[00:00:00] Nicole: A self identified apathist who takes pictures of shit. Marries an optimist in 1970s, New York city. A confrontational standup comedians relationship with an opera singer leads to murder and a baby with a beautiful singing voice. What do Alan Arkin's Little Murders and Leos Carax's, Annette have to do with each other.

[00:00:24] Let's find out.

[00:00:27] Movie Clips: I mean, what do you think you think they stand a chance? You're on their side, aren't you? Who are you betting on?

[00:00:39] Magic mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?

[00:00:50] One shall stand, one shall fall.

[00:00:57] Even if one of them survives. [00:01:00] 

[00:01:01] The only way to stop him is to make another movie

[00:01:07] Sean: Welcome to the Celluloid Mirror. I am one of your hosts, Sean Mannion. 

[00:01:12] Nicole: And I am the other one of your hosts. I am Nicole Solomon on the celluloid mirror. We take two films and look at what they reflect about one another, the audience and our culture. At large today, we are talking about Leos Carax's Annette and Alan Arkin's Little 

[00:01:30] Sean: Murders

[00:01:31] we'll start by giving a brief synopsis of each film, discuss our response to the film's critical response. And then we're going to dive in on what the films say about each other and maybe about you. You specifically, who are listening right now. And what does it say about you? How should, how should you feel bad about yourself because of this movie, these movies, either of these movies, both all of these movies, every movie, I really want you to feel bad at the end of this podcast.

[00:01:58] Nicole: I would say these [00:02:00] two certainly implicate the audience to a degree. So yeah, appropriate. We got to give synopes of these films. Don't we, 

[00:02:07] Sean: Sean, 

[00:02:08] We do. We do. And what are we going to do in these synopses, Nicole?,

[00:02:12] Nicole: We're going to tell people about what happens in the film. So if you have not watched Little Murders and Annette, and you are concerned about spoilers for either film, you know, feel free to hit pause right now, watch those fine films and come back to us later.

[00:02:29] But of course, I believe you would probably enjoy these films. Even if you hear us talk about them first as, as is the case with most quality, quality films of which spoiler, I think these two are, um, Sean, would you like to spoil Annette? 

[00:02:48] Sean: I would like to spoil Annette. Um, but I think I'll describe this movie called Annette first.

[00:02:53] Um, and uh, so Leos Carax's Annette is [00:03:00] about, it's a musical and it's, it's an opera or it's intended to be an opera, which doesn't mean a whole lot to me. Cause I've never actually seen an opera. Uh, I'm not even pronouncing the word properly. Um, you're pronouncing it better. Um, I have, I have improved upon the opera, uh, with my, uh, with my pronunciation, with my new pronunciation of anyway, it's supposed to be that is, uh, conceived by the, uh, the, the long running, uh, borderline underground, not quite really, uh, uh, banned, uh, sparks.

[00:03:47] Um, and it starts and ends. I'm just going to put this out there. It starts and ends by sort of showing its artifice by showing cast and [00:04:00] crew as part of, as part of like set up and then later breaking down the film. And then we see, we see the story play out in the plot. The story is, uh, follows, uh, two performers, uh, a opera singer and a standup comedian, a opera singer played by Marion Cotillard, uh, the stand-up comedian, uh, played by Adam Driver.

[00:04:27] And, uh, so two very different sorts of characters. She's just sort of this somewhat shy singer. Uh, and he is a very sort of confrontational, like in people's faces, very theatrical. Stand up comedian performer. Um, and uh, we find that they're in a relationship they're in love. We know this because they have a song that is about how much they are in love with each other while they're fucking, um, among

[00:04:55] Nicole: They love each other so much.

[00:04:57] Sean: They love each other so much. I was trying to remember exactly the words [00:05:00] and you know, this because it gets repeated. That's the whole song. That's the whole song. I think there's a couple other words, but that's most of the songs, 

[00:05:10] which honor 

[00:05:10] Nicole: Counter intuitive baby, and yet we remain, we love each other so much.

[00:05:15] Sean: There you go. 

[00:05:15] Nicole: Few, a few other similar additional lyrics, but it's primarily just the repeating incantation of sorts. 

[00:05:22] Sean: Yeah. Which is very much like some what sparks music. I have a listen to, not all of it, but some have for sure. Um, and they're pairing, uh, results in a baby, uh, and also, uh, discontent for Adam driver, the standup comedian, uh, and, uh, his career still starts to falter.

[00:05:49] Uh, and hers is fine. Uh, there are some revelations about [00:06:00] his behavior in past relationships. Uh, that would be very familiar, I think, to an audience in 2021. Um, And, uh, that he has perhaps been abusive 

[00:06:12] Nicole: No. That was a dream. That was a dream. 

[00:06:17] Sean: I see. I took 

[00:06:17] it as a dream of something that happened like that.

[00:06:22] It was a dream, but it was something that happens in the, that actually happens. 

[00:06:28] Nicole: I don't think there's anything that it could have happened. Sorry, not to cut you off, but I don't think there's any evidence that that actually happened. I think it's her fears. Okay.

[00:06:44] Sean: Okay. And so perhaps it did not happen. Um, but in the film, there is a sequence in which, uh, whether it's entirely in her dreams, which[00:07:00] 

[00:07:02] Nicole: cause how would she know that? 

[00:07:03] Sean: It's framed and it's framed in the dreams, but it's also, it's also like a news thing, but it's not it's, it makes sense that it's just an expression of her fears, but it also kind of makes sense that it would be a thing that actually happened, that they kind of let that she kind of let slide and other people have let slide, like, but regardless there is this thing, which is, which is sort of indicative of that he perhaps has.

[00:07:36] A history of, or she's afraid that he has a history of, or that she's afraid of how, how he's behaving basically, uh, towards her. Uh, and this is and his anger specifically, uh, and, uh, their relationship starts to deteriorate his, his career starts to deteriorate. Hers is doing [00:08:00] well. Uh, they go out on their boat with the baby.

[00:08:05] Uh, there's a storm and she goes overboard. Uh, I wasn't really super clear on he's drunk. I wasn't really super clear on if he's pushed her off. He pushed her off. 

[00:08:24] Nicole: Okay. Do you want it, do you want my interpretation after, um, having like, cause I've that moment absolutely is a moment I've questioned and like having watched it four times now I pay a lot of attention to that.

[00:08:38] And every time it's a bit ambiguous, he's drunk, he's on the boat. She comes out to get him to come inside. He won't come inside. He's like, let's waltz. We're gonna waltz. Instead he's being a Dick and is, and she's begging him to come in. And at a certain point he pushes her away and she goes off the boat.

[00:08:57] I don't necessarily think he consciously, [00:09:00] intentionally was trying to push her off. But he was also doing something that 12000% could result in exactly that like, this was a bad storm. This was like, nobody should have been out there in the first place. 

[00:09:12] Sean: We shouldn't have been out there in the first place. Like it, I think it's one of those things where, yeah, it's kind of ambiguous. Like, did he mean to push her or was it, 

[00:09:18] Nicole: it might be, it might be a manslaughter versus murder situation, I would say, but he's still 

[00:09:27] Sean: He's still responsible. Like, I don't think there's a question about that. 

[00:09:31] Nicole: Whatever his exact intent was. He's absolutely responsible. 

[00:09:35] Sean: Exactly. Um, so this happens, she dies. He suspected of things.

[00:09:41] The police come in question to him, but he's cleared of it. And so he's the only one. Well, he's not the only one taking care of the baby. There's a babysitter. Uh, and then he discovers that the baby has the baby whose name is Annette. The name of the film. Uh, the baby has a beautiful singing voice. [00:10:00] And so he starts exploiting the baby.

[00:10:03] For her singing voice and, uh, hooks in this pianist who had became a conductor, uh, and, uh, hooks him in to say like, Hey, we're going to do this thing. And there's going to be a big tour. And the composer, not composer, conductor, uh, reveals to the audience, uh, that he had a passing a relationship with a brief relationship with, uh, Annette's mother, right before she got with, uh, Adam driver's character.

[00:10:34] Anne right before, I can't remember Adam driver's character's name. 

[00:10:37] Nicole: Henry Henry McHenry, 

[00:10:39] Sean: Henry McHenry. That's it. Uh, so Henry right before Anne connected with Henry, uh, he, um, they had had a little something, so he has a certain, uh, suspicion, uh, about, about Henry and Henry's intentions and what happened with Anne.

[00:10:59] Um, [00:11:00] anyway, this turns into a huge sort of career for, uh, for a little Annette and, uh, she's doing, uh, she's doing big concerts all over the place. Uh, getting very famous. He kind of is, uh, Henry starts to kind of live the live through her for the fame, uh, until he's finally confronted by, uh, the pianist turned a conductor about.

[00:11:31] The, uh, about what happened, uh, and about, um, what's the song, what's the this, there, there's the thing that triggers. It is one of the songs I'm spacing, which song it is. 

[00:11:45] Nicole: He, she starts saying, Annette starts singing the way we love each other so much song. 

[00:11:49] Sean: That's it. That's it. So, uh, and, and he's frustrated by that, cause he's like, how does she know that song?

[00:11:57] What is this? 

[00:11:58] Nicole: That was my special thing with my [00:12:00] dead wife. 

[00:12:00] Sean: Exactly. Conductors, you know, the one who kind of showed it to her. 

[00:12:07] Nicole: Actually, that was my special thing with your dead wife. 

[00:12:10] Sean: Yeah. And 

[00:12:12] Nicole: We sang that shit to each other before you all got together is that was. 

[00:12:16] Sean: Uh, which ultimately leads to Henry killing the conductor.

[00:12:21] Uh, and then saying like, oh, Annette is retiring. We're going to do one big last final show, which, uh, the big, last final show ends with, uh, no singing, just Annette saying daddy kills people. I think that's the exact, uh, line, but it's, it's pretty much that daddy kills people on livestream around the world that some version of the super bowl, um, 

[00:12:45] Nicole: The Hyper bowl

[00:12:46] Sean: yeah. No, it's, it's amazing. It's, it's amazing. And, uh, he ends up in. Uh, for it. And, uh, the film ends with a [00:13:00] net confronting, uh, her father, uh, and basically basically iterating or, uh, not iterating uh, stating what is, uh, sort of shown throughout the film, which is that he really can't love other people, uh, the way he is or the way he treats people and abandoning him there, uh, because he kind of, it's kind of what he deserves, uh, in that, in that point, because of how he is uh key to part of the, the visuals of this is that Annette is a puppet for them 99% of her appearances in the film until the very end where, where she actually speaks to her, where she speaks to him and tells him that, uh, he can't, uh, he can't love, um, properly. 

[00:13:53] Not her at least.

[00:13:55] Yeah, not her. Uh, and, uh, [00:14:00] that's where it leaves it, except for the end bit that I was mentioning at the beginning where you see the whole cast and crew there wa they're 

[00:14:09] walking along and puppets, multiple Annette puppets. Yes. From different stages of her baby. 

[00:14:16] Yeah, cause there's a bunch of different puppets.

[00:14:18] It's interesting set of puppets for the baby. Um, and that is Annette a very loose, probably missing a lot of it sort of way. 

[00:14:28] It's a very long movie. So I would hope you missed some of it in the synopsis. It is a two hour and 20 minute long movie. Um, and as, as it should be, I would watch five hours of Annette but that's me.

[00:14:40] Um, so little murders, shall I? Yes. Go for 

[00:14:44] it. But don't spoil it. 

[00:14:48] Nicole: So little murders is a 1971, I guess what the note says here, it film, uh, directed by Alan Arkin. [00:15:00] It w and this was his feature film debut, interestingly directorial debut, at least. Um, he'd been, he'd been acting for a while. Yeah. He'd been acting but directing, I mean, um, and stars, uh, Elliott Gould, a young early seventies Elliott Gould, which is a fine period of Elliot Gould as well as Marsha Rod.

[00:15:22] And it's based on a play this weirdo 1960s play by Jules Pfeiffer, the cartoonist, if anyone is familiar with his work, which I grew up, I think my parents liked him or something. I was very aware of Jules Pfeiffer. Cartoonist and humorist, uh, growing up and he wrote this weirdo play and Elliot Gould really wanted to make it into a movie and they made it into a movie eventually.

[00:15:48] Um, and it's about, uh, Marsha Rod plays a character called Patty Newquist and she's an interior designer living in New York city. And it's a New York that's kind of this like [00:16:00] over the top caricature of kind of the image of New York city that became popularized through 1970s films in part, because I believe that's when they started shooting a lot more in New York again.

[00:16:12] And it happened to coincide with like all sorts of chaos happening. So, you know, it wasn't just the normal New York. It was New York during the garbage strike. So there was like garbage piled up, et cetera. There's so there's this New York city version that, you know, a lot of the country and perhaps world had in their heads specifically because of 1970s film.

[00:16:35] Some people think that is still what New York city is like, and this isn't that. Exactly. But it's almost like this whacked out, um, exaggerated version of that a little before the fact where it's just like, there's just like crime and noise and obscene phone calls and blackouts and ongoing all the time.

[00:16:57] People getting murdered all the time and it not being [00:17:00] solved. Um, And so Patty is an optimist. She's, she's a very positive person. She doesn't want other people to steal her joy basically. And she sees out her window, this man being attacked by people. So she'd go out. It goes outside and intervenes and is shocked to find that the victim who is Elliot Gould, doesn't even thank her.

[00:17:23] Um, he's like whatever, they were going to get tired out soon. And she's like, what's, what's wrong with you? What's going on with you and finds herself kind of compelled by him in part, perhaps, because she's a fixer upper kind of lady, she likes to find men who are broken and try to fix them. Um, I don't recommend that if anybody out there 

[00:17:45] is, I don't think that's realistic.

[00:17:47] I don't think I've met any person who actually tries to do that. 

[00:17:54] Never, never, totally not a thing or a primary dynamic and a [00:18:00] lot of male, female heterosexual relationships, especially that can be bad for both parties or anything. Not, no, not 

[00:18:06] at all. 

[00:18:08] Totally made up. No. So she ends up, um, attracted to this guy.

[00:18:13] Alfred Chamberlain played by Elliot Gould. Who's a photographer. He now takes photos specifically of shit. He like actual shit on the street and makes a living out of this now in like, you know, turn of the six days into the seventies, he used to shoot people and do more con uh, professional photography.

[00:18:32] But as he explains to her, he found the people just kind of growing more and more out of focus. It was just less and less able to photograph people rather than objects. And eventually all he could photograph was shit. So that's what, that's what he does now. Otherwise he's pretty emotionally vacant. He doesn't really feel much pain or pleasure beyond.

[00:18:52] He says he likes his work. He likes to do his work. When people are beating him up, he just disassociates and thinks about his work. So [00:19:00] that's his coping mechanism basically, as he goes through life, whenever he gets in a rough spot, he doesn't fight back as, as he says. And I was like, that's pretty astute.

[00:19:09] He's basically like, if someone wants to beat you up, they're going to beat you up. There's no right answer. You know, like they, they asked me what I was looking at, you know? Um, and it's like, if I say I was, you know, it, I don't, I don't remember the exact thing, but it's like, basically whatever I do, they're either going to be offended or they're going to think I'm a cop or they're going to this, or they're going to that.

[00:19:30] There's no right answer. It all ends with me taking a beating anyway. So like why even bother? Um, yeah. Why bother? I'm just going to disassociate and go to my happy place, which is me taking photos of shit and let them do what they're going to do until they get tired out. And Patsy's like, I can't handle this.

[00:19:47] How can you go through life like this? And she brings him home to meet her family. And it's, it's a very long scene. Um, which is [00:20:00] part of how, you know, you're watching a movie based on a play. That's keeping a lot of the structure of the acts of the play, basically like the whole rest of act one is them just at her family's New York city apartment.

[00:20:11] She's got a weirdo brother. Who's got like a weird kind of inappropriate seeming relationship with her. Yeah. And it seems kind of off in general. Um, he learns that Patsy had another brother who was murdered for some unknown reason and the murder was never solved. Um, you know, he doesn't really care about families, but like Patsy wants to get married to him.

[00:20:38] And he like agrees because it'll make her happy basically. Cause he's like, whatever I can be married or not. He's like an extremely passive protagonist. Like he's, it's almost like as an exercise, they were like, how can we make the most passive protagonist who literally just goes along with whatever. So they announced the engagement, um, and they're surprised and there's an [00:21:00] awkward long dinner scene.

[00:21:01] And then there's a very funny wedding where Donald Sutherland plays like this weirdo hippie, um, Pastor

[00:21:11] . And it's kind of a chaotic free for all a various sorts. It's a lot of sixties, chaos, um, and whatever they're married, then they continue with their life. Patsy trying to get Alfred to kind of engage with the world.

[00:21:28] More, try for things, have hope, passions, whatever he's resistant, but at a certain point he's kind of like a bit compelled by her, you know, idea that maybe you should give a shit wild ideas. I know. And at a certain point, like he actually agrees with her and he's like, yes. And, and, and specifically crucially, he agrees that he's going to try to be the kind of guy who will fight back and not just let people do whatever they want to him.

[00:21:58] And as soon as he [00:22:00] says that this is right around the end of act two, um, some unknown assailant fires gun through their window shooting and killing her. And she dies in his arms literally. And then he, and a few state leaves the house covered in blood, goes in like rides the subway. It's a. Funny scene where I was telling Sean before the show at a certain point, someone who's this, all the seats are taken on the subway at a certain point, someone gets up and off a state at a stop and Alfred totally covered in blood just goes and sits in his spot on like this very crowded bench, right next to other people who kind of look at him and like, notice the blood are kind of like, oh, that's weird, but then just go about their business and yeah.

[00:22:42] Sean: Cause that's just the subway. 

[00:22:44] Nicole: Yeah. That's just the subway. Exactly. Um, so he, you know, goes to the parents' apartment and like, you know, is in this stupor, [00:23:00] he's basically like unable to react. I think he tells them that she's dead, I believe. And then like a police detective shows up and drops by, um, and talks a lot about how many unsolved murders there are in the city and all of that.

[00:23:14] And it's clearly useless. Um, Alfred goes for a walk, he comes back with a rifle. He doesn't really know how to use it, but Patsy's father shows him how, and then the two of them and Patsy's brother end up taking turns, shooting strangers through their window and laughing maniacally about it, which leads Patsy's mom to say, oh, it's so great to see my family laughing again.

[00:23:39] For a moment, I was getting really worried. But now everything's fine because there's joy in the house. Again, that is coming from, um, the men in her family inflicting murderous violence against random strangers out the window. And then they all are happy and they dinner together. And that is little murders.

[00:23:58] Sean: That is right. Little [00:24:00] Murders. Yes. Yeah. 

[00:24:02] Nicole: That's, that's what happens in that movie. Um, you want me to talk about the connections between them? Yes. Cool. Um, well, to me, the main thing is these are both films about very different forms of dysfunctional masculinity that, uh, in the form of characters who then marry women who are very different from them and are kind of set up to save them in one way or another, or help them help counterbalance whatever's wrong with them to help keep them, you know, in the land of the living and become better people.

[00:24:42] Both of these women die. Um, I've watched little murders now twice. The first time I saw it because the structure is a little weird in part based on the play. Um, I thought at first that Patsy died halfway through the film. That's not true. It's really very much [00:25:00] end of act two, whereas. Yeah, Annette very much dies middle of act two and very much dies.

[00:25:06] Um, it's literally the exact halfway point of the film, but they are both movies where she dies. Um, with the husband present in little murders, uh, you know, Elliot Gould doesn't kill her. And, but is in terms of his words and the logic of the film, it responsible to a degree in her death kind of. So there's a connection there.

[00:25:31] And, um, you know, it's, they're both films that are kind of dealing with masculinity and critiquing hetero, patriarchal, uh, romantic and familial relationship structures. And they both also have this like stage element that I thought was interesting in that 

[00:25:50] Sean: both started as a stage thing. 

[00:25:53] Nicole: Yeah. Little Murders is based on a play and Annette was originally supposed to be a musical.

[00:25:59] They [00:26:00] 

[00:26:00] Sean: means 

[00:26:01] Nicole: sparks sparks wrote it as an opera. Um, they plan to tour with it. They ended up making a movie with Leos Carax instead. Uh, that's also where the puppet element came from, which I think is really interesting is that sparks were like, well, we can't have a kid. Tour with us or anything like that.

[00:26:20] Why don't we do this stylized thing of we'll have a bassinet with a doll in it originally it was going to be a puppet. It was gonna be a doll and like, you know, have the music player, whatever. And then when Leos Carax wanted to make the film, he was just like, oh yeah, we're keeping that part. And they were like, okay.

[00:26:36] But then it really, I think works as a very powerful metaphor, um, in the film as well. I think it works 

[00:26:43] Sean: very well there. I think, I mean, I would, I would slightly, I would slightly disagree that there is something that we can, we can discuss further down the line that there ma that their manifestations are that different of the toxic masculinity.

[00:26:57] I would say that they're very, very similar, [00:27:00] but we can talk about that more. Yeah. 

[00:27:02] Nicole: I, that, that sounds interesting. Yes. I felt, I felt that there was a connection between their versions of toxic masculinity and then the, the pivotal death. And, and neither we were talking before the show a little bit, neither is really a fridging death.

[00:27:16] It's not the thing of when the romantic partner dies to give motivation to the protagonist. It's not that at all. Um, it's arguably, you know, something that's really counter to that whole thing. 

[00:27:31] Sean: Yeah. Not necessarily the opposite, but it's definitely that. It's definitely not like it does not inspire them to do more because it's, but it doesn't inspire them to do more.

[00:27:43] And it doesn't like, certainly 

[00:27:45] Nicole: doesn't inspire them to 

[00:27:47] Sean: No. Um, 

[00:27:49] Nicole: there's certainly not any sorts of revenge or vengeance films either. No, not they're about bad people becoming worse, you can say. [00:28:00] Um, so how, how do we feel about these films? When did, when did we see them? What did we think? When did you first watch these films and what did you think about them?

[00:28:10] Sean: Uh, Annette I watched over last week, I had to break it up a little bit just because of, uh, life. Um, and I've been meaning to watch it for months, but, uh, hadn't gotten to it quite yet. Uh, because I saw reference to it in the sparks brothers documentary, uh, looked like it was going to be an interesting thing.

[00:28:29] It was kind of, um, nice to see. And one of those docs that they referenced something that's coming, something new, coming up from the subject, uh, and that it was coming up right away, basically. Um, so watched it over the weekend? Uh, I really enjoyed it. I like a musical. I like, uh, I liked in particular, the puppet and like how the puppet sort of visually re like what you talked about, about how the puppet was, uh, sort of, uh, [00:29:00] taken from it was going to be a stage show.

[00:29:02] And then the puppet is, um, very, very visually representative of the relationship between Henry and. And that his daughter, uh, that clicked right away. Like as soon as I was like, oh, puppet, oh, I see what's going on. Like at first I was just like, this is an interesting way to do it. And then when it becomes clear what, what they're doing, why they're doing it, like this is great.

[00:29:27] When they chose to change her to be an actual child actor. I was also very much appreciated like there is I think that was very well executed part of the film. Um, I like, uh, I like a lot of, honestly, I like a lot of how Henry is a deconstruction of a particular type of performer. Um, who's very recognizable who ends up [00:30:00] being very pop, very popular type of performer.

[00:30:02] And I think one of the reasons, you know, my, my synopsis, I kind of interpret that, that press conference that's her dream is being a real thing, because that would be a real thing for that kind of performer, like that would happen like, um, and has happened. And I think, um, yeah, that particularly deconstruction I really liked, uh, and is very timely.

[00:30:29] It's a very timely movie. Um, and I think it's nice to see a very timely movie with the kind of perspective that this has, um, Coming from honestly, coming from people who are more likely to be Henry McHenry in most contexts than not like, um, I'd read that read a little bit. In one of the articles that we have, we can talk about later about how there, there was some [00:31:00] interpretation of where there some discussion of how some of it seems to be not necessarily autobiographical or semi-autobiographical about Leos Carax, Leos Carax.

[00:31:13] Uh, not really, but kind of mirrors some of his personal life and that his wife died and that his wife died and he's got his daughter with him. And I guess his daughter is in some of the opening, uh, some of the opening sequence stuff. Uh, so there's something interesting about that and just sort of, um, reflective there.

[00:31:34] Uh, so I really enjoyed that a little murders I watched, uh, a month ago give or take it was about to leave Criterion. Uh, so I made sure to watch it. So before this really enjoyed it, it's, I mean, I really like, um, I mean, it was just weird and it's one of those ones that's that you're like, I watched that and I have an impression of what that is, but I'm not sure it could entirely tell [00:32:00] you what happened movie, like, but I have an impression of that movie and that character.

[00:32:05] And, um, you know, it definitely has that stagy, uh, feel to it. And, uh, it is as, I think you mentioned it's like peak Elliott gold. Um, and then also while you're describing it, I'd forgotten. I mean, I haven't forgotten that Donald Sutherland was in it, but I remembered that they were both, this would be like the year after they both did MASH which is a movie I personally like really, really enjoy.

[00:32:34] Uh, and can't get into the TV show because I'm just like, okay, but where's Elliot Gould and Donald Sutherland. Um, and that's another one where the main character is very recognizable and I appreciate the way that he's recognizable and the, the, uh, the, the, um, Patsy who he marries [00:33:00] is also like one of those, like, this is an absurd film with sort of almost disturbingly real characters.

[00:33:09] Like you just pluck these people out and it sort of grounds the absurdity, um, in a way, even though they seem like, sort of, they're sort of characatures, but they're not really, you just like. 

[00:33:30] Nicole: Um, extreme, but 

[00:33:32] Sean: they're kind of extreme, but like, they're like, I 

[00:33:35] Nicole: know that real people. 

[00:33:36] Sean: Yeah. Yeah. But you're like, but I know that person like, and so it's very good and it's very, it also, I really appreciate that one in that sense.

[00:33:44] Um, so both very new watches for me. Um, uh, both ones I want to watch more. Uh, and cause I feel like both of them are those types of movies, which I, I like, which are movies of [00:34:00] the more you watch them. Like I can tell I'm like, I'm going to see more every time I watch these movies and I'll like them more, every time I watch these movies.

[00:34:09] Uh, so that is, those are my personal reactions to the films. What are your personal reactions to the films Nicole? 

[00:34:16] Nicole: Well, I've found what you said to be true. I've at this point, seen them both. Um, at least two times, uh, a net I watched when it first became available this summer streaming on Amazon, I'd heard about it.

[00:34:30] It can. And it, where, where, you know, won some awards and was very polarizing. And I knew it was like the Adam driver and Marion Cotillard sex scene musical is basically all I knew. I didn't know the plot. I didn't know a lot of things, but I was like, yeah, I'm going to watch the Adam driver musical obviously, basically.

[00:34:50] Cause I really like Adam driver, right. I'm interested in musicals and I'm also interested in movies having sex scenes again. So I want to support that and I watched it and was just [00:35:00] like, what the fuck was that? I loved it. I loved it. Um, the first time I saw it, but I was really struck by it and it, I had quite an emotional experience with it also, which is interesting because I've read some criticism being like, there's no emotion.

[00:35:19] I'm like this moved me more than most movies. I've seen this movie guts me every time I watch it. That's part of why I watch it to feel something. Um, there's no one, like, I didn't know, 

[00:35:31] Sean: we should talk about that later, but like, 

[00:35:34] Nicole: um, I was really struck by it. I think Adam driver, he's one of my favorite actors working today.

[00:35:41] I, I think he is so great. And he's so great at taking a character like this and however much, however angry you may be at the character. You still want to watch the character. I was fascinated by him, whereas let's be real people kind of like him in real life for a lot less fascinating to watch [00:36:00] than he is playing that kind of guy.

[00:36:03] And I didn't know where the film was going. I didn't know Marion Cotillard was going to die in the first act. I was. I'm so taken by this relationship, this relationship, even though it's kind of between two archetypes of sorts, felt like such a more real and fully realized and complex and nuanced and not wholly good adult relationship.

[00:36:26] And I was just like, and I remember talking to my husband about, we were watching it together and we're like, we're so into like this, just watch this relationship. Not because the relationship is goals or whatever, but just like, because, oh, this feels like a real relationship. So interesting. And Adam driver's a Dick, but I wanted him to be better.

[00:36:43] I felt invested in his character because he felt like a real person. And so when he pushes Marion Cotillard and she dies, I felt like heartbroken. I felt heartbroken that she was dead. And I felt heartbroken that this is what had happened with this character, that this guy like, [00:37:00] couldn't get it together at all, that he just had to go to that place.

[00:37:03] And I felt heartbroken for their puppet baby. And I also think the music is beautiful. It gets stuck in my head all of the time. Some of it I think is very funny it's it was just like the emotion and the humor. Cause it's a very funny movie also to me and as lines that make me laugh just to remember them, um, and then being like, oh, this is a film about a narcissist and relationship.

[00:37:32] Like kids with narcissist parents is a big part of what this film is about. And I was worried watching it, that they were going to kind of redeem Henry McHenry in some way. And the only redemption is that he ultimately accepts responsibility for what he's done, but he is not rewarded in any way, shape or form.

[00:37:55] He ends up in prison alone with literally his [00:38:00] daughter saying he's like, you know, literally his daughter's like now you have no one to love and he's like, but can I love you? And she says, no, not really. That happens a couple of times over the course of this heartbreaking song they do together, where he finally sees her as a person separate from him and not a puppet as he's been imagining her for this entire time, but her own independent person who he has to say goodbye from to, and, and detach from.

[00:38:27] And his only solace and reward is maybe he can't hurt people anymore. And I was just like, damn, I'm not used to seeing characters like this, get treated that way, where they get to be both the protagonist of the film, where they're a fully formed person. Henry McHenry is by far the most developed character in this film.

[00:38:50] Um, and he's the protagonist. It's about him and it's about his shit and it really doesn't let him off. No, and it really shows, this is how [00:39:00] bad this is, regardless of intentions, regardless of whatever, this is like, how like truly evil, this shit will get. Even though he's a person he's not a mustache twirling villain, he's not, you know, and genocidal alien trying to kill the human race.

[00:39:17] He's just fucking jerk in a way a lot of people are. Uh, and I, I love this film. It is also John Waters, favorite film of the year. Um, that makes sense. Um, I'm not sure if it's my favorite film, just in that there are a couple that are kind of in a tie, but it may as well be it certainly the film I've watched the most.

[00:39:35] I've watched this film four times. Um, I watched it most recently within the past week just to prepare for the podcast because it had been a while since I'd seen it, but I watched it on my own volition two other times in between just cause I was like, I want to watch that shit again. And it's free for me to watch, so I'm going to watch it.

[00:39:51] Um, and I did a little murders I watched for the first time, I believe in September when criterion started this like New York city [00:40:00] movies series on their streaming channel. Yeah. And this was one of them. So I was just looking and I'm like, what's this weirdo Elliot Gould thing. Oh, I vaguely remember there being a plot line on mad men where like the daughter was trying out to be in this play.

[00:40:14] Interesting. Let's watch this. And I watched it and thought it was really interesting and unique. Um, it's a weird movie I felt throughout it. It's structurally very odd, in part, because it was based on a somewhat odd to begin with play. So it doesn't really have the kind of film structure we're used to.

[00:40:34] Um, and so I kind of never knew where I was in the film. I'm like, is this the halfway point? Are we w what's the plot here? I get that into this relationship, but what's, what's the plot. What is this very unusual protagonist with very unusual motivations and forces animating things. Um, and I, I thought of Annette I thought like, oh, interesting.

[00:40:58] That I just saw [00:41:00] fairly recently, this other movie where very unexpectedly cause both deaths the first time, at least to me fell out of the blue on rewatch they're foreshadowed, but first 

[00:41:11] Sean: time watching it kind of, yeah. In a net, I kind of, I'm sorry, 

[00:41:15] Nicole: I'm interrupting. There's a lot of foreshadowing in a net, but I didn't know that I did not see that happening.

[00:41:20] I could see picking up on it. Cause now when I watch it, I'm like, how did I not get this? They foreshadow in so many 

[00:41:26] Sean: ways I think because where, um,

[00:41:34] yeah, I think because of where I paused the movie between my, when I broke it in half that's, it was pretty apparent to me that he was that what was going happen. 

[00:41:45] Nicole: Um, you paused it basically like a few minutes before she died in 

[00:41:49] Sean: the, in the middle. Yeah. In the middle of his performance in which he's explicitly saying I killed my wife.

[00:41:55] So I jumped back another 15 minutes to make sure that rewatched, like the th [00:42:00] that chunk before that. Um, so I'd watch that. I watched that part with the dream twice, and then I watched his performance twice. Um, 

[00:42:11] Nicole: but 

[00:42:13] Sean: yeah, so, so I kind of was expecting it because 

[00:42:15] Nicole: of that, having seen that stuff twice and then right before I can see it.

[00:42:19] But like for me watching it for the first time, just going along, being like, where's this going? No, no, no. And being like, oh man, I don't want him to be terrible. You know? And you know, I didn't know that was going to come. Uh, but so they're both, but they're both pretty shocking. I would say, even if you expected it, it's still kind of shocking deaths that happen in act two of the film and then kind of set the destiny, uh, for the protagonist and his like kind of slog to down their downward spiral and whatnot.

[00:42:57] Um, so yeah, so I was, I was [00:43:00] interested in the connections between the two. I was interested in the connections between the two in terms of, uh, studies of masculinity, uh, critiques of the, you know, hetero, patriarchal, romantic relationships and ideas about them, about those ideas, about family as the building block of the state and whatnot and how, uh, toxic that can be for people involved with it.

[00:43:22] All that sort of stuff. And my brain just started pinging about the connections between the two. And I did watch little murders again, right before I left Criterion at the end of November, just to have it a little fresher in my mind. Uh, so I've seen that twice. I would watch it again. Um, Annette I will watch.

[00:43:38] I mean, I would watch it more than one more time, but in that I will watch a lot. Uh, cause that seems to be one of those movies. I just like to watch over and over and get more stuff out of it. But they are both to Sean's point earlier. They are both the kind of movie that I do. Like more each time I see them little murders, I liked better.

[00:43:56] The second time felt more like I had a handle on [00:44:00] it a little bit. And because I knew where it was going, I was able to pay more attention to other details, which I found very rewarding. So I think they are both pretty rich texts that, um, have, have a lot of, uh, elements that are, that are worth talking about.

[00:44:17] And we're not the only people who talked about these films. I think a lot of critics have talked about them too. Haven't they 

[00:44:23] Sean: Did they? What did Roger Green spun have to say? I always wonder about Roger Greenspun of the New York times. I think about him often 

[00:44:34] Nicole: who was writing right around the turn of the seventies.

[00:44:36] Yeah. Roger Greenspun I 

[00:44:38] Sean: only just heard of him like today, but I often think about what does he think? 

[00:44:43] Nicole: Sure. Well, do you want to tell us, or do you want me to, well, why 

[00:44:48] Sean: don't you tell us. 

[00:44:50] Nicole: Well, he said, um, Roger Greenspun wrote in the New York times when he reviewed the film little murders, I suspect that little murders, the [00:45:00] play has always been better drama and less social satire than many of its detractors or champions have been prepared to admit Pfeiffer such a brilliantly acute cartoonist, that there has been a tendency to read little murders as an animated cartoon, rather than accept the quite extraordinary theatricality of his drama of dark domestic comedy and maniacal declamation.

[00:45:22] Pfeiffer has no real reasons, no recognition of an order behind the disorder. That is his film, central subject, essentially little murders constructs its world. From the point of view of someone sitting behind the locked doors of an apartment on the upper west side. And so long as it maintains the conditions of that point of view, it works dramatically cinematically, whatever way you will, once it breaks those conditions, it becomes unterrifying unfunny, superficial, inadequate.

[00:45:45] I don't know if I agree with that, but little murders is usually funny in its great harangues and sermons in it's superlative cast and in Arkin's direct intelligence and handling most of the dramatic moments. So yeah, because [00:46:00] this, this film, it's a very bleak comedy. I would call it it's a comedy, but you 

[00:46:07] know, 

[00:46:09] Sean: it's that very specific type of comedy where it's not it's.

[00:46:14] It's not a comedy, like people like your standard, like mainstream comedy, where it's like, oh, you're supposed to laugh every couple minutes or every minute or whatever it is. The, the thing about like sitcoms where, you're supposed to have at least a joke on every page or something like that. It's, it's a comedy, it's a comedy in a stage sort of sense of a comedy of in, in almost like traditional theatrical sense of a comedy.

[00:46:38] And that like it, I mean, not entirely because I think traditionally in theater, somebody's supposed to get married at the end and they get married in the middle or the beginning, I guess, of the movie. Um, but yeah. Okay. Yeah. Beginning of the movie, ish, they're sort of [00:47:00] new anyway, anyway, in the middle of the beginning.

[00:47:06] And, uh, but it's definitely a comedy. It's definitely a comedy it's it's dramatic, but then so were a lot of them. Um, 

[00:47:19] Nicole: it's a scary comedy. It's a horror comedy of sorts, but not horror comedy, like Elvira mistress of the dark, which I also recently rewatched and is a fantastic film. We should discuss it to show, but scary, like actually.

[00:47:33] Because it's about real life. One point I want to make about it. This review, doesn't specify this. Some reviews, see it as specifically a satire of urban violence and decay. I did not see it that way. And from the expression on your face, it appears you didn't either. I saw it as very much about America or U S America specifically.

[00:47:56] Not like part of why I like it so much as it wasn't all like [00:48:00] man, New York city is like this it's people are like this. And my understanding is Jules Pfeiffer was, um, the Kennedy assassination was what kicked off this idea, not like how bad things are in New York city. It was about a state of being in terms of violence in the United States.

[00:48:20] And it happened to be about New York city. And for those of us who live here, at least I think we all probably really enjoy seeing New York city. And we're like, yeah, that's how it is. That's accurate because we all get satisfaction out of, you know, taking pride in how shitty things can be here. And yet we live here.

[00:48:36] Um, I mean, things are shitty everywhere and there's a lot of stuff great here, especially compared to, oh, this is and don't need to talk about any of this. Um, but, but point being, it's both a very New York movie, but also not. It doesn't have to be a New York movie. 

[00:48:56] Sean: It doesn't, it doesn't necessarily have to be a New York movie in a lot of ways.

[00:48:59] And a [00:49:00] lot of ways, like there's a lot of like the ways in which people connect with one another, like physically that I think is very New York, but

[00:49:17] that's one of the reasons that New York is always a good setting for drama and comedy because of the ways that very different people can come together. Like this movie, like there's much more opportunity in your natural in your normal day to day for you to see a photographer, getting beaten up on your street corner by a bunch of guys and go out there and, and you know how they meet at the beginning.

[00:49:50] Um, there's more 

[00:49:52] Nicole: population density. If 

[00:49:53] Sean: nothing else, there's more population density. There's a lot more fluidity between like how people move between different [00:50:00] areas. The fact that there's an actually functional public transit system, despite the fact that we all have many complaints about the public transit system is an actually functional public transit system that, uh, works more often than it does not.

[00:50:13] Um, And, uh, like there's just like, I think the ways in which people are like, oh, it's a very New York story. It's like, well, it's a very New York story, just in the sense that it's easier to tell these stories in New York, because it's more believable that these people would suddenly meet each other in New York.

[00:50:31] Nicole: Right. I don't feel like I, I agree. And I don't think, yeah. And I don't think Roger Greenspun's point that it works when it's like behind the locked doors of an upper west side apartment and needs to be from that point of view. And when they go beyond that, it doesn't work. I think that's an, I don't fully get that [00:51:00] 

[00:51:00] Sean: and yeah, I don't necessarily understand his point there.

[00:51:03] Okay. You know, Roger, he, he kinda misses sometimes. 

[00:51:08] Nicole: Yeah. I don't get this whole unterrifying unfunny, superficial inadequate. I just don't. I mean, I guess he thinks it works as a satire of like specific, um, New York types and doesn't otherwise, but that's like just a completely different way of viewing the whole film for me.

[00:51:23] Um, but it, it was overall a positive review though. It had these quibbles, but it was like, yeah, this is good. Um, it, it seems like it got, well, we'll talk about rotten tomatoes in a minute, but it, it got a lot of good reviews, um, as did Annette. And that's a very polarizing film. A lot of people fucking hate it, but it has gotten a lot of positive reviews.

[00:51:49] AO Scott in the New York times said that it's a musical about an ill starred romance between two artists, a description that suggests obvious kinship with Lala land and a [00:52:00] star is born not to play algorithm or anything. But if you like those movies, you'll probably like this one too. Or maybe not emphasis on the, maybe not 

[00:52:09] Sean: either of those movies, I'm not interested in Lala land.

[00:52:12] And I've decided that because I, there are 20 versions of a star is born and I've never seen any of them that I'm probably never going to see any of them. Um, 

[00:52:23] Nicole: I mean, I, 

[00:52:25] Sean: I understand how it's 

[00:52:26] Nicole: similar. Well, it's similar in that they're musicals and they're based on a romantic relationship at the center and they're all about white people.

[00:52:37] Sean: And a star is born, is about famous people and the change with like how one 

[00:52:42] Nicole: They're all kind of about showbiz. That's true. They're all kind of about, and they all, but LA land's not about that disintegration. And I I've seen all these movies and, you know, La La Land's, whatever, I never need to see it again. And a star is born [00:53:00] similarly.

[00:53:00] It's kind of whatever, like lady Gaga did a good job. Like there's stuff about it. That's good. I don't think it's that great. A movie or something I particularly want to watch again. Um, I think this is just, and as a musical, those are both like very conventional, whereas this is more not Brechtian, but very calling attention to the artifice of the musical is like from the opening scenes, who's the audience, there's the audience and the film.

[00:53:30] There's you, the audience watching this, we're going to call attention to all of these layers of what's going on right now. And in a rather funny games, ask thing, even implicate you like in that opening thing, um, the cast sings, like we might even kill for you. Like it's not, you know, and which implicating the audience much as Henry McHenry is very troubled in the first half of the film with how his, uh, girlfriend turned wife is this opera singer who [00:54:00] is always, as he says, like, you know, bowing, bowing, bowing, and dying, dying, dying every night.

[00:54:05] She dies for the audience and takes a bow. And he's very disturbed by this, uh, which I think we'll probably, we will, um, probably get into, uh, and you know, there's there, the audience, if they're paying attention might be drawn to question things like, well, what's the relationship between me watching this film as paralleled with the relationship of the audience inside the film, watching the opera and Henry McHenry show and all the news coverage of them.

[00:54:37] Because there are like humorously in the film, they're kind of a celebrity couple, which some critics are like, where's this where's the like comedian opera, singer celebrities. What opera singer is a celebrity these days. And I'm like, who gives a shit? Like, that's your problem with Annette? I don't know what to tell you in this world.

[00:54:53] It is great. So there's all these like entertainment tonight type like news reports about them and their [00:55:00] relationship. And you can see the public tide turning in various ways of how they feel about it. And that's anyway, it's, uh, um, point being, I think it's a very fundamentally different kind of musical than those other two.

[00:55:13] That's 

[00:55:13] Sean: fundamentally different than most musicals. Like just structurally the type of music it's doing, the what it, what it is. Uh, it's sort of, it's both being naturalistic at times and it's seen construction while also being extremely theatrical in terms of its its themes scene construction and the, and the music is not meant to be like the music's not meant to like even represent dialogue.

[00:55:42] It's meant to be a very, very much like, we're going to tell you a thing. Here's the thing thing. And it's more nuance than that, but like lyrically it's often 

[00:55:55] Nicole: just it's, it's operating on an unusual level. Like with the, [00:56:00] we love each other so much thing. It, it becomes this thing where it's like, they're repeating it for themselves.

[00:56:05] They're like. They're in love with being in love. They want to be in love. They're repeating it. There it's like an incantation bringing it to be almost, which starts to call attention to like, well, we'll do they? What does love mean to them? What does it mean to love each other so much are the kinds of questions the audience has kind of encouraged to ask of ourselves because there is so little additional lyrical content to process.

[00:56:34] It's just repeating these very simple things and the repetition begins to change the meaning, I think. Um, so on ebert.com, it appears that Ebert back in the day gave little murders four stars. And more recently, Sheila O'Malley because Ebert RIP passed away some years ago gave a net four stars. 

[00:56:58] Sean: I mean, that just sounds like him [00:57:00] making excuses.

[00:57:02] Nicole: Sure. So they were both well reviewed here. I was interested to see this because like, they are both polarizing works. They're certainly neither of them is universally acclaimed, but it happens that these two checks, we do every episode where we always are like, okay, what did the New York times say? What did Ebro Ebert say?

[00:57:21] Like two long running sources of film criticism that review a wide range of things and are very mainstream. They were all positive in this case. Um, yeah. And you know, Is there anything in particular from here, Sean? I see. You know, 

[00:57:39] Sean: well, not necessarily. I just pulled, I just pulled the quote that we, that we pull in our research doc to make sure that we had it available, but I don't know that we necessarily, like we can put the links in, but I think what's significant is we, you just said is that they are films that are very clearly the sort of thing that people are going to hate [00:58:00] because they're not by the numbers are straight, like plots necessarily.

[00:58:06] And there are things where you're like the hell did I just watch? Um, and maybe a little bit less to a net. I think a net, probably people are just like, I think people might be mad about, you know, uh, the, the, uh, Adam driver characters, um, position or whatever, in terms of 

[00:58:24] Nicole: people are made about everything, um, people are mad about the puppet.

[00:58:29] People are mad about the songs. People are mad about like his comedy bits. That's not realistic cause anything else in the 

[00:58:39] Sean: film. First of all, some of it is definitely like, I'm 

[00:58:43] Nicole: like, if I was so smart, 

[00:58:46] Sean: we should talk about that some more in a second, which is one of the reasons why I'm like, let's just say, you know what?

[00:58:51] In fact let's just like, say it was generally, these were generally liked by critics. We can't do the thing we usually do where we get mad at critics for being, for [00:59:00] being not good and understanding that movies are good because the critics understood these movies. Like 

[00:59:06] Nicole: the ones we chose, at least there, there are others that didn't though, if you look up either up these movies, certainly Annette, there are people trashing it and including critics.

[00:59:14] Absolutely. Yeah. 

[00:59:16] Sean: But our usual touchstones, which would show more like mainstream, I think like confusion with films or disinterest in films. Aren't, they're showing that they quite liked them. 

[00:59:30] Nicole: Um, I do want to call attention to one, uh, sentence from the Ebert review of little murders, just cause I think it's quite astute, which is Arkin makes little murders, so much of a piece so consistent on its own terms that while you're watching it, it doesn't even feel like satire just real life.

[00:59:48] A little further down the road, little murders is a very 20, 21 movie I'll say, yeah, I was watching little murders. And I was like, this is what life feels like right now. Not people [01:00:00] shooting at me in New York city in some sort of urban crime way, but people just shooting up every place else in the fucking country, as well as there being a pandemic right outside, waiting to get you in people being in all sorts of levels of denial about that and not willing to do the bare minimum to try to not have their fellow citizens die.

[01:00:19] And all of that, like, you know, the past couple of years I watched little murders and I was just like, some of the specifics are. But this is definitely 

[01:00:27] Sean: the vibe is, is basically the same shit. 

[01:00:30] Nicole: Yeah. I think Ebert was quite right to say a little down the road and now we're here. I do. Let's talk about rotten tomatoes where little murders was 69% fresh with critics and fif and 82% with audiences in part, because I would imagine at this point, anyone who's going to fucking watch little murders and write about it on rotten tomatoes is probably like going to have, they're not going to be like, what the fuck?

[01:00:55] Because they chose to watch little murders sometime in the past 15 years, [01:01:00] um, Annette is 71% fresh with critics. So kind of the same and 72 fresh with audiences. So less, I'm actually surprised it's even that high, there must be like Adam Driver stans or something. I'm 

[01:01:13] Sean: sure there's some of that. I'm sure there's also a degree of like, it falls, it flies under the radar of a lot of the people who would write stuff on rotten tomatoes that would mostly be to shit on it.

[01:01:24] Like, I feel like a lot of the people who probably are seeing it and don't care for it and the audiences aren't necessarily going on rotten tomatoes to write about it. 

[01:01:32] Nicole: I've definitely come across a lot of negative reactions to that film. 

[01:01:36] Sean: Definitely. I can imagine 

[01:01:38] Nicole: box office wise, it's almost not worth talking about Little Murders.

[01:01:43] Um, cost 1.3, 4 million, and apparently made 1.5 million. So Hey, success. Uh, Jules Pfeiffer was nominated for best comedy adapted from another medium in the writer's Guild awards did not win a net, had an estimated budget of [01:02:00] 15.5 million looks like it costs more than that. Honestly, they made good use of that money.

[01:02:06] You definitely see that 15 million and hear that 15 million, um, but it's worldwide gross was only about three and a half million, although it was released this summer and it was simultaneously released on Amazon prime. So, you know, like not that, that was going to be a blockbuster otherwise, but you know that, but it, it had a lot working against it box office wise, and it won a lot of awards.

[01:02:31] It won best director and, uh, best composer for the for sparks at Cannes. It was nominated for the Palm door, did not win. Um, Leos Carax also won the Douglas Sirk award at the Hamburg film festival and, and it has been nominated for best music, themed, film, biopic, or musical at the Hollywood music and media awards.

[01:02:53] And no doubt, it will be nominated for more. We're recording this at the beginning of December, 2021. [01:03:00] I don't know if it's going to get Oscar nominations, but you know, we were about to get heavy into award season and it's a contender. It didn't really get the kind of traction where I think everyone's, 

[01:03:12] Sean: I think it's going to depend on.

[01:03:14] Yeah, I think it's gonna depend on how much and how much Amazon wants to put it out there. 

[01:03:21] Nicole: What do these films reflect about one another? We've been talking about that as we usually do. What, what were you thinking, Sean, as somebody who's newer, both of them? 

[01:03:31] Sean: Well, cause so we were talking a little bit about the beginning, about the ways in which they portrayed toxic masculinity.

[01:03:37] I think they look different and I think there's ways in which they're definitely different obviously. But I do think that they're kind of the same thing though. Like there's a, there's a kind of like the passivity of Albert

[01:03:57] Nicole: is [01:04:00] 

[01:04:00] Sean: in some ways a different manifestation of the same sort of thing that Henry McHenry is doing. Like they both have this sort of spite for the world around them a little bit. Like the Alberts is like, oh, I'm apathetic, which isn't like, there's a, there's a real, like I'm giving up sort of selfishness that's happening there.

[01:04:23] Nicole: Yes. What I was going to say is an abdication of responsibility. It's one of the connections I see between them. It looks outwardly a little different, but it inwardly comes from this similar light. You know, it's not my fault. 

[01:04:39] Sean: Exactly. Like Henry's career falls apart and he's blaming his wife. He's blaming the baby.

[01:04:46] He's raging against everybody else. He's blaming the audience when really what it is is that it's his own, uh, you know, his career starts to fall apart for, this is one of my favorite parts, honestly like that second [01:05:00] performance of his it's the second, I think it's just the second, like full performance to see if his, 

[01:05:04] Nicole: This is why I wanted to do Karaoke at Halloween.

[01:05:06] So I could do the meltdown song. All I want to do is do that meltdown song, wearing a green robe, holding like a banana and a cigarette. This is all I want to do is 

[01:05:17] Sean: we'll do it. And someday we'll eat someday. You can do it. Uh, and 

[01:05:22] Nicole: I love, I love that because listen to on Spotify, that's one of the main ones I'll put 

[01:05:26] Sean: on it's, you know, the songs, one thing, but just that it is so, and it's so timely and it's going to keep being timely as the thing is like, it's a sort of thing that you see standups do.

[01:05:43] Like they'd be like, there's definitely some recent stuff that has happened that is like this, 

[01:05:50] Nicole: um, he's literally demanding of the audience. What's your problem. What's your fucking problem. And he's basically like, you used to laugh, [01:06:00] but you sure ain't laughing at me no more. And then like goes on and it's just basically.

[01:06:05] You know, if you don't laugh for me, I'm going to get the fuck off this stage. You better laugh. You better clap. And there were bits of that in the first one where like, they demand that you laugh and you clap and all that, but it's a little bit more, everyone's having a good time. He just crossed a line where the audience is like, no, this is too far.

[01:06:22] This is too much. Now. Now we're all uncomfortable. Henry McHenry before we were having an edgy good time. But you tipped over the edge and now everyone's just kinda like, Hm, but rather than him doing a critique of his performance, how could he possibly do that? Because the reason he does comedy and he tells us as he tells us very self servingly at the beginning of the film is because it's the only way he can tell the truth without getting killed.

[01:06:48] Sean: Right. Which is bullshit the yes. And it's the parody of the comedian in it of itself. [01:07:00] And I I like comedy and I like comedians up to a point. And that point is what happens with Henry McHenry in this film, which happens to so many comedians, someone a very large scale and some, not so much on a large scale, but it happens to all of them where basically they become separate from.

[01:07:22] They, they, they lose touch with like that core of what we, you know, when they do a good job when they are the Henry McHenry, we see at the beginning of the film where they're touching on like common things, like things it's like, yep, I'm fucked up in that way too. Yup. I'm dealing with these problems too.

[01:07:42] And then they start to turn it against people and, or see themselves as an opposition to the audience, as opposed to being a part of that group as a part of like this sort of community. And there's an expression of it. I mean, there's the hint there at the beginning of where he's [01:08:00] like, oh, this is the only place I can tell the truth without getting killed.

[01:08:02] Which is that hyperbole that you hear from many, uh, comedians, uh, about their importance culturally, which I don't completely disagree with. Um, it's just, when they start to talk about 

[01:08:17] Nicole: more likely to kill somebody else for no fucking good reason, then come to him. 

[01:08:22] Sean: Exactly. And like, it's, it's that it's that, that I'm just like, okay, that's this is here, this is good.

[01:08:27] And like the type of comedian he is and the type of style and the theatricality of it, like it all comes together, um, sort of perfectly represent the kind of, that kind of person. Um, and that kind of. I think that's why I, even though, I mean, I recognized it as a dream when she takes the nap and there's the, the, the press conference with all the women.

[01:08:54] But I think at the same time, I was like, okay, that's a dream, but like, it's coming from, did that [01:09:00] happen? Or is that happening? Is that something that we're just dealing with as a dream, but it's like a real thing. Was it a thing before? Like, and I was just like, I'm just going to accept that. Like for me, I just accepted it as a real thing that happened and that she happened to be dreaming about it.

[01:09:17] Like, 

[01:09:19] Nicole: yeah. I, um, see it very differently. Not necessarily that it didn't happen or that similar things to what happens in the dream didn't happen. I'm sure they did. I'm sure. You know, he's treated women shitty, but the reason I've just, it's very clearly set up that what happens is she's in the backseat of a limo there's news playing on a monitor on the back of the seat in front of her, she's watching the news.

[01:09:45] She falls asleep. She has this dream where she sees a news report about how six women have come forward each with a similar story regarding Henry McHenry and his abuses. And they sing this piece, these six women, and it [01:10:00] culminates with them saying the reason we came forward now is because we want to warn and like, you know, she's in danger, you know, et cetera.

[01:10:09] And, um, she. It also, oh, I forgot in the dream. Also, she wakes up and she falls asleep. She has a dream that she wakes up in the back of the limo and this, this is what's on the news now. And then at the end of it, she wakes up again, something completely different is on the news. So like that period is, is very clearly formally established as being a dream.

[01:10:32] My take on it is not that it's a dream of something she's seen before, but it's a dream that comes from her picking up on this uneasiness. She's been singing about at various points. I love this man, but something's not right. Something feels off, you know, I don't know what it is. And, and her subconscious comes up with that because it's tapping into something real.

[01:10:52] Like it is about something real, whether or not, you know, any of those women in her dream exists. I don't think we have any [01:11:00] reason to think those specific women exists, but I do think you're right. That we do have reason to think that things like that have happened. Um, the reason I was so like, mad about it is in part, because I read a review where somebody faulted the film for having Henry McHenry, get me too'd and then having the film forget about it.

[01:11:17] And I'm like, it didn't happen. That was, 

[01:11:22] Sean: see, I actually liked this. One of the reasons why I like interpreting that it did happen because it's not shocking to me that it would have been forgotten. 

[01:11:32] Nicole: No, it's not shocking to me that it would have been forgotten. I'm just saying formally the thing where we learn about that happened in a dream.

[01:11:40] Yeah. Um, I have no problem believing it would have been forgotten too, but I don't, you know, I think that is a, a wrong headed grounds on which to criticize the film because somebody misinterpreted something that happened in the plot. That's something I agree with you that it's supposed to be coming from somewhere.

[01:11:59] And I mean, [01:12:00] ultimately he fucking kills her. Yeah. Like he's more dangerous than she could have fucking imagined. Um, and I, he makes her laugh. Right? That's, that's so much of why they connect it. I found it so powerful that I believed them being together. I believed their relationship. I believe their chemistry.

[01:12:18] She doesn't, and he's on his best behavior with her during the honeymoon period. Because when we first meet them, they're in the honeymoon period and they're infatuated with one another. And then the second shit gets real. He starts falling apart and being a Dick and he's in denial about it himself. You know, it starts coming out in his dreams.

[01:12:37] He has some disturbing dreams and things like that. It starts coming out in his work, you know, what, what he's actually thinking about, but he won't take responsibility for it. Um, I wanted to speak though, to you were saying, we were talking about foreshadowing about the like, uh, killing being killed stuff.

[01:12:58] When we first see them together, [01:13:00] Well, we first see them together actually in that opening number where the actors kind of take on their roles in the film starts. But then, um, you know, we see them separately. They both go off and goes and does her opera, Henry McHenry goes off and does his comedy show.

[01:13:18] And then he rides his motorcycle to meet her and they kiss in front of the paparazzi and they ask each other how they, you know, you know, how they did. And Henry McHenry says, I killed them. That's what he, how he refers to his relationship with his, his audience he says, I killed them and Anne says good boy. And he says, how did you do?

[01:13:37] And she says, I saved them, which is, there's a lot of interesting stuff about the parallels between their two characters, which are also very much about the roles that men and women get to play in cultural life and art and things like that. And her role is to be the martyr, to be the kind innocent, pure, [01:14:00] loving all, all these, you know, cult of white femininity, fetishized aspects.

[01:14:06] That's her she's also, you know, has a great voice or it wasn't Marion Cotillard singing the opera bits. Um, but whoever I'll find the name, whoever sings them sounds fucking amazing. It sounds amazing. And she dies over and over again for them. Whereas Henry McHenry sees himself as inflicting, you know, taking his anger.

[01:14:26] Um, and inflicting outwards on the audience, not absorbing theirs. Right. But the other way to the point where even when he does this play on it, where he, um, in the opening bit, uh, fakes, like he got shot on stage basically to the point where almost everybody in the audience is freaked out. Not everyone.

[01:14:47] Some people are like, oh, I get it. But most people, cause it goes on so long are like, is he actually dead? But he's not. Then he gets up and he's like, see, I can die on stage too. But even when he dies on stage, he's doing it in [01:15:00] this confrontational way, um, against the audience kind of in opposition to the audience, not to like take on their, whatever the way Anne does, um, 

[01:15:12] Sean: yeah, it's, it's an interest.

[01:15:14] It's an, it's also an interesting look at not, I mean, the difference between male and female roles, but also somewhat. And, uh, well, I don't want it, that sounded almost essentialist but um, assigned roles or permitted roles, um, and archetypes which this film and archetypes and, but also like to a certain degree, even.

[01:15:43] Like the professions and how those get us also associated and sort of agender way, uh, like there's the whole thing which comes up every, at least once a year, you know, some jackasses like women, aren't funny, it's like, there's shut [01:16:00] up. Uh, but because stand-up is a very male dominated space, um, even the lots of thousands, millions of, of, of stand-up comedians who are women, like I say, male dominated in the sense of like, who's allowed to have chances, right?

[01:16:18] Uh, not who's out there doing their, not for good. Certainly not. Who's good. Definitely not good because honestly, most male comedians are doing the same show, 

[01:16:31] Nicole: but who's gatekeeping. And who's being let through those gates. Absolutely. 

[01:16:34] Sean: Exactly. Who's gatekeeping. Who's being led through those gates. Like it's very male dominated in that sense.

[01:16:40] And th in a lot of ways, and that keeps, and that keeps coming up as a problem. Um, and then acting, which is

[01:16:52] different because 

[01:16:56] Nicole: not just acting but singing and 

[01:16:58] Sean: angelic acting, singing. [01:17:00] Yeah. And that, that as well, but like her, because like, and this is to address what you were saying about how she saves people is like the actor. Doesn't necessarily confront the audience, but represents the like is, is a vessel for the audience to experience something or, and to experience a catharsis, which is, uh, you know, which has, there's sort of these different approaches to it.

[01:17:24] Like there's an approach to comedy that is more cathartic as well. I think I've seen that like, honestly, like, uh, the work of Bo Burnham, I think is a much more cathartic form of stand-up comedy because he doesn't really necessarily, he's actually more of just sort of a performance artist, uh, then even a standup, but it's a mix of things, but still like, there's a way of doing that.

[01:17:48] Uh, but it's that performer like representing the audience thing and there's a, um, the, the approach to the world. [01:18:00] Cause it's also like in how they interact with the, um, with the press. The first time they meet up, you know, as in character, the first time they meet up, you know, she's very open to them and he puts down his mask cause he doesn't want to, you know, he tries to separate.

[01:18:17] Um, and so there's, there's a lot of that, uh, there, and then if we go to little murders and we got our characters there, we've got, I think that. Uh, Albert Albert Albert, um, is Alfred Alfred. Um, Alfred is very similar. Like his way of doing it is like, oh, just let it happen. Just let it happen. Being shut off, shut off.

[01:18:48] It's being it's about being shut off, but it's that same? It's the same, like it's the same. Okay. I'm going to be I'm I'm not, I'm choosing not to, I'm choosing not to engage with this, you know, um, [01:19:00] Henry McHenry's performance is confrontational, but really just in this way where he's like onstage doing a thing at you, but you're separated from him still, like he's still is, is, is not, he's not having an emotional exchange with you.

[01:19:16] He's not having a physical exchange with, well, until he throws that thing at the guys at the OD, literally throw some stuff at the audience, but like, that's not, that's not the burn, the mouth you're right. You're right. Right. But like, it's like, there's that separation. I think there's that same separation with Alfred is like, they're doing the same thing in different ways.

[01:19:37] Even like the way Alfred's like, oh, I take pictures of shit. Uh, is a sort of like passive confrontation. Cause it's a very passive, aggressive sort of thing. And he's like, this is my art. My art is taking pictures of shit. 

[01:19:51] Nicole: Um, where's, Patsy's trying to engage. I mean, in a way you can argue is very steeped in denial in a way.

[01:19:59] [01:20:00] Uh, you know, Anne's isn't in the same way and might be in denial in some ways, but not, not the way Patsy is, but Patsy does have a point where she says she gives this monologue. That's quite good where she says something like for every yes, bad things happen constantly. But for every bad thing, there's five good things.

[01:20:16] I'm not going to let the people doing the bad thing. Stop me from enjoying all the good things. And she has a point it's kind of psychotic the degree she takes it to, but she has a point and there's something compelling about it. And it's about saying, I am not willing to shut myself off from life. I'm going to be open so that I can enjoy all that life has to offer.

[01:20:39] Even as more and more fucked up stuff is coming in this room, I'm still going to pay attention. You know, I get to choose where I put my attention. Why would I focus on the bad stuff when I can focus on the good stuff? Um, remind and say, it's not that different from a lot of actual, like self-help and life coaching stuff.

[01:20:55] That's really no more reasonable than what [01:21:00] she says. Hers is a lot more appealing to me because at least she comes to it, honestly. 

[01:21:04] Sean: Yeah. I mean, I think they both have, you know, both Alfred, Alfred, Alfred, Alfred, and, um, and Patsy both have like the standpoints that have their positives. Like Alfred's like, I'm just gonna roll with it is not an entirely bad thing.

[01:21:23] No, 

[01:21:23] Nicole: it's the degree to which. 

[01:21:26] Sean: Yeah. Cause sometimes it's just like, literally, sometimes he's just right. Sometimes associations 

[01:21:32] Nicole: really, really helpful survival technique. 

[01:21:34] Sean: Yeah. Well, and also just like sometimes yeah, no matter what you do or say, they're still going to beat the shit out of you. So you might as well just let it happen and get it over with like, sometimes it's just is what it is.

[01:21:47] Um, but she's also right in that. Yeah. You can't let all the shit get to you all the time. You have to find a way to pull your focus and, and find [01:22:00] the things that make you happy, whatever, like they're both. Right, exactly. They're both right and they're both wrong. 

[01:22:07] Nicole: Yeah. And, and also, you know, you can't fix people. These films are both kind of about how women can't fix men, but nobody can fix anybody.

[01:22:16] No mantic relationships. Don't fix people. They can be sites of support and you know, things like, oh, children, children definitely fucking don't fix people. Um, as, as we saw in Annette um, didn't get to see that in little murders, but I think they are both. Portraits of, um, a version of, uh, you know, idealized, romanticized, heterosexual, romantic relationship, even though in little murders, they're both totally fucked.

[01:22:44] It's like, and it's both like, this is what's going to elevate the fucked up guy and help him to not be so fucked up. Cause isn't that what happened, Sean? Like guys just need to grow up and like get a wife and a child and like get their priorities straight and then, and then they'll be better. Right?

[01:22:59] That's, [01:23:00] 

[01:23:00] Sean: there's a lot of ways in which little murders and I, I mean, I think this was already happening, but I, it, it became more of a thing about 20 years after is, is kind of a model for every sitcom of the nineties. It's like a dude who's kind of look, I don't know. It was like, he's disconnected from things.

[01:23:18] He doesn't find joy and things, whatever. Um, and then there's a woman who, who does, I mean, she's almost a manic pixie dream girl, like yes. 

[01:23:31] Nicole: Except that this film then kills her. 

[01:23:35] Sean: That's 

[01:23:36] Nicole: why, which is why it's like the opposite of a manic pixie narrative. Yeah. Because they're like, 

[01:23:42] Sean: no, it's criticizing what this, you know, other things are lionizing it and they're not lionizing, but celebrating the relationship and saying like her, like saying like the thing of like either they fall on the side of the woman can change.

[01:23:59] And the man does want [01:24:00] to change, uh, or they fall on the side of, uh, she shouldn't try to change him and she should accept him for what he is. Uh, I think more often than not, it's the, it's the ladder every once in a, the former rarely do you find one where they kind of meet in the middle, which is honestly one of the reasons why, um, I always liked knocked up is they kind of end up somewhere in the middle and knocked up.

[01:24:27] Um, but it has the same sort of knocked up, has the, almost the same sort of setup like Seth Rogan is kind of that sort of apathetic, idiot, um, and a different, 

[01:24:39] Nicole: Katherine Heigel's character is not like loving life though. She's just got my shit together and he's a schlub is, I mean, I saw this so long ago. That's my memory 

[01:24:48] Sean: of it.

[01:24:48] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's been a it's been a long time, but yeah, but it's a similar 

[01:24:51] Nicole: model, but she's kind of like more the ball busting bitch type archetype career girl. As I recall, whereas Patsy is the like starry [01:25:00] starry-eyed, but you're, I mean, I agree with you. I'm not disagreeing with your no, 

[01:25:03] Sean: no they are different archetypes of it, for sure.

[01:25:05] They're different archetypes of it, for sure. And, but like, it's the same dynamic of she's trying to change him and he's not, but ultimately they kind of fall like w w the only reason I brought it up is because it's one of the few ones where in the end, it's not about one or the other, but they actually find like an equilibrium.

[01:25:26] Nicole: Gotcha. I, yeah. I don't remember the film well enough, but that all sounds right. Um, that then you were saying 

[01:25:34] Sean: divergence, but 

[01:25:35] Nicole: yeah, no, it's great. Um, I'm just the sitcom thing that you were, um, talking about is really interesting. Cause that's the thing I think about a lot and I feel like, oh, what's so good about both these films is it's like this, this sit-com dynamic of like the kind of schlubby dumb guy and the wife who's kind of got it more together and is [01:26:00] always like, you need to, you know, not feed the baby donuts for dinner or wah wah it, you know, it's kind of the genre, you know, that's, you know, it's a sub genre of like, are straight people.

[01:26:13] Okay. Basically, as far as I'm concerned. Cause it's like, I think it speaks to really. Toxic dynamics that we all see in a lot of heterosexual relationships, not so much really among like my friend group. Cause it's whenever I encounter it, I'm like, why are you all married though? Then if you fucking hate each other, don't get married.

[01:26:39] Like there's so many fucking straight women who fucking hate men. And I'm not saying it's all for bad reasons. There's always some good reasons to hate men, but I'm like, why did you marry someone? You hate stop dating people. You don't like good rule for everybody of every gender, but there's this idea we have.

[01:26:56] And it makes sense because of like the history of [01:27:00] heterosexual romance and marriage and having kids and like, this is how we continue to perpetuate our shitty society. Like of course you have to do this. This is doing your part. And certainly being a woman. That's your part, that's your most important thing you can have, like for a lot of women, um, depending on your class location and things like that for a while, it's like, yeah, at a certain point, you're not even supposed to have a job at all.

[01:27:23] Like this is your job. And so we get a lot of miserable people where that's not necessarily what they wanted, but they were indoctrinated into it from a very young age. And so they're doing it. There are a lot of people who are married, who don't want to be married, who have kids. They don't want to have.

[01:27:41] Um, that's not that wasn't my path I, I early on was like, no. I am married now, but you know, as, as you know, married someone after 15 years, because at first we were like, we don't want to get married. That's a whole other thing. But like I 

[01:27:57] Sean: There's tax benefits. 

[01:27:57] Nicole: Sitcoms the more [01:28:00] money you make, the more tax benefits there are. If you're married, um, there's all, it's, this is a big digression.

[01:28:07] I don't want to get into, um, what I did want to get into, what I did want to say is that what sitcoms don't do is give their, I feel that sitcoms are this kind of pressure, tension, reliefs, um, the kind of sitcoms you're talking about, that have these kinds of relationships in them so that everyone who's in a miserable relationship can look and laugh at the sit-com and laugh at their misery and have a bit of a release and be like, that's just how it is.

[01:28:32] I've heard straight people say, what are to me, crazy things to other straight people about like they're fucked up relationships and be like, oh yeah, I know. That's just how it is men, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, I married a man. And if I felt that way about men, I would not be married to a man. I luckily have that option.

[01:28:53] I am not solely attracted to men. So like, if I wa I just, don't [01:29:00] just, don't just fucking, don't like, um, and sitcoms. Don't do the audience, the honesty of showing that actually Annette and little murders, that's kind of where this dynamic goes. Yeah. But the sitcoms are this like. That's this big myth of our culture.

[01:29:17] That's very important about like family and by family. We mean like heterosexual, patriarchal, nuclear family. There might be some exceptions. Maybe there's like one gay family in your circle of like 20 families, you know, with married, probably white, you know, upper middle-class gay people who are very respectable or whatever, but overall it's a hetero patriarchal structure.

[01:29:39] Um, and it's like, we all got to do it. It sucks sometimes, but that's part of the beauty of it. And that's what family is. And all this weird, like romantic mythology about family getting bundled up with these toxic elements as if you can't have one without the other. And I'm here to tell you, you can, and many people do, [01:30:00] but it's, it's a Smith we need to get.

[01:30:02] And Annette and little murders are like, well, this is where this goes. Woman ends up dead. It's you know, it's, sometimes people are like, want to argue that those shows are feminist in some way. Cause like, oh, the woman's smarter. And I'm like, no, that's a patriarchal stereotype that helps keep women in line and doing their part basically and gives men a get out of jail free card so that they don't have to take responsibility for all sorts of things.

[01:30:30] Cause it's like, what can I say? I'm just a dumb guy. This ultimately benefits men, 

[01:30:34] Sean: not women. Yeah, absolutely. 

[01:30:37] Nicole: But if in, in the immediate. It doesn't look like it's sexist. Cause it's like, oh, well it's sexist against the guy. The woman's the one with, and, and these films show, you know, actually the, um, the deadly, the deadly results of, of, of these dynamics of like women being one to keep it together.

[01:30:58] And men being able to be [01:31:00] kind of like, oh, well, I'm just a dumb guy who doesn't have my shit together. And I need the woman who's better and more loving and you know, more empathetic and more connected to the, you know, to, to save me and keep me connected to my own humanity. 

[01:31:14] Sean: And also just like the self-centeredness that happens there.

[01:31:16] And the, the, the, as you described it earlier, narcissism that happens with Henry McHenry and how he's like, well, if I can't be famous anymore, I'm going to be famous by proxy, through my daughter, through a net, through my puppet. 

[01:31:35] Nicole: Yeah. And he doesn't see, uh, so the, the conductor who had been Anne's accompaniest who we learn at a certain point, um, had an affair with her that ended as soon as she got together with Henry, then, then that ended and he's, you know, quietly been pretty unhappy, um, about this.

[01:31:52] Uh, he and Henry have this great song together when Henry first invites the accompaniest [01:32:00] over to hear Annette sing because he's like, I want you to. To play music while we tour. Cause I can't do that. So you, my, my, he calls him like my conductor friend. He never, he doesn't have a name. He's just the accompany us.

[01:32:12] And then he's the conductor and Henry McHenry, um, just, just keeps calling him my conductor friend and Henry doesn't pick up on any of the complex emotions that the conductor's having about all this, which upon further viewing you see it. Like he, he alludes to the fact that he might, he thinks he might be Annette's father, um, in his first song I believe.

[01:32:36] Um, and Henry doesn't pick up on any of this because it doesn't behoove him to cause his head's too far up his own ass. Yeah. Nobody else exists as a three-dimensional fully emotional person in his presence. Not even Anne Anne was the closest, but still he saw her as an object. He was either in awe of her or he was angry and resentful, but she [01:33:00] wasn't a full person with her own full psychology who he could talk to.

[01:33:03] Honestly, he either had to put her up on a pedestal and worship her or literally knock her down, which is a thing that's bigger than Henry McHenry. And oh, a quick note on his name. I haven't seen anyone say this, but I have to imagine, or at least like to imagine that it's a Lolita reference, um, preference Lolita to Humbert Humbert.

[01:33:27] Oh, 

[01:33:27] Sean: oh, okay. Got it. Got it. I just didn't hear the word. 

[01:33:31] Nicole: Henry McHenry is such a ridiculous name. And you know, both starting with H basically same name twice, but with a mic before the second one. And I feel like that has to be a little bit of a tipping of the hand to like, this is an unreliable narrator.

[01:33:47] We are centering a story around a fucked up guy and you can't trust his version of things. Um, that's what I got from it. I could be wrong, but it just seemed like, I dunno, sparks seemed like [01:34:00] fairly literate guys. They, I feel like they've got to know about Lolita and like one of the most famous examples of a unreliable, 

[01:34:10] Sean: but even if it's not explicitly that I think like the, the, the end result, I think you're still picking up on nothing, what they want.

[01:34:17] Uh, even if they're referring to something else, which they might be, they might be, they might be referring to that. I don't know, but like either way, 

[01:34:25] Nicole: I think it works, even if you didn't know the name, Humbert Humbert, I feel like you hear Henry McHenry and that's not like Anne. Anne's name is like Anne Dela Forneau, I think it's not the everyone.

[01:34:37] Everyone has a meaningful name, but they're very different, you know, like, and, and then Annette literally little Anne, and um, I don't know if we talked about this, but part of what's going on is, uh, Annette becomes a ghost story and continues to be in the film, but as a ghost, haunting Henry in part through.

[01:34:58] And that's voice. She gives her [01:35:00] voice to Annette does this happen literally? Is this a dream? I don't think it really matters. Um, it is literally the same voice coming out of, um, baby Annette. And so her gift is also haunting Henry and he also needs to like, control it, obviously. Like how else is he going to deal with it?

[01:35:18] Um, in a way, the parallels in many respects his relationship, uh, to the mother. And there's a lot of interesting stuff going on there, but point being the names are all really intentional and Annette, the conductor, Henry McHenry, what are we to make of these names? I think Henry McHenry calls attention to like, yeah.

[01:35:38] What what's real here. Like 

[01:35:41] Sean: yeah. 

[01:35:43] Nicole: Um, 

[01:35:44] Sean: yeah, no, I think I, I th I think that's interesting. I mean, I think that, yeah, his, his, um, name there, uh, and, and speaking of [01:36:00] sparks, um, when we were talking about the song, uh, we love each other so much and the repetition there. I mean, definitely listening to that. I was reminded, like watching the movie, uh, uh, and listening to that, I was reminded of, um, W probably the song that stood out to me the most in the documentary about them sparks.

[01:36:24] The Edgar Wright documentary that came out earlier this year, um, was the song. My baby is taking me home, which is literally just phrase repeated over and over again. One of the things that's so interesting about what they do and you know, one of the reasons I was interested in this as a musical, because I was like, they have a very distinctive musical style, like for what they do where I'm like, I get why they never gained like mass popularity, but why they've always maintained a career because they have this, this very, [01:37:00] this very particular way about them.

[01:37:04] And this my baby taken me home, which I definitely recommend that our audience listened to is just that phrase repeated over and over and over again to the music and it shifts and it, it changes in sometimes he doesn't necessarily change the way he sings. It, it just. Changes for you as it's going. And there are times, and there are moments in that song where it is very, very sad.

[01:37:32] It feels very sad, but then suddenly it's not necessarily that sad, it's sort of uplifting. The song kind of has these waves to it. And it's very, uh, I think one of the things w Edgar Wright I follow him on, on Twitter. Cause he's interesting to follow on Twitter because mostly, mostly because he just really loves films.

[01:37:52] So he'll just talk about stuff that's coming, oh, this is coming up on TV. I really love this film, you know, is anybody else [01:38:00] watching this with me? Stuff like that. Um, but also he, you know, after we saw the documentary, he's like, for those of you who never heard of the band before, what songs stuck out to you?

[01:38:11] And I know I responded with that one, but he, and he mentioned, I don't think he responded to me, but I think he mentioned in a separate thing that like a lot of people like that one was the one that stood out for them. Uh, and um, I think that to come back to this, when, when I was watching the scene with the, we love each other so much, I was getting, you know, you re you're getting that vibe from that.

[01:38:39] And I think it's an execution of that style of song that works very, that they have that, that works very well in context here, because.

[01:38:50] It's that thing. It's a thing of, uh, I think we all recognize that at some point, like maybe in our teens maybe earlier, it's like, if you repeat a word enough times, it loses all meaning for [01:39:00] you. It's like, you're just, it doesn't mean like a word just can stop meaning anything. Well, a phrase sung enough times actually, instead of losing its meaning starts to, as you were saying, it, it, it gains layers of meaning and then need, then, then this has the con the visual context.

[01:39:19] It has a musical context, and it starts to feel sort of structurally as in terms of the song, in terms of the scenes. Like, and I think you were saying this a bit earlier is that it, at times starts to sound like they're convincing themselves some themselves of it, almost as much as they're expressing it.

[01:39:42] They are trying to convince themselves that this is a thing, which I think also plays into what you were saying about the, the, the relationship structures that's reflecting on is that there's a lot of those relationships where people spend a lot of their time [01:40:00] convincing themselves that they love each other,

[01:40:06] or that they love each other in the way that they're quote unquote, supposed to, um, 

[01:40:15] Nicole: I, it is a mirror on the audience. There are no mirrors, maybe not the best way of talking about it, but the audience, maybe it's more of a screen 

[01:40:26] Sean: onto which well, I think we need to act, I think we need to say mirror because it's the name of our show, 

[01:40:32] Nicole: right.

[01:40:34] So sure. It's a mirror and it's going to reflect back to the audience, what they're looking into it. Sure. Great. But point being like, I I'm aware that like I'm bringing this, this meaning to it, but that's what it's inviting the audience to do. It's inviting the audience to bring meaning to the moment you could watch that scene and just be like, they really love each other

[01:40:56] so much and you wouldn't be wrong. [01:41:00] It's just that there's more there. Yeah. And I did also that my baby is taking me home song. I watched the sparks brothers documentary yesterday in preparation for this. And I definitely thought about Annette in general. And specifically we love each other so much when, when they discussed that song as well.

[01:41:18] Cause you're, I think you're absolutely right. It's a, it's a similar thing and that's a part of what they bring to it as well as a kind of word play and irony in general to their songwriting where, which is common in pop music. You know, there's a lot of songs that sound happy, but are actually sad when you listen to the lyrics, that's a very common.

[01:41:40] Way of approaching pop music. Um, and there's some of that with them, but that's not really what I mean so much as there's stuff where you can look at it one way, but the more you look at it, the more you start to see, oh, actually there's other ways to look at this. There are all these little tells.

[01:41:57] They're all these little, you know, there's, there's a little bit of a puz not [01:42:00] a puzzle. Exactly. But, um, there's still for you to put together. Yeah. That changed the picture. And I think that's true of at least a lot of a net as well. Um, it's a much more brutal movie than I was like emotionally. I feel like it is very tough, but fair.

[01:42:21] Yeah. 

[01:42:21] Sean: It doesn't, it doesn't like soften any of its edges. It 

[01:42:26] didn't 

[01:42:26] Nicole: give me any of the things that I wanted from it when I was watching it in terms of comfort. No, I wanted to be comforted. Yeah. I wanted out of like, quite frankly, I'm not proud of this reaction, but watching it initially, like a part of me really wanted Adam driver's character to be redeemed.

[01:42:45] Well, and I'm so glad they didn't. No, no, 

[01:42:48] Sean: no, no. I, I agree with you. And I think it's interesting. One of the articles that we pulled earlier, I was reading and I forgotten which one it is. Um, but one of the articles pulled, uh, that [01:43:00] reading was talking about very specifically Adam driver as a leading man. Uh, one, it was comparing him to leading men of like the sixties and seventies, which, or fifties, even like it was comparing him at one point to Robert Mitchum.

[01:43:13] Um, because he had, he, he does have sort of a different look, he's a handsome man, but he has a very different kind of look from like traditional Hollywood or not traditional Hollywood handsome, current Hollywood concepts of handsome men. 

[01:43:28] Nicole: He is very weird looking by traditional Hollywood that said, I, I think he's extremely attractive.

[01:43:35] I find it is generally. Yeah. I am very attracted to Adam Driver. Sorry. Yeah, no, no. That's 

[01:43:41] Sean: just how it is. Like, um, but it's, and you're not alone in that. Um, he's an attractive man. I, you know, I do think he's an attractive man. Um, but I, but there's, there's, uh, one of the things that we're talking about is he just has a natural charisma to him and, and I [01:44:00] think that's what works about great casting.

[01:44:03] Well, it's, there's a, there's just a, there's a, there's a frank confidence. There's a Frank confidence to it. There's a, I don't know how to describe it exactly, but it's serious that 

[01:44:16] Nicole: president and embodied honestly yeah. In this way. And he has a physicality that's different from a lot in on girls at one point a character described him as looking like an old timey pickpocket, which is a description that's really stuck in my head as being very astute in a way I'm like, yeah, I can actually picture him in some like Charles Dickens get up.

[01:44:43] Sean: Yeah. Um, but like, yeah, he's got this thing where he feels very real, you know, as you said, like he, he embodies characters that he plays, but he does the thing. He doesn't do Gary Oldman sort of chameleon thing, which Gary Oldman doesn't do as well as he used to. Uh, 

[01:44:58] Nicole: no, he's always very much [01:45:00] Adam driver.

[01:45:01] He's very 

[01:45:01] Sean: much Adam driver, but it's like, 

[01:45:03] Nicole: you don't forget it's Adam driver. 

[01:45:05] Sean: No, but he has sort of a, it is much more like a Robert Mitchum or a Cary grant or something like that, where they were always who they were, but they would play sort of a different version of that, like sort of a better version of Tom cruise.

[01:45:21] Nicole: Oh God, he's got more range, I think. But he also has a kind of lane, like there's continuity between this role and marriage story, which I did not like, but, um, I did watch a little bit. Um, which I'll explain why in a second and, and Kylo Ren, frankly, and star wars, like he's really, or 

[01:45:40] Sean: Or his character on.

[01:45:43] Nicole: Yeah. Or, or frankly his character on girls as well. Like he's good at playing a certain kind of usually asshole of a sort, there are different variations, but they're all really different is the thing it's not like, oh, that's that Adam driver part. Um, it's funny. I did [01:46:00] watch a chunk of marriage story recently after cause when Sondheim died, actually, I was like, oh, I want to watch the scene in marriage story where, um, Adam driver sang Sondheim.

[01:46:11] And I went back a little bit before it cause, cause that scene, um, I, it, you don't have to watch the whole movie at all. If you want to get both all of the best and all of the worst of marriage story, I can give you some timestamps and say, just watch these 10 minutes from this to this watch, like basically the scene before the Adam Driver Sondheim scene where, um, Scarlett Johannson also sings a Sondheim number, which I had completely forgotten happened, which tells you a lot about some of the problems with marriage story, frankly.

[01:46:40] Um, and then he does it. His scene is frankly, I think it's a great scene. It makes me angry because I'm like this scene is so much better than the entire rest of this movie. And also shows why this scene is such bullshit because fucking Noah Bomback has to rely on Stephen Sondheim [01:47:00] to do the heavy lifting in his writing.

[01:47:02] Like it's cheating basically to have the song he does from a company called being alive. Um, and because if you know, that show the context he's singing it in is kind of the inverse of the context. The character in the, in the show is singing it because the character in the show is singing it as this like permanent bachelor guy.

[01:47:21] Who's starting to open himself up to like, maybe I would want to open myself up to another person someday and not just be closed off and, you know, never get married. Whereas Adam drivers, things, this song with his theater friends and like a piano, not a piano bar, but like a restaurant, um, being a Dick also right after he signed his divorce papers.

[01:47:43] So he's singing this song that in context and because Adam driver plays it so brilliantly, despite the fact that I didn't give a shit about this movie, that scene can make me cry because, because Adam driver, with the context of what [01:48:00] you know, where you know, his characters at and his performance of that song is amazing.

[01:48:04] And I think Noah Bomback can take a little bit of credit for that for like having the idea, but the fact that nothing else in the film remotely approaches that idea for me in quality kind of is like, yeah, you, you, you cheated, you had Sondheim come in and fucking pinch hit for you basically. Good job, you know, and, but anyway, but also, um, I love to see Adam Driver sing.

[01:48:30] He's one of those actors. Who's not a singer who I think does a fantastic job whenever he sings and doesn't make me mad. And, you know, I sometimes get mad when non-singer singing musicals. You better be, if you're a non singer singing in a musical, you gotta be like Rick Moranis or Adam driver, or, you know, something of that line having parts to sing that definitely not Russell Crowe.

[01:48:55] Definitely not Johnny Depp. Oh yeah. Don't get me started on [01:49:00] Sweeney Todd. Although now I kind of understand why some people like the Sweeney Todd movie, because I've seen some other Sondheim movies recently that are real fucking bad. And I'm like, oh, at least that one was doing something didn't like what it was doing, but it's no a funny thing happened on the way to the forum.

[01:49:15] I'll tell you what, um, 

[01:49:18] Sean: yeah, I know he's very, he's a very, he's a very good actor. He's very good at sort of sucking you in and, uh, creating, uh, like he, you. Engage with his characters. Like you sympathize with his characters. He just builds that very well. Uh, it works well in this movie. I think he's well cast in this movie in Annette for that, because like, it wouldn't work as well.

[01:49:47] And I think people get mad at it because they probably did empathize with him, sympathize with it. It was like, oh, I want him to get better. So they get mad at the movie 

[01:49:56] Nicole: instead of taking a look at themselves and being like, wow, it's kind of fucked [01:50:00] up because actually, I mean, to me, it just speaks to how good his performance is and how human he felt in this highly artificial stylized production that I wanted, that I wanted that because he was feeling like a person I knew it's 

[01:50:14] Sean: also a much more effective way of criticizing the structure that the movie's criticizing because, um, those people are sympathetic people.

[01:50:26] Sometimes they're not always terrible monsters. They're your friends sometimes like there, uh, which, you know, just to go back to the thing comedians it's like, yeah, that person made you laugh. Yeah. That person has things that you really relate to, or, you know, has a history of whatever that is maybe reflected in how they're being fucked up right now.

[01:50:51] Uh, and then being on the other side of it. But that doesn't mean they're not wrong or that they're. They haven't done something wrong. They haven't hurt other [01:51:00] people in this context. It's just, it's like, he needs to be sympathetic. '

[01:51:05] Nicole: cause not man slaughtering people all the time. 

[01:51:09] Sean: Exactly. He's not, he didn't man slaughter me.

[01:51:11] Nicole: Nobody is. It's like, when people are like, well, he didn't, this person didn't sexually assault me. And it's like, they don't sexually assault everyone. They ever meet. Also most people who are serial abusers, very intentionally show a side of them to a bunch of people so that they've got like their crowd.

[01:51:27] Who's like, I would never like Marilyn Manson did there's those people who were like Marilyn Manson, I never saw him do. Oh, why would you have, 

[01:51:39] Sean: oh, it's um, but uh, these movies though, we did talk about these movies. Um, and you know, in all of the things that we've said about, uh, about a net, which I think is, um,

[01:51:57] you know, it's, [01:52:00] it's true of little murders in this, in, in a lot of similar ways where, where, um, we're at, uh, Alfred, I keep wanting to call him Albert Alfred, um, is, uh, is the same, is, is just a slight variation of what, uh, Henry McHenry is, you know, he's, his art form is just not as. Whatever, but the structurally, like the relationship thing is the same thing as you were saying.

[01:52:29] Um, 

[01:52:30] Nicole: and there is a parallel in the careers there. I think in that she's an, like an interior decorator interiors take domestic Sarah, traditionally feminine career. He's a photographer he's gazing on the world and interpreting he's the artist and it's, you know, external versus more and whatever, like kind of talking out my ass here, but also they are gendered careers 

[01:52:56] Sean: that, yeah, very, very much so, very much so.

[01:52:59] And I think that [01:53:00] then that's true across both of them. And it's, I think it's, they're both very, very good, um, uh, deconstructions of those dynamics, um, for the, for the characters and the, um, yeah, I think this was, uh, you know, I wouldn't always necessarily, there's plenty of the movies that we watch, that, that I would, I would say, uh, you know, watch this, if you kind of were entertained by it or if you're entertained by what we talked about.

[01:53:35] If you haven't watched already or reconsider some of these movies, um, There's not a whole lot that I would necessarily just recommend like, oh, you should just watch this. Like, cause I'm careful about my recommendations. Usually I'm like, Hey, you wouldn't like you shouldn't watch funny games. Um, I mean that one for

[01:53:56] yeah. You know, stuff like that. Or it's like, you know what? Yeah, you [01:54:00] probably shouldn't watch transformers the movie because you don't appreciate cartoons or something. Like you kind of, we're going to write it off as a cartoon or you're not gonna like that it has Weird Al. I think that these two are both ones that most people should watch.

[01:54:13] Yeah. They're doing no. And I think it's acceptable if you don't like them, like it's like, but think about why you don't like them. 

[01:54:23] Nicole: Like V they're both very interesting and very unique movies. Neither one of them is really other than that, they're like each other, clearly we, we think in certain ways, but also they're clearly very, very different movies.

[01:54:38] Yeah. You're not going to mistake one for the other and you're not going to mistake either of them for anything else. Not at least nothing else I've seen. 

[01:54:45] Sean: And I, I think, I think it helps to have an awareness of like, I mean, Annette it's has a relatively straightforward structure. Like it has a relatively straightforward three act structure.

[01:54:55] Like you would expect from a lot of movies watch like an opera 

[01:54:59] Nicole: [01:55:00] operatic. It's a tragedy, you know, it's an, it's an operatic 

[01:55:03] Sean: tragedy. And then, uh, but little, little murders is going to be awkward to watch because I mean, it has something there, but it doesn't have the right feel for that because it is that seventies, that time in the seventies, you know, before it became, you know, before, you know, people were turning screenwriting into, into, you know, college curriculum and formula and formulas and saving cats and stuff like that, where they were like, well, we got kind of like this stretch of sequences and scenes that come together to make a film.

[01:55:37] One of the articles that we read was comparing one, one Godard was asked to, uh, shoot the film first before Alan Arkin took it on. And they compared it to a couple of his films and the use of like explosions and bullets and sort of a, post-apocalyptic feel in both masculine feminine, which I, I have not seen and [01:56:00] Weekend, which, uh, I should probably see that one, uh, weekend, which I have seen.

[01:56:05] And I actually teach that one. Um, and 

[01:56:07] Nicole: I haven't seen Weekend weirdly. 

[01:56:10] Sean: Weekend is weird. 

[01:56:12] Nicole: I mean, I it's Godard. Shit's weird. I mean, I like Godard a lot. I like, I even, I'm kinda more, more recent stuff. It's just, it is what it is. I like the, um, I liked that he's fucking going for it. In in, uh, that he's just fucking going for it.

[01:56:32] And sometimes I really respond to it. Sometimes I'm left somewhat cold, but I like the adventure and journey of that. With Godard frankly. 

[01:56:41] Sean: Yeah. I don't have a strong relationship to his films at all. Like weekend is probably the one that I'm like, yeah, no, I really liked this one. Uh, it's actually the only one I saw in a theater, it was playing at a theater in the, uh, somewhere west side of Manhattan.

[01:56:57] Um, uh, [01:57:00] like a decade ago. And my friend was like, we got to go see the week we got to go see weekend. Um, my friend David, who's the one who whenever I'm like, yeah, there's some weird movie that I saw. It's usually, he's the one who was like, Sean, this is your movie. Like, go see this movie with me. 

[01:57:13] Nicole: Um, they played his stuff a lot at, in the before times, I'd go see a shit at film forum.

[01:57:18] Um, they'd play that. Might've been where we star quite a bit. There. They, they, they play a lot of Godard. There were have historically, at least, so 

[01:57:26] Sean: you'd be surprised, but it definitely has a similar feel to that movie. Um, less chaotic 

[01:57:33] Nicole: Than Weekend. That was also right around also when Hollywood was kind of catching up to the French new wave in a lot of ways, right.

[01:57:41] With like Bonnie and Clyde and things like that, that had a lot in common with some of the stuff that had been coming out of France specifically. Obviously this is based on a play. But yeah. And so stuff actually got interesting for a minute. Um, but, but yeah, I could see, I could see Godar that, I think that's a [01:58:00] very valid point of reference in terms of like a piece of this, but it's also not a Godard film.

[01:58:06] Um, it is like his stuff and some of the unpredictability of like the first time I watched it, like that scene where, uh, Elliott Gould goes over to Patsy's house for dinner at a certain point, like my husband and I turned to each other and were like, this seems been going on a really long time. Not because we were bored, just cause we're 

[01:58:30] Sean: like this is weird because it's going on.

[01:58:31] Yeah. 

[01:58:32] Nicole: Cause we notice and we, it is so even for like turn of the seventies, when scenes, I feel like a lot of stuff pacing wise was, you know, less formulaic, less regimented. But even for its time, it was like very notable that it just was like a 30 minute long scene basically. It's still going. It's still, you know, what, why not?

[01:58:57] Why not? I'm, you know, I'm [01:59:00] paying attention. I certainly don't think it hurts this film to disorient to make the audience feel a bit disoriented and unsure of where they stand. I don't think that that harms the film at all. Um, yeah, I think, I think people should watch it. Obviously. I like both these films.

[01:59:15] Um, I like little murders, a lot. Annette, I just love, it's just become one of my favorite films. It's just one of those that does it for me. And I like to watch, and sometimes I'm like, I'm just going to put on a net. Like one of the times I watched it, I didn't even mean to watch the whole thing. I was like, I just want to see that opening number again.

[01:59:34] But then of course I got sucked in and I'm just like, and watch the whole fucking thing. Cause it's a good movie. Um, Leos Carax's super, is a super interesting filmmaker in general, but this is also both has things in common with other stuff I've seen of his and is also completely distinct in different.

[01:59:53] Like 

[01:59:54] Sean: I've only think I've only seen holy motors. 

[01:59:57] Nicole: He did this movie that wasn't that [02:00:00] great Tokyo that also had a bit by bong Joon, ho um, it was an anthology and had, um, one also by, oh, Michel Gondry, I think to the other one, but he has this, uh, bit that is continuous with a bit from holy motors. If you remember the monster bit from holy motors, the monster character.

[02:00:23] Yeah. Tokyo hasn't has Tokyo predated that and has, um, has a bit with that character as well. It's not a great film, but it's, it's interesting to, um, to watch for sure, because those filmmakers are all interesting. Okay. I think the Bong Joon Ho one was by far the most successful overall, but as I recall, but yeah, what else I think is all I've seen?

[02:00:56] Yeah. All I've seen is a net, holy motors and Tokyo. Um, but [02:01:00] I, I will watch all his other shit because one, there's a bunch of good actors in it. And two, he's just doing interesting enough stuff that I'll I'll watch it. Like, I, I mean this, I loved and holy motors, I loved. So like I'm late coming to this. I know he's been working for decades.

[02:01:17] He only kind of makes a couple films a decade. Uh, and I look forward to exploring them. Um, Alan Arkin, I'm more familiar with a lot of his work. 

[02:01:29] Sean: Yeah. Uh, I don't know if I'm familiar with stuff he's directed, but obviously Alan Arkin, Alan, very familiar 

[02:01:38] Nicole: with him. So wait, did he direct anything else?

[02:01:41] Actually, let me. Uh, oh yeah, he did. Yeah. He, he directed a bunch of stuff. I've never heard of like people soup and wait. People soup was before little murders. I thought it was his directorial debut then maybe it was a short anyway, Alan Arkin directed some stuff. [02:02:00] Now we know, 

[02:02:02] Sean: and that's the thing that happens.

[02:02:05] Nicole: That's a thing that happens. And now, you know, it's been the celluloid mirror. 

[02:02:16] Sean: Thank you for joining us. 

[02:02:17] Nicole: Thank you for joining us. We'll catch you later, bye.

[02:02:30] Sean: The Celluloid Mirror is a four-mile circus production hosted by Nicole Solomon and Sean Mannion. Our theme music is twisted by Kevin McCloud. You can hear more from Kevin mccloud at incompetech.film music.io. Please take a few moments to rate and review The Celluloid Mirror on your podcast platform of choice.

[02:02:50] It really helps with discoverability. If you have questions or comments about what you heard on the show or suggestions for future episodes, [02:03:00] feel free to email us at info@4milecircus.com or seek us out on social media. We are at four mile circus on Twitter and Instagram. Want more from the celluloid mirror, Sean and Nicole.

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[02:03:31] Movie Clips: I ended up in that hall of mirrors. There was another girl she looked like me exactly like me. 

[02:03:48] Can you come with me in my dreams? 

[02:03:53] That'll do pig.

[02:03:57] What happens when the story dies and [02:04:00] the evil is set free. 

[02:04:47] I have to return some [02:05:00] videotapes.