WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.040 --> 00:00:10.199 Hold your books. It should die. People paid good money to see this 2 00:00:10.240 --> 00:00:13.560 movie. When they go out to a theater, they want cold sodas in 3 00:00:13.839 --> 00:00:18.000 hop pop corn and no monsters in the projection booth. Everyone for tend. 4 00:00:18.039 --> 00:00:46.679 Podcasting isn't borings. Son. You've got a penny on your head. You 5 00:00:46.920 --> 00:00:55.359 drove fast. The first time I met ed was in the county lockup in 6 00:00:55.479 --> 00:01:00.560 tampe Arizona. Flower, you are a day I'll never forget. I did 7 00:01:00.880 --> 00:01:06.159 you bet? I did? Okay. Then my lawless years were behind me, 8 00:01:06.599 --> 00:01:11.200 our child rearing years lay ahead, but no biology inspired to keep his 9 00:01:11.400 --> 00:01:15.040 childless. You go right back up there and get me a toddler. I 10 00:01:15.159 --> 00:01:17.920 need a baby hide. They got more than handle. At the time, 11 00:01:18.120 --> 00:01:23.519 his little plan seemed like the solution to all our problems and the answer to 12 00:01:23.640 --> 00:01:30.159 all our prayers. He's beautiful. What are you kid? We got some 13 00:01:30.319 --> 00:01:41.560 family here. I want bathing Junior. What's his name? Junior high Junior. 14 00:01:41.760 --> 00:01:49.920 So far we've just been using Junior. We called you saw somewhat. 15 00:01:51.319 --> 00:01:56.719 Hold on right, and we're gonna go pick up daddy. I've been taking 16 00:01:56.719 --> 00:02:06.280 these Huggies and whatever cash you got. You busted out of jail. We 17 00:02:06.439 --> 00:02:09.360 relation fish has on our own recalling whatever here is trying to say is we 18 00:02:09.479 --> 00:02:14.879 felt the institution no longer had anything to offer us. We get a job. 19 00:02:15.000 --> 00:02:23.039 Now everybody's stayed. Where's Junior? Who the hell are you? Oh 20 00:02:23.120 --> 00:02:29.919 fan? We're absolutely going to get him back. Just ain't no question about 21 00:02:29.919 --> 00:02:35.360 that one from an out And you want to know another thing, I'm gonna 22 00:02:35.360 --> 00:02:39.840 be a better person from here on out. Let's gool didn't It didn't Junior 23 00:02:40.360 --> 00:02:46.800 Raising Arizona a comedy beyond Little Leaf Broll. It ain't. Asie and Anne, 24 00:02:58.400 --> 00:03:00.439 Welcome to the projection booth. I'm was Mike White joined me once again? 25 00:03:00.599 --> 00:03:05.000 Is mister Rob Saint Mary? You're young and you've got your health. 26 00:03:05.199 --> 00:03:07.439 What do you want with a job? Also back in the booth is mister 27 00:03:07.560 --> 00:03:13.879 Keith Gordon. I don't have a line prepared. Oh man, I didn't 28 00:03:13.879 --> 00:03:15.919 realize that was the assign, but it was. I like that one. 29 00:03:16.439 --> 00:03:20.960 We round out a month of discussions about comedic films with a look at the 30 00:03:21.000 --> 00:03:25.840 Cohen Brothers nineteen eighty seven film Raising Arizona. It is the story of recipivist, 31 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:31.439 repeatal fender criminal Hi McDonough, also known as High and his marriage to 32 00:03:31.599 --> 00:03:36.960 Edwina, a police officer. They find that they are unable to sire a 33 00:03:37.039 --> 00:03:42.000 child and do the most sensible thing about it steal one from the famous Arizona 34 00:03:42.080 --> 00:03:47.000 quins from unpainted furniture retailer Nathan Arizona himself, and hell, you know who 35 00:03:47.039 --> 00:03:52.120 he is. I sincerely hope that everyone within the sound of my voice has 36 00:03:52.159 --> 00:03:55.000 seen Raising Arizona. But if not, you just owe it to yourself to 37 00:03:55.000 --> 00:03:59.719 go and watch the movie first before hearing us talk about it. So, 38 00:04:00.159 --> 00:04:02.080 when was the first time you saw Raising Arizona and what did you think. 39 00:04:02.400 --> 00:04:05.159 I have a very specific memory the first time I saw this, and I 40 00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:10.960 was young. I was ten, and it was probably the year after it 41 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:14.680 came out, which would have been nineteen eighty eight. Year came out ONBHS, 42 00:04:15.199 --> 00:04:17.600 and I was at my parents friend's house, and I think they had 43 00:04:17.600 --> 00:04:21.240 rented it and we all watched together, and I loved it as a ten 44 00:04:21.319 --> 00:04:24.800 year old kid, and I didn't see it again until I got into high 45 00:04:24.800 --> 00:04:27.199 school. Now, at that time, I had no idea ten years old 46 00:04:27.240 --> 00:04:30.079 who the Coen Brothers score her. I just knew that this was this crazy 47 00:04:30.160 --> 00:04:34.639 little movie. And then it became like one of my favorite films. It 48 00:04:34.680 --> 00:04:39.920 is one of my favorite comedies of all time. And then when I made 49 00:04:39.959 --> 00:04:44.240 my little, silly, little vampire film when I was nineteen, totally unrelated 50 00:04:44.240 --> 00:04:46.360 to me, like I had no input on the script. The co producer 51 00:04:46.519 --> 00:04:49.879 friend of mine at the time, who wrote the script has a whole section 52 00:04:49.920 --> 00:04:55.839 in there about how he was dating this woman and he decided to stop seeing 53 00:04:55.839 --> 00:05:00.040 her because she failed the Raising Arizona test. Jennifer, Well, Jennifer failed 54 00:05:00.040 --> 00:05:04.160 a test. No, you didn't give her the Raising Arizona test, fucking 55 00:05:04.199 --> 00:05:08.800 A I did. And there's no way the relationship could continue because she failed 56 00:05:08.839 --> 00:05:12.439 that test. What the hell does that prove? It proves everything, all 57 00:05:12.519 --> 00:05:15.759 right. If you cannot enjoy a brilliant, cinematic comedic masterpiece like Joel and 58 00:05:15.839 --> 00:05:19.759 Ethan's Raising Arizona, then you are bound, I mean, like genetically bound, 59 00:05:19.920 --> 00:05:24.079 to show up a deeper, numerous human flaw somewhere along the line. 60 00:05:24.480 --> 00:05:27.639 And Will Chamberlaine, you're the last owner should be lecturing me about my love 61 00:05:27.680 --> 00:05:30.160 life. I agree with that. There is very few people that I've watched 62 00:05:30.160 --> 00:05:34.800 this movie with over the years who it was maybe their first time seeing it 63 00:05:34.879 --> 00:05:40.240 and didn't love it. To me, it's broader enough, it's a big 64 00:05:40.360 --> 00:05:44.279 enough kind of good hearted comedy, but it also has some really fun stuff 65 00:05:44.279 --> 00:05:47.480 in there, in some deeper levels that I really enjoy and still enjoy it. 66 00:05:47.519 --> 00:05:50.399 Like I said, I've been watching it, I guess thirty five years 67 00:05:50.519 --> 00:05:55.560 or so, and it's still a favorite. Well, I've never seen it, 68 00:05:55.600 --> 00:05:58.279 but I hear a really good thing. No, damn, it's another 69 00:05:58.279 --> 00:06:02.800 elviral episode. No. I saw it when it very first came out, 70 00:06:03.240 --> 00:06:08.040 but it's funny. My reaction at the time, much like a lot of 71 00:06:08.040 --> 00:06:11.319 the critics, I was not that blown away by it. I had been 72 00:06:11.319 --> 00:06:15.000 a huge fan of Blood Simple. I saw Blood Simple at the New York 73 00:06:15.000 --> 00:06:17.759 Film Festival when it hadn't nobody really seen it yet, and you know, 74 00:06:17.839 --> 00:06:20.240 everybody was so charged. It was like, oh my god, this is 75 00:06:20.279 --> 00:06:24.959 amazing, and these guys in this new voice, and it was just everydy, 76 00:06:25.120 --> 00:06:28.199 you know, super excited. And then this was the follow up film, 77 00:06:28.240 --> 00:06:30.519 and critically it got very naked responses, and I remember the time being, 78 00:06:30.519 --> 00:06:33.240 oh, it's too silly, it's too goofy, and you know, 79 00:06:33.279 --> 00:06:39.000 where's all that deeper thematics that they you know, they were promising, and 80 00:06:39.199 --> 00:06:42.480 then, as has happened with a lot of my very favorite films, there 81 00:06:42.519 --> 00:06:45.680 was really an evolution with it, you know where you know, I saw 82 00:06:45.720 --> 00:06:46.879 it again a few years later, and I liked it more. And I 83 00:06:46.920 --> 00:06:50.199 saw it a few years later and I liked it more still, and somewhere 84 00:06:50.240 --> 00:06:54.079 and there, Yeah, it became a very favorite film, and among my 85 00:06:54.279 --> 00:06:58.040 very very top film of the Coen Brothers. I mean, it's a film 86 00:06:58.079 --> 00:07:00.240 now that I deeply loved, But it was it was a process of coming 87 00:07:00.279 --> 00:07:04.439 to greet it on its terms, rather than expecting it to be something that 88 00:07:04.480 --> 00:07:09.439 it wasn't, and understanding that underneath the wackiness of the humor there was an 89 00:07:09.480 --> 00:07:13.160 incredible amount of debt. But I will plead guilty. Well, but again, 90 00:07:13.199 --> 00:07:15.199 like I say, a lot of the critical establishment was also that way 91 00:07:15.199 --> 00:07:20.480 at the time that everybody was expecting the next blood symbol, and that's always 92 00:07:20.480 --> 00:07:25.360 a problem because what they did was they did something new and special and different 93 00:07:25.480 --> 00:07:29.000 rather than repeating themselves, and everyone's so confused by that. Yeah, they 94 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:32.600 have an interesting knack of exploring genres and just going to places that you don't 95 00:07:32.639 --> 00:07:36.839 necessarily expect, and when you think they're going to go left, they suddenly 96 00:07:36.879 --> 00:07:42.639 go right with films that they put out. Who would have thought that they 97 00:07:42.680 --> 00:07:46.079 this is somewhat of a Western, but now it's, oh yeah, old 98 00:07:46.120 --> 00:07:51.800 brother, we're out though, true grit, even no contratra old men. 99 00:07:53.120 --> 00:07:57.600 These are all westerns now and it's oh okay. But then you still have 100 00:07:58.079 --> 00:08:03.279 the Cia movie that they did, or cruel intentions or just that cruel intentions, 101 00:08:03.279 --> 00:08:07.560 what was that? Intolerable cruelty, intolerable cruelty, just things that you 102 00:08:07.600 --> 00:08:11.600 don't necessarily expect a remake of The Lady Killers, Like where did that come 103 00:08:11.639 --> 00:08:15.879 from? This is it's always another one of their films that I've come to 104 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:18.199 like way more like at first, you know, like, oh it's not 105 00:08:18.240 --> 00:08:20.639 as good as the original, and now I've come to really love it on 106 00:08:20.720 --> 00:08:24.920 its own terms. And I think that's filmmakers that are brave and buying things 107 00:08:24.920 --> 00:08:30.079 in odd ways. Often you kind of need to see things again and go 108 00:08:30.120 --> 00:08:31.399 back to them. And like I say, if I looked at a list 109 00:08:31.440 --> 00:08:35.440 of my top fifty films of all time, probably thirty of them, I 110 00:08:35.480 --> 00:08:39.039 wasn't blown away the first time, and it was only on revisiting that I 111 00:08:39.080 --> 00:08:41.120 really found. Oh, now I get it, and then how could I 112 00:08:41.159 --> 00:08:45.840 not have gotten it before? This movie kind of sets up what would be 113 00:08:45.879 --> 00:08:48.639 the checkerboard for them, because the thing I noticed is they went from serious 114 00:08:48.679 --> 00:08:52.840 to absurd to serious to absurd, and they did this like every other film 115 00:08:52.879 --> 00:08:58.480 for a while for about twenty years, and then it seems like they don't 116 00:08:58.559 --> 00:09:03.720 get as absurd as much. They got much more serious later. I actively 117 00:09:03.799 --> 00:09:09.320 refused to see this film when it was out. I had seen Peggy Sue 118 00:09:09.360 --> 00:09:13.679 Got Married and was just so not a fan of this, this Nicholas Cage 119 00:09:13.720 --> 00:09:16.440 guy. Who the hell is this guy? Anyway? So I'm sort of 120 00:09:16.440 --> 00:09:22.320 weird nepotism going on here. He's actually Nicholas Copela. I had made a 121 00:09:22.360 --> 00:09:26.399 movie called Peggy Sue Got Married. Chair had seen that movie, and she 122 00:09:26.440 --> 00:09:28.039 immediately said, I saw Peggy Sue Got Married, and I thought, I 123 00:09:28.080 --> 00:09:33.039 was your performance was like watching a two hour car accident. He was okay, 124 00:09:33.039 --> 00:09:37.440 and Birdie and rumblefish, he was all right, small roles, valley 125 00:09:37.480 --> 00:09:41.360 girl. He was really good and I don't need to see that. I 126 00:09:41.480 --> 00:09:45.399 saw that performance in Peggy Sue and I just didn't like it at all, 127 00:09:45.440 --> 00:09:50.519 and that I basically one of my college friends was like, you have to 128 00:09:50.519 --> 00:09:54.159 watch this movie. You of all people are going to love this movie and 129 00:09:54.200 --> 00:09:58.759 basically sat me down. And I wouldn't say forced me to watch this movie, 130 00:09:58.799 --> 00:10:01.440 but there was a lot of cajoling going on, some pluckwork, orange 131 00:10:01.440 --> 00:10:07.519 lidlocks involved, I guess maybe just about and I don't have to tell you 132 00:10:07.519 --> 00:10:11.120 guys. At first eleven minutes before the credits even roll, it just grabs 133 00:10:11.159 --> 00:10:16.159 you and throttles you, and I fell in love and I was just like, 134 00:10:16.200 --> 00:10:20.080 oh my god, where has this movie been for the last five years? 135 00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:22.759 You actively refuse to see it, you idiot. And then after that 136 00:10:22.799 --> 00:10:26.480 it was like, let's watch Raising Arizona pretty much as I possibly could, 137 00:10:26.960 --> 00:10:31.360 and oh my god, do I love it. This is one of those 138 00:10:31.519 --> 00:10:37.519 where never gets old, and there are just the use of the music, 139 00:10:37.919 --> 00:10:41.159 the dialogue, the camera work. Pretty much. Give me any aspect of 140 00:10:41.240 --> 00:10:45.720 filmmaking and I'll be like, oh, yeah, this movie excels in that 141 00:10:46.000 --> 00:10:50.960 production design, whatever you got, this movie excels at it. It is 142 00:10:50.960 --> 00:10:54.600 so quotable, like I can't tell you. Actually, when we were making 143 00:10:54.879 --> 00:10:58.080 my stupid little vampire movie, when we were ready to do a take, 144 00:10:58.120 --> 00:11:00.759 we'd be like, we'll set the pop here, honey. We would say 145 00:11:00.759 --> 00:11:03.240 that to each other because they take the photo with the kid. So I 146 00:11:03.279 --> 00:11:09.639 mean there's just even just little just the phrasing the dialogue in here. Talking 147 00:11:09.679 --> 00:11:11.919 to Mike about this before we started recording. We see this later. You 148 00:11:11.960 --> 00:11:15.799 wouldn't know this, obviously, Keith. You wouldn't know this when you saw 149 00:11:15.879 --> 00:11:18.919 this because you don't know what they're going to do ten years down the line. 150 00:11:18.279 --> 00:11:22.879 But to me, I think from a dialogue standpoint, it shares a 151 00:11:22.879 --> 00:11:26.960 lot with like Fargo, where it's supposed to be a regional but it's not 152 00:11:26.039 --> 00:11:31.240 really. It's got this kind of weird mash and then Oh Brothers the same 153 00:11:31.279 --> 00:11:35.440 way. Even though it's odd, it's like it's so charming in its way 154 00:11:35.559 --> 00:11:39.000 of doing that it's really odd, Like I can't think of too many filmmakers 155 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:43.200 that can pull that off like that well, and then that really consistently they 156 00:11:43.200 --> 00:11:48.080 write this odd poetic I mean, their dialogue is almost never naturalistic. I 157 00:11:48.080 --> 00:11:52.440 mean, their dialogue is not the way people talk. And that's what's amazing 158 00:11:52.440 --> 00:11:56.039 about it because it works really well. I mean, you know, it's 159 00:11:56.039 --> 00:12:00.080 something I feel like I've seen a number of people try to do, but 160 00:12:00.120 --> 00:12:03.559 it usually fails to write this kind of not naturalistic, poetic dialogue, but 161 00:12:03.720 --> 00:12:09.879 yet have it not be distracting or dobe or just why are you doing that? 162 00:12:09.919 --> 00:12:13.480 And there's stuff it flows so beautifully and in this movie, to me, 163 00:12:13.559 --> 00:12:16.039 that actually hasn't. There's a Yeah. One of the things I came 164 00:12:16.080 --> 00:12:20.399 to love about the movie is I think it adds a lot because one of 165 00:12:20.440 --> 00:12:22.559 the one of the things that movie is accused over early on, and I 166 00:12:22.679 --> 00:12:26.240 understood it and I actually felt it now again, I don't at all was 167 00:12:26.360 --> 00:12:30.159 making fun of rural people and making fun of poor people in me. And 168 00:12:30.200 --> 00:12:33.159 I actually think the language is one of the things that balances it because as 169 00:12:33.240 --> 00:12:37.600 much as their use of language is goofy and strange, it's also very poetic 170 00:12:37.639 --> 00:12:43.360 and beautiful and there's malapropisms, but there's also beautiful ways of expressing themselves. 171 00:12:43.639 --> 00:12:46.919 And I actually think the movie is like a fascinating movie in that whole arena, 172 00:12:46.960 --> 00:12:48.679 because on the surface it is it is, you know, make fun 173 00:12:48.720 --> 00:12:52.240 of the dumb rural folk, and then you get into the movie you realize 174 00:12:52.519 --> 00:12:58.279 it's way deeper than that, and it's way more complicated and it's basically, 175 00:12:58.519 --> 00:13:01.440 yeah, you really think you're smarter than them, You really think this isn't 176 00:13:01.440 --> 00:13:03.200 all of us? You really think you know? And I somehow think the 177 00:13:03.440 --> 00:13:07.399 poeticness of the language is part of what creates that ballance of Yeah, they're 178 00:13:07.440 --> 00:13:11.639 dokes and we're all dokes, and we're all insane and we're all and yes 179 00:13:11.639 --> 00:13:16.320 they're cartoons, but aren't we all? And somehow that language is an important 180 00:13:16.320 --> 00:13:20.679 part of why that works. And that was the thing that I got going 181 00:13:20.720 --> 00:13:24.240 forward through their work is the people who you wouldn't expect to be able to 182 00:13:24.320 --> 00:13:28.600 use these words like why Like, for example, John Goodman's character he uses 183 00:13:28.639 --> 00:13:31.919 the word domicile. We're hearing your domicile? Why use domicile? What do 184 00:13:31.960 --> 00:13:35.559 you just say? House? Or that? In their work over and over 185 00:13:35.639 --> 00:13:39.840 with these characters who you're like, these words just seem too big, And 186 00:13:39.720 --> 00:13:45.960 that's that artificiality you're really talking about. But lends something like it's almost like 187 00:13:46.399 --> 00:13:50.639 there is an intelligence, but it don't know how to handle the intelligence. 188 00:13:50.679 --> 00:13:52.960 Well, there's something I can't quite explain it, but it really helps to 189 00:13:54.000 --> 00:13:56.480 flesh out the character in a way. There's a whole theme too of people 190 00:13:56.519 --> 00:14:01.200 not understanding each other. When how you talking with mm at Walsh and he's 191 00:14:01.679 --> 00:14:05.639 oh, me and Bill were part of this highway patrol thing, Bill Parker, 192 00:14:05.759 --> 00:14:11.440 No, not that mother scratchers. There's always like little things where it's 193 00:14:11.440 --> 00:14:15.159 even when Glenn is talking about swinging, he has to say it in so 194 00:14:15.200 --> 00:14:20.039 many different ways. I'm talking about Lamore, I'm talking about wife swapping. 195 00:14:20.159 --> 00:14:24.159 I mean like each time they're saying things, they have to explain themselves several 196 00:14:24.200 --> 00:14:31.039 times. And the whole scene of the one cop trying to ask Nathan Arizona 197 00:14:31.159 --> 00:14:35.000 about what was going on, and then you've got the two FBI agents and 198 00:14:35.120 --> 00:14:39.919 FBI agents are acting like translators for this local cop and the local cops just 199 00:14:41.080 --> 00:14:45.559 trying to get his questions in there. Anything when he was abducted. Nobody 200 00:14:45.600 --> 00:14:48.840 sleeps nakedness. How I am asking the question's officer, if we're going to 201 00:14:48.840 --> 00:14:50.720 put an AVB, I might need a description he was. We're better trained 202 00:14:50.720 --> 00:14:54.600 to intervene in a crisis situation. What was he wearing a dinner jacket? 203 00:14:54.639 --> 00:14:58.000 What do you think he's wearing his damn Jammie's child was wearing his jammies? 204 00:14:58.039 --> 00:15:01.559 You're happy do you any disgruntled employee? Hell, they're all disgruntled. I 205 00:15:01.559 --> 00:15:05.559 ain't running a damn daisy farm. What did my motto is do it my 206 00:15:05.600 --> 00:15:07.919 way or watch your butt? So are you thinking it might have been an 207 00:15:07.960 --> 00:15:11.519 employee? Don't make me laugh without my say so? They wouldn't piss with 208 00:15:11.519 --> 00:15:16.120 their pants on fire? What did I don't know? They were jammies and 209 00:15:16.440 --> 00:15:20.639 Yoda isn't shit on them. Everybody has problems communicating with one another. And 210 00:15:20.720 --> 00:15:24.840 even when it comes through these balloons come in funny shapes. No, not 211 00:15:24.960 --> 00:15:28.879 unless round is funny, and then later on how evil's Oh these are circular. 212 00:15:30.240 --> 00:15:33.320 When gales, everybody get down on the ground. Nobody move when there's 213 00:15:33.360 --> 00:15:37.639 that whole misunderstanding there. Well, which is it, young Feller? You 214 00:15:37.679 --> 00:15:41.720 want I should freeze or get down on the ground. I mean to say, 215 00:15:41.919 --> 00:15:46.440 it's a nice freeze. I can't write any drop, and it's a 216 00:15:46.519 --> 00:15:50.120 nice drop. I'm going to be in motion. That's a real theme through 217 00:15:50.120 --> 00:15:54.679 this whole movie is people not understanding each other and that language, that that 218 00:15:54.840 --> 00:16:00.639 poetic language. Because I know there's references in here to Flannery O'Connor, William 219 00:16:00.720 --> 00:16:04.440 Faulkner, to John Steinbeck. I don't know if it's adopting that type of 220 00:16:04.519 --> 00:16:10.399 language. It's a more literary language than a spoken word language. It's not 221 00:16:10.799 --> 00:16:12.840 what you would hear when you're having talk with somebody, like you said, 222 00:16:12.919 --> 00:16:18.200 domicile rather than house or home. The only thing that I've read, I 223 00:16:18.200 --> 00:16:21.440 think it was in the interviews that you sent. There was a book of 224 00:16:21.480 --> 00:16:23.919 interviews, and they said that they wanted they figured that the characters would have 225 00:16:23.919 --> 00:16:27.799 been informed by two things. One probably raised around the church, so the 226 00:16:27.879 --> 00:16:34.000 Bible, and then also just like general magazines, just general popular reading. 227 00:16:34.080 --> 00:16:37.799 So they figured it was this mashup of high art, high language, and 228 00:16:37.879 --> 00:16:45.559 really low language at the same time, like Jugs magazine exactly. I worked 229 00:16:45.559 --> 00:16:48.679 in a place that used to sell Jugs magazine, so when I saw that 230 00:16:48.799 --> 00:16:51.960 and bade me last. But even the music has that too. I mean, 231 00:16:52.039 --> 00:16:56.120 you know, it's one of the great scores ever, and it has 232 00:16:56.200 --> 00:17:02.440 this mix of like Beethoven but played in a kind of almost Southwestern country kind 233 00:17:02.480 --> 00:17:04.880 of way, and then opera, and it's doing the same thing. It's 234 00:17:04.920 --> 00:17:10.599 kind of mashing together this sort of high art and low folk art and coming 235 00:17:10.680 --> 00:17:14.440 up with something new and special and kind of the best parts of both, 236 00:17:14.799 --> 00:17:17.000 and that's in a way what I feel like the language is doing too. 237 00:17:17.039 --> 00:17:19.400 And that's what I mean about there's something elevating about the story and the characters 238 00:17:19.400 --> 00:17:23.079 in it. As much as it's funny, it's also kind of saying these 239 00:17:23.119 --> 00:17:29.519 people do live in a world where Beethoven is part of their sub conscious world 240 00:17:29.640 --> 00:17:32.400 or opera or you know, they hear I mean, so some of these 241 00:17:32.440 --> 00:17:37.079 things are in High's dreams and you know, and he's hearing this music. 242 00:17:37.160 --> 00:17:38.799 So for me, there's something I like about it, and I may be 243 00:17:40.039 --> 00:17:45.039 reading in but there's something about elevating the common man at the same time that 244 00:17:45.119 --> 00:17:48.960 it's smoking fun at and it's something I think they do brilliantly well, and 245 00:17:48.000 --> 00:17:52.799 they do it over and over again. A lot of movies is both mercilessly 246 00:17:52.880 --> 00:18:00.680 teasing and kind of really appreciating and loving people will all types at. They're 247 00:18:00.720 --> 00:18:03.440 one of the only filmmakers and I think of the best a filmmaker, and 248 00:18:03.519 --> 00:18:08.799 it kind of does that things simultaneously really well, where they're both tease and 249 00:18:08.880 --> 00:18:14.400 make fun of people mercilessly, and yet somehow you never feel like it's cruel. 250 00:18:14.440 --> 00:18:18.079 And in the end, you realize they really love their characters and that's 251 00:18:18.119 --> 00:18:21.799 really hard to do. At the same time. I mean, I definitely 252 00:18:21.839 --> 00:18:26.319 feel there's a deep humanism in their work that they're willing to point out our 253 00:18:26.359 --> 00:18:30.240 foibles but really hugging us at the same time and going it's okay, we 254 00:18:30.319 --> 00:18:37.319 understand. The character that comes the closest to this pattern that we're talking about 255 00:18:37.519 --> 00:18:42.119 is probably the George Clooning character in Oh Brother, We're Out though, and 256 00:18:42.200 --> 00:18:47.799 with him when he starts spouting out about the pattern familius and just like using 257 00:18:47.839 --> 00:18:52.599 these high falutin terms, there's also that notion of maybe he's not as smart 258 00:18:52.640 --> 00:18:56.039 as he thinks he is. Because you get Temple like Nelson and John Taturo 259 00:18:56.400 --> 00:19:00.480 and they're not necessarily using that sort of high language, and I would say 260 00:19:00.480 --> 00:19:06.680 they're probably on the same playing field as him. You get Jim Blake Nelson 261 00:19:06.759 --> 00:19:11.039 like they loved him up and turned him into walk Horn, talking about how 262 00:19:11.079 --> 00:19:15.240 their prestidigitation or any of this kind of stuff. He's not using that level 263 00:19:15.240 --> 00:19:19.519 of language. So I think in that one they are not necessarily making fun 264 00:19:19.559 --> 00:19:23.319 of Clooney, But Clooney is playing such a blowhard at times, and just 265 00:19:23.359 --> 00:19:27.440 this whole thing about his palmmaide and he's a dapper dan Man and all this 266 00:19:27.480 --> 00:19:30.920 stuff. And of course I'm thinking Pommade because of the palm Aide that's in 267 00:19:30.920 --> 00:19:34.400 this movie as well, and I just was really hoping that it was Dapper 268 00:19:34.519 --> 00:19:38.920 Dan was the palmmaid, but unfortunately it's not. There's are great things that 269 00:19:40.039 --> 00:19:42.880 carry over from one film to another, and you get these kind of running 270 00:19:42.960 --> 00:19:45.319 jokes, Like I know a lot of people will be like, oh, 271 00:19:45.400 --> 00:19:49.079 look at High worked at Hudsucker Industries and we're going to get Hudsucker later on. 272 00:19:49.480 --> 00:19:52.200 Look at the film before, look at Crime Wave that they did with 273 00:19:52.240 --> 00:19:56.480 Sam Raymie, that's all taking place at Hudsucker as well, So they love 274 00:19:56.599 --> 00:20:00.640 that tour Man and then Rob. I know, before we started talking, 275 00:20:00.680 --> 00:20:04.160 you were talking about kidnapping and like how that's such a theme for these guys 276 00:20:04.200 --> 00:20:07.799 as well. When I look at all of their films, I think probably 277 00:20:08.000 --> 00:20:11.480 good seventy five percent of them have a kidnapping in the plot. So there's 278 00:20:11.559 --> 00:20:15.559 part of me that goes, do they have something they're working out? Is 279 00:20:15.640 --> 00:20:19.680 this like therapy? Did they have a family member who was kidnapped or were 280 00:20:19.720 --> 00:20:23.160 they just like going No. It's just a really good, like film noir 281 00:20:23.680 --> 00:20:27.720 plot device that you can use, that you can play with. But there's 282 00:20:27.759 --> 00:20:30.400 part of me that goes, yeah. But to have it in seventy five 283 00:20:30.440 --> 00:20:33.759 percent of your work, I could probably list off most of the films. 284 00:20:33.799 --> 00:20:37.759 I can't remember all of them, but almost seems like every single movie is 285 00:20:37.799 --> 00:20:41.440 a kidnapping, and it's like blood simple does and that's one of the serious 286 00:20:41.519 --> 00:20:45.400 ones, and then goofy ones like this one in Big Lebowski, So it 287 00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:49.799 just keeps showing up. I want to say that Fargo is very close for 288 00:20:49.920 --> 00:20:55.359 them, and that the whole idea of this kidnapping and stuff took place when 289 00:20:55.400 --> 00:21:00.279 they were younger, and that probably worked its way into a lot of what 290 00:21:00.319 --> 00:21:04.119 you're saying using kidnappings, because I think that whole because they say based on 291 00:21:04.160 --> 00:21:07.279 a true story, which of course is an absolute lie. But I think 292 00:21:07.319 --> 00:21:12.559 there are some aspects of that kidnapping that were true and that did take place 293 00:21:12.759 --> 00:21:18.599 around where they grew up. If anything. Playing armchair psychologist, that's as 294 00:21:18.640 --> 00:21:22.799 close as I can think of as why are there so many kidnappings in so 295 00:21:22.920 --> 00:21:26.480 many of their movies? It's a damn good trope, And with this one, 296 00:21:26.519 --> 00:21:30.039 it's not even really a kidnapping so much. It's just outright theft that 297 00:21:30.519 --> 00:21:34.480 they eat. Those who have so much should give to those who don't. 298 00:21:36.079 --> 00:21:40.799 Very socialist type of philosophy that we have here. They got five, they're 299 00:21:40.839 --> 00:21:45.200 fine. Nathan Arizona probably well to do guy. And it sounds like he 300 00:21:45.599 --> 00:21:52.160 and Florence had to go through treatments for her to have these kids, and 301 00:21:52.240 --> 00:21:56.559 that was probably very expensive as well. So it's that whole thing of high 302 00:21:56.640 --> 00:22:00.839 and ed are not rich, but yet Nathan Arizona's up on that hill, 303 00:22:02.319 --> 00:22:04.599 that high and low type of thing, and just hearing this person as with 304 00:22:04.759 --> 00:22:11.200 five boys and we can't even have one, So why don't we just take 305 00:22:11.240 --> 00:22:14.519 what the good Lord can't give us? Yeah, And looking at them, 306 00:22:14.519 --> 00:22:18.720 looking at that couple though, the way that they're staged and everything she is, 307 00:22:18.880 --> 00:22:22.599 she looks like she walked out of the early nineteen hundreds, like her 308 00:22:22.599 --> 00:22:27.880 hairs up, she's got these really very particular clothing, like a suffragette almost. 309 00:22:29.000 --> 00:22:33.200 It's like school marmish. What is the dynamic between these two? But 310 00:22:33.400 --> 00:22:37.319 in terms of Nathan Arizona, I absolutely love him, and I'm sad to 311 00:22:37.359 --> 00:22:41.319 hear that he died relatively the after, died relatively quick after this film, 312 00:22:41.319 --> 00:22:42.960 I think he meane like one mother thing he was supposed to actually, from 313 00:22:42.960 --> 00:22:47.839 my understanding, play the Albert Finney roll in Miller's Crossing. But he's just 314 00:22:47.920 --> 00:22:53.200 so amazing in here, and I love that character. And again a quotable 315 00:22:53.240 --> 00:22:57.400 piece like I'll say to people chairs you got a Dynette set, No chairs 316 00:22:57.440 --> 00:23:02.160 you got Dick asked my wife, you got more sense? And another character 317 00:23:02.200 --> 00:23:07.079 of who we on the surface is a schmop. He's greedy, he's disconnected, 318 00:23:07.279 --> 00:23:11.400 and when by the end he's wonderful. And that's that same thing that 319 00:23:11.440 --> 00:23:12.599 they do where like you know, he's like, oh, he's the rich 320 00:23:12.680 --> 00:23:17.000 guy and he's the shallow guy, and then by the end of the film 321 00:23:17.519 --> 00:23:21.680 it really do kind of love him and there's a real heart within all of 322 00:23:21.720 --> 00:23:23.640 his trappings. Through all the trappings are still there, but you know, 323 00:23:23.720 --> 00:23:27.720 he lets them go and he is very empathetic and he tells them to stay 324 00:23:27.720 --> 00:23:30.400 together. And you know that's that thing where they just, you know, 325 00:23:30.480 --> 00:23:34.920 the humanity keeps finding a way to come out underneath everyy's trappicks, every's got 326 00:23:34.960 --> 00:23:38.960 him. But then the good stuff kind of sneaks out in spite of themselves. 327 00:23:40.200 --> 00:23:44.480 I felt very happy. I once met a friend of a friend named 328 00:23:44.519 --> 00:23:48.400 Scott huff Heines, and I kept asking him, do you call yourself unpainted 329 00:23:48.440 --> 00:23:51.759 half Heines? And he's like, no, do you think that people would 330 00:23:51.839 --> 00:23:52.759 get it? I was like, yeah, I think they would, And 331 00:23:52.799 --> 00:23:56.839 then from then on he went as Scott unpainted huff Heines. So I feel 332 00:23:56.960 --> 00:24:00.440 very happy about that. Going back a little bit to the movie, because 333 00:24:00.440 --> 00:24:04.359 we're just jumping all over the place here, because it's tough to talk about 334 00:24:04.400 --> 00:24:10.920 comedy. It's really tough to talk about comedy. This is not just jokes 335 00:24:10.960 --> 00:24:14.799 for joke's sakes. There is a whole lot of stuff going on in here, 336 00:24:14.799 --> 00:24:18.319 and I love just the filmmaking prowess. When you come to that precredit 337 00:24:18.359 --> 00:24:22.920 sequence, the guy who's mopping the floor, and every time High comes back 338 00:24:22.920 --> 00:24:29.039 to prison, he has moved a little bit, or the counseling sessions that 339 00:24:29.079 --> 00:24:33.160 they're having, and you get to see the different people that are in jail 340 00:24:33.240 --> 00:24:37.279 with them. Why do you use the word trapped? Why do you say 341 00:24:37.279 --> 00:24:42.519 you feel trapped in a man's body? Were? Sometimes I get the minstrel 342 00:24:42.559 --> 00:24:48.519 crames real hard. That guy is overdubbed. It's William Preston Robertson doing that 343 00:24:48.640 --> 00:24:52.599 voice, and just that they used him in so many movies, like even 344 00:24:52.640 --> 00:24:56.920 when I think in Hudsucker, Proxy just has one line where he goes buzz 345 00:24:56.160 --> 00:25:02.200 and he's got that huge, deep voice. We're talking about like economics and 346 00:25:02.279 --> 00:25:04.640 stuff, and the way that at the end of every week he's got a 347 00:25:04.640 --> 00:25:10.720 paycheck and that woman smoking that cigarette. The job was a lot like prison 348 00:25:11.160 --> 00:25:15.839 sip ed was waiting at the end of every day and a paycheck at the 349 00:25:15.920 --> 00:25:19.200 end of every week. Government, do take a bite, don't you talking 350 00:25:19.240 --> 00:25:23.720 about that Reaganomics and all of that stuff that's in here. I tried to 351 00:25:23.759 --> 00:25:29.000 stand up and fly straight, but it wasn't easy with that some bitch Reagan 352 00:25:29.079 --> 00:25:33.160 in the White House. I don't know. They say he's a decent man, 353 00:25:33.799 --> 00:25:38.319 so maybe his advisors are confused as a kid who grew up working for 354 00:25:38.799 --> 00:25:42.880 during that era with a dad who worked in a factory what they show in 355 00:25:42.880 --> 00:25:47.599 the film. I think that was another element to this movie that kind of 356 00:25:47.839 --> 00:25:52.279 related to me because I didn't grow up with means and new people like to 357 00:25:52.359 --> 00:25:56.839 mean. Obviously not as far out, So that's where I think the connection 358 00:25:56.880 --> 00:26:00.720 came from. For me, It's like very much a working class film, 359 00:26:02.240 --> 00:26:04.960 but in that way it's a blown out version, but it still has that 360 00:26:06.079 --> 00:26:10.440 heart of these people are trying to scrape by and make it happens for them. 361 00:26:11.160 --> 00:26:14.400 Well, they all have their dreams, and I love keep he mentioned 362 00:26:14.400 --> 00:26:19.240 before about the dreams and that Hi. I don't know if he's necessarily controlling 363 00:26:19.279 --> 00:26:23.200 things with his dreams, but he definitely seems to have some sort of influence 364 00:26:23.319 --> 00:26:27.359 or things are being influenced by his dreams. Just that, I mean, 365 00:26:27.400 --> 00:26:33.640 he pretty much manifests Lenny Smalls. Just that after he does this horrible thing 366 00:26:33.680 --> 00:26:36.920 of kidnapping this child or taking this child, I should say, because they 367 00:26:36.920 --> 00:26:44.359 don't ask for a ransom, that he manifests this lone horseman of the Apocalypse, 368 00:26:44.759 --> 00:26:48.559 the ward hog from Hell, as Flannarey O'Connor would say, and Ed 369 00:26:48.680 --> 00:26:51.799 says later on, and I just love that, and that they have that 370 00:26:51.880 --> 00:26:57.200 connection of that woody woodpecker tattoo, and just that they seem to be coming 371 00:26:57.240 --> 00:27:03.799 from the same place that Lenny Smalls has that tattoo. My mama didn't love 372 00:27:03.880 --> 00:27:07.559 me when he's got the baby shoes and stuff, and you're like, Okay, 373 00:27:07.559 --> 00:27:11.640 are those his baby shoes? Are those like a trophy from another baby 374 00:27:11.680 --> 00:27:15.640 that he's stolen? And I love that you get these baby noises so often 375 00:27:15.680 --> 00:27:21.440 when you see him on screen, like when he's camped out above mc done 376 00:27:21.440 --> 00:27:26.079 a place looking down and you've got like crying of the baby when you see 377 00:27:26.160 --> 00:27:30.200 him again. The sound is wonderful in this. I think it's alluded to 378 00:27:30.319 --> 00:27:34.400 in the conversation with Nathan Arizona that maybe he was a baby that was sold 379 00:27:34.720 --> 00:27:40.559 to someone at some point thirty thousand dollars he fetched on the open market. 380 00:27:41.119 --> 00:27:45.400 As for that roadrunner tattoo, that has always been something that throughout my watching 381 00:27:45.400 --> 00:27:49.079 of the film, I was like because I knew that image. I knew 382 00:27:49.119 --> 00:27:52.240 that image because my dad used to work on cars, and my dad had 383 00:27:52.240 --> 00:27:56.480 a nineteen seventy Chevy Nova and he had one of those like in the back 384 00:27:56.519 --> 00:28:03.279 window, and it was this company that made like carburetors and things like that 385 00:28:03.359 --> 00:28:06.279 for cars. So I knew that image ever since I was a little kid, 386 00:28:06.799 --> 00:28:08.759 and so when I saw that they had it, I was like, 387 00:28:10.200 --> 00:28:14.960 Okay, they both have this thing that's weird, but it was only just 388 00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:18.079 recently, and I sent this link to you before we recorded a few days 389 00:28:18.079 --> 00:28:26.920 ago that I guess there is a gangs in prison called the Peckerwoods that have 390 00:28:26.000 --> 00:28:32.720 woody woodpecker tattoos that are like white supremacist gangs in prisons. I go, 391 00:28:32.839 --> 00:28:36.720 wow, that that got dark real quick. I didn't realize that, like 392 00:28:36.799 --> 00:28:41.519 I could have been initiated into some white Aryan Nations kind of things in prison, 393 00:28:41.079 --> 00:28:45.759 and that they're like brothers of a fraternity. And that's why in the 394 00:28:45.920 --> 00:28:51.200 end, when he pulls the grenade, he says sorry because he's sorry he 395 00:28:51.240 --> 00:28:56.119 did that to a fellow member of the same fraternity. I found that video 396 00:28:56.279 --> 00:29:00.759 interesting. There were some good parts to it. There are things that when 397 00:29:00.880 --> 00:29:06.559 High is pulling one of the Arizona quints from under the crib and then you 398 00:29:06.640 --> 00:29:11.119 get that same shot repeated when Lenny is pulling High out from underneath a car 399 00:29:11.200 --> 00:29:12.440 and just like pointing some of those things out. I was like, Okay, 400 00:29:12.519 --> 00:29:18.400 yeah, that's cool. Or like when he dreams about Lenny and that 401 00:29:18.480 --> 00:29:21.519 he's moving his head back and forth to the right to the left, and 402 00:29:21.599 --> 00:29:26.279 it's very similar to what happens later on when Lenny is meeting him and his 403 00:29:26.359 --> 00:29:29.640 head is going back and forth to the right to the left. I thought 404 00:29:29.640 --> 00:29:33.440 that was good. I don't necessarily buy High as a white supremacist, and 405 00:29:33.640 --> 00:29:37.640 that he's really annoyed the only African American. Actually there's two African Americans, 406 00:29:37.640 --> 00:29:42.640 because there's the guy who's got the metal cramps, but there's also his cellmate. 407 00:29:44.279 --> 00:29:47.480 And I don't see him being annoyed with his cell mate because he's black. 408 00:29:47.519 --> 00:29:49.240 I just see him being annoyed with his cell mate because it sounds like 409 00:29:49.279 --> 00:29:53.799 he tells the same stories about craw dads all the time. When there was 410 00:29:53.880 --> 00:29:57.920 no meat. We ate fall, there's no faull. We ate crowdy, 411 00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:03.599 there was no crowd had to be found. We ate saying what we ate 412 00:30:03.720 --> 00:30:10.039 sad. He ate sand. That's right, and I don't think I would 413 00:30:10.079 --> 00:30:14.319 believe that they ate sand either. But also the use of visuals, and 414 00:30:14.400 --> 00:30:18.839 I didn't pick up on this until years later, is the scene where he 415 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:23.599 I think it's in the dream, where he visualizes her Florence Arizona, going 416 00:30:23.640 --> 00:30:27.599 into the bedroom and the baby's not there. Where the camera goes from the 417 00:30:27.640 --> 00:30:33.480 ground over the car, up the ladder into the bedroom right into her face. 418 00:30:33.079 --> 00:30:37.039 That is a visual lift out of Evil Dead, which of course Joel 419 00:30:37.079 --> 00:30:41.440 Cohen was a co editor on Evil Dead. So I love that little nod 420 00:30:41.000 --> 00:30:47.039 that they did to Sam their friend that if you're a fan of bull films, 421 00:30:47.079 --> 00:30:49.680 you go now, Okay. Yeah, they use shaky cam like crazy 422 00:30:49.759 --> 00:30:55.960 in this and backwards shots. I love good backwards acting, which I know 423 00:30:56.039 --> 00:31:00.160 Bruce Campbell can do. And speaking of Bruce Campbell, I always felt he 424 00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:03.839 should have been Glenn. I love the actor that played Glenn, but there 425 00:31:03.839 --> 00:31:07.200 were certain line deliveries that he gives where I'm just like, may Bruce Campbell 426 00:31:07.200 --> 00:31:11.599 could have killed that line delivery, oh yeah, and just that like group 427 00:31:11.680 --> 00:31:17.400 of friends with Raymie and Tapered and you've got the Coen brothers, and then 428 00:31:17.519 --> 00:31:22.079 Holly Hunter was one of their roommates for a little while. I remember hearing 429 00:31:22.359 --> 00:31:26.599 commentary on the Evil Dead. I think the original Evil Dead disc about that 430 00:31:26.079 --> 00:31:30.880 and that they didn't cast her and blood simple, so they said, Okay, 431 00:31:30.039 --> 00:31:34.440 we need to write this character. That she was partially responsible for what 432 00:31:34.519 --> 00:31:40.160 this movie ended up being. Having that strong female character and here was pretty 433 00:31:40.200 --> 00:31:44.039 important. And that was the thing that I forgot to mention up the front 434 00:31:44.240 --> 00:31:48.400 was when I made that film, the Little Vampire film. The guy who 435 00:31:48.480 --> 00:31:52.400 wrote it and produced it with me who's in it. He's in Crime Wave, 436 00:31:52.519 --> 00:31:56.119 So there's another kidding. He was a child actor, and if you've 437 00:31:56.160 --> 00:32:00.720 ever seen Crime Wave, he's the kid who's in the yellow Vader who's pushing 438 00:32:00.720 --> 00:32:02.720 the buttons and annoying people and then they toss him out of the elevator. 439 00:32:02.799 --> 00:32:07.920 I think Brian James tosses him. So he's got this little cameo bit in 440 00:32:07.960 --> 00:32:10.400 there when I think he was like eight or nine years old. So it's 441 00:32:10.440 --> 00:32:14.400 funny, like it all comes full circle in that one, that video that 442 00:32:14.440 --> 00:32:19.240 you said too. I never really realized that High's car is there when he 443 00:32:19.359 --> 00:32:24.079 visualizes Florence coming in and the camera's going over the one car, that his 444 00:32:24.200 --> 00:32:29.640 car is still in the driveway when he left the ladder up there. I 445 00:32:29.640 --> 00:32:32.119 guess you just do that if you're coming old. But I love that whole 446 00:32:32.160 --> 00:32:37.119 thing and just the use of the shaky cam and freaking Barry Snefeld when he 447 00:32:37.200 --> 00:32:42.680 was strictly dpeeing at this point, just doing beautiful work. And I love 448 00:32:43.039 --> 00:32:45.599 and I hope Keith that you appreciated this one. He would always sneak in 449 00:32:46.279 --> 00:32:53.880 Kubrick references. So in the Bathroom, You've got Poe Ope so great, 450 00:32:54.400 --> 00:33:00.720 I can no longer sit back and allow I'm innestant infiltration, communist doctrination, 451 00:33:01.359 --> 00:33:09.960 communist subversion, and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and and purify all of 452 00:33:09.960 --> 00:33:14.880 our precious bodily fluids. One of the things I love about the poems. 453 00:33:15.039 --> 00:33:20.480 Their movies are so full of little throwaway nods to There are other films, 454 00:33:20.559 --> 00:33:23.240 friends, films people that admires, you know, classical fiction, I mean, 455 00:33:23.519 --> 00:33:27.440 and it's not always that meaningful. I do think you get to danger 456 00:33:27.519 --> 00:33:30.200 with them because people can over analyze it and start you know. I mean, 457 00:33:30.559 --> 00:33:32.599 That's why I kind of had mixed things of the video too, because 458 00:33:32.599 --> 00:33:36.599 I started to feel like, Okay, you're really flying to tie this all 459 00:33:36.599 --> 00:33:38.880 together, as opposed to the fact that I think they're just having fun with 460 00:33:38.960 --> 00:33:44.000 symbols and symbolism and all. I don't think it always necessarily all flies up 461 00:33:44.039 --> 00:33:46.079 to a grand thing. They're just kind of like, yes, I could 462 00:33:46.079 --> 00:33:50.359 see for example, with the Ope Poe, which is from Doctor Strangelove. 463 00:33:50.440 --> 00:33:52.720 In the bathroom, you know, first of all, it's a nod, 464 00:33:52.759 --> 00:33:55.400 but also yes, it's two films taking place in crazy worlds where nothing makes 465 00:33:55.440 --> 00:33:59.480 sense. Like you know, there's a certain amount of it that I think 466 00:33:59.519 --> 00:34:01.119 you can say, yes, there was a meaning. But I could also 467 00:34:01.119 --> 00:34:05.640 imagine reading some film arcles somewhere saying, well, clearly they were saying that 468 00:34:05.759 --> 00:34:07.360 the apocalypse is coming, and it's the same as the Apocalytis. It's like 469 00:34:07.480 --> 00:34:10.199 there's certain wines like, no, really, I think they're having more fun 470 00:34:10.239 --> 00:34:14.920 than that. Someone wasn't denied the essence. That's what happened. So there 471 00:34:14.960 --> 00:34:21.400 you go. I'm trying to remember the name of that critic who always reviews 472 00:34:21.519 --> 00:34:27.159 the Coen Brothers movies and he will even do introductions on their DVDs. Do 473 00:34:27.199 --> 00:34:30.719 you guys remember who I'm talking about. He's completely made up whole cloth by 474 00:34:30.760 --> 00:34:36.039 them. Oh yes, it's not Roderick James, because that's the editor editor 475 00:34:36.119 --> 00:34:38.400 that was made up. Yeah, no it was, and he's on the 476 00:34:38.519 --> 00:34:42.119 Yeah, it's the it's on the Blood Simple disc. He does the introduction, 477 00:34:42.840 --> 00:34:46.639 Welcome viewers to this special collector's edition of Blood Simple. Forever Young. 478 00:34:47.360 --> 00:34:52.599 My name is Kenneth Loring, Artistic director for Forever Young film restoration, and 479 00:34:52.039 --> 00:34:57.840 I'll be talking you enthusiasts or shall we say, aficionados through some of the 480 00:34:57.960 --> 00:35:01.599 technical aspects of the filmmaking here, even as the scenes under discussion unfold. 481 00:35:02.199 --> 00:35:07.679 But more on myself later during the slower parts of the movie. For now, 482 00:35:07.800 --> 00:35:10.639 let's admire some of these so called plate shots, that is, some 483 00:35:10.880 --> 00:35:15.199 shots that were filmed as background for titles, although tier as you see, 484 00:35:15.239 --> 00:35:21.199 there are actually no titles, so they aren't in fact plate shots, but 485 00:35:21.320 --> 00:35:25.480 simply shots. I suppose you'd call them. One of the movies actually one 486 00:35:25.800 --> 00:35:29.920 best editing, and they were like, oh, how the hell are we 487 00:35:29.960 --> 00:35:32.159 going to get Roderick James up here? Well, very few filmmakers seem to 488 00:35:32.199 --> 00:35:37.400 have the fun with in the films but also around them making of the films 489 00:35:37.440 --> 00:35:40.039 and their whole I mean, they do. They keep they have a playfulness 490 00:35:40.079 --> 00:35:45.480 that it's just great and I think is too missing from a lot of filmmaking. 491 00:35:45.840 --> 00:35:50.719 And they their films are playful, and their approach the filmmaking seems playful, 492 00:35:50.760 --> 00:35:53.679 and I think it's great. I always took the whole Woody Woodpecker thing 493 00:35:53.880 --> 00:35:59.239 to be more that this was a cartoon and that we were living in a 494 00:35:59.320 --> 00:36:05.280 cartoon old and Kai's care as very woody woodpecker esque, and apparently it gets 495 00:36:05.360 --> 00:36:09.880 higher and higher as he gets more stressed. And Alma's figured if money comes 496 00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:15.599 from High, that's why he's got the tattoo. That's as much stock as 497 00:36:15.599 --> 00:36:17.599 I put in that. I wasn't, yeah, thinking that he had joined 498 00:36:17.639 --> 00:36:23.480 the Peckerwoods the video. Did they sing the Peckerwoods actually have woody woodpecker tattoos 499 00:36:23.960 --> 00:36:29.239 or did they just were they making the connection between peckerwoods and woodpecker And because 500 00:36:29.280 --> 00:36:30.840 I could see the Color Brothers hearing, oh, there's a gang called the 501 00:36:30.840 --> 00:36:35.639 Peckerwoods and thinking it's really funny and doing a smriff on it called you know, 502 00:36:35.639 --> 00:36:37.800 wood with woodpecker, I don't know that they would be literally trying to 503 00:36:37.800 --> 00:36:43.440 make a point about High being a white supremacist, which is not referenced for 504 00:36:43.480 --> 00:36:45.039 a part of this. I mean, because not like they're filmakers, they're 505 00:36:45.079 --> 00:36:50.119 not scared of having their characters be really fucked up and you know, awful, 506 00:36:50.159 --> 00:36:52.599 and you know there would go there if they wanted to go there. 507 00:36:52.679 --> 00:36:55.920 So I think trying to make an hidden statement that Pie is actually a white 508 00:36:55.920 --> 00:37:00.119 supremacist just doesn't seem like they're filmmaking. And I didn't remember that though, 509 00:37:00.159 --> 00:37:05.760 that the real Pecker would actually did the woodpecker tattoos. I'm wrong, but 510 00:37:06.440 --> 00:37:09.559 it appeared to be from what he was showing. The thing that I eventually 511 00:37:09.559 --> 00:37:13.960 clicked for me later was, and this was in the video that I thought 512 00:37:14.039 --> 00:37:16.559 was interesting because I hadn't made that connection before, is that, in a 513 00:37:16.639 --> 00:37:22.599 way, the smallest character represents his future. That basically, if he doesn't 514 00:37:22.599 --> 00:37:27.199 get on the path, and if he keeps doing what he's doing, he's 515 00:37:27.199 --> 00:37:30.360 going to turn into a criminal, like a really bad criminal, and he'll 516 00:37:30.360 --> 00:37:36.079 be alone and he'll have nothing, and he'll just be this loan man by 517 00:37:36.119 --> 00:37:39.000 himself, miserable because you can't say that Small seems like a nice guy because 518 00:37:39.000 --> 00:37:45.480 he has no friends. So it appears that character is really a mirrored, 519 00:37:45.480 --> 00:37:50.679 twisted, darker version of where High could end up, and that the tattoo 520 00:37:50.800 --> 00:37:53.760 is a visual. It's hard to imagine though, that that High could ever 521 00:37:53.800 --> 00:37:57.199 be that guy. I mean, why doesn't even load his gunt? I 522 00:37:57.239 --> 00:38:00.239 mean, you know, I mean you got the feeling. Its small to 523 00:38:00.280 --> 00:38:01.639 me, Twalston, he seems like he was a guy who grew up. 524 00:38:01.719 --> 00:38:05.880 He was given away as a baby, you know, for thirty thousand dollars. 525 00:38:06.199 --> 00:38:08.679 He's a creature without a soul. And I just feel like, even 526 00:38:08.719 --> 00:38:13.519 if High has fears of that in himself, he says, clearly, so 527 00:38:13.800 --> 00:38:16.159 has a soul, and see for me, I don't think he says sorry, 528 00:38:16.239 --> 00:38:21.280 the thing about sorry because their brothers. He's never hurt anybody before. 529 00:38:21.719 --> 00:38:23.880 I think he's been sorry because he's I mean, he's been a career criminal 530 00:38:23.920 --> 00:38:28.519 who's never loaded his gun. He's never hurt anyone. He's He's really as 531 00:38:28.599 --> 00:38:30.559 harmless as you could be and be a criminal. I mean, the only 532 00:38:30.599 --> 00:38:35.960 person he ever does any harm to is land he punches for saying I want 533 00:38:36.000 --> 00:38:37.280 to swap with your your wife, But he just punches the guy he doesn't, 534 00:38:37.320 --> 00:38:42.000 you know. But he's a very harmless guy and a sweet guy. 535 00:38:42.400 --> 00:38:45.280 So I guess it's hard for me to imagine him ever becoming small, even 536 00:38:45.320 --> 00:38:49.639 if he's afraid. I could see that being his nightmare of himself. But 537 00:38:49.800 --> 00:38:52.320 I don't think that's really who he is. And I do think that he 538 00:38:52.719 --> 00:38:54.559 says sorry because he's for the first time he blows up. He blows up 539 00:38:54.599 --> 00:38:58.360 the worst human being in the world, and even then he's so sweet that 540 00:38:58.440 --> 00:39:00.400 on some level he's like, Oh, I really don't want to hurt somebody, 541 00:39:00.400 --> 00:39:02.920 even if you're gonna kill me if I don't. And I think that's 542 00:39:02.920 --> 00:39:06.039 why we love him, no matter how much of a criminal he is, 543 00:39:06.079 --> 00:39:09.159 because he's a really good soul who just doesn't know how to make sense of 544 00:39:09.199 --> 00:39:15.199 the world. And I love that mirroring too, with punching Glenn and that 545 00:39:15.400 --> 00:39:19.920 great edit, so he has to walk up to Glenn. He punched Glenn 546 00:39:20.039 --> 00:39:24.679 so hard that he's six meters away, and then you get that mirroring later 547 00:39:24.760 --> 00:39:29.679 on with Lenny where he punches high and then has to walk up to get 548 00:39:29.719 --> 00:39:32.199 too high because he punched him so far. I love when they do that 549 00:39:32.320 --> 00:39:36.599 kind of stuff. And then yeah, just those great visual jokes and they're 550 00:39:36.639 --> 00:39:40.119 like lead mister mcdunna's car alone, and then that cut to them all just 551 00:39:40.239 --> 00:39:46.480 beating the car just so loud, and you get I watched it today with 552 00:39:46.519 --> 00:39:52.639 headphones on and just the sound of the children just ever present in that whole 553 00:39:52.719 --> 00:39:57.320 scene. It's just so disrupting. Beauford over there writing on the walls, 554 00:39:57.679 --> 00:40:00.880 yeah, in the hole on account of something went wrong with miss Semen. 555 00:40:00.400 --> 00:40:06.840 Now I know that. I think it's Joel. They adopted Joel and Francis 556 00:40:06.880 --> 00:40:12.239 McDormand they adopted children. So I always wondered if there was some connection to 557 00:40:12.280 --> 00:40:14.880 the fact of, oh, we can't have kids on our own kind of 558 00:40:14.880 --> 00:40:17.920 thing, that maybe that was another piece in here, But I have no 559 00:40:19.000 --> 00:40:22.440 way to know that I've read anything that said that. No, you're absolutely 560 00:40:22.519 --> 00:40:27.199 right, because I was reading about they had trouble adopting and that this was 561 00:40:27.679 --> 00:40:30.039 a reference to that. So yeah, you're totally right out in the money 562 00:40:30.079 --> 00:40:32.519 with that. So yeah, something went wrong with his Semen as well. 563 00:40:32.880 --> 00:40:38.679 But speaking of Francis McDormand, blood simple, she's so good in a dramatic 564 00:40:38.760 --> 00:40:44.239 role and then a year she's off the chain. I'm just like wow. 565 00:40:44.679 --> 00:40:47.199 And this is before really I knew who she was because I had seen this, 566 00:40:47.840 --> 00:40:51.239 And then when I was in high school, Fargo came out and I 567 00:40:51.280 --> 00:40:53.840 loved Fargo, where everybody's like, oh my god, And ever since she's 568 00:40:53.880 --> 00:40:59.679 been doing great work. The last thing I saw was actually the Macbeth that 569 00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:01.960 Old did by himself, and I thought she was phenomenal in there, because 570 00:41:02.079 --> 00:41:07.079 Macbeth is one of my favorites, but like her lying deliveries in here and 571 00:41:07.159 --> 00:41:10.679 the chemistry between her and Holly Hunter. Then there's a dip theory of tetan. 572 00:41:10.719 --> 00:41:14.400 It's what they call the dip tat. You gotta get him dip tet 573 00:41:14.400 --> 00:41:19.239 boosters yearly or else we'll develop lock john that vision. Then there's the smallpox 574 00:41:19.320 --> 00:41:22.400 vaccine, chicken pox and easels son if your kids anything like, oh, 575 00:41:22.480 --> 00:41:23.960 you're gonna have to get all those shots yourself first four? He'll ever take 576 00:41:24.039 --> 00:41:29.679 him? Who's your pediatrician? Anyway? When exactly fixed on one? Yet? 577 00:41:29.800 --> 00:41:32.519 Have we high? No? I guess we don't have one yet, 578 00:41:32.639 --> 00:41:36.880 Jess's what you gotta have one? You're gonna have one this instead? Yeah, 579 00:41:36.920 --> 00:41:38.000 Well, what if the buddy gets sick, honey, Even if he 580 00:41:38.039 --> 00:41:40.320 don't get sick, he's got to have his dip tat. He's gotta have 581 00:41:40.360 --> 00:41:45.719 his dip tet. Honey. He started his bank accounts yet? Have we 582 00:41:45.800 --> 00:41:47.400 done that? Honey? We gotta do that, honey. What's that for 583 00:41:47.599 --> 00:41:52.079 dot that? There's for his orthodontre and his university. Now you soak because 584 00:41:52.119 --> 00:41:53.480 thumb and I died and you might could buy without the orthodonti him on our 585 00:41:53.559 --> 00:41:59.079 thing off the university. Me right, you take that dipper off your head, 586 00:41:59.119 --> 00:42:02.239 you put it back onto your sister. Honey, what you probably got 587 00:42:02.280 --> 00:42:06.559 the life insurance all squared away? Have we done that yet? Honey? 588 00:42:07.880 --> 00:42:12.840 Got to that high and here's got our hands with this little angel man? 589 00:42:13.159 --> 00:42:15.360 What would end little angel do? Truck came long, splattered brains all over 590 00:42:15.400 --> 00:42:17.719 the interstate. Where would you be? Damn? Yeah, honey, what 591 00:42:17.760 --> 00:42:22.360 if you get run over? Where he got carried off by Twister and then 592 00:42:22.480 --> 00:42:27.000 Evil later on? Did he get his dip tit? I don't have kids, 593 00:42:27.000 --> 00:42:30.280 so I don't know anyone who has children if they run into people like 594 00:42:30.360 --> 00:42:34.519 this where it's oh you have a kid. Now, let me impart my 595 00:42:34.599 --> 00:42:37.400 wisdom to you. Let me tell you all of these things. And I 596 00:42:37.480 --> 00:42:40.480 just love the fact that like every time someone takes Nathan, they gotta grab 597 00:42:40.519 --> 00:42:45.000 the doctor Spock book. You have to get the doctor Spock book, the 598 00:42:45.079 --> 00:42:50.000 instruction maybe yeah, yeah. They have to rename the baby too. Each 599 00:42:50.039 --> 00:42:54.960 time somebody tries to take him, it becomes Gail Junior, Nevill Evil Junior 600 00:42:55.400 --> 00:43:00.800 High Junior. Guess we'll be calling him Glenn Junior. They don't even know 601 00:43:00.079 --> 00:43:05.320 for sure if that's Nathan Junior. I think that's Nathan Junior, as Dad 602 00:43:05.360 --> 00:43:09.599 says, but he doesn't even know for sure which one he is. Having 603 00:43:09.639 --> 00:43:15.719 all of these couples as examples, having Dot and Glenn and then having Evil 604 00:43:15.920 --> 00:43:22.480 and Gale. Snokes William Forsyth. You talk about how you didn't recognize Francis 605 00:43:22.559 --> 00:43:27.760 mcdormant. She's got that great horrible wig on and just the over makeup and 606 00:43:27.800 --> 00:43:31.119 all this stuff. William Forsyth. People will tell you that he's not in 607 00:43:31.119 --> 00:43:37.159 this movie because after this he grows this badass mustache start. He starts pitching 608 00:43:37.199 --> 00:43:44.679 his voice down about an octave or more and just becomes this like badass investigator, 609 00:43:45.039 --> 00:43:47.719 serial killer, murderer type of guy where you're just like, really, 610 00:43:47.880 --> 00:43:53.039 that's sweet, little gay. The only other movie that I remember him is 611 00:43:53.079 --> 00:43:57.440 a character that I really liked as a kid. I haven't seen it since 612 00:43:57.960 --> 00:44:02.400 is We played Flattop in Dick Tray and I really liked like his character worked 613 00:44:02.400 --> 00:44:06.920 there, and then I liked him in Here, and then I've seen him 614 00:44:06.920 --> 00:44:09.840 in the market crime film stuff that came out and that kind of neo no 615 00:44:09.960 --> 00:44:13.559 our stuff in the nineties. I think he was in things of doing Denver 616 00:44:13.599 --> 00:44:16.679 when You're Dead or something. He was in that. But I've always really 617 00:44:16.719 --> 00:44:21.760 liked him. But like I said, this character, this type of performance, 618 00:44:21.800 --> 00:44:24.000 it's like I've never seen him do anything like this since. No, 619 00:44:24.280 --> 00:44:28.199 he's so good. And I'm sorry I called him Gil. He's actually evil. 620 00:44:28.719 --> 00:44:31.039 I don't want the tweets to be coming at me, because I'm sure 621 00:44:31.079 --> 00:44:35.159 there are a lot of evil fans out there. But then this was also 622 00:44:35.280 --> 00:44:39.519 the movie where the Cohens started to work with John Goodman, and to this 623 00:44:39.639 --> 00:44:43.159 day, I don't know if he was in Macbeth, but he sure has 624 00:44:43.159 --> 00:44:45.880 been in a lot of Cohen Brothers movies, both the serious ones and the 625 00:44:45.960 --> 00:44:51.480 comedies. And my god, he is just so good. I just love 626 00:44:51.599 --> 00:44:54.280 these guys, and I love to talk about communication again. I love when 627 00:44:54.280 --> 00:44:59.599 they break out a prison and they just are screaming it just and then later 628 00:44:59.639 --> 00:45:05.000 on they misplaced Nathan Junr they're screaming again. There's no communication whatsoever. There's 629 00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:09.760 just decretural screams that they're just laying out to us and pounding on the roof 630 00:45:09.800 --> 00:45:15.239 of the car. Or even when they're like doing their hair at the gas 631 00:45:15.280 --> 00:45:17.440 station, they turn to each other and they start screaming at each other. 632 00:45:17.760 --> 00:45:23.719 They God. But speaking of screaming, like their entry into the film after 633 00:45:23.760 --> 00:45:29.559 that group session is like a birth, like they're coming out of the ground. 634 00:45:29.679 --> 00:45:32.400 They're being berthed. And then I think they did this on purpose with 635 00:45:32.480 --> 00:45:37.079 them, it's probably planned. But you'll notice that out of the two, 636 00:45:37.159 --> 00:45:39.760 I would say that Evil is I used to pitch down a little bit, 637 00:45:40.119 --> 00:45:45.199 and he's reached birth like he he's borne by his leg Like, he doesn't 638 00:45:45.199 --> 00:45:47.599 come out head first, he comes out by his feet. So therefore, 639 00:45:47.599 --> 00:45:51.199 of course he might be a little more twisted, I guess, is what 640 00:45:51.239 --> 00:45:53.599 they're saying. Okay, just the little things that he does yet oh good 641 00:45:53.639 --> 00:45:59.760 cereal flakes, Miss Brandena, Oh, just so many good lines and yeah, 642 00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:02.000 and then of course the start of the show, just Nicholas Cage, 643 00:46:02.239 --> 00:46:07.920 what a performance. There's so many little things in here, like incredible chase 644 00:46:07.000 --> 00:46:10.840 scene that happens, and just that the Cohens just have to keep adding to 645 00:46:10.920 --> 00:46:15.320 it and adding to it. Once the dogs show up, it's just holy 646 00:46:15.440 --> 00:46:21.000 cow. What And when he goes into the grocery store and suddenly the music 647 00:46:21.079 --> 00:46:25.159 changes to a music version of the raising Arizona theme but I love that moment 648 00:46:25.239 --> 00:46:30.960 when the guy that is working at the grocery store is using a shotgun and 649 00:46:30.079 --> 00:46:36.280 at one point High's running down the lane and comes to the end and sees 650 00:46:36.320 --> 00:46:39.840 that guy with the shotgun. Just that look on Nick Cage's face, just 651 00:46:39.880 --> 00:46:44.280 this kind of like little like why is this happening to me? Kind of 652 00:46:44.280 --> 00:46:47.079 thing, And he doesn't seem like he's put out. He just turns around, 653 00:46:47.119 --> 00:46:52.719 puts that Huggi's container under the other arm, and starts running back as 654 00:46:52.719 --> 00:46:58.599 this guy's just shooting wildly in the store, not to be outdone by the 655 00:46:58.599 --> 00:47:04.840 cops though. That just loved shoot constantly, And when the one cop falls 656 00:47:04.840 --> 00:47:09.360 out of his own cop car at the convenience store, that never fails to 657 00:47:09.440 --> 00:47:14.199 him. Use me. I loves the love the old man in the truck 658 00:47:14.480 --> 00:47:17.719 where he stops him and he's got a penny on your head, and then 659 00:47:17.760 --> 00:47:22.800 when they stop and they go through the window because there's no window in the 660 00:47:22.840 --> 00:47:25.960 truck, and then he gets up and runs into the house. Everybody runs 661 00:47:25.960 --> 00:47:29.320 through the house, and the dogs go through the house, and the family's 662 00:47:29.360 --> 00:47:34.039 just sitting there watching TV. That's just they're watching TV, and there's a 663 00:47:34.119 --> 00:47:38.760 Nathan Arizona commercial on the TV. And I love when he runs into that 664 00:47:38.880 --> 00:47:43.800 house and he turns and says thank you to the guy before he ends in 665 00:47:43.960 --> 00:47:47.519 the house. Just all those little lines that they're doing, just the little 666 00:47:47.599 --> 00:47:52.159 like sometimes adr stuff that they occasionally stick in, that one character who is 667 00:47:52.159 --> 00:47:58.639 completely adr don't forget the bouquet ed just I love that they have these things. 668 00:47:59.159 --> 00:48:01.800 Well. Also what I caught I mean the whole gun craziness thing. 669 00:48:02.039 --> 00:48:06.679 I mean, still very much America, but they caught it really early. 670 00:48:06.760 --> 00:48:09.320 This idea that that guy in the store just has a shotgun ready to go 671 00:48:09.400 --> 00:48:13.360 and it's like, oh, an excuse to use it again. It's always 672 00:48:13.400 --> 00:48:16.440 fun, but there's something about the violence of America that the film really captures. 673 00:48:16.480 --> 00:48:20.639 And again that's why I think Pie sticks out because he's so not a 674 00:48:20.719 --> 00:48:24.199 violent guy in the and really he's surrounded by people who are more violent and 675 00:48:24.239 --> 00:48:29.000 there it's a whole country and that's where to use their guns and looks forward 676 00:48:29.039 --> 00:48:30.320 to it. It's like, oh, I give the shooting somebody. Yeah, 677 00:48:30.880 --> 00:48:34.159 And he's like the one guy who's gun has never loaded, which I 678 00:48:34.159 --> 00:48:37.440 think is really really sort of interesting because it's it's everybody has a gun. 679 00:48:37.719 --> 00:48:43.360 It's weird. It's guns not loaded, but he's shooting blanks. Or Ed's 680 00:48:43.440 --> 00:48:46.639 insides truly are a rocky place where his seed can find out purchase rob we're 681 00:48:46.639 --> 00:48:51.639 talking about quotable lines. There are so many things that I say from this 682 00:48:51.679 --> 00:48:55.760 movie all the time. I love when Ed is so mad at high about 683 00:48:55.760 --> 00:49:00.239 allowing the Snops brothers to be there, and Hi does that whole thing? 684 00:49:00.719 --> 00:49:06.000 Well, no, you gotta have a little charity, you know, an 685 00:49:06.000 --> 00:49:10.639 air Lands sit out a plate, just this delivery, just the pauses and 686 00:49:12.360 --> 00:49:16.400 when he goes low, and I am sad. It sounds like the Cohens 687 00:49:16.519 --> 00:49:20.920 didn't get along with Nick Cage as well as they could have. It's not 688 00:49:21.519 --> 00:49:27.679 John Goodman or Clooney or who's another one that they work with, Jeff Bridges. 689 00:49:28.280 --> 00:49:31.960 It's not like that type of relationship see BUSHEMI. Unfortunately they didn't get 690 00:49:31.960 --> 00:49:35.800 along real well. So that's why Nick Cage has him been back in another 691 00:49:35.880 --> 00:49:38.239 one of these movies. But my god, it feels like real lightning in 692 00:49:38.280 --> 00:49:43.599 a bottle to have him at that point in his career, especially where he 693 00:49:43.679 --> 00:49:47.039 was just balls to the wall. He hasn't really ever slowed down, of 694 00:49:47.039 --> 00:49:52.360 course, but some performances are better than others. This one is right there 695 00:49:52.400 --> 00:49:54.440 at the top for me. And then the Cohen brothers. This is not 696 00:49:54.519 --> 00:50:00.239 a sophomore slum ladies and gentlemen. This is kicking their career into a old 697 00:50:00.320 --> 00:50:04.519 different gear. Yes, I love Blood Simple as well, but coming off 698 00:50:04.559 --> 00:50:07.239 of that into this, I can see where we really would have turned some 699 00:50:07.280 --> 00:50:10.800 people off, and I definitely read a lot of those reviews as well. 700 00:50:12.199 --> 00:50:15.559 But my goodness, does this movie still hold a special place in my heart. 701 00:50:16.159 --> 00:50:22.159 The other aspect that I think really works for me is that they're dramatic 702 00:50:22.199 --> 00:50:28.639 films, and especially they're absurdist ones really have this lived in field. There's 703 00:50:28.639 --> 00:50:31.880 a real quality to the universe that they build, and it's even just through 704 00:50:31.920 --> 00:50:37.039 small things. But like I said, with this film out there and not 705 00:50:37.559 --> 00:50:45.079 realistic, but it still feels so authentic in a way. And I think 706 00:50:45.119 --> 00:50:49.039 that anyone who would try to make a comedy would probably play it more safe 707 00:50:49.079 --> 00:50:52.519 and go, we're just playing in contemporary time. We're just playing in the 708 00:50:52.559 --> 00:50:57.400 way people speak and the things that they're concerned about. Most people would never 709 00:50:57.440 --> 00:51:00.360 try to do this high wire act. Of what it is is that they 710 00:51:00.400 --> 00:51:05.920 do in this film in that way you're talking about genre conventions and kidnapping being 711 00:51:05.960 --> 00:51:10.000 a great trope for crime films. It feels like we have seen parts of 712 00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:15.360 this movie in other movies since then, and it's nowhere near this outrageousness. 713 00:51:15.840 --> 00:51:21.559 Okay, maybe Jason Segel started in a movie that was something like this, 714 00:51:21.679 --> 00:51:25.880 but just that insanity. And I love that they had a rule on set 715 00:51:25.960 --> 00:51:30.840 which was everything had to be wacky. Hey, Barry, is this shot 716 00:51:30.880 --> 00:51:35.760 going to be wacky? And just really trying to go all out with that. 717 00:51:35.960 --> 00:51:40.480 It's every shot counts man, everything, and these guys coming from an 718 00:51:40.599 --> 00:51:45.039 editing background, this thing is edited to within an inch of its life. 719 00:51:45.079 --> 00:51:51.280 It is so tight. There's nothing that's wasted in this and it's almost unfair 720 00:51:51.280 --> 00:51:57.480 that they give us this amazing precredit sequence because after that you can't keep that 721 00:51:57.639 --> 00:52:01.039 pace up. If you were to start the movie like when the credits start, 722 00:52:01.559 --> 00:52:05.519 of course, you're missing out on all the backstory and where we're at 723 00:52:05.519 --> 00:52:12.239 with this. But the movie that comes after that is really again very tightly 724 00:52:12.360 --> 00:52:15.679 edited, moves at a pretty darn good pace, but it doesn't move at 725 00:52:15.679 --> 00:52:17.400 that same pace as the rest of the movie. But it's nice. It 726 00:52:17.400 --> 00:52:22.760 gives you a little bit of a breather. When you get to that kidnapping 727 00:52:22.800 --> 00:52:28.159 scene, you're just like, huh, okay, let's enjoy watching these babies 728 00:52:28.280 --> 00:52:31.400 terrorized Nicholas Cage for a little while. I actually looked at the opening. 729 00:52:31.400 --> 00:52:35.559 I wanted to see how they wrote the opening in the script that you had, 730 00:52:35.880 --> 00:52:38.679 and it's all there, and it was amazing because I figured that, 731 00:52:38.719 --> 00:52:43.840 oh, it's voiced over, so maybe they added that in later or things 732 00:52:43.880 --> 00:52:46.960 like that. But no, it was very meticulous and they do exactly what 733 00:52:47.039 --> 00:52:52.800 they were visualizing to do it, and I can't think of anyone who's done 734 00:52:53.400 --> 00:52:59.559 like a big sequence like that kind of brings you in that way, especially 735 00:52:59.559 --> 00:53:04.519 for a medio's usually it's set up in a meet cute or something and then 736 00:53:04.559 --> 00:53:08.400 you're off for the next eighty minutes after that or something. That first eleven 737 00:53:08.440 --> 00:53:14.079 minutes could be a full movie in somebody else's hands. And just the weirdness 738 00:53:14.119 --> 00:53:16.559 at that time, particularly, we've gotten more used to the convention now of 739 00:53:17.119 --> 00:53:22.880 credits coming in at strange times, but it was very odd at that point 740 00:53:22.920 --> 00:53:27.239 in movie making to have the credits start like twelve minutes into the movie. 741 00:53:27.519 --> 00:53:30.920 I mean, you're basically so far into the film when that first sequence ends 742 00:53:30.960 --> 00:53:34.559 and the title comes up. And that was, as I remember, at 743 00:53:34.599 --> 00:53:36.960 least very kind of bowls for the time, because it was, you know, 744 00:53:37.039 --> 00:53:38.840 things send it to be very you know normal. You'd start with the 745 00:53:38.880 --> 00:53:42.800 credits, or there'd be one little teaser minute or two and you a doubt 746 00:53:42.800 --> 00:53:45.840 the credits, and this was like your way into the movie. It's always 747 00:53:45.880 --> 00:53:47.800 like, forgot, we didn't see credits and you're in the middle of the 748 00:53:47.800 --> 00:53:51.480 story and then the credits sort of interrupted. It's like, oh, right, 749 00:53:51.679 --> 00:53:53.920 credit, We're watching a movie where it's kind of it was. I 750 00:53:53.960 --> 00:53:59.599 just remember that was a very unusual and cool thing to do at that time. 751 00:53:59.639 --> 00:54:00.440 I mean now I feel like other people have done it, but it 752 00:54:01.000 --> 00:54:05.280 back then. I can't think of any other films that had that structure. 753 00:54:05.639 --> 00:54:07.400 Yeah, I think the closest you're going to get is like a James Bond 754 00:54:07.440 --> 00:54:13.000 film. But that's still, like you said, three minutes tops before the 755 00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:17.639 credits start for that, not eleven minutes. Not this continuous music that starts. 756 00:54:17.800 --> 00:54:22.800 I think like as soon as you see high walk onto the screen and 757 00:54:22.920 --> 00:54:27.000 start to talk, you hear that strum of the banjo and we're off to 758 00:54:27.039 --> 00:54:30.360 the races. And then yeah, when those credits come up and you get 759 00:54:30.400 --> 00:54:34.199 that amazing yode leging that goes with it. All, Right, we are 760 00:54:34.199 --> 00:54:37.880 watching something very special here. And what's cool is it's edited so tight and 761 00:54:37.920 --> 00:54:43.119 it moves really well, but it doesn't feel rushed. I'm not a fan 762 00:54:43.199 --> 00:54:45.880 of movies that feel like they're rushing it, and this movie is yeah, 763 00:54:45.960 --> 00:54:49.360 in the same way that they do a remarkable thing of kind of making funny 764 00:54:49.440 --> 00:54:52.280 characters and loving them and honoring them. At this they like they edit it's 765 00:54:52.320 --> 00:54:55.719 early kite and it moves really fast, but I never feel like, oh, 766 00:54:55.719 --> 00:54:59.039 we're rushing through this. I never feel like, oh, we're just 767 00:54:59.119 --> 00:55:01.519 kind of get to the next day. It always feels very deliberate, even 768 00:55:01.519 --> 00:55:06.760 though it's very quick, and that's really hard. You don't see that often 769 00:55:06.840 --> 00:55:09.000 because when you go at that basic usually feels like you're missing thing. It 770 00:55:09.079 --> 00:55:14.440 usually feels like you're jumping overstuff. And somehow, as filmmakers, they know 771 00:55:15.000 --> 00:55:19.480 how to make it so full that it doesn't feel like you're being cheated or 772 00:55:19.519 --> 00:55:24.159 you're being rushed through the story. And that's tough and that's part that I 773 00:55:24.199 --> 00:55:30.719 wonder how much of that previous work, like when you talk about Joel's work 774 00:55:30.800 --> 00:55:35.239 as an editor before he became a director, that he was able to go, 775 00:55:35.360 --> 00:55:37.039 Okay, I know how to do this much the same way. I 776 00:55:37.039 --> 00:55:40.559 think there might be a corollary in that way with Martin Scorsese, because he 777 00:55:40.639 --> 00:55:46.159 was editing before he really got into his directing career and really understanding how to 778 00:55:46.199 --> 00:55:50.360 make those edits, how to use the pacing, how to use the music, 779 00:55:50.400 --> 00:55:53.840 how to do all of those things. I think sometimes directors come in 780 00:55:53.880 --> 00:55:57.159 and they're just like, I have a really good visual sense, or really 781 00:55:57.519 --> 00:56:00.360 I can write a script and a very good sense of character and dial but 782 00:56:00.519 --> 00:56:04.719 sometimes that pacing, like you were saying, that's a special thing unto itself 783 00:56:05.000 --> 00:56:07.960 when you're talking about the script and just how tight the script is. And 784 00:56:08.239 --> 00:56:10.840 Keith, feel free to call bullshit on this. But this is a story 785 00:56:10.840 --> 00:56:14.840 I heard a long time ago about the Kohen Brothers. I might use the 786 00:56:14.880 --> 00:56:17.119 wrong terminology, so you might need to correct me on this one. I 787 00:56:17.119 --> 00:56:23.599 think it was The Big Lebowski and Jeff Bridges was talking to John Goodman and 788 00:56:23.679 --> 00:56:28.400 he was so confused because there were no I think they were calling them blue 789 00:56:28.480 --> 00:56:32.039 pages in this that every night when you're an actor, you get pages slid 790 00:56:32.119 --> 00:56:36.840 under the door, and then now I have to learn the lines again or 791 00:56:36.960 --> 00:56:39.320 learn new lines for the next morning. And he's like, there's no blue 792 00:56:39.320 --> 00:56:43.119 pages, and goodman, no, this is the Kohen Brothers. There are 793 00:56:43.239 --> 00:56:46.119 no blue pages. What you read, what you signed on to, is 794 00:56:46.159 --> 00:56:51.360 the script that we are shooting. There's no deviation from this. And I 795 00:56:51.360 --> 00:56:53.559 think that is unusual. I mean that, I mean it's not bullshit. 796 00:56:53.719 --> 00:57:00.400 Most movies, what are their commercial or even are films most Now you're a 797 00:57:00.480 --> 00:57:04.199 change and your people rewrite as the films being shot. They see something an 798 00:57:04.199 --> 00:57:06.719 actor is doing and they want more of it or less of it wherever they 799 00:57:06.800 --> 00:57:12.119 you know something, And it's a rare thing to write a script and go 800 00:57:12.760 --> 00:57:15.400 that's the story we're telling me. I don't think they're the only people to 801 00:57:15.559 --> 00:57:19.119 do it, but they do have the reputation that they don't rewrite. They 802 00:57:19.239 --> 00:57:22.119 very rarely rewrite, and if they do, it's minimal. But I'm shure, 803 00:57:22.199 --> 00:57:24.880 yeah, it's But again that goes back to the poetry. They're right, 804 00:57:24.960 --> 00:57:30.320 I mean, they write their films are it's funny because they're so visual 805 00:57:30.519 --> 00:57:34.480 and we think of them as these amazing visual artists, but they're also really 806 00:57:34.559 --> 00:57:39.639 written. They're beautifully written pieces. The dialogue is thoughtful and poetic, and 807 00:57:39.880 --> 00:57:44.800 the words are specific, and you know, every generation's got a few people 808 00:57:44.880 --> 00:57:47.519 like that, Harold Pinter, Dennis pot or you know, they're they're writers 809 00:57:47.559 --> 00:57:52.400 that write with just beautiful use of language and deliberate use of language. And 810 00:57:52.400 --> 00:57:55.199 I think the Cohens don't get enough credit for that. They get credit, 811 00:57:55.239 --> 00:58:00.599 people knowledge it, but because their visual style is so fond and free and 812 00:58:00.639 --> 00:58:06.719 crazy seeming, people forget how amazing their words are. And yeah, I 813 00:58:06.719 --> 00:58:09.360 imagine you get that script and that's the script, and that's what it is. 814 00:58:09.360 --> 00:58:14.039 What I've heard. I know that story, but I've heard similar stories 815 00:58:14.039 --> 00:58:16.320 about how little they change things and how much it takes to get them to 816 00:58:16.400 --> 00:58:20.440 change anything during production like that that's something they really don't like to do. 817 00:58:20.880 --> 00:58:24.679 I mean, the other element of this is because they give us that open 818 00:58:25.199 --> 00:58:30.239 and then we have those dream sequences that the ending can work the way that 819 00:58:30.280 --> 00:58:32.920 it does. And I think that's the place where we're talking about, like 820 00:58:34.159 --> 00:58:38.320 the humanity again, where it's going there is redemption that there is. Yeah, 821 00:58:38.400 --> 00:58:43.280 you're all goofballs, but we know that your heart's in the right place. 822 00:58:43.599 --> 00:58:45.480 You know, you're trying to do the right thing. And I always 823 00:58:45.519 --> 00:58:49.920 like the ending. I thought the ending was really well done. Yeah, 824 00:58:49.960 --> 00:58:52.119 for me, the ending makes the film. I mean, to me, 825 00:58:52.880 --> 00:58:55.599 the ending takes the film to another level because I find it so moving that 826 00:58:55.760 --> 00:59:00.760 I get choked up. I mean, I you know, here's this completely 827 00:59:00.880 --> 00:59:05.000 cartoon, over the top, silly film and the last five minutes make you 828 00:59:05.000 --> 00:59:07.880 want to cry every time I see it, and it's so beautiful because you 829 00:59:07.960 --> 00:59:10.599 don't imagine a film like that it's going to go there. You don't this 830 00:59:10.679 --> 00:59:15.239 kind of film should end on a big, wacky final joke and that's end 831 00:59:15.280 --> 00:59:20.880 of the movie. And instead it ends on a really deep consideration of family 832 00:59:21.000 --> 00:59:27.719 and meaning and connection and generations and love and super heartfelt. I mean, 833 00:59:28.159 --> 00:59:30.800 by all rights, shouldn't work. It should feel like, whoa, this 834 00:59:30.840 --> 00:59:32.440 is a different movie. You can't put that, and they just it's so 835 00:59:32.519 --> 00:59:37.320 beautiful. It just comes right out of everything we watch and you realize how 836 00:59:37.400 --> 00:59:39.119 much it's been laid in. I mean, you couldn't just PLoP that on, 837 00:59:39.280 --> 00:59:42.480 you know, on a Hollywood film that it would I could see something 838 00:59:42.800 --> 00:59:45.880 saying, well put some put some heartfelt in the end there, and it 839 00:59:45.960 --> 00:59:50.519 would just feel like that. And here you realize how brilliantly they have woven 840 00:59:50.559 --> 00:59:54.159 through this completely silly movie the strains that will lead you to somewhere that really 841 00:59:54.800 --> 01:00:02.159 is a deep embrace of humanity and love and caring and family and that we 842 01:00:02.440 --> 01:00:07.400 gro old and die. But the next generation takes that all on and I 843 01:00:07.440 --> 01:00:12.239 mean, it's it's gorgeous, and it's it's you know that Belonged could be 844 01:00:12.239 --> 01:00:17.239 in any drama and it's remarkable because it it on paper would be impossible to 845 01:00:17.280 --> 01:00:22.079 do, and yet they do it. We're talking about the editing background of 846 01:00:22.199 --> 01:00:27.039 Joel and how that adds in. But I wonder if you guys think that 847 01:00:27.079 --> 01:00:32.280 this is where the philosophy major Ethan comes in, where he's looking at philosophy 848 01:00:32.400 --> 01:00:39.320 and humanity and man grapfully with truth and everything that is the human existence and 849 01:00:39.360 --> 01:00:45.840 then plowing that into the films, because I think that's another kind of a 850 01:00:45.000 --> 01:00:50.800 tour piece that runs through their thing is always these existential questions, always these 851 01:00:50.880 --> 01:00:54.199 questions of humanity that run through all of their films freely that's a real one 852 01:00:54.280 --> 01:00:59.760 two punch too, because you get that dream sequence. But even before that, 853 01:00:59.800 --> 01:01:05.400 you get the confrontation between Nathan and then High and Ed, and like 854 01:01:05.440 --> 01:01:08.239 you were saying before, he could be a real jerk about things, but 855 01:01:08.320 --> 01:01:13.920 instead he shows us that humanity that we didn't necessarily see when he was talking 856 01:01:13.920 --> 01:01:17.679 about how Miles is so dumb and that if if Frog had wins, it 857 01:01:17.679 --> 01:01:22.880 wouldn't bump his as happen, and he's just so top of things, you 858 01:01:22.920 --> 01:01:27.599 know, why wait, the security guard kind of thing, and then here 859 01:01:27.679 --> 01:01:30.559 he's just so nice to them. Of course, he's still cheap. He's 860 01:01:30.639 --> 01:01:35.079 trying to use a line of credit at his stores instead of actually given a 861 01:01:35.199 --> 01:01:38.960 reward, but when he realizes who they are, and he does that whole 862 01:01:38.960 --> 01:01:44.840 thing about keep trying and him and you really get the feeling there how much 863 01:01:44.840 --> 01:01:47.880 he loves Florence, how he knows that he's blessed to have all these kids, 864 01:01:49.400 --> 01:01:52.519 and that he tells Hi to sleep on it. And I love when 865 01:01:52.559 --> 01:01:55.039 he's just like, sleep on it, because we know what sleep In this 866 01:01:55.119 --> 01:02:00.639 movie comes dreams, and we get that great montage too of him dreaming of 867 01:02:00.719 --> 01:02:06.280 High dreaming, and then all of the other people dreaming, the Snopes brothers 868 01:02:06.360 --> 01:02:12.239 going back to jail, just getting all of these little threads tied up before 869 01:02:12.280 --> 01:02:15.920 we go into that sequence, which just has I think that's three different parts 870 01:02:15.960 --> 01:02:21.679 to it as well. There's the whole thing of Nathan opening up the present 871 01:02:21.800 --> 01:02:25.039 and then showing him later on winning the football game, and then that whole 872 01:02:25.079 --> 01:02:30.000 like, now we go deeper farther into the future where we don't know anything 873 01:02:30.119 --> 01:02:34.280 and it may not be Arizona, that maybe Utah and I love that we 874 01:02:34.400 --> 01:02:37.719 have a little button on there, but it's not that, like you were 875 01:02:37.719 --> 01:02:40.679 saying, sprinkle heartfeltness on there. There's just a little tiny joke at the 876 01:02:40.800 --> 01:02:47.519 end after you get that amazing like Norman Rockwell pull out across the table with 877 01:02:47.559 --> 01:02:52.159 all the food and all the family, and then that the old couple that 878 01:02:52.239 --> 01:02:58.679 we never see their faces and just hunched over and looking at how wonderful the 879 01:02:58.960 --> 01:03:02.159 life has turned out. Just choke me up as well. And what's funny 880 01:03:02.199 --> 01:03:06.679 is I actually think the little bits of humor that are in there, whether 881 01:03:06.840 --> 01:03:12.840 it's Nathan still trying to be cheap or the very wonderful last line about Utah 882 01:03:13.400 --> 01:03:15.719 again, part of what make it work. If they've gotten completely serious that 883 01:03:15.800 --> 01:03:20.559 they dropped the sense of humor, then it would be suddenly like, oh, 884 01:03:20.559 --> 01:03:22.519 wait a minute, this is another movie, but what the line, 885 01:03:22.519 --> 01:03:27.360 and it is may talk about threading a needle. They keep just enough of 886 01:03:27.440 --> 01:03:30.159 the absurdity in the humor that you're in the same movie. It's just that 887 01:03:30.239 --> 01:03:36.239 same movie now is super moving and super d but it's still the movie you've 888 01:03:36.280 --> 01:03:40.079 been watching. And you know, for anybody's ever made a movie or written 889 01:03:40.079 --> 01:03:44.320 a book or whatever you've done, I mean, you know how hard that 890 01:03:44.519 --> 01:03:47.599 is. I mean, that's like, that's really hard to like introduce an 891 01:03:47.760 --> 01:03:52.760 entire new level to something right at the end, but not they could feel 892 01:03:52.920 --> 01:03:57.000 divorced from what you've been. I mean that is that's like some kind of 893 01:03:57.199 --> 01:04:00.719 acrobatic feet and they do it so easily that it doesn't I think you don't 894 01:04:00.719 --> 01:04:04.159 realize how tough that would be. But that could have gone south about eighty 895 01:04:04.159 --> 01:04:08.920 five thousand ways. And boy, they make it just without a ripple, 896 01:04:09.199 --> 01:04:12.880 because I know at one point when he's dreaming, the music that is in 897 01:04:13.000 --> 01:04:20.119 his dream eventually becomes diagetic with Ed singing that horrific lumma bye. It's a 898 01:04:20.199 --> 01:04:24.960 murder ballad. Actually I looked it up. Yeah, it's Rose Connolly is 899 01:04:24.960 --> 01:04:28.800 the name of the song. Yeah, And then I love that it's like 900 01:04:28.840 --> 01:04:31.760 this beautiful music in a stream and then you hear and she's singing that to 901 01:04:31.880 --> 01:04:34.639 this little baby, and I'm like, Okay, I guess that works. 902 01:04:34.760 --> 01:04:39.599 You have a pleasant song, but the lyrics are pretty horrific. And I 903 01:04:39.639 --> 01:04:43.639 can't remember if they use that again when High is dreaming in the future. 904 01:04:44.159 --> 01:04:46.039 Well, I think that's the theme that musically is the theme that runs with 905 01:04:46.079 --> 01:04:49.880 the whole piece. And that's it's so interesting because it's utie piece of music 906 01:04:49.920 --> 01:04:54.320 and then she sings it and it really is beautiful and it's really horrifying. 907 01:04:54.519 --> 01:04:59.360 And again it's that it's that dichotomy that they're just all through all their films, 908 01:04:59.360 --> 01:05:03.000 but this one pretty everything's a psychotic everything is beautiful and ugly and hysterically 909 01:05:03.000 --> 01:05:08.559 funny and really real. And you know that's another and that one seems very 910 01:05:08.559 --> 01:05:12.519 attentional. It's really gorgeous melody, and even when she's singing it, the 911 01:05:12.599 --> 01:05:15.119 first few lines you hear are not that horrific. He kind of takes a 912 01:05:15.119 --> 01:05:19.039 bit to realize, what if she's singing. But of course that's very much 913 01:05:19.039 --> 01:05:21.360 part of the draw of tradition with kids. And I mean, think about 914 01:05:21.400 --> 01:05:26.119 me. Nursery rhymes, they're really dark. I mean rock a bye baby, 915 01:05:26.159 --> 01:05:29.239 down, will come, cradle baby baby, nursery rhyme drake full of 916 01:05:29.400 --> 01:05:34.000 depth and loss and injury. And that's a really interesting thing about human beings. 917 01:05:34.079 --> 01:05:36.840 I think their films kind of capture that. But there's somebody about that 918 01:05:38.360 --> 01:05:42.480 weird counterpoint that we all seem to be drawn to without even being aware of 919 01:05:42.519 --> 01:05:45.840 it. I also took it like how we were talking about the Beethoven piece 920 01:05:45.880 --> 01:05:51.280 and how it's done with what we would consider folk instrument. Murder ballads would 921 01:05:51.320 --> 01:05:56.360 have been normal to people from Appalachia or something like that, who probably would 922 01:05:56.400 --> 01:06:00.519 have moved west during the dust Bowl or something, and they brought these old 923 01:06:00.920 --> 01:06:04.760 folk songs with them. So to me, it is that mashup of high 924 01:06:04.800 --> 01:06:10.480 culture low culture, and it's say, it still cracks me up talking about 925 01:06:10.480 --> 01:06:14.079 that chase where he goes into the grocery store and it becomes a music version 926 01:06:14.159 --> 01:06:17.800 like that just perfect me. You know. That was one thing that my 927 01:06:17.880 --> 01:06:20.920 friend pointed out to me as we were watching, and I was just like, 928 01:06:21.480 --> 01:06:25.960 Wow, that is really clever. It was like the Long Goodbye and 929 01:06:26.039 --> 01:06:30.480 just all the different versions of the Long Goodbye song that John Williams wrote, 930 01:06:30.800 --> 01:06:34.400 and how he just will I think in there it's the Long Goodbye music version 931 01:06:34.480 --> 01:06:39.559 when Philip Marlowe goes in to buy cat food for his cat at three in 932 01:06:39.599 --> 01:06:42.599 the morning or whatever, and then he goes up and he writes a check 933 01:06:42.679 --> 01:06:45.360 for sixty nine cents. Oh wait, no, I'm thinking of another detective 934 01:06:45.400 --> 01:06:49.239 movie that these guys worked on. It's so funny that I went and saw 935 01:06:49.480 --> 01:06:54.440 I think Big Lebowski's having its twenty fifth anniversary this year, and I just 936 01:06:54.440 --> 01:06:59.239 went to see a screening and I took my in laws, and they don't 937 01:06:59.280 --> 01:07:02.719 really care for swearing, so I don't think that they necessarily had a great 938 01:07:02.760 --> 01:07:06.559 time watching this. And then it's still funny to watch Labowski. And then 939 01:07:06.639 --> 01:07:12.239 you come back to this and this is basically like a kid's film compared to 940 01:07:12.519 --> 01:07:15.360 Labowski. It's one of those where I'm like, yeah, I could probably 941 01:07:15.400 --> 01:07:20.559 show this to like a ten twelve year old, but no problems. It 942 01:07:20.559 --> 01:07:25.480 does get violent at times, but it's almost always cartoonish violence, like when 943 01:07:25.480 --> 01:07:29.320 he is riding on John Goodman's back and pulling at his face and stuff. 944 01:07:29.360 --> 01:07:33.039 For I'd love that little detail when High reaches up to like pound on him 945 01:07:33.039 --> 01:07:42.400 and he scrapes his hand across the popcorn seat. Just all those little things, 946 01:07:42.400 --> 01:07:46.840 those amazing camera angles on good Men and Cage is they're flying around and 947 01:07:47.280 --> 01:07:53.800 Cage's feet going around destroying that entire trailer, and how thin the wall is 948 01:07:53.840 --> 01:07:58.159 when he gets thrown through the wall. There's not one moment of this movie 949 01:07:58.199 --> 01:08:00.400 roo. I'm just like, oh, yeah, this would this is the 950 01:08:00.440 --> 01:08:03.239 one sour note. I don't think there are any sour notes to this film. 951 01:08:03.440 --> 01:08:09.280 No, it's yeah, one of my favorites. It's so good. 952 01:08:10.800 --> 01:08:12.800 All right, we're going to take a break and we'll be back with an 953 01:08:12.840 --> 01:08:16.439 interview with Joseph McBride, author of the Whole during Human Comedy Life according to 954 01:08:16.479 --> 01:08:20.680 the Cohen Brothers, and we'll be back with that right after these brief messages. 955 01:08:21.920 --> 01:08:26.720 Hello, this is Will, a writer of three films plus a Christmas 956 01:08:26.760 --> 01:08:29.760 special, And this is Kevin, a writer of one in a bit films 957 01:08:29.760 --> 01:08:32.119 of three and a bit episodes of TV. Okay, we're screenwriters by day, 958 01:08:32.319 --> 01:08:38.000 podcasters by night. Yeah, okay, Batman, and we're the hosts 959 01:08:38.000 --> 01:08:41.319 of the Best Bits I Show, where each episode we pick our favorite film 960 01:08:41.359 --> 01:08:47.119 scenes for randomly selected, weirdly specific themes such as best fighting sex scene and 961 01:08:47.640 --> 01:08:50.880 best Tom Cruise running scene. Why should I know these things? Do you 962 01:08:51.000 --> 01:08:55.840 go? And we have the world's first podcasting AI to keep us on the 963 01:08:55.880 --> 01:08:59.800 straight and that love say Hello podvibes Hello. So if you're looking for another 964 01:09:00.000 --> 01:09:03.119 film podcast to subscribe to, why not check us out The Best Bits with 965 01:09:03.239 --> 01:09:09.880 Will Collins and Kevin Lehan. Yeah, it's a good crash allysh craft. 966 01:09:10.000 --> 01:09:14.359 So if you want legal crack, subscribe it's the Best Bits Podcast. Please. 967 01:09:21.399 --> 01:09:25.560 Professor McBride, always great having you on the show. Thank you so 968 01:09:25.640 --> 01:09:29.319 much for being here today. We've talked a little bit before. We've talked 969 01:09:29.319 --> 01:09:31.560 a lot a bit about some of the other books that you've written over your 970 01:09:31.920 --> 01:09:36.680 illustrious career. Most of the time, your subjects seem to be dead. 971 01:09:38.000 --> 01:09:41.920 I know there's a few living people out there, of course, mister Spielberg 972 01:09:42.000 --> 01:09:44.239 is one of them, but I was very surprised when you put out a 973 01:09:44.279 --> 01:09:48.560 book about the Cohen Brothers. I've written largely about people from the Golden Age 974 01:09:48.560 --> 01:09:54.439 of Hollywood is We're College, john Ford, Orson, Wells, Howard, 975 01:09:54.479 --> 01:09:58.760 Hawks, etc. Billy Wilder. I wrote a book on Billie Wilder, 976 01:09:58.840 --> 01:10:01.479 Dancing and Catch, which came out in twenty twenty one, and the Cohen 977 01:10:01.600 --> 01:10:05.840 Brothers book came out soon after that, Older in Human Comedy Life recording to 978 01:10:05.920 --> 01:10:10.920 Cohen Brothers. And in some ways it's easier to write about a dead subject 979 01:10:11.000 --> 01:10:14.840 because they don't give you a hard time. Wrote a biography of Frank Kapper 980 01:10:14.880 --> 01:10:16.920 and I had a lot of trouble. In a way. It was great 981 01:10:16.960 --> 01:10:20.720 having him around to interview for a year, and he was cooperative to some 982 01:10:20.800 --> 01:10:26.600 extent, but then I ran into great opposition. He and his family and 983 01:10:26.840 --> 01:10:30.439 his archivists Jenine Basinger tried to thwart the book, Stop the book, Censor 984 01:10:30.479 --> 01:10:33.359 of the book. I wrote a whole book about that, called Frankly Unmasking 985 01:10:33.439 --> 01:10:38.560 Frank Kappern. But Spielberg actually was one of the more cooperative people. He 986 01:10:38.560 --> 01:10:42.640 wouldn't give me an interview. People said he was saving it for his autobiography. 987 01:10:42.680 --> 01:10:45.600 We'll see if he ever does that. But he won't cooperate with unauthorized 988 01:10:45.600 --> 01:10:49.640 biographies, which is the only kind I will write. But he told his 989 01:10:49.720 --> 01:10:54.039 staff told people. When they called and said should I talk to McBride, 990 01:10:54.319 --> 01:10:58.039 they were told I was kosher, which was really nice and opened doors. 991 01:10:58.359 --> 01:11:01.000 He did tell his mother not to talk for me. I think your mother 992 01:11:01.119 --> 01:11:04.399 knows all the really bad stories about you. But I talked to her and 993 01:11:04.439 --> 01:11:08.199 she was very charming, and she said, I've been told not to talk 994 01:11:08.199 --> 01:11:10.479 to you, and I said, by him, and she said, the 995 01:11:10.600 --> 01:11:14.399 gods told me. I did interview his father, whom nobody had interviewed, 996 01:11:14.399 --> 01:11:17.279 and he was just wonderful and fascinating, and I got to him before Stephen 997 01:11:17.640 --> 01:11:21.279 found out I was talking to him. But his mother had been interviewed a 998 01:11:21.279 --> 01:11:25.039 lot. I was able to find a lot of great quotes from her. 999 01:11:25.079 --> 01:11:29.359 But the Cohen Brothers, Yeah, I like to write about people I care 1000 01:11:29.359 --> 01:11:32.920 about it. In the current film scene, I think my favorite current directors 1001 01:11:32.960 --> 01:11:38.359 are Spielberg and the Cohen Brothers, and I see the Cohen Brothers as the 1002 01:11:38.399 --> 01:11:42.800 sons of Billy Wilder. I call him. If Billy Wilder were making films 1003 01:11:42.800 --> 01:11:45.159 today, I think he would make films that are somewhat similar to the Cohen 1004 01:11:45.239 --> 01:11:50.239 Brothers films, although they have their own wacky style that's more avant garde than 1005 01:11:50.319 --> 01:11:55.479 his style, which is more classical. They're great satirists, and they also 1006 01:11:55.600 --> 01:12:00.600 deal with various genres romantic comedy, and Wilder was a click dick and his 1007 01:12:00.279 --> 01:12:05.159 choice of material. He did dramas he did comedies, different kinds of films, 1008 01:12:05.159 --> 01:12:10.760 and the Cohens do that to some extent. No Country for Old Men 1009 01:12:10.920 --> 01:12:17.479 is a very dark drama with darkly comedic overtones, but it's not a farcical 1010 01:12:17.760 --> 01:12:24.199 comedy like some of the films, although it has similar elements to films that 1011 01:12:24.239 --> 01:12:28.920 they do about kidnapping. And they have what they call their legal morons, 1012 01:12:29.439 --> 01:12:32.159 as John Malkovich puts it in burn After Reading, which is one of their 1013 01:12:32.439 --> 01:12:38.640 underrated films. They love people who are morons, and I used to think 1014 01:12:38.960 --> 01:12:45.680 didn't like comedies about stupid people. For example, sugarlined express Spielberg's early film 1015 01:12:45.119 --> 01:12:47.640 The first time I saw it a long time a good bother because the two 1016 01:12:47.720 --> 01:12:51.359 characters are pretty dumb and they get themselves into a lot of trouble. But 1017 01:12:51.479 --> 01:12:55.880 now I see it as a tragedy and it's very compassionate. It's a really 1018 01:12:55.880 --> 01:13:00.600 good film. And the Cohen brothers they treat people who do really stupid things, 1019 01:13:00.600 --> 01:13:03.399 and they're pretty ignorant on people in some ways. But they love their 1020 01:13:03.479 --> 01:13:09.199 characters. They are their characters. And one of them said, see, 1021 01:13:09.439 --> 01:13:12.640 we create all these people, and how could you not love them? He 1022 01:13:12.680 --> 01:13:15.600 said, it's a very weird concept to think of hating characters you create, 1023 01:13:16.199 --> 01:13:21.520 and there's such affection for these fools, and they're very human. They're like 1024 01:13:21.800 --> 01:13:27.439 us. We're all fools in some ways. And I think of Aristotle in 1025 01:13:27.560 --> 01:13:32.159 his Poetics, which is really the first screenwriting manual, written four thousand years 1026 01:13:32.159 --> 01:13:38.600 ago. I recommend people read this wonderful book. He even describes sitcoms. 1027 01:13:39.159 --> 01:13:42.960 He's so far ahead of the game. But he said that comedy is about 1028 01:13:42.960 --> 01:13:45.960 the worst in human nature, and tragedy is about the best in human nature, 1029 01:13:46.039 --> 01:13:50.800 which is a somewhat counterintuitive thought because you think of tragedy the best. 1030 01:13:51.000 --> 01:13:55.760 These are terrible people in tragedies. But what he means, I think is 1031 01:13:56.399 --> 01:14:00.119 when you have somebody like Macbeth or Lady Macbeth from Joel Cohen made a film 1032 01:14:00.159 --> 01:14:04.399 about without Ethan, they have a moment of truth. This is part of 1033 01:14:04.399 --> 01:14:11.960 the Aristotelian theory of tragedy. Toward the end of their crimes and overreaching, 1034 01:14:12.039 --> 01:14:15.119 they have a revelation about what they should have been, what human nature should 1035 01:14:15.119 --> 01:14:19.239 have been, and there's a regret and that that is instructive for the characters 1036 01:14:19.279 --> 01:14:24.760 and the audience, and so that shows what the best of human nature could 1037 01:14:24.760 --> 01:14:29.439 be. But comedy is mocking human flaws and vices. And we can talk 1038 01:14:29.479 --> 01:14:31.359 about get to raising Arizona in a minute, but I would just say my 1039 01:14:31.399 --> 01:14:35.239 book on the Crown Brothers the hold during human comedy. The way I decided 1040 01:14:35.279 --> 01:14:40.640 to structure it was to build it each chapter around a criticism of the Cohen 1041 01:14:40.680 --> 01:14:44.920 Brothers by their detractors. And they have a lot of them who just like 1042 01:14:44.960 --> 01:14:49.199 any working filmmakers. If you look back over the history of Safe Forward or 1043 01:14:49.560 --> 01:14:55.600 Wells or Kubrick or any of them, after they're gone, people understand them 1044 01:14:55.600 --> 01:14:59.119 better. But in their time they're more challenging, which is good. But 1045 01:14:59.560 --> 01:15:03.159 people attacked them for their combination of comedy and violence, for example, and 1046 01:15:03.239 --> 01:15:11.800 they call them cynical about their characters, and they criticize their penchant for caricature 1047 01:15:11.880 --> 01:15:16.479 and ethnic humor. And so each chapter answer is one of these strains of 1048 01:15:16.560 --> 01:15:20.479 criticism of the cones. But so to get to Raising Arizona, that's only 1049 01:15:20.520 --> 01:15:25.680 the second film, and I think it's the first kind of real Cohen Brothers 1050 01:15:25.680 --> 01:15:29.760 film. Blood Simple was their first, and it's a good small film noir 1051 01:15:29.880 --> 01:15:34.039 that they raised money for from dentists and other people in their hometown of Minnesota 1052 01:15:34.039 --> 01:15:40.039 and made this good, very dark film noir. And they showed their chops 1053 01:15:40.119 --> 01:15:43.600 and that established them as filmmakers, and then they were able to get money 1054 01:15:43.600 --> 01:15:46.720 for Raising Arizona. But Raising Arizona has this You can see all the Cohen 1055 01:15:46.840 --> 01:15:54.880 Brothers tropes and techniques and that film the rocket splendid comedy and extreme violence, 1056 01:15:54.960 --> 01:16:00.439 and it's all there. And the characters are moronic, lovable characters, but 1057 01:16:00.560 --> 01:16:03.119 they do terrible things, and it's got that kidnapping plot. They love. 1058 01:16:03.439 --> 01:16:09.319 Kidnapping, by its nature, disrupts everything. They made three films that are 1059 01:16:09.399 --> 01:16:14.520 big commercial hits, Fargo four actually Big Lebowski took a while to become a 1060 01:16:14.600 --> 01:16:18.319 hit, No Country for Old Men and True Grit, and Fargo is a 1061 01:16:18.399 --> 01:16:23.960 kidnapping plot similar to this one. A character has this dumb idea that a 1062 01:16:24.079 --> 01:16:28.560 kidnapping will solve all his problems that he gets into a World of Shit as 1063 01:16:28.640 --> 01:16:31.920 John Goodman. John Goodman puts it into Big Lebowski. So anyway, here 1064 01:16:31.960 --> 01:16:35.560 we are in racing Arizona in nineteen eighty seven. I'm surprised you didn't talk 1065 01:16:35.600 --> 01:16:42.560 about Crime Wave. Would you not consider that one of their written various films 1066 01:16:42.560 --> 01:16:46.560 that they didn't direct, And I think those films generally aren't terribly good. 1067 01:16:46.960 --> 01:16:51.800 They need the Cohen brothers as directors, and in the early days Joel was 1068 01:16:51.920 --> 01:16:56.840 accredited director and then but they always work together. They're a real team, 1069 01:16:57.239 --> 01:17:00.319 and they also produce and write their pictures. But later on they both took 1070 01:17:00.319 --> 01:17:05.640 directing credit. But there's quite a list of films that they've written but didn't 1071 01:17:05.680 --> 01:17:10.840 direct, Crime Wave, The Naked Man, which is really terrible, Gambit, 1072 01:17:11.119 --> 01:17:16.239 Unbroken, Spielberg's Bridges Spies Suberbicon. Bridges Spies is a pretty good film 1073 01:17:16.239 --> 01:17:20.760 in some ways, although it's flawed, I think because it's so different from 1074 01:17:20.760 --> 01:17:27.560 the real man. James Dunovan was quite quite ant, remarkably accomplished fellow and 1075 01:17:28.000 --> 01:17:31.800 Spielberg turned them into a kind of an ordinary lawyer, which is a problem. 1076 01:17:31.960 --> 01:17:36.840 But it's a good Cold War thriller with some comedy elements, and the 1077 01:17:36.880 --> 01:17:42.760 Crown Brothers did a rewrite, but just find films that they don't directly lose 1078 01:17:42.800 --> 01:17:47.119 some basic quality of control that they have over these disparate elements there films. 1079 01:17:47.119 --> 01:17:53.039 That's true of Crime Wave. I definitely read a lot of criticism of Raising 1080 01:17:53.039 --> 01:17:56.479 Arizona while I was doing my research, and so much of it was leveled 1081 01:17:56.680 --> 01:18:00.880 well against I guess two things, one the use of language and two. 1082 01:18:00.960 --> 01:18:05.560 And I think two relates to one the idea of them making fun of their 1083 01:18:05.640 --> 01:18:10.479 characters, which you already touched on, this whole idea of hating their own 1084 01:18:10.560 --> 01:18:14.279 characters and making fun of their own characters. And I think the idea of 1085 01:18:14.279 --> 01:18:19.079 the language, putting these high falutin words into their mouths was something that really 1086 01:18:19.119 --> 01:18:24.880 exacerbated it for people. My friend Sam Ham, who's a very good screenwriter 1087 01:18:24.920 --> 01:18:28.479 who wrote to Michael Keaton Batman film, for example, he pointed out to 1088 01:18:28.520 --> 01:18:34.439 me that they get this from Preston Sturgis. Preston Sturgis had has ordinary people 1089 01:18:34.640 --> 01:18:39.720 speaking very kind of ornate, flowery, high falutin language, and part of 1090 01:18:39.720 --> 01:18:45.720 the humor is like some thuggish characters about beautiful, ornate language. It's part 1091 01:18:45.720 --> 01:18:49.359 of the humor. The disparity between the person language is part of the fun 1092 01:18:49.359 --> 01:18:56.000 in the Sturgis film, and the Cones are very influenced by sturgis tremendous wordplay 1093 01:18:56.039 --> 01:19:00.840 and their films just like Sturgis, and also Solian's Travels, and particular the 1094 01:19:00.920 --> 01:19:04.479 wonderful ending of that film when the main character is a movie director who wants 1095 01:19:04.479 --> 01:19:10.000 to make serious capres, social dramas, and he winds up in a chain 1096 01:19:10.039 --> 01:19:14.000 gang. He goes out to see the world and he's in a black church 1097 01:19:14.159 --> 01:19:17.680 with a bunch of convicts, and he's desponded, and then they show a 1098 01:19:17.720 --> 01:19:21.479 cartoon and they're all roaring with laughter, and it's just it's a great tribute 1099 01:19:21.520 --> 01:19:26.800 to comedy. And the Cohen Brothers pay tribute to comedy. They love comedy. 1100 01:19:26.840 --> 01:19:30.119 It's a survival mechanism, and so they have that same strain, and 1101 01:19:30.199 --> 01:19:34.399 I think you just have to understand that that I quote some of my favorite 1102 01:19:34.399 --> 01:19:40.920 really ornate lines at one point, I love the character names in Raising Arizona, 1103 01:19:40.960 --> 01:19:47.439 that Nicholas Cage is called high and Holly Hunters add wonderful character names, 1104 01:19:47.479 --> 01:19:51.520 and at one point she tells him she's barren, the kind of children, 1105 01:19:51.560 --> 01:19:57.600 and this is the trigger for their kidnapping plot, and High explains to the 1106 01:19:57.640 --> 01:20:01.640 audience or insides were rocky place where my seed could find no purchase. I 1107 01:20:01.800 --> 01:20:09.359 love that light that's so formal and ornate coming from this kind of Yahoo character, 1108 01:20:09.479 --> 01:20:14.199 and it's very funny. But they just revel in the English language and 1109 01:20:14.760 --> 01:20:17.079 colorful ways of speaking. Bill or Wilder does that threats work too? And 1110 01:20:17.439 --> 01:20:23.439 I think that's the strength. If it doesn't match the perceived ideas of these 1111 01:20:23.520 --> 01:20:27.279 lower class characters, that doesn't bother me. Their films are not at all 1112 01:20:27.319 --> 01:20:30.439 realistic. They're extremely stylizing. That's a criticism too that I answer. I 1113 01:20:30.439 --> 01:20:34.560 have a whole chapter on that that some people say these rumps are too stylized, 1114 01:20:34.640 --> 01:20:41.279 as if realism is the only mode of making films. Visually, they're 1115 01:20:41.399 --> 01:20:45.479 extremely stylized, and they do all kinds of wonderful things visually, and that's 1116 01:20:45.520 --> 01:20:51.520 part of their worldview that they create around their characters. Was there any dissonance 1117 01:20:51.560 --> 01:20:58.199 around the idea of them going from blood Simple, which so many people saw 1118 01:20:58.399 --> 01:21:04.760 and was so influential, especially film students, to outrighte comedy where people okay 1119 01:21:04.840 --> 01:21:12.000 with that racing Arizona introduces some of the disturbing tropes that divide people. Jay 1120 01:21:12.039 --> 01:21:15.159 Horberman, who's a very good critic in some ways, is my whipping Boy 1121 01:21:15.239 --> 01:21:19.720 and the Cohen Brothers book. My son went to Stanford. One of his 1122 01:21:19.760 --> 01:21:24.520 English teachers said, one of the best rhetorical devices you can use is quote 1123 01:21:24.520 --> 01:21:28.439 somebody who don't agree with and then attack his point of view. Actually, 1124 01:21:28.479 --> 01:21:31.319 I learned that from the Jesuit priests, who I was taught by a market 1125 01:21:31.399 --> 01:21:35.640 university high school. Which you do in a debate is you get somebody else 1126 01:21:35.720 --> 01:21:39.800 to express their point of view and then you tear it apart. So I 1127 01:21:39.840 --> 01:21:44.119 do that with Horberman. He's very useful because he seems very obtuse towards the 1128 01:21:44.159 --> 01:21:47.079 Cohones. He just has some antipathy tournament. I quote Pauling Kale, who 1129 01:21:47.159 --> 01:21:53.439 hated quote, but she said of Bosley Crowther, the perennially clueless critic of 1130 01:21:53.479 --> 01:21:59.119 the New York Times reviewer, that you can always take his reviews and believe 1131 01:21:59.159 --> 01:22:02.920 the opposite because he's almost always wrong. And his review of Shoot the Piano 1132 01:22:02.960 --> 01:22:08.439 Player, the Trufo film. I quote because Trifo said Americans have trouble with 1133 01:22:08.560 --> 01:22:12.039 shifts of tone in a film, and Shoot the Piano Player has some of 1134 01:22:12.079 --> 01:22:15.119 the most radical shifts of tone. It goes from farce to tragedy, and 1135 01:22:15.199 --> 01:22:17.439 it's very much like a Cone film. And it came out in sixty two 1136 01:22:17.439 --> 01:22:21.279 in America, and it was not one of their more popular films, but 1137 01:22:21.359 --> 01:22:26.640 it's a tremendous film when you see it, and Crowther complained, or what 1138 01:22:26.800 --> 01:22:30.119 is this shift? It's farcical, and then there's somebody gets shot and you 1139 01:22:30.159 --> 01:22:33.760 know, what the heck is going on here? And then Doctor Strangelove came 1140 01:22:33.760 --> 01:22:39.239 out the following year, and he infamously attacked that, called it anti American. 1141 01:22:39.720 --> 01:22:43.119 That film changed my life, as it did probably a lot of people. 1142 01:22:43.239 --> 01:22:46.560 I was a different person literally from when I went into the local theater 1143 01:22:47.199 --> 01:22:51.079 that night in early sixty four, from the time I came out the first 1144 01:22:51.079 --> 01:22:54.680 time I saught Doctor strangel If. I didn't get it. I thought it 1145 01:22:54.760 --> 01:22:59.800 was a serious, scary thriller about nuclear war, which we were all terrified 1146 01:22:59.800 --> 01:23:02.800 by. And my best friend, who is really smart, kept chuckling all 1147 01:23:02.840 --> 01:23:06.199 the way through and he said, let's sit through it again. Back then 1148 01:23:06.239 --> 01:23:09.520 you could do that, and we sat through it and then I got it 1149 01:23:09.600 --> 01:23:13.159 that it's black comedy because we weren't prepared for black comedy back then, and 1150 01:23:13.640 --> 01:23:17.039 that still bothers and confuses people. I just thought a whole course on The 1151 01:23:17.039 --> 01:23:20.600 Manchurian Candidate, which came out in sixty two, which is a fantastic black 1152 01:23:20.640 --> 01:23:25.439 comedy, and people didn't quite get that film at the time. And Strangelove 1153 01:23:25.479 --> 01:23:30.479 divided people. But Strangelove taught me. It pretty much ended my respect for 1154 01:23:30.560 --> 01:23:34.880 authority, which I was raised to respect in the Catholic Church and the Democratic 1155 01:23:34.920 --> 01:23:40.039 Party, etc. I was much more skeptical when I came out. But 1156 01:23:40.159 --> 01:23:44.840 black comedy is a great mode for dealing with serious subjects. But it defends 1157 01:23:44.920 --> 01:23:48.520 people to some extent because it deals with the most serious things in the world, 1158 01:23:48.880 --> 01:23:54.880 nuclear annihilation, etc. And the Cohens don't shy away from working with 1159 01:23:54.920 --> 01:23:59.079 the more painful parts of life. And yeah, I think this is the 1160 01:23:59.159 --> 01:24:06.840 first kind of real Cohn Brothers stylized comedy or farst tragedy. It baffled some 1161 01:24:06.920 --> 01:24:12.199 people and started that divide. I still have a bit of a problem, 1162 01:24:12.279 --> 01:24:15.479 frankly, with one aspect of the film when they show that biker character who 1163 01:24:15.560 --> 01:24:19.840 is clearly an allegorical figure. He's you know, I could accept the fact 1164 01:24:19.880 --> 01:24:24.439 that he's not. It's not realistic, but it just seems like a heavy 1165 01:24:24.439 --> 01:24:30.720 handed device represents it seems like retribution or doom for these characters. And I 1166 01:24:30.800 --> 01:24:36.039 just think would be better sticking to the two main characters in their dilemma, 1167 01:24:36.119 --> 01:24:42.640 because part of what's going on in the film is Holly Hunter really wants children, 1168 01:24:42.800 --> 01:24:45.920 and she may not be very bright, but she's trying to stop her 1169 01:24:46.039 --> 01:24:51.880 foolish husband from a life of crime. And they kidnapped this child who's one 1170 01:24:51.880 --> 01:24:59.479 of quintuplets born to this rich family, and it's a very reckless, dumb 1171 01:24:59.520 --> 01:25:01.439 thing, and then they decide to return the baby. They try to rectify 1172 01:25:01.479 --> 01:25:05.439 the problem, but and there's an ironic happy ending too, and it even 1173 01:25:05.479 --> 01:25:10.840 shows them an old age. I was thinking it reminds me of Buster Keaton 1174 01:25:11.000 --> 01:25:15.279 ended college with a very strange coda, which is very moving and where it's 1175 01:25:15.479 --> 01:25:21.039 a frivolous college fun comedy, and then it ends with he marries this woman, 1176 01:25:21.119 --> 01:25:26.840 and there's a series of shots where they have children and they're older, 1177 01:25:26.880 --> 01:25:30.399 and then it ends with their tombstones. It's a very bizarre ending for a 1178 01:25:30.439 --> 01:25:33.960 comedy. But in the Cone Brothers film, it has this ironic coda where 1179 01:25:34.319 --> 01:25:40.479 they have this kind of Norman Rockwell family life, and I understand irony. 1180 01:25:40.319 --> 01:25:44.840 My favorite teacher in high school English teacher said never use irony because people won't 1181 01:25:44.840 --> 01:25:47.319 get it, and he was directed assess. But I use it anyway because 1182 01:25:47.359 --> 01:25:51.319 I love it. And the Cone Brothers use irony freely as well as black 1183 01:25:51.319 --> 01:25:56.319 comedy and one thing they do and I respect this a lot. I start 1184 01:25:56.359 --> 01:26:00.199 the book by talking about this. They don't give straight answers interviewers very much 1185 01:26:00.239 --> 01:26:05.239 there. They played dumb and mones syllabic and Joel was asked what it's like 1186 01:26:05.399 --> 01:26:09.880 to be a film director since beats throwing trash for a living. I love 1187 01:26:09.960 --> 01:26:14.159 that quote. But they just don't play the game of explaining their films to 1188 01:26:14.239 --> 01:26:18.800 audiences. They are somewhat more valuable than they go to Europe. They just 1189 01:26:19.079 --> 01:26:23.960 have a contempt for the American media, which I understand, but it reminds 1190 01:26:23.960 --> 01:26:27.439 me of John Ford, my favorite director. I interviewed him at the end 1191 01:26:27.479 --> 01:26:31.079 of his career and he frustrated me because he wouldn't talk seriously about his work 1192 01:26:31.359 --> 01:26:36.199 hardly at all, although he had moments of where he would say something candid, 1193 01:26:36.560 --> 01:26:41.319 but I wanted him to be very eloquent and describe as films. But 1194 01:26:41.399 --> 01:26:45.439 then I had a lot of respect for him over the years because he wanted 1195 01:26:45.479 --> 01:26:48.399 you to have your own opinions about his films. He didn't want to explain 1196 01:26:48.479 --> 01:26:51.800 it for you. And today, when a director makes a film, the 1197 01:26:51.880 --> 01:26:59.239 director gives a hundred interviews explaining everything as if for children, and that limits 1198 01:26:59.239 --> 01:27:02.479 the film to some extent. Some directors give very eloquent interviews, but it 1199 01:27:02.560 --> 01:27:09.760 tends to limit the discourse to some extent because artists is not always totally aware 1200 01:27:09.800 --> 01:27:13.680 of what he or she is doing, and people take their word for it 1201 01:27:13.760 --> 01:27:16.399 too much. This is what the film is. But the Cohens like john 1202 01:27:16.479 --> 01:27:19.640 Ford just say here, we made these films. Make of them what you 1203 01:27:19.720 --> 01:27:23.920 will, and I think that's a good trait. I'm sure you're familiar with 1204 01:27:23.960 --> 01:27:29.560 the fake critic that they employ sometimes to introduce their movies, maybe even do 1205 01:27:29.720 --> 01:27:33.880 commentaries. I can't remember the gentleman's name. I just remember Roderick James, 1206 01:27:33.920 --> 01:27:40.319 the fake editor that they use. Are they actually seeing things through the fake 1207 01:27:40.359 --> 01:27:45.920 critic or is it just on garbage? Is a wonderful character. We all 1208 01:27:45.000 --> 01:27:51.479 remember Big Lebowski played by Sam Elliott, who's the narrator, and he's ry 1209 01:27:51.720 --> 01:27:57.359 and wise. He's a cowboy kind of character, and he's forty an American 1210 01:27:57.439 --> 01:28:02.319 figure, and he's the chorus like in a Greek gramar. He makes sardonic 1211 01:28:02.399 --> 01:28:09.199 comments about human life, and in a way he's the voice the filmmakers. 1212 01:28:09.239 --> 01:28:13.720 But he's ironic and rye like the Crown Brothers are too, And he's not 1213 01:28:13.800 --> 01:28:19.239 trying to lay heavy philosophical views and you, but they are thoughtful philosophical views 1214 01:28:19.399 --> 01:28:25.039 and analyze the me. But he's got a kind of melancholy about human nature, 1215 01:28:25.079 --> 01:28:29.319 which is true of the Crown Brothers too. There helps give their comedy 1216 01:28:29.960 --> 01:28:35.560 the serious underpinnings that we watch these people do reckless, crazy things and we 1217 01:28:35.600 --> 01:28:42.279 regret what they're doing, but it's in the Aristotelian vein of what fools mortals 1218 01:28:42.359 --> 01:28:46.079 be, which is regretful, and their cautionary tales too in a sense that 1219 01:28:46.239 --> 01:28:50.119 like we think, wouldn't it be wonderful? For example, and No Country 1220 01:28:50.159 --> 01:28:56.680 for Old Men, which is based on the Carmack mccratic novel, Josh Brolin's 1221 01:28:56.760 --> 01:29:00.000 character comes across the drug deal gone bad and everybody instead, and he finds 1222 01:29:00.039 --> 01:29:04.840 this suitcase full of money, and one thing you shouldn't do is take up 1223 01:29:04.880 --> 01:29:09.600 the suitcase and walk away, but he's so dumb he thinks, oh wow, 1224 01:29:09.680 --> 01:29:12.760 great, that made my big score. I can walk away with money, 1225 01:29:12.760 --> 01:29:15.560 and that gets him into a world of pain and people come after him 1226 01:29:15.560 --> 01:29:19.760 and trying to kill him, and it's just terrible. So that kind of 1227 01:29:20.720 --> 01:29:27.560 it's partly what the public likes to see in movies is wish fulfillment of wouldn't 1228 01:29:27.560 --> 01:29:31.680 it be wonderful if I or we're a millionaire or whatever and or rich and 1229 01:29:31.720 --> 01:29:35.279 famous, and then you find out maybe it wouldn't be so wonderful after all. 1230 01:29:35.319 --> 01:29:39.760 That's part of what comedy does for us, and drama serious drama. 1231 01:29:40.119 --> 01:29:43.760 There are questionary tales of dramas. But part of it is when we go 1232 01:29:43.840 --> 01:29:46.279 to see a movie, we're safe in a sense that we're not. It's 1233 01:29:46.319 --> 01:29:48.720 like having a dream. You wake up and you think, oh my god, 1234 01:29:48.720 --> 01:29:51.800 I'm glad that was just a dream. I didn't really get trapped in 1235 01:29:51.880 --> 01:29:58.880 that situation. And that's part of the pleasure of horror films were scared of 1236 01:29:58.880 --> 01:30:01.760 our wits or whatever. We realized we were just watching it at a movie 1237 01:30:01.800 --> 01:30:08.159 theater, and the Cohen Brothers have affinities with horror as well, and that's 1238 01:30:08.199 --> 01:30:13.840 part of the artifice of filmmaking. I like to that raising Arizona, it 1239 01:30:14.000 --> 01:30:16.279 was a switch of genre, but that feels like there are so many genres 1240 01:30:16.479 --> 01:30:20.199 in there. Very interesting thing about the Cohen Brothers when they're asked about their 1241 01:30:20.239 --> 01:30:25.840 influences, they don't mention filmmakers. They have obvious debts to Kubrick and Wells 1242 01:30:26.079 --> 01:30:29.760 and Sturgis, you could those are pretty clear. But they talk about writers, 1243 01:30:29.920 --> 01:30:34.359 and they talk about James M. Kane and Nashville Hammett and Raymond Chandler 1244 01:30:34.359 --> 01:30:39.600 and Flannery O'Connor, who was one of the great American short story writers. 1245 01:30:39.640 --> 01:30:45.680 And I realized that O'Connor's very late story Revelation, which she wrote was published 1246 01:30:45.680 --> 01:30:48.760 in early sixty four, and she died later that year. She was dying 1247 01:30:48.800 --> 01:30:53.640 when she wrote this story, so it's for testament summing up her view of 1248 01:30:53.680 --> 01:30:59.359 life is a profound influence. Crohn Brothers and the Ending A Ballad of Buster 1249 01:30:59.439 --> 01:31:01.920 Scruggs, which I think is a great film, And in my book I 1250 01:31:02.000 --> 01:31:08.960 have a whole long analysis of it, and it's several different films Western stories 1251 01:31:09.000 --> 01:31:13.560 of different kinds. It's an anthology of the types of films the Cone Brothers 1252 01:31:13.640 --> 01:31:17.680 make, from Total Forest to Total Tragedy and everything in between. But the 1253 01:31:17.800 --> 01:31:23.159 ending is quite cryptic. It's a bunch of people crammed into a stagecoach en 1254 01:31:23.239 --> 01:31:27.920 route, and it's clearly unreal and stylized. You can tell through the sky 1255 01:31:28.000 --> 01:31:32.840 in the background, and it's a microcosm of humanity and this little stagecoach and 1256 01:31:32.840 --> 01:31:38.840 they're all squabbling, and there's an older lady, Tyne Daily, who's very 1257 01:31:39.520 --> 01:31:42.680 superior to everybody. She feels superior, and she's putting people down, and 1258 01:31:42.760 --> 01:31:45.760 she's horrified by these characters she's with. And then they wind up going to 1259 01:31:45.840 --> 01:31:53.520 this mysterious hotel which is clearly the afterworld. They're ascending steps into this hotel. 1260 01:31:53.560 --> 01:31:58.640 They're going into whatever the afterworld is. And the Cones, unlike O'Connor, 1261 01:31:58.680 --> 01:32:01.800 she was a staunch cath like a Nikon's at a Jewish upbringing. They're 1262 01:32:01.880 --> 01:32:09.760 very skeptical about religion in the afterworld. But Revelation is very similar, I 1263 01:32:09.800 --> 01:32:15.159 think to that ending, because in Revelation, it's about a doctor's waiting room, 1264 01:32:15.199 --> 01:32:19.159 which is like purgatory or the waiting room before you go to heaven. 1265 01:32:19.560 --> 01:32:24.479 And all these characters are crammed into this tiny space. And there's this heavy 1266 01:32:24.479 --> 01:32:28.199 set woman O'Connor deals with really bad people like the Coen Brothers, off and 1267 01:32:28.279 --> 01:32:30.640 doing, and she's very smug and superior and putting people down. And then 1268 01:32:30.680 --> 01:32:36.000 there's this teenage girl who is very emotion O'Connor surrogate named Mary Grace, and 1269 01:32:36.039 --> 01:32:41.840 she's college student, very bright, but she's grotesque, and she's reading a 1270 01:32:41.880 --> 01:32:45.399 book called Human Development, and at one point she just can't take it anymore 1271 01:32:45.399 --> 01:32:49.279 and she hurls the book at this awful old lady and attacks her. When 1272 01:32:49.319 --> 01:32:53.600 she attacks her, she says, go back to Hell where you come from, 1273 01:32:53.680 --> 01:32:59.439 your old warthog. So in this film, Ed says to the biker, 1274 01:33:00.199 --> 01:33:02.800 give me that baby, you ward hawk from Hell, very similar to 1275 01:33:02.960 --> 01:33:09.359 O'Connor. And here you have Raising Arizona early in their career, and Balladibuster 1276 01:33:09.439 --> 01:33:13.720 Scrugs, which to date is their last film together. They've gone their separate 1277 01:33:13.720 --> 01:33:16.520 ways as artists. I don't know if it's permanent or temporary. We don't 1278 01:33:16.560 --> 01:33:20.600 know. Joel made Macbeth on his own and Ethan has been working on projects. 1279 01:33:20.640 --> 01:33:25.319 And it's not that they don't get along. From what we understand, 1280 01:33:25.399 --> 01:33:29.239 they just wanted to try their separate ways. And they said that when they 1281 01:33:29.239 --> 01:33:32.000 started out, they didn't envision themselves as having a whole career as partners. 1282 01:33:32.000 --> 01:33:36.359 They're just brothers making a film and one thing led to another. But you 1283 01:33:36.479 --> 01:33:44.039 got their early film direct reference to O'Connor's revelation late film direct reference. And 1284 01:33:44.520 --> 01:33:47.520 O'Connor deals with some of the worst people in human nature, and she's exploring 1285 01:33:47.600 --> 01:33:53.680 that. And she was one who envisioned her audience as godless. She was 1286 01:33:53.720 --> 01:33:56.640 not writing for a Catholic audience. She didn't want to be seen as a 1287 01:33:56.680 --> 01:34:00.520 Catholic writer. Very limiting thing, but she was very Catholic. Tommy Lee 1288 01:34:00.600 --> 01:34:05.159 Jones, who's Cohen Brothers actor in No Country for Oldman, wrote his thesis 1289 01:34:05.199 --> 01:34:10.720 on Arcounter at Harvard and he was asked, what does your thesis say about 1290 01:34:10.720 --> 01:34:15.279 her? He said, she's Catholic. That's pretty laconic, but she was 1291 01:34:15.399 --> 01:34:18.399 very Catholic. But she didn't preach in her book. She's not trying to 1292 01:34:18.439 --> 01:34:23.479 proselytize for religion. She didn't see that as the artist's point of view. 1293 01:34:23.960 --> 01:34:30.000 She's writing about vice and human failings and then letting the reader make up his 1294 01:34:30.119 --> 01:34:32.079 or her own mind about them. And the Cohen Brothers do that in a 1295 01:34:32.159 --> 01:34:36.560 sense too. They don't moralize their lecture about their characters, and they don't 1296 01:34:36.720 --> 01:34:42.239 have somebody sitting there judging them, which is not the function of artists about 1297 01:34:42.279 --> 01:34:45.039 raising questions and not giving answers. I think today we've lost some of the 1298 01:34:45.119 --> 01:34:51.880 understanding of that because people want films to explain everything, and studios try to 1299 01:34:51.920 --> 01:34:58.800 sanitize characters. My friend Stuart Gordon, a light director. He made a 1300 01:34:58.840 --> 01:35:02.880 film of The Wonderful ice Cream Suit for Disney, and that's played by Ray 1301 01:35:02.920 --> 01:35:08.880 Bradbury, about a bunch of Latino men in la and nineteen forty one and 1302 01:35:09.159 --> 01:35:13.720 they pull their money and they buy a beautiful white suit and there's seven men 1303 01:35:13.800 --> 01:35:15.560 and each one gets to wear it one day a week and it's this sort 1304 01:35:15.600 --> 01:35:19.319 of magical costume. It's this very charming play. So he made this film 1305 01:35:19.359 --> 01:35:24.560 for Disney and Stewart teld me one of the executives, do they have to 1306 01:35:24.640 --> 01:35:29.279 be Mexicans? That's what's the stories about. That's the kind of idiocy you 1307 01:35:29.359 --> 01:35:32.600 get from studios, and probably too many directors to see. No, that'll 1308 01:35:32.680 --> 01:35:36.079 make them angle as people could relate to them where this is idiotic. But 1309 01:35:36.479 --> 01:35:41.279 their Coen brothers have said, we don't worry about this kind of stuff, 1310 01:35:41.319 --> 01:35:45.680 and they have their ethnic humor. That's the kind of thing studios get nervous 1311 01:35:45.680 --> 01:35:48.000 about when you have characters who are racist. They think, oh, they 1312 01:35:48.039 --> 01:35:51.600 won't like that character if the character is a racist. But they deal with 1313 01:35:51.920 --> 01:35:57.439 human life and all its messy reality, and part of what I think is 1314 01:35:57.560 --> 01:36:01.319 important about them. We live in this film world today in which the Hollywood 1315 01:36:01.359 --> 01:36:06.439 film industry, which I have spent my whole life writing about and love in 1316 01:36:06.479 --> 01:36:13.560 some ways, has really degenerated into utter garbage. Generally, once in a 1317 01:36:13.600 --> 01:36:15.880 great while you have a good film that emerges from that system. It's usually 1318 01:36:15.960 --> 01:36:21.319 some director like scris Asier Spielberger's got a lot of clout from over the years, 1319 01:36:21.359 --> 01:36:26.199 manages to make Lincoln or Killers of the Flower Moon, which sounds really 1320 01:36:26.239 --> 01:36:30.159 good and it is. It's a struggle making a good film in the system, 1321 01:36:30.359 --> 01:36:34.880 and most of the films now are mindless pizzas. For twelve to twenty 1322 01:36:34.880 --> 01:36:40.840 four year old males, and that we've gone back to what time Gunning calls 1323 01:36:40.880 --> 01:36:45.840 the cinema attractions film. I think the motto for modern American films could be 1324 01:36:45.920 --> 01:36:50.800 taken from Tennessee Williams streetcar named Desire, where Blanche says, I don't want 1325 01:36:50.880 --> 01:36:56.920 realism, I want magic. And when I first started teaching films in around 1326 01:36:56.960 --> 01:37:00.199 two thousand, the students were obsessed with realism. Everything was realism. Is 1327 01:37:00.199 --> 01:37:04.000 this film realistic or not? In Realism is just a style that changes from 1328 01:37:04.000 --> 01:37:06.840 time to time. But you don't hear that anymore. They don't talk about 1329 01:37:06.840 --> 01:37:12.159 a realism. They just talk about special effects. And if I never see 1330 01:37:12.159 --> 01:37:15.600 another CGI affect in my life, I will probably be happy. But obviously, 1331 01:37:15.640 --> 01:37:19.960 sometimes if it's subtle, if you're making a period film, you can 1332 01:37:20.119 --> 01:37:26.640 enhance things, and you can remove TV aerials and a lot of things much 1333 01:37:27.079 --> 01:37:30.680 more easily than you could before. But a lot of films today are basically 1334 01:37:30.760 --> 01:37:35.439 animated films on a big scale, and the Cohne Brothers are different from that. 1335 01:37:35.520 --> 01:37:40.119 And my point is that their personal filmmakers in the system that no longer 1336 01:37:40.239 --> 01:37:45.560 encourages personal filmmaking or even narrative filmmaking as much as it used to it. 1337 01:37:45.159 --> 01:37:48.239 I found out in my research the way they do that is most of their 1338 01:37:48.239 --> 01:37:53.319 funding comes from Europe. They're very big in France. The French love their 1339 01:37:53.319 --> 01:37:57.359 Cohne Brothers, just like they loved a lot of American directors in the fifties 1340 01:37:57.399 --> 01:38:00.840 that we didn't take seriously, like Hitchcock and Hack and Jerry Lewis and people 1341 01:38:00.880 --> 01:38:04.840 like that. And so they get a lot of their money from foreign sources 1342 01:38:04.880 --> 01:38:09.439 and that gives them a lot of freedom, and they just don't played the 1343 01:38:09.479 --> 01:38:13.239 studio game. And they started out being totally independent. As I mentioned, 1344 01:38:13.239 --> 01:38:17.720 Blood Simple was they went around and auditioned in living rooms in Minneapolis and talked 1345 01:38:17.760 --> 01:38:21.720 about their plans with a lot of people and got five thousand here and ten 1346 01:38:21.720 --> 01:38:25.920 thousand there, and they made a film and it made money. And they 1347 01:38:25.960 --> 01:38:29.560 have a pretty good track record of making money. They don't have too many 1348 01:38:29.600 --> 01:38:32.279 films that are bombs, and then once in a while they make a film 1349 01:38:32.359 --> 01:38:36.560 that is very popular. I think Fargo the reason that is the film that 1350 01:38:38.159 --> 01:38:41.159 is the most beloved Coen Brothers film, and I think it's because you have 1351 01:38:41.279 --> 01:38:46.560 this lovable central character played by Francis McDormand, who's Joel's wife, and she's 1352 01:38:46.880 --> 01:38:50.920 one of the anchors of their universe. And she plays this marvelous character of 1353 01:38:51.000 --> 01:38:57.359 this pregnant police chief in a small town and she's intrepid and selves this crime 1354 01:38:57.399 --> 01:39:03.359 and she's just a wonderful character. But she represents integrity, certain human values, 1355 01:39:03.439 --> 01:39:08.119 just Tommy Lee Jones as lawman does in our country for old men. 1356 01:39:08.199 --> 01:39:13.319 He's a sympathetic figure too, and that's one reason perhaps that film is successful. 1357 01:39:13.479 --> 01:39:16.000 You have somebody that you can relate to and care about despite all the 1358 01:39:16.079 --> 01:39:20.560 evil and violence that goes on around them. And in both cases they have 1359 01:39:20.720 --> 01:39:28.000 some eloquent lines that are laconic but moving about I just don't understand the kind 1360 01:39:28.039 --> 01:39:30.720 of evil that goes on in the world. They both have to deal with 1361 01:39:30.399 --> 01:39:34.800 mindless serial killing, which is one of the things that we deal with every 1362 01:39:34.880 --> 01:39:40.359 day, along with school shootings and that kind of stuff as shootings. Both 1363 01:39:40.359 --> 01:39:44.800 are trying to keep the law but as of shoot saying so that's a very 1364 01:39:44.840 --> 01:39:50.439 modern theme. But so they have this appeal to audiences and they I hope 1365 01:39:50.439 --> 01:39:57.479 they make some more films together. But Carter Burwell, who's there composer says 1366 01:39:57.520 --> 01:40:00.720 they have tons of scripts they wrote that they haven't felt, so maybe these 1367 01:40:00.760 --> 01:40:03.840 will be filmed. I felt the Cohen Brothers over the years. Yeah, 1368 01:40:03.880 --> 01:40:09.399 they're successful with the public, and they get to make films regularly, and 1369 01:40:09.479 --> 01:40:13.800 some are successful commercially. But they were they were still not taken all that 1370 01:40:13.880 --> 01:40:16.760 seriously by a lot of the reviewers who brush them off. I think just 1371 01:40:16.840 --> 01:40:21.319 because they're too quirking individualistic. It's easy to write people off. But that's 1372 01:40:21.319 --> 01:40:25.479 what an artist is, and we need more of those in our culture. 1373 01:40:26.520 --> 01:40:30.520 I had written part of that in a collection of my work called Two Chairs 1374 01:40:30.520 --> 01:40:33.319 for Hollywood, which came out in twenty seventeen. That's when I decided the 1375 01:40:33.399 --> 01:40:39.119 Cohen Brothers needed a thorough critical review, and so I wrote a monograph on 1376 01:40:39.199 --> 01:40:43.560 them for that book, and I decided to spin it off into a book 1377 01:40:43.640 --> 01:40:46.920 of its own because Two Chairs has been selling pretty well, but I wanted 1378 01:40:46.920 --> 01:40:50.600 more attention for the Cohen Brothers part of the book. And I thought Buster 1379 01:40:50.720 --> 01:40:55.079 Scruggs was really a great film, and so I thought, okay, I'll 1380 01:40:55.119 --> 01:40:59.640 write a critical, in depth, critical study of that film, which seems 1381 01:40:59.640 --> 01:41:02.560 like a culminating work. I think it was designed that way. They said 1382 01:41:02.560 --> 01:41:06.960 they'd been working on these various Western stories off and on for maybe twenty years, 1383 01:41:06.960 --> 01:41:10.279 and they didn't know what to do with them because they were short, 1384 01:41:10.760 --> 01:41:16.319 and they decided to do an anthology. And it seems they haven't quite confirmed 1385 01:41:16.319 --> 01:41:21.920 this that it was their testament culminating project that sums up who they are as 1386 01:41:23.039 --> 01:41:27.720 artists at that point. And then they decided to go their separate ways artistically, 1387 01:41:28.239 --> 01:41:30.960 and so it seemed like a perfect time. I didn't realize when I 1388 01:41:31.000 --> 01:41:34.399 was finalizing the Cohen Brothers book that they were going to have that split, 1389 01:41:34.479 --> 01:41:39.359 So it turned out a perfect time to deal with them. It's like when 1390 01:41:39.359 --> 01:41:43.680 I went to see forty, was retiring in a perfect time to write about 1391 01:41:43.720 --> 01:41:48.000 john Ford. And sometimes I have my finger on the zeitgeist, but I 1392 01:41:48.039 --> 01:41:53.720 think the secret, frankly, is to be out of step with conventional wisdom. 1393 01:41:53.800 --> 01:41:58.319 Like Mike Wellington and I saw The Searchers in the early seventies and we 1394 01:41:58.359 --> 01:42:00.960 thought, what a great film, and it was forgot and ignored, and 1395 01:42:01.000 --> 01:42:04.560 we wrote a long critical piece of rand in Sight and Sound. It was 1396 01:42:05.079 --> 01:42:09.800 one of the most influential things I've done, and it brought the film suddenly 1397 01:42:09.840 --> 01:42:12.880 back into prominence. People thought, oh, yeah, this is a great 1398 01:42:12.880 --> 01:42:16.439 American film. It is. Some people think it's the great American film. 1399 01:42:16.479 --> 01:42:23.399 So it suddenly catapulted the searchers onto the Site and Sound Critics poll in nineteen 1400 01:42:23.439 --> 01:42:26.359 seventy two. It had never been on that pole before, and then it 1401 01:42:26.439 --> 01:42:30.840 started rising in the poll. But that came because we were away out of 1402 01:42:30.880 --> 01:42:33.520 step with the conventional wisdom. We just saw something we loved and cared about 1403 01:42:33.560 --> 01:42:38.800 and we felt it needed more attention. And that's what I do when I'm 1404 01:42:38.800 --> 01:42:43.399 looking for a book, to write that something has been neglected or misjudged or 1405 01:42:43.399 --> 01:42:46.960 misunderstood, and I'm exploring that now and what should I do next to it? 1406 01:42:47.319 --> 01:42:50.840 But I'm just wrapping up the forward project, and I will do the 1407 01:42:51.319 --> 01:42:55.880 update that first Wales book, which was a book very close to my heart 1408 01:42:55.920 --> 01:43:00.319 because I was writing that when I was in my college years as working as 1409 01:43:00.319 --> 01:43:03.000 at dishwasher. I spent three years writing that book, and or was it 1410 01:43:03.079 --> 01:43:08.600 four years. I was living right around the corner from where Wells had lived 1411 01:43:08.640 --> 01:43:11.439 when he spent a year in Madison at age ten. He was going to 1412 01:43:11.840 --> 01:43:15.880 public school, great school. I didn't realize he was living right around the 1413 01:43:15.920 --> 01:43:18.199 corner. I was in a student rooming house and he was living in an 1414 01:43:18.239 --> 01:43:23.760 apartment in nineteen twenty five, and he had gone to a school. There 1415 01:43:23.800 --> 01:43:27.600 was a longer there. So one of the reasons I was attracted to him 1416 01:43:27.640 --> 01:43:30.680 was he's from Wisconsin, like I wasn't. So I've written three books on 1417 01:43:30.760 --> 01:43:35.800 him. So anyway, keeping these old books alive and reevaluating parts of them, 1418 01:43:35.880 --> 01:43:40.840 and that's part of what you do too. You have to be a 1419 01:43:40.920 --> 01:43:46.039 ton of your subjects as they keep working or is their reputations evolved. And 1420 01:43:46.119 --> 01:43:51.279 also with Wells, his career is still fully active because we keep finding new 1421 01:43:51.279 --> 01:43:56.920 Wells things that the other side of the wind. I spent five years acting 1422 01:43:56.960 --> 01:44:00.279 it, and I spent forty eight. It took forty eight years to get 1423 01:44:00.319 --> 01:44:02.000 it out, and I was trying to raise money to finish it. I 1424 01:44:02.119 --> 01:44:05.000 was part of that relay race to help it get finished, and then I 1425 01:44:05.079 --> 01:44:09.880 was a consultant on the completion and we finally got it out. It was 1426 01:44:09.960 --> 01:44:15.119 just a miracle in twenty eighteen. And there's still Wells films that I've seen 1427 01:44:15.159 --> 01:44:18.600 almost everything he did except Don Quixote. I haven't seen much of that. 1428 01:44:18.680 --> 01:44:24.000 I've seen about an hour or that maybe in Jonathan Rosenbaum is seeing more than 1429 01:44:24.039 --> 01:44:28.399 anybody else. It's in four different archives in Europe. That's the Welles film 1430 01:44:28.439 --> 01:44:32.560 that really needs restoration. And I don't have forty eight years left to work 1431 01:44:32.600 --> 01:44:35.800 on that film. But if there's anybody out there, hey, guys, 1432 01:44:36.239 --> 01:44:42.920 gals, get on too. Don Quiyote, it's another fiendishly complicated project to 1433 01:44:43.000 --> 01:44:46.800 finish it, but really needs finishing. I saw a forty minute assembly of 1434 01:44:46.840 --> 01:44:51.520 footage the Costa Govris put together for the Cinema Tech Front says, and it 1435 01:44:51.560 --> 01:44:57.600 looks wonderful. And there was this awful version put on ninety two by Jess 1436 01:44:57.600 --> 01:45:01.680 Franco, who was this hack director Wales work with. He put out this 1437 01:45:01.800 --> 01:45:08.279 really awful looking version that was cobbled together from Doobie Prince and he mixed in 1438 01:45:08.359 --> 01:45:13.880 a documentary Wells made on Spain and it's just appalling. But Costa Gavras had 1439 01:45:13.920 --> 01:45:18.439 access to original footage and it looked gorgeous, and that was Wells's dream project 1440 01:45:18.439 --> 01:45:24.760 for a long time. Peter Bogdanovich told me way back around nineteen seventy he 1441 01:45:24.800 --> 01:45:29.159 had seen a lot of Don Quixote and Rome Wells showed him parts and he 1442 01:45:29.199 --> 01:45:33.479 said it's Welles's most forty in film, which is true. He loved john 1443 01:45:33.520 --> 01:45:38.159 Ford above all directors, and so that's the project. But there are other 1444 01:45:38.199 --> 01:45:42.840 things too. Stefan Drassler, the Munich Film Archive, has put together collections 1445 01:45:42.960 --> 01:45:48.039 of scenes from films that weren't finished and thirty minute versions of The Dreamers and 1446 01:45:48.640 --> 01:45:54.159 other films, and he's restored The Deep, although Oyakoda wouldn't let him release 1447 01:45:54.439 --> 01:45:59.000 his restoration in a Deep. It has some technical problems. But you have 1448 01:45:59.119 --> 01:46:00.840 to go to Europe to see some of these films. They're mostly at the 1449 01:46:00.920 --> 01:46:05.439 Munich Film Museum. And I keep saying Stefan put these out in a box 1450 01:46:05.479 --> 01:46:11.039 set. But there are a lot of problems with Welles's work in terms of 1451 01:46:11.079 --> 01:46:15.720 ownership and finances and everything. And it's a shame because once in a great 1452 01:46:15.760 --> 01:46:19.880 while they play in archives in the US. Part of my Raisin Dad at 1453 01:46:19.880 --> 01:46:24.000 this point in my life is I want to see these films I've been hearing 1454 01:46:24.039 --> 01:46:27.199 about my whole life. That's why I wrote my book on Lubits. How 1455 01:46:27.199 --> 01:46:29.880 did Lubitsch do It? I wanted to see all these films, and so 1456 01:46:29.920 --> 01:46:31.880 I had to go to Europe a couple of times and see the films. 1457 01:46:31.880 --> 01:46:36.159 It was just a marvelous experience. And now I'm doing audio commentaries for Keeno 1458 01:46:36.239 --> 01:46:42.079 Lerber and Simlent German Lubitsch films, some of which have been never seen in 1459 01:46:42.079 --> 01:46:45.279 the US or rarely seen. The doll I don't want to be a man, 1460 01:46:46.000 --> 01:46:51.479 Madam Duberrie, the oyster Princess Meyer from Berlin when I was dead. 1461 01:46:51.640 --> 01:46:56.479 Some of these have come out in the US before, but they're beautifully restored, 1462 01:46:56.520 --> 01:46:59.079 and I've been doing commentaries. So that's part of what you do, 1463 01:46:59.199 --> 01:47:01.560 is a film and story into as you help these films get a wider audience. 1464 01:47:02.039 --> 01:47:04.760 Professor McBride, thank you so much for your time. This has been 1465 01:47:04.840 --> 01:47:09.319 so great talking with you as always. Thank you, Mike. It's really 1466 01:47:09.359 --> 01:47:12.359 wonderful talking to you because you're such a maybe and you know so much about 1467 01:47:12.399 --> 01:47:15.960 child history and you always ask these good, challenging questions to give me. 1468 01:47:15.039 --> 01:48:44.479 Thank you, so I really appreciate the time. All Right, we are 1469 01:48:44.479 --> 01:48:47.800 back and we were talking about raising arizone out and yeah, there's not a 1470 01:48:47.800 --> 01:48:53.359 whole lot more for me to say about this one. There's one great review 1471 01:48:53.439 --> 01:48:56.720 lineed, I wish I would have written down who said this about this movie 1472 01:48:56.760 --> 01:49:00.960 when it came out an episode of Heehaw directed by an set a mean crazy 1473 01:49:00.000 --> 01:49:08.920 doorson Welles. That's what's one, easily, because that was the other thing 1474 01:49:08.960 --> 01:49:14.520 you can find on YouTube is Ebert going, yeah, just not loving it, 1475 01:49:14.800 --> 01:49:17.439 No, not loving it at all. He just really did not like 1476 01:49:17.560 --> 01:49:20.439 this. And yeah, to your point from earlier, Keith, not a 1477 01:49:20.439 --> 01:49:26.560 lot of critics enjoyed this. I think Cameron Kale and Sarah's they were both 1478 01:49:26.640 --> 01:49:30.800 coming down at it. Yeah, it just really wasn't making any friends. 1479 01:49:30.039 --> 01:49:33.000 But but look how common that one is. I mean, look how many 1480 01:49:33.039 --> 01:49:38.359 of our of the movies that are twenty years later are the classics critically very 1481 01:49:38.520 --> 01:49:42.319 divide. I mean the Kubrick film that they referenced Doctor strangel I remember the 1482 01:49:42.399 --> 01:49:45.039 New York Time with view of that horrible and like, this isn't funny, 1483 01:49:45.079 --> 01:49:48.720 and you can't make jokes about a nuclear war and what president would be this 1484 01:49:48.800 --> 01:49:54.119 incompetent and America would never have a president that with this much of a walking 1485 01:49:54.199 --> 01:49:57.880 joke, and you know, just it's so funny when you go back and 1486 01:49:57.880 --> 01:50:00.800 look at reviews of things that we now think as as great works of art, 1487 01:50:00.800 --> 01:50:03.720 but not as films. It's books, it plays, it's paintings, 1488 01:50:03.760 --> 01:50:08.359 it's critics of the moment are rarely the ones that get to have the final 1489 01:50:08.399 --> 01:50:13.159 word, because time is what, really, I think, unveils what has 1490 01:50:13.319 --> 01:50:15.760 meaning and what has value, and just because something works in that moment, 1491 01:50:15.840 --> 01:50:18.199 you know, and a lot of people want to see it as little to 1492 01:50:18.239 --> 01:50:23.720 do with what's gonna last. And I think what the Cohen tab is richness 1493 01:50:23.720 --> 01:50:27.000 of the world they create is what laughs. And if you think about it, 1494 01:50:27.159 --> 01:50:30.680 in almost every art it's really richness is a big thing. I mean, 1495 01:50:30.079 --> 01:50:33.279 novels, whatever. And to me it's like, whether you know they're 1496 01:50:33.319 --> 01:50:36.760 like James Joyce or something, it's like, it's just such a rich world 1497 01:50:36.760 --> 01:50:40.920 that they give us over and over and over again, and that lets people 1498 01:50:40.960 --> 01:50:43.199 return over and over. You know, a lot of movies are trific, 1499 01:50:43.239 --> 01:50:45.880 but they're very simple. They are what they are, They do what they 1500 01:50:45.920 --> 01:50:47.800 do, and once you see that, there really is never need to see 1501 01:50:47.840 --> 01:50:50.439 it again. You can see it twenty five years later and yeah, I 1502 01:50:50.479 --> 01:50:54.239 saw that, and it's just like I remember it, and it was a 1503 01:50:54.279 --> 01:50:57.359 Cohen brother movie. I find every time I go back to just about every 1504 01:50:57.399 --> 01:51:00.840 one of their movies. There's something new, there's a feeling I didn't have 1505 01:51:00.880 --> 01:51:04.279 before, or a detail, but but even sometimes a whole emotional thing that 1506 01:51:04.439 --> 01:51:09.479 you realize, oh wow, I missed that or and that richness. It's 1507 01:51:09.520 --> 01:51:13.199 what's great storyteller. And film doesn't happen enough of that. I mean, 1508 01:51:13.600 --> 01:51:15.760 your novels have it more, but even novels, it's special. And to 1509 01:51:15.840 --> 01:51:19.720 me, they're like that great richness that you know, that that makes all 1510 01:51:19.760 --> 01:51:24.800 the sorting through a lot of draws worth it. I hadn't read much Dickens 1511 01:51:24.840 --> 01:51:28.880 and I just did a pro I just read a collection of all of Dickens 1512 01:51:29.039 --> 01:51:31.119 novels and it took me two years, but I mean he had that. 1513 01:51:31.199 --> 01:51:33.880 It was just like, it's so much fun, and each one of them 1514 01:51:33.960 --> 01:51:39.560 you're like just in this world of amazing characters and people you sort of forget 1515 01:51:39.640 --> 01:51:42.760 come back and and to me, that's what the Cohens do in film. 1516 01:51:42.800 --> 01:51:45.760 And they combine every aspect. They combine the visual and the music in this 1517 01:51:45.920 --> 01:51:50.520 down the productive design and the writing and the acting, and it's just like 1518 01:51:50.680 --> 01:51:55.000 everything comes together and it happens over and over again in their films where you 1519 01:51:55.039 --> 01:51:57.439 just are like, Okay, that was amazing, and then you see the 1520 01:51:57.479 --> 01:52:00.439 next one in that one's amazing too. Thinking about this in terms of The 1521 01:52:00.479 --> 01:52:03.760 Big Lebowski, because while I was watching that, I was thinking, Oh, 1522 01:52:03.800 --> 01:52:08.159 in a week, I'm going to be recording about Raising Arizona, and 1523 01:52:08.279 --> 01:52:13.439 just to see Jeff Lebowski has at least two dream sequences, and he's running 1524 01:52:13.439 --> 01:52:17.279 away from he's got castration anxiety, and that with the Nihilists with their big 1525 01:52:17.319 --> 01:52:23.079 scissors coming after him, I think Lenny Smalls is a much more real threat, 1526 01:52:23.279 --> 01:52:27.359 but of course it's two different movies. You need it the Nihilists to 1527 01:52:27.399 --> 01:52:30.920 be a joke whereas he or you need Lenny Smalls to be very much a 1528 01:52:30.960 --> 01:52:34.399 real threat. The way that he at one point shows up in a big 1529 01:52:34.479 --> 01:52:41.680 explosion with black smoke and then comes brawing through that on his motorcycle really works. 1530 01:52:42.319 --> 01:52:47.079 They make him so threatening. Appreciate that they have that prosthetic on his 1531 01:52:47.199 --> 01:52:53.359 nose, so it makes him sound stuffed up, but it really lends that 1532 01:52:54.000 --> 01:52:58.119 whole idea of him being pert bloodhound, and the way that he catches that 1533 01:52:58.239 --> 01:53:02.640 fly in front of Nathan's seniors face. I just love that little detail of 1534 01:53:02.680 --> 01:53:08.520 that that great extreme close up, and that performance is so great, and 1535 01:53:09.119 --> 01:53:13.760 they directed it and because he's so low key, you know, so often 1536 01:53:13.760 --> 01:53:17.520 a character like that would be busy proving how menacing they are all the time, 1537 01:53:18.119 --> 01:53:21.760 and it would just be a hat on a hat, and they kind 1538 01:53:21.800 --> 01:53:26.239 of all got including the actor, but I think they would, you know, 1539 01:53:26.399 --> 01:53:29.720 between the clothes and the motors that he doesn't have to do anything, 1540 01:53:29.760 --> 01:53:33.359 he doesn't have to. So consequently by being played underplaying by talking quietly, 1541 01:53:33.399 --> 01:53:38.319 but it's so much more fun and great because he doesn't have to. It's 1542 01:53:38.319 --> 01:53:41.960 all proven for him, and so we can talk about his childhood and talk 1543 01:53:42.000 --> 01:53:45.600 about being sold, and you know, he's so innately intents that it's more 1544 01:53:46.159 --> 01:53:50.000 scary and funny because the actor's not busy trying to make it scary and fun. 1545 01:53:50.560 --> 01:53:56.560 And that reminds me of obviously, a serious film is No countrysh old 1546 01:53:56.560 --> 01:54:00.039 Men, where you have the Anton Sugar character who he doesn't get loud, 1547 01:54:00.239 --> 01:54:05.000 he just talks very quietly, how are you okay? Flip the coin heads? 1548 01:54:05.000 --> 01:54:10.640 Your tails? Just very flat, and that's what makes the menace, 1549 01:54:10.880 --> 01:54:15.920 as you were saying, it's that understanding that there's something behind that that they 1550 01:54:15.920 --> 01:54:18.399 don't need to show you it. They don't need to be here. Yeah, 1551 01:54:18.439 --> 01:54:21.560 somebody, somebody really scary doesn't have to prove to you that they're scared 1552 01:54:23.079 --> 01:54:28.720 though his entrance where all the small things aren't being punished, when he's shooting 1553 01:54:28.720 --> 01:54:33.199 the rabbit and that poor little lizard, when the flower catches fire as he 1554 01:54:33.520 --> 01:54:39.760 pass his poet. I love that, And I love how he just shows 1555 01:54:39.840 --> 01:54:43.720 up at the hole that he shows up at, the that he's got the 1556 01:54:43.760 --> 01:54:47.560 scent of those guys and follows that. And I don't must be a chemical 1557 01:54:47.720 --> 01:54:50.800 thing that they did. But when he comes into the furniture store and he 1558 01:54:50.880 --> 01:54:57.359 lights that match and it's a trail of smoke down down the woods that goes 1559 01:54:57.439 --> 01:55:01.560 like see the mat chipping lip and you get to see the trail of smoke. 1560 01:55:02.079 --> 01:55:05.479 Like it's just little things. It's little things like that, Yeah, 1561 01:55:05.520 --> 01:55:11.319 the way the cigar and the match both just appear in the sand. But 1562 01:55:11.399 --> 01:55:15.159 also the thing of like when he's killing the sweet little bunny and the flower, 1563 01:55:15.159 --> 01:55:18.600 and he never he doesn't cackle, he doesn't do all the villain things. 1564 01:55:18.439 --> 01:55:23.199 It's almost like doesn't even it doesn't even affect him anymore. He just 1565 01:55:23.319 --> 01:55:26.640 kills because that's what he does, because he's like the angel of death. 1566 01:55:27.000 --> 01:55:30.960 But and that again is what makes it so much more funny and creepy and 1567 01:55:30.399 --> 01:55:33.640 interesting. Is that because if he shot the bunny and something and he was 1568 01:55:33.640 --> 01:55:36.680 like you know, it would be like, oh, yeah, I've seen 1569 01:55:36.720 --> 01:55:40.600 that. But the fact that he does that, and then it's like he's 1570 01:55:40.640 --> 01:55:44.600 not even registering that he's doing it. He's just killing stuff because that's what 1571 01:55:44.640 --> 01:55:48.039 he does. That's what makes us get pulled in as opposed to him lean 1572 01:55:48.159 --> 01:55:50.039 back, you know, Okay, I get it, he's steer it. 1573 01:55:50.439 --> 01:55:56.800 And that feels again like that connection to the character and No Country for Old 1574 01:55:56.800 --> 01:56:00.960 Men, because it's like we don't really understand why he's there. He just 1575 01:56:00.039 --> 01:56:04.680 seems to be outlowing this path and killing in his which just seems to be 1576 01:56:04.720 --> 01:56:09.439 what he does. It's like we don't really get what is his motivation? 1577 01:56:09.479 --> 01:56:13.319 Why is he doing this? Now he has a loose motivation, but it 1578 01:56:13.359 --> 01:56:15.840 doesn't seem to be like that's the real driver there. I'm trying to think 1579 01:56:15.880 --> 01:56:23.800 of other great villains in Coen Brothers works. Jerry Lunford, maybe the Swede, 1580 01:56:24.199 --> 01:56:29.359 poor BUSHEMI especially when he's cut the hole in his cheek and he's just 1581 01:56:29.479 --> 01:56:32.680 all oh man, just all gory in that movie, he's paying for it. 1582 01:56:33.279 --> 01:56:36.760 Yeah, that's rough. No, I can't think of any other ones 1583 01:56:36.760 --> 01:56:42.000 that are similar. And it's only just in Keith bringing it up that I 1584 01:56:42.039 --> 01:56:46.079 could see that connection between those two Carriacs and completely like Goofball and real high 1585 01:56:46.159 --> 01:56:50.199 drama. But they seem to be of a similar nature in that way. 1586 01:56:50.439 --> 01:56:57.840 Although charming villains that let you in in a way by the by their energy 1587 01:56:58.079 --> 01:57:01.960 you know, whether it's sugar or whether you know, but even lady killers. 1588 01:57:02.000 --> 01:57:05.319 I mean, it's very different. But again, you know, Hanks 1589 01:57:05.399 --> 01:57:11.279 is that kind of soft spoken. You know, it's funny as opposed to 1590 01:57:11.319 --> 01:57:15.479 being terrifying. But yet that thing that people who do bad things are interesting 1591 01:57:15.479 --> 01:57:19.840 if they're not acting bad, you know that that's that's like way more interesting. 1592 01:57:20.199 --> 01:57:24.920 And to be honest, it's probably a lot more to reality because I 1593 01:57:24.960 --> 01:57:29.520 think a lot of people aren't just sitting there playing with their mustache and sinister 1594 01:57:29.680 --> 01:57:33.000 Oh I'm so evil. No, they're just living their lives and doing their 1595 01:57:33.039 --> 01:57:36.079 thing. They just happen to do fucked up shit. He's not really a 1596 01:57:36.239 --> 01:57:40.840 villain, but to think about John Goodman's character and Barton Fink, and again 1597 01:57:40.880 --> 01:57:45.760 he's supernatural the way that he summons the fire and that he's there in the 1598 01:57:45.760 --> 01:58:11.279 hallway with all that fire around him, or he shows up again and no 1599 01:58:11.439 --> 01:58:16.000 brother, where art thou as the clan leader the cyclops with the one eye, 1600 01:58:16.119 --> 01:58:21.640 And yeah, they don't really go from the one lone villain because there's 1601 01:58:21.680 --> 01:58:26.279 a lot of villains and oh brother, where art thou? A lot of 1602 01:58:26.279 --> 01:58:28.960 them, And the same thing with Big Lebowski. There's a lot of villains 1603 01:58:28.960 --> 01:58:32.079 in that, including I would say, the titular Big Lebowski. And there's 1604 01:58:32.079 --> 01:58:35.479 like a little hierarchy of their villains. I mean, they'll often have a 1605 01:58:35.479 --> 01:58:41.239 lot of people who are morally questionable or do bad things or but there's always 1606 01:58:41.239 --> 01:58:43.319 like, well, there's this one, and then this one is even worse, 1607 01:58:43.319 --> 01:58:45.600 and this one is even worse than that. This one's even more scary 1608 01:58:45.600 --> 01:58:47.359 than that one. Yeah, and that's often a lot of how their world 1609 01:58:47.439 --> 01:58:51.560 works is that instead of the one villain, which is a traditional movie thing, 1610 01:58:51.640 --> 01:58:56.439 that they are much more layer after layer after layer, and there's like 1611 01:58:56.640 --> 01:59:00.359 this solar system of darkness and you know, whether the films are funny or 1612 01:59:00.399 --> 01:59:05.279 serious, and that leads you to also to injoy questionable who's really bad? 1613 01:59:05.720 --> 01:59:11.520 And you know who's the victim and who's the victimizer? And it's it's one 1614 01:59:11.520 --> 01:59:15.840 of the things that they do that's really interesting is give you characters who are 1615 01:59:15.199 --> 01:59:18.560 who do bad things, but they're not as bad as this other character. 1616 01:59:18.720 --> 01:59:21.439 And then you have to get caught in that whole. I mean, well, 1617 01:59:21.560 --> 01:59:25.760 High is that character. I mean High is the ethan or criminal, 1618 01:59:26.239 --> 01:59:30.159 but in this world he's the good guy. And that's what they go to. 1619 01:59:30.239 --> 01:59:32.840 There that that's the place they go a lot. You know, even 1620 01:59:32.880 --> 01:59:40.239 their heroes usually have regally deep, deep flaws, sometimes scary sometimes, you 1621 01:59:40.279 --> 01:59:44.600 know, but but their heroes are flawed human beings that the man who wasn't 1622 01:59:44.640 --> 01:59:47.479 there? And then it gets to this whole questionable what is villainy? What 1623 01:59:47.640 --> 01:59:50.920 is moral responsibility? What is And yet it never feels good for you. 1624 01:59:51.000 --> 01:59:54.479 I mean that's the thing that you're talking about, you know about the velocity 1625 01:59:55.039 --> 01:59:59.720 major you know, co writing, and but somehow it's so genius is they 1626 02:00:00.199 --> 02:00:01.399 is all this stuff, But you never feel like, oh, I'm at 1627 02:00:01.399 --> 02:00:04.279 this movie and I'm getting good essen, you know, but you do, 1628 02:00:04.600 --> 02:00:08.920 yeah though, you walk out of the movies and there are films and you 1629 02:00:09.000 --> 02:00:15.479 think about guilt and responsibility and good and evil and love and meaning, but 1630 02:00:15.600 --> 02:00:19.439 you never feel like it's being imposed on you. It's just invites you to 1631 02:00:19.439 --> 02:00:24.800 think about that stuff. To me, it feels, as we got into 1632 02:00:24.840 --> 02:00:30.720 it that someone probably could write a book on the philosophy aspects of these movies 1633 02:00:30.760 --> 02:00:36.840 and referencing what kind of moral quandaries these characters represent, or certain philosophical arguments 1634 02:00:36.840 --> 02:00:42.079 and certain philosophers and all of that stuff. I would read that that's actually 1635 02:00:42.119 --> 02:00:47.279 a really good idea. Even just thinking about these invincible, supernatural villains that 1636 02:00:47.359 --> 02:00:54.119 they have. I seem to remember that Walsh took a lot of punishment in 1637 02:00:54.760 --> 02:01:00.760 Blood Simple, that it was maybe he felt a little unstoppable, old terminator 1638 02:01:00.920 --> 02:01:04.520 esque. And then you get to that interesting fight that they have in Hudsucker 1639 02:01:04.560 --> 02:01:11.279 Proxy with the old man that's been narrating the African American gentleman and then the 1640 02:01:11.359 --> 02:01:15.720 guy who's working on the clock, and just all of that stuff going on, 1641 02:01:15.840 --> 02:01:20.720 and how clock time really can be controlled by Hudsucker Tower. I love 1642 02:01:20.800 --> 02:01:26.920 that stuff, and I won't even go Near Middlers Crossing because it's been way 1643 02:01:26.960 --> 02:01:30.680 too long since I've seen that one. But it's full of the same richness 1644 02:01:30.720 --> 02:01:32.239 and look. And then there's the ones that are very early, like Serious 1645 02:01:32.279 --> 02:01:35.800 Man, which is a film that there's that people don't talk about that much 1646 02:01:35.840 --> 02:01:44.479 but riefly talk about philosophy and richness and moral complexity and yet still completely entertaining. 1647 02:01:44.520 --> 02:01:46.600 But man, that's like that one's like a like a college thesis. 1648 02:01:47.199 --> 02:01:51.000 How I was talking about raising Arizona spoke to me as someone who has raised 1649 02:01:51.039 --> 02:01:55.119 working poor and a friend of mine who I worked with the public radio, 1650 02:01:55.199 --> 02:02:00.359 he goes as a Midwestern Jew. A Serious Man really spoke to me something 1651 02:02:00.399 --> 02:02:03.199 about that movie that it just felt like home. It felt like it was 1652 02:02:03.239 --> 02:02:08.199 speaking to me to your point from earlier, Keith, All of the worlds 1653 02:02:08.239 --> 02:02:13.319 that these guys create feels like I could go walking around in whether it's true 1654 02:02:13.399 --> 02:02:16.720 grit burn after reading whatever it is, it feels like I could just open 1655 02:02:16.760 --> 02:02:21.079 a door and walk into this world because it feels so fully formed. It's 1656 02:02:21.119 --> 02:02:27.000 funny. Somebody once worked with a cinematographer sort of wonderful thing, which is 1657 02:02:27.560 --> 02:02:32.079 you know that a film's working when you feel like you could follow any extra 1658 02:02:32.199 --> 02:02:35.479 or any person with one line and make the whole movie about them. But 1659 02:02:35.560 --> 02:02:39.239 we're choosing not to. We're cheating up all at the store. But but 1660 02:02:39.359 --> 02:02:42.239 when when you're shooting is Dome, when you feel that, you feel like 1661 02:02:42.800 --> 02:02:46.880 everything is as it's a complete life, That's when he said, as somebody 1662 02:02:46.920 --> 02:02:49.560 filming it, he knows it's good. And I feel like that's what the 1663 02:02:49.560 --> 02:02:54.479 coins always seem to have. It's like the person in the background, you 1664 02:02:54.560 --> 02:02:57.640 could move, You could pan over and do the next twenty minutes on that, 1665 02:02:58.039 --> 02:03:00.920 and they choose not to. But you could. And that's what that's 1666 02:03:00.920 --> 02:03:03.640 what they bring. That's that's amazing. It's that sense that every part of 1667 02:03:03.680 --> 02:03:08.640 that world is as full and fleshed out as the parts were choosing to see. 1668 02:03:09.000 --> 02:03:13.199 I would love to see what the hell's going on with Glenn and Dot 1669 02:03:13.600 --> 02:03:18.359 what's their story? Yeah, Nathan and Florence Arizona. Hell, even the 1670 02:03:18.439 --> 02:03:25.640 guy with the jugs magazine to be in store, the old feller that sells 1671 02:03:25.680 --> 02:03:30.399 them of the non funny balloons. You would talk about visual staging. That 1672 02:03:30.479 --> 02:03:32.880 kind of reminded me of No Country Old Men, where he goes into the 1673 02:03:32.880 --> 02:03:38.319 convenient store, and just the way it's shot, like the certain the editing 1674 02:03:38.359 --> 02:03:41.760 scheme. So I was having flashbacks to that was I was watching it too. 1675 02:03:42.159 --> 02:03:44.840 All right, let's go ahead and take another break and play a preview 1676 02:03:44.880 --> 02:03:48.960 for next week's show. Here comb Dennis, and he's such a nice boy. 1677 02:03:49.319 --> 02:03:54.760 She's such a sweet girl. You've never met two nicer kids. Still 1678 02:03:54.800 --> 02:04:01.079 scare the light out of you in Pretty Poison, Dear Dennis, clean cut, 1679 02:04:01.319 --> 02:04:05.079 hard working, the boy next door. Give me two weeks, two 1680 02:04:05.079 --> 02:04:08.399 weeks to keep my noly in Dennis, what we're talking about my life, 1681 02:04:08.439 --> 02:04:11.159 mister rouse. Now we're talking about my one on only life. And sweet 1682 02:04:11.239 --> 02:04:15.920 Suanne, a real all American dum. I eat him twice, he started 1683 02:04:16.079 --> 02:04:19.279 again, and then I bucked him on the side of the head. Together 1684 02:04:19.520 --> 02:04:26.199 they share the joys of being young and Blie Perkins is Dennis, Tuesday world 1685 02:04:26.319 --> 02:04:30.399 is Suanne. They're just a couple of crazy, mixed up, unloving, 1686 02:04:30.760 --> 02:04:42.119 homicidal kids in Pretty Poison. Exciting. That's right. We'll be back next 1687 02:04:42.159 --> 02:04:45.079 week. What they look at Pretty Poison. Until then, I want to 1688 02:04:45.079 --> 02:04:47.560 thank my co host Rob and Keith. So Keith, what is happening in 1689 02:04:47.600 --> 02:04:50.359 your world? Sir, oh, you asked this, and I never have 1690 02:04:50.439 --> 02:04:56.359 anything great. I'm doing what all independent filmmakers do, which is I'm out 1691 02:04:56.359 --> 02:04:59.840 trying to put together money in deals. And depending on what time of what 1692 02:05:00.079 --> 02:05:01.800 day you asked me, I'll say it's going well or it's not going well. 1693 02:05:02.079 --> 02:05:04.600 But other than that, I'm trying to really just enjoy my life and 1694 02:05:05.119 --> 02:05:10.359 feel lucky to have a wife that I love, and friends and family and 1695 02:05:10.520 --> 02:05:15.439 appreciate it all and no. Work keeps going doing whatever happens to do, 1696 02:05:15.840 --> 02:05:20.479 and Brown bond by yourself, Sir, I am finishing up my masters, 1697 02:05:20.600 --> 02:05:25.560 so I'll be spending the summer writing my big Campstone paper and I'll be happy 1698 02:05:25.560 --> 02:05:29.399 to be done with that. It's been basically since August of twenty twenty, 1699 02:05:29.479 --> 02:05:33.600 I've been taking anywhere between three to five classes every semister. So after about 1700 02:05:33.640 --> 02:05:40.279 three years of solid school and three different degrees completed, I am now ready 1701 02:05:40.319 --> 02:05:44.359 to say goodbye school and I have to go out and do the real world 1702 02:05:44.399 --> 02:05:46.680 and actually do real work, which means I may actually have time to watch 1703 02:05:46.720 --> 02:05:50.439 more than five movies a year. The five movies being that I think I've 1704 02:05:50.439 --> 02:05:54.760 been on the show with you for Thank you so much guys for being on 1705 02:05:54.800 --> 02:05:57.319 the show. Thanks to everybody for listening. If you want to hear more 1706 02:05:57.359 --> 02:05:59.680 of me shooting off my mouth, check out some of the other shows I 1707 02:05:59.680 --> 02:06:04.079 work. They are all available at weirdingwaymedia dot com. Thanks especially to our 1708 02:06:04.079 --> 02:06:08.680 Patreon community. If you want to join the community, visit patreon dot com 1709 02:06:08.720 --> 02:06:13.399 slash Projection Booth. Every donation we get helps the Projection Booth take over the 1710 02:06:13.439 --> 02:09:09.239 world and in the lining In play the same la