This Had Oscar Buzz - Mailbag Fishing In The Yemen

Episode Date: December 28, 2020

Happy New Year, listeners! To close out 2020, we’ve compiled all of your questions for this special mailbag episode! We kick things off by surveying the state of the current, pandemic-delayed Oscar race including First Cow’s win with New York critics. the New York Times’ 25 Greatest Actors of the 21st Century list, and how the … Continue reading "Mailbag Fishing In The Yemen"

Uh-oh, wrong house. No, the right house. No, I didn't get that! We want to talk to Marilyn Hacks. I'm from Canada, Water. I turn on my computer I go online And my breath catches in my chest

Until I hear three little words Hello and welcome to the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast The only podcast found dead and buried By Alia Shawcat in the Oregon Woods Every week on This Head 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 except not this week because, instead of talking about a movie, we're doing a mailbag episode. I am your host, Chris Fyle. I'm here, as always, with my fellow small bakery co-owner, Joe Reed. Got my oily cakes already to sell for a tidy but humane profits. We are a podcast that is rooting for the very soothing, calming movie about capitalism and friendship this season.

Okay, let's have a quick. sidebar about that, because as we are speaking, just yesterday in New York Film Critic Circle voted for their awards and their top prize went to, uh, in my mind, the most deserving first cow, the Kelly Rikart film, First Cow, which, to which, in my mind as well, to which Chris has been referring about Alia Shawcat in the Oregon woods and, uh, oily cakes and such. So, we both really love this movie. Marketplace Bakeries. I feel like the fact that, like,

This doesn't win New York Film Critic Circle for Best Picture, Best Film, in a non-pandemic year, which is nothing against either the film or the New York Film Critic Circle. But I think it's a quirk of this odd Oscar season with limited options and smaller films have been able to stay afloat in the season longer. Also smaller films that were actually released prior to the pandemic hitting. Right, right. Although, yes, I think that is true, although I don't, I think that if first cow hadn't been released in theaters before the pandemic, I think it would still be doing equally as well. Like, I don't know if that's necessarily as.

I guess it's, there's some of that nostalgia of just like this was the last movie I saw in a theater before the pandemic. So yeah, maybe that does play into it. But I, it's this sort of, well, whatever, we can, we can ease this into our first question. But I do think there's an interesting angle with something like First Cow in terms of, like, what makes this award season so different, which is that a movie like First Cow, if it was last year, it would be a great movie, it would be justice for First Cow. I can't believe nobody's talking about this movie. It's so good. Why isn't it getting any kind of attention at the end of the year? It's, you know, yada, yada, yada.

And now, I still think it probably has just as much of a chance at Oscar nominations as it would have a year ago. Like, I still don't think it's going to show up. Yeah, I don't either. But now all of a sudden, it's this sort of cause-seleb among critics. And now, like, this is a movie that we could end up doing for our podcast if it doesn't get any Oscar nominations in a few years. Well, and I don't, I mean, like, to talk. talk a little bit about the pandemic. I know we said we weren't going to talk about the pandemic on this episode. But I still think that it would be, it's not like it's winning critics prizes now because there's no option. Right. It's not that there's no options, but there is less like competition that this like very gentle, quiet, that doesn't mean it's not deep movie, you know, doesn't have to strong arm through a lot of. of louder competition.

There is, you have sort of listed here on our, on our agenda that a lot of the common questions we got were sort of about the class of 2020, what's going to happen with the class of 2020. And I sort of got to thinking, and I'm like, the awards economy is so off kilter this year that it's sort, it's a, it's impossible still. I think, to predict the Oscars, and it's December. And I know the Oscars are later this year. But, like, normally by this time, things have really started to firm up.

And it's just, like, it's so impossible because the choices are so far-flung, but also because the economy of Oscar movies is so outward. Like, the Blockbusters didn't play. And we didn't expect, very early on, we sort of expected that the Blockbusters were not going to play this Euro. or we're going to open much, much later. But, like, I think sort of from very early on, we kind of cut those out. So, like, you know, West Side Story and June and whatever big movies... In the Heights.

Right. Whatever big movies that we thought could have been Oscar plays, because as much as people, you know, deride the Oscars for being about movies that nobody sees, they're not. They nominate movies that people see all the time. And so with that strata cut out, that was one thing. But the one thing that I kind of expected... to happen, that didn't, was the sort of middle-tier, A-24 Fox Searchlight, Middle Major movies, I thought, well, those are just going to go to VOD because why not? And some did.

We're getting your one night in Miami's, and eventually we're getting Judas and the Black Messiah, and we're getting... The Focus movie, everything Focus did. They put it in theaters. They worked out this arrangement with Focus and Universal, with VIII. the, um, with like the AMCs and Cinemarks to like have a profit sharing basically when they do VOD a month later. So, like, you are getting the cajillionaires. You're getting promising young women and news of the world at home. But well, with the exception of news of

the world, I think news of the world sort of fits into the, the sort of range of movie I'm about to talk about. But like, I think with certain, with cajillionaire and even promising young woman. These are movies that probably would have been in some way or another too small to off the beaten path to whatever to be part of that like Oscar mainstream, which is what makes part of what makes this year so interesting as an Oscar year. But I was really surprised that that sort of middle path of movies that like even something like the French dispatch, which I know we think of it as major, it's Wes Anderson, it's a billion stars whenever, but you think of like what the commercial prospects for a movie like the French dispatch might have been.

And I'm, I mean, sure, on paper, but at the same time, like Wes Anderson movies make $50 million. I guess that's true. And I guess, and I guess this goes into a thing that is way over my head and out of my job description, which is the economics of the industry. And I'm just like, I guess I'm surprised that for as much as all these places are going to streaming and, you know, whatever, the HBO Max thing that I don't want to talk about, and, you know, movies opening on Disney Plus and whatever, I guess the economics of it are still, that that to me shows the value of theatrical enough that, like, if the economics weren't there to make it more or at least equally profitable for a movie like the French dispatch to go to streaming or VOD instead of opening theatrically, that tells me that theatrical still has major value. Because why wouldn't you? Because if, you know what I mean? Right. Well, and also, because of production shutdowns, like, they had to hold onto some content so that they, I hate calling it content. They have to hold on to their movies that they have because, like, with as long as productions were shut down, they may not have movies to put out if they had, you know, just dumped everything on VOD, whether it made profit or not. The economics thing, though, I think is going to be one of the most interesting factors in this year's Oscar race, especially for something like first cow, where it's like it doesn't seem like it's A24's first priority. That seems like it's Minari, which like if you want to go for Oscars, that probably seems like the safer bet. And that's great. Which, by the way, how wild is it that we're having that conversation? That something like Minari is a safer bet for Oscar. Like, what a cool year this is going to end up being if that happens. Like, But you also wonder if, like, smaller distributors of these, like, mid-size or small-sized movies that you're talking about will have the money to really put behind a campaign.

Whereas, like, Searchlight, which it doesn't seem like they're operating as autonomously from Disney as it was initially said that they would, but, like, they'll have Disney money to put behind Nomadland, you know. But I think you saw this when you saw the Toronto Film Festival lineup. And because the Toronto Film Festival is like the epicenter for this strata of movie that I'm talking about, which is non-blockbuster but not in like not tiny movie with awards hopeful, awards hope to it. So like I'm thinking of like the new Adrian Lion movie, Deepwater that is eventually going to come out or like something like the eyes of Tammy Faye, something like that movie that I think Tom McCarthy is still making called Still water and like who knows whether Matt Damon was yes who knows whether it would have been ready you know this year or not but like that's what I'm talking about in terms of like that middle class of movie that like Jojo rabbit type of movie spotlight um you know a billion movies that we've talked about on here truth and you know men women and children whatnot and some of them

are good and some of them are bad but like all of those movies seem to have been if not cut out completely like halved you know I mean, like, we've gotten such a fraction of them this year. And those are the ones that make up not only the Oscar conversation in the awards race, but like, those are our bread and butter because they have definite, genuine Oscar ambition, and not all of them, you know, by definition are going to be able to do it because there's just too goddamn many of them. Whereas this year, we're looking at stuff like Minari as an Oscar hopeful that might not have been the case last year. Or, like, I'm trying to think of, like, what, like, again, that's why I got into

this conversation with First Cow. Like, in a normal year. I mean, I think something like promising young woman would have a hard time otherwise. Right. And so many of these things now are, you know, people are talking about the Stanley Tucci, Colin Firth, a gay movie that if that comes out, that that's going to be, you know. That's not a real thing. I mean, I kind of don't think so either, but because that... I will eat my shoe on Mike if that's a thing, but it is not a thing. But what I'm saying is there's at least a glimmer of hope on paper for it that would have never been even close to a thing because there would have been too many other things crowding it out. Like something like I know you and I have

talked off Mike about a movie like Never Rarely Sometimes Always, which won two prizes at New York Film Critics Circle yesterday for its lead actress and for its screenplay. I don't love that movie as much as everybody else does. And but like, That is a movie that I think would have been relegated to the realms of wouldn't it have been nice, for the people who like it better than we do. Wouldn't it have been nice if that could have gotten nominated for anything? And now it is winning prizes, and there does seem to be critical advocacy for it, because this middle class of movies has just not opened. Anyway, I don't know. No, I mean, that is all to the point of we don't know.

what a class of 2020 might be. Right. Especially just like, you know, you mentioned the, you mentioned supernova. There's a few other things that feel like they are, you know, latching on somehow, like, not to keep beating up on that distributor, but Wild Mountain Time, like, these movies that. Because there's such a void, like, they're positioning them in a certain way that's like, that's not really what that thing is.

There's just nothing else in the conversation. like this so like or that you can mark it in this way right but yeah like especially when people were asking us about 2020 they were asking us about things like hillbilly elegy amonite those are the two big ones in terms of classic this had oscar buzz they played either on streaming or at festivals and people are seeing them they had definite even pre-pandemic they had definite awards buzz and would have been in the conversation whether there had been a pandemic or not. And so I think those to me are like the classic ones. And honestly, I am not ruling out that Hillbilliology could get a nomination or two. Like, see, this is my problem because eventually

I will have to watch the smelly. Yeah. You're, because we will either have to watch it for this podcast, which would be, like, a year out and, like, you can get away from the toxicity of that thing, or it gets nominated, and I have to watch it for my job. Yeah. I mean, you could not. Like, you, like, unless you're doing, like, a fully comprehensive thing. Do I need to, is my question to, like, to have a, you know, aesthetic, personal opinion that is not a regurgitation of someone else's.

Well, yeah. But do I know what the thing is? is, do I have a sense? Have I had enough people telling me the minutia of this movie to, like, be able to talk about what it is? Sure. The gag of the century would be if you were to watch it and just be like, you know, it's not that bad. I keep seeing these people that are like, people are just being mean to this movie. I'm like, absolutely not.

We do not need more movies by rich people telling us what they think poor people are. We don't need it. I'll tell you who I loved it. You don't need bootstraps. theory. Get out of my case. I tell you who I loved it is my mom and my dad. Like, absolutely loved it. And this is the thing about...

Famously, your parents are in the sound branch. So they might go forward. Their support is going to have a ton of sway. But Joe Reed's parents are sound editors. But that's the thing about Netflix this year is Netflix is the one place where this middle class of movies are getting released because Netflix is, Netflix. So, like, you're getting Hillbilliology, you're getting Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, which is going to end up being, like, a big Oscar contender. So good. So good.

Because this class of movie is able to get released. DeFive Bloods is another movie that I think counts for that. I think, even though I don't think it's going to get Oscar nominations, but you look at something like, let them all talk on HBO Max, which is now part of at least like the movie conversation right now. That's something that I think could be a class of 2020, because I don't. really apparently we're being told it's eligible it's eligible it's it's definitely eligible it is

but we don't really get a sense that they're going to go there no it's not the kind of they make it they would go for either like that sort of that sort of

muddy Soderberg aesthetic you know what I mean like they don't really they haven't gone for Soderberg since they gave him an Oscar and said he had the greatest speech that they ever heard but they you know

he can't get arrested for awards anymore But it's fine because it's a great movie. But I don't know if they're really going to do any thing for that, which is silly because Candace Berger's win. Well, I mean, I go back and forth because sometimes I think with less to do, I think weist is even more impressive. Like, I think that cast is just great top to bottom.

I think everybody's so wonderful. The movie's fantastic. So, yeah, class of 2020. Sorry to give you a non-answer, but we don't know, guys. It definitely feels less. plentiful than in past years. Like, in past years, we'd been able to rattle off like a good, like, dozen or so movies

that, you know, would be, you know, class of 2020 movies. And then this year, it's like, we're going to have to stretch some, you know, some definitions somehow. And, like, it's something like, like, I guess French exit would fit, right? Like, something where ahead of time, people are like, Fifer. I don't think that's going to happen. No, I don't think it's

going to happen. So, or even, I don't know, even something like Tenet, which I guess, like, we'll probably get nominations anyway, so whatever, like in technical categories. But his last few movies have been, or at least some, like two of his last four movies, I guess, have been Best Picture nominated. So I guess, I mean, I guess you could say Dunkirk is his best Oscar success. Well, Inception one more, right? A bunch. Dunkirk got him a best director nomination. But Inception

won a few, which I think Dunkirk won none? Something? I don't know. Hold on. Let me look. I'm not a Nolan Echolite. Yeah, no kidding. Yeah, no kidding, because I despise Tenet. Can I tell you, I watched Tenet again the next night?

I didn't understand most of it, but I did enjoy watching it. So that is my Tenet thing. it is the wildest thing that that movie got so much bang for uh it's gonna be the first movie back in theaters and it is such a whiff oh it's it's a good it felt it felt like watching a real movie again it genuinely did and i and i loved it for that dunkirk won three Oscars which i didn't remember inception one four i think inception one four hold on dunkirk won editing and both sound By the way, everybody's going to be so mad when Tenet gets a sound nomination. It's going to be glorious to watch. Just copy and paste your old pieces of other Nolan movies getting the sound nominations. Yeah, Inception 1, cinematography, both sound and then visual effects. Quite deservedly, Inception.

For as much as I did enjoy Tenet, it made me feel like, oh, Inception is great. And we should maybe talk about Inception being great, because it is, it does a lot of what Tenet does so much better. Absolutely, especially it does, for lack of a better word, dumb shit, better than Tenet does. It does better, it has better characters. It has a more, a story that you can grasp with both hands. And, yeah. It has more charismatic performers.

Yes, I think that's definitely true. Even to Bickey, who we love here, we're well on the record, as of last week, saying we love her, is not good in the movie. I don't know if I would say she's not good, but, like, she's not great. I think Pattinson's easily the best performance in Tenet, and would watch a whole movie about him, would kind of wish that we would watch the... You probably could have easily made a film with the perspective of that character. Instead, I know he's the one who knows more, so you want to be, you know, from the other... character's perspective. Anyway, anyway, anyway.

We're not going to talk about Tenet. Not this time. I'll end up yelling at this. You can now watch it at home safely, listener. Yes, you can, and you should. It is, I will say for, and this is going to be an obnoxious half-second conversation, but I will just say that, like, in the realm of streaming screeners, which I have opinions about that we're not going to get into, but, like, some studios are doing the transfer

better than others, and, like, Warner Brothers took care. to make sure that their streaming screener for Tenet looks great. It does not look muddled, does not look, you know, pixelated when everything gets very black and dark on the screen, which was a problem when I saw, for example, Relic, not to call out, you know, IFC or anything like that, but, like, Relic is a movie that lives in looking down into dark corridors and seeing the, you know, the inky blackness move around you.

And it's like, I couldn't tell what was happening because that's what happened all the time because everything, all the, like, dark colors were, like, blocking and pixelated. I mean, that movie's on Hulu. Just watch it on Hulu instead of the screener. I hate conversations about screeners, too. Just talk about the movie. You don't have to say, fine, but I'm just, but fine. I'm not yelling at you.

You know that we agree on this, but, like. It makes a difference if your shit is on. shitty quality screener when you want your you know the whole point is to show up for people in its best light sure did you find how many oscars inception won yeah four before we get before we actually get into the questions just like our episodes when we would normally have a 60 second plot description we're 20 minutes in before we get into real question yeah inception one cinematography both sound and visual effects yes so again look for tenant to get nominations at the least in both sound categories, even though

everybody hated the sound mixing intent. All right. I normally think it's fine. I couldn't understand half of that. The thing is, at some point, at some point Christopher Nolan is going to make a movie where everybody is wearing

masks. And by the way, this is like, this is Christopher Nolan's time, is to make the great pandemic movie where everybody is wearing masks all the time and nobody can hear a goddamn word everybody is saying, because it's all filtered through masks. Anyway, let's talk about the questions Let's talk

Guys, thank you for all of your questions Once again, we got like well over 200 questions That we wouldn't be able to fit them all into an episode So if we don't get to yours, we still love you Sorry we couldn't get to it We tried to create like a form to some of these questions that we got But we really appreciate you guys This is like a fun side episode

Just for you guys all of your burning questions. We thank you. We love doing this at the end of the year as kind of a little pallet cleanser for the year and we will be able to recharge our batteries to go blazing out of the gate in 2021. All righty.

So to start us off with like a big one, not to be like after we've just been like, look at all this big discourse that we don't want to talk about. Mostly because it's stupid. But this one I think is good. And this was actually an interesting one that people just wanted to be bad. But, like, I was like, there's things to talk about here.

So Jonathan asked us, what do you think of the New York Times 25 best actors in the 21st century list? Would you swap anyone in? So now that I'm seeing this question written out, I realized that I ignored the second part of the prompt. Who would I swap in? Because I had so many opinions about who they did choose. There's a lot of people that you could swap in. I think it's more who would you swap out for a lot of people. Yeah.

However, aside from any of the things that they actually wrote within the list, that is an unimpeachable top two. Number one was Denzel Washington. Number two was Isabel O'Pair. That's all I have to say on it. That's the exactly correct topic. This list was pandering to you specifically by putting Isabelle Hubert at number two. I do feel like you've sort of convinced me a little bit to the other one that Denzel has been doing some of his most. interesting work this century, although

I don't know. Number one feels very high for somebody whose best performance is still in 1992. But I'm standing by that. We have questions coming up that will help us get into this. But here's the thing. He's

also the most bankable movie star. His movies, even the dumb ones still make money. That's not the list. The list is acting. Yes. But, like, he makes those movies compelling. And, like, a wide swath of people agree that he is a compelling actor, regardless of, like, what the movie. I mean, he makes fucking flight watchable.

And it's a terrible movie. And he's brilliant in it. I don't disagree. I think he does make flight watchable, even though it is a terrible movie except for the crash scene, which is amazing. I watch it all the time to just, like, traumatize myself. It's, like, shock therapy or something like that, where it's just like, no, I'll just trauma. I'm traumatized myself watching this plane crash scene. At the risk of sort of being the Aretha Franklin, being like wonderful gowns, beautiful gowns, I do say, like, the design of this list is, it's so pretty to scroll through.

With the pictures moving and with the text sort of floating, I think it's, you know, whatever money they're shelling out for visual design at the times is worth it from a reader's perspective. the list itself feels very responsible, feels very carefully assembled, and sort of... I feel like it felt responsive. Like, they had... For some of these people, they have, like, one idea, and then, like, that idea, like, is used to bolster their entire positioning of that one performer on this list. Yes, yes, which is, like, and in some ways that is good, I think when you, you, you, you, talk about like their entry on Julianne Moore and that it sort of becomes this treatise on Gloria Bell, which I was very, very happy for because people don't talk about enough about how

wonderful she is in that movie. And sometimes that movie gets sort of swept under the rug of like, you know, middle tier Julianne Moore performances. So I did appreciate something like that. I appreciate that there are, there is an eye towards international actors on this. But again, sometimes the list felt more like covering bases and trying to make sure that nobody was going to yell at them. And like, that's good when it comes to like

accounting for possible blind spots in the culture. But like, I scratched my head at some of these entries. Catherine de Nive for a 21st century list seems insane. I agree.

West's duty for a 21st century list seems insane. Kiano Reeves, as high as he was, is such this weird Keanu Reeves' pop-domism thing going on with the, I keep one, again, I always call it Jack Reacher when it's not Jack Reacher, but you know who I'm talking about, the man on the streets. John Wick. A series that I cannot see because the first one puts his dog in peril, and I can't watch that. Oh, more so than peril from what I am given to understand. Yeah, from what I have had people spoil it for me.

I was like, great. Never watching this series. I can't. Again, with the appreciation for those movies so rides this line between, like, I love these movies and isn't it fucked up that I love these movies? Isn't it funny that I love these movies? Which is, like, my least favorite form of cultural enthusiasm. See also, everybody fucking flipping out for Borat this year.

See also College Dorm Rooms. Yeah. But, like, whatever, like, the Keanu thing aside, I think it does make some really good picks. I think Willem Defoe for a 21st Century list is very good. I think Oscar Isaac makes tons of sense. Viola, Sertia, Tilda, Zhao on this list made me very, very happy. Hell yeah. Hell yeah.

Not all the write-ups did it for me. The Nicole Kidman won. I love Manola Dargis in general, but it made me furious that people are still making, calls it a polite yawn of a movie, which middle finger in the air. you, fuck you. And also, like, we're still making jokes about the nose in 2020. Like, it has been almost two full decades. Like, we could maybe stop with that really dumb and easy joke and recognize the good work that she's doing. And this is all in a write-up that is saying how great Nicole Kidman. Also, as I tweeted at the time, the Melissa McCarthy write-up is so high on her performance in Spy that it completely like sweeps aside her performance in the

heat, which to me is the exact opposite of what we should be doing. Not the exact opposite. She's great in Spy. Talk about her great. She's in Spy. She's even better in the Heat. I think the heat is a better movie than Spy. And that annoys me because things annoy me. There was also though, Chris, and maybe this is something you want to talk about a little bit because I've been talking a lot. there was criticism about this list that it was solely about movies and talking about the great actors of the century without acknowledging any kind of television work is missing half the picture of what acting is these days which I mean they included Nicole Kidman she's basically going to be a TV actor from now but they did only talk about her film performances and like true I mean, I think really what this list is is about movie stars, which, like, that explains Michael B. Jordan being in there. It explains, like, I guess it's just like, to me, it was more about, it was a list about screen presence, which explains Catherine didn't know of being on there because she still absolutely has that, but she doesn't really make movies that really register in the culture that much. in the 21st century,

which is what the title of the list was. I mean, TV, like, I think they were also looking for breadth, and a lot of, like, the great TV performers that we think of, we think of them for, like, one or two performances, um,

you know, or, I mean, the 21st century is not that, old. It is a, we are still in a young century. So to me, like if you were trying to think of a Carrie Washington to put on there, like, we know Gary Washington from TV on scandal mostly. I mean, there's little fires everywhere, but like, give me some examples of TV performers who it's like, they're one of the greats and you can rattle off. Right. Many, many different roles. Right.

I think it's Elizabeth Moss, maybe, but like we think of her more for movies. Right. I think that's a big part of what makes it a different animal. That's why I am very, very fine with just talking about film performance in this. Like, there are different mediums. We're allowed to talk about one and not the other. I think sometimes the TV, for lack of a better term, TV Twitter, but like the sort of the television critical apparatus, gets their backup about movies.

having a perceived superiority, which, A, I get it if you like TV that much, and if you work in television, and then you don't sort of like to see your medium sort of cast aside in that way, I do think there is something to the primacy of movies, so it doesn't bother me as much. I agree. But that's me. So, yeah. Moving along, though,

we have another question related to this one. Yes. We kind of unpacked this performer already. Elisaio asks, how would you rank Denzel Washington's top five non-Oscar nominated performances? So you got into this a little bit when you were talking about Denzel Washington as a movie star. And again, he is a great movie star, one of our best movie stars. But when I was sort of going through his filmography trying to pick out my favorite non-Oscar nominated performances, what I noticed was his Oscar nominations are for all the stuff where he steps outside of that, like, Denzel Washington leading man, not bubble exactly, but like there is a Denzel Washington stock performance that he taps into a lot. This is, you know, Denzel Washington in the siege, Denzel Washington, an inside man, in Crimson Tide, in Man on Fire, in Fallen, in Dejaveu, in, you know, any number of these

movies, the one that's on the train, the one that's on, you know, fallen. Right, again, follow. The one that's with the devil. And like, nothing, which is not to say that these are bad performances. Again, I think there is, it's an underrated skill to be able to be, be to have that, like, screen persona that way. But, like, in many ways, all those characters are kind of the same guy. It's Denzel Washington. You know what I mean? Denzel Washington's here to foil a terrorist plot. Denzel Washington is here to solve a bank robbery. Denzel Washington is here to save the submarine. And it made it challenging to just be like, okay, but what are my favorite performances that maybe, you know, transcend that? And, like, he tends

to get nominated when he transcends it for fences, for Roman Israel, for flight, for, for Malcolm X for Glory, you know, all these things. My favorites, I watched the, this is all I wish to say is I watched the preacher's wife last night because I wanted to watch something that was different. And that's not a really great movie, I don't think, unfortunately. It's the rare, uh, lighthearted comedy. It is, which is like fun to watch him do. I wish, I wish the movie was more about him.

The movie tends to be very much about Courtney B. Vance as the stuck in his way's preacher of the title, and even less so about Whitney Houston's character than you would think, which is fine, because I don't think Whitney Houston is that great in that movie. I would have loved this movie to be almost all entirely about Jennifer Lewis, who is playing Whitney Houston's mother in this movie, even though she is only six years older than Whitney Houston, which, amazing. But it was at least fun to watch Denzel do something different. I will also caveat this by saying, I still have not seen Carl Franklin's Devil in a blue dress,

which I know is a huge blind spot for me, and I really, really will correct this. But, like, Denzel in the Pelican Brief, so good. Denzel in Philadelphia, like, so good in a way that, like, you overlook what the challenge of that role is. Denzel in... I think a lot of the type of characters that people complain about gay narratives being about the straight character and the straight character getting off easy by the terms of the movie's judgment is not true about Philadelphia. Yeah, that's a very good point. I think Denzel's performance is really great at really earning the respect of the fellow characters,

earning the respect of the audience in terms of his homophobia. Yeah. So what are yours? What are your favorite Denzel performance? Okay. My overarching point is, like, aside from thinking that Denzel Washington is the greatest living actor, he is also one of the few that it feels like Oscar has done right by them in terms of nominating his best work. So, like, I also did my top five of his performances and all of them are Oscar nominated or Oscar one. My top five for non-Oscar nominated Denzel Washington performances.

Number five, Inside Man. Inside Man is so fun. It is. Incredibly watchable. Yep. I think it steps just outside of the Denzel Washington saves X. Denzel Washington on a mode of transportation. Right. Just enough to be, like, really interesting.

Number four is Manchurian candidate, which is a movie I don't really like, but I think he is good in it. Number three is Devil on a Blue Dress. Number two is Philadelphia. And number one, our previous episode, Courage Under Fire. He's really good and courage under fire. So good, courage under fire. That's a great point. Very good.

All right. Our next question comes from Josh M. Who asks, given that it only naturally comes up a little less often than the women, I am curious who are a few of your favorite male actors of all time and or of recent years? I went with recent years. I mean, I could probably do all time easier than recent years. Because, you know, male actors are mostly just in franchise movies or they're Eddie Redmayne. So, I mean, of all time, I mean, I talked about how much I love Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Yeah. I love Jack Lemmon so much. Yeah. This year, I really got into Ben Gazara also because he's very handsome. You and Elaine Stritch, what the commonality is. It's very into. That's the meme of, like, Chris File, Elaine Stritch, handshake emoji, very into Ben Gazzar. Horny for Ben Gazzar.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I talk to, I think, I do think, I take your point about how the economy of Hollywood right now means that any halfway interesting male actor and a lot of the not interesting male actors all get sort of siphoned into franchise filmmaking. Thank you for saying it, Lucas Hedges. Yeah, that was a good point. in our interview with our wonderful friend Matt Jacobs. But I do think there's a good class of really interesting male actors right now.

I think about Oscar Isaac is incredibly compelling to me. Adam Driver, I find fascinating everything he does. Andre Holland. I know you're less bullish on him than I am, but I do think Timothy Chalame, for all the hype, is an incredibly interesting young actor, and I love watching what he does. we talked about Donald Gleason and Ben Washaw

when we talked about time with Katie Rich and I do think that they both have given some really good and interesting performances and a lot of different types of things and I mean it's maybe a little trite to say but I'm still incredibly into everything Tom Hanks does and the way the kinds of roles he's been taking and performances he gives

And for as much as Mr. Roger, his Fred Rogers is not the Fred Rogers that you expect him to give. And it is spectacular. He's doing some of the best work in his career in the last 10 years. And I think that's amazing. Here's what I'll say about Oscar Isaac, or what I'll pause it. Has Star Wars kind of killed the interesting side of his career? What interesting performances of his has he given since Star Wars? Well, considering since Star Wars is less than a year at this point.

I mean, since Force Awakens, I'll say. Well, now I'm going to bring up Oscar Isaac. I mean, it seems to me like you've done your homework on this and you know that I'm not going to be able to give you a good answer to this. But that's just how I feel. I do love him. I hope that we can get another most violent year out of him. You mean that literally and not like in terms of a film. Yes, I want him to, I want him.

to, no, I don't want him inflicting violence. That's not good. I'm not going to wish that. I take your point. So his post-Star Wars movies are, and we'll set aside the X-Men movie he did, because we'll all choose to forget about that. We should all choose to forget all X-Men movies. The promise doesn't exist. Suburban Khan is not a good movie, although he, I think, is probably one of the more interesting parts of it. Annihilation is a great movie that he has a very specific role that keeps him in a box. in that movie, but it's a great movie. I saw Operation Finale, and I can't remember what his role in it is, which is probably not great.

He has a small supporting role in At Eternity's Gate, that, you know, that movie was not about him. Oh, boy. The less said about life itself, the better. And he especially was tasked at playing, like, the most irritated character in life itself. He's the one that goes up to Olivia Wild at a party in the trailer, at least. and it's like, I can see our whole lives together, blah, blah, blah, blah.

I can't wait to force you to watch that movie. I can't wait to force you to watch that movie. Triple Frontier is what it is, and it's not for me. And maybe it's for other people. Remember when Netflix was like, 80 million people watched Triple Frontier. I do. I do. I do.

I do. I do. I do. I do. And, like, so upcoming is Dune, which I couldn't be more excited for, but like, he plays Lido Atreides in this. And, like, that's. A role that requires a lot of gravitas, but at least in the previous two adaptations of Dune, doesn't require a lot of acting is the wrong word.

But, like, it's not the most compelling role in the film by far. He's not even going to get to be, like, the cool character. Right. That, like, has the cool weapon, you know. So, let's see. What does he have upcoming? He has a film. He has a Paul Schrader film.

called the car counter. The portrait film I'm excited about. Yes, me too. Tiffany Hens. He reunites with his at Eternities Gate co-star Willem Defoe, which I think we've all been clamoring for. I know. The reunion of the century.

He does also have the remake of scenes from a marriage coming up, which what actress is attached now? I think it's the third one. It's not Jessica Chastain, is it? It still says Jessica Chastain on IMD. But we don't know. What television network is doing that? I think HBO Max, but I could be really wrong.

Yes, it is HBO. Okay. So, yes, that's worth getting excited about. The Schrader is worth getting excited about. There's another television series that he's attached to. Oh, it's a Marvel series. It's Moon Night. I don't know what that is.

Uh-huh. But good for everybody involved. involved in Moon Night. I'm sure that was part of the big Disney investor call that me not being a Disney investor did not pay attention to you. Moon Night, I'm watching P. Valley and obsessed with it right now. Moon Night would be Autumn Night's stripper sister. He's also attached to a James Gray movie, which again, people love James Gray more than I do,

but like I still think that's really interesting. It's him. Right now the cast list on IMDB is Oscar Isaac Robert De Niro, Donald Sutherland, Kate Blanchett, and Anne Hathaway. I'm absolutely interested in that. So, yeah, I think there's some interesting stuff ahead for Oscar Isaac. I will say you probably have a little bit of a point with your snarky little has Star Wars ruined Oscar Isaac thing. But I have faith.

I mean, maybe it was blunt. I didn't mean to be snarky. I don't, here's what I will say about that. John Boyega is finally emerging from it. he's incredible in red, white and blue, the small X film that he stars in. And Donald Gleason, like, has escaped the Star Wars thing, too. You're right to bring him up. He's very interesting.

But, like, he had the benefit of playing a villain. Well, in a small... And not, like, the main villain. Yeah. And I guess, you're right about Adam Driver. I worry, because, like, Adam Driver's next movie, it's going to be a Ridley Scott epic. I'm just worried. we're going to lose Adam Driver, too.

I don't think you lose actors to making one Ridley Scott movie, though. I'm being, I'm being gauche here, but, like, I'm concerned that he is, because he's going to be, like, the number one choice for, like, all movies, they're going to throw all of these big, boring movies at him. I have a little bit. I think your general point is correct in that, like, actors on the way up are more interesting than once they've made it. Whereas actresses sometimes are able to stay interesting because they have to seek out the interesting roles because there aren't as many good ones. So, like, that's, you know, you take the good, you take the bat with that kind of thing. But my hope is that with people like Adam Driver and Oscar Isaac that they still have an eye towards interesting directors. We see, obviously, Oscar Isaac wanting to work with James Gray and Paul Schrader is evidence of that.

I'm hoping that Adam Driver retains. Because, like, he was in a, like, a lot of really interesting types of movies on his way up. And, like, hopefully, and he's a theater guy. You know what I mean? He's idiosyncratic. I'm hoping that that, you know. Sure, sure. Didn't he play, like, Hamlet Bearfoot or something?

God, I would have paid to see that. Adam Driver's Hamlet. Amazing. Oh, not Adam Driver. Oscar Isaac did Hamlet. Oh, oh, yes. You're right. You're right.

you're right. God, I forgot about that. God, remember theater? Okay. Okay. So, keeping in the spirit of us getting a lot of questions about male actors this time, because we famously only appreciate women. Considering how hit or miss, mostly miss, this category is for you guys. What is your favorite best supporting actor lineup post 2000, and how does it compare to your personal five that year? That question was from Ty. Once again, I just like totally blow past the second part of questions. I'm fully prepared for the first part of this, and now I'm scrambling to bring up my own list. All right, so you leave the way. I'll take the lead then. So I guess my favorite would be 07, the Javier Bar Dem here, which is also Philip Seymour Hoffman for Charlie Wilson's War, Hal Holbrook for In the Wild, which is a movie I don't like, but he is good in it. and Tom Wilkinson for Michael Clayton, who am I missing?

Casey Affleck. Yes, Casey Affleck in Assassination of Jesse James, which is a performance I really liked at the time. And then when I rewatch it now, it feels really one note on top of being the lead, which is a conversation I hate. But yeah, that I think is a pretty interesting slash solid. lineup compared to a lot of other years, which is just like, look at this old man with punchlines.

I'm not talking about any Alan Arkin nomination in particular. But yeah, I guess my personal lineup would be, my carryovers would be Javier Bardam and Tom Wilkinson. Tom Wilkinson must always contractually carry baguettes from now on and this rule. He's so good in that movie. My other nominees would be Phil Bosco for the Savages. You love the Savages. I do love that movie. Buffalo Excellence, The Savages.

And then from our previous episode, Robert Downey Jr. in Zodiac and my winner, Mark Ruffalo for Zodiac. Yeah, we've definitely talked about this category before because I also have Robert Downey Jr. and Mark Ruffalo in my lineup, along with Bardem and Tom Wilkinson. and my fifth, instead of Philip Bosco, is the delightfully extra Ben Foster in 310 to Yuma that year. Yeah, 2007's my number one as well, as I went through everything. I think it is the most balanced in terms of, I don't, like, everybody in it, I think, is at least very good. I do like Into the Wildeism movie. I think the Hell Holbrook movie nomination is a little bit of a we like you old person nomination, which is fine. He had never been nominated, if I'm correct.

I think there are more interesting performances in that film. I think Catherine Keener is really interesting. I think both Christian Stewart and Jenna Malone are really good in that movie. But like everything else besides Emil Hirsch's really small roles. So whatever. I think other years that I looked to that were good, I think the 2010 lineup is actually really good. Christian Bale in The Fighter, Ruffalo and the Kids Are All right, John Hawks in Winter's Bone, Jeffrey Rush, who I think is actually very good in the King's Speech, although he is probably a co-lead.

And Jeremy Runner in the town, which is a weird nomination that I really kind of appreciate. That's definitely, well, the town was almost a best picture nominee. Yeah. That was definitely like Afterglow of the Hurt Locker. Yeah. But it's also, but looking at it now, it is like nominating Ben Foster for 310 DiHuma. It's just like, oh, Twitchy secondary villain, I am in. 2000s lineup, which we talked about recently on the Vanity Fair podcast, I think is very strong.

Benicio del Toro winning for traffic. Willem DeFoe and Shadam of the Vampire is so weird and good. Bridges in the contender, I think, is a hoot. Albert Finney and Aaron Brocovic, I love, and I was surprised at how much I loved Joaquin Phoenix going back into Gladiator. And I did not like Joaquin Phoenix and Gladiator. I do love that bridge's performance, though. he threatens people with like sandwiches it's great and then one that i think would be a big contender were it not for one performance is actually the 2018 lineup where mahershula wins his second for

green book in a performance i do think is really great uh sam elliott in a star is born who i love richardy grant for can you ever forgive me who i love adam driver's great in black clansman and then the only one i really don't like is sam rockwell is george w bush and vice but other I also thought of the Jared Leto year, with the exception of Jared Leto winning. That's Jonah Hill, though, right, for Wolf of Wall Street? I can get behind the Jonah Hill Wolf of Wall Street nomination in a way that I can't get behind the Moneyball nomination. Oh, I'm the absolute opposite. I think he's really good in Moneyball.

I could not stand him in Wolf of Wall Street. And I know, like, that's the point. I mean, I don't want to be the dude that's like, well, that's partly the point, but I mean, maybe it's partly the point. That whole movie is part. That is, that's the point, the movie in a way where I'm just like making the jerk off motion. Just like, okay, go away from me, Wall Street. You're not supposed to like him. Fuck you.

Martin Scorsese is having a ball with that character, and you cannot tell me he's not. And I mean, the Jordan Dalfourke character. We'll wrap up our actor discourse with the most important question that I think we were asked. asked by Jess She says I have come to provoke and will simply ask Concerning Caleb Landry she says love of her life

Jones thoughts She sensed a difference of opinion Between the two of us on this matter Oh have you I believe an in-depth discussion Is necessary to get to the bottom of this Do you think he'll ever be Oscar nominated Does he shower?

It's a limitless topic Honestly worthy of a full length app Jess, you are the new agitator on this podcast. I was twitching the whole time reading that question. That's appropriate. It's very appropriate. It is very appropriate. You're a method.

You're a method. I'm glad that you love him. I do not begrudge your love of him. I think he is a movie destroyer and derailer. I think he is an active problem for Get Out. I think he shows up in movies and exists in his own movie. I like actors who... I like, okay, I will say this.

I like actors who show up and exist in their own movie. He pulls attention in ways that's shitty to the movie. I think he's even a problem for the Florida Project where he's, like, still doing nothing, but like... No, he's great. Distracting. He's great. You and Katie Rich both bring up the same point about Get Out. I disagree, but I see your point.

I see, you know, what you're saying and that he is so obviously a problem once he shows up in that movie. That, like, part of its greatness is all of its pieces working together. He so clearly doesn't for the rest of that movie that I'm like... I'll give you that one. I will concede that one, even though I do enjoy him in pretty much everything. I like actors who seem like they're off in their own movie. I don't think that's the case in the Florida Project. I think he actually fits in quite seamlessly in that,

and his one scene in that movie is actually really effective. I loved, I really loved him in X-Men First Class. I know that's not much of a thing of just like, that's not an acting showcase or whatever, but like I really was fond of him in that. I think he's really interesting in three billboards, and I enjoy the energy he's putting out. out of his mouth in that movie.

No, I really like him. I don't remember him in The Dead Don't Die, but I don't remember very much about the Dead Don't Die, a film I was very disappointed by. Yeah, he's good in stuff like Byzantium, which is the Neil Jordan Vampire movie that nobody's ever seen that I always talk about. We love when you bring up Byzantium.

One of my faves. Thank you for your question. Jess, we're going to move on to actresses. Michael asks us, and Amy Adams had both been nominated for Best Actress in 2016. Who do we think would have won? Here's the thing. The Amy Adams' miss for Arrival gets talked about so much as, like, everybody was so late to the party.

I feel like I was having this conversation, and people looked at me sideways when I said it at the time, that, like, arrival would have been perfect for her Oscar. And, like, that was a Best Picture nominee. you can absolutely see how she could have won, I really don't think there's a scenario where Emma Stone loses that Oscar, especially after Isabelle Upaire won the Globe. I agree. Regardless of who you remove from the category,

because the nominees were Emma Stone, Isabelle Upaire, Natalie Portman for Jackie, Meryl Streep for Florence Foster Jenkins, and Ruth Naga for loving. So here's the interesting thing about that, is I think if you asked the average man on the street, and when I say man on the street, I mean homosexual on Twitter.

They would tell you that the two that would most likely lop off would be Streep and Ruth Nega. But if you remember at the time... Streep had that whole speech about Trump at the globe, which like absolutely cemented her nomination. Like the week before Oscar voting started? Yes. I think this is the thing is I think once that happened,

and already I think I was already predict. striped as a contender and like she was she was pretty close to already getting that nomination anyway and then that speech happened and i think it shot her up if you remember at the time we all got really nervous about natalie portman towards the end right there that she was going to maybe get a surprise nomination because jacky was such an odd bird and was so you know it was a very divisive movie divisive movie kind of off-putting whatever and then the oscars ended up liking that movie even better than i thought they would because they also nominated the score right which was also like super divisive.

Right. So, but I do think that if you look at the nomination totals, Streep is maybe third. And, um, but anyway, let's assume that it is Streep and Ruth Naga who are left off or perhaps Natalie and Ruth Naga are, are lopped off. Even if you assume Annette Benning is in, I don't think she's anywhere close to no, well, unfortunately. She's my winner, but she's my winner as well that year.

I think Annette Benning and 20th Century Women is one of her great performances and one of my favorite performances. One of the great performances of this century. The challenge in this kind of a question is because, like, if you put in Annette Benning and Amy Adams, we're still dealing with an environment that didn't like them enough to put them in for real, right? So it's tough to, like, imagine, you know, a world where people appreciated those performances better. But what I think you're asking is, once that line. up becomes set. We've talked about before about how certain things alter the alchemy of a category when it comes into Oscar voting. And I say this when I think about something like the 2012

supporting actor race, which was the one with all five previous winners, right? And we talk about how if Matthew McConaughey had been nominated for Magic Mike or if Leonardo DiCaprio had been nominated for Django Unchained, Leo came close. Leo was a Globe nominee. I think it all the chemistry of that contest because it enters, it puts in somebody with a factor that changes things, which is that, oh, this person hasn't won, everybody else has, maybe we'll go for this person. I don't think, I think the best case scenario when you're talking about Annette Benning and Amy Adams is what you're hoping is that with those two in the category, then all of a sudden it gets people thinking Amy's been nominated X number of times. This is Annette's

fourth nomination. Uh, fifth nomination. it would have been her fifth nomination, right? Yes. Yes. Grifters, uh, being Julia. I don't know if that was enough to have shifted an eventing though, because that was a movie that like not enough people were talking about. Amy Adams, I think without a globe win, like to solidify like how passionate people were

for the performance at the time. I mean, if she's in there, she's maybe enough to be solidly second place because I think second place is very far behind Emma Stone, but like I don't think it would be enough to be an active challenger to her that year. I mean, Emma Stone was in what was the best picture frontrunner for the entire season. Right. Right. Which negates the advantage that Amy might have had by being in a Best Picture nominee. Right. And also we've seen the scenario where Amy Adams has gotten a nomination for a Best Picture nominee more recently than Arrival, which is when she was nominated for Vice. And I know we all, you know, again, don't like Vice. But it's still

a nomination for a Best Picture nominee. And like that didn't cause... Best Picture nominee when she was nominated for American Ussel. I think the, when will Amy Adams win an Oscar thing is a much bigger deal online that it is among Academy voters. I think at some point the, the pendulum will swing on that. And it will become a major concern for Oscar voters in the last. like Leo DiCaprio vein of things. But like, again, it didn't happen to Leo until the Revenant. Like, we talked about it a little bit with the Wolf of Wall Street nomination, but there wasn't a huge groundswell for like, we've got to get Leo his Oscar now. Like, sometimes- I feel like Amy Adams, it's probably also a thing that there's confidence

in the academy that she'll win eventually. Right. Right. So there's no, there's, the urgency isn't there. And I think, again, a lot of times this is a thing that, this is a narrative that gets whipped up by publicity departments, right? Where, like, the Leo winning the Oscar narrative was something that was part of the Revenant's publicity from, like, day one. And so, at some point, probably that will happen for Amy Adams. Sometimes that happens, like, early on where everybody's like, big eyes. It's going to be big eyes, you guys. This is the time.

And we're seeing it a little bit this year with the Hillbilly Elegy. But then the movies come out and everybody's like, so maybe the next one. And it'll, you know, it'll happen when it happens for Amy Adams. But I agree with you. I think Emma Stone wins that Oscar no matter what. Yeah. All right. So our next question comes from Corey, who asks, you guys often talk about Oscar speeches where you can tell that they're a genuinely good person.

I know you often use Julianne Moore's speech as an example of this. are some other speeches that have the same energy? I always think about Olivia Coleman's speech and how it makes her seem like an absolute delight. Thank you, Corey, for that question. It took me all of three hours to be off book on Olivia Coleman's Oscar speech. I agree with you on that point, Corey. I mean, I think of, and not just because I just watched Jane Fonda and five acts, but Jane Fonda, all three of her Oscar speeches. Yes, I'm including when she accepted on behalf of her father. And, like, her first speech is very limited, and what's the actual quote where, like,

there's a lot to say, and I'm not going to say any of them tonight. I just want to say thank you very much. Like, you can just tell that she's an actively humble. The height of Hanoi Jane. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. You can tell that she is a very good soul and a very gracious person.

I'm desperate for Jane Fonda to get another Oscar now at this stage of her life because... Oh, my God. I can't imagine the tenor of speech she would make now. Like, it's truly something to behold, something to think about for sure. So wait, so what were your picks for... Was Jane your only pick, or did you have multiples? I mean, there's a bunch of people that I think of. I mean, it helps when there's multiple speeches, I guess, because I also thought of Mahershala.

Yeah. Who are some of yours? I mean, most of these are going to be actresses, so I do want to throw in a bone to say. Michael Cain's speech when he won for the Cider House Rules was so gracious and kind of lovely in the way he talked about the other nominees that year. And it really made me sort of like... say, like, Haley Joel Osmond deserves an Oscar. Well, he sort of said that about everybody. He said,

you know, Tom, you know, you were so wonderful in this movie, to Tom Cruise, and he said, thank God you didn't win, because your quote would have gone way down. I know what supporting actors make. Like, it's, you know, it's self-effacing, but it's also, like, but like, so sweet and so kind to Hayley Joel Osmond. And, like, so, you know, complimentary to

Michael Clark Duncan and Jude Law and it's just really lovely but my faves in terms of when I watch the speech, I think Julianne Moore's speech, I'm just like, you're such a lovely human being and I think you're the best. And I think that when I watch the Sandra Bullock speech, I think Sandra Bullock is so naturally gracious in that way. And like, half of that speech is me feeling terrible for her because of her rotten husband who at that time she didn't know was a rotten husband. And it's so sad to me that that, that

you know, great moment in her life is so inextricably tied up with him because she, you know, makes such a big deal of him during that speech. But I think that's wonderful. I think the Diablo Cody speech when she won for Juno just made her seem like a very

like cool, but like not straining. I know a lot of the thing about Juno and Diablo Cody was like she seemed like a try heart at the time, but that Oscar speech she just seemed like you know, a very... Her speech tells me that she really did not expect to win.

And she's just like genuinely, you know, kind of thrilled at the position she found herself in. And I love that. And then the other speech I'm going to throw in there is Cher for Moonstruck when she won for Moonstruck. Because the thing about Share is you always expect that she's

going to be this alien goddess like absolutely rarefied air untouchable. She's Cher. She's fucking share. She's immortal. She's the greatest. You also expect her to be an asshole and she's not. Also that. But like, but whenever you

hear her interviewed or she gives a speech or whatever, it's just like, oh, like, for as much as she sounds bananas on Twitter, like, whenever I hear her actually speak, I'm just like, oh, I kind of want to have a conversation with you. I want to have a three-hour interview with you where I get to talk about

whatever I want. And she just seems very nice. I don't know. It's weird to think of like Cher as nice, but like she does. She seems that way. I don't know. And that speech always makes me think like just the way she talks about never thinking that she would have this career and talking about Merrill and talking about, you know, her mom. And I don't know. I love Cher. I love Cher. We do love Cher. Next question comes from Erin. She asks, considering the far-reaching success of Roma and Parasite in the last two award seasons, I'm curious what your hopes are for international feature given its recent

rebranding. I'm also curious if you're excited for any non-U.S. films being released this year. We get a lot of questions during the mailbag, or we get a handful of questions each time if we're ever going to do a non-English language feature. And the tricky thing with international feature in relation to Oscar buzz is like it functions under I don't want to say well I mean like yes literally different rules but like it's a very different thing in the process of getting those uh that category the final nominees right there's the whole like bake-off lists where yes like now you have more and more countries than ever every year submitting right and then it goes down to like 15 and then it goes down to 10, and then it's the final nominees. And, like, there's always one every year, right,

that we talk about that, like, get screwed by being left off of one of those finalists lists until the final nominations, right? And it's also just, like, the nominating committees change every year. Right. They, like, sometimes they just fall back on, like, the corneous taste, so like things that are a little bit more avant-garde or difficult, don't make the cut because they just kind of fall back to populace taste. That's like the type of thing that happened with burning. Right. But you look at something like burning, or like the most famous recent example in terms of a non-nomination that got people up in arms, which was something like four months, three weeks, and two days. But like it would seem perverse to do a

this had Oscar bus entry on four months, three weeks, and two days, right? Because it's just like, yes. Well, we can't because it's a, oh, oh, I know what movie you'd. Sorry, I was confusing it with Marion Cotillard two days one night. Right, no. I'm talking about the Romanian. Imagine those movies and a mashup together. Exactly.

Fresh and sandwich. But I think when you talk about foreign language films that end up getting major nominations like Parasite and like Roma, them getting there, By the time they were nominated, they were not surprised. But, like, if you asked people, you know, very far ahead of time, if Parasite was going to be nominated for Oscars, people would be like, that's a long shot. And they are.

They're all sort of, by definition, long shots because they are from outside of the traditional Hollywood Awards economy. And so it's hard to look at something that doesn't make it and just be like, well, you tried it because it's just like, you know, they're coming from such a deficit that I think when we talk about movies that we talk about on this podcast, there's some expectation that, like, they're in this sort of pocket for this thing. And I think most international features are not in that pocket. There's some famous examples, too, where it's like, it's not the movie that's

selected by the country. Like, Olmotivars had that happen to him several times. It's part of the reason why talk to her one original screenplay and got that best director nomination. Probably would have been a Best Picture nominee if that was 10. that year. El Mottavar is an interesting case, though, because he is the rare foreign language director who does carry with him some sense of Oscar expectation because of his success at the Oscars over the years. So I feel like we could maybe do something like Broken Embraces.

Do you know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, that's been all the cruise, too. Yeah. So maybe we will. As far as this year, like, this is another one where I feel like the ecosystem during the pandemic has hurt. smaller movies or like movies that are at least smaller in terms of Oscar conversation.

Yeah. There's some good stuff out there. Um, Night of the Kings, the Ivory Coast's submission is really good. Another round is really good. And I think that's probably going to be our winner, though, like, as we just mentioned, the way that, like, the bakeoffs always shake down. You really never know. You never know. Yep.

That's true. But yeah. I think that that's the. Yeah. I think that's. To my mind, the most likely winner. at this point. Yeah. All right. Joel asks us, what's your most memorable below the line win from Oscar night and why? I've talked about this on Mike before, but I don't care because I love talking

about it. Iko Ishioka winning costumes for Bram Stoker's Dracula. Fucking rules. Yeah. That's amazing. I wish that they would be that weird more often. It's weird, but like, it's a weird pick because it's a weird movie, but it's also so incredibly opulent. You could make the case that it's like, sure, it's an oddball pick, but it's also most costumes. It's a phenomenal achievement

and we love it. I sort of went with Oscar moments from the ceremony, my favorite from below the line categories. I think a, anytime someone gay wins and kisses their boyfriend slash husband or thanks them from the

stage is fun. We don't get it often enough, but it does happen. And then two moments that are like indelible in my mind from Oscar ceremonies, one of which is we talked about this when we were on the screen drafts podcast when we drafted drag movies. Lizzie Gardner winning best costumes for The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, when she showed up with her dress made from American Express Gold cards, which I will never forget. I was totally wonderful. And I Obviously, you know, the unexpectedness of a, you know, small little Australian drag movie winning an Oscar was, you know, elated, you know, many people who really loved that movie. And then the other one I will always remember is in 2013, when 20 feet from stardom won best documentary, I was over the moon for that movie anyway, so I was so happy that one, one of my favorite sort of movie watching experiences of all time, just sort of watching that movie and sort of being, you know, filled up with joy watching these women sing.

But then to see Darlene Love take the stage and Acapella sing his eyes on the Sparrow as like Bill Murray, among others, are freaking out in the audience, is, was phenomenal. And I really loved that. That's a spectacular pick. Yeah. Robin asks us, inspired by the wonderful behind the scenes video for Kubu Gooding Jr.'s acceptance speech, What other Oscar moments would you want to see the production booth feed? I mean, this is the low-hanging fruit, but I would like to see the best picture Moonlight Lala, Lance Neffu from the production booth feed. I mean, not for the Schadenfreude of watching someone get fired in real time, but like when you read the immediate fallout and they were like interviewing production people from the Oscars.

Like, truly nobody knew what was going on in the entire theater. Yes. And, like, I think that would give a sense of scope proceedings. And my favorite thing about that Cuba Gooding Jr. video, when you watch the director, you know, calling out shots, is finding reaction shots that he wanted to cut to. Where in that one, he's like, cut to Muhammad Ali, cut to Tom Cruise, whatever. And, like, the decisions of who to cut to in the audience during the Moonlight La La Land thing would have been amazing. Cut to the card, cut to the card. Cut to Tramante Rhodes, grasping his chest, like all this stuff.

I have two other contenders. Tarashi P. Henson with her cell phone. Yes, yes, absolutely. All of that stuff. Like, just absolutely amazing. I think that's the right answer by two sort of semi-finalists for this. The 2010 Melissa Leo speech, where she becomes a runaway train of cursing and potential further cursing.

Like, I would have liked to have seen the chaos and the booth surrounding that one. And then also, one thing that is sort of less lighthearted, but do you remember in 1998 when Elia Kazan won the honorary Oscar, and there was the huge controversy over whether they should, because he had named names during the Blacklist era and all this stuff. And Amy Madigan and Ed Harris, I believe, are the ones that are, like, scowling. It's Amy Madigan and Ed Harris. Well, so, like, in the lead-up to this whole thing, there was this genuine, sort of dialogue about like, A, should this happen? And then it was happening. And then B, it was

how should the audience react? And there was definitely, there was like a thing where like people in Hollywood were like, we should all sit on our hands. We should all refuse to applaud. And that will be our statement against, you know, what this person did. And like, whether that was justified or whatever, it's a very complicated issue. He was a very old man by this point. So it did seem kind of mean to be that mean to an old man, but these were, you know, important issues that American history and whatever. But the ones who were on screen as overtly not applauding, where Amy Madigan and Ed Harris, Ed Harris was nominated for the Truman Show that year, and then Nick Nolte, who was nominated for Affliction, and at the time he was dating Vicky

Lewis of News Radio, if you remember. So the two of them also, sat there and like refuse to applaud and I again just the call the finding reaction shots and calling them out and like seeing who the production booth decided to cut to out as standing or not standing would have been really interesting choice yeah my other choice would probably be again another more basic Oscar answer of the naked guy 70s because when you watch it the camera barely cuts away. Right. So you wonder, did they just not react in time? Right. Did they, I'm speaking, of course, about when David Niven was on the stage and a man ran out from the wings, completely stark naked across the stage and through the theater. Yes. Um, but yeah, like, were they not paying

attention? Was it just the 70s and like, you know, TV production booths were chiller? Probably didn't have a delay like you would have now. So maybe that was part of it as well. I'm just like I should read up on that. I'm sure there's a great article that's been written about that or something. Because like how does that person

get that far in the process of like how does he get backstage? Like at what point is he like wearing a robe backstage and everybody's like we don't know who this guy is in the robe? How long was he naked backstage before he like runs across? How did he get there? Was he a stage hand that

Right. Right, exactly. I'm sure, like, somebody shoot us a link to something about this story, because I would love to read it. See, someone's personal. It feels like something that would have been part of, like, the annual E.W. Oscar issue, where they would talk about, like, old Oscar ceremonies. The naked man. Anyway, anyway, anyway. That's a great. That's a great choice. Okay. Next question. Kevin asks, what's the Oscar win over the last 30 years that has the worst consequences for following wins? is a very fascinating question and obviously right up my alley because I have weirdly made an odd little cottage industry around this kind of thing and we have more questions of the of the domino effect coming yeah um I don't want to just jump to like the lead acting races which is something we talk about a lot but like my gut instinct is Jody Foster winning for the accused that's my very top one as well.

Because... It would have saved us a lot of heartache subsequently when it comes to concluss. Absolutely. Absolutely. Because I've done... I'm doing catch up to some blind spots. I caught up to Blue Sky. Right.

A movie that I don't think existed even when it won an Oscar. I hear where you're going with this and I am already on board. Yes. It is one of the most atrocious acting wins I've ever seen. Much respect to Jessica Lang. She's a lot.

And part of the reason why she won is because when she did win her first one, it was for Tutsi, which was really because they couldn't also give her the Oscar for Francis because she was nominated against Meryl Streep for Sophie's choice. Exactly, exactly. And, like, there was some residual, like, Orion holdover because Orion had had that movie and didn't, they went under the movie. The movie literally sat on a shelf for two years. years for good reason. Yes. And like the other major contender that year was Jody Foster for Nell who would have won

if she was already not a two-time winner. Yes. Exactly. Yes. Even though Nell is a bananas movie too. That like any way you slice it in 1994, best actress would have been a weird winner, whether it's Jody Foster for Nell or Winona Ryder for Little Women or Susan Sarandon for the client.

like honestly give it to Susan even because like you could have had there's other good people she's nominated against in um dead man walking well okay so let's follow this train a little bit if jody if um if susan sarandon wins in 94 for the client which the drumbeat for susan to finally win one was loud then the client was seen as a little bit of a reach but you could have imagined a scenario where the emotional appeal for susan sarandon needs to win an oscar which had been mostly tying in Jody Foster again, mostly because Jody beat her the Thelman-Louise year. Because when Susan lost for Thelman-Louise, that's when this became this really loud call for just like, well, justice for Susan. And she lost for Lorenzo's Oil the next year. So anyway, let's say Susan wins for the client in 94. In 95, she probably is still nominated for Dead Man Walking, but probably doesn't win it two years in a row. So does it go to Elizabeth Shoe for leaving Las Vegas? Does it go to Merrill for the Bridges of Madison County?

Or does it go to Golden Globe winner's Sharon Stone for Casino? I think it... Okay, if Casino was nominated anywhere else, I think it could have gone to Sharon Stone. Uh-huh. I don't know if they were going to give Merrill a third Oscar at that point. Right. But that's one of her best performances. I agree.

I think they probably give it to Elizabeth Shoe. His and hers Oscars for leaving Las Vegas. In the context of that year. Yeah, I think you're right. And the other thing, I think, back to the very beginning of it, and I hope this doesn't derail you because it's a whole other thing. If you don't give it to Jodie Foster for the accused, you can give it to Glenn Close for dangerous liaisons,

which, like, that's not me shitting on her because, like, that is the performance her Oscar should have been. Yeah, and we can spare ourselves a whole lot of heartache. We spare ourselves the knobs of it all. We spare ourselves the wife. We spare ourselves, um... Hillbilly elegy. Yeah, yeah, it's true.

We spare ourselves the Smellogy. Uh, the other one, I think that's right. This was the number one choice in my mind. The thing about Jody Foster winning in 1988, 1988 is we didn't know the future. We didn't know that Jody Foster had the Silence of the Lambs coming up just a few years later. So, like, at that point, she was, this, you know, former nominee for taxi driver, she had grown up in Hollywood, and, you know, she had made good with this, you know, film. She was, you know, an adult actress now in giving this powerful performance. And it makes sense at the moment that they would have given it to her. But yeah, if it would have gone to Glenclose instead, who I think was probably second place that year for dangerous liaisons. Possibly, but the other question is, like, some of the weirdness of that Oscar year is Sigourney Weaver splitting her own vote.

Yeah. Well, again, that was the famous. So it could have been Sigour. Weaver. The famous three-way tie at the Golden Globes, where it was Jody Foster, and then Sigourney Weaver for Gorillas in the Mist, and also a non-present Shirley MacLean for Madam Susotska, which is my favorite trivia tidbit of all time. But the other year I had here, which I always talk about, is 1974, Best Actor, where Art Carney for Harry and Tonto beats out Al Pacino for The Godfather Part 2. and Jack Nicholson for Chinatown and like two other,

Gene Hackman, I think, for the conversation and like a murderer's row of nominees in 1974 and it ends up going to, you know, you know, nice old man, Art Carney with a cat. And that was sort of a little notorious of the time, but you look at that and of course the dominoes that fall from that is then Pacino becomes the, we've never given it to Pacino

and then he wins for Cent of a Woman, beating out Denzel Washington, who should have won for Malcolm X. And then, you know, what happens from there? Does Denzel Washington still win for Training Day if he already has two Oscars? Probably not. But then 2001 is such a great question mark for me because Russell Crow had won the year before. Does Russell Crow win two in a row? I kind of think he does, which is weird. But anyway, no, I think you're Jody Foster, the accused answer is the correct one.

sorry if you wanted to below the line question this is uh this this is who we are yes exactly all right so the next question we're not a stranger to the dark oh my god shut up all right next one what if rene zellweger won best actress for chicago this is from oliver i like that this question feels like oliver listened to our answer for the previous question and is just like well what about this smart guys uh so i think this is a fascinating question, but mostly what it makes me think of is if René Zelweger had won for Chicago, yes, you then wonder what happens the next year

with Cold Mountain. But my thing is who wins? I mean, I think the next year is easily answered. Showrag, Dashlu wins. Probably, period. Probably. But my most intriguing thing is, who would have won in 2019? Mostly, what I'm asking you is

who do we think was second place last year? Oh. Because that one kind of stopped me in my tracks. Again, I haven't really thought about it yet because Renee was such a, you know, shoe in. There was no other... There wasn't. Here's the thing, the whole season would shift. Right.

Because, like, nobody was ever really talking about anything. Right. Honestly, what I think happens and how the season changes is that it's probably Scarlett Johansson. Oh, that's fascinating. See, I think your greater point is absolutely on the book. button, which is the whole Oscar race for Best Actress has to, like, fundamentally change. And we talk about narratives a lot, but this is what we mean when we talk about that, which is Renee Zellweger from a pretty early stage by the fall was like, oh, it's going to be Renee this year. And so

everybody else was sort of in a race for a nomination. And because of... Well, and there was no, like, frontrunner challenger at any point. None of these performances really got to a certain level. And like, you could argue that at a certain point it could be Sersha because of all the nominations that she has. I think I, yes. I see. I think we like critics and the internet likes that movie more than the Academy ultimately did. But like they respect the movie, but they didn't you know. But if that field is wide open for a Sersha win, maybe that movie gets received a little bit differently. Maybe then that movie becomes the Sersha Rohn and Oscar movie. And then that narrative shifts a little bit. We already saw that they liked little women enough to give it a

bunch of nominations as well as a win for costumes. So I don't think it would have taken a lot for the Oscar voters to look at that movie just a little bit differently and a little bit more robustly as a potential best actress win. So that's one possibility. Another possibility, which would have been the inverse reaction on the internet, which would have been Charlize Theron for bombshell, which I do feel like there was a potential for there to be. be a very strong narrative. We know that the Oscars love imitation, obviously, with, you know,

Renee playing Judy Garland that year was, you know, but one example of many. And while I do think there would have been... She did well, the whole season. Charlize for bombshell? Yeah. She did. She was... Well, same with Cynthia Revo, but like... I think Charlize was probably second place in voting, is my guess. Really?

I do. Okay. I think marriage story... Well, I mean, Scarlet Johansson's polling her. own votes. Cynthia Areva is pulling her own votes. I think Scarlett might have been second for supporting. Maybe. Maybe.

But anyway, I think. No, I think Florence Pew was probably second. Yeah, you're probably right. I think marriage story had receded enough. And again, if it's a different year, then the narrative is different. I think a Cynthia Arrivo win is a strong possibility, though. I think that's possible. The thing is, like, we just talked about the,

when Emma Stone won. Second place was probably so far behind that, you know, second or fifth, could have been in literally any order. Yes. What I also think if she wins for Chicago, the big question otherwise is what happens to Nicole Kidman. I do think that probably, she doesn't win for Cold Mountain. I do think she probably gets nominated for Cold Mountain.

Yeah. Or, like, I mean, her later nominations would happen. Maybe she does end up getting nominated if she doesn't win by then for the paper boy. Or maybe she wins for lion, yish. I think Nicole Kidman, maybe her career is different. Like, I feel like, I think she ends up taking different roles then. I think not that, like, Nicole was so Oscar hungry, but, like, because that is such the apex of that, you know, I've been saying the word. She doesn't do something like the Stefford Wives.

She doesn't do bewitched. Right. And instead of those, she, you know, takes roles that, you know, are more geared towards an Oscar because I know I've said the word economy eight billion times in this podcast. But, like, it's true that, like, that is the way that, like, those movies and especially the movies that Nicole Kidman does, that's the structure of, you know, that pyramid. And well, and perceptions changed negatively towards her somewhat in the culture as, you know, she's. things do as people, you know, become oversaturated or win Oscars, that maybe things like Margot at the wedding or birth could have been received more... It's possible.

It's possible. On the face of what they are and easily written off because people thought they were abrasive. Maybe she doesn't win up until two years ago and she wins supporting actress for Boy Erased. Oh, boy. Maybe. Maybe. I'm just saying it's possible. I do think it's possible that Nicole Kidman doesn't have an Oscar if,

Yes. I also think that's a strong possibility. Yes. Our next question comes from Nina. Spotify rewrapped 2020 came this week, and my top artist of the year is Alexandre de Pla. I think he's my favorite composer, though I love a lot of scores from other composers as well. What are your top three or five favorite scores amongst the Oscar nominees and winners?

And then maybe a top three, five overall, regardless of nominations. And also if you guys have a favorite composer. I love this question. So, a prod conversation about favorite scores. I mean, Joe and I were both radicalized by the hours. I think you can imagine we both listen to the hours score often enough. A lot, a lot, a lot, a lot. Philip Glass, minimalist king, love it. Definitely on my list for top five nominated scores. I, as most of the things I talk about, skew more recent. I know there have been fantastic scores throughout the years. I did include, The Omen, Jerry Goldsmith's score for the Omen, because I think I just love that that was nominated. That's one of my favorite original song nominees. Yes, Aves Satani, yes, absolutely. Amazing. Hail Satan is an Oscar nominee for Best Song.

Like, we love it. We love it. That is the translation for Avis Satani. So that won The Ours. I included Road to Perdition, Thomas Newman's Road to Perdition score, which I think is incredibly underrated and absolutely gorgeous to listen to. I decided to poke at you specifically by including Hans Zimmer's score for Inception, where as much as we joke about the, you know, the big whanging horns or whatever, it's perfect and iconic and plays out through the phone.

Slowed down Edith Pia off, you know. Yeah. And then I did, I cheated and I put in a double entry for Nicholas Bertel. I put his Moonlight score and his If Beale Street could talk score, which I think. Pretella's on there. It's absolutely absurd to me. He didn't win for if Beale Street could talk. I think it's the finest score of the decade. It's amazing. I also put Mika Levy for Jackie. Yep. It is not controversial to me. That is genius. As far as non-nominated, also Mika Levy's work for Under the Skin is amazing. Yes. It wasn't nominated, I don't think, if I'm remembered correctly. But the The Beast of the Southern Wild score is one that I go to a lot. And then as far as winners, I put Dario Marinelli's Atonement score. Clacky, clacky, clacky, clack. Love it. We love it.

We love a typewriter score. People always, when writers do the prompt on Twitter of like, what scores do you listen to when you're writing? I always want to say the Atonement score has literal typing in it. It does. So my list of top five non-nominated scores. and so many of my favorite scores went unnominated. So I also had Beasts of the Southern Wild. It is a gorgeous arrangement by Dan Romer and director Ben Zaitland.

I cheated again. I did a double entry for John Murphy for his scores for Sunshine and 28 Days Later, the Danny Boyle films that were just astounding and propulsive and wonderful and God's so listenable. Clint Mansell's score for The Fountain is, Oh, God, yes, of course. Epic and gorgeous and perfect, and it's insane. I know the fountain was flop in many regards, but... That's probably one of my top five favorites, period.

We've talked about the door and the floor on this podcast, and I love Marcelo Zarvos's score for the door and the floor. The one that everybody thinks is the score for Never Let Me Go, because it was used in the Never Let Me Go trailer, but it is not. Rachel Portman has a score for Never Let Me Go, and it's actually quite good as well. And then my fifth one is a personal fave. Nancy Wilson's score for Almost Famous is so evocative to me. And that it exists among all of those song drops in that movie and still retains its own character so strongly. It's such a, you know, has such a theme to it is wonderful.

Next question comes from Anne. If you could cast a heist movie starring only character actresses of a certain age, who would you pick? and what would be their specialty in the heist? All right, so I initially went from like a soft Oceans 11, Oceans 8 template a little bit in that like you want to have your Danny Rusty or your, you know, Sandra Bullock, Kate Blanchett, like duo at the top of your ladder. So I'm casting Judith Light and Debbie Allen in those roles to be our leaders.

I think you need an inside man. for lack of a better term, which I'm casting a stocker Channing, you know, perhaps a society matron or something who ends up being their inn. You need a safecracker, that's Rita Moreno. You need a document forger. That's Lily Tomlin. You need a tech expert, which for me is Mary Kay Place. You need somebody who's like ex-law enforcement, who, you know, has a little bit of

expertise in that regard. That, to me, I think, obviously, is Ethepaitha, Markerson and spectacular. You need sort of like a honeypot, somebody who can sort of like flirt their way into information or access, and I am casting Shelley Long, who I know isn't necessarily a character actress. She's, you know, but like she's been on the shelf long enough that Sally Kirkland robbed again. Yes. All right, what are yours? I thought more vaguely about this. First of which it is a hate crime.

that you did not cast Margo Martindale. I thought she would be too obvious. I thought any time you talk about character actresses of a certain age, everybody says Margo Martindale, and I love her, but I wanted to go a different way. You did not cast a villain, who I am just going to give you Angelica Houston. Oh, perfect. Perfect. You also didn't cast a celebrity cameo as themselves.

Which, I, hmm, who do we, I'm going to cast Tina Turner. Oh, I love. that I love that yes um and I guess you also didn't cast like a weirdo like the person who just like in the group scenes has like the one weird comment that they move past that is like right you know a punchline for the audience right that's like they're just there to be weird aquafina and I um I am contractually obligated to make that person be Beth Grant of course Beth Grant thank you thank you Beth Grant yes all right next question uh anyway um i look forward to our tens of millions of dollars we make off of this please give us money to do this i want to make this movie now what's the title of this movie

and what are they stealing are they just stealing money yeah who doesn't like money that's the title of it also the title of it is who doesn't like money all right our next question comes from amy and she is asking what are your favorite and least favorite TIF venues, and why? She says, P.S., I'm sorry, the Scotia Bank escalator always breaks when we have guests in town. It does happen that way. It does be like that sometimes. This is not a brag.

This is not a brag. I'm just pointing it out. I have never had the Scotia Bank escalator break on me. You're asking for it to break on you the next time you set foot on it, Christopher. Don't tempt fate like that. Anyway, I love that we got TIF-related questions. I love it, too. Okay, what are your favorite and least favorites?

Okay, so for ambience, I go with the Princess of Wales. I love just sort of, when I'm seated at the Princess of Wales, just sort of like sitting back, looking at the whole proscenium and theatricality of it all, and I feel very special. I think for comfort, I'm very basic. I like the big rooms at Scotia Bank, because I can, again, walk all the way up to the top where angels fear to tread and where everybody gives up and takes a lower row. And if I go all the way to the back, I can get a seat all by myself, which is, comes at a premium at a film festival like this. For audience environment, I do love the Ryerson, especially for Midnight Madness stuff. I also have that little back row at the Ryerson with the secret staircase on the side that I love. And for least favorite, we've talked about it before, but the IMAX at Scotia Bank is a pain in my ass.

Yeah, I avoid scheduling anything there. Me too. What are your faith? No, I did see Lady Bird and IMAX, which is a brag that I treasure dearly. Ooh, I didn't think about the Scotia Bank IMAX. I mean, my least favorite,

I'm just going to be honest, I'm a very, I try to be a very practical person. It's probably the Ryerset. Yeah, I knew you're going to say that. It is comparatively a schlep. It is. Unless, like me, you stayed at the Chelsea Hotel on Young Street.

Sure. the first year I've also never done Midnight Madness and I might do, I always see the movies but I don't go to the mid yeah like you know me I hit a brick wall on like day three Well and also the big Midnight Madness one

is either the first or the second night It's usually the first night and you're putting yourself behind the eight ball When you volunteer to stay up until 2.30 in the morning on the first night and the rest of the festival you're just a fucking zombie More so than you already are When it's the busiest days I also just feel like the screen is so far away comparatively

And it feels like kind of small They fix that at the Roy Thompson But the Roy Thompson's also my least favorite Yeah, I don't love the Roy Thompson The Roy Thompson has such so many odd angles in that place Like it just does not seem like it should have ever been a place to watch movies Though sometimes it's wild what you can see there We saw clemency there together

We did Which like I'm sure it was the huge You just screened that that very good movie was unfortunately played on. Yeah. Watch Clemency, guys. My favorite venue, like, I want to say it's the Winter Garden because I do like watching a movie among the leaves. But it usually has, like, the worst acoustics. Yeah.

So I'll probably just say the lightbox. I will be an elitist, and I will say the Shishi Theater. But they do have the most comfy seats. Oh, that's interesting. That's a good point. They do have very complicated seats. All right, good. All right.

Sethan asks, in reference to the Nutcracker and the Four Realms, which of the Four Realms are you? I have many thoughts. Go for it. I have fewer thoughts. Just as a recap, the Four Realms are the Land of Sweets, Land of Amusements, the Land of Flowers, the Land of Flowers, the Land of Snowflakes. Please remember that the regent of the Land of Snowflakes

is an ice-covered Richard E. Grant. I mean, that gives it a big advantage. Obviously, the Land of Sweets appeals to me. But, um... You are, you are Kiranightly as the Sugar Plum Fairy, one of our more underrated camp performances of the past decade. She's a goddamn blast in that movie.

Like, honestly and truly. As I told Chris before, uh, if you watch this movie, this season, it is canonically Christmas adjacent because the Nutcracker is a Christmas object. So there. They tried it. Disney tried it. They sure did. And God bless

them for trying it. Try it with more things. Although, like, they tried it with Artemis Fowl, too, and that was bad. So maybe don't always try it. But, like, try it with the Nutcracker in the Four Realms. Nutcracker in the Four Realms, famously directed by Lassa Hallstron. Co-directed. It's also Joe Johnston.

Yes. I don't know. I'm probably, I am a winter queen. You are. I do like snow and stuff. Yeah. So I think that's me. I'm Richard E. Grant. All right.

I love that for you. All right. Next question. Are there any films slash episodes you have done that you cannot remember? This is from Jack. Cannot tell you how many there are. Oh, no. I mean, our joke was our Secretariat episode.

We don't remember doing that. It's a C-Biscuit episode. Yeah, the C-Biscuit episode. But, honestly, we're getting to the point because we've passed, like, two and a half years. We're coming up on three years, right? I know. I know. Of doing this.

Yes. That, like, there's so many. It's sometimes it's that I forgot that we've done a movie. And also, it's that, like, I wish we, I don't want to say that I want to do episodes again. Because that sounds psychotic. but like sometimes I wish that we had like held out on doing like serena yes or cake yes until we were more seasoned at this and had more of a better audio no more seasoned because like those episodes are still good I still think cake is one of our better episodes um it's it's it's

it's more so that like I don't know we've just we've done it for a long time and I guess we should say there's plenty that we've held out on doing, like the shipping news or Reservation Road or... Yeah. I love that there is still some big guns still out there. I always say that I can never remember actually talking about the Fifth Estate. That's the perfect answer. Or I tried to remember, for an upcoming question in this, I tried to remember what we thought of a love song for Bobby Long, and I couldn't remember it for the life of me. I only remember random hearts because we talked about the scene in the mall with the sales lady and how much...

It's like a 90-minute episode and we spend maybe an hour on that one scene because what a non-movie. Yeah. But I weirdly, going through our list of movies that we've covered, there's at least some little nugget in something where, you know, if I don't find a movie memorable, I remember a guest. or if I don't find, you know, whatever, our major discussions memorable, I'll remember a tidbit. And, you know, I love that about us. Okay, so next question from Patrick. Who are the Thob Atoors, the Sad Oscar Buzz Atoors? He says Terrence Davies because there's multiple actress contenders.

I feel like the Terence Davies movies, namely House of Mirth's Quiet Passion, and Deep Blue Sea was more of a critics thing than any real, like, Oscar contention. Rachel Weiss came close, I will say, for Deep Blue C. I don't, are you sure? She got some stuff for that. Let me look up. She got, like, a New York's Critics Prize, but, like, that was the end of the road for that. New York's Critics Prize is nothing to sneeze at, though.

That's one of the, like, you know, major critics' words. Hold on, hold on, I thought she also got a Golden Globe nomination. Hold on. A.P., okay. All right, maybe I'm here. Yeah, she did get a Golden Globe nomination. To Rachel. My respect to you, Rachel, I love you.

Definitely, I mean, our most covered director is still Ridley Scott. Yes. And there's still more that we could do. Still so much more. Famously Nutcracker and Four Realms director, Lossa Hallstrom. He's on my list as well when I was making notes for this. Absolutely. Yep. There's people who feel like they should be on there,

like Stephen Daldry, but aren't. But Stephen Daldry is almost always money with Oscars, even though that's faded in recent years. But his whole thing was that, like, he makes a movie gets Oscar nominated. I mentioned Lassa Hallstrom. I also wrote down Edwards Wick, who we've talked about when we did our Courage Under Fire episode

and our Love and Other Drugs episode. But there's a lot of other ones that, again, his whole thing is he's perfect for us, except his movies get one or two nominations. He's perfect for us with Legends of the Fall, but that got a few nominations. And maybe one for cinematography. Um, Last Samurai is a perfect movie for us, but Ken Watanavi gets nominated for supporting actor.

Defiance is a perfect movie for us, but that got something, which I still don't understand. Score. Yeah, but that's, I would... There's also directors that, like, we could do a lot of episodes, but I wouldn't say they're at this had Oscar buzz director. Like, we haven't really fully gone in on Ang Lee like we could. It's true. It's true. Ang Lee is definitely one of them.

Eastwood, Clint Eastwood, definitely. Weirdly, yes. And, like, again, somebody who will, or we're more reluctant to talk about, but, like, Woody Allen's got a bigillion movies we could do because his movies are always... We've never done a Woody Allen movie.

Yeah, we should. We should bite that bullet. Like, you know, talk ourselves around it or something. I would love to do what everyone says I love you. I really would. I would. I'm sorry. All right, good question, though.

Next one from Stewart, who says, which movie previously discussed on this had Oscar buzz would be a great subject for a movie about a movie, a la Manc or the director, the disaster artist. What would the movie be about? Who would write direct star? He says he would go with an Adam McKay dromedy about Jennifer Aniston's Lafty Academy Award admissions for cake.

Jennifer Aniston would, of course, be played by Claire Danes, is a great idea for a movie that I would love to watch. Did you have any ideas, Chris? I want like a Waiting for Godot-esque, existential dark comedy about the making of something like Exodus Gods and Kings where everybody is basically sitting around. Like, what the fuck are we even doing here, man? Yeah. I mean, like, there's crazy movies that it's just like, I just want to see the ins and outs of how they did that, like, mother, or like, I want to see the, like, I want to see the vetting process for John Travolta getting away with his a love song for Bobby Long dialect.

Yeah, it's true. I put down Hannibal because I would love to watch a movie about like Uber-casing drama. Uber villain Dino DeLerentis. Like, I don't know who we could cast who would be like, I sort of dropped the ball when it came to trying to cast these movies. But like, I'm trying to think of like a big, like, over-the-top Italian performance as Dino Dillarentus for the Hannibal movie.

You could also cast Jody Foster, the Julianne Moore of it all, get Herman Mankowitz to play Gary Oldman instead of the other way around, figure it out, I don't know, science, get on that. Yeah, I think that would be interesting one. I, of course, would love to do an expose on the making of Miss Sloan, and we'd find out whether Aaron Sorkin really did secretly write that movie. obviously the bonfire of the vanities has a huge production thing that was written extensively about and could easily be made into a movie the one I actually did cast

is I would love a natural born killers expose on the Tarantino versus Oliver Stone of it all and I said cast Joaquin Phoenix and Adam Driver but I'm not sure who I would want to play who I think you could do it either way and maybe you could do it

where it's like it's two movies where they swap roles midway through I want like a Diablo Cody-esque dark comedy character study of the awards publicist for salmon fishing in the Yemen Like nothing to do with the production of the movie Nothing to do with the stars of the movie But the person whose job it was to push that movie To sell that movie

I love it. Yeah and I want it to be like not that I want this person's life to fall apart at all but I want it to be like this is what my life is now young adult-esque I love that I hate my lifetime Mamie Gummer plays that main character

yes I want it to happen all right next question is from Sam which this had Oscar Buzz movie would be most improved by either one a Macy gray narration. Narration. I sound very drunk.

Narration. Narration. Number two, a Terrence Trent Darby title song, a la Frankie and Johnny. Or number three, a main character screaming about spoons a la far and away. Thank you, Sam. I think the correct answer is all of them. All of them at once might be too much chaos for one that I like to. I spread them out. I did one for each. Oh, okay. What are yours? So the movie I would most like to have a Macy Gray narration for is La Divorce.

I would very much like to have Macy Gray sort of commenting on these white people appraising art. And then also her describing the red bag floating over the city of Paris, I think would be beautiful and lovely. And I would want to see that. They say that bag carried its intestines five miles. That's what I want. That's the energy I want her to bring to La Divor. course. I want Terrence Trent Darby to sing the words salmon fishing in the Yemen so bad. I feel like that would be just over the opening credits and, you know, we'd all know exactly what it's

about. And for spoons, my spoons, no, everybody back away, it's my spoons. That's obviously, I want to hear the late Sean Connery and Finding Forrester becoming obsessed with his spoons. You're the spoon now, fork. Yes, exactly. Okay, so here's what I said. For a Macy Gray narration, I chose salmon fishing in the Yemen. That's also a fine choice. That's a good answer.

Terrence Trent Darby title song. I chose Goya's Ghosts. Sure. And the main character screaming about their spoons, it only makes sense that it's complicated. Oh. It's in the kitchen. I love it. I love it.

All right. That, you know, sometimes I trick you. I get a logical answer. No, it makes perfect sense. All right. What's our next question? All right. Next question from Stephanie on the recent me in Orson-Wells episode.

Chris mentioned that he has an entire horoscope-like mythology built around the before trilogy. He noted that he is a before midnight seline while Joe is a before sunrise, Jesse. So it got me curious. Can you expand on this philosophy? I feel like I am a before sunset cel. lean and I am worried about what that says about me. Stephanie, don't worry. That, I think, is a good one.

You like to dance to Nina Simone. You like to, you know, show up at book readings. That sounds pretty cool. I think, yeah. I think before Sunset is the most daring of the three in terms of just like, I think that's those characters at their most nervy. And I find that would speak well of you. And I think, you know, there's many benefits to being the Saline as opposed to the Jesse.

I am, as we mentioned, the Jesse because I am romantic and naive and given to facial hair. And I am before sunrise because I love the possibilities of things before they become complicated by reality. yeah okay so allow me to be your psychic friends network um come on miss dion okay oh god the the the the the the reason twitter has been all worth it um we can't go into it it'll it'll it'll it'll it will be derailed um god i i still don't believe that she writes those tweets i'm sorry but i don't okay no i think she does I think she does. Okay, so a Celine is more, like, focused on ideals and ideas and not so much, like, perfectionism, but, like, you are led by fulfillment in your life true to the kind of life you want to, like, live.

You have an idea in your mind of what it should be, and you are going to follow that as a beacon. Whereas if you are a Jesse, it's more instinctual, you are in the moment, you are not necessarily thinking about where something is going. It's more impetuous. And then, like, what type of romantic are you? It depends on the movie. Like, I think sunrise is the more optimistic, the more rosy. If you're a sunset person, you probably. have a foot in both doors, but you're also, like Joe mentioned, is the more, like, risky version. Yes. More willing to take a leap one way or the other. And midnight, I think, is like the hard line, reality, pragmatist, looking at all the scars and all, and still finding something beautiful and romantic about it. I think that's well.

I am absolutely a midnight selene. Yes. All right. Devin asks us, can you get, can we get your. picks for the Razzie winners among the movies you've done for the podcast. This is a little different than we've done from previous mailbags

than other, like, landmark episodes for us where we do our best. What would we say is the worst? So, for worst film, we've talked about a lot of bad films, and we can talk about, like, the one that I enjoyed the least, and this isn't necessarily that, but, like, I think

worst in terms of everything that it says and represents, I picked Stonewall. Yeah. I just, you know, I just did. The gulf between what it could have been and what it turned out to be was really bad. I think all the ephemera around it was bad. Obviously, Caleb Landry Jones was a bright spot, but not enough for me to escape a worst film.

How dare you know? He was not. What was your pick for worst film? I also did Stonewall, and I did that for Worst Director as well. Well, I didn't do worst director, but that's a good, that's a good pick. My worst actor would honestly probably be Brad Pitt in Meet Joe Black. Oh, wow. I did not have him on my list.

He did his patchwa in that movie without even blinking about it. I know. You're not wrong. I had, I wrote down Adam Sandler for men, women, and children, who I thought was pretty bad. I wrote down Nicholas Cage for Captain Corelli's Mandolin, because having watched that trailer again, because we did figure out that that was our series. Secret Nina Gordon movie trailer. His accent

in that is just so bananas. I can't get past it. I wrote down our recent discussion about Zach Efron and me and Orson Wells. We thought he was overmatched. I actually ended up going with Liam James for the way, way back, which I do

kind of feel bad about because he was young in that movie. A baby. I don't want to pick on him. But we mentioned the Lucas Hedges interview that our friend Matt Jacobs did at Huffpo, and he mentioned that he was up for that award and that award, that role and didn't get it. And now, all I've been able to think about was how much I would have liked the way way back better. Probably would have been good in it. If it was a Lucas Hedges

joint. Okay. Worst... Okay, maybe I rescind. This movie is getting a lot of airtime this episode suddenly. I maybe rescind Brad Pitt and put in John Travolta for a love song for Bobby Ball. This is why I was trying to remember what we thought about that movie, because I'm like, do I put in because he's really embarrassing in it. He is, right? Okay, that's what I thought. Yeah. All right. My worst actress pick is a double, uh, double nom for Natalie Portman in Goya's Ghosts and the Death and Life of John F. Donovan. Somehow, uh, are my two least favorite Natalie Portman performances ended up being like within three weeks of each other on this podcast. Sorry. I mean, I hate to say Natalie Portman, but

it's got to be Goya's ghosts Yeah, it really does I'm sorry The other thing is Sorry about it We love actresses Like even when actresses

Are in bad movies Or are giving odd performances I tend to give them A wide breath And so like I'm not going to say Jennifer Anneson and Cake

Even though We talk about Jennifer Anison and cake Sort of as a punchline a lot But or Naomi Watts And Diana or anything like that Speaking of Diana Though

My worst supporting actor Probably goes to Navine Andrews in Diana, who... I almost did Diana as Worst Picture. Yeah. The other one I had for Worst Supporting Actor was Michael Keaton for Much Adieu about nothing. Yeah, that makes sense. I chose Robert Townie Jr. for Natural Boyn Killers.

Oh, he's a lot. He's a lot. Just let's take it down to a nine, sir. Like, out from the rafters of it. He's operating at a, at 24 in that movie. He is. That's true. And for we're supporting actress, I had a hell of a time.

Again, I love supporting actresses. I will. Yeah, this isn't fun for us. I mentioned, I wrote down Cody Horn for Magic Mike, even though. That was my answer. I mean, I think it's the right answer. I hate, again, I hate to pick on, this is why we hate the Razis. I hate to pick on it.

But, like, she's bad. She's bad in a very good movie, and she sticks out because of it. I also wrote down Laura Dern and Dr. T and the Women, because I don't know what the hell's going on there. She was the thing that I liked about that. Yeah, I remember that. Dr. T and the women would also be up there for worse picture. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

Do you have a worse screenplay pick? I feel like with some of the dialogue we've had to deal with. Men, women, and children's really bad. It's really bad. Yeah. That could be it. that are like an unfinished life. Yeah, although I found myself charmed by an unfinished life, and maybe I'm just remembering the bear.

Yeah, you're just remembering Barth the Bear, too. Our beloved, Barth the Bear, too. Yeah, and his name is Iner. Suburicon, like, has a script, too. Yeah. All right. Sorry, Coens. All right. I like the Coens care about that, maybe. No, I don't think they do either. Next question. from Keegan, who asks, since there was a second-best exotic Marigold Hotel, what other this had Oscar Buzz film deserves a sequel, and what would you call it?

Carp fishing in the Yemen. I love that. All right. Salmon fishing in the Thames. Salmon fishing in the Erie Canal. Yeah. There are no salmon in the Erie Canal. I hate to break it to you.

Okay, mine are, I have two options for this, one of which is to Jillian on her 38th birthday. Because, you know, it was going to happen just that very next year. And at least then Claire Danes and her friend are one year older, so it's, you know, marginally less creepy when his friends hit on her. And then the next one is, I want a sequel to Random Hearts called Specific Hearts. and maybe it's about our sales girl in the one scene we remember from that movie but that's about it

I also thought of ladies in Mav goodbye to Marwin sure of course you are now leaving you have now left Marwin you have now left Marwin yeah the other others right much to do about something

And I, bottom eyes, emoji, Huckabee's. Wow. Bye. Good night, sir. Okay. Next question. Yes, the next question from Doug. Are either of you interested in visiting the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures when it opens and is safe to do so?

What would you like to do with the museum if you were in charge of it? Yes, I'm very interested in going to this museum. Its new opening date is set for September, if that date actually happens. What would I do with the museum if I was in charge of it? Okay, the photos of the theater in the museum are intense. And I, if I could be in charge of it, I would be in charge of programming that theater. Yes. Yes. Now, would you have like Disney World style animatronic reenactments of,

of speeches, of, you know, memorable Oscar moments and just have it... Oh, no, that would be cool. You could play that in, like, the pre-show before whatever movie you're going to program. So you could, like, play Jane Fonda's speech and then clute. Oh, like, doing the Alamo Draft House version of screening things at the Academy Museum would be my fucking dream. Like, absolutely, where it's just speeches and red carpet moments and little tidbits and whatever. I would die and go to heaven. Also, you could program a series of movies where the Oscars happen within a movie, such as the Bodyguard and the Naked Gun 33 and a third.

The Oscar. Right. Yes, exactly. So I would do that as well. Yeah. I will say, I just want to mention when I toured Warner Brothers Studios list this past February, on my way out of Los Angeles when I was. in L.A. in February, we did drive past the site of the still being built Academy Museum, and I was so excited. But when I was at the W.B. Tour, I got to hold an Oscar statue. And

more of that in the Academy Museum, for sure. Like, allow people. If I'm in charge of the Academy Museum, I get to hold every Oscar that has ever been given out. Yes, yes. Also, again, the Academy Museum should one by one every year declassify vote totals from the beginning and like move forward. And so like, so then we would have people make the pilgrimage every year and they have to like sign a non-disclosure so that like you can see it but you can't ever talk about it. And it becomes just your little secret.

I would. I think they would, all that would immediately come out. Homosexuals aren't good at secrets. Yes. It would be a class action suit against every homosexual. They would be on Reddit, you know, like spoilers for every single TV show. Yep. But no, I think one by one year by year, like declassify it, like the Kennedy documents, like, you know, and then you're just waiting for it.

You're just waiting for, you know, I don't know, 1968. How close were the others besides Streisand? I want to pour over it and know the single nomination that got the lowest votes ever. Oh, yes. Or, like, the lowest, like, per capita vote or whatever. Something like that. Again, all of that. Like, what the academy.

But again, but you go into, like, a secret room and, like, only you are there. And, like, they, like, non-redact, like, the lines one by one. I think it would be very dramatic and fun. All right. All right. Allison asks us, so there are several movies that you guys like talking about as future episodes, like Del Lovely Cats, The Shipping News. But are there any technically eligible movies that you guys hate thinking

of and would want to avoid for whatever reason. Okay, so you brought up Woody Allen earlier. Yes. We half joked to each other one time that we would do a mini-series on all the directors and never mentioned their name. Woody Allen, Roman Polansky,

Dustin Hoffman, who directed something, I think, at some point. I mean, like, there's certain things that, you know, exist, but like it's for us building episode, I think it's about making the conversation fun and light.

And, like, there's movies that I would absolutely, like, be fascinated to watch for these purposes, but wouldn't really, you know, make for an interesting conversation like the Paul Bettney movie Creation, which absolutely had Oscar buzz. And I just can't fathom us being able to create fun conversation around it. Yeah. That is my feeling. Sorry, go ahead. Continue.

I was going to say, that's just, that's a little bit more. I think when we're deciding what movies to do that comes into play rather than like we're trying to tiptoe around gross things we don't want to talk about. So I had a couple different. Obviously Woody Allen, the Roman Polansky of it all, even though there are films by both of those directors

that I definitely want to do. I mentioned everyone says I love you. I also deeply want to do carnage. But we'll talk about that at a later date. I wrote down something like funny people where it's just like, I don't want to talk about fucking justice for Adam Sandler like I'm over that I'm well over that I mean there's a few movies like movies like that where it's like yes we've had like they had Oscar buzz

but it's like they're also in the conversation in ways that aren't this yeah that like you don't need us talking about funny people well this is sort of where I met with heat too where it's just like right heat I don't want to be the like you know turd in the punch bowl about heat it's not like I don't like heat I think heat is very good But, like, that's what the whole episode would be is me assuring you that I like heat as I bring up things that annoy me about A, the movie or B, the phenomenon of the movie, or C, everybody's weird ass obsession with Michael Mann. Like, you know what I mean? I mean, and like, we've done movies like that, you know, we've done like Magic Mike. We've done Zodiac.

But I think when we've done those, I mean, A, the pandemic, we've tried to, you know, like make things brighter and happier and, you know, whatever. But also, like, we can maybe bring something to the conversation that or feel that we can bring something to the conversation that's not already there. I don't really know what we can say about heat that hasn't been said. This is why I'm very reluctant to do something like Billy Lynn's long halftime walk because, like, Blank Check put their stamp on it so definitively that, like, what I'm not bringing anything else to that. You know what I mean? Like, I can't compete with any of that. Like, that's... That are some of these things just need time.

like that's a relatively recent movie that like yeah there's also something that like sometimes i just don't want to have to see a movie that i didn't like again because it's not interesting in the way i didn't like it like last flag flying or it's i'm just like i didn't like it it wasn't that interesting of a movie to not like and i don't want to talk about it um or something like i also wrote down something like for colored girls where it's just like i have no business talking about that film and if a guest wanted to do it and like happily so absolutely they want to take the lead on that

that is yeah fine but I don't need to be you know jumping in here with you know opinions on any number of the angles on for colored girls for sure yeah all right final question from Bia knowing what little we know about the famed flora plum from the last two decades of its tortured history Who would you cast in it now?

Who are the Claire Danes and Russell Crowe of 2020? Who would dare dangle from that cursed trapeze? Bia, we appreciate any and all floraplum questions. We are, once again, the great floraplum historians on this podcast, Jody Foster's long-delayed torture production that never happened about the circus. I kind of want Russell Crow to be mo-capped into... Oh, no. Or the Russell Crow character, whatever, to be a mo-capped Andy Circus as some, like, huge

buff dude, because I want to see the circus at the circus. Oh, my God, shut up. I hate you so much. I was like, where is he going with this? Oh, no. Oh, God. Circus at the circus. Goodbye.

Um, I was trying to think of the clear names. I'm like, clearly given recent Hollywood casting decisions, like, she would be Lily James, because apparently everybody is Lily James these days. But I actually do think that might actually be a role for her that would work. Pamela Anderson, that is Looney Tunes. This would be a much better role for her. Play Flora Plum instead. Somebody give Jody Foster the money to make Flora Plum

and then we'll get Lily James off of that movie and we'll cast somebody else. Was it you who mentioned Florence Pugh for Pamela Anderson? I was like, that's wild. You said Florence Pugh. Who did I say? I said, I don't remember now.

that's going to drive me crazy, and I can't go three days worth of text. Anyway, Russell Crow... Sebastian Stan's good casting. Sebastian Stan, I think, is really good casting as Tommy Lee, and I'm very excited about that and would buy a ticket for that. Who was the Russell... So Russell Crow, when this movie was starting to get talked about being made, it was, what, the late 90s, early 2000s? Yeah. So, like, who is what Russell Crow was then?

I'm pretty... Unless I'm misremembering, I think even Ewan McGregor was on board, but then Bid Fish happened. I feel like Big Fish probably also really was the final nail. Honestly, like, Michael Fastbender is not a bad choice for Flora Plum 2020. No. 2021, I guess. Not at all. We're running out of days in 2020 that Flora Plum could conceivably drop on us, surprisingly.

It's honestly probably Adam Driver. I was thinking, I didn't want to bring him up because I had brought up a head of Driver on multiple occasions in this podcast, and I didn't want to be the psycho who keeps saying Adam Driver, but that's not a bad idea. The thing is, Adam Driver is more of a character actor than Russell Crow was, and, like, Russell Crow was firmly, like, leading man. Yes. And I feel like we have few people who are pegged into that one box, and again, partly because franchises eat them up. Yeah. But maybe this is a movie that you liberal

a franchise person. Like, I wonder if, like, Chris Hemsworth could do Flora Plum. Maybe. Maybe he's a strong man. Maybe that's the role in the circus is that he's a strong man. I don't know. That's the beauty about Flora Plum is it is an unopened box. We could project it. It's Schrodinger's film. It's everything and nothing at this point. Once again, our DMs are open if you have one of the original scripts of Flora Plum. Yes. Thanks for all these questions, you guys.

This was... You guys, once again, sorry, we couldn't get to all of your questions. It's an embarrassment of riches that you give us, and we love you, and we hope this is a lovely repayment of that love and affection. Indeed. Have a happy New Year celebration. When does this drop? Is this drop before the New Year? Yes.

It does. It drops right before the New Year. All right. Have a safe indoors and isolated New Year's celebration, and we will do this. Yes. We want all of our listeners, happy and healthy. Yes, exactly. All right, and we will see you.

We've got some already some really fun movies lined up for the new year, and we're very excited. Katzisode. Katzisode is coming. Katzisode is less than a month away. I feel like it is a beacon, a challenge that we have to meet accordingly. Somehow. We will do our best to make it worth your weight. All right.

Thanks, guys. See you in the new year. Thanks, guys. That's our episode. If you want more This Had Oscar Buzz, you can check out the Tumblr at ThisHadowscarbuzz.com. You should also follow our Twitter account at Had underscore Oscar underscore Buzz. Joe, tell our lovely listeners where they can find more of you and your stuff in the new year. Sure.

I'm on Twitter at Joe Reed, read spelled R-E-I-D. I am on letterboxed as Joe Reed, read spelled the exact same way. And I am also on Twitter at Krispy File. That's F-E-I-L, also on Letterboxed under the same name. We would like to thank Kyle Cummings for his fantastic artwork. and Dave Gonzalez and Gavin Mavius for their technical guidance. Please remember to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Google Play Stitcher, wherever else you get your podcast now, including Spotify.

Five-star review in particular really helps us out with Apple Podcast visibility. So please be the Flora Plum screenplay leak out into the world of good reviews for us and make sure everybody knows what we're all about. That's all for this week. We love you. We hope you'll be back next week for more buzz. I want to show my gratitude, my love, and my respect for you. I want to thank you.

Oh, I want to thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.