This Had Oscar Buzz - 403 – The Homesman (with Richard Lawson!)

Episode Date: August 31, 2026

We welcome back Richard Lawson this week to discuss Tommy Lee Jones’s final (to date!) directorial effort, 2014’s The Homesman. Led by Hilary Swank, the film follows a 19th century woman charged to transport three women with “prairie madness” across the Nebraska Territory. With Jones as a wayward man who assists her journey, the film debuted … Continue reading "403 – The Homesman (with Richard Lawson!)"

What's up, Gary's. Just a quick announcement up top of the episode here that Vultures Movies Fantasy League is back again for its sixth season, and we are once again having a mini league for listeners and fans of this head Oscar buzz. If you haven't played before, you can head over to vulture.com slash movies dash league to get the full details, including a look at the rad prizes you could win, including a 65-inch Roku TV, PlayStation 5, merch from A24, neon, and criterion, and much more. The gist of the game, if you haven't played before, it's like fantasy football, but for movies. You draft an eight-film roster from the movies of 2006, and then once we get to October 2nd, your selections can start accruing points from their box office earnings, from their awards performance, critical performance, etc. We even have a new category this season for letterboxed star rankings. Your team score will compete against everybody else who signs up for the game, but you can also

choose to either create or join a mini-league. That way, if you have a group of friends who want to have a game within the game, you can have at it. Just make sure you all enter the same league name in the field, marked for mini-leagues when you sign up. And as we have done the last few years, you can also join your fellow this had Oscar Buzz fans, the Garys, in our dedicated mini-league, which this year we are calling, perhaps inevitably Chris, Project Hell Garys.

It was right there for us. We could not deny it. My brilliant colleagues at Vulture have even created a custom URL for GARES to use. When you sign up, that will have the mini league name right there, auto-populated, right there in the form. So just go to www.vulture.com slash garries, G-A-R-Y-S, and it'll take you right to it. And otherwise, just put Project Hale-Garys, no capital letters, but spaces, project Hale-Garries, into the mini-league. and you'll be all set. Remember that scoring kicks off on October 2nd, and any sign-ups after that date will be restricted to movies

that have yet to open or earn points, so keep an eye on that calendar. That's right. Again, for full details, you can hit up vulture.com slash movies-dash-league or just go right to Vulture. We tend to have a link right there on the homepage. We look forward to watching the Project Hale Garry's League flourish every year.

The Viss Had Oscar Buzz Dedicated League is the most robust, and I'm just going to say it best of all the mini-leagues. So you make us so proud, and we look forward to competing for another year. No, the right house. I didn't get that. I'm from Canada water. Dick poop. You're not dead.

Help me. If I cut you down, will you do what I tell you to? Hell yes, I will. Anything. I've got a job of work for you. My name is Cuddy, Mary B. Cuddy. Where's Mr. Cuddy? I live uncommonly alone.

What's your job? Three women in this country have lost their minds. Her husbands can't care for them properly. You and I are going to take them back across the river to Iowa. I need someone who can hunt and guide and help with the animals on the trip. It's your job, and you sworn to do it. That's why I set you free. Three crazy women for five weeks is a lot more, and I bargained for.

Hello and welcome to the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast, the only podcast hanging dong in antiquity. Every week I miss had Oscar buzz we'll be talking about a 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 are here to perform the autopsy. I'm your host, Joe Reed.

I'm here, as always, with my plain bossy friend, Chris File, Hello, Chris. Now, which one am I supposed to be? Mary Bucity! I'm calling you Mary Bucity, which is the highest of compliments. Great. No one really has a friend in this movie. not really friends. There's no such thing as friends in this movie. The one bitchy girl in town at the

end of the movie who's like, don't speak with him or don't look at him. Those two. Oh, those two. Yes. Sure. They're friends. Yeah. That's it though. Those two jerks are friends. Even like men who drink together in this movie, they're not really friends. They could be in a physical fight at any moment. Right. Although, yes, all the people who like gather together to like oust Tommy Lee Jones from the whatever the claim he's jumping. Like, yeah, they're not friends. Listen, I am Maryby Cutting. I'm not here to make friends. I'm here to get a husband. That's her drag race intro line when she walks into the room.

I am Mary B. Cuddy. I'm not here to make friends. I'm here for a man. Mary B. Cuddy, it was originally recorded as Mary B. Cuddy before it was Johnny B. Good. Right. Yes. Well, that's what Back to the Future is about is Michael J. Fox convinced him to change it to Johnny

Be Good from Mary B. Cuddy. Right. Not to jump immediately to the end of the movie. But it took until seeing. seeing her tombstone that gets washed away in the sea to realize that it wasn't Mary B. B.E. It was Mary B.E. E. E. Yes. Yes. Have I told the story on this podcast that one of the people in my college graduating class was named Sarah B. Yellen with a middle initial B. Who I didn't know more than a just like a hello, how do you do kind of a, you know, passing in the hall kind of a thing. But man, years later, I had dinner with a couple of my college friends several months ago.

And sure enough, like, the subject of Sarah B. Yellen came up because it was just like the best name. There's just some things you can't do when your last name is an active verb. Exactly. I know this from experience. Go by, because it's not like she was just Sarah Yellen. Like, it was, you know, in all sort of official documentation, it was always Sarah B. Yellen. And she was actually fairly quiet. I will say, she was fairly reserved.

Women be shopping and Sarah's be. Yellen. We shopped in and Sarah's B. Was it Sarah B as in like one word, capital S, A-R-A, capital B, E-I-G-H? No, it was B-P-P-E-I-G-H. And Yellen like Janet B. And Yellen like Janet Yellen. Exactly right.

No apostrophe at the end, even though that would have been fierce. I would have put it there. I would have added it there. We have a returning guest, one of our very, very favorite returning guests. I can't even tally how. how many previous episodes, although we definitely did an episode on Diana. I know we did an episode on Evening. Yeah, we did.

And what other episodes have you been on? Richard Lawson is back with us. So welcome back, Richard. I'm drawing a blank. It was definitely the... Oh, did I do... I don't know. I didn't do Grace of Monaco.

We haven't done Grace of Monaco yet. Oh, so we must have just talked about it during the Diana episode. Yes, during the Diana episode, certainly. Richard. Oh, the medler. The medler. Yeah, of course. Our beloved, the meddler.

Yeah. There's another one. I feel like we're forgetting the most recent one, whatever. I think we probably are. We'll remember it. It's fine. Oh, we talked about the whale because I didn't get nominated or win anything. That's right.

True. Yes. Yeah, true. Right? Yes. Yeah, that's how we remember it. Yes. Good.

Richard, you are here representing both the Critical Darling's podcast that you and my vulture colleague, Alison Wilmore, co-host. And also your Premier Party newsletter, which every single time it shows up in my inbox, that is an immediate click, if even just to sort of like scan what you're talking about this week. And I'm like, I will read that as soon as I can. Well, thank you. The important thing is that you open it, because that's what the metric. I am an immediate opener, I will say.

So there you go. Yes, PremierParty.com. If people want to subscribe, it's three posts a week, two behind the paywall, one free every Monday. It's a good bang for your buck, folks. Like not to like chill for my friend, but it's true. Thank you. Yeah. I mean, you know, I try to make them substantial enough that it's worth the money.

You know, movies, TV, mostly, some other kind of random things sometimes. Hopefully some theater in the fall. Yeah, I love that you get to write about theater in a way that you, you know, weren't really able to at your previous job. Well, yes, except that, you know, unless I'm doing a freelance theater review for The Guardian or THR or something, newsletter writer is not the best, like, hey, public. Can I have free Broadway tickets? Sure. Which, you know, ever since...

That's why we got to get these subscription numbers up, folks, so we can get Richard into some of these... You know what? Honestly, Broadway publicists, the way that the state of the industry, shouldn't be turning up your nose at anybody, is all I'm so. Agreed. I love when you get spicy, Richard. I love your can coverage, specifically,

your coverage of the Hamaguchi running counter to kind of everybody else's stance and my excitement for the movie. But you know, I trust a writer and a friend when they say the exact opposite that I hope that they're saying. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, definitely calling a Hamaguchi three-hour movie about the importance of collectivist economics and kindness and friendship and me calling that the most annoying movie you can. I don't know that that would not have flown at my old job. So they didn't follow up with you to see if you could approve that quote for a one. awards materials? You know, for some reason, they didn't. Yeah.

Man, I hated that movie. Did you see, I think, quote you in French. I'm sure it sounds like it would be something very... Well, to them, it's kind of a compliment. It's like, oh, a stupid American hated it, so it must be good. You know, it's an advertisement. Did you see my latest quote placement that I got on an F.C for Summerhouse? For Summerhouse's Emmy campaign?

So if Summerhouse wins the Emmy, it's my fault, apparently. You thought you were reviewing something else. So weirdly, the Summer House Bravo show is, it's like... Benoche shines in Asseilla's masterpiece. Right, yes. And they're like, I guess those are characters on her. They're like, we think that's what he calls Amanda, like Benoche? Like, yeah, yeah, exactly.

So we are here to talk about the 2014 movie The Homesman, starring Hillary Swank. And I don't know, for whatever reason, I was like, I want to have Richard on to talk about the Hillary Swank movie. Because I figured, like, this is a weird. way to put it, but like Hillary Swank's movie career, I think, fits your sense of humor very well. Is that an odd thing to say? No, I, when you asked me to do this movie, I was like, oh, perfect. Like, I feel seen, you know? Good, good.

Because, I mean, there's some historical precedent. Like, this was that the first can that I ever went to. Oh, I was hoping. Okay, I was hoping you had gone to this one. I'm actually, I reread my review from 12 years ago, and I'm pleased with that review, so that was good. But, yeah, the Hillary Swank of it all has always been this odd mix for me. me of genuine outrage that she has two Oscars, whereas, you know, her direct competitor, Annette Benning

both ears, does not have any, and plenty of other great people don't have any. But then a sort of like horror and pity at what became of her career. Yes. After her Oscar wins, and even between her Oscar wins. That's the thing. Yes. And, and it's funny that, like, if the pattern was sort of repeating itself, maybe just a little bit longer in this case, like, Holmes Minter, and years or so after her second win was kind of supposed to be the comeback, which is the headline of my Vanity Fair review of this movie. But that just didn't pan out. So I always, there's a pity for her in a way, but then also a kind of like annoyance

because I watch a movie like this. And I'm like, she's just not a very good actor. It's funny because I recorded an episode of the podcast like It's podcast with Philiscove and Emily St. James recently. And they were covering the Black Dahlia. I have done podcast episodes on the Black Dahlia twice in the last 12 months, which should probably qualify me for some sort of federal benefit if you know who wasn't in charge and Doge slashed everything funding for benefits for people who had to watch the Black Dahlia twice. If you were back in

New York, Mayor Mombani would take care of it. That's true. Yeah. That's more times than Brian De Palma has seen that movie. It's very true. But so the- Well, yeah, speaking of a, you know, of Mumdani, I mean, Hillary Swank in his mom's movie Amelia. I was going to say because my The observation that I made was that, like, Hillary Swank, I said the same thing. I'm like, it seems crazy that Hillary Swank has two Oscars. Although if you look at them on an individual basis, they both seem pretty justified. They're both really good performances sort of in isolation. But, like, in the greater scheme of things, it seems nuts.

And then also, as you said, it's like first Oscar is followed by, like, five years of wilderness where, like, the most prominently role she had was in the necklace. And then she wins another Oscar. And then she wins another Oscar. And then does the same thing happens again, where she's sort of like, the career sort of like falls into these, like, in this case,

it's these, you know, P.S. I love you and freedom writers and the reaping and these movies. And then right on schedule, five years after a million-dollar baby, comes Amelia. Mira and I here's Amelia. And I remember thinking, like, here we go again.

Like, the Swanko coaster is about to fire up again, and it didn't happen there, but then five years after that. So it does feel like there's like a cicada sort of thing happening with Hillary for a while. It's like every five years, she sort of emerges from the ground. Except not anymore. We would have it so good with Alaska Daily. I was going to say, was Alaska Daily, like 2019? I think Alaska Daily was just pre or just post-COVID?

I think that's probably right. Yeah, right around that time. Which is, I know, like, some deranged gay guys liked that show. Bobby Finger. Devoted to him. It's satisfied an audience that it's just, like, she's kind of doing exactly what she should have been doing, right? It's a show like Alaska Daily. And I think there is, you talk about sort of, like, you know, I just saw the end of Oak Street.

So, of course, like, you know, wormhole, you know, events happening are on my mind. And you figure there's like a wormhole universe somewhere where Alaska Daily is on its seventh season. And every- She has three Emmys for it. Every week somebody makes a joke about like, is that show still on? Like, what show has gone, like, you know, 350 episodes or something like that? Right, exactly. One of those network shows that just sort of like has an audience somewhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, I mean, but speaking of, you know, sort of like wormholes or whatever, like Joe, you know, her two wins. like, yeah, she's good in both of those movies. But let's say Hillary Swank, if somehow we knew back, or the Academy knew back then, that she was going to win again for a million-dollar baby. Yeah. So if she doesn't win for Boys Don't Cry,

then Julian Moore wins for End of the Affair, and then Rosamond Pike can win for Gone Girl. Oh, I like this. I like the way we're going with this, yes. And then, knowing that Jennifer Lawrence is going to be in joy in 2015, that Nett Benning can win. wait, that was Natalie Portman's win for Black Swan,

Nett Behning, and the kids are all right. You guys are just setting up this alternate history where Annette Benning wins for Nyead. That's fine. I like that. Honestly, she's really good at Naya. Niaad is crazy. So was Jody. Jody was also really good in Naya.

What did I watch something recently? Where somebody was, it was a real-life thing where somebody was like slathering themselves up with something because they were going on a long swim or something. that and I literally am just like just like Diana Niyad. She's going full Niat. She's going full Niat, exactly. That's in the new Bellamy video job.

Oh. Not to out you, sorry. Um, so I did get really super high one pride weekend a few years back and I was like, let's watch Niyadh. Gay guy Niat night. Yeah, where's that happening? Cool kids of the South Beach. invited to an LA gay guy music video night, which has not happened in about 10 years.

I'm just going to, like, if the host goes to the bathroom, I'm just going to put on Niyadh and see what I hope, whatever one says. See who steps up to put an end to it? Knowing that crowd that I've done that with before, they would probably be fun. Oh, I would absolutely be the person who's, like, not putting on music videos, but putting on, like, trailers for, like, you know, weirdo movies that only I remember. The thin red line, june. And I'm just crying in a corner. I put on the Cloud Atlas trailer, and I'm just like, you guys don't understand. Dad, it's so good.

My first time doing ketamine and yeah, I'm just watching that. That would be a great first time to do ketamine or some kind of drug is to watch the Cloud Atlas trailer. Absolutely. The one time I did mushrooms, and I did like half the dose that anyone else did, it was my sister's 30-somethingth birthday. She rented a house of state with mostly her friends. And so I did whatever, and they were all having their experience. And I ended up just kind of playing DJ in the living room. I love that.

And then I made everyone watch the San Junipero episode. So that was my tripping balls experience. I love that. Oh, my God. Perfect. The Homesman would be a particularly interesting movie to watch while on your first trip on some kind of drug. Yeah. The first time you've ever taken a certain kind of drug and you're watching the Homesman.

There's a moment in the movie where it becomes a bad trip. Am I moved by this? What's happening? Yeah, it's a strange movie. rereading my review, it was interesting, because I obviously had seen the movie before when I rewatched it, but to read that review and be like, yeah, it was very surprising the tonal shifts this movie makes. And I think back, you know, we can talk about it at length, but like that's one, I think the chief reason why it sort of never gained traction. Well, this was a movie that I didn't see until, because at some point in that award season, you sort of got this, you know, you figured out that like this isn't really going anywhere. And so then that kind of falls unless you were at, you know, a festival where it played, and I wasn't, that sort of falls to the back of the list. So I remember seeing this movie like very, very late in that award season,

if not like maybe briefly after it. And so I spent a long time only knowing it as like a trailer or like a title and some stars. And you know what I mean? And I remember sort of like, it was the butt of many a joke for me at the time. And then I remember watching it this time reminded me of watching it the last time. I'm like, oh, right. It turned out I really liked this movie and was like really moved by, you know, the choices that it made and the things that it was talking about. And it's only, has Tommy Lee Jones directed a movie after this? I didn't think so. But now I'm realizing that I didn't do that actual specific search. Before this, he did the three burials of Melchiatis Estrada. Yes.

Which was a big hand hit. He won best actor, it won best screenplay. Yeah. It made sense that they invited him back almost 10 years later. Yeah. He got fired off of K-pop Demon Hunters. Oh, right. Right.

But a lot of what's in the final movie is his. Yes. Yeah. Well, they wanted it to be a lot more. They wanted to tone it down from his original vision, which is what you end up getting in the original project. He drew on his experience from, is it, man of the house, where he's the head of the sorority? Whatever that movie was.

Yes. Yes, that and also one of the movies he made with Ashley Judd, too, yes. Oh, sure, yeah. But so Belchiadist's shot is interesting because, yes, it did win. It won prizes it can, at least won. I think it also won time for screenplay, right? Yeah. Yeah.

And then it sort of comes stateside, and I remember the word on it was like, it's very long, it's very strange, and it's very good. And I remember being like, well, two of those things, like, I should have known better

that like, that's a perfect formula for something I would want to see. And I remember, for whatever reason, I was like, no women in it, and I was just like,

you know, sort of like, drag my feet. And so I still have never seen that movie. So one of these days, I got to watch it. Well, January Jones is in it.

She's in the trailer and she gets a title card. And when I met it was well before it was before Mad Men or maybe it was just as Mad Men was airing. And I was like, that's a made up name. That's not a real actor. Love actually is January Jones. Yeah, I was right. Yeah. Well, Melchiatus Estrada comes out right before Westerns or like Neo-Westerns were cool again. And then the Homesman comes out a few years after they are no longer cool. We've had enough with the Neo-Western or the Outright Western. And it has components of in terms of. of like the guy, you know, can't stop what's coming from, uh, no country is in this. And then Haley Steinfeld from True Grit is in this. And so it's just, but like you're right,

Chris, that it's just like, oh, because it has all of the component parts, great cinematographer, great score. You know, award winning actors, you know, it looks great, you know, Merrill Streep cameo. Beautiful locations. Yeah. It was just a few years too late, probably. It's also, it has components of Lincoln as well because it's Rascally Tomolee Jones, James Spader showing up barely to be like... In costume from Lincoln. I think he just literally just stayed in costume for a year and filmed his homesman scenes. But it reminded me of another movie that I also felt was like, oh, this is a little sort of out of its time, which came the year after, which was that movie Slow West with Michael Fastbender.

And is it Cody Smith McPhee, who's the younger one? Yes, sure is. Really good movie. A giant coat. beautiful movie, like really beautifully filmed movie, I remember. Ben Mendelsohn is the villain, with a big fur coat. Yes, I got to re-lunch that movie together. And like the home has been a really lovely, sad, contemplative ending, you know, that's sort of like, oh, this is kind of about, like, existence.

It's not just a Western, you know. Yes. Which I guess all the best Westerns are. Yes. You mean the hotels, and yes, I agree. You're staying in the Best Western, you're like, what is life? What is my existence? Yes.

Shout out to all the best Westerns. It's Continental Breakfast and Tommy Lee Jones. Exactly. So I was excited to revisit this one and sort of, as I was watching it, I was more excited to talk about it with you guys because I was like, oh, this is a good, I feel like this is a good wavelength kind of a movie. I feel, you know, this movie is doing some really interesting sort of oddball things. I was yet.

I could not believe how much I had forgotten the twist that happens three quarters into this movie. Oh. Because I was like, oh, right. Like, it's the, like, it's the Hillary Swank movie. And it is. But it's also like, it is, I guess, more so the Tommy Lee Jones movie, certainly by the end of it. I had also forgotten that Grace Gummer was in it because this is. I had forgotten the entire three insane women part.

I remember the end with Hillary Swank's, you know, ultimate fate. But, yeah, that aspect of it. it was like, oh, right, Miranda Otto. I had misremembered that she was taking Tommy Lee Jones across this country to, like, be tried for something or other, because I remember him being, like, on the back of the horse with the noose around his neck. But no. From the trailer, right? Because the trailer really doesn't set up the movie all that well because it's, you know, framing it around their relationship,

which also takes a decent amount into the movie to even get those two together, about at least a half hour into the movie. Yeah. Watching it, I was like, this makes sense that it was based on a novel because it has those sort of like novelistic kind of touches to it. And you would imagine that you would learn a little bit more about the women. You would probably get a little bit more information about their lives. I will say Tommy Lee Jones does a good job in brief of giving you sort of little flashes of them.

One gets the sense that it's a very descriptive novel that, you know, you can capture in an image on film, but all the texture. It's like a bit like Hamnet. Like that novel is so dense in its internal monologue and like, you know, describing the home and the fields and all that stuff. I also think, and maybe this is this podcast episode is going to blow this up and ruin it. But like, what a Sin a Matrix bonanza. Oh, Jesse Plemons, two letters, A to G or whatever.

Or A to H. Like, you know, Grace Gummer, you know, whoever else. It's a forgotten movie. It almost feels like a movie that. that did get beamed in from an alternate universe where it got six Oscar nominations, but lost to some other Scorsese movie that never existed in our realm. The world where dinosaurs are roaming the earth is also the world where the Homsman is a multi-Oscar nominee. The other thing I think about you say that it's so very based off of a novel.

I also in processing, because I somehow never knew about the twist of this movie or the pivot of this movie. Um, so I was really taken aback and I feel like I, as I was watching the movie, I realized in real time why this movie kind of failed in, you know, the expectation in regard. Uh, because of that, it's, it's, it's so much to deal with and it's such a, like, turn. But it also made me think, as I was processing about Lonesome Dove. So this is a, oh, okay. Definitely a book that probably was heavily influenced by Lonesome Dove. Uh, Lonesome Dove being, you know, a giant doorstop of a novel to the point series that defined like a generation of miniseries. Television for a decade. Although I never read nor

watched Lonesome Dove. So I'm kind of I really know what really is a title. It is probably, I would say as an adult, the best book I've ever read, if not. No shit. Oh wow. I didn't know this about you. Wow. In the way that like the great comet of 1812 is

a section of War and Peace you could believe that the Homesman would be like three chapters of Lonesome Dove. Yeah, like an anecdote that someone mentions, oh, Mary Beach, Cuddy, she used to live down the way, and she once escorted three crazy women to Iowa. Yeah. Well, and just the way that death comes unexpectedly,

and people who are significant characters suddenly don't become significant, or don't stay significant characters throughout. And also just the way that you were saying, oh, this is actually kind of about existence and what it means to be a person in relation to another person. And people who sort of live outside of community

and the people who are, you know, better served by community and the ways in which poorly socialized communities can really like ruin people in a way. And as they were also all ruining another community of people who live there more. Also that.

Yep, yep, very much. And self-interest, how even if you're in an incredibly intimate situation with someone, or maybe even it's not that intimate, but there's no one else around you for miles, self-interest can, you know, be this unbreakable wall between two people.

Yep. And sometimes three ladies, just to like to watch a lady and an older man. get at it under a bearskin. That moment is almost more shocking than what happens immediately after. Yes, it almost is. Yes, that first shot of her sort of standing above him like that. Yes.

We'll get into the plot description shortly enough, but Chris, do you want to let our listeners know why they should, if not already, be signing up for the San Oscar-Bus' turbulent brilliance? Hey, listener, we have a Patreon. By now you might have heard about it, but if you haven't, let me evangelize it to you. Gather around, I have news.

This had Oscar buzz turbulent brilliance can be yours for only $5 a month, in which you will be getting two bonus episodes. That's more of the show that you love already. The first bonus episode will come on the first Friday of the month. We call these episodes exceptions. These are movies that fit that this had Oscar buzz rubric of great expectations and disappointing results, but managed to score an Oscar nomination or two. Earlier this month, we talked about joy.

She's Joy, by the way. Jennifer Lawrence's most recent Oscar nomination. All about that mop. All about those other infomercial stuff. All about adversaries and commerce. Exactly. What other exceptions? Let me say that again.

What other exceptions episodes have we done before, Joe? Well, we've done things like 90s faves, like Contact, The Birdcage, my best friend's wedding. We've done masterpiece movies like Mahal and Drive, far from heaven, Steven Spielberg's AI Artificial Intelligence. We've done some bad movies like Rob Marshall's 9, Madonna's WE, and everything in between whatever you may think of it, like the Black Dahlia or House of Gucci. We've been doing this for, did we say three years, three years now?

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I reiterate. I endorse it. I like it a lot. See? Richard, listen to Richard if you're not going to listen to us. All right. We're talking about the Homsman this week, directed by Tommy Lee Jones,

written by Tommy Lee Jones, Kieran Fitzgerald and Wesley Oliver, adapted from the novel of the same name by Glendon Swarthout, starring Hillary Swank, Tommy Lee Jones, Grace Gummer, Miranda Otto, Sonia Richter, John Lithgow, James Spader, Haley Steinfeld, Tim Blake Nelson, Jesse Plemons, William Fickner, and Merrill Streep, got the and credit there, premiered on May 18th, 2014 at the Cannes Film Festival, we'll talk about that. Detoured, it did the whole shebang fall festivals-wise. Tell you right, Toronto, Mill Valley, the Hamptons, Savannah, Middleburg, AFI Fest.

Which festival do you think it got, like, the most perplexed reaction out of? The Hamptons. The Hamptons. Yeah. I ever tell you my Hamptons Film Festival? Really quick story. Do it. Yeah.

The first time I went there, I was there doing an hour-long thing with Alfrie Woodard, and we were backstage, and we were talking. And then when it was time to go on, she turned to me. She said, let's go entertain these white people. But this is why she should be an Oscar winner I agree But the next day I was there with my boyfriend And he wanted I had it was the first Knives Out year

And he hadn't seen it So we went to the theater in East Hampton Where it was playing that night at the festival And all the rich people were laughing laughing laughing And then when they realized it's a movie About undoing generational wealth I'm not joking I'm not exaggerating The laughs completely died for the last 20th

Oh wow It was fabulous. I hope somebody told Ryan Johnson that. I hope he was, felt accomplished by that. A nice festival, though. Oh, would love to go. Hint, hint, hint.

Limited, oh, sorry, opened in limited release on November 14th, 2014, distributed by roadside attractions. It opened on only four screens, and as a result, it opened in 43rd place on that weekend. Dumb and Dumber 2, Dumb and Dumbmer T-O was the number one movie of that weekend from Universal Pictures, scoring $36.1 million, ahead of the second weekend of Big Hero 6,

the second weekend of Interstellar, the first weekend of Beyond the Lights, the seventh weekend of Gone Girl. That was your top five. So honestly, if you went and saw Dumb and Dumber 2, you made the wrong decision. I was going to say, five Oscar nominees. You know, you have visual effects winner,

Animated Future Winner, Song Nominee, Actress Nominee, and the Best Picture Winner. Yeah, yes, obviously, yes. Other, I put down here some of these other movies because I thought they were notable. Number 13, the John Stewart directed Rosewater, which has the distinction of being the first TIF movie I ever got explicitly invited to the premiere of, that they actually, like, reached out to me, and were like, would you like a ticket to this premiere? And in any other year I would have known better to be like, thank you, like, my schedule is full, but like whatever. But that year I was like, I will say yes to everything.

And Rosewater's not, it was fine. But like, the- It's better than his other one. Well, that is true. Oh, the other one is, it should be scrubbed from the earth. Just deeply unmemorable. Number 15 is saving Christmas. And if you think that's just an innocuous Christmas movie title,

it is, in fact, the Kirk Cameron conservative Christian movie. that made $992,000 on its opening weekend. I knew I made $992,000 that weekend. I couldn't remember where it came from. That's how. Yeah. You can now fill in your books. I was going to say,

doesn't roadside attractions basically just do like Christian movies now for the most part? Oh, is that what roadside attractions is doing? That's crazy. The attraction is just a megachurch. On the side of the road. It's a giant statue of Jesus coming out of the earth. Yeah.

Foxcatcher debuted that weekend on six screens, 270K, good for 24th place. And yeah, then the Homesman in 43rd place. Alas, you know, 45,000 of four screens. I guess that's still even per average. That's not great. But it was all in bank notes from a bank that had gone bust. That's true.

They would have gotten more. That's true. Man, was that a kick in the balls at the end of the movie when the bank notes? Listen, I don't know. I would make a very cogent point about modern day finances if I had any knowledge of modern day finances. It's crypto. It's crypto. Yes.

It's the crypto. We're all gay guys here. None of us can drive and we don't know how money works. Yeah. Chris, would you do me a favor and time me while I deliver? I'm going to time you. You will be delivering the 60 second plot description of the homesman this episode. I will be.

Are you prepared to give that 60 second plot description of the homesman? Yeah. It's on my name. notes app, and I will just say right now that I typed this up very quickly. Your 60 second description of the Homesman is a notes app apology. Is a notes app apology. I typed it up

very quickly, and Notes app is to me notorious for making very weird autocorrects. So if I say something crazy, I'm just going to attribute it to autocorrect on Notes app. But otherwise, yes, I'm ready. Right. I'm ready. If you're ready,

your 60 second plot description of the Homesman starts now. Her name is Mary B. Cuddy. She is Plain. She is, to reiterate, plain. And she moved to the Nebraska Territory from New York in order to build a homestead for herself. The work is hard and no one will marry her, so it's not much of a surprise that she volunteers to drive a wagon, transporting three local wives and mothers who have fallen prey to prairie madness. Arabella Sowers lost three children to diphtheria in a matter of days.

Gross Venson's husband beats her and her mother recently died. And Thielim Bellnapp threw her infant baby down an outhouse hole rather than have to care for it through another harsh Nebraska. winter. Mary B. Acquires two mules in a wagon and soon after saves the life of George Briggs, a claim jumper in general old Coot, who was set to be hanged by the local men. Mary B. Promises Briggs a cool $300 if he can help her get the women to a church home in Iowa. And if he tries to harm or desert him, she'll shoot him dead. Good deal. The trip is hard, be set by weather, native tribes who threaten them. Ten seconds. And the women themselves who have behavioral issues, Briggs becomes increasingly helpful if attitudinally. Mary B. eventually asks him to marry her.

he declines. She then asks him to lie with her in the carnal sense. He reluctantly obliges the next morning Mary B. Cutty hangs herself on a tree limb. Mornful for this loss of a good and godly woman, Briggs momentarily tries abandoning the women, but when they follow him across a river, he rededicates himself to getting them to Iowa. Along the way, they try to get lodging at a handsome but isolated hotel, and when the proprietor callously refuses them, Briggs burns the place down with all the swells inside. Briggs and the women make it to Iowa. He hands them off to Merrill Streep. He learns the $300 is now worthless because banks can just go wonder and leave your paper bills worthless. He gives Haley Steinfeld a pair of shoes. He has a headstone made for Mary B. Cuddy's grave. He takes a river ferry across the Missouri. And while he's

slapping his ham bones to the tune of some body local bluegrass thing, somebody kicks the gravest into the water. Unnoticed, it sinks the end. And the human experience turns on. Yes. Forty-eight seconds over. Okay, that's fine. I'll take it. I could tell when you hit me 30 seconds and I hadn't gotten to her acquiring the mules yet that I was probably in trouble. You can't forget the mules. I can't forget the mules. I did make a note as I was making my note. I was just like, are those mules instead of horses?

And then later he mentions the mules. So I was very happy about that. I was right. Not the Grace Gummer kicks Miranda Otto in the face movie you'd expect. The fact that we haven't gotten a second Grace Gummer kicks Miranda Otto in the face movie is why the industry is tanking right now. And I would say it just seen Miranda's turn. Oh, no, I guess that was two later. But did you ever see Miranda Otto in her season of Homeland?

No. Oh. Oh, she plays this incredible sniveling villain. It's like, it's worth watching. It's a standalone season. It's worth watching for her. She's incredible. Okay. Awesome. Must have been that must have been the last one or whatever when they stopped. It was like the, it was like toward the end. Nice, nice. It's like how the killing kept going and they had one season set at a private boarding school with Joan Allen as the, they sure did. Oh, a military boarding school with Joan Allen as the headmistress. Yes. Military boarding school and Joan Allen, hello. I'm saying, yeah, yeah. Probably the last like really interesting thing Joan Allen has gotten to do.

Film, on screen at least, John Stee's story? You ever see that piece of it? Unfortunately, I did give Lisi's story a go. Yeah. Woof. Yes, I agree. With that cast especially,

woof is right. So, yeah, I think I started making my notes here about the Hillary swank of it all, which I think is a good sort of entry point here. We talked about her sort of post-Oskers filmmaking. A lot of movies that

I didn't bother seeing Freedom Writers, P.S. I love you. The Reaping. I did see conviction. We did it for this show. That's right. Although I had seen it before it. I think that was the second time I had seen conviction. That was a year where Hillary Swank was lurking to snipe and that Benning once again and didn't happen that time.

And like Rockwell was getting nominations for that for conviction, I think, here and there. Yes. New Year's Eve, I did see because I am a weird Gary Marshall holiday movie completest. To the point where I saw Mother's Day in a movie theater, I feel like. Wait, does she play like the head of New Year's Eve in that or something, right? Yeah. Doesn't she like run the Times Square thing? Yeah, she's Mrs. Claus of New Year's Eve.

Right. She plays Eve. She's doing antics. I think she's like the president of Times Square, though, or something like that. I think you're right, yeah, yeah, yeah. That movie... I feel like everybody gets paired off in that movie. And I feel like, is that the one where they pair off Michelle Pfeiffer with Zach Ephron?

Yes. In her like bucket list thing. Right. Yes. Yeah. Are you watching Michelle Pfeiffer on the Apple TV show? I watched a few episodes. I thought it was fine.

It was a little overwritten. It's good in a way that like, man, I can see a version of this movie that I love and is great. And it's just like I wasn't quite getting there. Well, what I like about the show that I, of what I saw of it, I liked that it, I liked that it feels a bit like anywhere but here where the heart is, like that sort of era of like women's pictures from the late, mid, late 90s. Yeah. Or like, or riding cars with boys.

Like, young spunky woman gets pregnant and has big character mom, you know. Yeah. But it's also doing the thing of like, it made me think of a lot of those like showtime shows where it's like a woman to make ends meet does something crazy. And it's like weeds or like. United States of Terror or Nurse Jackie or something like that. So does not surprise me that Al Fanning got nominated. They got a bunch of nominations, actually.

Well, so did Michelle, right? Yes, Michelle did. Nick Offerman did. I was kind of gratified that, like, Widows Bay came in and sort of like ate its lunch a little bit by being sort of like genuinely like a show that people just sort of like watched because it seemed interesting and they really liked it. But you know, the expectation had been that Michelle Pfeiffer was going to get nominated for her truly insane to.

Sharedan show. I remember. I remember the buzz on that. That show is absolutely, I mean, the big thing was like, oh, I mean, he has a lioness too, but this was like a Western set kind of in Yellowstone world, but it's about women this time. And the first five episodes are just about how women are flighty and stupid and just need to be educated in how to live a true life by a man. Isn't it also about how like only a truly insane person would ever live in New York? Oh, very much so. Very much so. But also it's about Ben Schnitzer being so fucking hot, it's insane.

As many things are. Ben Schnitzer, every once in a while, will show up in something. And he's like, I dare you not to find me hot. I am thinking of Snowden. And it didn't work, Ben. It doesn't work. Have you seen the episode of, I just rewatched the episode of Law & Order with him in it where he plays a teen boy who's secretly having an affair with Kathy Baker? No, but Kathy Baker you're talking in our language.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's pretty good. Ben Schnitzer, as I always say, is a soap opera Nepo baby, so I have to shout that out. His father was on another world. Yeah, Hillary, right. She enters after this movie. She has these kind of, like, the biggest role she gets are, like, villains in, like, Logan Lucky and the hunt. God, the hunt.

The Hunt, a movie that I probably should have liked in spite of myself, and instead, I really, really hated. Yeah. It's a dumb movie, but Betty Gilpin's good, no. Yeah, she is in everything. In everything. Yes. She's also in a movie called I Am Mother, where she is credited as woman. Women.

Right. I feel like the opposite exists somewhere to. I think it is about a robot. Yes. It is. Oh, that's a Hellen Ready movie. The film follows daughter, a girl in a post-apocalyptic bunker. being raised by mother, a robot who is aiding the repopulation of Earth.

It was a Sundance movie. It was released on Netflix. All of these things make sense. She also made two movies in rapid succession that I thought were both Christian movies, but maybe only one of them was. One of them was called The Good Mother, where she, her son is murdered, and she has to, her and, her and, his girlfriend have to find out who killed him. So maybe that's not really the Christian one. But then there was one called Ordinary

Angels that certainly was Christian. You know how, that's right, that was a Lionsgate movie. Every once in a while, Lionsgate will release something like completely irresponsible. And I was just like, what? Based on true events that transpired during the 1994

North American Cold Wave, a thing that has a hyperlink on Wikipedia. So, boy. You know what she also appeared in around the sort of 2010s, late 2010s, was there's an episode, I forget who the guest is. There's an episode of Jerry Seinfeld's comedians and cars getting coffee, while while they're driving, another car beeps and rolls down the window and waves. And it's Hillary Swain. That's incredible. Yeah.

Yeah. That's fantastic. See, like, that's what she should be doing. She should be doing, like, bits on, like, I don't know, shows produced by John Wilson. Yeah. Yeah. She was in a movie called What They Had with her and Michael Shannon and Robert Forster and Blythe Danner. I was into that movie.

I didn't see it. I remember it getting, like, whoever was distributing it, like, definitely sent out a war for that. Was it Bleaker Street? Okay. And then she was in a movie that I remember being at Tiff that didn't see, a Billy August movie called 55 Steps, where she's in it with Helena Bonham Carter, and it's about, like, mental health, but, like, in, like, decades ago before mental health was as advanced as now.

And I think it's a movie about, like, Helena Bonham Carter is crazy, but is she really, like, crazy? Like, that kind of thing. And Hillary Smake is, I believe, the doctor. Okay. So here's my question for both of you. Yeah. Is Hillary Swank a bad actor?

Good question. There's things that she would be so right for that she does not get cast in. That's why when Alaska Daily happened, it was like, this is perfect. This is what she should be doing. Because sometimes she's really great. Like, she's incredible a million-dollar baby, in my opinion. Yeah, I agree. Like, she's part of the reason why I could say I love that movie.

But she's cast so perfectly in that. Is she cast perfectly even in the homes? I would say no. I would say she's even a little miscast for this role. I remember liking her performance more than I did on this viewing. Joe? I think, because you can definitely point to movies where it's like, oh, she's like actively bad. But you chalk that up, something like Black Dahlia, obviously, which, like, I'm now...

It's impossible to be good at that movie. It really is. And she's poorly cast. but like she is kind of actively bad. And then there are movies in which she's maybe not like an anchor on the movie, but you get the feeling that like, oh, somebody else probably would have been able to do more with this. And I wonder if, I guess my cop-out answer is like,

it's probably a thing where like actressing sort of exists on a spectrum. And there are some actresses who can like do great work with anything. there are some who can be like really, really great in a very specific way and can sort of, you know, bring interesting energy to other things. I think Dakota Johnson is in that way where like even when Dakota Johnson isn't specifically good, I find her interesting. I find her very watchable. And I think when Hillary Swank isn't clicking with a role, it's not, it's hard to watch. It's not. It's very flat.

It's very ungainly. And you're just sort of like, I wish I was, even if it's not going to be great, I wish I was enjoying the effort and, like, some, and not specifically watching somebody be effortful, but like, I wish I was watching appreciating the swing of it more. And she's not a very idiosyncratic performer. Like, you don't watch her for the details or the minutia, you know. No, exactly. Yeah. And that's why she's, I would argue that.

No, go ahead. I would argue she has three and a half good performances. Give me. This is the half, homestead. Million Dollar Baby, but gradually, I don't love that movie. but she's good in it. Boys Don't Cry, kind of Dido. Don't love that movie. She's good in it. And I think she's good in Insomnia.

Yeah, we just... But in Insomnia, she's playing a really earnest, guileless kind of goober. And in the other two, she's kind... And in this sort of, she's playing sort of like a bumpkin of varying extraction, you know?

That like, somehow her sort of flat affect, her guilelessness, like, works for her in those roles. Yeah. I think where the performance falls short in this movie is exactly what you said, Chris. I want more detail here. There's a lot of silence,

you know, a lot of reaction to things that you're just not getting anything from her. You want a character actress. And it makes her a frustrating actor because you're like, you're not doing anything when you're not talking. And then when you're not talking,

it's often very flat. Well, you compare her in this movie. And like, I don't even think this actress had quite gotten to how good she would end up being. But like, you compare to Grace Gull. in this movie. And like, even as young as Grace is and how much she would still have to grow as an actress, you can, you can, I'm really interested in watching her react to things. She's not very verbal at all in this movie, but like she's, you know, she's reacting to things. She's very

present in her body. She's very sort of like active physically. And it's a much, much more interesting performance to watch happen. And, and, and I, I think, you know, you can see that in her, you know, as she's sort of grown throughout the years and in other roles. I honestly, like, I will always stick up for Mamie Gummer because she cracked my ass up on the good wife. But like, I think Grace is definitely, like, the impressive street offspring. Yeah, yeah. And it seems like Mamie's kind of given up. Like, not giving up, but just taking a break or whatever. But I think that, you know, I mentioned, like, having a sort of pity for Hillary Swank's career, too. And part of that is. And part of that. that, you know, to contrast her quite mightily with Grace Gummer, is that Hillary Swank is one of the very few, like, movie stars to emerge in the last quarter century who is from, like, real working class background. Yes. You know, like, her, chastain and, like, a few others. And other than that, it's like, waiting tables.

She was a working day actress for a long time. Yeah. Like, and I think that that there's something to be said for, like, she had to work that much harder to even get, like, the next karate kid or what came before that. And then 9-0-0. And then to work her way up to two Oscars, starring in big stories. starring in big studio movies. Like, I wish we had more narratives like that. I just wish that Swank was able to do more with what she earned.

Amy Adams is a very interesting comparison. We've talked about them, specifically at the very least, for that 2010 Hollywood Reporter Roundtable, where Hillary Swank tells a story about getting offered the role or wanting to get the role in people like us. But I think in general, they both sort of have similar ways in which they have a approached their careers in the past in which they will, they don't, and Amy Adams has definitely talked about it. She has talked about not feeling like she was in a position to turn things down for a very long time because I waited so long to get these opportunities. And now, you know,

all of a sudden I'm in this like blessed position where I'm getting them. What am I going to turn, you know, things down? And I think Amy was able to navigate that better. I think possibly because she was just sort of found her way into better projects, and that sort of helped spur her along. But whatever it was, like, she was able to, I think, navigate that come up in her career in a way that Hillary just couldn't quite do. Well, and I'll be mean if you don't want to be. It's because Amy Adams is a much better act. She is a much better actress. No, yes, that's absolutely true.

Yeah. With way more range. Yeah. Range is absolutely the way that I would probably put it. too. Yeah. Yeah. It's also maybe some of why she's so good in Million Dollar Baby is because

she probably feels a certain kinship to the drive of that character, the, you know, not to say that she's playing herself, that's not what I'm saying, but that there, you know, there's probably a connection to that. Yeah, I would think so. Because in real life, she euthanizes

Clinties Wood, or she's going to. Yeah, yeah. It's an inversion of what actually happened. Yeah. Well, he has that written down somewhere that like when it comes time for him to go that she's the one who has to And then when she walks to the room he's going to be like, oh, you've come for me at last, you angel of death. Yeah, exactly. You ordinary angel.

You ordinary angel. To talk about her in this actual best actress race, because it definitely felt like one of those things that was going to happen and that just never happened. There's like no precursor attention for her in this movie. Yeah. And this is why I was so surprised. that I didn't know the twist of this movie does some of that have to do

with the fact that she's not in the last 45 minutes of the movie because I feel like you maybe would have heard I would have maybe heard some of that during this season of how it's like yeah she's the lead of the movie until she's not maybe the movie wasn't itself being talked about enough but like does that hurt her chances too

that she's absent? I think the movie was sort of ruled out early enough that people didn't really go down that far down the lane with her. And I also feel like there is a reluctance to spoil

a movie to that degree, particularly a twist, like, I'm not going to call it twist because that cheapens it, but like a turn in the movie that did feel genuinely shocking. Like she, you know, you are not prepared to lose that character that early in the movie.

But I also think it contributes to the, or it is contributed to by the fact that like even going up to that point in the movie, Tommy Lee Jones is giving the more interesting performance. He's giving the more sort of magnetic, certainly, performance in the movie. Well, and it's more comedic to leading up to that moment. And it's a pretty grim movie. Yeah. And I think also the fact that Tommy Lee Jones, who directed the movie and like, you know, was responsible for the book being adapted. I do think that there was some criticism of like this was billed in as much as it was advertised at all as kind of like a feminist take on the Western because there were, of course,

many women out in pioneer days and we just don't see a lot of movies about them unless they're being, you know, captured and John Wayne has to go rescue them or whatever. And to that, to the movie's credit, like it does do that. But then to have this twist, you know, happen three quarters of the way through where it's hard. to parse exactly why Mary B makes this decision is it just does she hang herself

just because she got rejected by another man which then kind of undoes some of the feminist stuff and then Tommy Lee Jones director of the film gets to have the Tommy Lee Jones show for the rest of the movie

and so I think it felt a little bit I was reading a couple reviews like it just felt a little lopsided like so wait what is this movie's agenda actually? I thought about that too as I was watching it a little bit of like so much of the movie

is about not just you know, Mary B. Cuddy as this unmarried woman of the plains kind of a thing who is rejected for marriage proposals on the basis of her being plain and bossy. But also the fact that she's contrasted and compared with these three women who have for various reasons owing to various aspects of why it was hard to be a woman at this place and time. things like infant mortality, things like domestic abuse, things, you know, just like, you know, the hardness of living on the planes and also having like no actual agency in your life in marriage or whatever. Loneliness. Right.

And so I think Mary sort of looks at them as these paths not taken. You know, she didn't get married, but she also then didn't fall victim to what these women fell victim to. And I'm like, that's really interesting. and yet this is a story based on a novel written by a man, adapted by three other men, and then directed by one of those three men. And like, I don't really want, and again, this is a podcast where it's three men talking about it. So I don't want to, like, overstep, you know, my outrage here a little bit,

not to be an, you know, absolutist about it or whatever. But it does feel like this is a perhaps more interesting, nuanced, in-depth, commentary could have been made by any number of women with input on this creatively. I think that there's purpose behind the at least shift in protagonists of the movie. And it's also worth saying, too, that we're still introduced to more women that provide more perspectives in the Merrill Streep character and the Haley Steinfeld character. And I think those are two pretty significant performances in this movie. Yeah.

Haley Steinfeld is like great saying five words in this movie. I love Haley Stinefeld. Yeah. I think, I definitely think that something, you know, that like kind of tight rope that it has to walk thematically is something that could have been better directed by Tommy Lee Jones. I think where my hesitation is the thing that makes me like where this could have been a truly amazing movie if like I even understood. any motivation as to why she makes such a significant choice as a character, that it really, that's part of why it's so easy to say it's a twist because it's so unexpected, but like, it's not very motivated.

It's so abrupt. It's not motivated. And maybe, you know, if the performance had been richer, we would have sensed more of this real darkness, you know, sort of sitting in Mary Bee, that Swank is just not communicating, you know. And we see the one horribly painful. And I do think to be nicer to swank, a really well-performed scene at the beginning where she proposes to this guy essentially and he's being polite and then he turns on a dime and is cruel to her. So we have that establishing bit. But then we don't see a lot of it until right before she kills herself or when she comes back from having, you know, buried the child, reburied the child.

And I just, yeah. And so we kind of have these two reference points. it's two men turning down a marriage proposal and after the second when she kills herself. And it just kind of makes it seem like that's why she does it. Where I do think there's a deeper reason that's meant, I just don't feel it. No, I agree. And also there's the fact that she's such a religious person and that's such a big part of her personality. And you imagine that, and maybe this occurs in the novel, that there is an element of that,

an element of her sort of like her faith being shaken by the things that she's seen or whatever but like that isn't really communicated in the film anyway and she's so doning to the women too she cares about this mission I mean she's she's really a she's a great caretaker and then she just abandons that you know kind of like literally overnight and I I in a one way appreciate the abruptness of it because it makes the movie interesting in terms of plotting. But yeah, it kind of undermines the themes, maybe. It does come shortly after she has this, you know, mission alone that suggests, you know, she's out in the cold by herself, she's lost where she could have become ill in that time.

But again, it doesn't necessarily feel connected to that. And then that is followed by, well, it's followed by the scene where he tries to abandon the women and they follow him through the river and whatnot. But that is followed by the interlude with the hotel on the prairie, operated by James Spader, which perhaps in part it's because this movie co-starred Tim Blake Nelson, and I thought of it from that way, and perhaps it's because we're in the summer of the Odyssey. But I remember thinking of No Brother Were Art Thou,

and being like, this feels like the scene that you would put in a movie that's adapted from The Odyssey, because it's like, you know, this is an allegory for, you know, this particular, it's a, it's a stop on the journey and James Spader is supposed to be, you know, the sirens or whatever. But I thought that, because it plays as such an interlude. It's such a sort of like, now before we get to our destination, we're going to, Briggs is going to have his moment to be, you know, an avenging, you know, an avenging angel or something. He's going to bring some sort of justice. And it works for me to the degree that it does because it shows that, like,

Tommy Lee Jones has now sort of internalized this idea that, like, to turn yourself away from people who need, you know, help, who are, you know, sort of this kind of, like, you know, the wretched of the earth kind of a thing. And to turn yourself away from these people is the greatest sin you can imagine. imagine. And he has kind of, through Mary B. Cuddy's example, sort of, you know, turned a corner in his life. And I think it's also notable that, like, James Spader has this very heavy

Irish accent, because I imagine it's not an accident that, like, you know, the Irish immigrant who himself or his family or his ancestors or whatever dealt with being turned away by, you know, any number of people is now in the business of turning other people away. but it did feel like a moment where in this relatively kind of oddly paced movie complimentary that you would get this thing like, ah, yeah, like these fuckers are going to get it now. Yeah, and I think that like that scene, it does feel a little out of place because it's really violent. And it, I mean, not what it shows, but what it implies. Yes.

And, you know, he redeems himself by committing a really heinous murder of several people. he left a living witness who was going to be like, oh, yeah, the hotel burned down because this guy with this, like, prison wagon, they're going to know immediately who it is. And so he's, you know, going to be a wanted man even more than he already is. But what I think that sequence does well, even the shot of him pulling up to this blue brand new hotel in the middle of fucking nowhere is, like, this was an insane time and an insane place to be. And all of these people were kind of crazy, either because of economic desperation or hubris or both. And the relief you feel crossing the river into Iowa, and there's this genteel, grassy, verdant town with, you know, polite little buildings and people bustling around. You feel a palpable sense of relief. But that was still the frontier.

Yes. You know, people back east would have been like, those people in that Iowa town are nuts. Yeah. And then there are people who are even further nuts, you know. And I think that that the burning the house down, it's like, yeah, these people have all lost their minds. Yeah. These three women are not the only crazy ones. Right.

And, you know, it's also the characters, you know, the way he sees himself, too, because he sees that as a redemptive act, but we see it as this egregious act of violence, too. Like, he's doing it in the honor, or he might think he's doing it in the honor of these women, but it's also himself who's been offended. And that continues through the rest of the movie too, especially with the headstone that he has made out of wood for her, that he's just going to go find her grave somewhere and just put it there. And then he doesn't actually care enough to care for that thing and it just gets washed away in the ocean. You know, like there is no redemption for this character.

He may feel like he wants to, you know, do the right thing in a way. But like it's past that and it's probably past that. and it's probably past that for this, like, culture and time of men. And it's in a moment where he kind of, I guess you can say, regresses to this sort of antisocial nature. Like, he talks about how he ended up in Nebraska because he had a family that he couldn't stay with, and he left and abandoned them. And sort of he's ended up sort of, like, living on the fringes. And he loses the headstone because he's firing, you know, shots into a crowd of people who were heckling him for, you know, doing his little song and dance thing. For being a minute. For being fucking loud in the middle of the night. So I just thought that was interesting too. It's just like, you know, he is falling back on his, you know, anti-social behavior. And as he's doing it, the version of him that's this, you know, sort of more pious, responsible, you know, contemplative person is sinking into the bottom of the river. Well, and I think that what proceeds that is a really small moment.

between him and Streep where she's so genteel and nice and grateful to him. And you can see on his face that she's misreading him. You're such a good man. Like, please, you know, Jesus, like, protect this godly man, whatever. And then he kind of seems to lean into that idea. And then she's like, okay, you can go now. Like, he's not fully welcomed into this other realm that he kind of crossed into briefly. He does that.

It happens to it at the card table where he, he sits there. He sits down to play a game of cards. And not only do they tell him, because they find out that his money is worth nothing, which is one thing. And they, you know, inform him of that. And you can then follow that up with, you know, they might have followed that up with sympathy or kindness. But instead they're like, now get the fuck out of here. Yeah. You dirty old hobo, you know, essentially.

It's just like, you're not welcome here. And, yeah. And the beauty of the filmmaking, you know, like, Jones makes a lot of great choices in the movie. Like, of this, this, this, this, river ferry just, you. you know, drifting into the night and the end credits rolling. And his little reckless party is still going on, but like, to what end? You know, like, he's going back into this, like, hellish wilderness. Now with kind of two different parties wanting to hang him, probably.

Yeah. Like, yeah, and I think that that's kind of, like, one of the movie's most interesting ideas or themes is, like, how far goodness will get you. And, like, there are good characters or one main good character. who suffers a terrible fate. It's about sort of like the arbitrariness of success in this time and place, but also just in life in general. Like good deeds are not going to like put you on necessarily the path toward, you know, good fortune.

And how good is the good deed you think you're doing? Like he buys Haley Steinfeld some shoes because she's barefoot in this hotel that she works in. He doesn't know her shoe size. He's just like, I'll take those shoes. Well, back then, everyone had the same size feet. Oh, that's true. That's different. Everyone was hobbled.

Yeah, they didn't, shoe sizes didn't get invented until the 1900s. Yeah. But I also thought of, I don't know, that thought has totally left my brain. Isn't that so funny? Don't get old, everybody. It sucks. It's bad. I'll think of it again.

You know what this movie made me think about was weirdly, is Mel Gibson's Apocalypse. Go on. It's another movie about, like, people in a place. the new world where it's just like pretty much everything is just going to kill you. You know? Yeah. Like it's what,

why are you there? I mean, in Apocalypse's case, they're, they're native to that part of the world. Yeah. But like, but then at the end,

you see the settler showing up and you're like, just turn around, turn around. It's very dangerous here. Like, you know, they were the more dangerous entities ultimately. But like,

I know, just watching this movie, you really feel. And I think that Tommy Lee Jones to, and I guess probably, you know, Melchiotis Estrada does this too, but to demystify the West

like that. But to your point, Chris, like, that had already just been done. And it had won an Oscar in one, you know, a big Oscar in one case. And then in the case of True Grit, like that also did very well. And both of those movies in their interesting Coenzy way kind of do a lot of the work that this movie is trying to do, even though this movie does it interestingly as well. You just reminded me of the thing that I had forgotten about, which is no country for old men,

Tommy Lee Jones, in No Country for Old Men, being the same year that he's also nominated for in the Valley of Ella, which I think too, obviously he doesn't, you know, write or direct either one of those movies, but I do think his performances in those movies touch on things that I think I was reminded of in the Homesman where I think that was sort of a secret. I know he got nominated for In the Valley of Ella, but kind of a secret, like, career peak year for Tommy Lee Jones. Yeah, for sure. And, like, no, I'm not defending its filmmaker at all.

No, right. That's a haggis joint. But that movie, I think, is the best of those post-9-11 movies. You've said this to me before. And its allegory and its execution and its performances, like, it's just a really well-done, thoughtful, haunting movie. And I guess that's the kind of Americana that Tommy Lee Jones wants to traffic in. You know? Like, I don't actually think of him doing a lot of sort of more, like, jingoistic, patriotic American stuff.

He doesn't do that. I guess that's what happens when your Al Gore's roommate at Harvard. His demeanor, that's true. His demeanor being the sort of, you know, you get that, was it the Golden Globes or the SAG Awards where they kept going to him for reaction shots, the Lincoln Year? And he was just like, he was unamused by anything. And he's sort of, you know. You get the meme comparisons of him to Grumpy Cat. Right.

The thing where, you know, the quote comes out on him of, on the set of Batman Forever about how he won't tolerate Jim Carrey's foolishness. Right. It won't sanction this buffoonery. And I think maybe you, the sense of Tommy Lee Jones a little bit erroneously becomes that like he's a Clint Eastwood type and you sort of think of that like would translates politically. And I think it's probably important to remember. The one thing that stands out, it's not a political thing, but that stands out to me is in one of her many acceptance speeches, Merrill Streep mentions, she said, I was on the set with my friend Tommy Lee Jones the other day and he said something about how like

isn't it a gift that we get to do this for a living or something like that. And I remember thinking, being struck by A, the fact that they're friends because like, again, attitudeally you would think they might clash or something like that. But also the fact that he would say something so generally kind of like

sweet and, you know, cheerful and whatever. And I guess like, I imagine there's a difference between the level of patience one has for like junket reporters versus the you know someone's attitude when they're among friends and colleagues and things like that or at least among Merrill Street. And I bet he's much happier on a film set than he is at an award show. Yeah. Unless that film sets Batman Forever.

Right. Although the thing about Batman Forever is that his performance is bonkers. Like it's almost as over articulated as Carey as it. Yes. Yes. Well, there's no, we don't have that Tommy Lee Jones. anymore. We don't have Tommy Lee Jones like doing blow

off boners in a wig like he does in JFK. You know, like we, that Tommy Lee Jones used to exist. That was a Barbara Cople documentary footage that they were able to get, that Oliver Stone was able to get from the late 80s, from his days. And then he, he said to the

dick, don't you feel so lucky we get to do this? Don't ever take it for granted. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I should say, too, we have recently retired the Sixth Timers Quisces. This was our sixth Tommy Lee Jones movie. It's also our 15th Merrill Street movie, and... That train's going to keep on trucking.

She's our most covered actress. Do you think you'll ever get to the probably most forgotten modern Merrill Street movie, Dark Matter? Oh, a movie I've never seen. That thing barely got released. Barely exists. Very dark story. There are still Merrill movies that we can and will do. I keep threatening Chris that we're going to do the prom at some point.

Isn't that more of a threat to our listeners? Yes, it is. And listeners, I will make good on that threat one of these days. You better believe it. I think you could make the argument certainly that the prom had Oscar buzz. Absolutely. I don't know that you could make the argument that Dark Matter had any buzz. No, I don't think so.

It's just Merrill's here. Chris, can you remember what our first Meryl Street movie was? It was episode number seven. It was episode number seven. There we go. Were we having guessed that early? Was it Richard on evening? No, that was our fifth already, our fifth,

Merrill Street movie by the time we had Richard on. Jesus Christ. Yes. Was it like Prime? No, Prime was our six. That was our six-timer for Merrill. Damn. Can I guess?

Yes. Suffragette? No. Suffragette. That was our seventh movie. This movie was a real crash and burn. Was a real sort of earnest, didactic. Oh, Lions for Lambs.

Lions for Lambs. There you go. And you did before and after, too, right? No, we're not done before and after. Oh, that boy's a snooze. It is. It is. For what it's about, too, it should be a lot more interesting.

I rewatched it recently for some reason. I think I was feeling sort of sad and nostalgic for Eddie Furlong. and the Liam Neeson character in that is so annoyingly stupid and rash and like male that you're like, how is this movie sucking out all the oxygen out of a room that Meryl Streep is in? Yes, yes. Apple TV did a series that was essentially the same story that I, for Vanity Fair, interviewed Chris Evans and Michelle Dockery for. Oh, something defending Jacob or whatever?

Yes, it was with Jaden Martell as their son. and he was accused of killing a girl, and it's essentially the exact same plot as before and after. But it was like, it was one of the weirdest things that happened during COVID lockdown was I was there in like,

my parents' living room on a Zoom call with Chris Evans and Michelle Dockery. And I was just like, all right. And like that was back when like, that for whatever reason, his like Boston accent was like a topic of conversation a lot. And so I mentioned that to him. Like, everybody's talking about your Boston accent.

And he was just like, He was very nice. He was very sweet. The both of them were. That show was adequate and fine. Somebody shows up. It's not CCH Pounder. I think it's Cherry Jones is the lawyer in it. And I remember being like, well, at least I get to watch Cherry Jones show up halfway through a series and she's the lawyer. At least there's that. At least there was that. Yeah. The Homesman was in competition at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Richard, you said you were there. Jury President that year was Jane Campion. Palm winner was Winter Sleep, Nuri Bilga-Salons, Winter Sleep. Three hour, I believe. Yes.

This was, I remember saying it at the time, I can't believe the balls to title a movie that long, Winter Sleep. So this was my first can. I was at a Mexican restaurant on 6th Avenue in the West Village of Manhattan. on a Friday afternoon having like happy hour cocktails with friends and I got a text message from the Vanity Fair. I had been at Vanity Fair for less than a year. I was going to say. You were probably very new.

From the office assistant being like, hey, can you check your email? And they were asked. And this was like, it was probably April 16th or something. Oh, wow. And they were like, do you, would you want to go to Cannes? And I was like, are you kidding me? I, like, of course. And so it was this very rushed trip in terms of the planning.

Yeah. So me and my cogan, my boss. us at the time. We got there after the festival had already started. Oh, wow. And we left too early. And it was just kind of like, I mean, it was amazing week of my life. It changed my life, frankly. But, but the first, so we land in Nice, we drive to DeKan, get check into our Airbnb, walk the very you know, two miles to the Palais. We did not book the right place. And the first movie I could have seen jet lagged and overwhelmed was winter sleep. Oh, God. I was like, I think that would be a really, really bad choice.

So I did not. Just sawing logs in front of all the swells at the theater. Exactly. But I did make time that same day to go see my beloved, dearly departed Gaspar dearest in San Loren. That was my first Cannes movie. Yeah. That's a good movie, too.

Yeah. What was your favorite movie? Do you recall your favorite movie at that can? Yeah. Well, my favorite movie I saw there was, so a few days before the end of the festival, I was out carousing with Kyle Buchanan. This had Oscar Buzz guest. Likely things that Kyle to be doing.

And likely thing to do in Cannes, I had had about 14 gallons of rosé wine. And we went to the one kind of pop-up gay club that used to open in Cannes during the festival called Le Club 7. And sitting in a banquette with all of his fabulous, beautiful young friends, was one Zavia Dolan. I knew you're going to say that. And I very drunkenly in this very loud club tried to introduce myself and say I was excited for his film. and he said, you've seen my film and I said, no, no, I'm just, I'm going to see it. And he went, he looked at all his friends, raised his eyebrows,

and turned back to me and said, okay. And they all laughed. Rude. It was hardly rude. I can't believe a French Canadian, enfantirian would be so rude. I know, the hot young gay guy film director was mean to me. But anyway, so I went to the movie Mommy a few days later

being like this better fucking suck. Yeah. And I loved it so much. I like cried. I thought it was amazing. When he opens, you know, when he expands the aspect ratio with his hands. with his hands. The whole audience applauded spontaneously. So that was my favorite movie there. But then when I got back to the States, I saw Clouds of Sils Maria, a Stone Cold Classic.

And then at the apartment of one Joseph Reed, I watched a movie called Mr. Turner. Oh, that's right. On screener. We were catching up on Oscar stuff that that year. And I think that was the same infamous day that we watched The Lady in the Van. I was going to say, I literally was like, are you about to say The Lady in the Van? Because we definitely did watch that at my apartment. But I think the ranking of those three would probably be like Sils Maria, Turner, mommy, but they're close. I also recall, if not that year, then around that time, we watched the lone survivor screener at your apartment on 14th Street. Oh, boy. Not lone survivor.

I think we did. Yes. In our Peterberg era? Yes, in our Peterberg era. I think it was already nominated by then, and we're like, well, we got to see it. But, yes. But yeah, it was the big thing that I went there for. was to see Foxcatcher.

Right. And again, with the carousing, I overslept the 8.30 a.m. press screening. I ran down the two miles to the Palais, got there. It was still, the movie hadn't started yet, but the French being the French, they wouldn't let me in.

So then I had to, like, Charlie Brown walked the whole way home in the rain, tell my boss, who I was staying with, that I missed the big movie. The big American movie. And he somehow finagled me a ticket to the next screening, and I went, and I dozed off.

I will say, I watched, I watched, That movie at Tiff, later in the festival, at Princess of Wales, and I believe a critics screen, that was when they were still doing P&I screenings at Princess of Wales. And I remember dozing off. Oh, those morning ones. Yeah, those were nice. Yes. Yes.

This movie got six nominations from the Women Film Critics Circle Awards. Now, I mentioned this because there are some categories in this particular award show that I just want to mention, because I find them to be fairly interesting. So, sorry, I clicked on the wrong. There we go. It's nominated for Best Movie About Women, a category that was won by Still Alice. I think that is good. It is nominated for Best Male Images in a Movie, a category that is worded just non-specific

enough that I'm like, what are we nominating for and why the Homesman? Best, oh, like, oh, portrayal of mailness, maybe. I think that's... Is it a betrayal of maleness, or is it, like, best-examination? examples of good male behavior. Well, it's the winner is love is strange. Right. The winner is love is strange, which like makes sense. But like, you know, best movie made by a woman.

Yes, absolutely. We love that. Best. Okay. One category is just females right to male roles in movies. And the only nominee and winner is Jessica Chastain and Interstellar. I get what they're going for. But like, why is that an award? You know what I mean? is just sort of like best performance in a role that could have been interchangeably male or female.

Like is that what that is, I guess? I don't even think so, right? Because like, I guess like that could have been a movie about him and his son. But like, I don't know. I'm also confused because that Bellamy swimming video you mentioned, that won best male images. It did. Yes. Yes.

Well, it had won enough times in a row that they stopped submitting themselves like Candice Bergen for Murphy Brown that one time. Fair enough, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, okay, so worst male images in a movie was one by the aforementioned dumb and dumber two. So, like, is that a commentary? But they're supposed to be bad. Well, right, and is like, is that a commentary on, like, the... I guess it's like you don't need movies like that, or you don't want to watch movies of male behavior like that.

I get it. Right. The one I want to mention and single out. Best Female Action Star in 2014. Now, Love. You want to single out women in action movies. This is a thing.

Their choice for Best Female Action Star was Oprah Winfrey and Selma. Again. What? What are we trying to, like, is it, is like, kind of also offensive? Those are riot scenes. Who is that hacky old critic who used to always? say something, but the best special effect in the movie is the performances.

Oh, or something. Yeah, that's like a McLaSalle line or something like that, right? Like a Pete Hammond kind of a thing. Yeah, it's that kind of thing of like, but the best action of the year actually, Selma. Selma. Is Oprah Winfrey specifically. If you think about it. Yeah. It just sounds condescending. You just

sound unforgivably condescending doing shit like that. Anyway, sorry women film Critics Circle Award. I'm sure the individual members, as the ones and Gallica are very good, but I get it. All right. I'm looking at the Can't lineup, just to go back

to Can very quickly. It's interesting that Julian Moore won best actress at Cannes and then won the Oscar that same year, but two different movies. Well, so this was your first can. This year, 2014, was my first TIF. And so, still Alice, is

one of the, I think, maybe few times in my, you know, now going on. Well, it's 12 years, but two years, didn't go there. So I think it's my 11th TIF, where a movie is genuinely unheralded coming into TIF and emerges from it as like a frontrunner for an acting award in a way that like felt, I know a lot of people were very sort of poo-poohish about still Alice in many ways because it had that trajectory where it's just like, oh, it's a TIF movie that like made people cry and now she's going to win an

Oscar, but, like, I kind of loved that sense of discovery with Still Alice, or somebody was just like, check out this movie. Julian Moore is really good in it. Yeah, that was my first tip as well. And my sister had come for the second half of the festival, and we saw that together, like, late in the festival, like, the third replay or something. And I was like, could that actually be, like, a thing? Because I wasn't really familiar with how any of this worked, you know, and it felt very small

and unheralded. I mostly was like, I heard Kristen Stewart does Angels in America in it. Yes, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. And it's also thinking about, like, check off. Yeah, exactly. That best actress year, you know, where there was a little heartbreaker at the end for all Aniston. But if you look at the Cannes lineup, yeah.

Take also premiered at that Tiff. Two days one night was at Cannes. So Aniston lost that nomination to Cotillard back in May. Oh, wow. Well, they certainly were not giving her an Oscar for Maps to the Stars. I love that. performance. That movie is a mixed bag, but I love that performance. But she also gets Globe nominated for Maps to the Stars that year, right? For actress in a musical or comedy.

Yeah, yeah. That was a movie I did not connect with, I will say. I like a lot of Cronenberg stuff. I did not. That was my era where I was like, I wish everybody would stop telling me that Robert Pattinson is the next big thing. It was like, that and Cosmopolis, and I was like, jerk off motion, jerk off motion, and not in the way that you would think with Robert Pattinson. But it was a big can because both he and Kristen Stewart were both in, you know, autorey movies at Cannes in the competition. Yeah. And it was like, and from that can, like Kristen Stewart came out more on top, I would say, certainly. Yeah.

But now Pattinson is more of the movie star. I think they've both sort of settled into what they want to do. I think what they want to do. I think that's right. And I'm happy about that. And I'm thrilled that they're both doing it. What a great way to spend your Twilight money. is just like being in cool shit.

Totally. I also note that the queer palm at that can was Matthew Warkas's pride, which I saw. Speaking of Ben Shetzer. Speaking of Ben Shetzer, speaking of this year's Oscar contender Andrew Scott, that was. And that's written by the same writer as Elsinor. Oh, Stephen Bears. It's a musical on the West End right now. Oh, is it really?

Yep. Oh, I hope it's good. Or maybe not West End, but it's in London. As somebody who never watched the Sherlock TV show, the Benedict Cumberbatch Sherlock TV show, I'm pretty sure Pride was the first thing I ever saw Andrew Scott in, and immediately, like, fell in love. What a wonderful movie. It's a great movie. Also a great movie about labor unions. Yes, that's, when I recommend that movie, that's like one of the first things that I'm just like, yes, it is a wonderful movie about, you know, gay community in the 80s.

it is a great movie about labor unions. As we head into Labor Day, you know. I keep waiting for it to show up on one of the streaming platforms that my parents use because I will, I do feel like that's a movie that I can like wholeheartedly recommend to them and be like, it's gay, but it's also labor unions.

You'll love it. And so one of these days. Did I ever tell you about the day I walked into their living room and they're watching the bird cage and they're about like two thirds of the way through the bird cage. This is like 2022, 2022,

it's not long ago. And they go... And the day is Bench Nets or Andrew Scott? Yes. Yes, my parents, Bench Netser Andrew Scott. And my mom and dad paused the movie and they go, have you ever heard of this movie?

And I'm like, first of all, bless and keep you both. Second of all, that movies from 19, 36, third of all, it's the best movie. And they're like, it's so funny. I'm like, yeah, I'm just like, and then I was just like, I'm very proud of you both for liking this movie, but also like, I love how like very selectively you internalized culture

that this movie is new to you, but wonderful. My parents recently asked me for a movie recommendation. And I, even though this is my goddamn job, I always freeze up. Me too. I don't know, Paw Patrol. But and then it finally sprung to mind. Speaking of Danger Scott, I was like, oh my God, there's a World War II movie my dad hasn't seen. Yeah.

And I was like, watch the movie pressure, which I still haven't even seen myself, but I was like watch it and it went over a treat. Guess who sucks in pressure? Yeah, someone texted. I think Bobby or someone was like every moment he's on screen is an abomination. Bobby and I had like, I saw Bobby's review on Letterbox and it was exactly the same as mine. And I texted him and I was like, oh my God. It's so bad. It's so bad.

I will see it. I just, I really, I mean, I, he was speaking of kind of pitying an actor's career. Like, Fraser for years, I was like, wouldn't that be kind of fun if he, like, had a comeback of sorts? Like, I know we had a tough, like, divorce and all that. And then the whale and also the campaign for the whale, I was like, talk about Goodwill evaporating. Like, so quickly. I now, you're just like, get out of your guy. Yep, yep, exactly.

Made worse by his. presentations of rental family. Which I was like, shut the fuck up. I don't think I'll ever see rental family. Seals with a, you're better for it. A lotus kiss or something like that. I was like, that is the most racist shit I have heard, my dude. Yeah.

Oh, Brendan. I know. Sorry, sorry, generalize an hour. I quoted a couple of, oh, wait, let's talk about very briefly, Merrill, if you can speak about Merrill briefly. This was her, what, fourth big movie after winning

her third Oscar for the Iron Lady. She's better in this movie than she is in the one that she gets her third Oscar. Better in most movies than she is in the one where she got her third Oscar. But I remember, we've talked about this on the podcast before, the general consensus that, like, well, once they give her

third Oscar, they're not going to keep nominating her every year. And then for a while they just did. They're like August Osage County, yes, into the woods, absolutely. Florence Foster Jenkins, why the hell not? The post. I maintain that she's fantastic in the post.

She's great in that movie. Just rewatch that the other day, and I think she's wonderful. I don't think, and I do kind of stick up for her in August Osage County, because again, it's that Dakota Johnson thing where it's just like, if you're going to be not great, at least be very watchable, and I do feel like she is that for me.

I say that as somebody who knows. never saw the play. So I know I'm coming from a different place with that. And then I think sorry, Richard, you were going to say. The post is Streep's last nomination, right? Yeah. Yes.

Let them all talk, man. That would have been nice. It should have been. It should have been. I want to know specifically, if if Merrill was sat down in front of me and I could ask like five questions. One of them would be who exactly are you making fun of and let them all? talk. What author did you see a talk back that you are making fun of them? It's a reverse life of them, you know, the cusk book about Natalie Portman, where it's an author making

fun of an actress, this is an actress making fun of an author. Yeah, that's a great question, Chris. And you know she had someone in mind. Yes, absolutely. I almost wonder if it's a little Susan Arlene. I thought of that, yes, because having played Susan Orlean, I imagine she has some stories about that. Yes. Yeah. I think in that now we are by far the biggest Oscar nomination drought in Merrill's career going on 10 years now. She did at some point just decide she's just going to make television, which as much as I liked her in that one season, especially of only murders in the building, I would prefer her in films to television. And I don't want I don't want, I don't want Martin Short to be her Ben Falcone, you know what I mean? That is true. I like that. I love their relationship.

Don't she? Yes. Her Ben Falcone. I love that that is, I mean, that's gay guy shorthand right there, too. That is, who's her Ben Falcone. But I think after the post, I almost said post to the post, after the post, there are definitely really good performances in there. Let them all talk with one of them. I think she's really good for, you know, what little she has to do in little women. I am the one person who's like, the topsy scene in Mary Poppins return is. fun, I enjoy it. But there's some real misjudged. Like, I think she's really, I mean, the thing in the laundromat where she's in brownface, like it's 2019 lady, like somebody in your team should have dissuaded you. I don't care who's directing it. She's really grading and don't look up in a way that I really hated to watch.

Yeah, her in Don't Look Up is a bit like Natalie Portman in the Gallerist, the Sundance movie that people haven't seen yet, where I love Natalie Portman's, you know, Black Swan on big acting choices. I even like her in Lucy in the Sky. The gallerist is where she runs out of, like, her bag of tricks or whatever. It's just like, wait, this is not working. You're trying something big. And that's similar to Streep and don't look up where it's like, no, if you could just calibrate this a little differently,

it would have been another one of your fun character comedy performances, but it just doesn't work. It's disappointed to hear that about Portman, although I have heard from a lot of people that that's, he's really bad. so I definitely believe you. It makes me all the more angry that she didn't get nominated for May, December because that was another one of, like, big choices. She was making, like, she was, you know, doing something really intentionally,

and I think she's really great. And, like, even to the point where nobody got nominated from that movie, from the acting categories, at least. Just the screenplay. Just the screenplay. And I know that, like, by the time nominations came out, Charles Melton and Julianne Moore were like on the cusp and didn't get nominated.

And they were both great as well. But like by that point, people had sort of like resigned themselves to the fact that Portman wasn't going to get nominated. And I'm like, guys, she is so much better than so many of these other nominees this year. She might have been my number one best actress choice that year. I thought she was great. I wouldn't mind if Natalie Portman made a movie really quick this year that's not the gallerous because best actress is so empty this year that like... I really thought that her movie with Lena Dunham was coming out this year, but it does not look like it is. As much as I am foaming at the mouth for any movie, including the Mike Lee, I will be in a fugue state when that movie finally arrives.

This is why I'm calling, though, Julianne Moore No. 2 this year. I think it's going to happen. I think that's a great call. Yeah. How do we feel, speaking of Lena Dunham, Carly Dunham, Carly Ray Jepson, 10 Things I Hate About You Musical coming to Broadway next year? What? Yeah. Oh, you didn't see that new?

No, I didn't. I missed it. Someone didn't read to the end of my newsletter the other day. I'm sorry. I'm just kidding. It's like literally the last line. It's fine. Wow. Yeah, that's going to be a thing. I'm very curious about it.

I mean, it's going to be like that's Gay Guy Ragnaroff right there too. Yeah. Exactly. They're going to only show that movie at MetLife because gay guys need to take buses in large groups out to go see to whatever the show, not the movie, but you get what I'm saying. Yeah.

And now that I'm freelance, I'm able to do kind of different jobs. So I'm actually, I'm going to be the only person doing the casting for the Heathrow ledger role in a locked room. Yeah, yeah. So I'm excited for that. Very good. Broadway has healed to the point where they will allow shenanigans again. The lecherous creeps are back on.

Good news, lecherous creeps. We've made it for woke one. Maybe that'll revive the musical. Yes. Rudin's back, so are the leches. Yeah. I wrote down some quotes from some reviews to just give a sort of sense of how this movie was received when it opened in the States. Ebert called it a risky film.

Sometimes the risks pay off. Sometimes they don't. But the feeling of risk infuses the film with chaos, humor, violence, beauty. The Homesman doesn't play things safe. And that's a welcome change. I largely agree with that. I think not on a like these big. scale like at risk, but I think on a sort of on a tone and kind of like, um, odd,

angles, I think it's, it does some interesting things in a way. Yeah. I mean, it's, you know, again, like I said, like it has all of these pedigree trappings, you know, this great score, this great cinematographer, you know, Oscar winning actors, all that. Uh, why didn't it connect? and there are, you know, that's the mystery of your show, of your podcast. Like, you know, we were like, sometimes everything seems to add up and yet it doesn't, the math just isn't there. But also, if you look at what did get nominated for Best Picture that year, Birdman, American sniper, boyhood, Grand Budapest imitation game, Selma, Theory of Everything,

whiplash. There's no room for the Homesman in that lineup at all. That was a big movie year. Like, it was bigger movies. Yes, absolutely. Elizabeth Weitzman for New York Daily News sort of reflects some of the things we were talking about, saying, alas, the screenplay adapted from Glendon Swarthout's

1988 novel, lacks its heroine's rigid spine. The story buckles in the latter half. As a result, we wind up watching two very different movies. The first forges ahead with Cuddy's fiery righteousness. The second takes a much safer route in which her pioneering spirit is sorely missed. I don't know if, maybe that's not necessarily what we're saying. I think she was sort of getting at the idea that, like,

swapping out Mary B. Cuddy for Briggs as the sort of protagonist of the movie maybe takes away some of what was special about it, which I don't entirely disagree with. And then this I quoted, this was the subhead, which I know headlines and subheads are not always and sometimes rarely the authors work, but it fit the critic when I tell you. you who it is. Cowboys and Indians may equal box office Ebola, but the Homesman, directed by Tommy Lee Jones, is not your grandma's typical Hollywood Western. Say that in your head in the voice, of course, of Rex Reed from the observer. May he rest? Yeah. May he rest. Famed shoplifter of Mel Tormey's X-Reed. I once sat next to him during the New York Film Critic Circle vote, which is mostly a silent kind of affair, unless they're reading out the The vote. Did he just grumble about everything?

Everything. Oh, God. Oh, God. It was very like Aunt Judy or whatever, the Kristen Wig. Like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I love those.

I love that they were based specifically on Amy Poller's Aunt Linda. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I wrote down in the miscellania. This is not a full game, but I did write down for the three of us to declare what our homesmen. name is, your homestman name is your mother's middle name

followed by the insect you're most afraid of, followed by the first letter of your zodiac sign Udi. So mine, for example, would be Lucille Hornet Lutty.

You are really afraid of hornets and bees. I really hate hornets. Lucille Hornet Lutty is my home's name. Mine is kind of a pinch-in-esque one. It's Elizabeth Spider-Guddy. See? That's a really good one. I'm not really afraid of bugs.

Can I just, like, make it a snake? Yeah. I'm terrified of snake. Absolutely. And birds, I guess, too. So it's Lynn Snake Cutty. That does sound like that's really good. I would not mess.

Lynn Bird Cuddy. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. or Lynn Bird is Lady Bird's Lady Bird Johnson's first cousin. Anything else? I'm trying to like see what else I wrote down.

I did write down that Plain is just such an incredible insult. Calling someone Plain. There's really no coming back from that. It also does present a casting challenge. It does. It does. You know, Hillary Swank is gorgeous. Like, you know, you see her on red carpets or even,

or in her car and comedians getting driving cars and coffee or whatever. You know, but, you know, I understand. She has a sort of more angular features, whatever. You could kind of make her look, quote, plain. You couldn't have Natalie Portman in this role. You couldn't have Nicole Kidman in this role. The question I was wondering is who would you cast in this, if not her?

Oh, that's interesting. Because I was thinking, like, Mia Vasakowsko would be perfect. She's also gorgeous, but you know what I mean? But she was too young in 2014. I would think, yeah. she's supposed to have, you know, already had a career and, you know, moved away and is financially, like, you know, she's fine. I don't know how young she would have been back then, but I'm thinking of, like, a Marin, Ireland, sorry, Marin, Ireland. Or someone like that, I think, would, like, really...

Elizabeth Marvel, speaking of true grit. Oh, speaking of true grit. Absolutely. That is my choice. Thank you for giving it to me. Because, like, I... That's the thing, because, like, a movie like this doesn't get made if you don't have a movie star and my impulse is like, no, this needs to be a character actor. This needs

to be a Kathy Baker. Amy Madigan. Oh, I mean. I'm going to take, I mean, this is a Bobby Finger Joint, but he, because he recommended to me. There is an amazing. I think it's a PBS. It's not Ken Burns, but it might be Ken Burns about the Donner Party. I, it's on my, it's in my queue of PBS documentaries to watch. And Amy Madigan narrates some of the letters. particularly the letters written by a young woman who survived. And the last portion, the last two minutes of this documentary are Amy and Madigan reading a letter from this woman sent after she survived. It is incredible.

I'm getting chills right now thinking about it. I've decided that's why she won the Oscar for weapons because of that 30-year-old documentary. But yeah, Amy Madigan would have been. Her voice will show up every once in a while in certain Ken Burns and Ken Byrne's and Ken Byrne knockoff documentary. And it's always a treat. Because one of the things for me about watching those documentaries is that like 15 seconds it takes me to figure out who I'm listening to, who is talking. Yeah. Yeah.

I was watching the American Revolution one. I haven't finished it yet because I have too many YouTube vloggers to watch apparently. Of course, yes. Which I wish I was kidding. But I found myself almost a little distracted by that because it's so many big famous people who are like, reading, you know, one half paragraph of the letter. And you're like, wait, who is that? And I was pausing. And then, but, you know, it is fun, though. I watched recently the one from probably two decades ago now, because they filmed, they made a special addendum episode after

9-11. So this would have made in the late 90s, the one about New York City, New York City, like an American story or whatever the hell it is. Incredible voiceover stuff. I also, I mean, somewhat depressingly, the American Revolution. stuff. Hearing Peter Coyote's voice being noticeably more elderly in the later ones is does freak me out in a way

that I'm just like, oh boy. Former Oscar announcer. Oh, so this is what I was going to say about plane. So yes, there was a series of Hallmark Hall of Fame movies back in the 90s called Sarah Plain and Tall and several. And they're based on novels and I remember my mom really liked those books or whatever. I read those books as a kid or at least the first one, yeah. And I think it's, I do think it is kind of funny that, like, Glenn Close was the

star of the Sarah Plain and Tall movies, because, like, she's absolutely, you want to hand some woman. Yes, yes. I think that's absolutely perfect casting. And she can carry off plane in a way that feels, you know, sort of dignified. Well, it's like they weren't, they really didn't want to give Glenn Close the fatal attraction role. Yeah, yeah. And then she came in and did her reading, I think, with Douglas and just, like, nailed it. They were just like, oh, my God, like, we are seeing her in a whole different light, you know. Yes, yes. Did you ever see that movie Woman Walks Ahead?

No. The Chastain movie? Yes. About the painter, no. Which was also, I believe, at a TIF. That was a TIF special, absolutely. Yeah. Tiff Gala, probably.

That movie, I thought of it. I had not seen it either. But I remember thinking of that. Like, oh, I wonder if anybody I know has seen it. Like, that's one of those, there are those TIF movies where it's like, we were all at the same festival. We were all seeing different. movies, but we all collectively didn't see X, Y, and Z that had, like, you know, big major stars in it.

Well, speaking of the, of the Amy Adams, I'm just going to take whatever because it took me so long to get here, like Chastain doing that and Zookeeper's Wife and, you know, a couple other things after her first, you know, amazing 2011 was an interesting period in her career, let's say. Yes. Well, yes. Speaking of plain, though, one of my favorite Simpsons jokes was the one where, I mean, speaking of Glenn Close, Homer's mother comes back and is revealed alive. And they discover this because her grave has been dug up. And they're asking the grave digger

at the cemetery if you've seen anyone. And he said, yeah, two ladies come by the other day. One was real pretty. The other sort of plain looking. And then the next jump cut is to Patty and Selma. Simpsons used to be so good. Perfect show. Yeah.

What else did I write? Oh, when we got to the scene in which Tommy Lee Jones makes love to Mary B. Cutty, as was the style at the time, and they cut to the three women, roped to the wagon, just sort of like vacantly staring at them. I did write down I miss sex scenes in movies because, glad to see a movie with a real sex scene. Very surprising sex scene.

Very surprising sex scene. And watching it again today. Yes. And I'm sure there's... I'm not even sure. I mean, other than the JFK thing you mentioned, like, have I ever seen Tommy Lee Jones fuck on camera? Yeah.

Like, I don't think you see that in Hope Springs, do you? Like, they imply it? We did Hope Springs. He gets a boner in Hope Springs. He definitely does. Right. I don't think you see anything explicit. There's no implication of insertion.

Right. In Hope Springs. There's no moment in Hope Springs where he says, take it in your hand. Right. Yeah. I also wrote down this quote was from when he's leaving the hotel after they have refused them hospitality.

And he says, your mothers and your sisters and your wives and your daughters will cuss your broke dixels. I would like that on a t-shirt or on a tote of some sort. And what comes before that is you're talking about, like, their guts filling up with shit? Yes. You know, it's great. Because that's preceded by James Spader saying one of the most callous lines I've ever heard,

and it's a wonderful line where he says, you know, we cannot accommodate women such as these. The milk of human kindness be damned. And he says it in such a, like, Blythe way where it's just like, you fucking son of a bitch. It's also funny because, like, you know, I mean, I mean, we don't actually know what would have happened, but like we can pretty safely guess that had that place not burned down in the meeting, the big proposal meeting had gone as planned. Right. That was not going to become some great hub of the Midwest. Right.

Volhalla of the prairie towns. Yeah. Yeah. That wasn't Branson in its earliest stages or anything like that. You know, the great city of Branson, Missouri. Yeah. I mean, that's all I got. Any other closing thoughts from you guys? This movie successfully pulls off a, like, underlining of what its themes are in a way that I would normally, like, throw a hammer at my TV, but it pulls it off in this movie.

The scene where they're talking about the two mules that are pulling the track along, and she's like, I'm going to name that one, Grace, and I'm going to name that one, redemption. I'm like, ah, yes, here we are. These are, this is the theme of the movie. And you're like, shut up. One of them is the thinker. One of them is the worker. Like, yeah. Yeah.

It's very, yeah. But no, it works. I like this movie's sort of homespun poetry and, you know, even if it is, unfortunately, pales somewhat in the reflection of recent movies that came before it. Yeah. Yeah. All right. We're going to move on to the IMDB game. Chris, do you want to let our listeners know how this whole thing works?

Every week, we end our episodes with the IMDB game where we challenge each other with an actor or actress. to 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 mention that up front. After two wrong guesses, we get the remaining titles release years as a clue. If that's not enough, it just becomes a free-for-all of hints. And that's the IMDB game. That is the IMDB game.

Richard, as our guest, you get the choice of whether you would like to go first or go last, and whether you would like to give a clue to Chris or give a clue to me. Okay, so the person I picked, I picked a co-star from Amelia, Hillary Swanks, Amelia. Oh, I love that. Oh, boy. And I don't know if you've done her recently, Cherry Jones. I don't think so recently. Okay.

I'm going to give that to you, Joe. I think this is pretty easy, but I just like Cherry Jones. We did Cherry Jones back in 2019, so... It could have changed. No, 2019 is forever ago. Are you kidding me? All right. Cherry Jones, any television? No television.

Aaron Brockovich. Incorrect. The eyes of Tammy Fay. Incorrect. Pamela Duncan wouldn't even get on the phone with IMDP. Your years, our are... 2002 and two movies in 2004

Is one of the 2004 One's Oceans 12? Correct. Okay. So there's a 2000 movie with Cherry Jones that isn't Aaron Brockovich. This is rude as fuck.

It's really fucking rude. Is she in the perfect storm? Well done, yes. She's in the boat with Karen Allen and the older guy. Yes, yes. They have to get rescued from the sailboat. I should rewatch that movie.

I remember really like it. And they never really explain why these two middle-aged ladies and this older guy are on the boat together. Like, is it a thruple thing? Yeah. Yeah, they never... That is the craziest movie to be like a summer blockbuster, too. Like, a stone cold bummer. They all die.

Downer. Well... That, like, you're telling the audience what is going to happen in this movie. And they made a summer blockbuster out of it. I remember in the Entertainment Weekly summer movie preview that year, they set up the, like, head-to-head battle that opening weekend between a perfect storm and Mel Gibson's The Patriot. And I decided then and there that I wanted the perfect storm to defeat the Patriot. And it did. It opened higher. And I was like, I win. That's it. That's for me. I did it. The Patriot also

was Stone Cold Bomber. That movie, I mean, true. I mean, he didn't direct it. But like all of his kids die in that movie. Yeah, like Heath Ledger dies and Mel Gibson survives. It is a tragedy. You've got two left. You've got your 2002 and your 2004. Okay. Cherry Jones, 2002. Somehow she's not in the hours. Trying to think of, like, if she's in any of the Oscar movies that, Aaron, I don't think she is.

She's not in Lord of the Rings, the Two Towers, although she auditioned for a tree beard, and they said, no, we want to do CGI instead. Well, they didn't want to do TIE. typecasting. I mean... Right, right, right. O2. Is it like a... Is it an award-se movie or am I totally like...

Up the wrong tree? It is not. I think it had... It might have had buzz at some point because of the filmmakers' past efforts. Okay. Okay. Would we have done it on this podcast? No.

No. Oh, two. Mostly like a big movie. It wasn't like... Huge movie. Yeah. And some might say, depending on your perspective, his last good one. Oh.

And I would believe that she is third build. I'm going to look up if that is true. Small but crucial role. She's fifth build. I guess that makes sense. Small but crucial role. I can give you an even bigger hint that I crack it open. The remaining two films are from the same director.

Oh, so O2 and O4 from the director. Kind of surprise you did not get the O4 movie first. You got the other 04 before. 04 is the village. Yes. And O2 is signs. Yes. Correct.

She's great in signs. She's so good in that. But kind of is there while the whole thesis of the movie is explained basically. Yeah. Yes. I love signs. I think science is fantastic. Speaking of Mel Gibson, weirdly.

It's crazy how much I like that movie considering he's the lead in it. Really good. All right. Excellent choice. That was fun. I love to think about Cherry Jones. Okay. Chris, for you, I went to very, very, very, very.

very early in the Tommy Lee Jones filmography. I sent you earlier today, I found on YouTube, a like 10-minute-long featurette on the eyes of Laura Mars. I knew you were sending that to me for a reason and not just because I love

that stupid movie. Well, I hope you didn't then go look up Fay Dunaway's known for because I'm giving you Fay Dunaway's known for. Oh, okay. We'll network. Yes. Bonnie and Clyde. Yes.

Um, I mean, not eyes of Lorimar's. Chinatown. Yes. And the fourth one. And of course, whenever I get three right off the bat, I have to psych myself out because I'm like, and I could get a perfect score. And it's been a while since we've had one of those. Um, I'm just going to say Thomas Crown Affair. No, not the Thomas Crown Affair. Strike one.

What if I was just like, dunst and checks in? Supergirl. Not that supergirl. The other supergirl. Not right. The other one. Um, that's all of her Oscar nominations, right?

I've mentioned those. Does she have more than three? Wait, I'm, I'm having an interesting thing happen right now. I have a different top four than you do, Joe, and my IMDB. Oh, is it different on mobile? Maybe.

Um, I think we have the same one. I just know. Oh, oh. I can't believe I guess anything else. It's Mommy Dearest. It's not Mommy Dearest. I think Richard thinks that we have different ones because the rule, of course, is that you have to say that something's your guess. You can't just sort of blindly pass it.

Oh, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, okay, I'm sorry. It's Dunstan checks in. It's not Dunstan Jackson. All right, well, give me my years because I've had three wrong. 1984. Supergirl. It is Supergirl. Sorry, I thought, for stupid.

No, I was just trying to slow play it and let Chris speed past it. No, Joe likes when I do it. that. Joe likes when I'm like, it's probably not this. The cast in Supergirl is absolutely insane. Faydonaway, Mia Farrow, Peter O'Toole, The Great Barsoor. And Dunstan. Dunstan's in that. And Dunstan, yes. They had a long

working relationship, actually. All right. An affair. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Very. Well, yes. That also, that was, Dunstan Checks In was the first movie where she threw things at a gay assistant in Burry. them. Little gay ape. All right, Chris, you give...

That's actually what broke up their relationship. She kept calling Dunstan gay slurs. Dunstan was like, I'm bi. Yeah, she kept telling him that bisexuality doesn't exist in apes. The worst thing that Faye Donoey ever did was bi-arararer of an orangutanque. We all know it. She definitely did not do other bad things or say other bad things. Was Dunstan and orangutangangangang?

Speaking of unforgivable fauxas, yeah. All right, Chris, you're giving to Richard. So, for you, I struggled to come up with something from this. So apologies for reducing things to people's spouses, but Grace Gummer currently married to Mark Ronson. Isn't it funny to imagine, like, Mark Ronson and Meryl Streep at the holidays? I know. She was formerly married to the son of David Stray Tharn, so I have chosen for you, David Strait.

Oh, boy. Okay. Good night. Good luck. Correct. I'm trying to go through. I'm not, this is not a guess, but imagine if it was a little prayer. That's a good little movie.

He's good in that movie. Yeah. Um, um, um, the firm. The firm is incorrect. Mm. Okay. The River Wild. The River Wild would be a great guess, but it is also incorrect.

Okay. So I'm giving you your years. You have 1997, 2012, and 2014. Oh, boy. Okay. Oh, yeah. Stratharine in later career. That's tricky.

You have two Best Picture nominees, I will say. Yes. Oh. Is he in Lincoln? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Lincoln then.

Yeah. Lincoln is correct. Lincoln shows up for a lot of people. Yeah. And that's the 2012 one, right? Yeah. Uh-huh. You still have 97 and 14.

So 97. Oh, he plays the Sikh guy in English patient, but that was 96. 97. 97. Oh, L.A. LA Confidential. L.A. Confidential is correct. So, 2014, not a Best Picture nominee.

He, I believe, this has shown up for someone else, and they are both like, what the fuck are they doing in that movie? And there's more people that are like, what the fuck are they doing? This is a really well-cast movie for what it is. Not award-Z. Not award-Z. Although, no, it did not get any Oscar nominations, but it probably contended in, like, some of the... Visual effects. Visual effects sound kind of a thing.

A hit movie. Yes. Yeah, I think... Made at least 200 million. Yeah. And spawned multiple sequels. Though this is a reboot of sorts. Yeah, I always forget...

A long legacy of movies. I always forget that the sequels to this movie are sequels to this movie because the franchise kind of takes a tonal turn. This one is respectable in a way that the ones that came after it aren't really. Is this superhero? No. Not a superhero, but a name draw in a way that, like... Of a character, you mean, not an actor.

We can... Same character. Oh, boy. I don't know, guys. Like a non-human character. Garfield? No. I think bigger than many. Straight-thand would be great as who's Garfield's owner?

Would probably eat a Garfield's... On one of its urban rampage. a Garfield. Oh. Was he... Is he in, like, a Godzilla or a King Kong movie? It's Godzilla. It's the Gareth Edwards Godzilla from 2014.

Who the fuck does he play in that? He's a military type guy. Oh, he was Aaron Taylor Johnson Stand in, right? That's right. Yeah. As Admiral William Stens. I was sick that day, and I was like, I'll just call Struthairn, he'll come in. Ken Wananabe, Sally Hawkins, Julia Pinoche, David Stritharan, uh,

Brian Cranston. Well, Brian Cranston is believable in this movie. Juleipanos just wanted to see what a trailer looked like. There's a little bathroom in here. She shows up in that movie basically to die two seconds later. Yes, she's probably like her big... It's probably like her second ever biggest paycheck. Yeah, I think that's probably true.

Is it Wadenaabe who sort of persists into some of the other movies? I know that like most of the other ones don't. I think Rebecca Hawkins. It's squished at the beginning of the second one. Oh, is that it? Okay. Yeah. Well.

She survives the whole first one and then gets stepped on. So she's the Michael Bean in alien? No, just in general. She is the Michael Bean figure of anything, really. She's the Michael Bean of Mike Lee films. All right, folks. That's all of them, right? He got all of the...

Yeah. Okay. Excellent. All right. Not too bad. I didn't too bad. Very good. Well...

The firm and Riverwild should be in there. They absolutely should. Not everyone's 43 years old. All right. Folks, that is our episode. Richard Lawson, once again. Thank you for joining us.

This was such a good time. Yeah. Please, if you liked what you were heard, go listen to Critical Darlings. Please subscribe to PremiereParty.com. Reader support is how I make a living. So I would appreciate it. Support the folks

whose opinions are smart and entertaining. Oh, and, you know, like, I don't know. This is airing a couple weeks from now, but, like, you'll be able to go read Venice Film Festival coverage and Toronto coverage and all that fun, the start of a true award season. Yeah. This is a good, good time to hit your wagon

onto Premier Party, for sure. Especially because it's a weird year. Yes, I'm very excited for that, specifically. Chris, where can those listeners find more of you? Letterblocks. Letton. Let Herboxed and Blue Sky at Krispy File.

That's F EI.L. Yes, you can find more of This Head Oscar Buzz in general at our Instagram, at This Head Oscar Buzz, at our Patreon. At patreon.com, this slash this had Oscar Buzz. And if you still want to check out the Tumblr, one of these days, we're going to get a dedicated website, and the Tumblr will go by the wayside. But it's still there.

Thisheadoscarbuzz.tumbler.com. It has a lot of porn on it now, though, guys. Oh, yeah. Well, it's... I know it's allowed on there again, but, like, You really should tone it down. Or crank it up. Jesus Christ.

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