out of there. Joker will be what Joker will be. So there's about 10 movies that I think we can credibly call best picture contenders that no one has seen yet. We're just a few days away from the Toronto International Film Festival. Some of these movies will be playing there. Most of them will not. Let's just go through those movies. I'm ready. I think that the stock up, stock down, usually we need to decide if something is down. Nothing is down here. These are all things that are theoretically up

after we saw these other movies that went up and down. So we've got A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, which is, of course, the Mr. Rogers movie and is debuting at TIFF. Do you know if Tom Hanks is the supporting actor of this movie and not the lead? I read that. Well, they haven't made that clear,

but it's adapting, because why would they in a trailer? You need just Tom Hanks in the sweater saying it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, saying the title of the movie. Just put that on a loop on TikTok and then let people come to the movies.

But, you know, it's an adaptation of, I believe it's an Esquire article by Tom Junod and- Yes. Who eventually became close friends with Mr. Rogers. And I believe it's about their relationship and how Mr. Rogers affected his life. I think that's all correct.

So I think by that token, then it would be the Tom Junod character, who I believe is played by Matthew Rhys, as the main character, and Tom Hanks as Mr. Rogers as supporting. I mean, again, all these categories are made up and they can run people in whatever they want to run them in. But yeah, I think people are going to be surprised that it's a lot more just about a journalist than perhaps you're expecting. Yes, I've got my antenna up about that as well. So I'm very interested. The stock is up for now,

but we've seen a lot of movies about journalists having incredible experiences because of their proximity to famous people. So we'll see. It's Mariel Heller who has made a couple of interesting films and I'm interested in the kinds of movies that she makes. Bombshell is a movie that you're shaking your head. You don't know.

You don't know, you don't like it. No, I meant let's go. Show it to me now. I liked that teaser that came out two weeks ago, which, you know, this is a story of essentially the fall of Fox News in many ways and all the sexual harassment scandals that have plagued that network

for the last five to ten years. And it's a murderer's row of blonde Academy Award nominated actors. Chief among them, Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, and Margot Robbie. Incredible. Looks good.

It's a Jay Roach movie. Jay Roach, you know, usually makes broad comedies and or HBO docudramas that are kind of comedies. I've been told that this movie is not a comedy, that it is a drama.

That'll be interesting. I don't think this is going to do any of the festivals, is my guess. I think we will not see it until December. It seems like a popular movie play. I think they already, in terms of that teaser, which was, what, 20 seconds long?

And I've been on four different text message conversations about what kind of prosthetics they put on Charlize Theron to make her look exactly like Megyn Kelly. It's eerie. Which they did an incredible job, but I think it's going to be, they're not going to go for the prestige. They're going to go for mainstream, getting as many people to be interested in whatever part of that movie they're interested in as possible. I completely agree. It'll be interesting to see how all that shakes out because it feels very much like Vice. It's a movie with a clear point of view and message about its characters and who we should have sympathy for and who we should not have sympathy for. On the other hand, it might be a little bit

too broad and too weird to be as powerful as we want it to be. We'll see. It is also, it's being released at the end of the year. Yes. Which is typically a, what movie can I go see with my parents time? And can you take your Fox News parents to bombshell? Well, sure. Maybe they're rooting for Roger Ailes. You know, I mean, who can say? It seems like a lot of people would just be like, I don't want to deal with that. I think if you have any concerns about that, you should take them to Little Women, which is another movie that we have not yet seen. What? No, I don't know. I mean, yes, you should take your parents to see Little Women, I guess, but I don't know. But you don't want to have a political throwdown.

I suspect Little Women will not be that complicated. Likewise, The Irishman, which, as I said, premieres at the New York Film Festival. We haven't seen that yet. And it's three and a half hours long, which is great. They released the New York Film Festival press and industry screenings list today. Yes, the running time is subject to change. Subject to change. Don't even worry about it.

Maybe they heard the big picture and they heard me say, make it as long as you need, Marty. Or maybe they heard me say that endings are good. We'll have to wait and find out. Cats. A lot of laughs about cats at Telluride, let me tell you. A lot of jokes.

That's like the least appealing thing that you could say to me. I was in the mountains just with strangers laughing about the trailer for cats it was honestly was great okay i had a great old time jojo rabbit full trailer for that was released today uh that will be at the toronto international film festival i've heard some very mixed things about this movie some people have said this is an incredible satire one of the most funny and thoughtful pieces about fascism in our modern times and i've heard other people have said this is an incredible satire, one of the most funny and thoughtful pieces about fascism in our modern times. And I've heard other people say that this movie is not good.

So I think we're going to find out about it less than a week. That's Taika Waititi's anti-hate satire, Just Mercy. You and I talked about this a bit last week. Daniel Destin Cretton's Michael B. Jordan, Brie Larson drama about Bryan Stevenson. Lucy in the Sky.

You're out. I understand. I didn't say I'm out. I just, I need the accent work to be better. Okay. I'll overdub that and then send you a print. Great. Thank you.

19th century. Actually, I would love that. Maybe I should. Can I hear your Southern accent? Can you do it right now? What kind of a character do you want? This is a good why don't you play an astronaut who is burned and it's gonna drive across the country what's the other

astronaut's name and also and it's john ham is no but what's his character like what am i calling him uh i i don't actually know because it's this is a movie about wanting to fuck john ham as you've noted so i'll pull it up right now. He could just be an, I don't know, just call him like Jim Lovell or whatever. Just pick an astronaut name. Okay, let me see if I can do this. Oh, Jim.

Nope. Why don't you just come over here, darling? What is that? Are you doing Steel Magnolias right now? I want to do Scarlett O'Hara. That's what I really want to do. Okay, all right. But what is this like? Scarlett O'Hara. That's what I really want to do. All right. But what is this like?

Scarlett O'Hara was loud and aggressive. That's true. Well, she was defiant. Sure. So you want me to be defiantly tempting Jon Hamm? If you're doing Scarlett O'Hara, that's my note is that that was a little too plaintive. Okay. Okay.

I don't. Voice work is not really my. It's okay. My metier. 1917. Sam Mendes' World War I drama also I think is going to be kind of very similar

to Bombshell where we're just not going to see it until it gets out into the world and then Knives Out which is a TIFF and hopefully we'll see soon and is the Rian Johnson

I don't know murder mystery family murder mystery clue inside of a house I'm looking forward to that too all of those movies for the basically the last time get to be up They're all up by this time next week when we're doing this show Some of them are going to be down some of them are going to be up even higher Any guesses on which one is up even higher next week? Yeah

uh well I don't know the irishman because we won't have seen it yet. It's hard at this point unless you just have a total blazing film success, like festival success. I think what could happen is A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood could win the audience award at TIFF, which is what Green Book won last year and which has become a kind of new bellwether. Whereas for years, the Telluride, the sort of like Moonlight plays a Telluride and people are like, holy fuck, Moonlight. Last year's Green Book win, and we talked about this last week as well, just about the various TIFF audience winners over the years have been significant Oscar movies. I don't really see a movie on the TIFF list beyond A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood that could win this. I guess

maybe Jojo Rabbit if it really works, but I'm not sure. I mean, Jojo Rabbit at least has the political lightning rod aspect to it that was Three Billboards and Green Book in a way, though we didn't quite know it at the time. I really just wonder how many people want to see a movie about a journalist. That's where I am. Tell it to Spotlight, best picture winner. Yeah, but you knew that that was a movie about journalism. Yeah. And this is everyone thinks they're going to see a movie about Mr. Rogers. I'm curious. Maybe people will just be

completely moved by it anyway. Yeah. And, you know, notably, Morgan Neville's Mr. Rogers documentary was not nominated for Best Documentary. And so maybe there's not as much affection for Mr. Rogers amongst the voting bodies. Was Mr. Rogers a big deal in Canada? I couldn't tell you. Because that's another thing to keep in mind is that audience award, it's not actually Canadian audiences. It's a great point. I think the public broadcasting system is only an American only situation. So maybe it won't even resonate as meaningfully, though Tom Hanks does always tend to resonate. I agree. So we'll see. Let's go to the big race. Well, mama, look at me now. I'm a star.

This is not going to be the last time we talk about best actor, but I think best actor is the big thing to talk about. We've already discussed Leo quite a bit on this show and whether Brad Pitt should also be considered. This race, this category, is going to be really crowded this year. And I know that it always feels like it's really crowded, but some years are actually weaker than others. If you go back and look historically, you know, people playing real humans tend to do well in

this category. Rami Malek playing Freddie Mercury, for example. And so I thought it would be interesting to just kind of go down the list of the things that I think are in big contention right now with the understanding that say, we don't know anything about just mercy and how big Michael B. Jordan's role is for example so we won't talk about stuff like that but Leo and Brad Pitt today if you had to guess you think they'll go Leo best actor and Brad Pitt best supporting actor I would have to think so I mean it's it's imperfect but I mean you can't put Leo in. And I don't know anything about Leo's contract, but I would also imagine that it's in his contract that you cannot put him in supporting.

It's a great point. It's why I love to talk to you about this stuff because you're always thinking about the mechanics of how people get platform because it doesn't really matter what we think. It matters what has been agreed to. Right. I mean, I would be curious whether it was agreed

that Pitt would be in supporting even before they signed on to the movie. My guess is, and I'm getting ahead of myself a little bit, but my guess is that because of Ad Astra, that is the case. So Ad Astra, of course, James Gray's movie, which is coming out later this month, which also played at Venice and got great reviews. I still have not seen it. I'm very excited. Actually, that might be the number one movie I'm most looking forward to this year. That's out later this month.

It's hard to know if a movie like that in the same way that Motherless Brooklyn, it will be hard for it to work. I think it will be hard for Ad Astra to work. I hope that it does. Pitt is obviously the lead of that movie. So to get out of his own way,

maybe what you're saying is correct, which is that Pitt has officially agreed to campaign for Best Supporting while knowing that he's got a Best Actor showcase. Yeah, or maybe he just

isn't going to campaign and that means they put him in Best Supporting. I will say he's been showing up. he's been doing all of the junkets internationally from once upon a time in hollywood he was certainly the highlight of the venice red carpet in my opinion um can we just also very briefly i said this to you privately but what's up with all the models on the venice red carpet what's wrong with them? It's just they aren't in the movies. And it's like it's Brad Pitt was there. And then I think like Bar Raffaele for no reason. And then

a bunch of other models. Kate Upton was at the premiere of Marriage Story. Well, I mean, if you're a beautiful, famous person and you want to go to something, usually you can. That is true. It's just like an unusual padding of very famous models. Literal padding. Yes. Anyway. I think that's right. That Brad would run

for Ad Astra. I think there's a similar conundrum as I mentioned about Ford vs. Ferrari with Christian Bale and Matt Damon. Is it?

Because I thought it was already concluded as of this weekend. It's not though because this movie is actually I think closer to 50-50 in terms of screen time. And I think Bale's character has a deeper backstory.

We see his family, we see his interior life in a bigger way. But Damon is the person who pushes the movie forward. You know, Bale is the tool, Damon is the decision maker. And it'll be really interesting to see how they negotiate that. It's been a long time, I think, since two people were nominated in the same category for the best movie. It has happened in the past. I'm sure someone will tweet at us what an example of that is,

but it's very uncommon, and it really does feel very neck and neck, to use a racing metaphor. I will just say, watching from afar, that to me it seemed that Christian Bale emerged as the clear nominee. It's because he has the flashier role. He's the person who you're in the car with the whole time, and he's making the pained expression, and he's using his natural speaking voice, and he's got this incredible, almost like it's closer to the machinist look about him,

like lean athlete look about him. Damon is like a pudgy Texan who designs cars. It's just not as flashy. Right. I'm not saying who should be nominated. I'm just saying, if you had to call it right now, it seems like the Christian Bale role is what people are gravitating towards. Yeah, you're definitely right about that.

And the thing with Bale is like, Bale could just be nominated for every movie he does. He's never, ever less than fascinating. And he's almost always amazing. He's never, ever less than fascinating, and he's almost always amazing. He's similarly just amazing in this movie, and you are completely with him the whole time, and he quote-unquote transforms. He's just one of those guys who you forget you're watching Bale, even though it's a very movie-star-ish performance. So, it'll be interesting to see what they do there. I mentioned Driver. I haven't seen everything this year. I just hope he wins. I just was so taken with what he's doing in this movie. He gets two massive showcase moments in the movie that are the most Oscar-real-ready moments that I can remember in a movie.

Two things to keep in mind. Number one, he will also be in The Rise of Skywalker. Correct. Wow, can't believe I got the title of Star Wars 9, correct. But that will be out simultaneously, which people being box office stars doesn't matter as much for the Academy. But I do think it helps to be like, well, he can be in this tiny movie and also can make a ton of money. He'll just be in front of people a lot, both for that press conference and for Junket and for whatever he decides to do for Marriage Story. And that is a big deal. I also think, and this is uncommon for someone who is only 35, conference and for for junket and for whatever he decides to do for marriage story and that

is a big deal i also think and this is uncommon for someone who is only 35 but there like is a real it's time sensation around him already yeah which is nuts but he is probably one of the great actors of his generation already yeah i mean we talked i talked about him i think on the mailbag episode just about kind of who is my favorite working actor and um he's only 35 as i mentioned and they showed a clip reel of his work before the tribute that scorsese gave him and i mean he's worked with jim jarmusch and the coen brothers and martin scorsese and no bound back four times which i didn't realize this is his fourth film with bound back and he consistently and obviously he got his start working with Lena Dunham on one of the most

important shows of the century. And he does have like a pretty significant body of work in less than 10 years. And so it's, it is, I think you're right. There is a kind of a feeling of why not him, you know,

why it's not like, you know, Denzel winning for glory also like in his early thirties, like sometimes somebody just is so good and so consistently good and so worthy and famous enough in a way because of what you're saying with Star Wars that it just feels right. So we'll see. I think the honest major counter to that is going to be Joaquin Phoenix and Joker and how that movie plays because a lot of people are going to see that. And a lot of people admire Joaquin Phoenix. And he's frequently nominated.

And he may also have a similar kind of energy around him. You're making a face like you've got a snake coming out of your eyes. No, I don't mean to be making that face. Are normal, adjusted people going to care as much as everyone who is tweeting about Joker? I don't know. And who will be tweeting about Joker? Because that's the thing. It will be a sensation on the internet and we will not be able to not hear about it for six months. But that does not correlate to Academy votes.

It's completely true. And there may be something held against it because of its comic book origins. The fact that it comes from that, with the rare exception of Black Panther, it's not usually celebrated. So that'll be an issue. I mentioned Sandler, you know, he's another guy who at some point somebody's going to have to give him an Oscar because he keeps, you know, he makes three Netflix movies that people are like, this is garbage, but it's great for my kids. And then he makes a great movie and he's been doing this for 15, 20 years now. And his great movies are like aging well. And his great performances are aging well, like funny people at the time, people are like, oh long it's baggy or whatever but if you go back and

look at his performance it's fucking good and he's great in punch drunk love when he puts his mind to it he really is like one of the most interesting dudes doing this 100 he doesn't campaign i it'll be so interesting to see if he does that this time because one he went to tell you right and he went and he stayed like for four days and he shook a lot of hands and he seemed to be in a great mood. He was playing basketball in the local park with people. He's got a big shit-eating grin on his face

in the class photo sitting with Martin Scorsese. He really did seem to be there for it. And you're right, he never does press. He never does long interviews. He never turns himself over to this process. Driver, similarly, is a bit taciturn historically. He was celebrated at two separate tributes and did a number of Q&As and was pretty charming. You know, I would not say he was very forthcoming about his life.

Right. But he was great talking about the things that he worked on. And so if those guys can focus their energies on those things, maybe it's enough. We'll see. It takes a lot of work. Rami Malek was fucking hoofing for months. Yeah. I'm curious to see whether they can invent a campaign that fits this mold of guy who

definitely is eligible and who people love but refuses to do any press usually because you've got Sandler, you've got Adam Driver, got Eddie Murphy, who we were talking about last week. That's right. Interesting trend there. I mean, if Robert De Niro is incredible in The Irishman, will he campaign for an Oscar? I have no idea. I mean, probably not.

You know, and then you have to wonder whether, it seems unlikely. Every time I've started a sentence with, maybe the Academy will change, I have been proven wrong. Yeah. But they need stars they need people who have who are recognizable really in the acting categories because that more than the the movies because you can get someone to tune in to see adam sandler probably a hundred percent and you know i i think in part because we've discussed how there's not likely to be more than one big box office hit in the lineup this year, the way that there was last year

with Bohemian Rhapsody and A Star is Born and Black Panther. There were a lot of movies and I genuinely attribute the bump in the ratings to the fact that people had seen a lot of these movies. I think it's going to be a smaller year in that respect. So if you have, based on what we've just discussed, Leo, Christian Bale, Adam Driver, Joaquin Phoenix, Adam Sandler, Robert De Niro, Eddie Murphy, those people are famous. They're like actually famous. They're in hit movies. We have long relationships with them. That is beneficial. I, you know, who knows if Tom Hanks ends up becoming a lead or not. He's another guy who people, when you think Oscars,

you kind of think Tom Hanks. So that will be fascinating. There's a few other not. He's another guy who people, when you think Oscars, you kind of think Tom Hanks. Of course. So that will be fascinating. There's a few other ones. I did mention Jonathan Price in The Two Popes to you. He feels a bit like a, he's overdue. The Two Popes is my wife. That's what I realized. The Two Popes, I just can't believe that this is real and that I am going to be taking this seriously for however long. And I know you've seen it. Honestly, it was pretty good. Like, i really did think it was pretty good i just it's so not in line with what i thought that it was going to be and i suppose it's also for a slightly older audience i just can't it's

legitimately pretty funny and obviously also jonathan price is the connecting factor between the two of them but i i just i can't believe that it it's a buddy comedy. What? There is a long stretch of the movie about the revolutionary struggles and the problems of the Catholic Church in Argentina in the 1960s. That's like a 20-minute section of the movie. Listen, I don't want to make every movie about politics and issues. I want to have fun at the movies, too, but it's called The Two Popes. I didn't write it. They're popes. All right. Eddie Redmayne, The Aeronauts. I don't know. I don't care. If I'm being really real at the end of this podcast, it's just not for me. I didn't see it for a reason this weekend. I mentioned Edward Norton, of course, Motherless Brooklyn.

There's a world in which with the right campaign, because it's such a purposefully, it's a showy performance because it has to because his character has Tourette's. And so you have to evoke his disability in a meaningful way. And he's a person who's very admired in the industry and has a great reputation and has never won. And this is a passion project. Those things tend to do well. He'll have the Warner Brothers machine behind him. So we'll see if that comes to light. We talked about Dark Waters, Todd Haynes' mysterious movie last week. I guess I didn't add Dark Waters to that list of movies we haven't seen yet, but I don't know when that's going to appear in the world.

Right. And Mark Ruffalo is the star of that. Yes. Could be. Sure. I mean, I still think the number one problem is that you even forgot to put it on a list because we know so little about it. I know. There was a movie last year that you were saying it came out too late and it didn't get the right. I mean, I think Beale Street really fell victim to that.

And I wonder what will happen with Dark Waters, which I think is at the end of November in that crowded Thanksgiving moment. Daniel Kaluuya is in a big studio drama called Queen and Slim. He's already been nominated. He's definitely one of the most interesting living actors. Could be. That's pretty much my list. Who did I forget?

I'm sure people will be like, how dare you leave off Robert Downey Jr. for Endgame or whatever. But, you know. Would he be best actor? It'd be amazing if they nominated every single one of those guys

in supporting. It's just all one of those guys in supporting. It's just all of the Avengers were in supporting. That's how you get the ratings up. Give Thanos his Oscar. All right. When does Thanos get the Irving Thalberg Lifetime Achievement Award? Tell me. It's like you, this is your bit, but then like Thanos is going to present an Oscar.

Not even like in five years literally at the 2020 Oscars he's just they're going to do the whole animation thing and there will be a joke about the snap and all of this stuff was the snap this year or last year it doesn't matter okay because it ended and now everyone knows what it is I let's do it put Thanos on stage okay what's the downside what if we just put you

in a giant Thanos costume on stage great I'm in I'm in I'll be overdubbing movies going forward I'll be working on

my southern accent I'll be getting my Thanos cosplay on this is that's all I want from movies I'm so glad the Oscar show is back

Amanda thanks for indulging my Telluride observations. We'll have plenty of conversations like this one, hopefully for the next five and a half months. I'm ready. Let's do it. Thanks as always to Amanda Dobbins. Please stay tuned to The Big Picture later

this week when I'll be joined by Adam Naiman and we'll be talking about the movies of Stephen King. See you then.