Top 5 Movies Adapted From Iowa Writers – Live at Refocus Film Festival

28:53Yeah, Kiyosagawa. And, you know, I'd never seen this film front to back until two days ago. And that may be along with Gun Crazy. That's probably the least seen of the ones we're going to talk about tonight. But I found that that film version of this, you know, it's a simple story. The Frake family, this farm family going to the state fair, prize hog. Will Rogers plays the father Abel who really wants Blue Boy. He's a massive prize hog to win the blue ribbon and his wife competing in not just sour pickles, but sweet pickles and mincemeat. I mean, you know, big, big, you know, so some tension there.

29:35And the kids who are young adults, one of the daughters played by a beautiful performance by Janet Gaynor when she was, you know, this is like five years before she did A Star Is Born. It's just kind of what happens over the weekend, you know, at the fair. And I knew it was going to be like, okay, folksy humor with Will Rogers, although he's very low-key and easy to take, which is nice. There's a lot of things about this movie I did not expect, and mainly that these dual romances that the two young adult children of the Frakes kind of find in the course of this weekend are really tender and kind of difficult and very moving.

30:19And also, this is a pre-code film. It was a year before they started enforcing the code. So it's clearly implied they both lose their virginity over this weekend. Now, talk about something that would not have been allowed a year later and then for many decades later. After that, that's why I love pre-code. But that was truer to the novel. And somehow this mixture of, you know, very corny humor in many ways, But, you know, just enough feeling that this old war horse title that is famous, you know, mainly just for being kind of what it is. You know, it's been it's been almost a century in the culture.

30:54But well, we're seeing, man. I mean, really good, really good. And the reason I love the film, I found very charming, but it's also not candy colored. It's black and white, so you wouldn't get much candy out of black and white. But but it's it's a little seedy, you know, like like a good state fair has to be. They run into some unscrupulous Kearney Parkers. But they filmed more than the usual location work, just for background, than Hollywood would do at that time. Typically, they sent a camera crew in August 32 to the state fair and got just enough really good crowd scenes, some packing up with the fair and taking it down that you just felt like again you were a little more where you needed to be for a quintessentially Iowan story.

31:48So yeah, that's it. Okay, my number three. I don't know if this qualifies truly as a sports movie or not but I'm going with The Color of Money. Martin Scorsese, 1986. This is an adaptation of a Walter Tevis novel. Tevis was a 1960 grad of the Iowa Writers' Workshop. His sixth and final novel, I believe, a bookend to his career that started with The Hustler. I don't know. The Hustler might have been a good choice for this list. Maybe it will come up again later in the show. Might have been, Adam. We'll see. So from what I gather, I haven't read the novel The Color of Money, but if you go to WalterTevis.org, you'll get a nice description.

32:28I do want to read this here because you'll see how the movie changes one pretty key detail as you look up at the screen and you see Paul Newman playing fast Eddie Felsen and you see Tom Cruise, of course, playing Vincent, his protege. Here's the description. Eddie walked out on his talent and for the next 20 years ran a pool room, got married and watched pool games on television. One evening, he watches a fat pool player who reminds him of fats and the night he played him. When the television show ends, Eddie gets up and goes to his pool room to play straight pool alone for hours, missing dinner for doing it, playing with the old excitement.

33:03And finally, he allows himself to feel the feeling that has nagged at him since watching the show on television. It was grief. The best part of him had died and he grieved for it. So there's a lot that's different, but there's something that is fundamentally the same. This idea of kind of grieving for your past and being reinvigorated by seeing a version of someone from your past. Only the difference is it's not Fats, Minnesota Fats, played by Jackie Gleason in The Hustler. It's seeing himself. It's seeing a version of himself, which is Vincent, Tom Cruise's character here. And I know that there was talk, and maybe there is still talk, about this Oscar win for Newman at the time being a lifetime achievement award.

33:47And then I suppose the subtext of that is that maybe he wasn't fully deserving. I haven't seen the movie Mona Lisa, Michael, so I can't speak to Bob Hoskins' performance, but I have seen Around Midnight. I've seen Salvador. I've seen Children of a Lesser God. With all due respect to Dexter Gordon and to James Woods, and this is the only time I'll ever use the word respect in the same context as James Woods, and to William Hurt, I'm going to take Newman as fast as Eddie Felsen in The Color of Money every day of the week and twice on Sunday. I think it's an incredible performance, and for those who say maybe it's lesser Scorsese, Sure, but next to what?

34:23Goodfellas? Raging Bull? It's still Suercesi. It's the same editor as both of those films, Thelmish Schoonmaker. And it's the same DP as Goodfellas, Michael Bauhaus. And it's all there on the screen. Cool. But the thing is,

34:41even if it is just for bangers, everybody's doing it.

34:47Everybody's doing it. There's a lot of guys doing it. I haven't seen this film in a long time. Are other people like that too, where it's been a long time, or have not seen Color of Money? What I remember is that, like he had this challenge in Raging Bull, every fight has to be, he took on this idea of every fight has to be shot and conceived visually in a very different way. And it's like five times the action in terms of separate individual games of pool going on. And this is actually a pretty, this is like the one ruminative kind of quiet, you know, stealthy rhythm to any of it. I mean, because Scorsese was really jumping, he was like really, really out with the electrodes with this movie because it was just, you know, it's just very propulsive.

35:39And this is a nice changeup. Great scene too when Forrest Whitaker, my favorite scene of the film. Yeah, it's probably the scene of the movie. Forrest Whitaker is basically, you know, hustling, You a hustler, Amos? Yeah, hustling the Newman character, and it's a really stunning comeuppance. That's great. It plays out, again, in kind of a more methodical way than I would have expected from Scorsese. I'm really sorry. There's nothing I can do. It's nine ball, Phil. I can't believe you that. You a hustler, Amos? Come on, Eddie, man. Look. You a hustler?

36:22movies you might be able to check out for free right now as a regal unlimited member marty supreme number nine on allison wilmore's list an 11 through 20 pick for me incredible performance from timothy chalamet that is playing right now at regal and we've talked a little bit about some of these picks we've highlighted some of these repertory movies the limited engagements Josh, that Regal has been showing at some of their theaters. And I'm looking at regmovies.com and they have a limited engagement right now for its, what is it? It's 40th anniversary? It's 30th. Okay. Only 30 years. Shouldn't age it like that.

37:0730th anniversary of a movie. I somehow, I can't believe I'm admitting this. I have somehow never seen this film, despite the fact that it stars two incredible actresses, including one who I've always claimed to be a huge, huge fan of. And I may have to rectify this now by seeing it on the big screen, getting a chance to see it on the big screen at a Regal Cinema. Sense and sensibility. Ang Lee that's a way to do it great director too Kate Winslet the actress I'm referring to the great Emma Thompson never seen Sense and Sensibility and if you're like me maybe you're embarrassed about it like me you can check that out now at Regal Cinemas and maybe see it for free with that Regal Unlimited membership Regal Unlimited is the all you can watch movie subscription pass that pays for itself in just two visits and Regal is offering film spotting listeners endless movies for less.

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38:46Before we get back to the Iowa Writers Top 5 with Michael Phillips and me, let's talk about what's on deck for next week. Our favorite lead and supporting performances of the year. I'd ask you if you've been keeping a list, but I know you have. You're one of those critics who keeps that running list, at least of the movies of the year. Have you been good about keeping the performers as well? Oh, yeah. I mean, it started just with top 10 movies and then expanded it with our Chicago Film Critics Association ballots, knowing I needed to keep on top of that, and then expanded it again, Adam, since we've been doing our wrap party each year, which gets into most moving moment, funniest moment.

39:31I've got to drop those in this document too. Basically, if this document were to disappear, I would be in big, big trouble. Could I just borrow your homework maybe? Could you just share it with me? You'd think after all these years, maybe that would bleed over. I would learn that from you, but I haven't. I don't do this. Well, I can't explain that and I would share it, but what's the percentage chance that you'd agree with what I have on there anyway? So I don't know. There'll be some crossover. We always have some, but a little bit. We'll have to see how much. Also next week, we hope to get to it.

40:12It depends on how, how the movies line up in terms of releases, because I'm in one part of this country, the United States, and Josh is in another part of the world. and the movies don't always appear the same, do they, Josh? I have to get on like a hamster wheel and run to get my Netflix powered up. That too. So we'll see how much energy I have. But there's a lot of great movies that have just opened or are opening, like Hamnet, the new Knives Out mystery. We've got, what else were we thinking about? Oh, Sentimental Value, which I'm just going to keep rubbing in that as we're taping this, I've already seen.

40:50So we'll just have to see how things transpire. One thing we do know is we'll get to the results of, or you can actually just vote in right now, the current deeply flawed film spotting poll where we're asking you to choose one and only one 2025 scene stealer. We thought this one was pretty easy to vote on, but we like the poll a lot. Josh, give our listeners the option one more time. Amy Madigan in Weapons, Benicio del Toro in One Battle After Another, Marisa Abela in Black Bag, Michael Cera in The Phoenician Scheme, Ray Fines in 28 Years Later, Wunmi Masako in Sinners, or you can vote other. You can vote in that poll and leave a comment at filmspotting.net.

41:38It's right there on the main page if you scroll down or there's a link at the very top. And now we go back to Iowa City with Michael Phillips and me at this year's Refocus Film Festival and our top five movies adapted from Iowa writers. Good pick. Thank you. And yet you can beat it. Yeah, and yet I really, I got to go with The Hustler in my number two, the 1961 Robert Rawson original, which I may be an age thing, Adam. I have a year or two over you. But very different, and they are fascinating to kind of see his bookends made almost, what is it, 23 years apart, which is rare for a sequel. And to see Newman playing Fast Eddie at a point in his career when he was a star, but he really hadn't kind of dealt with that sort of character study.

42:43It's a very stark movie. Shot in black and white, gorgeous. And, I mean, my God, the supporting cast. Like here, but like a generation back, George C. Scott is just the most adversarial presence. Jackie Gleason couldn't be a more perfect casting for Minnesota Fats. And it's just got a look and a kind of leanness. Piper Laurie's really amazing in it. And she was relatively new, I think, to the cameras then. And let's see just a little scene of Newman's earlier iteration of Fast Eddie at the table. And this is where the movie actually is sort of like pre-Scorsese in its technique a little bit. before Scorsese came along.

43:30Very good shot. You know, I got a hunch, fat man. I got a hunch it's me from here on in. One ball, corner pocket. Did that ever happen to you? All of a sudden you feel like you can't miss? Yeah, I mean, the character's been down a long time, so this is like his reintroduction to confidence and just, you know, on indomitability, really. Yeah, no, I love The Hustler. I like The Color of Money a lot. I'll take it. I'm good with that, Michael. All right. All right, let's go to, are we good? Yeah. Let's go to my number two? Yeah, let's hear it. Okay, let's go for it. I think, I know you approve of this pick.

44:12Okay. 100%. Okay. Okay. I didn't pre-approve it, but. No, but I have a hunch that you're going to be on board with it. So you remember that AFI list, the top 100 films list, like 98, it came out, and then they did an update in 2007. From that 2007 list, I have three remaining blind spots. There are three films on that list I haven't seen. And maybe we can play a parlor game later and everyone can guess what the three films are that I haven't seen. I'm not going to get into that now. But I was really only ever embarrassed about the fourth film. There was a fourth blind spot up until just last year.

44:47It was the impetus for us over on Film Spotting to do a William Wyler marathon so that I would have no excuse. I could finally say I have seen and I would finally get to see the best years of our lives. Yes, I'm going back to McKinley Cantor from my earlier pick. This is the movie about three servicemen returning home from World War II and their struggles to adjust back to civilian life. And watching it, I found it just stunningly clear-eyed for a movie in 1946 about those struggles and the country's desire to move past those struggles as swiftly as possible. And Cantor wrote it. It was an adaptation.

45:29The book was called Glory for Me, and it came out in 1945. And it is considered a novel, but doing a little bit of research, it's actually a novel in verse. So sometimes it's referred to as a poem. And I found this on a substat called Screen Splits. Glory for Me is written in unrhymed iambic lines that vary in number of feet, generally between three and five, sometimes up to seven or as few as two. with no particular scheme. It's an interesting mid-century artifact, and I wanted to like it as a poem. Despite some moving passages, though, the verse form tends merely to make everything sound frightfully earnest.

46:06Here's Fred working at the drugstore. I'll do my best Olivier here. He set the Kotex boxes true when they had tumbled down. So that's this person's take on the verse. But there's a notable, another, you know, or at least a major change from the source in terms of my affection for this movie. One of the scenes that just cemented it really is an all-time favorite for me. There's a character in the movie and in the source material named Homer. Harold Russell won the first Oscar ever given to a non-professional actor. He plays a double amputee. In the story, he comes back from the war with athetoid cerebral palsy.

46:50So the condition's a little bit different. And actually, instead of the incredibly moving scene, I'm going to play a clip from here in a moment, his relationship with Wilma, I think they're high school sweethearts. She's with him before the war. And the whole movie, she's just trying to get close to him. And he's ashamed because of his condition. And he just keeps her away, away, away. And finally, in this scene, you're going to see he shows his vulnerability. But in the in the novel, he actually tries to commit suicide and she has to convince him that that life is is worth living. But that's kind of what ends up happening in this scene, too, in a less dramatic way.

47:32That's that's what she ultimately convinces him of as well, and that they can have a life together. So this is a scene, you know, from a production code standpoint, the entire this entire film where there are multiple married couples. Right. Every time someone goes to bed, they go to different rooms to go to sleep. And this is the one time where she comes in the room and helps him undress to get ready, you know, for bed. and it slipped by because of the fact that it seems so somehow safe and it doesn't seem like it's pushing boundaries, and yet it is so intimate. This is when I know I'm helpless.

48:14My hands are down there on the bed. I can't put them on again without calling to somebody for help. I can't smoke a cigarette or read a book. That door should blow shut. I can't open it and get out of this room. who's dependent as a baby that doesn't know how to get anything except cry for it the way weiler just lets the camera stay still doesn't doesn't try to do anything ostentatious lets the emotion of the scene play out because it is such a heavy scene we haven't we haven't witnessed homer be this vulnerable up until this moment and it it's almost like i remember watching it the first time and feeling like for a moment i was watching a documentary almost like It was about servicemen coming home from the war and in this situation, what it's like, what their nighttime routine might be like.

49:05And if you're a spouse, how you would understand how to deal with them and how you might handle at nighttime and what you might expect. And I think that was, you know, based on some things I've read about Weiler in this film, that's what he wanted to do. He almost wanted this movie to be, and this scene in particular, to be like a how-to guide, an empathy guide for people who, as I said earlier, maybe were a little bit too quick to say, well, we won and we're just going to try to move past this war now and we're going to try to pretend that people like Homer don't exist and we don't have to deal with it, but they do.

49:40And that's what he's showing us in this scene. And they hadn't dealt with the issue of PTSD, which is what Dana Andrews character is dealing with. So it's all, the conflicts, inner and sort of external, both, are absolutely what the audiences had been surrounded by during the war, shortly after. And no studio, the producer, Sam and Golden, believed in it, optioned it. But the studio system in Hollywood had no belief in anybody wanting to kind of revisit all this. Where's the escapism? That's the argument, right? You know, the economic thinking. And the film was the biggest hit since Gone with the Wind, seven years earlier.

50:23Everybody went. They just needed it. And it was damn good. It wasn't just the good for you. It was just, it just worked like crazy. I mean, Teresa Wright's amazing in it. I mean, every performance is good. And I just want to say one thing that's important about it. released in 46 and it would not it's likely many film historians have speculated and I think it's true. Five six years later never would have got made because you name it. Every reason. It just seemed anti-American. The Frederick March character comes back. He's a bank executive. He's arguably tipping into alcoholism but he's also very friendly about giving loans to fellow servicemen that everybody who works with thinks, well, they're bad bets.

51:13We'll never get our money back from these guys. It seemed very kind of skeptical about lending practices, all of it. And that film would not have gotten made five years later. And so the reminder, I think, for us all is that we cannot take our relative lack of censorship for granted with depending on how, uh, how the winds are blowing in DC. We're at your number one choice. But we're not done talking about this film, are we? Uh, okay. I mean, this is your number one. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's my, it is my number one. So we, we, uh, we agree. Have we exhausted the best years of our lives? No, no, no, no, no.

51:56I just think it's got visual things in it that, like Adam says, it's not ostentatious at all. But if you just look at it as Hollywood film craft, Weiler was working with a cinematographer, Greg Toland, who worked with Wells on Citizen Kane, and there's a deep focus technique at work in many shots. and the composition is really not ostentatious in the way it sort of like brings the audience into what is happening in the foreground and in the background. At the same time, we're like, you'll see what's going on in the phone booth in the back of the bar and maybe hear a bit of it. But it's all very, you know, and it's in perfect clarity there and it's in perfect clarity in the foreground.

52:42And that kind of technique was relatively new then. Not brand new, but certainly in the service of any kind of home front war movie, it was brand new. And Weiler had one other, I think, visual strategy that paid off wonderfully, which is like keep everything ground level. I don't want a bunch of sweeping, establishing shots of the street or whatever, except the one moment when Dana Andrews kind of confronts this graveyard of bombers, of planes, decommissioned planes. And just to get the sweep of this unbelievable sight when he's kind of about to revisit, you know, the worst of what he went through in the war, you know, then you get the traditional massive Hollywood boom.

53:27And by withholding visually that, again, you don't even notice it consciously as a spectator, maybe, but you just, you feel it. And that's what film is about. It's about, it's not always about the shot you can recognize as flashy or the cut you can recognize as beautifully right. but just it's so the technique is just sort of absorbed into what the story needs right then yeah i'm glad you said that michael because he's not a filmmaker that draws attention to himself and yet he's my go-to filmmaker when i'm talking to students about composition or if you're in a film analysis class you need an example of mise-en-scene look at this is from the wedding at the end of the film right and just look at how he packs a frame right every aspect of the frame And as Michael said, focus.

54:12There is and there's there's so much being communicated even in this next shot, which is also from the wedding sequence. Think about just without knowing the dynamics of the scene in the characters. You still have a sense of the drama of the scene just based on how characters are positioned within the frame. Weiler is a master at that. I didn't know that until I did the marathon, but when you watch about six of his films in succession, you start to see how he uses the camera so expertly, but again, in a way that sometimes it can feel a little bit invisible. But that's the magic of it. And the whole idea that nobody had any faith in that material, it just does prove that William Goldman, the screenwriter, the axiom that he came up with decades later, nobody knows anything out there.

54:57three words about Hollywood nobody knows anything you don't really know who knows what's going to work and why would some film that comes straight off of a war a big global war conflict why would it but it takes this level of achievement to make it work I mean audiences have been force fed a lot of second rate propaganda coming out of the studios with good actors but nothing more on their mind than to sell war bonds and to make the Japanese and Germans look subhuman. Maybe understandably, maybe not for the time. But this film was working at different aims and it took its time. It's almost three hours.

55:46Longer than average. I don't want to see this film too often in my life. I see every five. I don't really love to revisit stuff too much. I just don't. I want to keep it sort of surprising to me. And so I see it every few years just to be reminded that it's not just – it's a classic that many people regard as such, but it's both of its time and it still speaks to us. So after all that, there's probably no top five that should have a movie ahead of the best years of our lives, but I'm going to do it anyway. What? Because, yeah, these top fives are personal. That's the whole point. You have one last chance to change your mind and just say, I'm going to go with it.

56:31I'm going to go with it. It is 530, but I'm going to be quick here, as quick as I can. I do have one pick, and it is a very personal pick, and it's a nostalgia or nostalgic pick as well. And it's the world according to Garp. John Irving, my favorite John Irving book, my favorite John Irving adaptation. Of course, John Irving here at Refocus last year, Cider House Rules, right, was here. And as a latchkey kid of baby boomer parents with cable TV, I watched this deservingly R-rated film way too many times as a youngster. And as I said recently on Film Spotting, when it came up on a top five, I just found it so mysterious.

57:14And how to even summarize the movie. The synopsis is this. A nurse during World War II, Jenny Fields, played by Glenn Close, conceives with a dying pilot and bears a boy named T.S. Garp, Robin Williams, whom she raises alone. I mean, that doesn't begin to describe a fraction of what happens in the world according to Garp, but there was so little about it I understood or could process about the behavior of these adult characters when I was a kid, and I'm not sure I can process a whole lot of it now, which is why I still keep coming back to The World According to Garth and, you know, joking about the best years of our lives.

57:49Number 37 on that AFI list in 98, number 37 on the list in 2007. The World According to Garth will make no such list ever. It's probably not 1037, but that doesn't matter. I love it. And when I appeared on a podcast several years back, that was kind of about the movie that just talking about going in depth on the movie that made you as a critic and I had to think about it, I ultimately landed on this movie. And it's because it's the movie that got me fascinated with artists and the artistic process. And I point to this scene, the scene I'm going to play here, where it's a relatively early scene, about 45 minutes into the movie.

58:30Garp is just finding his voice as a writer. He's writing short stories. He hasn't written a novel yet. And he is finishing it. And then he is seeking his mother's approval, or at least his mother's opinion. I'm not sure I understand it. Mom, it's very simple. He can do wonders when he's wearing his magic gloves. If his wife is sad, he just touches her with his gloves and she's happy. If his children are crying, he just touches them and they smile, but he can't feel them. He yearns to feel. He can even hold off death with his magic gloves, but he can't feel life. So he takes off the gloves and he dies, but he finally feels life as he's flying into the arms of death.

59:15I like that. If that's what it means, I like it.

59:23So what I love about that scene, I think what just captured my imagination so much first was just this idea. I think this is what put the idea in my head of what a critic in some ways could do. And it's not so much her being critical of his work, but the way he, for her, and I understand he's the artist in this scenario, but the way he unlocked for her the meaning of it. And it helped her then to appreciate ultimately the work. And I think, I hope that on our good days, that's what we're striving to do. That sometimes with films, we're by talking about whether it's some of the formal elements or thematically or the personal resonance it has with us, we can sometimes help unlock meaning in films.

1:00:07And sometimes maybe the people listening or watching didn't have that strong of a reaction and then they have a stronger reaction to it. They may not enjoy it anymore, but maybe they do have a stronger connection to it in some way. And so for me, it's the sort of voice of a critic or the birth of a critic in a way that that really connected with me. But here's the other thing I thought of in light of us being here at Refocus and this whole idea of adaptation. I just thought of this today, watching the scene. It depicts the writing process. And you see this a fair amount in movies, right? Because you have to visualize it somehow.

1:00:44It's not very dramatic to watch people clanking away on a typewriter or scribbling. It depicts it as him putting onto the page what's playing out in his head. The movie, you might say, that's playing out in his head. Almost like he's adapting the movie in his head onto the page. And so I'm sure we have some writers in the audience, fiction writers, and they'll have to tell me later whether or not that's actually how it works or not. Are you ever actually just having the movie play out? Are you seeing the scenes? Are you inventing the characters? Are you inventing the scenario? And you're watching the film of your book before someone else has adapted it?

1:01:32Are you watching the first version of the film? Is that how it goes? And then you're just transcribing your imagination? Is that how it works? The imaginary movie? I don't know the answer. I've never been able to write fiction. That's why I'm up here talking about movies instead. I got to think that it's the state you dream of getting to and you maybe occasionally get there, where you have all the obstacles are gone and you're actually doing that. It's like free writing. And the critic in your head, the one you don't want to listen to, is gone, is out for lunch. So you follow. But that's it. I haven't seen this movie since 1982.

1:02:11Okay, well, I would say don't watch it because I'm afraid you'll hate it. No, no, no. You get that many decades between when you've seen something, and I liked it. Seen something, and you are not the same person, and the film is not the same film, and it's time to revisit. So I, yes, begrudgingly say thank you for, actually, it's a good scene, too. Yeah. Yeah, now I'll see you. Okay, good. Good work, Adam. Thank you. Well, good work as well, Michael. We are, it's a film spotting event, so of course we went a little bit over time. But to wrap up, any others, any couple honorable mentions that you need to honorably mention?

1:02:48Or did we get to all of the big ones? I mean, you know, I think I was searching more for new ones. I tell you, last night, it was very good, I thought. I thought that was a very good afternoon. Train dreams. Train dreams, yeah. And I would sneak the music man on there because I'm kind of a sucker for musicals. and it's, and it's, uh, Iowa has a lot to be proud of to have turned out two major Broadway musicals as settings, as far as I know, and they're both worth talking about and rewatching. So that's my, that's my honorable mention. Okay. Well, I would, I would take The Hustler, which was on your list.

1:03:23And also Tevis wrote The Man Who Fell to Earth, which is a very good sci-fi film from the seventies. Oh, and who saw the Queen's Gambit here? Yeah. The Netflix. The Netflix series. That was Tevis as well. That's a fascinating, not long resume, but he, I mean, he, he was born for the movies apparently. Yeah. And maybe just a closing thought. If you were at the screening last night, the opening night movie, the, uh, the showing of train dreams and the Q and a afterwards, I wonder if you had a similar thought, Michael, because I know how you feel about what makes a good adaptation and it comes down to it really not being faithful at all.

1:03:57The lack of fidelity, the better. And I wonder if as a good rule of thumb, it should be almost what Cindy Johnson, the wife of Dennis, said, which is her first reaction to the screenplay when she got it was everybody needs to be fired. She said she hated it so much that everybody should be fired. And then someone who fortunately she really trusts read it and said, Cindy, you have to just take a breath for a second. This is actually really good and it's probably as good as it's going to get. Like this is as good as this adaptation can get and you need to just, you know, deal with it. And she did have a few notes and they listened to her notes.

1:04:36But otherwise, that's the film. And of course, now she's seen it three times and it's an emotionally, you know, arresting experience for her. And she loves the film. And I almost wonder if that's how it should be. It's like if you if if you wrote it or you were close to someone who wrote it or you absolutely adore the material, like are obsessed with it. Your first reaction to the screenplay or the movie should be everybody should be fired. Right. That means it's a good adaptation. Yeah, I do wonder. I think what in code she was just saying, I do not know how to process the fact that so many things did not make the final screenplay version because that would be a very long movie.

1:05:15And that's where you have to just start living with the fact that they are two different, barely related, not barely, but related, but separate enterprises. But I can see why she would have that. And also, straightforward, and her ego is in the right place to be able to talk about it openly. I mean, if we can't talk about changing our mind, then I've already rewritten my top five. Well, thank you, Michael Phillips. Thanks to all of you for coming out. This was a lot of fun. Hopefully you had fun. And we'll see you refocus five. Bye, everybody. See you all. if you would like to see that full list of Iowa writers, the best works adapted from their works, you can do that.

1:06:04Filmspotting.net slash lists. A lot of fun to be there. Josh, maybe next October, you'll be back in the country and you can come back to Iowa city. We can hang out. Maybe you can return to refocus and we can do our top five thing together. Who knows? Yeah, would love to do it. I've been there, I think, two of the years I made it there. So yeah, always a good time. Okay. Well, that is our show. If you'd like to connect with Adam and the show on social media, you can find him at Instagram, Facebook, Letterboxd, and YouTube at FilmSpotting. You can find me at Larson on Film. FilmSpotting is independently produced and listener supported.

1:06:42You can support the show by joining the FilmSpotting family at FilmSpottingFamily.com. You can listen early and ad-free. You'll get a weekly newsletter, monthly bonus episodes, and access to the entire show archive. For show t-shirts and other merch, go to filmspotting.net slash shop. Out streaming or available VOD this weekend? Well, it's streaming because I think it's on Netflix. Isn't Noah Baumbach's Jay Kelly with George Clooney and Adam Sandler? I mean, don't ask me, Adam. Don't ask you. You may not see it. Yeah. Out wide, you can probably get to Five Nights at Freddy's too. That's playing in Scotland, I'm sure, Josh.

1:07:20I'll have to check on that. Also out, Tarantino's Kill Bill, The Whole Bloody Affair. I don't know if I'm going to be able to get to that one, but it would be intriguing to see both of those films together. Next week, it is our performances of 2025, our favorite lead and supporting turns. We will be recording that show the day after our ballots have to be turned in for the Chicago Film Critics Association. And so we'll see what regrets we have when Josh says some supporting actress or some lead actor and I go, oh, man, I completely forgot about them. How did they not make my list? Well, it'll be too late at that point.

1:08:00It is what it is. Film Spottin' is produced by Golden Joe Dessau and Sam Van Hogren. Without Sam and Golden Joe, this show wouldn't go. Our production assistant is Sophie Kempinar. Special thanks to everyone at WBEZ Chicago. More information is available at WBEZ.org. For FilmSpotting, I'm Josh Larson. And I'm Adam Kempinar. Thanks for listening. This conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye.

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