This Had Oscar Buzz - 283 – Garden State

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

We’re finally diving into the time capsule that is 2004’s Garden State. The writing and directing debut of Zach Braff, the film stars Braff as a depressed actor who returns to his Jersey home to attend his mother’s funeral. Once there, he reunites with former friends and maybe meets the love of his life (played … Continue reading "283 – Garden State"

Oh-oh, wrong house. No, the right house. We want to talk to Marilyn Hack, Maryland Hacks and French. I'm from Canada water. Dick Pooh. This is your one opportunity to do something that no one has ever done before. And then if nothing else, you'll be remembered as the one who ever did that. It's one thing. I've done that one before.

Hello and welcome to the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast, the only podcast that's insecure, but love is the cure. Every week on This Had Oscar Buzz, we'll be talking about different movie that once upon a time had Lofty Academy Award aspirations, but for some reason or another, it all went wrong. The Oscar hopes died, and we're here to perform. The Autopsy. I am your host, Chris Fyle, and I'm here, as always, with my Infinite Abyss Explorer, Joe Reed. You can't cue me up to scream like that when we're recording something. I'd blow out all of our instruments. I'm also maybe realizing I should... We shouldn't maybe start off the episode with something gay people can be messy about, like, just a term, you know? Infinite Abyss Explorer? Listen. Sure. I've been called worse things. Um...

What is this a euphemism for? Gay euphemisms have gone too far. Chris, when you're sitting around like a doctor's waiting room or like at a gate at an airport or whatever and you're listening to your headphones, do you ever just find a stranger and walk up to them and hand them the headphones and say, you got to listen to this? It's my podcast co-host Joe Reed. It'll change your life. And make them listen to me blather on about some movie or another. First of all, headphones in public spaces, that's an excuse to not have to talk to somebody, to not have to deal with strangers. It very much is. So using it to the opposite effect, I do think, is psychotic behavior. Well, we're talking about maybe a psychotic character. I don't know.

That's true. Okay, but, like, I do think one thing that this movie thinks is interesting, especially in the aughts period, is the idea of headphones as romantic device. Like, taking off a headphone and sharing it with someone could be... There is an intimacy there. There's an intimacy there of, like, this thing that was so very much a part of my personal space here. Remember, for a while, I know they used to sell, um, your, like, uh, what's, what's, what do you call the iPhone, uh, headphones that are, that are corded? Are those earbuds or earpots? Like, I, the terminology.

I think they're just headphones. Okay, but you know what I mean? Whatever. Like, specifically, like, those headphones. You lose the romance in modern day, because if you share your, like, AirPods with someone, you probably don't believe that vaccines are real. You're disgusting. Also that.

But they used to sell these little splitters that you could plug into, like, your iPod, right? Your little, your regular iPod or your nano is what I had. Also, sharing those are gross, too. And it could split those so that, like, I could plug my headphones in and you could plug your headphones in and we'd both be listening to the same iPod. You know what I mean? And that felt like audio quality was always horrid. Like, you know. Oh, I believe it. I believe it. But also, like, that took away a little bit, I think. That sort of was a faux intimacy, right? That was this idea of, like, we're both listening to the same thing. It's like two straws in the same milkshake or whatever. But it wasn't really. It was a way to sort of cheat that. that effect, right? Rather than, like, oh, we're going to, like, share headphones. I don't know. I don't know.

I do feel like there's a little bit of an intimacy to the way that they use it in Garden State. Well, it's this idea of, I'm going, you know, music, especially on headphones, can be very personal and intimate. It is the sound of your own brain amplified within your own brain. And it's like, here's the sounds that are going through my head. I'm going to give them to your head, and you have this little gateway into my brain through that. Well, also, and I don't know about you. Maybe you're less of a self-conscious person than I am. But there's music that I'll listen to on headphones that I won't really listen to out loud in a room. Do you know what I mean? If that makes sense, if I'm going to put on a playlist that, like, if I'm at home and I'm going to put it, even if it's just me in the house, I do feel like there's different. music that I listen to what are you what are you that I feel like this is also a different thing

when you're gay because it's like and this is also a movie that's making me feel like I'm back in high school again because there's like maybe no more like high school movie in my life but I'm just like yeah you're listening to your gay music and you don't other oh you're thinking about like closeted stuff to like know that you're listening to gay music or uh something along those lines but no I understand what you're the I almost have a different connotation quality. Like, I mean, you mentioned sort of this movie puts you back in high school. I imagine you were in high school when you saw this movie when this movie came out. It came out right before my senior year. I want to talk about this before we start talking about the movie. I want to sort of orient us in space and time because I think that's very important. So you were what year of high school did you say? I was going into my senior year of high school. You're going into your senior year of high school. And I was at this point two years out of college, but like still incredible. aimless. I hadn't really gotten a real job after college. I had sort of, for a while, worked at this book publisher, and then I quit that job because I hated it, and was sort of like

kind of aimlessly bouncing around not real jobs at the college library. And so this sort of, this was like my 2004 sort of like Fox Searchlight era was very, very much defined by watching movies and not really knowing what to do with that. And this movie was a big deal in especially like

indie circles. Weirdly, like, in like Oscar circles, even though it wasn't really like a huge Oscar-Buzzy kind of a movie, but like if you followed the Oscars, you also followed Sundance, so you also followed, like, it was in that, very very much that same ecosystem.

By nature of it being a searchlight movie, though, and a movie that Searchlight put a lot of effort into, I think it did elevate it to that type of stature. Certainly on a level of, like, could this get a screenplay nomination? I don't think there was a ton of, like, expectation that this could be, like, a best picture contender. But there was definitely the idea of, you know,

this could be one of those little movies that could, kind of a thing. Like many things, like many indies in 2004, Sideway sort of came along and then hoovered up all those expectations. Exactly. Well, but you also don't get, like, a Writers Guild nomination if you're not in that ecosystem. Totally. Like, this movie's Writers Guild nomination absolutely is one of those things that it's like, well, here's the B tier of possibilities that when you remove the ones that are not Writers Guild eligible, like Vera Drake or the examples. Sure, yeah.

It rises up in the standings, right? But I also feel like, I'm glad that you led with headphones, though, because I do feel like this movie is a very, this movie exists in my memory. And also, I think, in the sort of cultural memory, the way that certain music does in the way that, like, you can sort of. Specifically the music of this movie. Not yes and no. Like, yes, in that, like, specifically the music of this movie is really, like, inextricable from this movie. But also just in terms of, like, the general ways. in which you sort of look back and are like, oh, I was really into this band back then.

I can't ever be the person who was into that band, but I can remember who that person was. Do you know what I mean? Sure. Whereas I feel like movies exist on a much more evolutionary. I think movies sort of evolve with you, most movies at least, sort of evolve with you, and you maybe see them again or you, you know, you'll watch them again. or you've, you know, there's there's ways in which they kind of move with you through time in the way that like a lot of music to me doesn't, especially the music of, I think, this part of the aughts where this sort of, I think maybe the entire decade of the odds and maybe that has just a function of like that was when I was in my 20s and I was sort of going through this transitional period. but, like, the period that began with, you know, the pop revolution that happens in, like, 97 through 2001, kind of, to me, not to bring 9-11 into it, but, like, after 9-11, pop music doesn't really feel the same way, if that makes sense, do you know what I mean?

Where's like... 100%. But it's just, you know, like, the bands and the pop acts that were... big back then. I think you sort of transition into this kind of post. Maxim Magazine. Maxim Magazine. Eminem sort of like wins the war against the pop acts. And you get sort of, I don't know, like early black eyed peas and stuff like that. It's just like it's, it changes. And Christina Aguilera just like goes fully off of the, you know, white people wedding music, etc. Timberlake goes solo, all this sort of stuff.

And then the rest of that decade is sort of like indie rock trying to have a moment the way that like Seattle alternative did in the early 90s and it never quite makes it. And you can tell that like a lot of people really want it to happen, including me at the time, because it did feel like, oh, I want to go back to sort of those days where there was an alternative music scene that was a. an actual, like, presence next to whatever sort of pop exists and that you can have both. And I think, and obviously, like, this is not even getting into, you know, the fact that, like, hip-hop was just sort of, like, continuing its trajectory, like, up, up, up, up, up, up without ever really, you know, stop. I think the major outlier, speaking of music from this movie, hi, we haven't even said the title of this movie. Oh, Garden State. We're talking about Garden State. We're talking about Garden State.

Speaking of music from this movie, the outlier. of what you're describing is Coldplay, and it's hard to remember Coldplay as, like, an indie band. They became macroculture very quickly. Because of their second album. Right, but they do show up in this movie. Well, even that first album, I feel like I remember Yellow being, like, a pretty decent, like, crossover here. Regardless, you're right. That Coldplay sort of exists outside that.

But I'm talking about this sort of, like... The Shins. The Shins. But also a little bit adjacent to this is like the strokes and that's sort of like New York indie rock thing. White stripes, but like Jack White would go on to be huge. Right, exactly. And like Garden State very much dabbles into the sort of like subpop kind of Death Cab. Modest Mouse isn't in this movie, but like you feel like it's like Death Cab Modest Mouse Postal Service.

Imogen Heap, this sort of, and obviously the shins, a lot of those who are sub-pop artists, but I don't think all. But anyway, that really felt like they were so close to becoming a movement. And I think they remain sort of a micro movement, but they never really, like, actually broke through that barrier into the mainstream, the way that, like, Smashing Pumpkin's Pearl Jam, Nirvana did in the early 90s. All of this stuff is fascinating to me. And that lack of a like breakthrough, I mean, not really, breakthrough isn't even the right word, but the, you know, it didn't become so dominant in terms of the comparison you're making.

And I think because of that not happening, it distills all of this music in a certain amount of time that I think. There's people that have nostalgia for something like the Postal service. But I think there's a lot of people happy to just, like, leave this type of music in its time. Right, right. Whereas, I think there's, there's, there's an interesting sort of a few handful of bands who do provoke this kind of nostalgia. This is sort of a lateral away from Garden State, too, but like, your, your dashboard fans, right? You're kind of, you know, your heavy emo fans, which isn't quite what we're talking about here either. But I think this was

a decade in which... You're panic at the discos, your fallout boys, the indie rock bands that do sort of break through, or the indie style bands that do break through. I don't want to get into questions of like, what was true indie? We're definitely pissing off a sect of our listenership that is smarter about this than we are.

I will fully grant that, like, there are always people smarter about music than I am. But, like, Coldplay kind of seems to exist on its own when it breaks through. The killers seem to exist on their own. own. They don't seem, they don't exist as part of a collective in the way that like the alternative music scene did in the early 90s. Whereas like I, I, when I think of the killers, I don't really think of like two or three other bands in cahoots with the

killers. When I think of Coldplay, I don't think of like a cadre of Coldplay-esque bands. I just sort of think of cold play. White stripes sort of the same way. Whereas anybody on this Garden State soundtrack, I think of kind of in conjunction with the other ones, right? Yeah. Postal Service, death cab, shins, all this sort of thing, all feel like... Fru-Foo. Right. Fru-Fru does not exist outside of Garden State. That's the thing.

But they, or like the O.C. was very much contributing. O.C. culture was very much reflected in Garden State soundtrack culture. But none of that broke through into the mainstream in any real way. It feels very sort of subculturally. It still feels very subculturally, I think. I don't know. I just find that very interesting. So I'm sure, if you are more knowledgeable, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Now I feel like, now I feel like Tinsley Mortimer when Luann made fun of her for slurring a word. I was like, yes, Luanne, I've been drinking. I weirdly have watched that scene like three times this week for no good reason. I think it's a self-evident good reason why to watch that scene. No, the reason why is a friend of mine went to a little. Luan Cabaret. I talked about this recently. Kevin O'Keefe went to Luan Cabaret, and I just needed to find the GIF of Bethany just yelling, it's cabaret. I love how there's just whole seasons of Real Housewives that I have not seen, but I've seen because I'm gay. You're online. You exist in the world. Have we table set enough? I feel like I just wanted to lay sort of the groundwork of where, where are you? were you with the music... Had the soundtrack loved the movie in high school.

That's the thing. This is... Okay. Re-watching this movie is about, you know, when people talk about, like, past selves, their younger selves, bestowing grace upon themselves at different points of their life. Learning to forgive yourself? Is that what we're doing? It's not your fault. Rewatching Garden State is an effort in learning to forgive myself because I was obsessed with this movie.

Listen to the soundtrack nonstop. Absolutely adored it. And now I think it's awful and I really can't even like the music. So here's, before we get into the specifics of it, I want to sort of my mental state and my mission statement going to this movie. Because I, I too really liked this movie in 2004. I think I would probably stop short of saying I was obsessed with it. But like, I was absolutely, I was absolutely all about this movie. I was, uh, Sean Doherty, our friend Sean Doherty.

tweeted recently, I think like this week, something about like, I would just like watch the Garden State trailer every day. Okay, this is a movie we're also talking about where like half of the anticipation vibe and I would honestly say love for it is they cut a great trailer for this movie. A great teaser and a great trailer. How many have both? It's very, it's the rare movie that has a great teaser and a great trailer, although I will say as we'll talk about in the movie,

the part of the full-length trailer that I didn't remember is they do include the scene where Natalie Portman says the R-word multiple times. And I did not remember that part of it in the trailer. She's just like slamming our slurs. In the movie, she says it like five times. It's wild to me what was acceptable and what was not.

And like, it's not the only movie. And this is the introduction of this character and we're supposed to be immediately charmed by this person There's a lot, there are a lot of movies if you go back, if you go back to the 90s, there's a lot of movies that use the R word that you don't expect. I was watching Reality Bites recently and I was like, oh, God, right. It was a very, it was a very 90s comfortable thing. Whereas, like, if I'm watching a movie now and I hear an F slur casually, not like as a word of violence towards someone, but when I'm watching a movie from like the aughts or even the 90s, where they use the F-slur.

Listeners, I don't care if this makes you mad. It's somewhat comforting. Okay. How do you feel this was, this got brought up on Twitter this past week. When I hit the F slur, it's like, I feel like I'm hanging out with my friends.

How do you feel about the scene and bring it on where Eliza Dushke's character goes, you speak fag? It makes me feel so comfortable. Does it make you feel comfortable? It's such an odd thing for me. Eliza Dushku could say that word to and around. me.

Eliza Dishku could be saying that word as she's punching me to death and I would be fine. The thing is... We shouldn't be laughing about violence, you know? The thing is, I just... That particular phrasing of it is so funny and odd to me. Because, like, that's not a phrase that, like, that's not a way of using that word. Like, do you speak fagg? It's like, that's not really a thing anybody's ever really said.

So I don't quite know, like, what's going on there, but, you know, whatever. Yeah, because if someone in the real world said that, it would be like, do you, because that's not how we put that. Right, right, right. It's also the fact that... Meanwhile, the heavy use of the R-sler in this movie and any movie is just, like, immediate, like, bracing. It yanks you right out of the movie at this point. And I would also argue it makes it seem as dated as it is, too.

But anyway, the trailer and the teaser for this movie, both in its use of music, there are multiple songs. It's the fru-fru song in the teaser that plays throughout. But then in the trailer, they do the Postal Services version of Such Great Heights. Before it was co-opted by Gray's Anatomy, I should say. This was, like, for a good two years, Garden State owned that song. Oh, yes, Graze Anatomy, yes-anded the type of musical vibe. Yes, and. Yes, anding is a very good way of singing.

Because they yes-anded it with singer-songwriter. It was like, true-frew, yes-and, Anna Nalik. Yes, very good. Well, and they kind of, yes, and postal service into Snow Patrol. Like, we'll see your Postal Service. We will raise you a Snow Patrol. But there's also that Travis song that, like, is the back half of the trailer for Garden State, too. So anyway, tremendous, tremendous.

Were you a Travis fan? I was a Travis fan. I just knew this song from this, from that trailer. That's really the only Travis song that I knew. I think. Maybe I knew another Travis song. I, this was the part, this was a point in my life where I stopped. being an album person in very rare occasions. It was like I would like buy I bought Samstown,

the Killers album. I bought the well dashboard unplugged doesn't really count because it's like an unplugged but like there I was I was buying very very fewer and fewer and fewer albums that weren't like Tory albums. And even at some point I just sort of like stopped buying Tory albums. But this was the time when it was sort of happening. But I honor your, your Travis thing. Love to Travis. Yeah, the trailers for this movie really had you super, super hyped.

This was maybe, I feel like the peak era of, we talk about like Apple movie trailers, right? And this, like, 02 to 04 was the moment for that, I feel like. Also, it's not coincidentally that like 02 to 04 was my peak post-copy. Wilderness, like, didn't know what I was doing, did not know where I was going, just before I sort of, like, latched on to the scene at Television Without Pity and sort of, like, began putting my little footsteps down the road towards whatever bizarre version of a career I have right now. But, yeah, there was a lot of aimlessness, and that aimlessness was filled with Apple movie trailers and Oscar website. It's, and, um, seeing Fox Searchlight movies at the local indie theater, which was, honestly, in retrospect, I was living the dream and I didn't really know it. Because now you're like, take me back. Take me back.

For real. For real. I was in my 20s. Come on. Online movie culture at the time, Garden State felt like such a big deal. Like, it felt like something that was coming. that we could all get into I mean like

Well I'm like the dispatches from Sundance We're like up in the mountains There were people who were yelling about this movie That like oh it's coming Get ready Garden State is coming I ran out of time to figure out what the How it stood relatively at the time

In terms of the purchase of this movie Because it was a split between Searchlight and Miramax who release it outside of the U.S. for $5 million. $5 million outside, out of Sundance today means nothing. Doesn't mean anything. Probably means that whatever studio picked it up is not going to give it a major push. But $5 million then meant a lot.

Well, I was reading a few of the dispatches from Sundance when I was doing my research, and it wasn't like, it obviously wasn't record-breaking, but like the deal was definitely notable in that, like, it was mentioned in all of the write-up. particularly the angle of Miramax and Fox Searchlight sort of co-habitating on this, which felt like normally the idea was that like Miramax and Harvey Weinstein would like fight to the death to, you know, have the whole pie, right, for these kinds of things. So like Miramax being cooperative was an interesting angle. But it was, we'll get into the Sundance thing of it more because I want to sort of like talk more. holistically about that Sundance on the other side of the plot description. Along with Searchlights 2004, of which we get discussed previously.

And I want to talk about how this movie came together, because there's a couple kind of interesting notes in that that I was able to figure out. But let's maybe get some of the business. And then I have a feeling we might be fighting about this movie. I don't know. We will see. We will see. But before we get too into Garden State, I do want to jump in from our music.

episode last week, we heard Stewart's origin story, and we want to jump back in, make sure that that gets out there for Stewart. Stewart, who made us watch music. Stewart, who... Chaos agent. Inflicted music upon us. And this week, it is Natalie Portman inflicting lowercase music. Right, right.

Anyway, Stewart says... The Shins should be very offended by this. way, from what you just compared them to. I'm just going to say, we're going to get a angry voice mail from the shins, and we're going to deserve it. Fine, fine. The shins, I apologize. Mr. Shins.

I do believe that everyone in the shins is male. Anyway, Stewart's wanted to share his origin story with the episode. We didn't get it in time for music, but here we go. Stewart says, I watched the Oscars growing up, but the one that really resonated with me was the 2008 Oscars when I was a freshman in high school. My dad moved out that fall and in an effort to rediscover herself. My mom threw an Oscar party at the house, honestly, work, truly. I rediscover myself every year, so she knows what she's doing.

Oh, that was an editorial comment by you. Okay. Yes. Oh, okay, yes. Yes. Don't you rediscover yourself every year through the Oscar ceremony? Oh, I mean, I absolutely encourage people to rediscover themselves through the Oscar. So, Stuart, we support your mom's effort here.

It's a very mermaids kind of a thing, I feel like. It feels like a very Mrs. Flax kind of a deal. You also text me today about mermaids, so... Did I? Did you re-watch? I texted you about mermaids? Oh, you texted me about bridesmaids. Never mind.

Yes. It's been a long several. The maids are mating. Continuing Stewart's origin story. She forced everyone to dress up, laid out a literal red carpet in front of the house, and made a menu inspired by the Best Picture nominees. menu including alphabet soup for the reader

honestly funny buttermilk biscuits for milk button mushrooms for the curious case of Benjamin Button, chicken curry for Slumdog Millionaire and Frosted checkerboard cake for Frost Nixon Benjamin Button and Slumdog were two of the first films I recall feeling less adult

and like something I could actually watch and with up getting a Best Picture nomination the following year it was easy to start embracing more films out of my comfort zone. Lately, I really feel like I've gone off the rails in my effort to watch more films. I've convinced a friend to watch every Best Picture nominee, and we are currently up to the 1960s and also made a trip to the Library of Congress last summer to see 1928s a ship comes in

because it had a best actress nomination, and the only complete copy is in their archives. Stuart, you are a real one. Yes. Stuart, you're doing better than your two favorite Oscar. Yeah, quite a bit. Quite a bit. I have never gone that far, so yes. Full respect.

As far as music is concerned, it's a chaotic choice. Stuart, you are putting it mildly. But like Sia, I was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder as an adult, and I respect her, albeit extremely ill-advised attempt with this film. Stuart, thank you very much for giving us one of our most chaotic episodes. We salute you and your effort to see every... Best Picture nominee. Stewart, what you've done with this is you've sent me down a mental place where I am now

taking a journey, a parallel journey while we talk about Garden State, to also think of a way that I could pun when the president does it, it's not illegal into a themed foodstuffs for a Frost Nixon themed snack. I'll come up with something. When the president does it, it's not... Linguini. No, it's not quite. I'll fix it. I'll get it. I'll get it. I'll get it. I'll get it. I'll get it. The president does it. It's not illegal. Illegal. What a good line. Okay. But Joe, before we get into some of the table setting for the movie, why don't you tell our listeners about our Patreon? Yeah, we have a Patreon, you guys. If you haven't heard about it, then you're clearly fast-forwarding through the first 45 minutes of these podcasts. You really shouldn't because we've got some gems early on.

It's called This Had Oscar Bus Turbulent Brilliance. It is only $5 a month. You know, we keep saying for the cost of a cheesy gordita crunch, have you seen what cheesy gordita crunches cost these days? Okay. I feel like there's a lot of discussion on the price of Taco Bell in particular. In particular, Taco Bell is one of the bad ones. Are you talking about on like a DoorDash or in?

I am. Yes, because things are more expensive. on a door dash they price they price hike thing i think if you do go i don't have a taco bell that i can easily get to without door dashing so so all of your door dash taco bell is cold got it um honestly yes the door dash process for whatever i sound so bougie when i talk about this but like the door dashing for my taco bell is could really use some work because it does arrive cold every single time but it just keep throwing in the microwave my point is if you do go to a taco bell i think for five dollars you can get the cheesy gordita crunch and a Baja blast.

So, well, all this to say. Guarys, please get back at us with photos of your cheesy gordita crunch and Baja Blast and receipt and let us know how much it costs in an in-person Taco Bell or a possible Taco Bell Kentucky Fried Chicken combo. I haven't, Pizza Hut really has receded from the Can Taco Hut trilogy. It really does feel like you're just getting Taco Bell KFCs at this point, but regardless. Either way, what we're saying is you can buy your favorite podcast hosts, a cheesy gordita crunch, and then for the one who doesn't like delicious sodas, combined. I've had people, you've got people now in my mentions telling me to try the Baja Blast.

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And we just highly, highly, highly encourage you to sign up. It's a real good time. So to sign up, you can go to patreon.com slash this had Oscar buzz and click that little button and add This Had Oscar Buzz, turbulent brilliance to your Patreon portfolio and it'll change your life. Listen, that's all I can say is listen to this podcast. It'll change your life. Joe, you also mentioned that episodes come out on the first and the 15th of every month

over on the Patreon. We should prepare the listeners now that in May, that will not be the case because we have the May miniseries coming. And while there will be the same number of. episodes that you normally get on Patreon in a month. Yeah, they'll be released on weird days just for May. We are not ready to

reveal on this episode what the May miniseries will be, but coming soon, though. We are following up last year's extravaganza. Extravaganza on a hundred years, 100 snubs with something else that is format

breaking-ish, but also breaking the schedule and breaking our brains. I was going to say, don't worry, if you were worried that we were going to have a May miniseries that doesn't stress us out to the point of exhaustion, fear not. Fear not. It's happening again. All right.

That is coming. Yes. Back to Garden State. Back to Garden State, Chris. What are the particulars on Garden State? Listen, written, directed, and starring Zach Braff will get into it. Zatch Brath. Zatch Brath.

also Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, hello, Ian Holm, Gene Smart, The Great One and Only Jackie Hoffman. Is this our first Jackie Hoffman? It is our, I believe it's our first Jackie Hoffman. We should do Kissing Jessica Stein. We could probably get away with doing Kissing Jessica Stein. I would live for a day that we could have a six-timers club for Jackie Hoffman. She actually hasn't been in that many movies, but she has two perfect scenes in Garden State. for that. This cast is secretly packed. This cast is secretly just stacked with people, actually, so.

Method Man and Doubt for all of the basic internet gays. George C. Wolf. Wow. Basic. Shots fired. Oh, tremendous. Jim Parsons. Dennis O'Hare, as the little man in the boat, had to say that at least once this episode. And Ron Liebman. George C. Wolf, I should say, has appeared as an actor. His IMDB credits him as an actor in four movies, and this is one. It's just really interesting. What are the other movies? The Devil Wears Prada and then two other movies I can't remember. But it's the only ones I really remember him in are Devil Wars Prada, and now I'll remember this.

I had forgotten that he was in this. Garden State. Rod Liebman also has like one perfect scene in this movie. I love Rob Leibon. This is a lot of Angels and America connections because you have George C. of original director, Ron Lieman, original Roy Cohn. Dennis O'Hare had to have been in a production of Angels in America at some point. He's too perfect not to.

He's too perfect not to. Yeah. All right. The motion picture premiered at U.S. dramatic competition at the Sundance Film Festival and then was released limited July 28, 2004. Getting those back-to-school college crowds. Mm-hmm. Very good.

Yes. Joe, are you prepared to give a 60-second plot description of Garden State? I am, in fact. All right, then let's just get into it. Your 60-second plot description for Garden State starts now. All right, this is important to know that one day in 2004, I was recently out of college and didn't have a real job, and I saw a movie called Garden State. In that movie, Zach Braff plays Andrew Largeman, a meagerly successful actor who has just returned to his home in New Jersey for his mother's funeral, interrupting his very busy schedule of taking every prescription mood stabilizer known to man. At the grave site, he runs into a couple of old high school buddies, including Mark,

who invite him to a party thrown by another friend who's gotten rich for inventing silent Velcro. The party is full of drugs and sexy ladies, but Large can't feel emotions because of medication and 20-something-on-wee. And once again, I just want to stress that I was just out of college and directionless in my life when I saw this movie. In the waiting room for a doctor's appointment about his headaches, Large meets Natalie Portman playing a habitual liar named Sam with well-managed epilepsy and a very 2004 taste in music. The two hit it off and she invites him into her home, a human-sized hamster habitat where she lives with her mother and her adopted brother. Large and Sam steadily fall for each other while we get peaks into the lives of quiet desperation. His friends are living in, and Large decides to stop taking all his medications because Ron Liebman is the nicest doctor in the history of the world.

With the help Sam, Mark, and Dennis O'Hare living in his boat next to a quarry, they all help Large move towards living a more authentic, unexpected life, and so he screams into the void, while I at 20-something with no real job or prospects stare at the screen like the sickos mean going, yes, yes. Large is able to forgive himself for causing his mother's paralysis and forgives his father for blaming that on him, and then he's on a plane back to his awful life in Los Angeles before he realizes that, a terrible idea and returns to the airport and kisses Natalie Portman and Imogen Heap is on the soundtrack

and she's very happy in the end. About 20 seconds over, I have to say getting off of that plane is a horrible idea. Well, that relationship is absolutely not going to last, but like you have to like, you have to let that play out,

I feel like. I do also think she is insufferable, but also like, he could just be a normal person. He could be fine. I think he could just be a normal person. But not if he gets off that plane.

No, I think he's going to have to, I think he's going to have to get out of that relationship by its own momentum. I think if he goes to Los Angeles, he's just going to, like, they're going to struggle through long distance and whatever, and it's just going to be a big, huge pain in the ass, and it's going to stunt his recovery from making his way back from being medicated. Whereas this way, he'll just know that, like, after two weeks, it's just going to be like, yeah, this is not sustainable. and it'll end on its own momentum. No, absolutely cannot last that relationship. Yeah, I think mostly, I think a lot of people sort of remember back to Garden State and think, like, oh, my God, his character's the worst. And it's like, no, his character's actually, like, fine.

Like, objectively, like, as a person is, like, fine. I think you can take issue with... I think that's projection because we pin everything that's annoying about this movie on Zach Braff, so it's easier to pin it on that. character, but I do think the character is largely fine. I think it's projection from Zach Brough. I think you can find this movie irritating in that this is

a successful actor who comes from you know, decently moneyed New Jersey. It's not like he's comes from like a filthy rich family, but like his father's like one of like the preeminent lawyers in New Jersey. You know what I mean? Like he's doing fine. So he's this, this is

sort of this sort of privileged white ennui, you know, and a little sort of navel gaze, not a little, more than a little navel gazee. But also, I am fairly indulgent of that kind of a thing. I will say, revisiting this movie, I've been afraid to revisit this movie, almost as much as I'm afraid to revisit American Beauty. Those are the two movies that I've been like the most afraid to go back and revisit. And revisiting this movie, my feeling was, was, I don't, I think it's too easy for me to jump back into this movie and pull a 180 and be like, oh, God, everything about this is horrible. All of my old opinions on this were wrong and dumb because I was in my 20s. And now I hate this movie. So I really, really, really wanted

to, um, find a more sort of balanced way of looking at this movie. That was my mindset I was entering this movie. And then the first hour of this movie, I'm like, oh, God. I'm like, oh, God. I I'm not going to be able to do that. This is awful. This is really bad. The filmmaking is really pretentious. The shot, the sort of like, those very sort of like, look at me shots, the thing with the wallpaper and the shirt, the thing where they cut.

I take less issue with that. I mean, I do think that he has some interesting visual ideas in this movie that really will get into it. Allow me to sort of take this thought to its natural conclusion because I don't think, I think I end up a little more. Anyway, when they cut to the shot. of him in his all-white bedroom lying perfectly, like, flat on his back as his father's calling him. I'm like, this is a little obvious, right? But then it's also like the shot of the

medicine cabinet that is like chock-a-block full with pills, and then he shuts it, and his face is bisected by the mirror. It's like, all right, we get it. There's a lot of we get-it shots in this movie. But then, and then you meet Natalie Portman, and it's like, it's just too much that said, I think the back half of this movie calms things down enough. And I once again, I'm watching, I find myself yesterday watching this movie. And I'm like, oh, I'm like, invested, decently invested in these characters by the end of the movie. I'm like, this movie's clearly doing something right that even after that horrid beginning, I find myself a little bit, if not like, captivated, but like, you know, wrapped up in what's going on here.

The storytelling basics of this movie, yeah. And I think the shot making and sort of the actual look of the film, when it stops being so showboaty, ends up being pretty good. I think it's, I think I imagine also when you're at a Sundance, this was the Sunday. where Primer won the grand jury prize. Yikes Shane Caruth. Yikes Shane Caruth, but I think Primer's a very good movie. But also Primer could

not be farther away from Garden State in terms of like look and feel. Right. I mean like this is also the like in terms of independent filmmaking the digital filmmaking boom is starting to die out because people are tired of looking at movies that

look like shit. And you know, this movie shows up at Sundance that maybe has visual it has too many big shots and big obvious shots in this movie to really sustain itself but in that microcosm of like Sundance where you might be seeing some cheaper looking movies it has it has a impact this movie was reportedly made for two and a half million dollars Zach Braff says today that it was made for two and a half million dollars you can believe that or you cannot believe that um and I'll talk about the story of how this movie sort of came into being in a second. But for $2.5 million, this movie looks very good.

You know what I mean? And I can see where if I'm at Sundance and I'm looking at this and it's a first time director who at this point, Scrubs was like a very sort of, it was not the most popular, nor was it the least popular show. It was a very sort of like middle of the pack. Always on the verge of being canceled, basically. But critics really liked it. Critics, especially in the beginning, really liked Scrobs.

Scrubs because of the way it's sort of balanced goofy comedy with this kind of like, it would sort of dip into more serious and more sort of like melancholy every once in a while. And it, it balanced that really well. I think it was, I think this was a very early Bill Lawrence show, Bill Lawrence who ended up doing among other shows, Ted Lassow, which I think Ted Lassow was a less successful version of scrubs in terms of like it in the way that it deals with. the comedy drama thing, regardless. So I could see where people at Sundance are looking at this movie and being like, for two and a half million dollars, it looks really good. There's some really, like, it's not like it looks, you know, deeply expensive, but it does not look like it was made on the cheap, I will say. So I can understand why there was a decent deal of Ballyhoo, beyond the fact that, you know, festival fever, yada, yada, yada, and...

The thing that I am most struck by, looking back at this, is I was all about Natalie Portman in this movie. I was so, so, so enthused. Her being in this movie definitely had an impact in terms of the appeal that this movie. I mean, this movie definitely has such an audience, and they did a great job of, like, getting that audience excited for the movie. But I think a huge part of that is just her presence at this point in time. And, like, this is also the year of her first Oscar nomination. No surprise that they gave it to that movie over this movie, with that also being a much better performance. I want to dig into the Natalie filmography in a second.

But I think before we move past, let's just get the sort of the origin story of this movie out of the way. Because I think it's fairly interesting. It ties into the Portman thing a little bit. And this is based on stuff that, like, Zach Braff has said at interviews and whatnot. So, um... Around sort of the second or third season of Scrubs, he's got this script and he's sort of shopping it around to agents and studios and essentially anybody with money. Anybody who's sort of dabbling in the I want to be a film financier sort of tier, which I imagine is like a series of nightmare meetings with nightmare people. And so, and he can't really, he's having trouble making it happen.

meantime, he's in a production of 12th night at Shakespeare in the Park in New York City that I looked up the cast of, and the cast is kind of insane. It's Zach Braff, Julia Stiles, Jimmy Smiths, Christopher Lloyd, Kristen Johnston, Oliver Platt,

Michael Stulbarg, an incredibly young Sterling K. Brown who was going by Sterling Brown at this point. Natalie Gold, who played Jeremy Strong's ex-wife in succession. all these sort of people. So he's at this Shakespeare in the park.

He knew that Portman had done Shakespeare in the park like the year prior or something like that. So he like uses that little connection as a like excuse to like sort of reach out to her and be like, hey, I'm doing Shakespeare in the park. This is, you know, you were here last year. By the way, I have this screenplay and he shows her the screenplay and she really likes it and she gets on board. So she sort of, I guess, starts helping trying to get this movie made. he ends up meeting this sort of real estate millionaire named Gary Gilbert, who had never made a movie before. Gary Gilbert, if that name sounds familiar to you, when we did our episode on Marguerette, Gary Gilbert was the producer-financier who was essentially responsible for holding up Marguerette for all those years

because he wouldn't approve of a cut that Montergan provided. So this guy is like a movie villain. But at this point, he hadn't really done anything. And he puts up, I think Braff said he was asking for $6 million to make the movie. And he's like, I'll give you two and a half. Can you make it for two and a half? And so he decides to make it for two and a half. And so the story goes and it sells it Sundance for five.

So like, you know, Insta success. Anyway, so Natalie was on board quite early. and sort of instrumental in making this movie happen. But you mentioned sort of where she is at this point in her career. And that, to me, is very interesting because she's sort of one of these, like, kind of celebrated child stars who made it. She's the rare child star who had no presence on television. She sort of was a child star who began in the movies where she's television. And the theater, too.

Well, yes, but I mean specifically, usually when you see child stars these days, there's at least some sort of, like, they were on a Disney show, they were on a, you know, a Nickelodeon show. I mean, she had sort of, I guess she had like seemingly, oh no, like, yeah, even like Sesame Street. She does it when she's an established star. Anyway, so she's how old when she makes the professional, like 10? Like how, like, I think she's a little older than 10. She might have been like 12, yeah. Natalie Portman was born in, I feel like, why do I feel like she's like my age? Because she is.

She's a year younger than me. She's, so she was born in 81, and the professional was 94. So yeah, she's probably like 12 when she makes the professional. Not a comfortable movie to watch sort of knowing, you know, I think the fact that it's like, it's directed by Luke Bison. and it's not a movie that like it's not a movie that actively textually sexualizes her and yet also there is a

I think not accidental read of the movie where you could watch the movie and be like well they're in love with each other and and you know what I mean and it's and it makes it sort of an uncomfy movie for that reason but it's also undeniably a pretty thrilling movie and she is

undeniably very good in it, especially for her age. And then she's in Heat. We did Heat semi-recently. She's in 96. She's in three movies, which sort of, 96, I think is, I think it's a series of breakthroughs, right? Because the professional is like a breakthrough on one level. Heat is sort of a breakthrough on another level.

But, like, 96, she's in, everyone says I love you. She's in Mars attacks. which are both of the, both of them, these huge star studded, she's working with all of the people, you know what I mean? All of these are big ensemble movies. And then in Beautiful Girls, which is actually textually a much more uncomfy movie than the professional, but in beautiful girls, she's tremendously self-possessed and really, really good in that role, which is so problematic where, like, Timothy Hutton, like, legitimately is like, you know, I'll come back for you when you're eight. And it's played, I will say, I've rewatched Beautiful Girls recently. There was another movie I was afraid to rewatch for a while. Beautiful Girls holds up better than I thought it would.

That plot line is creepy, but it's also called out as creepy. But in this sort of like, ah, what are you going to do? You know, it's human nature. It's bad. Which is even more insidious. Which is more insidious, but it's also like, Beautiful Girls is a very interesting movie. I don't think we can probably sell it as the head Oscar buzz, but one of these days I'll sort of pontificate on Beautiful Girls.

But anyway, she, in a vacuum, that performance is incredible. You watch that performance, you're like, this is an incredibly self-possessed movie star in this movie. She shines in that movie. And that is a big part of that sort of year, I think, is a big part of why she ends up getting the role in Star Wars. She's not in anything really in between her 96 movies and Star Wars. At some point, she went to college.

She went to Harvard. And give me a second to see her. I mean, I thought she went to Harvard while she was still making movies, though. She attended Harvard from 1999 to 2003. So she's while she's making Star Wars. Oh, by the way, she's just going to Harvard. That's wild. So, 1999 is when the Phantom Menace comes out,

and her level of fame goes from, you know, here to the fucking stratosphere. She's, you know, one of the most famous actresses in the world from that point on forward. We've done a bunch of Natalie movies. This is our ninth Natalie movie. Can you name all nine? On top of your head.

Okay. So this, anywhere but here. Yeah. Anywhere but here. Good movie. um yeah what are the more recent ones that we've done we have not done fox lux we haven't that could be our 10th that could be our 10th i mean natalie goyous ghosts obviously obviously not a bad not a bad movie a good movie goyest ghosts what do you oh you're just bringing quote yeah yeah yeah yeah you're acting like this is a bad movie and this is a good movie

It's a good movie. Other Bolin girl. Yep. My Blueberry Knights. Yep. One I mentioned that she had done previous to Beautiful Girls. Oh. Heat, obviously.

Just said that we had just done that movie. What am I at now? I think you're missing three. One notoriously bad one that we saw together. I think. Lucy in the sky. Lucy and the sky. guy. Another notoriously bad one that we didn't see together, but I think played at a festival we

were at. Interesting. Like wildly, wildly bad. Oh, the Savi Adelon, uh, John F. Donovan. I saw that at that festival. Yeah. And then one where, um, Mommy has sex with Uncle Charlie or whatever. Brothers. Brothers. Yes. What's his name of that? Mommy and Uncle Charlie have sex all the time. A sex all of a time. Yeah, all right. Anyway, so Natalie's career during the Star Wars movies sort of levels up while she is sort of making these giant blockbusters, right? Where she goes from anywhere but here, where the heart is, then to Cold Mountain and closer, and Garden State comes the same year as closer. So it's odd that she's playing this sort of like woman child in Garden State right after.

After, she has played this really kind of like, in Cold Mountain, she's this sort of widow who is soldiering on. Widow with a shotgun, she's sort of soldiering on. She has this very sort of like melancholy one night sort of romance with. We need to make this franchise with Natalie Portman. Widow with a shotgun, too. Right. Still widowing. Widow with a shotgun three.

Bang, bang. So by the time she emerges from Star Wars, she's an Oscar nominee, she's an adult. She entered the Star Wars trilogy as a child, and she has emerged as an adult. And I think the question after that is, so now what? What kind of a grown-up actress is Natalie Portman going to be? And she kind of dabbled for a while, right? She does V for Vendetta. She shaves her head.

It's, you know, this big sort of thing. She tries out autours. She does Goya's Ghosts with Mielish Foreman. She does My Blueberry Nights with Wonkar-Wi. She does very briefly in the Darjeeling Limited with Wes Anderson. You know, she books a stay at Mr. Magoriam's Wonder Emporium at one point. She's the other Berlin girl we talked about. So it's like there's a little sort of.

there's a desert period for Natalie where she's trying a bunch of different things. And that it's really not till Black Swan that she, and sort of this like 2010, once the 2010s happen, I think something sort of clicks into place where not only Black Swan is the role she's been waiting for, she wins the Oscar, but she also starts producing around this time too.

And I think that for like a lot of actresses, for her, for Reese Witherspoon, I think that sort of lock. in a more distinct career path because she's obviously, she's taking more of the reins of her own career, but also sort of, you know, other movies. And that's when she can sign on for another franchise like Thor and not feel like she's unmoored in her career, because she's also, you know, sort of taking a little bit of control over the producing, which is not an unrocky road, because one of those movies she produces is Jane got a gun. which has somewhat of a disastrous production history that does not end up with anything to show for it by the end. No, not at all. Have you seen Jane Got a Gun? Did you ever watch that movie?

I've never seen the movie, no. It's very unmemorable as far as I remember. Black Swan is also this kind of moment where I think whatever it is about her as an actress fully kind of, realizes what it needs to be, you know, aside from the production side of it, where she's, you know, getting into producing, et cetera, it's that the Natalie Portman thing now, because it took a while for her to kind of settle into what is the Natalie Portman thing, is usually a tour movies where she gets to make a big swing and female-centric stories, et cetera. Whereas, like, now you watch something like Garden State is like, well, this isn't the Natalie

Portman I want. Where's the voice? Where's the, where's the big swing? Where is where is, uh, fascinating psychosis rather than an annoying one that this movie has? Yeah. But I also think Zach Braff is somewhat really astute and genius in wanting to get her in this movie because I think it there is, there's probably no woman, especially at this time, that millennial heterosexual men were more in love with than Natalie Portman. Imprinted upon.

My brother was one of those people and I was like, you haven't even seen a single Natalie Portman movie. How can you love her so much? But it was true. And I think this is kind of the first role that she had that really played into that.

Amadala does not count. Yeah. Where it's like, the key audience for this movie was an audience that was already in love with Natalie Portman. So bringing that into the movie makes this romance work so much more, makes this character seem more charming when we're introduced to her than she actually is.

It's very funny sort of becoming a Natalie Portman fan as I am. Like, she's one of my actresses, I feel like. Becoming a Natalie Portman fan as a sort of actress sexual first rather than you know, and anything else. It's just like, it's just because you do, you're right in that like the millennial men sort of straight millennial men imprinted upon her in a very weird way, where I'm like, she's so self-possessed and beautiful girls. She's so. It was such an interesting thing too because it's like she didn't really make movies before Garden State at least. And then I think even after Garden State, she didn't really make movies for that audience,

but they still obsessed over her. I think, and then she makes a movie like closer where I literally feel like if you set a straight male down in front of closer and put it on TV, all they would see is a white screen. They just wouldn't, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, uh, you know. It's the Westworld thing where she's like, I don't see anything. Like I don't, you know, just like they, they can't process it. Meanwhile, I'm like, you know, riveted to her performance and closer. We're just just like, she's, it's the, um, I don't know, she just dismantles both of those men, I think so perfectly. A movie, a screenplay that I hate that is wholeheartedly elevated by all of those performers and that director, and she's the best performance in it, probably. Well, no, I actually think the best performance in that movie is Jude Law. Doing the Jude Law thing of, he's just so good at playing worthless men who are only gaining self-awareness of their worthlessness. One of these days, I will write about this. sort of the canon of performances of

sort of callow, feckless boobs, awful men who are so good at those performances that people think the performance is bad because they don't like that person so much. Yeah. Where it's Jude Law in that movie, I always talk about Orlando Bloom and Troy as being so good at playing Paris

for being exactly that type of character that everybody's like, boo, boo! I would absolutely read your thoughts on that while probably being like, actually, my dude, Orlando Bloom is just bad in that movie. No, go back and watch. He's very, very good. Anyway, Natalie, Natalie, Natalie. Oh, so, like, so Natalie now in sort of like the last five years, I think, especially, I think,

well, Fox Lux is its own thing, and we will definitely, definitely talk about Oxlux as we absolutely had to. But I think May December is a really interesting sort of arrival point now for Natalie, where she's, not only is she producer on that movie, but like she is integral to making that movie happen. She pulls together the talent. She gives, you know, she gives herself this role, but she also like makes space for Julianne more and for Charles Melton especially to shine. And she gives one of her top three performances of all time. I think. in May December. I could get on board with somebody saying it's her best performance ever because, like,

absolutely. She's great at this, like, freak show comedy, things that you're not sure if you're supposed to laugh at or not, but because she's a genius, it is very funny. May December.

Yeah. And it goes wrong in Lucy in the Sky. But, like, I think that's what she's going for in Lucy in the Sky also. Lucy in the sky is not her fault It's not her fault No

No I'll blame that on Noah Holly But can I tell you a performance That is actually not like any of those And yet is maybe quietly One of her most impressive Is Annihilation She holds the center of that movie So well

While not being showy at all But like she really like It's incredible how steady And like And grounded she is in that movie She is she really helps that movie succeed to the degree that it does. Depression

as just like a large umbrella theme or something to be explored, clearly has a lot of interest to her as a performer because you have things like annihilation. And I think that that probably added to the appeal of

Garden State to her because I don't know. I don't, I wouldn't look at this character and be like, well, Natalie Portman, obviously. I I think it's more Zach Raff being a shrewd business person, probably. It's also a role that feels like it would have been right for Natalie about five years before she made it. Right.

You know what I mean? Whereas by the time 2004 hits, it's weird that Garden State and Closer are the two movies that elevate her, because they kind of elevate her in tandem in 2004, where Garden State was the movie that more people saw, and Closer was the movie that more people respect. did her performance, but, like, they exist kind of in tandem. They're for two different audiences, too. Like, even though Closer made more at the box office, but people also hated that movie. Did Closer make more at the box office than Garden State?

I mean, barely, barely, a little bit more million. Wow, that's surprising to me. You know, it was also, it received its wide release in Christmas time, and Garden State received its wide release at, you know, September, back to school. And I know she's supposed to be playing younger than the other. three characters and closer, but she still feels a good 10 years older than her Garden State character. Like, that just feels just like absolutely night and day. She plays, she's playing this sort of like, especially in the first hour of this movie of Garden State, this kind of woman child,

who the thing where she's like, I do a little dance that nobody's ever done before, which it's the worst, it's the worst moment. The worst scene in the movie. And then she's a full grown adult who has a cemetery for all of her dead pets in her backyard. Well, I can't, I, you got to do something with all the fucking rodents that die in that nightmare house. But she talks about burying a fish, doesn't she? It's like, you just flush the fish. If I'm him and I see the system of tubes and tunnels all over that living room, when she's like, you're so freaked out.

You want to just run out of here. And he assures her that that's not the case. Like, that would be the case for me. I would absolutely. I am the person she. And then that he goes into her bedroom after he sees all of the gerbil tunnels in the house, because you know that there's, like, rotting food in that bedroom. You know, someone who has an intricate system of gerbill tubes in their home

doesn't know where their trash can is. Now she's Britney Murphy and girl interrupted in my head. I don't like that either. But it's like, she's very sort of like young girl coded in ways, and not all ways. It's not like she's presented as a child. It doesn't get, it doesn't feel gross in that way. She's supposed to be free in a way that he can't be. free because he's so medicated. I mean, this movie also has an interesting relationship with

antidepressants, interesting, maybe euphemistic. Because, like, this, it was also just like, this is also a time where people were certainly medicated who didn't necessarily need to be medicated. There was a generation of sort of over-medicated children that did kind of have to be reckoned with in a way. I get that. But, like, it's not a movie. that, I mean, I don't think that this is a dangerous movie, but, like, there's no counterpoint of, like, someone who antidepressants actually was a good solution for this person. Right. Well, we've sort of, we've been culturally on this sort of like roller coaster of ups and downs. I've been, did you read that whole omnibus thing on Adderall that was going around last week? It's a really good series of

articles. I can't remember the publication now. I'm still in the middle of reading them. But it's sort of tracking like the sort of the history of Adderall and where we wind up in this like very quiet epidemic of people addicted to Adderall right now. Because the whole thing were like where there was an Adderall shortage a few months ago and people were like sort of surprised that that was still a major thing. And it's sort of like the crux of it is like it's like the opioid epidemic except it's very, very, very hard to die of an Adderall overdose. So everybody just keeps doing it and becomes these sort of like, you know, stressed out highly productive, but not really productive people.

Anyway, the point is we sort of culturally go on this roller coaster with particularly mood stabilizers and antidepressants and whatever in which we're over-medicating, we're under-medicating. There's a stigma in one way. There's a stigma in another way.

And we haven't ever really arrived at a leveling-out point in terms of like, these can be helpful when, you know, when needed, but they shouldn't, you know, be prescribed in the, the wrong ways and we're figure we are constantly still figuring it out i feel you mentioned american beauty earlier uh as a comparison point to this movie and that it's like the movie you don't want

to revisit like you didn't want to revisit this but like i think that that's there's more comparison there because american beauty i think of that as a movie that is kind of the culmination of a decade's worth of suburban life and you know looking at the suburbian uh suburban American life, et cetera. And it's the culmination of a lot of better and worse movies, but, you know, as a culmination that's pulling pieces that are maybe just at the point of becoming cliche, but it gets widely accepted. And I think that's true of Garden State in a lot of ways.

It's true in the way of this, like, these type of characters. It's true of the point of view of antidepressants. in this movie, this kind of sad boy independent American drama. This is the sort of, I know Prozac Nation was a little bit before this, but it's sort of that kind of thing of...

Sad boy Prozac Nation. Sort of, and also, but just like, what kinds of people did this generation of, you know, kids raised on mood-altering drugs, like, become? You know what I mean? Like, where does life's... spit them out when all of a sudden they have to, like, function on their own. And it's not an

uninteresting or unworthy sort of subject. And I think that's where I came out on the end of Garden State that I was a little bit surprised in. It's like, I'm not as annoyed with Zach Braff making this movie or, like, navel-gazing in this particular way. Because, like, I don't need every movie to be altruistic, you know what I mean? Like altruistic or like, or have like noble purpose or whatever. Sometimes you find some insights in people, navel gazing, because you find that like other people's experiences do sort of dovetail with your own in interesting ways. And I find that there's, there's value in that.

I'm most annoyed with Zach Braff screenwriter than I am Zach Braff, actor or director with this movie. I think there are some real broad swipes in this movie. And that's kind of what I was saying, too. It's like so much of this feels so tropey, even by a 2004 standpoint that he's, you know, dabbling in things that have been done repeatedly. But I think those tropes that annoy people get pinned on this movie because this was the most successful of that type of movie or, like, became more emblematic of a certain type of movie. it's also it kind of sabotages its own comedy in a way in that like one of the one of the movie's sort of funniest gags is when he wakes up the morning after the party and

it just says boobs on his forehead balls um or balls sorry it says balls right that's even funnier balls on his forehead um and and then later it cuts to the joke is first of all he gets he gets a cat scan at this regular doctor checkup, which like, no ma'am, no, you go to a specialist for that baby. No ma'am does insurance pay for a cat scan on your first, like, checkup visit or whatever, like, absolutely not. Anyway, but they cut to it, and he's shirtless in the cat scan and all the other stuff that they wrote on him where it's like, and that would be such a funny cut to sight gag if it didn't have these really on the nose, things of like weak, like, you know, like, uh, Hollywood boy, all these sort of things just like, oh, no, these are the things that he hates about himself. Like it's, yeah, it's, you know, it's, it's just too, too, too, too, too, too, you know,

precious. I don't know something. But, but like, the two, the two, whatever, I think makes it appeal to a younger audience. And like, I can say this. I am not condescending to young people because I was the young audience for this movie that it appealed to. Yeah. You know, it seems... Totally. When that's your vantage, it seems less crunchy, you know? And we need movies like this.

These are movies that actually don't really exist right now, which is starter autoture movies, starter, you know, where movies were like young people who haven't really formed their idea. You're not going to, like, get a young person to, like, fully come out. out of the gate and watch, like, you know, Tarkovsky or something like that. You're going, you need to ramp people up. Not everybody sort of jumps right into Godard or whatever. Middlebrow. Well, because middlebrow is so flattened that it's all shitty Netflix movies now.

Well, it's people who, instead of going to see middlebrow movies and forming their tastes that way, they just, I mean, I'm going to sound like such a grumpy old man yelling at a cloud, but like they do just scroll TikTok all day. You know what I mean? And it's like, and that's how they form their aesthetic. Like, that's how, you know, aesthetics are being formed these days instead of being formed by watching middlebrow, uh, somewhat pretentious indie movies. And it was just better.

It was just better when it was that instead of what it is now. I'm sorry. All that being said, Garden State is bad. Of course it's bad, but we need bad. We need to endure that kind of bad. You can talk about the things that, like, everybody hates this movie for. But I also think that a lot of the comedy is pretty... There's some good jokes, like, the cuts between him being like, I can't swim,

and then you see the whole party crowd. It cuts to the whole party crowd watching him not be a good swimmer is funny. Yes. But, you know, it is... We talked about... It's not a hilarious movie. Well, no. It's not like...

But some of it is just so, like, look at how pathetic these people are. Isn't that funny? Like, everything around. But that's what I mean. Like, it's not like, it doesn't, the comedy doesn't really like, you know. Best comedy in this movie. Unquestionably. The presence of Jackie Hoffman.

Jackie Hoffman singing once twice three times a lady. Once twice three times a lady. It's so good. At the burial site of Zach Braff's mother. I need to find a clip of it and put it in because, like, it's, you know what, Jackie Hoffman sounds like. And her particular way, that very sort of like nasal, your

mom's upper west side friend just sort of, you know, nasaling her way through three times a lady with her full New York accent on full display. It's great. It's so good. Once, twice, three times a lady,

I love you. Yes, you're once, twice, three times a lady. I love you. I love you. Yeah, that's the best part of this movie, for sure. But yeah, it's not like, it's not trying to be laugh out loud funny, but it still needs to be funnier in the moments where it is, you know what I mean, where it is funny.

It's also the kind of movie that, like, for the sake of a gag, will have somebody in full medieval times armor the morning after, like, they wake up. And it's like, why wouldn't he just, like, have that shit in the bag? You know what I mean? Why is he walking around in full medieval times? You can't drive in that. Well, you certainly, you also can't, like, did he sleep that way? Did he put it on in the morning instead of closed? Did he, like, he slept with, I know he slept with Gene Smart the night before.

First of all, Jim Parsons and Gene Smart is the sexual pairing of your nightmares and mine. Like, I, I, I, and they would become the pairing of nightmare television to come between Hacks and Big Bang Theory. Hacks is good. I hate hacks. I hate it. Oh, you're one of the people who hate hacks. Okay, this is fascinating. I don't like hacks to the point where I can't.

I can't rock with somebody who hates it. In fact, I enjoy talking with people who hate hacks, actually, because I'm not precious about it. But what do you hate about it? Do you hate the younger person like everybody seems to? Well, I feel like, you know, GeneSmart is great. GeneSmart can elevate truly anything. Yeah.

I think she's maybe played similar versions of that character in better material, but also it feels so underwhelming to what that character could be, even though she is doing well. I think it's so I found it really dated that other character, this whole point of view of... Sure.

Yeah, I hate that. I'm a millennial and you're a boomer. People don't talk like that. Maybe people tweet like that, but they don't talk like that, you know? Also, I do feel like... And it's such low-hanging fruit. It is very low-hanging fruit, that character to make her seem despicable and annoying.

It also does not surmount the not-inconsiderable challenge of trying to write fake stand-up that feels both real and funny. Like, it's such a hard thing to do, I admit, but like it doesn't pull it off. Like, that stand-up just doesn't seem funny enough. You couldn't be that successful, especially the stand-up that's supposed to be good, the stuff that's like, I always think. of Krusty the Clown when he became an edgy comic that one episode where he

like it's a ponytail and starts, you know, telling it like it is or whatever. I don't know. But I still like it. But I still think it's a fun show and I'm kind of amazed that like it's been like 18 years since it's been on the air and it's coming back soon. Right, right. I think you talked about

the whole Jim Parsons in suit of armor element. There are things that help make a great trailer but are ultimately annoying as like just visual devices things that are very easily reduced down to the annoying term of quirky you know yeah the wallpaper shirt help people be annoyed by it the motorcycle with the sidecar the uh-huh yeah that element that element They go visit a little man in a boat, played by Dennis Hare, holding a baby in a quarry. Who lives on the edge of a quarry. Yeah, exploring the infinite abyss.

Good luck exploring the infinite abyss, which to me as a teenager was like, right on, man. That says so much about life. And now I'm like, okay. The scene where they scream into the quarry, how does that get filmed on a two and a half million dollar budget? unsafely because you can literally see in the movie Peter Sarsgaard almost falls off the top of that thing Well that, but like it almost like I know that like from a 2024 perspective

I watch that and I'm like well obviously this is a CGI shot They have a crane half of the budget went into that crane It must have like I can't imagine like half of the budget for that movie's got to be for that shot because it's it sweeps it zooms back so far The crane in the rain stays mainly in New Plains, New York. It stands mainly in White Plains. Yeah, White Plains. That's a good show.

Where they shot. Anyway, that shot to me. And there are other stuff where, like, the overhead shot in the pool where I'm just like, and this is the before drones, obviously. So, like, you know, you were doing this stuff with cranes and stuff like that. I think that's part of the reason why, even if you don't think those shots are, like, the most. artfully done. It's kind of impressive that he was able to sort of pulls this off. I should also say that two of the executive producers on this that I saw at the end are Danny DeVito and Stacey Cher, who are like two major producers. And I wonder at what stage of the game they signed on to this movie, whether it was after the fact, whether they were brought on. The second they read in the script that this takes place in New Jersey. Maybe. And he's like, Jersey films. I got to get in on that. Do you remember that part in Julia Robert? Ritz's Oscar speech. Danny DeVito.

Jersey films Danny DeVito, and she puts her hand on her hip like that, and they cut to Danny DeVito sort of laughing in the audience, and Ria Perlman sort of looking at him, like, what are you laughing at, buddy? Like, that kind of, it's just like, you know, I don't know. There's an incredulous look on Ria Perlman's face, which I find very funny.

Anyway. It's hard to talk about this movie without talking about what people find annoying about it. Yes. Which leads me to one of the things I love about it, which is Peter Sarsgar. Okay, talk about Peter Sarskard.

Let's talk about Peter Sarsgaard, especially in this moment. Go back to our Shattered Glass episode, which like feels like a real, uh, yeah, that's like the elevation of Peter Sarsgarde into a certain class of actor. And in this year, you get Peter Sarsgarde and this and Kinsey. We don't need any more words from me on Peter Sarsgarde and Kinsey. Not if we don't want to maintain our, are safe for all audiences. thing. They're going to slap another slap another rating on us.

Spotify will take us down for doing the most. Doing the most. Peter Sarsgarde is shirtless, a not inconsiderate amount of time in this movie. Peter Sarsgarde is... Peter Sarsgarde's body is so funny. It's, it's

very pleasing to me, but it's also just like it is very square. You know what I mean? He's just sort of, he's just kind of a square with a head on top of it. I find him very alluring, but in a, in a peculiar way. Everything that feels a little tryhard about this movie, he's such a natural, charismatic performer that he brings such an energy that the movie absolutely needs.

And an energy of, like, he's not altruistic. He's, you know, he's a grave digger who, like, robs from the corpses or whatever. He's, he's a good friend. He's not delusional, you know, thinking he's going. friend to large, but he's also not somebody I would ever fully trust about anything. And he's Peter Sarsgaard, so there's always an edge of sinisterness that, like, threatens to break through. Like, when he's, like, threatening Jim Parsons, I'm like, he might actually murder this guy, like, at some point in his life. Like,

I also think there's something about this movie about sort of, like, coming home to see what the people you went to high school with are now doing in their, like, quasi-adult lives when he, like, runs into, like, the friend of his who's a cop. or the like not all of us have like friends who like invent silent Velcro and become millionaires or whatever but like a lot of us like have this thing where you go back and you're just like oh yeah some people are cops and some people work at Walmart and some people you know aren't really doing anything with their lives and are you know sort of and it's just especially in your 20s when you're sort of like that process of every

time you come home sort of everybody's at this different sort of stage of of of growing up and the estrangement you feel from that and the ways in which you sometimes want to feel like you could fall back into that, but at least for me, like, I was like, oh, yeah, like, there's, every time it's just like this realization is just like, that's not me anymore. You know what I mean? Like, that's not, right, right. The idea of doing that is repulsive to me, uh, personally, but it's, no judgment to anybody else who needs to.

But for me, I would sooner, uh, uh, uh, run. through hot coals in the town square. But I do think with Peter Sarsgaard's performance not only has the appeal of you know because he's so charming

allows us to believe that Zach Braff's character would just kind of fall into this relationship with a former high school person, you know, which always feels a little bit contrived in movies. There is a... That makes it more natural... But there's also, you mentioned he's not an unnefarious character,

but there is a kind of warmth and non-judgment from him, whereas the rest of the movie feels like it is accidentally mean-spirited in a lot of ways. And I think a lot of the humor is kind of mean-spirited in this movie. Yeah. That his presence, I think, does so much for this movie in making it watchable and palatable. and that's certainly at least a relationship you feel like will last longer than the romantic one he has with net for sure for sure which like okay by the end of this movie i buy their attraction and sort of bond to each other those two um and it sounds like maybe you don't um i mean they there's a lot of

vulnerability between the two of them. I feel like the ending of the movie is very contrived in terms of, well, this is what this has, this is the rules of movie storytelling in that there has to be one person wanting it to stay and one person being like, this is the end of the road, and then you have the dramatic thing of running from an airplane, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yeah, yeah, yeah. Although you never see him running from the airplane, which is interesting. Well, they spent all that money on the crane. They can't shut down a terminal. It's interesting that it goes from him on the plane and then the shot where he returns is fully on her.

Like, you don't see him until, like, she's out of the booth. You don't get that even that shot of him, like, at the door. Yeah. And I don't know. I would maybe buy it a little bit better if there's, was something a little more honest of it's like, yeah, we had this nice little fling and we can stay in contact, but like, we got what we needed out of this and you can go and live your life as a better, healthier person, yada, yada, yada, yada. Yeah. Which is maybe like nobody wants that movie, but like, I don't want, I don't buy the movie version of this movie at the end.

Is it always more honest, though, to have those things end on that kind of bittersweet note? Is it always more honest? Or is it sometimes honest that it drags out and then it's more painful? I mean, maybe, but we don't see that in the movie. I think sometimes movies go out of their way to separate characters who don't have any reason to separate themselves other than to, like, deny themselves what they want. sort of dramatically. I guess it also just feels dishonest because her character is a fantasy, right?

So to believe, to be told or be asked to believe that this is some great love and not, you know, him looking to connect with someone in the short term while he is at home, which he has no intentions of staying there. I don't know if it be good for him. You know, that doesn't feel honest to me. I don't know if I necessarily agree that she's a fantasy, though.

I feel like it's more that, like, she's a, she's his opposite, right, in every way, where she's, you know, he's unable to express, uh, emotions or sort of, like, deviate from this very sort of placid baseline where she's all deviations. She's, you know, she's so worried about being. She can't keep a goddamn thing to herself. She can't keep anything to herself. She'll lie to make herself seem more interesting. She, at a moment where she doesn't feel unique, she does a movement that nobody's ever done so she can feel unique again. And so it's like they're opposites. And it feels like they're trying to meet at a healthier middle, where she talks about like, you're good for me.

I haven't even lied in two days. And, of course, there's the, like, you know, he says, is that true? And she's like, no. But you get the sense that she's trying. to be, you know, less, I don't know, flighty, immature, whatever, whatever version of her is makes her act like that. And he's trying to feel more. And so I don't necessarily feel like she's a fantasy so much as they fit for this moment in his life right now. And I don't know if you need to interpret the end of this movie and like, well, and they happily ever after,

they ended up together and they're, you know. I suppose I meant she is a fantasy in the like taking a step back from the plot type of way in that she is the fantasy in the manic pixie dream girl's sense of like this character is not a real person. But he does feel way much more like a real person. Sure, yes, yes, yes, yes. Yeah, I feel like I'm better with that ending without the idea that like they were. made. They were made for each other. They were made to last forever. I think they are a, that is a relationship that you sort of need to see through. I think that's sort of where I, the thing I said at the beginning. I guess. I just, I don't think that there's anything

happening in this movie that's not, these two people are getting what they need from each other in the moment, but I'm not invested in the long-term success of this relationship. Because it's already a satisfying arc for them to be healing, restorative, et cetera, to whatever for what they need in that moment, not for... But they're just at the beginning of this healing is the thing. So I'm just like, why would you cut yourselves off from this thing?

Right. To me, I'm like, they're just beginning. It's not like they've been together for like a month. Like, they were together for like two days. So I'm just like, you know what I mean? But also, there's nothing good for him. to stay in New Jersey. I don't think that would be a wise decision for this. Well, this movie despises Los Angeles, so there's nothing good for him in Los Angeles. Like, this movie has established the fact

that Los Angeles is full of racist restaurants. Red Bull drinkers. By the way, the guy, the obnoxious guy at the restaurant who's like, what were on break, like that guy, is that Gary Gilbert guy, the producer who put up the $2.5 million, who blocked us all from seeing Marguerette for five years. So, like, this movie has a vile opinion of Los Angeles really, really hates it. So it does feel like a defeat that he would be going back to L.A. Just in time to, you know, start feeling things where, at least in New Jersey, like, you know, you said, like, mansions you can dance in front of fires at. Like, I'm fine with that. You've got a rich friend with a pool.

Listen, if I had a rich friend with a pool, I would cling on to that man, like, like a barnacle under the hull of a ship. I would. you're saying your dream is to be a friend of housewives. Yeah, so long as he doesn't actually hit me with the flaming arrows that he shoots in the air. Right, right. Then, yes. You do not see being friend of housewife as demotion. The big empty room with the fireplace, I find very alluring.

There is something to the idea of being in a social situation with a lot of people where you are able to pull, one-on-one time with somebody away that I find very romantic. And that's just sort of like a, I'm on an elemental level. And this movie multiple times makes use of that, both in the pool and also by a fireplace. And I find that, I do find that undeniable romantic. I see Peter Sarsgaard in a scene where there's a massive funer place at all darkness. And I'm like, ah, so Zach Braff's going to do a visual reference to women in love. I can't wait to watch the scene play out. Sarzgard in front of a fireplace. All right, all right.

I will see women in love and then I will understand what you're talking about. You don't know the scene? No. The women in love wrestling scene in front of the fire? No, I haven't seen women in love. But it's a very notorious scene. Well, then maybe I'll watch it and I'll see if I've seen it other places. I would be willing to bet that you have.

Okay. It's two naked men wrestling in front of a fire. How can you lose? And one of them is Alan Bates, one of the hottest men to ever live. Oh, I probably have seen that. Anyway, we're over time, but let's quickly run through the awards that this movie won, because it's not an inconsiderable number. We kind of talked about the soundtrack thing for this movie.

This movie is a Grammy-nominated film, Zach Braff, Egot, when... A Grammy winner, right? You said it won for Best Soundtrack? Beating. Cold Mountain, you will be my true love, Joe Reed. DeLovley, previous episode on DeLovly. Hill Bill, Volume 2, previous episode on Kill Bill, Volume 2, and Shrek 2, accidentally in love. I'm kind of glad.

I'm kind of glad. I like this win because it is the most, I mean, Cold Mountain also, I guess, feels like a cohesive album. I just like this one better. Like, I love the idea of a soundtrack that operates the way soundtracks used to, which is that, like, it's a cohesive, you know, vibe. and is also a hit. A piece of marketing for the film that doesn't feel like overt marketing like Hunger Games soundtracks for no reason. Sure. Sure. Also like much more, you know, prominent. I don't know. I think history judges that. Well, I will say the independent spirit win for best first film, which it beats among others, Napoleon Dynamite. Napoleon Dynamite and Garden State are twinned throughout this entire year. They're both at Sundance. Napoleon Dynamite is also. a big sale at Sundance that year. The Searchlight.

Searchlight. Right. Becomes a cultural, like, a weird, like, niche plus cultural hit, the way Garden State did. And that is up for a bunch

of the same Indy Spirit Awards and MTV Awards. Like, John Heater wins the MTV Movie Award for Breakthrough Mail that Jack Brath is nominated for. Um, it's just sort of, it's interesting. They sort of stalk each other throughout this award season.

Napoleon Dynamite further away from the Oscar season than, uh, Garden State. Yeah, Napoleon Dynamite did not get that what, Writers Guild's nomination. I'll say that. Yeah. I, writers guilds, uh, the, the precursor to Eternal Sunshine winning the Oscar, which I don't think I thought would happen until it happened. And that's always fun. We did a Cinematrix with Eternal Sunshine.

to commemorate the anniversary of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which had its 20th anniversary last week as we record this. And one of the columns was Oscar winner. And I was curious to see how many people actually remembered that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is an Oscar winner. Much to serve it. The original Kate Winslet sitting from the audience on the verge of tears happy for a winner before Leo's win.

Real. That's so real. I love watching that and watching how happy she is. for Charlie Kaufman. Charlie Kaufman, the least, the person least equipped to win an Oscar in that, like, I guarantee you, he didn't appreciate that for more than, like, a minute before he turned it into another reason to have crippling anxiety and self-loathing. Nominated for Critics' Choice Award for Best Soundtrack, but did not win, lost to...

Ray. Ray, probably because Jamie Fox had the audience at the whole award show, call in response, singing to it all night. One National Board of Review Breakthrough Director on top of that aforementioned indie spirit win. What were the other first films of 2004? I mean, I guess there was a few, because also Primer, I think, was the first film, the aforementioned Primer. The Indy Spirit nominated Primer for first.

screenplay but not first film and I wonder if that's a rules thing because Primer was nominated for best feature that year so I don't know if like you get in feature if that makes you ineligible for first feature or not maybe Maria Full of Grace also won first screenplay at indie spirit not indie spirit so that was another Sundance movie that year that won the audience award I believe for drama at that Sundance that was um oh who's that director who I really love uh Joshua Joshua Marston. Maria Full of Grace, a very good movie. I should rewatch that. I don't think I've seen it since theaters. I remember it being very suspenseful in parts. And Joshua Marston's made good movie since then.

This also won the Hollywood Film Award. We haven't talked about this in a long time for a breakthrough filmmaker. The Hollywood Film Award awards, all basically PR stunts that... Yeah. At a certain point, and I think at this point, these were handed out in the summer for a lot of movies that hadn't even premiered yet.

So clearly a plant on where, you know, studios, et cetera, were going to be making their efforts in the coming award season. They don't, I don't think they still exist anymore, or they existed for a while and they actually moved into, the award season, but former joke among people who paid attention to

Oscar precursory things 20 years ago. I want to talk about its three MTV Movie Award nominations, though, because they're sort of famously iconic in one particular way, but so Portman's nominated for best female performance. She loses to Lindsay

Lohan for Mean Girls. Braff is nominated for Best Breakthrough Male, and this line up is wild deeply unwell John Heater as we said

wins for Napoleon Dynamite which feels true like Napoleon Dynamite feels like an MTV movie even if it

wasn't like MTV films or whatever Freddie Highmore for finding Neverland is just deeply funny as an MTV

movie award nomination but also the fact that like the fact that Freddie Highmore is in a hit TV show

like I keep seeing ads for like the final season of the Good Doctor begins this week or whatever I'd love when

people go wild on the timeline that because like we are not the audience for it people on Twitter are not the audience for the good doctor but every once in a while people like do you know the fucking crazy shit that's going down on the good doctor and they'll post lips from it and everybody loses their mind for an hour or something it's great it's great uh Tim McGrath for Friday night lights which every once in a while I feel like the movie establishment tries to pull the we could make Tim McGrath a real actor trick because they did it

with Dwight Yoakum once and I'm like no like stop just no let's not do this Tim McGraw of the Best Picture nominee though

there was an incident one time where there was this big sort of country concert at the football stadium in Buffalo Tim McGraw was there Faith Hill was there

Kenny Chesney was there and one of Tim McGraw or Kenny Chesney punched a police horse and I can't remember which one. Okay, Blazing Saddle. There was like a whole deal. They got charged with, you know, a crime,

and they had to, like, there was a trial here in Buffalo where, like, Tim McGrath and Faith Hill had to, like, come back for the trial. So it must have been Tim McGrath, because I don't think he was a witness. I think it was Tim McGrath who punched a police horse. And that was a whole goddamn thing. But then also the fifth nominee, Tyler Perry, for Diary of a Mad Black Woman. Where do you come down on this Tyler Perry

World War II mail-sorting movie that he's doing with Carrie Washington? From Netflix coming this season. I'm kind of super excited to see what becomes of it. The plot synopsis he sent me was full Madlib situation. But, you know, who knows? Who knows? We love Carrie Washington?

It's the trailer looks like it's this very sort of inspiring, or it's not really a trailer, but it was part of the Netflix super trailer, the beginning of the year. I think it's a plan to be one of their fall movies. It's sort of featured in that clip, so I feel like it's going to be one of the big full movies that would not be surprised if we see it at Toronto. They've already premiered Tyler Perry movies before. But it seems to sort of like this inspirational story of Carrie Washington leading this all-female

battalion in the United States Army in World War II to sort through the mail. But it's like trying to be like, I want to see how they turn sorting the mail for the war effort into an inspirational like saga. I kind of can't wait. I'm super excited. Between that movie and Netflix is also doing the Lee Daniels horror movie. I cannot wait for the, I cannot wait for this movie. Netflix is like going weirdly maximalist this year in ways that I find deeply fascinating. So, um, yeah, I can't wait. I can't wait for that. Even if it's like one of those non-theatrical, uh, Netflix movies, like whatever, whatever the Richard LeGromeda's movie will be this year that got pushed back that has Zach Efron and Nicole Kidman, you know it's

going to be a piece of shit. I will probably not watch that, but I will be the real. Lee Daniels making a horror movie. That's just like, I just want to, you don't need to tell me anything else. That I want to see. Can we, can we watch the Lee Daniels horror movie, um, respectively in our, in our living rooms with like an open phone line and just sitting on the couch and just like we just hear each other hoot and holler as we're watching this. Let's do a Netflix party for it. Let's, let's re-pandemic it. I kind of want it to happen. Now that I'm sort of living far away from people, I want to, I want to experience that movie collectively. Maybe we'll get Katie on the line too. What's the third MTV movie awards category

that Garden State was nominated for? Oh, it's a little thing called Best Kiss, my friend, and this, I will read the nominees in a descending order of importance. Sky Captain of the World of Tomorrow, a hilarious. Objectively hilarious nomination. Like a fully CGI kiss. Like, all right, me. Fantastic. I remember loving SkyCaptain in the theater and then watching it several years later and being like, okay, I get why I like this, but this is actually kind of lame.

The Girl Next Door, which is the movie with Emile Hirsch and Alicia Cuthbert, I'm pretty sure, which is not a bad movie, but it is a movie that they desperately wanted to become like a varsity blues American pie style like teen sensation, and it did not happen. Electra star, the spinoff of Daredevil, where Jennifer Garner as Electra wields weaponry. Do you remember that the Evanescence song Bring Me to Life became popular through the trailer of Daredevil, like the trailer and like ad campaign for Daredevil? Really? Yes. And it was featured in that movie also. There's like there's the training montage in Daredevil where Jennifer Garner trains as Elektra to that song. Like that's how that song became popular.

Anyway, they all lost to, I'm just going to let you reveal. The Notebook. the iconic kiss from... Recreated on stage at the MTV Movie Awards. With Ryan Gosling... They understood the assignment of what they were supposed to do with that award speech. Ryan Gosling wearing a Darfur t-shirt. Rachel McAdams, taking off her jacket to reveal sort of a strapless boostier top.

And she looks as horny as I've ever seen a lady on a stage before. like, and rightfully so, like, jumping at this time. They were dating at this time. They were dating at the time and they made out. The timeline of their dating remains confusing. I think they were. I think they were dating. But like, the best part of that is it cuts to the audience and it's like Hillary Duff and

Lindsey Lohan and all these like teen stars who are like, and of course, Rachel McAdams was like a teen and was a 20-something in Mean Girls playing a teen. So she was always like older than all of these co-hosts. hoard or whatever. So it's literally these teen girls watching their big sister make out with this man that she's dating and it's fully adult hot and they're all looking at it

like, oh my God. It's so cute. It's very very cute. One of the great clips of our time. Anyway, I'm glad that Garden State got to be adjacent to that. Any last thoughts on Garden State?

No, I didn't hate it as much as I thought I was going to hate it. but I definitely, my esteem for that movie, as kind of expected, has sort of gone, gone way down. Certainly, my esteem for the Portman performance has gone down farther than I thought. I will say, anyone there's like top five Portman performances saying Garden State. Still has Garden State in it? Yeah, you're telling on yourself a past decade. I will say, I do feel like in the second half of the movie, she pulls that character out from a tailspin,

but it is a tailspin of her own creation. So I don't know quite how to judge that. This is the bad example of Portman doing a choice with a character. Yeah, yeah. She's come a long way. If you think that Portman doing a choice is bad in Jackie, but good in this, we will never see eye to eye on movies, my friend. So, okay, you did bring it up, so I am forced to ask really quickly.

You said top five Portman performances. Oh, okay. What would yours be? Ooh, I'm going to have to... I don't think I have the stones to say Fox Lux in that five. But... I feel like I have a very solid four. And then...

No, maybe I have a really solid five, actually. I'm just going to do a quick run of the list and see if I have a surprise. Mine, while you look. Well, no, I'll give you a second to look without having to listen to me. No, I think I'm ready. I think mine are, I think it's fairly pretty obvious, but mine are Black Swan, May December, Closer Annihilation Jackie, in some order. Yeah, I feel like I could replace closer with something, but I'm not sure what that would be. I still very, very much love and respect her performance and closer.

I know you want to put Mr. Magoriam's Wonder Emporium in there. No. No, why would I want to do that? What other, like, what are the others? Like, I feel like, honestly, she's so good in Cold Mountain. I could understand somebody putting that in there. I think she's so good in beautiful girls. I think she's so good in, um, what else?

Have you ever seen song to song? I could see her being good. Yes, I have. Is she good? Song to Song is not the one I like. I like Night of Cups. I should watch both of those together sometime. I know a lot of people have come to the defense of song to song.

Song to song was not the one for me. Night of Cups is not the one. Night of Cups. Is Night of Cups the one where Ben Affleck is standing in a Wheatfield just sort of staring? Oh, that's to the wonder to the walls. To the wonder to the wall. Maybe I should watch all three of those. I've never seen any of those days.

We should do one. Maybe we should do one. We should, honestly. We could do any of them, because they've all had, they all had fun. We could do a Malick, uh, May, uh, May miniseries, but we're not. We could have, but we're not. But like, no, it's kind of surprising because all of those Malick movies do end up having buzz because like. By nature of it being a Terrence Malick movie, just like this Jesus movie that he's made years ago, but still hasn't released, is going to have it. Okay. I almost put that in my yearly preview. I wrote the look ahead, uh, Oscar

preview for Vanity Fair. And then I took that out at the end because, like, that thing has been in development for, like, six or seven years. And I'm like, filming has been complete for multiple years. For a very long time. So I'm like, is this movie just like never going to come out? And it's Terrence Malick. It comes out when it comes out. But I mean, I guess you could say it's more likely that it comes out this year than last year, you know, because we're getting closer to the eventuality that the movie will come out. I guess. All right. Anyway, I think we would have the same list with my asterix being Natalie Portman is the type of performer who, at any moment, conceivably, she still hasn't given her best performance yet. And we know that it could come at any time. Yeah. With that caveat, closer will be the one that falls out for me.

Do you think it's this Guy Ritchie movie that she's got on the docket next? No. That cast, I will say, is going to get me excited for that movie. it's Donald Gleeson, Issa Gonzalez, Ariane Moyad from my beloved Stewie from Succession. I can't imagine anyone giving their best performance ever in a Guy Ritchie movie. A pair of estranged siblings team up

and embark on a journey to find the famed fountain of youth. Krasinski is also in this movie, and I wonder if he's supposed to be, he and Portman are supposed to be siblings, he and Gleason, is it Portman and Isa Gonzalez? Whoever the siblings will be, will really direct my level of enthusiasm for this guy-ritching movie. It's written by James Vanderbilt.

James Vanderbilt writes good scripts. He wrote Zodiac. He's also written Spider-Man movies and... Well, fair. Zodiac gets you... I don't know. Joe, how about we move on to the IMDB game? And in doing so, would you like to explain what the IMDB game is?

Well, every week we end our episodes with the IMDB game, which is a game where we challenge each other with the name of an ad-a-bed game. with the name of an actor or actress, and we try to guess the top four titles that IMDB says they are most known for. If any of those titles are television, voice-only performances, or non-acting credits, we mentioned that up front. After two wrong guesses, we get the remaining titles release years as a clue, and if that is not enough, it just becomes a free-for-relevance. And that's the IMDB game. Joe, would you like to give her guess first this week? I'll give first. All right. What do you have for me?

So I mentioned that Zach Braff, Shakespeare in the Park thing, and I also mentioned, where did this come from? Oh, right. Zach Braff's directorial filmography, we didn't really talk about that. I'm wondering if we maybe pulled the same person, which we haven't done since the beginning of time. We'll see, but I'd be surprised if we did. His directorial films, hold on. Most recently, he did a good person with Florence Pugh while they were still dating. That was basically a pandemic movie.

It was one of them that are lost to time. He also directed, Wish I Was Here with Kate Hudson. And that was a movie that people were pissed about because back when crowdfunding was still a thing to like get movies made. People were pissed at Zach Brath for doing it. People got so mad about Zach Brow. breath doing crowdfunding. Because it's like you're famous, you don't need to crowd fund, which like, I understand the philosophy of that. I maybe don't understand the level of Iyer for that. And now the only one who's crowdfunding is like Donald Trump. I no longer think that

crowdfunding is in any way inappropriate because I don't think there's any money for making movies anymore, like beyond making movies that are not like big studio temples. Anyway, yeah, he's only directed four movies. It's those two movies. It's Garden State. And then it's the one I delved into, which is going in style. Oh, my God, if we pick the same person, going in style, which is one of our pet genres. I think we, I love that we have this as a pet genre in the way that I don't think we've seen any of these movies, but we're fascinated by these old timers go on a vacation movies. Or just like old guys do a thing together, rob a bank, go on vacation. Yeah, these are the ones who rob a bank, right?

Post a bachelor party, yeah. Alan Arkin, Morgan Freeman, Robert De Niro, all in different hats on this poster. De Niro's got, or sorry, Michael Cain, not De Niro. Kane's got a cangle. Alan Arkin has like a baseball cap, and Freeman's got a fedora. That's the thing. And they're all wearing their whatever casuals. No, I didn't go for any one of them.

I went for supporting actor in that movie, Christopher Lloyd. We pulled the same person. Motherfucker, how do that? I felt this on the wind. I was like, that hasn't happened since the beginning days of the podcast. Listeners. Can I give you my alternate from that same movie who I was going to, but there's one really hard one. Yes, while I pull something else up, absolutely.

Okay, I'll give you a second to pull something else up, so you're not doing that and guessing at the same time. I'm surprised that you would have given me that Christopher Lloyd top four because it's a pretty easy top four. We should say, since, not to give our listeners blue balls for this, Christopher Lloyd's known for, is Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and then both the Adams family and Adams Family values. And I thought I would get you to try and guess multiple Back to the Future episodes. That's exactly what I thought I was doing, too. All right, I will, I'm giving first, right still? Yes. So from that same movie going in style is an actress known as Anne Margaret.

Oh, Ann Margaret. Put a pin in Anne Margaret because you may be talking about her soon. I'm just saying. Okay. What's Anne Margaret's known for? No television, no voiceover. Carnal knowledge. Carnal knowledge.

No, that's Candice Bergen's Oscar nomination. No, it's her nomination. It was her first nomination. I thought Candice Bergen's nominated for... No, Candace Bergen's nominated for... Starting Over. Starting over. You're right. You're right. You're right. You're right. Um...

Yes. The Who's Tommy? No. Got it. Strike one. Bye-bye Birdie. Yes, bye-bye Birdie. Grumpy Old Men.

Yes, grumpy old men. And now the secret fourth thing... Grumpy er, old men. I would have also guessed that, but no, it is not. So your missing year is 1966. The year is not going to matter for Anne Margaret. It's all these movies that are going to blur together. Viva Las Vegas.

No. Jail House Rock. Not an Elvis movie. Oh. Yeah. I maybe don't know what this is then. I don't know what this is either. The title has a very famous city in it.

New York? No. What's the second most famous city in the world? I don't want to be AmeriCentric, but Los Angeles? No, in the world, in the whole world. Like, like, vibes-wise? Yes, Paris. Paris is in the title.

The logline is, an ex-model, sales girl, and assistant buyer for a New York City dress store, lets her hair down when sent to Paris as a fashion buyer. Okay, me. Emily and Paris. poster. Not Emily in Paris, but you've got two of the words right. In Paris. Yes. Panic in Paris. No. Burning in Paris.

No. Think of the title of a John Favreau movie, but like not a very popular one. Chef in Paris. No, although I would watch. I'd also watch Swingers in Paris. Made in Paris. Yes, made in Paris. What is this? Why would this be on her known for and not any of the Elvis movies, not Tommy?

It's a movie where she stars with Louis Jordan, Louis Jordan, and Richard Crenna. It's directed by somebody named Boris Seagal, who also directed, let's see. And Margaret, new to Instagram. Maybe all she is doing on Instagram, aside from saying hello, friends and fans, like, she's very sweet and greeting her fans. But maybe she's just constantly stumping from Made in Paris, and I am just missing the posts. Boris Segal directed The Omega Man, among others, directed Rich Man, poor man, the miniseries from television, directed anything else we might have heard of? Not really. No. I don't know why this is her known for. Made in Paris. If you have any ideas, the listeners, get back at us. All right. What do you have for me?

I quickly pulled from the pool of famous actors from the state of New Jersey. I guess apparently Zoe Saldanya is from New Jersey. So you have Zoe Saldanya. Zoe Saldania from the great state of New Jersey. Um Avatar Avatar is correct Guardians of the Galaxy Also correct Now I wonder if you would

have bothered giving me one I think on the normal circumstance You wouldn't have given me somebody who's like just avatars in Marvel movies But on short notice You might the other thing is what ones would I choose otherwise if we were going away from those and it's like crossroads but like she's kind of

crossroads yes you're guessing crossroads yeah incorrect why did you push me to guess crossroads wild you just want this to get over with Okay, so Crossroads is wrong. Avatar the Way of Water. Incorrect. No, Avatar the Way of Water. Your years are 2009 and 2011. Okay.

Well, so no Marvels. 2009 and 2011 is one of them like, um, The Losers or something like that, that, uh... Is the losers, I guess? Yes. The Losers is incorrect, even though the losers shows up a lot in, uh... It does.

I will say, and I won't pin it to a year, but you're forgetting a franchise. Oh. Oh, Star Trek. She's good in the Star Trek. Is it Star Trek into Darkness? Is that the other one? No, it's just the first Star Trek. Just Star Trek.

Yeah, she is in three stars. Into Darkness blows, but I like that Star Trek franchise. Star Trek Beyond is so fun. It's so fun. It's so fun. It's very fun. Even though it has some of the most insulting exclusively gay moment content.

Sure, sure, sure. Sophia Boutella Hive feasting. I know you are Sophia Boutela Hive. I love her. I join you. I get a little resentful because, like, you're so much more vocally, Sophia Boutelive,

they feel like there's no room for me to exist. Yeah, Climax made me a, like, die hard for life. You getting to Climax before me is one of the great regrets of my life. I should have just seen it at Tiff. You should have went with me. I had a good.

I should have. And then immediately booked it to Voxlux. That day was... I need to find out what I saw instead of climax and really sort of castigate myself for it because climax in a movie theater full of people would have been a real time. Like, I saw that movie by myself at home on VOD,

and I regret not seeing it in a crowded theater. People, like, clapped and cheered for the first dance sequence. But then did they walk out by the end, like for the rest of the movie? The entire theater did not stay. Okay, I was going to say, all right, all right, that makes sense. You still have to get 2011. Smoking Aces? No.

You're not not on the wrong path, but you have to figure at this point she had already done two franchises. So she is the headliner of this movie that absolutely no one. Columbiana? Columbiaana. Yeah, Columbiana sort of semi-exists. Does it though? Remember Columbiana? Who directed Columbiana?

Colombiana directed by Olivier Megaton Megaton Megaton Oh, it has a writing credit to Luke Besant Oh, okay, that makes sense That makes a lot of sense actually Okay

Interesting, interesting known for Zoe Saltonia Apparently in a And I think is actually headlining this But a Jacques Odiar film That is rumored to be at Cannes this year That's fun That's good and fun.

Into it. I think Richard talked about that, actually, on our Vanity Fair look-ahead episode. I still have to listen to that. It's been a hectic week, so I haven't listened. There was a lot of us. There was like seven of us on that. So it was just like a caval. Yeah, it was a lot of people.

It was a cavalcade of people. But as always, our friend Katie Rich managed the chaos with a plumb, as she has done on that show for years and years. And if we can just take a moment to shout out what a great job Katie has done on Little Gold Men all those years. One of my favorite podcasts and in no small part thanks to Katie. So just wanted to mention that. And we will go about our base. Katie, we love you. Listeners, you may hear from Katie soon on this show.

Uh-oh. It's not even Thanksgiving. Uh-oh, not going into it. That's our episode, I think. If you want more of this head, Oscar buzz, you can check out. Tumblr at this head oscarbuzz.com. You should also follow us on Twitter at had underscore Oscar underscore buzz and follow us on Patreon at patreon.com select this ad Oscar buzz. Joe, where can the listeners find more of you? Oh, various socials, including letterbox. I've been lax

at keeping my letterbox updated, which is just bad because then I have to go back and remember days that I saw movies. Anyway, that's all at Joe Reed. Reed spelled R-E-I-D. I am also on Twitter and letterbox at Krispy File. That's at VIL. We would like to thank Kyle Cummings for his fantastic artwork and Dave Gonzalez and Gavin Meeves for their technical guidance and Taylor Cole for our theme music. Please remember to rate, like, and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever else you get your podcast.

Five-star review in particular really helps us out with Apple Podcast visibility, so explore our infinitvists of five-star reviews and contribute your own. That's all for this week. We hope you'll be back next week for more buzz and Joe is dancing with his headphones right now, uh, conceivably to the shins, but don't put them on my head because that is the thing that a serial killer would do.

Bye, listeners. We'll see you or hear you. Or you'll hear us. You know what you'll hear us. Goodbye. I love that I pulled a purely visual joke there at the end that only you will appreciate, but, you know. Whatever.

Whatever. Bye. Bye. Thank you.