The Big Picture - ‘West Side Story’ and Top Five Steven Spielberg Movies

Episode Date: December 10, 2021

This week marks the release of Steven Spielberg’s first musical, a remake and modest reimagining of the 1957 show and legendary 1961 film. Sean and Amanda are joined by Joanna Robinson to talk about the original, Spielberg's remake, and their five favorite Spielberg films. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Joanna Robinson Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ringer Films and HBO's next installment of the Music Box series is Mr. Saturday Night. This documentary chronicles the meteoric career of entrepreneur Robert Stigwood, who gambled on a magazine article about the Brooklyn nightclub scene and turned it into the 1977 cultural touchstone Saturday Night Fever, making a global superstar out of John Travolta and reinvigorating the genre of disco. Mr. Saturday Night debuts Thursday, December 9th on HBO or HBO Max. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins.

And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about Steven Spielberg. Perhaps you've heard of him. This week marks the release of West Side Story, Spielberg's first musical, a remake,

and modest reimagining of the show that was originally conceived by Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by the late, great Stephen Sondheim. The original 1961 film is legendary in Hollywood history. It won Best Picture at the Academy Awards, along with nine more Oscars, and it remains one of the most gorgeously photographed and choreographed movies ever made. So I think Amanda and I both had our doubts about the necessity of this remake and how foolish we were. Joining us to talk about WSS 2.0 and the work of Spielberg is Ringer Senior Staff Writer, Ringerverse co-host, my partner in Succession Podcasting, a Spielberg fan as well, Joanna Robinson. Hello. Hello. I'm a Spielberg fan, but I'm even more, I'm a musicals fan.

So I'm so excited to be here for this. So excited to meet Amanda. Likewise. And join you all here. So thanks for having me. Joanna, before we get started, just because I want to share this great shame, were you at all nervous about West Side Story, the remake? Oh, hugely.

I was like, don't want it, don't need it. No, no, no, no, no. I was against it vehemently. Would you say we were profoundly wrong? Deeply wrong? Foolishly wrong? How wrong were we to have doubted Spielberg, Tony Kushner, and the aligned forces of this remake? I think there's, I love, I'll say I love the movie. So that's true. But I think there are some people who still have their doubts and I think that's worth addressing. But I love this movie. I was very surprised. Very surprised. Amanda, what'd you make of it? Yeah. I mean, I put it on my top five movies of the year on our podcast. Sorry to spoil that for

you guys. That was a great podcast. Please check it out. We watched a lot of movies to talk about them for you. But yes, West Side Story was on my list. And that was a little bit an act of personal accountability because I was like, I don't know. Which again, just you don't do that when Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner are involved. But also because I just thought this was like a truly magical cinematic experience. And it's been really interesting for me to think in the last week about why I like West Side Story the musical, why I like West Side Story the 1961 movie, what about this worked

for me. And to Joanna's point, what about it is still worth having conversations about, which there is a lot and which also makes it, I think, an interesting cultural artifact. But yeah, just in terms of going to the movies and people singing and dancing, there's nothing more exhilarating to me. So I loved it. So let's start there because I'm a big fan of the film. I've never seen the show put on. I didn't listen to the cast recording or anything growing up. I liked it as a movie.

It's, I think, for cinephiles, for film admirers, for Hollywood history people, it's a big movie and there's a lot to glom onto. But as listeners of this show know, I'm not the biggest musicals fan in the world. There are some that I love,

but there are some that I truly don't get. Joanna, for you, why is this show a big deal if it is? I don't want to make too many comic book references because I know how Amanda feels about that. And this is her show. I just won't understand. It's not my show. I just, Joanna, I want to bond with you.

And we have like a lot of shared overlapping experience. And then there's another Venn diagram that I can't really access in the same way. But I think you'll agree with me about this, which is that when talking about comic book movies, there are some comic book movies that are embarrassed to be a comic book movie. And there are some comic movies that are like, comic books are great and this is what we're doing. And I usually prefer those movies. And there are some musicals that are scared to be a musical. And then there are some musicals that are like, no, musicals are great.

And that's what we're doing here and i think this is definitely a movie that is you know spielberg loves west side story has loved it since he was a kid so he's not embarrassed to go all the way in on this uh production and so this you know having everyone sing their own music is really important to me in a musical. I think it is really important for performance. Or in any Oscar competition. Yeah. It's very important. You shouldn't win if you don't sing, but continue. I agree. I agree with you. And then the dancing is incredible in this. And I want to say, I've been trying for years to understand what makes good dancing on screen and what doesn't, because it's not just down to choreography. And I was listening to, this may help my bona fides as a musical fan, I was listening to a Gene Kelly commentary track on Hello Dolly, a mixed bag of a movie.

But he was talking about how to capture dancing on film properly. And he talked about how you want to always keep the camera moving so you don't risk flattening your dancing. And that's what happens in this film is like when the dancers are moving, the camera's moving. And so everything just feels really active and really exciting. And so, yeah. And then I get those feelings in like big dance numbers where I just don't know where to look. And I can't wait to rewatch it so I can watch someone else dancing. So all of that,

you know, they're actually singing. The dance is incredible and it looks incredible among other things. Everyone's a triple threat or at least a twofer is, you know, is a big reason why I just loved this film. So, yeah.

Amanda, what about you? Yeah. So it's interesting. I would agree with Joanna that the Spielberg version of West Side Story has that. I love musicals. And really, I even love like the golden age of Hollywood musicals and all the Gene Kelly, but also the original West Side Story. I guess, you know, the concept, both the show and the musical. And I would say, I do think I saw like a 2009-ish product, like Broadway revival of West Side Story. But for the most part, I am just familiar with the movie and the music itself. And I would have said my connection to it is that it's like so a musical that it's almost not a musical. There is a lot of, I mean, there are a lot of musical influences on this, but obviously

Leonard Bernstein, there's a lot of opera influence on this, a lot of orchestral symphonic influence, and there's a lot of dance. The Jerome Robbins choreography is really, really central to the original movie and to the show and to like what makes it magical. I think we'll talk a lot about the original book and some of the updates and also the story itself. But you know, like some characters are better developed than others. I think like we'll have the, you know, we'll have a lot of conversations, but a Tony and Maria conversation is definitely one of them. But so for me, it really is elemental. I think the music is so like beautiful and overwhelming and the, like the, you know,

the ballet fighting and the, the jetés and the period, everything that it does on such a visual sensory level is to me what makes it so magical. I've said before that musicals are kind of like my action movies. I think the way that other people respond to, like, look what they were able to do visually on screen. That's how I feel about musicals. And I'll say one more thing.

Seeing this Spielberg version at the end of a year of movie musicals of a sort, I was just once again reminded that this is the type of music that I really enjoy in a musical. And more modern versions of musicals are not as much Amanda's cup of tea. And we will leave it at that. We can't leave it at that. We have like another hour and a half. I'm just trying to be like completely rude about like 20 years of, you know, musical innovation or whatever. I know rent means a lot to a lot of people. Not for me. Continue. Oh, wait, can I ask Sean something that well, I have a question about your connection to this which is that when we think about the original west side story film uh and the and the broadway show the iconography of the of the fire escapes and the fact that they shot some of

the film actually in new york i remember when the oscars did like that, we love New York montage. I think it was post 9-11. It like opens with the West side story prologue overture. They shot some of this in New York. I know you lived in New York. Like, does this feel like a New York film to you? It didn't feel like a backlot film to me, but this remake. Yeah.

It felt less like a backlot movie than i was worried it was going to feel well i i guess like one of the things that i think distinguishes it from the original is that the original is this sort of like there's artifice in the construction of the sets and the world and there's like kind of the inversion of that artifice in the version that spielberg is making it almost looks like um kind of like It almost looks like Germany during the war. It's so blown out. And there's this kind of pre-gentrification representation of New York City at a certain time in history where there's this... Obviously, it reflects the modern concern about immigration and this anxiety that kind of colliding cultures present to each other.

But the way that they built the actual sets of this movie um i don't think it feels real it feels like hyper real you know it doesn't and if if it feels like new york it doesn't feel like the new york that i lived in or the new york that i spent time going you know visiting when i was a kid it feels like um something elevated and i think the movie in general feels like that like if you look at um it's just a steroidal version i feel like of this show and to the point you were making about the gene kelly commentary sure the camera moves a little bit in fred astaire and ginger rogers movies and it moves even more in stanley donnan movies but there's literally no one alive who's better at moving the camera than steven spielberg

and this movie i think really emphasizes am Amanda's point about it being action filmmaking. You know, the opening kind of, you know, sequence, this sort of like that famous kind of finger snap, you know, first song. That's like a Michael Bay movie. I mean, it's kind of unbelievable the way the camera is like swinging around on a crane and the kind of energy and vibrancy that he's bringing to it and kind of matching the rhythm of the songs and so like it doesn't totally feel like a a new york movie to me the way that like taxi driver does you know you watch taxi driver and you're like oh yeah that is that's times square in 1978 you know what i mean it's something different than that yeah it's but it doesn't live in my like idealized new york and like i you know i watched a lot of movies growing up that were part of the reason that I wanted to move to New York, which wound up being a completely different experience than that of being an

idiot 20-something in New York. But I remember at some point during early lockdown, I was looking at Instagram and someone had posted a scene from the prologue. I think it is like that, you know, when the jets like fully break out into their, you know, arms soaring. And they had, it was that screenshot. And it was just like, I miss running around with my friends in New York.

And I felt that, you know, I was like, okay, that is, there's like an energy, even if it has like no literal, you know, analog in the real world. And it's so interesting how quickly this version lets you know that you're watching a different take. It opens with that idea of gentrification. The premiere was at Lincoln Center.

And there's a joke almost at the beginning of the film that like this neighborhood is being raised to put Lincoln Center there. So like the premier audience, I'm sure got a nervous, like self conscious chuckle out of that or whatever. But so that idea of gentrification there is right at the beginning. And then also when you have these two rival gangs running around in the 1961

film and in most high school productions that I've seen, the two sides are deeply color-coded in their costumes. So you know who is who. And something that I went to go see with my sister who played, who was very white and played a shark in two different productions of West Side Story. And we will talk about that. But like, you know, she was like, I couldn't tell who was who a bit running around. These jets are like more italian looking and so you can't really tell the difference between they're not color-coded blue and mustard

yellow versus the red uh you know purples of the sharks and she's like and i think i mean that's kind of the point feels very intentional yeah one of many points and then you know to your point about the iconic choreography they start the choreography and they're not doing the jerome robbins choreography as they knew they wouldn't they're doing some nods to it but like doing enough a little bit slightly different but i i at first was like oh that's not right and then i was like no i like this because it was more like more brutal and sort of pugnacious like version of it so there's still balletic aspects to it but it is also just feels more like the danger feels more real in this film um than it did in other uh other versions i've seen and so yeah right away you're watching a

different different but the same is like sort of the constant vibe of the movie you know yeah i think i was most nervous about losing the jerome robbins choreography yeah and i i agree with you that it was the right decision and i appreciated the nods to it. I mean, to recreate it is to just like recreate the show, you know, recreate the original, recreate the show because it is so literal. Like this person stands here and this move, you know, you like you're watching the same thing. I missed it a little bit at times, uh, just because that is part of like what draws me to to this experience in general. But I do think they managed a very nice balance of making nods to it, bringing enough in that if you know, you know, and you're like, oh, OK, there it is. While I agree also thematically that it would have stood out, there would have it kind of wouldn't match the updates that Joanna mentioned

in terms of just it kind of being a more brutal energy. Let's talk about why this exists because we've noted that Spielberg, of course, is a huge fan and the original is this acclaimed legendary film but the original is not

without flaw. Probably primary among the flaws is the casting of natalie wood is maria who of course is um not latina in any way shape or form and also does not sing the songs uh in in the in the film so there is and i'm a huge fan of natalie wood but it is a a glaring awkwardness even when you watch the film today that like she just kind of doesn't fit in the rest of the production in a way um i think there's also you know i think maybe joanna or maybe you amanda noted like richard bamers tony is also pretty bland in the film and it's odd to have a film in which the two leads are so miscast and kind of wrong and it's still be this kind of iconic

piece of work i i couldn't really think of a comparison point here for something where it's like, what's at the center doesn't work and everything around it, you know, specifically Rita Moreno and George Chakaris, but everything around it is kind of operating at the 10 out of 10 level. It's so unusual.

Well, and we should say that George Chakaris is also Greek, not, you know, like, and I think, I don't want to be smircher, but I'm pretty sure even rita moreno was wearing like bronzer makeup in this yeah and so yeah there's a lot of stuff in there that's awkward i feel bad for natalie wood because she was told that she was going to be able to sing and she like trained and they let her sing all the while knowing that they were going to dub her

with marty nixon who dubbed uh you know audrey happer and a bunch of other people famously but like yes there's things about natalie wood that natalie wood like i think really nails the ending but even but she's doing a thick accent that you're just sort of like it feels tough to watch you know so it's i in her defense the maria character i think throughout doesn't have that much going for her besides the songs and your like investment in this Romeo and Juliet love story. And the, and the show really does depend upon you understanding that it's Romeo and Juliet and these kids just like really need to love each other instantly. And that's like a thing that happens. And if you can't buy into that, there is this kind of hole at the center of the show.

She doesn't look comfortable. She just doesn't. Like Natalie Wood's a wonderful actress in many other ways. This is not the one. Well, yeah. And the same with Tony, I would say. Like these are kind of bland characters. And I think they did a lot in this updated book to flesh out Maria, I think really successfully, Tony maybe less so.

And to your point, Sean, the casting in this film is a lot closer to the mark here. And that is, I know that's a reason why a lot of people that I know were excited to see it. It is still, we should point out, the major creative forces behind this movie, just like the first movie, are all white men. That is still true. And as a white person, I can't really... I both love the 61 movie and this movie. As a white

person, I can't really speak to those nuances, but there is a really great roundtable discussion over the New York Times from a bunch of different like theater critics and playwrights and stuff like that talking about this idea of like one of the most seminal works of like Latina representation in our musical theater and theater in general. It was not written by own voices. And yeah, that's something. Tony Kushner is brilliant. Could they have gotten in 2020 when they made this a co-author you know that that might have made people feel um more represented i don't know yeah that's kind of an unresolvable i don't know it's not a conflict it's but there is like an asterisk in a way to to analyzing it because

spielberg is 74 years old and tony kushner i believe is in his late 50s and you know there's still like a part of like an older establishment in which someone like that historically would get the chance to tell this story the same way that Robert Wise is getting a chance to tell this story or Stephen Sondheim again like kind of irrefutable genius wrote the the songs and felt like he had access to the experiences that were so critical to telling the story. Nevertheless, I do think that the movie is very sensitive and unusually progressive. I think particularly the choice to not use subtitles when characters are speaking in Spanish, I think is probably the thing that is going to be considered the most bold in the film.

And personally, I thought it was, if not profound, I thought it was interesting and certainly doesn't take away from the telling of the story in any meaningful way. And in fact, it really just kind of situates you in the character's kind of state of mind and their attitudes a little bit more clearly. But otherwise, I didn't feel like there were any disrespectful or sort of blind moves in the direction in this new version. Was there anything that you guys flagged? No, I would just say, to Joanna's point, this movie, despite the fact that everyone, the main creators still are white men,

it does seem really engaged with a lot of the representational issues in the 1961 version specifically and also in imbalances in the book itself. And so I think that Tony Kushner in particular does a really fantastic job of engaging with the issues of gentrification and immigration and the jets and the sharks and really bringing in the like the balance between those those two gangs essentially and developing all the characters around Tony and Maria, which does give you a lot of context, I guess, into some of the conflict that's supposed to be in that relationship. But in establishing, and I think really ingeniously exploring a lot of

those tensions, even though they do give a lot more to Maria, it still does maintain a little bit of the imbalance of the original show, which is like everything that's going on around them is like slightly more interesting than what's going on between them, except for their songs. And that's the other thing. It's like, I mean,

they just, they have Tony and Maria just get bangers. So at some point, if you're just singing, you know, tonight or Maria or whatever, I'm like, okay,

sure. You're in love. I'll buy in. But I did think that it was interesting that even as I think there is like a tremendous amount of, um, like positive addition and enrichment to this text, there is still in doing that, just kind of like, okay, well we haven't solved these two teenagers just making some bad decisions like in the span of 10 minutes um well i think i completely agree with you and i i want to shout out that in i think i don't know if this is the

version you saw um amanda but in 2008 the revival that they did um on broadway was bilingual and that was from arthur lawrence who did the original book like staged that revival um and you know he like basically he's like not mistakes were made but just sort of like this i think is a more interesting right we're trying version of the original book that i wrote and let's try this out so like it can go out of the credit uh for what you see in this film goes to that revival production as well um but i think to your to your point about solving a problem like maria this maria um is the youth of the casting you know what i mean like natalie wood and richard baymer read as adults whereas um you know this cast reads very young um and i i will say i just i i re-watched part

of the original movie last night and then was googling Richard Boehmer expecting to find that he was like 40 years old at the time of filming and he's like 23. I feel I know I'm very handsome. Let me just say that the height that's he's bringing at least that but yeah, he's only 23. It just I think you're totally right. They read much older in the original.

But I think it's like any production of Romeo and Juliet. If you see actual young people perform it, you're like, oh, these are dummies. These are teen dummies, just how I was a teen dummy. And so then all of their mistakes make much more sense because you're like, oh, yes, the hormones are driving the bus here. Okay, I get it. That's actually one of my issues with this movie is that ansel elgort is 27 years old yeah and i don't know how rachel how old rachel zegler is i think she's in her early 20s um but she was really young yeah she does and she's obviously quite petite and you

know probably 18 at the time of filming because this was filmed a couple i believe this was filmed mostly pre-covid yeah so there is a weird imbalance there too where it's like this person could credibly be 10 years older than this small woman and And that also doesn't work, but that's kind of a whole other can of worms. We'll get to the performances in this film. Anybody's is like this tomboy hanger hanger around the jets who wants to join the team. And in this they make it, though not overtly, overtly, you know, step on the gas. So more of a question of like maybe a trans character, which I thought worked really well. And I really liked Iris Menace, who was cast in the role. So I thought that was a really good just subtle but interesting change that they made um we talked about the gentrification stuff

um oh the chino thing i think the chino thing is really interesting because you know talking about the balance of the text if you asked me before chino we're allowed to spoil the plot of west side story right? I think so. I think you can at least provide some context for who Chino is. Chino is like, you know, Maria's would-be suitor in Romeo and Juliet. This is Paris, like the character of Paris.

Paul Rudd in the Baz Luhrmann film, if you prefer. And he is, I will just say, a very key player in like the final moments of this story. And he is a complete non-character in the 1961 film. I can't recall if he's more of a character in the stage version, but I don't think so. And they gave him a whole entire character. The most character work was done on this person. And I thought it really helped the whole story hang together um and it gave more

another character on the shark side of things because you've got in terms of getting to know these characters you've got America which helps us get to know some of the sharks and who they are but the jets get a bit more like I could name a few more jets for you than I could name sharks and so to like build out Chino's character, I think, just evens the scales a little bit on all of that. And the Jets even get the really iconic choreography at the beginning is primarily the Jets. They get more songs in the first half.

When you're a Jet, you're a Jet for life. In the original, it's definitely, definitely just structurally tilted their way, both in the movie and I guess in life. And this movie does a lot to redo that, including restoring some of the songs to the original order of the, or closer to the original order of the musical. And I'm not the kind of like West side story expert where I'm like, no,

I feel pretty is supposed to come in at exactly at this. Like, you know, I, I don't have it all memorized, but I did notice that, um, there was a difference in the order of the numbers and it does kind of, it, it changes your like affiliations, like in the moment and how you're watching it. And certainly like the emotional flow of it and makes it a bit messier, which it is. This is, I mean, this is a real mess that everything that happens in the story,

sorry to spoil it. If you don't know how Roman and Juliet ends. Yeah. I was going to ask you guys about that because like, that's probably not something I've been eagle-eyed about while watching the original film is like the specific order of the songs. But it's been noted that there is a bit of a repositioning, a restructuring of the shape of the story. And like, I think it does.

I'll just say from a pacing perspective, I actually thought this movie was better paced than the original, which I think can kind of drag at times. And you're almost like you're waiting for America. You're waiting for G. Officer Krupke. Like you're kind of waiting for the big moments. And this movie I thought was much more sort of like linearly told, like more smoothly told. Did that track for you, Joanna? Yeah. I mean, it's interesting because Spielberg has said kind of over and over again that they, they took their main inspiration from the stage show. And I, I, what I actually think they did is sort of pulled the best from both because America, a show-stopping number, no matter how you slice it, but in the stage show, it's all women singing.

You don't get the, like, male-female, like, interplay. And so they're, like, when they started it and the men weren't on screen, you know, my sister was like, oh, no, they're going to do the stage version. And then the men came in and were like, okay, no, they're doing the film version. That's cool and like uh costume wise you know they still put maria in her iconic dress uh they still gave bernardo a like red shirt like some of the stuff is still there um but yeah cool is pre-rumble and i feel pretty as post-rumble that's the stage show order of things and they kept it that way they changed cool significantly in a way that i actually really loved it becomes this like duet with tony and riff and sort of helps build out

that friendship and relationship a bit more and i think the biggest change we talked a little bit about like this idea of danger um and and spielberg is always as we'll talk a little bit more when we get into the filmography, like putting kids in danger is something that he's kind of interested in. That makes it sound so awful. To put it mildly. Yeah, but like- I mean, come on.

Yeah, but like, again, the youthfulness, I would say, you know, to your point about Ansel Elgort, well taken. But like Mike Feist, who was a huge, along with Ariana DeBose was a huge standout for me as riff and the contrast between his riff and Russ Tamblyn's like teddy bear riff is so important to changing the tone of the film and I love Russ Tamblyn and I love that riff but this riff is all edges and um and I think it works really really well let's let's use that as an opportunity to talk more about the performances. I think that's probably the thing that rings out the most in this is, once again, the surrounding cast,

I think is perhaps likely to get more plaudits than necessarily the main two characters. Rachel Zegler, though, will start there. She plays Maria. Amanda and I called our shot on Rachel like six months ago doing a pod and trying to identify like the best 35 under 35 actors in Hollywood right now and she had never performed in anything and we were like you know what she's going on our list I don't know where she was like 28 or

something but I think we just had 34 34 but you know she was about to be Maria in West Side Story and then has like eight other roles lined up yeah I think she's gonna be like in a Disney princess remake very soon like she's kind of got like the cv lined up you know she's ready to go yeah yeah and boy she i thought she crushed it i thought this was like a pretty extraordinary performance to the point where i was like this is kind of an oscar worthy performance you know nails every song embodies the character deeply like has the range of emotion that you need for someone like this i think it's hard to play jul Juliet now. That's one of the most worked over parts in Shakespearean and in dramatic history. And I thought she was really great. Amanda,

what'd you think? Yeah, I felt wonderful about our placement. I think she should look forward to moving up next year and are totally made up. I don, like, we're not, I don't want people to start thinking this is, you know, Forbes or something. But I think also, to Joanna's point, she does, like, seem age-appropriate in this role, but also brings, in addition to, like, a total command of those songs, which are really hard,

and, like, going toe-to-toe with all of these established Broadway stars, and, you know, like with a Steven Spielberg production, which it's easy to get lost in, she manages to be completely in it and in charge of what she's doing while also maintaining like a sense of it's, it's not like a, to the back of the seats theater performance. It is a little naive. It is a little, I'm here for the first time and I'm kind of, and can you believe that this is happening, which is definitely a part of the Maria character. But it's also, you know, kind of heartwarming that it speaks to her experience as well. And I think the book does her a lot of favors in giving her a more rebellious nature, which is more interesting for us to watch.

And she has a sense of responsibility for how their love story is impacting the people around them, which is like nodded at to in the earlier versions. But like she at least she vocalizes it a bit more, which makes her feel more thoughtful and slightly less reckless. Yeah. I mean, like, sort of. I think she gets, what, like three minutes of that as opposed to none in the original? Sean, this is an opening for you to share your concerns. Just about the works of Shakespeare? Yeah.

Is he overrated? I don't know. I'm just asking a question.'m not i'm not sharing an opinion me sean sent me some tweet that was like maria is just like yelling at her like sister-in-law like two seconds after her brother gets murdered about how much she loves her brother's murderer what's wrong with her valid point yeah uh valid point i'd say it's a flaw in the story one of one of my takes it's a fun story but again it's like a little bit of flaw in shakespeare or it's just a flaw in teenagers and i would think you shot of all

people would be the defender of teenagers in love yeah but like the anita character doesn't you know the anita character is the nurse in shakespeare It's not Shakespeare's fault that, like, you know, the folks who made West Side Story decided to make it her brother, not her cousin. And, you know, and essentially her father, you know, all this sort of stuff. And she still makes the decisions that she makes. And none of it would work at all if the song weren't as good as it is. Yeah, totally. And the beautiful harmonies weren't as beautiful as they were. There is also,

we'll have a conversation maybe later this year about what happens to Shakespeare characterizations when you really cut down the runtime and it's no longer five acts and you're just hitting the highlights.

And then suddenly people are doing wild things with absolutely no justification whatsoever. So I'm chalking this up to teenagers. Incredible tease for the tragedy of Macbeth. I know. I'm so excited now. Sorry.

Are we allowed to say that yet? Yeah. I mean, we can note that we've seen a film. I think it's not necessarily a question of Shakespeare, though I think it's worth examining even the greatest works of all time. Joanna, Sean doesn't think that The Lion King is a good story. Listen, I've tried my King Lear takes on him on Succession and gotten the eye rolls, so I know where I stand.

Look, I studied Shakespeare, all right? I've read all the great works. I know it up and down. And I think it's worthwhile to... Joanna's point is the right one, which is that this isn't Romeo and Juliet kind of like perfectly projected. It's modified and changed. And I think if you believe

that the power of teenage love is deeper and more powerful than family or good sense, then it totally works. And if you don't feel that way, and especially if you don't really buy into Zegler and Ansel Elgort's chemistry, I think you'll have an even harder time with kind

of getting through this. Most people I think will. I think Ansel Elgort is like fine in this movie. I would say I was not blown away by his performance. He's clearly was cast because he has a kind of, he's a graceful performer. The way he moves on screen, I think there are very few leading men in Hollywood in this age range who can move like him. And he sings well enough. I thought he was okay. Compared to Rachel Zegler and particularly compared to Mike Feist and Ariana DeBose, there's no competition. They're kind of on another level in terms of musical theater performance. But I guess he kind of fills the slot ably. Joanna, what'd you think of Elgort?

Elgort is the hardest thing to talk about in all of this because there's two things we're talking about. One is that like after they filmed this movie, Elgort was publicly accused of sexual misconduct, which is a shadow that hangs over this movie. They didn't feel like they could reshoot. I mean, I'm not going to get into the minds of the filmmakers, but they decided not to reshoot anything. And it is a, I think, very valid reason why a number of people don't even want to see this movie at all. And I'm like, I'm not going to argue with that at all. From the performance side of things, he's getting kind of raked over the coals in a lot of reviews where they're like, we love this movie, but Ansel Elgort. And I will say as someone who has never liked Ansel Elgort, like I didn't like him when he was grappling with cancer and falling in love with Shalane Woodley. I didn't like him when

he was grappling with tinnitus and driving getaway cars. Like I'm not an Elgort fan. I don't get it. I was actually kind of pleasantly surprised by this, especially when Maria and Tony meet at the dance. Tony Kushner rewrote that scene, use a little Shakespeare and rewrote that scene in such a way where I'm like, Oh, I get it a bit more even than I get it in the original film. You're tall is what she says to him.

And let me tell you, put it outside everything else. You're tall. I felt that I was like, okay, I know what's up. Yeah, I get it.

I get it. And so Elgort, obviously this Elgort was way better than I thought he was going, okay, I know what's happening. Yeah, I get it. Yeah, I get it. And so Elgort, I will say this, Elgort was way better than I thought he was going to be. But my expectations were in the basement. So yeah, that's my Elgort take. Let's talk about Riff. I never saw this guy before in my life. I don't know who Mike Feist is. I was like, movie star.

Yeah. Two seconds in, I was just like, who is that person? This is incredible. incredible yeah he's really great um that's an interest that's an interesting part it's a flashy part obviously russ tamblyn's performance is also iconic in its own way but um he's doing something a little bit more menacing and a little bit more angular i would say uh and i thought he's really really really strong um so when the trailer dropped and i was like i don't know that i want to see this uh but i was like oh but that riff though what's what's going on there i was like immediately in

the trailer excited and when i tweeted about it uh the people who know musical theater way better than i do are like you don't know mike feist bro you do you even musical theater uh because you know he was in newsies and he was tony nominated for for Dear Evan Hansen and all this sort of stuff. But I have never seen him before. Oh, God. Who is he in Dear Evan Hansen? I mean, not Evan Hansen. Okay. Well, all right.

We can move on. But so, like, he's been on the radar of people who love, like, theater, theater. And I think this is an incredible debut. And then he just started giving interviews where he's like, yeah, I think I don't want to do acting at all anymore. And I was like, no, I'm so excited for all that you can do. You're incredible.

Um, but he like wants to go live in a van somewhere. So he's one of those. That's a great career move. Honestly, we need like a new reluctant, like acting genius, you know, to just go live in a van until he like shows up and as a cobbler in a movie or whatever. Amanda, now's the time for you to apologize to Ariana DeBose. I, no. I think now's the time for Ariana DeBose's agent and the people at the Oscars and ABC to apologize to Ariana DeBose. That was a losing gig though.

It was a total losing gig. And for a year, I've been like, oh, my God. This is the awards show or the pre-show is one of the worst things I've ever seen. And I feel like they did not put this woman in a position to succeed. And I was concerned that that would also extend to the movie itself. Luckily, it did not. She was fantastic in this movie. Incredible.

Incredible. She definitely has the hardest working agent in the world. She is everywhere. But I'm glad for her because she earned it. She's absolutely captivating in the role of Anita. I would say she also has the hardest job because Rita Moreno's performance in that part is, I think, the most memorable thing in West Side Story.

And it is the thing that has probably been like pulled out throughout history over the last 60 years. And so filling those shoes is tough. And the fact that like, not for a moment was I, I was like, this is actually her part now. And that's kind of impressive. Well, well, well, well, well, well, well, well. Let's like respectfully,

I still think Brigitte Moreno in the original 1961. Like I rewatched it last night. You can't take your eyes off her when she's on the screen. Joanna was talking about needing to rewatch dance scenes so you can watch the other people. I just rewatch America time and time again to watch Rita Moreno. Like, and just like, I, like, I want the dress with the skirt. Like that purple skirt is like the greatest movie prop of all time. Like, yeah, like Rita Moreno is an all-timer.

But I do think that Rita Moreno's inclusion in this movie and like a thoughtful inclusion, they've like reworked a part in order to really make a space for her is also helpful to Ariana DeBose because you don't have to be like but you know you don't have to do whatever like weird protectiveness or like this isn't Rita or whatever you know there's it there's like a nice passing of the torch that makes her more comfortable and and allows her also to do her own thing within the Anita which she does beautifully she's really

wonderful um to pull back the curtain when I was atity Fair, we were going to do at one point, and I don't think they're going to do it because it's been years since we said we were going to, a best on-screen dresses of all time feature. And the first thing that I said is I was like, Rita Moreno's purple dress in West Side Story, obviously. And that is Keira Knightley's green dress in Atonement. And then we can go from there. Well, I was going to say, Robert Weiss has a history with this also because Liesel's dress in the gazebo scene and sound of music also very important to me I google it every year uh still haven't been able to find it that's

like that's like a merch opportunity somewhere out there waiting for people like where can I buy we can get this made for you not listen not that i could pull this any of these off at at any point by the way like i like to think that i would be able to like swish that skirt around but again that is like oscar level skirt swishing um the the use of marina moreno and this is really interesting because i like you know so they changed the doc character into valentina like you know she plays like doc's widow essentially i thought a lot of that stuff was really really good when you're worried about these kids running around with no parental figures like this is the closest anyone has to a parent um in all of this uh i did not like the choice

to give her the song that they gave her wow it's like the one move that i did not agree with yeah did you cry though okay i cried for like the last 20 minutes. Yeah. Come on. But it's sort of like a Pavlovian response. Like as soon as you heard like the first chord. Yeah. Are we allowed to say what song it is?

It's. It's on. The soundtrack's out there. Yeah. It's somewhere. Yeah. So she sings somewhere. And you hear the first notes.

I like burst into tears. I should say at this point. At every single song. I was like tearing up um just just like the you know kind of like sensory overload but and I like agree I was even like oh they're doing this I know I'm being manipulated like I know that I'm being worked but also like I'm at the movies who cares and then I just cried the whole time if if they had let her start it and then like shifted over to the kids singing it, that might've worked for me,

but giving her the whole song didn't work for me. Sean, what were you gonna say? I guess we probably should give a shout out to David Alvarez too, before we close on the performances. Cause he also, I think is a better Bernardo. Like he's just, I liked him more than George Sicaris and I liked George Sicaris,

but this is like, it feels like a more authenticated kind of execution of that role. Like I just bought it in a way that maybe I didn't, I don't necessarily buy it. It feels like the original film is very much about,

like I said at the beginning, like artifice. And this movie feels like it is working harder to be in the real world. And I really appreciated that with Alvarez's performance in particular. Yeah.

And I want to quickly shout out the fact that they populated both, like David Alvarez is one of the original Billy Elliot's on the stage. And I just want to shout out that they populated this movie with like all kinds of Billy Elliot's and Newsies from the stage. These are like basically farm teams now for like what people are making. You came up the Billy Elliot oriott or newsies uh ranks uh so i i loved all the jets the officer kropke number i thought was incredible really well done so yeah let's just do quick oscar chances here does this feel like a replication of the original

which is like 12 noms five wins do you think 10 think- 10 wins. It won 10. No, I'm saying, but I'm like, no film will ever win 10 Oscars again. Like that's actually not something- Oh, you mean this film? Is it going to get 12? Could this film do that sort of thing? Like Amanda, what do you think? I mean, I was sitting there for the first 20 minutes.

I was like, holy shit, best picture. Like we got it. We're doing it again. And that is a little bit about kind of like just the exhilarating first 20 minutes of this show and this movie and also me being in that case. And, you know, my brain is addled, so I can't not think that way in the middle of a movie. It's a disease. I'd love to stop.

I it has won a tremendous this this like this movie won Best Picture. It's won a tremendous number of Oscars. And it's never stopped the Academy before of just rewarding the same thing over and over again. But I do wonder if the collective voting body has the same. There's certainly an older nostalgic element to the Academy, for sure. Is it going to totally run this way? I can't totally tell. I think it will get 10 nominations, 12 nominations for sure. Is it going to totally run this way? Like, I can't totally tell. I think it will get like 10 nominations, 12 nominations for sure.

How many it wins? I don't know. It could be the Irishman or it could win on a lot of the lower categories. But it's not, I mean, like picture. Dune's going to sweep like the technicals is how I feel. And like, this could get, you know, maybe a production design or something like that. But I still think Dune's going to pick up that stuff.

I think... Costumes. Costumes, maybe. Yeah, I could see costumes. I think whether or not it gets noted for its performances is an interesting thing because there's a lot of...

Ariana, I think, is the closest chance. And I don't think that category is currently packed full. I don't think there's no window for her to get in there. Whether she's going to win. I don't think there's no window for her to get in there. Whether she's going to win, I don't know, but I could see a nomination for her. And for me, the best, the likeliest chance outside of possibly picture, which honestly, like I'm with you,

Amanda, like I think it could do it with the Sondheim sentiment that's going on. And I think nobody expected it to be as good as it is. And also we'll get into this in a second, but I don't think Spielberg has made a movie this good in a really long time. And so I think people might be excited about that. And, and like, like some of Sean's arguments that he's made on other pods about Dune, like it feels like a movie movie, like a big spectacle movie movie.

And that might be something people want to reward in, in the end of this pandemic year. But I think Tony Kushner sort of steps out for me as he doesn't have an Oscar, he lost to Argo Fuck Yourself. So justice for Tony Kushner. If a white guy wrote this narrative doesn't sink him in some way. I think his updates to the book are extraordinary and I think he deserves this. So, yeah.

I think there's a, a strong likelihood that Kushner is nominated, especially given like what that category looks like this year. I think you can kind of count on power of the dog. You can count on Macbeth after that. It's a little bit of a coin flip for everything else. So there's a strong chance. I've seen some prognosticators suggest both Rita Moreno

and Ariana DeBose will be nominated in Supporting Actress, which also means that neither of them will win. So that's kind of tricky. I think Rita was good, but I think we should leave her out of it and let Ariana have her. Because she's got one. She's got one. 60 years apart. That would

certainly be the largest distance between wins in Oscar history. She is really fun. She'd be fun. 60 years apart. That would certainly be the largest distance between wins in Oscar history. She is really fun. Like she'd be fun on the award circuit. You know, she'd give great spicy interviews. Yeah, there's a pretty fun documentary that came out about her this year. I didn't really know very much about her life, but if people have not seen that, I would recommend they check it out.

I think there's also a real possible spot for Rachel Zegler here. Like that's a lot more crowded, but also, you know, love everyone loves an ingenue, like a 20 year old first time. Just that, that's a fun Oscar story and an Oscar campaign as well. That's that category is, is kind of a knife fight right now.

Like here are the 10 people who could be nominated for that, for best actress right now. Nicole Kidman, Gaga, Kristen Stewart, Olivia Coleman, Penelope Cruz, Francis McDormand, Gaga, Kristen Stewart, Olivia Colman, Penelope Cruz, Frances McDormand, Jessica Chastain, Zegler, Jennifer Hudson, and Alana Heim. I just don't want to put poor Rachel Zegler in an Olivia Colman knife fight.

That's what I'm saying. I don't think she's going to win, guys. But I think it's... There are a lot of those performances are not the same, but the same. And it's actress that you love playing character or person that you love. And I wonder whether you'll get three of those and then maybe you get one new person. I mean, it would be more exciting to me. I mean, I can't do eight more months of Spencer discourse. I really can't. I'm sorry. In the Oscars of my heart, it would be Mike Feist. That is the standout performance for me in this. I think he's just electric. I think his turn to the van life is

going to work against him then if he's not willing to hoof it on the circuit. I know. I don't think he's, he's not going to smooch the babies. He's giving the interviews talking about van life that's different than actually committing to van life. It's a fair point. Let's turn to Spielberg. I agree with what Joanna said. I think it has not been necessarily the greatest time for Steven Spielberg's work in the last five years or so. This is a big, big return to form. Obviously, he has loved musicals his entire life and has never made one, even though he is a person who is perhaps best suited to make a movie musical out of anybody out of any of his contemporaries, given the way that he creates a sense of vivacity and energy on screen. This is his first film in more than three years, which is unusual for him. He very

rarely takes a break. I think COVID is obviously a factor there. This movie would have come out last year, if not for that. He has been very prolific in the last 10 years or so. He's made seven movies in eight years. And not all those movies are good. Some of them are good. He sticks out to me, though, in the context of a modern movie podcast that we're making here on The Big Picture, because his themes and his point of view and the stories that he tells

feel very old-fashioned. And there's no snarkiness in Steven Spielberg's world. There's no heavy winking self-awareness. There's no interconnected universe of serialized storytelling. He is, even in the Jurassic Park world of films, it doesn't feel like he's leveraging some mega IP in quite the same way as we experience it now. And also he's just very sentimental. You know, he's a very, he's very trapped in a, the amber of his youth in many ways and ways that I, that I enjoy. Uh, but he is, he's, he's, he's different. He's built different. How do you guys, how do you, how are you guys feeling about, how are you feeling about Steven Spielberg right now, Amanda? Very positive. I mean, I did.

We put together our top fives. This was very hard. We can talk about why it was hard. But I considered putting West Side Story in my top five. I was like, it's too soon. I put it on another top five list this week. I want the opportunity to talk about other films. So I did not.

But just in terms of someone leveraging their just immense, like generational skill to make a movie musical, my favorite type of movie, like, great. Thank you. Would you also like to make an international art heist movie, a romantic comedy? And what are the other kinds of movies I like? I don't know. Maybe like a non-alien space drama space drama you know like man in a vessel in peril in space that's another one of my favorites I'm available Steven Spielberg to watch all of those so I feel warmly towards him I would agree that though I have enjoyed some of the movies of

the last decade um including the post uh that it's not the prime of his career and it's been interesting to watch him try to be more of a a grown-up or do kind of more mature types of movies i don't think it's spoiler to say that all three of us gravitate towards like the kid like wonder movies of the steven spielberg experience as opposed to the um the the dad movies respectfully uh so you mean movies movies for dads yeah movies for dads yeah movies about dad not movies about we're we are doing the movies about dad yeah we are pro and then and then he was like okay worked out those feelings. Now I'm going to try to get my dad to love me another way, which is making like 18 movies about World War II and other like historical figures. And those are good.

Like those a lot. Didn't put them on my list. So, you know, it's another interesting thing. We talk a lot about this with like pop stars and people who become very successful very early for a very specific time period in their life and career and which in a lot of ways Steven Spielberg did I mean he's successful very very young but then can like an audience grow up with you and can you grow up in your own career I don't think he has he's one of the greatest living directors and one of the most successful directors of all time. But I still do cling to the sentimental childhood parts of his career as well. It's interesting. A couple of years ago, I watched, I think HBO did a Spielberg

doc that I watched that really opened up for, my understanding of his themes and this idea that this like original wound for him, which is his like his really, you know, his parents divorced and his relationship with his dad just sort of like shows up again and again and again and again. And it's just like him trying to process all of this stuff. And I think that's where his most potent good stuff is,

is in that like very personal stuff and then in the last um 10 years i mean i don't think i haven't loved a steven spielberg movie since 2002 and i loved two movies and that steven spielberg did in 2002 but like it has been a while for me and in addition to those themes which he explored in some of these, still is exploring in some of these movies of the last decade, the twin fascination for him is like film innovation, right? You know, technical innovation. And I just haven't been able to follow him down a lot of the like CG invested paths that he has gone down. A lot of his films have looked really just too glossily plastic to me in a way that I just couldn't emotionally access. This feels like a return to form in terms of there's only a few shots that I was like, that feels a little, you know, digitally enhanced in a way that I don't want. But I was really worried that we would get like, I don't know, Baz Luhrmann's Gatsby or something like that, where I'm just sort of like visually not what I want.

And I love, I loved the visuals of this film for that reason. And I think it is, he's tapping into his own childlike love. Like when he talks about West Side Story, he talks about being 10 and listening to the cast album over and over and over again. And I think he tapped into that feeling again while making this film.

And I think that, you know, a lot of people are chasing that sort of Amblin Entertainment, never grow up, stranger things sort of feeling, but it's not really perpetual adolescence. It's not being a child while you're being an adult. It's like accessing that emotion. Trying to get back to that feeling.

Yeah, that's exactly it. And the thing that's so interesting about that is that his next movie which is out in less than a year is called the fableman's and it's apparently his most autobiographical film co-written with tony kushner starring michelle williams and paul dano apparently as his parents and seth rogan as his uncle and i believe julia butters of once upon a time in hollywood famous his sister and uh sign me up i'll be there i'm ready i'm ready in that one is it oaks oaks i love the fegley kids i'm a big fegley fan i believe gabriel labelle plays the the young spielberg yeah um man you know i actually did a top five spielberg's episode like three and a half years

ago before this podcast was is what was whatever it is or is whatever it was and me and chris talked about it and i don't even i didn't go back and listen to it i don't even know what movies i cited i'm looking i'm looking at the last 10 years of his career and it's like if 99.9 of filmmakers had made bridge of spies that film would be in their top five best films. And it's possible that's like Spielberg's 21st best movie. And that is- It's good. It's very good.

That's a testament though, I think, to just the extraordinary scope of what he's done. I mean, he's been making feature films for 50 years. Duel is 1971. And that's mind-blowing to be this prolific, this productive, this innovative, this consistent. He has some famous misses. You know, Always is a famous miss.

1941 is a famous miss. Kind of like Always. It has some charm. When I went back and looked at his movies this week i tried to look at the movies that have slightly more complicated reputations like i looked at the color purple um i looked at always during quarantine you know i looked at amistad during quarantine movies that like maybe don't i did not look back at indiana jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull i may never look back at that again um but did you watch

warhorse i didn't. I don't love War Horse and I don't think that I will. But again, there is like a War Horse hive. There are people who are like, this is actually one of his most significant works. I don't think I've ever seen anyone angrier than when my father walked out of War Horse. Oh, that's too bad. Just like won't stop talking about it 10 years later.

That's so funny. I think I gravitate to the same eras that you guys do. You know, the sort of like 86 through 93 and then that like 99 or 98

through 2003 corridor. Like those two eras are so, so amazing. But also like that doesn't account for Jaws and Close Encounters coming back to back. You know,

like his career is so big. It's so hard to tangle with. It's so big and it's so weird because, you know, he's like, he's credited for like inventing the blockbuster, right? With Jaws, et cetera. And then, you know, to your point, Amanda, about him wanting to be taken like seriously. He does his taken seriously movies early in his career

with like Empire of the Sun, et cetera. And people are like, no, we want the hits. Play the hits, you know? But one of my favorite, I think it is in that Spielberg HBO doc, or maybe I watched it elsewhere, but there's this great, they taped him. The year the Jaws came out, someone was filming him watching the Oscar nominations. And when he got like shut out, he just threw a fit about it. And he was so mad.

And he was just like you know make the most popular film of the year and like get snubbed like what the hell um and it's just so funny because he's now become this like oscar gatekeeper because he was like he was sort of instrumental it's just odd he was driving the like we can't let netflix win team and then he made a netflix deal so i don't i don't know what to say about that but like just his his complicated relationship with like blockbuster culture versus taken seriously win an oscar culture becoming you know starting up as the jaws guy and then becoming the like we don't need so many superhero films guy like it's just uh it's fascinating it's it's every person's

journey like live long enough to see yourself become the we don't need the blockbusters kind of guy. Yeah, he's a boomer, you know? He's a classic boomer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Can we also just say that the year of Jaws, the year he was shut out of Best Director, here is the most insane Best Director nominee list,

I think, of all time, right? It's Milos Forman, Federico Fellini, Stanley Kubrick, Sidney Lumet, and Robert Allman. Never heard of them. Never heard of them. Never heard of them. I don't know what you want, Steve. I'm sorry. That's tough.

I mean, there's a case that that's the greatest movie in the history of movies. But the fact that Jaws is ultimately the film that is best remembered, most seen, the most resonant,

the most influential, is a testament to kind of where Steve's head was at even then. He was like, I know what I did. I know how i pulled this off and there is that that you know abiding sense of self-confidence that powers him through five decades of films let's just let's just do our top fives i don't because because we could do a seven hour pod about spielberg and maybe we should next year when the fableman's comes out but um for now joanne i'll start with you what's number five number five for

me is minority report um i there was there was like a little tom cruise you know he has his like little leading man eras this is a little like tom cruise leading man era they'd wanted to make this for a long time it was like much delayed it comes out post 9-11 in that 2002 double whammy year um and has a lot of like Homeland Security, 9-11 themes to it, I think unintentionally. But he also, of course, injects like a father-son thing into it that is not in the original story.

He put that in there. This is one of my favorite Tom Cruise movies, honestly. An incredible Colin Farrell performance, a big like a big splashy kind of intro for Colin Farrell who had done like Tigerland and some other things. But like, this was sort of like, everyone's like, oh, okay, what's all this? He's not just in the tabloids with Britney Spears. He can actually like do a lot of stuff. I'm a huge Colin fan. So this is a big one. And then, you know, Samantha Morton. And then it just looks incredible in terms of this like grungy bleached out, cool future stuff. I think it's a really underrated Spielberg. And that's, that's why

it's my number five. This is one of the, I guess he started shooting with, with Kaminsky around Schindler's list, but I feel like this is one of the signature Kaminsky Spielberg combos. This is also my number five. Um, I think it's in the conversation for best science fiction adaptation, best science fiction film. I think it realizes something about this kind of future past storytelling that very few filmmakers are capable of. It's also just an awesome thriller.

It's just a really exciting kind of reverse whodunit. And it is definitely one of one of Cruise's best performances, the kind of movie that you would never be nominated for Best Actor for. But like, if you go back and watch this movie, and everything has to do the physical transformation, the sort of the blindness period in that film, the sense of, you know, emotional disarray that that character slips into. So incredible movie. I love this movie. Amanda, I feel like your number five is also released in the same year as this one. Yeah, I was going to say to the other film from 2002, which, Joanna, we share this.

It's a bit higher on your list. So I promise to make space for you. Catch Me If You Can, which, you know, I was joking earlier, could Steven Spielberg, like the greatest craftsman living, just make movies and genres that I like. And this is a caper film that's also about fathers and sons, uh, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks, two of the greatest actors of, of, of my lifetime. And it's completely delightful and it, you know, it moves and it has, it hits all the beats that I want from a caper movie, you know, with just like great skill. The production and like the 50s, 60s vibe really anticipates a lot of what we all geeked out over, like geeked out on Mad Men. I'm losing my prepositions, but what made us all like really be psyched about Mad Men

and just like peppered with great performances. Amy Adams shows up for like 20 minutes embraces along with Martin Sheen and a great Christopher Walken performance as the the the dad who can't quite deliver what he's supposed to one of the great Spielberg not great dads the universal dad the universal dad yeah just But just like a really well, like sharply done, enjoyable movie. And this is post, should I talk about Kashua? You can now. Yeah, please.

This is post Spielberg's like reconciliation with his father, which he had, I think in like the late 90s. So like on his trajectory of like father-son relationship through my art. This is a really interesting one. It's really interesting to think about. I mean, I think this is maybe Leonardo DiCaprio's best performance. He gets to play all the notes that are available to him. Got news for you.

You've just set me up perfectly here. Next week, we're doing Leo Hall of Fame. So we'll be deciding where this sits in the power rankings. Okay, where this compares to Don't Look Up? All right. And then I actually think it's one of the greatest Walken performances too. Walken gets to be like really funny and then really vulnerable emotionally. An incredible Hanks performance. This is my third most rewatched Spielberg, which is why it's number three on my list.

I rewatch it all the time. I love this movie. It's like a Christmas movie for me. I think it's a really, really incredible. And I think to speak to Spielberg putting his whole self into something, there is a bit of the con artist about Spielberg. And I don't mean that negatively. There's a story he likes to tell about how he snuck onto the universe a lot before he ever had ever had a contract and like just wore a suit and walked in and used an empty office. And then later it turned out that that was kind of a lie and actually, you know, so like he had this con man origin story

that he like liked to tell for himself. And then that in of itself was a bit of a con man job. So if you think of him as this like Leo character working through his dad's stuff, pulling all these various cons and escapism and all, it's just like it's a romp and then there's all this meaty stuff at the center of it it's incredible incredible so i wrote a piece about like a long column about spielberg when that documentary on hbo was released and at the beginning of the piece i tried to better understand how he pulled this off. And I was kind of trying to circle that con man aspect that you're describing

because at 22 years old, he was directing an episode of night gallery starring Joan Crawford. And I literally, the lead of the piece is like, how did this happen? Like how, like even if he was the most talented person in the history of film, which maybe he is,

how did he pull that off? How did he convince people this kind of like this brand of hustler we think of him as this kind of like avuncular kind of or granddaddy of american movies right now and he was something totally different he was much more um i don't know much more like he's slippery and and kind of fast talking and very convincing in everything that he was doing back then and so you guys are right. Maybe there's something to that in Catch Me If You Can that he's like identifies

pretty clearly with that Leo character. Plus an iconic John Williams score that doesn't sound like a usual John Williams score. The Saul Bass opening credits, like, you know, it has everything going for it. An incredible film. If you guys haven't, like,

if listeners haven't rewatched it in a while, just pop it in. Feel that Christmas lonely phone call vibe of the movie okay amanda let's ping back to you for for number four what do you got for number four i know but i'm stepping on joanna's list again no no it's fine okay well we share this as well it's a bit higher for joanna um it's indiana jones and the last crusade and i guess this is where I say that I don't have Raiders on my list. I went with last crusade and I think there are a few, I'm not going to make an artistic judgment, you know, justification for that. It's because I really liked the Sean Connery's and they're playing like the fun dad, but fun, but absent dad to Harrison Ford. And it is a little bit when I saw

it. And it's a little bit just about the fact that if you can have just Harrison Ford or if you can have Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, why would you not do the second one, in my personal opinion? But this is the one that I've rewatched the most. And I think, obviously, the Indiana Jones movies in terms of Jaws invented the blockbuster and how we watch the blockbuster, but maybe the Indiana Jones movies invented like the pacing and the structure and what we understand to be a blockbuster. So this is just a personal favorite. Yeah, so I will say that this is the internal debate, I think, Raiders versus Last Crusade.

And Sean will get to make the other case here. But like I also, like I had a moment where I was like, oh my God, are the, are the film bros going to come for me

if I put Last Crusade instead of Raiders? Welcome, Joanna. it's a beautiful island we have here without film bros because they're not allowed but um but all the ones on my list I've seen in the theater um and I never saw Raiders in the theater and like just I saw Last Crusade I think I probably saw Last Crusade first honestly um and then so then Raiders comes off as this like a great film, an incredible film, but a slightly darker prequel to like this other movie that I love. And this movie, I mean, this movie has a Tom Stoppard polish on the script. So it's incredibly zippy and really, really fun. It's got that dad stuff at the center of it not like the dad the dad stuff that's so

interesting in this is um you know in all of his movies indiana jones is like going after an item right the grail the whatever the case may be in this one he loses the item and gets his dad i mean come on it's just the relationship with his dad is the is the is the item. I mean, I just think that there's a lot of soul in this. And you get to punch Nazis in either Raiders or Last Crusade. And that's always fun. Sean? So number four is Raiders of the Lost Ark. I don't know what the fuck you guys are talking about.

Last Crusade over Raiders? What? Yeah, every time. You have fun in your little film bro canoe. What is that even about? You think Raiders your little film bro canoe you know is that even a bad you think if raiders is a film bro movie come on no but i just we're allowed to have our preferences we are uh you know i i just think i'm i'm more likely to be to feel closer to the the original the kind of the invention the the originating space like there's an interesting kind of star

wars empire conversation there too. A new hope versus Empire in terms of well this kind of invented or reimagined this form and Indiana Jones is very very similar to Star Wars in that it is so clearly aping something that the creators loved but also making it

its own. Making it its modernizing and recontextualizing a lot of what inspired it and Raiders of the Lost Ark I mean you know we did I think we did a rewatchables episode about it last year probably the one one of the rewatchables I was most excited to do since the inception of the show because it is um it is in some ways like kind of the first modern action movie and I know that that's like kind of an absurd thing to say, but the pacing of that movie and the way that the whole film is organized

around set pieces felt like a revolution. And you can make the case that in many ways, the things that Spielberg invented or pushed to the forefront of modern filmmaking, less talented people have kind of monkeyed with and ruined. But his sense of staging is unbelievable now the one thing i will say about last crusade is raiders feels like a lucas and spielberg movie and last crusade feels like a spielberg movie and i i accept that that like especially the the father aspect of that

story is kind of more resonant maybe emotionally but raiders as like a thrill ride is is my preference yeah and to be clear i love raiders it would be in my top 10 and um and i think karen allen as marion is like one of one of my favorite you know steve silver doesn't have a ton of great female characters um but but marion is uh despite the creepy age difference, a fantastic character. But I don't cry during Raiders, and I cry during Last Crusade, so it edges for me. Okay. Joanna, what's your number four?

Okay, so speaking of films that I've seen in a movie theater, I was too young to see this in the movie theater. I don't think I was born. But it had a revival a couple years ago where it was touring, and I had never seen it it's Close Encounters of the Third Kind and obviously it like looms as this huge film that people talk about but I had never seen it and um and I saw it in the theater and I was just blown away um by how I was moved by it um visually but Richard Dreyfuss's character Roi Neri I think is one of the best most iconic Spielberg characters because this is someone who is a combination of the bad dad because he leaves his family by the way um and the like artist the hopeful artist sort of obsessive

artist with Spielberg is like I think he puts himself and his dad into this character Dreyfus Dreyfus is incredible in the role and um it's just it's all there and it's all I was transfixed and transported by it and I think maybe every Spielberg movie should be seen at theater and I haven't an iconic one that's on your list it's not on my list I haven't seen in a movie theater yet and i would like to do that maybe it will be on my list of when i do i'm gonna hold my tongue on close encounters for the moment um oh okay amanda why don't why don't we go to your number three okay because am i the only person who has this on her list you are absolutely insane i agree it's a little film called et you guys ever heard of it um

joanna you don't need to share your uh deepest personal history with the with the listeners but this is a children of divorce podcast uh and so obviously you know we're just like really taking that subject head on here i mean i'm kind of like i don't know why steven spielberg needs to make an autobiographical film because he already made et you know and then there's just like basically there's just like the weird intense like very scary 30 minute like medical uh you know military state drama in the middle of it which i re-watched this movie last night cried many times um i just i really love et so much and but it is so strange how scary this movie is which again putting kids in peril yes joanna he loves to do that and also the 80s were just a different time i guess in terms of what we decided kids were were ready

for including being in a medical tent with your alien friend, who's just dying. And, uh, like every single law enforcement officer coming to get you, but you know, they save the day in terms of iconic imagery. I guess you can't, I mean, there are so many Spielberg movies, but just the bike and the moon and the kids flying. And when the John Williams comes in, if you had to distill Spielberg down to 30 seconds,

I like, maybe this is what you pick. Maybe not. There are some other movies. That's what's so hard about Spielberg. And I felt it was a little obvious putting ET on my list, but at some point that is also like this Spielberg experience. He has made like single

handedly constructed, like mainstream American blockbuster movies himself. So, uh, this is a beautiful and pretty screwed up movie about, about finding, finding yourself and finding your, finding your friends, even if your dad isn't there, which he's not. I think, um, your listeners would like throw their phones in the ocean if none of us had ETNR lists. So thank you for saving us from that completely. And my friend Matt Patches did a great essay years ago about this concept of Spielberg face. And like Henry Thomas as Elliot is like is sort of the number one Spielberg face when I think about that sort of stuff. Yeah, an incredible film. It deserves exactly face when I think about that sort of stuff. Yeah.

An incredible film. It deserves exactly what you're talking about. It deserves it. I love E.T. I'm not going to be like E.T. is lesser or greater than that's a challenge. When he wakes up. Oh my God.

It's so beautiful. And baby drew. So yeah. Okay. Number two, I'm having a battle with myself. I'm having a battle with myself. I'm having a battle with old me and new me.

Old me is Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I'm Richard Dreyfuss. I want to see what's out there. I want to explore. I want to think of a world beyond my own. I'm obsessive. I'm compulsive. I'm hypnotized.

You're building mashed potato structures out of your blu-ray collection yeah okay new me yeah AI artificial intelligence oh brother dad time it's dad time it's dad time oh brother AI artificial intelligence one of the most incredible films ever made I re-watched this film I was blown away all over again I don't know if I've seen it since it was first released. And when it was first released, I had a complicated feeling about it because obviously this is a movie that was developed by Stanley Kubrick and based on a Brian Aldiss

story called Super Toys Last All Summer Long. This came at the height of the Haley Joel Osment moment. And let me tell you, this is one of the single greatest screen performances you will ever see. Of course, he was nominated and acclaimed for his work in The Sixth Sense, but his performance as David in this movie, as an android boy and a kind of Pinocchio, is so touching and so beautiful. And this movie is asking literally the deepest questions about existence that you could possibly ask.

What am I connected to? Am I real? How does the world work and where do I fit inside of it? It's an absolutely incredible movie. Is it a little bit ponderous about some of those questions? Perhaps. Should more movies be a little bit more ponderous? I believe so. And I think it's also a movie about the terror of being a parent. And I just did not have access to those feelings a year ago, five years ago, 20 years ago when it was first released. And I do now. And I would have once said Close Encounters and I didn't relisten to that 2018 pod. I probably did have Close Encounters, and I didn't re-listen to that 2018 pod. I probably did have Close Encounters on that list.

It's not on the list anymore. It's AI, artificial intelligence. There you go. I love this. I love this journey for you. Thank you for supporting me. Amanda is mad. I relate to you in other ways, Sean.

Okay. So I held off on my number three because I want you guys to get a chance to talk about your number one right now. Joanna, why don't we start with you? What is your number one and Amanda's number one? My number one, my most rewatched Spielberg movie. I think I've sometimes in my life argued that it is the greatest movie of all time. A perfect film. I went to the San Francisco Symphony, did like an orchestral play along version that I went to for argued that it is the greatest movie of all time uh a perfect film i went the san francisco symphony did like a you know an orchestral play along version that i went to for my birthday a couple years ago uh it's jurassic park the best adventure film the best horror film uh incredible special you know you talk about when i was you know be, bemoaning Spielberg's relationship with CG and special effects before.

I didn't mean this because this holds up wildly. It's incredible the way that this movie holds up. I don't know how they did it. I have been frustrated, disappointed by all the all the sequels that have come after and continue to proliferate. I choose to acknowledge only one. Maybe I'll make a case for Lost World someday. but really just the one is the one I really want to acknowledge. And I just think Jurassic Park is a perfect film with a man who's not sure he wants to be a dad, but makes a connection with a small boy who I believe is a child of divorce.

Amanda, what about for you? Why is JP number one? I mean, the intellectual argument here is like this is the perfect marriage of like the childish sense of wonder that is a major Spielberg theme and just like pure entertainment like effects machine. And you've got it like the pacing

the how did they do that of it all that you borrow from some other movies that are going to be named later and all of the oh my god like the spielberg face to um as joanna mentioned so it's kind of all there together the emotional answer is that i was nine years old when i saw this movie and i was like, holy shit, look, there are dinosaurs on screen. And like, I'll just never get over just being like, oh my God, those are like real dinosaurs. And the John Williams score kicks in and then the kids get to almost be killed by dinosaurs a lot. And it's really scary. And it does, as Diana said, like still hold up the water glass shot and the raptors in the kitchen. And just knowing that raptors are a scary thing now, like all lives on with us. So, you know, I think always these lists

are a little bit of product of when did we see these movies and how did we come to the canon and how did we learn all of these things? But Jurassic Park for me, just an all-timer. Dinosaurs, they're real. They're there. I was way too young to see this movie in theaters and my dad knew it but I had read the book because I was like a big Michael Crichton,

John Grisham kid. You know, like normal kids like to read Grisham and John Crichton. I was as well. I was a huge John Grisham. Yeah.

I think I read the film the same year which was not appropriate. Yeah, I remember before YA when kids would read airport books. Anyway,

we- That's our generation. That's the truest thing that the three of us share is it was normal to just read sphere you know like that um but uh you know i i told my dad i was like this movie can't scare me i've read the book where like little little dinosaurs take chunks out of baby's faces like you can't't scare me in this, in this movie. And he took me and I was petrified. Like the Samuel Jackson arm moment, like all of that stuff. I screamed. The weird neck thing still freaks me out to this day. Don't like that one.

You know, what's interesting about our lists before we get to the final film we'll discuss is that we don't have any of the, you know, I think you use the word important films, Joanna. We don't have Schindler's list. We don't have empire of the you know i think you use the word important films uh joanna we don't have schindler's list we don't have empire of the sun we don't have amistad or munich the films that feel more rooted in a history that feel more or lincoln or kind of a prestigiousness i think and i think the

reason for that is because spielberg is one of the few filmmakers who makes popcorn movies that feel important yeah and they. And that's unusual. And there are people who try to accomplish the same thing and very rarely pull it off. Actually, we did a Ridley Scott episode recently. He's one of the few people who I think does something similar, who makes a movie for everyone that also could credibly be the best film that you saw that year. And I have a lot of respect and admiration for Saving Private Ryan. It's not a movie that I return to every year in the same way that I would

return to the movie that is my number one. I felt a little queasy for myself when like none of us had Schindler's List on our list. But then I was like, yeah, I mean, I just, I couldn't do it.

Is it my favorite? You know, it's kind of a weird movie to be a favorite. Yeah, I admire it. Again, I was nine when it came out. So like, well, of course I liked Jurassic Park. Empire of the Sun, I have rewatched many times. For some reason, I really, really liked that film a lot,

even though it was not well-received. A great Malkovich performance. When we talk about kids in peril, Christian Bale running through the streets in that movie is like my number one. That's scarier to me than some of the dinosaur stuff

that we get in Jurassic Park. Empire of the Sun is very good. I mean, I think even a lot of those 80s films that were maligned at the time have, I don't know

if they've aged well necessarily, but there's a lot to it. There's like, there's some image making in The Color Purple that is on a whole other level that is like extraordinary how beautiful some of the work

in that film is despite some of its complexity and whether or not he should have made it I think is a reasonable question to ask. Okay, number one is, Amanda's number two. It's Jaws.

Jaws is the greatest blockbuster of all time. It's one of the most important movies ever made. It's a movie that saved Hollywood and destroyed Hollywood. You know, it is a movie that saved Hollywood and destroyed Hollywood. You know, it is a movie that is worthy of that kind of a delineation.

I love this movie. I love this movie till the day that I die. The one thing I am sure of about that 2018 list is that Jaws is at the top of it because it's a big fucking deal. Amanda, why is it number two? Well, these are the things where we make these lists and I put like Jaws at number two on any list. I just feel like such an idiot because like Jaws is one of the greatest movies ever made. And

as you said, it like changes Hollywood, but it also changes our concept of the blockbuster into what you were saying about directors. We really admire that a film that millions and millions of people want to see can also like be like well done and that there is like craft and skill and intention that goes into these things and you and you recognize it when you see it so i just there are also just so many things that people have been ripping off of jaws for almost 50 years now is it really almost 50 years i mean i don't know why i'm saying like jaws is older than me so that's fine it'll always be older than me that's one of the reassuring things about life and time. You're younger than Jaws. I'm younger than Jaws. I'll never, never, I'll never be old. But it's, you know, it's still exhilarating when you go back and kind of see

like, oh, that's where everybody got that shot. That's where everybody got that idea. It's total genius. So again, Jurassic Park is my sentimental favorite. And this is a Spielberg podcast. So we get to be sentimental. Yes. But yeah, Jaws, it's pretty good. This is the movie that I haven't seen in theaters. And I would really like the next opportunity.

I would like to go see in theaters because I saw this shamefully late in my life. Only a few, not a few years ago, like, you know, but like late. And it's one of those movies where, to Amanda's point, I had seen all the movies that had been inspired by it before I saw it. And that always works against someone really understanding the full wonder of something. So you guys are very nice and didn't criticize me for not putting Jaws on my list, but I felt like the need to be defensive about it anyway. But I do want to see it um in a theater one of the distractions one of my dreams for a world without covid running our world is to do a big picture watch along in person where we are renting out a theater people can buy a ticket and we can watch the movie together and talk about the movie and maybe that will be a

chance for you to see it in theaters although that would probably include me interrupting the movie constantly to be like did you see this shot over here and that would suck for you but nevertheless a little laser pointer is that going to be allowed perhaps wow that would be awesome and a microphone you're just sitting in the audience with a microphone imagine if i didn't have a microphone just screaming from the back row guys that's what this is look at that shot um okay let's wrap it up there great episode joanna thank you so so much for joining us today. Lovely to have you on the show. Amanda, you crushed it as always.

Also crushing it, our producer, Bobby Wagner. Thank you for your work on this episode, Bob. Next week on The Big Picture, like I alluded to earlier, we're talking about Adam McKay's new movie, Don't Look Up. And we will be building a hall of fame to one of our favorites. Our favorite?

Is he our favorite actor? His name's Leonardo DiCaprio. He's your favorite actor. And he means a lot to me. And I think that somehow this will still get contentious, which is just how you know we're doing our jobs.

Always looking forward to fighting with you, Amanda. We'll see you then next week.