The Robert Altman Hall of Fame

24:40And this movie Bodyguard, he thought was going to be his big ticket. the problem is is that he was not allowed on set and he was not allowed to write the screenplay he was only allowed to come up with the ideas and he did this one or two times and then got very frustrated and was like why am I not why can't I crack through the glass ceiling of Hollywood the same thing that so many other people have encountered and this kind of seems like one of the origins of his outsider anxiety and one of the reasons why he's always interested in people who are outside even though he's like kind of a rich kid you know He's not really some downtrodden young man.

25:16So he decides he's going to be a playwright. He's like, I'm going to move to New York. I really want to be a filmmaker, but they won't let me be a filmmaker. So I'm going to move to New York. And he's driving to New York in his car with his friend. And on the way, he stops in Kansas City, where he's from. And he runs into a friend in a bar. And the friend in the bar is like, what have you been up to? He's like, oh, I've been in Hollywood making movies. And he's kind of talking himself up. And the guy is like, oh, interesting. I make movies too. I work for this company called the Calvin company and we make industrial instructional videos not videos they weren't video they were film at the time and Altman's eyes grow wide because he doesn't really want to be a playwright he wants to be a movie maker and he goes to work for this company and he stays in Kansas City and he makes like 50 plus industrial videos about like you know 40 minute films about how to play football or you know how to change your carburetor you know these like very straightforward things, but he has like a real knack for visualizing and executing.

26:14You know, he gets noticed pretty quickly. He gets hired in 1957. So you've got like basically 10 years of doing this. Gets hired in 57 to make an independent film in Kansas City called The Delinquents about crazy teenagers, which is all the rage, right? In the 50s, the rise of rock and roll and the crazy teenagers. and he makes like a very serviceable 80-minute Teen Panic movie set in the suburbs of Missouri. And there's a young actor named Tom Laughlin who he did not really like very much but who went on to become kind of a star in the 70s. He was the star of the Billy Jack movies and he just so happened to get this guy in this movie.

26:54This movie gets noticed. He then gets hired very quickly thereafter to make a documentary about James Dean who's just died in a car crash. He doesn't seem very fond of this documentary but it gets a little bit of notice. And then he gets a call from Alfred Hitchcock's production company. He was like, I saw the delinquents. I heard about this James Dean documentary. I'm starting a new show called Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Why don't you come out and work on my show? Pretty good phone call to get. If you've been trying to make movies, now he's already in his late 20s. He's already been married once.

27:23He's already had a kid. No, he's like 30s. If it's left in the 50s, and he's born in 1925. Yes, by 57, he's 32. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, not to age shame anyone, but I do think that the age is interesting. Yes, he's not a wonderkin. And the point that you're making is that in the new Hollywood, which he would eventually become a part of, most of the people who are making movies then are these like 25-year-old whippersnappers who haven't done anything. Wet behind the ears, Steven Spielberg, who's also roaming the sets of shows like Night Gallery and learning how to figure out how to make movies.

28:00but he comes over and in 57 he gets hired to work on TV and he spends 10 years making TV shows and he makes Worldly Birds Peter Gunn Ruth 66 Alfred Hitchcock Presents he's well known for directing over a dozen episodes of Bonanza which was the biggest show on television in the 60s and he's just like a hired hand and he's very good on set he's very good with actors he's very good at improvising in tight situations and then he finally gets a chance to make a movie and that movie is called Countdown. We can talk about it a little bit more when we start going through the actual Hall of Fame. It is included in the Criterion streaming collection.

28:39It's a Warner Brothers film that has real stars. In September 2025, if you're listening, I can't guarantee for the future. Yes, who knows how long it will hang on. But you're right that he's an older guy and he's more like, I think of him like John Frankenheimer or Sam Peckinpah or Peter Yates. like these guys who made movies about like when men were men, but during the new Hollywood. So they're like a little bit different than that. They're a little bit more transgressive and weird. But he's doing the same thing that those guys are doing. He makes a lot of genre movies. He bounces around. And no, actually Steven Spielberg said this last night.

29:12He said, I think of you, Paul, the way I think of someone like David Lean in that he never made the same movie twice. And Robert Altman, And even though there are a lot of recurring ideas and recurring stylistic choices, he never makes the same movie twice. He's always like, okay, now my Western. Right. Now my gambling movie. Now my old time gangster movie. Now my love story. A ballet movie. A ballet. A fashion movie. Hollywood. You know, this is a movie about broken down people in the West. This is a movie about, you know, friendship among women. This is like, he's always kind of like cycling through all this stuff.

29:49and I even though he's like seems like kind of a sarcastic cynical prankster arguably one of the great humanists in movie history at least in the second half of the 20th century where he like really likes his weirdos I would say yes or he doesn't judge them doesn't judge them exactly and has and understands that they're interesting that doesn't mean that he protects them which is which is very different but yeah like a he a deep understanding and curiosity about how strange people can get he clearly is influenced by what's happening in European cinema in the 50s and 60s but maybe not in the same way that like Dennis Hopper was you know like it takes a little while for him to kind of metastasize a lot of that stuff into his system but I don't know his alright let's talk about his hallmarks like the things that you know you're watching a Robert Altman movie if.

30:49So what I talked about in the introduction on the Criterion channel is like subversion at all costs. Right. There's no like regular war movie. There's not, this is not a normal detective story. This is not, if it's a Western, there's not going to be like big gunfights and shootouts. People will die, they'll get shot, but it will not be in the way that you expect. You mentioned stylistically the overlapping dialogue. Yeah. Which you also know is a hallmark of 40s screwball comedies. but he takes it and applies it to drama and to satire. Yeah. And, and also amps it up. I mean, at, at some point the people are overlapping and speaking of each over, over each other in a way where you're like, I don't actually understand what anyone's saying, or I need to like, ISO this track in order to follow it, which is again, the point.

31:39And to your point about subversion, he is really trying to get your attention that way. But yeah, that, I mean, And I think if there is one, if you had to pick one thing to define Altman-esque, it's a lot going on at once defined by the overlapping sound. Yeah, it's cacophonous. And also the idea of accepting that you don't have to understand and hear everything clearly. Right. Because that is how life works. Sure. When you're in a noisy room, not in a room like this, where we speak very quietly to each other. But in real life, at Oasis, you couldn't hear all, how many thousand people? I could hear Noel.

32:17Yeah, you could hear. Thankfully. Thankfully. He had a microphone. And it's a heightened realism in his movies. It's not the real world. But people do seem normal. And they seem often, they're grounded in realities that are fantastical. That's probably the best way to describe the world that he creates. But they are also incredibly fantastical, bordering on surreal a lot of time. And he has a real zest for that. Yes. And so there is a weird Altman set piece that often involves a lot of people marching around in a marching band. Yes. The various marching bands of life. He sees them everywhere. He does.

33:04And really wants to make it real. Well, one of the key reasons for this choice, I think, I don't know if I've ever even heard him say this, but that cacophony of sound from music and people talking over each other is that one of the problems of the world is that no one is listening to each other. They're just trying to say what they want to say. They're just trying to get their point across. And not all of his movies are about the social problem in the country, but a lot of them are. Yeah. And period pieces are about contemporary times and contemporary pieces are about the past and the way that they're like lies and dishonesty and aversion are kind of what is rooted in the American experience.

33:50And if people don't listen to each other, you can't get anything done. Something related to that that is also a three line is he's very, he's interested in a show and in a performance and how to some extent everything is a performance and what someone is putting out in the world or what someone is trying to be versus who they really are. And there are literal versions of that. The Paul Newman, Buffalo Bill movie. There are Hollywood versions of that. That is, in a lot of ways, the player is about how fake Hollywood is. But it's a through line. And you do always, you often see the structure of someone putting on some sort of performance.

34:35Totally. You can see it in Nashville. One of the through lines of that movie, there's, I think, a through line of a lot of his movies. It's true of California Split. It's true of The Company. It's true of a lot of the movies where people are forward-facing. It's like also if people do hear me, if they do, I will be like redeemed as a person. I will be more special and more important if I have a voice in the world, which is a very powerful idea that is very contemporary. That's the thing is I think if you start to pull these movies apart and think about what their themes and ideas and what's interesting to him about them, most of them still really just work right now some will feel more like the player will feel more contemporary than something like images but I like it I'm not criticizing it but that is a movie that feels very much inside the 1970s and that's another thing too is like I've mentioned this on the Criterion intro not a lot of male filmmakers making films about women at this time you know a lot of the best movies of the 70s are like two guys in a bank trying to do something terrible or dirty cops or someone trying to exercise a demon out of a young child.

35:42And over and over again, he makes movies about women. I'm very curious for your opinion if you think he understands women. I've often wondered if he understands women. But he has this unique male perspective on women, which is like, they're kind of crazy, but they're so interesting. You know, like that's kind of like his female-focused stories always seem to be about that. And he has empathy for them, obviously. I don't maybe he's in pursuit and of understanding them. And I think in some ways he's also in pursuit of understanding his male characters. It's maybe less controversial for him to be like, these people are kind of crazy.

36:18But I like, you know, we've we've bought into that by watching these movie stars in this period of time. But yeah, I think he's at least trying. And I and aren't we all every day? He's certainly I am. Yeah, I'm trying to understand women every day. and getting further and further from the truth. You know, you mentioned also stylistically, he would not be described as the most rigorously formalist filmmaker. That's not really his thing. His films can be shambolic. They can move slowly. They kind of take their time. And that is metastasized in the way that the camera moves in his movies, which is these very slow, zooming, roving movements where it almost feels like the camera operator is trying to figure out where to go.

37:06Yeah. To me, it feels like when I am doing the airplane spoon, you know, before I'm trying to get it and I'm like, no, this way, here it comes, slower, slower, boop. But then exactly the boop is when he does a slow zoom and then holds on someone's face. And when he finds someone's face who he likes or who he's interested in or who is in crisis, you can learn a lot about what he thinks about them and what the movie thinks about them and how they're feeling just with the movement of a camera to me this is super sophisticated it's not like original but it is like a tool that he goes back to over and over again where he lets the camera sit quietly on a person thinking about something and who among us would not like to be understood in our weakest times sometimes you know with the power of a can.

37:58Do you want to be understood? A hundred percent. Why do you think I talk for a living about how I feel? I don't know if I do but maybe you know that's another. You're trying to protect yourself. I'm hiding but I'm speaking. You know you are you're withholding. You're protecting. Right. Yeah. What does that mean? Maybe and maybe that's why some of the Altman movies make me if not uncomfortable a little. Total McCabe and Mrs. Miller energy. Yeah. You know I am McCabe and you are Mrs. Miller. That is literally how those characters define themselves. Tough break for us. They are like outwardly, she's outwardly strong and needs to be known that she's not one to be fucked with.

38:33However, the vulnerability it's a little harder to come by. McCabe is like nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, here's why I'm great, here's why I'm great, here's why I'm great. And he's a sad weak boy, you know? So these movies are very powerful. Any other like thematic things? I mean obviously he's like the king of the ensemble. He's like, he's amazing at making movies with 15 characters. MASH is his big breakout. Nashville is like this. The Player is like this. A number of his movies have huge casts and they're hard to keep up with all the characters. And the movies don't flow in the same linear narrative expectation that you might have for a movie.

39:10And that's okay. And when we talk about PTA and you look at a movie like Boogie Nights, a lot of Nashville in Boogie Nights. That's true. There's a lot of Scorsese, but there's also a lot of Nashville. It's like, this is a world. I'm going to plunge you into the world. You're going to understand all these little peccadillos about the people in this world. And you'll get a snapshot. You won't get the whole story. Right. But you'll get a sense of what it means to be this character in this part of time. Yeah. I mean, there's a tremendous amount of shortcuts in Magnolia. Very much. Yeah. Very much.

39:39Magnolia seems like the closest of this is what I'm going to do in a great way. Undeniably. Shortcuts, sadly, not a part of the Criterion grouping. It is the best movie that is not in that collection right now. We'll get into it when we start talking about it. But that's a movie that obviously had a massive impact on a lot of our favorite filmmakers and is rarely seen. So we'll get into that soon. Here, just a short list of other filmmakers who have cited Altman. Altman in part because I think certainly there's a bitterness to a certain kind of a movie that I think you and I historically connect on.

40:20We just talked about Jay Kelly and the kind of lack of bitterness. Well, I was about to say, except, and that's true, that that is kind of my hurdle, but Jay Kelly has like a direct Altman tribute, basically, to kick off the movie. Yeah. And I mean, the studio, Seth and Evan's show literally has a character named Griffin mill who is the character from the player in that show so you've got those guys are obviously influenced by wes anderson has said time and again how much he loves all which is interesting because allman's very messy and wes is very neat yeah but the ensemble yes and the specific um the interest in weirdos and also getting the people um where he wants them to get emotionally you know like you really can feel it even as he is like dioraming to a within an inch of his life and I think also using stories in the past to talk about the present is something that they both do really well Ina Ritu you know we're not the biggest Ina Ritu fans on the show but he obviously always looking at ensemble stories looking at stories where time is is kind of fractured and you're not totally sure linearly where you're going with everything I mean the Safdies yeah especially in the use of kind of like normal people or people you don't expect to see on screen.

41:32They both have an incredible eye for just grabbing the unlikely star and plugging them into a movie. That's something that Altman, he didn't necessarily invent it, but it was pretty rare in Hollywood movies to take first-time performers or people who are not very seasoned. I mean, Shelley Duvall's career is entirely indebted, I think, to Altman just kind of grabbing her and plugging her into five consecutive movies. And then PTA. And PTA is notable in part because he became friends with Altman, not just an influence, but he sat beside him during the production of Altman's last movie, A Prairie Home Companion.

42:05Some say he co-directed the movie. They're obviously out of respect. They're not saying that, but Altman was very sick during the making of that movie. It was the last film he made before he passed away. So, I thought it would be helpful to talk about Entry Point. There's probably some people listening to this show who've never seen a single Robert Altman movie. Our producer, Jack Sanders. Yeah, Jack, what did you start with? what did I start with oh Secret Honor oh wow okay weird that's an interesting one yeah what led to that um truthfully I had to make a dinner reservation and it was 90 something minutes great I love the honesty so honest yeah and that is listen that's how it works sometimes well Secret Honor of course is one of Paul Thomas Anderson's favorite movies stars Philip Baker Hall as Richard Nixon yeah and Philip Baker Hall of course was the star of Heart 8 PTA's first movie so nice synchronicity there Secret Honor is a great movie fucking amazing.

42:56Great. Okay. My entry point was The Long Goodbye. Yeah. Which I think will be most familiar to movie fans because it's a detective movie but it's not really a detective movie like you've ever seen before. Right. But it does capture both the like slack, laconic sense of the 70s and Elliot Gould's star persona but also it was like really kind of a bitter and hard-hearted movie with a really tough ending. So, for you, what do you think would be the best place for someone to start? The player. Yeah. And the player is 90s rather than 70s, but it will give you a sense of the rhythm, the style, the perspective, the bitterness.

43:36It is one of his also most formally accomplished movies. You know, it has that amazing tracking shot at the beginning. The sound technology is better than it was in the 70s. It's a little bit more slick and very watchable and funny. Yeah. So that's a good call. Especially if you're starting now in 2025, I feel like 90s can then be a bridge to the 70s. It's not contemporary, but it's maybe more contemporary. Agree. Did you get to the player yet, Jack? I did. Did you do Long Goodbye? I did. Okay, yeah. What's your biggest hole right now? Maybe Images? Okay. Okay, that's not that big of a hole. I've done pretty all the very, very beloved ones.

44:18The mega hits. Okay. Yeah. Allman's a funny one because like so many of our favorite directors has been hugely honored but never like got over the hump at Best Director so yeah well that's that's a them problem you know it really is that's an Academy issue he does have this very cool honor of being one of four filmmakers and it just became four filmmakers who have won the Golden Bear at Berlin the Golden Lion at Venice and the Palm Door at Cannes and the other three are Henri-Georges Clouseau, Michelangelo Antonioni, and then just this year, Jafar Panahi achieved this because he won the Palme d 'Or with it.

44:58It was just an accident. He won an Emmy for directing, Altman. He was nominated for five directing Oscars. Right. He was given an Honorary Academy Award in 2006. Great speech. If people haven't heard it, they should listen to it. He had a heart transplant and he talked about how he thought he would make 20 more films because he had 20 more years left. Sadly, he did not. he was nominated for MASH Nashville The Player Shortcuts and Gosford Park two of those movies are nominated for Best Picture Nashville and Gosford Park hard to believe only two of his movies are nominated for Best Picture and that's it a legend I mean now I'm just like oh should I have said Gosford Park instead but no I think The Player is the right one Gosford Park's an interesting one because it obviously sets up an entire cultural industrial complex you know there's like the Julian Fellows yeah it's true like world of content that we're still living in yes you up on Gilded Age I started watching the first season on vacation and I was enjoying myself yeah yeah yeah and I promised both my wife and Tracy Letts that I would watch it I also promised Tracy but then I fell asleep on the plane so I'm gonna get through season three okay I was prepping for this you know it was fun yeah it was fun it's not as good as Goss for Park is my take so the Hall of Fame yeah now he's made a lot of movies I haven't seen all of them.

46:19Okay. I've seen every single one. Well, that's great. They're not all great. I did my best. They're not all great. I did my best. Well, here's the tricky thing. Yeah. Some of these movies, like, do not exist anymore. Right. There's a movie from 1980 called Health, which is a, like, a health industry spa satire that bombed very badly and was part of his kind of like epic fall in 1979, 1980, which was coincided with basically the fall of the new Hollywood and the rise of 1980s Hollywood. And for whatever reason, this movie is just not available. It's not available on Blu-ray. It's not available on DVD.

47:01It's not available. I'm sure there's a VHS. I don't own it. And it's not streaming. and you just can't really watch it. I'm sure it's available on like Internet Archive or YouTube or something like that. And I have seen it in the past in one of those formats. But there's going to be a couple of titles that are like that. You know, like A Wedding Has Never Been Issued in America on Blu-ray. That's one of his better movies, I think, of the 70s. But it doesn't have the same legacy because it hasn't been restored by a collection. They haven't acquired the rights. And it may feel a little more slight compared to some of this other stuff.

47:32So I'm just flagging that for people. You know, you may have a little bit more trouble tracking down stuff. But the wonderful rise of physical media has brought a lot of these movies back. Yeah, though I have to, I borrowed one from the library and I have to tell you, I ran into region difficulties. Oh, you did. Yeah, it was Italian. That's why. Italy strikes again. I thought it was Spanish. Is it Italian? I thought it was Italian. Okay, that's another movie. Pret-a-Porter is not available on Blu-ray. I don't know. I mean, it's a Miramax movie. That might be why. But Pret-a-Porter was his first movie after The Player.

48:04It was a big, noisy movie. and didn't do that well at the box office and then just kind of vanished. And this happens over and over again to his movies. You want to do the haul? I do. Okay. We'll start in 57 since, or yeah, we'll start in 57 since that's officially his first movie. Yeah, you like to do it. This is, it's almost like he made a Roger Corman movie without Roger Corman. And you can definitely see signs that he's going to be able to do something cool, but it's very modest. and is definitely not. So this is the James Dean story or the delinquents? No, the delinquents. James Dean story technically comes out after the delinquents.

48:42But the James Dean story is... You made the spreadsheet, not me. Yeah, I know. That's Wikipedia's wrong. I just copy and paste it from Wikipedia. Both the James Dean story and the delinquents are critical because they get the attention of Hollywood that gets him out to Hollywood to make TV shows. But you're not going to make an argument for like, this should be like the... We have to start where it started? He just made too much stuff. He doesn't have that tidy... I agree with you. Boom. Duel. He made a TV movie. It's incredible. On Hall of Fames. Did Duel make, would Duel make, Duel would make the Spielberg Hall of Fame?

49:14We never did a Spielberg Hall of Fame. We did rankings. We ranked them, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's got a new movie coming out next year. I know. I guess he was able to take some time off from that to laud Paul Thomas Anderson. He's seen it three times, he said. Yeah, that's great. I got to catch up to Steven. So the James Dean story, which is kind of a straight ahead, like news bulletin style documentary about the late great actor, and the delinquents are not in. Countdown. Did you watch this one? I did. It is included in the collection. My review is that James Caan looks extremely hot as an astronaut.

49:46I knew you were going to say this. I knew you were going to say this. I mean, this is an interesting, because it's about the space race. It's a sci-fi space race movie, but it's 67. So it is before the U.S. landed on the moon. And the script is, the premise of the movie is like a sort of crazy plan to get, a man on the moon before the Russians. And it's not actually how we did it, ultimately. The plans were revised. But it is... It's kind of an interesting script. Yeah. It's a cool story. It is like kind of an unsuccessful movie, in my opinion. But, you know, it's all of your favorite new Hollywood actors, like with crew cuts and in the tight astronaut shirts.

50:27And as we know, I like this period of space history. So I was interested. You enjoyed it. Yeah. Yeah. It's not bad. Um, Altman was fired off this movie in post by Jack Warner. Okay. Well, Jack Warner, I think like went on a vacation after Altman got hired and he was like, don't let this guy pull his, this shit he tries to pull on television. And then he pulled his shit and then got booted off of it because he introduced the overlapping dialogue. Right. Introduced, you know, the unsteady camera and you can see like the early makings of the things, but it still is kind of like a tight studio drama.

51:01Yeah. You know, it still feels like from another time. Countdown's not going in. No. That cold day in the park, do you see this? No. Okay. This is the movie that is probably most neatly matched to images. It is... Well, now I'm mad. ...a psychological exploration of a woman who is very lonely and thinks she has found love, but in order to hold that love does very strange things. This was a Canadian-financed independent movie that he made very quickly after Countdown he kind of got pushed off of Countdown just so he could make something again very quickly. Sandy Dennis is the star. It's very European, is what I would say.

51:44And so this is the polarity of Altman as a Hollywood filmmaker in two movies. You've got one thing that's like a studio job that he's trying to do while also trying to secret in some of his stuff. And then you've got a very odd character study that is not commercial at all. But if you like arthouse cinema, there's a lot that you will take away from That Cold Day in the Park. It's also definitely not going in. Okay. Alright. 1970 MASH This will be going in. So this is definitely going in. Yeah. This is, if you have not heard of the movie MASH, which was one of the biggest hits of 1970. One of the biggest hits of the 1970s.

52:23One of the, obviously the launch point for one of the biggest television shows in the history of the medium. Right. It's a movie set during the Korean war about surgeons working essentially in the battlefield. And it's a wildly irreverent comedy that helped to launch the careers of Elliot Gould and Donald Sutherland. It's a quote-unquote outrageous movie. Now, I will say, never one of my favorites. Not a movie to me that I would like hoist up and say to me, this is cinema. I do understand why it was a smash, why it kind of cemented him. The story that I told on the Criterion intro was that this movie was being made concurrent to Patton by the same studio.

53:0720th Century Fox had all their chips on Patton. George C. Scott in this big biopic written by Francis Ford Coppola who would go on and win an Academy Award for that script. And they spent a lot more money on that movie. And Altman makes MASH and he gets it in under budget and on time. And he's just like, please don't pay attention to me. Leave me alone. Just put it out. just let's get this movie out and it took off because it's got nudity it's got cursing it's got blood it's got all things that you just don't see in movies in 1970 and it blew up and he kind of gets to do whatever he wants for a very long period of time because of the success of this movie but for me personally it feels like a movie that my parents love do you know what I mean?

53:50I agree I think also like my parents actually did love MASH and I think you know this was maybe not as early as Diner, but one of the ones where they tried to show it to me fairly early, especially because the TV show becomes such a part of like pop culture stretching throughout the 70s, almost to when we were born. I wonder, I feel the same way where it's like obviously going in and, you know, Donald Sutherland and Elliot Gould are very hot and like doing their charisma thing that Altman isolates and kind of propels both of them through the 70s. But I wonder if it's because of the order in which we saw it.

54:32And also that we didn't see it in 1970, like during Vietnam. And it sets up a lot of the other things, not just his career, but stylistically, the types of movies that he would make. And, you know, we respond more to the gambling movie or the Hollywood movie than the Vietnam movie. So it's just a little bit about like when we receive it. I think that's right. Right. But he does do something in this movie that you mentioned before, which is that he's putting on a show in this movie. Yeah. In the surgery room, on the football field, during the game. There's this sense of like the circus has come to town in a lot of his movies.

55:10And this one is definitely one of them. He also does something cool, which is that his son, Michael, writes the lyrics to Suicide is Painless, which is the sort of the theme of the film and would become the theme of the TV show and become one of the most heard songs of the 1970s. And Altman works with his kids and his family on all of his movies and builds this kind of like clubhouse mentality on all of his work. And when you see Gould, you see somebody joining the troupe who will recur over many movies. And there's a number of other actors who are in MASH who you'll see over and over and over again.

55:43I mean, let me just see who in this one particular. I mean, this is Robert Duvall's second movie with him at this point. Sally Kellerman appears over and over again. Rene Aubergenois appears over and over again John Shuck a lot of these actors Bud Cort like you just keep seeing them because he kind of falls in love with kind of like beautiful weird looking people yeah that's kind of his thing like he's a very L.A. Gould is like very tall and handsome but also not right and that that liminal quality of beauty he kind of redefines with a lot of other filmmakers, like how you're allowed to look on screen.

56:23And I find that to be very appealing. And actually the people like Michael Murphy, who's like a more standard handsome guy, he often relegates to like bureaucrat or bad guy. They look square. They look, they're not interesting. Exactly. Exactly. So that's a cool feat. Now, you mentioned the 70s and how it's a pretty crazy time. One of the cult favorites of his is the next movie that he makes, which he makes immediately afterwards, Bruce Stormer Cloud. Yeah. One of the weirdest movies. This movie, the takes on this movie veer from the wildly negative, from Quentin Tarantino, who calls this like one of the most incompetent movies ever made, to like our friend Griffin Newman, who it's like one of his favorite films ever.

57:07Okay. And I'll say, yeah, just sit somewhere in the middle. Yeah. I think it feels at times irreverent for irreverence sake, but has some great scenes, some great music. Sure. Again, it is a movie we're putting on a show. Right. Then the literal marching bands. Yep. Marching bands and gospel choirs. Oh, that's right. Yeah. There's all this music and sound and there's a weird serial killer plot. A lot of birds. And birds. Birds. You know, that's my one word review of this. But I think this movie agrees with you about birds. It does. It knows that something's up and that you can't trust it. So if all of his other films are exploring how we can't trust the American government, this is like we can't trust the birds.

57:48and I would agree. This is a movie about a kid who lives in a nuclear fallout shelter who wants to fly. He wants to build wings and fly. He's met by an angel who will help imbue him with the power to fly, played by Sally Kellerman. And there's also a murderer in Houston and he may or may not be the murderer. Right. Very odd movie. I like it. I would say it's yellow. I don't think it's going to wind up going in, but I'm fine with a yellow. Okay. He made this real quick. Yeah. It bombed. It bombed very badly. It's memorable. All of the Astronome stuff and the final sequence is very memorable. I believe that this is also Shelley Duvall's first movie.

58:43Okay. And for that reason, it is important. Because she'll come up a few more times in a row. But we'll say Bruce McLeod yellow. Also looking at the PTA connection, it's not quite the same age gap, but a little bit of licorice pizza in this. Oh, sure. With Bancourt's character. And the older gal and the younger boy. Yes, sure. That's a very good point. Where did you fall in that age gap discourse? No comment. Okay. 1971, McCabe and Mrs. Miller. Yeah. This is another green. This is definitely going in. This is pretty famous. This is a famous one. This is a famous one. He did good. Warren Beatty at the height of his fame as one of the handsomest, most bankable stars in Hollywood.

59:24Yeah. Opposite Julie Christie, with whom he had a romantic relationship. He plays a man comes to town who's got big dreams for developing a Western town. And he falls in love with a madam who's working in the town running a brothel. And we learn very quickly that all capitalists are vulnerable sad boys, I think is one of the takeaways from the film. You know, it's his riff on a Western. It's based on a novel. And it's an anti-Western, you know? It's like, it's pretty simple. Like it's not, it doesn't flow in the same way. There is a kind of, there is an enemy force that is pursuing the McCabe character, but it takes a really circuitous route to get to its conclusion.

1:00:12It has this unbelievable four song score from Leonard Cohen that powers it. Some of his best cinematography, I think it's Vilma Sigmund, who shot this movie and it looks like it's in like a haze of the West. And they built the entire town and it's a beautiful part of the Pacific. Yes. Is it the, is it? I thought it was like Montana. Yeah. That seems right. And yeah, if you've liked the movie Horizon, when they built the town, you know, just think about McCabe. We've talked a lot about how he picks unusual stars or not like traditional. No, you're right. It is Pacific Northwest. Washington. Leading men.

1:00:45But you know, this is, it's Warren Beatty and Julie Christie. But there is something funny and Altman-esque in a good way about how he isolates just the absolute bullshit in Warren Beatty, which is an essential part of Warren Beatty's both on-screen and off-screen persona and what we understand about him. But to use someone as traditionally handsome and charmed and make him this kind of fast-talking loser is... With a beard and a bowler hat and hiding. Hiding the same way that we were describing earlier. Just a very shrewd and beautiful movie. Personal favorite of mine. I have three posters of this movie.

1:01:31Okay. What are the three origins? Yeah, tell me the breakdown of the three posters. Two are the same poster at the same size and one is just a different image. I think one of them is the Japanese version of the poster. Okay. But there it's the same image. It's the same. No, the Japanese poster is a different image. Okay, all right. I'll pull them up later. Why do you have two? One was gifted to me. Oh, that's nice. Because this is a real me movie in college. Okay. Where you're kind of like, you're discovering stuff you like. And you're like, yeah, this is not like High Noon at all. This one over Long Goodbye in college?

1:02:06I probably saw them around the same time. Okay. I mean, I feel like, you know, all the boys I dated, including my husband, are the Long Goodbye college boys. Yeah. Yeah, it's okay with me. I just think all of these movies in the 70s, we'll get into them. Yeah. With a couple of exceptions are wonderful. So images. Yeah, I had never seen this, watched it, fucking loved it. You did? Yeah. So tell me about it, okay. So this is, it's about another woman losing her mind. In this case, played by Susanna York. Yes, co-writer of the movie. She has a beautiful country home in, I believe, Ireland, where a lot of this is happening.

1:02:47And so it's, she's in this country home and she's having delusions that are presented as real things happening. And so it's her husband and a friend slash lover who kind of keep being switched in and out. And it's filmed, I guess, like, you know, realistically. So there's no indication of like, oh, this is a dream. And this is a real, and so she doesn't always know who she's talking to or she thinks she knows who she's talking to. And then they're also being duplicitous. But is it she who's being duplicitous? And then, you know, ultimately bad things happen, but in an awesome house. And they make a lot of spaghetti and have a lot of wine.

1:03:38And I liked it a lot. It's a very confounding kind of movie because the narrative is very loose. Yeah. Yeah, but it's one where you ultimately want, you don't need to know which one it is. And at some point, the narrative is that you don't really know what's going on. And it is filmed beautifully and also in such a, the story is confusing, but it's sort of like a straightforward filming. So you're like, okay, I'm just going to go with this. And I guess we're all just going to hallucinate together. Yeah, it's a callback to that cold day in the park and that he does kind of toggle between these big epic ensemble stories like McCabe in Nashville.

1:04:22And this is as tight a character study as you can do, right? I mean, there's really like three people in the whole cast of the movie. And it is intentionally kind of confounding. And like the same way. Yeah, but it's not like it's not an M. Night Shyamalan movie, you know? No, no, no. It's not twisty. yeah and you're not so I don't need to figure out that hey did you ever watch the sixth sense jack yeah I did okay did you and it wasn't spoiled for you it wasn't spoiled yeah so but you're not waiting for a I see dead you don't want to get a verdict from well did you like the thumbs up thumbs up thumbs up okay great yeah okay great I'm glad we got that on the record um you know I I don't mean to mischaracterize it's more just that it is it is like a Bergman movie there's another movie that is just like a Bergman movie it's clear it's clear he watched persona and was like that's so cool how Bergman will just swap a character mid movie and not explain himself and you'll understand that we are in the dream state and that identity is this thing that there's transference in our understanding of who human beings are and what our relationship is to them and what our own psyche is versus someone else's you know it's very heady it's very like I smoke a lot of pot too like a lot of his movies are like I smoke a lot of pot and what if this happened that would be fucking crazy which I enjoy if not taken too seriously.

1:05:40This is my flavor of I smoked a lot of pot and what if this happened? But interestingly, this is basically a psychological horror movie. Yeah, but it's, you know, that's psychological being the key word. Okay. Would you put images in? Let's yellow it. Okay, we will yellow it. Definitely a fan favorite. If you're like big Altman fans, admire the audacity and the oddity of this movie. 1973, The Long Goodbye. Green. It's going in. Green, green, green. Great movie. It's a great movie. It's a very fun movie and a very sad movie. It's a very beautiful snapshot of Los Angeles at this time. And that amazing elevated apartment complex that he lives in with the hippie girls who are always topless.

1:06:20And just kind of ambling through convenience stores and police stations and residences. Watching it again this time, Mark Rydell is so fucking menacing as the gangster who's threatening him, who smashes the bottle on his girlfriend's face. All that stuff is so fucking raw. And that's the other thing is that I'm joking about him being a stoner, but he could make a movie with a little bit of menace sometimes. You know, there's some real danger in this movie as well. I think when we moved to Los Angeles, I thought it was going to be Clueless and my husband thought it was going to be the long goodbye.

1:06:56Yeah. And it turned out it's like to live and die in LA. So that's going in quite obviously. Yeah, I think this is my second most, or maybe it's my most seen. Oh, okay. But yeah, just... Because you have a partner who's also really into it. Yeah. 1974, Thieves Like Us. Did you end up watching this one? I didn't. It's never been one of my favorites. This is a period piece gangster movie starring Shelley Duvall and Keith Carradine as he's an escaped convict and he's on the run with his buddies, John Shuck and Burt Remsen. And they're robbing banks and they're making trouble. and it's funny. I do feel like a lot of filmmakers like to get a movie like this off their chest.

1:07:39Richard Linklater made one called The Newton Boys. It's somewhat similar. It's never been a personal favorite of mine. It's fine. There's a lovely addition from Vinegar Syndrome of this movie. So if you like it, I would recommend checking it out. But to me, it is red. It is not in the hall. That's fine with me. 1974, California Split. Green. Speak on it. This is my favorite. Robert Altman movie. Yeah. It's the best gambling movie ever made. Mm-hmm. Ellie Gould Returns. Is that just, is that from a communicating like the spirit and the, or of gambling or is it that they are playing poker correctly?

1:08:20It's both. I mean, I think that there is certainly like technical aspects that are very accurate. Okay. Because Joseph Walsh who wrote the movie and Altman were gamblers. Mm-hmm. And you get the impression that Gould and George Siegel as co-star in the movie got into gambling. Because they have a real facility with the language and the energy that gambling. So there's like, there's accuracy to it. But to me, it's more like there is a, there's a vibe, like a kind of comic chaos that if you're having a crazy night in a casino, and I'm not saying I do this all the time, but I've had nights in casinos where I'm like, I've been in the side of this space for seven hours and I've lost a lot of money and gained a lot of money in a short period of time.

1:08:56I don't play the same games that all these characters play, but there's the middle ground of gambling, even if you're very calm, is like chaos inside your body. Yeah. Like anything can happen. I mean, you've seen me at the table the one time. I hated it. Yeah. But I don't, it's funny, when I am watching this movie, I don't totally feel stressed out in the way that I felt stressed out sitting next to you. I think it's because it's not like there's 10 million dollars on the table. Yeah. But the thing that I really like about it is that it's a movie about regular people. It's not a movie about high rollers.

1:09:34And so George Seagal's character is literally a magazine editor and kind of just abandons his life to go throw himself at gambling. And he makes great friends with Gould, who you can tell is trouble right away. Yeah, but so charming. Wonderful. It's like Ellie Gould sitting at the table with all the old ladies being like, come on. Yes. And this is a movie where like the way that the dialogue is recorded and then dubbed in. And this movie is so entertaining because like, again, when you're at a poker table, everybody's talking and they're all talking over each other. And at the person, one person's talking at the person over there and the other person's talking to you over here.

1:10:13And it just feels like what it feels like to be hanging out. Obviously, I didn't live in 1974 and I wish I could have for some reasons. but this movie really nails something very true and very funny and also I think Anne Prentiss and Gwen Wells are very good in this movie as the two gals who sort of like kind of fall in love with them but also know that they're trouble and right just kind of floating around yes and again like you can see Brutte Remsen again in this movie Walsh makes an appearance Jeff Goldblum pops up in a very early performance in this movie so it's green it's a huge personal favorite all right one more green Okay, one more green for sure.

1:10:50What if we were just like, you know what, everyone knows about Nashville, so we're not putting it in. There's so many movies to go. Nashville. Yeah, this is the one. Well, it's his calling card. It is his most celebrated. It's his big statement movie. It's his big statement about America and how it works. And electoral politics, stardom, the act of creation, intimacy and relationships between people, what the country stands for. You know, it's made in the shadow of the bicentennial and the 200th anniversary of the country. And it's like a hundred character pieces all strung together about all of these people descending upon Nashville for this celebration concert during an election year during this celebration.

1:11:36And it's a very long, beautiful, very shambolic movie. Yeah. Not like a tightly knit masterpiece in that way. It doesn't feel, you know, it feels like you can feel him discovering the movie as it's going along. He really favored improvisation. The smartest thing that he did, the coolest thing that he did with this movie is that he had all his actors write the songs that they perform in the movie. David Carradine especially, who wrote I'm Easy and won an Academy Award for it, who plays this kind of like heartthrob singer-songwriter ne 'er-do-well who keeps entrapping women in relationships that he has no intention of committing to, is utterly amazing.

1:12:18But yeah, this is a hard one. It's a little bit like talking about the Mona Lisa. Right. You know, where you're like, yeah. It is critical to the history of art. It does also verge on the Mona Lisa where you're like, yeah, I know. It's like, how many times do you want to look at the Mona Lisa, even though it is the foundation for everything that came after it? Yeah. So, Nashville, and it is a little bit because it is three hours long and he's finding it. Sometimes I'm like, uh-huh, okay. Like, I get it. You have to try to open yourself up to every single character. Right. Which not everybody will.

1:12:59Yeah. Also a lot of singing, you know. I love that. No, it's amazing in this, but sometimes I'm just like, oh, and another performance. Yeah. It's a very long movie that is really hopscotching from character to character. And it takes a long time to realize what the connections are in the film. But I think it's beautiful. It is beautiful. I'm not like... It's a real, like, it's better to see this on a big screen movie. This is not a movie that works well on streaming, in my opinion. No offense to our wonderful friends of criterion but like if you get a chance in in when i first moved to la i saw a triple feature of long goodbye california split in nashville at the ucla film archives and it was a crazy day you know that's like nine hours when did it start like it was probably noon and then went all the way through the day but it was really really special and you know nashville after seeing long goodbye in california split is a lot to ask um but it just it felt bigger and deeper in that environment.

1:13:56And it's a movie that like I think if you want to understand a lot of your favorite directors. Totally. There's a really good segment on the Criterion channel of Steve James the documentarian talking about Nashville and with the impact that it had on him and the way that he used some of the methodology that Altman developed for this movie to make documentaries. And it's beautiful and yeah it is an auto green and it's a movie that like it did well and was a big deal at the time and was you know Pauline Kael raved about it and it kind of it got its flowers. I mean, it's funny to imagine Nashville just premiering, you know, and it hadn't existed before.

1:14:32And then now it exists because it's literally 50 years ago. And we live in a post-Nashville world and it has influenced so many of the filmmakers. But, you know, if you were just seeing it for the first time. Yeah, I think it's like watching Mean Streets a little bit. Sure. Where Mean Streets, you're like, oh, I see. This is like source text. Yeah. And sometimes source text is maybe not as powerful once you've gotten Goodfellas or you've gotten Boogie Nights or something that you just have a deeper personal connection to. But it was both a big deal at the time and I think it hangs in there for him canonically in a way that it always will.

1:15:11Okay, so Nashville's in. Okay, so how many do we have? One, two, three, four, five. Okay. We're getting to the back end of the glory period. Now, Buffalo Bill and the Indians or Sitting Bull's history lesson is the Paul Newman film that you referred to. This is a film that had stymied me over the years, but that I really clicked into when we did our Paul Newman episode. And it was because I think I read a lot more about the movie at that time and the way that it was made. And Paul Newman had been wanting to work with Newman for a while. Or Paul Newman worked with Altman for a while. And it is also a movie about Paul Newman.

1:15:41Yeah. In a lot of ways. And so when you're watching it in the context of trying to understand his career and his stardom, it does really click in. It does. So it's like it's a story of Buffalo Bill Cody at a kind of later stage of his showman persona. And Newman obviously relates to this because he feels like kind of a charlatan, you know, and he's like this beautiful person with all this mythology around him. But he feels very kind of like sad inside and unresolved. And he relates to the way that this movie kind of pitches Buffalo Bill and all of the people around him in his world. It's a very cool movie about the lie of the American myth.

1:16:17That's kind of what the whole thing is about. It looks good. It sounds good. A lot of the older school Hollywood stars didn't like working with Altman that much. Beatty famously did not like working on McCabe. Burt Lancaster did not like working on this movie. He thought it was going to be absolutely terrible. Turned out to be pretty good. But I would recommend it. It is read, I think, in the canon of Altman. But I'm a fan of this movie. Agree. It's not going in, but it is very cool. And I do think if you're doing a Newman project also, that's the way to seek it out. It's a good one to click through, for sure.

1:16:5277.3 women. Green. Yeah. This will probably be the last auto green for a while. We already mentioned Bergman, but this is the one that most people will point to for Persona, Sissy Spacek, and Shelley Duvall as two people who swap their psyches in real time. one of the great dream state movies ever made very beautiful production his first spa movie not his last would we call it a spa? I mean I have elder care spa? I have thought about the I mean oh that's some of the tension is it right? It's like how much spa or care are those sad people getting? I've thought about the elder care a lot obviously you know Shelley Duvall is like one of the Altman players but the Sissy Spacek performance here is lights out.

1:17:44Yeah, she's amazing in this. I think in the immediate aftermath of Carrie as well, which is just an amazing stretch of time. I hadn't seen this until we did the 1977 draft. Yes. And you rightfully told me, no, this is the one that you want. This is one where maybe he doesn't, he doesn't understand women, but understands the dynamic between or at least lets them find it on screen. Yeah, I feel like there's two ways to think about it, I'm curious what you think about this. Yeah. That sometimes in female friendships that there's, you know, there's like power dynamic. Yeah, I know. And that like the power dynamic can swap, but also within a woman, there is like a power dynamic, like within one person.

1:18:27And that some days you are like this and some days you are like this. And the movie seems to be kind of - Yeah, well, it's not specific to women. Are you not some days like this and some days like this? There's not. Historically, I don't find that there are power dynamics among male friends. No, no, no, no. As a single person, there are not it's so funny because Alex Russell was on the show talking about Lurker and he was like there are power dynamics among friends and I was like sure man well friendship is sort of the Tim Robinson it is it is is about that and I like that because you guys historically don't get that treatment also you do have some power dynamics but you are just hiding from them and you don't want to but we can like offline that interesting the beard strikes again I think within myself I don't know it's hard to say yeah I think I think I'm pretty vulnerable most of the time.

1:19:16I think there are things I'm protecting myself from, of course. I'm here. I think that's nice. I think it's nice that you want to be vulnerable. That's good. And that you think that you are. What am I not revealing? What pain am I keeping from you? Well, maybe it's just that we don't talk about it. You know what I mean? We don't talk about it? Yeah. Or we just... You're very mean. It's hard to be vulnerable to someone who's mean. I'm direct. Sure. That is a word for it. You can be tough. Sure. To those who will accept my foibles. But I also accept your foibles. We just don't have to talk about them.

1:19:54Yeah, of course I do. I'm here every damn day. I've been watching Robert Allman movies for three months while on leave. So we can do this for you. I accept you and who you are. Should we make a movie called Three Men? They're all about me? Yeah. Three Women is a fabulous movie. And it is clearly, he made a couple of movies that were sort of leading up to this, but I think it's his best movie of this kind that he ever makes. And it's definitely going in. And that gives us six in 1977. And we have 30 more years of films to go. I think we expected that. I am not as expert on a lot of these movies.

1:20:29Many of these movies I've only seen one time. But 1978, I already mentioned, is a hard film to track down. Yeah, I wasn't able to. I would highly recommend it. It is all about two families coming together for a wedding. It is an observational comedy that like you could see Rob Reiner or Nora Ephron making this movie. It would feel a little different. It would not feel as kind of frantic. It would feel a little bit more kind of staged. Does it follow your wedding rules? Your movie wedding rules? It does. Okay. Do you want to restate that for people? Movies that open with weddings are... No, it doesn't.

1:21:06No, it doesn't. It doesn't. Yeah. movies that close with weddings are a problem are not to be trusted but movies that open with weddings are Clueless closes with a wedding well there are exceptions to rules okay and I'm willing to note that Clueless is a wonderful masterpiece a wedding is not going in 30 years this summer we did nothing it was 30 years this summer I felt like Blank Check was doing their Amy Heckerling thing and I was like I don't want to stomp on that but you know that was essential to me we'll do a Clueless thing next year 31 31 and Shining 30th observed just like me 30th observed that's right That's right.

1:21:40A Perfect Couple. I'd only just seen this movie for the first time this year. And it's a weird one. It's a little confusing because there's a new show on Netflix called A Perfect Couple. Yeah, who was in that? Starring Nicole Kidman and Leif Schreiber. Oh, sure. The Ellen Hildenbrand adaptation. I watched all of it. Whatever you say. It wasn't that good. It was also not filmed on Nantucket. But they're making another Ellen Hildenbrand adaptation. And they were doing a casting call while I was on Nantucket with my in-laws. Is it a remake of Three Women? No. Okay. That would be good. A perfect couple you should check out.

1:22:11It's a rom-com. Okay. Paul Dooley and Marta Heflin. And they play an unlikely pair of people who are matched via dating service. And they don't have a lot in common. Marta Heflin's character is in a band and kind of like a post-punk new wave band. Okay. And Paul Dooley is like a real square type guy. So it's just wish fulfillment? A little bit. and they find ways to be connected and he kind of tries to become a part of her life as a musician, as this like bohemian type. Lots of music, you know, as with a lot of his films, a lot of live performances of music where you're like, okay, this movie for the next four minutes is just going to be this band doing a song.

1:22:58It's nice. It's a little underrated or underseen, but it is not special in my opinion. So not going in the Hall of Fame. health. Sure. I already mentioned this. Yeah, I haven't seen it. It is, it's satire is that it is effectively like a, yet another political satire about like a, almost like a presidential campaign, but it is in the context of these two kind of warring older women in this battle for the right to this health club. I'm trying to remember who the two women are. One is Lauren Bacall. Okay. and the other is I think is Glenda Jackson Carol Burnett's in this movie James Garner's in this movie it's got a really cool cast you know Paul Dooley and Henry Gibson from his troop it's a very funny moment where Dick Cavett appears in the movie and he sits in a hot tub between the two candidates and interviews them sure but I've only seen the movie once I would like to see it again and not like in a shitty VHS and I don't know when that's gonna happen okay but maybe by making this episode people will find you know a Brazilian Blu-ray that they can share with me so that I can observe these movies all over again.

1:24:11Are there a lot of niche Brazilian There are a lot of foreign Blu-ray companies. Sure. And they're really getting into the Altman deep cuts? You never know. You never know. The best foreign stuff is probably from Australia at this point. Yeah. Setting aside England. Australia is making imprint. They're doing some crazy stuff right now. When can we go to Australia? I know we were talking to Elizabeth about live shows and where we're going next year. I actually did almost should we go to Australia? I did almost say Australia. We have some Australian listeners. The thing is is that I would want to go we would like have to finish Oscars and then get on a plane.

1:24:50You know? Because I want to be there in Australian summer.

1:24:55I mean it's not the worst idea I've ever heard. Okay. So you want to do Australia and then Cannes. yeah I know it's a lot I think that would be a little challenging yeah okay we'll mark it Health is Getting a Red okay 1980 Popeye well this is an interesting one this is an interesting one yeah not a movie I've ever loved personally but I did see it at a very young age maybe this is the first one I saw yeah oh on Criterion I said it was the player but maybe it was this movie on television as a kid yeah that's very possible it's very possible this is the first time I ever saw Robin Williams wow so Robin Williams plays the legendary cartoon character Popeye, the sailor man who loves spinach.

1:25:38And Shelley Duvall plays Olive Oil, the role she was born to play. And this is one of the biggest fiascos in movie production history. Went way over budget. They shot in Malta. Barry Diller recently gave an interview where he said this is the most coked out film experience he's ever been a part of. Yes. Williams, of course, he had his struggles. They were like shipping them and shipping the cocaine and film canisters? Yeah. To Malta? Yeah, it's weird because this is actually not, Altman was not like a crazy, we're going way over budget kind of a filmmaker. But this movie starts to epitomize, it's not quite Heaven's Gate, but it approximates the like, the out of control nature of the Hollywood auteur and the way that things can get away from them.

1:26:24He was hired by Dino De Laurentiis to make this movie, Altman, which is kind of an odd hire for a Popeye movie. Well, isn't Altman at this point... Oh, we skipped Quintet completely. Oh my gosh, we did. We'll have to go back to it. That's another one we talked about in the Paul Newman episode. He's had a few bombs in a row. It doesn't go well and it's not going in. So isn't Altman a little bit looking for cash? He's looking, yes, he's looking for cash. He's got his own movie studio, Lionsgate, that he eventually sells. Not the Lionsgate that we know now. It's Lionsgate, two words. and he's been trying to use that production company to support movies by Alan Rudolph and other filmmakers and he's struggling.

1:27:05He's pulling a Coppola where he's trying to expand the purview of his work and it's hard. Quintet, this 79 movie starring Paul Newman, which I think we talked about very briefly, but it's about a post-apocalyptic world in which a game called Quintet will define the power in society. And it's kind of like Megalopolis in that it's like a really audacious and interesting idea with not the best execution. It's a very slow movie. Features like some extremely hallowed European film actors and Newman in this very quiet, reserved performance. But that bombs A Perfect Couple doesn't do well. Health bombs.

1:27:42He takes the Popeye job. Things get a little... He gets out over his keys. Yeah, but it doesn't do like that badly. Right. You know, like it's kind of a success. Another reason I love this movie is that Harry Nilsson wrote the songs for it. my favorite singer songwriter and he needs me which which olive oil sings will eventually become basically the theme to punch drunk love yeah and so who did i who was i just speaking with who told me that he needs me was their song that they got married to that's cute that was their wedding their first dance at their wedding shit oh it's my friend mike of course my friend mike emailed me and he was telling me about that well this was like 15 years ago but it was very nice um so So the score is really nice.

1:28:28The production design is really good. It is a movie about Popeye. You kind of need to get on board with that. Yeah. And it's a nice matching with Eraserhead and how hard it is to take care of children. That's also... Sure. Okay. I'm going to yellow it. Yeah. I think that's fine. Okay. It's definitely one of the most well-known Altman movies. Right. It's no Nashville. I mean, that's because it's IP. It is IP. Respectfully. You're right. It's IP. This is his Barbie. Okay. Relax. I mean, the set is not, you know, it is visually pretty interesting. The costume design and the production design is cool.

1:29:02But it has that sort of like surrealist, but, you know, like actually made. I totally agree. 1982, come back to the five and dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean. So this starts the I'm just adapting plays era. So in the early 80s, he basically leaves movies to go make, to go direct plays. Right. and he spends roughly 18 months directing plays and this is one of the plays that he directs and he likes it a lot so he decides to make you know I would I guess this got a theatrical release but a lot of the next few movies are more or less TV movies okay they're not necessarily premiering on ABC but they are much smaller productions from much smaller companies this was distributed by Cinemacom Cinemacom International Films I don't know what that is but it's based on the play by Ed Gratchick stars Sandy Dennis who we worked with in the cold day in the park all those years ago Cher, Karen Black it's about a number of women who gather in a Woolworths Five and Dime and worship James Dean and have friendship and relationships and emotional explosions I think this movie is just okay some people really love this movie I it's a good adaptation of a play and I think it's an interesting play but you know it is it is that it is one set I mean there are there are a number of flashbacks that I guess are handled well and not but yeah it's nice I was like hey it's Cher yeah it's a good Cher performance I just you know in the middle of like a really good period of Cher movies right that's like right around Moonstruck and mask and everything that she's doing then.

1:30:49Yeah, it's a little before, but... I'm going to say Red for Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean. That's fine. Streamers, I just saw. Okay. I have a DVD of this movie that I had never watched before. It stars Matthew Modine as a soldier. And basically, same thing, it's a play written by David Rabe in the barracks in the army. and there's a queer guy in the company and he's kind of having a hard time deciding whether to come out and how to exist inside this company. And then there are all these kind of fractious experiences amongst all these guys. Very like minor work to me, like not really very good.

1:31:34And you can kind of feel him figuring out how to shoot enclosed spaces in these last two movies that we're talking about. Yeah. And I'll say, so Streamers is Red and then Secret Honor is I think where he like figures out how to do that. And he's helped a lot by this Phil Baker Hall performance, which is just bravura. But the blocking in the movie is really cool. Yeah. And the design and the use of like other screens, there is visual interest and depth. And I mean, it helps also that it's a movie, an imagined portrayal of Richard Nixon. and so you also like you've got tapes you have you have like a lot of media embedded into the text just because of who it's about yes that helps uh text rise it a little yeah it is like a 90 minute one man rant um but visually it is actually one of the most dynamic and plotted movies that he's ever had so this is like yellow verging on green for me it's definitely one of his better movies um from this period maybe it probably is best 80s movie i would say yeah i think so i like Fool for Love as well.

1:32:38Yeah. Well, Sam Shepard. Your boy, Sam. I know. Sam Shepard looking very handsome and Kim Basinger looking very striking. He's using a lasso. Yes. Two lost people living in the desert. Yeah. Harry Dean Stanton is in this film as well. This is a very, this is a good adaptation, I would say, and it's good to get him out of a space and into the open world. Well, it's like, it's three spaces, you know, but they use, you know, like a little compound. Yes. But he gets to move around. Some horses. Shepard, you know, he's got incredible presence and this is a really good use of him and this is his play and he knows the material really well and Kim Basinger is a little over the top I would say in the movie just a little bit yeah I mean yes she is the material is also a little over the top it is all Sam Shepard plays her yeah high dramaturgical power what's the other what's the woman the you know with the big hair who shows up in the car what's her name the countess is that what like does she have a name anyway that's a lot in a very 80s way her mother you mean oh the countess yeah Deborah McNaughton yeah yeah yeah it doesn't have to go in but it's this is also available on Criterion it is let's yellow it I would recommend watching this movie if you like his movies if you're starting to scrape or if you like Sam Shepard yeah if you like Sam Shepard 1987 Beyond Therapy is an antic comedy that I don't think is very successful.

1:34:10It's funny, when we did the 87 movie draft, Roger Avery was saying that he liked this movie, or at least that he was very familiar with it. Okay. And I don't think anyone ended up drafting it, but I thought it was pretty dated and didn't work that well. And the same is true, I think, of the next movie, 1987's O.C. and Stiggs, which is based on a National Lampoon cartoon about these two high school kids who get into trouble. This movie was actually made in like 1982 and sat on the shelf for a number of years. That's never a good sign. And it's not great. It has some admirers. It feels like him either trying to do or portending the like Porky's John Hughes 80s teen com.

1:34:57But he doesn't have like, he doesn't have the ear for the youngins, you know? Yeah, or for, I mean, comedy relies so much on timing and pacing, and he is on his own time. Yes, he is. This movie is also not tight, and a movie like this needs to be tight. Yeah. So I'll say no on O.C. and Stiggs. Vince and Theo I rewatched for the first time in a long time, the first, like, hour of it last night, and I was like, how is this even made by Robert Altman? It's not good. It's so turgid. I didn't get to it. It's ostensibly a portrait of Vincent Van Gogh and his brother. And Tim Roth plays Van Gogh as the pained artist.

1:35:39And the one formal trick is that it cuts between a real-life Christie's auction that is auctioning off Van Gogh's and using that as a contrast point between the actual drama of Van Gogh's life and the kind of agony with which he created under. but I thought it was very unsuccessful going back to it and then that is an important movie because that's the last movie he makes before he comes back and he comes back in such a big way in 1992 with The Player okay so we have six right now six greens, three yellows and The Player will be our seventh green yes The Player based on the Michael Tolkien novel a satire like a satire of a satire really one of the most inside baseball movies ever made that also appealed to audiences was a hit is extremely funny really acid burn sense of humor great Tim Robbins performance at the center of it as a duplicitous studio executive who accidentally does something very bad and then needs to maneuver his way through the travails of Hollywood a good match for the long goodbye in terms of the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles and what you think you know and what you really don't know it's a great movie for movie dorks like us it's a primer it's you know it's funny like a a very dark satire in many ways feels like the best explanation of hollywood as it still operates and there are individual scenes that i think of every time i'm reading one of the trades whether it's you know the any of the the maneuvering to for the schedules and trying to get the scripts or the very last julia roberts performance which we you know i don't want to spoil if you haven't somehow seen the player but it's it's all really good is automatically going in is a personal both of ours did a very fun episode of the rewatchables about it some years ago so if you check it out look for that the next movie is you were you were foiled in your attempt to see this movie no you've seen it you did see I've seen it yeah did you rent it internet archive thank you so much good job that movie is pret-a-porter oh no no no oh you're you're going out of order yeah you skip shortcuts Shortcuts.

1:37:53Oh my God. Yeah. I apologize. But I have, whatever. Shortcuts. Green. Let's do it. It's an automatic green. This is, you mentioned Magnolia. This is a similar, it's similar to Nashville in that it features many characters and it is about one city and the crazy happenings in that city all across one day. In this case, it's Los Angeles. It's based on a series of Raymond Carver novels. and it is similarly fractured and a little confusing as to how these figures relate to each other and they don't necessarily fully converge but they do make sense to one another. They pop up, yeah. Yes, they start crossing over in exciting ways.

1:38:37Just cooked my noodle the first time I saw it. I absolutely loved it. It is very long and it's very hard to find but it is, I think maybe his most beautifully written movie. Yeah, very, very emotionally involving and upsetting, I think. It screened recently here in LA. Yassi went. I didn't get to go. Where was it? It was, I believe it was at The Arrow. Oh, sick. And it does not screen very often. There's not a lot of prints left of this movie as far as I know. And it is, there's a case to be made that it's his masterpiece, I think. I, in doing my rewatches this time, I found that I responded to it more than Nashville, which again it's more recent it's more recent more stars you are like have a bigger relationship to and it is also a little bit like the the Nashville thing of it's always existed to us so um and everything else is in response to Nashville yeah yeah and this is it's funny because it's um it's not as grand a statement about the country or creativity or politics the way that Nashville is right Nashville is so 70s because it is so thematically bound this is a movie about people right about like the pain and the vulnerability and the mistakes that people make and like the situations that they find themselves in a lot of his movies too are really good about being like you're 37 and you're stuck a lot of his characters are just stuck and this is a movie full of characters like that and like people who desperately need each other but don't know how to say the thing they need to say to make things right with the other person that they're with or like if they're cheating why are they cheating on their partner and who are they cheating with and what does that say about them like this is just a very you know Carver stories obviously are very very observant about that nature of human behavior and relationship but this is a very a darn good movie I wish it was easier to see honestly but it is going in and does that give us nine or eight I think player was seven short cuts is eight so let's go to Pret a Porte okay this I had seen before but like in the 90s because it was Julie Roberts exactly it was sort of a buzzy thing I don't think I saw it in theaters because I was 10 but I would have sought it out at some point and I'll be honest I was very puzzled because I was young and I is Prédiporte the first Robert Altman movie I ever saw it could be could be 94 it takes place during Paris Fashion Week it is a similar convergence of a number of different characters I think primarily like Kim Basinger is like a reporter Julia Roberts is a journalist Tim Robbins is also a journalist there's like a number of designers there's real life designers real life models who figure prominently the movie is like kind of kind of a dud yeah it's not really super successful you'd think that this would be a place where he'd be able to do his stuff but you don't ever get the impression he actually cares about fashion all that much right or at least like the kind of the art of fashion that it's more like it's just the scene is the thing that is portrayed here which I guess is a viable space for an Altman movie, but I'm not a huge fan of this one.

1:41:48And maybe he's also, I mean, the thing is that fashion is like a business and hugely commercial, and he is pretty skeptical of most of that stuff. So probably not interested in portraying that. Okay, Pret-a-Porter is red. Yeah. 96 Kansas City. Okay. Also a really good film. Not one of his like all-time classics or anything, but a period piece set in I want to say it's the 30s in his hometown also set amidst an election incredible performance from Jennifer Jason Lee in this movie haven't seen this in some time I remember really liking the music it has kind of a rote criminal plot criminal political plot behind it but very solid but he's like kind of firmly in his like back nine back five even with this movie but worth checking out The Gingerbread Man is a Kenneth Branagh adaptation of a John Grisham novel.

1:42:50Okay, sure. That came out amidst this flea of Grisham adaptations. Okay. Let me just make sure I have all my info correct on this one. What is the plot of either the Grisham novel or the adaptation? I'm going to read it to you right now. Okay. um so Bronagh plays a divorced lawyer who thinks he's gonna have a one night stand with a woman but he finds out he's in love with this woman she's played by M. Beth Davids and he offers to help her with some problems and most significantly her unhinged father who's played by Robert Duvall okay he she claims that her father is stalking her and so So this guy helps her, the lawyer, but then by helping her, he realizes that she has actually ensnared him in kind of a plot.

1:43:46So it's like a noir-ish thing. Is it set at Christmas? What's going on with the gingerbread man? That's a good question. I can't remember. I guess you can't catch me. I'm the gingerbread man. Okay, so. Yeah, it's like a twisty plot. I don't know if this book was ever published. I think it might have just been a story that Grisham wrote. Okay. here's the thing to keep in mind here. This movie cost$25 million and it made$1 million to the box office. This is kind of a movie that doesn't really exist. Robert Downey Jr. is in it. Okay. Daryl Hand is in it. Okay. The fact that you haven't seen it, let alone heard of it, should tell you a lot about how much this doesn't exist.

1:44:29Yeah, well, you know. Branagh fan that you are, Grisham fan that you are. And Altman, but that's an unusual Mad Libs. Yeah. Those three. It is. So The Gingerbread Man is not going in. Okay. Cookie's Fortune is another fun ensemble dramedy, like black comedy about a group of people in Mississippi. Very, very good performances in it. Not the most memorable movie. Glenn Close, Liv Tyler, Charles S. Dutton, your boy Chris O'Donnell. Yeah. It's the same thing. Like people kind of crossing over into each other's lives. It's fine. It's red. It's not going in. How are the Mississippi accents? Respectful?

1:45:09I don't know. I don't know how to judge that. I've never known how to judge that. Dr. T and the Women is a movie I always wish was better. This, I saw it when it came out. Okay. Or shortly thereafter because I had moved into like Entertainment Weekly nerd territory. But this felt like it immediately was like a useful, the title itself is just a pop culture punchline, you know? I mean, it is a funny title. so I never really took it seriously and I didn't revisit it. It's about a wealthy gynecologist played by Dr. T, played by Richard Gere and the many women in his life. Among them, Shelley Long, Helen Hunt, Farrah Fawcett, Laura Dern, a lot of blonde women.

1:45:59He has a type. They're all sort of in love with him. They're all sort of annoyed by him. It's a rom-com. Yeah. It's a proper rom-com. It's not super successful. Dr. T, would you trust someone named Dr. T to deliver your children? My answer to you is no. Man or woman? I'm going to need a full name. Okay. I think Dr. T could be reliable. I don't want to see his face on an advertisement on the subway. Right. It has that vibe for sure. Or a billboard here. I don't want that. Yeah. Dr. T is out. 2001 Gosford Park. Green. Yeah. This movie is nominated for Best Picture. It's an upstairs, downstairs murder mystery.

1:46:46Unlikely movie for Altman to direct. Right? A British chamber drama. Yes. And does, like, really baked in and understands all the conventions of the genre. You know, it is, as you said, a Julian Fellowes script. He went on to create Downton Abbey and the Gilded Age. Perhaps you've heard of them. And so it does ultimately upend what you expect from these movies, but it plays. It's not that it is like, you know, sticking to type throughout, but formally and visually, it is very, very familiar with the genre. And so really, like, I think brought a lot of people in who were just expecting Downton Abbey, which is possibly how it got nominated for so many Academy Awards.

1:47:36Yeah. It was also a huge hit. Yeah. It made almost$100 million at the box office, which is just remarkable for a movie about old British people. And it was Altman and Bob Balavan's idea, and they gave the idea to Fellows to write it. And I wonder if I like this movie more because it was Altman's idea, but Fellas' dialogue. Yeah. We're on the verge of seeing Downton Abbey 3 in theaters. I'm so excited. I really like Downton Abbey. I always have. I've always liked the movies. I do think it is pretty frothy. You know, it is not very deep. I don't know if this movie is deep per se, but it's very sharp.

1:48:13You know, it has an edge to it. I think it has more emotional depth than Downton Abbey with respect. because, I mean, just world historical events are happening on that one at a huge clip. It's also, I mean, obviously Maggie Smith is in the film as well, but it's Kristen Scott Thomas, Michael Gambon, Clive Owen, Kelly MacDonald, Helen Mirren. Like, it is an all-star cast of great British actors. So if you have not seen this one, you definitely should seek it out. Two more. Yeah. The Company, which is his ballet drama, which has some cool stuff in it. I mean, the ballet stuff itself is amazing.

1:48:50Dance is amazing. It's the Joffrey company. And I, watching that, just, you know, there are not enough ballets committed to film, like, in an artistic way. He shoots them beautifully. I didn't remember a story by Nev Campbell when I, so that's... Who trained as a dancer. Listen. And wanted to tell a story about the world of dance. and she and James Franco and Malcolm McDowell. It's kind of a baddie performance movie. It is weird. The performances are quite strange and the plot is not really all that urgent. But I really like how this movie looks. Yeah. And I'll give it a yellow for that reason.

1:49:36We have center stage, you know? But this is... You do. You still have never seen it? No. Oh my God. There's just a lot of joy awaits you. Mamma Mia, center stage. Yeah, Mamma Mia coming soon. The Amanda Seyfried Oscar run. It's going to be a big one. No. The Testament of Anne Lee. Also not honored at Venice. We didn't even mention that. Yeah. Another interesting. Listen, the Italian, I guess, I liked it. Okay. I hope it sells. 2006, A Prairie Home Companion. Yes, saw this in theaters, my Lindsay Lohan era. I did as well. Lindsay's pretty good in this. She's good. Yeah, she plays Meryl Streep's daughter, right?

1:50:15Yes. In this film? This is based on, of course, the Garrison Keillor show and is this similar kind of collection of performances. Performance is like a huge thing throughout his career, but you can see in kind of the latter stages of his career, people who put on a show kind of fascinate him. It's also obviously very clear in the company and even in the upstairs, downstairs in Gosford Park, where it's sort of like the downstairs is kind of performing for the upstairs. And the upstairs is also performing for each other. This kind of this this idea recurs over and over again. And Prairie Home Companion, I think, is also just about found communities of strange people who have a story to tell.

1:50:50Right. Which is, of course, the whole idea of his career and his work. And it's a nice movie. I think it is like... It's fine. It's fine. Yeah, it's not going in. It's not going in. So... I think we have nine greens. Let's take a look at our list, okay? In right now, and it's not changing. Yeah. MASH. Yes, one. The Cave and Mrs. Miller. The Long Goodbye. Three. California Split. Four. Nashville. Five. Three Women. Six. The Player. Seven. Shortcuts. Gosford Park. Nine. Now, here are our yellows. You can do that with your hand, with the pinky down. That's really good. I can't do that. What do you mean?

1:51:27You can't do this? No, look at me. Look at my mangles. I would have had a real problem. I wouldn't actually get caught in Inglourious Bastards because I can't. This is... Three Glazer? I can't, yeah. I am a little ambidextrous Oh As well Okay My father's entire family is left-handed Okay You and Knox should talk about this Is he showing left? It's day-to-day I mean he is like definitely showing left But then sometimes he's like No, I want to bat right Well, that's something that happens I think Craig Horlbeck is Thoreau's left, bat's right Okay Or golf's right He definitely eats left Psy sucks his left thumb, which I've never seen before.

1:52:10So that guy is fully left-handed. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not going to make the joke. I was going to make a CR joke, but I'm not going to do it. Okay, so Yellows. Brewster McLeod. Images. Popeye. Secret Honor. Fool for Love. Okay. And also The Company. No, The Company is not Yellow. No, that's nice. You can take that right out, Jack. So. I like ballet, but no. my my pick would be Secret Honor okay I think some people would say that Bruce McCloud or images are better or at least more representative of what he does but we have a lot of movies that are representative of what he does well let me let me float this to you okay is there a world where we should consider putting Tanner 88 in even though it's a TV show no we have never allowed TV shows is that true I think so here's the thing Jack is just shrugging.

1:53:05Come on, man. Jack is kind of shrug wincing at us. I believe one time we tried, and then I forget which part he was like, no, we're not putting television in, which I stand with. I think it was you. Let me talk about Tannier 88 really quickly. He does have, Altman does have a career in television. Some of these movies are made for television. He made a series in 1988, co-created with Gary Trudeau, the creator of Doonesbury, that is an amazing eight-part series about a prospective presidential candidate named Jack Tanner, played by Michael Murphy. they just throw this guy and a handful of actors, including Cynthia Nixon, a very young Cynthia Nixon who plays his daughter, into the world of the presidential race in Washington, D.C.

1:53:45in 88, which is, of course, the George H.W. Bush election. And they kind of invent a type of TV show that we now see all the time, that the Larry Sanders show is like this, that the studio is like this, of using the real and the fake and trying to blend them together and shake them up together and see what happens. Michael Murphy plays Jack Tanner. He's amazing on this show. It is definitely one of the best things Robert Altman ever made. It's very watchable to this day. It is a part of this collection on the Criterion channel. He also made a follow-up movie 12 years later called Tanner on Tanner, which is just a movie, I think, but it's not as good.

1:54:24It's not as revelatory as the first one. So if you disallow it, I understand, but I want to cite it because it's very cool. It's not me. We have rules. We have been working together, and I'm pretty sure that we've never allowed TV, and I'm sure that someone, you know, our, like, at-home ombudsman will correct us if we ever have. I remember what it was. We were doing Nicole Kidman, and I believe the point of contention was Big Little Lies, the television show. Right, and did we do it? I don't think we did. Yeah. Okay. I do also want to note that he did a pilot, I think, for Showtime in 1998 called Killer App, which you can watch on YouTube, which is about the internet and is not totally successful but shows how ahead of the curve he was.

1:55:09That's fine. We have a task here and it's to talk about film and cinema. So you want to do Secret Hour? He also made another show called Gun in 1993. It was an anthology show that I think he made, was it for ABC? I think it was for ABC. It was for ABC. It aired from April 12th through May 31st. A number of different directors worked on this show. That's cool. He directed one episode. Daryl Hannah Sally Kellerman after the death of a golf club president womanizer Bill Johnson has elected the new leader but though he's now in charge at the club he's losing his grip on the many women he's seeing interesting stuff I lied Big Little Lies did go in wow we did it okay great see I think Secret Honor should go in I bent the knee I bent the knee I think it's called compromise I mean if okay that's fine so we have a precedent I'll put Secret Honor it's fine because I stand for movies as you know I don't know none of this TV you don't want to do Popeye instead of Secret Honor no I like Popeye just fine okay I think it's really more of a nostalgia play as opposed to an achievement okay I think people should listen to that soundtrack that's a really darn good soundtrack I accept Secret Honor I'm fine with that okay Secret Honor that's it were it me it would be images but I think that Secret Honor is the correct representative choice okay does that is that our only that's our only 80s title yeah so I feel like that's that's The right move.

1:56:30Okay, so just to recap. Okay. Robert Altman. MASH, McCabe and Mrs. Miller, The Long Goodbye, California Split, Nashville, Three Women, Secret Honor, The Player, Shortcuts, Gosford Park. That's 10. No surprises here. Should we do the blue thing? Remember, was it blue for Paul Newman where one pick that's not going in but we recommend it to people? Yes, great idea. Mine is images. Okay. Mine would be Buffalo Bill and the Indians. Okay, there we go. Speaking of Paul Newman. both very both good picks I think Yeah, this is right. Nine of these ten are also available on the Criterion channel right now.

1:57:10so you can go and watch them if you haven't seen them. Who is someone you would want to do this treatment for in the future where we have to spend nine months prepping? I mean, you know, it requires like a... Who works at this volume? Very few people that we don't cover on a consistent basis. Do we also have to do it for someone's 100th birthday? No. Okay. That just happens to be... I just... That's an easy thing to look for. Yeah. You know, we did it for Mifune during COVID, Chris and I. We did it for Lumet. It's been helpful.

1:57:41I don't know. Has Catherine Hepburn turned 100 yet? I would imagine she's older than 100 at this point. Or would be. But then we could make her brownies? She'll be 125. Oh. No, she'll be 120 in 2027. She was born in 1907. Thanks for trying, but that doesn't really mean. She died at 96 years old. Yeah. Have you ever had her brownies? It's like a famous brownie recipe. They're quite good. Is it like a batch that she made before she died? Like a big batch? Yeah, no, I'll send you the link. It's good. It's on your... Her recipe for brownies? I mean, they're brownies. Like, how different could the recipe be?

1:58:20There are actually many. A lot of variation. Okay. But is there like a signature ingredient? There are walnuts in it, in them? No. You don't like walnuts? In brownies, like, I don't... With a brownie, I just... The smooth delivery of chocolate is what I'm interested in. Okay, and you want fudgy. you don't want cakey. Correct. Same. Correct. Fudgy for sure. These were on the fudgier side. But with walnuts. I do like walnuts. But I also like a ganache on the top. A ganache on the top? Yeah, like the thick icing. The chocolate icing. You're really weird. You don't like icing? Brownie is just like something you just throw in a pan and you throw it in the oven.

1:59:03Well, that's what this recipe is like. And then just take it out and then you just give it to your younger siblings and then they just have something to eat when your mom is working. You know, like that's what you do. Catherine Hepburn brownies. That's how I made brownies. I mean, this is basically what it is. It's just cocoa, butter, eggs, sugar, flour. Oh my God. Come on, New York Times cooking. I am fucking logged in. Let me, Jesus Christ, I pay you. Okay.

1:59:29So you haven't figured it out. You wanted to do Hepburn. We can just do a Hepburn episode. I mean, when I was thinking of someone like with an expansive body of work over many decades. Sure. Who means a lot to me. What I usually do when I'm trying to solve against that is I just look for an anniversary of a film. Okay. So we could say, well, that's not great. There's no movie in 1950. Okay. So you'd really want to have one of those.

2:00:00I mean, do we have to do it this year? No, I meant for next year. Oh, okay. We're kind of scheduled out right now. Did you notice? We kind of have something every single fucking week. Trust me. I'm pretty... Listen, I know. So then that would be 51, right? Yeah, 50th observed. No, no, no. The year... So you were looking at movies of 1950? Yeah, 51 is The African Queen. 1940 is The Philadelphia Story. Bringing That Baby is 38. I know. Oh, that's a long time to wait. Yeah. we don't have we don't have any matching Pat and Mike's 52 well okay so that would be 20 if we did it this year 7 Lion and Winter is 68 so no matches so we got no anniversaries 38 no birth anniversary no nothing alright well well fuck off and die Catherine Hepburn sorry any closing thoughts I'm pro Altman pro Altman yeah pro Altman thanks for coming on this journey with me.

2:00:59Good job on the Criterion Collection. Thanks. You looked great. Thanks. They put makeup on my face. I was going to ask. Yeah, they put makeup on my face. How did it look? Looked good? Looked amazing. Not 18 months off my years. The Criterion Collection people have been wonderful and I know I gave a promo code earlier and this is a collaboration, but what they do, in addition to the Altman programming right now, the programming on the channel right now, which includes two Paul Thomas Anderson movies 70s 70s conspiracy thrillers a number of other great packages they're the absolute best what they do so want to give a shout out to Elisa there to Kim to Curtis who helped me look good during the production of that project they are all awesome and the whole team there is really great thank you for watching all these movies coming on the journey with me you're very welcome this is really one of my guys although I don't know that I need to see a Robert Altman movie again for quite some time it is if you are just starting your Robert Altman journey space them out yeah I don't I don't know if the binge recommendation it lends itself the best you know let them let them breathe see other stuff maybe intersperse it with you know PTA bomb back other people inspiration points exactly and so you can like see how they work that's a good project in the future is if you like yeah kicking and screaming you will like OC and Stiggs you know what I mean like there's a way to kind of match those things in the future I love kicking and screaming.

2:02:28I do too. Yeah. Was that like number three on our list or number two? On what list? We ranked the Baumbach movies. I think on the Marriage Story episode. Yeah, I know. Oh my God, that's insane that that was six years ago. Yeah, more than six years ago. Okay. Well, I also want to thank researcher Branley Palmer, who was kind enough to provide like an incredible wealth of documents to us, who went back and looked at every movie, read all the books. I'm also going to do a video about the physical media and some of the books that are out there about Altman, so you should check that out on the Winger Movies channel.

2:03:01I brought your DVD back. Thank you very much. It is a DVD and not... It is a DVD. A lot of these movies are only available on DVD, unfortunately. And thanks to our producer, Jack Sanders, for his work on this episode. And later this week, just to tie everything neatly in a bow, we'll be doing a Paul Thomas Anderson movie character draft. Now, just let's get this out of the way. No one battle after another character. is eligible because of CR. Yeah. And everyone else. Yeah. Because we can't split it. But there are some good ass characters in that movie. Yeah, sure. And it's fresh on our mind. I mean, listen, it's what a time we'll have.

2:03:36What a time we'll have. Thanks everybody for indulging this episode and we'll see you later this week.

2:03:55Thank you.