EP.52 Family Stories

 This Newbies to Movies podcast episode celebrates its one-year anniversary with a special episode looking back at a year of cinematic discovery, complete with a definitive ranking of the co-hosts' favorite films covered so far. The episode dives deep into the complex dynamics of family storytelling, anchoring the discussion around two powerful and contrasting films: the resilient immigrant experience in Minari and the enduring sisterly bonds of Little Women. Reflecting on how their perspectives have evolved since launching the show, the hosts share personal insights, humorous behind-the-scenes memories, and debate which films truly earned the top spots on their ultimate tier list. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:14

Hey everyone, welcome to newbies to movies. I'm Tyler. And I'm Justin. This is a podcast where we like to talk about new movies that we're watching, with this week's theme being family stories. But before we get into that, this is our one year anniversary of the episode starting, so a fifty-second episode, counting for each of the weeks in the year. Kind of a big milestone for us, because when we first started this, we were really just both of us really liked movies, and we're like, well, we kind of want to expand talking about them, but also expand and get out of our comfort zone. I think this was one of the bigger points of the podcast was to be able to critically talk about these films that we always really like, but also expand our knowledge of them and get out of our comfort zone from watching the same old movies that we're comfortable with watching and watching stuff that have surprised us and even like actors, genres, and directors that we normally wouldn't try to reach out to.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Justin, you want to talk a little bit about it? Yeah, yeah. First off, I'm on vacation. That's why I got this giant sea turtle behind me. But yeah, since I am on vacation, me and Matt were talking about it a little bit this week, and I went back and listened to some of our first recordings, and God was it bad. Like our conversations have gotten so much better. But also, I was looking back to the stuff I used to watch and looking at the list of 103 movies that we've watched on the show. It kind of amazes me how much we've expanded out of our comfort zone and how much I've learned in the meantime as well. And I gotta say, it's ironic you pick family stories because I wouldn't want to do this with anybody else but my brother like you. So I appreciate you always uh pushing me forward and expanding my comfort zone. It's been amazing doing this.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Yeah, I I've had a really great time. Um, because I've always wanted an avenue to like be able to talk about like one of my biggest passions, which is film in the first place, watching it, and then now being able to talk about it critically. And hopefully we come back in another year and it's our two-year anniversary, and we can talk about it and how much we've grown from this point. Because yeah, like you said, the first couple episodes we were kind of just throwing stuff at a wall and hoping it's stuck. Um, and then now I think we can critically talk about different parts to these these themes a lot better.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Yeah, that and everything's so natural now. I felt like at the beginning we were doing homework, you know, trying to get these things out, but now it's just like we can kind of hop on here with limited notes. I know you've never really used notes, yeah, but I come on here with limited notes now. It's like a a fun process rather than you know a grind. Yeah, cool, cool. So I'm gonna share some stats too. I put together just because I was uh chilling on the beach yesterday and decided to go through some stuff. So overall, the podcast we filmed 52 hours, 29 minutes, and nine seconds of podcast hours, I guess. Pretty crazy to think about. We've sat down in last year for 52 hours and just talked about movies. Yeah. We've had 829 downloads, which hope that goes up, and then 61 countries and 172 cities, which is pretty nuts. I attribute a lot of that to probably your friends spread across the world. Yeah. But still really neat. We've also watched 217 hours and 29 minutes of movies for the podcast, which is all again pretty nuts. Kind of tells you how much we've been expanding. And then any guesses on our top directors? I know a couple episodes we did directors specifically, but any idea who our number one would be? I think it's Denny, Denny Rumueva. Yeah, Denny was one, uh Nolan was two, Tarantino three. Tarantino's definitely up there because you know we did the part one and part two with Nathan. Yeah. David Fincher, Martin Scorsese, Spielberg, and Paul Thomas Anderson were up there as well. Yeah. Any guess on the actor? Or actress? This one is, I think, a little bit harder.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

It's kind of it shocked me. Actor? Man, I'm trying to think, dude. I have no idea. Actress? Maybe Amy Adams.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Yeah, that's not a bad guess. It was Merrill Streep with five movies. Wow. And then I guess Double Wars Prada 2, yeah. Yeah, and then we did her the one week, so that's two, and then we also had her in Little Women. I'm counting this week as well. Oh, yeah. And then, yeah, Matthew McConaughey with four, Robert De Niro with four, Ryan Gosling with four, another sneaky one, Willem Defoe with four. I think he just kind of was showing up in movies that we were watching. He's just like he was the lead. Yeah. Our top genre was drama with 37. I mean, this could you can kind of label drama in a lot of films, but thiller thriller and crime with 28, comedy with 16, sci-fi fantasy with 13, horror with 10. I don't know how you got me to do that. Yeah. And then romance with eight, but uh just some fun stats I thought were kind of cool just looking back. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

I feel like in the future, probably maybe going a little bit more romance, maybe, because I feel like there's a lot of romantic films out there that are like more dramatized that we haven't reached out to. Maybe a little bit more action as well. Because I feel like that's like a genre that we haven't really touched as much.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

That's a tough one though, too, because you know, a lot of these action movies are just blockbusters that we can't really dive that deep into. I mean, there is good action movies, don't get me wrong, but sometimes it's kind of like just surface level stuff.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

Yeah, exactly. Quick pause, real quick. You're good. Is yours having a time running? Yeah. Okay, mine isn't, so I was just making sure. Yeah, it's good. Okay, we'll just resume then. Yeah, so another thing that we I just wanted to bring up was like, I think in this next year, now that we're more experienced at talking more critically about it, and my plan is when I get more time, is to try to reach out and do a little bit more collaborations, possibly other podcasts, and then as well as Justin did a really cool podcast with a director. And I think that would be really cool to try to reach out to actors, actresses, directors, or really anybody in the film industry in the first place. Like it doesn't even need to be like director or actor. It could be like a produ could be like a producer, camera worker, anything. I think just getting different perspectives would be such a cool thing.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Really cool. And I wouldn't trade that experience for the world. That was so neat to be able to sit down with somebody, you know, a small filmmaker, and kind of just understand a little bit more about the process. Funny enough, it was like a real pain scheduling it, and it kind of just worked out to where she emailed me at like 5 30 on a Sunday night and was like, hey, can you do it in 30 minutes? And I was like, Yes. And then I just like threw some clothes on. I was in my bed. I threw some clothes on and just ran and got ready. But you know, funny stuff just kind of works out like that. So I hope to do more like that in the future. I want to say thank you to all of the guests we've had on throughout the year, too. Really couldn't have done it without you guys, especially with Tyler having to be out some weeks. That would have left me in a tight spot just talking to myself in a camera. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Yeah. That's not really podcasting at that point. That's just talking to a recording.

SPEAKER_00 7:05

But it was so fun to have even just people who aren't film analysts on and seeing their outside perspective, especially because I felt like watching so many movies, I got stuck in my ways at some point. So bringing in those extra perspectives were uh really amazing. So thank you to everybody.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Yeah. Yeah, thank you for sure. Uh I think another cool thing that we've been talking about, just texting about, but would be cool to do in the next year would be uh like a film festival and to record like while there as like a vacation. There's a bunch of film festivals, even a small one, I think would be cool to go to because I feel like the smaller ones we could have those interactions with like little time directors, actors, and other like film industry workers. So yeah, hopefully that's in the plans as well. For sure. Awesome. So we'll get right into like how we usually start with what have you been watching this week, if you want to go, Justin.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

Yeah, yeah. So been on vacation, been on the beach a lot, haven't uh really had time to watch a ton of new movies. I did re-watch Project Hail Mary. Uh Paige, my sister, was bashing it a little bit too much for my liking, so I had to go back and get some ammo. Still good, still amazing. I really like that movie. And then uh I've been keeping up a lot on Twitter with San Diego Comic-Con going on. Marvel should have their Hall H announcements here in the next hour or two. Like Tyler and me were talking about before the show, take it with a grain of salt, because they're gonna have a plan for the next 20 years, and who knows if that stuff will actually work out. Yeah. That came out. Uh one of the really cool ones I really liked was the Clayface trailer and the Green Lantern trailer. Those got me all the way back excited into DC after Supergirl. Yeah. Wasn't too excited for anything coming, but it seems like they're hitting some really good points, which should be fun.

SPEAKER_01 8:46

Yeah, Clayface seems like a really original take or like a really original like film idea about like uh pretty much just the comic book type of movies, like very much like Hellboy Blade kind of time, early 2000s, where you're it feels a horror type, right? So I'm interested to see how they take that turn on it, really, compared to where Supergirl and Superman were very just enthusiastic, happy and total 180, it looks like. Yeah. Yeah, so we haven't recorded in like two weeks, so I have a lot of films. Uh I'm just gonna talk about four and a half or up for me that I watched. And there's uh or and as well as one of the newer ones, one of the big ones to talk about is the Odyssey. I was able to watch it, not in the best setting, I would say, because I think this is a movie that you need to be able to watch in the theaters. And I will rewatch it when I have a chance to watch in the theaters. But after watching it, I gave it a four out of five stars. I enjoyed it, thought it was good. I just have a little problems with some of the dialogue and plot points in it, but I still think it's a good movie. But I think I'm a little bit lower on it than a lot of what other reviews that I've seen out there. Yeah. And his other movies, I think, is a little lower for me. So four and a half higher. So I watched Dog Day Afternoon today with Al Pacino. Great, great movie. It's about a bank robbery that just goes wrong right at the beginning, and it's based on a true story. And Al Pacino has one of the best performances I've seen in any movie ever. And I was like, holy crap. Like, I I get it. Like, I know we did a week on him, just him. After that, I was like, holy crap! Like, I get I get the hype about him now, even more. Like, what a great actor he is in that movie. I watched The Hunt, that is a Denmark film with Mads Milkelsen, where he gets accused of something and it kind of goes through the emotions of that, of him not doing it, but he's innocent. But the whole town's after him kind of idea. Really interesting, really nuanced. Another Norwegian film that I watched, Worst Person in the World, it follows uh Renette Renat Rezve, the girl that's in uh back rooms and was she it follows her through like a coming of age from like early 20s until like her late 20s and through like romantic trips. And I thought it was a really interesting way to tell a coming of age, and I just thought it was so so expertly done. I gave it five stars. Broadcast news, it's like the inner workings of broadcasting, but working in between like a love triangle kind of situation. I just think all the actors are so charming in it. Um I really like the dialogue in the movie as well. And I and I just love like news, newsroom situations so much. Sound of Metal. I know you've talked about this a lot, Justin. I finally got to watching it. I really liked it. Four and a half out of five for me, Resenbed was amazing in it. The sound design in it was really cool, like going in and out of the sound. But then at the end, it's like such a tragic story to where like he finally grows at the end, but at but he lost everything at the same time. But it's like, where does he go from here? But that's like the whole point of the story. It's like you gotta accept it where it is rather than being the place of somewhere or trying to improve something that you can't, you know.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

Yeah, that movie. I was basically saving it in case we ever did a week on like best sound design movies. Yeah, that's it right there. That shit was so good.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

Yeah, no, it was yeah, surprised I just started watching it, but yeah, dude, such a good movie, such a good movie. Awesome. So cool. We wanted to do like an exercise as well, since it is a one year and kind of like cage what our likenesses are of movies, and then probably re-attack it in another year of our personal top ten films. So, yeah, Justin, if you want to start off with your honorable mentions, are pretty much 15 through 11, just quickly.

SPEAKER_00 12:18

Um Yeah, I got a couple here. Um 12 Angry Men being one of them. I've watched this before the podcast, but just one of my favorites of all time. Um, a lot of people are gonna hate me for this one. Oppenheimer, I think it's one of Nolan's best. Um, and I know a lot of people don't feel that way, but it is for me. I'm putting Kill Bill here. I'm gonna count as the whole bloody affair. Um both of just I don't see them as two separate movies, but that's just me. Parasite and then Goodwill Hunting as well. And then I also threw in The Singers, the short film that came out last year and shared an Oscar. Funny enough, I really enjoyed that. Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Yeah, uh I would yeah, doing Kill Bill on one and two are separate. I think including them is fine as I got total one, especially because he released it as a whole film now. So for my honorable mention, going through 15 through 11, I have nope, uh, movie by Jordan Peel. Me and you watched it in theaters together, really enjoy that one. 14 Wind River, Taylor Sheridan, really what got him on the that hell or high water and Sicario. All three of those films kind of got him on the page, and why he's creating like every show that you see on CBS now. Inglorious Bastards, Tarantino film. He's one of my favorite directors. Number 12, Spotlight, somehow. And it's like thrilling, questioning, disbelief, and disheartening at the end of the day. Like the last like five minutes of that movie just makes you feel bad for everybody involved. And number 11, prisoners. We did it on the podcast. It's dark, revealing, honest, and just tragic. Yeah, it's good honest moment. So, yeah, yeah. So now we'll start where Justin's gonna give his number 10, then I'll and talk about a little bit, and then I'll give my number 10, and then we'll keep going down each one nine, eight so far, so far and so forth.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

Yeah, so my number 10, uh, one of my favorite movies of all time. It moved down my list a little. I don't think it did anything wrong. I think other movies just moved it up, but 1917, uh, just amazing cinematography. I remember um watching this for the first time. This really was one of the movies that got me into wanting to do this with you, got me into cinema. Just seeing the tracking shots, seeing how a movie could be edited so perfectly. Such an amazing movie and a great story, too. I mean, it's a really, really beautiful story and a tragic story, but yeah, just so well done.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Yeah. I I haven't revisited that movie in such a long time. I feel like it definitely deserves a revisit for me. Because I remember when I first saw it, I was just like, wow, this is so cool. Because it looks like it's all just one take of a film and really unique in a way of like making it a blockbuster movie, because there's definitely been one-track films before, just not necessarily in a blockbuster format that it was made in. Number 10 for me, Justin doesn't really like this movie, but I'm a big Batman guy, so The Dark Knight is my number 10. It's my favorite Nolan film keyword. I I think favorite, I think his best is Oppenheimer, but like this is a personal list. I just think it's iconic, thrilling. I mean, it's Batman, my favorite comic book character. Um I remember watching this when I was young and just enthralled about like the opening scene, just engages you so much. Keith Ledger as the Joker is so iconic, and yeah, I just love the Dark Knight.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

Yeah, don't get me wrong. Yeah, I like that it's a Nolan film. I like the film from Nolan's perspective. I'm just not a big fan of that Batman iteration. That's that's basically it. And it's not anything Christian Bale did or anything like that. Just I like a more crime detective Batman, which that's just preference. Yeah. My number nine, I have Whiplash. I love Whiplash so much. It holds a special place in my heart just from a place of music. Actually, I I'm not gonna talk about whiplash, everybody's seen it. Uh this week, me and Madison, we actually went to a really nice jazz club at the uh island we're staying on, and they came out the caravan, and I almost teared up. It was so cool.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Yeah, dude, I really like Whiplash too. It's a little bit lower on like my overall, but I have a feeling this isn't the first uh Damian Giselle movie that we're gonna see on your list. If any people have been listening to the podcast, everyone knows what's coming. Yes. Number nine for me is Fargo. I think it's a funny crime drama that is like super serious in the plot, but then the dialogue is super funny just because of their accents as well. And yeah, it's just like the crazy good dialogue in that film. Um I think this movie really made me realize how much I like dialogue in film itself.

SPEAKER_00 16:34

Yeah, this one was a close honorable mention for me. That one's one that was teetering on and off my list. Yeah, I enjoyed watching that one on the podcast. I'm very happy you showed me that one. Yeah. Number eight, I have The Shining. Again, I a lot of these movies are stuff that really made me realize what cinema could be. This is definitely one of I was so amazed. I thought I was going to just gonna watch like a cheesy slasher movie, and just the story that came out of it and kind of the uh openness to the ending was just so amazing. And I I was kind of infatuated by this movie, and I still am.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Yeah. That's another movie I have to re-watch because I rewatch when I will first watch it, and I feel like watching it now, I'd have a different take on it, just with our experience of being able to talk about it and understanding film a little bit better. But I just remember liking it a lot as well. Yeah, really cool film. Number eight for me is Before Sunrise, Link Later film that we also did on the podcast. That's true romance, instant chemistry in a film and just banter, another crazy good dialogue film where it's nominated for a screenplay, like such an original idea in a romance film, which sounds crazy to talk about when it's like, oh, it's just two people falling in love, but it's no two people like literally talking all day, walking through this new city that neither of them know. Like it's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

So you texted me this week and said that there was potentially one movie we'd both have in our top ten. Is that it? Yeah. Okay, because before sunrise is my number seven. Yeah, yeah. I really like this movie too. Uh just I would honestly say this is probably one of my favorite dialogue movies. I know you said that about Fargo, but just that the whole movie is literally just them walking through a city and just talking. It relies so heavily on dialogue and it was executed perfectly. I wouldn't change a single thing about the dialogue in this film, and it felt so real and it felt so, how do you say, like you could relate to it? Yeah. That was an important thing for me in this movie.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Yeah, it's like everyday conversations that you would have that isn't because sometimes in film you can get some people saying stuff to each other, you're like, would anybody actually say that to each other? This film, it's like, nah, like there's like those awkward uh pauses, looking away, like silence as well. Cool. Yeah, number seven for me is Emily, a new film that I've watched within the past two weeks. It's a French film. Folllows this girl that goes through like being doing good deeds for everybody, and can she figure out how to do one for herself? It's fantastical, and the way I like to describe it, it feels like a hug of a movie. Like at the end of it, you just feel warmth in the world, and it was right after the movie, I was just like literally in awe of like how cool it was, like the way the cinematography was, just the way it was shot as well. Yeah, really cool.

SPEAKER_00 19:13

Yeah, you talked about that uh a couple weeks ago, and I have it on my list now. I definitely need to get to that one. Yeah, I liked it so much. My number six is gonna be Blade Runner 2049. Uh I remember watching this on the show. It might still be my highest-rated one we've done on this show, besides one that we'll see later. But just an amazing movie. Not necessarily a fan of the Blade Runner franchise or anything with that story, but just so well shot. I think it has some of the best cinematography I've ever seen on this show. Obviously, when you're looking at Denny, he's just gonna do that. Yeah. Yeah, just so well done. Great story, and it's a contained story. Obviously, it's set in a bigger franchise, but um, you could kind of watch this on your own. I've never seen the original Blade Runner. So I watched this on my own and completely was just moved by the story.

SPEAKER_02 20:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

Really iconic cinematography with that film. Going from one Denny film into another, my number six is Sicario. It's tension, it's real. I'm a sucker for like government workings of like trying to kill bad people. Just love that. Love that plot line of it. Yeah, Denny, this isn't the only movie from Denny that I have on this list. He's probably my favorite director working right now. I'm looking more forward to after the Dune films, even though the Dune films are made really well, just not my cup of tea. Pre-Dune, Denny is top tier. Just the stuff that he was producing was crazy.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

Yeah, I need to watch the Dune movies, and I told you that we need to do that before Dune Part Three comes out, because I haven't seen any of them yet. Just the genre to be straight up Dune. Yeah. My number five, I have a newer movie, Hamnet. I think we were both super high on this one going into the Oscars last year, and rightfully so. This movie was so shocking to me because it's not at all something I would be like, I need to go to the theaters and see this. Not interested in Shakespeare, not interested in period pieces, but I was just completely and utterly moved. The acting was insane in this movie, even the child acting. What a great story, great cinematography. I was gonna get into this a little bit with little women, but that period is always made like super dark, and um, the clothes are always super worn down and ugly, but this movie just did it in such a beautiful way and brought like really nice color to the cinematography as well.

SPEAKER_01 21:24

Yeah. Hamnet last year, I loved it so much. I don't know if it's a movie I'll ever revisit because I remember just bawling my eyes out on a Thursday. Um, and I don't know if I really want to re-attack those that feeling, but there's two movies from last year that I think would go up in my rankings on rewatches and over time, and that's gonna be Centers and Hamnet for me, just because I remember both loving both those films so much last year. Um, number five for me is Heat. It's intense, two great performances from De Niro and Pacino going head to head, thrilling, loud. If you want to think about a loud movie and don't and talk about the darkness. Night. Dark Knight gets so many inspiration from Heat itself, especially like the heist part of the films. Yeah. You every time I watch Heat, I just turn the volume at 100, and I don't care about anyone around me because it's just like you need to watch it. The shootout scene is insane every single time. Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Number four, I have almost famous. This movie means a lot to me. I kind of grew up with my parents showing me about rock and roll, learning about rock and roll. I play guitar now, and this movie just kind of encapsulated all that. So that's why it really hits home with me. Along with that, it's a really great storyline and actually really delved out characters, which you know could have been kind of tossed aside. But I this is like my comfort movie. I'll just turn this on all the time just to relax and just watch. It's one of my favorites, and I think it always will be. Another one we did on the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yep. So number four for me is actually one of the movies we're doing this week, Little Woman. Um exciting, coming of age, innocence in a film with some of it, but just like another movie at the end that you kind of feel like you got a hug in a way, where it's just like so colorful and so like inspiring, and like the way the storytelling is so unique and to like an adapted screenplay to where like this is like kind of an old book. There's a lot of other films on it, but they just did it in such a unique way. Greta Garwig in her second film doing that. It's just we're gonna talk about a lot this film to later, but I really like this, and that's why I recommended it this week.

SPEAKER_00 23:24

So yeah, pretty amazing movie that we're gonna get into. But uh number three for me, I have Fantastic Mr. Fox. Uh I love this movie. I made that well known when we uh when we did it here on the show. Uh just such a good comfort movie, again, really great story. It's an easy watch too. You can we talked about it, you can really dive into it, or you can just kind of watch it from like a kid's perspective, uh, but also has a lot of really deep themes into it as well. I love the movie. I think the voice acting is amazing and the kind of claymation style of animation is is pretty amazing too to watch.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Yeah, I really liked Fantastic Fox. I was a little surprised by it just ca that kind of claymation. Usually not a big fan of that. I haven't really like seeked that out, but really well done for that film. My number three is Arrival, another one, another Denny movie, emotional, the wonder of the unknown, super deep. That that the Arrival and Hamnet have the same song to end the film that makes you just want to weep your eyes out at the thought of it. But it's like language is the communication of love, and I just love that the idea of that as well. One of my favorite performances as well by Amy Adams.

SPEAKER_00 24:33

Yeah, that was a great one. I'm happy I watched that one on the podcast as well. Number two, I don't think we've really talked about this movie a lot or Kubrick in general, but um, one of my favorites is 2001 a Space Odyssey. Um story behind this for me is took a cinematography class at uh my community college, and uh I had to do a 10-page paper on just the scene where Hal is talking and kind of turning, you know, his uh innocence into being evil. That was really awesome for me to dive into that, and I love this movie forever for that because it it really got me into realizing how much you could take from such a short clip and write a 10-page paper about it. It was uh pretty awesome. And I ended up going to see this when it re-released in theaters a couple years back, and they had like an intermission like they would back in the day and everything. It was uh pretty neat to see. Oh, yeah, that is cool.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

Yeah, I definitely want to start going to more of those kind of things where they re-release stuff in theaters. So I feel like they dive into it as well. Like it's not just the show of the movie, they also and also with those older movies, we never got the chance to see them in theater, so it's just a different experience. Yeah. Number two for me, we we never really talk about it, but we did do this director before on the social network, is my number two. It's intense, tragic in a sense, of a movie as well, where you can see he loses his all his friends, but gain that success success. I think this is the best edited movie of all time. I just think somehow they made this story that seems so bland on paper about him creating a creating a company into this like thrilling thing that like keeps you engaged. I I've rewatched this film so many times just because I think it's so well done.

SPEAKER_00 26:11

Yeah, no, definitely an amazing movie. I I really like uh that movie as well. My number one, who am I kidding? It wasn't tough. It's La La Land. We knew this.

unknown 26:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Yeah, two Damian Chazelle movies on my top ten, which is uh pretty interesting. I really like him as the director. I, you know, huge music fan, so I like how much he incorporates music in both this and whiplash. Never thought I'd be a musical person, and this ended up being one of my favorite movies ever. I I think the acting's amazing. I think the cinematography and use of color is perfect. Yeah, everybody already knows how I feel about this movie.

SPEAKER_01 26:47

Yeah, that's pretty well known, but both of our number one movies on because we talk about them so much, with my number one being uh Django Unchained. We did this on the podcast as well, revenge, but also fun dialogue. That's just part of like Tarantino as a whole. But in this film, I think it's on a 10 of like the how fun the dialogue is, crazy performances, and then like very intense dialogue as well. So you got the fun, and then you got the turn of the intense. Like the moment DiCaprio turns on turns it on, that's like the the change of the film, and that's not even the end of it. Yeah, I love that film so much.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Oh man, cool. Any surprises from my list that you're like, I'm shocked that's on there.

SPEAKER_01 27:25

I think almost famous. I knew you liked it, but I didn't think you liked it that much. I think that was like the one surprise.

SPEAKER_00 27:31

Yeah, I was debating putting little women on my list. I just felt like I just watched it, so I have to let it like cool down in my head a little bit, but it's definitely there for me too, which we'll we'll dive into here in a minute.

SPEAKER_01 27:43

Yeah, I think I was a little surprised that I put Emily up that high already after only watching it one time. I was shocked to hear that too. But I have a feeling that and before sunrise may go up over time just because I've only watched both of them once and I just like them so much. Yeah, I recommend anybody out there to check out Emily if you like those kind of like feel good movies that make you like believe in humanity again, you know? Yeah. Awesome. So yeah, this week is family stories, is the the genre of the week that we wanted to do. Um it's really a way for me to like go after these two films that I personally really love, and because I knew Justin, I knew Justin would like both of these films as well, and I've always wanted him to reach out to do it, but also I like this genre in general. I think any movie about family can be done in such like a nuanced and like cool way, um, where you dive into each character's like deeper thoughts. And we've done multiple films during this past year of like different family stories, but I really want to deep dive into these two too specifically, with them being Little Woman and Minari. Justin, do you want to start with Minari?

SPEAKER_00 28:49

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Minari, I hadn't heard of it actually up until this week, but I did do a little reading before watching and you know how much it was uh well praised for this story that it put together. So the plot is kind of semi-autobiography. Um the uh director uh kind of attributes this story to kind of his upbringing living on a farm as a with a uh being a Korean immigrant family. So it follows a South Korean immigrant family who re relocates from California to a kind of a rural Arkansas farm. The father Jacob is chasing after the American dream by attempting to grow you know his Korean produce for Dallas vendors just because you know they wouldn't have it in that area with so many Korean immigrants coming in. And meanwhile, his wife Monica kind of struggles to adapt, creating a very severe strain on their marriage, and also obviously following David and Anne, who were the kids, and kind of them trying to understand uh their family's relationships and everything that's going on. So for the overall plot, I gave it a nine.

SPEAKER_01 29:50

Yeah, I thought it was such an interesting way to tell the story with following the Yi family. He stripes like the idea of a American dream. I mean, he has like the farmer hat on, he has like the cigarettes in his pocket shirt, he's working hard, and he's like, we we don't we don't pay people to do something that we can do if we're just smart enough. He ends up by the end of the movie being like, wait, wait a second, maybe people know what they're doing actually. Uh trust the locals. I think another interesting like side plot to it was Patton's character trying to like relieve or revive like his relationship with God through helping the Yi family, uh, because he was a veteran of the Korean War, which is slightly mentioned at the beginning. And if you don't listen to that part, you're kind of confused why is why does he care so much? And it's because he's trying to like relieve of all the horrors that happened in the Korean War for him.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

Yeah, a lot of different subplots going on here, and you know, you know, it kind of brings the question, you know, what makes family? Because he was by the end of the movie, he was clearly like another family member, an extension of a family member to them. But then I really enjoyed the dynamic between uh David and his grandma as well. Just kind of the separation of generation was uh really cool to see.

SPEAKER_01 31:01

Yeah. That yeah, that's another big point where they bring in the grandma to help with the kids as they're pursuing this stuff, and the guys are working over time, and then at first she's like not the best grandma. They're like, She isn't like a normal grandma, and then she kind of develops into it, but then she gets sick, but then without yeah, and then at the end, like she like messes up big time, kind of ruins all the produce, but then they're like, You're still our family. Like, just because you mess up doesn't mean we're gonna give up on you when you're at your lowest, kind of thing, and just kind of reminds you like what family really means.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Yeah, and diving into that with the characters, obviously, I gave it an eight. I think pretty much every character was really fleshed out and drawn out. I know Anne was kind of more of a side character, the older little girl. So she didn't have a huge plot line, but um every other character was really flushed out and the every relationship was really flushed out, right? You had uh you had Jacob and the grandma, you could tell they had a little bit of uh not beef, but I'd say they didn't get along too well. David and the grandma were kind of butting heads over, you know, what it means to be a grandma, what it means to be a good grandson, be a strong, strong boy. Monica and her mom, that relationship was really flushed out in the beginning, too. Really good just character development overall, and kind of seeing these characters grow into um the struggles of the American dream.

SPEAKER_01 32:17

Yeah, another side plot into it is like David's like heart problem throughout the film. And right when the mother is trying to leave, like she's like, all right, we're gonna move back, and you get to stay out here to the f to Stephen Ewan's character. It turns out that like the heart's healing, and they're like, you gotta keep doing what you're doing, and that pretty much what decides for them to stay, and it kind of leads right into like the burning produce and limp save. But like you don't understand the depth of that if the characters aren't flushed out in the first place for you to really care about the emotional context of what the fire actually means for the family. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:51

Cinematography, I gave it a nine, it uses very intimate and kind of naturalistic framing, a lot of harsh lighting, which I really liked. It just made it feel really raw and showed the beauty of living on this farm. And I think it did uh an amazing job at just framing every scene really well. The conversations were done really well. I never felt like it was in a uh the camera was in a bad place, even you know, watching subtitles for a good portion of the movie. It it never was like I didn't understand what was going on because a character was talking off screen or anything like that.

SPEAKER_01 33:24

Yeah. I I really loved it because it made Arkansas look just so beautiful. Yeah. As a state uh idealistic, and then like the but the inside of the trailer and inside of other buildings were like more dark and gloomy, and then making the nature look so fantastical, and then even the Minari one being mystical, like where they were growing it on the river stream looking just saw the cinematography, it was so cool, really beautiful.

SPEAKER_00 33:49

Dialogue, I gave it an eight. I think it was really well done. Uh my favorite line was uh from Grandma Sunja. She said, Getting hurt is a part of growing up, which I thought was a really good turning point in the film, obviously for David's character. Um you could feel in the beginning everyone kind of looked down on him like he was weak, but she really saw him as like a strong kid and everything that he did. But also not long after this, we realized his heart's healing and that kind of turn in the family's head uh of their view toward about David was really cool to see.

SPEAKER_01 34:19

Yeah, yeah. Real family dialogue throughout obviously you have the Korean family part of it to where like just the Asian culture, they usually uh hit their kids a little bit more, or like I would say, but even that's turned into kind of a joke because the grandma's like, it isn't where they aren't in Asia anymore, kind of thing, idea to it, where she's like, smart kid, smart kid. I like the banter between them, but then even like the arguments between the fa the father and mother doesn't seem to be like out of spite or abusive, it's just them going through a hard situation, but you could tell there's still love there, which is like yeah, really important, I think, to try to distinct uh in that kind of setting.

SPEAKER_00 34:59

Yeah, I mean, even at the end of the movie, like they were ready to walk out on each other, and then you know, the fire and everything happens, and they're in there screaming at each other to try to find one another. You clearly know that there's love there. Gotta bring up the line too, David really hit grandma with uh how'd my pee taste?

SPEAKER_02 35:18

That was so funny.

SPEAKER_00 35:24

It was actually we'll get into it with acting, but actually I'm just gonna do acting. The child acting in this was actually really amazing. David was so good, but Stephen Wen and Yoon Jung were both nominated for Best Actor and Bec Best Actress respectively, uh as well, which is uh really cool, but yeah, amazing child acting in this as well. Everything was uh really great.

SPEAKER_01 35:45

Yeah, the child acting spectacular, but like the grandma, you Yun Jung Jung, she was great, she was absolutely outstanding. I think she won the best uh supporting actress that year for her performance. Yeah. Yeah, I think overall, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:00

The kind of forced perspective of like you being in the child's brain for that scene because she was fine. She was talking to David the night before, and then he woke up, thought he peed the bed, but she peed the bed, and she was barely moving. And then all of a sudden it cuts to a couple scenes later where like obviously she's been like had a stroke. You could tell she had a stroke. But yeah, as a kid, as a young kid, you would never see the in-between, right? Her getting transported to the hospital, seeing what's going on. So that forced perspective was really amazing for us as the audience to kind of be like, wow, what is going on with grandma? We care about her so much because they've developed her, and then now this terrible thing happens and we don't really know what's going on, just like a kid would.

SPEAKER_01 36:40

Yep, that's a really good point to bring up.

SPEAKER_00 36:42

Yeah, yeah. And then well, yeah, I kind of got off topic, but just her acting switch too. You could tell there was clearly something wrong with her after that, and that was just amazing to watch to be able to pull that off as an actor was uh nuts.

SPEAKER_01 36:55

Yeah, yeah, it was so well done, and then even at the end of the film, like the emotional context to be like, I I can't control my body right now, but I just like ruin the family, and then it's like so emotional, and the way that she's able to play it off also well, it's like, dude, like that's 10 out of 10 acting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:14

Getting into set design, again, we kind of talked about it with the cinematography, but it was uh a really cool set. Uh it was led by young O.K. Lee, and it you know, just focusing on that hyper-realistic, emotionally grounded details that you know, Arkansas farm kind of look. It was really well done. Everything from even the costume design, I think, really fit that uh 1980s time period really well. Yeah, it was it was great.

SPEAKER_01 37:39

Yeah, the char the trailer park felt really small, and then the land felt ever-ending, like you never really knew where you are within the farm because it's just like felt like you could go where you wanted out there, you know, while in the trailer home you knew where each room was, which is just like kind of like part of the American dream, right? It's to like grow your own land and be on your own open free, right?

SPEAKER_00 38:00

Yep. And then directing, directed by Lee Isaac Chung, uh, is directed, you know, it's obviously an autobiography story that we were talking about of him growing up in his rural Arkansas farm and kind of drawing on this childhood memories. Just a very neat story to do. I don't know if he's done anything else. I don't know of any other movies, I'm not sure if he does. I can look it up real quick.

SPEAKER_01 38:24

I'm pretty sure he did because a lot what I've I read was that he wanted to build up like a filmography before going after this. Okay. Because he thinks that this was more like a a risk riskier kind of thing because um he's more of a Korean-based where just stuff based in Korea before, as far as I know. But yeah, pretty much he said he wanted to build up his filmography before doing a personal piece, because this was a very personal piece for him.

SPEAKER_00 38:49

Did Twisters, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:50

Cool. Interesting. Not a bad movie at all. Just quite a different Twitch.

SPEAKER_00 38:55

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

Not a bad movie.

SPEAKER_00 38:57

Okay, I'll check it out. Soundtrack, I gave it a 10. Uh Needle Drop of the Week for Justin, Jacob and the Stone. Such a raw sound to kind of embody the emotion of the movie. Obviously, this song I realize is used all over TikTok now. Had no idea that this is what it was from, but such a great song. And you know, I love when movies kind of reuse songs throughout the movie in different styles. And this movie movie did it perfectly.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

Yeah, if I could give it 20 out of 10, I would. Because the sound is amazing in it. And I also heard it all over like social media before. And then when I first watched this, I was like, this is what it comes from, this movie. And I was like, dude, this is this is beautiful within it. I wish social media didn't like overuse this thing and like bullshit circumstances.

SPEAKER_00 39:42

Yeah, I'm actually mad. I watched it on vacation on tiny 20-inch TV up on a wall. Getting into the theme, I gave it a 10. Uh so much to dive into here between the different relationships. Obviously, we have the American dream and its cost, as well as the family dynamics involved and marital strain. I thought it was cool using Minari as the title of the film. Obviously, it serves as a metaphor for resilience. I kind of read about the plant. It's very resilient, can be grown pretty much anywhere uh under the right conditions, just kind of like the family, right? They're kind of misplaced uh in a place that they typically wouldn't be, but they're chasing after this dream. And although it might not seem like it'll work out, they know that they can thrive with their love of each other and their bonds and kind of using that to fuel their make the right conditions.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Yeah, the the themes American Dream is super drawn out into it. Um, I'm pretty sure when we did the July 4th draft, I drafted this in American Dream. I really like that standpoint from it, the family dynamics, never giving up on family, seeing like real, true, authentic love for it as well, the innocence view that that the director put you into a kid's lens. Yeah, just so many deeper themes in this movie that I really love.

SPEAKER_00 40:55

And then finally getting into the editing, I think it was edited perfectly too. Did a little reading about it. Um they actually, the editor and the director collaborated on Skywalker Ranch to kind of help shape the the story and what what they wanted to tell the audience about the story. So both Yoon and Chung, the director and editor, kind of both brought their own lived experiences of their early childhood living in America, um, to kind of balance the tension, humor, and the tenderest, the tenderness of the overall fan family dynamics, which I thought was uh really neat.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Yeah. Yeah. No point in this film do I did I feel like it was too long or too short. I feel like this was like exactly the right amount of like scenes put into the film. There's nothing I would take out or add. It was just yeah, perfectly edited, and like even the cut shots like you talked about before, where it seems maybe a little too quick of a term, but again, it's through the kids' lens where they won't see the behind the scenes of her actually at the hospital. But cutting quickly in between that is quite a choice from the director, but also an editor.

SPEAKER_00 41:58

Yeah, yeah. So overall, I gave this movie an 8.8 out of 10 or an 88. Uh I really loved it. I wouldn't change much about this movie. There's a really great overall contained story with great dialogue, great cinematography, great acting all around.

SPEAKER_01 42:12

Yeah, I gave it a pretty high score, a 96 out of 100, 9.6 out of 10. And this is a five-star film for me, almost perfect. I remember I first watched it like a year and a two years ago now, at an Austin, Texas hotel, and I was just amazed by it. And then that revisiting it now, I was like, yeah, it was just as good as I remembered, like such a unique take on a like a story like this, but also just like so beautiful in a movie. Awesome. So uh the next one being Little Woman. So this is like an older book set in the like the set set during Civil War in Colonial America or Massachusetts. Um, and it follows like the the March family or the March girls as they grow up, specifically through the lens of Joe March and her sister Meg or Meg, Amy, and Beth as they come up in age, but then it cuts through different times of it. So right at the beginning of the film, you know that like somebody's died in the family. You figure it out before like it it really happens at the end of the film. But the for me, like the timing of it all was never confusing for me. I could keep track of it. It's based on the novel. Everything I read about it was this was a very unique way to look at it as well and to cut the film. Just great storyline. I I'm I'm a sucker for a coming-of-age film, so I really like this. And I think we'll get into characters a little later, but like I just really like the dynamics throughout the movie between all the sisters.

SPEAKER_00 43:34

Yeah, the plot was uh pretty amazing. I thought that was the first thing that kind of caught my eye was like the nonlinear storytelling, but it was never hard to follow. That's something you can easily mess up, but it was always done really well, and maybe it was because the main character's hair was always kind of cut differently, so you knew you were jumping periods. But little things like that, they made perfectly just so you knew exactly what was going on to the plot the whole time. You were never lost.

SPEAKER_01 43:58

Yeah. Uh yeah. I read some stuff that people were like, well, they never really age. And it's like, this is like a five year span. Like these girls aren't gonna age crazily, like in five years. Like, yeah, they're gonna have different fashion choices than they do in the film. That's like even a more nuanced thing. Like you can see Amy Florence Pew, like she gets more like fancy with like her dresses as the time passes, where she kind of goes from this tomboy into this more like ladylike woman, and while Joe kind of like becomes more independent in the way she dresses. And then Meg at first is like more of like the ladylike look to her, but as she grows and falls in love with a poorer man, she doesn't dress as fantastical to it. That's actually like a whole storyline to it. Um there's just so much depth to each character. Going right into characters, I gave it or plot I gave it 10. Characters, I also gave it 10. Joe is an independent, that she's an aspiring writer. Amy is the youngest, but likes like she's really artistic, but also kind of jealous of Joe, not just because of Lori, which is connected to uh played by Timothy C. Chalamet, who is in love with Joe, but Amy loves Lori, and then Beth plays the piano really well, and then Meg is the smartest of the family, is kind of told, but falls in love with a poorer guy, and that's like her main storyline of like falling in love with somebody.

SPEAKER_00 45:13

But yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think the characters were all super flushed out and well done. I mean, I don't know how they accomplished flushing out all the characters in such a short amount of time. Even um the mom, the dad was flushed out, the Lori's dad was flushed out. It was like it was pretty amazing to see. Like I cared about every single one of the characters involved. And their immediate family, yes, but then Lori's family as well, kind of that connective neighbor, neighborhood family was just really cool to see.

SPEAKER_01 45:42

Yeah. And that's why like the decision at the end of the movie, like again, based off like a real life novel of like having like a school with all of them involved, even feels more important because you're like, oh wow, they all get to do what they like to do, all at this institute because of Joe, which I think is so cool. Like the way to end a film. A cinematography I gave out a 10. It's like a homey feeling to the movie, the way it was shot, like so like cozy from a third-person point of view, like a fantastical way to film. And like you, like we talked before, the way you mentioned it, where sometimes in colonial America they make it look really dark. I think about Lincoln, a super gritty film looking, while this one is bright and colorful. And this is during the Civil War, so I just really think it's cool.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

Yeah, I mean, even we just watched that Mel Gibson one, uh, that was more revolutionary, but super dark. Like every movie needs to take notes from this movie on how to color grade because it was so beautifully shot. Even in his darkest moments, there was uh you know, dull scenes that showed the darkness and in the scene, and then it would go back to a really colorful shot about uh love, or it's one of their you know, interconnected uh kind of stories would be kind of uh emphasized by by the scene around it, and I think that was so well done.

SPEAKER_01 46:57

Yeah, the the whole Christmas scene is like such a memorable scene for me. I I like that scene so much, and that's why I think I think of this movie as a Christmas movie, even though there's only like one scene that is, just because I like that scene so much, the way it's shot and put together. The dialogue, I gave it a nine out of ten. It's it's old English, but it delivers great. Sometimes with old English, you get confused of what they're trying to say with it, but it's really well done. The scenes between the sisters are just like so good with like the banter back and forth of each other. They made them live with each other for like a couple weeks before filming, so they could get that like sisterly, like living with each other feel to it and like actually get to know each other more, and you can really feel it within the you could definitely feel it.

SPEAKER_00 47:40

It felt so real, even like you talked about the old English dialogue, it never felt force, it just felt like it was part of their daily conversation. But yeah, you could tell they definitely had a bond with each other. Every time they'd see each other, their faces would light up, and you can't really just act that you have to actually feel it, which is uh really neat to see.

SPEAKER_01 47:58

Yeah. And the thing is talking to the acting, which I give a 10 out of 10, of like their delivery of all of those lines are like so good. And I mean, you look to the actresses, it's a stat cast. I mean, you when you have like Meryl Streep and Laura Dern as like the mother and grandmother, um, or the aunt, I mean, and and then but then you have Florence Few, Cersei Roan and Emma Watson, it's just they're all gonna be great together. And Emma Watson was replaced Emma Stone, so originally Emma Stone was supposed to be in this, but she couldn't film it. I think it's a different film. I I just don't know how Emma Stone plays that specific character. I just feel like it would be a little bit different, you know. I think Emma Watson gives off like a more nuanced feel of being like that kind of character, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 48:42

Yeah, she gave off more like older sister vibes where I feel like Emma Stone would give more like Florence Pugh's character's vibe.

SPEAKER_01 48:48

Yeah. Yeah, I could see Emma Stone doing Florence Pugh or Joe, like the character, either one of them, more than I could see with Meg. So yeah, and I already talked about them living together, just acting so good. Exactly. The score I gave a 10 out of 10 for this movie, it's just like such a calming score that fits it so well, uh so well, and it doesn't overwhelm the film. That film that heavily relies on dialogue and cutting between scenes, you you don't want a score that kind of overtakes that and it just fits into it perfectly.

SPEAKER_00 49:19

Yeah, it was perfect in the scenes it needed to be in, it was there. You know, the deep emotional scenes and then everything else, it it it let the dialogue do the work. So I I I completely agree with you. I think it was perfect for the film.

SPEAKER_01 49:30

Yeah, there was a I think another reason why I think it's a Christmas theme, because I could hear this music like on Christmas Day in my ears, like kind of feeling to it. The set design, I gave it 10 out of 10 as well. The cotchume design, they wanted Oscar that year for it, and it makes complete sense. It's really closey and cozy feeling to it, but the March house was built from scratch in Concord. So Greta like got it built for a couple months before that, and I think that's a really cool like thing too.

SPEAKER_00 49:56

Yeah, I one of the things I really took away from it was the not necessarily the accuracy, but the difference between the poor people's house that they would take food to to help, their house being kind of like the lower middle class house, as well as Lori's family's house being a very upper class and drawn-out house. Just little in uh idiosyncrasies like uh paintings and wall decoration furniture. You could really tell the difference between the three, and I think it was done perfectly to give us the feeling of where we were at at that in that scene.

SPEAKER_01 50:29

Yeah, and to like show like they were like kind of like the middle class type of family that just lived next to like both different types, so they were quite literally like in the middle of everything. Directing, I gave it a 10 out of 10. This is my favorite Gerwig film by far. The cra fact that you make this with your like second film is insane to me. I think it's so well done. I've seen Lady Bird. Lady Bird's really good, and so I think Barbie's also really good, but this movie is just on a different type of level for me. I just really appreciate everything that she did with this film and her take on the novel itself.

SPEAKER_00 50:59

Yeah, I haven't seen Ladybird, but I had seen Barbie before watching this, and I now completely get why somebody was like, Yeah, just give her anything doing relating to womenhood and sisterhood, like she's gonna cook. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:13

Yeah, pretty much. That's why the Narnia film that she's working on. People were like, Oh, it's with Netflix, all this. As long as she's at the the head of it, I I'm not that concerned. Narnia has a lot of feelings, looks very similar to how this movie looks, and I'm like, dude, I think Narnia, she could hit it out of the park. I really could. Editing, I gave it nine out of ten. The time-lasting and jumping around was done so well, and that's really on the editor itself, and as well as like working with the director of where do you want to cut it to and where where does it make sense to, you know, because you can confuse the audience really easily when you do it like that.

SPEAKER_00 51:45

Yeah, I was never once lost, and I didn't think of like it never came up to me until I was sitting here doing my notes today. I was like, damn, like you could have easily gotten so lost in between the scenes cutting, but I always knew exactly where we were somehow. And it maybe it was I'd have to re-watch it, but maybe it was like some of the first lines of dialogue in each scene kind of established it. Or I don't know what. Like thinking back, I can't even think to a time where I was like, this we're switching periods now. It just automatically clicked in my head. They I they did that good of a job.

SPEAKER_01 52:16

Yeah, I don't like comparing directors all that much because they have different takes on it, but I'm comparing it to Mer to like Memento, where a lot of time jumping in that film, where you get really confused in that film without narration as well. And you see some other time jump films that I know of that where they use narration as that like bridge piece, and somehow this builds it into the dialogue to be able to be that bridge, which I think is really, really well done by the screenplay. Yeah. Themes, I gave it 10 out of 10. I again, like I really like coming of age films. It's finding your passion and as well as family within it all and in the day, like love. Because one big change in this and compared to the novel, apparently, is that Joe does end up with somebody. I mean, that's kind of a plot point at the end of the film. It's like, well, like, no, she needs to end up with somebody. Um like the editor says that to him, and that that's Greta Gerberg's like take on it, is that like, yes, she does end up with somebody.

SPEAKER_00 53:09

Yeah, yeah. I think just the ideas behind you know, female autonomy and kind of growing up as kids with your siblings and transitioning into adulthood was just so well done. But also the themes of kind of all of them being artists and trying to grow in that passion was just well done. And I think the acting had such a huge part in that.

SPEAKER_01 53:29

Yeah, especially in like a world where women weren't definitely like artistically liberated to be able to express themselves all that much, but then they grew up in a family and an area that let them be that was also like kind of powerful. Yeah, super well done. At the end of the day, I gave it a 98 out of 100 or 9.8 out of 10. We went over it earlier. It's my fourth favorite film of all time for a reason. I really like this film.

SPEAKER_00 53:51

Yeah, I'm not far behind. Yeah, I gave it a 9.3 out of 10 or a 93. Just an amazing movie that I never would have in a million years thought I'd be interested in, but just so well done in every aspect. Uh yeah, not my many complaints here.

SPEAKER_01 54:06

Yeah. It's I I've watched it for the first time like two and a half years ago, and I think I've rewatched it now six times since then, just to say how much I I like it. I think it's super rewatchable too. Yeah. Awesome. Cool. So yeah, that summarizes up like our family stories thought. Yeah, I really like this genre. I have a feeling this is the last time we're gonna ever touch a family story of any type in any other like upcoming episodes that we do. Yeah. Awesome. So the draft that we're gonna do today is gonna be of all the movies that or the selection will be out of all the movies that we have done on the podcast before. So 103 movies to select from. The categories are gonna be Rotten Tomatoes, over 90%, the critics, the critical audience. And then the favorite performance, so you call out the performance from one of the actors that we did, favorite director with their movie, so you call out the director, one of the directors that we've done with the movie, uh, favorite genre, so one of the genre of pieces that we've done. And then Oscar nominated, one of the uh stageholds that we usually always do, and then as well as movie that surprised you um that you didn't think it you would like as much as you did, and then of course, what I just spun a wheel and Tyler, you would go on first. Okay, going first. This is a little tough. So I'm gonna go with favorite genre.

SPEAKER_00 55:25

What was that? No, no, no. I was just gonna say I don't know how much we'll have intersecting. Like we might be really close on a lot of these, or we might just be way off. I mean, we have 103 movies to choose from, so yeah, there's a there's a lot of choices.

SPEAKER_01 55:37

There's a lot of choices, and based off of like what our top ten was, I've feeling we won't have as many intersecting. Yeah. That's why I'm going after this one of these first, and I'm going after with favorite genre with the movie, and it's literally the one that we just did with family stories and being a little woman as my selection for family story.

SPEAKER_00 55:57

Yeah, that's good.

unknown 55:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:59

I might go ahead and wait on my genre then. I think I'm gonna go ahead and take my favorite director, and I I'm taking him just because he had two in the top ten. I'm gonna take Damien Chazelle, which might seem early, but I think it's just meant for me. I'm gonna take Lola Land too for obviously. Yeah. And I guess I got one more here. Let me see. I'm gonna go ahead and take movie I was surprised by. Um and I gotta give credit where credit's due because Madison actually picked this movie the week that we did it, and she still tells me, like, I'm so goaded for picking that movie for for you guys to watch. Uh I'm gonna take uh the holdovers when we did our Christmas movie. That one really surprised me. I hadn't never heard anything about it, and so coming from Madison, I was like not sure what to expect here, but yeah, great movie. I really enjoyed that one.

SPEAKER_01 56:53

Oh yeah, for sure. I think where I want to go with this. I'm gonna do favorite performance. Yeah, I'm gonna do favorite performance, and it's gonna be Amy Adams and Arrival. We did Amy Adams on the podcast specifically, so I think it'd be a cool call out to just do her performance in that movie. Yeah. Such a unique performance. It's crazy that she wasn't nominated for an Oscar that year, but she was for the Master. Like, like, like, what are we doing out here?

SPEAKER_00 57:23

We watched The Master, and I just remember texting you and being like, she might have 15 minutes of screen time in this movie.

SPEAKER_01 57:30

Yeah, yeah, that's insane. And then I yeah, it's alright. I'm gonna take this movie because I have a feeling that you want to take it, and I'm going to take Before Sunrise, but an Oscar nominated, yeah. Okay. Nominated for original screenplay. I know it's in your top 10, so I was like, this is the one movie that I think we have overlapping, and I wanted to to be on my team. I really like this movie. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 57:54

I could probably wait on this one, but I'm just gonna get it out of the way. I'm gonna take my favorite performance as Kate Hudson as Penny Lane and almost famous. I think it was such a well-done character and so well drawn out throughout the film. Yeah, I just love that movie. I had to get it on here somewhere. Yeah. And then I think I'm gonna go ahead and take uh favorite genre, and I'm gonna take sci-fi, and I'm gonna take Blade Runner 2049. Cool, cool.

SPEAKER_01 58:22

I think for now, favorite director with the movie, take my number one and Tarantino with Django. Yeah. We did part one and part two with him, so there's a lot of films to pick for him, but Django's my favorite of his.

unknown 58:36

Cool.

SPEAKER_01 58:36

Rotten Tomatoes over 90. At this point, just gotta go with whatever's higher on my personal list that we've done. That would be Sicario for over 90. Really like Sicario, got two Denny movies on. Not surprised, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 58:52

Yeah, cool. Um, let me see here. I think I'm gonna go ahead and take my Rotten Tomatoes over 92. And this one was also up in debate for my movie I was surprised by. I'm gonna take the good, the bad, and the ugly. I was shocked how much I liked this, especially being such an older film. But just the way it was done really like still holds up today. The cinematography, the sound design, the soundtrack. I really liked every part of that movie, and it was really good. I need to finish the trilogy. I just haven't had the chance to yet. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And then Oscar nomination. I'm gonna take a look at the no, no, no. I just picked the good, the bad, the ugly. Okay. Wait, how many do you have left? I have two categories left. Yeah, so do I. I think that's right then. Okay, yeah, yeah. And then actually, I'm gonna wait on Oscar nomination. My wild card, I'm gonna take Akira. I actually kind of forgot about this. I don't think it would be in my top ten, but it'd definitely be an honorable mention. I love that movie. It's so good. Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 59:49

Yeah, for me, movie that surprised me. I don't know if this affects your list at all, because I have a feeling I already know what movie that's about to come up. Uh, but Fantastic Mr. Fox for claim mode. Uh just I did not expect to like this film. I'm coming into it, but I did a lot. I really like Fantastic Mr. Fox. And then for my wild card, yeah, I'm gonna go with another thing that's gonna be top of my list, and that's gonna be Fargo. Really like Fargo. Already talked about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:16

So yours is all done, right? I have one more pick. Okay. So for Oscar nomination, there's so much we could do here, but I think I'm gonna go with one of my favorites that we did early on. I'm gonna take the usual suspects. Okay. A little bit different out there, but I just remember how much I loved watching this movie and it was really enjoyable and fun. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:38

Man, I thought for sure you would take like one of the Tarantino films.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:41

Yeah, he wasn't as high up for me. I was thinking about Kill Bill, but yeah. Why don't you do something different for the draft? Cool, cool. You want to read through your team?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:51

Yeah. So My Rotten Tomatoes over 90 was Sicario, favorite performance, Amy Adams and Arrival, favorite director, uh Tarantino with Django, favorite genre, family stories with Little Woman. Oscar nominated Before Sunrise for original screenplay, movie that surprised me, Fantastic Mr. Fox, and then Wildcard Fargo. Oh, cool.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:14

Yeah. My Rotten Tomatoes over 90 was the good, the bad, the ugly. My favorite performance was Kate Hudson as Penny Lane and Almost Famous. Favorite director was Damien Giselle with Valorland. Oscar nomination was The Usual Suspects. Favorite genre was Sci-Fi, and I took Blade Runner 2049. And then movie I was surprised by was The Holdovers, and then Wildcard was Akira. Nice, nice. Pretty good list.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:38

Yeah, awesome. Some honorable mentions for at least out throughout for performance-wise was Daniel Day Lewis and There'll be Blood, McDormand and Fargo, Matt Damon and Talented Mr. Ripley, um, and then Jillian Hall and Prisoners that we've done.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:52

Yeah, one of my favorite performances too was dude, I can't think of his first name, Affleck uh in Manchester by the Sea. Yeah. But you didn't do that on the podcast. Didn't do that on the podcast. I don't know why I had that here. Good performance though. Still good performance. Matthew McConaughey and Dallas Buyers Club.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:10

Yeah. Yeah, I was surprised no Emma Stone mentioned, honestly. Or Ryan Gosling.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:14

I had La La Land.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:15

Yeah, but for performance-wise, you'd probably call it out. That's fair. But yeah, cool. Well, thank you all for again for listening for this past year. Or if you're a first-time listener, welcome to our podcast. I think within this next year, we're also gonna be a little bit more interactive with our social media, like throwing out polls, QA's, different type of movie going experiences that we're gonna be doing. I'm currently working on a personal screenplay or two that is a personal um project for me that uh yeah, I just want to keep updated through the podcast as well.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:47

Yeah, thank you guys for watching. Uh, we really appreciate it. Love doing the show with you, Tyler. Uh I'm excited for what we have to come.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:53

Yeah, for sure. Thank you all for listening. See you next week. See ya.