Critical Darlings: Sentimental Value and Belated Oscar Breakthroughs with Joe Reid

Welcome to Critical Darlings, a conversation about the awards season conversation, one contender at a time. Please welcome to the stage your hosts, Richard Lawson and Alison Wilmore. marie thank you as ever for your spirited introduction uh we are once again joined with producer ben hello ben hello and we have a special guest uh from vulture allison's co-worker and the host of this head oscar buzz of the podcast joe reed hello hi thank you for having me well we're glad you could make it me too especially because you're in a really busy time of your working life right now yes you every people don't know every year joe does a ranking of every film if short or feature yes right every nominated for an oscar so you have to watch a ton of shit and i say shit deliberately a lot of times there's bad stuff uh-huh live action short has not covered itself in glory for many many years i feel like this no is it any better this year no it's as i was saying to allison earlier there are fewer things that feel like absolutely terrible and awful you know there's usually some like incredibly treacly like animated short or whatever or like a live action and it wins right and it inevitably wins um there's none of those but there's also none of like the one or two that are like oh this is really great right there's one animated short called butterfly that i think looks incredibly beautiful it's and they like painted on glass to like do the animation and i'm like this is really but what animated short tends to do for me is like it really it highlights how samey animated feature tends to be every year where it's just like even when there's like like arco looks differently different than zootopia 2 or whatever but then you look at the animated shorts and it's like oh there are so many different ways to do animation yeah but at the same time also whenever i watch the animated shorts i'm always like oh you thought so much about like the technique and visuals you were going to bring to this and like not about the content or structure at all a lot of times it's students, you know. And you're like, well, you did this incredible job of using a watercolor technique for this or something. I've never seen anything like that. Yes, but it's Sally just to get a job at Pixar or... Right. No, right. Yes, to put it on your... Or you have, yeah, you just have national funding to support you when doing this kind of... National Board of Canada comes through again. They come through all the time, those shorts. Or the Estonian one, Flo, that won at the Oscars. And I think it's exciting to see Flo, which also looks different, and Spider-Verse. um so you're watching all the nominated films but your podcast has had oscar buzz as the title suggests is about movies that people thought might get awards but didn't end up getting them or even the nominations it's a tricky way to make me have to watch all the movies because it's just exactly you know i get them coming in and get them you know coming out so do you have like off the top of your head like a couple of like the biggest 2025 movies that had oscar buzz that failed to realize it's more so than i would have expected because this was such and you guys i'm sure i've talked about this before like it's such a top heavy year in terms of nominations all the nominations are really concentrated in those like best picture ones so like things that like jay kelly that like even when jay kelly disappointed i don't i don't think that's a real movie though well no i mean but the idea of jay kelly sure yes yeah um i mean the fact that wicked for good didn't get any nominations was like i got so many messages that day being like for me included yes I can't believe you can cover Wicked for Good on your podcast. That's crazy. Things like, I mean, stuff that died in the festival season, like Rental Family, stuff that I think people were maybe hoping might get a Kraft nomination, like Testament of Ann Lee. So the nice thing about doing our podcast is sometimes we're talking about a movie that we really liked and we wish had gotten Oscar nominations, but it didn't happen. And then the other side of it is movies that turned out to be really bad and everybody sort they got kind of found out before the Oscars. Yeah, I think it's almost like an even split. It is, yes. Stuff that you're like, oh man, that would have been so cool if that had actually gotten over the finish line and other stuff and you're like, good, rental family, good. I'm so excited to do our episode on Ella McKay. We usually tend to let these movies tend to wait a year before we get into them to give us a little bit of distance. What movie is Ella going to talk about when she's on the show? The documentary that they made about her life? Being the first person to become the governor of the state that they were born and raised from. Right. Did that state have the blizzard? We don't know. The climate is all over the place. Well, yeah, people can listen to that. We are here to talk about sentimental value this week. Yes, before that, I did want to pick up a thread from last episode where we talked about The Secret Agent, and we were mourning the fact that Tanya Maria, the incredible actor... Oh, Donna Sebastiana. Donna Sebastiana in it, someone who is not really a professional actor, who's kind of in Filio's films, has become this national icon. did not get, you know, an Oscar nomination. But what she did get is a series of Burger King ads. That's right. Oh, I'm so happy. Yes, in which she is touting, I guess, a meal that offers two hamburgers, a side and a drink for $25.90. So the where's the beef lady could never. Exactly. Yeah. So you can find those online. She's wearing the Burger King cardboard crown. There's one where she's just like sitting on a bed and like munching in this very relatable way. Well, she for years was inside the Burger King costume with the big hat or whatever. So now she gets to show her. Yeah, she's very good. Her cadence is very similar in the end. Yeah, yeah. She's just sort of like shouting almost. Hi, guys. How am I happy with another indication? How am I proud? And how am I? She says like absolute cinema, I think. You can practically see the cigarette smoke from the ashtray right off camera. No, good for her. I wish that we would do that with our elder discoveries in this country. I guess we have in the past, maybe. June Squibb should be doing many more. But she's like getting... She's not lacking work in any way. She was just on Broadway. Going close for Wendy's. It's come to this. I mean, you know, maybe it is time to bring back the Where's the Beef campaign. Well, we've completely lost the taboo of actors doing ads anyway. If you watch the Super Bowl, like it's just like a wasteland of that. So, you know what? Have them do silly, funny ones. Yeah. No, I'm just going to say, time to bring back that taboo. Bring back many more taboos, and that's one of them. You want to preserve your movie star gleam? Yeah. You got to choose here about the, you know, I know we all have to make money. we all have to pay rent and or purchase a nice house on the hills yeah back to the area of bill murray doing centauri times yeah yeah exactly yeah i know to do it in america well that's the thing is like you used to be able to kind of go to europe or go to japan and shoot commercials and no one would know yeah a low-key movie that like the kids wouldn't understand now because they're like what why doesn't he just do ads in the america why isn't she an influencer you know yeah um but it's also it's sucking up the work that like the snapple lady used to get and the where's the beef lady used to get you know that the guy who talked fast for micro machines the the dancing i saw a clip of him on the oscars recently actually the micro machines guy because they had him come out and to read the like they used to have somebody come out before they realized that the oscars had to be as short as possible um they used to have somebody come out and read the rules about like how movies are submitted to the academy and who votes for what and what committees and whatever and so they had the micro machines guy come out and like motor mouth his way through uh through the uh rules oh that's nice i mean would you say that the micro machines guy has some sentimental value oh perhaps for those of us who were there at the time yeah i mean i loved him yeah um so yeah we're talking about yoa kim trier's sentimental value a film that we've all seen and i think all liked yeah yeah okay um and i had seen it at can and liked it but i was like so raring to go uh because of i'd loved worst person so much that i think that sentimental value on that first viewing was a little bit of a comedown but on the second viewing maybe it's because I had been, like, alone for days. Like, it really affected me in a really strong way. So I think, Allison, you and I were talking about, like, how part of this podcast where we were re-watching Oscar movies, which I don't always do every year. It's nice, because I now have a deeper appreciation for this film than I did before. That said, I really wish that the attention that this has gotten at the Oscars was what Worst Person had gotten. Yeah. But sometimes that's just not how the Academy works. Yeah. Yeah, it's funny how often, I mean, at least anecdotally, and maybe we can come up with actual examples of this. It does feel like it is not someone's incredible breakthrough that is the film that gets rewarded. It's like then afterwards they're like, oh, we like this person. And then it's like maybe a slightly lesser film. And I do feel like Sentimental Value is, I do not like it as much as Worst Person in the World. I do like it, but... It just doesn't have that same exciting verve in the way that like... Well, I don't know. His other films, some of which deal with some kind of, you know, like deal with depression, deal with suicidal ideation. They have this kind of French New Wave-y energy, this kind of like propulsion and like youthfulness. Yeah. And this film is a more grown up film. It is as rooted in this kind of aging filmmaker, you know, father figure who is trying to reconnect with his children as it is in these two daughters, both of whom are adults. One for the boomers a little bit. A little bit, at least partially. I think so. Yeah. Like it is. Yeah. I mean, it's been interesting. It's about people who own real estate. So that's not for millennials. Right. That's not for us. Yeah, exactly. Generational. Generational real estate. So also an enormous pain point for them and carries some significant financial stakes as well. So, yeah. But no, it is. It is by some measures. I mean, there is that part halfway through or so where there's that kind of face montage where their faces keep changing that you're like, OK, this is more experimental in the vein of something for a worse person would be. but you know it's a sturdy family drama and i i think it's just it's less exciting and i think that i would say the same about other filmmakers who have made good work but the academy has either ignored entirely or like given a courtesy not nod here and there too and then their more conventional film is the one that breaks through David! What? This episode... Don't act so surprised because it's a familiar friend. Oh, okay. This episode's brought to you by MUBI. Yawn! Just kidding! Comfortable! Secure! We love them! They are a global film company of champions great cinema, iconic directors, emerging auteurs, always something new to discover with MUBI, each and every film hand-selected. So you can explore the best of cinema. Nothing more to say, I guess. Wrong! 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We love that Mubi puts Mubis in theaters before ultimately ending up on their wonderful platform. Dang right. I'm just looking at some of the stuff they got right now. Die My Love, of course. An important watch. A necessary watch for any blankie. La Graza. La Grazia, the new Paolo Sorrentino movie, which I missed in theaters. Good moment to catch up with it. The Great Shall We Dance. Oh, the classic? The original. Oh, my goodness. That's fun. Like a restoration? Yeah. And look, they got a collection called Heartthrob Nicolas Cage. It's young, dreamy Cage. Well, still dreaming to me. Hey, you're very open hearted. Anyway, to stream the best of cinema, you can try MUBI free for 30 days at MUBI.com slash blank check. That's M-U-B-I dot com slash blank check for a whole month of great cinema for free. And then go see My Father's Shadow in theaters. Please, thank you for listening. Thank you. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Thank you. Very kind. So obviously there is the like the Yorgo-see thing of like them picking up on this movie because it's after the breakthrough. But could it also be something to do with the fact that this is about Hollywood or not Hollywood, but this is about filmmaking and acting and the, you know, how hard it is? Sure. Or just about the business. Very honestly. Yeah. I mean, I think it is right. It has been long accepted, if not necessarily supported in terms of the numbers that Hollywood loves to award or loves movies about itself. right yeah and like certainly there have been some very high profile movies that uh have gotten slew to um but like uh ben zosmer who who wrote this book called oscar metrics did a piece in the new york times in 2020 um and just kind of running the numbers about like if you like depending on how broadly you define right like where you're like is marriage story a movie that involves an actor but it's not about right like it's not necessarily about the business which is about an actress Exactly. And I feel like even counting those, he kind of arrived at this that, like, no, we're not more inclined. Like the Oscars are not more inclined to give out awards. And like of all of the kind of like Best Picture winners. I mean, it's because I think we think about this because the artist and then Argo. Yes, yes. Yeah. It was those two years where it was like, wait a second. There seems to be a secret formula to getting this Oscar attention that maybe actually isn't. I mean, because if it was, then Babylon would have like 12 Oscars. The Fablemans is another one that I remember going in. It's like, what does Spielberg have to do to win another Oscar? It's like, oh, be sentimental and to make a movie about movies. And it's like, well, he did it. What else do you want? And people were like, yeah. Well, so that was another interesting, like that piece, the New York Times piece was from 2020. Sure. And pointed out even then that like, even though that statistically these movies are not more inclined, uh more recently hollywood has been more inclined to be interested in them in terms of awards so like yeah um you know like i mean famously singing in the rain uh never up for best picture right um but like uh yeah like it was the 2022 which was the 20 the oscars in 2023 um the oscars that went like overwhelmingly to everything everywhere all at once yes but that was the year of babylon empire of light the fabelman's blonde uh you know a loving tribute to hollywood i mean or um i mentioned like the the india submission that year was last film show um nope came out that year did not get oscars but about was about yeah partly even like uh panahi's film no bears was about right filmmaking yeah it was about him making a film right um but yeah like when you read those, you're like, those are not the films that went and dominated that year. Right. There is a little bit of everything everywhere that has a little bit to do with one of her personas. She's an actress and they recreate the in the mood for love and that kind of stuff. I mean, the kind of martial arts, you could say, are existing within her own personal film history. And I always think about a movie like The Shape of Water and the fact that that movie, I was always so impressed with the way that that movie was able to that year capture the, oh, we remember when Hollywood was, you know, old Hollywood or whatever, without because that was the year B2 was happening. Like did that without actually making a movie about a filmmaker or the studio system or anything like that. And that was a movie that felt like it was a movie about movies without actually ever being about that beyond the fact that like she lives above. Right, but the fish monster did represent CAA. Oh, yes. There was some celebration happening. I mean, a lot of the kind of hang-ringy pieces that I found that were about this topic were from 2020. Do you know why? There was one movie. Yeah, Mank. Oh, Mr. Mank. Mank, which did seem like kind of created, yes, to be like a movie that we all talk about all the time. I love Mank. I did not love Mank. but uh it was like it was almost like a joke about oh yeah oh yeah i mean i the thing about like maybe i'm wrong but do authors like of books get shit for writing about writers it's like well wouldn't filmmakers sometimes make something that's kind of out of eight out of ten stephen king books are about a right but that said i do feel like i personally complain about how many novels are set like on college campuses uh you know maybe adjacent to my professor's cheating on their wives. Yeah, exactly. Maybe some adjunct who is a novelist on the spectrum. You know, you're like, what are you drawing from here? So, yeah, sure. I mean, I don't mind movies about movies. I think as long as they're not. I think the thing that made... As long as it's America's Sweethearts. Obviously, that's the pinnacle. I mean, the thing about that 2022 year is what was saying that was not just how many movies were about movies, but how many movies were about these kind of incredibly bittersweet, but glassy-eyed cinematic experience. I think I wrote about it that year. Multiple of those movies started with someone explaining 24 frames per second and how that... Yes, I remember that. Multiple movies that year included someone giving that explanation for how we process that into the illusion of movement. I will defend Empire of Light. Yeah, you love Empire of Light. And that got one single solitary Oscar nomination. It's beautiful. Should have been scored too. I was always a little bit annoyed that nope wasn't able to because my thing with craft categories is always like if you make a movie about a fashion designer you are probably going to get a costume nomination you know what i mean sure sure um and i always was like nope has a cinematographer as a character like what else i have bad news for angelina's julie's couture yeah i don't i don't think that's getting in there it was a toronto movie probably not yeah yeah but yeah i know how many movies have not just like a cinematographer character the one who comes on board with their like personal made like crank camera to explain. And it's like integral to the plot or whatever. Wait, can we do an experiment and we'll pool our resources and make a movie about like a sound designer? Yeah, exactly. And see if we can sweep those categories. Yeah, I know. We can do it. We can do it. It'll be called like underwater or something and they're like, they're an expert in like underwater. There's the podcast movie. There is. There is also like, there is a horror movie about a sound guy from, uh, not look it up. We'll just let it sit. The podcast movie I did see it's on Anthony's Soundgates. Yeah. Also, I think I might have said this when I was back from Sundance, but it imagines podcasting as something you do at two in the morning for five minutes. No, but that's not the podcast horror movie because there is also a horror movie coming out about like essentially it seems like it's a haunted podcast. I'm not even making it. Well, Undertone? Yes. Yeah, that was at Sundance. Oh, that was at Sundance. Yeah. Yeah. And it's very bad. Okay. But it's basically just like what if Hereditary had a podcast element? I didn't realize it was at Sundance. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, so I think that the podcast movie is still, we could still make it. Berberian Sound Studio. Oh of course Yes that right Yeah Anyway Yes What about a movie about a dedicated animated short filmmaker How would that work What if it's about getting Film Board of Canada funding? Oh, my. Honestly, a worthy subject for a movie. Yeah, exactly. In Trier's case, maybe it was the sort of filmmaking aspect that helped him. I mean, look, Worst Person got an expected international feature nomination, but a kind of more surprise screenplay nomination. which was pretty exciting yeah people i thought or hoped that maybe renata reinesville who also starred in that film would get in but she didn't yeah um but like there i feel like there are other examples of this like why did sean baker after years of kind of not even i don't think he was knocking at the door i think people were knocking at the door for him yes and then they were like okay willem defoe is good in the florida project yeah and that was the lone nomination for that movie and then all of a sudden anora like crashes through the side of the wall you know like the building why did that happen with an aura i believe i was on a podcast with you where i made the prediction that simon rex was going to get a nomination for red rocket i mean he's incredible in that movie i think so too um but uh after that movie really sort of got passed over i remember being like even more sort of pessimistic about like once an aura won the palm i think that made it something that you have to really pay attention to yeah and it sort of like demanded uh attention for itself but i that still is it kind of runs counter to my sort of grand theory about this kind of thing whereas you know these tours will have an early movie that is obviously very specific esoteric challenging edgy the kind of thing that you're really only going to get like small financing for pie from darren aronofsky or like uh citizen ruth from from alexander pain or something like that and then as they sort of move up they get more funding there are more people whose opinions they have to listen to they get bigger stars you get about schmidt for you know nicholson and i think then sort of inevitably i think also there is an element of um just awareness builds you know what i mean more people know who you are and i think so much of the oscar race ends up being like familiarity. You have to be somebody who these voters already know about or else they're just not going to watch the movie. Or someone who hits that new factor exactly right. Yes. You know, which is really hard to nail that. And like Sean Alon being an example. Sure. That wasn't his first movie, but like it was early enough that they really like got him on the up. And I would say the Daniels to an extent. Yeah. Like they had other stuff, but like Swiss Army Man was never going to register. He was brand, they were brand new to the a lot of Academy movies. Well, I mean, you know, but it's interesting to look at someone like David Fincher, say, you know, and you're like, he's made these movies like Fight Club, like that feels like it has a larger cultural footprint, you know, but like was not like a kind of like an Oscar favorite by any. And I imagine there were a ton of Oscar voters that year who just didn't watch it because they didn't want to watch a movie called Fight Club that all the previews looked like was, you know, bloody and ugly and they didn't want to subject themselves to that. Yeah, and then you did Zodiac, which is a movie that you would think would be. And if that came out now, it would get like 12 nominations. Because he wasn't in the club yet. That's the other thing. And there was more to choose from back then from an Academy perspective, maybe, where they were like, that's a great, robust movie. But we don't need it. And so then instead, of course, they do give him nominations for the movie he makes the next year, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. which like you know i will defend that movie but like it is uh it is almost shocking for someone where fincher was at that point in his career you're like whoa you this is a this is a real right turn like yeah into really like oscar-friendly territory in a way that i did not think and you know look if there was a movie if the movie j kelly had been made and come out let's just like you know hypothetical theorize yeah you know you would look at a filmmaker like noah bomb back and be like how did the guy who made the fucking squid and the whale right get to this point right whereas marriage story exists on this sort of crux where like it has that bomb back edge but it's just nice enough and then he tips way too far toward the oscar-friendly direction whereas fincher kind of pulled back almost immediately he was yeah he doesn't also ever seem like someone who i mean aside from benjamin button he's not someone who feels like they're chasing and then of course the greatest film he's ever made but that was like for his dad like yeah but i mean Sputton is also a movie that features like tiny old man Brad Pitt. You know what I mean? Sure, sure. It's one of those movies that when you watch it, you understand like the classic elements to it. But it's also one of those things like if I describe the plot of this movie to you, you're going to be like, what are you talking about? You know, a little Shape of Water-esque, actually, where it's just like on paper, this is bizarre. I'd be like, go back to Julia Ormond in a hospital room. Right. By the way, Fight Club did get one Oscar nominee for our favorite category, Sound Effects. Yeah, Fincher was good for like one craft nomination for like, I think seven got one craft nomination and probably art direction or something. Alien 3 got a visual effects sound, something like that nomination. So two part question. One, how much of these sort of catch up nominations do you think are attributed to people feeling like the they got snubbed for their last movie? And I guess how do these movies get snubbed in the first place? Are people just not watching them? I don't know. Do voters actually watch all the movies? No, but it's also like, I don't know, like you look at like Chloe Zhao, right? Like the writer was never going to get a Best Picture nomination. No stars. Yeah, but it's her best film. It's her best film. To date. And like, it's like a spin called. It's that and Eternals. Yeah, a masterpiece. The short of Eternals, of course, the greatest film she's ever made. Yeah, but you have, you know, like that film where, yeah, there's no stars. It's all, you know, like people who are not professional actors. and it was like this small film and that lived on the festival circuit and then the art house circuit. It's not even that these movies are getting snubbed. They just never entered into the conversation to begin with. But I think the people who do see them are like, well, this is someone to pay attention to. And then I think a few years later then, you've had enough people tell you, did you see that movie The Rider from last year? It was really good. And it snowballs a little bit, the attention snowballs and the prestige snowballs. And more and more people want to see him in the know because I'm not saying that I and just like so supernaturally aware of all filmmakers in any stage of their career. But having met a lot of these people at like, let's say out in L.A. who are a bit older than me, sort of like mid to late career, they are shockingly incurious about like the world of film. Yeah. You know, they know who they know. They like what they like. And once in a while, they will pat themselves on the back for, quote unquote, discovering someone. Yeah. And I think that they like that Nomadland. They're like, well, look, I mean, I found this great new and it's like, but she did half this other movie that is kind of why you know about her but you don't know that that's why you know well and this is why something like the golden globes which on its face mean nothing of value because the people who vote for it have no place within like the like hollywood like the industry but in attention economy terms it's incredibly valuable because if you are making somebody with us you know you used to say a stack of screeners now it's you know an inbox full of screeners or whatever, give their attention enough to watch your movie, that's sometimes the best you can do. Yeah. The problem that I have with this, it's not always, but sometimes is that the film that finally gets this filmmaker that kind of awards attention, which is not necessary to their career, but it helps, is oftentimes a lesser effort. Not always. I think that one example we talked about before we recorded was I love... Boogie Nights, which was PTA's second film. Yes. And that did get Oscar attention for sure. But in that limited sort of like, we're not going to get you a Best Picture nomination. Right, exactly. And then it took like a big American epic to, in their worldly blood, a couple of years later, or actually almost a decade later. Yeah. And that's an incredible movie, but like, I don't like it as much as I like Boogie Nights, but I don't know. I think also like a lot of these films, they feel edgier, they feel more disreputable in terms of like what they they do or what they're like their tone and so like i mean the oscars now feel more open to things like that but i feel like nor is it not even right not even that long ago yeah you would do uh like danny boyle you know where you're like what is a danny boyle film that gets in it is not the films that we think of right these enormously influential shallow graves not happening yeah right but uh some dog millionaire right like um yeah really edgy film i don't know what you're talking about um but yeah there's a kid in poop but yeah you know it's like when someone then shapes up and makes a movie that feels yeah oscar-y oftentimes they put a suit on yeah right yeah right they shaved you know they uh they comb their hair and here they are presenting themselves to their peers to be and sometimes there's a degree degree of like meeting in the middle i feel like the cohen brothers had a little bit of that where like fargo sort of met the oscar voters halfway it was still really idiosyncratic the comedy was very sort of particular but in a post-pulp fiction kind of a world the academy was moving towards stuff but it wasn't so it wasn't the hudsocker proxy right it wasn't like the kind of cohen's movie that people are like i don't know what they're doing with this thing yeah so um and then you get something like no country which is then combining all like western tropes that they know and like but also this cohen kind of edge and perspective yeah really prestigy really i mean like look spielberg had to work for years before the academy was like really took him quote unquote seriously as a best mercilessly snubbed for fellini back in uh 75 right yeah and like and you see like you know martin scorsese winning for the departed which is a fun movie but you could kind of feel that you're the academy being like uh so we just look back at the records we probably definitely should have given this to you yes earlier sorry about this uh here you go here's also while you're at it here's best picture actors i think get the uh oops we're sorry about that award much more often than directors i think um with directors it's a little bit more complicated than that there are more sort of elements at play but yeah it definitely does happen although scorsese had like multiple years of like well they're gonna give it to him for gangs in new york because they didn't give it tune for raging bull i'm like that didn't happen and then the next time i was like but the aviator it's so much up their alley and then they didn't for that kind of about hollywood in part yeah yes david yep you and i have a lot of shared interests sure common interest film the movies comedy podcasts life new york city bagels sandwiches these are all true sleep oh i love sleep so much sleep rules so much it is kind of wild how sleep is constantly underrated i don't think people give it enough credit and it gets credit and nonetheless even when it's bad it's good well i don't know i I don't think anything could really change how I sleep, though. 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Exclusive for our listeners. that's l-e-e-s-a dot com promo code blank check for 25 off mattresses plus an extra 50 off support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout that's lisa.com promo code blank check and david just because we invoked president's day in this ad read i do think we need to show our support for our president rulk thunderbolt ross the red hulk is he in prison yes is he no longer the president maybe in letter of the law but not spirit but here's the good news while stuck on the raft marvel's high-tech sea jail yes he's sleeping on elisa a mattress fit for a rolk i mean with trier you know obviously he's a different very different kind of filmmaker he did not have a ton of american attention until very recently right but he had made these two great films reprise and oslo 31st august that you know were in the festival circuits in the late aughts and early 2010s um and you know the manola darguses of the world were like super onto him and into him you know um i think that her lovely long quote is at the top of the reprise like dvd or poster or something uh-huh um and then he took this weird detour where he made a movie called louder he went english language which is something that you always you know It was always risky for a non-American or non-English language director to do like, okay, I'm going to cast stars now. I mean, one of them was Isabella Pera, who's not in a Native English movie. But that movie, it's her, I think Gabriel Byrne, Jesse Eisenberg. That is a stinker of a movie. It is bad. That was one of those, I mean, not legendarily, but for me, that was at, I believe it was at TIFF that year. And I remember people being like, don't see that. Yeah, because it had premiered at Cannes. And I saw it there because I'll admit, at the time, I had not seen Reprise or Oslo 31st August. But people like the Allisons of the world were like, oh, no, he's good. You should go see that. And then I was mad. It was like Suburbicon levels of bad festivals. And it was also like, you know, sometimes when something like that happens, you're like, oh, was this like a work for hire or something like that? Or is it like, you know, working off a script from someone else? But no, like he co-wrote that with Eskil Vogt, his like collaborator and collaborator who's like worked on like almost every film with him. And you're like, OK, so can't even be like, oh, that wasn't his fault. No, it was like it wasn't a paycheck. I mean, maybe it paid a little more. Yeah. And then he made Thelma, which is this very strange sort of supernatural lake creature. Yeah. Sexual allegory kind of movie. It feels totally YA-ish, right? Like, yeah. And I guess you could maybe see him trying to, like, establish himself more on a marketable standpoint or an international standpoint, which is like, you know, he's got to pay the bills, you know. So I guess I get that. But it's just so interesting that after that, he's then like, this is not working. Let me go back to Anders Danielson Lee, who is the star of his first two films. Let's go back to Oslo, like, fully. Yeah. And just start talking about life again. and then it's worked so brilliantly and renata reines was in uh also august 31st uh you know and he made her the lead of worst person in the world and that really also introduced her like that was her international breakout film you know she was the first time a lot of us kind of were like oh she's amazing yeah i have not seen any of his previous films yeah but you're talking about how he made an english language movie that maybe didn't work there's a a lot of discussion in this movie about whether whether the movie is going to be in english and like it's going to be on netflix are you and because this movie is i guess more about the process of making a movie do you feel like there's a lot of his experience making about making films in this movie i would guess so i mean it is in particular about the idea of you know he's trying to make uh essentially like a scandinavian art film right like he's like this revered swedish filmmaker uh stalin Skarsgård's character and has this reputation that gets him invited to festivals. But yeah, like, you know, how does this Hollywood star played by Elle Venning, like, notice him? It's because she happens to see him getting this tribute at a festival. Is that the Deauville American Film Festival? Yes. Which is a particular kind of film festival that she would be at. Yeah. And then she's like so moved by this screening, you know. But yeah. That she defies Kat Cohen to go hang with him on the beach. Away from her publicist team. Yeah. It's like, you know, to me, more doing passion of mind. Like, you know, like there's a long history of actors being like, I'm going to seek out this like Euro director and they're going to really transform me. And I think that partly that's the meta textualness of like Trier doing this story. I mean, you know, Scarsworth's character is significantly older than Trier is. But like, is like maybe him resigning a little bit to like, I think I'm good in this lane. Like, I'm probably not going to skip across the Atlantic and become, you know, Jan de Bont. I mean, I don't think he wanted to become that. But you know what I mean? Like a European director who then goes and makes like a full train in Hollywood. He's like, I'm good here and I can kind of work not necessarily in or out of one system, but kind of between the systems. All right, we're going to talk more specific plot points and spoilers for sentimental value. If you want to skip that, you can fast forward 19 minutes. I think it is a bit about the kind of like thrill, but the terror of being like, oh, you know, you have this major star on board. does she actually fit into your movie you know like in ways that make sense you know even if she's incredibly game you know she really wants to do it like the vision that you actually have like can you compromise it in ways that you know make a film that you still think is your film and i think yeah in in really delicate ways you know sentimental value is like no right yeah well and And also there is a thread about sort of authenticity and how that matters for this movie that he's trying to make where he wrote the movie for his daughter. She won't do it. So Al Fanning's character, Rachel, is so interested in him and so interested in making this movie. And yet he can't help sort of like he has her dire hair the same color as his daughter. And like everybody sort of sees what going on and it all none of it feels very like manipulative or sinister It not like a vertigo kind of a thing But Elle Fanning character ultimately is like I can I can do this movie I don feel like I right for this movie And you know that I not right for this movie We all sort of like can see this and ultimately it ends up working with the daughter. And I think it's, I kept going back to like, why is, you know, what's the title mean? Sentimental value. And this idea that like sentiment sometimes can work, you know, against something and sometimes it can, you know, sort of work in its favor. um and i like the way the movie does not treat al fanning's character as this like stereotypical actress while also letting you in on the fact that like you know she's not like the best actress she's not like the most you know intelligent or intuitive but she tries and she takes her craft seriously and it's right and that's ultimately i think what he respects yes you know yeah and maybe he's being a little hyperbolic when he's like she's the best actress of the generation but like he sees something yeah i was white knuckling at the first time i saw this movie being like don't have them sleep together don't have them sleep together um yeah that's luckily not a direction i i think trier would go in yeah at least if or and if he did it would be done in an interesting sort of sensitive way yeah yeah was she expected to get nominated for this l yeah i think she was in the mix like it wasn't a huge especially because people felt she got a little bit snubbed from a complete unknown last year um monica barbaro got the supporting nomination for that movie instead so i think that l was kind of like she was they were like uh don't leave the building yet yeah let's just see how this year goes yeah you know i mean this isn't actually a tricky movie uh i think kind of campaigning wise right because i don't know like as much as i would say if i were to pick one lead and i don't know that you can you can say there was maybe not one true lead in this movie but i would say it's stellan's character um but i i think like like on second viewing that i felt like it was definitely you know and but like you know they all share time like inga gets slightly less but still has her own kind of like storyline there um and it builds she gets more as yeah yeah it's but i mean that can make it really tricky to build an oscar narrative right oh yeah you have like different and instead like this film did quite well by that yeah i do think like to bring this back around to the idea of like movies about movies unlike jay kelly if they had ever made jay kelly um you know this is a movie where it is very takes craft very seriously it is also like look at how annoying actors can be like i love the scene with renata in the beginning having what is apparently like oh my god a regular burst of stage fright that she has every time yeah that involves them having to physically restrain her and like push her on stage at which point she gives a great performance but um yeah you know it is it is very much like about uh like look at how difficult and like kind of abrasive and like sometimes like painful like like trying to channel your truest self into your work or artistic work can be especially when it comes to all of the ways you are worse at communicating those things in person to like these your loved ones yeah and the movie never stacks the deck against any of the characters everyone is she is difficult but also very sensitive and and a good actor and skarsgård's character similarly is like a very difficult person but the scenes where he is uh protecting l fanning's character in um from the press and stuff are actually kind of moving that junket guy right out of it yeah and so you see i mean this film is really anti-press which i don't we we should be celebrated um yeah i mean i think the conversation the the conversation where he like his character and renata's character are just like riling he's like riling her up so much also where he is trying to kind of express that he's concerned about her but instead is just like coming across as like criticizing all of her life choices yes and she also just takes it all so personally immediately yeah i think it's such a great like it sums up like these years of like pain and miscommunication so perfectly and like a very small scene and i think scenes like that are one of the reasons that this film has done so well in terms of like acting yeah and inga representing like i don't know maybe i'm speaking from personal experience being the sibling who has issues with parents but not the issues that the other sibling has where it's like i know that like my sister and my mom for years it was like whoa they just cannot get along like and they're fine now but like but like in those rough teenage years and i was the one the pacifier or whatever and like kind of trying to like maintain the household harmony and and um are you the older or younger i'm the younger one yeah yeah which is if there were a middle yeah it's a classic middle child thing but also like it falls to the younger i think in two siblings. But what I think that Inga's character also knows and sees is like after that kind of bickering moment, you know, the other two go out and smoke cigarettes and kind of like conspiratorially smile at each other. And it's a lot like that scene in The Fablemans where the creepy uncle Judd Hirsch comes and has this weird conversation with Sammy Fableman where he's like, they don't get it. Like we are artists and it's going to be painful for the rest of your life And you're going to have to alienate your family if you want to choose this art. Yeah. And I think that Skarsgård's character and Reinspawn's character understand that in each other, even if they can't get along. Yeah. And in another way, like the other person in that family unit is on the outside, even though she gets along with everybody. Right, right. Well, and the other thing that I thought watching it this time, and this sort of goes to my like, you know, this would appeal to boomers, is this idea that this screenplay, finally, Inga's character says to Nora, And it's just like, just read it. You know, you don't have to do the movie, but just read it. Because I think this is about you. And I think this is ultimately, you know, him finally apologizing to you through this script. It's not about his mom. It's about you. But he still will, throughout the movie, even when given like ample opportunity, just refuses to give her an inch. Every time she, you know, calls him on the carpet for not being there for them. He has this defensive, like everybody's piling up on dad or whatever. And it has this very thing of just like, I can only apologize to you in a way that feels like, you know, this one particular way. Do not ask me to actually say the words. I am sorry, but I will, you know, do this. And that to me felt like every Oscar voter whose kids have a problem with them and they don't want to admit anything. But like, but can't you see that through my work? Sure. It's really romantic, right? That idea of being like. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Like, like, I, like, maybe a failure in so many personal ways, but, like, in my art, I can, like, communicate something, like, more true than I ever could. Like, does Christopher Nolan's daughter eventually see Interstellar and say, I guess this is an apology for missing all of my school plays? She wouldn't, you know. Supposedly, Jay Kelly is also about this. Allegedly. Or was supposed to be about it. Right, right. That was, the trades were reporting that, but then it obviously never got made. It is amazing that they both have like two daughters. Like they're so structurally like they're begging to be compared. And it just turned out so nine nominations for one. What I think that Sentimental Value does better than a lot of those director apologizes movies, and there are a lot of them, writer apologizes, you know, whatever, is that, like you said, it gives equal weight to everybody. It understands where everyone kind of fits in this ecosystem. And I think it also has something really beautiful in the way that it is kind of almost resigned to kind of like the way that generations tumble through time. you know one of the sort of closing chain you know sort of turns in the plot of the movie you know is that like oh another generation's getting into this yeah you know the grandson is going to be in the movie and this never ends and like did being in the movie harm agnes so much no not necessarily but it did change the course of her life yeah pretty irrevocably it was like an example of like this pain at the heart of a relationship with her father which is like when she was doing the thing he cared about yeah like he she had all of his attention and as soon as she was not and she was just a regular person again yeah that the light was not on her anymore and yet something in her as we all do maybe you know with a fair amount of hopefulness or foolishness is like it'll be different the next time yeah different for him because i'm around i can i can make sure this doesn't happen what happens you know i'll always love him even when he's not starring in my dad's movie or whatever but you also know that there's a gamble there there's a definitely risk there and i think that what the movie says about like how much you can change family trajectory and how much you kind of have to deal with what is innate and yeah most kind of inevitable yeah i think is really really well done i also wonder if part of it is the fact that it is all this is ultimately not jo kim trier telling his own story yeah so trier has two kids who are relatively young i believe and um so maybe he's sort of almost anticipating what he's going to be on that right i don't know yeah there's still enough of a yeah i think he said he like he was he had become a father when he started writing the movie but then and then like learned his second child yeah away and the same kind of spacing as the two women right grown women right i gotta say like i and look he's not the only one doing this but i really do respect a filmmaker sort of on the younger side of things I mean, he's what, like late 40s, early 50s? 51, I love it. On the younger side, who is like, he's writing outside of immediate lived experience, which is like kind of increasingly rare. Like, I feel like everything in this sort of auteur era, it's like, why is that horror movie this? Well, because my mom got sick when I was here. And it's like, okay, that's a perfectly valid thing to make a movie about. But what if you just came up with a story that had nothing to do with it? Poor Ari Aster's real mother is getting dragged through the mud with every movie. The poet who lives in Westchester, who sounds terrifying. You know, there is sentiment, as the film's title would suggest. But I think there is also a really respectable and interesting amount of darkness. Like, watching it for a second time, I was like, oh, this is a haunted house movie. You know, this is a movie about people contending with a spirit or several spirits that are, like, filling this space and infecting their lives. and Elle Fanning is this kind of like final girl-esque person who shows up and is like, oh, this house is fucked up. That stool, which she thinks, was used for this terrible thing. And I think that maybe I have issues with the very end of the movie where there's this knowing look exchange between father and daughter and it feels a bit like on the nose. But for the most part, he really resists getting anything sort of sappy in there at all. Yeah, I mean, I think that is what makes this movie feel less maybe like gooey than yeah like uh you know movies that are very like have this very kind of wet-eyed uh idea about the the process of making movies or anything like that like it is it is very much like the family drama comes first you know uh like the kind of filmmaking is the mechanism through which the family drama continues but also So it is like it is about like a work, right? Like workplace, like issues in a lot of ways. The fact that it ends with them on the set rather than filming in the house also feels significant. Well, the house is gone, right? Well, the house has been renovated. And I think that that's such a crucial little bit of footage in that the very end of that movie, it's never commented on. But it's like, oh, look at all the new modern trappings, the fancy stove and all that. this house is now changed and it's going to be someone else's and we have left the building we have then instead safely recreated our version of the house in an environment that we can control yeah yeah yeah and there's a crack in the foundation which is at the very beginning and i sort of wonder at the end by selling the house are they repairing that crack or are they passing it on to someone else um i do appreciate that the remodel is like your standard like bland colorless like yeah like it's just like yeah oh it's the regular remodel they do this in norway as well um i do i will say my favorite parts of this film are the bursts and this is like very much uh like brings you back to trier's earlier films like the bursts of flashbacks uh into the house like the past uh you know like uh from when when the women were children and then from previous generations like the the part that just like runs through um you know from like uh gustav's childhood into like the aunt inheriting the house like the kind of lesbian aunt uh when it was not acknowledged and then like into rowing parties at the house yeah like passed on and on and this kind of like the ways in which there's like enormous bursts of history that are like just i i love his montages of those. There's this kind of energy to them that I wish some other parts of the film had. Yeah, that's fair. I think it's fun to watch him be like, oh, he's really going for it. He's going to do the house up in period detail, and he's going to have actors in period costumes, even if it's only for 20 seconds of footage. I think that's cool. It reminded me of a film that I actually liked more than this this year, though. It didn't go anywhere. Sound of Falling, which was like the German's mission for international film, which didn't get nominated. It was too much of a slapstick comedy. It was. It was. Hilarity all over the place. No sound nomination for a movie about the Sound of Falling. Yeah. There is a lot of good sound in that movie. There is. So this is a German film that takes place entirely on this one kind of farmhouse over four generations. So basically covering a century and skipping between these four generations and these different four families. Yeah. Gets into some really dark territory. also like drops you in and really does not extend a hand to give you any guidance for a long time it's alienating yeah it is uh it's a tougher set certainly though i i thought it was incredible but like that is a uh a film that is entirely like the the axis of the film is this physical space is this building um and i feel like the parts of sentimental value that did that i loved yeah and i think that the device of having characters listen through the little the stove yes and the first time we you know we we see nora telling her nephew about it and she's just showing it to him and then she puts her ear to it and then all of a sudden she hears her father's voice yeah and she didn't know he was going to be there and it's like and you can almost see her calculating like is that a ghost like what what's going on am i hallucinating yeah and then to have that come back where it's another a relative listening as her mother is sort of being taken away you know like like i think that yeah the house stuff is really interesting and the movie i think does sag a little bit when it leaves the house you know um there are great moments but i think that the stuff with anders danielson lee is a little bit more schematic like oh he's left his wife but now he doesn't want to be with me like that's a little bit feels a little leftover from yeah worst person in the world agrees a little bit too even though i love seeing anders at any time he's oh yeah he's incredible and also a doctor yeah he's also a doctor yeah um you should really re-watch Oslo 31st of August and Reprise because he's very handsome in them and very good in them. I was bummed it didn't get a production design nomination for as cool as I thought the house was. It's interesting that it got that editing nomination, which the editing is interesting and good, but it's like, okay, if you're going to go that deep on this movie, then let's keep going. Cinematography and production design. Do we know if it's a real house? Can we visit? That's a great question. I'm assuming that the exterior would be real. Maybe it's a house he's walked by in Oslo and is like, I want to make a movie about that house. I don't know. Or maybe they built the whole thing. I genuinely don't know. Yeah, I have no idea either. So at the end of this movie, when they're on the set, Trier is careful to show the old cinematographer sitting to Gustav's left. Yeah. Are we to take that that means he dropped the Netflix and so he was able to hire who he wanted to hire? So we think the Netflix has been eschewed, right? Yeah. I mean it's been a return to yeah the fact that he got to make the movie he wanted to make his daughter's in the role and yeah so Netflix probably left with Rachel yeah isn't the presumption that he sold the house in order to finance the film maybe yeah they never say it right that would make sense though yeah also do we think that she did hang herself at the end of this movie within a movie oh like in the movie when she shuts the door yeah i don't know though i think they're maybe trying to like cure the past a little bit there like oh maybe i'm wrong i feel like the maybe it doesn't hear the chair fall yeah but i also felt like it would make sense for her reenacting it to also then feel like it's closing the door on like her own depression right and her own kind of like ideation that she's like struggled with so so that would make sense as a kind of exorcism so that's that's true to my embarrassment that that fooled me that scene where they pull out and it's just like oh they're filming a scene i was just like so good dummy of course they're filming you know what i mean it's a very blue sky outside those windows yeah i'm like she was babysitting the kid what's what you're talking about this as we said it's uh a movie we all like a lot though like not our favorite of his movies But it is in a particularly difficult race for international film this year, I would say. It's going up against, it was just an accident. The first film that R. Panahi was able to make since the ban on filmmaking was lifted, even though he was making films the whole time, kind of in secret. The Secret Agent, which we talked about in the last episode. And it's gaining tons of momentum. of momentum and it just like feels like this just incredible like uh enormous swing of a film um then you've got surat this kind of like very jagged interesting movie that feels like it speaks to this moment of like things like the kind of like like like thing like structures that we previously saw as kind of like stable crumbling or yes in the background yeah and then the voice of henry job which is you know has this like kind of like enormously uh heartbreaking story that it is reenacting uh and that uses the real audio uh from from the death of this child yeah i mean sentimental is the only non-political i mean you could make there are there are politics in that movie for sure but it's you know the other they're significantly more minor scale than uh than these others yeah and it's the whole the movie as its awards sort of positioning is is strange i mean because it did you know it played very well it can it won the grand prix i believe which is second prize or third prize second um and uh so it had like great momentum coming out of that and everyone and i actually wasn't even that sold but i was there with a former colleague who's a big like oscar predictor and he was like oh yeah that's a lock for these categories and i was like really though i mean i don't know that seems far-fetched um but he was right it turns out But I think it hasn't quite, despite overperforming, arguably, in nominations, I think it hasn't held on to that momentum or that sort of heat. Because I think what you pointed out just now, Alison, it's like it doesn't have that extra hook of urgency. But it also really overperformed at the Oscars in terms of nominations. I mean, it's possible that it will then go on to not win anything. But I was surprised by how many nominations it got. There was a time when it was like, oh, Skarsgård is winning. It's a career. It's for both a great performance in one movie, but also a career Oscar. And that got resurrected at the Globes a little bit. Now we're like, we're still now. And then the BAFTA is where I thought that's where he would repeat if he was going to repeat in the lead up to Oscars. It didn't go his way. And I was like, oh, I guess maybe he doesn't have this sewn up. And what Kyle Buchanan, our friend and colleague, has been saying for months now is like, no, no, no, don't pay attention to what's happening before the Oscars. Sean Penn is winning that Oscar. The extreme degree of confidence Kyle has in that is both worth listening to and also love you Kyle has me rooting against that so hard because I just like you so confident I just need it to be wrong Do you have any thoughts Joe on whether or not there would have been any wisdom in running Stellan in lead I mean, it would have been more honest, I think. And I sort of felt the same way about Paul Meskel, who ended up not getting nominated even for supporting. Oftentimes, this is the it's a you know, it's a strategic calculus, right? You're keeping them out of best actor in part because best actor tends to be filled with often bigger stars. And certainly Selen Skarsgård has been, you know, a character actor throughout his career and whatever. But it's also performances where, you know, Michael B. Jordan is playing twins, the two twin leads of the movie. Timothy Chalamet is playing Marty Mauser in Marty Supreme. He's the sole focus of that movie. dicaprio is a little bit more has to sort of like share the spotlight a little bit more but like wagner mora ethan hawk like it's as much about um it's as much about being the focus of your movie i think every time this is studios seem to think they can get away with it when it's like yeah but the movie's not really just about them it's about you know it's it's it's jesse buckley's story it's renata rinds of a story they're the leads um there's this you know this fallacy that drives me crazy when people are just like you know um but there's only one lead of the movie it's like no there are movies with two leads they're often there are movies with four leads there are movies with zero leads sometimes you know what i mean um but uh j kelly because they never made it they never made it sometimes new york is that's your main character and you know what like dame sutherland new york has never been nominated nor has tiffany new york pollard let's address that well not yet um but i think that's sort of what you're getting in the case with, if you put Stellan in lead, it's very, it would have been very, very difficult, I think, for him to be as impressive and to stand out to voters. For as much as I think it's a really great performance, I think if you're looking at it strategically, then you're thinking, well, in a supporting category, then you're putting him up against other people who are sharing their movie spotlight a little bit more. And it would have meant, no, ethan hawk presumably right which i'm so glad that that's a nice nomination although i don't know i kind of think this is a bit of a digression but i kind of i was thinking about it the other day i was like maybe it was baffer related i think that dicaprio might be in fifth position i think he might be the weakest definitely a lot of people are still framing this as like timmy i don't see it that way it hasn't been that way if ever it hasn't been that way for a long time yeah uh and now it feels to me much more like Timmy, Wagner, Jordan, probably Ethan. I would say Leo's. They're given so many other things to one battle after another. They're not going to go out of their way to give Leo a second Oscar when there are other more attractive narratives or performances. That role is deliberately this diminished, non-heroic you know like that's the point of that role is that like he's this kind of fool uh you know running around trying to get to help and not actually accomplish designed to be more appealing to critics types like us who look at that and be like look at what he's doing playing a non-dynamic character and stuff like that it's like awards voters just don't operate along those lines yeah so um do you think having l in this movie helps everyone else like if you're if you're making a foreign film it's probably easier to get attention if you have a big american star in it yeah i think it for sure helps um i mean it's it's definitely i mean trier is a lock to direct the next predator movie with l it was just everyone loves that it's really good it is a queer ya about you are you're correct a young gay alien finding the strength and female look who else plays twins in that movie you know who loved when i said that in my thr review is all the men on twitter i was They really enjoy that take on their beloved predator. But no, I think to your I mean, I think that at something like can after worst person in the world, Trier had no problem getting attention there. But having Al Fanny and Stone Skarsgård in it, like bumps it up that one extra level where it's not just winning awards at Cannes, but then it has like a hope of a life past, you know, that festival. Well, and one thing I wanted to mention about the international feature race, too, is it's so interesting in part because the Academy has become more international and thus the best picture race overlaps so much now with international feature where like, you know, multiple international movies are now nominated for best picture. And so those movies, their buzz in their story sort of evolves over the course of the season in a lot more interesting ways. Whereas like you remember like the SAG nominations happened and none of the international movies got anything from there. And with the DJ and PGA too, I feel like, right? Like it was a thing like what's the problem? Well, they're not in our union. So I mean, some of them probably are. Right. But I think and so that then plays into a Best Picture nominee like Sentimental Value and like The Secret Agent in ways that like that wouldn't happen in the past when you didn't have any international movies. And so the narrative with Sentimental Value and It Was Just an Accident is also really interesting because Sentimental Value seemed like the favorite going into Cannes or one of the favorites to take the palm. And I feel like it was just an accident kind of leapfrogged it there. Yeah. They've been sort of they were sort of seem to be jostling with each other for a little bit. There are some thoughts about I mean, I think this is unfair. It was just an accident because that's a brilliant movie. But like there were some thoughts on the ground at Cannes at the closing night party where when when we weren't staring at Oliver Lachey, the director of Surak. Staring up, craning your neck. Binoche, Julia Binoche was the president of the jury last year, and she had worked with Kirastami, who is a close colleague of Panahi's. And she knew Panahi for a long time, was really close with him, or to some extent, that they were like, oh, if his movie was even halfway decent, there was no chance that anything else would win. I think that's probably unfair because the movie is really good. And like, but I think it was also the vibe at Cannes this year and maybe it was kind of leading that charge was like, we're not giving top prize to something that does not respond to the political times. Yeah, sure. Yeah. And sentimental value does not do that, which is fine. A movie doesn't have to do that. Neither does Hamnet or whatever. But like, but yeah, that was kind of. I mean, when Worst Person in the World was out, I definitely remember times on Twitter where I got the feeling from like, you know, when you discover that someone halfway across the world has followed your career long enough to hate you really passionately and in like very specific ways. But like had like, like responded to something, but like describing Worst Person in the World and like Trier's films in general as like white person problems. And I'm like, sure, certainly on a global global sense, they absolutely are about white person problems. I mean, I was thinking about that with the Dreams trilogy, you know, also from the lovely films that are also set in Oslo. We were like, oh, these films are able, these characters are able to embark on these like very delicate explorations about their identities and sexuality and their gender and about like what they're looking for in terms of romance. In part because they seem to have like a really solid, you know, stable platform. Beautiful stained wood floors underneath them. Self-care, blah, blah, blah, all this other stuff. One of them is like a chimney sweep and seems to have this incredible middle-class life. Maybe that's the subtle politics of these movies. They're like, see how it could be. Yeah, yeah. Like, look, you'll have all of this time to then have a broke class with your daughter at revenge by casting an American star in the role she turned down. Or wistfully ride the ferry and flirt with a man. Exactly. It's just one of the other ones. But I do wonder if that is something. I mean, like, this is, yeah, a film that broke out into the larger, like, kind of, like, nominations pool. But, like, I do feel like in a year where it feels like there is a lot of urgency, even if the Berlin Film Festival and no one wanted to, you know, talk politics, including, you know. Yeah. But, like, that there is a lot of pressure to be, like, to donate something or to award something that feels like it has some sense of urgency. Especially because, like, last year, you can certainly, there are definitely politics in Enora, for sure. But, like, that also is a really fun time. You know, it's lighter than some other things. You know, maybe they were just like, okay, now this year, though, with everything, like, we need to go this direction instead. Which is kind of why I was holding on to the Skarsgård thing as being like, well, but that sort of can exist outside of that concern. and he can just win for a great career and he was so good on andor recently and he's great in this movie and people like him and yeah he's you know basically uh sired the next generation of actors right right you know like so like he's contributing to the economy in that way um but i just i don't know i just don't feel it right now even the goal the globe thing felt very like globe's gonna globe and i just the bafta thing i was like that's where i really thought he was gonna get it there but Yeah, all of the acting categories feel very unsettled now. Three of the four. I think, yeah, Jessie Buckley is still pretty. But even that one, she's been so locked in that one that it feels like, well, we just like haven't talked about best actress kind of at all. Right, right. There's something crazy happening. We wouldn't know because like nobody's talking about it. But yeah, supporting actress, supporting actor and best actor all feel excitingly. My worry is that like the SAG, sorry, the actor awards are going to happen. Genuflect when you say. But and then like my worry is that like, well, then whoever wins those is just going to win the Oscars. And it's going to seem in retrospect a lot more boring. And I hope that's not the case. I hope my, you know, my hope is that like, well, you know, different people who's won everything else can win at, you know, actor awards. And then all of a sudden it's just like, well, we're going in there and like nobody has a precursor advantage. And that's kind of the dream for an awards nerd like me. I'm like, yes. We were talking about this with our EP Griffin Newman. And like he was saying like, oh, it reminds me of the year that when when Tilda Swinton ultimately won for Michael Clayton. Yeah. Like everyone else had won in a different award show. Right. There's also the Marsha Gay Harden year to consider there. Yep. And that's exciting. You know, I. It's a thrill. I do think that Inga and Elle probably will split that vote a little bit. I don't think they're at the front of the pack. I agree with that. But Winmi Misako winning the BAFTA is really interesting to me. And Tiana Taylor, still, I would probably place her at the head of that pack. But I think those two and Amy Madigan are pulling votes, and we'll see how it shakes out. Are these ranked choice? Not for acting. Not for acting, just for Best Picture. So it's first past the post for acting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they never will show us the numbers, even though that's the great wish of all. I keep sending them envelopes full of money. How close was Blake? They're like, you're not wealthy enough to sway us. Well, someday we'll do a heist of the Academy Museum and steal all that data. Yeah. And be like, we don't want to know who's going to win the next Oscars. Just give us the data. We'll be really mean and call up Glenn and Annette Bening. Uh-huh. Look, do you want to know how close you were? My proposal is... Because I have good news and bad news. Yes. My proposal is that we treat it like the Warren Commission reports. And just like after a certain number of years, like this year gets declassified. So we won't be able to find out anything that we remember from our lifetimes. But like the 1964 Oscars, now we can. How close was Marsha Mason when she was? Right. Exactly. Exactly. Those burning questions. All of those Peter O'Toole glasses. And then when we're very old, they'll finally like slip like, oh, Lang almost lost for Blue Sky. It's the Tontine from The Simpsons. It's like the last remaining 1968 Best Actress nominees finally died. We can reveal these totals. So they have that data. Oh, yeah. Somewhere in a vault somewhere. Either at Price Waterhouse or in some academy office somewhere. Unless there was some sort of suspicious fire before it was all digitized. The Watergate of the – no, I'm going to write that movie. Yeah. All right. There we go. You know, we've talked about – last time we talked about the increasing kind of like international focus of the Oscars. um but how much do you think the like i mean the actors who got breakouts in in international films and then have come and worked in english english films like we're seeing that a lot more too i mean like vagnar moore we talked about uh lee bang hun in uh no other choice did not end up getting nominated but like i i feel like his visibility in uh a flash of like mostly unfortunate uh hollywood roles um you know like he he was like a known commodity even for people who did not actually pay a lot of attention to south korean cinema right and then like renata now renata has like started to make some american films she's not like like dove full force into some like she's doing like interesting kind of smaller things yeah but like things that people have seen right like people have liked uh a different man uh for instance i thought she was so good in that yeah and she's got some she's going to be in back rooms the a24 movie being directed by a teenager 20 he's 20 sorry now he's 20 why are they doing that i don't know i mean maybe this kid's brilliant but like i don't know anyway whatever yes just gonna be an ad that'll get more attention some family guy like gifts just like that would be really good like the jump scare at the end is like the top of the screen is going to be like someone doing a playthrough of a video game the bottom screen is going to be like yeah family guy like they do on tiktok and then renata is just gonna be acting over the other corner yeah and then she's gonna yeah keep saying let's go like she's in one of my most anticipated movies coming up which is fjord she's gonna be uh she plays the fjord in fjord no i heard sebastian stan in the new christian munju movie oh right language that's assumed to be at can yeah um which would be english language i could be wrong about that but it's uh certainly christian munju working with hollywood folk for the first time you know i my my hunch would be that you know ryan's who by the way watching the movie again what a face like as someone who has rosacea and my face often looks very flushed i appreciate that that is also true of renata i don't want to like make any comments about her appearance i mean she's gorgeous right but i was watching the movie again and i was like yeah same girl yeah yeah i look very red-faced a lot of the time yeah just that that sort of placid but but but thoughtful like there's something so just fascinating to watch about her i think that she will have a nice career be it you know in the your art house may be an occasional sort of dip into something hollywood adjacent um inga is daughter lilias like i hope the same for her yeah um my hunch is that she'll probably do more norwegian tv theater all that stuff like everyone will be like benefited by this yeah but unfortunately the sort of global film economy seems to that is governed by the u.s sort of interest will like in some senses will probably be like we're going to pick one or one of you every couple years we're not going to let you all in come on like that's too much but yeah and i think that renata is that one renata reinsfa in a mia hanson love movie what would you do to make that happen i mean i would fund it that's what i would do i would i would rob the academy i would rob the academy museum sell that data yeah that'd be great she'd be perfect before we go i thought it would be funny to check in on uh the vulture.com instagram account which um oh wait no why why are we doing I know. This is too scary. Well, first, for people who haven't been following us from the beginning, our friends at Vulture, they are clipping video of the show and putting it on their Instagram and other social accounts. And for last week, they clipped us talking about Wagner Mora's wonderful performance in The Secret Agent. And what do you know? You're looking through the comments there. And it's almost entirely in Portuguese. I was going to say, Brazilian flag, Brazilian flag, Brazilian flag. Brazil Film Internet represents. This is becoming like the new sort of like put the number, like put a listicle in your headline and you're going to get traffic. It's like just Brazil. The last two years, you know, on Oscar nomination morning, you sign on, you pull up the YouTube, and then they have the chat there. And the last two years, I signed on and I click it, and it literally is just like a rapidly unfolding list of Brazilian fans. What is this, the Azores? It's that over and over and over again. But now the crucial, I mean, it's, they're very active. the crucial question has been are the comments have like are they favorable oh yes there's a lot of okay a lot of pro-vogner um the actor not not the composer although there might be some of those it is it is comments um where are we going next week oh yeah so we uh are leaving norway and flying back to america but also back into the past of sinners yeah which i think you can probably find they might it might be on movie i don't know it's a pretty small movie but let's try seek it out if you get a black you know like a black copy of it um so long as you're doing video for uh for instagram you want to you're going to break out your irish jig i think at some point right it's i mean it was inevitable at some point okay yeah looking forward to it uh yeah so everyone if you haven't yet watched sinners or re-watch it which i'm excited to do i haven't seen it since the spring of last year uh and we'll see you back here and joe thank you for being here thank you um good luck how how much how many more nominated films do you have to watch i have three short films that's it that's still yes oh wow was my last feature that i watched yesterday so yeah i'm just can you give us any kind of tease about what might be toward the bottom or toward the top um i watched a movie about dinosaurs the other day that i didn't really care for so um that could be near the bottom um i will say the best picture nominees this year that's a really really mean description of the diane warren documentary the diane warren documentary is going to be higher than a lot of people want it to be and by that i mean it's not in the it's not in the bottom five so okay um yeah i think the best picture nominees are all generally towards the upper half of the list it's a good year yeah um well people should look out for that on vulture.com And also, while we're plugging, Joe, what's coming up on this at Oscar buzz? This at Oscar buzz, we just had an episode go up on Robert Altman's The Company, the movie. He followed up Gosford Park with him and Neve Campbell. Made what, $400 million worldwide? Oh, yeah. It was a huge blockbuster. And then coming up soon, we did an episode on the Don Roos movie Happy Endings. I love that movie. Maggie Gyllenhaal got an Independent Spirit nomination for. Well, because she sings songs beautifully. A couple of Billy Joel songs. one of my things we talked about there was like why did she never just like record a cover of billy joel i had an album of billy joel covers yeah i had a non-ipod non-zune i had some other third secret third mp3 player that could fit about 40 songs and two of them were jill and hall singing yeah billy joel from that movie she's got a great voice so yeah okay well i'll be you're listening that while we're plugging also people please subscribe to premiere party.com my newsletter, doing fun things there, including coming up, my recap of the Oscars from 20 years ago, which will include probably hundreds of gifts, which I have to make. I always look forward to that. Alright, we'll see you next week. Critical Darlings is a Blank Check production in association with Vulture. Hosted by Allison Wilmore and Richard Lawson. Produced by Benjamin Frisch. Executive produced by Griffin Newman and Neil Janowitz. Video production and distribution by Anne Victoria Clark, Wolfgang Ruth, and Jennifer John.