Top 5 Robert Redford Movies, Chicago Int'l Film Fest Preview, Diane Keaton

29:18You become eternally confused by the difference between yourself and who your public thinks you are. And it's a disarming, dissociative experience. And Redford played that very well. The better McKay gets at campaigning, the more he loses himself. I say to you, can't any longer. Oh, no. Can't any longer play off black against old, young against poor. This country cannot house its houseless. Feed its foodless.

29:59I think that's what Redford really taps into well, is that that split, that that dichotomy that I think was inherent in Redford as well as the pretty face that everyone saw him as. And he always saw himself as as someone who was able to give a little bit more. whatever it was it it comes through really well in the candidate so you just unlocked something for me regarding another pick on my list that i made that we'll get to in just a bit so i'll come back to this um but yeah it it supports sort of an instinct i had for putting this other film on the list and i love that reading i really like the candidate i think it's a very strong film and great performance.

30:49It was an honorable mention for me. But we'll come back to it for now. I have a different title in mind at number four. And this is, you know, speaking of Redford and Pollock pairings, as I mentioned with The Way We Were, I heard from Patrick Banks via my Larson on Film email newsletter who highlighted his favorite of the Redford-Pollock collaborations, Three Days of the Condor. So that's my pick here at number four. Patrick said it's one of the best of the 70s political thrillers, its posters proudly displayed in my family room right next to two other fantastic 70s thrillers, Black Sunday and The Taking of Pelham 1, 2, 3.

31:29So in Condor, Redford plays Joseph Turner, a low-level CIA researcher who returns to the office after lunch one day to find every one of his colleagues murdered. This is the distressed pick on my list, Adam. to use your term. We absolutely see Redford not in control here, out of his element, not the suave guy. He's still elegantly disheveled for sure. And he's never quite clumsy. But yeah, this is someone who does not have supreme control of the situation and nothing comes easy to him. Part of the thrill of the movie is watching him use his wits to outthink these tougher, better trained spies who are on his trail.

32:15Patrick put it this way, he's an intellectual who must use all his smarts to avoid bullets from all levels of assassins. Oh, I get it. I get it. You expect me to draw fire. Like one of those penny arcade bears that parades back and forth waiting for somebody. Somebody's very good just to take another shot. And you're just going to hang around and pick him up before he does it or just after? I'm going to try and find out what's going on. I'm going to cross-check all those names. Nice talking to you, Higgins. No, wait a minute. Have a nice day. Where are you going? Where will I find you? So I do think there's maybe a bit of subversion going on here to that easygoing matinee idol persona in Three Days of the Condor.

32:58It's a stress test of that for me. And that's what makes it a very interesting Redford performance. and I love the choice because I really am a fan of three days of the condor but what's ironic to me Josh I think your read of the film and the performance and the character is right on but the spy movie that I considered for my list that had just a slight advantage over three days of the condor was the more recent relatively more recent spy game and what's the difference in those characters and performances, though, that character is definitely in distress. He spends the entire movie trying to get his his friend and colleague, the the protege that he trained, played by Brad Pitt, out of a harrowing situation.

33:50Right. But he plays it only with elegance. He plays it only with charm and ease. It's the Redford that you might imagine who is the CIA a professional who has to always just act like everything is perfect because everything he's doing is a, is a ruse. He's doing it. He's doing it on the down low, right? So it's a completely different type of spy character and, and spy movie to, to three days of the condor. And I love that we get both types of Redford characters and performances in those spy movies. Yeah. Spy game honorable mention for me. I'm a big fan of that one too. So my number four is a nostalgia pick that had to be here.

34:34And it, it, it doesn't go, it doesn't go with my, with my Redford thesis here as much as some of my other choices though. Now, as I say that out loud, it doesn't go with it, Josh, only because I don't have a great, I don't have a great scene that depicts him listening, reacting, small gestures. What I do have, what I do have is a lot of physicality, but I also do have a character who is tortured. I do have a character who has a haunted past. I have a character who is trying to keep that past and those secrets at bay because he doesn't want them getting out. And the movie is, I also like that I'm getting to the eighties here, at least one different decade, not the sixties and the seventies.

35:28The movie is the natural Barry Levinson's film, the character Roy Hobbs. I did just rewatch a bunch of scenes from this, not even in preparation for this, this list. And maybe I'm just too much of a sucker, Josh, But the end of this movie, which, yeah, dramatically different than the book, which is way more cynical and most people think is better, at least people who don't maybe love the movie or come at this from a more intellectual point of view, and appreciate more pessimistic, cynical things. The movie ends with such triumph, such brio with the home run and the ball hitting the lights and the sparkles of the after the light is shattered coming down on the field as he rounds the bases in the dark.

36:22It's it's incredible. And the music, the triumphant score. I still get chills. I get chills now watching it for the millionth time. and and here's where i give redford so much credit the movie's called the natural we do have to believe that that he is this natural performer as a pitcher early in the film and as a hitter most of the film early on but also especially later in the film and that really is Redford throwing the ball throughout the movie as a pitcher. One of the best actors playing a pitcher you'll see in any movie. I know Kevin Costner gets all the credit and deservedly so as one of our best athletes on screen.

37:14But Redford's performance here is right up there as a pitcher, looking the part, playing the part, throwing the ball for real. And as a hitter, he is often the one hitting the ball, sometimes hitting the ball into the stands. Josh, no, he didn't hit the ball into the lights. That was some movie magic. But he is sometimes actually hitting a home run. That's his natural swing. Redford that physicality was so essential to this role and us believing him as a character and I certainly believed it back when I was in grade school watching this movie over when I was obsessed with baseball as a kid I'm less obsessed a lot less obsessed with baseball now but the movie still as I said earlier the movie still has magic over me and Redford's performance not just the physicality, but, but the, the quiet of the performance, the mystery of the performance, the way he, he doesn't, what he doesn't express through his, his words is, is something that really always draws me into the character of Roy Hobbs as well.

38:28Redford literally glows in the natural. It's, it's incredible. And I'm not as big a fan of the movie, but I know many people are, so I won't give them any distress by detailing that further. And I'll say what I love about it is the cinematography. It is the way Redford glows and all the other incredible use of lighting by Caleb Deschanel in this film. It turns Redford into a mythic figure, an instrument of God. And he's preordained, predestined for this sort of holy level of baseball playing. And if there's something for me a little narratively less interesting in that visually, visually I've got to give you like there may not have been a better actor to choose to be that instrument than what they want to do in the natural.

39:23He's not the only one that benefits from Caleb DeChanel's cinematography. Glenn Close as well. Oh, that shot. That's my favorite shot. That shot. And and she I did just find this out recently. She actually thanked him when she got her Oscar nomination for best supporting actress. She thanked him saying that he he did all the work, basically. And he was she was probably right. Right. And it's funny you mentioned that about maybe the religious overtones in a book that just came out this year called Baseball the Movie that Noah Gattel wrote. He talks about something that I never fully picked up on, at least back when I was a kid.

40:02I certainly wouldn't have picked up on it. The myths, all of the different mythological narratives that the natural taps into. It's like 17 different stories that we're all familiar with from from the Bible to the Odyssey to the Fisher King. I mean, you know, anything about King Arthur, like it's all crammed into the natural, which I suppose for some may may be over overstuffed. But it's also all of those myths are are also what contribute to it feeling like something we latch on to and can't forget. And just for those who haven't seen it, there is this moment where Glenn Close is in the stands and this heavenly spotlight comes down on her.

40:48What's incredible about it is this is not a nighttime scene. It's the daytime. And somehow Deschanel manages to pull that off. So, all right, let's go, Adam, to a pick that is about puncturing myths, I feel, and maybe a little bit more in line with what you've been keying in on with Redford. And this is a directorial effort. It is Quiz Show from 1994. Quiz Show was based on a real-life TV game show scandal in the 1950s. In the movie John Turturro plays, the reigning champ of this show that's called 21, the ratings start to sag. He's been on there for a while, so the network looks for a new star, and they find one in Ray Fiennes' Charles Van Doren.

41:33He is a handsome, waspy, sound familiar, Columbia University instructor who becomes morally conflicted and complicit as he enters this quiz show world. This is sturdily directed, which I think you could say of most of Redford's efforts as a director. it's a very gripping story full of what would I do elements you know you're you're asking yourself that question continually throughout quiz show would I say no here would I would I put a stop to this and in terms of its overall place in Redford's career I wonder if this is something of a self-interrogation on Redford's part and here is where we can circle back to your pick of the candidate, I think, Adam.

42:22I can see Van Doren being a stand-in for the tailor-made star, the handsome boy who things came easily to, at least on the surface. But perhaps if you're that person, if you're behind the scenes, you know that it's not that simple. It's not that easy. Maybe compromises have inevitably been made along the way to your acclaim to your stardom. And obviously I'm getting into some psychologizing here, but it tracks with your setup and your discussion of the candidate. It's just intriguing to think about what Redford might have seen in this story to bring it to the screen. And I wonder if it is something of what he got to play with as an actor in the candidate.

43:10I lied to the American people. I lied about what I knew, and then I lied about what I did not know.

43:24In a sense, I was like a child who refuses to admit a fact in the hope that it will go away. Of course, it did not go away.

43:35I was scared. Scared to death. I had no solid position, no basis to stand on for myself. There was one way out, and that was simply to tell the truth. So Quiz Show, an honorable mention on my top five films of 1994 list we did some years back. I know I reviewed it on its release, but I could not find that anywhere, even in my old print clippings I had. So rather than pull from that, I'm going to cite Manola Dargis. This comes from her LA Weekly Review of Quiz Show at the time. And she used language that somewhat fits with my theory here. She called it a terrifically entertaining account of the tarnishing of television's golden age.

44:23And I do wonder if it's that tarnishing quality that perhaps Redford was intrigued by. Either way, he made a pretty great film, my favorite of his as a director quiz show. Adam prestige movie season is right around the corner titles from major filmmakers featuring major casts that we've been anticipating all that have hopes of gaining nominations and awards when we do get to award season so as moviegoers suddenly our schedule is going to be packed we're going to have a ton of films we want to catch within the course of a month or two I'm thinking maybe of something like Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein.

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45:47Also with Regal Unlimited, you're not going to only save money on tickets. You'll also save on snacks. members get 10 % off all non-alcoholic concessions. So sign up now in the Regal app or at the link in the description and use code FILMSPOT25 to receive your discount.

46:12When it's time to scale your business, it's time for Shopify. Get everything you need to grow the way you want, like all the way. Stack more sales with the best converting checkout on the planet. Track your cha-chings from every channel right in one spot and turn real-time reporting into big-time opportunities. Take your business to a whole new level. Switch to Shopify. Start your free trial today. Quiz Show, an honorable mention for me, a movie I do quite appreciate, Josh, but there is another Robert Redford directorial effort. I like more haters like Michael Phillips' Be Damned. I don't care how cheesy, I don't know, it may feel now, some 45 years later.

47:04I'm going with the movie that won Best Picture in 1981. It is his debut as a director, Ordinary People. And yes, I can look back now. I have not seen Tess, but I like Coal Miner's Daughter. I really like Coal Miner's Daughter. I like Ordinary People better. Do I like Ordinary People better than Raging Bull? No. Do I think Robert Redford should have won Best Director for Ordinary People over Martin Scorsese for Raging Bull? No. I don't think he should have beat David Lynch for The Elephant Man either. I like that movie more than Ordinary People. But I'm not an Academy voter, and I can't go back in time and change how that came out.

47:51All I know is I've always loved the movie Ordinary People. And I don't think I probably have to go into a lot of detail, Josh. in order to explain why it's on my list in terms of my Redford theme. Ordinary people just Google that and repression, right? It's all about the things we say and the things we are brave enough to say because we've been holding them in. This is the story of Conrad Connie, played by Timothy Hutton, who feels tremendous guilt after being involved in a sailing accident where his older brother, Buck, Buck died. And it, it feels to him and it feels very much to the audience as well.

48:38Like his mother, Beth played by Mary Tyler Moore favored Buck and hasn't really been able to move Vaughn with Buck being gone. Donald Sutherland plays Calvin, the father, and Judd Hirsch is the psychiatrist trying to help Conrad through this. If you needed a little more, though, I found an old, you know, kind of Q &A on Entertainment Weekly or an oral history, a brief oral history. and Robert Redford, I wanted to know what drew him to the material, Josh. I wondered if there was something that would fit with my notion here of what would bring Robert Redford, what would draw him to this material, the original source material, the book by Judith Guest.

49:30And guess what he said? I was looking for a piece of material that was about behavior and feelings. When I read Judith Guest's book, I thought this is it. Behavior and feelings. It's behavior. Behavior is the best word to describe what it is so much that I love watching Robert Redford do on screen. It's not make grand pronouncements. It's not dexterity with words. It isn't even ultimately amazing physicality, even though that is something I love watching in the natural, a certain type or specific type of physicality. It's the way he expresses behavior and that combination of behavior in feelings.

50:14And I think he does it very subtly more often than not. I do want to draw attention to one scene because I think you hear this a lot, right? And it makes sense. You hope that when an actor and a very good actor makes the transition to being a director, you hope that they're able to work with actors in a very effective way and maybe even in an efficient way, right? Because they can cut right to the heart of what the other actor needs. Maybe they can give them the right type of notes or maybe no notes at all, but they can give them the direction that they need to get them where they need to go. And as we're talking about expression and repressed feelings and finally saying them out loud, the moment in this film that's so heartbreaking when Calvin, when Donald Sutherland finally tells Beth, his wife, how he feels when he's finally coming to terms with what he thinks the true nature of their relationship is as husband and wife.

51:26In that oral history, And Redford is complimenting Sutherland. He says he could do anything. And he knew this scene was going to be this big, dramatic moment. He has to tell his wife that he's not sure he loves her anymore. And he mentioned to Redford as the director that he was looking forward to it, that he was anticipating it eagerly. And Redford thought maybe he got a little too excited about it, that he got a little wired for it. And so when the moment came, he maybe his words were he really let loose, Redford said. And Redford thought it was it was a bit too much for it. Here, here, I'll go back to what he said.

52:13Maybe he just wanted Sutherland to exhibit some behavior, behavior and feelings, and it needed to be more subtle and more restrained. And so what he did, all he did as a director, and he compliments Sutherland for interpreting this correctly, is he just showed him the rushes. He just showed him the scene. And he just said, Donald, I want you to look at this. And they just watched the scene together. And that's all Donald needed is basically to see it. And he said, can I do it again? and they went back to the location and they shot it and they recut that into the film and he knew that he needed to take it down just a little bit and that's what we see in the final film.

53:02I don't know who you are. I don't know what we've been playing at.

53:11So I was crying.

53:19because I don't know if I love you anymore. Yeah, I do like ordinary people, not quite as much as you, but as you've been talking about gestures in terms of Redford using them, I think of that scene where Mary Tyler Moore, who's excellent in this movie. She is. Her son is trying to connect with her at a certain moment, and instead she prioritizes adjusting a vase. And if you could ever have just a small gesture that communicates everything you need to know about a character, it's something like that. So, yeah, I was thinking about that, too, when you mentioned you were picking Ordinary People of what is Redford bringing to a project like this as an actor turned director.

54:05You probably see that particularly here in Ordinary People. All right. My number two, getting into iconic territory here, it's Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Early, relatively early in his career, but I still think maybe a test of the Redford charm because, you know, he's playing this wanted robber in the American West of the 1890s. So he's ostensibly a bad guy. He's the Sundance Kid and Paul Newman is Butch and, you know, they're robbing folks. Newman, of course, by this point, he was way more experienced at playing the antihero. He had the likes of Hud and Cool Hand Luke already in his filmography before he got to this in 1969.

54:51It's fun to see Redford pushing in that direction, but let's all be honest, neither of these guys is an antihero in the way we would talk about, say, a Hackman character or a Nicholson character. Uh, this is really more a mythology of the old West robber as dashing romantic figure and Newman and Redford. They look the part of course, but to me, the real success of this movie is the way they take William Goldman script and they turn it into, and I promise you, I mean, this is the highest of praise. they turn it into a superior sitcom. By that I mean it's character-based interplay and the exchanges are just electric.

55:37All right. I'll jump first. Nope. Then you jump first. No, I said. What's the matter with you? I can't swim.

55:55Why are you crazy? The fall will probably kill you. As the title suggests, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is also a good example of Redford's willingness to share the spotlight, which we touched on earlier. and think about the major movies where he did this, Streisand and The Way We Were. The Sting Again with Newman, which was 1973, Out of Africa with Meryl Streep. There are probably others we could mention, including my number one pick, which I'll get to shortly, but I have Butch and Sundance here at number two. Honestly, could have maybe put in an argument for number one, but you know, raindrops keep falling on my head.

56:39It's no, every time I watch it, Adam, it's still there. It's still in the movie. So you're not a fan of raindrops is what you're saying. Brutal. Yeah. In that Terry gross interview, he mentions that when he saw the film for the first time, and I think he's referring to maybe an early cut of it. He's like, what is happening? Why is this song here? There's no rain, first of all, he says. And then it just, it doesn't work. Why are you ruining this movie? That was his thought. And then he said, well, what do I know, right? The next six months, all he heard on the radio was raindrops keep falling on my head.

57:19And of course the movie's a huge hit. So. Maybe that's, maybe that's what I'm responding to, to be fair, is the ubiquitousness of it and not necessarily the use in the film. Yeah. Well, I'll be shocked if we don't share a number two and a number one here. I say every now and again that sometimes there are just right answers and there might be right answers here with this list. I also have Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And maybe when I talked about the concept for my list and that essence of Redford, part of it came from this gesture, a gesture that I had in mind. And I don't remember what the top five was.

58:01I didn't have time to look it up. But a top five we did fairly recently. Time is a flat circle, so who knows? It could have been eight years ago. But I think sometime in the past three years or so, we did a top five. And I had Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on it. And I talked about my favorite moment being the famous scene where Sundance wants to shoot his way out and Butch wants to jump and Sundance has to admit that he can't swim. But what I love about it is Redford's choice, the gesture after he says, I can't swim. He admits he can't swim. And there's a pause. And Redford just does this very pronounced shrug and head nod.

58:43And he, in that silence, Newman, then after that silence, he, he bursts out laughing. And something about that is just always registered with me, Josh. It cracks me up. It's more than the, the line that he admits. It's the way he's like, with that gesture, he's like, so there, you know, and, and something about it just always kills me. But one thing I heard in that interview that really stands out talking about this movie is he said that Newman was originally going to be Sundance and Redford was offered Butch. And Redford didn't want it. He didn't want to play Butch. He responded more to Sundance.

59:32He felt like that was a character. he was more interested in playing and could play better. And what's the big difference? At least what I'm going to tell you what I think the big difference is. The big difference is Butch is the talker. Sundance lets his guns do most of the talking. Butch is the jester. Butch is the provocateur. He's the charming one. That's why I love the scene where they're playing cards and Sundance wins and the guy he beats says they can leave but the money stays. The money stays and you go.

1:00:17Well, we seem to be a little short on brotherly love around here. If you're with him, you better get yourselves out of here. We're on our way. They're building up to some suspense because again, Butch loves to be the provocateur and then he finally says it. He finally lets it out. He says to Redford, I can't help you, Sundance. And when Sundance sees the look of recognition on the guy's face, now that the name is out there, he knows him by reputation, of course. Redford just subtly clocks that recognition in the other guy's face by tilting his head back just a bit, just slightly. and then he stands up slowly just in case the other guy's actually going to draw.

1:01:02Because at this point, he has cocked his gun, but it's in his holster still. So he's standing up slowly. In the last minute of this scene, Josh, Redford says three words. Otherwise, he's just standing there, waiting, and he lets Butch have his fun. So why don't you just invite us to stick around? You can do it. Easy. Come on. Come on.

1:02:02And we see Butch entering the frame so that he can start putting the poker chips in his bag or his sack or whatever, right? But it also visually anticipates something's going to happen because the guy is also in the shot. He's in the kind of the middle ground of the shot. And of course, he can't help himself. What does he say? Hey, kid. Hey, kid. How good are you?

1:02:36And if you watch the scene, Josh, what's so great about it is Butch is there, as I said, picking up the money. The guy asks it twice. How good are you, kid? Before he can even finish the second line, Newman's running out of the frame. Butch is running out of the frame because he knows what's coming. Butch, like it's, it's choreographed down to that level that Butch knows that this question's coming because Sundance gets tested all the time. They have to try him, right? They got to know. They always got to know if he's really as good as they say he is. And Sundance always is going to show them.

1:03:17And that's what he does. He, he gets the gun out and he shows him just how fast he really is. And Butch has to move. Butch has to move quickly because the bullets are going to come flying that way over the poker table. It's such a good scene. There's so many good scenes in that movie, but that scene is so good. And it's Redford just keeping it all contained. He doesn't smile. He does nothing except pretty much use his body. And he says about maybe the whole scene about 10 words. Just looking up, top five bromances. We did that in 2022. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And you had it there at, at number two. All right.

1:03:58Should we get to all the president's men? Yeah. I think it has to be there. I think it's about time. Redford is the woodward to Dustin Hoffman's Bernstein. His most, I don't know, this sounds like it's your area. So you tell me his most de-charmed performance. Maybe. Maybe the, the opposite end of what we get in something like The Natural. And that fits because this movie is all about the unglamorous, nuts and bolts work that goes into the level of journalism that brought down Nixon and his cronies. And Redford is completely in sync with this. Similar to how you were just describing the Butch character and him wanting Newman to have that, he allows Hoffman to be more of the armor here, right?

1:04:47Or at least have more of the personality, the lively one in the scenes. Now, when we did our Sacred Cow review of All the President's Men, I called out one of my favorite scenes, which I'm going to refer to here because it's also to me the epitome of Redford's acting career. It's where his Woodward manages to get Kenneth Dahlberg back on the phone after he'd already been hung up on. So this is a long single take where a couple of phone calls have been going on during this single take. And Woodward has to play that tenuous game that reporters play of being direct in his questioning, not wasting any words, but also not scaring the subject away.

1:05:33I know I shouldn't be telling you this. I gave it to Mr. Stant.

1:05:44I beg your pardon? I gave it to Stanz. Maurice Stanz? The head of finance for Nixon? Yes, in Washington. Now, what he did with it, I really do not know. I see. Were there any other checks, sir, that you might be aware of that could have come? That's all I had to say. When Woodward is so close to getting what he wants, when Dahlberg basically says, I know I shouldn't be telling you this, watch Redford's eyes. They close slowly as if he's saying a little prayer. It's like, you know, it's fishing, right? You don't got the nibble. You've got the snag, but you know it could still go wrong. And his eyes in that moment are just waiting for the full hook.

1:06:31It's just a master class of an actor being compellingly simple while being on one side of a phone call. We never cut. to the other actors we hear in the scene. And here's the key for me. Think of all the tools Redford has to make this scene compelling. He has that essence of ease. He has that charm. He has so many of these things that would make the scene work, but instead he sticks to the nuts and bolts of being completely inside this character and completely in this moment. I don't know if Redford could ever fully disappear into a role, but for a star of his magnitude, that's incredibly difficult to do, no matter how talented they are.

1:07:22I do think this might be, I think all the president's men might be where he comes closest to managing that. You said it's a masterclass of acting in terms of the performance. I agree. I think it's a masterclass of 70s filmmaking. or just a filmmaking, right? That's what we spent a lot of time on in our Sacred Cow review is talking about the split diopter use of the lens. Split diopter, all of that. And I didn't go back and listen to it, but we did put that recently back in our feed if you want to listen to that 7 from 76 Sacred Cow conversation. But I looked at my notes, and I know we did devote a ton of time to that scene.

1:08:04I always loved it, But getting to really devote that time to it and really just pay more attention to it as part of a sacred cow discussion was great. I saw things that I hadn't noticed before, and it's the shot of the film in a movie I love and credit to Alan Pakula, obviously, as a director. But I think it really is one of the shots of the 70s and hell of cinema. How it's shot with that split diopter, the long take, the way it creeps in eventually to a close-up, but how it's written and acted, and what Redford does. You mentioned the gestures, the small physical parts, the eyes. That's the moment of the—that's where we're so aligned with Woodward there when he does that.

1:08:56We're exactly praying for the same thing that he's actually going to say it, right? But it's not only that. It's the moment, for example, when Redford lifts his head up when Dahlberg says stands. The significance of stands, it is significant. It means, oh, this goes all the way up to the top. And he knows that. And he shows that just by he's kind of looking down, just taking notes. And then all of a sudden, all he has to do is lift his head up slightly. And it tells us that, oh, OK, we have now gone to another level in this investigation. And and and that that's that's Redford just just doing really great, subtle work.

1:09:43But it's almost not quite because that scene is incredible. And if you're watching us on YouTube, I'm sure Sam is showing it. But I also will make sure that we're linking to it in our show notes or over on our website. If you go to filmspotting.net slash list, it's such an incredible scene. It's also fun, though, Josh, just watching, of course, the scenes where Redford's talking to Deep Throat. The way Redford exhibits paranoia, the desperation, the way he is so craving as here again, we are too, as an audience member and the way Redford is our surrogate craving more information. And you know he's wanting so desperately to just ask some direct questions and get direct answers.

1:10:37And he's trying sometimes to cajole more information out of Hal Holbrook's Deep Throat character. But he also understands that he has to do this on that character's terms. He has to do it on Deep Throat's terms or else he goes away. And he has nothing. And he risks sinking this entire investigation. Forget the myths that the media's created about the White House. The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand. Hunt's come in from the cold. Supposedly he's got a lawyer with$25 ,000 in a brown paper bag. They follow the money. What do you mean? Where? Oh, I can't tell you that.

1:11:26but you could tell me that when holbrook says follow the money redford's instinct to pause to process it still completely still he understands that this is this is so major he stays completely still and and then he says where and and when he says where he just he leans in. He just leans in slightly. He knows how important this is. And he leans in as if leaning in will somehow get him to say where the money is going to lead him. Right. Of course, he's not going to tell him that. And he says, I can't tell you that. But I love the lean in that he does there, Josh, as if that's going to somehow pull the answer out of him.

1:12:12So, yeah, all the president's Men had to be number one, one of my all-time favorite movies in a movie that is in the pantheon for a reason. Those are our top five Robert Redford films. We would love to hear your picks. You can email us feedback at filmspotting.net. A few other titles have come up, Josh, but would you like to officially put some honorable mentions on the record? Yeah, we brought up Spy Game. the candidate on your list, both of those honorable mentions for me, wanted to give a nod to River Runs Through It, which I saw on its release and actually rewatched for this because, you know, I wanted to make sure I gave, you know, significant consideration to his directorial efforts and again, sturdily directed, as I said, but mostly interesting because Redford just hovers over this thing like a ghost as a director, of course, but he has the voiceover.

1:13:10I'd forgotten that. His is the voiceover as the older version of one of the brothers here. And of course, just the fact that Brad Pitt is shockingly a Robert Redford stand-in in terms of physicality in this movie, maybe not quite yet acting ability, but that is still another, you just feel Redford throughout this film. And I also thought it was interesting about thinking about Redford as placing himself or his interest in landscapes, which has been a through line in his career, which also brings me to another bit of homework I did out of Africa. I liked it. I'm just going to say, I actually think Redford is not good in it.

1:13:56But since this is a career memorial, praising him as an actor, I'll leave it at that. But yeah, River Runs Through It is definitely another one I considered as an honorable mention. I've got a few that have been set already. Quiz show on your list. Three days of the Condor on your list. The way we were on your list. Spy Game, as we said, I really do like him in All is Lost. The J.C. Chander one-man show. Very good movie, and he's very good in it. Speaking of physicality, it's basically a silent film. I mean, it would have been perfect for my list, actually. I can't believe I didn't find room for it because he's out at sea all by himself.

1:14:34The Sting, another Paul Newman collaboration, obviously very good, very entertaining film. And this one would have gone against my list in terms of its theme, but I really do like Indecent Proposal. I'd say that Adrian Lyne film is a guilty pleasure, but again, I don't believe in guilty pleasures. And it would have been good for your list, Josh, because he's a character based on what he does in that movie. you should hate him as an audience member as a viewer you want not only should you hate him you want to hate him i remember sitting in the theater wanting at every turn to loathe him and simply never being able to never never getting there and it's it's because of redford it's just it's just who he is he pulls it off as that character that was my experience with it anyway So I'm going to put in decent proposal on my list.

1:15:34Again, we would love to hear your picks. You can email us feedback at filmspotting.net. We may share some of that feedback on a future show and you can find our picks and some of those scenes at filmspotting.net slash lists. Listening is the number one thing you could do to support an independently produced show like film spotting. There are a couple of other things you could also do. You could take a minute to give us a rating or a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It doesn't matter if you're a brand new listener or you've been with us all 20 years. Every new review does help us reach new listeners.

1:16:10The most substantial way to support us, however, is to join the Film Spotting family, and you can do that at filmspottingfamily.com. We want to thank Family Plus member Zach Mulhagen in Reno, Nevada. Zach's letterboxed handle, if you want to follow him there, is Film Hunt Podcast. Here is Zach. He says he started listening in college as I was diving deeper into film criticism and the Criterion Collection and Film Spotting were my guides. This would have been around 2011 when I was just cutting my teeth on cinema and its history. A favorite review or segment, the review that got me hooked, was Matty Ballgame's run on Tree of Life.

1:16:49I heard that right after seeing the film and I was pumping my fist saying yes on every point. Can't wait to return to that review with the archive. I think, you know, film criticism that makes people throw their fist in the air. That's that's what all film criticism should do. Shouldn't it? Agreed. It's like a spectator sport in the Coliseum. What review did we get wrong? I will die on the hill that Benjamin Button is Forrest Gump perfected. Adam, when will you open your heart? Look into your heart, Adam. Come on. Look into your heart. Yes. My number two Fincher film. I mean, I don't think he's wrong.

1:17:26I don't think he's wrong. Wow. Letterboxd top four. Brazil. Fight Club. The Godfather. And Akiru. The sequence of those changes all the time. A favorite movie that he revisited recently was Wizard of Oz. Thanks to us. He watched it as part of our 85th anniversary Pantheon Project review. That was episode 980. Thank you for doing your homework there or playing along with us. Zach, a random film or filmmaker that he loves. Not sure how random it is, but every person I can get into Truffaut and the French New Wave is a win. A movie you credit with becoming a cinephile. I'm a crazy person, but Tarkovsky's stalker lit the spark in me.

1:18:08I feel like he's not that crazy. He's probably not alone in that. Right, Josh? No, that makes sense to me. Okay. I think he's accurate on this one too. a book about movies or movie making Hitchcock slash Truffaut is goaded. I think it might be, it might be goaded. Our thanks to Zach for joining the family and for all of those years of listening. In addition to keeping us doing what we're doing, your sport comes with perks. You get to listen early and add free. You get our weekly newsletter. You get to participate in exclusive things like being part of the film spotting family discord. You also get our monthly bonus shows.

1:18:43is our October bonus show is a film spotting family draft with a film spotting family member. And we did finally put out the email. The submissions have been coming in now. Nice. As as we're taping this, we have not made the selection yet of the family member or the topic, Josh. But by the time people hear this, that will be the case. We will know both. We will have reached out to both the film spotting family member and and secured their topic. So, you know, if only we could live in the future. But at this moment, we we don't know that. I'm I'm excited about it, though. And we do have a plethora of entries.

1:19:29I mean, that's a that's a quick turnaround. I'm just trying to figure out how the slacking is. Are we doing are we going to do some massive slacking? Is that what we're looking at to figure this out? Gird your loins, Josh. Massive slacking is coming. Oh, boy. You can learn more. I mean, I was hoping for a production meeting, but your timeline does not allow for that. Yeah. You can learn more about becoming a family member at filmspottingfamily.com. It all starts with something magnificent. Adam, the 61st annual Chicago International Film Festival is underway as we're recording this. just getting started here.

1:20:10And yeah, I look forward to this every year. Usually try to make it for a couple of titles there in Chicago, but being off here in Scotland studying, this one's slipping past me. So I'm going to be relying on you to give me and listeners a little roundup of what's happening at the fest this year and maybe highlight a title or two that if they're interested in going, they might want to try to grab some tickets for. Well, as you know, I'm in Iowa City, so I may not get to as many films as I would like either, though I am making a trip to Chicago and I will see at least a few films at the fest. We typically, with these previews, try to highlight smaller films, and that's because we try to do a bit of a service for our audience.

1:20:57And what I mean by that is we don't need to promote the bigger movies, the special presentations. Those are going to find an audience. They probably are already sold out, but there's a lot of interesting films or films that look or sound interesting to us, sometimes by filmmakers that we know are interesting filmmakers, but they might go under the radar. So we want to highlight those, and maybe those have some tickets available for people who are listening to seek out. That said, I'm going to give you four bigger titles real quick, and one of them is a movie I am going to get to see this Friday night.

1:21:33As people are hearing this, it will have already passed, but Friday night at the Music Box, October 17th, Frankenstein, Guillermo del Toro's film that's coming out here in a month or so. That's one of the special presentations. It is playing again on October 20th. I don't know if there are tickets available or not. It might be Rushline only, but sometimes you can get in Rushline. I'm actually, Josh, very excited to be bringing 10 of my film criticism students from Iowa City. And we're closing out our little trip to the fest with that music box screening of Frankenstein. Frankenstein. Of course, one of the big movies that everyone's buzzing about this fall is Chloe Zhao's Hamnet.

1:22:16First of all, if you just told me that it's, I'm reading here the synopsis, the powerful story of love and loss that inspired the creation of Shakespeare's masterpiece Hamlet, I'm interested. Then you tell me it's Chloe Zhao. Then you tell me it's Jesse Buckley and Paul Meskel. Yes, of course, I want to see Hamnet. That is playing Saturday the 25th and the last day of the fest, the 26th. Nouvelle Vogue. I mean, come on, Richard Linklater reimagining the making of Godard's Breathless. Yeah, of course I want to see that. That's Sunday the 19th and then the last Sunday of the fest, the 26th. Right before that at the Siskel, though, Josh, they're playing Breathless.

1:23:00So you can do a double feature of those back to back. I think it's noon and then a 2.30 of Nouvelle Vogue. And Sentimental Value is also one of the films I'm most excited about this fall. That's the new Joachim Trier film that stars Renata Reinsva, who I thought they were so amazing as collaborators on The Worst Person in the World. A few years ago, this reunites that actress and director. That's another special presentation that's screening Sunday the 19th and then Saturday the 25th. So those are some special presentations. May already be on your radar. May not. In terms of some smaller films that I'm very interested in trying to see, Josh, Michael mentioned this movie that played at Venice that I believe he saw and recommended.

1:23:49It wasn't just one that he said there was a lot of buzz about the new documentary from Laura Poitras called Cover Up, which is a film about Chicago journalist Seymour Hersh and is about accountability, holding holding those in power accountable. And the the journalist role in that, I don't know, seems fairly relevant right now. Right. Friday, the 24th cover up a screening and Saturday, the 25th. We did a marathon a few years ago, Argentine cinema. We watched a couple of films by Lucretia Martel. She's got a documentary that's playing at the fest that chronicles the trial of three men who killed the leader of an indigenous community in northern Argentina.

1:24:37I'm intrigued. Saturday the 25th, Sunday the 26th. This one, Josh, I don't know anything about the main character of this documentary. I love docs, so I've got three docs here that I'm mentioning. I don't know anything about this main character. I don't know anything about this director, Andre Horman. But the description says shot over 10 years, this intimate family story charts the path of an aspiring cowboys coming of age struggle in the American heartland. So just the fact that the subject matter itself interests me, but the fact that it was shot over 10 years also sounds like a fascinating project.

1:25:11That's called The Cowboy. And that's Monday the 20th and Tuesday the 21st. And then two more maybe under the radar titles. You may recall that we were both fans of Radu Judah's Do Not Expect Too Much From The End of the World last year. Yeah, for sure. He's got two films playing the festival. One is Dracula, and that's just under the spotlight heading at the festival. It is a version of the Dracula story, though you can imagine it's got his own absurdist take on Dracula, from what I understand. And then he's got a movie that's in the international competition called Continental 25. I'll read you the description.

1:25:53Plagued with guilt over her role in the suicide of a recently evicted man, court bailiff Orsolia wanders the city of Cluj in search of absolution. So two very different movies by Radu Judah playing the festival. And after seeing Do Not Expect, which was the first Judah film I had seen, I'm going to be interested in any film or films in this case that he makes. I've got three other titles for you, Josh. These are three titles that I've seen that are playing the festival. One of them is a documentary that's part of their Black Perspectives lineup called Seeds that just came out this year. I think it played at Sundance is where it premiered.

1:26:36It's from a director named Brittany Shine, who is a cinematographer by trade. And boy, can you tell watching the movie in terms of her eye, the black and white cinematography. It's a portrait of black farmers in the South. And as you can imagine, they're not having a good go of it. It's about their resilience. You also can probably imagine that it seems as if they may not be getting a fair shake, that they've been taken advantage of a bit, but they have this tremendous legacy that they're trying to still fulfill, that they're trying to continue. And it's not a talking heads documentary. It's not filled with a lot of information.

1:27:20You know, it's not dense in that way. It's dense with imagery, certainly. And that that's why people should seek out seeds. I don't have the exact dates that that's screening, but you can look that up at Chicago Film Festival dot com. The Helsinki Effect, I told you I'm into documentaries. I watched The Helsinki Effect. This is from director Arthur Frank, and he's a Finnish director. It's a documentary that consists entirely of archival footage from the 1973 global security conference that took place in Helsinki. like Brezhnev and Gerald Ford, the whole world converged on Helsinki. It plays on Saturday, October 18th and Monday, the 20th.

1:28:12It's in the documentary competition. It's intriguing. It's interesting. I'm glad I watched it. I think it's worth seeing, Josh, if you're someone who is really into politics and I don't know who's into bureaucracy. So maybe that doesn't make sense to say. But you're into the machinations of politics, the maneuverings of politics, but not the broad sweep of it, the actual – the little movements that make – Nuts and bolts. The nuts and bolts that make politics happen. What I'll say about it, though, is that I think it has a very worthwhile payoff, and it's a short movie. It has a worthwhile payoff.

1:29:01It takes a long time to get there. And what I mean by that is maybe you've even done this once or twice in your career as a writer, whether writing a review, writing some kind of it could be a news report or maybe it was a longer feature. And maybe you've had an editor say, I understand why you're withholding this. Not a twist, but you're withholding this kind of surprise reveal for the end because you're trying to build up to it. You think that it needs to build up to it. So you're not, you don't want to, you don't want to reveal this ending just yet, but you're going to lose people along the way, unless you give them something, you know, you can't withhold this.

1:29:43That's the, that's the advice I probably would have given him. I think maybe an editor, uh, not even a film editor, but any kind of editor might've given him that advice because I think it takes a little too long to get to that payoff, even though the payoff is one that we need to hear right now, considering the state of our domestic and global politics. The last movie I'll mention, man, here it is again, another documentary, One Golden Summer is the movie that opens the fest or it opened it this past Wednesday night. It is also playing on Saturday the 18th and Sunday, October 26th. It's directed by Kevin Shaw, and it's about that team from Chicago, Jackie Robinson West.

1:30:32You probably remember all the stories about the Little League team that really captured the imagination and the attention of Chicago, but also the United States getting tons of media coverage in 2014, winning the Little League World Series, the United States title. Not the world title, but they won the United States World Series title. Incredible story. But then there was a downfall. There were complications. There were legal complications after that. They really muddied the story and ended up making it for those players who are now obviously many years removed from that since it was 2014. made it for many of those boys then made it a negative story.

1:31:25And seeing how they've had to deal with that, that's what director Kevin Shaw chronicles. Chronicles the high of it, the many highs of it, and also chronicles the lows of it. And chronicles the very interesting media coverage of both the highs and the lows. So I recommend One Golden Summer if you get a chance to see that again, that opened the fest, but it's also playing on the 18th and the 26th. So that's my snapshot Chicago Film Fest preview. Sounds like a tantalizing lineup like we tend to get every October. The 61st Chicago International Film Festival is open now, and it does run through the 26th.

1:32:08If you want more information, details on any of those films Adam mentioned, their showtimes, and yeah, just more background info, go to chicagofilmfestival.com. Adam, you're fresh out of another film festival, previously the Refocus Film Festival, closer to home there. How did things go? I saw on Instagram some photos of you and Michael there in front of the crowd. Yes, I felt a little left out. I'll admit it, but I just had to miss this one. But yeah, give us a little feedback on the recording of the show and some of the movies you caught. Yeah, it really was a good time. October is a very busy time with refocus and the Chicago Film Festival usually coming right on the heels of each other, sometimes overlapping.

1:33:00Michael did come to town. His second trip to Iowa City in a row and his first time at the Refocus Film Festival. We had a good turnout Friday afternoon for our live taping. We did a top five. We've been talking about it the past couple of weeks here on the show. Our top five movies adapted from Iowa writers. Got a lot of good feedback. I had a lot of fun with the top five. We ended up talking about some movies that this was the good feedback to get. We talked about movies that a lot of people in the audience weren't familiar with, and that's always good. We like sharing movies that people then get to discover, or in some cases, they say, oh, you know, I've heard of that one, or I've always heard that's supposed to be good, but I've never taken the time to see it.

1:33:48Now I'm going to go see it. We got that quite a bit. So the feedback was really great. Michael and I had a very good time. I didn't get to see as many movies at that fest. The age-old dilemma, you never get to see as many as you'd like. You never have as much free time as you would like. But I want to thank Andrew Sherburn, the executive director, Ben Delgado, a longtime film spotting listener, Ben Delgado, who's the programming director. They did put together an incredible lineup, and they made the event a really smooth one for us. Our listeners will hear that top five. We usually save that and play that around Thanksgiving.

1:34:26So we will share that later in November. And as I said, I thought it was a good one. I did get to see one movie that was really a highlight. I know you've seen the movie, Josh. I think you might have watched it last year at the Chicago Film Festival. The Spook Who Sat By The Door, the movie, the satire, Ivan Dixon satire from 1973. His daughter, Noma Dixon, who travels with that movie, attends screenings of that movie very often and does talkbacks with the movie as she did here. She was there. And I was really blown away by The Spook Who Sat By The Door. great film. So I'm really glad I got to see that, got to see it with a crowd, got to see it on the big screen.

1:35:16Yeah. I saw that come by a letterbox that you logged it and was so thrilled. I can't imagine seeing it right now with what we're going through here in the US and how it mirrored a lot of the political unrest and the hammer coming down on that. And who, what a film to program at this moment, the spook who sat by the door. If it's, if any listeners out there like what, I've never heard of this film either had I until it came up in the 2022 documentary. Is that black enough for you from Elvis Mitchell, the film critic, Elvis Mitchell talking about it on there. I was like, I have got to check this out.

1:35:58And yeah, so check it out if you haven't before, especially right now. An infamous film in many ways because of its incendiary subject matter and the filmmaking as well to some extent. But Ivan Dixon didn't get to make much after this. The main Lawrence, maybe you can just make sure I'm saying this 100 % correctly, Josh Lawrence. Is it Lawrence Cook, the actor? Lawrence Cook, yep. Lawrence Cook, who was so good, really didn't get to appear in many films after this because of this. David Picker, Noma said, or maybe it was Toriano Barry who did the Q &A, said this, that David Picker essentially got fired from United Artists because of this film.

1:36:43So there was a lot of fallout because of this movie, but that's to its credit. That's absolutely because of how provocative the movie is. And as you were alluding to, it would have been even more heightened had it been this year playing at the Chicago Film Festival instead of at a film festival in Iowa City. But this is a movie in which the National Guard rolls into Chicago to put down. In this movie, though, there's actually a revolt, you know. Good point. It's a little bit of a different scenario. Right. Right. But but it would have felt even more relevant in that case. So the spook is about a double feature with this in one battle after another right now.

1:37:32I mean, absolutely. That'd be incredible. So next week on the show, Josh, your number one film of 1985 ahead of Kurosawa's Ron and the Coen Brothers blood simple. That is how much you love. We'll see if it sticks. I have a feeling it will. That's how much you love back to the future. Yeah. I mean, in that context, I better, I better bring the justification right out of my better had this on top five lists here and there over the year and, and referenced its greatness in my mind. But now this is it. If we're doing, if we're doing the sacred cow, I don't know, is this going to be a Pantheon project consideration?

1:38:13Maybe in any case, we're, we're putting back to the future under the spotlight. so it's time for me to justify my love for it. I cannot wait to watch it yet again. It is not currently in the Pantheon, but yes, this might or this will make it eligible for Pantheon consideration in the next induction round. It turns 40 this year. There are so many movies coming out that we need to see and we'll try to review on the show. This coming weekend is the last weekend where we looked at the schedule and saw that we kind of had an opening. That short of seeing movies at the film festival, which Josh can't see, obviously, we had an opening.

1:38:55We saw that this is turning 40, that it's going to be back in theaters later this month. And we thought, why not? So we're going to give it the sacred cow treatment. And yes, maybe queue it up for Josh's film spotting Pantheon nomination next year. Also next week, results from the deeply flawed film spotting poll asking you to choose one and only one Robert Redford performance. Sam didn't say anything. As far as I know to you, he didn't say anything to me either or in the newsletter about how we took out other and just left it Woodward or Sundance. I don't know if that silence means that he's, he's so livid that he's, he's just not going to talk about it or if he's, He's fine with it and he doesn't care.

1:39:46He's just stewing. He's just stewing alone over it. You know what? I feel better about our decision based on the top five list we just shared. I think the fact that we had those as our shared number one and two picks in the same order justifies making people choose between the two. Some credibility. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know if Sam agrees, but we'll see if he weighs in on that. For our current show schedule, you go to filmspotting.net slash episodes. Speaking of one battle after another, Adam, I just queued up the episode of The Next Picture Show where they do discuss the Paul Thomas Anderson film.

1:40:26I've been enjoying it quite a bit. The Next Picture Show, of course, our sister podcast, Looking at Cinema's Present via its Past. This is part two of their Revolutionary Roads pairing. So part one, they considered Sidney Lumet's Running on Empty. an inspiration for one battle after another. And now, yeah, the latest episode, they're digging into the new film. Spent a little more time than we did, Adam, on the Christmas Adventurers, the white supremacy conspiracy group that is horribly amusing. Horribly amusing in that movie. We touched on it a little bit, but I enjoyed the conversation so far where the Next Picture Show group is digging into it.

1:41:09New episodes of The Next Picture Show drop every Tuesday, and you can find them wherever you get your podcasts. All right, it's time now for Massacre Theater, where we perform a scene and you get a chance to win a film spotting prize. Last time we massacred this scene. Where are we? Canterbury. We're close. Anyone know if there's a hotel around here? What? Julian promised me a little bit of action. You still like it in the afternoon? So what'd you do? Rob a train? Blow up a building? There's a girl alone. You told me he was suave. One kid's a drunk. He's suave. Should have seen him in the old days when he was a real activist.

1:41:53You were the activist. I just wanted to get laid. One time, the police came to throw us out of our squat, and Theo invited them up for coffee to negotiate, only the coffee was spiked with ketamine. Julianne Moore, Clive Owen, Claire Hope, Ashety, and Pam Ferris. in 2006's Children of Men. It was written by Timothy J. Sexton, David Arada, Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, and Alfonso Cuaron, directed, of course, by Cuaron. That massacre was part of our one battle after another show a couple weeks back. There's always a tie-in, so why that scene from Children of Men? I count five names, five actors that you read there, but we are but two performers, Josh.

1:42:37How did we do that scene? I mean, Sam has been pressing us with some of his choices for Massacre Theater lately. Apparently, we've gotten too good at just doing two-person scenes. Sure. And he feels like he has to raise the challenge. Okay. Sam is also doing something that I don't think he's ever done in the history of the show. He's telling us what his tie-in was. Former-slash-present activist on the run trying to protect an innocent young woman. But wait, there's more. Our listeners always come up with more and better tie-ins. Carrie in Chicago says, It took me a minute, but this is definitely Children of Men.

1:43:14There are a few connections between Children of Men in one battle after another. One, cursed road trip. Two, former activist turns into grumpy, apathetic man. Three, children are the future. There's a great book by Mark Fisher called Capitalist Realism, which uses Children of Men as an example to introduce the concept of this book. I could definitely see Leo's character reading it in one battle after another. All right. Thank you, Kerry. I'm not sure Leo's character reads. He likes to watch movies. We know that. Here's Frederick from Norway. It's been a while since I saw Children of Men, but the characters indeed have to navigate one battle after another.

1:43:56And Julianne Moore is, of course, a former collaborator of Paul Thomas Anderson. PTA is also known to dabble in the occasional use of the single long take, something that is also used to great effect in Children of Men. There are also thematic connections between the films. For me, they are both films that reflect on how our children and the following generations inherit our battles, conflicts, and that state we leave the world in, all in spite of having no say in their origins. Well said. Here is Chris DiIppolito in New York. Josh, I had to laugh at your gravelly take on Clive Owen, but Adam, a surprisingly effective Julianne Moore.

1:44:34This is why you must keep Massacre Theater going. I can always count on the segment to provide a good chuckle on my commutes to and from work. Thanks for everything, guys. We did get a decent outpouring. It worked. You threatened to cancel the segment, and you received praise for your performance. There you go. Balance has been restored. And I got what I wanted. I got enough people saying that they like Massacre Theater to keep it around for at least another month or so. Reach into the Film Spotting hat. It's more brimming than Top Gun Maverick. I'll say that. I guess that tells you where our audience's head is.

1:45:14Right, Josh? Reach in and pick out this week's winner. Our winner is David Martin, who we believe is from Washington, D.C. I think so. Congratulations, David. Email feedback at filmspotting.net, and we will set you up with your very own Film Spotting t-shirt, tote bag, or trial membership to the Film Spotting family. Would the detour so simple? Would the detour so simple? Would the detour so simple? Would the detour so simple? My dear boy, why do you say that? Why do you say twer? Well, you should say it like I said it. We move on now to this week's edition of Massacre Theater, and this scene will not require any setup.

1:45:54That doesn't mean it's necessarily a famous scene. The tie-in will just be incredibly obvious, right, Josh? It will. And this is the place where listeners, we expect you to do the deep dive, the investigative reporting into other possible tie-ins because yeah, it's going to be clear immediately why we chose it, but there's got to be more here that we're not aware of. So you let us know. There usually is. And I tried to think about what that might be. And when I say tried, I mean, I thought about it for about seven and a half seconds. I didn't come up with anything, but our, our listeners, our listeners are smarter than we are.

1:46:33So we'll see what they can dig up in their investigative reporting. You started off. I'm going to give you the action. Are you ready? Let's do it. And action. What are you doing here? I just came here to make sure that you were all right. You did not. You're trying to horn in on my source. How come you get to meet Deep Throat? I'm the one who actually saw that movie. You're supposed to be checking phone records. I did. It gave me a headache. Stop whining. I'm not whining. I'm explaining. Yes, you are. You're whining. I'm at work. We've talked about this. And. And. Scene. I saw the rolling of your eyes.

1:47:15I feel like we were putting in some. I think I see that look too often. was it intentional that David Lynchian pauses between responses or is this the lag? That's called internet in Scotland. That's internet in Scotland, Josh. Hey, don't blame my internet. My experience is things work pretty well over here. I don't know. Do you want to do a live speed test? We can do it. That would be fascinating. Now that we're on YouTube, I think we should especially do it. Great, great, great video podcasting. If you know what film we just massacred, email the movie's title and your name and location to feedback at filmspotting.net.

1:47:57The deadline is Monday, October 27th. We will select the winner randomly from all the correct entries and announce it in a couple of weeks. Josh, that is our show. All right. If you want to connect with us on social media, you can find Adam and the show on Instagram, Facebook, Letterboxd, YouTube, all as FilmSpotting. I'm in those places as well as Larson on Film. We are independently produced and listener supported. You could support the show by joining the FilmSpotting family at FilmSpottingFamily.com. That way you can listen early and ad-free. You'll also get a weekly newsletter from Sam, who did a lovely job this week of writing about the late Diane Keaton.

1:48:42You'll also get monthly bonus episodes and access to the entire show archive. For show t-shirts and other merch, go to filmspotting.net slash shop. In that archive, you can find that conversation about all the president's men. It is episode 812, but it also was just dropped in our feed recently. So it's available to the public as are our most recent 50 or so episodes. Out streaming or VOD this weekend, good news. Robert Daniels says it's a deeply funny and wonderfully bonkers satire. It's on Netflix, also on Netflix, The Perfect Neighbor. And on Apple TV +, man, do I need to make time for this.

1:49:25Mr. Scorsese, a documentary about the filmmaker by Rebecca Miller, who made Maggie's Plan and The Ballad of Jack and Rose. In wide release, you can see Luca Guadagnino's After the Hunt with Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, and Ayo Adeburi. Ethan Hawke is back in Blackphone 2. The Aziz Ansari-directed Good Fortune is out with Keanu Reeves, Kiki Palmer, and Seth Rogen. And Pets on a Train, it's animated. this is real it's called pets on a train josh apparently i believe you i'm gonna take your and sam's word for it sometimes i just wonder if sam is playing games with me though if he's doing the anchorman thing he just wants to see if i'll read it out loud right and it's his revenge it's his revenge for us messing with his pole there you go in limited release if i had legs i'd kick you a howl of maternal desperation spiked with jagged humor according to the new york times It stars Rose Byrne.

1:50:25Now, here's the movie I almost proposed instead we should be doing a Sacred Cow review of. Josh, it would certainly be a more entertaining conversation. St. Elmo's Fire is 40. Demi Moore, Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, and company. Yeah, they're all there in St. Elmo's Fire. Go ahead, sing the theme song for us, Josh. I know you can do it. Well, I can't because this would have been a blind cow review, Adam. What? Despite your confidence that this would have made for a better conversation. Man. Even more reason to do it now. I haven't really felt the need to catch up with St. Elmo's Fire. So sure, I guess there'd be more to talk about there compared to Back to the Future, though.

1:51:13Come on. Come on. I might be able to quote more lines from St. Elmo's Fire than Back to the Future. Well, I think that is how they determine the sight and sound best films of all time list. So you have me there. Okay. Also 40. Yeah. Back to the future. Okay. I guess we're going to do that instead. You can listen to that next week. Film spotting is produced by Golden Joe Dessau and Sam Van Halgren. 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 Film Spotting, I'm Josh Larson.

1:51:51And I'm Adam Kempinar. Thanks for listening. This conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye.

1:52:14Film Spotting is listener supported. Join the Film Spotting family at filmspottingfamily.com and get access to ad-free episodes, monthly bonus shows, our weekly newsletter, and for the first time, all in one place, the entire Film Spotting archive, going back to 2005. That's filmspottingfamily.com.