This Had Oscar Buzz - BONUS – And From Canada, Virtual Festival (A TIFF ’20 Recap)

Episode Date: September 19, 2020

BONUS EPISODE ALERT! Though physically returning to the Toronto International Film Festival this year proved impossible, we are delighted to bring you a special dispatch from the virtual festival. This year, TIFF went online (while still providing in-person screenings for Canadian viewers) and we unpack the awards potential from the lineup! We get into heavy … Continue reading "BONUS – And From Canada, Virtual Festival (A TIFF ’20 Recap)"

Uh-oh, wrong house. No, the right house. I didn't get that! We want to talk to Marilyn Hacks. I'm from Canada, Water. top leading men grew up here. Five minutes from another Oscar nominee. Before his arrival on the red carpet,

this Quebec director studied here. Where are you headed, Kareen? A filmmaker from Montreal took us to Dallas for a different kind of club. Over here, worlds of assassins, cults, and aliens are just waiting to... Oh, sorry, Jacob. A show about clones,

bought an Emmy to the Prairies. Toronto became a dystopian world for an author's chilling tale. A young actor left the West Coast to fight demigorgans. Our studios are defining VR. Oh, look out. And that fowl-mouse superhero once roamed these holes. This is Canadian content. And it's time we take credit for it.

Starting now. Hello and welcome to the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast. The only podcast that had very optimistic plans about attending film festivals in person this year. Every week on this 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 am here as always with the Winter Garden to my Princess of Wales, Chris File. Hello, Chris. Hello, I am covered in leaves

You are getting ready to show Wicked next week When all of the stuff is done You have to take 17 escalators to get to me I miss Can I tell you of the ephemera that I miss from Tiff It's that weird shit that I miss most of all It's just like all those escalators

Just like the wonky escalator at Scotia Bank Or like walking up those endless flights of stairs at Princess of Wales to get to what are inevitably my like back of the back row seats at Princess of Wales or it's just all that little stuff I was talking to Katie Rich

past guest to the show Katie Rich maybe this was in our group chat where I was just like what I would give to have that shitty chicken sandwich at the snack bar at the Scotia Bank you know that for me personally you know I've hit that goddamn wall

I've hit a wall when I'm like okay, I'm just getting chicken at the Scotiabank. I just, I have 50 minutes. And it's because I just don't want to leave the theater and have to come back. You know what I mean? I just want to sit. I just want to sit and wait. So today.

I definitely miss, like, all of those things, too, that, like, you've called it movie camp before where it's like, yes. The thing about TIF is that they call it the People's Festival, and it is very much that, too, where it's like you really, especially if you're not someone who, like, has a community of film lovers that you rely on in your area. Right. Like, it really does feel like a sense

of community, watching all these things together for the first time in a way that's exciting, that, like, you could mimic it through, like, texting people and, you know, having group chats, whatever, during this, but, yeah, that's the thing

that I was missing. And, like, those in jokes of, like, the Winter Garden Theater, the ceiling is covered, it in leaves, like, you know, joking about things like that. Or just I mean, this has been said by other people besides us, too, but just like, the way that talking about

the movies as you see them becomes its own sort of like animate creature in and of itself and, like, certain movies, like, I know that, you know, texting and social media exists and all that stuff, and everybody who was seeing TIF movies was definitely talking about them because they definitely

saw those conversations. But it to be chill on Twitter about it because there's so many people that got screwed out this year of not getting to participate that I didn't want to be one of those gauche people, to be honest. Well, and I think also it's just like there's still, there's a formalism to even tweeting. Like I know people, it seems that most people don't have a thought in their head as they tweet and whatever, but like there is still that thing of just like, I need to put, you know, I have to type this thing out where it's just like, the conversations that you have in person where you're just sort of like you're standing in line and what did you just see and what were the reactions to this and, you know, being able to

experience a crowd reaction to a movie is incredibly informative. I always think of when I saw the premiere of I-Tanya at the aforementioned Princess of Wales Theater with Katie. And I remember, A, just like watching the way the crowd reacted to that movie, but also the ovation that Alice and Jannie got as she and the rest of the cast came out. But like, especially like when her name came up in the credits and then when she was introduced after the film and just the absolute enthusiastic ovation, I was just like, oh, yeah, like this is going to be a huge Oscar thing. Like it's, you, you can tell. And it's, and we'll certainly get into, in our conversation, about whether any of these movies had that potential anyway,

but, like, it makes it impossible in a lot of these ways to, or at least a lot harder, to anticipate that kind of thing without that crowd reaction. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out. Anyway, yes. So, as our listeners are well aware, there was no in-person press experience for the Toronto Film Festival of this year. There were local screenings at very limited capacity for people in, who were physically in Toronto, which in this case are Canadians and people who aren't American, because Americans are not allowed into Canada with good reason at this point. But the press experience for Toronto

was fully digital. My illustrious co-host, Chris Fyle, was happily given. an accreditation this year, and I was not, and I'm fine. I'm taking it very well. No. I'm here to report back to our lovely listeners. So this episode is going to take the form of, I mentioned it to Chris yesterday. I am the frost to his Nixon. I will be interrogating him on his experiences with the handful of films more than a handful, a heaping handful. You saw 30 films? And not a crook, et cetera, et cetera.

You saw 30 films. 30. You're amazing. You're absolutely amazing. 30 of the lineup of 50 or whatever. Yeah, that's like remarkable. For some context, the TIF lineup is usually like close to 300, like usually films. 300, 400 sometimes.

Yeah. So, Chris's percentages for this festival will never be matched at a future TIF. a regular year. Yeah, no one will ever reach the percentage that Chris is reaching with this festival, so very good. He turns out, just because it's a virtual festival does not mean that you have any way diminish your festival-going habits. For me, notably, it was eating terribly and over-extending myself to the point that I watch so many things that my eyes are completely sore and my brain becomes gobbledygook. Well, I'm glad you were able to replicate that part of the festival experience, because

that is also a very important. Where I'm like, I can still squeeze one thing in there, right? With the notable caveat that you were not able to join me for crapes at odd hours of the day to really recharge. I miss our crepe place. I hope it's still there when we go back. God. Me too, man.

Because that, as I've mentioned, that Tim Horton's that I always went to is no longer there, and neither is the little sports bar that we all went to. The shitty sports bar that we went to, because it was always empty, and you can get food fast, and it's, like, not necessarily more. And you can sit, like, ten people at a table at a moment's notice. Yeah, it was great. Anyway, so I wanted to start with, because we want to enter this still from our perspective, which is, you know, Oscar Buzz, what TIF movies, had Oscar,

buzz going in, what maybe movies or performers have it coming out. This is obviously a much more, a much less flashy lineup from TIF. You got the sense that a lot of the major awards hopefuls set it out. And this feels a lot more about like truffle hunting, not to borrow a title from a TIF movie. But like, you're sort of, you're really trying to dig out less hype-based, you know, stuff, I feel like. Anyway, so the movie I wanted to start with is actually the movie that you and I are on very similar ground and is that neither of us have seen it,

which is the Kate Winslet, Sirsher Ronan, lesbian cliffside, seaside, Fossil Romance, Ammonites. Which they, it wasn't made available to the press on the TIF platform. A few movies were like that, and it was dealt with directly through the studio, and I think they were trying to have it be very specific targeted press or, like, limit the exposure of the movie because of the risk factors involved with, like, piracy and such. But I think it's someone backfired. Lord knows those TikTok kids really are, you know, passing around Ammonite. Yep, they're stumping for the fossil movie, man.

Yeah, I think that might have backfired a little bit for them because it, I mean, like, it's not completely out of the equation anymore, like, God knows, it's like Rotten Tomato and Metacritic's Thor is still in the upper 70s, so it's like, it's a positive response to the movie, but to say that the, um, large swath of opinion is a much more muted on this movie, I think is, fair. You got that experience, or at least I did, when either the embargo went up or people had just sort of finished watching it, the press that were able to watch it. And it was that sort of wave of like six or eight critics being like Ammonite, frowny face. Like, it was, it was a lot, it was air being let out of a room. The first whispers I was hearing was like, eh, very much so. A lot of people calling it slow, a lot of people calling it cold, which feels a... Very familiar to the history of gay movies being responded to by straight critics? Yes, I was going to say, I remember that song and dance from Carol.

Which Carol is anything but chilly. But it also felt like a lot of people were comparing it directly to Portrait of a Lady on Fire. Right, which is very... Even if it's just a lot of sequences of these two women gazing at each other or, like, you know, just living in the seaside manner, it is a very hot and heavy movie. Okay, but here's as I try not to be too reductive, but like, a portrait of a lady on fire lends itself to heat, if only because of that, you know, it just felt very easy to be like, oh, Ammonite's cold. this, you know, movie that takes place in the literal frigid waters off the coast of wherever the fuck, Ireland, England.

And then Portrait of a Lady on Fire literally lights one of its women on fire, and people are like, the heat, the heat in this movie. So, like, those observations very well may be true, but it also seems like very easy. But like Portrait of a Lady on Fire, which is a movie I adore, it's very panty.

It is like... Bated breath. Yes. that type of movie. And, like, my other response to this is, did you guys not see God's Own Country, which is what I certainly felt from God's... I'm not a fan of God's Own Country. It's certainly, I remember God's Own Country being the, um, the contrarians gay movie of choice, the year of Call Me By Your Name, which I think sort of set me against it initially because I was just like, all right, we get it. You're too cool for the popular gay movie. but also yeah I didn't it didn't fully hook me

watching it but it did have like that did have a lot of fucking in the mud like you know what I mean like there is like a lot of what call me by your name didn't have and that there is like sex on screen visible nudity that's what people wanted people wanted to see penis and they got it in that movie

and congratulations I also just think this whole muted response to that movie I think they absolutely shot themselves in the foot there because there were barely any queer critics

that I saw reviewing this movie. I didn't see a single review from a queer woman. I'm sure that someone, I'm sure that it's out there, but like, I, if they're cherry picking the press that gets to see that movie, like I understand

that you might. Yeah, I know a lot of straight, I know a lot of straight guys who were reviewing that movie that week, that day. and yeah. And I don't know. I mean, if you're going to be cherry-picking your audience, maybe be a little bit more thoughtful on who might be the people to respond to your movie. So my question to you, though, Chris, is, is there room for Ammonite to crawl back from this? In a very odd year, in a year where just having a movie that people have seen with a performance, like, even the people who didn't like it are like, Kate Winslet's very good. is this a thing where like Winslet can still hang on to the best actress conversation in a strange year?

I mean, yeah, it's a very strange year. She's a noted actress and I think people will still watch the movie and I think more so than ever the challenge will be to get people to watch the movies even if they're stuck at home because like there's going to be a whole like publicity apparatus or like you're not being in rooms with people who are talking about movies. So like I think it's still going to be hard to get people to watch the movie and I think Ammonite is a movie that they will still watch because of the actresses involved. I mean, the whole, like, chilly response to it that you see multiple people calling it

chilly, that specific word, I think that probably removes it from any best picture conversation if that's how people are responding to the movie. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, but again, we have to see it. Yes, hopefully soon. Speaking of the best picture conversation, though, I will say from my observations, the only movie from TIF that I saw mentioned even in the vicinity of the best picture category at the Oscars is nomad land Chloe Zhao's Nomad Land and that was when the when Tiff sort of announced that it was going to

be going forward with the festival with a limited lineup or whatever nomad land was initially sort of put forward as like the big the big name right it's the Francis McDormand movie it's It seemed like it was the one with, you know, the big expectations. And it was also the one that was announced that it was going to play all the festivals. It was going to play New York and Venice and Toronto. It was going to be the Fall Festival movie. You did see Nomadland. All the rest of the movies, we're going to talk about our movies that Chris has seen.

What were your reactions to Nobittals? I mean, I'm one of the many in the chorus saying that it's the best thing I saw at the festival. I think that Here's the thing about Everybody's wondering how it's going to fare for these movies playing a virtual festival. Nomadland is absolutely the movie that will really benefit

from how they've handled the festival situation, I think. And I, because it's a dominant force on the festival scene because it's playing all of the major festivals and they're really making sure that people see the movie in creative ways and it's because of that

it'll make it a movie that people really want to see and find out that they have to see this movie is it a sorry I just because I'm still

somewhat in the dark as to what it is is it a road movie is it a like what is the nature of this movie? If you've seen Chloe Jaws other films

you know that she works a lot with non-professional actors and this This is her first time with a major star and Francis McDormand. David Strathairn is in there in a minor role. I mean, he shows up a few times throughout, but the movie's not focused on him.

It's focused on her. And the people she basically meets along the way of these nomads that across the country in living in vans and, you know, kind of going off grid. The movie opens as she's working at an Amazon facility. and just like finding work across the country because her mining town had been completely shut down and she lost her husband as well. So she's just like essentially,

it's a journey with this woman, Francis McDormand-place Fern, who is just finding her place in the world, both alone and finding community at the same time. And it's incredible. It's wonderful. Is there any chance that Francis can contend for a third Oscar for this?

I think it's harder to say that. I mean, we'll see how people feel in a weird year of awarding someone with their third after they just won their second. She's amazing. I mean, I would honestly think if she hadn't won for three billboards, I think it would kind of be a slam dunk.

Yeah. They could have given it to Sersia, this whole thing could be academic at this point. Not that I didn't like Francis and three billboards, but like that was sort of, that could have been Sersh's moment. I will say, I mean, we are seven months out. We're further away from the Oscars than we are close to them.

Yeah. Than we are to the last Oscars. The last Oscars, yeah. But at the same time, I do really think that this movie has the absolute potential to be a zeitgeisty best picture player. There's something about seeing this movie now in the moment that we're in, especially with like COVID and quarantine, this movie speaks so much to how it feels to be alone, like really alone and isolated, but at the same time have these like flashes of connection and community in a way that I find really moving and I see a lot of people responding to just from the people that got to see it at Tiff and it'll soon be playing at New York and people who saw it at the

drive-in from Telluride and the um at the Hollywood Bowl yeah um I really think that this is a movie that because of the moment we're in people are going to connect to it more than you know if this was a standard year that people might think it's a little more remote or um you know too small which I think is stupid um there's a lot of feeling in this movie that I think people are going to respond to. From my perspective, it feels like the one movie that everybody agreed on is great. Yeah. You know what I mean?

And I think for an indie movie like this, it's Searchlight, right? Mm-hmm. So for a movie like that, I think that kind of early consensus really matters, because not only are you going to need, you know, full-throated critical support for a movie like this, but also now it's like it's the movie people are hearing about if you are if your ear is anywhere close to the ground for you know film festival stuff if you're in that kind of demographic nomad land is the movie that you're like oh that's the movie i'm hearing about and you know it'll it'll help that build some momentum too i also feel like i think

Chloe Zhao being such a big momentum force at this point. Like, where the rider felt like it was like, that was her previous movie, The Rider, was sort of moving her up to the cusp, and then the fact that she does have a Marvel movie coming out whenever we get big movies again, it was initially supposed to come out this November, I'm pretty sure, Eternals. Still scheduled for February. Yeah, we'll see. As with everything, we'll see.

Disney hasn't shifted anything yet. Yeah. But I think that can only help her profile as well. I also just think that some of what you're saying that it's the movie that you're hearing about. Really, this is why they've played their festival. Searchlight has played Nomad Lans festival runs so well. Because even though there's a lot of stuff to talk about in this TIF lineup specifically,

there's still like it doesn't seem as like meteor in terms of the best picture players as you said but because they turned this movie that could very easily be talked about like it's a small movie into the big player i think um it's it's paid off really well for this movie yeah one speaking flipping from best actress to best actor then a movie that people did see at sundance that resurfes at tiff as many sundance movies often do, especially in the early days at Tiff, as we well know, is the father, the Anthony Hopkins Alzheimer's movie, The Father. The Sundance buzz on that felt very strong for Hopkins specifically, that like, we have our first Oscar contending acting performance. It was sort of the word out of Sundance. Was that kind of anticipation, did it sort of like? oversell the father for you or where'd you come in on that um i don't know if it oversold it

for me i think what it undersold to be honest and like we can talk about it separately because we're talking about best actor a little bit um it undersold olivia coleman for me i think she's as good as he is if not better in the movie um we all know i love her but i she's his daughter yes and uh i hadn't really heard much about her performance um out of Sundance, and I'm stunned about that, because she's incredible. I don't know if they're running her as supporting or lead. I think it

kind of occupies a little bit of a gray area. Wow, Olivia Coleman occupying a gray area and supporting versus lead. She's not a gray area in the favorite. Anyway. You're right. She's definitely supporting in the favorite. Whatever. We're not getting into this fight. I hate this argument in the first

place. Anthony Hopkins is great. At least from the things that we've seen, I would imagine it could be a two-way race between him and Delroy Lindo for the Defy Bloods. Right. He is all of those things that you've heard. It's an incredible degree of difficulty, and the movie is really smart in just like the concept that it's doing.

It kind of, there's almost kind of, I don't want to say pervasive, but it does move a little bit like a thriller, because it places us in. his headspace dealing with dementia in that things are constantly shifting, even within the scene, like it can suddenly become incredibly tense because he doesn't know what's going on. He may not know who he's talking to. Characters are played by multiple people or we can't, we don't know if they're multiple people or if they are one person and he perceives them as someone else. So it really places the audience in an experience of dementia. In a way that feels just outside of genre, of like a thriller genre. And Olivia Coleman is his daughter taking care of him and responding to him. And there's just moments where it's like she just like gets a wave of emotion across her face or like fear or pain that I think audiences are really going to connect with in a really strong. way, especially the academy, because, like, I know that this comparison has been made. It's not as, as difficult as Amor, but it did, it did remind me of a lot of Amor in the way that

Amor ended up being a Best Picture nominee, partly because it's such a universal story, or it's one that a lot of people have experience with. Yeah. I think they'll have an emotional time with this movie, because people will have had parents or grandparents that have gone through dementia. Right. And it's a very emotional movie. And in that regard, I do think that this could actually be a Best Picture nominee.

What's the studio for The Father? Sony Classics. Sony Classics. Who also had a more. Right. Here's my question. If I decide to embark upon an awards campaign for this movie that centers on justice for proof, will that be successful? It will absolutely not be successful.

This is the better Anthony Hopkins Dementia movie. Olivia Coleman never says proof once, let alone 1,500 times. Damn it. I did have some, like, small problems with the movie. There are parts of it where it looks like crap. Like, it's just not always shot very well. Like, there's this, a scene with a window where I was like, that is absolutely the shittiest rear projection I've ever seen for that tree.

So, like, there is a little bit of, like, cheapness at play in this movie. However, like, the things that people are going to respond to are all uniformly great. All right. Bouncing to the next movie I want to talk about is the... I feel like this festival had a few directing debuts from actors, and the one that I find the most exciting is One Night in Miami, which is the Regina King directing debut. And I feel like with that movie, more than anything,

the performance that I was hearing about was Kingsley Benadier for a supporting actor for his performance as Malcolm X. Can you explain a little bit about the plot of this movie and about his performance? Okay, so One Night in Miami,

it's Regina King's feature directorial debut. It is set after a big fight for Cassius Clay, and it is a bunch of major figures of the Civil Rights Movement coming together for basically this extended conversation that kind of grapples with, you know, how to forward life for black people in America in the 60s. As you mentioned, Kingsley Benadier plays Malcolm X. Aldous Hodge is a football player and actor Jim Brown. Jim Brown, right.

Probably most familiar to general audiences is Leslie Odom Jr. as Sam Cook. He does sing in the movie. Oh, that's wonderful. There's a certain level of this movie That one thing I appreciated about it That there's not a whole lot of mimicry Or it's at least kept at bay Like you can imagine someone playing Cassius Clay

Muhammad Ali and like Going to the full like Ticks and things And it's not really that kind of movie To the point where even like Leslie Odom Jr. doesn't necessarily Try to inflect or change change his voice to sound more like Sam Cook. He sounds like Aaron Burr.

Well, he sounds like Leslie Odom. Right. For the most part, you know, and like there is a level of restraint to this movie that I really responded to and I really loved. I think one of the complaints that people threw at it is like, first of all, that's never going to be a problem for me because like everybody who's like it feels like a play. It's very stagey. It's just these people talking in a room, which is. is entirely a complaint that you could throw at the father

but I didn't see anybody saying that about the father Right My thing is if the performances are compelling enough Then I don't care Oh absolutely I mean like the performances are compelling Regina King like has a real sense of control Over the ebbs and flows of this conversation

And it's not literally just people sitting in a room and talking Like there's a whole sequence before the movie And at the end of it that I think are really well, um, assembled in a way that it's like she's walking you in this conversation and walking you out, um, in a way that I found really cinematic and compelling. Um, yeah. Again, like we said with Ammonite, the thing that like these complaints seem so wide that it does seem like maybe this isn't going to be a best picture, best director play.

I hope that it has a better chance. I think Amazon is going to put their full weight behind it. You mentioned Kingsley Benadier as supporting. I would understand if they pushed all four of these actors because it is kind of a shared weight throughout. However, I do think it would be smart to at least run Kingsley Benadier as lead because it does feel like Malcolm is given an added weight or like he's at least the one that we see kind of interacting and responding with all of these characters. If there's a central conflict, it's between him and Sam Cook because they are the most diametrically opposed. But then from a studio perspective, doesn't that make it an even better play for supporting actor? Because he's like... Not when you see the movie, I think.

I think it would be smarter to run him as lead. I would consider him a lead. I think he's so good. He also, interestingly enough, is playing Barack Obama in the Comey Rule, this coming a week, which is... Oh, really? I think I just avoided everything about that show like the play. I mean, naturally.

He also, I have a soft spot for it because he was in the second season of the O.A. And you know how much of... Your beloved O.A. Yes, exactly. Anything the Brit Marling touches is your kingdom. Absolutely. Absolutely. Why did I just go into the Lion King?

I don't know. I hate the Lion King. Why'd you do that? Why'd you say you hate the Lion King? What a weird thing to throw in there? Listen, I have watched 30 films. My eyes have been locked to a computer on top of my day job. My brain is fried.

I don't hate the Lion King, but why did I quote the line? I don't know. Anyway, anyway. Also, I think that there's another really great performance that I think would be more suited to, like, a supporting campaign. And that's out as Hodge as Jim Brown, who, like, my favorite scene of the movie, is the moment and like the conversation that he and Kingsley Benadir get to have towards the end that kind of ties things together. But how does Hodge is just so good? We were both fans of him last year in clemency. Right. So I would hope that, you know, audiences respond to him as well.

Couple things. A, you failed to cite Jim Brown as Mars Attack star Jim Brown, first of all. Second of all, I think it's, and it just goes to sort of the conception of this film and what the play that it was based on is that this is a collection of black celebrities in their own, like Cassius Clay in the field of sports, Jim Brown. Yeah, different arenas, you could say. but also who had very specific political awakenings, political, sort of like they were all sort of known for, I know Jim Brown was like very outspoken. And this movie finds them all on a different kind of precipice that they have to respond to. That definitely, the situation you're mentioning is definitely Jim Brown's story in this movie. I see.

That's cool. Okay, so moving on to the next film I want to talk about. I heard a lot, especially out of Venice, but also this played Toronto, about Vanessa Kirby's performance in a film called Pieces of a Woman. I, in all of the sort of praise that I saw for Vanessa Kirby, I still never got even an inkling about what this movie is about. So can you maybe lead with that just to satisfy my curiosity? Well, Pieces of a Woman, it's basically a melodrama about Vanessa Kirby and her husband, played by Shia LaBuff,

have a tragedy that happens during a home birth, and the whole movie is kind of the fallout of that, where their doula or their home birther goes on trial for... And she's played by somebody notable. Molly Parker, the great Molly Parker, who is also really good in this, with very little to do and very little to say. And, like, much of the...

the praise for this movie is this 20-minute unbroken shot through the house as the birth is happening. And it's just Vanessa Kirby, Shilabuff, and Molly Parker, and all three of them are stunning in the scene, and it's like this incredible feat

of Brevora one-shot filmmaking that starts the movie off, and as many people have pointed out, the movie really can't live up to. It really falls into a lot of cliches otherwise, even though Vanessa Kirby, her character doesn't respond in the way that you

would expect someone to respond. But at the same time, we never really get the sense that we know anything about this woman, who she is, like, what motivates her beyond, like, problems that she has with her somewhat, I guess you could say, overbearing mother, played by Ellen Burstyn. It's really, and it's one of those movies where there's just like scenes of people screaming at each other, that you don't know why they're screaming. Yeah. And then for the third act of the movie, it finally becomes the courtroom drama that

otherwise you were appreciating it for not becoming. I see. So it's like, it's this really, really great shot at the beginning of the movie. Some people are saying it's 30 minutes. It's not. It's 20. the movie has it like the title card arrives 30 minutes into the movie but the movie has stuff that happens before this shot um and it's uh it's fairly traumatic i am shocked that

netflix is the one that's going to be uh bringing this movie to audiences because i know that there's just a lot of people who once that shot happens they'll tragedy strikes yeah they will absolutely uh turn something else on so uh kudos to netflix for trying it well it'll count as a view for Netflix, for sure at that point, because it'll, you know, if it goes past two minutes, I'll count as a view for Netflix. The director, I thought, this was interesting, I just looked up, Cornell Mondrusco, a Hungarian director who directed that film White God about the dogs. Which I refuse to see. I can't watch animals in peril. I didn't see it either just because I don't care about dogs. I think I come at it from the opposite end of you.

Right. I can't watch animals in peril, sorry. But he, I remember that film, getting a good bit of attention in the indie scene back in 2014, anyway. All right. Vanessa Kirby's great. Vanessa Kirby's great. Is she going to be a contender, do you think? If they release it this year, maybe. It also feels like Netflix has a lot on its plate.

That's the Netflix thing we always talk about, right? Netflix has Viola Davis on their plate this year for Monoraney's Black Bottom. I have a hard time believing that this movie will be a priority for them. They've been able to campaign multiple. movies before in the last few years. It does feel like they're gaining power in that way. They definitely were able to do Irishman and Marriage Story last year. They had many Best Actor contenders last year.

If they'd campaigned some of them harder, they could have had a real stronghold on Best Actor that didn't pan out. And they still have yet to show that they can do the Fox Searchlight Sony Classics thing of elevating something small. It does feel like their best successes have been these big undertakings. Roma, marriage story, Irishmen, high auteur, high, you know, the big guns. You know what I mean? They haven't really been able to do, even two popes doesn't feel small the way this feels small, right? Yeah. Anyway. And they also haven't been faced with this level of bad reviews. Right. All right. Talk to me about some gay shit. Oh, God. The two worst movies. I saw at the festival. Vigo Mortensen's falling, which is, like, I am not, I don't want to speak too negatively on any of these films playing because I think they have a harder time with the whole digital thing. Most of these movies don't have distribution.

Vigo Mortensen's falling, however, is one of the worst movies I've seen in quite some time. It's just really poorly assembled. It is very much like box checking representation on screen, but it is all straight people telling this story. What is the story again? His father is a bad man and a bigot and going through poor health as he ages. And Vigo Morgas and is playing his gay son. You see a lot of flashbacks to his youth and like the full extent of why this father is terrible.

And it's also just really poorly made. It's just, it's really bad. It's a pilot that didn't get picked up. The problem to me with Vigo Mortensen playing a gay character is there's just absolutely no way you're ever going to get a scene of him folding up pizza and eating it because, like, gay guys won't do that. To Vigo's granted, it's not, he's not, like, doing some type of affectation, but, like, that's me finding the best thing I can to say about that movie. Even Laura Linney showing up did nothing for me. I was more so, like, girl, you did not need to accept that called in favor. Okay, what director do we need to put in a room with Laura Linney to give her the kind of role that I need her to have?

So that it's not just, oh, I should be watching Ozark because that's where. the best of Laura Linney is happening right now. I don't know. Put her with Mariel Heller. Mariel Heller is a good idea. Mariel Heller and Lorene Scifari are my answer for like, absolving everyone. You're not wrong, though. Put her in a room with Lorraine Scaria. Put her in a room with Maryle Heller. Put her in a room with Chloe Zhao. Put her in a room with Yorgos Lanthamos for God's sake. Like I think that would be... A Yorgos Lanthamus, Laura Linney movie,

um, uh, you just, uh, you just added four years to my... line. Yorgos Lanthamos, Laura Linney, Rachel Weiss, Colin Farrell, something. Do something with it. Make it happen. Some weird relationship sex stuff. Thank you. The other gay movie, which also, as of recording, does not have distribution that I

found to be embarrassing and terrible, was Good Joe Bell, which stars Mark Wahl as a father of a gay son who's walking across the country. to do penance and spread a message of tolerance. It's directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green, who, like, I want good things for. I thought he had a great debut with Monsters and Men a few years ago. It definitely feels like, and like knowing the production history of this,

that he was, like, brought on to this movie. It doesn't, you know, it feels more like a Mark Wahlberg Vanity Project. He does have the Will Smith. Richard Williams' biopic coming out next year that I'm still very interested in. Yeah, I'll be excited for that. Richard Williams' father of Serena and Venus, if people

who are not more into tennis, don't know. A very interesting person, indeed Richard Williams. To the credit of this movie, it does feel like it is not letting his character off the hook in a way

that, you know, I think maybe the average movie on this subject matter would really aggressively try to do but that being said it ends incredibly bleakly in a way that feels like you know shoving the audience's nose and shit a little bit I see but also there's a lot

that is just embarrassing there's a sequence of like him and his son who um what's the the son is played by Reed Miller they're talking about Lady Gaga and Mark Wahlberg recites lyrics to Born this way in a way that I think the movie thinks is charming but is incredibly cringy.

It feels like it's like assembled by chainsaw a little bit. The screenplay, it's worth noting, is by Larry McMurtry and Diana Osana, the Oscar winners for Brokeback Mountain. Yeah. Who wrote the screenplay adaptation for Brokeback mountain, which is interesting, you know what I mean? Yeah.

And the movie also has this structure that it pulls it, if you don't want to be spoiled, skip ahead a little bit, but it's not spoiling it because this is based on a true story. The movie in the first half of it makes you think that they are going on this walk together, he and his gay son, but then it pulls this Chamelon twist. Is he not alive? The son is dead. He's not alive. He's already killed himself.

And I found it so... To play gotcha with that. To play gotcha not only with the audience, with a real-life person, with these gay issues, I found to be quite reprehensible in a way that, like, kind of sank the movie that I already think is not very well made. And I'm a little baffled by people saying that Mark Wahlberg is good in this movie. We've talked on this podcast before that he has this like wide-eyed, like, loud thing that like he just defaults into this mode

of playing people who don't understand their situations by just like popping his eyes out of his head and having this baffled tone of voice and it's just bad. The trees are trying to kill us. It's very the trees are trying to kill us. It is very much explaining his feelings

and perspective to a three-year-old, and we are the three-year-old in the audience. Also, I mean, it's outside the universe of the movie, and sometimes I don't think it's quite fair, but, like, I maybe don't want to watch Mark Wahlberg playing a redemptive father to a gay son, knowing what I know about Mark Wahlberg in his life and history. I understand that. I didn't necessarily have issue with that in the movie, because I don't think the character is ultimately redeemed. However, I think anyone having Oscar conversations about this movie or

thinking that it could be, I think that's largely the reason why even if a distributor picked this movie up, that it wouldn't be. I think it will put people off. I think it won't be the type of thing that people can pat themselves on the back for in the way, like people are calling this gay green book. I think that's not quite what's going on. But like the way that people could pat themselves on the back for not being racist because they liked Green Book. The funny thing is they won't be able to do that as me. Like Green Book is

Green Book is also Gay Green Book. Yes. Oh God. All right. Yeah, I understand people trying to read into the intentions of this movie, which I do think are there. They are not, I don't think they're trying to redeem this

character. But I do also find the intentions of this movie incredibly suspect based on how it's structured. Yeah, now that you've told me what you've told me about it, I have a very wary eye on it, although I will see it and figure it out for myself. One

movie slash performance that I had no knowledge of before the festival that I am now very excited to see is Rosamund Pike in a movie called I care a lot, where she plays... The reason you felt that way is because the one production still, they released of it, centers on Diane Weist and not Rosman Pike.

Listen, I love Diane Weist, too. Diane Weist is good in this movie, too, so you'll be happy. Okay, Rosman Pike is great in this movie, and I think... Is it a comedy? It would be Globes comedy. Okay. It's more of a crime movie. It felt, I mean, this isn't a great comparison, but it felt a little baby driver to me.

Oh. that like I didn't like Baby Driver but like that kind of I think maybe conveys the tone of the movie at least she's playing someone who works

with the state in being a what's even the word again my brain has got like a caregiver right something like that she's a court ordained caregiver for elderly people and she scams them

she basically like robs them of their money she can sell their houses for profit it because she has the legal authority to do that. And she does so with... She's playing American? Yes, yes. And she does so with Diane. I will say, from Gone Girl, we know.

Sorry, I keep interrupting you. Yes, yes. And, like, the comparisons are there because she is this kind of, like, manipulative person who, like, in their evil ways, you kind of root for in a way that makes you question your own morals. But she, with Diane Weiss' character, ends up trying to do this with the wrong type of scenario. And then it kind of devolves into this crime story in a way that I don't think that this is an Oscar movie. But I do think someone will pick up this movie and it could make a little bit of money.

Your description of it makes me think of bad education? No, it's way more crass than that. Okay. That's cool. Yeah. Like, that's also why I use the baby driver comparison, because it is a pretty violent movie. Oh, okay. Yeah.

Do you think it'll be something, though, because I did think of bad education. I was like, oh, this could be a thing that gets picked up by an HBO or something like that. I think it would be picked up more by, like, a, I mean, it could be picked up by, like, a focus or something. A Hulu would be a great home for this movie. We'll see who buys it. I think someone will. I'm excited at the very least for a Rosamond Pike performance worth watching because since I did never saw I patch Sally, but I did, she's supposed to be great in it. I know, I know, I know.

We'll eventually do it for this podcast. Probably true. But since Gone Girl, I've been waiting for the next sort of like spectacular Rosamond Pike performance. So I'll watch that for this. A film I am somewhat less enthusiastic about, but more. The one our listeners have been waiting to hear me talk about. Lord knows we love our Naomi Watts miniseries. We love our Naomi Watts, and we always look out for our Naomi Watts, and there is a film

that she is in that played at Tiff called Penguin Bloom, that genuinely, I wanted it to be a sequel to Molly's game so bad that, like, Molly had a sister named Penguin, played by Naomi Watts, and her name is Penguin Bloom, and now she's, like, into, like, video games instead of poker, but, like, another, like, very, like, very Boise activity that she scams people at or something. I don't know. The slow, creeping realization that I experienced watching this movie in discovering that Penguin Bloom would be the name of the bird. that it would be a titular bird named penguin bloom because the family that she is in is the blooms and they name this bird, this wounded bird. But it's not a penguin.

No, it's not a penguin. God damn. They call it penguin because it's named by children. Is there a penguin in this movie at all ever? Well, Jackie Weaver is there, but no. Wait. I love Jackie. That was mean.

I love Jackie. I love you, Jackie. Oh, my God. It's, okay, so it's a family tragedy. It's another true story. Naomi Watts, while on vacation, falls off of a balcony and is, she has some type of trauma to her spine and can no longer walk. And the family is struggling with that. And then they take in this wounded bird that helps them cope as a family.

A literal wounded bird. A literal, subtle metaphor. It is exactly the movie that you expect it to be. I didn't think it was good, but I wasn't as burdened by it as some other people were. In the vast array of headshaky SMH Naomi Watts' Tiff movies that include films like Demolition, like Three Generations, which at that point was known as about Ray, like St. Vincent, which we certainly talked about on the podcast, where do you where do you rank it um i mean i do think that on some level it's better than a lot of the naomi movies that we've covered on this podcast um it's certainly not a diana um is it a la divorce

it's probably a la divorce okay my problem with this movie is like it does focus a lot on the kids but it never feels like a kid's movie i think that like if this movie was like four children about the same thing and like maybe less like Naomi sobbing so that it wouldn't traumatize children like I think it's a better movie I think tonally if it tried to be that it would have made for a fine movie so the bird what kind of a I'm curious about the bird a little bit girl the bird let me tell you about this bird I couldn't tell you off of memory the breed of bird I think it's a magpie um I couldn't tell if it was a CGI bird or a real bird or not. Oh, okay. Actor, kudos to that bird. Does the bird have a chance at a Golden Globe nomination? I think it will be the Golden Globe ambassador.

Miss Golden Globes is Penguin Bloom. Yes, yes. Better performance than the seagull in the shallows. No, no, the seagull in the shallows, that's a chameleon. That is a... That's a true multi-tool performer right there. Absolutely. Triple Threat, the seal from the shallows.

Better or worse movie if Jacob Trombley plays her kid? A better movie if Jacob Trompley plays all three of her kids. Well, better or worse movie if Jaden Lieberhair plays her kid. Mine Leber Hair, a better movie if mine Leiber Hair plays Penguin Bloom. Okay. Perfect. All right, I'm glad we thoroughly investigated Penguin. Penguin Bloom, the film of the festival at Toronto.

Do you feel like... I think people will like the movie. Like, I do think that there is an audience for that movie, so I hope somebody buys it. Don't you feel like if there were a real Tiff this year that, like, Penguin Bloom would have been one of those movies that would have been, like, the punchline of every conversation that everybody was having? Not, like... I mean, it's a good intended movie, so, like, I wouldn't want to shit on it.

I think most people wouldn't have seen it, but just the... Oh, yeah, we would have seen it. We would have seen it. It was, like, the festival where, um, was it Blake Lively played a blind person in a Mark Forster movie? Yes, yes. Wasn't that a thing? Nobody saw that movie. Richard Lawson definitely saw that movie, but he's the only person I know who saw that movie at that festival.

Um, but it felt like everybody was kind of joking about like, oh, did you see the Blake Lively Blind movie? It was just like, it was, it was, oh, my God. I know, I know. Anyway, documentaries. I want to talk about documentaries. Oh, my God. The docs are so good at TIF this. year. Talk to me about him.

MLK FBI was picked up by IFC. I think especially if IFC has a spotty awards history, but I think they really could have a documentary frontrunner on their hands. It's

it charts the it's more about the FBI than it is Martin Luther King Jr., but it charts the FBI's spying on him and the surveillance that they put him under. it's incredible

That was one of the better docs I saw Loved City Hall, the new Frederick Wiseman I can't wait to see City Hall. I love Freddie so much, four and a half hours. A brisk Wiseman at four and a half. Yeah, it's his second longest movie. It's a really

kind of crucial document of how actual local government and democracy works. Um, I, it's four and a half hours long. I was riveted the whole time. Is it Boston? I heard right. It's Boston. Yeah. Which you know is a roadblock for me, but I'll get past it for wise. You'll get past it. You'll get past it. It's a good movie. Um, I will, I always say that his back-to-back films of, um, in Jackson Heights and ex Libris gave such a fascinating portrait of New York City and how it works on a sort of, um, in Jackson Heights and ex Libris gave such a fascinating portrait of New York City and how it works on a sort of, municipal, sociopolitical level that, like, I, I, it, I always say that you should watch them both in tandem, and I'm very excited to see him do that in a different city, and it feels like, but it feels like it would be a lot of the same concepts, maybe, or maybe not. The thing about Wiseman is he'll really drill down into something really specific for about, like, 15

minutes and then move on to something else very specific for another 15 minutes and the patchwork that he creates always always it's pretty astounding yeah i mean like this one does feel like it is more um focused on a conversation we're already having um in a way that like i hope that maybe the academy would respond but like he has his honorary an Oscar and none of his documentaries have been nominated yeah so um i i think especially because it's four and a half hours long, that might continue. Yeah. But I'm excited.

Natrino from Gianfranco Rossi, who got really close to a documentary nomination for Fire at Sea a few years ago. This movie is just kind of a portrait of life in the Middle East and ongoing

conflicts of war and what it's just kind of a ground-eye view of what its life is actually like there that I found very, very moving. What is it called? Noturnal, which is also playing a lot of festivals. I believe New York has it at least.

Cool. That's something people should really, really see. I also saw another documentary called No Ordinary Man that I hope gets around about a trans jazz artist, a trans man who was not discovered to be trans until after he passed. Yes, I heard about this. It's a really different take on, you know, a biographical documentary because you also have testimonials from several different trans men who also do an audition for a biopic for this character, for this man. And so it kind of is a biographical documentary, but it's also a portrait of transmasculine life in a way that I just kind of blew my mind in the way that it blurred between different types of nonfiction.

So I hope that that makes the rounds and gets out there. Did you see the Truffle Hunters? Oh, the Truffle Hunters. The Truffle Hunters is just a real delight. I think that could potentially be just because it's so charming. And Sony Classics has it. It could be a documentary player. It's also playing all of the festivals as well.

What is this one about? What is this one about? It's just about these elderly men that hunt for truffles with their dogs. and the dogs are all wonderful That's cool Yeah, it's a brisk like 85 minutes That was another one that played at Sundance And I remember people really had liked it at Sundance

And then now it's sort of resurfacing as things tend to do It is charming without being oppressively so So it worked on me Any other docs before we move on to our next subject Oh man, am I forgetting any of them Oh, there is a COVID doc that I don't think anybody has bought. This was actually the best doc that I saw. I know other people haven't really responded to it.

It really is just kind of a very sobering look at the early days of the epidemic or the pandemic in hospitals, mostly in Wuhan. There's just things in that I'll never forget. And I hope that it gets out there so that everyone can see it as soon as possible. I have to admit, I'm not super excited to see it. Well, I would understand why people would be reserved about seeing it, but I do think that it's something that needs to be seen. Yeah. Yeah, and they were pretty clear to press that they didn't want identifying details talked about in any coverage of it, like names of hospitals. So I think that there is some issue in getting it out to the public, but I hope people can see it.

So outside of the realm, we sort of talked about, I guess Penguin Bloom being the exception, we've talked about movies that at least have an angle towards some sort of awards success. I want to have you sort of expound about any other movies that you want to recommend that you'd feel like exist outside. of the sphere of awards hopefulness, but are still, like, really good. I mean, one of the very best performances I watched was Mads Mikkelson in another round. I've heard very good things about this performance. Some people were saying it's a comedy. It's as much a comedy as, like, John Cassavetti's husbands is a comedy. It very much, I was like, oh, okay, so this is a more, like,

audience-friendly, palatable husbands, right? Right. Matt's Mikkelsen starred in Thomas Vinterberg's Back in the Hunt Which he should have been further in the Oscar conversation He won Best Actor at Cannes for that movie But that film was a foreign language film nominee, yes? I forget if it was or not.

Thomas Winterberg directed that and this And he has been nominated in a foreign language, I believe. This one, I don't know if Denmark will submit it. Samuel Goldwyn has it as the distributor so that kind of it doesn't that doesn't spell that this movie will be everywhere for everyone or that it'll be a big movie

but I do really think in terms of something that should be in an awards conversation that might not get to be because of its scale and its size Mads-Mickleson absolutely should be in Best Actor Conversations for this movie it's about four mid-life

crisis men who are all teachers who decide they have to they want to experiment to have their blood alcohol level constantly at a point zero five so that they can you know they're better at their jobs

they're better interpersonally and it sounds like a funny concept the movie goes to it's not I would not say that this is a comedy it goes to a lot of the expected places that you expect it to go, and yet it's the one that I've thought more and more about after I watched it,

especially Mad's work in the movie. He's just one of our underrated actors. He's incredible. The Hunt, by the way, was a foreign language film nominee. It lost to The Great Beauty at the 2013 Oscars. It should have beat the Great Beauty. Yes, it should have. I mean, The Hunt is one of, is a movie about somebody who's accused of something. It's, It's very much, like, not to bring up about the specter of cancel culture, but is very much like a crucible-esque of, you know, what if we accuse somebody. It's a little bit the children's hour, too. Yes, I think that's a much better comparison. It's like the children's hour capturing the Friedman's kind of situation.

And sometimes it feels a little broad, but Mickelson is great in that. This, too, another round, feels a little broad sometimes too. and he his character of all of the men they all are experienced different like midlife crises basically he is like removed from his wife he has pressure on him as a history teacher to like help these students get good final exam grades so it's like it's a scenario that like we're kind of familiar with, but he brings out these like really unexpected emotions at unexpected times, and it's always really complicated and compelling to watch. I hope that people catch his performance. Talk to me about a movie called Shiva Baby. Shiva Baby is a riot. It's amazing. It is

Rachel Senat, the actress who I knew from the Twitter video of Come On, it's L.A. Um, she is a young woman who is going to, um, see her parents at a Shiva for someone who has passed. And it is a, uh, it's a Jewish celebration where she doesn't really have a connection to the person who is dead, but has all these extended, um, relationships to everyone who is there. It's this very compact house and it gets very, it, there's these sequences where it ratchets up the tension. of people like getting in her business too much and then it immediately alleviates it in a way that was really funny if a little repetitive but the central conceit of it is she has a sugar daddy from an app

who shows up at the Shiva and so does his wife so like she's avoiding like her parents think that she has a job but really she's making money off of her sugar daddy and it's like it's an hour and 15 minutes long I was laughing the whole time I love any movie that will give me

Jackie Hoffman and Diana Agron in the same movie truly perfectly cast Diana Agron in the movie Jackie Hoffman not nearly in there enough however we get Polly Draper as another I kept thinking of obvious child I was going to say the mom from obvious child yeah Polly Draper is wonderful in this movie.

Fred Melamed shows up, so of course, Fred Melamette is wonderful. He is never not. One of the great voices. This is a movie that would be great to go to Hulu. Oh, that's interesting. I think Hulu would be a great home for this movie. I feel like Polly Draper, around the time of obvious child, was also in another project that I thought she was really good in, and now I want to very quickly peruse. Oh, she's so good in side effects, a movie, again, that I don't want to.

as the boss she's Rooney's boss in side effects I thought she was very good in that anyway what else did I want to ask you about oh concrete cowboy with Idris Elba

oh yeah that I mean I hope somebody picks that up I don't think it's really an Oscar movie but it's a teen drama based off of a teen novel set in Philadelphia with these urban cowboys these black cowboys And it's a very typical, like, teen drama where it's like he goes to live with his dad, who he hasn't really seen because he's a troubled child and he's getting into, like, trouble.

And then there's also his, like, former friend who's played by Gerald Rome is, like, getting him into trouble there as well. There's a few of these cowboys are played by the actual cowboys in Philadelphia. Um, including one of my favorite performances I saw during the whole festival, Jamil Prattis, um, who, like, I loved him. Not enough of him in that movie, though. Um, but yeah, like, this could be a, a movie that would, like, make money. It's not fully, uh, like, it's not really anything you don't expect it to be, even though it's a unique, um, like, setting for a movie that we haven't seen before. That makes it always, like, interesting to watch, but not, like, you know, the actual story beats of it. The father, son stuff is not necessarily all that exciting. Lorraine Toussaint is in there, though. Oh, I love Lorraine Toussaint. Lorraine Toussaint, um, on a horse, you know.

What else do you want? You sold me. I love her. She's a legend. That's all I made. Lorraine Toussaint on a horse, absolutely. Was there anything, just sort of in terms of, like, a wrap-up, anything else that you want to talk? about. Anything else that you feel like, I don't know if you want to take a stab at the People's

Choice Award winner that will probably be announced on Sunday. Yeah, it'll be announced either like right before or right after we do this. I don't know how the People's Choice Award is going to work in a largely virtual festival. I was going to say with those very limited in-person screenings, because the they did drive-ins too that I guess were more people, but like the screen, the physical screenings that took place at the lightbox. It was a max of 50 people per screening so it's not a lot of people my imagination would be that it goes to nomad land just because the response is so universal yeah um at this point but like i wouldn't be surprised if something that's just like fun and distracting like shiva baby one yeah that'd be cool

considering the um the history of the people's choice award at toronto being so tied to best picture contenders. I would imagine that if something more off the path does win, I would imagine that it means less for Oscar than it normally would, to be honest. Do you think American Utopia could win? Is it in contention? I do, actually. We haven't talked about American Utopia and largely because it's HBO, it's not going to be eligible for Oscar unless they do something. I feel like HBO should be... Because that's the other movie besides Nomad Land that it feels like everybody was in agreement that it was great. I mean, it's the first time I felt euphoria since the pandemic.

It's a concert film about... Yes, Spike Lee filmed David Burns' Broadway concert show. He toured the show, I guess, before it went to Broadway. And it's very much in the tradition of Stop Making Sense. Spike Lee, I think, is the best person capturing live theater and live performance working today. If anybody knows the musical Passing Strange, he also filmed that in a way that felt incredibly cinematic

and not just like, here's a bunch of cameras, capturing things that happen on stage. And this is more of that as well. It'll be on HBO, I believe, October 17th, mid-October. It's wonderful. I was like either on the verge of tears or crying through half of it because it's just so joyful, but it does also speak to a lot of the things that we're going through now.

It has a whole sequence that deals with police violence and police brutality that I wouldn't want to spoil for audiences, but is incredibly moving. But it also speaks to a lot of things we're going through currently of isolation. He has a funny anecdote about his song, Everybody's Coming to My House. That feels really prescient in terms of, like, everybody going through being alone or not being alone, the stress of being around other people right now. That obviously is not intended to comment on our current time, but it does for us as an audience watching it post-pandemic. Cinematography by Ellen Kuros, who I, of course, have loved forever for her work on Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. oh yeah you can maybe get a ground swell i guess if it's HBO it wouldn't count for film although

who knows what counts as a film in this super weird year i think HBO is should be a line in the sand i just got to say well but i but i feel that way about like the emmys nominating documentaries from HBO that also get oscar nominations yeah yeah and also i've been talking to a lot of people there's a lot of people who are going to be very intent on putting bad education on their best-of lists for this year. We'll see how it goes. Chris, I will say, for a festival that it has been painful for me to miss, and I mostly mean as a in-person experience, without it being an in-person experience, missing it

as accredited press this year has heard a lot less. It's mostly, I missed being there. I miss being there with you and our friends and doing our thing. Today would have been the day that I would have come home from TIF, and I would have been wistful today, so it's probably fitting that I'm feeling wistful about it right now. But you've done a very good job of sort of cluing me in as to what the big ones were while my brain is still in collapse. I love it.

What of all these movies, what do you think, what is your prediction as to what will be something we could cover on this at Oscar buzz coming soon? I mean, the response to Ammonite makes me wonder. if it is a class of 2020 movie. I don't know how we're going to have a class of 2020 if there's no movies release. I don't either. Also, maybe not because there might not be movies released and it gets a costume design nomination or something. Right.

I don't really know, because even something like Good Joe Bell, I don't really know how much of an Oscar buzz type of thing it is because like that movie, I feel like nobody really knew it existed until... I feel like I'm hearing a little... I think we can make the case for Buzz. And I would be fully willing to lie about the case for Penguin Bloom just to talk about it. Well, when Penguin Bloom becomes available on Premium VOD... Yes. You... Yeah, I will pay $30 goddamn dollars to watch Naomi Watts Care for a Magpie.

I will say that. It's a secret Batman movie. Jackie Weaver plays the Penguin. Wow. Perfect. I feel like we can end it right there. This was truly a blessing, I will say. I know that a lot of people got screwed over this year just because of the circumstance and, like, I wish that wasn't the case.

So, like, I did feel really lucky to be able to experience all of these new films and hopefully find some joy in them, even the ones I didn't like. All right. I'll see you on King Street next year. That is our episode. If you want more of This Had Oscar Buzz, you can check out the Tumblr at this hadoscorbuzz.com. You should also follow our Twitter account at Had underscore Oscar underscore Buzz. Chris, where can the listeners find you in your stuff? You can find me in my Penguin Blune Mansion on Twitter at Chris V-File.

That's F-E-I-L, also on letterboxed under the same name. I am on Twitter at Joe Reed. Read is spelled R-E-I-D. I am on letterboxed as Joe Reed, Reed spelled the exact same way. We would like to thank Kyle Cummings for his fantastic artwork and Dave Gonzalez and Gavin Mievous for their technical guidance. Please remember to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, or wherever else you get podcasts.

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