Existential Zones, Pt. 2 — It Ends

26:29I think there's a conversation that happens early on it's kind of key to this movie where James is going on about envisioning the rest of his life like what's going to happen next and his vision of it is funny but it's also this is going to happen then, this is going to happen next and it's like this vision of his life is being on rails, like once he chooses his direction he can only keep going in that direction to me I feel like that is kind of a key to unlocking what this film is about these are characters at a particular point in their lives where, I mean, think about where you were out of college and things that didn't seem like momentous choices that ended up affecting the rest of your life.

27:08And I think this film's very good at kind of capturing, turning that feeling into a feature-length experience in some ways. Yeah, that little bit of dialogue where James kind of lays out the pitilessness of the life that he sees ahead of him. And he's just very derogatory about, you know, marrying somebody and having kids and getting this tedious job where he does the same thing forever and ever. And I think it's Day calls him out on, you know, your most depressive version of your life involves having a family and a home and a job and a purpose. And she's kind of like laughing at him because he's depicting all of that as just kind of like soul crushing and horrible.

27:52But what he's describing is a sense that he doesn't have any control, you know, that society has kind of laid out the one path that you're allowed to take, and he sees himself as stuck on it. And yeah, that does seem like a metaphor for what's going on in the movie. I think one of the important things about this movie, and sort of the really profound thing to me about this movie is how much it you know addresses what it is that we actually do you know what what our lives are about what what composes our lives what do we talk about how do we actually pass the time right because we do a lot of uh you know our interactions with each other are often banal and silly you know and you get to this point in this movie where the conversation it has no substance to it at all it's just it's just how do we pass the time we have to fill the air with something and it all comes back around to that framing device with the scenario of the of the 10 000 rats and the five gorillas and the human with the gun and the 50 hawks and in that that scenario it's just it's a kind of a nonsense kind of game that you get that you play with each other that really has no actual meaning so yeah it's uh it's i just find that interesting uh you know you'll philosophically just about like what what this film actually is sort of getting at or suggesting about, you know, the ways in which we talk to each other, you know, in the way that we spend our time on Earth, which is not to say it's being judgmental about it, but I think it's well observed.

29:24I want to get into a little bit of what that talking to each other looks like, because it heavily affects what happens in the rest of the film. And effectively, you know, what happens is Tyler dips pretty early. He decides fairly early, once they realize that the people attacking them from the woods want the car and don't care about them as individuals and won't come after them, he suggests that if he himself joins the woods people, he's probably just going to fall quietly into oblivion when cars are not passing. And he just gets out of the car and won't get back in, which feels to me a lot like moments in Stephen Kings, the long walk book and movie where people just realize they can't walk anymore and they just stop.

30:10The movie does make reference to suicide. Day has apparently attempted it at one point and wonders if others have. To me, Tyler's stepping aside from the situation and choosing oblivion rather than continuation feels like a metaphor for suicide. But what we see after that is some unknown period of time way later where Day, Fisher, and James have all kind of developed a pattern for their lives, a literal schedule from day to day where they have the time during which they tell each other stories and the time during which they play a particular road game and the time during which they air their grievances about each other to clear the air, which they've developed kind of a patterned way to do.

30:58And as you say, all of this seems kind of meaningless in a way, but it also seems very creative. And I don't just mean, you know, creative in terms of the filmmakers. I mean, these people have found ways to both pattern their lives to give them meaning and like exploratory ways to keep themselves fresh to each other. And I find that kind of buoyant in the middle of so much existential despair about what is life and what's it for. Human creativity will still find a way, even if it looks banal from the outside. It's still people trying to communicate and connect. I found that pretty touching. When you say Tyler bails relatively early, and it is relatively early, but I believe the mile marker is at like 52 ,000 miles at that point, which is more miles than I have in my six-year-old car at this point uh so you know uh he's been there for a while before he decided compared to how long everybody else lasts especially james uh it's relatively early but he doesn't give up right away oh true and he he's not there for the exciting changes that happen later on like coming across some abandoned cars on the road and and uh getting to a point where no one's coming out of the woods to attack them or few people are anyway.

32:21And so he's missing out on these signs of hope or signs that there's some potential end to it. I mean, sorry, it's in the title. It ends eventually. He totally misses them finding a marker. What a development that is. They can draw on the car at that point. Yeah, a magic marker, not a mile marker. I guess in those situations, you look for those green shoots, I guess you would call them, But they're pretty bad even for, as green shoots go, not that hopeful, but enough to cling to it. And I do find it an interesting kind of running idea of them wondering if they are in purgatory, how they got there, do they deserve to be there, what do they need to do to go out, how much of the suffering are they being asked by some being they don't know, how much are they being asked to withstand, to be delivered to wherever they're supposed to go.

33:09So that's all, you know, creates kind of an interesting spiritual dilemma that, you know, at least one of them is up for, even if the end result is not what he had hoped for. Well, we know we could continue down the road that we're currently on, which feels a little narrow and directed. And like we should go into what happens with Dan Fisher and then what happens with James and what happens with the ending. But I'm going to take a left turn here. Normally, by this time, we've transitioned into connections. And I think what the next steps are in this story do connect to Solaris in a pretty literal way.

33:45So I'm going to say rather than continuing to discuss kind of the spoiler section, we're going to go ahead and take the off ramp and get into connections. The Next Picture Show is presented by Regal Unlimited, the all-you-can-watch movie subscription pass that pays for itself in just two visits. By the time you hear this, it'll be September and we'll be headed into a season of theatrical revivals and anniversary screenings. The week I'm recording this, Pixar's Cars, The Hunger Games movies, and the anime classic Akira are all back in theaters. Cars for its 20th anniversary, The Hunger Games movies ahead of the new prequel Sunrise on the Reaping, and Akira in a new 4K edition.

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35:56now it's time for connections when we bring these two films together and talk about all the things they have in common keith i'm going to kick directly to you i told you i was going to bring up your point about no matter where you go you take your baggage which you brought up in connection with solaris in the first half and i immediately thought wow that certainly does describe the four people in a car and it ends uh how do you how do you see that connection working yeah i think that's fair to say although i i think ultimately well i guess we don't really learn that much about our characters in solaris either but we don't learn that much about the various characters in it ends enough that they feel like real characters and they have some key details about their their past they're very distinct and well drawn but in terms of like you know their actual histories presumably they all know each other's histories to the point it doesn't bear repeating but we don't learn that much.

36:50We do learn the day attempted suicide. And Tyler, you know, would not drive to a pumpkin patch. Realized his relationship had reached an impasse because he was not willing to drive to a pumpkin patch for a date. But I don't know that much about James or Fisher. Beyond that, I don't mean to say that. I think I get into who they are as characters, but not necessarily the details of their lives. Yeah, we don't know very basic things like what they majored in, where everybody who is not James in the car wants to end up. Why Tyler joined the military, you know, his accent and his persona could very easily suggest somebody who, you know, has a family connection or felt a drive to serve or somebody who, you know, given that they all went to college and they don't say much about him in college, you know, possibly he came from poverty.

37:42And that's why he joined the military. You can fill in a lot of blanks for yourself, but you don't get those blanks filled in. And that is a result of this movie being kind of minimalist, which I think makes an interesting contrast with Solaris, which is kind of maximalist. One of these movies being 89 minutes long and the other being 166 minutes long is pretty funny to me, given that I feel like we end up knowing about the same amount about the characters in the end. One connection, I mean, I thought of it because I think I had suggested this as the pairing so so it was on me a little bit it was just trying to figure out you know what it ends even reminds me of because i think we did feel like the link ladder connection that the director had brought up wasn't quite sufficient enough for us to do like a slacker pairing say and i think what i ultimately came to was that both of these films but what Solaris does is and and what it ends does that it takes a few characters and puts them you know puts them in a situation and uses the uses what is a genre present premise in both films to do a type of story that isn't what we expect from those genres I mean you know this is you know Solaris is not a not a conventional science fiction film you know it ends is not a conventional horror film, certainly.

39:01But these two are similar in terms of placing these characters in this extreme, strange situation that causes them to turn inward. They're forced to be reflective. They're forced to kind of assess this situation that they can't really unpack and that the film doesn't really even give them any clues as to how to unpack. They try. They try to figure it out. they don't figure it out they just they act on it and then but mostly uh the situation acts on them and reveals that stuff about them uh and thus become these sort of existential journeys of a kind so so that was kind of why i thought these two films meshed well together and you know even though who knows if you know alexander olum had not was surprised to hear his movie compared to uh to sartre and and maybe he'd be surprised to hear compared to tarkovsky as well but it definitely came to mind.

39:56Yeah, it seems from the interviews I read with him, he was very much kind of exploring his own questions about his own existential questions about who he was and where he wanted to go. And he seems to have been a little surprised to find out that people before him in various ages and in various ways were asking the same questions. It does not seem like he came to this from a, like, I have read a bunch of philosophy and here's my take on it kind of way so much as he was looking at, you know, the path ahead of his own life and saying, is that all there is? And he turned it into a big central metaphor, which is something else I see as connecting these two movies.

40:35You know, in the one hand, you've got this sort of limbo-like place where death does not mean anything. In the other, you've got a sort of limbo-like place where life does not mean anything. And exactly what the symbolism is, what it's a metaphor for, is kind of Rorschach blobby enough that you can interpret it in different ways. But the end result in both cases is that you're kind of examining, you know, that age old science fiction question, what does it mean to be human? And specifically, what does it mean to be human when a lot of the kind of things that we associate with being human, like reacting to the passage of time in certain ways, having bodily needs, death being the end, like when those things are stripped away, then who are we and what do we become so i i found both of these movies to be highly metaphorical in kind of like pleasing ways without hitting us over the head about exactly what they mean i feel like it ends is i'm not sure that the endless drive is a necessarily a metaphor that works in any other country uh but americans like is this very it is very much an american version of uh of an existential uh prison i guess in a way now i'm thinking about what other countries' versions of that might be, if it's the American road.

41:53Like, what is, I don't know. I'll tell you. I mean, one of the movies this most reminded me of was Exit 8, which came out earlier this year and which we talked about, I think, as your next picture show, rather than a main focus. But in that case, the main character is caught in an endless, it's a Japanese movie based on a video game, and it's a character caught in an endless series of Japanese subway tunnels. But Scott, my mind also goes to The Death of Mr. Lazaresco. Is that the title of that movie that you love so much? Sure. And kind of the endless limbo of being stuck in a dysfunctional, like medical industrial complex.

42:35Yeah. I think tonally it's not that far off either because, I mean, Death of Mr. Lazaresco is a comedy. I mean, it's incredibly dry. It's very dark comedy. But it is absurdist. absurdist in this situation of this poor man who's getting getting like passed around in this uh this cold thoughtless bureaucracy until he finally kicks the bucket i mean it is a it's about as bleakly funny a premise as you get but i think it's a it's a pretty good one for our purposes and i think you mentioned also the groundhog day thing is definitely present here too just what happens when you live every day in the days are homogenous but and repeating but though i would say with all of the difference between it ends and the uh and the other the groundhog day type movies is that is that there's always that promise i think and i think at least the audience feels like okay there's there's like a cosmic lesson that has to be learned in order for this basic spell to be broken and maybe the characters in it ends are searching for that that lesson that way out but the film is a harsher about it and thus it takes on a different tone i mean you really have to really grapple with hopelessness in a way that you don't in those other movies.

43:48I think that's another connection too, because they, at least up to a point, think there's a way out of this. If they can just crack it, if they can figure out why they're there, or maybe something on the road itself will present itself. And in Solaris, Kelvin is presented with this visitor in the form of his wife who's killed herself. And it's almost like, you know, if I can, it's a second chance. I can fix this. My life has been ruined by this loss. And now is my second. But it's not that at all. There's things that maybe look like solutions that just aren't in both these films. And one of the solutions they reach for is kind of appeal to the divine, which I found interesting as a connection.

44:32Tarkovsky kind of famously, the censors in Russia wanted him to remove mentions of God from the movie. And he kind of pushed back and did the MPAA thing that people in America do, where he kind of twiddled with the film, but didn't actually remove anything, and eventually got away with it. And it's not necessarily a religious movie, but it is a movie where people are kind of debating humanity's place in the universe, and debating, of course, whether the ocean itself is God or is effectively God, given its power and its position. In It Ends, that connection, I think, becomes a lot more literal at the point where Fisher and Day give up hope and try to force James to give up hope as well by turning the car off and taking away the keys forcibly.

45:24To me, this is the one evil act that takes place in It Ends, because they try to take his choice away from him. And they tell him it's for his own good that they're trying to rob him of hope. Like how bleak and despairing is that? From two relatively upbeat characters too. Yeah, two characters that you think have reached a point where they're balanced and they're supporting each other. And instead they're conniving with each other against James. And it feels like a shift into like a movie that doesn't have a villain to me in that moment kind of has a couple of villains. But James gets back into the car and tries to restart it.

46:02And when it won't restart, he works himself up into an emotional frenzy until he finally starts calling on a higher power, just kind of trying to bargain with something, anything, kind of finding prayer in a moment. And that's what makes the car restart. And, you know, as he goes on, when something else happens that is anomalous, he immediately starts again, praying in an albeit like kind of like awkward, inexperienced kind of way. He's talking to something outside of himself. So both of these movies have kind of like fumbling, quasi philosophical relationships to God or the divine or the idea that there might be such a thing.

46:45Neither one of them, I think in the end, has something strong or, you know, like there's something all powerful there that might or might not be observing and judging you. I think it's a very natural topic for the characters to bring up and maybe more interesting that none of them really have any basis for or understanding of religion to start with as a kind of a building block for that exploration. Yeah, that's really interesting, Tasha, because I did kind of think about that. I mean, it ends that moment you discuss of him desperately trying to start the car and the car improbably starting, which would seem to confirm that there is some kind of force or there's some sort of presence that is acting in that moment that is responding to something like prayer when I think there's been no evidence that such a presence exists.

47:43and there's almost not that much evidence later on. I think it rains, I guess, so that's something, and the road does eventually, you know, spoiler alert, it does come to an end. But even when it comes to that end, it's like, is that all there is, is sort of the response. It's like, where are we? What is this? What do we do now? So it becomes quite bleak, but the acknowledgement that there is this, that there is some kind of presence that does something miraculous or responsive to James in that moment, is notable, I would say. It's really possible to start thinking about some of the other passages along this road from that final scene, too, because there's a couple I think there's like an old Packard in there too, so this road may have existed for a long time, but I think it's also kind of like Solaris in that way.

48:34There's things we see on the station there are obviously the results of some fairly dramatic events that we'll never know what the story is, behind them. We'll never know what happened to that car that clearly had reached the end, had had it back. It's a dollar, it reached a million. And then did they give up on the way back? I mean, it's, yeah. I like the way that in both these films, we kind of get hints of stories that we'll never really know. I agree with you very strongly there. And one of the aspects of that that I found kind of interesting is both of these films kind of present a dichotomy between the newbies in the situation and the veterans in the situation, with the implication that the veterans have absolutely lost their minds and that the newbies are progressing toward that.

49:25In Solaris, you know, you have these two very cynical men who don't really want to discuss the situation, but do want to kind of discuss the high-minded philosophy behind it. They don't have the courtesy to talk to Kelvin and explain anything about what the situation might be, what they've gone through, who they are, what he might go through. You know, they don't set him up in any way for it. And he is there literally to determine whether they're both psychotic. In It Ends, we get the kind of the suggestion that the people in the woods are all people who were also on the road and whose cars broke down and who disintegrated into some sort of madness that eventually gives way to just a catalepsy, basically.

50:12And the horror of the situation in both cases is that we kind of see our protagonists moving in that direction and seeing it in front of them as evidence of what they might become as they're subjected to this experience outside of the reality that they know. I think another thing too is to circle back to one of the very first things we talked about with Solaris is that, you know, Kelvin is there kind of haunted by his memories of home, sort of, you know, ultimately, which ultimately manifests themselves in the final scene of the movie. We get a little bit of that here as well. I think it's Fisher who plays the voicemails from his mother.

50:57there's sort of this kind of talk about what they've left behind. I think kind of curiously, though, apart from I think the very beginning of the trip, no one talks about wondering what the people they've left behind will think about their disappearances as well. But nonetheless, there's still like even in the strange space that both, you know, that the characters find themselves in both films, there's a pull of the life they left behind that feels like it's kind of tugging on their psyches at the same time. I mean, inevitably, I think to go back to your first point, wherever you go, you take your baggage.

51:34That's because your baggage is from home. Your baggage is from your past, your history, your experiences. And seeing these two different approaches to, in many ways, kind of conceptually or metaphorically different stories. Here's the 89-minute version. Here's the 166-minute version. One of the big differences there is that 44 minutes that we spend at home with Kelvin, seeing his life and his relatives and what normal looks like for him and having none of that sense from the others. It does feel like in It Ends, one of the reasons we don't spend more time with that is that very early on, they kind of tag into not having any idea what they might have left behind in terms of did they die?

52:20Are there corpses at home? Or did they just magically disappear? Is any of this real in any meaningful way? So not knowing what their families might be experiencing seems to be a solid reason for not discussing it. And at the same time, you know, given how young they are, it does seem a little bit surprising that none of them really kind of goes into my relationship with my brother and how much, you know, he needs me and I'm not going to be there for him. Or at least I'm out from under my dad's thumb or anything like that. We just don't get that sense of like who they are or where they're from.

52:56yeah it's kind of a funny thing that i literally i'm only just thinking about now that you mention it tasha and i almost feel like it's part of the film's design in a way and maybe that also aligns it with solaris because it's such a you know uh that even aligns with it's something like i feel like it ends is really about these characters learning very fundamental things about themselves as individuals apart from whatever baggage they bring with them. Who are they? What can they withstand? What do they believe spiritually? That's what movies, that's what stories do. That's what situations do that we're put in extreme circumstances.

53:39How we react to those circumstances tells us something about ourselves. And I think that's kind of what happens. It ends and it ends up happening without a lot of pieces of these characters' lives that maybe we would expect to know in terms of who they're leaving behind by being on this road. You know, whereas obviously Solaris, this very personal, important piece to Kelvin's life is very present and something he's going to have to contend with. It's like this grief that has followed him and then manifests itself in a three-dimensional way in space. It's a much different situation. I think, you know, part of, to address part of what you're talking about, I think we should talk about the endings of these two movies.

54:19But rather than do that and then, you know, wrap up with just sort of a like a piddlier, like rundown of a bunch of the other connections, I'm going to do the piddly part first so we can we can go out on a bang discussing the endings. In terms of just small connections, both of these films feature sudden rainstorms that are very emotionally important and, you know, and narratively important to our protagonists. Both of them, we kind of talked a bit about the passage of time via cuts in It Ends. Solaris also does some similarly dreamy things with time, particularly when Kelvin has a fever and kind of just lets a pretty important chunk of the story go unexperienced in a dreamy kind of way.

55:09Both of these movies are about regret. Both of these movies kind of address things that people have done that they're sorry for and how they feel about them and to what degree any of that really makes a difference on like a cosmic level in terms of the experience of humanity. Both of them, there's the man needs man line in Solaris. And you see that kind of like played out in the action in It Ends as the characters depend on each other. But you also kind of see it refuted when Day and Fisher betray James. I guess finally for me, Tarkovsky talking about how what interests him is the dogged character that moves forward no matter what and gets to the end of the road that all of the people around him don't get to the end of.

56:00I mean, that just describes it ends very, very literally, doesn't it? Yes. And speaking of the ending, we should talk about it. Go for it. Oh, me? I just talked for let's check the timer I'm pretty sure it's in double digit minutes oh wait no it was only like four minutes but still yeah go ahead and lead us off on this one Keith I like how we're thrown back we know people listen to the first episode so they got that joke alright so we have on our discussion sheet here elliptical yet definitive endings but I have a little question the definitive with it ends because as we discussed that James gets to the end, the sign that says road ends, he heads back.

56:41So, you know, the cycle kind of begins anew, whereas Calvin ends up at home, but not his home. It's a not quite perfect simulation of his home to which he seems to have a complicated emotional response. But I guess in both cases, though, we have characters that are beginning a new phase of a journey we'll never see the end of, but I think it may not matter. It's a journey to this point that might have mattered for these characters and for us watching them. Yeah. When I wrote elliptical but definitive endings, what I kind of meant was we end on pregnant pauses, I think, as kind of a new phase of their lives begin.

57:18But to me, while the story may be open-ended, what happens next may be open-ended, it feels like both characters have crossed a Rubicon. Both characters have come somewhere that they want to be. It's a little uncertain to me whether Kelvin chose not to leave the planet or thought he left the planet and then discovered that he didn't. But either way, the way he falls on his knees before this avatar of his father, you know, to me says he's where he wants to be. With It Ends, I found that ending very rousing and very touching because it seems to me that what James has determined is that he can do more by connecting with others and helping with others than he can by going on solo.

58:02And if that brings him to contact with new people, I mean, that's one of the big ways I get through the tedium of life is reaching out to new people and making new connections. So I connected a lot with that ending. And whether it's meant to be like a permanent step, whether he's just rescuing this one person or he's beginning a career of bringing people back from despair. We don't know. But to me, making that choice to stop pushing forward and instead turn back and help other people felt really definitive. I think the Carl Mase eats five though, Tasha. There's sort of a limit to how many people he can bring back with.

58:40That's pretty funny. I guess I didn't interpret the ending like you did, Tasha. I like the thought. It's more optimistic than what I saw Because I think it's now when you kind of close that loop and you're back to asking this silly hypothetical question that was asked at the beginning, you're starting this cycle all over again. And you're starting it with someone who's processing speed, at least at this point, is really low. I mean, it's almost like I always find it kind of a funny sort of comedic button to the movie more than anything. Yeah, to me, it's a moment where we see that people can be brought back from that catatonic state.

59:24The road may not lead anywhere, but the end state does not have to be the same for all people. And the fact that the strangers in the woods are so desperate and screaming and clawing for access to the car and the ability to move forward, and the characters are terrified of them, But they're screaming for help. And the response to people screaming for help is to flee them and to avoid being pulled down with them physically in a dangerous, painful kind of way. I think that's a very common response to the degree to which we could all drown in the number of other people out there needing our help.

1:00:08and James making the choice to actively seek out one person he can help, to me, feels like he may have infinity. This may be a drop in the bucket, but it's the first drop in the bucket. So yeah, I did see that as a very positive ending. And given the guy he picks comes back from complete limp catatonia, the fact that he's willing to respond at all is a step forward. I more than I think he's going to. They're going to just continue to talk about, you know, hawks versus gorillas for the rest of their existence. I like it, Tasha. Well, you know how much I love ending on a place where Scott Tobias actually agrees with me about something, or at least says that he's willing to enjoy something that I've said.

1:00:57Solaris is available on streaming services, including HBO Max and the Criterion channel. It's on Criterion DVD and Blu-ray. As we're recording this, It Ends is pretty close to ending its run in theaters, so it's possible you might not be able to see it immediately by the time this episode airs, but it should have a second or possibly third life in digital release soon. We'll be right back with your next picture show.

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1:04:44Finally, it's time to recommend a film or film-related item that complements this set of episodes. We call it your next picture show, with hopes that it will put some interesting choices on your radar. All right, Keith, let's hear it. Okay, well, briefly, I sat down to see it ends for a second time, and I thought, you know what? We should have done Tulane Blacktop, which is one of my favorite films, but I'm sure we'll get to it eventually. And actually, now that we've done it, I think the Solaris has been good. But if you want to keep the Solaris vibe going, you can watch the 2002 remake by Steven Soderbergh, which is not well-liked, not widely-liked, not widely-remembered.

1:05:20Best I can tell, it was when Soderbergh was in his super productive phase in the early 2000s, unlike now when he's merely in the extremely productive phase of his career. But it's a remake that stars George Clooney in the Kelvin role and Jeremy Davies, Viola Davis and Ulrich Tukor as the astronauts on the space station. And the plot is really roughly the same, just as it's roughly the same as the novel. Natasha Macalone plays his wife, who, like the wife in the original film, has killed herself. But it is much more emotional. I think this is really, you know, everything that Lim objected to about the Tarkovsky film, which he seems not to actually have seen, is heightened in this version, which Lim lived long enough to disapprove of without seeing this film, too, which is kind of nice.

1:06:20But I think it's really, I think Clooney, it's one of his really, his best performances. I think McAlone's really good. I think there's some really scary moments early on before it becomes this sort of this fairly highly emotional kind of romantic film. It's also lean. I mean, Soderbergh was an editor before he was a director and he also did a, at one point, I've never seen it, but he offered a more fleet cut of 2001 A Space Odyssey by re-editing the film himself. I think he kind of cut this one down to a very lean running time, but I think it works as sort of like, I don't know, sort of like the chamber music version to Tarkovsky's big symphonic version of Solaris.

1:07:06I like them both a lot. I think Solaris' Tarkovsky version is probably, no, it's definitely more of an artistic accomplishment, but I think the Soderbergh version is quite strong. also has one of my favorite scores of the century. Cliff Martinez does the score that I still listen to when I write sometimes. So check it out. It is failed parental most places and the usual places. And I don't think it ever even came out on Blu-ray. But it's out there. Check it out. Keith, does Soderbergh at any point zoom way, way, way into George Clooney's ear? No. It's been a while since I've seen the film. I rewatched it for defense.

1:07:45I've mounted on the reveal. You can find it there if you look for it. I do not recall that shot. Sorry. All right. Well, if you take Keith's advice and watch the Soderbergh Solaris, either to revisit it or for the first time, please write in and let us know if there are any deep dive ear shots. But in the meantime, Keith, thank you. I have not seen it myself. And I certainly am curious after watching the Tartofsky version, not for the first time, but definitely for the first time while being awake the entire time, shall we say.

1:08:24That's it for this edition of The Next Picture Show. Scott, can you tell us about our next pairing? In the new independent drama The Wait, Ethan Hawke stars as a convict in 1930s Oregon who's desperate for the opportunity to end his prison sentence so he can be reunited with his daughter. Such an opportunity arises when the Warden, played by Russell Crowe, offers him the chance for an early release if he leads a crew on a dangerous mission to smuggle gold through the wilderness. This high-stakes proposition calls to mind William Friedkin's Sorcerer, a 1977 remake of the French classic The Wages of Fear, about desperate men who agree to drive trucks filled with unstable nitroglycerin to an oil well 200 bumpy miles away.

1:09:08Though Freakin's film was a flop at the time, in part because it opened against a little film called Star Wars, it's since become a cult favorite. Please join us next time as we compare these compelling takes on a white-knuckle thriller. For now, we welcome your feedback on Solaris, It Ends, and anything else film-related you'd like to talk about. Email us at comments at nextpictureshow.net or leave us a voicemail at 773-234-9730. Before we close out this week's episode, and you know you guys know where to find me these days pretty much just on vulture and uh a little more on blue sky at tasha robinson um but mostly land back and we can find you guys mostly in the same place so who wants to kick off by telling us about the reveal wow okay you're breaking format i don't know what to do let me start uh i suppose you can find me scott tobias on blue sky at scott tobias and uh you can find my work at the reveal i certainly do a tremendous amount of work at the reveal uh that newsletter i edit and write with qthips it's the reveal.film and you can also find my work in the new york times uh guardian the vulture and other fine publications uh keith yeah that's right i mean you can find me at kphips 3000 mostly at blue sky you can find my work at places like vulture and tv guy but also the reveal the reveal.film with scott tobias and um if you like this podcast you'll probably enjoy that newsletter and i do have another podcast that that I co-host with my friend, Mike Ryan.

1:10:35It's called Ford Focus, a Harrison Ford podcast. You can probably piece together what that podcast is about. Our absent co-host Genevieve Kosky is the TV editor at Vulture. And you can also find her mostly not blue sky and on blue sky at Genevieve Kosky. Stay updated on the next picture show at next picture show.net and on blue sky at the next picture show. Get bonus content and open discussion at patreon.com slash next picture show. And as always, we appreciate your rating and reviews on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you listen to the show. Thanks to Dan the Bake Jakes for his assistance in producing this podcast.

1:11:11The Next Picture Show is proud to be part of the FilmSpotting family of podcasts. Please tune in next time.

1:11:27That was a good movie. Yeah, seen here before once. Some people use ChatGPT to answer questions. Others use it to get real work done. With ChatGPT Work, you bring the goal, plus real inputs like briefs, notes, files, feedback, data, and project plans. It can help turn them into an analysis, tracker, deck outline, prototype, or workflow you can review and keep shaping. You stay in control, giving direction and choosing the final output. Put ChatGPT to work on your most ambitious ideas and projects. Get started at ChatGPT.com by selecting Work Mode. available on Plus and Pro Plans. There are exciting things happening at your local CVS.

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1:12:59We'll be right back. Additions apply. Bank of America and a member FDIC. This episode is supported by FX is the drop. A snowfall saga. Wanda and Leon are back, but this time they're chasing a different kind of legacy. As West Coast rap begins to take over 90s Los Angeles, Wanda is betting on a new generation of artists. But in a city where every opportunity comes with a price, they'll have to decide what they're willing to risk to leave their mark. FX is the drop. Now streaming on Hulu. You