What the Flick?! Podcast 12/14/18
It’s a Christmas miracle: All four of us are actually here for the first time. And it’s a good thing, too, because this week’s What the Flick?! Podcast features blockbusters, comic book extravaganzas, serious awards contenders and everything in between. Ben, Alonso, Matt and I review the thrilling animated adventure “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,” Barry Jenkins’ gorgeous romantic drama “If Beale Street Could Talk” and Clint Eastwood’s creaky drug thriller “The Mule.” (Along those lines, we take time to remember Sondra Locke.) We also revisit our favorite profane superhero with “Once Upon a Deadpool” and I made myself endure Lars von Trier’s latest provocation “The House That Jack Built.” And we have an early review of “Mary Poppins Returns,” which opens next week and is totally freaking delightful. We hope you enjoy.
Great song! Happy you are all in the same place finally.
As are we, thanks!
Wait, are y’all actually at one place at the same time? I guess Santa does exist.
Thanks for your take on the Von Trier, Christy. I feel similarly. Technically speaking, he’s often astounding, and Big Ideas are in short supply in 2018, but he’s so often obnoxious in his execution. I think his last remarkable work is Melancholia. I couldn’t stand Antichrist and Dancer in the Dark. The America films were good and stayed just on the right side of pretentious. I’ll never forget Breaking the Waves for introducing me to Emily Watson, who’s been consistently incredible over the past 20 years.
I loved Breaking the Waves and Melancholia. Zentropa (which is admittedly a very different kind of LVT movie) is one of my favorites and an early exposure to arthouse cinema for me. I’ll always watch what he has to offer, maddening though it may be.
For more information about today’s podcast and a download follow this link:
http://www.chromapure.com/WTF/wtf.htm
Hey guys, you are having audio problems again. Matt was very difficult to hear and there was a lot of hiss/noise throughout.
One clue as to what’s causing this is that after Matt and Ben left Christy and Alonzo sounded PERFECT: clear and crisp with no background hiss or hum at all.
I caught The Roger Ailes doc on Amazon this week. It was really, really good. I am something of a political junkie, and yet it revealed interesting things about Ailes and Fox that I didn’t know.
I also watched Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood and I read the book. Oddly, I thought that the film was more persuasive than the book. Maybe this is because with the film you get to evaluate people’s tone of voice and body language.
The only part of the story that I find implausible is Scotty’s claim that he procured over 150 women for Katherine Hepburn. I have read a couple of Hepburn biographies (Scotty was mentioned in both) and I have no trouble believing that she was essentially bisexual, preferring the company of women for most of her life. What I find implausible is the 150 number. I just don’t believe that Hepburn was that libidinous. Everything I have read about Hepburn suggests that she ran rather cold when it came to her intimate relationships. Hepburn most likely not have a physical relationship even with some of the women with whom she spent a good deal of time, even those companions who were unquestionably lesbian.
One interesting fact about Hepburn was that rumors of her interest in same-sex relations go all of the way back to the 1930s, and that this played a substantial role to her being labeled “box-office poison” in the late 1930s.
Yeah, I’m aware of that and tried to tweak the levels before I posted it. Not sure what the problem was at first, only that this was the first time we had all four mics going at once, and maybe the sound was bouncing everywhere in my not exactly sound-proofed dining room? Still figuring all this out.
We so appreciate the effort you guys put into this. Obviously it’s on your own time, and for no monetary gain. The new venture will most likely be set up to monetize in some way, as it should be. But, keeping the band together and sharing your passion for movies is all straight from the heart. Thanks to all of you! Even in this minimized format, I still look forward to the WTF team every week!
Thanks for sticking with us, Larry!
Thanks to all for continuing the format as a podcast. Loved WTF for all 8 and 1/2 years. Just now discovering the podcast – plan to return regularly. You all present such informed and insightful perspectives. Hard to enjoy the movies without your engaged and entertaining analyses. Thanks again.
I was just thinking today about how I hadn’t seen What the Flick?! pop up on YouTube in a while, so I went searching and was elated to find that you’re doing a podcast now. Thank you for continuing to provide your expert opinions!
An issue I’m having, though, is that I’m unable to subscribe to the podcast in my preferred podcast app, Pocket Casts. It does not see any audio files when I try to add the link manually. Would it be possible to include a direct link to the file in the posts so those of us who use this app can be sure to catch every episode?
Copy and paste the RSS feed into your Pocket Casts app, Orion. The rss feed is the top right link on the desktop version of the web page (orange and white wi-fi looking icon). To hopefully make it simpler, it’s this:
http://christylemire.com/feed/
I use Pocket Casts and this works in mine. Hope this helps!
It is not true that ‘La La Land’ and ‘First Man’ haven’t been compared in a critical context, nor is it that a moviegoer will have no more comparative commentary on a film than a bland value statement weighing the director’s previous work—especially not if your anticipation for a film is primarily determined, or heightened, by virtue of a director’s involvement. ‘Widows,’ for example, would not have been a priority of mine had I not known that Steve McQueen made it (it also wouldn’t have been as great were it not for the same visual instincts we see in ‘Shame’ and ’12 Years a Slave’).
After the release of ’First Man,’ I recall reading something that found thematic reverberation between all three of Chazelle’s films, arguing that ‘Whiplash,’ ‘La La Land,’ and ‘First Man’ are all about the pains individuals go through in dedication to their craft. Certainly, a critical essay can be written on the physical and emotional scarring we see in his first two films and the way he chooses to portray the space program as a series of brutal trials. Also, there is that great shot of the LEM right when it is landing, and its shadow on the moon’s surface looks exactly like a needle dropping on a turntable, harking back to what I’d guess is Chazelle’s first love, and what until ‘First Man’ had been his primary focus: music, and what people go through in order to succeed in their performance of it. That’s what Armstrong is doing throughout the entire film, and of course what he’s doing when he’s trying to land the LEM with a rapidly declining fuel supply. In other words, he’s performing the skills he’s honed for this very moment.
I’m not sure if Ben’s implication was that the two Jenkins films are being compared because they’re seen as necessarily linked by being about the black experience in America, but, A) I have not read or heard these kinds of comparisons, except on Alonso Duralde’s ‘Best of the Year’ list, when he ties this movie and ‘The Hate U Give’ as two parts of a whole because of their subject matter, and B) After seeing ‘If Beale Street Could Talk,’ I immediately said it was better than ‘Moonlight’ because it was much visually crisper than that film (perhaps more a credit to James Laxton), and I thought a real compliment to Jenkins’ theatrical sensibilities, which I found too showy (especially in Naomie Harris’ scenes) for the kind of quiet story ‘Moonlight’ was trying to tell.
Honestly I love that you guys have more time to give your opinions and bounce off of one another. I miss the visuals but this format suits all of you 🙂
Great to hear the fantastic four back together! Please tell me you guys recorded a best and worst of the year while you were together… 😬🤞🏽
Even if not…thanks for bringing us the podcasts either way. You guys are my faves.
Alonso kinda lost me when he said 2001 Bradley Cooper was charisma free and wasn’t a good actor. 2001 was Alias began and Cooper was fantastic on that show. In fact, while I haven’t seen A Star Is Born yet, Alias is still far and away my favorite thing Cooper has done.
So… Alonso is talking about Richard Brody loving every Clint movie even when they’re total garbage right?
I’m so glad you guys are continuing to do this. You were my favorites on youtube and i was really sad to see you go. Your chemistry is amazing and i love your insides into the industry as a whole. Happy holidays to all of you!
Thanks, Kasper. To you, as well!
I never comment, but just wanted to say. I love these.
Thanks for the kind words, Ben!
I love you all, but honestly, I could get better sound from my crappy house with a cheap microphone. What is going one with your sound here? Still, love you all.
Thank you the podcasts.
Also, I’m a long-time watcher and fan and I need visuals y’all! I can’t abide zero eyeball media. It doesn’t have to be well-lit or stylized. Just a static cam directed at whomever’s sofa set would suffice. Waaahhhhh.
MP3 download link of this week’s podcast:
http://christylemire.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/WTF-Podcast-121418.mp3
What song is playing at the beginning? It sounds familiar…
It’s “Supermassive Black Hole” by Muse.
While I enjoyed the songs from the 1964 version of Mary Poppins I don’t recall enjoying the movie that much. Maybe I was moving out of Disney into Stanley Kubrick territory.
Mary Poppins Returns, on the other hand, totally charmed me. Maybe I’m reliving my childhood. (Ominous thought.) Hold up. Rewind. The beginning . . . found myself drifting off, then the bathtub scene brought me back and held my attention til the nostalgic end.
I loved Mary’s clothes and shoes contrasted against Lin Miranda’s bland colors. I loved Lin Miranda’s hispanic Londoner. I loved the evil banker (Mr Darcy) and his cohorts plotting in cartoon shadow (shades of Pinocchio). I loved the bicycle. In fact, I want one of those. I loved the carriage chase scene. I loved the fact that the luminaries used their ladders to climb Big Ben … then Mary steps in. I loved the patched kite … a device used to make the audience feel smarter. A shared secret. I especially loved the closing scenes. This movie had such heart. Whenever I go to Disneyland (at least 3 times a year) I grouse about the exorbitant ticket prices . . . and then they make a movie like Mary Poppins Returns and once again I’m lulled into whole-heartedly supporting that machine.
Normally I see most things Alonso recommends. This time . . . not so much.
At 01:08:25 who does Alonso say are the provocateurs of this generation? Harmony Korine and who? It sounds like Espre Noe. Haha. Please help! Thank you.
Nevermind I figured it out. Thank you!