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- [00:01]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm Yossi Salik and I'm here to announce a brand new season of my Ringer original podcast, Bandsplain, the show where we explain cult bands and iconic artists to you and yours. This time, babe, we're going across the pond. That's right. I'm absolutely chuffed to be talking about the music scenes of 80s and 90s Britain. I'm talking Manchester, I'm talking baggy, I'm talking shoegaze. I'm talking Brit pop, mate. So tune in every Thursday starting November 7th for a new episode of Bandsplain on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.
- [00:33]
Sean Fennessey
This episode is brought to you by State Farm. From your morning podcast to your afternoon playlist, State Farm knows you personalize your entire day. And that's why State Farm helps you personalize your insurance with the State Farm Personal Price plan. It offers coverage options that help protect what you care about most at an affordable price, just for you.
- [00:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
- [00:54]
Sean Fennessey
Prices vary by state, options selected by customer availability and eligibility may vary. I'm Sean Fennesee.
- [01:09]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm Amanda Dobbins and this is the.
- [01:10]
Sean Fennessey
Big Picture, a conversation show about Nicole Kidman. Later in this episode, I'll have a conversation with Helena Raine. She's the writer director of Kidman's new film Baby Girl. It's an erotic, thriller black comedy mashup that Amanda and I will talk about today along with Kidman's expansive career in building her hall of fame. Halyna was last on the show for her film Bodies, Bodies, Bodies. Phenomenal guest, incredibly funny, insightful person. I encourage you to stick around for that conversation, Amanda. I think you will enjoy it as well. I hope you'll listen. But first, you know I didn't wait for you for very many movies on the pod while you were out. But I did wait for you for Baby Girl. Because I saw Baby Girl like three months ago and I was like, it was like probably three days after you gave birth. I was like, you are a baby girl of your own. And I was like, boy, this is an Amanda text if I've ever seen one. For a variety of reasons. Baby Girl, of course, stars Kidman and Antonio Banderas, your beloved Harris Dickinson. It's Helena Rain's third feature as a director. She wrote this movie as well. It's about a high powered CEO who puts her career and her family on the line for a torrid affair with an intern. It is that and it is a lot of other things as well. A story about power, sex, Passion Desire. A very funny movie, I thought. What did you think of Baby Girl?
- [02:41]
Amanda Dobbins
It would be irresponsible and betray the ideas in the movie. And a great performance to just start with Harris Dickinson dancing to Father Figure. But Harris Dickinson dancing to Father Figure. Holy cow. That was very important. I like this movie a lot. It was interesting to. To watch everyone else see it before me and it seems to be somewhat divisive.
- [03:06]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's pretty mixed. Has been the reception. Yeah.
- [03:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, is it mixed or is it. People either love it or hate it. Because I saw a lot of polarizing takes. Excuse me. Really still getting over Harris Dickinson. I'm somewhere in the middle. I think it's really good. I think the Nicole Kidman and Harris Dickinson scenes together, frankly, the sex scenes and the ideas about sex and power, but really sex on screen were very cool and very good and very memorable. The CEO stuff and this idea of a woman in power. Yeah, like, getting there to some extent. And, you know, the further you get to the sides of some of the Hedda Gabler constructs, some of the robot concepts, I was like, okay, there's a lot in this movie, and I don't know if everything is pinned down, but it has sort of that. That instantly memorable what it's trying to do. It gets really right in a way that I think will be referenced for a while to. To come. So I'm pro.
- [04:12]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, I feel pretty much the same way. I don't think it's a. A perfect execution of what it's attempting to both honor and subvert, but it's an interesting attempt at taking the framework of a certain kind of a movie, an erotic thriller, and using it to basically tell a very, like, vulnerable and at times very goofy portrayal of desire. And there's just not a lot of examples for that. I think one of the reasons.
- [04:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, is it about desire or is it about suicide? Is Antonio Banderas, like, wails into his hands at the table when talking about Hedda Gabler. Not suicide, but wanting to wreck up. Wanting to wreck your life.
- [04:52]
Sean Fennessey
I think we should talk about that. I think we should talk about, like, some of the. Like some of the things that Nicole Kidman's character thinks she wants.
- [05:00]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [05:00]
Sean Fennessey
Versus what she actually wants and how some of those things are communicated and how the Harris Dickinson character becomes like a kind of portal to getting what she thinks she wants and then looking that right in the eye and figuring it out. I think we will be spoiling the movie again. This is not a movie that necessarily, like, hinges on Its plot turns. It's really a movie of set pieces. It's a movie that really uses music very effectively to kind of build to its set pieces. One of the reasons why I think it's so divisive is this is not Basic Instinct, you know, this is not Fatal Attraction. It at times feels like it because of the way, say, the score works and we see the characters in very up close, like handheld, intimate photography. And the idea that, like, characters are climaxing on screen and that there's this. But, like, there's no murder in this movie. The stakes are like a person could be felled from power, but it's. This is. There's no Sharon Stone slashing someone's throat.
- [05:55]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [05:55]
Sean Fennessey
It's a. It's a very different kind of thing. It doesn't even have the mania of, like, the Rabbit with Glenn Close. And so I think one of the reasons why it's divisive is it's selling us on a very sexy, very kind of scary thriller. And it's not really that. It's like a comedy of manners played straight. And I think because of that and other things, for sure. But the screenings that I've been to of this movie, people are laughing in the movie theater, I think, because of some of the discomfort that they have.
- [06:25]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. Yeah, it was. I mean, it was absolutely silent in my screening yesterday. I mean, it wasn't, like, packed.
- [06:30]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [06:31]
Amanda Dobbins
You people catching up. But no, like, you know, and. And the movie very memorably starts with just Nicole Kisman. Well, Nicole Kidman. Orgasming or fake. It's the sounds anyway. And those sounds are, like, piped in loud. And there's nothing else. No one else was making any noise for a very long time.
- [06:52]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. I don't think that you're meant to think it's funny right away.
- [06:56]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [06:56]
Sean Fennessey
And. And at first. Okay, let me ask you this.
- [06:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [07:00]
Sean Fennessey
This. Hopefully an episode of Great Revelation. When you were watching that sequence where you're like, well, this is clearly a fake orgasm. And this is immediately being communicated to us.
- [07:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Of course not.
- [07:09]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [07:09]
Amanda Dobbins
And even when she storms down the hall and gets out her computer, I was like, oh, okay, so now she can't enjoy sex. She's gonna, like, pull up this screen and, like, get back into her meetings or whatever. Yeah. And then great reveal instead that she's like. I mean, I had some computer safety and just like, basic computer practices concerns with her. You know, she watches the porn, which is, like, very readily available on that laptop that is, like, seems to be in an open office. That she shares in a house that she shares with her two teenage daughters and her husband. And then when she is done, she. She doesn't hit stop and close the tab. She just closes the computer. And I was like, lady, come on.
- [07:50]
Sean Fennessey
Like, next time you open that laptop.
- [07:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, exactly. I mean, technology in general and how it's used.
- [07:56]
Sean Fennessey
Sounds like someone with some porn watching experience.
- [07:58]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I mean, Samuel is saved in her phone as Samuel. I mean, come on. I had some concerns about that again. So right off the bat, we're like playing fast and loose here. And on the one hand, I was just like, okay, so this is. This is a movie. You know, they're not going to get everything right. And on the other hand, maybe it is. This person is being reckless. And I think.
- [08:19]
Sean Fennessey
And I think in some ways, at least in that sequence, well, that raises a question about laptop etiquette in one's home, especially with a family, which is, I have my laptop and you have yours. Don't open mine and I won't open yours. Is that how it works in your home?
- [08:31]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [08:32]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [08:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [08:33]
Sean Fennessey
And my wife has a Lenovo and I have a MacBook. So it's almost like driving an EV in a gas powered car. Like, they're just two different machines.
- [08:40]
Amanda Dobbins
And there's also like password protection and. But all sorts of things. But Zach, there's one iPad.
- [08:47]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, interesting.
- [08:48]
Amanda Dobbins
That's used a lot now for Knox's stuff.
- [08:52]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [08:52]
Amanda Dobbins
But somehow is still connected to my. Listen, you guys know me in the cloud. Like, I have not enabled that ever.
- [08:59]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, you have to download all your.
- [09:01]
Amanda Dobbins
That is not. And it's like somehow, like FaceTime is still going off on my iPad and I'm just like, okay, that's not great. And sometimes, you know, Zach will need to do like a podcast or an audio recording thing. And so I'm like his engineer and he uses my home setup. Okay, so. But because of the software.
- [09:20]
Sean Fennessey
But you close all the tabs before that happens. Of course. Yeah. Got it. That's a no. The way that this, the Dickinson character comes into Nicole Kidman's character's life is because there's an internship program at this robotics company where she is the CEO. I agree with you that I think some of the storytelling frameworks on the edges of the movie feel a little bit underdeveloped.
- [09:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. It's also like, I get it, okay? Robotics. And we are all robots going through the day to day of our life. But it was like. And there was also some attempt to comment on. It's a Very Amazon style warehouse. And there is a lot of camera facing, corporate PR speak. Soullessness.
- [10:04]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, it's represented, but it's kind of just gestured at.
- [10:07]
Amanda Dobbins
It's not really explored. Yeah, I get it.
- [10:09]
Sean Fennessey
There is a kind of critical power dynamic between her character and her assistant that is essentially like a plot device that allows us to get to the conclusion of the story. But this intern comes along and Harris Dickinson, who is an actor you've expressed serious affection for, but who is, you know, embarking on like a pretty cool career. Star of Beach Rats, star of Triangle of Sadness, star of the Iron Claw, he's had good taste. He's become one of the tall British A24 boys.
- [10:36]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [10:36]
Sean Fennessey
But like they're collecting a massive.
- [10:38]
Amanda Dobbins
He is notably tall, like even in that first. I mean, you see him on the street and he's wearing. He has his like, chopo bag like Chris Ryan sell incredible stuff. Big, big luck for Chris ride.
- [10:50]
Sean Fennessey
And then I'm not. I compare Chris Ryan Dickinson, just for Chris's sake, please.
- [10:55]
Amanda Dobbins
But then he's like, heard it around with a group of interns and my guy is two heads taller than anyone else. Like, it's, you know, that is again the point of the movie that he is supposed to stand out a little. But like, lol.
- [11:08]
Sean Fennessey
His. He's costumed perfectly. He's wearing basically like either hand me down Brooks Brothers or J. Crew clothes, doesn't button the top button on his shirt. It appears to be the first time he's worn his tie since his first communion. He looks like a kid. Even though Harris Dickinson, I think is like 26 or 27 at this point. And they meet on the street because a dog is about to attack Nicole Kidman's character in the street. And Harris Dickinson's character, before they've entered the office building, subdues the dog with a cookie.
- [11:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Right. Just the crowds part. On a busy. Like on a New York. What is that? Yeah, Where. Where is it? It's sort of midtown.
- [11:48]
Sean Fennessey
Bryant park maybe? Something like that. It had. It was in an area where the crossing signals give you the weight.
- [11:54]
Amanda Dobbins
It seemed like lower Broadway because I think there was like a sign that said lower Broadway. Anyway, so the things part and then there he is and it's a vicious dog. And I did think that this movie very quickly got right dog safety and owner's irresponsibility. But that's a. That's a separate conversation when I watched.
- [12:15]
Sean Fennessey
It a second time with my wife. And when we watched it, I said to her, this is probably my Most perverse takeaway from this movie. But I think we should get a dog. I've been wanting to get a dog for a very long time. But there's a very memorable image at the end of the film.
- [12:29]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [12:29]
Sean Fennessey
Featuring Harris Dickinson and a dog.
- [12:31]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. Okay.
- [12:32]
Sean Fennessey
But not for the purposes that are portrayed in the movie. Just because I love a tamed dog. And yeah, I mean, they essentially, they very quickly encounter one another at work. He applies. They have a follow up conversation in the break room. He applies to be to her mentor program.
- [12:49]
Amanda Dobbins
The break room's really good. Where she's like, hey, make me a coffee. And then she's like, clearly from the minute she sees him with the dog, is taken by him, but doesn't want to engage and is like trying to be like, boss, CEO, make me a coffee while I'm on the phone. Which is like not normal CEO behavior, but whatever.
- [13:08]
Sean Fennessey
It's not something I do.
- [13:10]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, it's not something. It's 2020.
- [13:12]
Sean Fennessey
I don't know if I ever asked anyone who isn't Chris for a coffee at work.
- [13:16]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, or if you do, you're like, hey, are you going? Can you. Whatever. It's very brusque. And I think intentionally and sort of a power thing, he does it. And then there's the exchange about the cookie. And she's like, do you always have a cookie on you? And the way that he just like volleys back, like, does he say sometimes or. Yes.
- [13:33]
Sean Fennessey
He smirks and says, why, do you want one?
- [13:35]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [13:37]
Sean Fennessey
And the smirk is the revelation that the power exchange between these two characters will be basically the primary engine of the movie. And that the next thing that he asks her, which is so wonderful, or he just scolds her and says, you shouldn't have coffee after noon.
- [13:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Mm.
- [13:51]
Sean Fennessey
And how many have you had today? And she says, that's none of your business. 7. 7.
- [13:55]
Amanda Dobbins
The Nicole Kidman timing on that is very special.
- [13:58]
Helena Rain
Very, very good.
- [13:58]
Sean Fennessey
She's really good in this movie. I think one of the reasons why the thing I like best about this movie in particular is it's a great star part For a star exploring some of their kind of external mythology. Nicole Kidman has been one of the most beautiful people on the planet. For going on 40 years. She has emerged as like one of the signature stars of Hollywood. We just watched the Golden Globes last night. They mentioned that she has been nominated for 20 Golden Globes. She is in the firmament. One thing that's cool about her as an actress, though, is that Even though she has such glamour and is just so darn famous, she often takes on parts that kind of dismantle our expectations of her. This movie in particular, I think, dismantles something super cool, which is what does a powerful woman who needs to be presentable every day have to do to feel confident, to feel like they're successful, to feel like they're communicating what their role in the world is? And so when we see her interacting with Harris Dickinson's character, she's trying to control herself, but there's primal desire leaking out.
- [14:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [14:57]
Sean Fennessey
But the movie itself shows her getting Botox. It shows her going to audio therapy. It shows her going to the cryo chamber. It shows her trying to do the things that we in the outside world think Nicole Kidman probably does.
- [15:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [15:15]
Sean Fennessey
And I don't know if that's like a fearless act, but it's a cool way to kind of gesture at. Because even though Nicole Kidman isn't a CEO, she sort of has the same responsibilities. She has to speak in public. She has to represent something more meaningful and moral and forward thinking than maybe it really is. She has to make a lot of money and she has to represent a kind of untouchable power. So this movie, like, it slots in really nicely there. And then the subtext or the just the subterranean aspect of the movie is what all people, but especially powerful people have, which is like desire.
- [15:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [15:45]
Sean Fennessey
To get the physical feeling and emotional feeling that they really want but can't say out loud. So I love. It's a fun movie to think about in that way. I agree with you that there's a little. There's some leaky parts of the storytelling and there were some underdeveloped parts, as you said. But for her, I just really liked watching her kind of go through the process of like, allowing herself something and then taking it away from herself and then allowing it for herself and taking it away from herself. Because we hear this about powerful people all the time. What did you think about that part of the story?
- [16:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. Another part of Nicole Kimmin's career that I noticed while preparing for the hall of Fame. And. And you. You do kind of think about it, but when you're looking for patterns, I mean, she's not afraid of sex scenes on screen. She is not afraid of pretty uncomfortable, vulnerable, provocative scenes and. And exploring power and sex and like putting herself on the. On the upsetting side of that a lot. And in a lot of ways, I'm in a lot of places where she's. I mean, she's like, definitely having a sex scene, but. Or is she being sexually assaulted? Or is she like the. The wife who is. The only thing that she has is her sexual power or. So this was an interesting continuation of. Of what it means to be Nicole Kidman doing this on screen and what these scenes mean. And I actually did think this. The sex scenes as set pieces were, like, fascinating and really well filmed and. And memorable. You know, there's like the hotel scene that. Well, there are two hotel scenes.
- [17:27]
Sean Fennessey
There's the dog, the motel.
- [17:28]
Amanda Dobbins
The hotel.
- [17:29]
Sean Fennessey
Sure.
- [17:30]
Amanda Dobbins
At the beginning there is the fancy hotel, which I believe is the Carlisle.
- [17:35]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [17:35]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know if it's the Carlisle, but it's Carlisle S. There's the rave, where at first I was like, this. This is stupid and getting away from you. But then there's just something about watching the two of them in the, like, the strobe lights for an extended period of time. And the, like, the physicality of Nicole Kidman, like, she does not look cool. She does not look sexy. She is. She is really examining or just going for it physically in a new way. And then also to your point, and it shows her getting Botox. It shows her a lot of things as a physical performer. She. She lets herself go a little bit in this one. She looks her age. She. I mean, she's still the most beautiful person in the world, but I, you know, I. You have to assume there's tight close.
- [18:21]
Sean Fennessey
Ups on her face. Tight, tight, tight.
- [18:23]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. But even, like, the lighting and the way that, you know what wrinkles you're allowed to see and what you're not allowed to see, like, is definitely a choice that an actor of her caliber and phase of life makes.
- [18:38]
Sean Fennessey
She gets to make that decision.
- [18:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, and she's making it and she's making it in, like, noticeable and interesting ways. So I thought that was cool. And I thought that the age stuff of it to me was very. Was interesting just because, I mean, all actresses who, like, have to age in front of the camera as she has, like, have that sort of public spoken or unspoken conversation. But hers has been somewhat spoken. So it was cool.
- [19:06]
Sean Fennessey
No, I mean, it's often rumored about. And it's an interesting time for this movie to come along in the same year as the substance where that movie makes the metaphorical literal. And this movie is not that far from doing the same thing and confronting it. Both movies made by women. Made by women, I think, who are like, I'm getting a little bit older. You know, I'm into my 40s and now this is something I have to think about quite often. I think the other thing too that is notable and it's so interesting talking to Halyna because she's like, this is very much based on my experiences and how I feel.
- [19:38]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [19:39]
Sean Fennessey
And the sexual nature of the relationship is like submissive domination.
- [19:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Right, right, right.
- [19:45]
Sean Fennessey
And putting herself in that position as an actress on screen. And also the very amusing way in which Harris Dickinson plays the dom is really, really good.
- [19:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, Incredible. And they together, like figured something out in terms of like, it's palpable from the second that he's on the street letting you know, the coffee, everything are just like, wow, this is amazing. These two are really like, they have working it out together and they have like.
- [20:11]
Sean Fennessey
There's a choreography that goes especially in that motel scene where they're kind of like figuring out what they're going to do together for the first time. And the difference between this and other erotic thrillers, like I said, is this is not like a take your clothes off and thrust on top of me kind of movie. No, it's a totally different kind of sex scene that is shown a few different times. And the way that the characters are having orgasms is different than Sharon Stone does in Basic Instinct.
- [20:35]
Amanda Dobbins
And even then what Nicole Kimmet does at the very beginning of this movie, you know. Yes, yes, the sounds are quite different.
- [20:42]
Sean Fennessey
That's meant to be the sort of normie version of sex, which used to be the whoa, can you believe this sex scene. And so there's something really interesting about that. And I agree, I think their ability to make those scenes work. And then later the Carlisle scene too, where, you know, she does strip down in that sequence, but she's sort of covering herself and then she's just sort of embraced by him.
- [21:00]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [21:00]
Sean Fennessey
And it's not meant to be like, look at me. It's a different psychological portrayal of a sexual relationship.
- [21:08]
Amanda Dobbins
They are. And they are playing off of each other and ping ponging. Like that motel scene where they're figuring it out for the first time and he is going from the dom to like a 23 year old being like, I don't know what you want to. No, I don't like it that way too. And then she is like laughing and then hiding and then angry and then submissive, you know, and it's. I mean, it's in seconds. Yeah, I. It's amazing. It's amazing stuff. You wonder like how much of it is like written, how much of it is them in the room. Not that one is better than the other. It's just kind of like a fascinating creation because it is like two people really reacting to each other in real time.
- [21:49]
Sean Fennessey
Yep. Well, she particularly, like after the conclusive moment in one of those scenes, kind of just like collapses into him. And it's a movie weirdly about like the warm embrace of transgression, I would say.
- [22:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [22:02]
Sean Fennessey
You know, like doing the wrong thing. That makes me feel right and it.
- [22:05]
Amanda Dobbins
And that, like being okay.
- [22:07]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. And not being punished for that. Not being criticized for it, but then being confronted because there were consequences to the things that they are doing together. Being confronted by those consequences. I think one of the complicated parts of the movie. I don't want to spoil the ending of the movie or the way that it concludes, but there's something tidy about the way that it concludes. We're sort of like, we can have it all.
- [22:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [22:28]
Sean Fennessey
I'm not. Maybe that is true. I guess it's not for me to judge, but for a movie that feels like it is constantly bumping up the edge of like, this could blow up your life. This could blow up your life. Maybe a good message is it doesn't have to blow up your life if you find a way to communicate honestly with the loved ones in your life. I don't really know. I guess. I guess for different people it'll matters differently.
- [22:46]
Amanda Dobbins
It is. It is tidy. But it's also. It's not like you walk away being like, well, she's fundamentally a good person and she like got what she wanted. She's not a bad person, but still a cunning CEO. Yeah. And. And like, decisions have been made, traits have th. Things have been done where you're not like, wow, it's transgressive. Desire is like, okay in consensual circumstances. And you know, like, we need to break out of the structures of like our expectations of women. And it's. It can be okay. It's like, oh, no. Like some fucked up things happened.
- [23:24]
Sean Fennessey
One small thing related to that that I do like in the movie that isn't like, we don't spend too much time on it. But she has two young daughters in her marriage to Antonio Banderas character. And it's clear that one of the daughters is like Antonio's character and one of them is like Nicole's character. And she keeps recognizing these moments in her, I guess, her elder daughter that are like chilling to her. But also she makes her feel close to her daughter and they have this kind of frictive but deeply connected bond. And as parents, you know, you see your kid do something and you're like, whoa, that is a me thing. Or that is a my partner thing. And in particular.
- [24:06]
Amanda Dobbins
Or you get told repeatedly, hey, that's you.
- [24:10]
Sean Fennessey
That's also something that happens. But this is a different version of it. It's with like a 19 year old or whatever. I don't know how old that daughter is meant to be. And they don't totally circle the square on that part of the story, but it's something that a person in Nicole Kidman's character's experience would be feeling. Would be seeing.
- [24:26]
Amanda Dobbins
There's also that fascinating, this scene after the rave where she comes home at like 4 in the morning and I don't know if she is like actually on something or if. Yeah, sure. I mean you don't. You see her take it. But. But the performance she's given is like she's just been at a rave.
- [24:45]
Sean Fennessey
Y.
- [24:45]
Amanda Dobbins
And the. And then it's the daughter sitting at home at the counter being like, what's going on? I'm worried about you. Like, are you okay? Incredible. Nicole Kidman. I'm on drugs, but I'm trying to pretend it's okay. But also I'm slightly liberated by this. But just an amazing scene.
- [25:04]
Sean Fennessey
Nice callback to Eyes Wide Shut and lecturing Tom Cruise in the bedroom while stoned out of their minds. What other scenes? I mean, I guess we'd be remiss if we didn't mention the ordering the milk, which is something I will be doing to someone at some point sometime soon.
- [25:17]
Amanda Dobbins
And then the good girl as he walks out. Really. But also her chugging the milk. Also, there is a tremendous amount of conversation at the table before of like, who sent you that milk? Don't drink the milk. You know, I did find myself bumping against not bumping, but being like, you guys are being so obvious throughout the movie. And that is actually paid up. Well.
- [25:45]
Sean Fennessey
Well, okay, so at the end of the film.
- [25:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [25:48]
Sean Fennessey
This is a spoiler. If you don't want to hear it, we'll try to talk to it really quickly.
- [25:55]
Helena Rain
Spoiler warning.
- [25:58]
Sean Fennessey
I didn't totally get it. So I want you. Maybe you can help me understand what was meant to be important.
- [26:02]
Amanda Dobbins
We'll try to figure it out together.
- [26:03]
Sean Fennessey
So at the very, very end of the movie, like things get sorted out, right? Like they figure out how to stay together as a couple. Banderas character and Kidman's character, Harris Dickinson's character gets shipped off to Japan to go work for. Was it. Was it Kawasaki? I can't remember.
- [26:18]
Amanda Dobbins
What? Yeah, that sounds right.
- [26:21]
Sean Fennessey
And another leader at the company who we previously seen get handed a coffee by Harris Dickinson earlier in the film is having a conversation with Nicole Kidman. And he says to her, he implies that like they could have a sexual tryst in the near future. Cause his house is empty.
- [26:38]
Amanda Dobbins
Right. And because he's like, I see that this is what you do now, sort of. He seems to imply that he knows what was going on.
- [26:46]
Sean Fennessey
So. But was that an implication that they had had a relationship before and that she had done that or just that everyone knew?
- [26:55]
Amanda Dobbins
I think just everyone knew.
- [26:56]
Sean Fennessey
Slept with an intern so that maybe you would then sleep with me?
- [26:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. Yeah. I think he was trying to blackmail her because he implies that everyone knows because there is another employee of the company who comes to her and is like, I know.
- [27:11]
Sean Fennessey
Who is also effectively blackmailed her.
- [27:13]
Helena Rain
Yes.
- [27:13]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [27:14]
Sean Fennessey
Which I get. But I was. That seemed, that seemed a little forward on that gentleman's part. Obviously we live in a culture where these terrible things happen. I'm not blind to that.
- [27:24]
Amanda Dobbins
I agree. And that's where like some of the. That was kind of one of the two tiny moments because she responds to it with this, like, don't speak to me that way. Like, you know, I'm the boss, like I'm a boss lady. Like I'm the domno speech, which, like that, that's cool, cool, you go girl. But also like, it's one of those moments where you're like, huh? Like, okay, that's it, that's what we're.
- [27:45]
Sean Fennessey
I think one of the reasons why I failed to like jump out of my seat and applaud at the end of the movie, even though I had a really good time, was there were a couple, couple sequences like that where I was like, what? What just happened?
- [27:53]
Amanda Dobbins
Right?
- [27:54]
Sean Fennessey
What? Like it's not totally clear and I wasn't sure if I was meant to say you go girl or not or meant to be like, oh, wow. We all just live in the corporate hell and our inability to escape these gender based power structures is, is dooming us all. I honestly couldn't tell.
- [28:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And again, the corporate stuff I felt was in some ways like very like well observed. And so, I mean, it is hell and is also you know, just kind of like a metaphorical stand in for women are expected to present as like, you know, perfect and in control. And we're supposed to, you know, like my generation has been like, you can do anything and you must do anything and you can have it, you will have it all. And it Will all look, you know, perfect on the outside. And I haven't slept in three months. I actually haven't slept in a year. That's, you know, they. You can't sleep while you're pregnant, and then they definitely don't let you sleep afterwards.
- [28:49]
Sean Fennessey
It's going to be okay. I got you. I got you.
- [28:51]
Amanda Dobbins
It's going to be okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. So it seemed to me and that you're. And so implied in all of that is like you're supposed to assume all this power, you know, like women, we are all supposed to go girl at.
- [29:05]
Sean Fennessey
All times, express it.
- [29:06]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah. And so part of her desire was. And being like, that's so exhausting that, like, to. To actually not have to do all of that is, you know, is. Is part of what turns it on. Yeah, yeah. Is release. And so that the. The her coming back to her, like, no, like, I can do this when I need to is like. I guess some sort of. It's not redemptive, but it's. I guess she's like turned the mask back on, you know.
- [29:37]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. And I wonder if that is repression or not. I guess it ultimately doesn't matter. The movie that I've seen this movie compared to quite often is Secretary. Have you seen Secretary?
- [29:45]
Amanda Dobbins
I have, yeah. I mean, well, in like the motel scene, there is like a beautiful wide shot that you immediately do think of Secretary.
- [29:53]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. The Maggie Gyllenhaal and James Spader 2002. Basically like a black comedy as well about power dynamics in the workplace.
- [30:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Speaking of Secretary, just this is like a total random aside, but Jesse Eisenberg was on. As part of his press tour, he was on Table Manners, the podcast with Jesse Ware, which I recently learned, no one under 30 who knows who Jesse Ware is and like, educate yourselves, open the schools. But they. He was telling a story about taking his now wife on a date to see Secretary. And he, like, didn't really know that Secretary was going to be about what it is.
- [30:28]
Sean Fennessey
Sure. Yeah.
- [30:28]
Amanda Dobbins
And I believe his wife was so uncomfortable that she just put her coat over her head throughout the thing. And he says. And then I was like, wow, she's so weird. I wanna marry her. Which I thought was a really romantic story.
- [30:40]
Sean Fennessey
Heartwarming tale. I hope. An aspiring young writer, director, actor is currently seeing Baby Girl with their future wife and making a happy life for themselves. Yeah, I guess. One other thing I want to mention is the music in this movie is amazing and kind of like carries certain parts of the movie. You know, obviously father Figure George Michaels song, the kind of Harris Dickinson Shirtless Rising.
- [31:11]
Amanda Dobbins
No, he's wearing the tank top and the chain. And I do think, like, Harris Dickinson's chain is like the new Paul Mescal normal people chain, you know?
- [31:21]
Sean Fennessey
All right.
- [31:21]
Amanda Dobbins
Like, I guess baby girl isn't wide enough for those meme accounts to have started.
- [31:25]
Sean Fennessey
Is it just a gold chain? What? Is it.
- [31:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Does it. No, it's not Andrew Barkley. Oh, that was some good stuff. No, it's just very powerful.
- [31:38]
Sean Fennessey
It hangs well in excess. Never Tear Us Apart, I think is the song that hits when their affair starts. Really hitting hard. Yeah. Robin's Dancing on My Own, which has been used quite often in the last 10 years, but it's, like, feels appropriate for this.
- [31:53]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, it's. It is a generational touch point for. For women my age. Now, the original Robin, not whatever the Phillies are playing after they win games. Like, what are we going to.
- [32:02]
Sean Fennessey
It's not your Phillies played. Dancing on My Own.
- [32:04]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes, but a cover. Bobby, help me out here. I know that you're a Mets fan.
- [32:08]
Bobby Wagner
No, this was a big thing a couple of years ago. It started with the Red Sox, actually. And then Kyle Schwaber came to the Phillies and brought it with him. They play the. I forget his name. Callum something.
- [32:16]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know.
- [32:17]
Bobby Wagner
Dancing on My Own and not the original.
- [32:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Is it.
- [32:19]
Bobby Wagner
Is it too much Phillies.
- [32:21]
Amanda Dobbins
Is it too much to ask that. One, we learned to hit in October, and two, we play the original Robin version of Dancing on My Own.
- [32:27]
Sean Fennessey
It is too much to ask.
- [32:29]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [32:30]
Bobby Wagner
Concerning me a little bit that you're saying we. With the Phillies. It just hurts my sense.
- [32:33]
Amanda Dobbins
I had to renounce the raves. I had to. And that's fine. That's okay.
- [32:37]
Sean Fennessey
For the record, a Braves Phillies, Dodgers fan over here. So you take some invalid.
- [32:42]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I. Listen, let me say once again, I renounce the Atlanta Braves. We had a good run in the 90s, but, like, I'm not welcome in my own home if I'm a Braves fan.
- [32:53]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [32:54]
Amanda Dobbins
And the way. And the way that you guys look at me, the way that Chris looks at me, the way that Zach looks at me. Anytime that the. Listen, I've. I have renounced them.
- [33:02]
Sean Fennessey
Must be nice.
- [33:03]
Amanda Dobbins
They moved to Cobb county, which I do not support. And I was like, I'm out. So, yes, for the happiness of my. My son and husband and my other son, once he, like, learns what a.
- [33:13]
Sean Fennessey
Ball is, we'll be bringing him into Mets high.
- [33:17]
Amanda Dobbins
That. That would be tough.
- [33:19]
Sean Fennessey
We will.
- [33:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [33:20]
Sean Fennessey
We will. Bob, will we do it.
- [33:21]
Bobby Wagner
Would Zach, like, set it on fire if I just, like, start sending Mets onesies to your house? Like, what would he do?
- [33:27]
Amanda Dobbins
One time before, well, before I was pregnant with Knox, just like, the concept of children, I made a joke that I was like, I'm going to raise our children to be Cowboys fans just to mess with you. And Zach, like, both got so angry and almost started crying in a way that it was like. It was a combination I hadn't seen before and haven't seen since. It was so. And I learned, you know, like, that kind of rare emotional response taught me, like, this is. We're not joking around. So both my sons. Well, Knox knows how to say, go, Birds. Sy doesn't know how to talk. But I. No, that's how I show my love. Okay. This is what I do. I'm pretty mean, but I can be.
- [34:08]
Sean Fennessey
A Phillies fan and wish you guys well.
- [34:10]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm not a Sixers fan. I just. Can we please. We need baseball to start again. This is just excruciating.
- [34:16]
Sean Fennessey
Two more months, very quickly. Awards chances for baby girl.
- [34:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Nicole Kidman is probably the only person in the running at this point, so maybe she'll get it instead of Angelina Jolie. Maybe she'll get the fifth spot.
- [34:35]
Sean Fennessey
Seems possible. One thing we forgot to say during our Golden Globes conversation is Marianne Jean Baptiste was also snubbed by the Golden Globes.
- [34:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, of course. That's right. And that's also.
- [34:45]
Sean Fennessey
I feel like that's going to happen.
- [34:47]
Amanda Dobbins
I do think that that's going to happen.
- [34:48]
Sean Fennessey
And so, honestly.
- [34:49]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, so who.
- [34:50]
Sean Fennessey
Angelina Jolie and Nicole Kidman go out and Fernanda Torres and Marianne John Baptiste go in. I wouldn't be stunned.
- [34:56]
Amanda Dobbins
I wouldn't be stunned either. I do. With respect to the people of Brazil and their enthusiasm for their cultural product, the Fernanda Torres Golden Globes history.
- [35:10]
Sean Fennessey
We got that.
- [35:11]
Amanda Dobbins
Brazil. Lots of Brazilian voters.
- [35:12]
Sean Fennessey
A lot of Brazilian voters in the new academy.
- [35:15]
Amanda Dobbins
That's something to keep in your head.
- [35:17]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. Fernando Torres feels actually less likely to me than Marianne Jean Baptiste. I could be wrong about that. That's my gut on.
- [35:24]
Amanda Dobbins
But so Mikey Madison for sure. Demi Moore for sure. Who else I'm forgetting?
- [35:32]
Sean Fennessey
Let's just say Marianne John Baptiste.
- [35:34]
Amanda Dobbins
Marianne Baptist. I think that's correct. I got to see that movie. Oh, Cynthia Erivo.
- [35:39]
Sean Fennessey
Cynthia Erivo.
- [35:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. I think that's. That's pretty guaranteed.
- [35:43]
Sean Fennessey
Carla Sofia Gascon.
- [35:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, I think that's also happening.
- [35:47]
Sean Fennessey
I agree.
- [35:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [35:48]
Sean Fennessey
So it would be interesting if Nicole Kidman and Angelina Jolie got blanked it would and would also, I think, signal what's increasingly been happening, which is like, star power is not really what drives a lot of this stuff, you know, and star power is certainly not what drives the wins in these categories.
- [36:04]
Amanda Dobbins
That's true. This movie is still.
- [36:08]
Sean Fennessey
It's doing solid business. It's made like almost $20 million already.
- [36:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [36:12]
Sean Fennessey
Which for a movie this size. Nicole Kidman has been in some successful movies, but I would not say is a classic box office draw.
- [36:20]
Amanda Dobbins
I would say that this has like anecdotally among the women in my life, it's been like, oh, have you seen Baby Girl yet? When can I see Baby Girl? When is Baby Girl coming out? Like, both from people who do follow these things and people who, you know, text me. When the Golden Globes started, started being like, how is it the Golden Globes again?
- [36:40]
Sean Fennessey
So part of a coordinated effort, I think on the part of a 24 to 1. They hit a lot of doubles this year. They had a home run with Civil War. But, you know, you had We Live In Time. We had Heretic. Now this movie, then the Brutalist. A lot of movies are going to do like pretty good business.
- [36:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [36:57]
Sean Fennessey
And that middle that we're always clamoring for.
- [36:59]
Amanda Dobbins
So they're finding their audience.
- [37:01]
Helena Rain
Yeah.
- [37:01]
Sean Fennessey
And also finding female audiences. You know, We Live In Time was huge with female moviegoers and this movie obviously would be.
- [37:07]
Amanda Dobbins
Unfortunately, I'm never going to be able to see that one. But you liked it.
- [37:11]
Sean Fennessey
I did, yeah. I did. I mean, it's Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh with a three year old.
- [37:16]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. I can't do it.
- [37:17]
Sean Fennessey
It's pretty, it's pretty relevant to my interest.
- [37:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. So. But I. Nicole Kimon also always finds a way. She always finds.
- [37:25]
Sean Fennessey
You're betting on her.
- [37:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, I'm not betting her. I'm just saying I think I did bet on her for the Oscar bet.
- [37:30]
Sean Fennessey
That, that exercise, because we did it in like September 8th is so fucked. Like, there's so. We've made so many bad picks in there, but it'll be fun to go back and look at it in March. Let's talk more about Nicole. Okay.
- [37:42]
Amanda Dobbins
She's really good at acting.
- [37:44]
Sean Fennessey
She's. She's fantastic. And it's weird that we haven't. She's. It's weird we haven't really focused our energy on her on the show too much because she is one of the few big, big, big stars who has not stopped working and in some cases has been doing excellent work. It's just that a lot of it has moved to television and she hasn't stopped making movies. In fact, she makes more movies than any big star in the last quarter century. She has made 47 movies since 2000.
- [38:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [38:13]
Sean Fennessey
In addition to starring in at least four TV series and doing guest spots on other shows. The thing about her is she fucking works, man. She is present all of the time. In some cases. She works with really audacious and interesting filmmakers. She's one of the only female stars that works hard to work with female directors.
- [38:30]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. She made a point of it.
- [38:32]
Sean Fennessey
She is a really, like, exemplary contemporary, boom, Gen X movie star. She puts her money where her mouth is in a lot of ways. Not all of her stuff works, though. She makes a lot of stinkers because she takes a lot of chances and then she tends to dot it with, I think, pretty smart supporting work in popcorn movies.
- [38:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [38:52]
Sean Fennessey
You know, your Golden Compasses, your Aquamans, your things that are sort of like, I'm always on a red carpet of some note, because I am also.
- [39:01]
Amanda Dobbins
And she'll do the work also. She shows up for the photo shoot. She shows up for the. The interview. Yes. She's good at giving just the right amount of quotes. A recent interview about how Keith Urban bought her this fancy car and she hated it and she just drives her Subaru around instead. Really good.
- [39:19]
Sean Fennessey
Stayed with me, just like me, you know?
- [39:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [39:21]
Sean Fennessey
What is she good at as an actor?
- [39:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Reserve. Holding a little back. And she can still go for it, and she can still be big and she can still do silly performances, comedic performances. It's not quite chilliness and it is not quite. She's not subdued. But you. You lean in with her because it's not. It's There, there. There's something that she's not giving to you, even when she's, like, putting it out all out on the screen right until she does. And that's kind of the. The power of the thing that at some point she, like, completely. Let's go. But she's not. She works all the time and she does all sorts of projects, but she's not like a theater kid, if that makes any sense. She's. And she's not even. Charisma is not what you would say about her. Even though there is, like a. An energy that's pulling you in, but it's not. She's. It's. It's. What's. What's it called? Is it entropy, when it all, like, comes into you? Entropy.
- [40:27]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, I think that's right. I think she is extremely good at having Like a domineering quiet because she's so tall, so striking that if she's in the center of the frame, she can't hide. But she's not an actor who plays to the back of the crowd. She doesn't like rattle, she doesn't speechify when she's performing. Doesn't mean she's quiet. But like you said, she knows how to pick her spots. I think she also had this interesting kind of, I don't know, trajectory I guess you would call it across her career where the first seven or eight things she does in Australia are mostly comic. And so she develops kind of rom com y chops. But she's almost like too Beautiful in her 20s to be cast as Meg Ryan. So she starts taking on the girlfriend parts in movies like Far and Away and Days of Thunder and her relationship with Tom Cruise then kind of powers some of that through. But then she uses that period from her like late 20s and early 30s to capitalize and to start making really complicated, interesting dramatic roles. And then at a certain point kind of circles back and is like, actually, just kidding, I'm in Bewitched, in the Separate Wives, I'm a comic actress. And then circles back and is like, I'm actually really into soapy stuff, like Big Little Lies. Like, she's kind of always moving around. She doesn't get stuck in one genre. She, she's just as comfortable in Dogville as she is in Nine Perfect Strangers, you know what I mean? Like she, she, she has like, she's not chameleonic as a performer, but she's chameleonic in terms of the setting that she fits into, which is a real gift. I mean, most performers don't bend themselves. They actually do the opposite. They sort of think to themselves, like, what is my core strength? I mean, her, her ex husband is sort of like in the last 15 years has been like, I'm good at running and being serious and executing missions.
- [42:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [42:22]
Sean Fennessey
And has stuck pretty tightly to that. And she doesn't do that, which I think is really admirable and really cool.
- [42:27]
Amanda Dobbins
She really does work all the time. She just seems to say yes to stuff in a way that is really cool. And I mean, I guess like she has the ability and, and there are a lot of women actors who like grow up in front of Hollywood and then they make it past 40 and they're just kind of like, well, I don't know how long I'll get to keep working. So I'll just keep saying yes. But in her case it feels. I guess she realized she needed to create more opportunities for herself, but she really. She's just taken all of them all at once. It's very cool.
- [43:02]
Sean Fennessey
I don't know. Some of it I'm trying to figure out. Cause there's a period basically between 2008 and 2019 where she's made a bunch of movies I haven't seen, and a bunch of movies that had, like, very limited distribution or that in the parlance of blank check, do not exist.
- [43:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [43:18]
Sean Fennessey
And, like, there's a thriller with Nicole Cage, with Nicholas Cage, called Trespass that I just haven't seen. And I don't know why I missed it, but I missed it. And it doesn't seem like it has any huge reputation. There's one even later after that that I'll get to that I want to talk to you about. I don't know if you've seen it, maybe you have, but it's one of those things where I'm like, this feels like it's imagined, but it has secret in their eyes. No. Oh, even. Even, Even.
- [43:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Even more imagining and smaller than that.
- [43:42]
Sean Fennessey
So I think that one of the consequences of working all the time is it she's not a rare object. You know, it's not like, everybody gather around. The new Nicole Kidman movie is coming out.
- [43:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [43:53]
Sean Fennessey
Because she puts out five in a year sometimes. So she doesn't hold that same level of, oh, my gosh, Brad Pitt is at the party, or, oh, my goodness, it's Meryl Streeper. You know what I mean?
- [44:02]
Amanda Dobbins
I think. I think she's starting to. But do you know why? Because of the AMC thing, which we do. We need. Which we need to talk about. So that is 2021.
- [44:14]
Sean Fennessey
I think so. Yeah. The advertising campaign for AMC theaters.
- [44:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Right. Which quickly becomes, like, an Internet sensation as well. And like a moviegoing sensation. People go to say it along with her.
- [44:30]
Sean Fennessey
And it started out as mockery because of the deep sincerity with which that commercial is being communicated at the beginning of movies.
- [44:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [44:40]
Sean Fennessey
It felt like within minutes, everyone was like, actually, no, this rocks. This makes me feel like I'm in the place where I like to be, which is going to see movies, and then you get to be a part of it. People are still, to this day, in theaters in Los Angeles, clapping and happy and speaking along to that end.
- [44:55]
Amanda Dobbins
When I saw it for the first time in 2024, when they introduced a abbreviated version, an abridged version with new films, Creed was cut out. And I was. First of all, I was like, Where's Creed?
- [45:06]
Sean Fennessey
You did say that. I was.
- [45:07]
Helena Rain
And then.
- [45:07]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, and then I was like, they edited it. They made it shorter, you know, and at this point I'm like, if I'm going to go, I'm going to sit through it. It's sort of like saying, you know, like our fathers before you, like, do whatever.
- [45:18]
Sean Fennessey
There's obviously a long history of this at the movies. The. Let's all go to the lobby. You know, like the sort of like pre movie experience that is non trailer is baked in. And for whatever reason, amc, which has been like a failing business for the last 10 years, still kind of landed on this wonderful, weird, awkwardly sincere suit.
- [45:38]
Amanda Dobbins
And like a little, A little camp. So I think she becomes like a.
- [45:41]
Sean Fennessey
Little bit of a pop cultural silver sequined suit.
- [45:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. Yeah. And when we were going to recreate that for the ringer, I was going to try to find a suit like that.
- [45:51]
Sean Fennessey
Did you find it?
- [45:52]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I didn't get that far. But I. It's, it's, it's still available if we want to do it. I could.
- [45:57]
Sean Fennessey
You're in your era, you know, this is. Now's the time.
- [46:00]
Amanda Dobbins
That's true. But I. That changes everyone's understanding to, to her as like a person. Because she's doing that as Nicole Kidman.
- [46:11]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. And as an ambassador of movies.
- [46:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [46:14]
Sean Fennessey
Which is ironic given how much television she does.
- [46:16]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. But I like, I don't watch that being like, oh, great. Yeah. Nicole Kidman is defending cinema. I'm like, Nicole Kidman is trying to like, she's getting what I hope was a giant paycheck that bought her 45 Subarus to prop up like, like Adam Aaron's game stock. You know, experiment. Yeah. So that's fine. Go see movies in theaters, everyone, and, and, and be responsible with your investments.
- [46:44]
Sean Fennessey
Absolutely. You know, we all agree with that.
- [46:46]
Amanda Dobbins
To me, it's more about. Oh, it's like Nicole Kidman. She is. It's her meme era for. For lack of a better word. But you need that in this day and age.
- [46:56]
Sean Fennessey
You do, you do. And I'm sure she had no idea that that would be the outcome of this, but now she has leaned into it.
- [47:01]
Amanda Dobbins
No, there's a great interview where someone asks her about it and in her real time she's like, wait, what? And her publicist is like, oh, yeah, it's a thing. And she's informed that people are reciting this. I don't know. But. But again, she seems game. You know, she does even the things that she doesn't quite expect, but again, like, that has burnished Nicole Kidman in a different way. So that I do now think when people watch, whether it's like, junkie Netflix show or Baby Girl, you are watching, you know, you're like, oh, it's. It's Nicole Kidman who has been in my life, queen of movies.
- [47:37]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, I. I was just watching her four favorites on letterboxd and.
- [47:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, what are they?
- [47:44]
Sean Fennessey
When she. I can't remember.
- [47:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, they were good. That Clueless is the first one.
- [47:46]
Sean Fennessey
Clueless was the first one. All four of them are all. They were all good picks. You know, I love letterboxd, but they're. These people are getting tipped off beforehand that they're going to get asked by letterbox. So they're prepping, you know, they're not coming up with them off the top of their head.
- [47:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Why. Why wouldn't you prep? I think it would be because if.
- [48:02]
Sean Fennessey
You'Re a true ambassador of cinema, you don't have to prep.
- [48:07]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm disgusted by you. No, listen, you're not doing your job as a person who walks red carpets if you don't know that question's coming and you're not ready. And you should absolutely fire your publicist.
- [48:19]
Sean Fennessey
I agree. I agree. Yeah, she did a great job. I can't remember what her four were, but they were good.
- [48:23]
Bobby Wagner
I got em. I got em right here.
- [48:24]
Sean Fennessey
What are they, Bob?
- [48:25]
Bobby Wagner
Clueless, the Piano Teacher. Piano and A Woman under the Influence.
- [48:29]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [48:30]
Amanda Dobbins
Sick.
- [48:30]
Sean Fennessey
Great picks.
- [48:31]
Amanda Dobbins
Amazing.
- [48:32]
Sean Fennessey
She also did the whole, like, I only get four so hard. 12 minutes before they encounter the letterboxd microphone. But when she saw them, she went letterboxd. We love letterboxd, you know, and her eyes are bursting out of her head. She knows how to play the game. She's a really good celebrity. Awards history. She's been nominated for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5 Oscars. She's won once.
- [48:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [49:00]
Sean Fennessey
Her nominations are for Moulin Rouge, the Hours, Rabbit Hole being the Ricardos, and Lion. Her win is for the Hours. I would argue that these are not even close to her best performances.
- [49:11]
Amanda Dobbins
That was a watch bit from like 10 years ago, like yelling lion the movie. Like DJ Khaled being like, there's my lion. Lion. Yeah.
- [49:20]
Sean Fennessey
Anyway, she's won six Golden Globes.
- [49:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [49:24]
Sean Fennessey
Golden Globes don't really mean anything.
- [49:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Tell that to Jennifer Lopez.
- [49:28]
Sean Fennessey
Did you? Did you? That's the thing is, when you see Jennifer Lopez longing, what she really longs for is Nicole Kidman's stature. How do I be an elevated celebrity that is beloved but is also celebrated as an artist.
- [49:44]
Amanda Dobbins
But also I need to make my own 40 minute music video with Jane Fonda and Post Malone reading the signs of the zodiac.
- [49:54]
Sean Fennessey
You Post Malone head.
- [49:55]
Amanda Dobbins
He's very, very charming in the documentary. Like you should actually, everyone should watch that documentary.
- [50:01]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [50:02]
Amanda Dobbins
It's honestly riveting, riveting stuff. But he comes in to film his bit in her music video and he is just charming her like instantly flirting with her. Really good. It really converted.
- [50:14]
Sean Fennessey
He's really on quite a five year run.
- [50:16]
Amanda Dobbins
I know one Post Malone song, I think White Iverson. Yeah, that's it. But. But sure. Good for him.
- [50:26]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, he's doing well. He was. It was fascinating to watch him stand beside Beyonce at the Christmas Day football game.
- [50:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Watch that yet it was good. That's what everyone said. I mean, I saw clips on the Internet, but you know, my child had his second ear infection, so.
- [50:40]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, not ideal. But you know, as with all those Beyonce productions, like this is good. Yeah, she knows what she's doing. Okay. If you. Did you look at the box office, the top 10 for her for like what are her highest grossing?
- [50:50]
Amanda Dobbins
Not until right this. Lol.
- [50:52]
Sean Fennessey
We can't do the game of me asking you what they would have been. But the Nicole Kidman Top 10 Highest Grossing Movies worldwide is a hilarious list. I'll read the list to you right now. Number 10, Cold Mountain. Sure makes sense. Number 9, Moulin Rouge.
- [51:05]
Amanda Dobbins
Big.
- [51:06]
Sean Fennessey
Totally makes sense. Number 8, the Others. Secretly a very big movie.
- [51:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [51:10]
Sean Fennessey
So far so good. Number seven. Just go with it.
- [51:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure, yeah.
- [51:13]
Sean Fennessey
Adam Sandler movie that she makes a memorable appearance in. Number six, Australia. A movie that was not very big here but was very big overseas. Number five, Paddington.
- [51:22]
Amanda Dobbins
That's right.
- [51:22]
Sean Fennessey
Movie you love. She plays the villain. Number four, Batman Forever. Okay, makes sense. But that movie's not very good. But okay. Number three, the Golden Compass.
- [51:29]
Amanda Dobbins
Those, those movies were big. And this was at a time when they were trying to make it happen. It didn't, it wasn't very good. But have you read those books?
- [51:36]
Sean Fennessey
I haven't, no.
- [51:36]
Amanda Dobbins
They're good.
- [51:37]
Sean Fennessey
I'm probably, probably will with my daughter would be my guess. Okay, number two, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
- [51:42]
Amanda Dobbins
That's the one that came out like a year and a half ago.
- [51:45]
Sean Fennessey
Yes, I enjoy. No, it was I think 14 months ago. I enjoyed it.
- [51:48]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, okay. 14 months is like almost a year and a half.
- [51:52]
Sean Fennessey
Sure.
- [51:53]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [51:53]
Sean Fennessey
Plus four months.
- [51:55]
Bobby Wagner
Math Corner.
- [51:56]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, I think it was. I think it was legit. December 2023. It was the conclusion of the DC.
- [52:01]
Amanda Dobbins
Right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right. Listen, like, I'm just looking ahead. New Year, you know?
- [52:05]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, New Year. And then number one was Aquaman.
- [52:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. So who is she in the Aquaman universe?
- [52:11]
Sean Fennessey
She's Aquaman's mom.
- [52:13]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh.
- [52:13]
Sean Fennessey
She's an Atlantean who comes to the shore and fucks a fisherman.
- [52:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, thank you. That. That is what I was gonna ask. But then. Does she live on the shore? Does she live on Atlantis?
- [52:24]
Sean Fennessey
But she pops in.
- [52:25]
Amanda Dobbins
What's up with Atlantis? It's not underwater yet, so it's just a.
- [52:31]
Sean Fennessey
What do you mean?
- [52:31]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't really know. The.
- [52:33]
Sean Fennessey
He's Aquaman. He goes in the water.
- [52:35]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. So is Atlantis in the water? Yeah, but. So she lives underwater. Yes, but she's a human.
- [52:42]
Sean Fennessey
No, she's a merperson.
- [52:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, she goes to the shore.
- [52:47]
Sean Fennessey
I don't have the terminology here. This is kind of a Midnight Voice question.
- [52:51]
Amanda Dobbins
She is the water base Jean. And then the dad. Who's the dad? I'm sure this is a spoiler.
- [52:58]
Sean Fennessey
Timur Morrison, the actor who played Boba Fett.
- [53:01]
Amanda Dobbins
That doesn't mean anything to me. But, like, what is his life? Like?
- [53:06]
Sean Fennessey
He's a human fishing.
- [53:07]
Amanda Dobbins
He's a human.
- [53:08]
Sean Fennessey
He's literally just a guy.
- [53:09]
Amanda Dobbins
So she fucks a fisherman. Okay, sorry. Okay.
- [53:12]
Sean Fennessey
And they make a magical creature that becomes Jason Momoa.
- [53:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Is she related to Triton?
- [53:16]
Sean Fennessey
I believe you're thinking of the Little Mermaid.
- [53:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Well. Or Poseidon.
- [53:21]
Sean Fennessey
It's not really that mythology.
- [53:24]
Amanda Dobbins
It's okay, but, like, it is a.
- [53:25]
Sean Fennessey
Little bit baked into it.
- [53:26]
Amanda Dobbins
He is borrowing from all of that stuff all of the time.
- [53:28]
Sean Fennessey
It's kind of soft bacon.
- [53:29]
Amanda Dobbins
She like the sister. Like, what's.
- [53:31]
Sean Fennessey
Is the sister of who.
- [53:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Of Poseidon.
- [53:34]
Sean Fennessey
No, I can't recall who the. Oh, Javier Bardem is. The. Is the. Is the king.
- [53:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [53:40]
Sean Fennessey
Of Atlantis, I think. Who is. Let's. Let's. Let's take a look. This is really worth our time as we have to go through this. This person's entire filmography. Or maybe was Dolph Lundgren the king? This is also confusing. Javier Bardem was King Triton in the Little Mermaid.
- [53:56]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [53:56]
Sean Fennessey
Not in this movie.
- [53:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. Those behind the scenes of him filming that are in the water tank are quite something.
- [54:03]
Sean Fennessey
Well, Patrick Wilson played Orm.
- [54:06]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [54:06]
Sean Fennessey
He was known as the Ocean Master. That was my favorite performance from that movie.
- [54:10]
Amanda Dobbins
Sort of like the air boss.
- [54:11]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. Yes. I don't know. Maybe there was not. Nicole Kidman was Atlanta, the Queen of Atlantis, mother of Arthur and Orym. I don't know, maybe she doesn't have a husband of any kind.
- [54:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [54:23]
Sean Fennessey
Is she a single mom?
- [54:25]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, maybe.
- [54:26]
Sean Fennessey
Wow.
- [54:27]
Amanda Dobbins
You know, but it's sort of like a little girl. So is she the. If she's the descent, like the.
- [54:32]
Sean Fennessey
This is why you should have joined me for this episode. You bailed on me on this one. I remember very vividly, I think the first Aquaman movie episode I did with David Shoemaker.
- [54:41]
Amanda Dobbins
I think I maybe wasn't invited because, like, sometimes you don't think I'm going to be a good Hank. But I asked the important questions about underwater monarchies.
- [54:49]
Sean Fennessey
You know, let's pivot to Nicole Kidman's career. She's made so many movies. This is.
- [54:54]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm going to be really honest. So I did my best to prep for this, but when I like finally sat down, I didn't remember 45 movies. And I was like, oh, okay, we're not going to get through all of them.
- [55:05]
Sean Fennessey
I mean, for starters, the first two, four, six movies she makes are in Australia and I haven't seen them. They're mostly romantic comedies. She's usually playing supporting parts. Her character is often on the VHS box, but throughout the 80s before her big breakthrough. These are relatively small films, so they're all going to be read. The titles of those movies are Bush Christmas, BMX Bandits, which many people joke about now that she was started in a movie called BMX Bandits. Willis and Burke, or Wills and Burke, Windrider, the bit part and Emerald City. Maybe some Australians are listening. I know we have an Australian contingent of listeners.
- [55:38]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, we do?
- [55:39]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, absolutely.
- [55:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Can we go to Australia?
- [55:41]
Sean Fennessey
I don't know.
- [55:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Can we go? Remember this?
- [55:44]
Sean Fennessey
You can go to Australia if you want to.
- [55:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Eternal summer, you know, so we're going to spend it's summer there right now.
- [55:49]
Sean Fennessey
Sure, you can go and you can.
- [55:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Next January. Let's do all of January and February.
- [55:55]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, I know what to do. The awards race, that's tough.
- [55:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Like both time wise and, you know, school is obviously.
- [56:02]
Sean Fennessey
If Australia would like to invite the big picture to its wonderful continent, we would love to come and celebrate films. We'll find a reasonable time to do so. Hopefully not in the dead of winter. And maybe we'll get a chance to see BMX Bandits.
- [56:13]
Amanda Dobbins
No, not in the dead of winter there. Yes, in the dead of winter here.
- [56:16]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, I hear what you're saying. Okay. 1989, dead calm. This is her big breakthrough performance in a very small thriller directed by Philip Noyce, co starring Sam Neill and Billy Zane.
- [56:28]
Amanda Dobbins
Billy Zane.
- [56:30]
Sean Fennessey
Billy Zane is a menace on the water. A madman. Yes, exactly. Sort of preparing for his role in Titanic. All three of them are electrifying in this movie. This movie is great. If you have not seen Dead Calm, I would highly recommend it. In the spirit of the hall of Fame and all my shtick about the breakthrough.
- [56:48]
Amanda Dobbins
You like to do the breakthrough.
- [56:49]
Sean Fennessey
This is one where I feel like, at a minimum, it needs to be yellow. And it feels like. Feels pretty green to me to.
- [56:55]
Amanda Dobbins
Your shtick about the breakthrough performance is really her. Her international. Her marriage. Her Hollywood breakthrough is Days of Thunder.
- [57:03]
Sean Fennessey
Which comes one year later.
- [57:04]
Amanda Dobbins
And that is obviously, she plays like the love interest who is a doctor for. In Daytona.
- [57:11]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [57:11]
Amanda Dobbins
But she's also Australian and is just there to be like, you're a great Tom Cruise.
- [57:15]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. So it's Cole Trickle.
- [57:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. Despite, obviously, that's, you know, where Cole Trickle's from. Where?
- [57:22]
Sean Fennessey
Eagle Rock, California.
- [57:23]
Amanda Dobbins
She is.
- [57:24]
Sean Fennessey
No, he is. His character is from Eagle Rock.
- [57:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Cole is. Oh, okay, sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Listen, all the greats started in Eagle Rock.
- [57:30]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, absolutely.
- [57:30]
Amanda Dobbins
Many people are saying, Matt, Barry, Obama, me.
- [57:36]
Sean Fennessey
You didn't start in Eaglewear. I didn't start there, nor did any of those people.
- [57:39]
Amanda Dobbins
But my sons. Yeah, sure. You know, but like, we all. It was formative. Days of Thunder, it's important to her tabloid and her celebrity thing, but I would. I agree that Dead Calm is a more exciting.
- [57:52]
Sean Fennessey
It's one of her. Days of Thunder is one of her biggest movies and obviously it kicks off her relationship with Tom, but for her, I don't think it's a Hall of Fame movie.
- [58:00]
Amanda Dobbins
I agree.
- [58:01]
Sean Fennessey
Should we yellow it just for the purpose of this?
- [58:03]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [58:03]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. So Dead Calm and Days of Hunter will be yellowed. 1991's flirting, which is a film in which she plays a high school girl in Australian production. John Dugan, her Tendiwe Newton and her best friend, Naomi Watts. This is a pretty good movie, a very enjoyable kind of dramedy that in most people's careers you would be like, this is Yellow. We have so many movies to go through that it's hard. But I do want to just cite. I think Flirting is going to be Red, but it is a pretty good movie. Okay. 1992, far and away. Ron Howard.
- [58:39]
Amanda Dobbins
You skipped Billy Bathgate.
- [58:40]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, Billy Bathgate, Robert Benton's gangster drama starring Dustin Hoffman. I believe she was nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance in this movie. Roger Ebert famously located her sense of humor in his review of this movie. It is way too long and overstuffed. And not very good. So I would say it's red.
- [58:58]
Amanda Dobbins
What a cast, though. Dustin Hoffman, Nicole Kidman, Lauren Dean, Bruce Willis, Stephen Hill, Stanley Tucci, Steve Buscemi, just Maura Kelly. I see down here. Okay. It's not going in.
- [59:10]
Sean Fennessey
Big fussy Hollywood production that didn't totally land.
- [59:13]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah.
- [59:13]
Sean Fennessey
Some people like it.
- [59:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. Far and away.
- [59:15]
Sean Fennessey
Far and away.
- [59:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Our Irish representative speak on it.
- [59:19]
Sean Fennessey
This movie's not that good, so.
- [59:20]
Amanda Dobbins
It's not that good. I rewatched it last night. I hadn't seen it in a long time and like I rewatched part of it. What? What are we doing?
- [59:27]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, this is a tough one. So Tom Cruise is a bare knuckle boxer who is traversing the land, trying to make a better life for he and his partner.
- [59:37]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, I would not say that his Irish accent really lands.
- [59:41]
Sean Fennessey
No, I think they're actually weirdly both miscast in this movie.
- [59:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, she's not bad.
- [59:45]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, it's fine.
- [59:47]
Amanda Dobbins
At the end he just. He rides the horse, you know, Shades of future Tom Cruise. He's just going so fast for a very long time.
- [59:54]
Sean Fennessey
I haven't seen this in a really long time, but I remember when I first saw it, I did not like it.
- [59:58]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [59:59]
Sean Fennessey
And I'm predisposed to liking a movie like this for a variety of reasons.
- [60:01]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, but it's. It's sort of like. It's like fake epic. I mean, at the end they. I mean, they just do like this giant, like. It's called a land race and it is like Cruise for five minutes just writing, you know, as fast as he possibly can with tons of other people. And you're like, wow, we used to spend money and make movies.
- [60:20]
Sean Fennessey
That's true. Something you do see in a lot of her movies here is extraordinary production value. 1993's Malice with a screenplay by Aaron Sorkin. Yeah, this is the Alec Baldwin I am God speech.
- [60:34]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [60:35]
Sean Fennessey
This is George C. Scott and Nicole Kidman in an erotic thriller. Yes. A nasty little erotic thriller.
- [60:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Absolutely nuts.
- [60:47]
Sean Fennessey
Extremely fun movie. Is it a good movie?
- [60:50]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know if it's a good movie, but it's.
- [60:53]
Sean Fennessey
I mean, you think it's important for her.
- [60:55]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, I mean. Spoiler alert. If you haven't seen Malice, fast forward.
- [60:59]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. I don't even remember. You're gonna reveal the ending?
- [61:02]
Amanda Dobbins
No, no, it just. It hinges on her, you know, and even that like gives a lot of it away and that there' a lot going. There's more going on there than just being the doctor in the you know, NASCAR movie.
- [61:15]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [61:16]
Amanda Dobbins
And. And that is something. And it subverts your expectations of what she's doing.
- [61:21]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, yeah.
- [61:23]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, sort of absurdly, but no, it's.
- [61:26]
Sean Fennessey
It's a. It's a very entertaining little movie. It's yellow. I agree. It's definitely yellow. It was. It did well at the box office. It puts her in, like, a different kind of class as an actress. Okay, I'll go yellow. 1993's My Life, which we recently discussed on our Michael Keaton Mount Rushmore episode.
- [61:43]
Amanda Dobbins
I watched this while pregnant. Why? Why did you do that to me?
- [61:46]
Sean Fennessey
This was. Michael Keaton is dying, so he's capturing the final days of his life for his unborn child.
- [61:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [61:53]
Sean Fennessey
Very cool.
- [61:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Listen, I didn't make she's the Wife. Yeah.
- [61:58]
Sean Fennessey
As she many times is cast as the wife. This is red.
- [62:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [62:02]
Sean Fennessey
1995, Batman Forever. She plays Chase Meridian, who is, of course, the damsel in distress to Val Kilmer's Batman. This is the Batman with. Who is the villain? Two Face. Is the Batman the villain in this movie? Two Face and the Riddler, I believe.
- [62:20]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, don't ask me.
- [62:21]
Sean Fennessey
I did give Jim Carrey's the Riddler.
- [62:24]
Amanda Dobbins
A child in my life. A Batman, Lego Batman, Joker, Lego for Christmas this year. So, you know, I. I'm part of the problem now.
- [62:32]
Sean Fennessey
My.
- [62:33]
Amanda Dobbins
He was. I think he was very happy.
- [62:34]
Sean Fennessey
Wife took my daughter to Target the other day, and she was looking at the toys, and my wife said, you could have one thing under $5, and the one thing that she chose was a batmobile.
- [62:44]
Helena Rain
Wow.
- [62:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Under $5?
- [62:45]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, well, I mean, she. It was just Christmas.
- [62:48]
Amanda Dobbins
That's true. No, no, no. Not. Not that she wasn't allowed to spend more. Just that it was. The Batmobile is under $5.
- [62:55]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, it was a hot Wheel.
- [62:56]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, I see.
- [62:57]
Sean Fennessey
Batmobile, hot wheel. Okay. Okay. Batman Forever, I think important to her visibility as an. As a movie star. But I don't think it's a really. A performance anyone cares about. Right.
- [63:07]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't.
- [63:08]
Sean Fennessey
So, Red. Yes, Red.
- [63:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Red, sure. Yeah.
- [63:11]
Sean Fennessey
Have you seen Batman Forever?
- [63:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes, but I didn't revisit it, and I don't remember. I saw all the Batmans. You know, this is the one. This is where Chris O'Donnell comes in, right?
- [63:21]
Sean Fennessey
No, that is Batman and Robin. He is the titular Robin.
- [63:25]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, okay. Well, maybe I didn't see.
- [63:27]
Sean Fennessey
Also, Alicia Silverstone is Batgirl.
- [63:28]
Amanda Dobbins
That I definitely saw.
- [63:29]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. That's Batman and Robin.
- [63:31]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. And that's George Clooney.
- [63:32]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [63:33]
Amanda Dobbins
But this is the Val Kilmer one, right?
- [63:34]
Sean Fennessey
This is the Val Kilmer one.
- [63:35]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, I've seen it.
- [63:36]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. Great. 1995 to die for. This is my favorite Nicole Kidman movie.
- [63:41]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [63:42]
Sean Fennessey
I think this is our best performance. It's a Gus Van Zant satire, I guess, about a real life story that was actually. I think there's a Max documentary that just came out last year about this real life story. Okay. About a woman who is an aspiring broadcaster and her relationship with her husband and her quest for fame. A movie that is like the great script that is played very amusingly by her, where she's sort of like giving away everything and nothing at the same time. And shows, I think, like, her range as a performer.
- [64:16]
Amanda Dobbins
It's comedy, but it's not super black comedy. Yeah, yeah. It's really. It is messed up. And again, this thing of. There is. There are like five things going on here, and you're communicating all of them while also communicating what your character thinks they should communicate. So it's. I mean, it's all time.
- [64:37]
Sean Fennessey
Really great movie. Great Joaquin Phoenix performance in this movie. Great Matt Dillon performance. Great Ileana Douglas performance. Like, just a really, really good Casey Affleck. Casey Affleck, Yeah. Very early Casey Affleck. That's going green. I think that's our First Hard Green. 1996. The Portrait of a Lady. So where do you stand on Henry James?
- [64:59]
Amanda Dobbins
I haven't actually read a lot of Henry James. Yeah. I don't know why. Henry James is very important in the plot of Notting Hill, so I support that.
- [65:08]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. Turn to the screw. Haven't read it?
- [65:10]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [65:11]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [65:11]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know why I skipped right over that in my education. Should I go back? Is that what I should do this year? I'll read Henry James. If you read Bridget Jones.
- [65:20]
Sean Fennessey
No deal. The Portrait of a Lady, I think, is her leveraging some of her power and taste, some of her celebrity, to get bigger movies made. This is a Jane Campion movie, her first collaboration, though not her last with Campion, and it is a simultaneously faithful but also experimental adaptation of the James novel that I rewatched and found extremely dull. The story itself is really cool, but I think it's kind of like meanders through a lot of its story, and it reminded me a little bit of reading Henry James. So I admit to some bias here where I just.
- [65:55]
Amanda Dobbins
It's not your thing.
- [65:56]
Sean Fennessey
It's not my thing. Yeah. I think some people like it. I think it's one of Campion's worst movies, personally. And I'm A big fan of her movies, so I wouldn't put it in.
- [66:06]
Amanda Dobbins
No, it's not particularly memorable.
- [66:09]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. 1997. The Peacemaker. Yeah, this is George Clooney's big, noisy post, er, feature film starring breakout slash non breakout.
- [66:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Right. Cause it didn't.
- [66:23]
Sean Fennessey
Didn't break out, didn't hit. Didn't hit. Didn't, like, utterly fail, but it didn't do what was expected of it.
- [66:28]
Amanda Dobbins
I didn't revisit this. I haven't seen it in forever, and I wish that I had, because in some ways it's like, I wish they would make a million Peacemakers right now. You know? Like, it is very much like, please make an international thriller starring George Clooney and Nicole Kidman. It doesn't matter if it's that good. Like, I just would like to watch that every week. But I didn't rewatch it because I was like, I don't think this is gonna go in, so I need to refocus my time.
- [66:53]
Sean Fennessey
It's not. I mean, she's playing, you know, a doctor who's trying to avoid a nuclear disaster of some kind. And he's the heroic, I think, governmental figure working beside her. It's, you know, standard action fare. It's just not that great. Okay. 1988. Practical magic. I would not say this is like one of my big Nicole Kidman movies, but it is one of Nicole Kidman's big movies.
- [67:14]
Amanda Dobbins
This is, like, has, like, a very big following.
- [67:17]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [67:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. Was this. Hold on. When is Hocus Pocus? Before that? Yeah, Hocus Pocus is before this, but it is. Yeah, it's like, slightly more grown up. Hocus Pocus.
- [67:27]
Sean Fennessey
It's witches. It's. Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock are witches.
- [67:30]
Amanda Dobbins
And it's gals you like.
- [67:32]
Sean Fennessey
Yes, I. I think this is among her most beloved movies. So my impression is that this should go in, but I'm not a practical magic expert.
- [67:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, let's yellow it.
- [67:44]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, we'll yellow it for now, but.
- [67:47]
Amanda Dobbins
We see you Practical Magic fans.
- [67:49]
Sean Fennessey
Absolutely.
- [67:49]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [67:49]
Sean Fennessey
I don't want to disrespect that.
- [67:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Green, green, green, green, green, green.
- [67:54]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, we're going on a little run here. 1999, eyes wide shut. Obviously a masterpiece. Stanley Kubrick's Christmas movie about men and women failing to fuck properly and so creating enormous discontent between one another.
- [68:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Did you see? Not just to make this about, like, our friends, but. So you did one of your little stacks?
- [68:14]
Sean Fennessey
I did for Nicole.
- [68:15]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And did you see, like, my best friend Katie was just, like, eyes Wide Shut, eyes Wide Shut. Eyes Wide Shut in the comments. Like, Katie, I got you.
- [68:21]
Helena Rain
Okay.
- [68:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Also, you can text me.
- [68:23]
Sean Fennessey
I did see that. Yes. Yeah. Obviously, Eyes Wide Shut is. Is going in. I mean, for the. For Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. A very complicated movie in a variety of ways.
- [68:31]
Amanda Dobbins
Movie that obviously the beginning of the end. Well, we don't know the beginning of our understanding.
- [68:36]
Sean Fennessey
Presumably. The incredible amount of attention that was put on this movie and their relationship. The fact that its production was so elongated that it's the last thing that Kubrick made. He died before the movie was released. The suspicions of how it had been edited and what was taken in and put out of the movie. And then the fact that it didn't become a widely acclaimed film, in fact, was heavily criticized upon its release.
- [68:58]
Amanda Dobbins
You guys were wrong.
- [69:00]
Sean Fennessey
Very obviously a fascinating, gorgeous, confusing, wonderful movie. Love Eyes Wide Shut automatically and particularly. Nicole Kidden's performance is awesome in this movie. She's so alluring, so mysterious, and also so vulnerable and open and a nice little beginning of the capstone to baby girl. They're very much in conversation with each other.
- [69:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Completely.
- [69:21]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. 2001, Moulin Rouge.
- [69:23]
Amanda Dobbins
Green, green, green, green, green, green, green.
- [69:26]
Sean Fennessey
This is.
- [69:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Listen. Practice.
- [69:28]
Sean Fennessey
This is okay. And I. I welcome the. Hate. The most annoying movie ever made. The most.
- [69:36]
Bobby Wagner
It's a horrible take.
- [69:37]
Sean Fennessey
This movie fucking sucks. I watched it again last night and I was like, who? What? How? I know. I know why it's loved and I know that it's loved. And I know that I'm. I'm sharing.
- [69:49]
Amanda Dobbins
People hold this feeling, hold this feeling, bottle it, and know that this is how I feel. Listening to you talk, like, about so many things. I don't care. How old was I in 2001? I was 17 years old. Elephant love song. Like, you are there and you were 17 and you know or you were not there and you don't know. And that's okay. Like, I. Like, I'm aware that this plays like Wicked played to me for a huge number of people, but I'm telling you, like, I was there and it was.
- [70:21]
Sean Fennessey
Turn of the 20th century. France Singing Smells like Teen Spirit.
- [70:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [70:26]
Sean Fennessey
Can. Can kill me. Like, literally shoot me in the face. This movie sucks, guys. It's fucking horrible. We're going to look back on this, be like, what were we doing?
- [70:35]
Amanda Dobbins
We're already looking back and just being like. It does require a lot of chutzpah to just build the whole movie around. Just like Roxanne being the big. It's fine. I loved it.
- [70:47]
Sean Fennessey
I know people love it. I know, I don't want to take their joy from them. It's definitely going in. It's a huge box office success. She's nominated for an academy award. She's very good in the movie. I don't think Ewan McGregor is very good in this movie. No, she's giving it her all. It's obviously like it's one of the most overwhelmingly made movies ever. The amount of cuts, the artificiality of the sets and the world. I mean, it looks like it was made in Ms. Paint. Like it looks terrible. Guys.
- [71:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure. Yes, I agree with you.
- [71:15]
Sean Fennessey
Like, I don't Jurassic Parkers meet you at all years before this movie. Come on.
- [71:19]
Bobby Wagner
I think this movie is a masterpiece. And I think Baz Lman is a visionary.
- [71:21]
Amanda Dobbins
I think it's five times is a visionary.
- [71:24]
Sean Fennessey
Shame on you, trying to cater to the children that listen, I'm not catering to anybody.
- [71:28]
Bobby Wagner
This has been one of my favorite movies for years.
- [71:31]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm a grown up.
- [71:34]
Sean Fennessey
I fear no criticism about this take this is the movie. Is.
- [71:38]
Amanda Dobbins
That's fine. You're allowed to have that opinion. And it's going in.
- [71:41]
Sean Fennessey
It is going in. I agree.
- [71:43]
Amanda Dobbins
It's also hugely important. It finds her like a new very wide audience.
- [71:48]
Sean Fennessey
100%. Yeah. It's a huge, huge movie. Arguably the most important movie in her career. Right?
- [71:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes, I guess in terms of.
- [72:00]
Sean Fennessey
Because, you know, it's an original story. She's singing and dancing. She's getting awards recognition.
- [72:04]
Amanda Dobbins
It's an original success. But that's okay.
- [72:06]
Sean Fennessey
You know what I mean, though? Okay. 2001, the others. I think this is also going in. I just rewatched this again last night. Alejandro Amenyabar's ghost story just came up on the Ghost Stories episode that we did not so long ago.
- [72:21]
Amanda Dobbins
Which one was that?
- [72:22]
Sean Fennessey
I can't remember. Honestly. We've done so many of these.
- [72:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. I don't think I listened to that one. But I'm a devoted listener of the big picture.
- [72:28]
Sean Fennessey
Maybe it was last year. Could have been last year. Beautiful movie. 24 year later. Spoiler alert.
- [72:37]
Amanda Dobbins
Right, Right.
- [72:38]
Sean Fennessey
Insane twist. Like one of the great in theater twists. Coming hot on the heels of the Sixth Sense as these two movies are sort of paired in many ways.
- [72:46]
Amanda Dobbins
She's really good at it.
- [72:47]
Sean Fennessey
And the way that you were describing Kidman's performance, that sense of reserve.
- [72:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [72:51]
Sean Fennessey
Is on display, I think, at its best in this movie. Not a very funny movie. Not a very fun movie per se or stately, quiet movie. The exact polar opposite of Moulin Rouge. And the fact that they happen in the same year. Shows like her. Incredible.
- [73:05]
Amanda Dobbins
The amount of restraint that I am showing. Not like bursting into the Moulin Rouge version of Heroes. It's just really. I. I should get a prize.
- [73:16]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, definitely. You should get a prize. 2001 Birthday girl.
- [73:23]
Amanda Dobbins
I haven't seen this.
- [73:25]
Sean Fennessey
It's a thriller starring. Is it Ben Chaplin? I think Ben Chaplin. I don't know.
- [73:31]
Amanda Dobbins
I haven't seen it.
- [73:31]
Sean Fennessey
About a Russian girl. It's not very good. This is one of those things where it was like, okay, so in the same year she released Moulin Rouge, the Others and Birthday Girl. This is an actress who really likes work, working and three very different kinds of performances. Birthday Girl was not a success and looks a lot more like a lot of the movies that are coming later in her career. 2002 the hours.
- [73:53]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, so this wins her Oscar. Don't like this movie. And sort of a lame performance. Not a lame performance. She's perfectly fine. So this is an adaptation of the Michael Cunningham novel. It's like a nesting dollar take on Mrs. Dalloway, the Virginia Woolf novel. Nicole Cameron plays Virginia Woolf in one of three timelines. And she's just kind of siloed off being unhappy, as Virginia Woolf famously was. She wears the nose so she doesn't really look like herself. This comes very soon after her divorce from Tom Cruise and it all comes together and she wins Best Actress. So I guess we have to put it in, but do I want to put it in?
- [74:40]
Sean Fennessey
No, let's yellow it.
- [74:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [74:42]
Sean Fennessey
I'm not a fan of this movie either. I do understand why she's won. I think it is a little bit of a, like, whoops, we should have given it to her for Moulin Rouge and the others in a collective way and did not do that. And so we're kind of making up.
- [74:54]
Amanda Dobbins
For it because of the aesthetics and the narrative and the divorce and the. That was the whole thing.
- [74:59]
Sean Fennessey
She's coming off of an incredible, incredible run of success that is getting recognized. It's just getting recognized in kind of the most boring Oscar y way. 2003's Dogville. Very challenging Lars Von Trier movie.
- [75:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [75:14]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's debatable whether or not it should go in. I think this is the beginning of her really taking chances because this is a really hard movie that is hard to watch at times that it clearly was hard to make. She did not return for the continuation of this Manderley Bryce. Dallas Howard was recast in her role. I think I'm getting that right. If I'm Getting that wrong.
- [75:34]
Amanda Dobbins
Excuse me. I have some other challenging movies that.
- [75:38]
Sean Fennessey
I want to put in, so let's yellow this.
- [75:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [75:40]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. We'll acknowledge Dogville. You know, Von Trier, complicated figure in movie history. He's made some amazing films. This is among his best, certainly among his best American productions.
- [75:50]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [75:51]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. 2003 is the human Stainless, which is a really, really bad movie. Another Robert Benton movie, an adaptation of. It's the Phil Broth novel, which is based on Anatole Broyard, who was a famous literary critic. And like his life story, which I weirdly studied in a long class in college. He's like one of the great literary critics of all time, but has this incredibly complicated personal story that if you haven't seen it, I guess is worth learning about. He is notably played by Anthony Hopkins in this movie, which I would say is a mistake.
- [76:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [76:24]
Sean Fennessey
Something I just want to put out there. The Human Stain is not going in.
- [76:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [76:27]
Sean Fennessey
2003'S Cold Mountain. I didn't rewatch it. Did you rewatch it?
- [76:30]
Amanda Dobbins
I did.
- [76:30]
Sean Fennessey
Anthony Minguela's follow up to the talented Mr. Ripley.
- [76:34]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes. Which was the follow up to the English Patient. Two movies. I adore. I do not adore Cold Mountain.
- [76:40]
Sean Fennessey
This is also based on a big novel.
- [76:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And Nicole Kidman has sort of the Thankless part. Renee Zellweger is her, like, sidekick friend. And she won an Academy. An Academy Award for it. And she's just sort of pining and being beautiful and writing letters. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then. And you lost. She's the. The Penelope part.
- [77:02]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [77:03]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, she looks very beautiful, but, eh.
- [77:06]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. At the time I was not a huge fan of this movie either. But, you know, she did. She got an Oscar nomination for this movie, did she not?
- [77:13]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't actually know if she did. Jude Law did.
- [77:16]
Sean Fennessey
Let me see here.
- [77:17]
Amanda Dobbins
And Renee Zellweger.
- [77:18]
Sean Fennessey
No, you're right. She did not. She did not. Okay. I feel comfortable making the red.
- [77:22]
Amanda Dobbins
You don't have to put that in. Yeah. With respect.
- [77:25]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, now's your time.
- [77:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, she's very good in the Stepford Wives, and it's another example of her taking a role and giving a performance that plays with the public perception of her and with the idea of perfection and with the idea of reserve. And I do also think this introduces the Stepford Wives to a new generation of people. She is really good in it. Like the movie is.
- [77:52]
Sean Fennessey
It's not very good.
- [77:53]
Amanda Dobbins
Not good and not as good as.
- [77:55]
Sean Fennessey
The original, directed by the great Frank Oz.
- [77:59]
Amanda Dobbins
I think we can we can yellow it.
- [78:01]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's probably red.
- [78:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [78:02]
Sean Fennessey
I don't think it's gonna make it.
- [78:03]
Amanda Dobbins
All right. That's fine.
- [78:04]
Sean Fennessey
2004'S birthday green. I agree.
- [78:06]
Amanda Dobbins
I love. This is my favorite Jonathan Glazer film.
- [78:09]
Sean Fennessey
This is one of the best films of the century. I think. Which Jonathan Glazer movie we should consider? Well, for 25. For 25 is a very interesting conversation because he's. This would be movies.
- [78:19]
Amanda Dobbins
This would be my pick.
- [78:21]
Sean Fennessey
This is a movie that was very controversial and then ignored in its time about a young woman who loses. Or about a woman who loses her husband and who is about to be remarried. And a 10 year old boy knocks on her door in her apartment in New York City and says, I am Sean. I'm your husband. And this 10 year old boy is convinced that he is the man who died, who she was married to. And they begin this complicated relationship trying to unpack what is really going on. Just beautiful, beguiling movie.
- [78:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And it's a therapist. The flavor of unraveling that she does in this movie is again like really controlled. And I guess she unravels in a lot of movies. That's kind of one of her specialties. But she finds a new way to do it every time. And like the weirdness and the hope that goes into just this absolutely messed up situation is. And the. And she just goes for it. Like that is. The Nicole Kidman thing is that she's not ever trying to make it prettier or make you like her.
- [79:31]
Sean Fennessey
So she is stunning in this movie. She has a very short haircut. There's a sequence. There's a long sequence at the opera that is just a tight close up on her as she is sort of losing control of her feelings. That is amazing. There's a collection on the Criterion channel right now that is a bunch of Nicole Kidman movies. This movie is not available in Blu Ray 4K, for example. And I don't think it's streaming in a ton of places. It is streaming on Criterion.
- [79:55]
Amanda Dobbins
I'll call all friends and let them know and they'll get you a 4k.
- [79:58]
Sean Fennessey
I would love for there to be a 4k.
- [80:00]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean there should be a 4k if there's a 4k of I don't know what else.
- [80:04]
Sean Fennessey
A lot of the movies on this list have a 4K. Birth does not. I'll try to remember what the other films are. I know Margot at the Wedding is also on Criterion right now along with some others. 2005 the interpreter this is a Sidney Pollock thriller starring Sean Penn that I watched, I think, for the first time last year. And it's fine.
- [80:24]
Amanda Dobbins
I remember seeing it in theaters. This is another peacemaker thing, you know?
- [80:27]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. It's not quite as, like, actiony. It's more of a thriller.
- [80:31]
Amanda Dobbins
That's fine. Just, like, make, you know, fairly generic mediocre international intrigue films starring movie stars. And I'll watch every one of them. I didn't get to revisit this, but I think I would have had a nice time at the movies in my home.
- [80:46]
Sean Fennessey
It's the ultimate two and a half star movie. It's not bad by any means, but like.
- [80:50]
Amanda Dobbins
But it's the kind of. The genre of two and a half star movie that I like. Okay, so that's.
- [80:56]
Sean Fennessey
Well, it's read in this formulation. Nevertheless, I hear what you're saying. Okay, now is a really important conversation.
- [81:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Doo, doo, doo, doo.
- [81:03]
Sean Fennessey
Are you Gonna make case 2005? Bewitched?
- [81:07]
Amanda Dobbins
It's not good. She's good in it. It's not. Written and directed by my beloved Nora Ephron.
- [81:11]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [81:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Adapted from the TV show.
- [81:14]
Sean Fennessey
Yes.
- [81:15]
Amanda Dobbins
Bobby, do people of your generation know about Bewitched?
- [81:18]
Bobby Wagner
I don't, but people in my generation could.
- [81:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Thumbs up, thumbs down. Through the control room. Thumbs down. Okay.
- [81:23]
Sean Fennessey
You don't know what the television show bewitches.
- [81:25]
Amanda Dobbins
You didn't have access to Nick at night.
- [81:27]
Bobby Wagner
Well, I know what it is, but it was not important in my life. But I did have Nick at Nick.
- [81:31]
Amanda Dobbins
But they were 100 hours of Bewitched. This is a Nick and Knight divide. They were doing important.
- [81:36]
Sean Fennessey
You didn't have Nick and Knight growing up?
- [81:37]
Bobby Wagner
I did have Nick and Knight, but they were playing nothing but Fresh Prince of Bel Air.
- [81:40]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, God. Wow.
- [81:42]
Amanda Dobbins
That's so crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, where it would, like, again, open the school.
- [81:46]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [81:46]
Amanda Dobbins
Nick at night was this.
- [81:47]
Sean Fennessey
I can't say that Bewitched is like cultural enrichment, but it was a signature. It was one of 25 shows that was on Nick and Knight that we probably watched all the time.
- [81:55]
Amanda Dobbins
So many. Yeah. Because there was nothing else on.
- [81:57]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. Bewitched was. Was a great sitcom.
- [82:00]
Amanda Dobbins
She's very funny.
- [82:01]
Sean Fennessey
This movie, I think is underrated, but not good. Like, it was considered a fiasco at the time. And I think what Nora Ephron is going for about this blurring of the Isabel Bigelow actress character and Samantha the real witch and the sort of, like, Persona esque, like, are they the same person? Thing is kind of cool.
- [82:22]
Amanda Dobbins
No, it's cool and A lot of the industry stuff is. Is, like, very good because Nora Ephron knows it so well. And it's, like, filmed in la, I think. You know, it's like all this backlot.
- [82:31]
Sean Fennessey
Stuff going on and like Beverly Hills.
- [82:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Hotel and all sorts of.
- [82:34]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, it's weirdly like. It's, like, all wrong, but there's something very cool on underneath it that I like. It's definitely red. It was not a big success, but it's an interesting. Like, if we ever did a Nora Ephron thing, which we actually haven't done, it would be cool to have spend some time talking about it, because I haven't rewatched it in a while. Okay. 2006 fur. This is about Diane Arbus, the photographer who shot unusual people in our world and had a curiosity. That is interesting. It's kind of a very small character study. The kind of movie that, you know, she made Bewitched so she can make fur.
- [83:11]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [83:11]
Sean Fennessey
It's okay.
- [83:12]
Amanda Dobbins
All right.
- [83:13]
Sean Fennessey
It's red. It's not going in.
- [83:14]
Amanda Dobbins
I haven't seen it.
- [83:15]
Sean Fennessey
2006 is Happy Feet speak on it. This is George Miller's animated penguin movie that I wish I liked a little bit more. She does have a significant part in it, but this is a film with her country person, George.
- [83:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [83:28]
Sean Fennessey
You know, I didn't include it in the box office list because it's just a voice performance. But it would be very high in her box office successes.
- [83:35]
Amanda Dobbins
I didn't know that that was one of your. That was one of your filters.
- [83:39]
Sean Fennessey
It is in this case. Okay. Wag's Happy Feet. Is that a big one for you? It actually is, although I don't think it's very good.
- [83:45]
Bobby Wagner
I remember watching it a lot and not really liking it by the second half, but it's really fun. When the penguins are dancing at the beginning, you're like, whoa, what's going on here?
- [83:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, I've seen the clip of the penguins dancing. Yeah.
- [83:57]
Bobby Wagner
I think that this might actually be the first time that I realized Prince was cool, was because they sing Kiss in the opening, like, five minutes of this movie.
- [84:05]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [84:05]
Bobby Wagner
I was like, oh, what's this song? This song has a little juice behind it. And then I discovered Prince.
- [84:09]
Sean Fennessey
It's fun. I tried to watch it with Alice when we were doing Furiosa, and she was not really super into it. So I'm gonna say Happy Feet is red.
- [84:18]
Bobby Wagner
This came out, like, concurrently with March of the Penguins, which was like a documentary about emperor penguins. And I was like, well, if I'm Gonna have to watch penguins on screen. This is much more fun than march of the penguins.
- [84:28]
Sean Fennessey
2007, the invasion. Did you see this?
- [84:31]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I didn't.
- [84:32]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, so this stars Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig. This is an Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake directed by Oliver Hirschspiegel, who directed Downfall, the film about Hitler.
- [84:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [84:44]
Sean Fennessey
I wish this movie was better. As someone who has dedicated a lot of time studying all of the adaptations of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, it doesn't really get there. It has some style. The performances are pretty good. This story always works for me. Yeah, it's just. It always feels resonant because it always feels like we're living in a dystopia where people are not being their real selves. But it's not a hit, so I'm making it right. 2007, Margot at the Ring.
- [85:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Green, green, green, green, green, green, green. I mean, this is. It's all so uncomfortable.
- [85:17]
Sean Fennessey
It's the most unpleasant.
- [85:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Borders on unwatchable.
- [85:19]
Sean Fennessey
It is so unpleasant. It is expertly done and knows exactly what it's. It's trying to be unpleasant.
- [85:25]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [85:25]
Sean Fennessey
This is Noah Baumbach's. I think it's his follow up to the Squid and the Whale. Is that right? Yes. And it stars Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jack Black. Nicole Kidman is a single mother who is borderline repellent.
- [85:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, she's awful.
- [85:43]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. Really nasty person. But the movie doesn't do the thing that, like, when you are introduced to a nasty. You know what it is really a neat little pairing with. Is Hard truths, which. Have you seen that yet?
- [85:53]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I'm okay.
- [85:54]
Sean Fennessey
So when you see that, I think you'll see a little bit of it. I think it's a really, really, really sharp movie. Great Jennifer Jason Leigh performance in this movie, too. You think it's green?
- [86:03]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. She is just so vividly awful. Yeah, she's really good in this, in a way. And again, just like the absolute. I'm not going to try to make you like me, even for a tiny second. Like, this came out. I think Rachel getting married is like 2008, but. So there was like this era of actresses, you like, being really awful at small family weddings and how he's very good in Rachel at the Wedding and is dealing with, like, It's a slightly different. It's a someone who has done a lot of wrong, you know, and as opposed to just like an awful person. But she. She's not as ugly as Nicole Kimmin is. Like, Nicole Kimmin goes for it.
- [86:49]
Sean Fennessey
I like your. Your. Your. Your certainty.
- [86:52]
Amanda Dobbins
I do also remember, I think, that I made my dad see squid and the whale and then Margot at the wedding. And the end, he refused to see a Noah Bombach film. I like, I think for the rest of his life. I don't.
- [87:05]
Sean Fennessey
He considered that maybe he played a part in making you a person who likes Noah Baumbach movies. Would be an interesting conversation for you guys to have. 2007, the Golden Compass.
- [87:16]
Amanda Dobbins
This is not going in.
- [87:18]
Sean Fennessey
I don't think so.
- [87:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [87:21]
Sean Fennessey
Is this book called the Golden Compass? Isn't it?
- [87:23]
Amanda Dobbins
The first one is. It's a series.
- [87:24]
Sean Fennessey
What are the others called?
- [87:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, I don't remember, but I think it's the Golden Compass series. It's Philip Pullman.
- [87:30]
Sean Fennessey
Philip Pullman. Okay. Yeah.
- [87:32]
Amanda Dobbins
They're quite something. They're dense and they have a lot more. You know, it's like fantasy with, like religious ideas, really, that they're. They're a little subversive.
- [87:45]
Sean Fennessey
This is a talking polar bear.
- [87:49]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. There's. This is also the thing where you have a. It's called a. I. Golden Cummins. People don't come at me on the pronunciations. I don't know whether it's like demon or Damon, what are we doing here? But you have like a. A little person who's following you. Not a person, a sort of spectral creature that's an animal that represents things about you, but also it can do things for you.
- [88:13]
Sean Fennessey
I see.
- [88:13]
Bobby Wagner
This series is called the. His Dark Materials.
- [88:16]
Amanda Dobbins
His Diligence. That's right. Because then that. Yes.
- [88:18]
Bobby Wagner
He adapted into the TV show.
- [88:19]
Sean Fennessey
That's right. It was a TV show.
- [88:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [88:21]
Bobby Wagner
It was only called the Golden Compass in North America and the rest of the world. It was called Northern Lights. The first book.
- [88:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, okay.
- [88:27]
Bobby Wagner
So just a little fun fact from Wikipedia for you guys.
- [88:29]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [88:30]
Sean Fennessey
This was a reunion from the same year, the Invasion of Daniel Craig. Daniel Craig's also in this movie.
- [88:38]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, right.
- [88:39]
Sean Fennessey
In the same year, Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman made a movie together.
- [88:41]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [88:42]
Sean Fennessey
Made two movies together. Very weird. 2008, Australia. I just watched in its entirety the extended version of this movie, which is called Faraway Downs.
- [88:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [88:52]
Sean Fennessey
This is Nicole Kidman's reunion with Baz Luhrmann. It was, I think, like a two and a half hour, almost three hour movie. And then it was expanded into a four hour feature series.
- [89:06]
Amanda Dobbins
So you sat down and watched four hours?
- [89:08]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, maybe three and a half hours.
- [89:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. What'd you do while.
- [89:11]
Sean Fennessey
Respond to some emails. You know, just. I watched the first Hour pretty intently to get the vibe. I got the vibe. You know, Listeners of the show know Baz is not really my thing. I really love the first two Baz Luhrmann movies. Strictly Ballroom and Romeo and Juliet. Great movies. Everything since then, I can't. I can't even. I can't hear it. Even the Gatsby. I just can't. I can't get into it all. And this one was really bad. And I regret spending three and a half hours watching it. You didn't see it?
- [89:37]
Amanda Dobbins
I saw it when it came out. When it was upstairs. I didn't revisit it.
- [89:40]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, it was. It's Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.
- [89:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, my God, we have so many more movies.
- [89:46]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, let's go a little faster number.
- [89:48]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm really hungry.
- [89:49]
Sean Fennessey
2009. 9. This is Rob Marshall's Daniel Day Lewis musical.
- [89:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [89:54]
Sean Fennessey
Nicole Katman has a very small part in this movie. It's also a disastrous film.
- [89:58]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, it's red for me.
- [90:00]
Sean Fennessey
2010 is a hard one to talk about. Rabbit hole.
- [90:03]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [90:04]
Sean Fennessey
Oscar nominated for this movie. This is our introduction to Miles Teller, directed by John Cameron Mitchell, which I think is his follow up to Hedwig.
- [90:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [90:13]
Sean Fennessey
Maybe Short Bus came between them. Very good movie and a very good performance. Very small movie. Did you ever see this movie?
- [90:19]
Amanda Dobbins
I did at the time and I am not revisiting it because of obvious reasons.
- [90:24]
Sean Fennessey
It's a really, really hard movie about parents who've lost a child. Yeah. And I haven't seen it in a long time either. But I do feel like it's one of the best things she's done. I would say we should at least yellow it because it's damn good.
- [90:35]
Amanda Dobbins
That's fine.
- [90:36]
Sean Fennessey
Although it does not have like a. I feel like it doesn't really have much of a reputation these days anyhow. 2011. Just go with it. Now, if Bill Simmons were sitting in my seat, this would be Otto Green.
- [90:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [90:46]
Sean Fennessey
This is a movie that his family loves.
- [90:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure. I rewatched it last night.
- [90:50]
Sean Fennessey
You did?
- [90:50]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. I wouldn't say that. It is my favorite of the. Adam Sandler takes all of his friends to a. A beautiful destination for an extended period of time. Films I also like. Don't think Nicole Kidman's that good in it. She's fine and she kind of has a thankless part, but it's like not. It's not that funny.
- [91:11]
Sean Fennessey
What would you say is your favorite of the. Adam Sandler brings all of his friends on a vacation. You don't mess with the Zohan I.
- [91:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Liked the first murder mystery.
- [91:22]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, yeah, you did like it? Yeah, yeah. Okay. You know, second one.
- [91:25]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. But you know, it's that they're on a boat in the Mediterranean and they're doing Agatha Christie. Send up that. That was good by me.
- [91:32]
Sean Fennessey
It's a good call. Just go with it as red. 2011's trespass is the film I was referring to earlier with Nicolas Cage. Haven't seen it, so it's red. Okay. No offense to the fine people who made trespass. 2012's the Paper Boy.
- [91:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [91:44]
Sean Fennessey
This is Lee Daniels is 1950s set melodrama.
- [91:49]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [91:49]
Sean Fennessey
In which, remind me, is it Nicole Kidman pisses on Zac Efron?
- [91:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes, correct.
- [91:55]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's green. I think this is one of the funniest performances. Incredibly brave. Really weird movie. If you're like, I like Camp Nicole Kidman. I'm not. I don't want. I don't rouge version. I want this version.
- [92:08]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't disagree with you.
- [92:10]
Sean Fennessey
So this is a very fun movie. It's ridiculous, but it was.
- [92:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Everyone is leaning into it. It was a real thing at the time.
- [92:16]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. McConaughey is leaning into it. David Oyelowo. We can yellow it, but I think it's a lot of fun.
- [92:24]
Amanda Dobbins
How many greens do we have right now? That's a good thing to know. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Okay. Yeah. Yellow.
- [92:32]
Sean Fennessey
Seems things get a little rocky in the back half here, so I'm not too worried about it.
- [92:35]
Amanda Dobbins
But yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [92:36]
Sean Fennessey
2013. Stoker, tricky one. Park Chan Wook, divisive movie. I think this is his only English language film. She has the lead role. She's opposite Matthew. Good, Very steamy movie. Mia Washakowska as well. I love this movie. I loved it when it came out. I don't remember where I put it on my list back in 2013 when I was just putting them on Tumblr. But I seem to remember being in the top 10, maybe the top 15. It's really cool. It got really ignored. She also goes into like a real movie dead zone after this movie. Yes. Where there's a bunch of stuff that just doesn't work or doesn't hit or isn't good. I don't know if Stoker. When I announced that we were doing this, a lot of people were like, stoker, auto green, bro. But it's a bit of a. It's, you know, it's for the Citadels.
- [93:21]
Amanda Dobbins
Speak your truth.
- [93:21]
Sean Fennessey
Let's yellow it so we can come back to it. Because I really like Stoker. 2013, the Railway Man. Have not seen the film.
- [93:28]
Amanda Dobbins
Nor have I.
- [93:28]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. 2014. That's Red Bob. 2014, Grace of Monaco. I watched this movie this week.
- [93:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Not good one.
- [93:34]
Sean Fennessey
So boring.
- [93:35]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [93:35]
Sean Fennessey
So, so boring. Which is only about Prince Rainier negotiating taxes.
- [93:41]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, I, I.
- [93:43]
Sean Fennessey
While she's not an actor anymore.
- [93:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [93:45]
Sean Fennessey
What? What?
- [93:46]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know, because there's, like, all sorts of rumors and sad stuff and, I mean. And, like, the way that she dies is also very great.
- [93:55]
Sean Fennessey
Princess Grace, but it was years later when she died. It's like they're focusing on.
- [93:59]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't know. I didn't make the movie.
- [94:01]
Sean Fennessey
So strange.
- [94:02]
Amanda Dobbins
But this is also sort of like the Pablo Lorraine project, like before Jackie.
- [94:05]
Sean Fennessey
It is, but I would argue what happens with Les Craft.
- [94:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [94:08]
Sean Fennessey
It's Olivier DeHaan, I think, is the filmmaker who made La Vie En Rose.
- [94:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Right.
- [94:13]
Sean Fennessey
So it sounds like it should be good, but it is not good.
- [94:16]
Amanda Dobbins
This is also right around the time that Naomi Watts makes her Princess Diana movie. So they're both trying to do, like, the famous.
- [94:24]
Sean Fennessey
That's right.
- [94:25]
Amanda Dobbins
Dead blondes thing.
- [94:26]
Sean Fennessey
That's right.
- [94:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Anyway, this. It's not going in.
- [94:30]
Sean Fennessey
I agree. It's not going in the next movie. Before I go to sleep. I also haven't seen. Its distributor in the United States was Clarius Entertainment, which is a company I've never heard of.
- [94:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Don't know.
- [94:40]
Sean Fennessey
It stars Mark Strong, Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman.
- [94:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, what's it about?
- [94:46]
Sean Fennessey
It's directed by Rowan Joffe. A psychological thriller based on an S.J. watson novel.
- [94:53]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, maybe I would like that.
- [94:55]
Sean Fennessey
You might. It might be like the Interpreter. It's not going in.
- [94:58]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. No. No, it's not.
- [94:59]
Sean Fennessey
2014'S Paddington doesn't need to go in.
- [95:01]
Amanda Dobbins
We can. Honorary yellow.
- [95:04]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [95:04]
Amanda Dobbins
She's the villain.
- [95:05]
Sean Fennessey
She's a Millicent Clyde.
- [95:07]
Amanda Dobbins
Right. She's a taxidermist. And, you know, there's a whole thing about her father and a. Whatever. Um, Paddington 2 is preferred in my household, as it is among the dads of Paddington. I understand it. I think it is a cinematically higher achievement. But also Knox's feedback is that there's more Paddington in Paddington, too.
- [95:31]
Sean Fennessey
So we don't need all that origin story.
- [95:32]
Amanda Dobbins
That's just something to think about.
- [95:34]
Sean Fennessey
Well, it's kind of like a First Avenger versus the Winter Soldier. Yeah. Okay. Okay. 2015, Paddington Yellow. But it's not going in. 2015, Stranger Land. I don't know what this is. I haven't Seen it. Probably won't be seeing it. There's only so much I can do to prepare for this show.
- [95:50]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, I'm also in this run.
- [95:52]
Sean Fennessey
The same is also true of the Family Fang. Don't know what it is. Haven't seen it. It might be wonderful. She plays Annie Fang. Okay, hang on now.
- [96:00]
Bobby Wagner
You skipped 2015's Queen of the Desert.
- [96:02]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, Queen of the Desert. My bad. Have I seen Queen of the. I don't know if I've seen any of these movies.
- [96:06]
Amanda Dobbins
Hold on.
- [96:07]
Sean Fennessey
You've seen Queen of the Desert?
- [96:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Queen of the Desert is a Werner Herzog film.
- [96:10]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, I haven't seen this.
- [96:11]
Amanda Dobbins
I haven't seen it either.
- [96:13]
Sean Fennessey
It's about Gertrude Bell. It's a bio doc.
- [96:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. The Family Fang.
- [96:19]
Sean Fennessey
Something is happening in movies here where.
- [96:21]
Amanda Dobbins
The Family Fang is directed by Jason Bateman and it's. Hold on. But we're not. Wikipedia is not giving me a log light. Come on. The Family Fang enters a bank. Baxter robs a teller of her lollipops, shoots, and Caleb rushes. I don't even know what this sentence means. Okay, So I don't. I don't know what's going on with Family Fang.
- [96:44]
Bobby Wagner
A brother and sister return to their family home in search of their world famous parents who have disappeared.
- [96:49]
Amanda Dobbins
That's. That was good, but I have never seen it.
- [96:53]
Sean Fennessey
Still, I mean, this is remarkable. It's. It's. It's written by David Lindsay Abair, who wrote Rabbit Hole that I have never heard of.
- [97:04]
Amanda Dobbins
Pulitzer Prize winner. Yeah, okay.
- [97:06]
Sean Fennessey
I've never heard of this movie.
- [97:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Nor have I.
- [97:09]
Sean Fennessey
It's not going in. If there are huge Family Fang heads out there, let us know. We apologize. Bateman, congrats on Carry. Carry on, bro. Good job. You see Carry On.
- [97:21]
Amanda Dobbins
You know, I thought you were saying like. I thought you were saying not keep.
- [97:25]
Sean Fennessey
Calm and Carry On. I was saying carry on the film.
- [97:28]
Amanda Dobbins
I do. No, I thought you were saying it like with an I. And I was like, I don't know what's happening here.
- [97:32]
Sean Fennessey
Like carrion. Like dead.
- [97:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [97:34]
Sean Fennessey
Like what vultures eat.
- [97:36]
Amanda Dobbins
I have not yet seen it. I'm aware. Obviously. Listen to the Chris Ryan segment.
- [97:41]
Helena Rain
Yep.
- [97:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Seems I look forward to it.
- [97:44]
Sean Fennessey
It's fun. Yeah, it's fun. It's one of the most watched films in Netflix history.
- [97:48]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure, yeah.
- [97:49]
Sean Fennessey
2015. Secret in their Eyes. This is a film you were referring to earlier. A star studded affair. I think the only time that Nicole Kidman and Julia Roberts are featured in a film together. Tuotel Ejiofor this is a film based on a very successful 2009 Argentine film that is one of the great international movies the last 25 years. This version stinks.
- [98:13]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And this was also like a real. It's like it didn't happen.
- [98:18]
Helena Rain
Yep.
- [98:18]
Sean Fennessey
Billy Ray is a writer and director who. Writer, Director. I like movie doesn't work that well. Okay, 2016. This is the movie I was referring to that I was like, what is this? Who is alive when this happened?
- [98:28]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure. Yeah.
- [98:29]
Sean Fennessey
Movie is called Genius. Do you know this movie?
- [98:30]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [98:31]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, let me tell you a bit about this movie. I'm gonna pull it up for you right now.
- [98:35]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm reading it.
- [98:36]
Sean Fennessey
So it's directed by Michael Grande, who's best known for his stage direction. He also directed My Policeman, the Harry Styles movie that came out a couple of years ago.
- [98:43]
Amanda Dobbins
That's different than what was the hey, Mr. Policeman. I gave you all the clues.
- [98:49]
Sean Fennessey
That was the Snowman.
- [98:51]
Amanda Dobbins
Right, but it was Hey, Mr. Police. I gave you all the.
- [98:53]
Sean Fennessey
I think that's right. Yeah. That movie was just announced. It'll be released on 4K. Birth. Not available on 4K. The Snowman, starring Michael Fassbender will be. Okay, this is a movie about Thomas Wolfe in New York City trying to get his novel O Lost published. And he goes to Maxwell Perkins, the editor, and he tries to get this book edited down from like 5,000 pages to something that the world would actually want.
- [99:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, so Jude Law is Thomas Wolfe and Colin Firth is Maxwell Perkins.
- [99:23]
Sean Fennessey
Furthermore, Nicole Kidman is Aileen Bernstein.
- [99:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, my God.
- [99:27]
Sean Fennessey
Dominic west is Ernest Hemingway. Guy Pierce is F. Scott Fitzgerald. Laura Linney plays Colin Firth's character's wife, Louise Perkins. And Vanessa Kirby is Zelda Fitzgerald.
- [99:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Vanessa Kirby as Zelda Fitzgerald.
- [99:41]
Sean Fennessey
Inspired cast.
- [99:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Wow.
- [99:43]
Sean Fennessey
Not a living soul has seen this.
- [99:44]
Amanda Dobbins
Here's one thing.
- [99:45]
Sean Fennessey
What is this?
- [99:46]
Amanda Dobbins
Listen, I don't know what this is, but okay. Dominic West, English. Guy Pierce, Australian. Vanessa Kirby, English.
- [99:56]
Sean Fennessey
I was telling. I said the same thing to Chris, and I was thinking about this movie yesterday.
- [99:59]
Amanda Dobbins
This is. This reminds me. Are you watching the Agency?
- [100:02]
Sean Fennessey
I'm not actually, but we're only a.
- [100:05]
Amanda Dobbins
Few episodes in because I. A lot of catching up to do. But Dominic west is playing like basically the head of the CIA.
- [100:11]
Sean Fennessey
Cool.
- [100:11]
Amanda Dobbins
And just George Tenet. Listen, I. Sometimes we do know these actors nationalities, and sometimes we do need Americans to play Americans, you know, when it's Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
- [100:28]
Sean Fennessey
I watched a little bit of this and Jude Law doing like. I'm just here in the big town, ready to write my Book as Thomas Wolf. It really doesn't work that well. This movie's written by John Logan, who wrote Gladiator and Skyfall and many, many good movies. Amazing that this even happened. Okay, 2016 Lion Academy Award Nominated for this movie.
- [100:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [100:48]
Sean Fennessey
That I don't think is that great. Stars Dev Patel. I would say it's red.
- [100:52]
Amanda Dobbins
I don't feel any need to put it in.
- [100:54]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. 2017. How to talk to girls at parties. Very small part in this. A 24 movie, I think. Is it. Elle Fanning is the star of this movie. Definitely not going in red. The Killing of a Sacred deer. This movie and baby girl have something in common about how Nicole Kidman's characters like to have sex. Yeah, that's kind of weird that that's come up again. I love the killing of a sacred deer. One of my favorite Yorgos. Want the most movies.
- [101:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [101:17]
Sean Fennessey
I don't know that this needs to go in. It's pretty bold performance.
- [101:21]
Amanda Dobbins
I like to be fair, how she does or doesn't like to have sex is a recurring theme in movies.
- [101:26]
Sean Fennessey
So in her movies or in all movies?
- [101:28]
Amanda Dobbins
In her. In her movies.
- [101:29]
Sean Fennessey
How Nicole Kidman likes to have sex is a recurring theme in all movies. Got it. Killing of Savage. In or out.
- [101:37]
Amanda Dobbins
Yellow.
- [101:38]
Sean Fennessey
The Beguiled. Sofia Coppola.
- [101:39]
Amanda Dobbins
We don't need to do it.
- [101:41]
Sean Fennessey
You don't even want to yellow it. Just to pay homage.
- [101:43]
Amanda Dobbins
It's not my favorite Sofia Coppola film.
- [101:45]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's a pretty interesting movie. I'm not sure that Nicole. It's like Nicole Kidman's best work or anything like that.
- [101:50]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [101:50]
Sean Fennessey
I mean, very good Kirsten Dunst performance. Yeah. Interesting.
- [101:55]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm not friends with Kirsten Dunst yet, in case anyone's wondering, another situation where.
- [101:58]
Sean Fennessey
She made two movies in the same year with the same actor. Just like she had the Invasion and the Golden Compass with Daniel Craig. Colin Farrell in the killing of a sacred deer. And they be. Oh, that's interesting. I wonder if that's something she does on purpose. She was also in the Upside, which is a remake of a French film that starred Bryan Cranston and Kevin Hart and was a huge box office success. And I've never heard a person talk about it. I'll tell you what, I saw it in a movie theater and I kind of liked it.
- [102:23]
Amanda Dobbins
This was a. It came out like early January. I remember this. And everyone was like, oh, we all saw the Upside. Except for movie people.
- [102:32]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, it was not a movie people movie, but it was pretty enjoyable. She has a Kind of a nothing part in it. 2018's Destroyer.
- [102:38]
Amanda Dobbins
I love this movie.
- [102:39]
Sean Fennessey
Me too. I don't. Were you on the show when this came out? I. Karen Kusama came on and we talked about it, but I don't think you were on yet.
- [102:46]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I think that I was doing award stuff.
- [102:49]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [102:50]
Amanda Dobbins
Because I watched it.
- [102:52]
Helena Rain
Yeah.
- [102:52]
Amanda Dobbins
Because I. Yeah. And because it was at least part of the awards partition and so I think we talked about how much we liked it. This is really. This is a really good movie and like. And also really cool that Nicole Kidman did it. And this is around the time that she very publicly is like, I am going to start working with more female directors. I'm going to make that part of my career strategy to try to promote the work and get this movie made and seen and talked about in awards season.
- [103:17]
Sean Fennessey
Yes, it's very good. I'm not. I would yellow it just out of personal affection. I'm not sure if it goes into like a hall for Kidman, but it's meaningful for the reason that you just described. 2018's boy erased. This is Joel Edgerton's movie about a couple and their son who is struggling with his queer identity, I guess. Or his parents are struggling with his queer identity.
- [103:40]
Amanda Dobbins
His parents are trying to get him to conversion therapy. It's upsetting, but I don't think.
- [103:45]
Sean Fennessey
Sad movie, but not a great movie. 2018's Aquaman if you'd like. No, I think it's red. Okay.
- [103:52]
Amanda Dobbins
So in this instance, honor Queen Atlanta. She. Queen Atlanta likes to have sex with humans.
- [103:58]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. So it's the same sex scene as the scene in Baby Girl.
- [104:03]
Amanda Dobbins
I thought you were going to say the shape of water. Is it like a one time thing?
- [104:07]
Sean Fennessey
Not sure.
- [104:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [104:09]
Sean Fennessey
Not sure.
- [104:10]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, well.
- [104:12]
Sean Fennessey
Kind of a you up situation.
- [104:13]
Amanda Dobbins
So. So Patrick Wilson is the brother.
- [104:17]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. Orm.
- [104:17]
Amanda Dobbins
What's his parentage?
- [104:18]
Sean Fennessey
I don't. I can't remember.
- [104:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [104:21]
Sean Fennessey
Some other fisherman.
- [104:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Listen, I do the work.
- [104:23]
Sean Fennessey
Why can't. He's hoaring on the shoreline of wherever he lives.
- [104:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [104:28]
Sean Fennessey
Is that a Pacific coast situation or Atlantic Coast? I can't remember. Is it Maine? Where's Aquaman from? More of a Red Sox guy. If it's not more of a San Francisco Giant fan.
- [104:37]
Amanda Dobbins
If it's not Atlantic based, then we've named Atlantis inappropriately.
- [104:42]
Sean Fennessey
Should we do an Aquaman rewatch?
- [104:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [104:44]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. Aquaman's red. The Goldfinch is also red.
- [104:47]
Amanda Dobbins
It is. This was such a disappointment.
- [104:49]
Sean Fennessey
What a shame. 2019's bombshell.
- [104:52]
Amanda Dobbins
That stranger kids thing. Is in it. No.
- [104:54]
Sean Fennessey
The what thing?
- [104:55]
Amanda Dobbins
The Goldfinch.
- [104:56]
Sean Fennessey
The stranger kids thing.
- [104:57]
Amanda Dobbins
What's that show called?
- [104:58]
Sean Fennessey
Stranger Things.
- [104:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Stranger Things Kids.
- [105:00]
Sean Fennessey
Stranger Kids. That would be a tough name for that.
- [105:03]
Bobby Wagner
The Nettlens are still on their way back.
- [105:04]
Sean Fennessey
You know, it takes time. 2019's bombshell. No, she has a small part in this movie. She's pretty good in it, but I don't think it's in the hall of fame. 2020's a prom was atrocious.
- [105:14]
Amanda Dobbins
Who is she in the prom?
- [105:16]
Sean Fennessey
I don't know, but her character's name is Angie Dickinson. I don't think she's playing The Angie Dickinson. 2021. Being the Ricardo's, she was good. One of your favorite films of that year. Oscar nominated for this very bad movie. For the movie that. To me, that broke the curse on the Sorkin thing for me, where I was like, oh, it's curtains for this dude. And I like a lot of. Isn't that the most recent.
- [105:40]
Amanda Dobbins
Isn't that the most recent movie? Because this is.
- [105:43]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. After or was was trial of Chicago 7. 2020. And then being the Ricardo's was 2021.
- [105:49]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes, that sounds right.
- [105:51]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. And I mean, trial of Chicago 7 had some stuff. I liked being the Ricardo's. I found.
- [105:55]
Amanda Dobbins
She was. She was good in it.
- [105:57]
Sean Fennessey
Fine. She's fine.
- [105:59]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. At least she's being funny and kind of. All right, whatever. I don't. To me, it's like, I don't. I don't. I don't need to defend it. It doesn't need to go in.
- [106:08]
Sean Fennessey
It's like a bad biopic. You know, she did get Oscar nominated, but it felt like a kind of a weird nomination. It's like you don't nominate her for.
- [106:15]
Amanda Dobbins
Shit like this, but the FBI, you know, J. Edgar Hoover called and said that she's not on the list. And Javier Bargadem got to announce that to everyone. Just like deus ex Hoover. Great stuff.
- [106:29]
Sean Fennessey
Absolutely. It was a great movie about how she's not a communist, so that's awesome. Okay. 2022's the Northman. I don't know if this is going in, but she's amazing for like eight minutes in this movie.
- [106:42]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [106:42]
Sean Fennessey
She has a turn. You didn't see this?
- [106:44]
Amanda Dobbins
No, I didn't.
- [106:45]
Sean Fennessey
Oh, God damn. Really good.
- [106:48]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm open to it.
- [106:50]
Sean Fennessey
It's not really a very big part, but she has a sequence with Alexander Skarsgrd that is excellent.
- [106:57]
Amanda Dobbins
Do they have sex?
- [106:58]
Sean Fennessey
Obviously people. Not exactly.
- [107:01]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, okay. Well, now I gotta explain.
- [107:03]
Sean Fennessey
Well, it's more complicated than you think.
- [107:05]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, well, is she his mother?
- [107:08]
Sean Fennessey
Maybe you should watch the film. Eggers is back in the news. Nosferatu is in chat.
- [107:11]
Amanda Dobbins
I'm going to go see it. Every man in my life has been like, actually, Amanda, I think you would like Nosferatu. So sometimes I listen to the men in my life.
- [107:19]
Sean Fennessey
You might enjoy it. I'll say, yeah, well, Yellow Northman. I don't think it's going to make the cut. 2023, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. Not going in. Queen Admiral.
- [107:28]
Amanda Dobbins
I was trying to think of more inappropriate questions to ask you, but we've. We've covered it.
- [107:35]
Sean Fennessey
2024, your favorite film of the year, A Family Affair.
- [107:38]
Amanda Dobbins
I felt that she and Zac Efron were quite charming.
- [107:41]
Sean Fennessey
A reunion of the paperboy duo.
- [107:43]
Amanda Dobbins
Yes.
- [107:44]
Sean Fennessey
And she pee on him in that movie as well.
- [107:47]
Amanda Dobbins
You didn't want. You watched this?
- [107:49]
Sean Fennessey
I watched like the first hour and ten minutes. I was like, I don't.
- [107:51]
Amanda Dobbins
I like. I liked her wardrobe a lot. I mean, I had a lot of questions about. So in both this and the. The TV series A Perfect Couple, also on Netflix this year, she plays a writer of some renown. This one, she seems to be more of like a high literary sensation. She freelances for Vogue as the literary writer as opposed to a Colleen Hoover type person. In A Perfect Couple, she seems to be a little more mass market. She's basically being Ellen Hildebrand. She affords just like an incredible amount.
- [108:32]
Sean Fennessey
Her house is sick.
- [108:32]
Amanda Dobbins
Her house is amazing. She had divorcee and also. Yeah, I think so. And also just like a very classic, like MishMash of like LA Real Estate Exteriors.
- [108:43]
Sean Fennessey
Almost like Beamer in the driveway and.
- [108:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, and it's like a. You know, but it's like right on the ocean, which doesn't exist. Beautiful house, great clothes. I like, didn't have a bad time watching this. It doesn't need to go in.
- [108:55]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. It's the Instagram is evil of streaming movies, in my opinion. You can have this, Trust me. Unless you want to pay a mortgage and have a family and try to manage your career while managing the rest of this world.
- [109:08]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, so you. So you think it sets unrealistic expectations?
- [109:12]
Sean Fennessey
I do. I mean, yeah, you can have it all. Including Zac Efronce Cox.
- [109:16]
Amanda Dobbins
She does say that Vogue pays her $4 a word.
- [109:20]
Sean Fennessey
She does say that, yeah. What does that get you in this economy? 1.
- [109:24]
Amanda Dobbins
It's true. Definitely not that house or any of those clothes.
- [109:29]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, baby girl? I don't think so. But for.
- [109:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, but it's early.
- [109:34]
Sean Fennessey
It's early.
- [109:36]
Amanda Dobbins
So it, like, might be down the road.
- [109:37]
Sean Fennessey
We very rarely put the new one in.
- [109:39]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, well, we got to go through all the other stuff.
- [109:42]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. So baby girl will Yellow Spellbound is a voice performance. Sure. For a Netflix film this year.
- [109:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Tell me more.
- [109:48]
Sean Fennessey
Haven't seen it.
- [109:48]
Amanda Dobbins
Oh, okay. You're really falling down on your responsibilities.
- [109:52]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, thanks for pointing that out.
- [109:53]
Amanda Dobbins
I had. Listen, I did a lot of work on A Family Affair and I can speak to the TV shows shortly.
- [109:58]
Sean Fennessey
Appreciate that. She's worked on a lot of tv. I don't ultimately think we should include any TV in here, but there would be one exception.
- [110:06]
Amanda Dobbins
Big Little Lies.
- [110:07]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. So just for context, through the 80s, she appeared in a number of TV shows, a lot of episodic television. She also was a regular on a handful of shows. She also appeared in a very well known miniseries called Vietnam. Nicole Kidman was born during Vietnam. Her parents lived in Hawaii when she was born. Her father was a professor of some regard. She has dual citizenship in our country and in Australia. Her family eventually went back to Australia. I think Vietnam was a meaningful conflict and something that her parents were focused on when she was younger. I haven't seen this series, but apparently it's very good, this Vietnam miniseries. It came out in 1987. I want to check that out. She's also on a show called Bangkok Hilton. She had like six or seven appearances and then nothing until 2012. She's in the HBO movie Hemingway and Gellhorn.
- [110:55]
Amanda Dobbins
Sure.
- [110:55]
Sean Fennessey
Opposite Clive Owen.
- [110:56]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [110:57]
Sean Fennessey
Another film that she appears in about.
- [110:58]
Amanda Dobbins
Ernest Hemingway and another time that a British person is playing Ernest Hemingway.
- [111:05]
Sean Fennessey
That's fine. I think. It's also directed by Philip Noyce, who was the director of Deadcom. Not going in. Big Little lies comes in 2017.
- [111:13]
Amanda Dobbins
You could make a real case for this.
- [111:15]
Sean Fennessey
So this kicks off a stretch here where we get in a seven year period on television in sort of fancy streaming, Prestige tv. Two seasons of Big Little Lies, Top of the Lake, China Girl, the second season of Top of the League, the Undoing on hbo. Horrible ending, but pretty good.
- [111:32]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, it was fun.
- [111:33]
Sean Fennessey
Very watchable.
- [111:34]
Amanda Dobbins
It was like what?
- [111:34]
Sean Fennessey
It was very watchable. It was Nicole and Hugh Grant. So it was good for you. Nine Perfect Strangers.
- [111:40]
Amanda Dobbins
I actually never saw this, even though.
- [111:41]
Sean Fennessey
I read the book, did not like it. One episode of Roar on Apple tv.
- [111:45]
Amanda Dobbins
Plus Lioness, which would be remiss to omit.
- [111:50]
Sean Fennessey
I was calling it Lioness. And shouldn't it be Lioness? Like, where's the emphasis on the wrong syllable there.
- [111:57]
Amanda Dobbins
I am not a part of the Lioness Hive, even though my husband has been converted. Went straight from Landman into Lioness.
- [112:04]
Sean Fennessey
Did you know Nicole Kidman is not the titular Lioness?
- [112:07]
Amanda Dobbins
That's Zoe Saldana, right? Yeah.
- [112:10]
Sean Fennessey
She's like, who is the director of the CIA in Lioness? Do you know?
- [112:14]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [112:14]
Sean Fennessey
Morgan Freeman. No. I believe it's Michael Kelly. And Morgan Freeman is the Secretary of Defense.
- [112:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Sick.
- [112:22]
Sean Fennessey
I have not seen this.
- [112:22]
Amanda Dobbins
I mean, that's a. It's a whole world.
- [112:25]
Sean Fennessey
Lulu Wang's TV show Expats, which I have not seen, also came out last year. She stars in that.
- [112:31]
Amanda Dobbins
I wanted to read the book and then watch it, but you had a baby instead. Well, it's also about bad things happen to a kid. So I was just like, I can't believe. Also a recurring theme in her work.
- [112:43]
Sean Fennessey
And then 2024, you mentioned the Perfect Couple, which is the series that she was on.
- [112:47]
Amanda Dobbins
Tremendous Trash. I had a fantastic time. Really, really poor decisions made in the casting of every single man on that show except for Liv Schreiber, who is having the time of his life. And I don't know if you guys heard about the flash mob credits sequence or the flash mob title sequence.
- [113:04]
Sean Fennessey
I have. Yeah.
- [113:05]
Amanda Dobbins
Which they all hated, except for Liv Schreiber, who was like, no, no, no, I really want to do this. So that's pretty legendary. Doesn't need to go in. Her accent is all over the damn place.
- [113:14]
Sean Fennessey
Okay.
- [113:15]
Amanda Dobbins
She just like starts being British about three quarters of the way in.
- [113:18]
Sean Fennessey
That is something that occasionally happens in her work. She'll go for an accent pretty big, and then it'll waver at times.
- [113:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. Let me make the case for Big Little Lies.
- [113:27]
Sean Fennessey
Good.
- [113:29]
Amanda Dobbins
It's a sensation in terms of. Of television, of movie stars doing television. I mean, like that. And it's really Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon doing it is what turns the tide. And I mean, that's like, I guess bad for us, but it's for their bank account.
- [113:46]
Sean Fennessey
I think it's pinging back right now, so I'm not so worried about it.
- [113:49]
Amanda Dobbins
It's also. It starts the whole Reese Witherspoon thing, the book adaptation thing. It was part of the whole. Produced by women. Working with it is like, really essential in recent industry as well as in her career, and also corresponds with sort of a resurgence in her doing things we actually care about, work wise.
- [114:11]
Sean Fennessey
I'll tell you what, I'm on board.
- [114:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [114:13]
Sean Fennessey
We can include it. For the first time ever, a television show in a hall of fame on a movie podcast.
- [114:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Here's the other case I was going to make. Okay, the AMC promo.
- [114:22]
Sean Fennessey
I. I get it, but no, like, I get it, but no. Because then we're getting into a place where ad campaigns are eligible at all times. And that's a slippery slope and I don't want it. Big Little Lies is a work of art. Like what AMC is not. So the hall of fame is for art.
- [114:40]
Amanda Dobbins
What was the Kevin Costner thing that I was so mad about when he was Molly's game? Oh, right. Okay. Molly, coffee. I mean, I was mad about that too, but. So when you wouldn't put Molly's game in the Kevin Costner hall of Fame, I was angry because I really thought we'd like you on this show. I thought that we had something together. Right now I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed because, like, I have the galaxy brain, you know, I can see all of it and you're usually riding with me and you're not.
- [115:13]
Sean Fennessey
Well, I'll tell you what. You can have one or the other. You can have Big Little Lies or you can have the AMC ad. And if you choose the AMC ad, I will support you.
- [115:20]
Helena Rain
That's.
- [115:20]
Amanda Dobbins
That's not fair. That's hard. Bob, where are you on this?
- [115:25]
Bobby Wagner
On the split between whether we should. To be clear, are we greening one of these or we just yelling green?
- [115:30]
Sean Fennessey
As you can see, one is getting a bigger.
- [115:32]
Amanda Dobbins
It's gotta be Big Little Lies. I know it has to be big.
- [115:34]
Sean Fennessey
This woman's made 380 films and we're cutting one of them out.
- [115:37]
Amanda Dobbins
It's Big Little Lies.
- [115:39]
Sean Fennessey
Do you want to have an opinion bod?
- [115:41]
Bobby Wagner
Oh, I think it's definitely Big Little Lies. It's like actually a performance. I mean, the ad is one thing.
- [115:46]
Sean Fennessey
It's.
- [115:46]
Bobby Wagner
It's not really even a commercial though.
- [115:47]
Sean Fennessey
It's.
- [115:48]
Bobby Wagner
It was like for the 100 year anniversary of AMC theaters right when it came out.
- [115:51]
Amanda Dobbins
But I mean, it is for a corporation that I think is run very poorly.
- [115:56]
Sean Fennessey
These are all for corporations that are run poorly. Just. That's a great point in dying Hollywood today.
- [116:02]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, that's so Big Little Lies.
- [116:03]
Sean Fennessey
Big Lies. I think that's a good one. I like the case that you made for it. We all watched it. It was very entertaining.
- [116:09]
Amanda Dobbins
Their first season was good also.
- [116:10]
Sean Fennessey
Alexander Skarsgrd, I think that once again, that's why she, why they worked together in the 90s. I miss him probably being great somewhere. He's wonderful. Pretty consistently great in Everything he does. He must have a big movie coming out this year. He didn't have one this past year. Okay, so we'll go through our Greens very quickly here. The Greens are to die for. Eyes Wide Shut, Moulin Rouge, the Other's Birth, Margot at the Wedding, and Big Little Lies. That gives us 2, 4, 6, 7 greens. We have several yellows. I'll read them to you right now. Dead Calm, Days of Thunder, Malice, Practical Magic, the Hours, Dogville, Rabbit Hole, the Paperboy, Paddington, the Killing of a Sacred Deer, Destroyer, the Northman, and Baby Girl.
- [116:52]
Amanda Dobbins
I'll just say, how many do we have? Sorry, I was thinking about Alexander Skarsgard.
- [116:56]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. Oh, my God. 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 13 yellows, which might be the world record for yellow. 7.
- [117:06]
Amanda Dobbins
1, 2, 3, 4, 7.
- [117:07]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, so we've got 20 films, or 19 films in one television series. I'll just. Let me just say this. I think that Practical Magic and Dead Con basically need to go in. I think we were being delicate by not putting them in.
- [117:19]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [117:20]
Sean Fennessey
But I think they're movies that people love, that she is acclaimed for, that are two totally different types of parts. I think also you get this sick period from 1998 through 2004 where she's just awesome in movies. She's just great in everything.
- [117:33]
Amanda Dobbins
She's fine. Except. And Practical Magic people. I see you. Love you. Well, why can't we.
- [117:40]
Sean Fennessey
So you're gonna have the Practical Magic people coming for you. The Moulin Rouge people coming for me.
- [117:43]
Amanda Dobbins
The same episode, but, like, we put Moulin Rouge in.
- [117:46]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, well, of course I acknowledge its power.
- [117:48]
Amanda Dobbins
Why can't we do something for us? Why can't this be our list? I know, but, like, why can't we do. Why can't we do Destroyer? Why can't we do Baby Girl? Like, why can't we.
- [117:58]
Sean Fennessey
If we put in Deadcom and Practical Magic, we still have one other.
- [118:00]
Amanda Dobbins
What if I want Destroyer and Baby Girl?
- [118:03]
Sean Fennessey
Women really can't have it all.
- [118:04]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. But, like, you're with me.
- [118:08]
Sean Fennessey
Why don't you do what you want to do? Right?
- [118:10]
Amanda Dobbins
You're with me on Destroyer over Practical Magic.
- [118:13]
Sean Fennessey
I like Destroyer more than Practical Magic. Of course.
- [118:15]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, then why don't we just do Practical Magic, Destroyer and Baby Girl? Girl.
- [118:19]
Sean Fennessey
What about Dead?
- [118:20]
Amanda Dobbins
Like, it's good, but I would rather.
- [118:22]
Sean Fennessey
Watch Dead Come than Baby Girl again.
- [118:24]
Amanda Dobbins
Well, that is your patriarchy and internalized sex at work. Okay, so that's on you.
- [118:29]
Sean Fennessey
I've seen people twice. I've probably Seen twice. You know, I.
- [118:34]
Amanda Dobbins
Listen, it's fine, Sam. Neal's just like on a boat for a while.
- [118:37]
Sean Fennessey
Let me pitch an idea to you.
- [118:38]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [118:39]
Sean Fennessey
Should we hold a listener vote?
- [118:42]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [118:42]
Sean Fennessey
Or a final spot in the. In the halls of fame in the future where we give them the remaining yellows and they vote?
- [118:48]
Amanda Dobbins
Do we have to?
- [118:49]
Sean Fennessey
Well, I. Listen, we all know that you're a demagogue dictator.
- [118:53]
Amanda Dobbins
No, listen, it's. You know, women have been waiting this whole time and now we can have it all. So now I get you.
- [119:00]
Sean Fennessey
What if only women can vote? You know, we'll do like a little reverse.
- [119:06]
Amanda Dobbins
So. But okay, so then what would be.
- [119:08]
Sean Fennessey
The last spot if you wanted to do? I don't. I don't think Baby Girl should go in. I really like Baby Girl, but I really like a lot of these movies that aren't going in. Paperboy's not going in. Killing of a Sacred Deer. That's a movie. I really like. Rabbit Hole. That's a movie. I really like Dogville.
- [119:21]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [119:21]
Sean Fennessey
You know, I think if you were building a hall of fame as an objective member of cultural.
- [119:28]
Amanda Dobbins
But I'm not.
- [119:30]
Sean Fennessey
The hours would go in. I don't want to put it in. I'm not making you.
- [119:33]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. Okay.
- [119:34]
Sean Fennessey
You know.
- [119:35]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [119:35]
Sean Fennessey
We're working together. This is a. This is a team. This show is a team effort.
- [119:39]
Amanda Dobbins
That I know. And you left me hanging on AMC and you're not. Teamwork would be destroyed. We both really like that movie.
- [119:46]
Sean Fennessey
I'm. You're a corporate stooge. I'm not allowing that. I can't allow you to sell yourself in that way. Especially not with the themes of Baby Girl.
- [119:53]
Amanda Dobbins
I just understand the I. The zeitgeist. You know, I've got my finger on the pulse.
- [119:59]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, For a three year old meme.
- [120:02]
Amanda Dobbins
I do think we should like, really bring back old memes. There was another meme that we were just discussing from like 2017 that was really good.
- [120:10]
Sean Fennessey
You're mommy a little bit here. Just so you know.
- [120:12]
Amanda Dobbins
Sorry.
- [120:13]
Sean Fennessey
You should bring back old memes.
- [120:14]
Amanda Dobbins
I have respect for history, okay? It's my Roman Empire.
- [120:20]
Sean Fennessey
You got three. You can make three picks right now.
- [120:22]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay.
- [120:22]
Sean Fennessey
I won't even. I'll let you do whatever you want. Honestly, that's not. You're in charge.
- [120:27]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. That. You know. All right.
- [120:29]
Sean Fennessey
You're the boss. You're the Baby girl.
- [120:32]
Amanda Dobbins
So dead calm, practical magic and Baby Girl sold. Okay.
- [120:40]
Sean Fennessey
Got that, Bobby? I do.
- [120:42]
Bobby Wagner
So. So all that and Destroyer is not even going in?
- [120:45]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, because what do you think if we put these other 10 things up for the public, and they can have the 11th spot.
- [120:51]
Amanda Dobbins
No.
- [120:53]
Sean Fennessey
Why are you fighting?
- [120:54]
Amanda Dobbins
Why are you trying to involve. This is our time.
- [120:57]
Sean Fennessey
We just had it.
- [120:58]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. All right. Sure. They can vote for the 11th, like.
- [121:00]
Sean Fennessey
No matter what happens. We had our say. Yeah.
- [121:03]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay. Yeah.
- [121:04]
Bobby Wagner
So wait, you want to give the listeners the participation trophy spot?
- [121:07]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah.
- [121:08]
Sean Fennessey
It wouldn't be that. It would be an alternative opinion. What I'm doing is I'm opening my ears to the world. I think they can make their own lists. Well, they certainly will.
- [121:18]
Amanda Dobbins
Yeah. And that's cool. And I support them on their own time.
- [121:22]
Sean Fennessey
You know, you do not believe in democracy. You believe that this fascist direction that world politics has taken is healthy and just.
- [121:29]
Amanda Dobbins
It's good to know this is. We carved out our space. This is our table.
- [121:33]
Sean Fennessey
It's true. This is our table. Okay, great. Let's go to my conversation now with Helena Rain. So happy to be back with Halina Rain. You have a new film, baby girl. Thanks for being here.
- [121:54]
Helena Rain
Very exciting to be here. Now we're live.
- [121:57]
Sean Fennessey
We're in person.
- [121:57]
Helena Rain
Last time we were distant.
- [121:59]
Sean Fennessey
Yes. We were on Zoom.
- [122:00]
Helena Rain
We're very much in the same space, which is exciting.
- [122:03]
Sean Fennessey
This is a movie about intimacy. So maybe it's better that we.
- [122:06]
Helena Rain
It's way better. Way better.
- [122:07]
Sean Fennessey
Closer. Take me back to the moment after Bodies, Bodies, Bodies came out. I think I might have asked you what you were doing next if you knew what you were saying.
- [122:13]
Helena Rain
What did I say?
- [122:14]
Sean Fennessey
I don't remember. Honestly, I didn't go back and listen to it.
- [122:16]
Helena Rain
People should go back and listen to it. Or at least I should. No. So, yeah, Bodies, Bodies, Bodies came out. And I think it was even before that, when I was editing still, that I was, of course, kind of like, okay, what's next? And was considering different things that were sent to me. But my sisters, who kind of are my coaches, if you will, or the good witches over in the Netherlands who helped me to sort of navigate all the things that are new to me, always said, you should write something yourself. And I wrote Instinct together with another woman. I wrote Red Light, a TV show on sex work that I did in the Netherlands with a team of other people. So I never wrote anything alone. And Bodies, of course, was not my original script. And then Sarah Dillap and I wrote. Rewrote it together, but very different than writing something by yourself. But a 24, as they are, are very supportive. And they were like, oh, you should write in English, because they found me working on Bodies proved to them that I could do it and that I had a fast pen and they thought I was funny in my writing. And then I always just had this idea to create something about the complicated relationship that I have with myself. The question, can you love yourself completely or, you know, not just the parts of yourself that you like to show to the outside world, but also the things that you are embarrassed about? And that's kind of deeper question and led me to think, oh, maybe I can make a sexual thriller, but maybe mine is more sexual comedy. I think if we look at it.
- [123:43]
Sean Fennessey
I want to ask you about that. Yeah, yeah.
- [123:45]
Helena Rain
So I thought maybe I can do that and make a fun sort of of big, seductive movie with that hidden message of that question of self love. So that was kind of like my starting point.
- [123:58]
Sean Fennessey
When I saw you introduce the movie, it was at caa, and you seemed very nervous, you seemed very open, but you were like, this is extremely personal.
- [124:07]
Helena Rain
Yes.
- [124:07]
Sean Fennessey
And obviously, I assume everything that you work on is extremely personal. You wouldn't do it if it wasn't. But why specifically was this so personal?
- [124:15]
Helena Rain
I think, like, I'm happy that you say that. That, like, on one hand, you could give me the phone book right now and I could perform that for you in a very personal way. But I do think that this. Why this scares me so much. And even because, you know, we're still doing screenings and premieres coming up, and I still am nervous. It's because it's. So the topic is, of course, shame in a way, because I wanted to create, you know, something about my hidden. The hidden parts of my personality and my hidden thoughts and feelings. And so it's all on the screen. And that is just scary to sort of share with others. And even though everybody keeps saying Nicole Kidman, who stars in my film, is so courageous, and the movie's so courageous, and it is, but that makes it also still. It's not like we're like, oh, yeah, of course we're doing this. Like, we're doing it and thinking, oh, my God, what have we done? Is this really something I want to share with other people, or should I just have, like, kept quiet about it? Then? Should you just not talk about these things? Because there is in me a warrior that's like, we need to talk about the orgasm gap. And then there's in me a woman who goes, oh, please, please stop. You know, just like, I feel like.
- [125:24]
Sean Fennessey
That exists inside the Nicole character, the sort of like this bifurcated shame, but desire to be clearly expressing yourself, but also, you know, it is very, very funny. And it's not clear necessarily how early on can I laugh at this? Am I allowed to laugh at this? Especially like, can a man laugh at this movie? Is that okay? Do we feel safe doing that? So when you were writing, did you have a clear sense that you wanted it to be not joke laden, but that like bursting the bubble of anxiety that comes with topics like this while also making a very propulsive thriller? Maybe talk about like blending those two things.
- [126:00]
Helena Rain
Yes, definitely. I really set out after Bodies, I discovered humor and I was like, this is amazing. And of course, as an actress, I've always really loved humor as a weapon in all the. Mainly I did mainly stage work, but also in my movies. I love being a comedic actress. So when I started to write this, especially because I think that human nature is incredibly tragic but also incredibly funny, to me, like, human behavior is just so. We constantly contradict ourselves and we're constantly, constantly conflicted. And so I thought, I just want to add that layer, that tone that with Bodies, of course we. We also really had to search for that. It's very complicated to make a movie that has tension, you know, where you actually are a little bit afraid, but at the same time you're laughing. That's the same with sexuality, because sexuality, we don't necessarily think about humor because it's kind of like humor is always a relief. Sexuality builds up to something and so it's hard to do. But for me, everybody can start laughing. Not, of course, the very beginning, because that's pretty intense. But once they have that kind of like cookie scene, there's a scene in the beginning of the movie where she asks him how he got a dog to calm down on the streets. And he just says, I gave it a cookie. And then he offers her one. And I think that to me is kind of the beginning of the game, is where they sort of set the rules of the sexual game, if you will. And then the humor also starts.
- [127:20]
Sean Fennessey
For me, it must be so exciting. In my screening, that's when everyone started laughing was the, do you want one? Scene with the cookie? It must be exciting to watch, to recognize that people maybe have the same sensibility that you two too, or like, what is that? Like when you're writing something and you're like, I hope that this is going to connect the way that I see it or the way that I understand this idea.
- [127:38]
Helena Rain
Yeah, no, that's most of all a relief because of course we all think, or at least I think constantly, that I'm an Alien and that I'm an imposter and that I don't belong on this planet. And then, of course, humor is such a specific thing. So then to watch a lot of people laugh at a joke that you wrote or make. But I also really have to give credit to the actors because, of course, Harris Dickinson, who plays the young lover, Nicole Kidman's intern in the movie, he's an amazing actor, and he has really. He's a comedian, so he can really do that in a way that is very subtle, because the humor in Baby Girl is not like, in your face, but it is constantly present. Because I also think that if you want to tell a story with a little bit of irony and you bring awareness to what is sexuality really and what is a sop Dom relationship, because that is something, of course, that we are exploring in this movie. I just think that it is very funny if you bring it in a realistic way, not if you kind of paint this glamorous old Hollywood picture of it, because then it's just something that we might aspire to, that we dream of, or an escapism. But I wanted to create something that would feel completely human at all levels.
- [128:48]
Sean Fennessey
We were talking about Verhoeven before we started, and you have acted in for him in a film. And, you know, that is a very distinctly Verhoeven idea, too. That sort of, like, the intense tension and action, in some cases, blended with this absurdist sense of humor that, like, kind of pierces the bubble of the tension really well. Like, did you pick something up while working with him? Like, how is that an influence on you?
- [129:10]
Helena Rain
Well, I do think that we are very similar. Maybe it's also a little bit of a Dutch thing that, you know, we're very much earthy people. You know, we're very grounded people. And from that, almost like a little bit like farmers, you know, and from that comes a lot of humor. I think the Dutch have a lot of cynical, ironic humor. And so maybe that is a little similar. Yeah. And I just think, again, that if you want to go into these really dark areas of yourself and of humans in general, you also gotta seduce the audience a little bit to come with you. And why is humor such a weapon for that? Such a Trojan horse, if you will? Because it just connects us. Because if we can laugh at something, even in very tragic circumstances, it just feels that you're together. And so that's. And sexuality is such a charged subject for everyone. There's so many things that we still are afraid to talk about or. And that we feel very alone in. And so there's a lot of humor when you bring it in a vulnerable, human way, I think. And then you sort of feel that the audience, like you say they are maybe a little bit uncomfortable. And then they are so relieved and they can laugh.
- [130:22]
Sean Fennessey
Did you write it with actors in mind?
- [130:25]
Helena Rain
No, I write very much. I just play all the parts. You know, I did that with Bodies too. I sort of like. I write a scene first, I write it out and then after. So first I have a treatment and all of the technical things where you sort of like laid land and you really structure everything. Because, like the character Romy, I come from chaos. So I love structure and organization. And then within that I can be free in my. My little house where nobody can see me. And I can act out all the parts to sort of feel if the rhythm adds up, if it's like music, if it really. And also to see if it's sort of. Of possible even to do what I'm creating on the page. And so I don't write with people in mind. And Nicole came into my life after Instinct. She already contacted me and I worked on something for her company. And it was really, really great because it gave me a lot of confidence to write in English. But then after Bodies, I was just so inspired by making a movie in America. And I felt. What I really love about America is that I feel when I'm here that there's no boundaries in how I think about my creativity. Whereas in Europe, I feel always that you're kind of weighed down by the beautiful but very huge history that we have there.
- [131:40]
Sean Fennessey
That's so interesting. I mean, you would think that the opposite would be true for so many people. Because there's this understanding of European film history that there is something kind of unbound about it. Whereas in America it's very commercial. But you don't feel that.
- [131:51]
Helena Rain
No, I feel so. I understand that, of course, that archetype of how we think of both the continents and how creativity is there. But no, for me, I think it's a very interesting paradox, I think here, because, of course, listen, we could talk for hours about all the things that are wrong in Europe and all the things that are wrong in America, of course. But to keep it positive for me, what I found here is that when I think, for instance, let's say I'm thinking about making a big scale movie in New York that's super sensual. And then in the Netherlands, I would think like. But shooting in New York, that would never be possible. It's too expensive. You know, that's very much the European mentality of be normal. That's, that's funny enough, like, don't think you're all that. And that's because we, we are in. We have behind us these enormous amounts of history and culture. And, you know, we kind of like look up and we're like, oh my God. And here there's this almost, but I don't want to say that in an offensive way, but a childlike mind that I have when I'm here and I can just dream big. If I would tell you now, hey, I'm starting an ice cream shop in New York. What do you think about it? A lot of American people in my life would say, great, great. And in the Netherlands, it was an ice cream shop. Are you insane? So here everybody's very enthusiastic. And I think that I don't know where that comes from, but I feel for me because my ideas are quite dark and strange. It is amazing when a 24 goes, oh, great, yeah, yeah. Walk further into that dark forest.
- [133:20]
Sean Fennessey
Is it. I say this with, with admiration. Is it possible that you don't realize that you have a certain kind of personality that invites that, that welcomingness to the idea in this country? Because I don't. That's not how I see America at all.
- [133:34]
Helena Rain
No. You don't think that people here are, at least when it comes to entrepreneurship or wanting to build something, are very. And are like, that's amazing. You should try that. Whereas in Europe they're like, what?
- [133:45]
Sean Fennessey
Maybe you're right. I don't know. I candidly just have not spent enough time in Europe to be able to answer that specifically. But in America, I don't know. I think that there is maybe like a forward facing positivity that underneath the surface is skeptical. But you know what, the fact that that emboldens you to be creative is fascinating to me. Nicole, also not American.
- [134:04]
Helena Rain
No, my whole cast is not American. I did not realize that at all till later. Antonio Banderas is of course not American.
- [134:11]
Sean Fennessey
Harris is not.
- [134:11]
Helena Rain
Harris is from the UK and Sophie Wilde is from Australia.
- [134:15]
Sean Fennessey
Oh my goodness.
- [134:15]
Helena Rain
So that's, that's kind of strange. I do think the Australians share the same kind of like earthiness that the Dutch have and that humor that very much like self deprecating elements. And that is what look Americans. And again, we're completely generalized, but we're having fun with it. Americans can be emotional and enthusiastic without any reservation. That is in Europe. That's unthinkable. It's Unthinkable. You could never say, oh my God, this is such a beautiful moment. You know, you could never say that. People would literally be like, what are you doing? And so, and there's something in that for me personally, that because I really changed my whole life later in life, you know, I just thought, after all these years, I'm gonna be a director now and not an actress anymore. That was in my country was really looked upon as what? Like, we have this saying, it's like shoemakers stay with your profession. So if you're a shoemaker, you're a shoe repairman and you're never changing. And here I feel like you can reinvent yourself. But of course, there's other downsides to that here, right? I mean, there's no safety nets. If you don't succeed next week, you live in your car. So in that sense, I find it a super scary place.
- [135:29]
Sean Fennessey
I can feel that in the movie though, because in the movie you've written this character to be a very powerful person, a very forward facing person who has to perform all the time, but who is in a position of decision making power and is concerned about perception about all things. You could say this feels very much like an actress or it feels very much like a director.
- [135:50]
Helena Rain
Yeah.
- [135:51]
Sean Fennessey
Or maybe an actress who was a director. How much did you think about putting yourself into it? And also just why a CEO in general for the character?
- [135:57]
Helena Rain
Yeah. Well, because I wanted to make a comedy of manners, about power and sex and control. And I wanted to be conversation with the past. I wanted to be in conversation with all the sexual thrillers that I so loved in the 90s and the early 2000s, but that I also thought were incredibly sexist and not human. And so I was wanted to show, you know, I wanted to purposefully and playfully show. Like, listen, I'm playing with all these tropes and I'm playing with your expectation as an audience that we're going in a certain direction and then whoop, we're going totally into another direction where every character is ambiguous and there's no villains and angels like there is in Fatal Attraction. So I really wanted to create my own path in that sense. And yes, I am very much of the school of write what you know. But on the other hand, I'm not a mother, I'm not a CEO of a robotics company, unfortunately, because I would love to be. And you know, so I'm a lot of things I'm not that are taking place in the movie. But yes, I bring my own pain, my own Jokes, my own experiences and the ones of people around me. A lot of people in the Netherlands, when we had a premiere there the other day, and a lot of my friends and family, they recognize pieces, and they all feel, luckily, honored. They are not angry at me. And when the stories are extreme, I ask for permission, of course, but it's kind of like, yeah, I kind of use all these things and put them in the story. But the story is very archetypical. It's really a story that we've seen before when it starts about power and submission. But we swap genders, of course, continuously. And we swap everything so that you don't know anymore. Because the intern, Samuel, played by Harris, has just as much power over her, in a way, because he can cancel her every minute of the day. But on paper, she, of course, has the power. And why did I want to do that? Because I think still, as women, we still are searching for our place in the world. And I thought it would be incredibly interesting to see a woman that has everything. You know, when you look at. You think, oh, my God, she has beautiful family. She has a beautiful woman. She has a wonderful marriage, and then she has a beautiful job, but yet she's unhappy. And slowly, an animal's waking up in her, inside her, and she's kind of in a midlife crisis, and she cannot keep that animal asleep anymore. And that's kind of exciting to watch because.
- [138:08]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah, well, related to that, the choice that you make to have the characters have the audience see what the decisions that the character makes, to attempt to maintain a certain standard of beauty is. I think one of the things that people are saying is really bold of Nicole's performance, that she is willing to show injections in her face or the way that she treats her body and tries to stay in shape as she gets a little bit older in life. Was that always a part of the story? How much of that was conversations with Nicole? How do you develop those? Because it's asking a lot of an actor, a very famous person, to reveal themselves in the way that she does in the movie. So I'm just kind of curious how you kind of broker that creativity.
- [138:50]
Helena Rain
I wrote that all before I ever thought of her in the part. And after I worked on her project and I said, sorry, I'm gonna isolate myself. I have this idea, and I want to completely focus on that. And she was, of course, incredibly supportive, but she always stayed in touch with me. And then she asked, like, what is it? And I said, it's called Baby Girl. And she Immediately got obsessed because apparently her husband has a tattoo of baby girl in his neck and he calls her baby girl in there. So there were kind of. She was just intrigued by that. And then she read a very early draft and it was already in there, exactly like it is in a movie. And why I put that in the movie is because I will speak for myself. But I feel in this time there's this tendency of. To want to be perfect, to think that we can control everything. So we think that if. If I do enough ice baths or go to the gym enough and do enough therapy, I can get rid of all the blemishes on my soul and on my skin and I can become this perfect being. And then I will be happy and then everybody will love me. But mostly then I will love myself. And I think, I mean, walking around.
- [139:49]
Sean Fennessey
In la, it's an epidemic of that anxiety.
- [139:54]
Helena Rain
But I mean, I think it's a worldwide phenomenon. It has always been in humans, right? I mean, even before Christ. Like we have proof of that. People always trying to live longer, trying to look different. And so I just wanted to show that. That struggle and, and that. And. But what I am very much interested is in. Of course she does the Botox, and I understand that's shocking to look at. But she's also doing this EMDR therapy where she thinks, well, if I do enough therapy, I will, I will just. I will be able to get rid of the darkness. And that is, of course, misunderstanding. And I'm also talking to myself here. I think it's way better to look at your darkness and accept your darkness and be in touch with your darkness, because then it's manageable. But if you start to suppress it or you think, I can get rid of it, then it can become risky and dangerous.
- [140:38]
Sean Fennessey
It's really impressive what you kind of force us to look at. You know, it's almost like because you can't look at yourself in the mirror when you're doing these things, when you go to therapy, you're not looking in the mirror at yourself. When you are doing something to, to enhance your quote unquote beauty, you don't see it. So you're almost like confronting us with the things that we think are solutions, which are usually not. This is why I don't do anything. This is why I don't go to therapy.
- [141:01]
Helena Rain
Well, you look great.
- [141:02]
Sean Fennessey
I just know he looks great. I was not fishing for that. I promise you, no one is watching this and thinking, sean looks great. There's not a single face that's Such bullshit.
- [141:11]
Helena Rain
But that exactly confirms my point. We all have this self hate, you know, but it is. But of course, I'm also with my movie. I'm not saying I am above that at all. Like, I agree with you. We have no awareness often that's so interesting about living. Even if you can. If we now have this conversation and it's like, oh, we know it.
- [141:29]
Amanda Dobbins
We.
- [141:29]
Helena Rain
We look at it and we see it so sharp. And then I walk out of that door and I, you know, I could. If someone would say, hey, you look tired. I could be like, oh, maybe I should get a little Botox, you know, And I don't even think about it.
- [141:39]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [141:40]
Helena Rain
And I'm in the chair and I'm getting it and I feel better after this. And then. So we constantly. We just don't bring awareness to certain parts of ourselves. And that's just fascinating to me.
- [141:50]
Sean Fennessey
It is. It is.
- [141:51]
Helena Rain
And this movie is. I mean, most and foremost. Or how do you say it in English? First, not most and foremost. First and foremost, I hope that it's a fun, sexy, hot fairy tale, but underneath it, I am trying to say this woman, she's, you know, in sort of the second half of her life, she sees death on the horizon, like we all do after, like, let's say 50, 45. I'm 49, by the way, in case anyone wants to date me because I'm single. But. And she is, you know, and she. She sees the avalanche coming, as she says. And so she is kind of like, what is life about? What am I doing?
- [142:29]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [142:29]
Helena Rain
And on those crisis moments that we always think are so painful and we don't want them, they are opportunities, of course, to bring in insane amount of awareness to what we're actually doing. But what she then does, instead of like talking to her husband and really meditating on, like, okay, so where do I want to go? She doesn't do any of that. No. She falls in love with this young guy.
- [142:49]
Sean Fennessey
So I want to talk about that. How do you forge a dynamic between Harris and Nicole that makes us believe it? Obviously, there's the age gap, which is an important part of the conversation of it. But even just between the two actors, if we don't buy them, the movie doesn't work.
- [143:05]
Helena Rain
Yeah, no, that's very true. I do think it's. Casting is a large part of that. And then also writing to not. Not to be arrogant, but I do think you need very good writing and you need to really. What I always say is, with anything that you create, whether it's a painting or an essay or whatever you're doing. Like, it's really good to have it sort of be judged by others. To have it be almost like killed by so that it gets better and better and you're sharpening it and sharpening it and to read it out loud with a friend and send it to your friends and people you trust. So good writing. And then casting is everything. And I think with them, you can't. Like in the Netherlands, I could say, hey, let's do a chemistry reading. But with these kind of level of stars, of course, you kind of have to cast them and then just trust, you know, if they say yes, then okay, great, yeah.
- [143:52]
Sean Fennessey
And then have you ever seen that happen in your career with two people who are meant to be in love in a film and you're just like, oh, no, they don't. They've got no energy.
- [143:59]
Helena Rain
I mean, I've experienced it myself a lot where, you know, I've done so many theater shows and films in. In my country and I've experienced. But it's very interesting because sometimes you can feel absolutely no chemistry with your co star or have you call them, and then the audience will feel it, everything. So it's not always the experience that the actors have that is truthful. And with movies, I mean, of course, with the camera you can trick so much. So it's not always that it has to be totally real. But in this case, it's such a complicated casting because you have Nicole Kidman, which is maybe one of the biggest actors on the planet, and then you want a very young man to be able to not only stand his ground as an actor, but also to dominate her in these scenes, you know, and whilst she's challenging him not to dominate her her. So that's that. You just need to find somebody very special. And after Nicole said she wanted to do the film, and then immediately both of us were like, okay, but who's gonna be Samuel? And then that week that we really started the process to speak about it, I accidentally just really, I didn't even think about it. Went to see the premiere of Triangle of Sadness in New York and I immediately thought, who is this creature? Who is this? This guy is so strange and very funny, but very weird. And then I went home and I immediately watched Beach Reds.
- [145:27]
Sean Fennessey
He's amazing in that movie.
- [145:28]
Helena Rain
Amazing. And also, I love that movie. I had never seen it and so it was such a delight. And then I saw all of his other work and I got obsessed and I got really scared because Once, you know, you want something. And then I really thought, we need to have him because he's not only just an insanely talented young man, but he has a vulnerability and a very unique masculinity that you don't see often with male actors. I gotta get him, you know? And so I remember that I was so nervous. So nervous to had a zoom with him. And he was a little bit like. I don't know, like, he was not at all, like, you know, where he was like, oh, yes. I wanted. He was kind of looking at me, asking me questions, which only made me more certain.
- [146:11]
Sean Fennessey
Was he trying to suss you out, to try to figure out what your intentions were?
- [146:15]
Helena Rain
Yeah. Because I do think that, of course, people who will see the movie will see it is risky material. It is a very. There's not a lot of actual sex acts in the movie at all, but the sexuality is dark, you know?
- [146:30]
Sean Fennessey
And I want to ask you about his character in particular, because there's an aspect of him that is incredibly knowable. And then there's a huge part of him that is not. That is very much like a cipher. And we see these, like, maybe a glimmer or two of his past or his personal history, but there's no big psychological exploration of him or his feelings. Why frame it that way?
- [146:50]
Helena Rain
Because for me, again, I'm in conversation with everything that I experienced being an actress and all the beautiful stories I was part of myself in the classical theater, but also all the amazing stories that I looked at. But in all those stories and on all the characters that I had to play, like Ophelia or something, I always felt that I was a mystery. I always had to be this mystery that a man created. And I wanted to reverse that.
- [147:17]
Sean Fennessey
I love that.
- [147:17]
Helena Rain
And so I did that on purpose. And so for me, it is. He might be a fantasy. Maybe he's not even there. But I did want to give him a lot of humanity, of course, because you do have to really enjoy the whole rollercoaster ride that you're going on when you come to see the film. So we. Me and Harris talked a lot about that. And there are scenes, you know, when he asks her. This is not giving anything away. I hope the studio won't kill me. But when he asks her to hold him, and all those moments are very human, and he shows his full range in it. But, yes, he doesn't really have a backstory.
- [147:51]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. No details. Just that there's something a little broken.
- [147:54]
Helena Rain
A little broken. And you feel that.
- [147:56]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [147:56]
Helena Rain
And he's looking for love. And he's very much a. Exploring his masculinity. And that is something I really didn't want to. I want to create a very feminist movie in the sense that I wanted, you know, the female lead, and I wanted it all to be about female desire and the orgasm gap and all of that. But I also really wanted to include masculinity in that discussion. And how are men supposed to behave? And two men of two very different generations, Antonio Banderas and Harris, are both kind of like, at loss points in this movie. Like, what am I supposed. What is expected of me? What can I do? What can I not do? I'm sorry, but I don't understand.
- [148:32]
Sean Fennessey
Very relatable bit of male dynamic that you've created. Honestly, I think a lot of men are gonna get it in a way that you don't often see it portrayed.
- [148:41]
Helena Rain
So hold on on that one, I hope. And also for Nicole, that was incredibly important and for Sophie, that we really felt like the four of them, that everybody and every sense gets a say and it gets space, like the men and the women in this kind of, like, exploration of what is sex and power.
- [149:00]
Sean Fennessey
So there's. It's interesting because Bodies, bodies, bodies sort of gets at this, but not really. But there's a sense that a younger generation, maybe younger than you and I, has some anxiety, particularly about sex in movies, that the portrayal of the sex act in movies is something we may not need. I don't actually know how much of that is real or not, but it's often discussed.
- [149:18]
Helena Rain
Yeah, very often.
- [149:19]
Amanda Dobbins
And.
- [149:19]
Sean Fennessey
And your film, as you said, doesn't feature a ton of portraits of it, but there's one very strong, almost abstracted version of it at the beginning of the film. And it's clearly on the minds of the characters throughout the entire film.
- [149:31]
Helena Rain
Yeah, no, it's a very sexual film without ever really. There's like, snippets of actual sex, but there's never a lingering on it. It's not about that.
- [149:44]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah. Why not portray it that way?
- [149:46]
Helena Rain
Because I totally identify weirdly with that generation. That. That. That particular study or whatever it was, came out when I. When we were already done shooting. But I'm very. I very much relate. Because when I was shooting Bodies, there was already also a lot of articles about how that generation might not be interested in the act of sex. Now it's about how they don't want to see it on a screen. But for me, I'm a little bit dissimilar. Nobody will believe this, but I am a prude. I come from chaos. I come from radical hippies where everything was completely like, there were no boundaries. So for me, it's very scary if it's too much, too much in my face. So the milk scene, for instance, where Harris Dickinson orders a glass of milk for Romy, who sits at a totally different space in the bar and she drinks the whole thing and then he walks, he says, good girl. For me, that's the most sexual scene. That is so sexual. But nothing happens. They don't touch, they're very far apart. And so I always love when it's a suggestion. And I think for a lot of people, sexuality is a story. It's a mind game, and that is a turn on. And I don't say it's not shocking because I understand to see a grown woman in a corner of a hotel room or crawling around or eating candy out of someone's hand, I understand that that can be shocking and sexy. But I don't like just two bodies just moving up each other. I don't want to see that. So in that sense, I totally understand that generation. And my movie, apart from being about sexuality and power, is also very much a movie about two generations. Very much like that is maybe even more important to me than anything else. And it's kind of like looking with humor and playfulness, but at my generation and a little bit above me, how we think, how feminine, how we think, what we think feminism is. And then these younger people that walk in and are like, excuse me, what are you doing? And I love that. And I love how the female cao gets kind of like a lesson in that she should be more vulnerable and that she should be more open to, you know, and not think in like this old fashioned form of hierarchy. So we're just discussing power throughout all these sub themes and different generations is definitely a topic. And I have a lot of hope for younger generations to have different attitudes towards sex identity. They're more fluid, they are more kink positive, they're more body positive. So I'm kind of inspired.
- [152:12]
Sean Fennessey
Just a couple more things for you. I'm very curious about the big needle drops, which there are not very many, but they're very impactful. And I feel like I could feel when I was at the screening, everybody was like, ah, this is so the right song for this moment. So maybe you could talk about how you chose a couple of those.
- [152:32]
Helena Rain
Yeah. So again, we stay with the generation topic because so there's, there's Nicole Kidman's world. So to say and then there's the young people's world and in the music and how we handled the music. And so even before I started writing, I knew Father Figure. Cuz Father Figure has become my anthem of my life. I lost my father when I was very young, so I, I, I was kind of frozen in time. I was 10 years old. And when you're 10, you think your father is Superman and the strongest man in the world. So I always had a bit of a daddy complex. So when George Michael released that song, I remember, oh my God, I just felt so seen by it. Anyway, so there was always a song that would be on my playlist. And then when I started to think about this sexual story and how I had powerful woman falls in love with her male intern who's dominating her sexually, I thought, oh my God, Father Figure has all these elements. And if you play that under a scene where this younger man acts fatherly over this older woman, that has all the power, that could be so interesting. And then of course, Nicole is as much his daddy, you know, as, as he's her daddy. And so I called the head of film, Noah Seko, even before I started writing it, I said, hey, it's Alina. I need that song. Father Figure, I need the rights. And he was like, what are you talking about? And I still didn't really know how that all works in Hollywood and how expensive, not cheap.
- [153:51]
Sean Fennessey
Yeah.
- [153:52]
Helena Rain
So he's like, well, maybe first start to write the movie and then see if we're going to make it. But once I showed it to him and it was in and they said, yeah, we have to get it. And so we were lucky enough to get the rights. And then in Excess song that, that we're playing at another moment is of course also really a song from her generation. And then when they go to the rave, there's a huge rave scene which is kind of like the orgasm of the movie, if you will, the climax, then that is all his world. And that I had that rave composed, or you'd call that composed, created by my friends of Yellowclaw, These are Dutch DJs that are also filmmakers and that are very popular also in America. And so I thought that would be very appropriate. And we played that song during the night that we were shooting it. And Nicole, who can never go to raves anymore and who loves raves, just kept dancing. You couldn't drag her off the dance floor in between takes. And it became this thing where these background actors, of course they felt that. And it was an incredible, it was Just incredible.
- [154:53]
Sean Fennessey
I love it. The music works so well. It's really a great choice. Helena, we gotta let you go. We end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers started. No, we've been going for a long time. That's how much fun you've been having.
- [155:03]
Helena Rain
I do. I have fun.
- [155:04]
Sean Fennessey
We end every episode of the show by asking filmmakers what's the last great thing that they have seen. Have you been able to watch any movies while you've been promoting?
- [155:13]
Helena Rain
Oh, God, let me think.
- [155:15]
Sean Fennessey
Could be new or old.
- [155:17]
Helena Rain
Oh, yes, I know. I am obsessed with the Brutalists.
- [155:23]
Sean Fennessey
Yes, Me as well. Yes. It's my favorite movie of the year. No disrespect to your film, which I also love.
- [155:27]
Helena Rain
No, of course. And so I had to go to a screening of it at the New York Film Festival.
- [155:32]
Sean Fennessey
You know Guy?
- [155:33]
Helena Rain
Yes. Guy is with my best friend Carice. So I know him and I know Brady and Mona also, who wrote and of course directed it. But they told me, okay, you know, and I was invited and I had to go. But I really, honestly, if I'm honest with you, I wasn't looking forward to it. I was like, it's so long. There's an intermission. I have adhd. How am I going to get through it? And I loved every single second of it. I never thought about the time. It was just an emotional journey. It was amazing. It looks amazing. It really says things about our time, even though it takes place in the past. It's beautifully elegantly written. It's insanely well acted. I can't be. I'm so proud of both of them and of the writing. Mona and him together, they did such an amazing job. And they're a couple, which is so amazing. And they always. They are like a group. They always create so much joy around them. When I arrived in New York, I was so lonely. And I was on stage with Jude Law, who of course, worked with them as well. And he introduced me to them and he said, you should meet them because they will give you a feeling of warmth. They have a lot of friends and they were. From that moment on, my life in New York really changed. And then seeing them having created this movie, they were like, this is one of the best things I've ever seen.
- [156:47]
Sean Fennessey
So, yes, it's an amazing recommendation. Congratulations on Baby Girl.
- [156:50]
Helena Rain
Thank you.
- [156:51]
Sean Fennessey
Thank you for being here.
- [156:52]
Helena Rain
Thank you so much for having me. This was so much fun.
- [157:02]
Sean Fennessey
Thanks to Jack Sanders. Thanks to our producer, Bobby Wagner, for his work on today's episode. Later this week, we are sharing our most anticipated movies of 2024. Are you excited?
- [157:13]
Amanda Dobbins
I am. Can we do our in and out lists?
- [157:16]
Sean Fennessey
Yes, we can.
- [157:17]
Amanda Dobbins
Okay, great.
- [157:17]
Sean Fennessey
But is it only movie focused or is it for everything in your life?
- [157:20]
Amanda Dobbins
No, no movie focused.
- [157:21]
Sean Fennessey
Okay. But you know what is in on trend and what is out on trend or what you want to be in on trend and what you want to.
- [157:26]
Amanda Dobbins
Be out on trend? Setting my intentions.
- [157:29]
Sean Fennessey
Okay, got it. All right. Very cool. Thanks, Amanda. We'll see you later. This.